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Post by NELL DOE DALE on Apr 29, 2012 12:15:44 GMT -5
Nell could only think of one amusement park from her childhood, but it wasn't one she hadn't ever been to. Coney Island. The name was interchangeable with the word 'park'. She'd always wanted to go there when she was younger, like she had wanted to go to the sea and like she had wanted to go to Spain. She had wanted to go to a lot of places, but they were off-limits, she could see the caution tape surrounding her house. Like the caution tape that must have surrounded it when it was condemned. Past thoughts never came, though, not for her and especially not when she was having fun. She tried to stop them before they surfaced, because they tended to bubble up one by one, like ship wreckage that had been lost over time. But it was hard when she was learning that the past was a huge influence in her life now.
After one ride, Nell figured that it was, of course, time to eat. "Wanna get something?" she asked Sandra as she walked through the people, some with huge stuffed animals they'd won at the games. Nell wanted to try them later, since she figured that she'd be pretty pro at them. Games? Count her in. Unfortunately, they couldn't do anything in the water thanks to it being autumn and far too cold. And the park was only open on the weekends in the off-season, but she thought it was a perfect time to go. It wasn't too hot, and there weren't many long lines. Nell thought it was the perfect idea. Even though it was strange not to have to kick off flip-flops on every rollers coaster where your feet dangled. She thought it was a little more comfortable, since she also usually had a wet bathing suit on underneath her clothes in the summer.
She got herself funnel cake at one of the kiosks before finding a place for them to sit down and eat. "Okay, so, what have we not gone to yet?" she questioned the Water girl as she pulled off pieces of the dough, her hands already coated in the powdered sugar. Probably the messiest snack she could get. The weather was at least warm for fall,which meant that they could get any food they want. Not that Nell usually went along with the whole 'only drinking hot chocolate in the winter' deal. "I know there's one roller coaster, because I keep seeing it but I don't know how to get there," she admitted. She seemed startled for a moment before she patted her butt and said, "Whoa, thought I might have lost my phone." She laughed after a moment for her own paranoia, but really, it was far too easy to lose something at an amusement park.
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on May 1, 2012 19:32:00 GMT -5
Amusement parks were definitely very fun places, Sandra thought with one very bright grin on her face. She'd come out here with Nell, and the two of them had decidedly blown all of their money on those ticket things needed to get onto rides and into attractions and the like... only not really all of it, because they still needed to have lunch and buy stuff, but they'd spent a pretty huge amount. Her pockets were not kind of stuffed with the little bits of paper, but hey, she couldn't help it if they were having some kind of half-off special this weekend or something! She followed along after Nell, not really trying to stay behind her, but it was hard to walk side-by-side when there were people going in all those different directions.
"Let's do it!" she agreed, grinning as she looked around at all the different things there even were to get. There wasn't as much as there would be in the summer, she was sure -- amusement parks weren't as popular at this time of year -- but hey, this was still a pretty wicked selection when she was used to having meals at the Academy. (Meals at school weren't bad, of course, but still...) The funnel cakes Nell was looking at was pretty damn good, and so she ordered one for herself too -- loading it with sugar, strawberries, and a pretty huge mountain of soft serve ice cream. She was determined to finish it, too... even though she might just throw up after the next ride she went on. It was too late now that she'd already bought it, though. She handed over the amount of money -- costs were pretty high of course, but they always were at amusement parks -- and then again followed along after Nell. Luckily for the two of them, there was a table available just there.
She dug into the ice cream first before anything else, attacking it kind of ferociously with her plastic spoon. She was hungry, maybe... or, more likely, she was just really craving something sweet. Then again, Sandra was nearly always craving something sweet. "Hm... The ferris wheel! Oh, or that big spinning one that makes people throw up." Sandra wasn't scared of a challenge, after all -- she kind of hoped she could stomach more than other people, if only because, tiny girl like her, nobody would see it coming. "But oooooh," she said, attention caught immediately by the mention of a roller coaster, "let's do that next!" Hopefully they wouldn't throw up on that either, though -- these funnel cakes were pretty huge... and delicious (but mostly huge). Sandra stared, confused, at the look on Nell's face and then watched as she patted her butt -- an action that explained nothing -- but then nodded once Nell spoke again. "Oh dude, that sucks. That happens to be like... all the time." Her hand went to her pocket immediately to make sure that her phone was indeed still there. Yep, that it was. "Not today though. I think Matt might kill me if I did lose it."
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on May 3, 2012 17:03:28 GMT -5
Nell loved high places. She felt like a bird whenever she got to be on a plane or a rollercoaster. It would be just too cool to actually ly. But such was not possible. She’d once entertained the thoguht that maybe Wind elementals were capable of flight, but learned from a friend that that didn’t happen. Oh well. A girl could still dream. ”Ferris wheel is a must,” Nell said, pointing a piece of her funnel cake at the Water elemental. Or so she figured by now, since friends she went with usually dragged her to the giant ring. She still hadn’t been to enough amusement parks to be absolutely sure of the customs. "The spiny top?” She motioned with her finger to imitate its movement. “It’s probably what a fly feels like on one of those sticky traps.” She never used those kinds of things. She couldn’t even kill a spider, she preferred to use the cup and paper towel method. Or just hold it if it was a daddy long leg or something else she was certain wouldn’t hurt her or hop at her.
Nell pumped her fists as Sandra’s agreement. And oh, she was such an agreeable person. Which was great. There was never any difficulties between them. But then again, neither of them were really disagreeable people. Easy as Sunday morning. ”Aw right, rollercoaster!” Rollercoasters—well, any ride—was a guarenteed way to lose your phone if you kept it on you. The Earth elemental was always afraid of losing something. ”On rides or in general?” She didn’t know if Sandra was the forgetful type of person or not. But everyone experienced those moments when you’re looking for your keys and they’re in your hands or when you walk into a room and then forget why you’re there. Nell had that quite a bit, she must admit. She was constatntly losing her car keys. Maybe it was her subconscious way of abandoning Gwen, even though by now she didn’t think she could give up the PT Cruiser. Before, it’d be a good one to keep arouund.
She grinned when Sandra mentioning her brother being mad at her for losing her phone. In Nell’s mind, that was absolutely adorable, the kind of sibling concern. She wouldn’t voice that aloud, of course. ”How’s it going, living with him?” she questioned. It must have been prtty cool, not living with restrictive parents or anything. But then again, parents were a nice thing to have. Nell sometimes let herself yearn for a childhood with a nuclear family and parents who loved and care for her like they should have. It was fleeting. ’Boys are gross, but I doubt her like…leaves the toilet seat up or anything. Dirty towels lying around and all that.” Nell didn’t ever have complaints about Josh, having lived in both her apartment and the mansion. He was a tidy person, which had been about the first thing she learned of him thanks to his nice-smelling apartment. And it wasn’t only a guy thing, really, even though if you put a single guy into a house more often than not it was very unclean. Depended on personality, she supposed.
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on May 6, 2012 14:24:41 GMT -5
Sandra nodded her agreement. The ferris wheel definitely was a must -- she was pretty sure she'd never gone to the amusement park without dragging her family or friends onto the ferris wheel at least once. She'd always done it as a child, when the ferris wheel had been one of the only things she could ride, and nwo that she was sixteen and no longer being led around by the hand with her parents, she had no intention of stopping a perfect tradition. "We're not leaving today without riding it," she stated, though the image of her literally preventing Nell from leaving the park before going on the ferris wheel was pretty hilarious. Sandra was pretty sure it wouldn't come to that, though. "Yeah, that!" She giggled a little bit at Nell's imitation of the spinning, though made a kind of horrified face at the comparison to the fly. Sandra wasn't quite an avid enough animal lover to feel sympathy for killed and squished bugs, but that was quite some perspective there. "That makes it sound so awful, though..."
Sandra kind of half-cackled, half-giggled with glee at the prospect of going on a rollercoaster, though she was pretty sure that this made her look like a maniac. Oh, well. She was pretty sure that Nell wouldn't hold it against her; the girl was fist-pumping, after all. "If we can find it," she added in retrospect, then popped a chunk of funnel cake into her mouth now that she'd finished off about half of her ice cream already. Ice cream was so good, though... "But I'm sure it can't be that hard! The park's not that big." It was pretty puny compared to some of the things that could be found by larger cities, but for the Hollow, this was a pretty decent size for a park. "In general," she said, her smile a bit sheepish. "I think if it was just on rides it'd be okay, but..." She trailed off, pulling a cross-eyed face and then laughing. For Sandra, the ability to laugh at herself was a pretty useful skill, though she was sure other people wouldn't really understand why.
She considered the question for a second as she poked at her strawberries with her spoon before choosing a particularly big one and shoving it into her mouth. She chewed and swallowed before answering, "It's good! I mean, it's Matt, you know him." She knew that they were friends, though the three of them didn't really all hang out that often, which was weird, but it was probably better this way. How weird if they had all the same friends or something, though due to the way the Academy kind of worked, it wouldn't have been that surprising. Either way, living with Matt was just fine by her. "Plus it's cool that he's around the Hollow again." She'd kind of missed her older brother in the time that he'd been gone back home after graduating, while she'd still had to come to school -- it had been a lot like those two years when he'd come to the Academy when she was twelve. Sandra would probably never let Matthew know this, though, so she didn't say it now either. "Yeah, luckily he's not that gross," she said, wrinkling her nose, though it wasn't that surprising -- their mom would have probably killed both of them if they weren't at least somewhat tidy. "I'd just get our mom to make him stop anyway." She laughed at the ridiculousness of the whole thing -- she wouldn't be the type to do that, just like Matthew wasn't the type to just live in filth. If anything, he was the one to get her to clean up.
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on May 6, 2012 21:18:37 GMT -5
Nell laughed at her friend's words, covering her mouth until she swallowed down her food. She may have eaten like a pig, but she had the manners of a queen. "You may have to remind me." As she wasn't a very forgetful person, it was never to major a concern for her. But it was too possible that Nell would be swept up in everything else and neglect to remember that there was a huge wheel they needed to get their butts on. "But hey, it does make you wonder how they came up with the ride." She held her hands up and put a serious expression on her face as if she were at a meeting. "This new ride is gonna be inside a top. It's gonna spin really fast. And then you're gonna puke." She threw up her hands like a period at the end of her sentence. She actually wasn't too fond of the ride. It was small, you were closed in and it felt suffocating. But she was willing to swallow it for Sandra's benefit.
Oh jeez. Finding things. Not on the list of "Things Nell Can Do Exceptionally Well." Her directional issues weren't really well know because they were a weakness, and she couldn't reveal a weakness. "Do you think we should get a map?" It was almost comical that Nell might need a map in this small-sized park, but that was her for you. A map might not even help her, sometimes they just impeded her more. She'd used one in Spain...after she doodled all over the Iberian peninsula. "Then you shall lead away." She waved her fingers as if to emphasize this. She trusted the Water student more than she trusted herself. At least it wouldn't be too bad if they lost their way. They wouldn't be wandering for hours, she didn't think. "They do have those little boxes, they're convenient. But I always get wary yanno. Luckily people are usually trustworthy." In Nell's world, everyone was trustworthy.
She was glad to hear that Sandra was enjoying it with her brother. Nell did know that Matt was trying hard for his little sister. He was an adorable person all around, and that just boosted his adorableness through the roof. "Yep, spic and span. Really nice place, hmm." Coming from the girl who lived in a mansion now. But she was also the girl who lived in a graffiti'd row house and a crappy apartment downtown for a while. She'd had worse. A lot worse. Nell laughed at the mention of tattling to their mother, wiping her powdered fingers off on her jeans. "How is she?" Nell asked of Sandra's mother. She wondered if the girl had spoken to her recently. Her friend, Angela, didn't talk to her mother much, no matter how many times Nell told her to do so. It was saddening, how thoughts of Ang now were riddled with guilt and anxiety.
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on May 8, 2012 18:09:08 GMT -5
With her most determined face, Sandra nodded. "Deal." She laughed thereafter, though. She wasn't very good at being serious at all, but she was being pretty honest about the ferris wheel thing. It'd just be a shame to come to the amusement park today without going on such a classic ride. It was like not going on the swings at the playground or something -- just wrong. She giggled at Nell's impression of the ride designers. She was sure that wasn't really how rides were created, but hell, what did Sandra know about this kind of thing anyway? She didn't know much about... much. She straightened her own back, though, putting on a fake deep voice to imitate the kind of stern man that would work in, er, amusement park design. "But ma'am, are you sure making the riders puke is a good idea?" Then she went back to normal, spooning more ice cream into her mouth. "They should give us a prize if we manage not to puke."
She looked around up in the air, trying to see over the vendors' stands, but from down here it was too hard to tell where anything was. She was trying, of course, to locate the roller coaster, because roller coasters tended to be pretty tall and therefore easily spotted in an amusement park, but maybe they'd have to do some walking around to find it. "Maps are for the weak!" she declared, though this was a pretty useless point anyway. Maps were definitely pretty damn useful if only either Nell or herself would be able to read one properly, but even when they were the most basic of all basic maps, Sandra had difficulty telling which way was which and normally ended up walking in the completely opposite direction. "I'll try my best. Let this quest for the roller coaster commence-eth!" she said in her bravest tone of voice, picturing herself as a knight of the Middle Ages. '...After we eat-eth!" Food was important too -- one of the most important things, in fact. "This is true," she agreed. "I'm pretty sure people wouldn't be enough of jerks to steal from those." Sandra was just as trusting, to be honest.
She did like the apartment. Well, she had always thought it was pretty nice, when she'd gone over to visit her brother before moving in and the like at the request of their parents, but now that she was living there, she had to say that she knew for sure it was a very nice place. Considering they were really just two teenagers, living there was very, very decent. She didn't know the specifics, seeing as her parents footed her half of the rent for her, but living there really couldn't be very cheap. Matt was pretty lucky to have found it. "Definitely very nice," she said with a grin. Of course, she'd never been to the mansion where Nell now lived with Joshua, so she couldn't very well compare. "You should come over more! We'll lock Matt out and have a girls' night." She grinned in an almost evil way, but on Sandra's face it didn't really work as planned. The idea was kind of hilarious anyway... and Nell came over pretty often as it was, not that Sandra was complaining. "My mom? She's not too bad, same as usual I think." Though they'd been at the Academy for years, Kagura had never failed to call every week or so to check up on Sandra and Matt -- she was that kind of worrier. "How's your family?" she asked happily, mostly unaware of any weird feelings this might bring up.
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on May 8, 2012 22:19:03 GMT -5
Nell put herself in a boardroom meeting of her mind. She held up her hands, trying convince Sandra of her idea. "Think about it. If they puke, they have to buy more food. Huh?" In theory, once you emptied the contents of your stomach you needed to fill it again. But then again, you'd probably feel sick. Nell poked at her teeth with her tongue to try and get out the dough as the Water elemental worked on her ice cream. And now Nell wanted ice cream. Oh joy. "It is so on." She'd never thrown up before, right? She didn't know Sandra's track record, but she believed they could make it. Nell nodded her ascent when she saw Sandra look over and declare maps being for the weak. Nope, no maps. That meant adventure. "It'll be a journey, ya dig?" A journey in an amusement park. Sounded good to her, actually.
And it sounded good to her companion as well, apparently. To Sandra's battle cry, Nell replied, "Huzzah!" They were lucky it was a loud place with a lot of sound pollution, otherwise they'd be freaks right about now. But that's how friends were--freaks. "Verily," Nell said as she very enthusiastically ripped off a piece of her funnel cake. Her stomach was an amazing thing, she wasn't feeling at all full. Which was good for the rides, actually. Less chance of ending up with her head in a trashcan. Her mind wandered away from that unpleasant train of thought when she suggested they lock Matt out, a grin spreading over her face. She'd definitely love a sleepover with Sandy. "We can leave a bowl of food out for him, though. While we party hard and tear the place up." Like Nell would actually do that. She was much too concerned about other people having to clean her messes up.
She smiled when Sandra said her mom was doing good. It was like a feeling of relief, oddly enough. But that relief soon turned to some discomfort. Nell sucked the powder off her fingers, faced with a dilemma. She loved Sandra, the girl was her friend. But if she were to tell the truth, she'd have to say that her father was mysteriously ill, her brother was blackmailing her, and that her aunt had given her an ultimatum to either join the mob or become a target of it. She didn't want the Water elemental to have to hear about that, but she wondered if she'd want to know like Nell would want to know if anything was up with her. "Pretty good. Josh is busy as usual. Everything's been kind of all over the place lately." This was certainly a nice reprieve. Then she remembered something. "Did I tell you I got a new job?" It seemed like something Sandra should know. Nell was slowly trying to get better talking about her personal life for her friends' benefits.
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on May 10, 2012 18:24:14 GMT -5
Sandra put on her best contemplative face, assuming again the position of a businessman or something. In her mind, her businessman self probably had a mustache and one of those gray plaid suits, but his pants were too short. Luckily, though, this imaginary boardroom probably involved everyone sitting at a table with those fancy desk chairs and coffees and what-not, so nobody would be able to see her businessman self's socks, even though they were probably something embarrassing like purple with yellow polka dots or something equally weird. "True, true," she said, stroking her imaginary mustache. "And those vendors have been complaining that nobody's buying their funnel cakes..." That was just a silly thought considering hello, Nell and Sandra did both have funnel cakes right there in frnot of them, and last she had checked, the vendors had had no shortage of customers. "So on," she agreed with her 'challenge accepted' face. Oh yeah. Game on, amusement park spinning top ride. It was about to be bested by two pretty shrimpy girls. "They'll never see what hit 'em!" Hopefully, "what hit them" wouldn't be vomit. Eurgh.
She dissolved into a fit of laughter at the literally medieval talk, covering her mouth with both her hands in a vain attempt at stopping. Obviously, it didn't work as planned -- it was still a few minutes before she finally stopped, her stomach now cramping up from all the extreme giggling she'd been doing. She groaned and flopped over onto the table a bit, being careful to avoid getting her face (or hair, which was a pain as it was so long) shoved into the funnel cakes or something. "Neeeell," she whined, still giggling softly to herself as she sat back up. "My face hurts..." People might expect that, what with the more or less perpetual grin, Sandra was kind of used to that kind of thing and therefore had pretty well-trained face muscles or something like that so that they wouldn't hurt. Those people would be wrong. Her cheeks killed. The idea of actually locking Matt outside only made her giggle a bit more -- she was in that kind of mood, apparently. "Yeah, we'll even toss him some cutlery too! We're so nice," she said, putting a hand over her heart. The problem was that they really were nice, though... far too nice to do anything like that. "Though not literally toss it to him because we might accidentally stab him with a fork or something and that would be bad."
Sandra was under no delusions that she'd ever had a tough life. Things had been more or less handed to her, honestly, and she was kind of living proof that it wasn't only the rick kids and upper class who had that kind of a life. Her parents more or less took care of things, and it wasn't only when it came to money, but with all those general parts of life as well. Their family of six -- including her grandparents -- tended to get along pretty darn well, and Sandra really, really had no complaints, at least none that ever made sense. There were always small things, of course, like how her parents always found the most inopportune moments to call, or how Matt lectured her on doing her homework. They were kind of endearing things about her family, though, in a weird way. "He does always seem busy," she said regarding Josh, nodding once. She didn't know Nell's fiancé very well, but she did know from what she'd been told and seen herself that he was a pretty busy guy. "Oooooh... where's the new job? Wait, all over the place how, though? Is everything okay?" she asked, eyebrows knit together in concern. She didn't much like when her friends were upset.
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on May 11, 2012 18:37:19 GMT -5
Nell nodded, agreeing with the words as she contemplated the decision. "It's been decided. Spinning top. We shall have them constructed at once." Was that how people in boardroom meetings usually talked? She only had experience with them in movies, so she couldn't say for sure. And it would be a rather odd boardroom meeting, but she figured that even amusement park decisions had to be made by someone, right? Why not a group full of stuffy old guys in suits. Sandra's enthusiasm certainly helped Nell in her decision to go on a ride she was a little iffy about. She could barely sit for long periods of time without getting antsy, so this was a good thing for her.
At first, Nell didn't know what to do with herself when Sandra started cracking up, a pained expression crossing her features as she tried to keep herself from laughing at her. It was hard, though, and she closed her eyes, leaning back in silent chuckles. She opened her eyes to see the Water elemental on the table, and a burst of laughter did come out then. "That was all you, Sandrita," Nell said, covering her mouth. She then used her hand to nudge her arm. "You need to control yourself. You can break your laugh box that way." The chuckles laced through her voice as she said it, and there was no way she could even be taken seriously. Especially since she was pretty sure the mysterious laugh box did not exist. As far as she knew, anyway.
Josh's business did worry Nell sometimes when it came to his health. She'd never known anyone like him, so it was a learning process in how to deal with the fact that he was such a driven purpose. Nell just made sure he ate during the day when she noticed that he was concentrating on something. "Well, I guess it's better to stay busy than to be sitting around all the time, yanno?" she said, waving her hand. "Unless you enjoy it. Like sleeping. A lot." She gave a knowing smile to Sandra, who slept about as much as a cat, she'd imagine.
And that brought an idea to her mind, and she tapped her lip, her other hand playing with a piece of the funnel cake. "You remind me of my kitties. They sleep most of the day and only wake up to cause mayhem." Well, not all of them. It was really just Eris and Pablo. It was strange, thinking of Josh's cats as her cats too. But she wanted to get more adjusted to the idea of sharing a life with him. They were going to be married eventually, after all. "It's at a Concert Hall. The philharmonic orchestra performs there." Along with a lot of other bands and performers. "I'm a house coordinator, which is fancy talk for making sure the ushers and everyone are on task." Nell laughed a bit at the other girl's concern, warmed by the fact she worried. "Just the change in majors and the new job and all that. Gotta adjust. How've your grades been, anyway?"
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on May 12, 2012 0:27:37 GMT -5
Sandra nodded smartly. "Next week we'll discuss the underwater roller coaster. Meeting concluded!" She was almost positive this wasn't how these things were really decided, but that was okay. Sandra could never get this kind of job anyway -- it involved too much sitting around and doing nothing all day but talking, and while Sandra was very good at talking, she was terrible at the kind of talking that required making real decisions... or something like that. It was all much too real for her. She dropped the pencil mustache businessman act quickly, though, and she was glad when Nell just joined in on her laughing as if it were perfectly normal. Well... okay, even then it probably still wasn't, but now they were two weirdos laughing at nothing rather than one, and that was good enough for her. "If laugh boxes could be broken, I think mine would be dead already, Nellita," she said, giving her friend a cross-eyed look. "I'm pretty sure it's the other way 'round, though, you know. The more you exercise your laugh box, the stronger it gets!"
She didn't really know, not really, because Sandra was pretty sure it would be far more fun to sit around doing nothing all day. She could definitely get behind that. She would be able to spend so much time napping! Eating! Sitting around munching on candy and singing along to music! Her mom always said something about how it was better to keep busy, how sitting around too often would make her antsy and bored and make her want to go out and do things, but Sandra never really understood this. She could think of nothing better than no school, no work, and no real obligations. She guessed that this was virtually impossible, though, because she had to eventually get a job, she figured. "Well, I don't think I'd mind it," she said with a small giggle, "but I guess I understand." The bit about the cats brought on another round of giggles, but this time mercifully a briefer one, and she was able to talk at least a little bit through her laughing. "Hey, nothing's worth doing all day but sleeping and causing mayhem," she pointed out. "Your kitties have the right idea! How many do you have, anyway?" She cocked her head to one side. She'd probably recognize the names if she heard them, but it was pretty unlikely that she'd be able to name them all or anything like that.
Sandra didn't know much about music, but she did know at least that "philharmonic orchestra" sounded extremely fancy, and concert halls sounded seriously awesome either way. "Your job sounds awesome," she told her friend with wide eyes to show her interest. Then she thought of something and laughed. "Do you get to yell at people if they do stuff wrong or slack off? 'Cause then you should carry around a big stick and whack them with it." She nodded as if she'd just said something very wise. The idea of Nell actually smacking slackers around with a big stick was kind of hilarious, though... Then Sandra realized that she was a slacker, and she really didn't want to be hit with anything, so maybe it was better if Nell didn't. Well... then again, it wasn't like Sandra worked at the concert hall too, so she would be safe unless Nell started carrying that thing around everywhere. In all seriousness, though, she was glad to hear that Nell's business lately was mostly due to normal, run-of-the-mill things, and nothing tragic. At least, she would just have to take her friend's word for that, so there was nothing out of the ordinary, not as far as she could see. "That's good! Um... my grades are okay," she said, a little bit sheepish-looking -- she felt kind of like this was Matt making sure she was doing her homework or something. "Nothing too weird!"
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on May 12, 2012 14:53:43 GMT -5
Nothing about this converation was really normal, but that's okay. People weren't normal. Sometimes Nell had to wonder what the passersby thought, but they were probably too focused on which rides they wanted to go on next and eating their snacks. Which she supposed was a good thing since they were now speaking of laugh boxes because they totally do exist. "Touche," she agreed when Sandra said that hers would have been broken by now. She read omewhere that laughing was actually healthy, which was a good thing for Sandra, she supposed. "There is such a thing as over-exercising. Maybe. Or I could be lying to you, I don't know." Ironic that she be speaking of exercise when eating this unhealthy snack, but it did make her wonder if that really could happen. She didn't really set out to exercise, per say, but she played quite a bit of sports to keep her energy up.
Of course Sandra wouldn't mind it, and Nell remembered a time when she wouldn't have minded it either. Of course, it wasn't because she enjoyed sleep and lazing aroun like Sandra did. It was because she had just...given up on everything. It chilled her to even remind herself the way it had been. Sleeping more than she did anything else, the weight she'd lost. She did have to agree that cats did have a pretty awesome life. Especially since they didn't really have to do anything and they got free food and shelter every day. "We have five of them," Nell said. "Four are Josh's." She rolled her eyes playfully. He was the cat person here, the one who actually got Pablo for her. "And I was thinking of getting birds." Nell didn't want to make any decisions involving the mansion without her fiance's consent, however. It was weird thinking of how that was where she'd be spending the rest of her life with him. So she didn't think about it.
The Earth girl was flatterd to hear that Sandra thought t was a good job. Nell nodded her head a few times, sucking in her cheek before saying, "Mhmm, I get all up in their grill and go, 'you be slacking, holmes.' And then I fire them." She shrugged, like saying that's the way it had to be. Not having asked about it, she was only semi-certain that she had the power to fire people. "That's it," she said, patting her hands against the table, "I'm carrying a big stick. And speaking softly with it." Now she had the interesting image of her walking around the hall with a big stick, striking fear into the heart of innocent employees. She grinned and lifted her eyebrow at Sandra's shy response. "Uh huh," she said with a hint of playful incredulousness. "You know a great way to get up grades? Food. As reward. Would definitely make me work harder." She worked hard as it was, she didn't like to procrastinate or anything like that. But food would definitely be great as reward. She wondered if parents maybe did that, rewarded good grades, but she didn't know. "And food, I hope you've been eating good food. That does not involve hot sauce."
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on May 14, 2012 15:08:24 GMT -5
There probably was such thing as over-exercising, and Sandra was pretty sure that most people had managed to tire themselves out straining something in one way or another. Still, her original point still stood. Few people exercised their laugh boxes quite as much as Sandra herself, she was pretty sure, and if it were even possible to wreck such a thing, she would have done it years ago. She really couldn't help it, though -- she had the uncanny ability to see the positive light of most everything, and what was a day anyway without a bit (or a lot) of laughter? "Not for laugh boxes," she said, shaking her head as if she knew exactly what she was talking about. Sandra was kind of a boss at making up scientific facts, though -- her teachers didn't always appreciate it on tests, of course, but luckily she didn't have to make things up that often. Occasionally it worked. "Laugh boxes are special muscles! Or something. Are they even muscles...?"
She laughed as an image of Josh as some kind of old cat lady or something came up in her mind. Actually, now that she thought about it, that was kind of a hilarious image -- Joshua in one of those long grandma nightgowns or an apron, with graying hair and hunched over leaning on a cane, with thirty cats in the background... Ah, well, she was sure that Josh would never become a cat lady (and not only for the most obvious of reasons). He was too driven in life, from what she knew of him -- there was too much going for him to just suddenly wind up old and lonely and with that many cats. Then again, she'd never known that he liked cats before this moment, so there wasn't much Sandra knew about him. "Ooh, birds!" she said, giggling excitedly. It was a pretty adorable idea, Nell and Josh and a house full of cats and birds and whatever else they decided to get. "Oh, oh, oh, the kinds that talk? Becaues that'd be awesome. You could teach them to say really awesome things, like. Uh. Well. I don't know, but something awesome." She wondered how many times she'd just used the word "awesome".
The idea of Nell getting up in anyone's grill was kind of hliarious, but this was probably because "grill" made Sandra think of someone pretty huge and rich with a ton of mouth bling, and Nell was pretty tiny compared to this image of a person in her mind. Then again, little people could be pretty fearsome too. Sandra liked to make people believe that she was intimidating, at least, even though she wasn't sure it ever worked. "Woah, big boss Nell is probably scary," she said, inching away a little bit, but her laughter betrayed her. Her mild "fear" turned into positive shock when Nell actually decided that the big stick was a good idea, though. Well, Sandra supposed that it really had been her idea. She was an evil genius. "Please don't whack me with the big stick, though. But you should decorate it. Like a pimp cane." She waved off the bit about food as a reward for working harder, though. Even food probably wouldn't encourage Sandra that much, to be honest. "Wouldn't work anyway! I eat lots of food without all those extra steps of doing work first," she told Nell, smiling, but it was... actually a pretty accurate statement. "And what food doesn't involve hot sauce?! Except for candy." She paused, then added, gesturing to the plate in front of her, "And funnel cakes." Candy and funnel cakes were definitely special cases, though.
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on May 14, 2012 17:58:30 GMT -5
You can't over-exercise your laugh box? That was something interesting to consider. This was considering if such a thing was real. She took science classes, her father was a biochemist, she knew about things like this. She remembered all the stuff she used to read in her childhood. Nell was not so good around her friends, though, easily lapsing into joking, disregarding scientific basis. "Well, laughing is the epiglottis constricting the larynx." She wore an expression of triumph as she nodded her head and let out a soft 'ah' sound from her throat. "And they're muscles. So the laugh box must be..." She swallowed down the piece of funnel cake as she used her finger to gesture to her throat. "...Somewhere in this area." She coughed as she choked a bit on the funnel cake. "And that would be an epiglottis just constricting." She clapped a hand against her chest, shaking her head a bit. Nell needed to be a more careful eater.
She liked all kinds of birds, especially sparrows, so she couldn't really think of ones she wanted. All kinds, really. Nell wasn't really good at making decisions like this. She tended to get...overzealous. But there was nothing at all wrong with that. "Mhmm. Those are cockatiels, right? My friend has one that likes to curse." Instead of foul language, Nell was just going to teach the birds Spanish. Pablo wasn't really getting it. He understood some of the language, she believed. Commands, really. When she'd call him for dinner, she'd tell him cena and he'd come down. It was probably just the sound and not the language itself. "Maybe I can teach them to do tricks and junk. A little bird circus." The thought made her eyes glimmer in amusement, something to look toward. She enjoyed teaching things, especially to animals. Animal trainers must have loads of fun. She had to make note of that.
She grinned slyly and arched her fingers, growling a little bit. "Better believe it." Sometimes Nell did wish she could be intimidating so she could handle some situations better, but there was no such luck. Heels helped a little in the height factor, but that was about it. "And I need a pimp cup to carry around with my pimp cane. And a fuzzy hat. And a pimp name. Give me a pimp name, holmes." She leaned forward with interest, balancing her chin in her hands as she waited. It would have to be something to get her respect on the streets. "You have a point there," she stretched out her arms across the table, cracking her back. When you ate food a lot it was kind of hard to use that as incentive. "Maybe some other kind of reward." Something they didn't usually eat. Nell shook her head, trying her best not to laugh as she covered her mouth. "Your food pyramid is hot sauce, yo. Just one main food group." She nodded her head. "You've got a little Spanish heat in ya, ese. We like everything to be spicy." Her culture was a lot like that, she didn't know what it was. Maybe the heat of her home country. She spread her arms. "What would you do if like, there was a huge hot sauce shortage?"
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Post by SANDRA HARU CHANG on May 16, 2012 16:55:21 GMT -5
She was pretty sure she should know the meanings of these words from Biology class or something, but all Sandra really knew was that the epiglottis and larynx were, as Nell said, somewhere around the throat area. She didn't even know what exactly they were, though, so all these silly scientific terms were gibberish to her. Sandra just nodded as if she understood completely, though, and this stuff did kind of sound vaguely familiar, but not enough that she would actually be able to come up with a vaguely intelligent-sounding response. She did giggle a bit when Nell started choking though, at least once she was sure that her friend was actually okay and not about to choke to death or anything like that. "Woah woah, tell your epiglottis to cool its jets!" She couldn't imagine how that would even work at all, using one's throat to tell something in one's throat to calm down, but hey, this was a conversation about laugh boxes. "Though we should definitely hire a doctor or someone to find the laugh box. It exists somewhere in there!" She definitely wasn't volunteering to be cut open in this quest for a laugh box, though.
She'd never known very much about pets and animals in general at all, though she did have a particularly soft spot for puppies. She didn't know much at all about birds, though. "Cockatiels," she said aloud, liking the sound of the word. It was definitely a pretty amusing word to say. She'd heard this elsewhere before too, but she'd never actually known what they were -- mostly she called all talking birds "parrots" and all the other types of birds just "birds", unless they were something easy like pigeons or seagulls or something like that. "I figure they say whatever you teach them, though! Teach them to say cockatiel. That'd be fun." Cockatiel, cockatiel... Sandra was amusing herself way too much with nothing but a word. "Oh, do it! Then you can give them little circus outfits... What types of tricks can birds even do, though?" She couldn't think of any, but the idea of a bird acrobat was hilarious.
Nell was probably the least intimidating person Sandra had ever met, except for maybe small children and the like. She was cuter than she was anything else, just being so happy and... content to be who she was. That was definitely admirable to be sure, but it wasn't what she'd call scary, not even a little, and this was coming from Sandra. She could scare pretty easily sometimes. "Pimp cup, eh? I can probably get you one of those... and I think I have a fuzzy hat from Halloween some year. And what do pimp names even sound like?" Sandra asked, in complete seriousness for all of these points. She'd probably have to Google what a pimp cup looked like, but hey, how difficult could one be to find? Well... maybe it'd be a little bit difficult in Maple Hollow, which was a considerably quiet city compared to others, but she could probably poke her head around some of the freakier parts back in Vancouver. Then again, her parents probably wouldn't like her going around there. As for a fuzzy hat, she'd had some very weird Halloween costumes before, and well, Sandra had no reason to know what a pimp name was like. "The prize should be a lifetime supply of hot sauce... That would be awesome." She gave her bilingual friend a confused look next, though -- Spanish was really not something Sandra could boast knowledge of. "Ese?" she repeated, probably butchering the word. "Though can't argue with that! Spanish people are pretty awesome... And I think I'd just cry if there was a shortage. What about other spicy stuff? Peppers or something! Gone too?" That would be a true tragedy.
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Post by NELL DOE DALE on May 16, 2012 22:16:32 GMT -5
Eyes watering, Nell waved a hand in front of her face. Choking alway left her with a lovely sensation. "Yo epiglottis, better cool it." If only she had such control over her body. It would reassure the girl who was terrified of ever falling ill again. Unfortunately, humans weren't so lucky. You could only hope for a kickass immune system. "It's strange indeed that we have yet to find this enigmatic organ," she murmured, stroking her non-existent beard. Sandra seemed to really like the idea of cockatiels, which amused Nell to no end. Birds were pretty darn cool, she decided, and since there was a good chance she could get her hands on them, she was going to try. "Then it can be like a Pokemon and speak its own name." That was totally legit. It'd be better if the birds had super powerful attacks and Nell could journey the world wit them, but alas, she'd just have to settle for a circus. "Dunno," Nell said honestly, pursing her lips in thought. "Trapeze acts, maybe? They have those little perches." She'd still have to talk it over with Josh, though, so this was all hypothetical for now.
Nell's main knowledge of pimps came from listening to word on the street and movies. So she considered herself educated enough. "I'm going to go ahead and ask what you were that required a fuzzy hat." Maybe she had been a pimp. That was a costume, right? One year's experience taught her that there were all kinds of costumes. "And something along the lines of A Pimp Named Slickback. But you have to say the whole thing. Like A Tribe Called Quest." This was a class a example of What Nell Learns From Television. "You'll be eating hot sauce on hamburgers with your dentures." She shook her head, imagining elderly folk trying to consume such a large sandwich. It amused her a little too much and she bit back a laugh. Nell liked it when people questioned her about the language instead of bypassing it without knowing. She didn't like talking when people couldn't understand. "Kinda means like...homie. Bro. Or literally 'that one'." She nodded. She often spoke in Spanglish, it was easier for her considering she learned the two languages together. They were both technically her native tongue, and she had used them with equal frequency in her childhood. Her father was a stickler for having his daughters speak in the language. Sometimes she wondered if it was because he missed his childhood in the country, but she always thought it better not to wonder about that man.
Hot food too? Nell had to think about that. She did love her peppers, after all. "That'd be a sin," she decided. "But you never know." Nell's voice warbled as she moved her fingers around like she was telling a ghost story. "There was a butter shortage in Norway. Who can predict a hot sauce shortage in Canada?" Nell dropped her elbows to the table. "And you'd probably be the one responsible for it." As usual, Nell was doing her light friendly teasing. She loved Sandra and all her weirdness. It really lightened up her day to be around the girl. Especially nowadays. Her friends didn't know it, but they were her supposed system. Always would be. Noticing her food was gone, she said, "Ready to upchuck?" She had it on good authority that the whole waiting a half hour until swimming after eating was a lie, so she supposed the same thing would apply in this situation. They were tough, they could handle it.
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