Shots of yours truly, on stage at the Spruce Winterspringsteen protest concert, in Freewind Post!
We were chiefs of the valley, out in Alterac
The dwarves come chargin’ up the hill, and we roared and sent them back.
Now there’s so much that grind and pick-up dungeons fade away
We got our own epic mounts to ride, and not so much time to play.
We stood side by side each one fightin’ for the other
We said until we unsubscribed we’d always be Horde brothers.
Hallo, fellow travellers,
I have a stack of spasmographs and notes waiting for publication, but they will not be seeing the light of day for about another week, as my publisher has gone mad about finishing a chaper of his dissertation at the University of Silvermoon on the varying nutritional qualities of different types of dandelion or some elvish bullshit like that.
We will speak again soon!
Ten Thunders.
The Silverleaf 400 is the biggest racing event in Azeroth and frankly they don’t have anything like it on Draenor either. You can hear it a day before you see it. It echoes off the titanic walls of the Shimmering Basin and blows up so much glittering silt you can’t see anything in front of your face. Half an hour ploughing across the flats towards the race, you and your mount are the same colour and texture, packed with silty mud from head to toe, blind, thirsty, and cranky.
If you think that’s bad just imagine stumbling onto the raceway by mistake during one of the heats. Cursing and swearing about the dust and trying not to step on any scorpions, and then all of a sudden there’s a vortex of clear, hot air that spins you into daylight, which would seem like a blessing from the ancestors except oh shit it’s boiling off the front of a goblin rocket, it’s a sperm-shaped pocket of terrified wind trying to get the hell away from this piece of moving death – it’s so close on top of you you can see the driver trying to put out the fires that are all over the cockpit… good luck having any time to steer — no time, you dive to the ground and hope your mount has the sense to run
Pretty much every morning – or afternoon – I woke up in Freewind, there was a brass band playing behind my eyes and a game of orcish canasta winding down in my mouth. So I didn’t immediately associate all the ruckus I heard outside the tent with anything other than all the wine I’d drunk last night.
Turns out, though, that it was some kind of protest. Or, like a preliminary protest. A pretest.
Anyway, there was a milling crowd of slightly reedy, bookish types, some with kids on their shoulders and others with placards in hand, trying to get themselves organized for a march north across the Barrens towards a populated area and thus someone who might give a darn. Mingled among them were sturdier orcish types who I recognized as tradesorcs from the Pork Farmer’s Union in Orgrimmar, and at the head of the crowd was a guitar-wielding fellow in overalls.
“Who’s that?” I asked Manny Umpo, a troll drummer who was leaning against the tent post nearby and cleaning his teeth. While all this was going on, I realized my braids had collected an astonishing collection of cling-ons during the previous night’s festivities – bay leaves, clods of wax, bits of fruit, and – oh, ancestors, is this an eyeball? whose was it? euuugghhhh.
“’dat be Spruce,” said Manny. “He sum bigtime shouter from Durotar.”
“Spruce?”
“Ya, Spruce Winterspringsteen.”
Many people come to Freewind Post to find themselves. I don’t know why it takes them so long, it’s not very big.
It is, however, the site of the world-reknowned Free Wind Music Festival, and for a while after the Truce of Hyjal it was a little like New Dalaran is nowadays, but more affordable and much further from any swarms of undead. Freewind started out as a war camp against the centaur, then became a shaman’s meditative retreat, then during the lead-up to the end of the Legion War it was a rear assembly point for Horde supply trains. It was this period where they put in all the manitcore nests and navigated the flight routes from the Needles north to Durotar and the Barrens.
Well, I know y’all have been waiting on me real patient-like, so I’m a might more embarrassed than usual that the sorry tale to follow is shorter than you deserve, and not terribly useful in terms of travel advice.
In a few short days we’ll be coming out with our Freewind Post edition, and I expect our journey together will get back on track, figuratively if not literally speaking.
Actually, there is a piece of practical advice in here, maybe two. One, just leave your childhood alone, let sleeping bullies lie, don’t try to change the past. Your time is much better spent fishing, napping and rambling than plotting elaborate revenge. Yes, Ms. Forsaken, I’m talking to you.
Take care, now.
Tenny
Well howdy there folks, It’s been a bit of a rough week chronicling-wise. I’ve been laid low by some varmint of a disease, which diminishes my enthusiasm for writing something significant. In addition my publisher has been distracted by something about massive effects. I think he has a new girlfriend or something. I’ll be filling […]
Well, li’l Thunderers, I haven’t been supremely regular in my writing this past week. I hope you’ll forgive me. The truth is, I’ve been a bit soggy, in body and spirit, after an attempt to transcend some of my childhood trauma ended poorly.
Remember when you were growing up, and there was always one big, dumb kid who lived down the way and who would make you miserable for fun? I’m assuming that you do, since you’re literate, so you probably weren’t the big dumb kid in question.
If you’re a Tauren, you remember, and you will also remember that that big, dumb kid was probably named something-or-other Grimtotem.
Naturally, if you’re a Tauren you have an excellent sense of direction and a mystical bond with the Earth Mother, and you will never get lost crossing the Needles. All of these canyons have their own unique appearance, from the subtle gradations of the rockface, to the pillars of rounded stones shaped by wind and long-vanished rivers, to the carcass of the hyena you passed an hour ago the third time you came through this way. Yes, you will certainly not break down weeping, terrified of never having another tea biscuit like mother makes again, squeezing the dead hyena like a teddy bear for comfort, all alone in the vast and windy darkness between the spires.
Not if you stay on the damn road.
