This is not fencing!

i got to thinking on the subject of favors,tokens,decorations of orders,shires,baronies and households that are worn by the populace in the sca.
at events i see fencers with just one spiffy token, colour coordinated to their outfit and ones with so many tokens their belt and pants are hidden underneath!
me, i was beyond proud when i was entered into the order of the combatant ram and was happy as a clam to wear just that black and red rams head cloth on my belt. but as i collected up the favors i have received over the years to wear on my belt at coronation i realised all of them came from
a.) ladies
b.) because i was to be their champion/fighter in a tourney.
c.) i'd never received a favor to wear permanent like from a love or a friend?
which chaffs somewhat since i've given out quite a few. yeah,yeah i know one should not give a gift expecting a gift in return. but when one 'asks' to be given the boon of carrying a lover's favor & never receives one,does it means i just don't nag enough? sorry, but i'm a bit proud and feel that if something is not given freely it is not something worth having.
i'd actually decided not to give out favors to adults any longer, and only give favors to the youth fighters from now on. but my last boyfriend *pouted* so i gave in and made him a token. ~surprise!~ no favor did i receive in return again. ya think i would learn by now,eh?
i asked a friend who also has given out favors to her friends and love but has been given no favor herself 'isn't it all awkward like to just stand there when the marshal calls for the fighters to salute the one whose favor they wear?'
she agreed. so we think we need to work on nagging, or maybe pick someone with class to ask for a favor from next time? i'm pretty sure she is gonna get a token from her love soon. he is classy but confused as what to do, she rarely wears a belt. ;-)
-)--------

 
do not wear a baseball cap with your viking garb and do the whole smoldering gaze thing.
  ~ it just comes off as creepy stalker guy.

please ask before you go to help carry things that i am already carrying.
 ~  a person likes to feel somewhat capable of carrying a couple of water jugs.

yes i am a chick, yes i am wearing chain maile, yes i have learned that this does it for a lot of people. but if you don't even know my name, how about you ~ask~ before you go to petting the mithral maile?
  ~it hurts much less than what i am going to do to the easiest target of yours: hand,ego or kidney, i promise.

 *grin*
-)------------

 that in nine years that i have been a single parent i have spent five days separated from my daughter.

and now we are home schooling.      0.o     poor thing i do hope she survives this.

-)----------

 riddle me this, why in the 11 worlds would a fellow even bother to ask the likes of me out *after* going on at length about how odd is was that soph & i dress up & hang out with those medieval people? saying he does not understand what could be fun about swords? when we talked about going canoeing, that he wouldn't go on a boat for money even. that he was happy sittting in his chair looking at the water ?  that he likes to go home from work & watch t.v. every night  when we talk about needing to get to the library this week?

how do you nicely say :  'err, thank you no but i would loath live your life, i'm enjoying mine just fine, thank you?'

 the zydeco song lyric 'i'm hotter than tobasco sauce just being myself, i can't be anybody else!'  is what i'm dancing to right now!

-)--------     ---------(-

so if someone is in a long distance polyamourous relationship, of some years mind you & their long distance partner does not tell them they have a plane ticket to go visit another person when they had ,oh 4 weeks or so to do so, one of those weeks spent in your company you might just, i don't know, wonder about that persons trust worthyness a bit, yes? and then of course the fact of not telling the person they are visiting about you whatsoever, much less your importance in their life, might uh, ~smart~ a bit, understandable eh?

 but then when 'that' person shows up at a cool as all get out fencing event [30! of us in the tourney! my team came in second! yay! on being the first losers!].... unannounced..... [gee i'm supposed to 'announce' my arrival, wow, that means i'm royal now! woo-hoo! if so where the hell is my punkah boy!? ]
 and proceeds to have fun greeting old friends & making new ones with the knight from her shire who also ditched our kingdom's event to come to this one because it was closer by an hour & a half & was going to have more fighting.it's all good right? since it is a public place & i'm booked in a group cabin and did not expect to actually see the fellow who had disclosed his relationship A WEEK after his visit to me, because last i heard via facebook wall posts he was stuck at home with a bad alternator in his car.
    so i was pleasantly surprised that he makes it to the event a few hours late but able to compete in the big tourney my team whooped his team in. *grin*
     we were on the field the whole day , wonderful, wonderful moc crew be forever blessed! but were not a couple, flirty as all hell, but then again i flirt with all the cute ones.=-)  later he invites us to go off site to dinner with him & his shire's crew because it turns out they were not staying the night all news to me since we had not been talking, just fencing all day.
 i call him the next morning at his house & get an invite to come up there & go to his fighter practice. which i accept & head up there & have a fine ol time getting beat on by the locals while a 5k race goes on in the park and going out to dinner after wards.
 well it turns out his car is still kaput, his house is a shambles and his friends are looking at him worriedly over the condition of his home.
    i offer to stay & whoop up on his house while he & friends fix the car.  we make plans to get the tools they need to finish the car repair job & his dad is to come over the next day to finish the repairs. the house needs more than 1/2 day so i offer to give up to 2 days to fix it & all seems well in the world. but i get told later that day that he never has gotten around to telling his long distance partner that i'm there?!?
    joy, so now i get to be complicit in his deceit.=-( because he is a stress puppy, & it sounds like she won't take this news calmly & he does not want to face it right now on top of all his other stresses,etc. so putting it off & letting the problem grow bigger is his answer.
   i say it is his choice but, it is also my choice to be purely a house guest & not a bed guest until he faces the music. hey! i know i have no morals but i do have standards ,thankyouverramuch! =-p my other choice for my bleedin honor is to leave right then. but i'm dead beat tired so lazy me stays. 
  well i find that i can't eat the lunch i cooked the next day because the fact that he is making something that is no problem into a something that is going to cause him problems for a long time to come by still not having talked to his partner i go to contact his partner myself . he gets rather shaken by this & asks that he be the one to do that. i agree that would be the best thing for him to do just like i have since he put me in between the rock & hard place! grrr.
 he does. he tells me it is all okay afterwards, but his partner is not happy that he was hiding me again.
*sigh* me? who they hell could think ~i~ could be hidden? i'm drawn in rather bold strokes, i was so unsubtle in my dealings with him that it was other people who i had never even met in person that told her of him coming to visit me not him!? now he asks that i not post to the flickr account that he has photos ~i~ took up, i have to assume because it is because this is the one that he uses to keep her updated on his daily happenings?
 all i got to say is that her friends need to tell her to let him off the leash all the way or go get a bleeding facebook account & check out all of his flickr accounts so she can keep tabs on who he is hanging with to keep his leash on or at least let it be public knowledge that he does have a partner since he has proven twice over to not be real good at the whole open & honest bit. *grumble*grumble*
 
-)-------

p.s. i like distance, i like a fluid life, i like being a third in other people's stable relationships,i like the occasional rogue,i like no commitments i.do.not.like.games.
'k?thnxsbye.


   
 

 long morning, turning into a longer day.
   i was outside burying a dead hen when sophia discovered the bunny hutch door ripped open.
   we went on a search until we found the second clump of fur and i had to tell her that the bunny could not have survived missing that much skin. soph still held to a chance that her bun-bun, could still be alive out there somewhere in the woods. we spent some time searching about as the sweat poured down talking about,lies ,truth, arteries vs. veins,the inadvisability of getting another bunny, city laws vs. rural laws for animal control [it was prolly the neighbors dog that wreaked the havoc] the 3 branches of government, who makes whole country laws and who makes local laws, how laws are for children and grown ups who refuse to act like grown ups . i was bushed by the time we got to work. =-p ~late
 at work there were messages from the realtor that we had an actual contract offer on the house in memphis. they did not go for my counter offer, it is a seriously low ball offer, less than half of what houses are going for in that area.? *sigh*
but an uninhabited house next to highland ave. is not a good idea & since i can find no one who wants to live there & fix it up instead of paying rent i guess i'm going to have to take it?
 then my bisque supplier called & said 'your credit card was declined' errr? so off to the bank i go to find the trouble. turns out brand spanking new teller removed my $ as requested yesterday, but she did it  from the wrong account? ahh gee thanks!? it looks like nothing was messed up other than my glaze order which will not be shipped out until tomorrow now. & the nice people at the bank gave me grape gum.
i'm still groggified from staying up so late last night so everything is taking longer than it should.=-p
well the kiln is  cooled enough to open now so i'm going to ignore any further slings & arrows sent my way as i take care of business, 'k?thnxsbye!

-)--------

 sissy dog brought home jack dog from up the road yesterday morning.
then she brought me a very dead possum when i drove up to the gate after work.
and this morning she & jack stayed on the other side of the gate and barked very threateningly at all the cows meandering up and down the road. i'm happy she did not try to bring me one of the calves.=-)

jack dog

sissy dog & her prize.

ever alert!

hey! you try to take a pic while cows go unexpectedly galumphing by!

i don't think i've posted about work here at all this year? *geesh* livejournal is for whinging & facebook is for happy thoughts? am i turning into a compartmentaliser??? *facepalm* not enough *headbutts wall* ahh, better.
  i quit l.t. after 11 years & one month employ there & bought a paint your own pottery studio. life has slowed in some areas & gotten mighty compressed in others.
balance, it is such work.
 today is yet another s l o w day in august now that the kids have all gone to school. it was fully expected but still scary to be living in person. painting, teaching others to paint, getting to spend so much time with my daughter again, firing up the big kiln and opening it up to see the treasures inside have all been so rewarding. that alone has been worth risking my home-financial security for.
 but n a slow day like today, i just wish that every lookie -loo & the salespeople! had to pay to get in,lol!
 i put up a terrif 'no soliciting ' sign,  but so far only one solicitor has read it & gone boggle eyed. *sigh* for literacy in mississippi.
.......
How many

NO SOLICITING
Signs do you need to read…
…before you realize that
NO SOLICITING
means NO SELLING, NO HAWKING, NO
ANNOUNCING YOUR NEW PRODUCT OR
SERVICE, NO INTRODUCING YOURSELF
AS A REP OF SOME BLA-DE-BLACOMPANY,
NO MARKETING, AND NO SOLICITING!
We don’t want your phone service, your water service, your
framed artwork, your coupon books, your internet service,
your copiers, your fax machines, your office supplies, or
anything you are trying to sell. Cya.
....
well back to glazing


 

i'm addicted to love. lust comes easy & is as easily forgotten, but l o v e , that sticks with me for-ev-ah.
not 'true love' -they are the only person for me, i need them or i shall pine away stuff. but love as in the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own. [thanks RAH]
but people seem to want the 'i'm your one & only' from me? *sigh* or the ones i think i have a chance of co-habitating joyfully & peacefully turn out to be more than a little emotionally unavailable after the glow of mutual appreciation wears off.
i seriously like to crush on & be crushed on in return, d'oh who does not? but impulsive me gets caught up in it a bit much & lets it blind me too well. it seems i am such a girl after all?
i'm just having to adjust to the fact of my wiring that i'm best as a solo operation. but i do really like living with another person?i'm not looking for perfect, but as good as it gets sure sounds nice. domestication it is sooo nice, wanting to be the best person you can for them & all & i was married for 10 years & did well there until we needed things from each other that we were unable to give any longer.
seeing my ex,christopher always makes me get all stupidly introspective about 'relationships.' does the period go after the quote marks?

i went 7 years as a monk when i got pregnant with my daughter. i knew i was not okay/healthy & needed to straighten my stuff out by myself. and i have had a wonderful time back to being amoral cat me for the past 3 years. unfortunately getting into no where near the trouble i've wanted since i live in the great state of paucity. but i've sure as hell tried my level best.=-)
currently crushing hard on a two dimensional [to me] fellow who looks from a distance to a perfectly delicious mix of hurt-strong, gentle-brave, kind-determined, self destructive-striving for health, open heart-critical eyes, sexie-shy. and i'm going to spend this weekend with him.*shiver*
i would like to pick his brains & learn all about him beforehand , but he is interested in meeting face to face with just our assumptions, leaving all the possibilities open, all the preconception, the expectations fluid. me being me, is a willing accomplice in this. but the curiosity is killing me,arrrg.
does he want to keep it superficial/hot/impersonal? does he want a chance at love? is he as hungry as i? i don't mind being used because i use people too, i just prefer that the communication line is open & above board, with no false expectations.
i firmly believe a sad heart is much preferable to a lonely heart.
i hope to never be afraid to try. even if the odds are gi-normously against anything but a fun weekend & a long distance friendship developing. friends, they are few & far in between. but the long distance part,uhg. so caution to the winds! because life is to be lived, not just fretted over!

-)--------
p.s. added aug.25th: it was a wunerful weekend. but had decided it was a case of ' i'm more into him than he is into me ' & was letting go with a minimum of sniffles when i received a "we gotta talk" confessional e-mail? [wtf did i do to rate only electronic communication? grr ] well the note cleared up some false notes but opened up others.
simple, why oh why can i not have s i m p l e???? c'est le vie & merde. glad i'm gonna go dancing this weekend i be needing it like NOW.

  the shire's biz. meeting was last night here at the shop. i gave a key to the shop to our sceneschal so it is now the official meeting place after years of meandering from the cities of pearl, richland, ridgeland, clinton & brandon libraries & shire folk homes. hopefully it will help with attendance?
 i totall failed at reservationcrat. *facepalm* it turns out there is one way & only one way to do anything as a reservationcrat. i have oodles to learn as deputy reeve.  on the bright side 2 experienced reeves were amazed that i had done the job as well as i had since i was on my own until the friday night of the event. the reeve i'm deputy to has promised to return my phone calls now & i have arranged to start reeve lessons from my peer. so at the next event i reservationcrat i should have it down perfect.
 today is my daughter's birthday, christopher her stunt daddy is up in chattanooga now in from istanbul, he should be at the house sometime tonight.  he will only be able to stay with us for a short while & then head out to sacramento to see thelma his grandmother who has had a couple of small strokes this year.=-( how i wish i could go out there too. i love that ornery tough lady. she was one of the inlaws that informed me that " this divorce has no legal standing with her & she was still my grandmother -in-law."
  so many people i would like to see. i know my old job was killing me inch by inch & taking over this shop is the better choice in the long run, but it sure ties me down,the rom in me will not be denied much longer.
 sophia & i went shoe shopping before we went to work. she is in women sized shoes now? wow
i'm trying to get her transfred to a public school closer to work otherwise i'll start a homeschooling program for her.*shiver*
sophia is an amazing thing to watch grow, learn and explore. i need to get my slr camera fixed so i can start to do her justice.
   i like having lots & lots to do & think about but when it gets to this pace i feel the coiling inside of me that dreams of tripping, forgetting i'm falling & flying, of walking barefoot in fresh turned earth thinking of nothing but the scent of the sunlight around me, of sitting the whole night through at the edge of the surf being part of the ebb & flow of the tide as the moon hurtles by.
  -)-------
 

 

 my independence was gained a week before independence day but tomorrow is moving day & the phone calls from home while i'm at work looking for lids to pots,books & pillowcases while he is packing are driving me crazy. okay so it does not require a drive, more of a short stroll & i'm there.
 i've not been posting here because i've been busy night & day . i've got some hilarious animals on the farm vignettes/pictures to post when i get a chance.=-) for me writing is an act best done in the still of the night.  i like to think out loud, to a listening ear preferably, but when ears are scarce,or people don't really need to hear what i'm saying typing works. my girlfriends have been seeing me through this stuff mostly but it has been hard to have a good biatch session with sophia underfoot. o.0 kids take things so literally,eh?
  disney world needs to stop tempting me. i've the urge to travel before i set to finishing my house decorating/repairs that were interrupted by the standard relationship ' he would like this colour, she would like that colour' discussions. my room *will* be RED muah-ha-ha!

 

 what is attraction? a glint in the eye? a challenge for the mind? a need for approval? trying to find a like mind?
getting as much as you give?
 these & other questions will not be answered today but i fear take a lifetime to decide.
this is where the questioning,inquisitive,logical mind makes life a bit fustrating.

just sayin.

 disclaimer: i am a vegetarian . i don't hunt. i am an odd vegetarian since i do not have any problem with anyone else hunting.
 but  in my not humble opinion using dog packs to hunt needs to be banned.
    a pointer, a bird retrieval dog, a scent hound, or treeing hounds are great examples of working animals. but the near feral packs of black & tans that are used every deer season up here are horrors. they pull down any game they can, does,one point bucks,fawns,cats, & chickens.  most of these packs have one dog with a radio collar and the hunters don't have much recouse to recalling the pack once they cross a few fence lines. since property owners take a dim view of people cutting fences to drive their 4 wheelers through....
   i've found homes for the starved & injured dogs that i have found on my doorstep. i have had to shoot the one beagle mix that was too feral to catch that kept climbling my fence to kill chickens.
  and now there are 2 deer skulls and a few random legs in my yard. these are the grusome trophies that my silly dog has fetched out from hunting packs kills in the woods next to my house. they are from tiny, barely one point bucks, the doe carcass was claimed by the neighbors dog. =-(
  what were fox hunters called? the "unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable"?

-)--------

riiiight.

snow it is beautiful to watch falling, from INSIDE a cozy house,beautiful on the evergreens, and makes me smile to watch the kids sledding in..... but the whole getting from car to grocery, post office, pick up cardboard boxes & the bank,shoveling the sidewalks no one uses,scraping the windsheild clear after being in a store for 15 minutes slushy icy driving around day to day stuff? ewwww.
 can't wait to get home!

-)--------

i took all this week as a 'staycation'. it has been divine & made me lust after a life of leisure even more than usual.
 *snicker* soph & i have actually been busy little bees, gutting her room of unused/broken toys [filled the pick -up bed 3/4 of the way with donations.=-o]
 insulating the attic, putting in a new kitchen faucet, painting the livingroom [4 rooms down 2 to go after living with nasty white walls for 10 years, woot!], finished staining the living room floor, insulating the water heater, staining a dozen wooden cheese boxes, putting up new towel bars in her bathroom, clearing the porch of randomness that has accumulated, cleaning both vehicles., whew, i think i'll need a vacation to recover from my staycation?
    so it was 'black friday' today.
tons & tons of people awoke from their food comas before the sun arose this morning & headed out to shop 'till they dropped.
 i too joined the fray this year, at like 10 am. but did not go to the clothes stores, the jewelery stores, the craft stores,the discount stores, or  the all in one department stores.... i went to lowes hardware store!
i'm now the proud owner of a tiny, dirt cheap, $79.! 10" table saw.
 the first one i brought over to theilman's house to assemble was found to have a bent up table when we unpacked it. so i left sophia watching a black & white nancy drew movie & went to exchange my saw. i did not see it at the time but there was a $10 off coupon at the bottom of the reciept. when i returned the saw i got to keep the coupon and then use the coupon on the replacement saw. ~as well as~  have a new coupon print out because i had just 'spent' more than $50. yay for the department of redundancy department!

=-)
 so now i have this cool table saw, wood screws, glue & a half ton of aged pine boards that i dumpster dived for 10 years ago, lounging on my front porch dreaming of becoming shelves! *sigh* but i must drive over to doyline, la. to attend the war practice saturday, even if no other fencers have said they would make it.  i'm the cap'n general so i should be there & picking the brains of the heavy fighters about melee unit tactics....
i'll have fun no matter & the autocrat is the newest fencer in kingdom so i'll at least have him suit up & play a bit. hopefully one or more folks from memphis/grey niche will make it down to our local rapier practice sunday so i'll get a little rapier fun in this weekend.

 'kay here i am at KWAR sitting down,at a table after trolling in grabbing a bagel to eat,realizing i'm operating on maybe 2? hours sleep since thursday, trying to get used to not traveling 70 miles an hour, while i look at today's classes to take, watch a bit of the tourney & get hugs from the meridian folks i know from war & dance & all.
 when this quiet man sits down & talks about my maile shirt & alchem katana. super nice, not all flashy peacock like sooo many of the rapier guys.
 we talk & end up on the subject of the schola st. george & he says he is a member i say,' cool i didn't know, didn't see a schola belt on you! ' so i told him my best training has come from members of the schola & that i don't think gleann abhann would have c & t now except for the efforts of the wma school & wished there was a branch further south.
 other folks stop by to look at the maile & blue bweep aramis swords & say 'ello. while we chat. i head off to class after he gives me a card i slip it into my snack basket.

 what was the senior moment here you ask?

 well unpacking the basket this morning i find the card & as i put it with the others i got, i read the name.
IT WAS BRIAN PRICE I WAS TALKING TO!!!!!   *damme*  

-)-------

   whew. back from KWAR. that 10+ hour drive was killer. but sooo worth it.
i took a class from crazy connor the gypsy on 'off the wall fencing'. part of the instruction was about iai, the art of drawing the sword/ the 8 directions/happo-no-kamae. but  he put it in simple english so it sounded,um, silly? accessible? rather than zen mind~ mountain top kind of impossible that formal books on the subject make it out to be.
   another gypsy class i enjoyed was 'stick to the schtick.'  where i learned his top 3 fencing movies and that my darkwood blade does *not* like being kicked but my katana will happily leap into my hands from the ground?   = - )

the darhling  don giovanni ran a wonderful hands on class on Liechtenstein/ two handed sword ,the physics of cutting practice and the even more important physics of cutting against an opponent you don't actually want to injure!!!
 don mateo taught us how to ' stop the charging bull in 5 easy steps'  and had his masculinity challenged a bit when he used my dagger sporting pink ribbons &  *bright* pink tape. btw~ i still say it is a semantics game to say teaching one move makes it  just a 'trick' and teaching why that move works is a 'style'. because i think if one learns more than one move one naturally  develops them into a 'style' and can use a step 'out of order'  because one has learned physically why it works?

the pick up fights were astounding good fun. watching the mounted horse combat that took place on the dance fool in the hotel ball room was incredible. [ don't worry the parquet floor survived,they were amazingly clever wooden horses people were riding.] there was dancing every night and a small bardic circle on saturday night that lasted until 3 am. it was uber cool to see so many women rapier fighters, every class i took were nearly half & half split gender wise. girls in doublets & skirts, mmm-mmm good!
 but what i gained from this event  more than improved swordsmanship, getting to know old friends better & make new friends & great potato pancakes is a heartfelt yearning that my kingdom will one day have such a community of fencers that is respected and enjoyed by the populace at large and the crowns.
 sitting in court  was quite an experience for me & a few of the meridians who had not visited the middle kingdom before. a gentle was awarded an AoA for their service to the crown and their service to the arte of the rapier.  another gentle was brought into the company of the bronze ring during the court and there was a standing ovation and tears shed for them when this happened.  then the herald called forth for members of the company to stand, there were over 30 people who stood. it was fabulous to see so many people who held the middle kingdoms highest rapier award in one place.
 you say i should not be surprised that the middle kingdom should have so many since the c.b.r. was established in anno society 33, [nine years ago]  and this was a rapier  event after all?
 but doing the math using the list of warders on the company's webpage; www.companyofthebronzering.org
 shows me that there were an average of 7 warders of the company recognized a year. here we are in year  3 of our kingdoms existence and there are 8 members of the order of the queens blade, our highest level rapier award?

   but what left me and my court companions speechless ,was the range of ages in the company standing before the crown. if the gentle who had just received her c.b.r. dress gorget was even 30 years old [ i'm thinking she was 25 ish?]  i'll getting my vision checked pronto!
 there were lots of folks with grey in their hair but there were sooo many without .

only three rulers have awarded the scarf as regalia for the highest award for rapier in our kingdom.
       <  insert  disbelieving  *gasp*    here  >
is this because no one writes in recommendations?
is this because rapier tourneys  have often gone on to the side and sometimes out of sight !  of the main fighting field?
do the younger people in the company of the bronze ring keep it more visible in the populaces eyes?
 no way can i know for sure since i'm not privy to the deliberations of c.q.b or the crowns. but wanna bet all of those things play a serious part in our fractured , and sometimes fragile fencing community here?

 in the conversations i keep having with people about the state of rapier in our kingdom.  it seems quite a few feel it is in limbo at the best & imploding at the worst. personally since i just got back into the game 2 years ago i think i see a lot more people active in rapier each year, and rapier tourneys seem to be expected at events now.
    i remember writing to autocrats & the rapier lists on yahoo asking if there was going to be any rapier activities at an upcoming event my first summer back in the game. now the  autocrats go in search of rapier marshals to host a tourney if their group does not have a rapier marshal , and they advertise said tourney's in their ads in the ambassador.
     i've been to more & more events that will have a morning & an afternoon tourney for rapier & heavy too.  but the attendance is pretty erratic. from 3  up to 19 in a tourney?   gas prices,distances & loss of central sites have hurt attendance at events.  so hopefully that will even out with carpooling, new sites & the [ for now] lower gasoline prices.

 but how to get the community that i was so envious of to grow down here?
that kind reader is a subject for another night/morning attack of  ' i is not sleepy.'  

*wave*




  -)---------  pimenta de spadaccina

 dear rulers,

  please be advised that if one of your number were to catch a field mouse, bring it inside your castle and then proceed to toy with it until it escapes, you would not be living up to the reputation of mighty predators.

    it is also conceivable that the mouse might expire under the fridge. and after an undetermined amount of time then may become odoriferous [in a bad way, not in a freshly opened can of kibbles kind of way.]
     using only their paltry ape sense of smell ,your servants may be forced to track down the corpse [hoping vainly all the while it is just an olfactory hallucination on their part, or just some spoiled cabbage. ] then retrieve the corpse [using mad skills in wire shaping to scoop out the possible corpse without rupturing it's wee little gas bloated skin.] and  finally dispose of the corpse while several of the rulers look on in disgust at the servant with the bit of previously good eating she is now allowing to stink up the house.
 but we your staff would like to point out our joy to discover a squirrel's  tail, laid blood & gutlessly left in front  of the door earlier this week as excellent support of your mad predator skilz, so there is no need to bring in any other rodents at this time.
 

in service,
 the staff

     but i do not appreciate them stealing from  *my* boss. 
i had to stay late today putting together the proof of an interesting system of thievery.
 in the grill room the waiter gives the order directly to the chef who cooks, instead of sending it through the computer.
     well one of the rats figured out that when a customer pays in cash there is a window of time that you can delete the ticket from the billing computer records and it will not show up in my end of shift records.
no sale = no record
but for this to work it needs to be busy so i don't pay attention to how many customers paid in cash vs. credit card at a table or for the waiter to make the customer's change them selves bypassing me entirely.
     most waiters run what is called a 'bank' & make change for customers themselves in the restaurant biz. but in the grill room a waiter can plausibly have 40+ customers so they are to bring the cash to me & run the credit cards at their work station so they won't get totally in the weeds. they are also paid a 5$ per hour base vs. 2.13$ that the other waiters get because the grill room is notorious for cheap tipping customers & out & out stiffing.
    we got a new waiter a few weeks ago, & to say he is about as smart as a bag of hammers is insulting the hammers.
 he took a long while learning the menu & all but was finally doing ok. & had not asked where the microwave was for a ~ whole~ week... you would think he would have caught on when the 3rd person told him ' the kitchen.' ?
  then whammo!  his end of shift paperwork was a mess, every day for a week. none of the cash sales & total sales matched, credit card reciepts with no customer ticket record on the computer you name it it was messed up.
 then a customer complained they had recieved incorrect change for thier 100.$ bill payment on a 30.$ ticket.
   what's the problem with that? i had no 100.$ bill in my register. so the waiter had made the change.
i did a rough count of the next two tables after that of customers with food in front of them & checks turned in to me & came up one short. 
one off could have been a mistake on my part easy, it was a busy day.  so all i did was tell boss lady of my suspicions & tell her i'd be watching the waiter closely on their next shift.
 so today i kept a careful count of every table and their orders & came up 4 tickets short and with 2 tickets for tables that were never sat?  the waiter collected the $ from the customers & pocketed it. looks like it was a 45 $ five finger bonus today + tips they did not have to share with the chef. extra sorry thing was that there were 2 waiters today and both of them had missing tickets.  i did  not  expect that.

 i learned something new  today.
 i totally thought one had to belong to a union/church/school to be part of a credit union! but no , there are credit unions that let people join just because they live  or work in my county ! ~woot!~

 my mortgage bank [regions bank] totally jacked the interest rate on the loan i looked into.  but my personal bank [bank plus] offered a great interest rate & told me my credit score so i *know* my mortgage bank is crazy in the head. but my personal bank only offers insidious 'interest only' home equity loans for get this a ~ five!?~ year span, ick.
  payed off a 20k loan in three years before. but that was life before child, when i could work night or day as well as live off of ramen & true love.  *sigh*
 so my bank ~if i were to be stupid enough to accept a loan from them ~ offers me  a balloon payment of the entire principle at the end of the loan OR accepting any old high interest rate they feel like offering me?
 no, i don't think so. i'ma going to listen to mr. wolf & check out the non profit magnolia credit union tomorrow after work.
shoot i may just move my whole account over there after looking into my banks' predatory loan practices today? =-o


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