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Super Smash Quest² - Story - Chapter 2: Business and Loathing in Mobius
Date: July 24th, 25th and 26th, 2008.
Metal Man (GM): It is the morning on the Emerald Coast. The Fisherman is still fishing... there's Sea gulls in the distance. The sun is shining and it appears a good day to travel.
Aribar rolls over in the sand, wincing as the morning sun shines in the mage's eyes.* "Five more minutes, sun..."
Lance pokes the mage.
Trigger wakes up yawning and stretching. "Meh, stupid light."
Digifanatic tries waking up quietly, hoping that he doesn't disturb anyone who doesn't want to wake up... but instead it probably triggers everyone else getting up anyway.
Trigger: "Ugh, I need something to wake me up..." *smack.* "Zzzzzzz."
Digifanatic stands up and simply brushes the sand off his clothes... for not having like a blanket or a pillow, it still didn't feel quite that badly.
Metal Man (GM): The sand here is quite nice, after all.
Trigger fell back asleep.
Lance: "..." *grabs a lump of wet sand and drops it on Trigger.*
Aribar yawns, slowly getting up and looking about.* "Morning, everyone..."
Digifanatic: *whispering to Lance.* "This ain't gonna end well."
Trigger: "Zzzz."
Digifanatic: .oO(Wow, Deloth is a really deep sleeper.)
Lance: "He said he needed something too..." *starts to roll Trigger towards the watter.*
Trigger starts to wake back up after noticing that Lance is rolling him out so sea. "Hey... stop?"
Digifanatic: "If it's low tide, it's probably going to lull him that much more... until he wakes up 400 feet away from the shoreline... or not."
Trigger wakes up. "Ugh, sorry and you really didn't have to do that Lance..."
Lance: "OK."
Trigger starts to stretch and dust off all the sand on him.
Digifanatic: .oO(Heh... malletspace plus the most loud, screwy, dissonant chord wouldn't have hurt.)
Trigger: "Thanks for that sand bath by the way..."
Lance: "No problem, anything to help you get up."
Digifanatic: "I think he was being sarcastic."
Trigger: "Yeah... whatever... I was."
Aribar does another yawn and begins stretching.* "Sooooo... A new day... At the beach..." *The half-elf seems a little dumb-founded as to why they're out here, the remembers yesterday's events.*
Trigger: "Well, I guess we should go buy those parts for the fisherman's boat now that we're up."
Digifanatic: "And nothing came out of the Ocean of Chaos to wreck our first night on a new planet. That's a record."
Lance: "Yep."
Trigger: "Thank god..."
Lance: "We have to help gather the parts too. We also have to ask that nice policeman about the storage lockers."
Digifanatic: "Yeah... and hopefully we'll find some real housing."
Lance: "I think this beach is fine for now."
Trigger: "I wouldn't mind a couch and a TV about now... And a fridge..."
Digifanatic: "Heh. Well, nothing else to do, so let's go, right?"
Lance: "No use buying housing if we will have to give it up later."
Trigger: "...Meh."
Aribar: "You won't be saying that if it starts to rain."
Lance says hello to the fisherman.
Digifanatic: "We'll figure it out. Who knows if we're staying here for the next six months or if we're boarding a ship to some other continuent in three weeks."
Fisherman: "Er... hello." He himself wakes up... he was asleep and fishing!
Trigger: "Well, if we got a place here we could have a place to crash if we end up in this place again."
Lance: "Excellent Multitasking."
Trigger: "You know, like a safehouse or a secondary base of operations."
Lance: "We are going to gather the parts today, or as much as possible."
Aribar: "Okay... So we're heading up to Station Square for the parts... It would possibly be easier to just leave our weapons here, rather than travel all the way to Central City to store them."
Lance: "So can you watch our weapons for us Mr... erm, I never got your name."
Trigger nudges Lance "It was Marley."
Digifanatic: "Yeah, it was."
Lance: "Marley, right, sorry, slipped my mind."
Marley: "Oh. Well, yes. I have nowhere else to go."
Lance: "Thank you." *drops off his bow.* "Looks like I will be using ye old energy bow."
Trigger drops off his sword by Lance's bow. "I'll be using my fists then, I guess."
Digifanatic keeps his Digivice concealed in his pants pocket--sticking to his belief that it's so small, who would notice, and that he's got a decent enough set of moves in case they have to get into a battle.
Aribar leaves his sword with the other weapons as well.*
Lance: "So on to Station Square."
Trigger: "AWAY!!!"
Lance looks at the list of parts and stores.
Trigger: *follows Lance.*
Aribar follows the others!
Metal Man (GM): It's a simple list. 'Boat engine', 'Boat Propeller', 'Boat Guns', 'Boat Cigarettes.'
Digifanatic: *keeps going... in this case, north to Station Square.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers have also 50 rings... Which are also coins. But the coins equal rings, so it's all equal.
Digifanatic: "Looking the list a bit over...* "Cigarettes?!"
Trigger: "What? Let me see?"
Digifanatic: "One of the items says 'Boat Cigarettes'..."
Lance: "Let's not ask and just get the parts. *face palm.*"
Trigger: "...Odd."
Metal Man (GM): Station Square is dead ahead... well, through a thick forest.
Lance: "Through the forest, wonder if there is a path?"
Aribar: "Hopefully..."
Metal Man (GM): The Questers find a path. It winds erratically.
Lance follows the path.
Aribar follows the follower of the path.
Digifanatic: *keeps walking ahead.*
Metal Man (GM): They keep walking... It's rather lonely and confusing in this forest... and humid. It's all green here, too. The path keeps going onward through the dense forest... the Questers reach a fork.
Aribar: "I half wonder if Eggrobos ever roamed through this place..." *The elf thinks back to the Eggbots that lived with the Kokiris in Hyrule long ago..*
Metal Man (GM): The fork in the road is unmarked. One way goes left, the other goes right. They both head in the same direction, though--they curve to the direction the Questers are going in.
Lance: "So what do you say guys, left or right?"
Digifanatic: "Well, if we're pointing north right now... left would be the way to go because it'd probably have to hit the coastline at some point. Even if we're a bit closer to east, left is okay."
Aribar shrugs.* "I never had much of a sense of direction... Left sounds decent..."
Digifanatic: "Okay then..." *starts walking down the left side.* "If anyone objects, I'll stop and wait."
Lance follows the lefty.
Trigger: *follows.*
Digifanatic: *And we'll just assume Dragoshi follows.*
Aribar starts down the path.
Metal Man (GM): The Questers walk on down the left, unsure as to whether it goes where they want it to. However, today is their lucky day. They hit a slight clearing, and the town is actually this way.
Digifanatic: "That worked out."
Aribar: "Hm. Things are going pretty easy thus far."
Trigger: "Let's keep going."
Digifanatic: "You do realize you just tempted fate with that one, right, Aribar?"
Aribar: "Karma owes us a heck of a lot."
Dragoshi: "...Quite."
Digifanatic: "Touché."
Metal Man (GM): Right before the city, the Questers see a strange man with shades. Hm. He looks like one of those thugs they encountered earlier.
Trigger: "...Karma better not be a bitch about this. SON OF A BITCH!!!"
Lance: "Ignore him."
???: "Hey, if it isn't the people who ducked out on our fee... twice..."
Lance: "Hello there."
???: "And then you skimped Al, too! And the casino guy! We figure you're either some sort of agent or stupid. So I'll give you an offer you can't refuse."
Lance: "Your name?"
???: "Pay up all the money you got now, or I beat your skulls in."
Metal Man (GM): He glares at Lance.
Trigger: "I gotta deal for you."
???: "I only tell my name to dead people."
Lance: "How about your gender then?"
Dragoshi: "..."
Metal Man (GM): He cracks his knuckles.
Trigger: "...Nice one."
Aribar: "There is one of you, and five of us. Think about this for a moment."
???: "In case you don't understand, I am the head of the people you just blew off. The amount of complaints means that it was rather nice of me not to skip to the killing. I don't need five people at my back; the minute I raise a fist in anger, you're all pretty well screwed."
Trigger: "Guys, someone is in the bushes."
???: "So I'm going to ask this one more time, and you're going to say yes, or maybe this will be idiot memorial trail."
Trigger: "Someone check on that?"
Metal Man (GM): He stares at Trigger. He begins laughing.
Digifanatic tries to confirm Trigger's suspicions...
Trigger: "Hey, what's so funny?"
???: "Man, I overestimated you guys. I thought you'd know what this is by now. You're not worth my time."
Dragoshi: .oO(A dick move?)
Metal Man (GM): Digi look in the bushes. Oops, he just peered at a gunbarrel. *BLAM.*
Trigger: "Digi?!"
???: "Guys, kill'em and loot the corpses. I'm gonna go eat lunch."
Metal Man (GM): He casually wanders off.
Dragoshi: "...Welp."
Trigger: "DAMN IT, GET BACK HERE!!!"
Metal Man (GM): Digi takes damage.
Lance: "Trigger, shut up."
Metal Man (GM): The men leap out of the bushes.
Lance: "The less we have to fight the better."
Metal Man (GM): There are... five of them.
Trigger: "Okay..."
Dragoshi: "...Oh, swell."
Metal Man (GM): They block the path to the boss and point their guns at the Questers.
Thug 1: "So, yeah, you think you're hot? You're gonna be shot!"
Lance: "Your a poet, you just never knew it."
Metal Man (GM): Argh. He apparently sicked the most annoying of his minions at the Questers.
Thug 2: "Ahahahahahahaha!!! AHAHAHAHAAHAHAHA!!!!"
Trigger: "...Stop encouraging them please..."
Thug 1: "I hate you all, please fall and be appalled."
Aribar: "We'll make short work of your smirk!"
Thug 2: "AHAHAHAHAAHAHAH!!!!!"
Thug 3: "Smirk? Duhhh... what's a smirk?"
Lance: "... ... ..."
Thug 3: "Ahahahahahahaaaaaa!!!!"
Thug 1: "You shall all die, and then I shall eat pie."
Trigger: "Dear god, they're retards..."
Digifanatic: .oO(That's how he celebrates? That is weak.)
Dragoshi: "...This has taken a turn for the screwy."
Thug 4: "The boss says I'm special! I'm special! I'm so very special!"
Digifanatic: "Just like old times."
Thug 3: "What's a special? A sandwich?"
Lance: "Your poems are lame, they hurt my soul, for you see your to the blame, for earth's intelligence hole."
Thug 2: "Ahaahahaahaahahahahaaaa!"
Thug 5: "..."
Dragoshi: "...Does he always laugh like that."
Thug 1: "Never did he stop laughing, not even when he was drafting, he was always laughing. Ahahahaha."
Trigger: "..."
Dragoshi: "That has to get pretty awkward sometimes."
Lance: "As long as these guys don't turn out like... I don't know, some sort of munchkin boss squad, it will be fine."
Metal Man (GM): They... don't look so tough. Apparently, the Questers got off lucky. The Boss thought they were too dumb to be worth his full wrath.
Thug 1: "We shall punch your spleen, and then you shall be clean, for you shall be lean."
Lance: "At least use rhyming couplets!"
Thug 3: "What's a spleen?"
Dragoshi: "In aaaaany case..." *Dragoshi slides out a pair of Kamas, then tosses them both at Thug 1.*
Thug 1: "Behold as your attacks do not hold for I am bold and... oh no, gold!" *CRASH.*
Dragoshi: "Eat it."
Metal Man (GM): He's pretty beaten up by that. Apparently these are guys who have only fought... in their minds!
Thug 2: "Ahahahah... Ah ah ah!"
Thug 1: "You are quite rude, I will beat you blue... d."
Lance: "Points if you can get the first one."
Thug 3: "What's a first one?"
Aribar frowns, wondering whether to take out Mr. Punny or Mr. Funny first... Yeah. Funny. The elf tries to silence him by summoning down some hail upon Thug 2!* "Freeze!"
Thug 4: "Hey! You're special too! No fair! No fairrrrrrrr~"
Dragoshi: "You know what's not fair?"
Metal Man (GM): Hit, Aribar.
Thug 2: "Ahaahahahahaha!"
Aribar: "Life?"
Dragoshi: "Having to deal with a group of random asshats, like..."
Thug 1: "He must not feel pain, for he is quite vain."
Dragoshi: "10 minutes or so after waking up. Seriously."
Lance: "I have an idea after this battle is over. Heh."
Thug: 1:: "Oh the rain, it is so vain, I like to gain, now for main."
Lance: "Oh you simple poet, you should learn the signs, 'case, don't you know it, your going to be blind."
Digifanatic: .oO(We didn't start the fire?)
Thug 1:: "Ah, shiny colors of blue, how I love you."
Thug 2: "Ahahah... ahahahaha!"
Lance: "As for you Mr. Laughs, have an arrow up your - bass."
Thug 2: "Ahahaahaahahaaha!"
Digifanatic: *muttering.* "That boy needs therapy."
Metal Man (GM): Thug 1 attacks... Dragoshi!
Thug 1: "Die, person! Person! Die!"
Metal Man (GM): Dragoshi is enraged! Dragoshi deals 2x damage... but half of the damage done is done back to him! Thug 2 attacks... at Digi. Miss. Thug 3 attacks... Aribar. ...
Thug 3: "SPECIAL BULLET SHOT!"
Aribar uses the magic of being so damn cool to dodge.*
Metal Man (GM): BOOM! HEADSHOT!
Aribar: *... Ow.*
Metal Man (GM): Thug 4 attacks Darkdata.
Thug 4: "Hey, you stole my gun!"
Thug 3: "No I didn't! Duhrrrr..."
Metal Man (GM): Darkdata is smacked by Thug 4 miming a firing motion. Thug 5 is silent. Thug 5 does nothing.
Dragoshi: "...Okay, what." *Groans in annoyance.*
Digifanatic decides to beat up on Thug 2--after all, Aribar put a number on it. We'll stick with the ice theme by laying an Icy Kick first... and we'll follow it up by taking a leap into the air and punting him down via Generic Air!
Metal Man (GM): Hit with the air.
Trigger stands back and jabs thug 2 in the face. Then follows up with a power combo.
Metal Man (GM): Hit. Thug 2 dies!
Thug 2: "Ahaaha--gurk."
Thug 1: "His existence was short and... bort?"
Dragoshi: *And, Dragoshi starts off his turn by trying to jack Thug 1 in the face and steal his gun.* "Shut the hell up!"
Metal Man (GM): ULTRA HIT. Dragoshi steals his gun. It's pretty shoddy.
Aribar points a finger at the first Thug and snaps his fingers. Three bolts of lightning are conjured into existence and lance towards their target in the blink of an eye. White Lightning x 3.*
Metal Man (GM): Thug 1 dies.
Thug: "Life is but a bitter candle, I should really have not gambled." *Thunk.*
Lance: "Hmm, I feel random." *Throws a gravity attack at Thug Three.*
Metal Man (GM): Hitzorz. Thug 3 continues to use his stolen gun. At... Digi.
Digifanatic: *And he does.*
Metal Man (GM): Thug 4 attacks Dragoshi. ...
Digifanatic: *DUN DUN DUN.*
Metal Man (GM): The dice are evil! AHHHHHHHH. Thug 5 attacks Dragoshi.
Dragoshi: *Sidesteps.* "Stupid zeros!"
Digifanatic hopes that with his next turn, he can finish someone off, so he attempts a big old stomach-squisher in the form of a Golf Club Ram aimed at Thug 3.
Metal Man (GM): Hit. He's knocked into a tree and dies!
Digifanatic: *His golf club vanishes into malletspace again.*
Trigger latches onto Thug 5 and suplexes him into the ground. After waiting for him to get back up, Trigger then slugs him in the face... hard.
Metal Man (GM): He gets smacked... a lot.
Dragoshi: *Dragoshi takes a deep breath, and regains his composure. He then proceeds to run over to Thug 5 and attempt to kick him upside the head, then follow up by attempting to blast him in the face with acid. So, yeah.*
Metal Man (GM): Hit. Dragoshi blinds himself. And he misses!
Dragoshi: *And, Dragoshi stumbles around and stuff. Whoo.*
Aribar draws back his arm and thrusts it towards Thug 5! A powerful burst of wind blasts the vagabond and Aribar follows it up by snapping his fingers once again and having lightning lance towards the Thug!*
Lance: *Systemcrash Combo BSOD/Underclock to Thug 5.*
Metal Man (GM): Thug 5... Explodes.
Lance: "Erm... ???"
Dragoshi: "...I ain't cleanin' that up."
Digifanatic: "...Nice?"
Trigger: "Yay?"
Lance: "Was he made of plastic explosive or something?"
Thug: 4:: "I am the only guy left! I'm special!"
Metal Man (GM): Thug 4 aims!
Aribar: "... You certainly are. Ow."
Metal Man (GM): He fires at the air!
Digifanatic: *And it's down to Thug 4! He takes a leap before popping in a big elbow to the head and switching to the other arm and Fire Punching him to the temple!*
Lance: "Thugy! You know wha'd be fun! You should run along and go play in the forest!"
Metal Man (GM): He leaps over the attack, Matrix-style.
Digifanatic: *And it's worse!*
Metal Man (GM): He leaps over that too!
Trigger tries to take out the last thug with a suplex.
Metal Man (GM): He dodges!
Dragoshi: *Tries to disarm Thug 4, then hurl a Kama at him.*
Metal Man (GM): Fail. Hit.
Aribar launches a Wind Blast to put the Thug up into the air, then another one to slam him down into the ground. Screw the physics, I have magics!*
Metal Man (GM): He is thrown away... and... battle finish! The thugs are penniless. Sigh. Meanwhile, the leader of the Thugs, thinking the Questers to morons, has already begun walking towards Station Square. His back is turned, but one probably wouldn't want to sneak up behind him...
Digifanatic: *muttering.* "Well, now that we got rid of that distraction..."
Metal Man (GM): The jungle surrounds the path. The head of the thugs is nearly to the town, which seems to be about medium size.
Digifanatic: *still quietly so as not to have anyone questionable overhear the conversation.* "Well, we could be able to find a marina down by the western side of the city."
Deloth: "I thought we didn't have any money for parts."
Digifanatic: "He gave us the bag of coins?"
Deloth: "When was that?"
Digifanatic: "Before we left the beach. I think Lance has it."
Deloth: "Oh. Guess I wasn't really paying attention."
Lance: "Yeah, I also took your (weapon?) and placed it with ours. Fisherdude is watching them."
Metal Man (GM): The Thug man vanishes, having apparently no interest in entering the town. The road ahead is clear... it begins to be paved, up ahead.
Lance: "Ok, so we need to find a boating store."
Digifanatic: "Yeah, probably right on the shore. Our idiot enemy is gone, so the coast is clear."
Lance starts walking towards the town.
Digifanatic: "Just find the first street west when you can." *starts walking ahead to Station Square.*
Lance: "Hope we can "Sea" the store."
Deloth heads to Station Square.
Dragoshi: *puts the machinegun he stole in the Wario-faced treasure chest, and follows the others into Stations Square.*
Metal Man (GM): It fits right in, Dragoshi. The Questers walk in and see the first thing here: Town hall, a tall, square building. It has got a fenced off courtyard; the gate is closed. The road turns to the left. One can freely walk down it; average people are wandering around. While some of them glance at the Questers... they don't seem to worry.
Deloth: "At least we're not getting screamed at here."
Lance walks down it keeping an eye out for a boating store.
Digifanatic heads to the left.
Lance: "So, starting to get used to your body Del?"
Metal Man (GM): The Questers turn to the left. Many shops here. A burger shop to their right... A shop with weird eggs to their left...
Deloth: "Sort of. It's still a bit of a shock to take a bath and see feathers floating in the water."
Metal Man (GM): And just down the way, a Train station on the right... And further down the way is a large building with some generic name 'Mechanical Parts Company.'
Deloth: "Plus, these headwings are hard to rinse... anyways. You think that parts company's what we need?"
Lance: "I think we are looking for something more sea-like?"
Digifanatic: "Perhaps."
Metal Man (GM): Speaking of sea, the Questers are right on the coast, and can see it further south. There's a boat sitting near the coast for no reason. There's also a Theme park... 'Twinkle Park' Also to the right is... a motel.
Digifanatic: "Boats are prominent pieces of machinery and such, so... no, I am not going to hoard random boat parts if I don't have to."
Metal Man (GM): The boat is of an eccentric design, and appears to have been used by various people. There's a sign next to it.
Digifanatic: *walks over to the sign and reads it.*
Metal Man (GM): 'Egg Carrier Historical Center--Take this boat to visit.' Ah, also: The hotel reads 'Vacancy.'
Digifanatic: "Uh...'Egg Carr'--no. Not today." *walks back to the others.* "I think we should just check out the parts building for now."
Metal Man (GM): The Theme park costs rings to enter, so unless the Questers feeling irresponsible, they probably shouldn't enter it.
Lance: "So to the generic Parts store!"
Deloth: *Let's go for the parts warehouse for 200, please, Alex.*
Lance starts walking there.
Digifanatic: *heads in there as well.*
Dragoshi: *Moseys on along behind the others.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers walk on in. It's a corporate building. An echidna receptionist girl greets them.
Receptionist: "How can I help you?"
Lance: "Do you sell the oat parts on this list?" *lists off the parts.*
Receptionist: "Yes. Yes we do. That sounds like a special order..." *She takes the list.* "There's just a bit of a problem. Not with your order, of course."
Digifanatic: "You don't sell the cigarettes?"
Dragoshi: "What's the problem?"
Lance: "Hmm? You need help getting the parts?"
Digifanatic: "I know, it's just thing a random thing at the end..."
Receptionist: "The cigarettes?" She chuckles. "That's just a word for torpedo."
Digifanatic: "Ohhh... I'm sorry. I've never been much of a boater."
Receptionist: "A certain person helps manufacture some of these, and he's been missing. We've been going off of the warehouse, but this list indicates you're going out to the deep ocean."
Dragoshi: .oO(...So, do they call torpedoes cigarettes then?)
Receptionist: "And this money indicates... you need the high quality parts."
Deloth: "Well, uh... do you know where he was last, then? Maybe we can find him."
Receptionist: "Unless you'd want the cheaper ones to save money. It's your life."
Lance: "Best we can buy."
Chancé: .oO(Not really our money anyway, so...)
Receptionist: "Well, you should be familiar with him." She picks up a picture of Miles 'Tails' Prower. "He went off on some adventure to find Eggman... even though Eggman is seemingly gone forever. I have no clue where he went, though... well. Knuckles would know, but we don't have an airport either."
Deloth: "...Yeah, I think we know him."
Digifanatic: "Ahh, Tails... yeah, he's good with these things."
Receptionist: "Oh. There is one person you could talk to. He lives in the forest. So... what do you think? I can give you directions to either."
Lance: "Who is the other person?"
Receptionist: "He's... Big. Very... Big."
Lance: "Can we get directions to both please?"
Receptionist: "Sure." She begins writing... slowly.
Metal Man (GM): She finishes, handing it to the Questers. It says... 'Big: Walk on the right path in the forest.' It also says 'Tails: Go to Central City Airport, charter a flight under our name (Machine Parts Co.), explain the situation, give them this phone number: (Insert phone number).'
Lance: "Thank you for the help."
Digifanatic: "Indeed."
Deloth: "...Why do I have the feeling that one of these choices is a sucker bet?"
Lance: "Well, why not check BIG first?"
Deloth: "Because that sounds way too easy?"
Lance: "Right, because it is easy. No use going on a flight for nothing."
Receptionist: "Feel free to ask anything else... you're doing us a service by getting him back. We need to do more research on how Eggman made his Egg Carrier."
Metal Man (GM): Sooo the Questers in the lobby, cooling their heels.
Lance: "Then again... Hoe about a vote then? Tails or Big?"
Deloth: "Tails. I want to see how he's doing nowadays, anyways."
Digifanatic: "I can go either way. As long as we don't get killed doing it. I'll only vote if we're tied."
Dragoshi: "Big. Just to get him out of the way."
Lance: "Yeah, let's go see tails. We can help the nice receptionist's company too."
Digifanatic: "Okay, that's cool... problem is, even if we do all the favors and such, will we still be able to afford all the expenses?"
Metal Man (GM): The airport is in Central City, of course.
Deloth: "You're thinking too far ahead, Digi. Gear down a notch."
Lance: "I thought it was payed for? Since we are chartering it under their name."
Digifanatic: "True."
Receptionist: "Yes, it is paid for."
Deloth: "Cool. Let's go."
Digifanatic: "Oh, well in that case, I've got no problem doing that."
Deloth starts heading back to Central City. Wheeeeeeeeeee!
Digifanatic: *heads out.*
Lance: "Thank you for your time once again, if we hear anything about tails we will let you know." *follows the Angeldemon and the Frandon.*
Dragoshi: *Follows the guy with the pink sunglasses.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers walk their way back down the street... and of course, down the path too. Man... they're walking a lot.
Digifanatic: "Okay, looking at the map, we've got to head to the southeast corner of Station Square. So let's head off to that end of town."
Metal Man (GM): The Questers walk their way for a very long time, eventually reaching the outskirts of Central City. No thugs. Just some people staring at them. The city is very large, and the Questers can't tell where to reach the airport from here.
Lance: "To the police station to ask for directions then?"
Digifanatic: "...No."
Deloth: "And by no, he means HELL no."
Metal Man (GM): Shops and the police station and a much larger building on the left, a street on the right as well as a grocery store and... a library.
Digifanatic: "Hmm... would a library have local maps?"
Lance walks to the library.
Digifanatic: *What the heck--he follows Lance in.*
Deloth: *follows.*
Lance: *w* "Remember to talk quiet guys."
Digifanatic: *nods.*
Dragoshi: *Also nods.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers are inside the library. It's a square building. Books everywhere. A librarian busy looking through recently returned books. The inside of the building has green walls and a brown floor. It's very earthy. The librarian is a man with short hair and generic white T-shirt and brown dress pants. He wears normal glasses. There's a few other mobians and people milling around the library. The area is rather quiet, and indirectly lit.
Lance: "*w* Excuse me?"
Digifanatic: *walks up and w as well.* "Hello. Do you have any maps of the city? We're trying to find the airport."
Librarian: *Puts down a book.* "Oh." *He glances at all of the Questers.* "I see. We have entire books of maps, but you need library cards. Do you... do you have IDs?"
Digifanatic: *w* "Oh, no... we're just tourists. We lost our last map..." *w* "Look, we don't even need to take it out of the library. All we have to do is just take a look at it and write down a set of directions."
Librarian: "?"
Lance: *w* "Mind your manners Digi, you could be a bit more polite."
Digifanatic: *w* "I'm trying to be polite." *Not that way.*
Librarian: "Er... I've seen tourists before." He glances down. "You can get an ID at the GUN office, just next to the Police Station... of course, you need some sort of birth certificate or something... Can't just give IDs to anyone."
Digifanatic: *w* "Right, I understand. That's cool. Thank you very much."
Lance: "So, we can't view the media in your presence?"
Librarian: "..." He smirks. "Nothing stops you from looking at it inside the library, although law forbids you copying it with one of our machines. Though what would be easier is to simply use a map online..." He points to the computers. "No card needed to use those."
Lance: "Sure, and thank you." *goes to find a empty computer.*
Digifanatic: *w* "Oh, that will work nicely. Is there a writing utensil and a pad of paper we can borrow?"
Metal Man (GM): Lance finds one quickly.
Librarian: "..." He points at the computers again.
Metal Man (GM): There's scrap bits of paper and random pens laying around.
Digifanatic: *w* "Ah, thanks." .oO(Well, I am unfamiliar with the area...) *settles over next to Lance.* *w* "If you need any help, I'll be glad to assist."
Lance tries to use the computer to find the map.
Deloth just looks around at the books while the others take care of the map.
Metal Man (GM): Deloth sees many books in this area... ironically, they're all to do with computers. Though there's a hallway which goes down further. The book subjects change down the hallway.
Deloth heads down that way, looking around.
Metal Man (GM): Darkdata find a large scale map of the city. (It isn't that hard.) It's a map search page. He isn't sure how to input 'Airport' as it wants an address. There is a nice search engine though.
Deloth: "Let's see... magic, magic..."
Digifanatic: *w* "Look to see what street the airport's on."
Lance tries Central City Airport.
Digifanatic: *w* "...if that doesn't work."
Metal Man (GM): Deloth keep on going... the books do get a bit more mystical here. Deloth finds a book about... whatever he was looking for. Meanwhile, Darkdata finds a big ol' website, including the address, for the airport.
Lance writes down the address and enters it into the map search thing.
Metal Man (GM): Lance gets a map... he'll need to write it down, of course. Luckily, it's a straight walk from here to there.
Lance passes the pen and paper to Digi.
Metal Man (GM): Unluckily, there's a strange amount of houses along the way. Might be either a rough neighborhood or a rich one with paranoid people.
Digifanatic: *w* "Hang on..." *looking at the map.* "What's with all the houses?"
Lance: "*w* No idea."
Digifanatic: *w* "Maybe we can skirt around those by going one block left or right, then going in our original direction and cutting back once we pass by the weird part of town."
Lance: "*w* Write the directions out then so we do not get lost."
Digifanatic: *w* "Got it." *writes down directions to the airport, emphasizing to go left/right at a point before the 'strange amount of houses' for one block before going back in the same direction until they pass the strange houses before heading back onto the street they started at.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers have their directions.
Lance thanks the librarian and waits for Digi.
Digifanatic: *gets Dragoshi, thanks the librarian for the computers one last time and walks out back to the street.*
Dragoshi: *Walks on out.* >_>
Metal Man (GM): The Questers walk on out. Deloth walks out, with a funny look on his face. All attempts to ask him why the funny look fail. So then, the Questers are on the street. They can walk towards the airport easily; you spent plenty of time researching it. And they're fairly safe, as there's GUN officers every so often. Which is weird, as not even Earth cities have that many people on the streets.
Digifanatic: *just follows the directions he wrote down.*
Lance follows Digi down the city road.*
Digifanatic: *Which shouldn't be a problem judging by the GMspeak.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers walk past a nondescript area. They reach the 'weird houses' area... indeed, they can turn right. Why, it is rather peaceful in the city.
Digifanatic: *Turns right.*
Dragoshi: *Goes right. Just as planned.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers turn right. They see large mansions here... hm. Some mansion guards eye the Questers cautiously, making sure they stay on the sidewalk.
Digifanatic: *Oh yes, he is staying on the sidewalk! Why would he enter a mansion at this point?*
Metal Man (GM): Give in, walk on the lawns and eat the grass! ... The Questers make their roundabout route, to the airport... which is huge, and happens to have an inspection before they can enter it.
Digifanatic: *He has his Digivice in his pocket, but that's not made of metal.* *Let's say he wasn't expecting airport security to factor into this.*
Dragoshi: *He has a cheap machinegun in a treasure chest, buuut... He was planning on asking the others if he could leave for a few minutes so he could leave it behind somewhere outside the city so he doesn't cause a ruckus bringing the thing with him, so... yea.*
Metal Man (GM): This airport... think 90's security. No weapons. So Dragoshi is left with a dilemma as to what to do with the machinegun. As they won't let anyone in without an X-ray scan. Also, one's not technically supposed to have a gun inside city limits... So he can't really take it out in front of people.
Digifanatic: *muttering to the group.* "Should we just go back and find Big in the forest?" *m* "Or are you all still adamant about this plan?"
Dragoshi: *w* "Don't see why not. I mean, we have the time, right?"
Digifanatic: *w* "Well, if you want to head back while we wait... Marley put no deadline on this."
Dragoshi: *w* "Yea. I'll go do that. You guys find something to do while waiting. yanno, to fight off boredom." *And, thus, Dragoshi goes off to the coast to leave the chest with the machinegun it with Marley. And stuff.*
Digifanatic: *w* "Hang on." *unpockets his Digivice, a bit nerved thinking he wouldn't have to worry about this, catches up to Dragoshi--hopefully not too far down the road--and puts in the chest.*
Metal Man (GM): Digi does that. Dragoshi is on his way now...
Digifanatic: *back with Lance.* "Now what do we do?"
Lance: "No idea. to the library? But we have to wait here for Dragoshi, hmm."
Digifanatic: "Yeah. I know what we can do... We can enter now, and book the flight for a time after Dragoshi's expected to come back."
Lance: "Sure, why not."
Digifanatic: "Then we can meet him back here. We'll still be able to pass security a second time and we set up what we need to do."
Metal Man (GM): It's pretty boring, but the Questers see a plane land at the airport. Then another. Whee, airport.
Digifanatic: "So let's go for it." *enters security now weapon-free WHEE.*
Lance has no weapon, so wee.
Metal Man (GM): They enter, the guard nods at them as they enter. They enter the main terminal... it's large. Tiled floor, security guards, various areas for airline tickets...
Digifanatic: "Okay, any one of these ticket booths should do it."
Julian: *And Julian. Don't forget the Julian. The man himself walks out of one of the smaller terminals, with what looks like a baseball equipment bag slung over his shoulder. You already know what Julian looks like (Editor's note: Actually you might not, but, his lack of description is his loss, not mine.), so I'll spare you the details aside from the fact that his vest is gone, in favor of a "Sawyer City Monarchs" jersey (long story).* "Easiest time I ever had through customs..." *Julian then notices Digi and Lance walk through the door! Horjay! Julian stops dead in his tracks for a few seconds, then starts walking over to them, waving his free hand.* "Hey!"
Digifanatic: *flashes a thumbs up.*
Lance is back and waves.
Digifanatic: *takes a quick chuckle, but he means it in good humor.* "You rewrote yourself as the founder of a city?!"
Julian: *Julian reaches the two.* "Where the hell have you two been? An' where's everybody else for that matter? Here I am, fightin' my way through someplace worse than Toad Town, an' I ain't even got back up."
Lance: "Dragoshi will be back in a bit, Deloth has gone to bed on the beach, Aribar did not want to get up today."
Julian: "Lucky I found that lil' freak otherwise I mighta not made it out..."
Digifanatic: "Heh, tell us about it later. We need to book a flight."
Aribar, ah... Stayed behind to watch the weapons. That's it. >.>
Julian: "A flight? To where? Station Square's one'a the safest places there is, why'd you wanna leave?"
Digifanatic: "Business trip for someone else."
Lance: "Need to find Tails."
Julian: *Sure, yeah, Central City.*
Digifanatic: "We found us a quick job, and yeah, Tails will hopefully be involved in it. Right." *walks over to the nearest ticket booth, waiting in line for the man or woman at the desk to call him up.*
Julian: "Tails? Shit, you guys jus' missed him."
Digifanatic: "Aww... please tell. If you know where he's going this will make our job a lot easier."
Metal Man (GM): Dragoshi reaches the coast, and drop off the chest by now.
Julian: "Freak gave me a ride in. Y'know, not like I wasn't grateful, y'know, but that dude's a freak. Thought I could find you guys back here easy enough wit' some GUN help... Where he's goin'? Told me he's goin' back to Final Egg. Granted I dunno where Final Egg IS, so he probably didn' feel too threatened 'bout tellin' me."
Lance shows Julian the map: http://www.smbhq.com/users/ssb_rpg/segaregionmap.png
Dragoshi: *After doing so... Dragoshi heads back to the airport in Central City.*
Julian: "Huh... That helps."
Metal Man (GM): Anyway, there's a desk for tickets right nearby.
Digifanatic: "Hang on. I'll get our flight."
Metal Man (GM): A woman sits there.
Lance: "Remember to tell them all the information Digi."
Julian: "Can't we catch a bus or somethin'? It's like right next door."
Lance: "Digi can ask."
Digifanatic walks over. "Four tickets please for Machine Parts Company... *insert phone number.*"
Woman: "Oh, certainly... your company called in beforehand." She hands Digi them.
Metal Man (GM): Dragoshi would be at the gate now.
Digifanatic: "Thank you very much. Have a nice day."
Woman: "You have a nice day too." She sits back.
Dragoshi: *And, Dragoshi finally makes it to the gate. Yes, he has no weapons, no weapons today, so he goes on in. Woo.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers see it's for an airline terminal... at the far end of the terminal. Small planes.
Lance: "Did you look at what the tickets are for Digi?"
Digifanatic: "Hang on." *takes a look.*
Metal Man (GM): 'Angel Island'
Julian: "See, that ain't anywhere close."
Digifanatic: "Angel Island... hmm... yeah."
Lance: "Go explain the situation to the nice lady."
Digifanatic: "Oh, sure..." *walks back.* "Hmm... we were just informed by one of our partners that we need to make a last minute change on that destination. If you can call back Machine Parts and allow me to explain this to them, it would be a very appreciated gesture."
Woman: "Hm... you'll have to call them... let me get you a phone." She walks in back, gets a cordless phone, and dials in... and hands it to Digi.
Metal Man (GM): The Receptionist is on the other end.
Digifanatic: "Thanks." *waves Julian over.*
Receptionist: "Hello... did something new happen?"
Digifanatic: "Yes, one of our friends has an update on Tails. Hang on a little bit." *is willing to hand the phone to Julian if it's better off the way.*
Julian: *Julian makes the universal gesture for "Fuck that person on the telephone, tell 'em I ain't here."*
Digifanatic: *widens his eyes, a bit surprised by that.* "Uh, he told me to tell you that he last saw Tails over by the Final Egg region."
Receptionist: "I see. Give the phone to the other person then. I'll settle it."
Digifanatic: "He left to find someone else. Is there a problem with changing the destination at this point?"
Receptionist: "No... just hand the phone to the person who first spoke to me."
Digifanatic: "Oh, I apologize!" *laughs at himself.* "Here you go..." *gives the phone to the ticket lady.*
Metal Man (GM): Digi gives it to her... they speak for a moment, then the lady hangs up.
Woman: "Okay. Give me the tickets back, and I'll get you new ones. They must want him a lot--Final Egg is... a very under-traveled destination."
Digifanatic: "Sure.* *Ticket exchange!* "Important trip."
Lance: "Nice work Digi."
Woman: "Go right that way." She points at... a nonstandard terminal exit.
Lance: "Thank you for your time."
Digifanatic: "Thank you very much for understand the situation." *casually nods at Lance before handing out the tickets to the other and heading for STRANGE TERMINAL.*
Julian: "Man, we gettin' set up..." *Heads for a nonstandard terminal exit!*
Lance: "Hmm?" *following Digi.*
Dragoshi: *Follows along, heading over to the nonstandard terminal exit of nonstandard... ness... yea.*
Metal Man (GM): The Questers walk out... it's a helicopter. A man with aviator helmet and glasses greets the Questers.
Julian: "'Least it ain't a plane..."
Franz: "Hello, I am Fraanz. I will be your geede. Yoo must have much money to hire meeh! I am zee only helicoptor piolet un thees ceetee."
Metal Man (GM): He opens up the back, revealing several seats.
Digifanatic: "That must be nice. No competition..."
Metal Man (GM): It's like one of the helicopters from those Jurassic Park movies.
Julian: "Ain't that great..."
Franz: "Yees. Zee others moved to more helicopter friendlee places."
Lance enters ze... the helicopter.
Digifanatic: *takes a seat in the back.*
Julian: *Helicopter fun!*
Dragoshi: *ENTER THE HELICOPTER: GENERIC MOVIE SUBTITLE.*
Metal Man (GM): He starts up zee chopper and it begins to fly. Flying out of here is hair-raising. He expertly dodges three airliners on his way out.
Franz: "Bah! So much traffeec! I long for zee day where theer eez no more planes."
Metal Man (GM): He turns it around, jerkily, and then makes his way towards Final Egg... it's another forest area!
Julian: *Hot damn!*
Franz: "Now... before wee land... you know zee Final Eeg? Zeer is something to know about eet... eet is dangerouz!"
Julian: "Ya don't say..."
Digifanatic: "Hopefully, we'll make this as quick as possible."
Franz: "Zee Eggman used eet as hees base. As a result, he left behind many traps."
Lance: "Joy."
Franz: "Now zen, we land."
Metal Man (GM): The helicopter begins beeping wildly and losing altitude.
Franz: "Do not fear, zees happens a lot. I will try again."
Digifanatic: "May I help?"
Metal Man (GM): He pulls a switch at the last moment. *SMACK.*
Digifanatic: "Maybe not."
Metal Man (GM): It lands... just a bit heavily.
Franz: "Zee thing lacks good... how do you say... brakes?"
Julian: *oof!* "Well, bumpy landin'...but you got us here."
Lance: "Farkensauce! Ogg."
Digifanatic: "Ohhh... as long as the damage isn't too bad, if there is any."
Franz: "Eet is no problem! I have insurance. From a Geecko!"
Metal Man (GM): He opens the door. It sort of opens half-way and jams.
Dragoshi: *Is dizzied by the heavy landing for a little bit. He then snaps out of it.* "..."
Julian: "...Right." *Julian'll just be leaving now.*
Digifanatic: "Good news."
Franz: "Watch your way. Eet does not open well."
Julian: *Watches his way.*
Digifanatic: *heads out, being wary of IT'S A TRAPisms.*
Dragoshi: "'k." *Also exits, making sure to be wary of the door in all it's half-opened... ness.*
Lance follows.
Metal Man (GM): The Questers are now at the Final Egg, it's a wide area. No real tarmac, though... That's why the only plane here is Tails'. Tails is busy working on it. He doesn't seem to notice the Questers.
Julian: *w* "Told ya..."
Lance: "Hey Tails!"
Tails: "Wha?" *Bumps head on plane.* "Ow!" He gets out from under it. "...So now there's more of you guys. Well, nice to meet you... I guess Julian told you my name."
Digifanatic: *w* "I never doubted you, Julian..." *grins.* "No, actually, one of your friends at Machine Parts Company did."
Julian: "Yo, Tails. These guys were lookin' for ya for some reason... Why ARE you guys lookin' for him, anyway?"
Digifanatic: "We got sent on an odd job by a native we befriended. Needed some quick cash. Boat parts." *shows Tails the list.*
Julian: "...Boat parts."
Digifanatic: "Somewhat of a long story."
Julian: "Boat parts."
Digifanatic: *muttering to Julian.* "The folks at MPC were concerned about Tails' location. That's why we went here..."
Lance: "They want you back badly too, they payed for this flight and everything... although." *looks at the death trap.*
Tails: "Boat parts? Hmmm... Well, I have them back at my workshop. You have a way to get there?"
Digifanatic: *checks if Franz and his helicopter is still there, which they should be.*
Metal Man (GM): Franz is busy staring at his bent helicopter.
Tails: "...You do know that helicopter couldn't carry parts, right?"
Julian: "We do NOW."
Tails: "Especially with a big crack in the middle like that?"
Digifanatic: "I didn't see that..."
Lance: "Erm, that helicopter could not carry us well enough. @@;"
Franz: "Thees eez comseetic!"
Metal Man (GM): He taps it and the door flies off.
Digifanatic: "DUDE..."
Franz: "I will feex it!"
Dragoshi: "...You go do that."
Tails: "...So... is there anything else? My plane only has two seats."
Julian: "Keep it up, big guy!" *back to Tails.* "Could it hold the parts?"
Tails: "How many do you need?"
Julian: "Hell if I know."
Lance: "Just the list, really."
Digifanatic: "Just one of each, 'cept the torpedoes, but those are probably still only two or three. If you have enough room to carry the parts by yourself, we can wait until you come back. Hopefully, if we can help Franz here fix his helicopter it'll make the process a lot smoother."
Lance: "Or, you know, We could drop them off on the beach instead of lugging them here?"
Tails: "That's... a lot, actually. Have you seen how large they are?" He turns to Lance. "Maybe you need a bigger plane to carry them. Don't worry, though. My place has a landing strip. Who sent you here anyway?"
Digifanatic: "The receptionist at Machine Parts... female echidna type, never gave us her name."
Tails: "Them?" He looks confused. "Did they need something?"
Digifanatic: "They said you hadn't been there for a while and they wanted to know how you were doing when they heard you were looking for Robotnik. The folks just want you make sure you're fine."
Julian: "Set-up."
Tails: "Hm... Well. We'll need to get in contact with them, then. They can ship the parts. Who will fly to the city with me to do so?" He looked at the helicopter. "Because that thing isn't going anywhere."
Digifanatic: *sees nobody appears to have volunteered yet.* "I don't mind."
Julian: "I dunno what's goin' on, so I'll let someone who does go."
Lance: "Have fun Digi."
Tails: "Ok then. We'll see you in a while. While we're gone... you guys could explore the ruins a bit. You look bored."
Metal Man (GM): He walks off towards the plane, aaaand... that's all for now.


Bata, port, northwestern Equatorial Guinea, West Africa, lying on the Gulf of Guinea 18 miles (29 km) north of the Río Mbini. One of the deepest seaports in the region, Bata serves as one of the country's main ports. Because Bata has no natural harbour, a jetty was built to facilitate offshore handling of ships' cargoes. The principal exports are timber and coffee. The international airport at Bata has flights to several cities, including the Guinean capital, Malabo (formerly Santa Isabel), and to Libreville, Gabon.
After the anti-Spanish riots of 1969, there was a dramatic decrease in the number of resident Europeans in Bata, followed by severe economic stagnation that extended into the early 1980s. The discovery and development of the country's oil reserves in the 1980s and '90s led to an increase in business and development in the city. Pop. (2003 est.) 66,800.


Marijuana helps relieve pain from neuropathy, migraines, and other conditions...find out how!
Like most people, you've probably heard impressive stories of how marijuana helps people beat pain problems, especially if the discomfort relates to a severe illness. However, even if those accounts interest you, it may not be enough to take them at face value without doing further research.
Despite what Donald Trump thinks, many journalists do a great job of thoroughly covering the news, including stories related to marijuana and pain relief. The fact is that many articles can't cover all the aspects of particular stories. Doing that would result in newspapers that are as heavy as encyclopedias, not to mention cause problems for people with short attention spans who aren't as eager to get down to the nitty-gritty details.
For example, you might think, "I liked reading why marijuana made that woman's life better by reducing her pain, but how did the drug do that?" The good news is that you're not alone in your active curiosity. Keep reading to get answers about how marijuana helps relieve pain.
Psychologists sometimes refer to pain as a psychological phenomenon. In other words, pain tends to be most severe when people focus on it. When individuals use marijuana, the parts of their brains associated with reward and motivation are more active. The brain then releases more rewards-driven neurotransmitters than usual, giving people a sense of euphoria. Marijuana also typically makes people more easily distracted, because their short-term memory abilities get temporarily compromised. In short, the euphoric effect marijuana has on the brain and the likelihood that users become more distracted than normal when using it both often result in pain relief.
Think about the last time you were in severe pain and watched your favorite comedians perform hilarious sketches on Saturday Night Live or asked a few friends to come over and play board games with you. Those activities probably didn't take your pain away, but they might have made you forget how much you hurt for a while. Researchers say that marijuana taken for medicinal reasons frequently has the same effect.
Millions of people suffer from nerve damage that occurs due to an underlying cause. Also known as neuropathy, the nerve issues can cause painful problems ranging from tingling to a stabbing sensation in the extremities. As you'd expect, these symptoms make it extremely difficult for individuals to live comfortably and often has a negative impact on their ability to remain employed and do the things they love.
On a positive note, scientists have found that cannabis consumption relieves nerve-related pain. Understanding how it does that requires remembering that peripheral nerves perform several functions, ranging from bladder function to temperature-related sensations. Damaged nerve centers send incorrect messages to other pain centers in the body.
The peripheral nerves that relate to feelings of pain contain cannabinoid receptors. They respond to marijuana intake and regulate neurotransmitters, as well as the central nervous system. In turn, a person's perception of pain often lessens.
Migraine sufferers report severe pain as well as other debilitating symptoms including temporary vision problems, the inability to tolerate bright lights or loud sounds and nausea. The nausea is sometimes so severe that they cannot keep prescription pills down.
Migraines and neck pain are two of the most common sources of pain people experience. In a recent survey, these problems together affected about 30% of people polled about common discomforts. Even worse, neck pain often occurs alongside migraines, which makes people particularly miserable.
A recent study suggests that marijuana could be an effective way to reduce migraine headaches. It involved 121 people who were diagnosed with migraines and given medical marijuana as an attempted course of treatment. 103 of the participants had fewer migraines, and only three people had more than before they started taking the drug.
The researchers involved said they need to do further investigation to give a definitive response about how marijuana eases migraine pain. However, many believe that marijuana has an effect on serotonin in the brain. Serotonin is a chemical that facilitates communications between nerve cells. However, it can cause narrowing of the blood vessels, too. When serotonin levels fluctuate, migraine headaches can occur.
Even without knowing exactly why marijuana worked well for those migraine sufferers just yet, the people involved in the above study mentioned the participants felt better and had higher levels of functioning. Given those effects, the people taking part in the study probably didn't care about the specifics of why they got migraines less often than before and were just happy with their outcomes.
Another advantage associated with this particular study is that some people smoked marijuana and others ate it in edible form. Individuals said the smoked marijuana worked more quickly than the kind they ate. But, as you'll recall from the overall study statistics, most people saw positive results regardless of the ways they consumed marijuana.
Also, remember that migraines commonly make people feel like they'll throw up. Many often do vomit, which makes the experience of having a migraine headache even worse. Eating marijuana edibles may not be feasible for people who are very nauseous, but smoking the drug could work well by providing fast effects without aggravating nausea.
Regardless of if you warmly embrace the idea of using marijuana for pain relief or still have some lingering doubts, the research covered here has hopefully reduced the lack of knowledge that prompted you to start reading this post in the first place. You might even try marijuana and see if you get results that are like some of the ones just described.
How can medical marijuana help with ….CHRONIC PAIN?
Chronic pain is a pain that lasts longer than 3 to 6 months and doesn't improve. Pain, which persists over a long period of time after the cause of it is removed, is also called chronic pain.


The layout file is a plain ascii file with the extention *.lay. It gives you exact control of the 2-D position of the channels for topoplotting, and of the per-channel local coordinate axes for the multiplotting. The 2-D positions of the channels can be expressed in an arbitrary coordinate system. Once read in, they will be shifted and scaled such that they fit within a prespecified x- and y-range ([-0.45 0.45] a.u.). After shifting and scaling, a circle representing the head with nose and ears will be added. This circle has a center (0,0) and radius 0.5 (a.u.).
The 1st column is the channel number in the layout file, it is not used any more by the plotting functions, but should be present in the layout file.
The 2nd and 3rd are the X-position and Y-position.
The 4th and 5th column specify the width and height The 6th column is a string with the channel label.
The width and height are used for the subplot that will be made in ft_multiplotER and ft_multiplotTFR. The width and height represent 80 and 60% of the smallest 2D channel distance respectively. The channels in the data are matched case sensitive to the channels in the layout. There are two additional labels, SCALE and COMNT, which specify the location and size of the comment and scale.
Instead of constructing an ascii layout file, you can also specify one of the supported electrode or gradiometer files (e.g. Polhemus file, or CTF *.res4 header file). The ft_prepare_layout function will read the 3-D sensor positions from the file and will projected these to a 2-D plane. Furthermore, if no layout file is specified, but if electrodes or gradiometers are present in the data, the ft_prepare_layout function will use those to create a 2-D layout on the fly.
This structure describes the position of each channel, the width and height of the box for ft_multiplotER and ft_multiplotTFR, and the label. Furthermore, it optionally can contain the outline and the mask.
The optional outline in the layout defines the black lines that are drawn on top of the color-coded interpolated values. In this case it contains four line segments: a circle that represents the outline of the head (101×2), a triangle (3×2) that represents the nose and two other shapes (10×2) that represent both ears. These outlines just contain the 2-D points that should be connected with a black line. The default is to use a head-shaped outline, but especially for ECoG data it makes sense to use the sulcal pattern as outline.
The optional mask in the layout defines the region over which ft_topoplotER and ft_topoplotTFR should interpolate the values. Usually the values should be interpolated over the whole head, and in this example it therefore corresponds to the first outline that is a circle representing the head. For ECoG data the mask should represent the area of the cortex that is covered by the electrode grid. If the recording was done with multiple electrode grids that are spaced, i.e. such that the topographical values should not be interpolated between the separate grids, you can specify one mask for each grid.
See the layout tutorial for more information.


Obama's plans for education reform have not taken place all at once, but for students with loans he has announced the Pay as You Earn" student debt repayment plan. This plan will be offered to as many as five million borrowers who had previously been ineligible for the plan.
The Pay as You Earn plan caps repayments on federal student loans at 10 percent of debtors' monthly income, but is not currently available to those who have taken out older loans—those who took out loans before October 2007, or who stopped borrowing before October, 2011.
Obama will answer questions on tumblr about student loans and education costs.


The Youth Development Institute (YDI) supports the growth and development of young people by strengthening the quality and increasing the availability of experiences offered by the organizations that serve them. They partner with community organizations, schools, colleges, policy makers, funders, and others to create programs, train staff, and develop policies that encourage and enable young people to transition successfully to adulthood. The Institute publishes materials and provides training to organizations seeking to embed the principles of positive youth development into routine operations and workplace culture.


Margaret is so much fun. I love her energy and voice and would totally search her out as a narrator on Audible. Margaret shares about her career, starting businesses and adventures with Keith like the Dairy Mart and Random Art House. We laugh about my painting skills, but she assures me its okay because I gave of myself. I hijack the intro with a soapbox about the awesomeness of Main Street and we laugh and laugh and laugh. I hope this episode inspires you and I hope you start calling yourself a "podder" - Thank you so much for supporting That's Colorful!


(c) if the original power of attorney has been executed, filed or deposited in a province or country the laws of which require that the original power of attorney be filed or deposited with the officer preparing it or with some other officer or a court, a copy of the original power of attorney certified by the officer under the officer's seal of office or under the seal of the court, as the case may be, and accompanied by a certificate or other evidence that the original has been so filed or deposited, and that the filing or depositing was required by the law of that province or country.
(2) The execution of a power of attorney must be witnessed or proved in the manner required for instruments by Part 5.
the signature of the person signing the agreement on behalf of the adult making the agreement is deemed to be the adult's signature for the purposes of this Act.
(3) Subject to subsection (3.1), a person who is appointed an attorney for the execution of an instrument tendered for registration must have reached 19 years of age at the time of the appointment, and proof of that fact must be given to the registrar at the time the power of attorney is filed.
(3.1) In the case of an enduring power of attorney, a person who is appointed an attorney for the execution of an instrument tendered for registration must have reached 19 years of age at the time of registration, and proof of that fact must be given to the registrar at the time the enduring power of attorney is filed.
(b) an application, in a form acceptable to the registrar, for the return of the original.
(5) A certified copy filed under subsection (1) is conclusive proof of the contents of the power of attorney for the purposes of this Act.
(d) subsection (5) applies to a change to an enduring power of attorney as it applies to a power of attorney.
52	Unless a power of attorney provides expressly to the contrary, the rights and powers conferred on an attorney with respect to land owned by the principal at the date of the execution of the power of attorney also apply to land acquired by the principal after that date.
(b) the names of the principal and the attorney.
(2) The registrar must endorse on every power of attorney, or certified copy of it, filed in the land title office, a serial number and the date and time of filing.
(b) the date and time that the changed enduring power of attorney was filed.
(b) section 57 is complied with.
(b) section 57 of this Act is complied with.
(b) unless expressly forbidden by the trust instrument, give a valid power of attorney for the exercise in British Columbia of that power and of all discretionary powers in connection with it to any person capable of acting as attorney, including a co-personal representative or a co-trustee.
56 (1) For the purpose of this Act, but subject to subsections (2), (3) and (5) and unless the effect of this section is expressly excluded in it, a power of attorney filed in the land title office either before or after this Act comes into force is not valid after 3 years after the date of its execution.
(ii) entered into within 3 years after the date of execution of a valid power of attorney.
(3) For the purpose of this Act, but subject to section 57 (1), an enduring power of attorney that is filed under section 51 of this Act remains valid, unless terminated by another means, until an order terminating the enduring power of attorney is filed in the land title office.
(4) Section 57 (3) of this Act applies to the order filed under subsection (3) as if it were a notice of revocation.
(5) Subsection (1) does not apply to a power of attorney executed by a corporation after July 30, 1981.
(6) The amendments to this section made by the Attorney General Statutes Amendment Act, 1981 do not apply to powers of attorney executed before July 30, 1981.
(2) If the power of attorney has not been filed, the principal may lodge a caveat under section 283.
(b) unless the power of attorney has been microfilmed, endorse on the document itself the fact that it has been revoked.


text:
In this section: Undergraduate
Arabic, Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies
Asia Pacific Studies
A History of East Asian Studies at Leeds
Linguistics and Phonetics
Russian and Slavonic Studies
Part-time and mature students
Alternative entry
artsadmissions@leeds.ac.uk
Show all contents
Founding Professor Owen Lattimore: Early Life and Career
Founding Professor Owen Lattimore: McCarthy Trials and Time at Leeds
Founding Professor Owen Lattimore: Contribution to Leeds and Area Studies
Teacher and researcher, explorer and ethnographer, geographer and historian, one of the leading Western students of China, the West's leading scholar of Mongolia and inner Asia – these are but some of Owen Lattimore's claims upon us.
Professor Esmond Wright (University of Glasgow), speech on the conferment of Founding Proffessor Owen Lattimore's honorary doctorate
East Asian Studies at the University of Leeds was originally established as the Department of Chinese Studies following the presentation of the Hayter Report in 1961 to the British Government.
This report recommended a 10-year programme of government funding to expand area studies in the United Kingdom. Specifically, this recommended a shift from 'classical' studies to 'modern' studies as well as diversifying funding away from the older regional study centres at Oxford, Cambridge and London universities that were previously established by the Scarborough Report of 1947.
In Yorkshire, three centres were established: Chinese Studies at the University of Leeds; Japanese Studies at the University of Sheffield; and South East Asian Studies at the University of Hull. Special funds became available the following year in 1962 and the University of Leeds invited Owen Lattimore as its first Professor of Chinese.
Professor Lattimore was a British educated American scholar and frontier explorer. During World War Two, he was President Franklin D. Roosevelt's appointed personal political adviser to the Chinese wartime leader Chiang Kai-shek, and later the Director of Pacific Operations in the Office of War Information in San Francisco.
Owen Lattimore - who was fluent in Chinese, Mongolian, Russian and French - was teaching international relations at John Hopkins University at the time. He made the move to England in 1963 to establish the first modern Chinese Studies department in the UK with the personal encouragement, support and endorsement of the greatest China scholars of his time. These included: Joseph Needham of Cambridge University; Dennis Twitchett of London University; John King Fairbank of Harvard University; and Arthur F. Wright of Yale University.
Lattimore brought with him his vast collection of Asian studies books for the Brotherton Library as well as his personal ideas of how to teach modern Chinese studies. He also actively promoted the specific study of Mongolia. Mongolian Studies was officially established in 1972 and has been taught as a unique subject at Leeds ever since.
Japanese Studies was added in 1990 and the department changed its name from Chinese Studies to East Asian Studies to reflect its broader East Asian sphere of activity. In 2003, the Centre for South East Asian Studies at the University of Hull was moved to Leeds to became a constituent part of the department.
In 2006, East Asian Studies at Leeds and the School of East Asian Studies at Sheffield together with Leeds University Business School collaborated to form the White Rose East Asia Centre (WREAC), that comprises the National Institute of Chinese Studies and the National Institute of Japanese Studies.
WREAC provides the basis for undertaking broader collaborative research in East Asian Studies, as well as advanced research and language training in Chinese and Japanese Studies as part of the latest government drive to strengthen the United Kingdom's specialised research capacity in these study areas. Through WREAC and also through the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN), East Asian Studies at Leeds is reaching out and collaborating with partners in East Asia, Europe and globally.
NextFounding Professor Owen Lattimore: Early Life and Career

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Meaning and origin of the Biblical baby name Jeaterai. Meaning of Jeaterai. What does Jeaterai mean? Jeaterai origin. Information about Jeaterai.
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With the development of microbial nutrition industry, more and more demands not only come from microbial fermentation but also dehydrated culture medium industry.
This field require prepared culture medium rather than only one ingredients such as yeast extract or peptone. Angel develop a new product TSB(Tryptic soya broth) as a first product to enter this exciting application and get a very good sales result and appreciated from customers who focus on microbial quality control and culture medium.


PVC Magnets can be soft and durable, great for promotions and marketing events.
Add your business logo to use it in promotional campaigns. Soft rubber PVC can be made in any shape you can think of: round, square, or custom shaped (die cut).
Are you considering PVC Magnets for your products?
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While we make patches of all sizes, the most common ones used on uniforms are based on the placement: for patches used on hats and shoulder of jackets, the most popular ones are 3″ x 2″ Flag Patches and 3″ round patches. Standard shapes include rectangular, round, square with rounded corners, and shield shapes.
What is 2D / 3D ? Which One Is Right for My PVC Patch?
2D Design. There is sharp corners on the elements, when viewed on the side, the layers are flat.
3D Design. The contour of the elements is rounded, or "puffy". When viewed on the side, the 3D elements appear rounded.
Our standard minimum order quantity is 100 pieces. We can make orders of 50 custom PVC patches but the total of the order is very close to the cost of 100 pieces, so our recommendation is to order 100 or more patches.
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Our average production time is about 3 weeks from approval of pre-production sample. Turn-around time for Re-orders is a little bit less since the mold is already made and it can take about 2 weeks. Shipping times vary and can be adjusted to fit your needs.
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We keep your mold in storage for 2 years. This means that you can re-order within 2 years and pay only for the patches you need. This means big savings for you. Every time you use your mold, the time gets reset for another 2 years. If the time has elapsed and we do not have your mold in storage anymore and you wish to order the same design, we will have to create a new mold and charge you for it.
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text:
Senior appointment as Saffery Champness continues to invest in Yorkshire growth
Business/Harrogate
Saffery Champness has strengthened its tax department and senior management team with the appointment of chartered accountant and chartered tax advisor Sally Thomas.
Sally, a member of the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners with almost 30 years' experience in the accountancy profession, joins the Harrogate firm from PwC in Leeds.
Martin Holden, head of office (left) with Sally Thomas, who joins the firm from PwC
Commenting on her move to the firm she said Saffery Champness was well-known and highly respected for its private client work, an area she has specialised in for 25 years.
Sally Thomas said:
I have spent most of my career working with Yorkshire businesses and their families and high net worth individuals, including those on the Sunday Times Rich List, advising on all aspects of their taxation affairs including income tax, capital gains tax and inheritance tax.
Saffery Champness is widely recognised as a leader in this area and I am looking forward to continuing my career with the firm and contributing to the expansion of its private client work across the region.
Martin Holden, head of office at Saffery Champness, said Sally's experience in the firm's core market of owner managed businesses and their families would be invaluable as it pressed ahead with its growth plans.
Martin Holden said:
This is a significant senior appointment for the firm and signifies our commitment to growth in the region.
We are delighted to be attracting highly experienced individuals like Sally to our team as we push ahead with recruitment at all levels of the business as part of a long term investment strategy for our Yorkshire operations.


Are you or do you know Marc Campos?
Marc Campos is a published illustrator. A published credit of Marc Campos is Superman: The Wrath of Gog (Superman (DC Comics)).
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text:
Q: How to count vowels and consonants in Python I'm trying to write a program that takes a user inputted sentence and outputs a count of both Vowels and Consonants in python. My Vowel counter works without any problems but the consonant count always returns 0. I have no idea why.
def checkvowelsConsonants():
    consonants = 0
    vowelscount = 0
    index = 0
    sentence = input("Please input your sentence here. This sentence must contain a speical character eg, - ? etc.")
    Vowels = (["a", "e", "i", "o", "u", "A", "E", "I", "O", "U"])
    vowelcount = 0
    while index < len(sentence):
        if sentence[index] in Vowels:
            vowelcount += 1
        index += 1
    while index < len(sentence):
        if sentence[index] not in Vowels:
            consonants += 1
        index += 1
    print("The number of vowels is", vowelcount, "and consonants is", consonants)

here is an output I recieved for refrence
Please input your sentence here. This sentence must contain a speical character eg, - ? etc.aaaaaaaasssssssssss
The number of vowels is 8 and consonants is 0

A: def classify_letter(string: str):
    vowels = 0
    consonants = 0
    for i in string:
        if i.casefold() in 'aeiou':
            vowels += 1
        elif i.casefold() in 'qwrtypsdfghjklzxcvbnm':
            consonants += 1
    return vowels, consonants

or with a list comprehension
def classify_letter(strng: str) -> tuple:
    x = [i.casefold() in "aeiou" for i in strng if i.casefold() in string.ascii_lowercase]
    return x.count(True), x.count(False)

^ I acknowledge this might not be the best way to implement that, im open to suggestions to make it shorter and optimized!
when passed "hello-" these both return:
(2,3)

A: The problem here is that you don't reset your index variable after counting vowels. Therefore, when it gets to the consonant loop, the index variable is already set to whatever the sentence length is, and the consonant loop is skipped. Something like this would fix it:
def checkvowelsConsonants():
    consonants = 0
    vowelscount = 0
    index = 0
    sentence = input("Please input your sentence here. This sentence must contain a speical character eg, - ? etc.")
    Vowels = (["a", "e", "i", "o", "u", "A", "E", "I", "O", "U"])
    vowelcount = 0
    while index < len(sentence):
        if sentence[index] in Vowels:
            vowelcount += 1
        index += 1
    index = 0
    while index < len(sentence):
        if sentence[index] not in Vowels:
            consonants += 1
        index += 1
    print("The number of vowels is", vowelcount, "and consonants is", consonants)

Notice how after the first loop, there is the
index = 0
line.
This resets the variable so that it is ready to go through the loop again.

A: The issue, as was pointed out here, is that the index variable is not reset after counting the vowels, and so your program doesn't iterate over the string again to count consonants.
In fact, the index variable should be done away with entirely. There are a few other issues with the code, too: The most important one is the fact that you're counting anything which isn't a vowel as a consonant. The string ',' isn't a vowel, but it certainly isn't a consonant.
Here is a refactored version of your program:
def count_vowels_consonants(str_in: str):
    vowels = {'a', 'e', 'i', 'o', 'u', 'A', 'E', 'I', 'O', 'U'}
    consonants = {'w', 'm', 'j', 'r', 'z', 'c', 'h', 'l', 'p', 'k', 's', 'b', 'y', 'n', 'f', 'q', 't', 'd', 'x', 'g',
                  'v', 'L', 'S', 'N', 'Q', 'F', 'B', 'R', 'Z', 'X', 'J', 'D', 'H', 'V', 'C', 'P', 'G', 'K', 'T', 'Y',
                  'M', 'W'}
    num_vowels = 0
    num_consonants = 0

    for char in str_in:
        if char in vowels:
            num_vowels += 1
        elif char in consonants:
            num_consonants += 1

    return num_vowels, num_consonants

sentence = input('Please input your sentence (this sentence must contain a speical character eg, - ? etc.): ')

sentence_num_vowels, sentence_num_consonants = count_vowels_consonants(sentence)

print('vowels: {}, consonants: {}'.format(sentence_num_vowels, sentence_num_consonants))

I also improved the names, and moved code around to ensure the function is pure and easy to reuse.

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text:
UN Secretary-General honoured by the University
The Vice-Chancellor, Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz conferred an honorary degree on His Excellency Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of The United Nations, in the Senate House earlier today.
The honorary degree of Doctor of Law was conferred on the Secretary-General in recognition of his humanitarian work, support for women's rights and achievements in pursuit of global peace and security.
The honour comes in Mr Ban's last year as Secretary-General of the United Nations, a position he has held since 1 January 2007.
He took his bachelor's degree in international relations at Seoul National University before earning a master's degree in public administration at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
At the time of his election as Secretary-General, Mr Ban was South Korea's Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
His 37 years of service with that Ministry included postings in New Delhi, Washington DC and Vienna, and a variety of portfolios, including foreign policy and national security.
Mr Ban's ties to the UN date back to 1975, when he worked for the Ministry's UN Division.
His extensive diplomatic efforts have helped to put climate change at the forefront of the global agenda, while his notable support of women's rights, including backing for many high-profile campaigns, has seen the creation of the agency UN Women, plus the establishment of a new Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict.
Throughout his time at the UN, he has driven forward improvements to the UN peacekeeping operations.
Accountability for violations of human rights has received high-level attention through inquiries related to Gaza, Guinea, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, legal processes in Lebanon and Cambodia, and advocacy for the "responsibility to protect," the new UN norm aimed at preventing or halting genocide and other grave crimes.
He has also worked to strengthen humanitarian response in the aftermath of disasters in Myanmar (2008), Haiti (2010) and Pakistan (2010), and mobilised UN support for the democratic transitions in North Africa and the Middle East.
Mr Ban has also increased efforts to rejuvenate the disarmament agenda.
The University has been conferring honorary degrees for some 500 years.
One of the earliest recorded ceremonies was in 1493, when the University honoured the poet John Skelton. An honorary degree is the highest accolade the University can bestow.
The text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.
University of Cambridge honorary degrees 2018
Honorary Degrees 2017
Nominations for Honorary Degrees
The Vice-Chancellor
Honorary Degrees at the University of Cambridge


text:
Exclusive: Banking Giant Capital One Enters B2B Software Industry With Launch Of New Business
Capital One has turned itself into a major player in America's banking industry by competing in markets for everything from credit cards to auto lending. Now it has set its sights on the software industry, too. Forbes can exclusively reveal that the banking giant, which has $434 billion in assets and more than 100 million customers, is launching Capital One Software, a business that develops and sells software products to companies scaling up their use of data and cloud computing.
The new venture, which has been created by Capital One's CEO and founder, Rich Fairbank, is based at the company's headquarters in McLean, Virginia, and has its own dedicated personnel as well as access to software developers in Capital One's 12,000-strong technology team. Its first product, Capital One Slingshot, helps companies speed up their adoption of Snowflake, a popular cloud data platform, and manage costs associated with it.
Many other companies outside the software industry have hired armies of in-house developers to create mountains of code for internal use, but relatively few have commercialized some of the software they've built. NYSE-quoted Capital One joins a shortlist of businesses that includes the Washington Post, which sells its Arc publishing platform, and BlackRock, which offers its Aladdin data cloud to other investment managers.
Rich Fairbank, CEO and founder, Capital One
Ravi Raghu, the head of Capital One Software, says executives at Capital One see its creation as a natural evolution of the overall company's digital journey. "We've been talking of Capital One as a technology company for a while now. The best proof of that is [to become] a technology company that's actually selling software. That innovation just runs in our DNA."
Rob Alexander, Capital One's CIO and a Forbes CIO Next List honoree, echoes Raghu's view and underlines the scale of the opportunity the company sees ahead. "We're still in the relatively early innings of enterprises moving to the cloud. We're still in the early innings . . . as they get their data in order in the cloud so they can pursue things like machine learning and AI. There's a lot of runway here for these markets to grow and develop."
A fintech before the fintechs
Alexander is the architect of a long-term digital transformation plan that helped spark the idea for Capital One Software. Over the past ten years, he has hired thousands of engineers to create software for Capital One's own businesses and championed a strategy that has led the financial giant to close its data centers and shift its operations entirely to the public cloud, a process it completed in 2020.
The company's obsession with technology goes even further back, dating from its early days in the 1990s and 2000s when it used its prowess in data management and marketing to help consolidate the highly fragmented U.S. credit card business. "Capital One was a fintech 20 years ago and continues to be one today," says Jason Goldberg, a banking analyst at Barclays.
Under Alexander's watch, the company has built numerous cloud-based software tools because it couldn't find ones from vendors that satisfied specific needs. It now plans to commercialize some of them via its new business, starting with Slingshot, which Capital One Software claims can reduce the cost of managing workloads on Snowflake significantly and help eliminate data bottlenecks.
"We've been talking of Capital One as a technology company for a while now. The best proof of that is [to become] a technology company that's actually selling software."
Ravi Raghu, head of Capital One Software
Kaushik Patel, an executive at ThoughtSpot, a cloud analytics company that's been using Slingshot for a couple of months, says the fact that Capital One is facing some of the same pain points using Snowflake's platform as his own company helps make it an attractive partner even though the financial giant is new to the software business. Its scale and resources are also reassuring. "I would be more worried about [using a product from] a Series A startup . . . than I would using [one from] Capital One," says Patel.
Raghu, who reports to Capital One's chief enterprise services officer, Frank LaPrade, declines to reveal how many employees his new business has or what products it will launch beyond Slingshot, saying only that it will be guided by what it hears from customers. The fact that the banking giant's years-long digital transformation journey has turned it into a kind of boot camp for tech leaders who have gone on to be CIOs at other top American companies means Raghu has plenty of Capital One alumni he can tap for insights, too.
Founder vision
Still, making Capital One Software a success will be no slam dunk. The markets the new business is targeting are big but they are also full of formidable competitors whose sole focus is on software and there are significant costs associated with things such as building teams that consult with customers to help them get the most out of the products they buy.
Capital One may also need to reassure investors, who have seen its share price fall by almost 12% this year to $127.86 at close of trading on May 31, that its move into the software business will not distract executives from its core finance ones, especially as the economy shows signs it may be tilting towards recession.
In response to skeptics, the company can point to the fact that CEO Fairbank has repeatedly taken it into businesses that have compressed margins and driven up costs in the short term, only to pay off handsomely over time. "Rich is a visionary," says JPMorgan analyst Rick Shane, who has followed Capital One for 20 years, "and . . . having the confidence and success to support and invest in his vision is largely a function of those prior successes."
CIO Alexander acknowledges the level of commitment that will be required to make Capital One's latest venture a success. "We go into this with . . . humility about the challenge of building a software company," he says. "If you look at the average [enterprise] software business, the time it takes to get to $100 million in revenue is, like, five to seven years for the winners. We recognize that this is something we need to be in for the long term."
Sustainability Efforts At Equinix And SoftIron
Synopsys Touts Smart "DesignDash" To Help Accelerate Chip Projects
Handling Jobs That May Not Be Suitable For 100% Remote
ChatGPT: Massive Disruption


Will Trump tap Palin, Gillam to lead federal land management agency?
The United States Department of Interior manages roughly 198 million acres of federally owned lands in Alaska, a block that is 10 percent larger than the entire state of Texas. So, it is only fitting that two Alaskans - Robert Gillam and former governor Sarah Palin - are being floated as contenders for secretary of Interior as President-elect Donald Trump builds his cabinet.
"Over 50 percent of our nation's federally protected lands are located in Alaska. This is why it makes so much sense for an Alaskan to lead the Department of the Interior and champion our great state while guiding our nation," Gillam explained in a written statement explaining his interest in the job.
While both of these candidates would likely be more open to access and development of federal lands in Alaska than current Secretary of Interior Sally Jewell, Alaska's mining community would much rather see Palin take the job, or someone from outside of the state, than to have Gillam hold such a high post in the Trump Administration.
While Gillam may not be a household name, as founder and CEO of McKinley Capital Management, an Anchorage-based advisory firm that manages roughly US$6.7 billion in investments, he is well known in Alaska business and political circles.
Though Gillam has little in the way of political experience, he believes President-elect Trump's endeavor to fill his cabinet with savvy American's outside the typical Washington D.C. political circles provides him with an opportunity to cap his successful business career with a high-level political post.
"I woke up on November 9th and realized that America voted for a change in Washington; one that perhaps favored outsiders as opposed to career politicians. I recognized that suddenly it was possible for me to serve in a role that has otherwise been one of career politicians and people (many of them talented of course) looking to use the job as a stepping stone," he explained in a statement provided by his son, also Robert Gillam.
The fact that Gillam and Trump are both Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania alma mater does not hurt the Alaska businessman's chances of gaining a post in the incoming administration.
Gillam told Alaska Dispatch News that he had been in touch with Trump over the course of the election.
Since his college days, Gillam has amassed roughly US$320 million, enough wealth for Forbes Magazine to deem him the richest man in Alaska in 2015. The financial advisor believes the business savvy that elevated him to this status could be applied to the management of America's public lands.
"I consider land development like the professional investor that I have been all of my career, and carefully measure the cost versus the benefit of each decision," he explained.
While Alaska's mining community can appreciate a business approach to land management, they are concerned that Gillam would use any influence gained in Washington D.C. to further one of his personal goals, stopping the enormous Pebble Mine in the Bristol Bay region of Southwest Alaska.
From 2006 through 2008, Gillam directly spent US$820,000 on Ballot Measure 4 in the 2008 Alaska primary election and evidence suggests his contributions were in the millions when you include the monies he donated to groups that in turn funded advertising campaigns supporting the anti-Pebble initiative.
Ballot Measure 4, also dubbed the Clean Water Initiative, was crafted to prevent development of the world-class Pebble copper-gold-molybdenum deposit. If passed, however, the stipulations of the measure would have made it difficult to permit large scale metal mines across much of Alaska.
It is believed that Gillam's motivation for preventing development of a mine at Pebble is the beautiful home he maintains about 25 miles away from the proposed mine site in Southwest Alaska. This wilderness retreat on the shores of Lake Clark was used as a meeting place for anti-Pebble planning and as a perk for big contributors to the "Yes on 4" campaign, according to a complaint with the Alaska Public Offices Commission, alleging Gillam violated campaign law.
The complaint was put to rest after Gillam paid US$100,000 in a 2010 settlement with APOC.
In a separate case, APOC fined an air service owned by Gillam US$25,500 for charging anti-Pebble candidates only the cost of fuel for flights, an illegal contribution that could change the outcome of the initiative, according to the election watchdog group.
Though Ballot Measure 4 failed by a healthy margin, Gillam's role in promoting and funding the initiative put him at odds with Alaska's mining sector.
The investment manager, however, chalks up the experience as qualifying experience for his aspirations to serve as secretary of Interior.
"In the course of my life, and the many years I spent working on the Stop Pebble Mine initiative, I have learned a tremendous amount about our nation's land and the people who rely on it," he inked in his statement.
While Gillam's bid for secretary of Interior has gone virtually unnoticed outside of Alaska, former governor Palin's name has been in play for the post since Trump's victory in the general election.
Interestingly enough, Palin was still serving as Alaska's governor when Ballot Measure 4 was put before state voters.
On the day before the Alaska primary election, Palin took off her governor's hat and threw it in the ring opposed to the anti-Pebble measure.
"Let me take my governor's hat off just for a minute here and tell you, personally, Prop 4, I vote 'No' on that. I have all the confidence in the world that the Department of Environmental Conservation and our Department of Natural Resources have great, very stringent regulations and policies already in place. We're going to make sure that mines operate only safely, and soundly," Palin said.
The governor's remarks echoed the sentiment of leaders from more than a dozen cities and boroughs, the majority of Alaska Native corporation leaders - with the noted exception of Bristol Bay Native Corp., which did not take a public position on the issue - as well as various business associations, including the Alaska Oil and Gas Association, Alaska Auto Dealers Association and Alaska Forest Association.
Three days after the primary, then Republican presidential candidate John McCain announced Palin as his pick as Republican running mate during his 2008 bid for the White House.
Though the McCain-Palin ticket lost to President Barack Obama in the general election, the campaign put the former Alaska governor in the national spotlight. Since that time, Palin has remained a player in national politics with her support of conservative candidates, a move that has put her in consideration for a role in the Trump Administration.
While the former Alaska governor is considered to be pretty far down on Trump's shortlist of candidates for secretary of Interior, her notoriety as a fiery pro-development conservative has environmentalists concerned.
As vice presidential nominee, Palin famously used the phrase "Drill baby drill!" as a mantra for more oil and gas production in the United States.
This call for increased domestic petroleum included a call for opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a move some Alaskans see as an answer to the dwindling flow of oil through the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System, which has the ability to transport more than 2 million barrels of oil per day.
Palin also coined the phrase "Mine baby mine!" during the 2008 presidential campaign, as a show of her support coal mining and the sector at large.
While Gillam and Palin are in the conversation, most pundits have non-Alaskans higher on the list of potential candidates to run the Department of Interior.
Those considered more likely to lead Interior are: Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, who was named vice-chair to Trump's transition team on Nov. 29; Robert Grady, a venture capitalist who served in the George H.W. Bush White House as associate director of the Office of Management and Budget for Natural Resources, Energy and Science; Continental Resources CEO Harold Hamm, known for pioneering the development of the large shale oil resources of the Bakken formation and ranked by Forbes Magazine as the 98th richest person in the world; and Forrest Lucas, co-founder of Lucas Oil Products.
Whomever Trump picks to lead the Department of Interior, that person will be charged with overseeing nine land and resource-management bureaus, most of which have some bearing on mining in Alaska.
In addition to the two major federal land managers, Bureau of Land Management and National Park Service, Department of Interior oversees regulators such as the Bureau of Reclamation, Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Last but not least for the mining sector, U.S. Geological Survey falls under the Interior umbrella.
While secretary of Interior may not be highest profile position in the Trump cabinet, with nearly 200 million acres of federal lands in Alaska and so many resource-related bureaus under its control, this post is important to Alaska's mining community.


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