So I am extremely pleased with myself and others. Meanwhile, Alric reminds me of a story....

So there was this girl back in college, we were both stage managers, and given her precise ungirliness and unselfimportant seriousness as well as verbal prowess, I had a rather substantial crush on her, and indeed named her my Last, Best Hope. At one point she was stage managing a Shakespeare play which required beheading, and actors being at a premium, there was some question as to how to effect the severed head, triumphantly carried. In our banter I suggested a canteloupe, and good to my word went the next day to purchase a canteloupe from the local supermarket, which I did successfully. In trying to deliver it to her, however, I was only able to hand it to her roommate. It is this roommate whom I would later imagine saying, "Oh, some fruit came for you..."

In any case, she's now working at Alric's firm, where a surprising number of my old acquaintances have ended up.