#How to do the thing

[cyberphuck]

HOW TO DO THE WRITING THING: OUTLINING AND WRITING YOUR FIRST WORDS

Previously: Feeding the Story Monster

[IMG ID: a black Corona typewriter.]

HOW DO I LIKE, START WRITING THOUGH You’ve fed the story monster, figured out what kind of stories you like and even have an inkling of the story you want to tell, and now you’re ready to start banging the keys. Great! Do that. Yes, for some people it’s as easy as just sitting down and starting from Chapter One Word One, without even a slight idea of where the story is going to go, and I assure you those people are not invited to my biannual Creative Crying Party. (We call those people “Pantsers,” as in “Flying By the Seat of Their Pants.”) Pantsing works best for short works of fiction, since by the time you’re done, there’s going to be a lot of editing and revising to do and that gets to be a pain in the ass with novel-length works. I used to Pants exclusively from High School until about 27 or 28 years old, keeping only a very, very loose idea of the story in my head and just letting whatever was going to happen, happen. I wrote a lot and did not finish much. HOW TO DO THE OUTLINE THING Once I realized that just winging it wasn’t going to work for me, I started experimenting with different forms of brainstorming, outlining and story building and came up with a mishmash of methods that I use at different times for different purposes. (I’m not going to go over the Three Act Structure because it’s one of those things that’s been so oversimplified to fit every story that it’s become kind of useless. I will instead link you to HULK PRESENTS MYTH OF 3 ACT STRUCTURE, in which a blogger and screenwriter writing as the Hulk breaks down why the TAS kind of sucks.) TELLING THE STORY TO YOURSELF You’ve probably already done this part: this is just you and you, thinking about how cool it would be if a robot chef entered a chili cookoff and had to compete against the notoriously anti-robot Sheriff Blowhard for the blue ribbon. You may have even done the next part, which is jotting some of this stuff down when you have the chance. I used to send emails to myself, but now I use the notes app on my smartphone because I can come back from a half-asleep bedtime brainstorming session, grab my phone, turn on dictation and just blurt out a few lines so that in the morning I can still see the shape of the story I’d been dreaming of.

[IMG ID: screenshot of the notes app. Text reads: “The use of aperture runes, also called moving runes, spring runes, or trap runes, is forbidden by students and can result in expulsion. Turning argentavis house into a workable novel. Neptune is protag and every chapter ends with him dreaming, seeing himself frequently. It isn’t revealed until later that he’s dreaming other people’s dreams.]

[IMG ID: screenshot of the notes app. Text reads: “Who is the patron saint of Limberry? It is saint katherine, is it not? the woman who--

--drank all the waters of Lake Poescas when the Ydorans tried to drown her in it, yes.

and does she not appear nude in the visions she visited upon high confessor whatever?

Yes, but--

Do you think her nakedness was inappropriate then? That she had appeared to tempt the high confessor into sin?

No, I--]

[IMG ID: a screenshot of the notes app. Text reads: “Brig Thing. Burying Milleuda and burying Wiegraf. Zalbaag sends Wiegraf’s body back west and expects it to be all gross and rotten when it gets there, but he opens the coffin and discovers he’s still completely intact, like a saint. Wiegraf is injured and too weak to dig a hole in the frozen ground. Also crows keep trying to eat her and he can’t shoo them away and dig at the same time. Wiegraf upends his money bag looking for viaticum but he’s broke. Zalbaag says oh let me and reaches for his purse but Wiegraf is like fuck you. Wiegraf ends up putting something precious of his in her mouth, like his cross or a rock or something.]

Once you’ve got the loose shape of a story-- what dirty beatniks call a premise-- you can move on to step two. TELLING THE STORY TO SOMEONE ELSE (QUICKLY) When you search for a movie on wikipedia, there’s a section marked PLOT. In this section is a brief synopsis of the entire film, beginning to end. Look up a movie you know pretty well and read the plot section. It doesn’t have every single detail, but it does have all the important points so that you can understand what happens in the movie, and what it’s about, in five hundred to one thousand words. Try to do this for your own story: tell it to someone else (in a message or email is ideal, since you can copy-paste it into a word doc for safekeeping), front to back. Don’t be coy about spoilers, don’t get bogged down into unnecessary exposition or scene setting, just let it all out as if the two of you are standing at the-- do they even have watercoolers in offices anymore? Hell, do we even have offices? Fuck it, let’s reel it all the way back to 3rd grade and your friend has asked you what happened in the last episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. When you write out the wiki-plot section of your story, make sure you’re asking yourself the kinds of questions that someone seeing the story for the first time would ask (or pay attention to the questions they are asking!). The robot chef is entering the chili competition. Why? What is Sheriff Blowhard going to do with the prize money if he wins? Why would that be bad for all of robot-kind? You guys have no idea how hard it is to find an example in my notes that isn’t NSFW, so here’s just the beginning of a story that I told to my brother last year: a lawyer who mostly works from home doing simple wills and amicable divorces and stuff like that does a job for a super shady guy who ghosts him when it's time to pay. Lawyer sends this guy like fifteen invoices and then threatens to sue, which is a real threat since he's a fucking laywer.

The next morning someone knocks on his door and it's the shady guy, with a catboy. He says "I don't have any money but here, take this it's worth a lot more." Lawyer says bullshit, get the fuck off my doorstep and come back with my fucking money you deadbeat, and slams the door… Very casual, hardly structured, just a rundown of what happens in the story. If you find that you get stuck in the middle, that’s fine! Make a list of questions that need to be answered in order for you to fill in those gaps. Keep going back until you’re able to tell the story all the way through. SOME THINGS THAT YOUR STORY WILL NEED: A place to start. This does not have to be “at the beginning.” The start of your story should be attention-grabbing; a lot of authors like the first paragraphs to be an action scene, or finding the main character in the middle of a crisis. You can always catch the reader up later. A place to go. Something happens to upset the status quo and start your character on their journey through the story. Lawrence the Lawyer is paid for his work with what is effectively a living sex doll and now he has to figure out what to do with it. The robot chef finds out that if he presents the blue ribbon to the mayor, it can be taken as proof that he’s human enough to own his own business. A problem. If everything goes smoothly and as planned, it doesn’t make for a fun read. Something, maybe many things, have to go wrong along the way. Sheriff Blowhard sends his goons to kick dirt into the robot chef’s chili pot. It might rain, and robot chef’s partner, rustbucket, isn’t waterproof. A solution or a way through. How do your characters solve the problem? Does solving the problem make more problems? How many obstacles will they have to face until they reach their goal, and does that goal change through the story? Do they ultimately succeed, or fail? A wrap-up. It doesn’t have to be THE END, but you are going to have to stop writing eventually. Not every single question needs to be answered, but the biggest ones should be in order to have a satisfying conclusion, whether good or bad. NOTE: this is not EVERYTHING a story needs-- just some things for you to think about when you’re getting ready to write your synopsis. THINGS THAT HELP OTHER PEOPLE Go ahead and experiment with other methods of outlining to see what works best with your creative process. Some of the things that other people do to help them tell their story: Drawing Maps Making Timelines Character Profiles/Relationship Wheels Song Playlists and Image Boards Very, Very Detailed Outlines But be wary of doing all these things just because it gives you the feeling of getting something done. At the end of all of it, you are going to have to start writing. You can’t avoid it forever. COME BACK HERE. MAKING NOTES, OR, A CHEAT SHEET Alright, Act One, Scene One, Paragraph One, Line One… Word One.

[IMG ID: Spongebob “The” meme]

Alright, alright, still a little bit scary to jump into feet-first. So we’re going to tell ourselves the story again, but just a piece of it-- the piece you’re about to write. [In this section, the robot chef is just seeing the headline in Robo News Daily that anyone who wins a human competition will hereby be declared a human by law. He jumps up from the table, spilling his mug of oil coffee, and yells for Rustbucket to come over and see. Together, they re-read the article and agree that this is their big chance to be able to open a restaurant of their own…] You’ve got the work blocked out. Now all you have to do is the little noodly bits, the description, the dialogue, the nice prose. Once you’ve reached the end of what you’ve planned out-- and try not to do more than a chapter or a few pages at a time, so you can keep your planning true to what you’re actually writing-- take a breather, look back on what you wrote, and then plan some more. [Chef and Rustbucket agree that Chef’s Six Alarm Chili is the best in Botville and he’s sure to win the ribbon at the Chili Cookoff if he enters…] BANGING. THE. KEYS. Set a daily time goal for yourself-- say, 30 minutes of writing-- and try to get to it every day. This works best if it’s at the same time every day; your brain will start to associate 3:00 with “time to write” the same way it associates 4:20 with “time to study quietly or volunteer at the old folks’ home.” Notice I said set a time goal, not a word goal. This is because in my humble opinion, setting a word goal is setting yourself up for failure. You’ll end up setting it too high because you think you have to, struggle for hours on end alternately picking at the word doc and scrolling Twitter, and ultimately give up, falling further and further behind on your quota and then giving up altogether. Everyone writes at a different pace; people who write very quickly don’t necessarily produce better or worse work than those who take their time with every word. And let’s face it: folks be busy. So just set yourself a reasonable amount of time in which you are to do nothing but write (and maybe sip a hot bev), and then get your fingers moving. If you write a thousand words one day and two hundred the next, that’s okay. You’re getting it done, little by little, thirty minutes by thirty minutes. If at the end of your writing time you don’t feel like you’re “done,” great! Keep going until you feel like stopping. If you write pretty much nothing one day because you just can’t get into it, that’s fine too-- just make sure that you’re not doing anything but writing during that time, even if you’re just making notes for the next scene, or a blog post about how much you hate writing today. “SPRINTS” A writing “sprint” is when you and at least one other person decide to take writing time together, usually in increments of 10, 15, or 30 minutes at a time with breaks in between. Sprints are a great way to get your writing done since you have the fun and companionship of “racing” another person, and you can even share what you wrote afterwards for some of that sweet sweet validation. In my experience sprints work best in person, but with the world being on fire right now it’s fine to virtually sprint with someone over Discord or on Twitter. A BRIEF NOTE ON ROUGH DRAFTS Save the editing for when you are done with a section-- a chapter, an act, a half, whatever. See how the story begins to take shape before you start hacking bits off and sticking them back on. And, if you can help it, don’t edit as you go for anything bigger than spelling, grammar, and word choice. (Some people don’t do heavy editing at all. I’m mostly one of those people, but I will have some wordage about it when the time comes.) TAKE IT EASY ON YOURSELF Not everyone can write all day, every day. In fact, almost no one can. There are certain authors who shall not remain nameless-- STEPHEN KING-- who are of the opinion that if you don’t spend all your time writing, then you aren’t a writer. Tell you what, Steve, fuck you. Let me let you in on a secret: everyone is a human being, and human beings need fun, community, social activity, and rest. If you need a break, take one. In fact, let’s call it a “Fuck Steve” break. Take a “Fuck Steve” break anytime writing begins to feel like a chore for you. Fifteen minutes or one entire day, however long you need to look away from the page and gather your thoughts again. Grab a drink, a snack, a blanket, make sure you feel comfortable and content. Because your writing is important, but so are you. TODAY’S TAKEAWAYS: Fuck around a little bit with outlining and see what works for you. I showed you a method that works for me that’s beginner-friendly. Remember to ask yourself questions about your story in order to get the full synopsis. Set a reasonable daily writing time (not a word goal) and try your best to stick to it. You can also do sprints with writer friends! Give yourself a fukken “Fuck Steve” break. Writing should not be painful, it should not be something you dread. Take a breather and come back to it later. NEXT TIME: POV and rich description!

[swan2swan]

Whoever conceived and animated this moment, I hope they're doing well and thriving. This is S-rank romance stuff here.

[just-spacetrash]

the 'what if you played it a little risky' post literally Changed my life but i cant fujkign find it in my blog because its. a tiktok screenshot

[lazylittledragon]

can't believe we're all adults being forced into the club penguin level of censorship in 2024

[gert-the-disaster]

does anyone understand my curse

[dirtytransmasc]

the men and boys are innocent too.

we cry "the innocent women and children" to appeal to the masses, to try and force their sympathy, but the men and boys are innocent too.

I have seen sons crying out for their mothers, their fathers, their siblings. I have seen them break down at the loss of their families. I have seen them cling to their dead and grieve.

I have seen fathers cradle their dead children, seen them kiss their faces and hold their little hands. I have seen them faint with grief when asked to identify the dead. I have seen them carry their sons and daughters. I have seen them fasting to provide what little they can for their families.

I have seen men and boys digging through the rubble with just their bare hands, I have seen them comforting strangers, playing with children, rocking them, hushing them, even if the face of such imminent danger. I have seen them cry, seen them grieve, seen them break down into each other's arms, seen them be selfless, beyond selfless, becoming something I don't have a word for.

I have seen the men who are doctors refuse to leave their patients, even when they have no medicine or supplies to give them, even when they're threatened with bombings. I have seen fathers who have lost all their children pick orphans up into their arms and proclaim them their child so they are not alone. I have seen men and boys digging pets out of the rubble.

the men are innocent too. the men and boys are being hurt and killed too. the men and boys are grieving too. the men and boys are scared too. the men and boys are fighting to save their people too. the men and boys deserve to be fought for too.

[baristabomb]

...weird amount of dunmeshi fans have been saying being a caretaker in a relationship is the worst thing ever..marcille must want to killl everyone soo bad because doing things for people suuuucks sooo muchh

it's an act of love, not just a job i promise. we all want someone who's willing to take care of us in some way, just like how senshi shows care for others by cooking for them :'|

[phayz]

learning that self deprecation isnt cool and just makes the people around you uncomfortable unironically improved my mental health a lot. like if you just stop saying negative shit about yourself you will genuinely like yourself more and other people wont be repulsed by your attitude and you will have more friends. it's true.

[hinamie]

10 years later

[redvelvetwishtree]

[cyberphuck]

How To Do the Writing Thing: Feeding the Story Monster

(these “how-to” posts were originally posted on my ko-fi page, and originally-originally posted on Reddit’s r/writing forum from which I am now banned which is an angry rant for another time. I thought some of the people who follow me would appreciate being able to read them here.)

[IMG ID: a black Corona typewriter.]

WHERE DO I START? The asshole answer to this question is “just start writing, hur hur!” And yeah, sure, in order to write you do have to actually write. But if you’re not in the habit of doing it, or if you’ve seldom or even never done it before, “just start writing” is about as useful as dumping someone in a river and telling them to “just start swimming.” THE STORY MONSTER: AWAKEN Before you think about your story, let’s think about other stories that you enjoy. It doesn’t have to be in a book; these days sitting down to read is getting more and more difficult with all the other data being shoved in your eyeballs every second. I like to start with movies, because everyone has a favorite movie (or two, or several) they know by heart and can dissect to figure out the story-type elements of it. (Listen, I tested out of high school and dropped out of college. I’m doing the best I can.) The best way to start doing this is to ask yourself a lot of “why” questions, starting with, “why do I like this story?” We’ll use Star Wars: A New Hope (the first one) as an example since most people have seen it and it’s a very basic story. You liked that movie well enough: why? Did you like the dialogue? The characters? Luke’s coming of age story, the dark menace of Darth Vader? Did you like how plucky Leia was, how dashing Han Solo could be? Did you just really like all the spaceships? Think about your favorite movie, and ask yourself, why do I like it? - it’s exciting. Why? What parts were most heart-pounding? - it has great characters. Why? Which ones, and what kinds of characters are they? Heroic but flawed? Determined and gritty? Deliciously evil? - the story is amazing. Why? What kinds of twists and turns are there? (and why are they so satisfying? A twist has to make sense backwards and forwards!) Pick apart two or three of your favorite movies and see if there’s a central theme there, so that you can make a statement like “I like movies where x happens” or “my favorite type of movie is x because y.” That’s getting to know yourself, and the better you know yourself, the better your own writing will be. Now that you’ve got the hang of picking apart your favorites, see if there’s a movie or TV series that you’re not that into, and ask yourself why you don’t like that one as much. This’ll be easier-- everybody likes to talk about stuff they fukken hate. There’s a prestige series on Prime called The Boys that my dad loves and I can’t stand; it’s a superhero tale that loves to make scenes as bloody and ultraviolent as possible. People’s eyes get burnt out, heads explode, guys get cut in half or blown up, etc etc. I’m not into that, so I won’t put that on my list of “story stuff I like.” (Don’t get me wrong, it’s an extremely well written and well produced show-- it’s just not For Me. A show can be really great in every way but just not your cup of tea, and that’s fine. I really like Call the Midwife. It’s a very twee British show about nuns helping women give birth. My dad fukken hates that show.) At this point you might want to get a notepad or text document to start writing down things that you saw, or read, that you really loved or really hated. Write down the name of the show, the day you watched it, and a little blurb about what it was that stood out to you and why you liked or disliked it. 50 words or less-- don’t get too carried away. Then, when it’s time to think about the story you want to tell, you can refer back to your notes. THE STORY MONSTER: FEED The more media you consume, the more feed for the story monster you’ll have, but you’ll have to keep cutting the stories up into bite size pieces (liked x about y, hated z about b) to really get a handle on the kind of story you want to tell. You’ll also start noticing how stories are structured, what type of pacing is used for different kinds of scenes, and how a character’s actions and dialogue affect how the author (or director, or whatever) wants you to feel about that character. Cut out those pieces of story and hold them up to your budding idea, and ask yourself, “how can I make this work for me?” Chopping up stories to feed the monster is something that you should keep doing even after you’re a total expert writer with nothing more to learn who makes a million dollars a second, like me. You can use stories from anywhere, too-- not just TV, movies and books, but also newspaper articles, comics and graphic novels, dance, poetry, any medium at ALL that has some sort of message to it or is designed to make you feel a certain way is something you can chop up for the monster. Dance and music are particularly good for pacing; poetry is good for interesting and varied descriptions. Listen to people tell stories out loud to learn the rhythm and cadence of the way people talk in real life to give your dialogue a boost. (Real People Talking will also be important when I get to Word Choice and Tone in writing!) TODAY’S TAKEAWAY: Watch, read and listen, take a lot of notes about what you liked. Get to know yourself, and your writing will improve for it. NEXT TIME: Getting the words down, “taking notes,” outlines and rough drafts.

[fruitfloats]

some of the habits different robins didnt realize came from Dick:

-Jason has kept the same stretching routine this whole time, even Dick has changed his, but Jason does the one that dick used to do in preparation for his circus act.

-When Tim taps his feet while writing out a report, he always taps out the same rhythm, the same one Dick used to do when he had to sit for long periods of time.

-Everytime Steph ties up her hair she uses a blue hair tie, they were the only ones around in the batcave when she needed one and then it became tradition for her. Dick used blue ones when he had longer hair because its his favorite color.

-Damian always rolls his right shoulder when hes standing around, he doesn't know why he does it or even notices that he does it. Dick injured his right shoulder years ago and it always needs to be stretched out or it gets stiff.

[verflares]

just how long is forever? // not long enough, with you

pssst. check this out on inprnt :]

[inbabylontheywept]

bad dating stories time: the shoe incident

so in highschool, my best friend wasnt allowed to go on dates unless there was another couple there to keep an eye on him. part of this was his parents being insane, but also, part of it was him being insane. in a problem with no reasonable parties, there are no reasonable solutions.

at some point in my junior year, my sorta-gf broke up with me, and i just wasnt feeling dating, which was bad for my friend, because he had a good thing going with a girl he met in court.

he kind of hounded me about it. kept pushing me to just put me feet back in the dating pool and i wasnt real thrilled about it, because i knew he was pushing me for his own benefit, not mine, so i kept telling him to fuck off, and after a few weeks of being told that i would date when i was damn well ready, he eventually said: okay. what if i paid for the date AND found you a blind date AND all you had to do was show up?

and i shouldve said no, i know, but i let him wear me down, and i will own my fault in that. a date starting on such a stupid premise could never have gone well.

but he still managed to find a way to make it worse.

i dont know how long he tried to set a blind date up. it couldve been multiple attempts. he couldve stooped to this immediately. but what happened in the end was that he called a girl from the ward he attended - a girl that he knew had a giant, mushy crush on him - and he said: hey! how would you feel about going on a date this weekend?

(you know, implying it was with him, but never actually saying it.)

and she said YES WOW I WOULD LOVE TO and he said great! and then he called me up and said he found me a date.

i did not learn about his crimes until several weeks later. i will die swearing before god almighty that i would never have allowed this travesty to happen if i had known.

that was on a monday. the date of the date rolled around that friday evening, and im sorry to confess, i really phoned the whole thing in. i showed up in my favorite comfy outfit, which was also a fashion crime: basketball shorts and flipflops and a baja hoodie. it was super comfy but it made me look kind of crazy. i picked him up first, and then i picked up his date next, and then we went to pick up my date, and thats where you're gonna get the play by play.

i arrived, walked across the yard, and knocked on the front door. she opened it almost immediately, like shed been waiting right by it, and i could see her expression go from OMG IM SO EXCITED to super disappointed, then disgusted and finally pissed. and because i didn't know about my friends sins, i thought it was from my outfit. which seemed... harsh. like, hey, im allowed to be quirky, fuck you. also its a blind date, i thought the deal was that we were both going to be sad broken sacks of mortality.

anyway, we looked at each other for several seconds before she slammed the door in my face.

i looked back at my friend. he was sweating bullets. i dont know what he expected from this, but there was this big long pause where we both tried to figure out what to do, and then the door opened up, and her dad invited me in, and he said she was gonna need a few minutes to finish getting ready, and that in the meantime we could sit and talk.

we did not talk. we did sit. i sat down on the couch, and he sat down in a chair across the couch, and then instead of talking he cleaned his pistol on the coffee table. i wasnt actually sure if it was a threat, or if it was just a fidget thing for 40+ year old republican men, but when i tried to help he got snappy so i just watched him put a pistol back together.

he was okay at it.

eventually my date came downstairs, still mad as hell for reasons beyond my ken, and i felt pretty guilty for being such a mess because i thought that was why she was so angry. i tried to make up for by walking her to the car and getting the door for her, just generally trying to be extra polite, but before i could make it back to the drivers side, her dad called me back to the door. so i flipped around, went to the door, and immediately regreted my decision.

soon as i was within range, her dad got waaaay too close to me, leaned in, and said "whatever you do to her, i will do to you," and my brain went into overdrive making three consecutive realizations.

realization one was, damn, the pistol thing was a threat. that sucks. what an asshole. realization two was, wait, im autistic and even i know theres a 0% chance me and my date even hold hands, least of all boink. does this guy actually think there's even a 1% chance of anyone in that car getting laid tonight? is he an idiot? and then realization three went through, which was wait, is this guy threatening to fuck me? and unfortunately, with my brain doing so much processing, my mouth was left to run amok, so somewhere between realization 2 and 3, i said:

"i can't get pregnant"

which, i swear, wasn't actually me trying to be a smartass, it was just me pointing out that he couldn't actually follow up on that threat. it just wasn't possible. we do not live in the omegaverse and im not scared of you.

still, it was an insanely catastrophic thing to say, and the moment we both heard it, we bluescreened. that single sentence obliterated both of our momentary streams of consciousness like a saltine in front of a sand blaster. problem was, he'd probably gone his whole life not even realizing someone could say something that stupid, and making that realization was going to cost him a lot of thinking time. me though? i had been saying shit like that for 17 years, i didnt have to rewrite my expectations of human nature, i just had to plan an exit and start striding. so i was already halfway back to the car before i heard "hey. hey come back. Hey. Hey. HEY. HEY WAIT. HEY GET BACK HERE. HEY-"

and then i was in my car, and i drove away.

if this happened today, he'd have called her, and the whole thing wouldve imploded then and there, but back then, there were still a decent number of teenagers without cell phones. especially the teenagers of insane, gun toting parents. so she just said: whoa what was that all about? and i said: dont worry about it, he'll tell you about it when you get home.

and she said: ok and went back to staring daggers at me and my friend.

WHICH SURPRISINGLY isnt even how the story ends.

we went to an improv comedy show, and it was a disaster. it shouldve been like, 7/10 tops, but between my date being mad, and my friend having a good time, and me having the existential terror of knowing that a guy with a pistol was probably waiting outside his house for me to come back, it was easily 11/10. i laughed way too hard at everything. especially the jokes that flopped. id sit there in this mostly silent room and laugh until i dry heaved a little, and my date was absolutely disgusted, and even my friend was a little embarrassed, which would just make me laugh harder. i laughed so hard that night i could barely talk the next day. and then the show ended, and my friend said, you know, that was a good time, but i think we should maybe do something a little chiller? who wants to walk around the park? and his date said yeah, and my date said no, and i finally had mercy on the poor woman so i said, look, im gonna drop you off. and i am so, so sorry about this, but im dropping you off like a block away. super duper sorry.

do talk to your dad about the pistols thing if you dont want this happening more in the future tho.

and she said: okay. so i dropped her off, and she walked a block down, and that was that.

then i drove my friend and his date to a park that was good for wandering. i figured they wanted something more private, so instead of following them around point blank, i chose a park with this 30 foot rope tower, and i climbed to the top and i said: hey i can see you anywhere from up here, you are officially chaperoned from a distance. get panopticoned idiot. except my friend really is an idiot, and he didnt really get the whole 'now i dont have to third wheel so insanely hard with you guys' thing so he climbed up the tower too, and then his date followed behind him, so there are three people basically sitting together on top of a telephone pole.

and then they started making out.

i was close enough to hear it.

i didnt really know what to do so i was just kind of sitting there, dissociating, when some college kids came around and started shaking the tower. my friend's date went aaaaaaaaaa im afraid of heights :( and my friend went oh, dont worry, ill hold you tight ;) and i went hey, im gonna climb down and ask them to stop.

so i did climb down, and i did ask them to stop, and they flipped me off, which i wasnt even mad about. at that point i was i was like yeah, it would be weirder if this wasnt a mess. gods plan has been to fly this day like a 747 into my metaphorical twin towers and brother he is close enough for me to see him grinning through the cockpit window. still, eventually the college students got bored, so they climbed up the tower, which gave my friend and his date a window to climb down, and together we walked back to my car.

now, i cant explain why this is, but sitting back in the drivers seat was my carriage-back-into-a-pumpkin moment. i'd been chill about all the chaos, just rolling with the punches, but sitting down made me realize how much of a shitshow the day had been, and while i couldnt go back and fix all of it, i could go back and fix one thing.

so i told my friend and his date, hey, you two, stay here and don't do anything weird. don't. then i walked back to the rope tower, and i started picking up the shoes the college students had left at the base in order to climb.

about halfway through this, i realized that if i took all their shoes, they might think i was in it for the money, and i actually wanted them to know i was in it specifically to spite them. fuck those guys. so i put all the right shoes back, gave myself a 100 foot headstart, yelled "nice shoes, assholes", did a little jig, and started running.

my advice to everyone is that college students are faster than you think. even with the headstart, and the whole climb down the tower thing, i was still only fivish seconds ahead of them by the time i got to my car. i flung the door open, looked in the backseat, didnt see anyone, flung the stolen shoes in the backseat, heard two "ow"s, took that as proof of presence, jumped in and pealed out of the lot.

my friend and his date popped up a few seconds later. they were, uh, doing something weird in the back seat. my one request - obliterated.

they climbed up to ask where the hell all the shoes had come from, and i was like yeah i stole them from the college students, and they were like oh. cool. hope you had fun. and i was like, i did. i did. but speaking of fun, what were you doing back there?

and for the first time in my buddies life, i think he was actually embarassed.

[snarkspawn]

based ofc on this

[qiinamii]

we'll do fine.