Chapter Sixteen [Dictated]

[thebestseller]

It's the first day of December, Paradisa, so it's time for me to try my hand at the 3rd overall Paradisa Betting Pool. The idea is that you try and guess what kind of crazy thing is going to happen to us this month, and whoever gets closest wins the pot.

I'm just going to use the rules Gary wrote down, since they seem reasonable.

1. Bets are for the first incident that will happen during the month of December.
2. I'll take bets for any amount from 1 to 100 Caisos.
3. Bets will be taken any time from now until the first event hits.
4. In the event that more than one person guesses correctly, the pot will be evenly split.
5. If nobody wins for the first event, I'll keep rolling the bets over til someone wins. In the event that nobody does for the entire month, the slate will be wiped clean, everyone gets their money back, and we can try again in January.

I'll be at the Death March til about 11 o'clock tonight if anyone wants to come by with their bets.

Comments

Dictated forever

[mal_addict]

Thirty caisos on animated, evil snowmen.

Action

[putuporshutup]

[Meg comes out from the kitchen with an amused look on her face. Yup, she's cooking again! What has the world come to? She fishes a few bills out of her jeans and sets them on the bar next to him.]

There's fifty on some played-out "twist" on Scrooge. Ghosts in different tenses trying to inspire acts of altruism and all that nonsense.

Forever

[thebestseller]

Oooh, I like that one.

Action

[thebestseller]

[Castle has a notebook and envelope at the ready, writing down Meg's name and prediction before placing her contribution in the envelope.]

God bless us, every one. Would be even more fun if there was one that was totally incompetent and tried to goad people into dancing naked around the kitchen for good luck or something.

dictated;

[gottaknockhard]

[Spike, being in his own world the majority of the time, apparently missed an announcement or two.]

Still doing this, huh?

dictated;

[thebestseller]

Yup. I figured what the hell, people seemed to enjoy it.

dictated;

[gottaknockhard]

['What happened to Gary' seems like an obvious question, so he'll just gloss right over that.]

Sure. Even more when they don't win.

[putuporshutup]

[She laughs and pops open a beer, offering him one as well.]

Something tells me a lot of people here wouldn't really even need the convincing. Maybe just some spiked egg nog.

dictated;

[thebestseller]

True enough. It's a risk some people were willing to take, though.

[thebestseller]

[Castle gladly accepts, sipping at his drink.]

Yeah, and if people look askance at them, they can just say it was the castle's fault. Handy excuse, isn't it?

dictated;

[gottaknockhard]

I never had much luck.

dictated;

[thebestseller]

Could be that it turns around this month. Or if you still fancy playing, you could always just put one caiso down.

dictated;

[gottaknockhard]

I've got an unfair advantage.

dictated

[vampirize]

Hmm. Twenty caisos on a dumb world change to Santa's workshop, because really, where haven't we been.

[mal_addict]

So do I. I can't remember us ever having those, either.

[thebestseller]

And we all know how much the castle just loves to surprise us.

dictated;

[thebestseller]

How so?

dictated

[thebestseller]

Sounds like a pretty safe bet. If we can go to ancient Italy, why not the North Pole?

dictated;

[dgaf]

We'll get a skinny Santa who demands vegan cookies and only gives out fair-trade Oxfam shit. And he released his reindeers into the wild and fired all the elves because he's against animal abuse and slavery.

[mal_addict]

Especially during this holiday season.

dictated;

[gottaknockhard]

Tradition.

dictated forever

[vampirize]

Exactly. Besides, this castle is crazy enough to think we need to visit the actual place to, I don't know, learn about the true meaning of Christmas or something.

[thebestseller]

Maybe they'll be accompanied by an evil robot Santa.

dictated;

[thebestseller]

Paradisa having Christmas traditions? I am totally, totally unsurprised.

[thebestseller]

And some of us will be forever changed by the experience, no doubt.