From Mortimer Shore, 05:47:
<grin> we do now . . . it was the easiest way to manage the numbers. Turns out that you can’t just paint any old number on the back of a shipping container and have it work . . . there’s an owner code, and a check digit, and some other details . . . all covered by an ISO spec that I had to get my head around.
From Tristan Lyons, 05:51:
Figured. That’s why I asked Rebecca to put you on it.
From Mortimer Shore, 05:55:
So, before you get out of range, here’s the number: EHTU 314 1597.
From Tristan Lyons, 05:57:
You used pi? Really?
From Mortimer Shore, 05:58:
Just an accident:) The 7 is the check digit, if that’s not right the computers in Le Havre will reject it.
EHTU is East House Trust—all part of the shipping company thing—had to do it so it wouldn’t cause trouble going through customs in Le Havre.
From Tristan Lyons, 06:00:
So if I paint this on the back of the ATTO, everything is going to just happen automagically?
From Mortimer Shore, 06:02:
According to our modern standards of magic, yeah:)
See you in Le Havre.
Post by Rebecca East-Oda on
“Ops” GRIMNIR channel
THREE HOURS LATER, 09:21
Note: Spotty Internet so have written this in real-time commentary but will now upload all at once.
Have reached Portsmouth, which none of us was expecting. In the guise of dotty but vigorous spinster tourist (which isn’t too far off, in some sense), enjoyed a gusty walk from the railway station to the harbor, where I am now comfortably ensconced at a table in a waterfront pub. Will explain what I’m doing here.
Tristan, I expect you’ll be back in cyberspace by the time I upload this, and so you might be wondering what I’m doing on this side of the Atlantic at all.
Briefly, the answer is that I came over to London because we had to manage a number of legal and financial transactions related to setting up the new shipping company under the umbrella of the East House Trust. Frank and I are co-trustees and so a lot of documents needed to be signed. Our scanner was on the blink and apparently fax machines are no longer au courant. It was simpler for me to just be in this country. So I got on a plane.
Frank could not join me because he is still working on the ODEC in our basement—some parts unexpectedly came in.
I was planning to fly home today. I’d have liked that. But we’ve received some new information about ATTO #2 and I’ve changed my plans accordingly.
This is a long story, but via Chira Lajani, we received a “leak” from DODO two days ago suggesting that hasty arrangements were being made (presumably by Gráinne even if Blevins or Frink signed off on them) to get ATTO #2 moved into a cargo plane—a 747F capable of swallowing a whole shipping container.
It turns out that there are persons called “plane spotters” who have nothing better to do with their time than to keep track of the comings and goings of airplanes. They are all on the Internet, naturally. Thanks to them, Mortimer was able to identify a 747F that made a flight yesterday from Hanscom to Gatwick.
I took the train from London to Gatwick and arrived in time to watch from the roof of a nearby hotel as ATTO #2 was unloaded in plain view and placed on a tractor-trailer. I recognized it as an ATTO from the side door, which makes it different from other shipping containers. We don’t know why DODO wants an ATTO over here, but here it is.
Hailed a taxi and asked the driver to attempt to follow the rig. It left the airport southbound, as if headed for Brighton, but we lost track of it. Had the driver deposit me in Brighton and paid him a frightful amount of money, but there was little to see there—it’s a resort town, with not much in the way of port facilities.
On a hunch I took the train here to Portsmouth today. By hunch I mean common sense: there was a brochure about Portsmouth in the Brighton train station, complete with detailed map of its large port, with freight and passenger connections across the Channel (including a direct connection to . . . Le Havre. Maybe just a coincidence that DODO wants their ATTO directly across the Channel from where the Fuggers’ ATTO is bound, but maybe not.).
My perch here in this pub gives me a direct view through a chain-link fence, topped with copious snarls of razor wire, into a huge parking lot adjoining the ferry terminal. Several score tractor-trailer rigs and shipping containers are scattered about the place.
One of them is ATTO #2. It has been dismounted from its trailer and is quietly sitting in a corner of the parking lot. I’m keeping my eye on it.
Update, forty minutes later:
I am still in the pub. Management have apparently decided I am a harmless trainspotter type. Which I suppose I am.
Here is where my story stops being about an old lady spy and adopts witchy overtones.
A few minutes ago I began to pick up a strong sense of GLAAMR from the ATTO. I can both feel it and see it (Erszebet gets credit for being a good teacher). Clearly, the thing has been turned on. Meaning there is a witch in there. Gráinne herself? Possible, but maybe she would want to stay near Blevins to pull his strings.
A white van has pulled up to the side of the ATTO, just next to its door. From it, men are unloading some kind of cargo and tossing it in through the ATTO’s side door. I gather it doesn’t weigh much—perhaps clothing, stuffed into garbage bags. I presume these people are from DODO/Gráinne since DODO/Gráinne caused this new ATTO to be here.
Hmm. Perhaps it is another coincidence, but the passenger ferry to Le Havre departs in one hour.
Update, twenty minutes later:
Oh dear, hang on a moment: Magnus just showed up in an Uber! How very confusing. I thought he and Gráinne were utterly at odds with each other re: Walmart shenanigans.
Supposition: in light of the Fuggers’ stealing ATTO #1, they (Gráinne and Magnus) realized they would have to make common cause to retrieve it. Still, I wonder what each of them intends to do with it once they have it back. Are they going to share it? Neither of them plays nice in the sandbox with others.
Update, a few minutes later (10:31):
Strong GLAAMR from the ATTO, and men are coming out of it now, one by one, every few minutes. Dressed in civilian clothing. But they are Vikings. I think it’s the same crew that sacked the Walmart.
Update, fifteen minutes later:
White van just took Magnus and eight of his Vikings over to the passenger terminal. They are getting on the ferry to Le Havre. I’m going to get on the ferry too, and try not to let Magnus see me. Going to click “send” on this now. Hopefully I will be able to update you all soon. If I do not, assume it is because the Walmart Vikings have gotten to me, in which case somebody please remind Frank to water the garden.
(If you had told me five years ago, when Mel and Tristan first knocked on our door, that I would find myself writing that sentence I’d have laughed you down the street.)
Scribbled addendum in pencil at the bottom of Melisande