Introductions, Part I

Who are the uniquely shaped shod & shaven stars of this new strip? (cf. look at this blog some more).  Will we hear more from them?  Can we meet them?  Have they experimented with any mind-altering drugs, and do they have some for us?

In the fez of course is Rodock - Rodock is who I am.  I am of Dervish stock, and I live roughly in the late nineteenth century.  If this is anachronism, so what.  If you know it's anachronism, you're an-asshole.

I care for things like horses, broth, rope-pulleys, grottoes, bones you can use for purposes that are not biological, and mapping the species/genus distinction onto most discussions I have about food.  I have been married twice, once sanctioned by God, and my father invented the sturdiest available tent-pole in what is modern day Nepal, leaving me (in what we'll call his will) a comfortable annuity.  I have parlayed my father's ingenuity into a semi-regional celebrity, culminating in appearance fees for most major feasts (buffing out Pournt Poles)...

...and most recently my election as Watchward (read "client-mayor") of Khet-moun-dhoo.  More on that in time.

The hair fellow is my boon friend, Pilant.  This is a buddy-comic.

We do not call Pilant by a last name.  In Khet-moun-dhoo, surnames are patronymic, and Pilant is the fatherless son of a jackal.  But there's no reason for you to hold your left flank from him.  Pilant is even-natured and honorable; gamesome for sport; and subtle-strided as he is subtle-minded.  As they say, "I love him with forelock, but I will hate him with loin-shock";  a Scotch Presbyter with a mission in Dubai told us we're "Neo-Platonists."

I considered adopting Pilant to spare him the considerable dishonor of his heritage, but by law and custom this would compel him never to speak in my presence, and require 2/3 of our encounters to terminate with jelq.

Sky deepens, and it is too late to journey further; we'll break camp with the dawn.