SHIP'S LOG:

Spatuloso

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Bosun Meringue 11/27/2017 10:10pm


I reported for duty today. I was almost late getting to the harbormaster's office to pick up my paperwork, too!! We took flying carpets in from Djerba and you know how it goes. You get the threadbare one and start poking holes through the weave with your finger and then it's listing off to one side and you overcompensate and end up drifting a hundred miles off the shore at Tangier.

Well I made it anyway and I'm very excited to see where the Spatuloso heads next!






Elvin Nelson 11/29/2017 11:53pm


Oh boy! I'm fresh out of my Merchant Airservice Training and got my first posting on the Spatuloso! When I got to the aerodrome I was so I excited, looking at all the ropes and the pulleys and the big ships moored above, but I let my guard down and a slimey little rat knicked my wallet! Why a rat would want my wallet is beyond me, but he ran off with it in his mouth. I suppose he's got little ears and mouths to feed back home, and he was forced into servitude by a "King Rat," who's actually a man who wears a rat mask and sits on a throne made of tin foil salvaged from the rubbish heap and says "Go, oh rats, and bring me papers and money and fresh leather wallets!" but the mask is itchy and makes his face sweat, and he can only take it off when he thinks all the other rats are gone, but there's one little mouse that hides in the rafters and knows his secret.

It must have been one of those big heavy pulleys that hit me in the head. I woke up in the infirmary of the Spatuloso, being tended to by the kindly Doctor Maraca, who says I can't leave the bed till he says so. But I'm lucky and have a porthole! This is going to be great.






Elvin Nelson 12/7/2017 9:19pm


Oh boy! Life on the Spatuloso is great! I haven't been able to leave the infirmary yet, on account of my head injury, but I've got a porthole that I can see everything through, and sometimes they bring me soup. Like today, the soup was turkey with mushy pieces of carrot and we made call on the tiny hamlet of Ricketty Hole, which consisted of a single strip mall. The big box store had gone out of business a long time ago, and people used it as a communal fabrication space and brick oven bakery. Pretty standard for the Blasted Region. In the few hours we had on land, a number of crew members visited a shop in the mall called the Arf & Barf, which was a tavern and darts place run by Anubians. I could see the storefront of the Arf & Barf from my porthole and I can tell you that the establishment most definitely earns its name.






Elvin Nelson 12/13/2017 8:52pm


Oh boy! Doctor Maraca says I'll be able to leave the infirmary any day now. Just as soon as the stitches heal over the medallion he sewed into my head. Guess that pulley hit me pretty hard and left a big hole in my skull, but Doctor Maraca happened to have a strange medallion of mysterious origin there on his desk and he says the fit was perfect. Eerily perfect, he said. I'm wearing a beanie so it doesn't get cold and give me a big ice cream headache! Doctor M is a great doctor and he really wants to make sure I get better and says that I should draw and draw, so he's brought me parchments and a pen and he is very interested in my drawings and that I should keep drawing islands and star charts and coastlines because the Captain likes them.






Elvin Nelson 12/18/2017 8:38pm


Oh boy! Doctor Maraca let me out of the infirmary! He pretty much HAD to, the way I kept bangin' my head against the door. It's that dang medallion he sewed in my head! It's got a life of its own, it has. And I have to do what it says because we're a team, that's what we is. So we get to the hall and we puts our face in the corner, we do, and Doctor Maraca he's on the speaking tube shouting out directions to the Captain like "45 DEGREES SOUTH!" and the whole ship starts turning, and we're facing the hall again and we start running till we hit another wall and Doctor Maraca calls out some different numbers and directions till the ship turns and we're free and we bounce down another hall like a ball in a maze.

Finally, Herb Seafort, the burly quartermaster, catches me up in the iron cage he does, and then they hangs me just outside the cockpit, so's I can better tell the captain which way to go. I'm a pilot now, see? Isn't this great?






Elvin Nelson 12/25/2017 9:42pm


Oh boy do I love the warm tropical air! Especially since I'm hanging in this metal cage outside the bridge of the Spatuloso. It swings real easy so I've been able to point the ship right in the direction the medallion wants to go. Doctor Maraca says the hole in my head is healing up good on account of all the fresh air, and that the medallion has taken a liking to me. I guess it's real picky but the doc says I'm one in a million. Or number thirteen at least.

They've been feeding me soup from a can at the end of a pole, and apparently the blackouts are just part of living with the medallion in my head. But the Captain says I'm doing a great job and to keep it up and pretty soon he's likely to promote me to Ship's Figurehead!






Elvin Nelson 12/30/2017 11:49pm


Oh boy what a view! You can see everything when you’re in a cage hanging off an airship! You can even see straight down through the bars and pretend you are flying. Well, of course we are flying, and it’s my job to tell the Captain that we’re still heading in the right direction. We’re above some of the clouds and they look just like big fluffy pops of popcorn, floating above the sea and the islands and the and the big black smoke pouring from the volcano in the distance. Yep that’s where we’re headed alright I can feel it in the medallion sewn into my head, just like a magnet it is. It won’t be long now I can tell you that!






Elvin Nelson 1/6/2018 11:58pm


Oh boy that sulfuric volcano gas sure gets hot! The Captain drove the ship right though it and since I was out there hanging in the cage I got a face full of it let me tell you. Singed my hair and my eyebrows and my clothes are burnt off and I think the medallion sewn into my head must have taken over because I don't remember landing the ship or getting this chain around my neck and heading out into the jungle but here we are. I'm still leading the Captain and the crew to the very place the medallion wants to go and they say I'm doing a great job and that they'll even gave me water as soon as I take them to the temple. Isn't the Captain the greatest?






Elvin Nelson 2/1/2018 10:32pm


Oh boy these natives sure know how to treat a fella right! It's been nothing but parties and dancing and food since we ran into them. That ol' medallion sewn into my head hasn't done me wrong yet. It led me right to the temple and there was a little altercation at first with the arrows and the spears and they had us all hog tied on spits ready for the fire when they noticed that shiny thing the doctor sewed into my head to keep my brains in and once they saw it they started treating me like a king! Or a god. Or something but whatever it is it's just more of the great luck I've been having ever since I hooked up with the Spatuloso. I just wish Doctor Maraca and the Captain were here to enjoy it with me. They've probably got their own private huts somewhere with the dancing girls and the feast meats. Mmmm mmm mmm yessiree this roast feast meat is so delicious mmm mmm! Wanna bite?






Elvin Nelson 2/18/2018 9:04pm


Oh boy things sure are getting busy here on the old Volcanic Island! I've lost track of Doctor Maraca and the Captain and the old crew but I'm sure everything is just as fine for them as it is for me! Not long after our big arrival party, there were MORE visitors, and these ones were bearing gifts! Whisky, guns, gasoline, and then cell phones, semiconductors, solar energy! Just most recently it's cryptocurrency, smart contracts, and drones. I'm living with the chief's daughter up on top of the highest high-rise on the island, monitoring the output of our underground AI manufacturing facilities. Sheela (the chief's daughter) wants to diversify into bio-tech, and she's got super great intuition about these things so I'm all for it. She's also the one who put resources toward our defenses on Volcanic Island, and right now I'm watching a small group of drone attack helicopters remove some small invader from the perimeter off-shore. Gosh am I lucky to have her I'll tell ya!






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