OOC: Ten things about Adrian Shephard.
1. He's from the town of Rowlesburg, in Preston County, West by-God-SMILE-when-you-say-that Virginia. This is, to put it bluntly, holler country. The major industries in the area are coal and lumber. Mostly coal. There's farming in the area, and white-water rafting on the Cheat River (class IV and V rapids nearby), but Rowlesburg is a small town (we're talking six hundred people, total) in an economically slow area- or was, before the Combine came.
2. He's the third of five children and the middle of the three boys: girl, boy, Adrian, girl, boy. The last two were a pair of fraternal twins born about a year after Adrian, which is part of why there were only five kids in the Shephard family instead of six; that many very young children in the house at once put Mrs. Shephard off having any more kids at all, ever.
3. His father ran a pretty successful satellite TV business, since cable TV doesn't run out to the hollers and people will do a lot to get decent television. His mother was a stay-at-home mom with a serious vegetable garden bordering on a small farm, a couple of chickens, and some beehives. The veggies and the chickens were for feeding the family. The beehives were for selling honey- and for shipping bees to farmers around Preston County who needed an extra boost of pollinators.
4. When the Cheat River flooded in 1985 (a century flood that wiped out the nearby town of Albright), Adrian was six years old. He has some vague memories of National Guardsmen helping evacuate people and working with the townsfolk to save as much of the town as they could. The Shephard family was mostly spared- nobody died, and the house had been built on high enough ground not to get inundated- but the beehives and a chunk of the farm went down hard. It took a lot of work to make up for that come spring.
5. Adrian's older sister and older brother both went to college; state school, and on multiple small scholarships each (academic and sporting alike), but still. Adrian probably could've gone to college himself, but he really wanted to get out of Rowlesburg and start making a name for himself as soon as possible. When the Marine Corps recruiter turned up at the county high school he jumped at the chance, and had the full blessing of his entire family. Military service is something of a tradition for people who want to get out of Rowlesburg, and it's generally understood that sooner or later they come back. Adrian figured he'd probably do that eventually.
6. Adrian is an accomplished swimmer and outdoorsman. He's not that fond of organized sports other than hockey and rugby; he feels most of them are too tame. Yes, that includes football. He likes hunting, though. Something like half the meat in the Shephard family freezer at any given time was wild-caught, either by him or one of his uncles. His father had no particular love for hunting, but was deeply fond of fishing, and took each of his sons out regularly when the fish were biting.
7. Adrian would've liked to learn the violin in high school, but never got the chance, as the instrument was expensive even to rent. Drums, on the other hand, were not a problem, and he was in the marching band in high school. Had he gone to college there would probably have been a band scholarship in it for him. He's good on drums.
8. Adrian dislikes politics intensely, on the grounds that most politicians wouldn't know life on the ground if it bit them. Nevertheless he's a registered voter, though he's generally favored third-party candidates. He voted Nader in the 2000 presidential election because he wanted the mining companies in the Rowlesburg area to clean up their act, and he didn't trust Al Gore to do the job. He regretted that decision after the fact. (ETA: Shephard is of the opinion that if they were still around he'd probably vote for the Bull Moose Party, but he'd prefer they not have that plank about limiting naval armaments and that they put an actual antitrust plank in the platform. He also admires Teddy Roosevelt's attitude towards conservation: wildlife and wilderness are resources to be managed so that they can be used. Essentially, preserve wildlife so that there'll always be enough to shoot at.)
9. He's a Kinsey zero and gets intensely uncomfortable dealing with visible or open indicators of anything higher on the Kinsey scale than that, but he won't talk about it or give people a hard time about it if he can avoid it. He'll just change the subject, get out of the conversation, or otherwise attempt to avoid the person in question. If people start asking him about it his response essentially consists of "Did I ask? Did I indicate I wanted to know? No!" and the like.
10. He's a Methodist. His family usually went to the Corinth United Methodist Church in Terra Alta.
2. He's the third of five children and the middle of the three boys: girl, boy, Adrian, girl, boy. The last two were a pair of fraternal twins born about a year after Adrian, which is part of why there were only five kids in the Shephard family instead of six; that many very young children in the house at once put Mrs. Shephard off having any more kids at all, ever.
3. His father ran a pretty successful satellite TV business, since cable TV doesn't run out to the hollers and people will do a lot to get decent television. His mother was a stay-at-home mom with a serious vegetable garden bordering on a small farm, a couple of chickens, and some beehives. The veggies and the chickens were for feeding the family. The beehives were for selling honey- and for shipping bees to farmers around Preston County who needed an extra boost of pollinators.
4. When the Cheat River flooded in 1985 (a century flood that wiped out the nearby town of Albright), Adrian was six years old. He has some vague memories of National Guardsmen helping evacuate people and working with the townsfolk to save as much of the town as they could. The Shephard family was mostly spared- nobody died, and the house had been built on high enough ground not to get inundated- but the beehives and a chunk of the farm went down hard. It took a lot of work to make up for that come spring.
5. Adrian's older sister and older brother both went to college; state school, and on multiple small scholarships each (academic and sporting alike), but still. Adrian probably could've gone to college himself, but he really wanted to get out of Rowlesburg and start making a name for himself as soon as possible. When the Marine Corps recruiter turned up at the county high school he jumped at the chance, and had the full blessing of his entire family. Military service is something of a tradition for people who want to get out of Rowlesburg, and it's generally understood that sooner or later they come back. Adrian figured he'd probably do that eventually.
6. Adrian is an accomplished swimmer and outdoorsman. He's not that fond of organized sports other than hockey and rugby; he feels most of them are too tame. Yes, that includes football. He likes hunting, though. Something like half the meat in the Shephard family freezer at any given time was wild-caught, either by him or one of his uncles. His father had no particular love for hunting, but was deeply fond of fishing, and took each of his sons out regularly when the fish were biting.
7. Adrian would've liked to learn the violin in high school, but never got the chance, as the instrument was expensive even to rent. Drums, on the other hand, were not a problem, and he was in the marching band in high school. Had he gone to college there would probably have been a band scholarship in it for him. He's good on drums.
8. Adrian dislikes politics intensely, on the grounds that most politicians wouldn't know life on the ground if it bit them. Nevertheless he's a registered voter, though he's generally favored third-party candidates. He voted Nader in the 2000 presidential election because he wanted the mining companies in the Rowlesburg area to clean up their act, and he didn't trust Al Gore to do the job. He regretted that decision after the fact. (ETA: Shephard is of the opinion that if they were still around he'd probably vote for the Bull Moose Party, but he'd prefer they not have that plank about limiting naval armaments and that they put an actual antitrust plank in the platform. He also admires Teddy Roosevelt's attitude towards conservation: wildlife and wilderness are resources to be managed so that they can be used. Essentially, preserve wildlife so that there'll always be enough to shoot at.)
9. He's a Kinsey zero and gets intensely uncomfortable dealing with visible or open indicators of anything higher on the Kinsey scale than that, but he won't talk about it or give people a hard time about it if he can avoid it. He'll just change the subject, get out of the conversation, or otherwise attempt to avoid the person in question. If people start asking him about it his response essentially consists of "Did I ask? Did I indicate I wanted to know? No!" and the like.
10. He's a Methodist. His family usually went to the Corinth United Methodist Church in Terra Alta.