…nope, doesn’t have the same catchy sound
WooHoo, Wednesday post is up way early!
The Doclopedia #217
Tiny Folk: Ehdan Underbarn
Ehdan and his clan, the Red Rooster Clan, have lived on the Yoder family farm for well over 150 years. While some of the clan live beneath the farmhouse, most of them live under the huge barn. Life on the farm means hard work, but there is also great comfort and plenty of good eating.
Although the Tiny Folk raise many crops and animals of their own, they still harvest some things that the Giant Folk grow. Most notably, they gather up corn, soybeans, apples, tomatoes, peppers, squash and eggs. They also trade goods with other clans in the area, generally at the Spring and Fall Harvest Festivals.
Unlike many Tiny Folk who live in towns and such, Ehdan and his Clan often do little things around the house and farm to help the Giant Folks. Ehdan is particularly fond of sorting through the nuts, bolts, screws and nails in the workshop and putting them into neat piles. The farmer thinks his kids are doing it.
Recently, the Ehdan and his brothers have figured out how to milk a goat (no easy task for such small people), so now they don’t have to steal milk from the milkhouse to make cheese. Now if they can just figure out how to kill, butcher and transport a hog in a single night, they’ll really be doing well.
Ehdan has long red hair, green eyes and a rather big pair of ears. He is married to Roobah and they have 5 children.
AFTER THE CHANGE CAME
A Night For Going To Bed Very Late, But Happy.
The barbecue party was hella fun and there was less flesh left on that pig than if it had been dipped into a pond full of piranhas. The festivities went on until about 7 PM, then everyone that wasn’t actually staying at our house went home.
And then it was GAME TIME! We busted out boardgames, card games, online games and RPGs. I ran a short TOON game for Peter, Holly, Mary, Avis, Miranda and Roscoe, then we joined Spike and several other folks for three rousing games of Kill Doctor Lucky!, Settlers of Catan and the newest edition of the Race Across The World card game. The new edition includes cards that abduct you to Wizard Time and one card that throws a Dragon Breeding Zone in your way.
On the online game front, I joined Doc Mystery (one of several guests who arrived just after my last post went up), Lori Curley (ditto), Peter, and Grace in playing through two of the new QuestWorld: Showdown dimensions. These were the “Cowboys & Amazons” world and the Robin Laws designed “Doomed Planet” world. Both were very well done, with Cowboys & Amazons having a much lighter tone and 4 pretty easy quests. Doomed World only has 2 quests, but they’re pretty damned hard and the second one has a time limit or you’ll die in a super volcano eruption. At some point, we’ll all get back together online to tackle a few more worlds. I’m told this edition of QuestWorld has at least 16 worlds up front and maybe 7 more that you can stumble upon if you do quests in the proper order.
Once the gaming was over, most everybody went off to bed. Me, I sat up a bit longer chewing the fat with Avis and Spike, but now it’s off to bed. It’s a good thing we can sleep on the train, because I’ll be up again in a mere 5 hours.
A Day For Riding A Train, Albeit Not A Crazy One
I was torn from the arms of Morpheus at 6:00 AM by my house elf/gentleman’s gentleman, Ben, telling me in his Alec Guinness sound alike voice that I should “awaken and greet the day”. I told him to piss off. He then snapped his fingers and I was in a cold shower. There are times that I hate house elves.
And since I’ve been asked before, yes, his name is taken from Ben Kenobi and no, he will not under any circumstances say “Use the Force, Luke”. I’ve tried a hundred times to get him to.
Anyway, after a loud scream and a fast shower, I was dressed and sitting at the dining room table sipping tea and watching various friends wander in. Grace, as always, looked like she had been awake for hours and was smelling like new cut hay.
Fun Fact About Green Ladies: They always smell great, like some sort of flower or herb or other vegetation.
Once most everyone was present, Annie produced the huge and varied breakfast, then she and Ben left for their annual day off. I’ve often wondered what House Elves do at the Hoedown, but never thought to ask. Might be better not to know.
Once everybody was fed, we schlepped our baggage out to the bus stop (1/4 mile from the house) and caught the Anibus to the train station. Today’s Anibus was Rudy, our regular catbus. He’s a very dependable fellow and usually shares the route with Cisco, a bunnybus.
30 minutes later, we were in what passes for “downtown” Sacramento and a few minutes after that we were on the #3 Valley to Coast Loop Express and heading west towards the coast just north of Bodega Bay.
The trip was delightful, with great scenery and great company. Near Sonoma, we saw a pretty big herd of land whales, with the big bull measuring at least 50 feet long. Once the train was running along the coastline, we saw several sea serpents on the beaches, this being the birthing season for them.
We got into Mendocino at about 1:15 and it was time for lunch, then a bit of sitting around on the ocean facing veranda of the Mendocino Hotel. Now it’s time to round up the troops and stroll around town, with stops at the various candy makers, wine tasting rooms and craft shops.
The bloggage, she will continue later.
A Night For Reporting In
Since I am about to collapse from exhaustion, this will be a quick update.
We are in San Francisco until tomorrow afternoon. Springfest is going on here and we’ve visited maybe 14 neighborhoods, all of which tried to feed us to an early grave. The pastries in the Fae area of the Noe Valley probably took 10 years off my cardiac life.
My old friend Jim Hong took all of us on a tour of Underground Chinatown. It was by turns fascinating, creepy, funny and scary. Also: Chinese Dragons? Surprisingly sentimental about the old country.
Several of us guys tried our hand at Hill Surfing, which is like snowboarding without snow on steep ass San Francisco streets. I’m surprised that we all survived with only minimal bruising. Not a surprise was the fact that no women gave it a try.
Time to hit the bed. More bloggage soon.
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