In short, it was a sweet setup, and the crew loses no time settlin’ in, after some of them scattered and went explorin’ to find out just what sort of stuff we have inherited to ride herd on while a couple of us tried to make sense out of the paperwork and charts heaped up on the desks.
“Hoo-ey!” Shu Flie sez, emergin’ from the stacks with his brother at his side. “I’ve never seen so much stuff in one place! They got everything here!”
“A lot of it’s pretty old, though,” Hy Flie sez. “We had newer stuff than some of this junk back on the farm … and most of that stuff is still around from Pop Flie.”
“Pop Flie?” I sez before I has a chance to think about whether or not I really wants to hear the answer.
“That’s our grandpa,” Shu explains. “Course, sometimes we call him …”
“I get the picture,” I sez, interruptin’ before he can explain any more.
It occurs to me to make a point of not ever visitin’ the Flie residence.
“What I can’t figure,” Junebug sez, joinin’ our discussion, “is how they keep track of all this stuff. I mean, there doesn’t seem to be any order or scheme to how things are stored. It’s like they just keep pushing the old pile further back and stack the new stuff in front as it comes in without any effort to group things by category.”
This sounds uncomfortably like the beginnin’ of an idea which could improve our efficiency … which is, of course, the last thing my cousin and me want to see happen. Sneakin’ a glance at Nunzio, I can see he’s thinkin’ the same thing, and catchin’ my eye he gives a little shake of his head to confirm that observational.