The following anecdote was received and published by several different journals all at the same time. Although not all of them published quite the same version, seeing fit to remove or embellish bits, enough versions appeared in print to give fairly strong evidence that the following is the source they all pulled from.  _______________________________________________ 

Tim 

Hey, so Tom, Gordon and I found this scribbling mimir at a junk sale;

Tom

We’d never seen a scribbling one before, only the chattering kind.

Tim 

Yeah, it was pretty spad so we grabbed it. And now we actually have something to tell it, don’t we?

Gordon

Snuf, I suppose. Course, we always do, but this one’s special. Tom, you want to start us off?

Tom

K, so lets see, where to start. So, one day we was standing by the ol’ vacant lot--

Tim 

--The grassy one on eighth--

Tom

--yeah, not the one by the sward, it’s to busy. Anyways, we was there, chucking red-hot javelins.

Gordon

Probably ought to say we really like javelins. For the fair we have to get them through these big target things, but we like the small light ones better, so we heat them up red-hot and use these sliding sheath things to huck them with.

Tim 

Kind of like an atlatl but with no arm, if you’ve seen those things.

Tom

Not even! What are you talking about, Tim?

Tim 

They are so like an atlatl. Little things you hold that hold the javelin; just because they don’t look or work the same doesn’t mean they aren’t similar.

Gordon

Anyway, as we practiced, up came this chick. No, I go too far; not a chick, just a lady. Well, no, not a lady, really, but a woman, but calling her a “woman” makes her sound so normal; maybe what I mean is a...

Tom

Pike it, Gordon. No one really cares what you call her.

Gordon

I do. If you don’t listen to what you say, you’ll never learn to speak correcter.

Tim 

More correct.

Gordon

That’s what I said. Correcter.

Tim 

No, see, “correcter” isn’t a word. You have to say “more correct” instead.

Gordon

How would you know?

Tim 

Me ma told me.

Gordon

Oh, well in that case.

“More correct” is correcter than “correcter,” you say?

Tim 

That’s what ma says.

Gordon

That’s good enough for me. More correct it is.

Tom

All done with the metaspeak now? Good.

So, we was chucking javs when this gal comes and says, “Hey, whatcha doin’?” And Tim here says back to her “Throwin’ javelins.” Like she didn’t know that already.

Tim 

Hey, I was just trying to be nice. She was plain and all that, but nice and smart-looking.

Tom

Yeah, when she asked us what we was doin’ when she could see plain as glass what we was doin’, the first thing I thought was, “Now there’s a real bright cutter.”

Gordon

Gotta admit though, she turned out to be a blood.

Tom

Yeah, but she didn’t put it on at first, did she?

Tim 

Most don’t, not the real sangies don’t. Anyways, she comes over and we chat about the javelins for a bit.

Gordon

She actually tried to toss one, red-hot, and didn’t do to bad, either.

Tom

So, after we chat for a bit she asks us if we want to go to her house with her. I’ve never been to a lady’s house before, so I wasn’t sure;

Gordon

Can’t be to careful, and we knew she’s an alien by now.

Tim 

Yeah, so we decides to talk it over in the cant.

I says “Et shesa nokit?” what if she’s a hooker?

Tom

And I says, “Peelyo! Snitnokit, sgysh!”, Look at her; she’s no hooker, she’s ugly.

Tim 

Well, I disagrees, so I says “Snitgysh. Blah, snitgysh.” Not ugly, plain but not ugly.

Gordon

At this point I pointed out “Peelt peel. Sarit; trys, ooner.” You’ve got to look to see (it’s sort of a proverb back home); but it’s ok, we outnumber her three to one.

That sort of settled that, so Tom here says to her, “K,” and we goes.

Tim 

Had to put up the javs and that first, of course.

Gordon

Yeah. So anyway, we gets to her kip and yowza, but it’s a regular burg! I mean, like it looks on the outside like a big brick box, but on the inside it’s got desks and shelves and a little house off in one corner and lazer eggs and lazer slugs and pipods and trinkets galore and heaps and heaps of little bits and parts to make things with and...well, all that.

Tom

Not only that; there’s also two other cutters there; this chick in britches and a wiry little basher in a jumpsuit.

Gordon

Yeah, so we talks to the three of them for a bit and they gives us lazer slugs and pipods and hires us to go down to the socks.

Tim 

Whoa up there, berks! You’re talking up a storm, but not explaining anything.

Tom

’Course not. The Cowbird did that already.

Tim 

Not everything, though! Plus you’ve left out the connectors. Look, so this lady was Sam Smoot, with Yolk and Corky in tow, and they had to explain the whole thing to us--

Tom

(Not to me. I actually read the rag myself earlier)

Tim 

--and teach us how to use everything and all that.

Tom

(Didn’t send him his precious money, though)

Gordon

True, I forgot to mention that they taught us how to make our own pipods before we left.

Tom

(I think he’s a maggot to even think of asking for money)

Tim 

Well, mostly. They didn’t teach us how to get the smord, did they? But as it turned out, that was the easy part with the Socks.

So, I don’t think our friendly neighborhood Doctor of Magi--

Tom

(Doctor of Magots, you mean)

Gordon

(Pike it, Tom)

Tim 

--Dr. Green, MgD, told you anything about lazer slugs, and they are kind of important.

Tom

Yeah, like every javelineer’s dream! Basically, they are the same as our javelin sheaths, except smooth and rounded and they generate their own javelins out of a stick of braided lazer.

Gordon

There’s supposed to be another version coming out soon, but the one we’ve got now is a regular cutter’s co-op.

Is there anything else we need to say about SIGS?

Tim 

Nice folk. I liked them.

Gordon

You like everyone!

Tom

He doesn’t like the big Sock, does he?

Tim 

Oh, sure, I just love barmies who have enough power to destroy the world by sneezing. They are just my favorite people in the whole wide world--if it really is a world--

Gordon

Tim, you’re giving away the plot!

Tim 

Like anyone who reads this doesn’t already know the outcome....

Tom

They might not. I met some proletariat who told me the world was really flat.

Gordon

Smart proletariat.

So, anyway, we got on our pipods and went down to the Gattah desert. Pretty drive, you ought to try it some time.

Hey, mimir, you want to copy down this map?

---

___ Figure 1: Map of salient places

---

Tom

So, we had some pretty simple instructions from the folk. We were to become the Sock’s constant companions, freezing on his every action. “Stick to him like a limpet” was how Yolk put it, and Yolk is a man after my own heart.

Gordon

I’ll say! Did you see his wife?

Tim 

Gord! Scrub yourself, berk.

Gordon

Sorry.

Tim 

They wanted us to figure out what he was planning to do, and they told us he would only try to kill us if we acted scared or threatening.

Tom

“Act like buffoons,” that’s what Yolk told us to do. “It should be pretty easy for you; you look like buffoons already, and I think you might actually be buffoons too.”

Tim 

(For the record, “buffoon” means something in between barmy and berk, with a bit of fop thrown in for good measure)

Gordon

Anyway, we got our directions all mixed up. Not my fault, mind you,

Tom

nor mine,

Tim 

and certainly not mine,

Gordon

but we got mixed up anyway, and ended up stopping for directions at the croc hole.

Tom

Hey, that reminds me, we forgot to tell the croc story, didn’t we?

K, so while we were at SIGS’ place we had luncheon, and so Yolk went up to the attic to get some dishes and as he was coming down stairs, Corky called up to him and said, “Look out for the crock!” and he jumped like a barmy in a circus and dumped the dishes all over, but what she meant was the crock pot! Khee hee hee! Khee hee hee <snort> Khee hee hee! Khee hee hee <snort> Khee hee hee! Heh heh heh heh, Whooooooooo...<snicker>.

Tim 

Tom! Take a short stick!

Gordon

<snicker> It was pretty funny....

Tim 

Yeah, like busting open your head is funny--

Tom

Bwa! ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ...

Tim 

Tom!

Tom

Busting your head! Hee hee hee ho ho <snicker> hee hee ha whoooooo...Wow! Oh my, heh heh, whew!

Tim 

Uh, Mimir? You’d better stop for a bit. Getting a bit cuffy here; we’ll tell you when we need you again.

..........................................................

Gordon

K, so we’re back.

Tom

And we’re calm and logical this time.

Gordon

So we can finish telling this story without Tim popping us again. There was really no need to be so harsh about it, Tim, it’s not like we wanted trouble or anything.

Tim 

Hmph.

Gordon

So, we stop at this mud hole in some savanna somewhere, because we were lost and we saw people down there.

Tom

Also because one of them startled me and I slipped. Pipods are really great when you’re flying high, except that if you don’t fly real smooth they sort of slip and next thing you know it’s all you can do to avoid full-out free-fall. Sam warned us of this, and tried to explain about how it was unavoidable for some reason, not just a glitch with the current model.

Anyway, there I was before Gordon and Tim could catch up, on the ground beside a group of tan-robed men. The force of the landing had numbed me, and my pipod had slipped out from under me only to float sideways in the middle of the mud puddle. I was going to go after it, but one of the men shouted something and tackled me, which turned out quite a good thing; as I lay under him, I saw a huge crocodile lunge from the mud and swallow my pipod.

Gordon

It was about then that Tim and I arrived on the scene. There were eight men there, besides us, and each had a large barbed javelin with a length of rope. We guessed they were hunting the crocs, though it seemed a dangerous operation and they seemed somewhat distracted by our appearing on the scene.

Tim 

Well, we collapsed out pipods and slung them onto our backs. Gord pulled out his slug, while I ran to Tom to make sure he was alright. It was a pretty long fall he had taken.

Gordon

Meanwhile, I gave the men a howdy, but they didn’t understand me, nor I them. We jabbered for a bit like so many starlings, then I shrugged and turned to join them in the hunt. Before anything else of interest happened, Tim and Tom had joined me in this stance, so when the croc made its next move there were a total of eleven men, armed and ready, standing on the side of the old water hole.

Tom

So, eleven strong, all eyes looking for the croc, and I was the one to see it first; In fact, I had put a full seven feet of lazer into it before anyone else even noticed it was there. Not quite enough to flash it, for it was one of the largest crocs I have ever seen, so it started glowing and smoking, emitting big bubbles of slimy yellow smoke and shining like an underwater fire.

Tim 

There was a good deal of noise at this; Gord and I congratulating Tom for his excellent eye, the other men shouting in surprise and confusion; they hadn’t realized, I think, that our lazer slugs could generate glowing javelins like that, and seemed more than a little put off by it. I tried to show them there was nothing to fear, but Tom and Gord lost no time slugging the croc a few more times.

Gordon

There was no time to waste. It was going down fast, and if we didn’t get it soon it would be too dim and obscured by mud to see.

Tom

Get it we did, though, with a most satisfying flash and, carried upward by its own bubble of smoke, it was soon floating unconscious on the surface of the pool.

Tim 

Well, by now I had gotten through to the men that we were alright, and convinced one of them to harpoon the croc, so it was soon pulled ashore.

Tom

We knew it wasn’t dead, though the men seemed to think otherwise, but fortunately they decided it was too heavy to carry, so one of them pulled out his knife and started cutting the thing into pieces.

Gordon

And guess what was inside its belly: not only the body of Tom’s pipod, but also a nearly life-sized obsidian statue of a man, broken into several pieces.

Tim 

Well, the statue was too heavy to carry, so we left it behind, but we took the pipod bits and helped the men carry the meat back to their village.

As we go, I starts talking to them, and finds they really are speaking the same language as us, they just pronounce it real different.

Gordon

I still say it was a different language.

Tom

Tim’s right. I could almost understand them sometimes.

Tim 

They tell us they had a giant come from the same water hole a while back and stay with them for a few days. I thought this was more than slightly weird, so I asked them about it. They said something about how the hole has a really really large footprint, and almost any reasonably straight path in the area runs into it. That’s why the crocs do so well, which in turn is why they hunt there.

Gordon

When Tim told us this, we were all baffled. What’s it mean, a large footprint? We couldn’t figure it out. We felt like idiots later on, of course, for not understanding, but we didn’t get the info from the villagers so you’ll have to wait a bit for the explanation.

Tom

So anyway, we stayed at the village that night, got our directions, fixed the pipod in the morning, and were off again by noon.

Gordon

Right, so we flew pretty low that day because the folks had told Tim that we needed to look for certain landmarks; but we didn’t find any of them, and we got where we were going anyway, so about all the low flight did for us was make us hot and sweaty.

Tim 

But we did get there, right to sock city around sunset. And you have to admit, speeding over sand dunes and through rocky canyons at several times faster than any bird is spad.

Tom

Yeah! well worth the jink.

Tim 

Uh, there wasn’t any jink involved.

Tom

Well, if there had been it still would’ve been worth it. Gord’s right, though; if I was paying for it I’d rather go in cooler weather.

Tim 

There isn’t any cooler weather! It’s a tropical desert!

Gordon

Anyway, we got to sock city around sundown and approached the main gate on foot,--

Tim 

can’t use a pipod in crowds; someone’ll break the neck.

Gordon

--getting in without much trouble. We thought there’d be a row, what with their neighbors at war with them and us being foreigners and all, but there wasn’t any difficulty at all.

Tim 

I dunno. We did have to grease their bouncer’s palms a bit...

Gordon

That’s why Sam gave us the werebane. And it worked like a dream.

Tim 

Still, I don’t approve of bribery like that.

Tom

Well, who does? I mean, we’d all like to get in without loosing any jink over it, but then like Gordon said, they wasn’t our stingers anyway.

Tim 

So we get into the city and find ourselves a cozy little kip that’s got some really nice grub and call it a night.

Gordon

I dunno about the grub. Their cheese was a bit runny.

Tom

I wish I had gotten the cheese. I like it runny.

Gordon

Yeah, but this was very runny.

Tom

No matter, no matter. It would’ve been better than the meat-thing I had.

Gordon

I think it was runnier than you like it, Tom.

Tom

I don’t care how excrementally runny it was, it must have been better than the leather they served me!

Tim 

Scrub yourself, Tom! Besides, Gordon already ate it, there’s no use talking about it now.

Gordon

Yeah, I did eat it, and I don’t remember you getting sick from your steak...

Tom

You didn’t get sick from the cheese, you oaf. You got sick because of the big Sock.

Gordon

Yeah? Well, you would’ve too if you had had very runny cheese sloshing about in your belly all night, weakening your immune system before lunch.

Tim 

Pike it! If I hear one more word about the cheese or the steak--

Tom

That was no steak, it was a piece of leather

Tim 

Mimir, if they keep this up, just--

Tom

--keep on writing. It’s two against one, Tim.

Gordon

Not if you insist on calling that steak a piece of leather, it’s not! That was a really nice steak!

Tom

How would you know? You were too busy slurping your cheese to even know what was going on.

Gordon

Too busy! What are you talking about? Who was it that had to go get a rag when someone made a mess, hmm?

Tim 

Mimir, do you have an eraser, perchance?

Tom

Hey, it wasn’t me that placed the pitcher right in front of my plate.

Gordon

Well if you hadn’t of been tearing your steak apart like some sort of cave man, it wouldn’t have mattered where the pitcher was!

Tim 

I’d like to see you eat it any other way, bubber.

Tim 

Ah, I think I found the off switch. Here goes nothing!

. .........................................................

Tim 

Guys, this is getting old. Think we can make it twenty minutes without a disturbance this time?

Gordon

Come on, Tim, it was laughing last time, arguing this time. We aren’t repeating the same mistake twice or anything.

Tom

Yeah, we come up with new mistakes every time.

Tim 

Creative.

Tom

If you’re going to be sarcastic about it, we can just turn off the mimir until you feel better.

Gordon

Oh, pike it.

So, the next morning we head for the big Sock’s compound The city’s a bustling place, and downright confusing. We asked this merchant for directions at one point and he replied by pointing out that the compound was to the west so our best bet was to head northeast for two blocks, then turn and head south for five before turning west-sou-west for the rest of the trip. Strange, but it worked somehow.

Tim 

Well, we get to the compound and now we have a challenge, because we can’t say the big Sock’s name and people here don’t call him the big Sock. So we go to the door of the compound and I ask to see the boss. This didn’t quite work, though; the guard just said “wha?”

Gordon

So I says, “Ee speelt flash topodon,” and the guard says, “I don’t getcha.” and I says, “Oosa blinker? Ee speelt flash topodon, oos cheese. Eesese kip, ne?”

Tom

Which means “We’re looking for the head topologist.” “What, are you stupid? We’re looking for the head topologist, your boss. This is his compound, isn’t it?” I don’t think the guard understood, but it worked out in the end because he went to get someone who might,

Tim 

and while he was gone we let ourselves in. My idea, I’m afraid; I mean, he left the peep hole open, and we didn’t have anything to loose except our lives (which we have never shown much respect for before) so why not?

Anyway, I lead the way into the compound and we start searching for the big Sock. Well, with our luck we find him right away; as we’re walking down the hallway along comes the boss himself surrounded by a dozen armed men.

Tom

I know he’s called the big Sock because of the shoeless nation he lives in, but anyone who wanted to be unkindly just would call him that anyway. Big tall guy, taller than any of us, but he droops just like a soiled sock when you try to get it to stand on end. Smelled pretty bad too; obviously doesn’t pay much attention to toiletries and such.

Gordon

Well, the men the Sock was with all looked kind of put-out to see us there, but the Sock himself looked more curiously daft than anything else, so I walked right up to him, grabbed him warmly by the hand and said to him in my most enthusiastic tone,

“Ol’ Sockie! Flash me, but it’s been a while! How are you, you ol’ spoonbender you?”

“Pleát^.a?” he asked, peering into my face. “Is that you?”

Well, I wasn’t sure if I should say yes or no,

Tom

so I walked up and said it for him:

“Cheese, boy, don’t you remember us at all? Gord, Tim, aye Tom? You’ve been peel’n’ too much bendery, boy! Lost you memory down one of them Klein bottle things again?”

Tim 

Well, this seemed to set the big Sock to thinking, but the other men seemed to take it not well at all. One of them gave Tom a shove and said something about being a runt, so I gave him a few feet of lazer and left him unconscious on the floor.

“Whoah, boys!” I said as the man fell. Then, turning to the Sock, “Boss, it looks like your lads are forgetting their ol’ style hospitality!” To the other men I added, “Don’t worry, lads, he be right as rainwater soon enough.”

Gordon

So anyway, there was a little stir, but by playing the ol’ school chum and sticking to it like a limpet (what’re limpets, Tim?

Tim 

Little barnacle-clam things.

Gordon

Oh) just like Yolk told us to do, we got him to take us into his chambers and give us luncheon.

Tim 

Not a word about the food, you two!

Tom

Aw, come on, Tim. It was worth the description. It’s not like we’re going to argue about it or anything.

Tim 

Not even slightly like it, because you are not going to speak of it at all.

Tom

Alright, alright. But I think you’re being overly strict and arbitrary.

Gordon

Well, over luncheon we chatted about us (all made up, of course) and got him talking. He told us all sorts of stuff, and we ended up having dinner with him too. Quite the decent sort; we could do with a few more of him around.

Tim 

Nonsense! He’s so self-centered he wouldn’t notice if his entire city vanished one afternoon. Being barmy’s K if you’re ordinary, but anyone that powerful--and that scattered too--is a danger to society.

Tom

Like him or not, he told us a really interesting story--though he told it all out of order--that we will now try to relate. Now let’s see, where should we begin....

Gordon

Sockie is a topologist; we’ve mentioned that already. What this means is that he plays around with the basic geometry of the universe. Like, he’ll turn bits of it inside out or things, just to see what happens. Normal topologists power their tinkerings with magic, and so did Sockie for a while, but then he was playing around with space one day and out popped a smord ball.

Tom

Smord is a--well, how do you describe it? It’s like a really light-weight liquid with unbelievably strong surface tension, so its droplets are several feet across. It’s hardly got any watchamacallit, stickiness

Tim 

(viscosity)

Tom

to it, and it burns for a long time at a cool temperature, though it still takes fire to get it started burning.

As we noted, it is in pipods; we don’t know why or how SIGS got it, but it seems to be pretty nifty stuff.

Gordon

So anyway, he had this ball of smord, and he thought it was pretty neat stuff. Well, using it in some way,

Tim 

(none of us are spoonbenders, so we don’t understand how)

Gordon

he managed to get permament changes in the unvierse’s geometry. Well, he wondered just how much warping he could do, so--

Tom

Whoa! You’re skipping stuff.

Tim 

Yeah, remember how he decided to start selling people extra space by warping enough room for closets inside their walls and things? That’s how he got so famous and rich and powerful in Sockland.

Tom

And if he hadn’t of been rich and famous with the Socks they wouldn’t’ve supported him in his mission to permamantly iron out the universe. At least, I don’t think they would.

Tim 

Don’t really matter, does it? They are trying to iron the universe, and that’s enough.

So anyway, Sockie decided to tell his neighbors, the Boots, about it, and at first they were all barmied by the idea. But then one of them said he did some computations and found that if they flattened space, they would find that the world isn’t a globe at all, but just a lump on a much larger land, and that then all the beasts and things on the larger land could invade the world and that would be the end of it.

Gordon

Which the boots bought, hook line and sinker, and decided to genocide the Socks to prevent it.

Tim 

Genocide! Come on, they’re just trying to save the world from some topological maniac!

Gordon

Uh, I don’t think “topological” means what you use it to mean. Besides, what Boots’re really doin’ is trying to keep us cooped up on a tiny globe by killing everyone that tries to open up the rest of space to us.

Tom

Fact is, we don’t know who is right and who is wrong. So let’s not argue, but get on with the story instead.

Tim 

No! I’m not going to give in that easily. Just because the two of you are deluded by the rattle of some barmy spoonbender....

Tom

Tim, what is it you said about arguing? Don’t make us turn off the mimir, now.

Tim 

Oh, all right. But you’re still wrong.

Gordon

Anyway, in addition to hearing all this, we found out that Sockie has no clue about the giant or the golems. Didn’t even know they exist. It seems he’s not even aware there is a Sock army out chasing anyone; he spends all his time in his compound, working out bits and pieces of a universe-flattening spell-thing.

So we were feeling pretty good, like our limpetteering was paying off. In fact, we had addressed all the issues Sam had given us.

Tom

So, with that load relieved, I decided to ask him about this Boot theory that the world was really part of a much larger land-mass. That’s when things really started to get interesting.

“Oh, but of course,” he said, “Didn’t you know? But the rest of it is quite empty, except the motens.”

“The motens?” I asked.

“Yeah, there the ones I get my smord from. They trade it for whistling pineapples, which I pick when I go over there for a night.”

“Go over...you mean you visit this other place often?”

“Sure, I’m popping back and forth all the time. Here, I’ll show you.”

And with that he grabs a smord ball from the table and does something or the other, which leaves the four of us and about half of the furnishings of the room sitting in the middle of a deciduous forest covered in a light blanket of snow.

Gordon

At first, it was kind of nice not to be hot anymore, but it soon got really really cold. We’ve only been in snow once before, and none of us are used to it.

Tim 

So, I’m just starting to chew Sockie out for dumping us in a wilderness without so much as a by-your-leave, when Tom here pulls out his pipod and weaves out of sight into the woods. Sockie suddenly exclaims, “How was that?” so I show him my pipod, and the next thing you know he and Gordon have gone off after Tom, leaving me to freeze in the woods by myself.

So, I’m sitting there, wondering what to do, when suddenly I hear the sound of running feet approaching in the forest behind me. Spinning around, I’m just in time to see a herd of a few dozen bright-pink armadillos go sprinting past me through the woods at near-pipod speeds.

Gordon

Meanwhile, Sockie and I zipped out to the edge of the wood, which was not far away, where we found Tim standing on a bluff, overlooking one of the most magnificent views I have ever seen. You could see for dozens of miles, forests and rivers and mountains and lakes--it was truly breathtaking.

Tom

As we’re standing there Sockie says, “I have got to get one of these little silver things. Is there any way I could get one?”

I reply, “Sure, we can make you one, not a problem. But we’ll need to get back to your compound where we can get all the parts.”

So the three of us zip back to Tim, who is all in a fluster, and Sockie transports us (and the furniture) back to his kip.

Tim 

Well, I’m firmly against teaching the barmy how to make pipods; he’s dangerous enough without them. But Tom and Gordon get him to agree to give us detailed instructions on how the transportation process goes in return not for instruction on pipod building, but just for a single pipod to use; so we stay there overnight, give him his pipod, get the instructions, and head back home.

Tom

I didn’t want to leave that quickly; I really wanted to have Sockie show us around the woods and all that, and introduce us to the motens, and so on, but Tim would have none of that, and neither Gordon nor I could remember how to make the lazer spinner.

Gordon

So anyway, we got back home without incident, gave SIGS their report, collected our pay, went to the fair and Tim got silver

Tom

(it was a beautiful throw)

Gordon

And now we are home again, talking to this scribbling mimir.

Tim 

K, so now that we are done, what are we going to do with this manuscript? Try to get it published or something?

Gordon

I say we give it to SIGS and let them figure it out. Publication is too much like work.

Tom

Not when you’ve got something the publisher wants; I’ll bet we could get any journal or rag we wanted to print this thing.

Tim 

I dunno. Remember what happened to Dr. Green? Still, I think there are venues we could try with success, like Brimmoth Monthly or Cityspeak, for instance.

Tom

Are you kidding? You know how much money Cowbird made off of his pamphlet?

Gordon

Didn’t he go into debt to print it?

Tom

Yeah, but look at how many printings he made. I guarantee you he made some nice cash on the last three editions.

Gordon

Tell you what, boys; you two figure this out, I’m going to go find a nice enchanter and get her to send me back to the woods there, using Sockie’s charms.

Tom

No, you think you can?

Gordon

Corky says it’s possible, and she should know. After all, she’s the one who gets SIGS all their smord.

Tom

Hey, I’m coming too! You can have the article, Tim; Gord and I are going where the fun is.

Tim 

Not without me, you aren’t.

Gordon

But I thought you didn’t like Sockie and his other land!

Tim 

I also don’t like mosquitos and bears, but that doesn’t stop me going camping with them. If you honestly think I’m going to stay around here and mess with publishers and editors and things while the two of you are piping all over a bizarre and dangerous wilderness....

Tom

K, so what do we do with the mimir and his sheaf of papers?

Tim 

Let’s get the mimir to make a few copies, mail them off to several major rags, and then take the mimir with us.

Tom

Brilliant! You hear that, mimir? Start making copies!