There was no way it took the number of people swarming about to get me into the armor, but they were checking its fit before letting me out of the workshop yard. The small, dusty courtyard was edged on two sides by the forges proper, and by horse stalls on a third. On the last was a plain wall with a gate leading to the street. At this point, they were fussing over the length and precise siting of the secondary straps and buckles. I kept dredging up new reserves of patience. For what we paid, the armor had better fit as if it had grown out of my skin. So I let them make the adjustments. It wasn’t until the surcoat arrived that my expression truly soured.
“What is that?” I asked. My tone made the poor apprentice carrying it nearly leap from his skin. My consternation was with the blatant error in the livery. The surcoat was quartered in black and white with a prominent blue shield bearing the Raven Coast Roc upon the torso. Zeelan must have heard me, because he hurried from around the corner.
“Is something the matter?” Sture asked.
“The field is supposed to be blue,” I said, gesturing towards the surcoat.
“Yes, well,” Sture tapped his fingertips together as he composed his next words. “Prince Kord, I’m afraid the city is out of blue cloth.”
“What?”
“We barely managed to scrounge enough to make the shield devices required for Freiherr Gost, you, and your horses. There simply was no other option.”
“And you decided that surprising me with this information at the last moment was the best approach?” I asked, more than a little sarcastic.
“We continued looking for a source of blue until the last possible second-” I raised a hand to halt his apologetics.
“Did you at least inform the heralds and master at arms?” I asked.
“We did. They were already here about a conflict regarding Edler Ritter’s coat of arms.”
“Oh?”
“A black horse rampant on a red field with a star mark of distinction is too similar to the arms of Burgrave Rappe. As the one with the lower precedence, Ritter had to bear something else.”
“So, no more blue,” I sighed. I could rail about the issue, but what good would that do? If the city had simply run out of blue, added noise would be naught but wasted breath.
“I’m afraid not.”
“All right, letβs get this all fitted so I can properly embarrass myself on the tilt.”
Sture frowned. “You are the least enthusiastic nobleman I have ever equipped for battle.”
“The field armor I had with me is unsuitable for shrugging off lance hits,” I said. “Until today, that was the heaviest armor I had ever worn. When I tilt against a human being instead of a ring or a quintain, I will end up in the dirt.”
“Well then, should we pad the backside some more?” Zeelan asked.
I laughed. “No, build it the way you normally would.” The assistants finished fitting a gauntlet and vambrace to my right hand. I flexed my fingers and worked my wrist and elbow to get the feel of it. “Pass me my sword, please.” A moment passed before someone laid in my hand the grip of a plain, cruciform-hilted sword. I stared at it for a moment in silence.
“Something the matter?” Sture asked. “I know it’s a little ordinary, but decorating it-”
“I already had a perfectly functional one-handed blade.”
“You commissioned arms along with your armor and accessories. We took that to mean arms for all of the events.”
“All right, there has been a breakdown in communications. What in all have we bought with my uncle’s four hundred marks?”
“For each of four men and four horses: a suit of plate and barding; a shield; a surcoat and caparison with heraldry; a set of lances; an arming sword; and a long sword. I confess I did source some of these items from other shops, but they are craftsmen whose work I trust and vouch for.”
“Were there any other compromises you needed to make?”
“No.”
I tightened my grip about the sword and tested the balance. It swung easy arcs through the air. It wasn’t bad, but was not particularly special. The apprentice brought the surcoat forward as the armor over my left arm was adjusted. I handed off the sword to make it easier to get the surcoat on.
“The short sword I showed you, were you able to find out who made it?”
“Oh, that one was easy. His name is right in the image. Krahenhammer. He’s a bladesmith in Freinmarkt. His signature is elaborately detailed ornamentation like that grip. His work takes a great deal of time, so he did not bother to come to this tournament.”
“Thank you, Mister Zeelan.”
“What is the significance of this sword, and why is it so dirty?”
“I’m trying to find the owner,” I said. “I hope to return it to him.” It was a partial lie. I wanted to know why he’d tried to kill me. I also entertained the idea of returning the blade point-first to the would-be assassin. My mind was taken off the thought of petty vengeance as the surcoat was belted on me. The scabbard for the plain blade now sat on my hip. One of the attendants put the sword in its place. They seated the helmet upon my head and made sure it did not run into trouble with my eyeglasses. I tilted up the sallet and lowered the bevor so I could see more clearly.
“You can lock those into place,” Zeelan said. The attendants stepped back, and I started walking around, seeing how the armor felt. Distributed over the entirety of my frame, the weight wasn’t bad.
“Dressed like that, you almost look like someone who should be taken seriously,” Soren said. I turned to face his voice. He held his helmet tucked under one arm. With his absurd curls restrained to accommodate putting it back on, and his foppish attire replaced with plate steel, he looked like a proper warrior. Without the frivolous decoration, the severe lines of a face not unlike the harsh visage of his father was plainly clear. It also reminded me he was the oldest of the lot of us. The shield devices on his surcoat were a paler blue than those I wore. Probably a choice of hue forced by circumstance. The substitute background was in crimson and yellow.
“I could say the same about you.” Our exchange brought the others out from where they were being fitted. Lenz looked like he was born to the armor, the sharp features of the Castor bloodline complementing the hard edges of the steel. His livery was the only one done properly. The white horse flowers rode on a field of green with the mark of distinction for the eldest son crowning his upper chest. Poor Ritter, however, looked like a kid who’d climbed into his father’s armor.[28] The change they’d made to his heraldry was to repeat the image four times, reversing the colors on two of them.
“Tomorrow is currently empty,” Soren said, “But if you wanted to be prudent, I’d advise practicing in the armor.”
“How much did Kord pay you to say that?” Lenz asked.
“Do you want to lose with style or just humiliate yourself?” I asked.
“Hey!” Lenz said. “I plan to win.”
“How many competitors here say that?” I asked.
“All of them,” Soren said, “Except you.”
Prudence won out, and we spent our free time practicing with the long blade. The tall, two-handed swords were not new to me – we just normally spent more time on one-handed blades.
***
Graymire was even more annoying armored up. He was dressed the same way I was, with blue shields on the black and white horse coat. The lames that made up the barding were overlapped to allow an attack from the front to skid along without snagging. Of course, the brutish Graymire was not only not slowed by the added weight, but he was veritably prancing and preening in his new attire. I could still guide him with my knees, but the added padding and his willful nature made it obnoxious to get him to go where I was telling him to. Still, I got him to the lists and joined the crowd of brightly liveried men-at-arms assembling for the opening of the tournament. While the saddle that went with Graymire’s armor didn’t have a banner pole, I hung the Raven Coast Roc flag from the tip of a lance and held that aloft. It was the same banner I’d flown when we’d rode into the Slagveld.
My mood was not brightened when the heralds began sorting the assemblage by order of precedence to get ready to ride in. The four of us were nowhere near each other in the schema. I ended up near the front. The only man in front of me was in overly gilded armor, the sort of highly decorated raiment you got when giving the armorer all the time in the world to work. Over it he wore a gold tabard bearing the image of a sable manticore battling a crimson lindwyrm. I was not an expert on the myriad arms across the Empire and the Five Kingdoms, but even I recognized it as belonging to Herzog Hackenhof. An unsettling feeling crept through me as I stared at the short hair on the back of his head. It was House Hackenhof that had controlled Salzheim before Jochen Grosz had invaded the North. Then he’d hacked off the head of at least three different Hackenhofs in as many battles. This reminder of history made Hubert’s advice seem ill advised. The current Emperor was Adelbert Sitzauer-Hackenhof before he became Adelbert I.
Checking the state of the assemblage, Hackenhof glanced back. Even if I weren’t immediately behind him, I was rather hard to miss. His eyes went to the heraldry on my surcoat and the banner on my lance before settling on my face.
“Kord von Karststadt?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. His face cracked in a viperous grin.
“Otto Hackenhof von Altschaft,[29]” he said. “My apologies, I only arrived this morning and have not had time to introduce myself.” Otto looked to still be in his prime, his face clean shaven. Any further potential conversation was forestalled by the arrival of a herald who indicated that the ceremony was about to begin. Otto turned his attention forward again as the ‘King of Heralds’ began calling the crowd to order. The lists were a square patch of ground around which had been erected tier after tier of benches to form a bit of a wooden amphitheater. The passage before us pierced the seating and let contestants ride in, lances raised. The King of Heralds called out Otto’s name and a long, flowery procession of titles as the gold-clad Herzog rode into the open air. As he rode a circuit of the lists, I steeled myself. I could hear the cacophony of the crowd and dreaded being subjected to it without the baffling effects of the passage.
“Erbprinz Kord Grosz von und zu Karststadt-Salzheim,” the King of Heralds belted out. Seated as upright as I could, I nudged Graymire forward and rode into the lists. The cheering rose mainly from the middle and upper tiers where the Burghers and a few lucky peasants sat. They had no idea who I was, They were simply here for the show, and I was just another contestant. The front ranks were allotted to the nobility, and they were more reserved in their applause. The occupants of these seats also scrutinized me more judgmentally. Their gazes picked apart every detail of my attire and poise, evaluating my fitness as if I were some stallion offered up for sale. In a spark of realization it occurred to me that was exactly what was going on. A tournament of this size was one of the few occasions that large numbers of nobility would be gathered in one place. It was a chance to judge the suitability of various unwed scions to be suitors or sons-in-law. Oblivious, Graymire cantered about the perimeter of the lists, head high, nose down, preening in his new attire.
My circuit complete, I came in beside Otto and pointed Graymire towards the side of the lists where the royal booth was positioned. It was the only seating in the area with a canopy above it. Hengist sat there, behind the King of Heralds, Alyssa de Corval to his left, Hubert Freinmarkt-Ziegeberg to his right. Of Ambassador Partanen, there was no sign. As the procession of participants continued, faces both unfamiliar and familiar rode by me. Some played to the crowd, others were more taciturn and stoic in mien. Once everyone had taken their lap and we’d formed up into a square at the middle of the lists, Hengist helped de Corval to her feet. The wizened twig of a woman was somehow still able to project her voice for the benediction. Of course, blessing the event in the name of the Judge would not really prevent people from cheating, but it might make those so inclined think twice. After the benediction, she delivered the oath for the contestants to abide by the rules.
As de Corval slumped back to her seat, Hengist rose. “I would like to welcome all of you to my modest little tournament,” he said. “While I was putting together this little celebration, I opened my coffers to the almshouses of Zesrin. After I had contributed what I could, I wished I could give more, but I had other obligations I had to meet. So I asked myself how I might convince others to give.” A moment of dread passed through me as I anticipated a call for the contestants to contribute. My fears proved to be unfounded as Hengist continued. “I realized there was a gap in our tournament schedule that could be put to good use. I have whole stands full of people who would never get the chance to ride in the lists and stables full of personable horses. So from now until the sun sets, I will let anyone who can drop a coin or two into the alms box tilt against a quintain using one of my horses. All in the name of good fun and charity, though I will have to ask our more esteemed contestants to quit the field for this to begin.”
***
Freed from the obligation to present myself to the crowds, I took the opportunity to return to the villa. Letting Graymire sit in the stall nearest the northeast tower, I headed inside to get out of my armor before getting him out of his. Pushing through the door to the kitchen, I heard a startled yip. I raised an arm in time to stop the cloaked figure that leapt at my face, blade first. Doubling over my armored vambrace, the dagger-wielding creature proved to be about half my height. Squamous and reptilian, it had a long snout protruding from the hood of its dun brown cloak. As I threw it back, I noticed that it was not alone. Three more drew knives and daggers while the fourth additional intruder spun a staff. Viridian energy crackled along the staff as two of the knife-wielding creatures bounded over the work table and the third slid under it.
The pommel of my sword slammed into the ribs of one of the pair going over the table, and I shoulder-checked the other mid-leap. I heard bones crunch as my armored bulk slammed into the smaller saurian figure. The one coming under the table stabbed for my groin, but lost his forearm to the bite of my blade before he could castrate me. He hissed in pain as scarlet vitae jetted from the stump of his limb. Crackling green lightning slammed into my breastplate and sent spasms through my frame. Pain coruscated along my body with the energy. I sagged to one knee amidst the smell of burned hair.
The first creature returned, stabbing for my uncovered face. I punched it with a solid left hook, knocking it sprawling into one of its rising fellows. I aimed to skewer the pair with my sword, but they scrambled out of the way. My arm moved too slowly, I was sluggish from the jolt I’d taken. Hurling a chair at the caster, I got him to duck aside before he shocked me again. My alacrity was returning as the knives came back. I hacked through the wrist and into the throat of the first. The second balked as he was struck with the spray of blood. He turned tail and scampered off.
Snatching up one of the fallen knives, I hurled it at the caster. It didn’t hit, but I never expected it to. It did, however, distract him long enough for me to cross the room and plunge my blade through his chest. Slit-pupiled eyes stared up at me as the creature trilled out a mournful death rattle. I lifted the staff from his clawed fingers as his life ebbed and he slid off the sword. The staff was about three feet long, made of ebon wood and inlaid with liver-hued hepatizon. Its head was a bird skull rendered in mahogany-colored agate with an open copper beak.
Looking around for any more of my little antagonists, I found only a stunned Gunther Heintze standing in the doorway. He stared agape at the bloody scene writ across the kitchen. I noted that the two I had merely injured had gotten away.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“I wish I knew. I stepped in and there were knives coming for my face.”
“And the noise I heard?”
I held up the short staff. “The thunderclap from their sorcerer?” I asked.
“That sounds like it.”
I set the staff on the table and began searching the remains.
“What are you doing?”
Finding a slip of paper in the sorcerer’s pocket, I pulled it out. It was a charcoal sketch of the Raven Coast Roc. I closed my eyes and muttered a quiet curse. Why would anyone want me dead? I haven’t done anything. My eyes fell on the blood dripping from my blade. Defending myself against an assassination attempt did not count. Thwarting their attempts to end me would not be the reason for someone to try to end me in the first place.
“Skrael,” Soren said, rolling one of the bodies with the toe of his boot. I looked up as he passed the still confounded Heintze.
“I know,” I said.
“Not exactly the most imposing enemies.”
“They’re probably sell-swords. Someone paid them to kill me.” I handed him the slip of paper.
“Same people as Amber Town?”
“We don’t know who was behind that. But I have no doubt the intruder at Amber Town was sent by the same people. It would beggar belief that there is more than one group out for my blood. It’s hard enough to believe there’s even one.”
“One of these days they might have better luck – or hire better killers,” Soren said.
I shook my head and headed upstairs to finally get out of my armor. When I returned to the kitchen, soldiers in black and silver livery with a silver goat sigil were hauling the Skrael remains out. The Herzog Freinmarkt-Ziegeberg turned the short staff about in his hands, scrutinizing it with his good eye. I perched atop a stool, quite awkwardly watching them.
“Why did you not tell me someone had already tried to kill you once?” Hubert asked.
“It didn’t seem relevant.”
An icy glare from his good eye lanced into me and I stiffened, chastised.
“You should have a unit of bodyguards.”
“That would present a bit of a logistical challenge at this point,” I said. “And forming one now would invite whoever paid this lot to infiltrate it.”
“At the very least you should not go anywhere alone.”
[28] This is likely a comment on the youthfulness of Johan’s features. It is improbable that Zeelan would have improperly fit the panoply as the wording implies.
[29] This was, in fact, the man who would later be crowned Emperor Otto IX. I cannot help but be favorably inclined towards Otto, as he was the one who ennobled me and created the post of Imperial Navigator.
If you want your own copy, the whole book is available from Amazon in eBook, Paperback, and Hardcover variants.
This chapter feels slow.
It certainly ends with sufficient excitement.
But it looks like it put most of the glibertariat to sleep.
I’m here. I just don’t have any pithy comments to make about your story.
How about Insightful? Curious? Funny?
I don’t think I want to see the romance between Kord and his bodyguards.
I hope UCS is taking notes.
It certainly escalated.
*jots notes.*
TedS wants the narrator to have a harem of Amazonian bodyguards.
Got it.
I am not asleep. I was cleaning the house and just sat down. I was surprised to see this on a Sunday. I will pour some bourbon and have a read.
Got my copy of this book from Amazon today. I’ll start it when I finish up Neil Gorsuch’s new book.
I dare say I expect them to be quite different books.
OT, but for RJ I just noticed that the 1981 Lady Chatterley’s Lover is currently on Tubi.
The Sylvia Kristel one? That stuck in my memory for some reason…I wonder why.
Yes. Or, if you will, the Golan/Globus version.
Noted.
That is good to know. I’m sure that many of us who grew up before the internet was freely accessible are quite familiar with much of Sylvia Kristel’s work.
Is the staff magical or just normal?
It’s a channelling staff – it allows a wizard to draw more magic than they normally could manage.
That informations wanders in at some later chapter. I forget when.
“I want to talk to your manager.”
Boise State agrees.
βAt the very least you should not go anywhere alone.β
A fate worse than death.
For men, at least. Women can go to the bathroom together.
“Women”
The Olympics may have a job opening for you, if you can define that.
Related to the Ennio documentary link I posted yesterday….just wanted to share this video/song that was excerpted/discussed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LOSrvtCegY
Good stuff.
Getting here late tonight.
I am enjoying the story. That’s for bringing it here.
I second this!
3rded
I am triggered.
Fourthded.
I even put my new reading gloves on.
I am dead.
Huh…so USSS breaks into the building on Kamala rally, supposedly administers an apology, and only ‘right’ wing sites report. This is the fortification. Report only what needs to be reported.
https://www.cnn.com/search?q=secret+service&from=0&size=10&page=1&sort=newest&types=all§ion=
https://www.washingtonpost.com/search/?query=secret+service\
https://www.foxnews.com/search-results/search?q=secret%20service
https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=secret+service+breaks+in&ia=web
Awesome. We live in an awesome period.
“Nobody is above the law!”
A good read. Iβve never written fiction, a question for you and those who have: How do you write the internal thoughts of the characters? Write them in the style of the character, I would presume is good (but difficult) writing. It also seems an opportunity for writers to get out their inner thoughts and emotive style. Seems an easy place (for me) to get lost if not careful.
Iβve never even tried to write a purely fictional work. I fear it would end up being far too autobiographical. I imagine those are the βpracticeβ novels to get off your chest, βfreeβ to explore βnewβ ground. I shall remain curious, as Iβve got far too much non-fiction to express at present.
That is exactly what happened the few times I tried.
I don’t have the bug so I never tried any further.
This is where being exceedingly boring helps. I have no personal story to tell.
When I write inner thoughts, it will be in a context where the work is in a first person perspective. So the entire work is in their voice except for the dialog of other characters, so It doesn’t stand out from descrition or exposition, being the same narrator voice.
I don’t do third person omnicient, instead seating those narrators on the shoulders or in the eaves so a character will have to express their thoughts through dialog, expression, or action.
I’ve been doing this since I was 5 years old, and I don’t think I really know how to describe it. What I will say is that if you have any wish-fulfillment ideas/fantasies involving real people, just start writing those down. You will gradually move out of autobiography and fantasy, and start building independent people whom you can create scenarios where your characters make choices based on the personalities you built for them, and your life experience. People who read a lot of fiction will pretty much be able to fall into a storyteller’s pace.
“People who read a lot of fiction…” is the key issue, though I’m not focused on ‘fixing’ it at the moment. I honestly can’t remember the last novel I read. It’s probably been 10+ years. I’m too busy sussing out the ‘real’ world and its fascinations to ‘imagine’ an alternative. I fill up stories of the past, present or future based on ‘normal,’ social primate drives.
It was hella helpful to dive into AP writing. Helped me focus my shotgun-y thoughts. Without the Tribune, I have to poke myself to ensure I have an ‘audience’ in mind and what type of writing I’m gonna do. In the past, I think y’all were more entertained by my more flowery, playful voice than by the straight-reporting style that was key to my life.
AP is wondrous for boiling your ideas down, but I often forget who I’m (‘supposed to be’) writing for. I think many are more drawn to the literary fun one can weave for the reader, even down to the pacing of syllables and specific diction to guide them, than the actual thought (or plot point) the author is expressing. tldr: Playful poetry with sparse impact is more inviting than profound analysis.
Exception may be humor, the hardest to get to page. The syllables DO matter, their order and flow. Like music. Ya can swing and dance all ya want with the reader, but ya best stick the punchline or you’ve wasted the setup and your audience’s attention. Immediate feedback’s powerful, and ya only get ONE first impression. (“Please clap…”)
Poetry/lyrics (two different things, really) and comedy aren’t the only genres that demand musicality. Narrative, not so much, but dialogue definitely.
It’s why I always jerk at this: “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.”
To me, that feels wildly incomplete, like a sneeze that never happens.
I don’t know if I read this growing up or what, but it SHOULD be: “The quick red fox jumps over the lazy brown dog.”
There is a parallelism in the second one that finishes the thought.
Ev – You had to have read a novel in 2019.
Mo: Agreed. The musicality of language, just the physical sounds and act alone, is powerful in most writing. It only ISN’T when writers aren’t very good or when the point is to NOT be musical, as in (proper) AP reporting. Don’t know if I agree with the ‘red fox/lazy dog’ analogy. Both versions JUMP to the word and coast back down. Different readers, different meter? Meh.
@UCS: In 2019 I moved from Korea to Thailand, and on Sept. 22 was run over by a car. Not much reading going on. Mom brought a few books, including some Calvin & Hobbes. (That DOES count as fiction. So, there. I have read fiction!) Not sure when my memory started working again. For a year or two before/after The Incident, it’s smeared, at best. It’ll be the 5th Anniversary, soon. Pretty much My Rebirth, or that’s the healthiest way I can look at it, and certainly the only I can grasp. That’ll be a pretty big day. Not sure how, but it will be. I’m pretty proud of that, especially that most wouldn’t even know it.
It might have been late 2018, because you edited “Beyond the Edge of the Map” which can’t have been done without reading it
HA! Yes, that I did read, and yep, 2018. However, that was reading for work rather for pleasure. I did enjoy it, but my mind/eye were in a different gear. That may be the last new fiction I’ve read. That’s a glaring omission in my stimulus input. Like interesting nooks of thought I’ve left unturned and unexplored. My squiggly mind likes to expand where it hasn’t been before.
I wish I wrote like you and MO, but I get by,
Also your critiques
I’m just not into fiction much but reading historical biographies is a lot of fiction. I want to believe…
Good morning all you weird people!
πβπ
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=qUE4oDunYkc
πΆπΆ*
*Thank you YouTube, for the CommaLa likes to kill babies commercial when looking for music. ππ
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/us-sends-submarine-aircraft-carrier-middle-east-iran-israel-attack-rcna166170
“Joe, we did it!”
-CommaLa
Yay, full on war.
We’re already at war with Russia.
Β―\_(γ)_/Β―
I’ve seen 6 fucking commercials for that harpy bitch since I’ve been up.
Not counting YouTube. π π
I need to reset my day. Already.
Sounds like a goo time to stop watching TV/YT
Or to invest in an adblocker.
Oh, he implied TV.
Yeah I don’t see many political ads. Wonder why. π
While I was watching Lady Chatterley’s Lover yesterday evening, I got about half a dozen commercials for “Local TEAM RED Congressman will ban abortion nationwide! Don’t take away our rights!” [sic — they’re all for taking away every other right]
I do not understand the Pro Baby Murder voting bloc.
UCS: There seems to be in inverse relationship between self-absorption and self-awareness.
It is very complicated.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-g6TAwGJYsyk/UehdWRvqLcI/AAAAAAAAAMA/iVOjWmd2YtQ/s1600/notyourbodynotyourchoiceabortionismurder_zps464aedad.jpg
I had a hell of a time finding this. I went through a dozen ‘connection timed out’, ‘safari cant open the file’, etc before I found that one. Is someone scrubbing it or something? WTH?
I’m surprised it wasn’t couched as “women’s rights” or “women’s health”.
That seems to be the usual euphemism.
The temperature is down to 57! Of course the forecast says “Don’t get your hopes up that the week will be comfortable, that’s a fluke”
Good morning, U, Suthen, Ted’S., Teh Hype, and Sean!
56 degrees here at the moment, forecast high of 79 today, but creeping upward as the week goes on.
How goes?
So far, so good! When I left work early Friday, the renaming of “PTO” to “Sick” hours had been completed successfully in the payroll software – the dollars and cents side – with employees showing their correct balances of time available. All that remained was for the information to by synched up to the timekeeping software – the hours and minutes side. I’ll see how well that happened when I get to work today. ππ€
How about you?
I made it to the office.
My brain does worse than draw a blank when trying to figure out how to word these performance plans. My brain locks up and starts to spin.
π΅
Does anyone who matters actually take these plans seriously?
Everything needs to be documented, especially job expectations, or any later breakdown becomes “he said, she said” and that doesn’t fly.
I blame the union.
How much can you crib from the job description(s)?
Not nearly enough.
I’m trying to cram in here something about ongoing projects and deadlines, along with clarity of client and vendor communications, and those are not strictly in the descriptions used for the hiring, more in the “penumbra” of implied but not explicit duties.
A whole new perspective on white privilege
https://x.com/its_The_Dr/status/1822801132562911325?s=19
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a busy day ahead…..
A day full of exercising your white* privilege?
*assumed from context
“We’re going to get jobs on Wall Street” π
We should build a road along the southern border and name it Wall Street.
βSecret Service apologizes for Pittsfield salon takeoverβ
https://www.bostonherald.com/2024/08/11/secret-service-broke-into-pittsfield-hair-salon-used-bathroom-during-kamala-harris-visit-business-owner-says/
Taped over the security camera first thing. Your fine fedgov at work ladies and gents.
They said they were sorry, what else do you want? Jeez *rolls eyes*
Criminal charges against the agents for breaking and entering and vandalism.
What? ANOTHER Alphabet agency has no respect for the Constitution. Oh I declare! /faints
This was amazing.
From this we learned:
the secret service and a candidate can shut down businesses for a couple of days to hold a political rally. No compensation is apparently due.
The secret service can commandeer your building without asking and provide your restrooms to other people.
The secret service can blind your surveillance system so you can’t see what they are up to in your offices.
She shut down ‘voluntarily’ cause of all the security around, but that doesn’t negate everything else. I don’t think it is a stretch as a Third Amendment violation on top of local and state violations. Business owner will still most likely check the box for Kamala though.
suh’ fam
whats goody
I’m off to West Virginia. Luckily its not a rafting trip with Burt Reynolds and Ned Beatty.
Stay away from the biscuits & gravy.
How did the Skravens get in?
On the back of a lynx
If you mean the Skrael, security isn’t exactly that great when you didn’t bring guards.