I forgot to mention the best part. Yappy, being a "domestic" droid, has a Bocce interface. That means Beru can finally use Shmi's old appliances again. It's probably also the only reason Owen doesn't hate the dog!
20060114
20060113
Of dogs and droids
I asked myself, am I having a good time? Is this how I want to spend my entire day? And the answer was no. So I'm taking some time out for a long overdue blog post.
First topic: The fish farm. Kane and Dofi were right about Sandpeople. They're capable of excellent work. The problem is, I when I look at Sandpeople, all I can think of is what happened to Shmi, and the neighbors and friends (including Mary Sue's parents) who were hurt or killed trying to rescue her. I stayed away during most of the construction, but I had to have a conversation with their foreman - or forewoman, I'm not sure if there's a way to tell - when it was time to set up the water supply. I don't speak Huttese, and Sandpeople don't speak Basic, so this meeting was facilitated by Biggs. (It could have been Kane, but Kane tends to editorialize, so I decided to go with the kid.) Hilarity ensued.
Biggs can translate Huttese/Basic, but he can't translate Construction/Moisture Farmer. Even if the Sandguy and I had both been speaking Basic, I think we would have had a hard time. It was made all the more awkward by my inability to hide my concern that he might hit me with a gaffi stick at any time. In retrospect, I think he was more afraid of me than I was of him, because I was so paranoid. But he got the water running, and after a few false starts (it's hard to get viable eggs transported out here) we finally have some little baby fishies.
Now is probably a good time to admit that we, the Darklighters and I, don't know a thing about fish farming. But they didn't know anything about mushroom farming either, and they did extremely well with that. The two of them, Kane especially, believe that you can learn just about anything you need to know by reading about it, and it's better than asking an expert, or as Kane says, "some know-it-all."
I believe that you can learn a lot out of a book, but can a book look at your pool and say "that's not the right shade of murky"? I'd feel better about this project if one of us knew what we were doing.
Second topic: The dog. Shortly before Onegee ran off, Fixer had an old mechanical pet (kind of doglike) for sale at Tosche Station. He hadn't repaired it yet (I was going to say "fixed," but that doesn't seem quite right), so I had the chance to buy it at a discount.
I don't know why I thought I wanted a mechanical pet, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. Onegee did the fancy soldering, and soon we had a dog.
The dog really seemed to irritate Onegee, inasmuch as a droid (other than a fussy protocol droid like Shmi's) can be irritated. Whenever the dog approached, Onegee seemed to twitch all over. It was like watching a person with an allergy.
Yappy (as I uncreatively named him) had a strange effect on me too. I didn't get anything done when he was around. Wanting attention and being cute was part of the dog's "personality," but there was more to it than that. Despite his slightly tarnished, but still shiny exterior, he seemed like a real dog to me. I wanted to play with Yappy and keep him happy. (Yes, that was my little rhyme, and I'll thank you not to taunt me with it.)
When Onegee ran away, I wondered if it had something to do with Yappy. Now I know that Onegee was going to run away regardless, but I still wonder why Yappy bothered him so. Maybe conflicting frequencies, or something. Most droids of Onegee's caliber can run and report their own diagnostics, but Onegee wasn't able to communicate so well, due to his defective speech center.
In any case, Yappy was gone before Onegee ran away, because I gave him to Luke, who was thrilled. Owen was less thrilled, but he got over it.
Third topic: Speaking of mechanical pals, RIP poor One-Onegee. He was found. He ran a lot farther than I would have expected on that wheezy old power supply, and was discovered by a researcher who was inspecting a group of Krayt dragon skeletons. I didn't have to pay him a reward, because he foolishly took Onegee to Fixer's for repair, trying to pass him off as his own droid.
Fortunately, when Fixer gave the researcher a chance to revise his story to something that wouldn't get him thrown in jail, he admitted that he had found Onegee clinging (motionlessly, of course, since his power supply had been depleted for weeks) to one of the skeletons' ribs. Actually, the way he demonstrated it to Fixer and Fixer demonstrated to me, it sounds more like he was humping one of the skeletons' ribs.
In any case, I am now in possession of one very defective droid, which I have disassembled and crated per the SORAS instructions. However, I haven't decided yet whether to go with the SORAS offer or the class action lawsuit. (Filing an individual lawsuit wouldn't be feasible, for a lot of reasons.) If I choose the SORAS offer, I can have a brand new droid fairly soon, but I'll have to choose from the existing SORAS line. If I choose the lawsuit, I'll have to wait, and if we win (which seems very likely), my piece of the settlement may be a lot smaller than the value of the SORAS offer, but I'll be able to spend it any way I like - as a down payment on some other manufacturer's new droid, or a used droid, or a DIY kit, or even a human or other sentient assistant.
It's funny - before I got Onegee I didn't think I had a chance of finding a truly helpful droid because the local offerings were so limited. Now I realize that having more choices also means having more chances to make a wrong decision! Readers - if you have any droid information to help me make my choice, please comment.
First topic: The fish farm. Kane and Dofi were right about Sandpeople. They're capable of excellent work. The problem is, I when I look at Sandpeople, all I can think of is what happened to Shmi, and the neighbors and friends (including Mary Sue's parents) who were hurt or killed trying to rescue her. I stayed away during most of the construction, but I had to have a conversation with their foreman - or forewoman, I'm not sure if there's a way to tell - when it was time to set up the water supply. I don't speak Huttese, and Sandpeople don't speak Basic, so this meeting was facilitated by Biggs. (It could have been Kane, but Kane tends to editorialize, so I decided to go with the kid.) Hilarity ensued.
Biggs can translate Huttese/Basic, but he can't translate Construction/Moisture Farmer. Even if the Sandguy and I had both been speaking Basic, I think we would have had a hard time. It was made all the more awkward by my inability to hide my concern that he might hit me with a gaffi stick at any time. In retrospect, I think he was more afraid of me than I was of him, because I was so paranoid. But he got the water running, and after a few false starts (it's hard to get viable eggs transported out here) we finally have some little baby fishies.
Now is probably a good time to admit that we, the Darklighters and I, don't know a thing about fish farming. But they didn't know anything about mushroom farming either, and they did extremely well with that. The two of them, Kane especially, believe that you can learn just about anything you need to know by reading about it, and it's better than asking an expert, or as Kane says, "some know-it-all."
I believe that you can learn a lot out of a book, but can a book look at your pool and say "that's not the right shade of murky"? I'd feel better about this project if one of us knew what we were doing.
Second topic: The dog. Shortly before Onegee ran off, Fixer had an old mechanical pet (kind of doglike) for sale at Tosche Station. He hadn't repaired it yet (I was going to say "fixed," but that doesn't seem quite right), so I had the chance to buy it at a discount.
I don't know why I thought I wanted a mechanical pet, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. Onegee did the fancy soldering, and soon we had a dog.
The dog really seemed to irritate Onegee, inasmuch as a droid (other than a fussy protocol droid like Shmi's) can be irritated. Whenever the dog approached, Onegee seemed to twitch all over. It was like watching a person with an allergy.
Yappy (as I uncreatively named him) had a strange effect on me too. I didn't get anything done when he was around. Wanting attention and being cute was part of the dog's "personality," but there was more to it than that. Despite his slightly tarnished, but still shiny exterior, he seemed like a real dog to me. I wanted to play with Yappy and keep him happy. (Yes, that was my little rhyme, and I'll thank you not to taunt me with it.)
When Onegee ran away, I wondered if it had something to do with Yappy. Now I know that Onegee was going to run away regardless, but I still wonder why Yappy bothered him so. Maybe conflicting frequencies, or something. Most droids of Onegee's caliber can run and report their own diagnostics, but Onegee wasn't able to communicate so well, due to his defective speech center.
In any case, Yappy was gone before Onegee ran away, because I gave him to Luke, who was thrilled. Owen was less thrilled, but he got over it.
Third topic: Speaking of mechanical pals, RIP poor One-Onegee. He was found. He ran a lot farther than I would have expected on that wheezy old power supply, and was discovered by a researcher who was inspecting a group of Krayt dragon skeletons. I didn't have to pay him a reward, because he foolishly took Onegee to Fixer's for repair, trying to pass him off as his own droid.
Fortunately, when Fixer gave the researcher a chance to revise his story to something that wouldn't get him thrown in jail, he admitted that he had found Onegee clinging (motionlessly, of course, since his power supply had been depleted for weeks) to one of the skeletons' ribs. Actually, the way he demonstrated it to Fixer and Fixer demonstrated to me, it sounds more like he was humping one of the skeletons' ribs.
In any case, I am now in possession of one very defective droid, which I have disassembled and crated per the SORAS instructions. However, I haven't decided yet whether to go with the SORAS offer or the class action lawsuit. (Filing an individual lawsuit wouldn't be feasible, for a lot of reasons.) If I choose the SORAS offer, I can have a brand new droid fairly soon, but I'll have to choose from the existing SORAS line. If I choose the lawsuit, I'll have to wait, and if we win (which seems very likely), my piece of the settlement may be a lot smaller than the value of the SORAS offer, but I'll be able to spend it any way I like - as a down payment on some other manufacturer's new droid, or a used droid, or a DIY kit, or even a human or other sentient assistant.
It's funny - before I got Onegee I didn't think I had a chance of finding a truly helpful droid because the local offerings were so limited. Now I realize that having more choices also means having more chances to make a wrong decision! Readers - if you have any droid information to help me make my choice, please comment.
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