== Summary ==
A view of Chur, looking down from the ancient bishopric vineyards of the Hof: in the background, the Calanda mountain

2024-03-11T16:51:05Z

EWImportBoss:

Pennsylvania Station

2024-03-11T16:49:29Z

EWImportBoss:

Located at 33rd Street between 7th and 8th Avenues in [[Manhattan]], [http://www.transitcenter.com/transitguide/hub_nyp.htm Pennsylvania Station] (like many other large busy transit points on Earth) conceals in its workings a [[Worldgating facility | worldgating facility]]. Penn's two worldgates are used mostly for on-Earth "rapid transit" by wizards working on the East Coast of North America: doing a personal worldgating into Penn and then letting the hard-wired gates handle the longer part of a transit is a time-honored energy-saving strategy.
[[Image:NewFarley.jpg|thumb|200px|The future Penn Station]]
Transits through Penn, however, are likely to become more problematic over the next few years despite the long-anticipated relocation of all Penn's Amtrak rail services from the cramped quarters beneath Madison Square Garden / the Felt Forum into a new space at the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moynihan_Train_Hall Moynihan Train Hall] in the beautiful old Beaux-Arts building that housed the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_A._Farley_Building Farley Post Office]on 8th Avenue. Since the worldgates are normally tethered to current track structure, the tracks' reorganization and relocation means that the gates too has had to be relocated. This work is mentioned briefly in [[OHMWS/TVTQ]] and also in [[WH]], and the actual moving of the gates is described in the first chapter of [[TBM]].

If the current NY state plans for the [https://new.mta.info/project/penn-station-reconstruction reconstruction of the Madison Square Garden-adjacent Penn Station space] go forward, this will probably cause much more disruption to worldgating schedules. Transiting wizards should be careful to check their manuals for details before travel.

[[Category:Locations]]

Grand Central Terminal

2024-03-11T16:34:01Z

EWImportBoss:

[[Image:GCT_in_Blizzard_of_2015.jpg|thumb|250px|The Main Concourse at GCT in 2015]]A major public transport hub in mid-Manhattan, [[New York City]], and the location of the [[Grand Central Terminal gating complex | larger complex]] of New York's two [[Worldgate complexes | worldgating complexes]]. The facility appears often in the Young Wizards series, due to characters who either use the gating complex there for "mass transit" purposes, or work there full time. (Much information about the public/nonwizardly aspects of Grand Central can be found at its [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Central_Terminal Wikipedia entry]. NB: the usage "Grand Central Station" properly refers to the associated [https://www.loc.gov/item/ny1617/ US Post Office], not the terminal.)

The venerable Terminal has an eventful time of it in the series. Most prominently, [[Nita]] and [[Kit]] flee the [[Lone Power]] through the Main Concourse in [[SYWTBAW]]; and the downstairs track structure is subject to an invasion by mutated extradimensional saurians in [[TBONWM]] -- an incursion which requires a lot of [[patch | patching]], as among its many untoward results is the devouring of a tenor closely resembling [[Pavarotti, Luciano | Luciano Pavarotti]] by a dinosaur.

However, the Terminal's use by wizards is mostly much lower-key. Rather than do custom-constructed gatings for long-distance travel -- since these use a lot of energy, and saving energy is a major concern of those out on [[errantry]] -- most wizards east of the Mississippi elect to do a short "jump" to Grand Central and then use one of the gates associated with the upper-level track structure there for their onward journey. Since the gates are invisible, it's fairly easy for a careful wizard in a crowd of commuters to go completely unnoticed as they make that longer transit to Borneo or Antarctica.

The worldgates in GCT are managed by a team of [[Primary worldgate management team (Manhattan) | feline worldgate managers]]. Cats are best equipped to work casually with worldgates because they can see and handle [[hyperstrings]] naturally; most other wizards must employ special routines to perceive and manipulate these.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Transport]]
[[Category:Locations]]

Grand Central Terminal

2024-03-11T15:04:05Z

EWImportBoss:

[[Image:GCT_in_Blizzard_of_2015.jpg|thumb|250px|The Main Concourse at GCT in 2015]]A major public transport hub in mid-Manhattan, [[New York City]], and the location of the [[Grand Central Terminal gating complex | larger complex]] of New York's two [[Worldgate complexes | worldgating complexes]]. The facility appears often in the Young Wizards series, due to characters who either use the gating complex there for "mass transit" purposes, or work there full time. (Much information about the public/nonwizardly aspects of Grand Central can be found at its [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Central_Terminal Wikipedia entry]. NB: the usage "Grand Central Station" properly refers to the associated [https://www.loc.gov/item/ny1617/ US Post Office], not the terminal.)

The venerable Terminal has an eventful time of it in the series. Most prominently, [[Nita]] and [[Kit]] flee the [[Lone Power]] through the Main Concourse in [[SYWTBAW]]; and the downstairs track structure is subject to an invasion by mutated extradimensional saurians in [[TBONWM]] -- an incursion which requires a lot of [[patch | patching]], as among its many untoward results is the devouring of a tenor closely resembling [[Pavarotti, Luciano | Luciano Pavarotti]] by a dinosaur.

However, the Terminal's use by wizards is mostly much lower-key. Rather than do custom-constructed gatings for long-distance travel -- since these use a lot of energy, and saving energy is a major concern of those out on [[errantry]] -- most wizards east of the Mississippi elect to do a short "jump" to Grand Central and then use one of the gates associated with the upper-level track structure there for their onward journey. Since the gates are invisible, it's fairly easy for a careful wizard in a crowd of commuters to go completely unnoticed as he or she makes that longer transit to Borneo or Antarctica.

The worldgates in GCT are managed by a team of [[Primary worldgate management team (Manhattan) | feline worldgate managers]]. Cats are best equipped to work casually with worldgates because they can see and handle [[hyperstrings]] naturally; most other wizards must employ special routines to perceive and manipulate these.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Transport]]
[[Category:Locations]]

Grand Central Terminal

2023-01-24T11:41:13Z

EWImportBoss:

Apple Without A Bite, the

2023-01-24T11:40:43Z

EWImportBoss:

[[Image:101px-Striped_apple_logo.jpeg|left|thumb|100px|First observed version of the Biteless Apple]]This symbol first turns up in [[HW]] with the arrival of the [[Callahan family | Callahan family's]] new [[Apple IIIc | Apple IIIc+]] computer.1 The Apple logo in question is the early striped version, noticeably without the "bite".2 To [[Callahan, Dairine | Dairine]], initially much more interested in the computer itself than any weirdness in its logo, this difference is initially of no interest. But when she clones the computer and takes off with its portable version on her [[Ordeal]], she slowly begins to catch on to what the apple's biteless status implies.
[[Image:SmallResampledBlueGlassApple.png|right|thumb|150px|Dairine's version of the glass Biteless Apple]]

The next mention of the symbol comes in [[TWD]], when Dairine upgrades the Callahans' household computer. The original machine machine arrived with the software version of the [[Wizard's Manual]] installed, making her one of the first "Ordeal early adopters" and entitling her to membership in the [[Manual software | Manual software's]] beta group. As such she has been added to the "intensive upgrade" list for the Manual's accompanying hardware. In [[TWD]], the newly upgraded machine on which she's testing the Manual beta is plainly a tweaked version of the [http://www.apple-history.com/frames/body.php?page=gallery&model=g4cube Power Macintosh G4 Cube]. Its logo is the modern, non-striped variety, and biteless like its predecessor. Other routine upgrades are assumed to have taken place since, as Dairine's father mentions in [[WH]] that he's in favor of them (presumably because they're free). (Dairine's "beta version" wallpaper, minus the computerized Manual's lovely rippling-curtain desktop animation, is [https://www.youngwizards.com/yw-wp/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Dairines_Wallpaper_Large.png here,] at 1920x1200 resolution.)

The latest variation on this theme occurs in [[WAW]], when one young wizard turns up at the crisis meeting on the [[Moon, the | Moon]] carrying a [[WizPod]] that features a "glass" version of the biteless logo. (An ad for this interesting piece of hardware, detailing some of its more attractive features, can be found [http://www.youngwizards.com/The-WizPod-Touch here.])

[[Image:Spot Small Image.png|left|thumb|250px|[[Spot]] (after his second upgrade, in [[AWOM]]) wearing the Biteless Apple]]

In the YW universe, the Biteless Apple has become something of a symbol of the wizardly implementations of modern technology, and therefore seemed like a perfect choice for ErrantryWiki's logo. Whether the symbol's usage in the books also implies some covert admiration of the intrinsic coolness of the products of the company associated with the Biteful Apple in what passes for the Real World, the [[Powers That Be]] have so far declined to say. ([[HW]], [[TWD]], ''et seq.'')

1 This computer is, of course, fictional, and loosely based on the
[http://www.apple-history.com/frames/body.php?page=gallery&model=aIIc Apple IIc/IIc+.]

2 It's interesting to note in passing [http://www.perfectlyintune.com/page34/page35/page35.html this source], which shows the front page of the original manual for the Apple I: the apple is biteless. More info about the evolution of the Apple logo in the so-called Real World, and the logo's connection with the general concept of knowledge and other archetypes, can be found [http://www.theapplemuseum.com/index.php?id=44 here.]

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[Category:Theory of wizardry]]
[[Category:History of wizardry]]
[[Category:Objects]]

File:SmallResampledBlueGlassApple.png

2023-01-24T11:34:48Z

EWImportBoss:

File:101px-Striped apple logo.jpeg

2023-01-24T11:30:44Z

EWImportBoss: Early striped Apple

== Summary ==
Early striped Apple

Nolan, Ronan

2022-10-13T21:10:26Z

EWImportBoss:

A teenaged wizard based in Bray, County Wicklow, in the Republic of Ireland: son of [[Nolan, Ronan Sr. | Ronan Nolan Sr.]]

<div style="background:#efefef;margin:20px 10px 20px 10px;padding:10px;border:1px solid #cccccc;"><div style="float:right;">[[Image:45px-Information_icon.svg.png]]</div><div class="clear:both;"></div>'''Vital statistics:'''

''Full name / formal name'': Ronan Harris Nolan Junior 
''Height:'' 178cm / 5' 10" 
''Weight:'' 64kg / 140 lb 
''Ethnicity:'' Irish (caucasian) 
''Age:'' 16-17 +/-? {{age warning}} 
''Education:'' (primary) Cronan Naofa National School, Bray, County Wicklow (secondary) Presentation College, Bray, County Wicklow 
</div>

During the events of [[AWAB]], [[Callahan, Juanita L. | Nita]] meets Ronan in a fried chicken place on Main Street in Bray, and is more or less immediately attracted to him, struck (initially) by his dark good looks and his edgy, slightly punk attitude toward life in general and her in particular. When she discovers -- having made her way to his address, needing a consultation on local wizardly conditions -- that the shaggy-haired, dark-eyed, intriguing presence a few tables down at the chicken place is a fellow wizard, she's initially shocked... but she gets over it.

The attraction Nita initially feels is if anything made stronger by her discovery that Ronan is a wizard of considerable talent and power -- one strong enough to have survived the dangerous [[Ordeal]]-experience of the [[elemental exploit]] known as [[Sea, Taking In The | taking in the Sea]]. The difference in their ages -- he has at least a couple of years on her -- does not particularly bother her: what does bother her is that she realizes how attractive she finds this opinionated, annoying, annoyed, abrasive guy. The realization leads to some moments of discomfort for both of them. Some of these are comical, such as the incident during the wizards' crisis meeting in the [[Long Hall, the | Long Hall]] pub in [[Dublin]], during which Nita (as the [[Senior]] Wizard for Europe puts it) inadvertently "turns Ronan into a soggy beermat." The tension between them -- and the appreciation that each has for the other's talent -- probably makes the long "first kiss" they eventually share more or less unavoidable.

What Nita and Ronan discover from this kiss, however, is far more important than any mere realization about personal emotional development (or the lack of it). During the moment of intimacy, Nita detects, buried deep inside of Ronan, the unmistakable signature of one of the [[Powers That Be | Powers that Be]]. Ronan, it turns out, has been at least since his Ordeal, and possibly much longer, a hiding place for this Power, which has been biding Its time, waiting for mortal events to move into a specific configuration... one that's now drawing close.

Ronan's opinions about this are initially unprintable, and become complex -- possibly understandably so for someone on the threshold of adult life who suddenly finds that his life is not his own, and that he is a weapon in the One's hand, no different from the terrible [[Spear of Light]] with which he shortly finds himself invested (though a case could be made for the opinion that the situation was actually the other way around). Nita's reactions to Ronan's evolving predicament are similarly complex. Her longstanding relationship with [[Kit]] has suddenly had a factor added to it that neither of them expected, and one that Nita finds profoundly uncomfortable -- since the three of them will need to be working together professionally in the short term, handling the incursion of [[Balor]] and the supernatural forces of ancient Ireland into the present day. Fortunately the situation does not resolve itself as tragically as it might have if that three-way tension was ''not'' operating; Nita's and Kit's presence prove vital to the effective use of the Spear Luin on the field of the [[Second Battle of Moytura]], and Ronan departs the field still in possession of the Spear and his sanity...though certain other tensions, particularly between him and the [[Michael Power | Power]] guesting at the bottom of his soul, are not entirely resolved. Neither are other more personal ones, though these are at least not actively toxic.

After [[AWAB]] Ronan remains mostly in the background until [[WAW]], when Kit calls him in to assist with the events starting to unfold surrounding the beginning of the crisis caused by the [[Pullulus]] and the [[Lone Power | dark force]] driving it. While he makes light of the tensions between him, Nita and Kit, those tensions are still there, though in diminished form due to everyone's preoccupation with the growing danger and the imminent loss of wizardry among adults. Ronan becomes an important part of the expedition to [[Rashah]]: and not even he fully realizes (until events there begin to unfold) exactly how important he, his inner guest, and the Spear they both wield will be to the final outcome, especially the rise of the [[Hesper]]. He gives Nita at least one terrible moment during this period, which Nita later threatens to take out of his hide: but so far this promise remains unfulfilled.

In [[AWOM]], Ronan is one of the group of wizards who turn out to meet [[Mamvish]] on her arrival on Earth. He later is called in again by Kit (along with [[McAllister, Darryl | Darryl McAllister]]) to assist in investigating events surrounding the discovery of the [[superegg]] on [[Mars]]...with very mixed results.

Ronan's personal life continues rather complicated. Issues regarding his interior "houseguest" seem largely to have been resolved. But, possibly secondary to his increased presence in and around the Rodriguez household, he has succeeded in attracting the attention of Kit's sister [[Rodriguez, Carmela E. | Carmela]] -- never an entirely safe situation, and one which has caused Nita to stand back and watch with clinical interest (and an occasional urge to sell tickets). How this will develop, possibly not even the Powers that Be can predict with any certainty. ([[AWAB]], [[WAW]], ''et seq''.)

[[Category:Characters]]
[[Category:Wizards]]
[[Category:Personages]]

Binding Oath, the

2022-09-15T16:34:47Z

EWImportBoss:

One of the most powerful [[strictures]] in the [[Speech, the | Speech]], the Binding Oath is the basis for almost all [[Promissory statements | promissory statements]] and wizardly vows; even the [[Wizard's Oath]] is derived from it. It is phrased in the [[Enactive recension]] of the Speech, and the Binding Oath has so much power inherent in it that any being who swears it -- even the [[Lone Power]] itself -- is required to abide by the Oath's terms on pain of the withdrawal of all energy which has been invested in the being by the [[One, the | One]].

The Oath begins, "I swear by the One to perform what I promise, fully and without any reservation, nor with any mechanism or execution founded in the intention to deceive; to fully inform the wizards to whom I swear this oath of all manner and matter of things pertaining to their querying and desire; to carry out this information at a speed and in a way best suited to these wizards' desires and the achievement of their ends; and at the end of said achievement, to depart without doing any harm to them or any thing or person affiliated to them in whatever degree, and when the conditions of this swearing are discharged and acknowledged to have been discharged, to go peaceably again into my own place. And all this, by the Power of that One in Which all oaths and all intentions rest, inviting It on my abbroachment of this Oath to withdraw the gifts It allows me to enjoy, I swear -- " There are several more optional phrases setting out any additional conditions and requirements, the fulfillment of which will signal the oath's completion and the release of the being doing the swearing.

A wizard will only be able to use the Binding Oath once in a lifetime. In [[WH]], [[Nita]] judges that the right moment has come, and forces [[Esemeli]] to take the Binding Oath...with mixed results that serve only to emphasize how dangerous the [[Lone One]] is to deal with even when the wizard thinks he or she holds all the cards. Additionally, the Oath is as binding on the administering wizard as it is on the being who takes it. So powerful a stricture routinely demands a high price; the power of the binding (determined by the power of the being which is bound) implies a directly proportional payment in energy by the wizard. Such payments can take years to clear. ([[WH]])

(See also: [[Adjurations, formal]].)

[[Category:Theory of wizardry]]

Wand

2022-09-15T16:22:37Z

EWImportBoss:

[[Image:Bittersweet.jpg|thumb|right|300px|A wand donated by a 30-year-old bittersweet vine (''Celastrus scandens'', aka "Wilma"): from the author's collection]]One of the most commonly used physical wizardly tools, especially for wizards in the earlier stages of their careers.

A wand normally is used in one of two ways: as a tool with its own specific properties and powers, or as a [[channeling device]] used to direct the forces of a spell in a specific manner or direction.

In the first instance, a wand usually shares some of the properties of a [[charm]], in that it has a specific small wizardry associated with the physical fabric of the wand itself. This wizardry may be something independently applied, or a property already associated with the physical object (such as a [[rowan wand]]'s affinity for moonlight). In the first instance, the wizard intending to use the wand will normally try to construct it from some material which has little affinity with any specific wizardry. This ensures that there will be as little interference with the channeling of the wizard's personal energy as possible.

The wand is one of the more personal objects associated with wizardly practice. Wands are normally made from requested or donated material -- as Nita's [[rowan wand | rowan wands]] are all donations from the [[rowan]] tree [[Liused]], and Kit's antenna-wand was a present to him from the [[Edsel]] his father has been detailing. Since a given wand is usually made or prepared by the wizard who will be using it, it's viewed as inappropriate (if not simply unwise) to sell, trade or transfer them. There are rare exceptions to this rule involving legacy (in the word's original sense) or "heritage" wands that either possess significant historical value, or have been involved in wizardries that have imbued them with qualities requiring special management or curation, usually by Advisory-level wizards or above.

As their practice progresses, there are wizards who become ambivalent about wands. They may start to see them as a "crutch", a shortcut device, or a gimmick -- something slightly juvenile and embarrassing, associated with the early days when, as most wizards do, they had more sheer power than expertise. But such opinions are probably not particularly helpful. Like other skilled craftsmen for whom the work is what matters most, the smartest and most gifted wizards have no compunction about using a wand when it's obviously the right tool for the job. ([[SYWTBAW]] et al.)

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[Category:Theory of wizardry]]
[[Category:Spells]]