Poem: "Until Someone Lives in Them": ysabetwordsmith

This poem is spillover from the July 2, 2019 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by a prompt from DW user Siliconshaman. It also fills the "Home from School" square in my 12-1-18 card for the Summer in December Bingo Fest. This poem belongs to the Fortressa thread of the Polychrome Heroics series.

This microfunded poem is being posted one verse at a time, as donations come in to cover them. The rate is $0.50/line, so $5 will reveal 10 new lines, and so forth. There is a permanent donation button on my profile page, or you can contact me for other arrangements. You can also ask me about the number of lines per verse, if you want to fund a certain number of verses.
So far sponsors include: DW user Siliconshaman, general fund, DW user Bairnsidhe,

mdlbear,

lone_cat

67 lines, Buy It Now = $34
Amount donated = $30
Verses posted = 14 of 17
Amount remaining to fund fully = $4
Amount needed to fund next verse = $1.50
Amount needed to fund the verse after that = $1

Until Someone Lives in Them

[Monday, June 1, 2015]

It had only taken about a month
for everyone to decide that
the simplest way to solve
Penny's difficulties in finding
space to live and work was
to move her into the lair.

Fortressa's garage had
plenty of space, so they gave
Penny the big room between
the conference room and
Fortressa's office, whose
awkward shape had formerly
relegated it to storage space.

By the time Penny graduated,
her sewing room was all ready,
and she took a bunk in one of
the garage apartment's flop rooms.

They worked out a schedule so
that Penny could start selling
her premade summer clothes
at festivals while she worked on
patterns and production stock for
the fall line of safari clothes.

The Pit Group wound up
helping her playtest designs,
much as they did for Fortressa --
with very similar results.

"Your belt loops suuuuck,"
Primer whined. "They keep
snagging on everything."

"Well ... they have to be
wide enough to hold the belt,"
Penny said with a frown.

"Why?" Fortressa said.
"Your cargo pants have
a fitted denim yoke. They
don't really need a belt
to hold them up."

"It's the fashion,"
Penny replied.

"I don't even know
what fashion means,"
Actuator said. "I just
want comfortable clothes."

"I know," Joint said,
rolling her eyes. "Fashion
is stupid. That's how we got
clothes with no pockets
in the first place."

"Clothes mean nothing
until someone lives in them,"
Penny said. "Fashion isn't
meaning, it's just ... weather."

"Yeah, well, I think fashion designers
should have to live in the clothes they make
for a month," Primer said. "Then maybe
they'd design clothes are comfortable,
practical, and look halfway decent."

Penny got a glint in her eye of which
Fortressa heartily approved.

"Care to put your money
where your mouth is?"
Penny challenged.

Everyone reached
for their wallets.

Yeah, Penny was
fitting right in here.

* * *

Notes:

"Clothes mean nothing until someone lives in them."
– Marc Jacobs

This is exterior of Fortressa's garage lair. It has a one-two-three layout of machine shop, garage, machine storage although the layout of the machine room is different than shown. Fortressa has the 48x56' version as shown in the upper right corner of this set. The 10x12' office is the patch room that says "Body Shop" on the door. Fortressa also has the 16x24' office suite as shown in the upper right corner of this set, located in the upper right corner of the garage area. These are some of the important garage elements.

This is the conference room in the office suite. The popcorn machine was installed as a joke because of all the drama. But it actually makes excellent popcorn and the Pit Group have come to enjoy making some in all different flavors. This is Fortressa's office.

Between the conference room and the office, the old storage room has become Penny's sewing room. Beside the door is a small sewing table and material storage cabinet.

Fortressa's garage apartment is located above the machine shop. This is her gizmotronic spa tub, unlit and lit. She also has a fitness gym and a combat gym. Between the windows are more work tables and a tool storage wall. Penny has an assortment of mannequins and sewing machines. Cube shelves provides storage for equipment and supplies. A serger makes it fast and easy to finish seams.

The living room is defined by an ivory shag area rug. Across from the fireplace is the media wall.

A media wall or video wall consists of multiple screens connected through a computer network, along with supporting hardware such as speakers.

The cupolas are functional. The center one is a tiny room with a teleport pad and a spiral staircase leading down. The outer two are air vents. The interior of the vent cupolas looks like this. Here is part of the finished attic and stairs from the teleport cupola. That cupola has a compass rose inlaid in the corner.

Starting a home sewing business requires attention to scalable ideas. At this stage, Penny is still focused primarily on product development, but also making a lot of the stock herself. Over time, more of the production will transfer to other people as she sends them the patterns; then she'll be able to concentrate more on developing the business itself.

A yoke is the piece of fabric between the waist and seat on the back part of the pants. In jeans, it defines the shape of the seat. When fitted pants use a waist and yoke of sturdy cloth that doesn't stretch, they will "lock" into position around the flare of feminine hips, removing the need for a belt. This feature can also support a considerable amount of weight in pants with cargo pockets. The pockets at the top will stay snug against the body even when full. However, pockets lower down the legs tend to flop around as more weight goes into them.

[To be continued ...]

sent 10

zianuray

July 7 2019, 03:20:06 UTC 1 year ago

New comment

This looks good!

Re: sent 10

ysabetwordsmith

July 7 2019, 03:42:06 UTC 1 year ago

Thank you! Your new verses are up. :D

mdlbear

July 7 2019, 16:21:40 UTC 1 year ago

Looks promising. You have the series given as "Path of the Paladins".

Thank you!

July 7 2019, 17:51:52 UTC 1 year ago

>> Looks promising. <<

Yay!

>> You have the series given as "Path of the Paladins". <<

Fixed.

Anonymous

July 25 2019, 10:29:30 UTC 1 year ago

Wonderful! I don't wear a belt but use the loops for my key chain. And razor knife, tape measure, etc when building. I've killed a phone with my keys in same pocket. Margali

July 25 2019, 10:46:38 UTC 1 year ago

>> Wonderful! <<

Yay!

>> I don't wear a belt but use the loops for my key chain. And razor knife, tape measure, etc when building.<<

Yep, I've done that.

>> I've killed a phone with my keys in same pocket. Margali <<

I have no idea how other people keep those things intact. They can't be dropped, can't be sat on, can't have other objects in contact with them, some can't even get wet -- but you're supposed to carry it with you? And it demands attention or it stops working. I swear, it's like Satan saw Tamagochi and crossed it with crack. >_

RE: Thank you!

Mark Mandel

July 27 2019, 19:06:59 UTC 1 year ago

I keep my Android phone in an Otter case. It has three parts: a hard back that fits over the back of the phone, with windows for the camera and flashlight; a screen protector that snaps tight to the back cover, with openings for the button at the foot of the screen (which is also the fingerprint reader), and for the camera view and audio grid at the top; and a thick, flexible, rubberlike case that goes over the back and wraps around the edges of the front. I don't know how many times I have dropped it and it has suffered no damage whatever. When my old Otter case just wore out after years of service – the outermost cover stretched out of shape till it wasn't fitting right – I went into a Verizon store and asked about replacing it. The salesman asked what kind I was looking for. I told him "Otter," and he said "Oh, those are the best. I'll show you where they are."