Rodent fiction

Keek'k 8330 d'Chiqi v'Springdale had unfortunately been late to the meeting, and as a result, found himself volunteered to write the big report. His chief's instructions boiled down to, "Summarize the current projects, lay out the alternative directions for future projects and their estimated costs, and make a really good case for an interstellar trip because that's the direction I want to go in."

Keek'k didn't necessarily agree with that, but since he could make the case to himself that any of the directions were good, because they were all space exploration, he was willing to go along with the chief's slant.

One thing the chief hadn't mentioned, that Keek'k thought he'd better include, was the buy-in status of the various Families on the existing projects, and the likelihood of non-Squirrel support for each alternative, monetary and otherwise. The Chinchillas, he knew, would be all for building another large orbital station in addition to the four already in orbit; they wanted to start holding Contests in space. Their Contests drew audiences from all over the world to South Twin Continent to see the various sporting events, and over the last 50 years, they had expanded the Contests to include sports of other Families, a very successful move. The Chinchillas loved zero gravity, as long as there was plenty of room - the ones who worked on the orbital stations almost universally went through a period where they acted as if zero gravity were an intoxicating drink, and it took a couple of weeks for the newbies to settle down and get to work. (You couldn't get a Chinchilla to undertake a long trip in a small ship, but give them space to move around, and they were happy.) But Keek'k knew that even with major Chinchilla support, a recreational orbital station would not be a big enough priority with other Families to warrant serious consideration. But was there some sort of minor project that the Squirrels could allocate to the Chinchillas that would include sports, as a way to convince them to buy in to the more serious projects? Would an interstellar ship perhaps be large enough to convince the Chinchillas to participate?

Almost all of the projects were engineered by the Beavers, and Keek'k knew they would view an interstellar trip as another engineering challenge - but if they wanted to go along, that would increase costs significantly; a ship built to accomodate the larger-bodied Families, and hold supplies for them, could cost billions more. Of course, there was the offsetting savings of having members of a longer-lived Family on board - less training of new generations, for example - but would that be enough?

random tidbits

I was reading an article in the 6/25/07 New Yorker, which was about the new books written about Princess Diana. It mentioned that she left prep school with an award for the best-kept guinea pig. I thought people ought to know that.

Prevention magazine mentions that Haagen-Dazs has new flavors including Pomegranate Chip and Coconut Sesame Brittle.

I have more magazines piled here, which I will get around to soon.

Rodent fiction

A digression regarding names
Keek'k was born in the year 8330 [1]; his mother's name is Chiqi, and his hometown/clan (those concepts overlap) is Springdale.

[1] 8330 years since the invention of writing, and, therefore, of recorded history. Since the year system wasn't invented until several hundred years after writing was (by the Squirrels, of course), the exact year may be different, but this is the system and start date People have agreed on, after a couple of millenia of squabbling.

Like the Squirrels, Guinea Pig names are entirely audible, and Keek'k has no trouble dealing with them. However, several Families have names that consist in part or in whole of gestures and/or pheromones. Chinchilla names, for example, consist entirely of tail and hand gestures. The Squirrels have adopted a notation system for these, so that names can be written down, but there is always some squabbling; a Chinchilla from one town will insist that his name be written as TC3TC5H3TF1, while a Chinchilla from another town will insist that the same name should be spelled TC2TC5H3TF1. Chinchilla passports contain heiroglyphs of the gestures, as well as Squirrel notation, to try and reduce confusion.

While the Mice-and-Rats, and indeed most of the Myo SuperFamily, are concentrated on Large Continent, and more toward the eastern and south-eastern sides of that, there are a few everywhere. Names for most of these Families, including Mice-and-Rats, Hamsters, Lemmings, and Voles, among others, tend to be "audible" in that they are spoken - but they are above the audible range for most Families in the other two SuperFamilies, the Sciurs and the Cavs. So they can be spelled, but when Squirrels are speaking to a Mouse-or-Rat, they usually spell out the names in Common Hand, as well as say them in a lower range. Most of the Myo languages are tonal, as well as largely supersonic to Squirrels, so in fact, although one can speak to the Mice-and-Rats, one usually uses Common Hand. The disadvantage of Common Hand is that it doesn't work that well for audible names. However, everybody knows it, along with their own Family language. For written matters, Squirrel is nearly universal; many other Families never did develop their own writing, and even among those who did, Squirrel Written is taught to all the children. Transportation all over the world - air, ground, and water - is always handled in Squirrel.