Virtual Quill

Happy Mother’s Day to all moms out there. Kell gets up early, and I called her at dawn before Fenton and I went to sleep for the day. Then I heard later that she went back to bed so Rudy and Coney could “surprise” her with breakfast. This year the main course was a particularly dense weasel, and Kell said it was delicious. Fenton called his mom as well.
Classes for the Spring semester are coming to an end here at Beige U. I’m still working at the lab as I pursue my Master’s in genetics, and Fenton is slowly working on his Bachelor’s in computer science. Due to his Hare-Link responsibilities he only takes three classes a semester, but he doesn’t mind. He has a job already, so there’s no rush.
A sleepy quiet summer looms after the students depart from this small college town. We’re getting used to its unique rhythms, which seems to suit our nature. We both feel we made a good choice settling here. Of course, Tree is the one most permanently rooted. (Pun) Like last summer, I’m sure we’ll see a lot of our bee neighbors across the street.

While Aby and her staff at the shop work to create a new ride for Mark Meadowvole, a team of MOUSCAR officials visited him. Even though he participated in just one race (and didn’t even get to finish it), he excited the fans with his deft maneuvering in the short time he was in the maze. The officials are now trying to capitalize on that.
There were discussions on exactly how to market him, as if he were a piece of meat. (That must have been uncomfortable for him, especially considering that Herd Thinners is his main sponsor.) MOUSCAR takes each driver and spins a caricature of his or her personality to their audience to built identification (and course, to sell merchandise).
With Mark they took a basic fact; namely, that he is dating Aby, and presented that as a sign of an insane danger-seeker...”Crazy Mark” Meadowvole. Nothing could be further from the truth. While possessing an iron will, he is genial and pleasant in person. He went along with it, though, since he hasn’t yet established himself on the Scamper Cup circuit.
Aby says the new car should be ready toward the end of summer, in time for the the last few races of the season.

Gran frequently comes over to the house to look after Coney on weekends, since Dad and Kell both have demanding careers and Elanor needs a break sometimes. This weekend for the first time, Gran’s visit coincided with one of Coney’s play dates with Lin Lee.
Actually, the play date was necessitated by Lin’s mother conferencing with Dad and the Hare-Link staff in the basement offices over the ISP’s legal issues in regards to privacy. Fenton and I participated over Skype. The recommendations were all common sense ones, but it’s always valuable to refresh ourselves on them.
While that was going on, Lin met Gran for the first time, and right away she got on Gran’s bad side. Gran handled it well, taking the girls outside to play games that Lin had one experienced before; namely, games for little herbivores. She’d already taught them to Coney as a toddler who, in her innocence, hadn’t seen them as specific to any particular group at the time.
That’s not the case now. There probably won’t be any immediate consequences, but we’ll have to see how things play out. As it stands both girls will be going to Predator Camp for the summer, while Coney’s cousin Wendell will be across the lake at the Herbivore Camp.

The pollen around here, always heavy in April, is approaching mythic proportions. The mild March weather was jet fuel to the local flora’s reproductive systems, and the output has been stupendous. A pollen count of over 9,000 particles per cubic meter was recorded back home.
Tree is a prime offender, and she’s apologetic. Being sentient she’s one of the only individuals of her species that realizes what she’s doing to the rest of us, but she’s really powerless to stop it. The La Nina weather pattern has put her natural behaviors into overdrive, and she can’t stop them any more than I could stop my quills from growing.
Due to eating the vegetation all year, Dad isn’t sensitive to breathing it in. Less lucky is Kell, who is miserable. With her demanding job she can’t afford to take time off, so she loads up on antihistamines.
The prey species initially saw the pollen as a boon, since they thought the clouds of it would hide them from predators. Then their sneezing started giving them away.

As I write this, Danielle is doing the family’s taxes. The finances got a lot more complicated, as 2011 was the first full year with Kell making CEO money. Danielle is up to the task, though, and she’ll be handsomely compensated.
The other big news was Kell appearing on the NPR (National Predator Radio) quiz show “Wait, Wait...Don’t Kill Me!” as their celebrity guest. We listen to it every week. It’s hosted by Peter Seagull with the announcer Carl Kestrel.
Usually the show is done from Chicago, but sometimes they go on the road and this week they were here at the CornCob Energy Center. Kell was invited on to promote the new Herd Thinners line of insect meals; now starting its second year of operation. In return for the free publicity she had to answer three questions in the “Not My Prey” segment...about rabbit meat.
She kept her composure and got two correct (while intentionally getting the third wrong in order to make predators think rabbits tasted like tofu). That was enough to win the prize for the home listener: Carl Kestrel’s mating call on their voice mail.
All in all it went well, and everyone was pleased. If you’d like to listen to the show, go here. Of course, it’s probably very different in the human world.

It’s never a normal Easter back home when Rudy is fulfilling his duties as the county Easter Bunny. As usual he was accompanied by Fiona (who sees it as yet another opportunity to cosplay). Dad performed his usual support service, and the new wrinkle was little Wendell coming along for the first time in an official capacity.
It was rather awkward when Wendell showed up dressed as Rudy, right down to the shades. Despite that the evening went smoothly, as Wendell did demonstrate a talent for the job.
That’s when the unthinkable occurred; one of the eggs hatched. These are all supposed to be non-viable, and hard-boiled to boot. Yet, one was locked and loaded.
Dad identified it as a cuckoo, a species which sneaks its eggs into the nests of others to be raised by them. It seems that one Mother Bird got wise to the scam and dealt with the impostor by placing the egg amid the ones for distribution.
Wendell kept it from being eaten by Rudy and Fiona, which caused a problem. What could be done with it? Once the eggs were successfully distributed, Dad called me.
Thanks to my new relationship with the Birds, I put out a request for volunteers to adopt the hatchling willingly. A parrot family came forward, and now he’s safe and sound.
All in a night’s work.

Fenton and I drove up to Domain, and the whole family went downtown to visit the High Museum. They were having a special exhibit on 20th century artists, and we wanted to view it before it closed on April 29. Piling into the minivan were Dad, Kell, me, Fenton, Rudy, Coney, Dorothy and Elanor.
Many of the works were on loan from MOMA, and all the Big Guns were in attendance: Picasso, Matisse, Pollock... all the way up to Warhol whose great talent was ultimately in the area of self-promotion. But I digress.
Rudy’s interest in art comes and goes, waxing and waning with his athletic accomplishments. Now it’s competing with his gardening competition with Dad, so I hope he doesn’t let it slide completely. Perhaps one day he’ll synthesize all of these fields. Perhaps this show will inspire him. Or, maybe he’ll just end up drawing lame parodies of the works.
Meanwhile, next week at this time Rudy will be delivering Easter eggs. He’ll have Fiona with him as usual, but this year he’ll also be mentoring little Wendell. We’ll see how that battle of wills goes.

Kell usually has lunch with R.L. about once a month, since he’s CEO Emeritus of Herd Thinners and because he and Angelique hold a great deal of company stock. It’s not a controlling interest, but enough to have a major influence on the company. It’s a good idea for her to keep him in the loop.
She’s instigated some reforms that he disagreed with, but he’s let her go ahead with them and they’ve paid off. The company stock price has risen on her watch, but as R.L. pointed out, it’s all about the perception of beating expectations.
She emerged from the lunch quite unnerved. All he has to do is issue one statement of No Confidence in her, and the Board would vote that she be dismissed. That’s never happened before, but only because previous CEOs didn’t survive a physical challenge. (R.L. was the first CEO to actually retire while still alive.)
Dad wondered why Kell hasn’t replaced the Board with those loyal to her. She’s tried, but that has to be a gradual process or less the business community will get spooked by “turbulence” within the company. Out of a dozen members she only has a couple absolutely loyal supporters. (All canines, of course.)

Back when Aby was converting Mark’s Camaro into a race-winning vehicle, she surreptitiously installed every safety feature known to automotive science. She felt she had to do this in secret because she assumed that a mouse brave enough to date her would have objected to the extra weight of those protective elements...and that a risk taker like him would see them as useless or worse, as unnecessary things slowing him down.
They didn’t slow him at all, since he was leading the field as the drivers navigated the maze. It was then that his rival Sam Sewerrat unveiled his own secret: rotating blades to cut through the hedges of the maze.
He emerged on the other side of the barrier, directly into the path of Mark who T-boned him. Both cars were totaled, but thanks to Aby’s foresight Mark was unhurt. That was when he revealed that he’d known about her life-saving strategies all along.
Mr. Sewerrat suffered only minor injuries, and was able to escape before the MOUSCAR authorities could prosecute his blatant cheating. Kell vowed that Herd Thinners would sponsor a replacement car, but unfortunately it will be months before it’s ready.

Kell doesn’t usually use her newfound power and influence as CEO for personal reasons, but an opportunity arose for Herd Thinners to increase its profile among a new demographic: MOUSCAR race fans. She agreed that the company would sponsor the vehicle driven by Aby’s partner Mark Meadowvole.
The Camaro was already in race condition (thanks to Aby) and her staff of mechanics at the garage made up the pit crew. It was a dream come true for all of them, and their enthusiasm showed.
It took three weeks for the paperwork to clear (A timeframe shortened by the cash that the company directed to the proper locations). Mark was cleared to compete in his first Scamper Cup series race this weekend.
Interest was high, and the dividends paid off immediately for the company in increased sales that were far above the costs of the racing team. It was a successful marketing strategy for Kell, but she was admittedly unfamiliar with the details of the sport. It was left to Dad to explain those during the race.
Kell pointedly sat in the bleachers instead of the owners skybox which she gave to HT employees who’d won a company-wide raffle. Kell wanted to take in the full experience, and she wasn’t disappointed.
Next week: a full report on the race itself!

Hearing about Coney and her friends at the Happy Little Predator Preschool takes me back to my days growing up in the rabbit warren. Mainly, I think of the contrasts between the two.
I had been concerned that Coney’s appearance would cause her to be an outsider in that setting; that the other children would see her as prey and (while not eating her; the staff is trained to prevent that) would simply ostracize her. Instead she impressed them all with her carnivorous skills, and now they see her rabbit exterior as a form of hunting subterfuge allowing her to lull prey into letting down their guard. In truth, I’ve rarely seen this strategy employed by her, and never intentionally. Coney is 100% wolf underneath her bunny fur, and wolves generally attack straight on without engaging in such ruses.
Coney’s best friend is Lin Lee, whom I’ve written about before. The two of them have bonded; perhaps because they’re both top achievers who nevertheless have issues that come from high expectations. I’m glad they’ve found each other.
That’s quite different from my solitary experience growing up among rabbits, but that’s how it goes in a school system where Fluffiness is part of the graded curriculum.

I have to hand it to Dad. He knows exactly how to handle Rudy.
Rudy’s innate competitiveness is among his prime qualities (both pro and con) and engaging with him is a process of channelling it into productive directions. Hence, Dad has issued a challenge to see which of them grows the most food from their gardens by autumn.
Rudy actually has some advantages here. Coney has allowed him to use the small plot that she’d maintained just to keep Gran happy. In addition to having more land he has the added edge in that, as a carnivore, he won’t be tempted to eat the produce during the course of the summer.
Whatever he grows will be sold online; as we discovered last year there’s a market for vegetables grown by a wolf. Some herbivores get a placebo-like feeling that the food’s dangerous origins give it more flavor. Go figure. I’d like to see that theory survive a double-blind test.
The main thing, though, is that Rudy has something to focus his energies on. For that, we’re all grateful.

It was Valentine’s Day this week, so I knew better than to check in back home; I knew the folks would be preoccupied. They out-do even us newlyweds.
For once, Valentines’ Day wasn’t just another day of the week for Aby. (It’s strange not calling her Ms. Eyeshine, but she correctly pointed out that I’m a married woman now, and one of the perks of that status is being able to call everyone of any age by their first name.)
Aby asked Kell for a recommendation of a good interspecies restaurant, and she and Mark went to an establishment that Kell and Dad frequent. However, while the waitstaff was used to my folks, they weren’t prepared for cat and a mouse. There was initial confusion that was quickly rectified.
Meanwhile, Fenton and I are swamped with our studies and could only manage a quick dinner break on Tuesday. I told you we were out-done in the romance department.
Lastly, Rudy finally gave up his MyTree account and switched over to Facebook. Help him out here.

I’ll be reporting on my findings when I have them. Like any good researcher I won’t announce anything until I have results that will stand up to peer review.
In the meantime life goes on back home. At the Caliban Academy sports awards banquet Rudy was the big winner. He took home the trophy for Top Carnivore, and from what I hear he earned it during the season. Even though he rarely hunted in one-on-one competition, he put up big numbers in two- and four-predator hunts. This allowed him to focus on his strengths at bringing down prey while not being impacted by his tracking difficulties. In those cases Fiona’s amazing sense of hearing them to their quarry.
Then there’s the matter of his motivation. Ever since last year’s Easter Bunny assignment was saved by the whole Kindle clan, Rudy had to grow a garden for them in return. Rudy does keep his promises, and he surprised everyone (including himself and especially Dad) by producing some outstanding vegetables. The accolades poured in from the herbivores, and it seems that Rudy felt he had to prove he was still a meat eater.
Still, due to popular (and monetary) demand, he’ll be growing another garden this year.

Dad’s plan, it turned out, was to basically drive around the maze staying out of Mark Meadowvole’s way. He wanted to create a yes/no situation for the mouse in which one outcome would be to never see Aby again. If Mark did, in fact, love her, he would choose reconciliation. The relationship would either be saved, or it didn’t exist in the first place.
Dad could hear Mark’s Camaro come to a halt, meaning that in a face-saving gesture Mark was letting him win. Upon reaching the carrot Dad called Aby with the news.
Aby was just outside the maze and was there to meet Mark at the exit. At that point she offered to create a fund for families of prey lost to predators with the revenue from servicing the Herd Thinners, Inc. fleet of company vehicles. (The irony was so thick it showed up on the weather map.) Of course it will start small with just the immediate town of Domain, but that’s how all big ideas begin.
Meanwhile, the Beige U. genetics lab received a large grant from a mysterious source. (Guess who.) They strongly requested that I be put in charge of it, so suddenly I have both the funding and the school research lab’s resources to pursue my line of inquiry into the instinct loss issue.