View source for Logs:It's Good To Be The Little Guys

{{Log
|involves=High Reaches Weyr
|type=Log
| who = Ainslee, Vienne
| where = Garden Patio Ledge (HRW)
| what = A pair of recent transfers discuss the state of the weyr... and the state of the weyr's booze.
| when = It is a winter dusk, 17:09 of day 3, month 12, turn 30 of Interval 10.
|day=3
|month=12
|turn=30
|IP=Interval
|IP2=10
| gamedate = 2013.01.28
| quote = "I keep trying to read up on the history, but I always feel like what's been recorded isn't the whole story."
| weather = Steady, today's snowfall sticks, creating dunes on the bowl floor.
| categories = Divided Leadership
| mentions = Azaylia, Brieli, K'del, Taikrin
| ooc = 
| icons = ainslee_autumn.jpg, vienne.jpg
| log = 

It's SNOWING. A big dark green is trying to stick her head under the roof/overhang, looking Greatly Displeased about the current situation. Her rider, laughing, has a mug of something steaming in one hand, and snowflakes still in red curls. "Kalaith, quit scaring all the customers away!" Ainslee cheerfully calls at her lifemate, who sharply angles her wedge-shaped head even *further*, huffing angry (maybe mildly annoyed) stagnant breath over her rider. (Ainslee is unfazed.)

Vienne has only managed to collect so much in the way of winter gear, and whether she really needed to or not, it might look like she's put all of it on at once. Her wool jacket is the same, but it's so suddenly snug that it's all too likely she's wearing as many sweaters as possible beneath it. With the hat and mittens and boots, she's basically a bundle of clothes on sticks. Now she climbs the steps from the bowl with an eye for Kalaith's antics and for Ainslee's red hair. "The two of you are such a picture out here in the snow," she calls out with a grins.

Kalaith turns abruptly, this time to better examine Vienne. Her posture is- just shy of critical, perhaps, if dragons could posture criticism. "Well, someone has to be!" Ainslee replies, airy, grinning. "She's mad because I refuse to go /flying/. ''Flying''? In ''this'' weather? She's out of her mind! She doesn't need me. Just go!" She'll even scuff a boot t'wards her lifemate's nose, as close as it is. "The first snow of the season is always the coldest," is her next sage wisdom for the bundled Igenite. "Quite the revel in there," with a jerk of her chin over a shoulder towards the Snowasis; "Mulled cider and Bitran Klah."

"Aw, you don't want to go with her? Don't you want to share it with her?" Vienne asks, all big eyes and sad mouth, all to make Ainslee's life just a little harder, all in fun, of course. And as she mounts the snowy steps and comes beneath the shelter of the overhand, one snowy mitten comes up to try brushing the flakes from her snowy hat. "It might be cold," she says, "But it's beautiful. We had snow at Igen, but never... piles of it. It's totally different." Ainslee's gesture toward the Snowasis pulls Vienne's eyes that way, but she frowns. "Mulled cider and klah... in the same cup? That sounds gross."

"No, not in the same /cup/," Ainslee laughs in return, eyes merry. She REFUSES to let the antics of certain bronze and goldriders stress her out, obvsl. (Or maybe there's just a tremendous amount of /booze/ in that mug.) "They've got both in there." Spiked klah and boozy cider. What's not to love? A barmaid comes bustling out with a tray, bestows one or the other on Vienne before flouncing her way over to the packed table on the far end, where a bunch of Icicle riders are trying to catch snowflakes on their tongues (that totally just happened). "The snow is fun," and Ainslee is belated! "...Just don't smack an ex-weyrleader in the mouth with a snowball, and you'll be fine." Words of wisdom for the day.

"I wasn't sure if it was some sort of weird... Reaches thing. Discovered during long long nights of being stuck inside," Vienne says, plainly trying to cover up how silly it might have been to even suggest a klah-cider combo. And now she pats her hands together, as if any of this sticky snow is going to go anywhere. Anyway, the klah (that's what she chooses) should be just fine for melting the remnants off her wooly mittens. She's just about to bring the cup up for a sip when Ainslee drops her gem of wisdom. "Did you... Or did someone else?"

Ainslee wrinkles her nose, doubtless considering what /else/ High Reaches may have discovered, during all those... long, long nights of being stuck inside. This distracts her for a moment, enough for Kalaith to /snort/ expressively and withdraw abruptly. Her sudden launch of black-glassed emerald wingsails against the grey sky is a pretty thing to watch, the faint cobalt looking nearly irridescent in the light. The greenrider shakes out of it long enough to sidle a wry glance to Vienne. "It was me." There's a sigh in there. "He was pretty... easy-going about it." Beat. "For a bronzerider."

Vienne does take a moment to appreciate Kalaith's departure, the burst of color that she is in a world gone largely white and brown and gray. And then for Ainslee's admission, there's a quick laugh, the bluerider's glance skimming out over the bowl for signs of other snowball fights in progress. "It was you? Was it intentional? I mean, I guess you didn't accidentally ''throw'' the snowball, but... the mouth? Maybe you should be warning people to keep far, far away from ''you'' when you've got a snowball in hand. It sounds like he got the shorter end of that stick." Her eyes laugh merrily as she finally takes that first sip of her drink. And then they widen when she discovers how much booze is in it.

"Yeah, probably a good warning. I was playing with some kids! He just happened to ... step into it." And it may not have been on the mouth. On the face? "He may have slipped and busted his ass into some snow at the same time." Well-groomed fingernails slip up to scratch lightly, absently, at the line of jaw from ear downwards. It's a vaguely sheepish gesture. She laughs aloud for the eye-widening: "/Something/ to keep you warm, isn't it?" Delightful, Ainslee. She'll have to come down from this high ''eventually''. Kalaith, meanwhile, gains altitude and slips out of sight. Then, abruptly: "What do you think of Brieli?"

Vienne takes to nodding, long and slow, not buying Ainslee's description of this snowball play gone awry, or perhaps, more accurately, just giving her a hard time about it. Apparently that's the mood she'd in today. But she puts on a wide, tight smile for the boozy klah, lifting it a bit. "I think it's going to take me a while to get used to just how much this Weyr drinks. It ''must'' be to keep warm." It can't possibly be anything else that would drive these people to the bottle. Nothing like sudden, on-the-spot questions about the weyrwomen. "Brieli?" she repeats, just buying a second of time. "I think she's bright. And I was impressed by just how much she seemed to admire Azaylia. There was something about the way she talked about her." Such a nice thing, all that goldriderly affection. Vienne smile gently for it and sips again. "How about you?"

"Igen doesn't drink so much?" Benden apparently does; Ainslee's surprised. The woman seems to dial down her manic-panic, though, leaning a hip against a free table and visibly admiring how... very talented a particular Icicle greenrider is at catching snowflakes. Mmm. Wait, Vienne said something? Her gaze tricks backwards to catch the commentary on Brieli, and the woman nods along. "Yeah. I think about the same." She hesitates, here. "But something -- I don't know. She came up on K'del and I earlier. It was... strange." An exasperated (or perhaps frustrated) noise: "I keep feeling like I know /nothing/, here."

"No, they drink," Vienne corrects, trying to explain. "It's just different. It's not everyone. I don't think it's everyone here either it just feels... celebrated?" Still, even if she thinks the klah is strong, she does keep drinking; they're just very little sips. However, some of Ainslee's distraction seems to catch Vienne's notice and the bluerider's brows furrow a touch as her companion's attention wanders. "Strange how?" She gives a little sniffle, the cold getting to her nose, "I keep trying to read up on the history but I always feel like what's been recorded isn't the whole story."

"Oh, that makes sense," Ainslee nods along to Vienne's explanation. "Benden, see, it's /tradition/. Bitra, it was always commerce, and... Well, before Bitra, I don't think I ever paid much attention to drinking habits." A shrug of narrow shoulders, reaffirmation of attention onto the transfer-bluerider. "It does seem as if there is a great big /deal/ that I don't get. Like... maybe reading it, or hearing about it, doesn't really encompass everything that actually ''happened''. You know? There's all this friction that I don't understand." And not the ''good'' kind of friction, either!

"Friction," Vienne repeats, zeroing in on what seems to be the core of Ainslee's observations. She's got her mug held close to her chin now, even when she's not sipping, and there's a quick glance just to see how those snowflake-catchers are fairing. "Friction with Brieli, you mean? With Azaylia?" Because Vienne has not assumed there's any connection between the snowball accidents and discussion of the young goldrider.

"No, the goldriders seem... well. I've not met Azaylia," Ainslee slowly meanders out, thoughtfully. "I've heard they are well-matched." The goldriders, that-is; "Or that," she amends, "They work well together." There is something of a difference there. "No, but. Maybe it's just the /bronzerider/ thing. They seem to be... discontent? Some of them. With the... brownriders." She flickers a hand, gesturing expansively for such a small motion. "I don't see why they have to be hard-headed about it. This isn't the first time browns have caught young golds." Probably has a ''little'' something to do with the whole /who's running the weyr/ part, but. So easily glossed over!

"Neither have I," Vienne is quick to add in about Azaylia, though she also tries her hand at summarizing the situation between the two weyrwomen. "Happy together?" Anyway, that isn't really the meat of it. "It does seem like it's the brownriders -- not them personally perhaps, but the color of their dragons -- that has people feeling..." She'll steal the word, "Discontent. Do you really think it's just bronzeriders? That they're just feeling their place in the hierarchy has been called into question?" Vienne won't mention the glossing over, even if she does press her lips together when situation is, perhaps, a little misrepresented.

Misrepresenting cultural norms since the tenth pass: Ainslee, at your service. "The only ones I've seen /ruffled/ over it have been brown and bronzeriders," she comments. "/We/ don't seem to care one way or the other." We being an expansive generalization (also likely mistruthful, is that even a word?) to all green- and blue-riders. "You know what I mean," comes her belated follow-up to that. "I don't know. I don't really /get/ it, but. I don't see what the big deal about a woman being a weyrleader is, either." Maybe it's just because she hasn't actually ''met'' Taikrin yet...

"Well, none of us have been slighted. Our job wasn't stolen, no one's trying to discredit our position..." And rather than feel too terrible for all those poor bronze and brownriders, Vienne lifts her mug again in a clear 'good to be the little guys' toast, her smile wry and eyebrows high. She takes her sip, as all good toasts should end that way, and cants her head to the side as she swallows. "I can't say I know much about Taikrin," she offers over judiciously, gaze wandering as she thinks over this whole woman-weyrleader thing. "I'm not sure that's the whole of the discontent, though." Perhaps there's only so much oversimplification the former harper can ignore.

"Cheers to that," Ainslee follows that toast with a glass raised and a generous sip taken. The greenrider's mania seems to peak and then slope downwards: sudden awareness floods back in - does it have anything to do with the sudden loom of Kalaith, just there, darkness amongst the snow? Reality snaps back, Ainslee shakes her head, and quirks lips at Vienne, thoughtful. "I'm sure the two-golds-rising-at-once has a /little/ to do with it." A wry nod; she shakes her head, again, downs the rest of her cider. "Anyhow. She's not giving up. I'd better go sate this before she--" Does whatever it is that Kalaith does. "Next time, we've got to find a little-old-lady." /Significant/ look, and a quick smile, before she's leaving her cider mug in a bin and trotting down to meet her lifemate, wrapping her scarf more snug about her neck as she goes.

A little? Vienne lifts a hand, and if she weren't still wearing mittens, this might be when she would hold up thumb and forefinger with little space between, but since she doesn't actually have fingers, all she can do is approximate it with her thick mitten. A little. And eyeing it, she has to chuckle, then use that hand to shoo Ainslee off. "Go. Enjoy the snow," she says, altering the shoo into a wave for Kaliath. And though she could linger out here a while longer, Vienne turns to seek out the warmth of the Snowasis. She can finish her klah in there.





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