Earlier this week, SED figurehead Morticon ruined a cookout in the Rose Garden by refusing to climb into a giant 'George Foreman Grillmaster'.  The cooking device in question had been set up by local sloth vigilante Vassily.  Vassily had nearly convinced Morticon that the Grillmaster was in fact a tanning bed and that Morticon would look suave like Ricardo Montalban if he used it.  When this wasn't enough to get the evil wallaby to enter the device, Vassily offered to throw in a supply of tanning oil containing herbal extracts.

         The offer of marinade, accompanied by comments from hungry bystanders about how great it made him smell, convinced Morticon to get into the grill.  At the last minute however, Vassily mentioned that it would take "about twenty minutes a pound" to properly tan Morticon.  The wallaby balked at this comment and quickly left the Rose Garden before another ploy could be attempted.  When Morticon was reached for comment, he said "I will never buy a George Foreman cooking product - ever."  Spokesfurs for the vigilante sloth claimed that, "He's been under a lot of strain lately, and the focus groups said a more proactive approach towards evil management was needed."

         Morticon, leader of the SED, recently held a press conference concerning his desire to launch the Orion, a nuclear powered experimental spacecraft located at N8 E8.  Before discussing current plans, Morticon presented some information from Suri about the Orion: "The Orion Heavy Lifter was a project that actually didn't get very far, but remains one of the most audacious designs ever conceived for a rocket.  It's an external-combustion pulse rocket - instead of burning it's fuel continuously inside a combustion chamber like a normal rocket, the Orion burns it's fuel outside behind the rocket in a series of discrete explosions that push it along.  The true distinguishing feature of the Orion is the way it generates its pulses.  It uses small nuclear bombs ejected from a specially designed cannon, which explode behind the ship and push it along.  The explosions are modified a bit by water in the bomb jacket (for extra reaction mass) and the energy is transferred to the ship through a pusher plate mounted to huge shock absorbers on the back.  It really would work - the project completed most of the qualifying tests before funding was cut.  Instead of the relatively small payloads of the multistage chemical rockets that we ended up with,  Orion was roughly the mass of a battleship, and the whole thing was one piece.  It was designed for a 150 man crew, and could carry literally tons of stuff into space.  Politics killed it.  At some point in the future it's almost certainly going to be built.  It's just too fundamentally good of a design not to.  Also, it's just plain COOL!  Imagine that squat gray cone taking off, trailing a series of tactical-size nuclear airbursts across the sky behind it like a string of sunbright pearls. :D"

      Morticon says that, "I plan to launch it for the good of Spindizzy and to make a twinkle form in every space-fanciers eye.  I'm doing it to put awe in those who have never seen such a craft launch."  Morticon then wept briefly and had no comment concerning where the ship would be headed towards during launch or what it would do once it got there.

         Recent attempts to change the message displayed when I enter The Rose Garden were finally successful after Austin, local Coati, guided me step by step through the process. I thought that I would share these commands so that we can all have cool messages show as we enter and leave places on SpinDizzy.  Plus, if you and others are as tired of your message, as I and others were of 'Argon trots into the Park, his gold and bronze tail waving behind him', then you and others might appreciate knowing how to change them. Also, with the number of Rogue Sputniks and Hippopotamus Mouths in the area, you can avoid meeting with either by setting your own messages.

         The following can be set for any global shortcut, such as The Rose Garden, Centaur Square, Care-A-Lot, etc., by entering the command you use to go there in place of 'rose' in the examples.  I understand MPI can be used with these, so go crazy!  Here are the commands:

@set me=rose/succ: The message I see as I go to the Rose Garden.

@set me=rose/osucc: The message others see as I go. (Name is automatically prepended)

@set me=rose/drop: The message I see as I arrive.

@set me=rose/odrop: The message those in the Rose Garden see as I arrive. (Name is automatically prepended)

         Because it is so easy to change your entrance messages, you could get creative and change them daily, seasonally, etc.  Anyway, I appreciate Austin clearing up the 'mystery' (to me anyway) of how to customize the entrance and exit messages of the globals.

         Spin and Dizzy have announced (nearly at the last minute) they are going to try and explore the Squirrel Park area (S4 E0) this Sunday (1/7/00) at 8pm MUCK time.  When I briefly chatted to them about the RP, it sounded like they have a lot more planned compared to the original exploration as started by Nikon and joined by many others.

         According to Spin and Dizzy, "Squirrel Park has long remained a mystery to the world.  A labyrinth of dark caverns, ruins, tunnels, pipes.  There's lots of nasty slimy stuff to crawl through and danger lurking at every corner.  Wanna come along? Spindle and Dustin squirrel are calling for members on an expedition into the mysteries of Squirrel Park.  It will be this Sunday, at 8:00 PM.  Anyone is welcome to show up.  Think of a nifty way to shrink down to squirrel size though.  :)  If no ideas come, you can always use a drone."

Doze Garden

>> Procedure for submitting an article:

 *  The newspaper building is located at Role Play Central (rpc).  When you

enter the building you will see a bulletin board.

 *  Go ahead and 'write' your story.  If you decide you don't want to write

one, hit .abort and forget about it.  Otherwise page 'newspaper' alerting

us that you wrote one when you finish pasting it in.

 *  An alternative to this is to page #mail newspaper with your story OR

email it to newspaper@spindizzy.org

 * We will edit it and tell you where you can look at it to make sure it wasn't mangled.  You can then p #mail the editor involved saying that it is ok.  Otherwise, suggest changes that should be made. If you trust the editors feel free to put something to the effect that you pre-approve the editing in your rough draft.

 * That's it!  It'll appear in the paper!

>> Guidelines for writing articles:

When writing articles for the paper...

 * Try and do some proofreading before submission.  That means spell check!

However, if you're no good at that sort of stuff, just send it as-is and the

editors will try their best.

 * No articles whose sole purpose is to flame someone.  You can use the SpinDizzy BB for

that ;)

 * Please strive for accuracy.  If they have time, the editors may check up on some of the quotes and perhaps the basic facts of the article.  Otherwise, it is assumed you did your best to write an accurate article.  If this is abused and inaccurate things are complained about, stricter rules may be put in place.

* Submitting your article anytime on Friday evening through the normal publishing date (Saturday night) will usually waive your right to review the edited version because of time constraints.  You will be contacted and informed but if you cannot get on before the publishing deadline to check your article it will be published regardless UNLESS you specify otherwise.

 * The editors' decisions are final.  This is not a wiz ran paper so do not

complain to them.  We can be reached by paging 'newspaper'.

 * Just about anything is published, so be creative!  It can be IC views on

RL topics, RPs that occurred around the MUCK, or most other things you can

think of.  You have creative license when it comes to documenting RPs, so

feel free to expound on the action, etc.  If you aren't sure if a story is

acceptable, page 'newspaper' and find out! :)

 * The AUP applies, so keep language and content acceptable.