Fandom Island and Town

Tisarwat was feeling incredibly impatient, waiting not only for her scheduled portal back to the Radch, but also for Lucille to finish up putting a few of her affairs in order to join her. But who could really blame her? After far too long of waiting around, being idle, on this weird island on this backwater planet, Breq had finally given her the directive to return. Breq warned her that it might just be temporary, but it didn't matter. She was going home, and once there, she was hoping she could find a way to stay there and not get sent back again. Not any time soon, anyway.

So she'd actually gotten to the office well before her portal to leave, in the hopes that maybe the scheduled time was just a guideline and they might be able to figure out a way to get it going earlier, but, of course, they were telling her that the time was the time, there was no changing it, she would just have to wait, and hope nothing screwed it up in the meantime.

Aatr's tits, it was impossible to be patient in this scenario, but at least she had some tea to enjoy while she waited.

[[ I've been so, so, so lazy about this for a while now, but I'm finally getting around to OFFICIALLY sending Tisarwat off on space-hiatus with her canon-mates for the time being. open, of course, for all your tea-fascist or portalocity needs! ]]

Tisarwat was hoping for just a nice, quiet, uneventful day at the music store that week, where she could finish her paperwork in peace with some nice tea and maybe explore around some new music a little bit to genuinely start being better about knowing more about Earth music.

Even thinking that this could be a possibility, of course, was her first mistake, although what she did come in to discover was at least nothing too demanding, it was just annoying and confusing and potentially a loss of business...not that anyone was beating down the door for a piano purchase lately.

But in the odd chance that someone did want to buy a piano today, they might have to wait, unless they were, in fact, in the market for something small and colorful and clearly meant for children, because that was all they had.

Groovy Tunes is open!

Tisarwat wasn't even going to bother with the stereo today. It wasn't admitting defeat, however. It was merely biding her time, maybe luring it into a false sense of security, until she would pursue a more target attack at an unknown future date. For now, she would just ignore it. Maybe the cold shoulder would have some positive effect or at least have it realize that she wasn't going to be bothered by it anymore.

She was just going to make herself some tea, enjoy the silence of the store as she sipped at it, and then spend the rest of her time plucking at a guitar or (once she remembered that that needed to be done, too) taking care of some administrative work.

Simple. Quiet. Surprisingly effective, since she honestly expected the stereo to start blasting music over her playing, but it was being oddly cooperative...

....aaaand now she was paranoid. Great.

Groovy Tunes is open!

To her credit, Tisarwat had tried to get some of the information she'd gotten from Charlie regarding her employment here into the computer that Thursday, but, in her continued frustration with the inadequacy of the technology in this dimension and on this planet, the computer was not cooperating, and so she just gave up, made herself some more tea, and almost went to just put on some nice, soothing classical music to just stew in annoyance to. But then she thought about the trouble the stereo had been given her lately, felt no desire to add insult to this injury, and just stewed in silence again, wondering if she should use next week's school break as an excuse to go bother Breq again and nag at her about letting her come back finally.

And as she stewed and looked around the store, she thought to herself that maybe she should decorate for Halloween or something, but she was really stuck in the stewing right now, so that sort of motivation would have to wait for another day.

Groovy Tunes is open!

There were few things as annoying to Tisarwat as when she came into work to discover that the chosen playlist from the stereo (she had given up long ago on thinking she had any sort of control on that kind of thing) fell into repeating a song throughout the day after only playing a few other songs in between.

Today's, however, was especially annoying, because it seemed to be asking a direct question with the song's main chorus.

And it was also annoying that, once she finally, vocally, shouted out, with frustration, "Yes, of course I remember, it was just yesterday!" did it stop.

But at least it did stop.

Groovy Tunes is open!

The fact that Tisarwat had disappeared on an extensive globetrotting holiday and returned to work without piles of paperwork or other administrative tasks awaiting her was just the ultimate proof to her that her position her at this store was completely superfluous and served absolutely no point. The store had obviously been just fine on its own without her; what was the point in her even being here?

But she sighed, because orders were orders, she guessed, even when those orders made no sense.

She figured there was at least one thing she could be at the forefront of, though, and, since her return coincided with a new semester, that meant there might be some new students looking to pick up some work, so she found a "HELP WANTED" sign and a "NOW HIRING" sign and popped both of them into the windows.

Although, really, considering that Rosa had been hired without Tisarwat's involvement at all was just reminding her that she wasn't even necessary for that, either, apparently....

Groovy Tunes is open!

In an unexpected and altogether thoroughly handwaved turn of events, Tisarwat had finally gotten rid of Seivarden's cat. It was probably only a temporary departure; she wasn't as concerned about hurting Seivarden's feelings by foisting the duties onto someone else so much as she really didn't want to deal with her moping about it if she ever came back. But it had only been a few days, and, already, she could feel the weight of that responsibility lifting off her thin shoulders and she was really wondering why she hadn't done it earlier.

And with the cat gone, Lucille was in a much better mood, and with the cat gone, Tisarwat herself was feeling incredibly free and was half wondering if they should use that newfound lack of feline responsibility to their advantage with a little bit of a trip or something like that.

Which meant that, instead of getting any work done at all that day, Tisarwat was mostly browsing the internet for good potential locations.

Or, more specifically, where they might have exceptionally good tea....

Groovy Tunes is open!

There must have been some sort of a glitch or a mistake in one of Tisarwat's orders, because what was supposed to be a piano to replace one they'd sold to a customer in Baltimore the other week arrived that day, only it wasn't a piano at all. Well, it was piano-shaped, piano-inspired, but it was far less intruments and far more...

Couch.

Tisarwat thought about it for a little bit, considered the hassle that would be involved in sending it back and getting what she had really ordered, and then decided, well. Looks like Groovy Tunes had a piano couch now.

Honestly, though, with some of the redecorating that had gone on with Rosa's painting, it could be a good centerpiece for maybe a little lounging area for people to just sort of sit and talk music, listen to tunes and (hopefully if they were any sort of decent people) drink some tea.

It was definitely something worth considering. She might even start to do something about it today, too....after she'd finished her own tea, of course.

Groovy Tunes is open!

Tisarwat wasn't exactly sure how a few porgs had managed to get into the store (she was mostly blaming the annoying vinyl hipster, of course), but it mostly seemed like more trouble to shoo them out than to just let them waddle around. So she mostly just let them do their thing while she sipped at her tea and watched them, wincing a little when one of them ran into a drum kit and knocked a cymbal over, and, while she was going to put that back up, they'd somehow gotten over to the turntables and were now having a blast just riding them around like a carousel.

And, again, she was left wondering if it was just easier to let them do their thing, but once one of them (intentionally or accidentally, who could even tell?) turned up the speed to a point where the porgs on the turntable went flying off like missiles around the store, she figured it was time to step in and get them out of there.

Which was about to be an adventure all its own.

Groovy Tunes is open!

The Annoying Vinyl Hipster was mad and sulking at Tisarwat because she'd told him his taste in music was terrible, which wasn't even a truth day thing, she'd have told him that regardless and had told him about it before, but for some reason, he was being extra sensitive about it that day, apparently.

She wasn't too concerned about it, obviously, and decided that today was going to just be a good day to work on her guitar; she'd been neglecting it for piano work these last few weeks, and part of her wondered if the whole exercise was kind of futile, what did she need to know how to play guitar for? But she really didn't have anything better to do, so why not?

Groovy Tunes is open!

Tisarwat still couldn't believe this place had turned into a coffee shop over the weekend. It was almost insulting, really, and you'd better believe that she planned to drink more than enough tea that day to make up for it.

With Troy now gone and off to brighter, greendaleer pastures, she figured she settle nicely back into the Thursday shift as her day for doing all the usual administrative tasks that running a business around here called for, which were generally handwavey in nature but still clearly required. Considered trying to do maybe a hiring bout, but if there was no one interested at the moment, putting a sign in the window wasn't likely to garner much more responses. It's not like the business demanded a whole lot, anyway, and Rosa was probably at least more capable than Troy had been, anyway.

Oh, and don't mind the snake over by the pianos and keyboards. Figuring Lucille wasn't likely to get into too much, Tisarwat had brought her roommate-turned-serpent with her today, just to get her out of the apartment and mainly away from the cat. She really didn't feel she could trust either of them alone with each other in their current states, and she definitely didn't want to have to explain to Seivarden at some point in the future that Issa was gone because Lucille ate her while she was a snake, or something.

(Even if she wouldn't have blamed Lucille one bit).

Groovy Tunes is open!

Apparently, Tisarwat had chosen the absolute best time to be sent back to Fandom, and the first week of her return was a rather pleasant blur of getting...reacquainted with her roommate and making up for some lost time. But even if the effects of the pollen still managed to linger just a little bit longer for her based on pure momentum alone, she did eventually have to pull herself back into the routine of the island and start taking Breq's directives to heart about making the most out of a less than desireable situation by being back here instead of out there.

And a good portion of that, obviously, was getting back in groove (hilarious, really) with the store that she was supposed to be running and had only ever really done a mild and middling job of. Apparently, in her absense, they'd managed to gain a new employee and a bit of a renovation with the mural on the wall, the theme of which she couldn't help but find mildly amusing, considering her circumstances.

But the mural definitely got her thinking about renovation and redecorating, and so most of her time at the shop that week had handwavily been going through some stuff, thinking of how it could be rearranged or how they could maybe change the look in here to make it a little more fresh, to give it sort of her own touch, and then it was a matter of figuring out how to make some of those renovations happen.

Or even if they could. Imagining and envisioning things were free, but actually doing it? Was not. And a music store on a small island on a backwater planet like this one was hardly bringing in the big bucks.

Groovy Tunes is open! And the boss was (finally) in.

So, Lucille had turned into a snake at some point on Saturday; Tisarwat spent most of the day not even realizing it, assuming her roommate had just gone to work like any other given Saturday, and she went about her usual Saturday loafing around, making some tea, doing some reading, contemplating attempting to actually cook something and then just being lazy and ordering food from somewhere again. It was only until she'd started up on some piano practice and was having difficulty with a piece that she even realized a snake was even in the apartment, because eventually, she slithered up to the piano keys somehow and very promptly corrected Tisarwat on the notes she kept messing up.

At first, Tisarwat hadn't been sure what to make of this piano-playing snake, but something about it felt familiar enough that she started to have an idea, and, purposefully playing a few more wrong notes to see how they were primly corrected by the snake, she came to her conclusion.

It did seem like a fitting transformation for Lucille, she felt, and it was very easy to still spend time with her, as she made for an almost striking fashion accessory, wrapped around her for warmth as she went about her various tasks.

Which included Groovy Tunes, where Lucille would just wrap herself around the warmth of Tisarwat's tea flask if Tisarwat had anything to do that involved a lot of movement, but, other than that, they were mostly just chilling out and listening to that snake jazz that Summer had introduced her to that one time. She figured the snake part might win Lucille over, but she wasn't quite sure if jazz was something she'd be able to get into.

And she really wished Lucille could offer more of an opinion on it than a few flicks of her tongue right now.

Groovy Tunes is open!

Troy's choice of costume for the homecoming dance had Tisarwat wondering if she should maybe actually take a venture into the basement to ensure that that tangled ball of headphone wires really wasn't turning into a monster, which would have been ridiculous, anyway, and besides, she used to live in that basement, it wasn't like it was some creepy dungeon or something, so she didn't know why she was filled with such trepidation and worry and wishing she had a better weapon than a microphone stand that she grabbed along the way as she flipped on the lights and went to go have a look.

And, sure enough, it was fine. Without anyone living there for so long, the place did start to give her faint 'undergarden of Athoek Station before we got there' vibes, making her wonder if she should actively try to rent the rooms out, but it was fine. In fact, she didn't even see the tangled ball of headphone wires down there.

....wait a minute...

Then where had it gone?!?

Groovy Tunes is open!

The party last weekend was excellent, and though she enjoyed herself considerably at the time, in the aftermath, it was just making Tisarwat a little homesick. And even more than that, it was making Tisarwat a little wistful for the life she could have had if all that business with her brain being hyjacked by the Lord of the Radch. Just her luck, right? Not that she didn't adore Breq and her Bos and the chance to be a part of something greater, obviously, but if none of that had ever happened, she would probably be enjoying a nice desk job back home and partying pretty much every night. Instead, she had a much different kind of desk job and was partying in the rare occasions that someone could be bothered to throw one.

Granted, she supposed she could throw one, but...most of the time, she couldnt' be bothered, either.

(It was almost as if all the time and effort she could have put into it was being channeled elsewhere instead. Weird).

But there was homecoming coming up, and so there was that, but with it being Halloween and what happened last year, Tisarwat figured they'd need to be careful what she and Lucille decided to do for their costumes. So she was trying to do research on Earth monsters on her phone, frowning deeply as she found herself falling down quite the strange rabbit hole.

The stereo was still on its spooky music bullshit, which she thought might have been inspiring, but it, apparently, was not.

Groovy Tunes is open!

Considering that the place didn't pull in much business normally, Tisarwat wasn't exactly expecting to be very busy today with almost everyone else off on the school trip. The quiet that settled over the island during these weeks was more than enough to drive her to wistfully dreaming about maybe planning some sort of trip for just Lucille and herself one of these days, to just disappear somewhere strange and different for a week or two and just explore somewhere different. It wasn't like travel was usually that difficult to pull off, from here, assuming Portalocity cooperated...

...but for now, for this week, there was a cat, and that cat was, she supposed predicatably, causing their fish a great deal of distress and trouble, so, if anything, Tisarwat was at the shop today just to get Issa out of the apartment for a little bit.

The cat seemed thoroughly unimpressed with the place, and seemed rather fond of expressing this distaste with a lot of swishing of her tail that sent things tumbling or a lot of prancing on piano keys and testing guitar strings with her claws, leaving Tisarwat to wonder, as she idly watched the attempted chaos from the counter with her tea, knowing full well that she'd just have to do it all over again if she went and took care of it now, if explaining to Issa what most of those strings were made of.

(Yes, she knew that the term 'catgut' was a bit of a misleading misnomer, but Issa surely wouldn't).

Groovy Tunes is open!