Log:Utridge Planning

Utridge Planning
Whatcha reading? Is it on how to get blood outta silk?
Participants Ben Utridge, Weaver Utridge	29 May, 2018 Ben and Weaver plan some things for the family's future.
Location Red Clover Hotel
Ben is sitting in the sofa at the family living room on his pijamas. In front of him, over the center table, there is a pile of books, handwritten notes and a mug. He looks like to be studying. Or researching something of the occult matter. His eyes are deep and blackened as if he had spent the night up doing that. Weaver's arrival is from foyer instead of the usual trip downstairs. The draconic's wearing a t-shirt pronouncing his love of waffles and their superiority to pancakes, blue jeans, and dark blue sneakers. Ben gets a wave from the younger Utridge, and then a curious stare. "Whatcha reading? Is it on how to get blood outta silk?" Ben lifts his eyes just in time to see Weaver coming. To the man's question, he shakes his head."No. Just a pet project I'm looking into." He says as he closes of the books and leans back on the couch."Com on. Join me." He says as he gestures to a nearby chair."Tell me how are you doing, Weaver." "Nothing much," Weaver initially responds. He moves over to grab that offered chair, pushes it a bit back, and leans back in it. "Mostly been catching up on everything in town that I've missed, made a few new connections, got engaged, dealed with that mess of a fire, and thinking about throwing a few parties to get some good rep in the family's name. What about you? Most I heard from other people is about staring." "Did you get engaged? Really?" Ben asks looking slightly curious."Parties, hm? I was about to talk to you about that. I've talked to Olivia already. I want to come up with a charity ball event. To gather resources for the survivors of the wild fire. Make our family look philantropic, you know. But I can't be the public face. People don't like me much and I scare the shit out of them. I need someone that has good looks and know how to deal with the crowd. I'd do all the backstage preparations and stuff." He offers as he puts his legs up on the couch and sits in a lotus position. "You do tend to weird the fuck outta people," Weaver agrees with a chukle. He reaches into his pocket then, and taps away at the screen for a few seconds. "I can easily do that. If you don't have a bunch of the legwork already set up I gotta friend that can probably help set a lotta that shit up for us. The only hard part'll be finding the right joint to do it all at." "I put an ad at the newspaper, but, so far, no one came to talk to me about the event planning. You can call your friend. I don't mind. Friends are best than strangers." He then pauses a moment, probably pondering on something before going on."Why don't we use the Hotel for it? Don't you think it is big enough to host an event of such scale?" Ben asks after a few. "I'll make sure to give 'em a call asap, then. Probably tonight if I can help it, but can never really tell." Weaver lets out a chuckle along with a small cloud of smoke that soon dissipates into nothingness. "With the hotel, can't say and it depends. If we can bring some pub to one of the local places it might help us make a few new friends, and I'm sure I can work out something that'll benefit the family as much as them." He smiles, and wickedly so. "Something too that'll have people spending more of their own money than we will, and get us a good enough bit of money back in return." To that last statement, Ben grins and shakes his head."You're a true Utridge, aren't you, kid?" He asks retorically."Maybe we can talk to the Mayor and see what he can do for us. What do you think? He's an enchanted mortal as far as I know. He can be inclined to help if the right one of us of go talk to him." He offers as he leans forward to retrive his mug and sips from it calmly."If don't get our hands in a proper place, we'll have to use this place and make it work." "Nah," Weaver answers with a dismissive wave and a shake of his head. "Don't wanna be in some mortal's debt in any kinda way, and I'd rather find a way to put him under my thumb than anything else." A shrug follows. "Unless you disagree with that kinda plan, uncle." "Controling the Mayor would be very useful for us. But I assume there are people of our side protecting him from unwanted pledges." Ben says after a moment of consideration. Then, he takes a deep breath."We can call the Alexanders and call one of our old favors. They must a place big enough for a spring ball." He murmurs before sipping once more from his mug. "I'll try digging up some dirt on him. It might help to see if Velvet can shadow him for a while." Weaver scratches at his chin, humming pensively for a moment. "Only Alexander I've met so far is a weird one, but I guess it might not hurt. Push come to shove there's the Cascades. It looked really good, and was more than big enough for a huge thing." Ben listen and ponders for a little while."The Alexanders grew soft after the years. Most of them are too busy playing the nice guys these days. I met an Alexander pretty boy it Crossroads Cafe the other day. He was just that, apparently. Young and green. But there is C.B. Alexander. He doesn't have good relations with the family, though. I can't blame, he doesn't look the social kind of guy." He quiets himself for a moment."I like the idea of the Cascades. I wonder how much that'd cost us, though. Eleanor didn't give me much to come up with this event." "Let me worry about money for the time being." He lifts a hand, scarred palm facing Ben. "At least on this thing." Weaver smiles and leans forward to rest his elbows on on the table. "And like I said before, I can try to talk to the owner to turn them into a new connection. If nothing else a useful ally in the future if they own that kinda place." Ben arches a brow, measuring the boy in front of him. A moment later, he sighs."Okay. I'll leave that to you. Just let me know the outcome of it out. But hurry up, the window for the event having an impact in the city is shortening. We need to do as soon as possible or we risk another family or charity group comes and do it first." He says. "That's fair, and I'll hop right to shit today and tonight. I can sleep later on anyway, and I could always use a lot more coffee." TO that Weaver nods, and lets out a happy sigh at the thought of a mug of brew. "That reminds me, though. I Liv a warm beer and some burnt toast, but she'd be good to rope into this too. At least to distract her for a bit." "I talked to her before all the wild fire thing. She told be she would participate. I asked her to hire as many musicians as she wants to. Or juts go solo a capella. She has a great voice and would be seen as we're on the charity thing will all our hearts." He comments."I just hope she's still up to it. How is she doing, by the way? I haven't seen her around much." "She might be," Weaver answers after moment of uncharacteristic hesitation. "She decided to play hero when the fires went up, and ended up sucking in a lotta smoke. It didn't kill her and she's mostly fine, but I'm worried about her for the time being. She can talk, but there's a lot of coughing." "Maybe I should try to find someone else to be the singer, then. There is a member in my court that has a very good voice. No point in making her worst." Ben comments with a serious face on."Do you believe a Fruit will help her somehow?" "Even if Liv's fine it won't hurt to have someone else on lead or standby just in case." Weaver taps at his chin for a moment, humming once more. "And no fruit," he answers flatly. "She's good with healing up on her own, and I'm not going through the trouble of lying and explaining that to her anytime soon." "Alright. Your call since you look closer to her than me. All I know is that she's as fierce as all of us in this family. She'll be in good shape before summer. Hopefully." Ben says as he lands his mug back over the center table before looking around suspiciously."I've joined the Custodians. As a Custodian Recruit. Someone called Kip is going to be my mentor." He says in a lowe voice."They have a very big library with lots of old tomes." At that point, he gestures to the pile of books over the table. "Books, huh? I never cared for books unless it was about money," Weaver points out with a life. "I can't really say any of those freehold groups are for me, but who knows. Maybe they'll have one for greedy bastards one day." He chuckles, leaning back again as he looks over the collection of books on the table. "Anything good in there that might have a lot of value? Maybe made of gold?" Ben watches as the younger Utridge takes a look at the books."Actually, if my research is right, there is something of very high value, yes. Deep in the mine. But this isn't the right place to discuss things like that. As much as loyalty and secrecy that goes on inside these walls." He says still using that lowered volume of his voice."We can discuss it another time, if you're really interested. Right now, I'd like to talk to you about something else. I need to make a purchase but I don't my name on the papers. Can you help me with that, Weaver?" He asks giving the other man a very malicious smile. "That depends, but it sounds easy enough." Weaver snaps his fingers, his visage changing to something a bit more canine and amber in the process. "Just depends on what you're buying and why. I can help family without a price, but I need to know what it is first. Cost of doing business." "It's called Oak an Thistle. It's a business in Tamarack Fall's town square. You know how that folk when it comes to our family buying properties over there. So it needs to be undercover. Come up with a fake name or something." He explains calmly as he picks a piece of paper and writes down the address of the building."Here. This is the place. I want it the way it is." He says as he hands over paper. "That'll take some work to set up a fake identity. At least one so that if some jackass actually wants to check in to it that they can't track it back to us. I could talk some asshole into buying it for us, but I don't want that to turn into them knowing what the fuck we got going on. At all." Weaver reaches over for the paper after speaking. Looking it over, and then shooting a glance to Ben over the top of it. "What's so specuial about it?" "Nothing. And that's the point. It's just a regular occult store. It sells magic junk like wands, crystals and whatever. But it makes me feel confortable when I'm inside somehow. I heard this morning it's up for sale and I decided to make the move. We can use it to our more private conversations too. In case we need one." Ben explains as he leans against the sofa again. Weaver's brown quirks at that, leaning back again as he eyes over Ben. "Alright. It'll take a while, but I'll do it." He nods to that, and moves a bit to yank his wallet out of his back pocket. The paper's stowed away in his wallet which is then returned to his pocket. "I do have some wedding things to look into first, I admit, but I'll hop to it." "Okay. There is no hurry. First things first. Your wedding and the charity event. The rest can wait." Ben says as he starts gathering his books and notes calmly."Don't forget to invite me to you wedding. I'm improving my social skills." He comments and offers Weaver a smile."Someone is helping me with that." "I'll make sure to send you one. I swear you're the umpteent to tell me that, though. I promise when we know what's what I'll try to let people know and do that invite shit to." Weaver sighs, eyes rolling hard. "I'll even have a fucking bird deliver 'em too. With bells and shit. But that's for later. Who's helping you out? If you say a little birdie I think it's time for me to get my afternoon drinking on." "Adeline, but she calls herself Nana. She's an old looking woman and member of the blackbirds with all that 'healing your soul' vibe." He says sounding a bit in disbelief."She told me I should go out and make more friends. With mortals." At that, he rolls his eyes. Once he has all his books gathered on his arms, he stands up."That's it. I need to head to the Library. There are somethings I need to reread. Take care of yourself and tell Olivia I say hi." With that, he heads in the direction of the hotel's foyer. Weaver shivers at the notions of healing and blackbirds. "Sounds like shit, but I just so happen to like my blackened, corrupted soul." He laughs, and flashes a smug grin. "I'll make sure to tell her, and hope whatever it is this nana is doing works out. Mainly so people can stop telling me you're creepy."