Hey there, y'all. Poor Kimberly was feeling just a tad under the weather last night so she and I agreed that we could do a double post today.
I am Dr. Tabitha Clarkwell, Kimberly's steampunk persona. I am from the South - about the central part of the state of South Carolina. My mamma was a chemist of some small repute, and my daddy was a steam engine designer. I was raised in a big plantation house (that oddly enough didn't have a plantation attached - more science, less farming I suppose) with a large library and some equally large labs so I got into the various sciences at a very early age.
When it came time for my debutant ball, I decided I wasn't too keen on being escorted or fawned over (this is a little white lie. In truth, I just forgot about it), so on the day of I rushed through getting into my dress. I quite forgot about the hair, which still had my goggles nested in it and was standing a tad on end since I had been replicating a
Leclanché cell - a type of battery invented by Georges Leclanché. I quite forgot about the shocks, and then there was another kind of shock when the high society ladies saw me in my slightly stained, wrinkled, crooked dress, mildly dirty hands and face (what? Working with metals and such can do that to your hands!) and sticky-up hair.
The ball was soon forgotten, but my successful cell wasn't. It sparked an interest in electricity that brought me into school and into my career as an electrical engineer.
As I reached adulthood, I met someone who would change my life. He was another electricity fan by the name of
Nikola Tesla. He and I were talking in a restaurant about the theoretical design of a little device we only somewhat jokingly called a
death ray. We then went back to his lab to test the theory and successfully built one. Then, being the intelligent, world war fearing folks we are, we dismantled it.
Too bad making a death ray doesn't exactly go unnoticed.
Now, good old Nikola, he's a bit infamous. But most people have never heard of me. So while he continued to profess his success in order to create some level of doubt as to the actual ability of the machine to work, I went on the run from several world governments (and the odd super villain or two) who want me to rebuild it so they can conquer the world. You'd think humanity would come up with a better life goal than world domination.
Well, one of those super villains is named
Dr. Steel. This is his song Back and Forth.
The next song on the playlist is by
Steam Powered Giraffe (no, that is not a joke or a fake band name). It's their song Brass Goggles.
We'll see y'all tomorrow with another song!
