Seems simple enough. Y’all don’t need a setup, do you?
Okay, fine. But I’ll spoiler-box it to spare the killjoys.
[spoiler]It’s Christmas-bonus-distribution time here at Evil Industries, and everybody’s happy. (Well, everybody but the real Elena Kagan. But that is not my fault. She has 24-hour, four-star room service, and as long as she stays away from the windows and the door, her living quarters look like a suite at the Waldorf rather than a prison cell.) Between the recession, the oil spill, and the wars, it’s been a banner year for the bad guys, with only one minor setback for our side, and rising political fortunes of a certain Alaskan should more than make up for that.
But I digress. Both productivity and profits are up, and since I want to keep the minions fat & happy, I have opted to forego the usual magic trinket giveaway in favor of cold hard cash. (Gold, actually, as minions often have concerns about paper trails.) That leaves me with the trinkets to dispose of. I have in my possession 24 amulets originally intended for the Influenza Mutation & Distribution Team.) 12 of them grant the wearer truly amazing hand-eye coordination. Any task requiring such skills – juggling, dart throwing, etc – becomes trivially easy for the person to learn, master, and achieve, limited only by her native stamina. The other 12 give the wearer similar skills in vocal control. Not only will his singing be as beautiful as an angel’s, but he’ll be able to flawlessly imitate any human voice he ha has ever heard.
Any takers? Only one amulet to a Doper, please, and I’ll need a good reason.[/spoiler]
I’ll take the vocal control amulet, please. The hand-eye coordination thingie sounds like fun, but it’s not really in line with my interests. I want power, not just the chance to amuse drunk people at parties - anything that would make me a better public speaker is all to the good. Besides, the ability to imitate the voice of any other human presents obvious opportunities for fraud-based evil. (For example, if I were running for office, I could pretend to be my opponent’s campaign manager, and direct their PR staff to put out statements or ads with weaknesses I’d be prepared to exploit.)
ETA: For that matter, I could pretend to be my opponent, and record myself saying something unacceptable. “I despise Natalie Portman,” for example.
I’m sorry, but I need a reason of some sort. Those things aren’t cheap, and I expect you to explain how you’re going to either wreak havok or be amusing.
Unless you’re gonna help save kitties from being drowned. I’ll allow that 'cause I love kitties.
'm more than happy to drunkenly mangle tunes during karaoke, but if all I had to do was hit the gym for a few months to lose my fat and get some muscle, and suddenly I could be one of the best baseball, football, basketball, tennis, volleyball, golf (ESPECIALLY golf, since it requires a lot less stamina and muscle strength, which you said I don’t automatically get) etc… players of all time? YOU BET!
I mean…if I understand you right, I could hit almost every pitch perfectly…not always a home run, and I might not always get on base, but I’d have almost no strikes.
I would have a 100% free throw percentage, and still be pretty good during regular play as long as no one is right in my face.
I could send a football exactly where the receiver is, provided I have the arm strength to get it that far.
I could hit every golf ball to the exact spot I wanted, so long as I have a club capable of doing so.
it certainly wouldn’t automatically make me awesome, but it wouldn’t take much work to get really, REALLY good.
I’ll take hand/eye coordination and use it to wreak havoc!
Imagine if you will any situation where a group of people need to get along. A party, a meeting whatever! I’ll slip one participants wallet out of their pocket or purse and deposit it on another. If I really dislike someone I can give them several! Fun for the whole family. Or well, me and the great Skald.
Another vote for vocal control. My hand eye coordination is already good enough for my purposes. But with vocal control, I could actually sing Lady, by Kenny Rogers, to The Druidess, and that would make her happy. With a happy Druidess by my side, conquering this and/or other realities becomes trivial.
I’ll take the hand eye control. I’d be a world class baseball player for a couple of years and make a fortune. Then I’d think try my hand as a pool shark, it’s a nice job that I can earn good money at but that doesn’t require much physical skill beyond hand-eye coordination.
I can make good money for the rest of my life and not have to work nearly as hard as professional performers and worst case senario I can always turn to petty crime to support me through fought times; lockpicking, pick pocketing and shiplifting would all be a breeze.
Vocal control: not for me, but for my daughter. She’s starting to come in to her own as far as vocal skills, and she wants to be able to sing in front of crowds. This would give her more self-confidence to get up in front of people and into the spotlight. She is quite talented as far as acting skills, but she is shaky on her vocal abilities.
How old are you? How difficult is it for an unknown not in college to get a major-league tryout? (All lI know about baseball is that there are cards involved.)
I’ll have the hand-eye thing, please. My vocal control already scores quite high for awesomeness and I’d like to have phenomenal dexterity. I’d like to have a crack at being by far the oldest Test cricket debutant (not the oldest player though - Wilfred Rhodes played his last international when he was 52) on the strength of my ability to make a spun cricket ball deviate eighteen inches in either direction with no detectable change in action, and in my down time I might make and fly some astonishing model aircraft.
I’ll take the hand-eye coordination amulet, please. Reason being, I’m going to use it to pick your pocket and get one of the vocal control ones, too. Hey, you asked. You hired me to be evil, right?
There are already awesomely amazing singers who will never become famous because they don’t have the right look or agent or the right person will never hear them sing. I’ll take the coordination. I love music and I’d love to be a better pianist. And it seems like there’s a more open job market for someone who’s coordinated than someone who can sing well. What if you can sing perfectly but you get bored of it? If I’m a unicyclist and get bored of it I can always switch to juggling or tightrope walking.
Come to think of it, tightrope walking between very high buildings could get me tons of money and a reputation for being pretty much the coolest person in the world.
Hand-eye coordination. While it is a tad late in my life to become the Goddess of Surgery or some such (plus I never had any interest in the medical arts to begin with), I’ve been in many emergency situations where it would have come in handy, and suspect there are more in my future.
That includes the possible saving of kitties.
ETA: oh God. Oh GOD. oOOooooOOh GAWD! I wonder whether Circus du Soleil accepts 42yo applicants. Firejuggling on a tightrope! Do they have an ERP? I can help with that too, and with safety procedures
