text: [Themes: Fantasy, surreal, wordplay, transformation, silly, magic]
  
  So you just got fired from the best company ever, and it's the best day of your life. New opportunities! New horizons! New ways to look at things! Like calling this stupid kiss-off job fair a "convention."
  
  This is the ritziest hotel you'll ever stay in. Terraces are west, a banner hangs over an auditorium entry to the east, and the elevator you came from is to the south. North's a function for later in the day.
  
  There's a sign over an odd side passage the bustling, babbling masses seem to be ignoring.
  
  [Author's Note: A weird power to save a weird world. So you just got fired from the best company ever, and it's the best day of your life. New opportunities! New horizons! New ways to look at things! Like calling this stupid kiss-off job fair a "convention."]
  
  > look at the side passage
  It's just under the NONE TRY sign. You could probably ENTER it, or go INSIDE. It's not really any direction you can tell, and you could have sworn it was near a different exit before you turned your back on it just a bit ago. It curves quickly so you can't see much of it.
  
  > read the banner
  "This way: BEING FIRED!" People walk by, discussing how the DEBRIEFING should make Mondays dynamos again.
  
  > Go east
  That way's an hour or two of listening to an under-action denunciator. You sure?
  
  > No
  You pause before entering. The lecture seems like it'd be fun to ditch.
  
  > Go south
  You already spent too much time in the overlate elevator.
  
  Your eye catches the side passage, which looks more interesting than the standard ways out. Maybe you could give it another look.
  
  > go to the north
  That way's a costlier cloister of rooms than recent firees deserve. The measure-a-resume event will be there, but not for another couple hours. You don't really want to get an agent, anyway.
  
  You feel sort of cornered by all the main passages. Sneaking off anywhere would be kind of fun.
  
  > enter the side passage
  Someone tugs you by the arm. "Can't you read? It says NO ENTRY! Quit dawdling and get to the DEBRIEFING already!"
  
  You check and make sure. No, still NONE TRY. As you walk away, you hear "INSTRUCTIONS, son. I trust I c..."
  (this is the first in-game pause. Whenever the game pauses without a cursor in the future, you need to push any key to continue.)
  
  > examine the toga
  On it you see a four-legged animal with a sort of beard and horns. In one corner you see some writing. The toga also smells vaguely of barnyards.
  
  > look
  Nothing particularly beautiful grows here. All manner of prickly things and dried-up weeds lie around. You see an exit in some direction or other where the thorn was. The shrub and brush the goat wrecked are here, too.
  
  The goat is half-sleeping here. He's probably best left that way.
  
  > Cat
  (examining instead)
  The goat ate enough of it, it doesn't look like anything any more.
  
  > Exit
  You feel a sudden sense of vertigo as you walk towards the passage where the thorn was. You realize you have lost your sense of direction, and for whatever reason, you're preoccupied with finding it before you can continue. So, which way is the thorn?
  
  > North
  With the big thorn gone, why, of course you can go north. Though the goat didn't clear out all the thorns. One rips your nametag slightly. But beyond that, there's a path that leads to an open field.
  
  You're not sure what to do here, and there's no welcoming committee. But there's a broad board with various scrawlings.
  
  You see an incomplete-looking dollhouse with a crackling noise coming from a few loud holes. It is labeled FOR INSTRUCTIONAL PURPOSES ONLY.
  
  It can't be... can it be...? A cabinet floating in mid-air. It looks acne-bit. It's open, too.
  
  A gateway is here. You can see through its sturdy wire fencing, but it doesn't seem to lead anywhere.
  
  > check your inventory
  Item time! You are carrying:
  a dope tan notepad
  a magenta nametag (being worn)
  
  > look at the notepad
  It's your workbook. It holds bookwork. Not a thrilling color to most, and one of many you bought cheap a long time ago, and they haven't run out yet. It's small enough to fit in a pocket, and you have clipped a pen over it, too.
  
  (To use the notepad, you can type PAD (subject) or CONSULT PAD ABOUT (subject). If you forget what you've written about, you can type PAD or CONSULT PAD.)
  
  > examine the nametag
  It's still a bit scratched from your trip through the thorns--about 3/7 of the way from the right.
  
  > Man gate
  Which do you mean, the gateman, the dead beat deadbeat, the cheesy spearman or bearded man?
  
  > look in the cabinet
  (Nothing in this game has anything deeply hidden, so searching works like examining.)
  
  It's open. The cratered bits, once retraced, spell CAN BITE. You see a tinfoil info-lit, a tagged gadget, an idlers' slider and a salient saltine inside.
  
  > Consult pad
  Currently you can consult it about:
  --notepad, lecture
  
  > take the gadget
  You wonder what this gadget IS as you pick it up. It looks like it analyzes something. Perhaps you should try it on a few available things like the nametag?
  
  > use the gadget on the nametag
  Use is a bit too vague for this game's parser to understand. You can SWITCH something, or PUT something IN/ON something, or even ATTACH something to something. You can PUSH a button or OPEN something, as well. Specific items should clue you what to do if you EXAMINE them.
  
  > look at gadget
  It looks like a wall stud sensor, six inches by twelve, with a screen broken into nine mini-panels. An instructional tag you can read is tied to the handle, which narrows where it meets the main part. The gadget crackles with greeny energy.
  
  > examine tag
  (the instructional tag)
  "This gadget is certified untransmogrifiable. It can be used to SCAN objects to determine their transmogrification states. Removing tag invalidates warranty. One beep means item is changeable. Buzz means it has been changed."
  
  The good stuff is about how one beep means something you should change, and a buzz means something that can't be changed again. Above a small print disclaimer you see the text EXAMPLE: LEMON <- RGRGG -> MELON. A little thought and you realize only two reds on the gadget makes things trivial. The example seems loaded in the gadget's favor, but hey, that's advertising for you.
  
  > scan nametag
  You see lights form on the screen--RGRGR*R--the sixth light starts red, then flashes to green and back, as if there are two aspects to the magenta nametag worth considering.
  
  > look at the gateway
  It's a fence gate, so you can see beyond and through it, though it seems too heavy to lift in any case, but who knows, maybe if there was a guy who tended to gates, he'd help you. It'd be neat if...
  
  (You can say the name of the gateway now to enter it. There's nothing more hidden in its description.)
  
  > Gateway
  (entering instead)
  It doesn't lead anywhere. Yet. Plus, you'd run into the, uh, gate part. Maybe if you had someone who could give information. And not stupid information like a silly old nametag.
  
  > Gateman
  If you really CAN change the nametag, you don't want a gateman in your face--so you chuck the nametag away. Not really believing...
  
  Whoah! The nametag pulses and pops in directions you didn't think something that flat could. You hear a gish, then a sigh. A tall, grouchy old man in sober robes so aged you almost say "Egad" cries "The eyes! They see!" He grumbles how he shoulda been a portal king in the parking lot, he's such a talking pro. Then he notices you.
  
  "Smug gums. But you'll have to do. Ehh? Heh. I'm Old Man Almond. What d'you want? I can tell you about this-here quest."
  
  > ask the gateman about the quest
  "Three major problems. Noise is one. A lupine lineup. Noble Ol' Ben: gone. Lorn. No longer."
  
  "And I think I know who's behind it: RED BULL BURDELL!"