Call It Ishmael's

In the coming scene we will find ourselves in Ishmael's. It's a little coffee shop on Main street. Only a few blocks from the high school, it's a popular after school hang out. You might be wondering about a place called Ishmael's well, you see, it came out of a love of literature and coffee. Bohemia is the type of town that would (and has) continually fight big chain stores coming into town. That's all well and good for the small shop owners, but what about the folks who wanted a better cup of coffee than what was available at Mal's Diner? Well, a few years back now, when one of Bohemia's own, Tracy Presperoa, came back to town she decided to open up a coffee shop, similar to the one you'll find on every corner of any other town in California. In homage to the great work of literature from which that other coffee shop got its name, and being a lover of literature herself, Tracy named her place: Ishamael's.

Ishmael's has that familiar but new and exotic feel. Always smelling like a cup of coffee laced with comfort, happiness, and adventure, Ishmael's had the power to draw even the anti-coffee people from two blocks away. And once you stepped through those doors, you never wanted to leave again. The walls were painted in dark hues of burgundy and blue, the floor could have been seen as simple and concrete, if you could ever peel your eyes away from the intricately detailed rugs the were strewn about. None of the chairs were uncomfortable and most were the well-worn sort that, if they were feeling particularly meddlesome, could eat you up and never let you go. Those darkly painted walls were covered with a collection of paintings and photography, most of which had been crafted by Tracy herself of people and places, things and ideas, both real and fantastic. From the way she talked about them though, you'd have a hard time knowing whether or not she did, indeed, meet some of the more fantastic looking, places, people, ideas and things in her travels (she swears each story the art tells is true). In one corner of this marvelous place was a wall covered with books, not for sale. No, they were Tracy's personal library; there for others to enjoy while they were around. Above all else, there always seemed to be a bit of what one could only call magic hanging about.

lunch pt. 3

ok, so plans have changed...for lunch pt. 3 go check out my facebook notes.

Originally I was planning on writing 3 parts of lunch time from each different perspective, however, when I realized that this POV could do something I hadn't realized, the number of parts needed for lunch was cut in half. Be aware that this story is going to be a. very rough, and b. changing as things go.

lunch time pt. 2

Audrey and Jenny made it quickly through the lunch lines and headed off to eat lunch in the theatre classroom, as is their habit.

However, we're staying in the cafeteria for now. In a few minutes, oh wait, it's starting: see Ronnie Bertram there walking boldly (as boldly as he can) toward the Davis twins' usual table? It seems we're not the only ones caught off guard by it as a small number of students have turned their gaze that direction as well. Let's move in to find out what's going on.

With a quiet "ah-hem" Ronnie tried to catch the attention of Ethan, being too afraid to touch him and risk possible physical injury, to start a conversation. However with the years of practice most people at Bohemia High have of ignoring Ronnie, the small cough didn't do much to catch anyone's ear.

"mʀ[χ]xʷ’m"* Said Ronnie, more matter-of-fact-ly this time. When IPA is thrown in, with a nice link, it makes it more difficult to ignore. So, with a rather confused look, Ethan turned to see who was throwing IPA around to get his attention.

"Hey Dan, check out Berty over here! Hey Berty," as that's how they always referred to Ronnie, "where'd you learn to do that?"

"Oh, that? I've been talking in IPA for years!" Replied Berty, I mean Ronnie, with such enthusiasm about someone noticing the IPA that he almost forgot what he came over to talk about.

"Neat trick" said Dan. "Did you need something?"

"Right, straight to business" fidgeted Ronnie. "Well, you see...ummm...uh, you know", he couldn't say it here, not with all of these witnesses. "CanIbuyyouacupofcoffeeatIshmael'stodayafterschool?Ihaveabusinesspropositionforyou" Ronnie blurted out as one word.

Ethan responded in his usual quip-ish nature, "Sure, but no caffeine for you or I doubt we'll be able to understand the proposition!"

Dan confirmed "3:30 at Ishmael's?" with a vigourusly nodding, but silent (because he was afraid he might toss his cookies as the attention from the surrounding students and the aquiescense from the twins was more than he could take at once) Ronnie.


More to come probably tomorrow since I was bad at updating this week.

*to those of you who know IPA and may actually be able to correctly transcribe an attention getting cough, please let me know what it looks like, I'd like to be accurate!

lunch time at Bohemia High

(this is the 1st 3rd of lunch, more will be coming either later today or tomorrow)

While the class filed excitedly from the classroom towards the cafeteria sundry side conversations were shared by various pairings of students. If the topic of the conversation was still on the assignment that had just been dropped in their laps, the sound accompanying it seems mostly to be grumbling. However, there appears to be a pair that's not as disappointed.

Wondering aloud, Jenny Jordan asked her long-time best friend Audrey, "Do you think we can choose any scene we want, and any scene partner?". Audrey's eyes followed the direction Jenny was so longingly staring and found, as she suspected, Ethan Wallace walking and scheming away with his twin, Dan. Despite Jenny's ability to become anyone and anything on a stage, when it came to talking to Ethan Wallace, her words got as tangled as pantyhose in a dryer.

In a rather mockingly wistful, falsetto retort, Audrey replied, "Who knows, maybe this will be your big break to tell Ethan how you really feel!"

To busy lost in her thoughts about performing Sylvia to Ethan's Valentine, or maybe Hero and Claudio...Jenny didn't bother responding to Audrey's veiled jab.

As we've been following these ladies, who are following the Wallace twins, to lunch, it might be a good idea to look over our shoulders and see that not far behind is Ronald "Ronnie" Bertram, the boy with eyes only for Jenny, has been hoping that he might get to do a scene with her.

Just as we have noticed Ronnie, pinning away for Jenny, so has Audrey. "Maybe this will be Ronnie's big chance with you!" She pointed out while discreetly signaling that Ronnie wasn't far behind.

"Ew! Don't even joke about that" whispered Jenny so that Ronnie couldn't hear, as she really doesn't like being rude to him, but honestly when will the boy catch a hint! To stop Audrey from her ridiculous suggesting, Jenny punctuated the last remark with a smack to Audrey's arm.

"Ow! ok, ok, I'll stop" said Audrey, while a visible "for now" flitted across her face. Audrey would probably have continued on in this strain except for the fact that they'd reached the cafeteria. With more than half of the school about, she resigned herself to mocking her friend later.

....lunch will be continued later...

just to clarify

So as to clear up any confusion: the last 3 posts have been part of a story I decided to write. I'm coming up with some rules of the writing as I go along:
1. it can only be written/worked on/edited, etc. while a blog-post-editing window is open!
2. thoughts about it are allowed to happen during other times, but that's it!
3. unless for some strange reason I have time or feel the absolute need to write over the weekend, posts and additions to the story will only be added during the Monday-Friday week!
4. there really isn't a 4th rule yet, but I just thought I should let you know about the above 3

Also, in case you're wondering the general story idea is one I've been playing around with for a while, thanks to a comment Ashley made one day about events in my own life. That doesn't mean, however that these situations come from my own life.

and finally: as an experiment, I've started to write this story from Audrey's 1st person perspective on my facebook notes. So, if you're interested in seeing how this 3rd person telling differs, or if you'd rather read it from Audrey's POV, feel free to go check it out. Some days I'll be writing this part first, some days I'll be writing that part first. Either way, each day, each post will have about equal amounts of the story (so as not to give something more away here or there).

Now you know: also if a post is started/ended with a line or two of text regarding where to find other information and or "to be continued" those are notes from me, they are not meant to be read as part of the story itself. From this point on, any notes about the story and not of the story (like this entire post) will be blue instead of purple.

It all started with Ms. StClaire....

so as not to read and be confused, I suggest you go read the two posts below this, starting with the lowest one.

It's that time of year when no matter how interesting the lesson may be, even the best students in class have a hard time paying attention. This season of time comes every year and to everyone from the kindergartners to the graduate students, and on occasion even to the teachers themselves. Everyone in any one of these situations feels as if no one else could possibly imagine this torture they are enduring; none of this is more true than in the case of high school seniors. But yet, of a sudden, from one classroom in one high school the whole world over uproarious laughter is heard; it appears that a someone has finally found the antidote to these horrible springtime doldrums. As Ms. StClaire (the senior English teacher and head of the theatre club at Bohemia High - home of the Bears. She's of a more eccentric/free-spirited nature that would fit a good Theatre/English teacher) has been made head of the entertainment for the Summertide Upon Bohemia Festival, she decided to proverbially kill the two proverbial birds with a single project, I mean stone. She has just announced to her 3rd period English class:

"You are going to be selecting a scene from a good rolicking, Shakespeare comedy to perform in a compilation of scenes at the Summertide Upon Bohemia Festival." The laughter heard in earlier an earlier paragraph was the response, from that wonderful class of seniors, to this announcement. When Ms. StClaire went on, the class' laughter was quickly overtaken by the silence of courtroom at the reading of the verdict. "Now, during your tenure"; Ms. StClaire used words like tenure all the time, it's the way she works, "here at Bohemia High you've read a good number of Shakespeare's plays including the usual dramas: Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet. Many of you have also read Much Ado About Nothing, the next three we've read in the last year, so they should be fresh in your minds: Twelfth Night, Midsummer Night's Dream, and Taming of the Shrew".

"Ms. StClaire!" Complained two voices from the back of the classroom, accompanied by two identically and indignantly raised hands belonging to Ethan and Dan Wallace. But before they could voice their many objections to such an assignment, they were rudely interrupted by Chad Davis.
"Excuse me, but Summertide Upon Bohemia takes place the day after graduation which means that you, Ms. StClaire, have no right or authority to assign such a project as it falls outside your jurisdiction."
"Excuse you indeed, Mr. Davis," replied Ms. StClaire, "as you should not be speaking out of turn; it is out of your jurisdiction. Class, however rudely he may put it, Mr. Davis would have a point that I see many of you are agreeing with. To put your minds at ease, I've already made allowances for that". Slowly, the twins hands returned to their desks from the air along with their hopes of getting out of this assignment. Ms. StClaire went on. "Last week I talked to all of your parents as well as Principal Barrie and they all seemed pleased with the idea..."
Just as she finished this sentence (or as the students saw it, sentencing) the bell rang for the class to go to lunch.

....more to come...

Dramatis Personae & Milieu

So far we have: Audrey Adrianna Arden (yes, she hates her parents for naming her that way)
Gertrude Jennifer Jordan (goes by Jenny)
Ethan and Dan Wallace - twins, sons of the mayor - trouble makers
Chad Davis (sort of a "big man on campus", mostly a jerk, but smart, and sometimes useful)
Aaron Arden (Audrey's little brother - a freshman and all that implies)
it's been decided that as far as characters go, those are the only one's you really should be allowed to know. I mean, honestly they don't know anything about you and to make things more fair, that's all you'll get. As you run into other characters you will be introduced to them.

There's a little town, nestled in the toes of the foothills of the Sierra-Nevada mountain range, it's only a short trip from there to California's state capitol-Sacramento and if you were ask any of the inhabitants of this town from whence they came, they'd answer "Sacramento" knowing that you would probably think they were joking if they said Bohemia. It's a small community right between Loomis and Auburn (places about which most of you are probably still saying "where?!?"). It's there, an unincorporated piece of Placer County that has as much history as the state of California itself. That history has little to do with the lives about which this story revolves; except in the instance of an annual beginning of summer festival which is a long standing town tradition called Summertide Upon Bohemia

To be continued

something different

unlike many stories that begin with a "once upon a time" or an "a long long time ago" or something similar this story begins with a simple, welcoming, and heartfelt "hello". Not from the writer, no, nor from any of the characters, but from the story itself. It wants to be trusted by you as it is read by you and therefore it starts as any good introduction between people should start. But from there it continues on in a more usual sort of way. For now it begins to introduce you to the people involved in the action of this story:
Audrey Arden (she's 17, hates her parents for loving alliteration so much that her middle name is Adrianna, and she's about to graduate high school)
Gertrude Jennifer Jordan (hasn't gone by her first name since 2nd grade and therefore everyone knows her as: Jenny Jordan...which is actually how she and Audrey became such good friends when they met in 5th grade as Audrey thought she has a fellow sufferer in the problem of parents with above-average affection for alliteration...also about to finish high school)
Ethan Wallace
Dan Wallace (these two are twins, the Wallace boys, their father is the mayor and they're frequently narrowly escaping trouble. Rarely seen apart, the boys are facing separation as they prepare to go away to school)

there'll be more later...promise....just need to spend some more time thinking...

ACRG

It stands for Agatha Christie Reading Group. We had the first meeting on Saturday. It was at this meeting where we decided that the first book would be Christie's first book: The Mysterious Affair at Styles and that our 2nd book would be The Murder of Roger Ackroyd we also decided that having it on Saturday's for sharing tea-time together while discussing would both be grand fun and also extremely appropriate. All in all, I'm really excited to be reading these great books with these fun people. If you're interested in what we're reading as we move along, just keep watching. I'll update this as we decide each month.