#and i like that i can be myself around them and not have to filter myself in any way to be understood

[squatch-and-stretch]

Chapter 5

“We… we need a plan,” Stanford says after a while, once they’ve all pulled apart from their group huddle.

“Well,” Fiddleford says, standing up. “Here’s step one; I gotta get you boys all fixed up.”

“What?” Stanford glances at Stanley, then furrows his brows at Fiddleford. “I’m fine.”

“Your eye’s bleeding, hun.”

“That happens,” Stanford says, blinking a few times before angrily swiping at his face with the heel of his hand. “Just an unfortunate side effect of…”

“Let me get ya cleaned up, at least,” Fiddleford says gently once it was clear he didn’t intend to continue.

He moves over to the fridge and retrieves a bottle of water. He’d prefer to use the filtered water from outside, but after the night’s events, he was hesitant to let them out of his sight. He's hesitant to let himself out of their sight, afraid that without their eyes on him, without a direct plan of action, he’ll fall apart.

He's fine, Fiddleford tells himself as he retrieves a clean cloth from the nearby countertop. There's no blood on the counter where Stanford hit his head.

“Does your head hurt any?” Fiddleford asks, twisting the lid off the water and using it to wet the cloth.

“It’s felt better, but I don’t think I have a concussion, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“I’ll be the judge of that,” Fiddleford says, flashing the light in his eyes again. His pupils dilate as expected, and are still as round as they should be. “Who’s the president?”

“Ronald Reagan, that bastard,” Stanford says quickly, clearly, and with audible contempt.

“Good,” Fiddleford reassures, reaching out to card his fingers through the hair around his temple. His hair is greasy and a bit sweaty, but not bloodied. “I didn’t break your cheek or anything?”

“You’re not that strong, Fiddleford,” Stanford says with a tired smile. “Bill just has bad balance.”

“And thank goodness for that,” Fiddleford says, gently ruffling his hair before pulling away to retrieve the wet cloth he left on the counter.

“I can handle this,” Stanford says, catching Fiddleford’s hand before it can reach his face. “Just… take care of Stanley?”

“I will,” Fiddleford agrees, reluctantly handing off the cloth.

“And, Fiddleford…?”

“Hm?”

“I… I really am sorry. For everything.”

Fiddleford sighs, turning away.

“I know you are, Ford.”

He retrieves another rag from the counter, and then has to dig through the cabinets for a bottle of antiseptic. He’ll admit, his organizational system could use some work, but he finds it eventually. He even keeps bandages in the same place, which he retrieves as well.

Fiddleford had taken a few bottles from the remains of what had once been a convenience store, figuring through context clues that it was some substance used to clean wounds. It stung like a motherfucker, but it had kept his arm from rotting off entirely.

Fiddleford soaks the cloth, and turns to Stanley, who has been watching the proceedings in polite silence from his place on the couch the whole time. He stiffens a bit once Fiddleford’s full attention is upon him.

“Take off your shirt,” Fiddleford instructs.

“Woah, Fidds, I didn’t know you were freaky like that,” Stanley jokes, but his smarmy smile is a bit strained. “You heard the guy, Sixer, you’d better clear out.”

“He is not propositioning you, you knucklehead,” Stanford snaps.

“Right, I’m sure he’d much rather fiddle Ford,” Stan’s grin widens. “Heyo! Haha!”

“What! What are you even—“ Stanford’s face flushes.

“Stanley,” Fiddleford cuts in firmly. “Stop goofing around, this is serious.”

“Yeesh, Fidds,” Stanley says, deflating. “I've had worse, I’ll be fine.”

“Just let me do this for ya, Stanley,” Fiddleford insists. “Infections can get real nasty, and I don’ know what I’d do with myself if I’d let ya get one under my care.”

The ‘let me take care of you for my sake, not your own’ was a tried and true method for Stanford, and it seemed to work on Stanley as well. He sags a little, letting out a belabored sigh before delicately taking his shirt off. It was a slow and visibly painful process as sweat stuck it to his skin and he tried to avoid jostling his shoulder, but it came off eventually.

Even in the dim light, Fiddleford could make out a multitude of scars across Stanley’s abdomen. Combined with the ones he’d already seen on his face and arms, they told a story of a life hard lived. Fiddleford knew that Stanley had been kicked out at seventeen– Stanford, as it turns out, was a very sad and very talkative drunk— but Stanford had always assumed his twin was doing fine for himself, so Fiddleford assumed the same.

Clearly, that wasn’t the case, but it also wasn’t the point.

“Sit down against the armrest, will ya?”

In a surprising display of obedience, Stanley folds his arms protectively around his middle and does so without complaint. One hand cups itself firmly over a jagged scar just above his hip, blocking it from view a little too late.

Fiddleford stations himself behind Stanley, taking in the wound. He recognizes the symbol burned into his shoulder, of course, had almost burnt himself against it a few times, but he’s not about to ask how it ended up branded so deeply into his shoulder of all things. Besides, that's hardly his biggest concern right now.

Whatever scabbing might have been present had been torn away by Stanford’s nails, leaving the wound open and agitated. There’s red scratch marks carving their way up his shoulder, but Fiddleford’s more worried about the reddened, swollen skin all around it; the beginning of cellulitis, Fiddleford reckons. Luckily, it only covers a small area, and the foul odor just comes from Stanley’s stained clothes, as far as he can tell.

It’s not too late. Ideally, Stanley would be taking some antibiotics orally, and maybe some painkillers too, but things haven’t been ideal in a long while.

“Alright buddy, keep your mouth closed, this is gonna hurt,” Fiddleford warns.

“Yeah yeah, I’ll be fine, nerd,” Stanley says, waving a hand dismissively. “Nothing I haven’t felt before.”

“You worry me, Stanley,” Fiddleford notes. He wants to steady Stanley with a hand on his shoulder, but he doesn’t have a hand to spare. “Here goes…”

He starts at the top of his shoulder, wiping at the scratch marks Stanford’s nails left. They aren’t deep enough to draw blood, but they’ve broken skin enough to hurt as Fiddleford wipes them down. Stanley hisses through his teeth, but remains in place.

That is, until Fiddleford drags the cloth lower, down to the actual body of the burn. Stanley’s entire body jerks violently away, and Fiddleford himself flinches back from the sudden movement.

“Fuck!” Stanley grits out, folding forward over his legs, hands clenched into tight fists. “Son of a bitch, Fidds, what do they put in that stuff?”

“I don’ rightly know,” Fiddleford confesses apologetically. “All I know is that it does the trick, if you actually let me use it.”

“Easier said than done,” Stanley grumbles, eyeing Fiddleford over his shoulder. The hurt, the mistrust in his eyes stings a bit, but Fiddleford pushes it aside.

“I know, I know,” Fiddleford soothes, “maybe… Stanford, darlin’, could you hold Stanley still?”

Stanford looks over, eyes wide. His face is clean now, and he’d retrieved his glasses from the back of the couch at some point.

“Um,” Stanford sputters. “I… yes, I can do that.”

It’s clear to Fiddleford that he very much does not want to do so, but he obediently moves over to sit in front of Stanley. Awkwardly, he places one hand on Stanley’s uninjured shoulder and presses the other to his sternum. His gaze lingers on a scar near his armpit, just beside where Stanford placed his hand. It’s a burnt puncture wound, a bullet wound, worryingly close to his lungs. It takes him a moment to tear his eyes away to look up at Stanley’s face.

“I— is this okay?” Stanford asks, his tone uncharacteristically uncertain.

Stanley just rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t complain. Fiddleford gives Stanford what he hopes is a reassuring smile when he glances up at him.

“Ready?” Fiddleford asks softly. Stanford nods, while Stanley lets out a grunt of acknowledgment.

Fiddleford returns the cloth to Stanley’s shoulder. Stanley keens painfully, slamming his head down on Stanford’s shoulder as he grits his teeth and fists his hands into his shirt. Fiddleford winces, but wills his hand to remain steady as he forces himself to continue.

“Sorry, sorry,” Stanford mumbles frantically. Fiddleford understands the sentiment. Stanley just whimpers in response, shaking his head.

“Almost done, Stanley, hang in there,” Fiddleford murmurs soothingly.

He scrubs away at the last section of his wound, makes sure there’s no visible debris stuck within the burnt flesh, and then finally, mercifully, pulls away.

“Done, that’s it, I’m done, y’all right?” Fiddleford says, as steadily as he can.

He moves as far away as he can on instinct, nearly tripping over the tangle of blankets that make up Stanley’s bed before he slams his back into the counter. Stanford is staring at him, brows furrowed, but he can’t read his expression beyond ‘displeased’. Stanley doesn’t respond, just slumping weakly against his brother.

“I’ll— here.” Fiddleford drops the cloth in favor of the roll of bandages he’d retrieved earlier.

He's so reluctant to get close to the twins again that he contemplates just tossing it in the direction of the couch, but eventually he settles for getting just close enough to place it against the arm rest before backing away.

“You can take it from here, right, Stanford? Won’t be much help bandaging with only one hand, so I’m just gonna—“ Fiddleford jabs a finger towards the door behind him, “work on my prosthetic, or somethin’. Try ‘n’ figure out what to do next. I’ll see y'all in the morning, right? Maybe get some rest, if you can.”

All this is said as Fiddleford shakily backs out of the room. Neither of them say a word as Fiddleford exits the break room and slams the door behind him.

(Un)happy Reunion

Ford Pines & Stan Pines & Fiddleford McGucket | 3,143 words | Mystery Trio Through the Multiverse AU

Fiddleford reunites with Stanford and meets Stanley after 6 months alone in a post-apocalyptic city in some other dimension.

Chapter 1

see notes for future chapters!

If Fiddleford had to describe this world he’s spent the past 6 months in in a single word, he’d probably choose terrible. Other descriptors such as strange, horrible, post-apocalyptic, and dangerous also come to mind. Lately, though, he’s been putting a lot of thought into the word lonely.

There were intelligent species here, once. It’s clear in the almost-familiar design of this destroyed city, in the tattered books written in a language Fiddleford can’t make any sense of, in every little item he comes across. He even has an idea of what they looked like— he’s seen their art, their pictures, their mangled bodies— and Fiddleford has to wonder if Bill understood the cruel irony of sending him to a world that was once inhabited by pig people.

He wonders, sometimes, if he could have found a way to communicate with them, if any of them were left. Would his throat have been able to form the words of their language, or theirs his? Would they have tried to help him? Just being around another living creature that didn’t try to kill him on sight would be pretty nice right now.

Unfortunately, that’s never been what this planet has in store for him, and when he hears something move nearby, he knows it’s a threat.

It must be in the next alleyway, and it’s fairly big— most of the monsters Bill left here are. Fiddleford goes still, staring in the direction of the alleyway and listening for any other sign of movement. It’s quiet for a moment, until Fiddleford hears a loud crash and what sounds like hushed murmuring. So many things have sounded like human voices lately that he doesn’t put any stock into it, just dips into the nearest alleyway in an attempt to escape whatever is making that noise before it even knows he’s here.

It’s an attempt that fails immediately, as he crashes into a pile of shredded metal like an idiot. It slices through the worn fabric of his pants, but as far as he can tell it doesn’t reach skin. It does, however, make a very loud noise, and the not-voices go quiet.

“Son of a gun,” he allows himself to hiss, and he takes off down the alleyway without any further regard to the sound he’s making.

Something steps out in front of him, blocking his way. It’s taller than the previous inhabitants of this planet, but smaller than most of the monsters he’s encountered. It’s built a lot like a person, and not a particularly imposing one at that, so Fiddleford doesn’t slow his roll for a moment. He fishes a knife out of the tattered pocket of his lab coat, and slams his shoulder into the beast.

It cries out, still sounding a heck of a lot like a person as it hits the ground, breaking Fiddleford’s fall. He presses the knife to what should be its throat, and is almost surprised to find smooth, human-looking skin beneath his blade. It’s a familiar shade, even, and Fiddleford can’t help but let his eyes wander further up to its face—

“Stanford?” Fiddleford spits, downright baffled to see his big brown eyes looking up at him.

Stanford opens his mouth to respond, but before he can, Fiddleford is being hauled off of him. Something has grabbed the back of his scarf and pulled it tight, tight enough that Fiddleford gags against the construction, tight enough that he’s reminded of Bill’s hand around him, crushing the breath from his lungs, and suddenly he’s being slammed against the brick wall of the alleyway and crushed between Bill’s uncaring fingers and—

“Stanley!”

That’s Stanford’s voice, he’d recognize it anywhere, but how is he here?

“Who the fuck—“

A voice, closer than Stanford’s, unfamiliar but definitely not Bill. It’s a person that’s holding him, and even if he’s struggling to breathe against the arm pressed to his throat, he can deal with a person.

Fiddleford kicks out, slamming his knee between the legs of his assailant.

“Son of a—!” he shouts, but he lets go of Fiddleford to stumble back.

“Stop! Stanley, this is Fiddleford! He’s the reason we’re here!” Stanford says, inserting himself between the two of them. “Well, he’s the reason I wanted to be here. You’re the reason you’re here and we don’t know how to get back.”

Yep, that insufferable holier-than-thou tone is definitely Stanford.

“I’m the reason you’re here?” Fiddleford chokes, rubbing his throat as he tries to regain his bearings. “It’s your fault I’m here!”

“I know that!” Stanford says, turning to Fiddleford.

Stanford looks about the same as he left him, beyond the dark circles under his eyes. Fiddleford knows the same can’t be said about himself.

“Listen, Fiddleford, I—“

“Save it, Stanford,” Fiddleford snaps, shaking his head as he turns towards the other man in the alleyway. “You must be Stanley?”

When Fiddleford first heard about Stanford’s twin, he imagined a carbon copy of his then-roommate. Stanley is not that. They’re nearly identical in the shapes of their faces, the texture and shade of their hair, the slope and color of their eyes, but the similarities end there. Put simply, Stanley looks like shit, with long, tangled hair, an unshaven face, and dark circles to rival Stanford’s, all wrapped up in a ratty jacket over an even rattier shirt. Even the way he holds himself is worrying, the way he’s hunched in on himself like a coiled spring, turned to the side like he’s keeping something just out of sight, eyes weary, teeth grit.

“Yeah, that’s me,” Stanley grumbles, and he draws himself even tighter. Even in conversation he’s locked on the defensive, and with the brief glimpse of an interaction between him and Stanford, Fiddleford can’t say he blames him.

“Nice ta meet ya, Stanley. I’d offer to shake your hand, but mine seems to be missin’,” Fiddleford greets. “Well, not missin’ exactly, I know where it is, but it ain’t doin’ me much good inside the stomach of some rottin’ monster.”

“Your arm!” Stanford exclaims belatedly.

He grabs for Fiddleford’s shoulder, but Fiddleford quickly smacks his hand away, a shudder running through his body at the phantom sensation of someone grabbing at what remains of his arm. He steps away, eyeing Ford wearily, almost expecting him to try again.

He doesn’t. He brings his hand back, tucking it to his chest for just a moment, hurt in his eyes. After a moment, he clears his throat, straightens up, and tucks his hands behind his back.

“I take it that’s a new development?” Stanley says, watching Fiddleford carefully. The matching scrutinizing gazes of both twins sets Fiddleford even further on edge.

“I would never have allowed such grievous injury to come to him under my care!” Stanford huffs, glaring at Stanley.

Fiddleford barks out a laugh, shaking his head.

“And who’s god-forsaken vanity project brought me here, Stanford?”

“Easy, Fiddlesticks,” Stanley cuts in before Stanford can respond. “None of us are happy to be here, but he—“

Fiddleford raises his hand. “Shut yer yap.”

“Okay, rude—“

“I mean it, don’t ya hear that?” Fiddleford hisses. It’s barely audible, not like Stanford and Stanley’s rustling in a nearby alleyway. Something is moving through the main streets.

“I don’t hear shit, except some hillbilly interrupting me wh—“

“I hear it,” Stanford says, and Stanley throws his arms up in frustration.

Click-click, drag, click-click, click-click. Three functional limbs, one dragging along, moving at a gradual, unhurried pace. The time between each step suggests a step length of perhaps a meter. It’s large, too large for Fiddleford to deal with without his arm, but likely small enough to fit into this alleyway. Stanley seems pretty tough, and Stanford had somehow held his own for 6 years in Gravity Falls despite its many dangers, but he wasn’t about to trust either of them in a fight against whatever unknown beast was approaching.

“It’s coming from—“ Stanford whispers, and despite the low volume, Fiddleford cringes at the sound.

“I know,” Fiddleford snips quietly, “follow me.”

Fiddleford doesn’t bother to check if either of them listened— Stanford reacts well to confidence, and with any luck, Stanley would as well— before he’s slinking out of the alleyway, carefully watching his step this time.

“Come on, dumbass,” Stanley hisses, and Fiddleford spares them a glance. Both have moved to follow, but Stanford is hesitating, looking behind him even as Stanley grabs his arm and pulls him along behind him.

“I just want a look—“ Stanford mumbles, shaking Stanley’s hand off.

“This ain’t Gravity Falls, Stanford, an’ I won’t hesitate to leave you ‘n’ your brother for mincemeat if you don’t hurry yer asses up!”

Stanford immediately turns towards Fiddleford, eyes wide, mouth parted in shock. Fiddleford glares at him, lets him truly believe he means it (Fiddleford knows he wouldn’t leave Stanford or his brother, damn him) before he turns back around and continues on the way. This time, Stanford and Stanley follow without any further prompting, though Fiddleford hears what sounds like an amused snort from Stanley at Stanford’s sudden obedience.

[xxswagcorexx]

Bro I literally obsessed with the casino quartet now plssssss tell us more

omg . actually a lot of my Thoughts about them r au based but ^_^ i think while i am here i might as well share that they're named that is bc the idea of all of them working in a casino 2gether rlly caught on!! (this was mostly brought up by thegalacticbucket and things just sorta snowballed from there .)

anyways the fun dynamic between them is that red's a dealer + deals with the finances with clown, clowns the owner of the casino and manages the casino, branzy is there as eye-candy branzy is the shill aka he gets the games rigged for him so people r more inclined to gamble more bc he's winning a lot + he encourages them, and ash is the bartender! he has arm garters and makes drinks for all of them after hours

so dats the fun history lesson 2 why the 2 fics of them atm have 2 do w/ them working at a casino and chilling w each other and why they're called casino quartet ^_^ hope u enjoyed the Lore

[vulpinesaint]

my problematic gender truth is that i actually feel no attachment to either of the two binary gender constructs. it just like. makes no sense to me. i've got my own unrelated thing going on. but in the absence of connection to either choice i really do find it more convenient to cosplay closer to the one that people treat like a human being

[screamingay]

somehow these current roommates we have are the worst that ive known yet and last semester we literally had a girl who smoked cigs IN her bedroom. list of grievances below lol

[widevibratobitch]

.

[hobbitunderthemountain]

2023 is gonna be the year i start allowing myself to buy 'disability aids'

things that may not seem practical but will greatly improve the ease of which i'm able to tackle everyday tasks

things that i may not have looked into because 'those are for people more sensitive/disabled than I am'

things that make my routines easier to follow or easier to build habits that seemed like monumental tasks

this is the year im gonna actually be gentle with myself

[hua-fei-hua]

exciting news!

i have figured out how to filter out all those damn x reader fics that don't tag themselves as x reader fics on ao3!

i simply exclude all fics categorized as f/m except for what i put on a damn whitelist.

[adore-gregor]

🤯

[wordsgood]

loreleaf sees his parents killed at age 6 and stumbles through the next 15 years finding older guardians who are somewhat emotionally available but very much like "i am absolutely not your father/mother, please, i can't handle the responsibility of taking care of you" and obviously having them is better than not having them but also it kind of just sucks. and i think that tomi, when he's recovered from a century of imprisonment, looks at loreleaf, sees the small frightened little boy inside the young man who's grown up way too fast, and goes "i'm gonna parent that" and does not wait for an answer

[mcmansionhell]

the motel room, or: on datedness

I.

Often I find myself nostalgic for things that haven't disappeared yet. This feeling is enhanced by the strange conviction that once I stop looking at these things, I will never see them again, that I am living in the last moment of looking. This is sense is strongest for me in the interiors of buildings perhaps because, like items of clothing, they are of a fashionable nature, in other words, more impermanent than they probably should be.

As I get older, to stumble on something truly dated, once a drag, is now a gift. After over a decade of real estate aggregation and the havoc it's wreaked on how we as a society perceive and decorate houses, if you're going to Zillow to search for the dated (which used to be like shooting fish in a barrel), you'll be searching aimlessly, for hours, to increasingly no avail, even with all the filters engaged. (The only way to get around this is locational knowledge of datedness gleaned from the real world.) If you try to find images of the dated elsewhere on the internet, you will find that the search is not intuitive. In this day and age, you cannot simply Google "80s hotel room" anymore, what with the disintegration of the search engine ecosystem and the AI generated nonsense and the algorithmic preference for something popular (the same specific images collected over and over again on social media), recent, and usually a derivative of the original search query (in this case, finding material along the lines of r/nostalgia or the Backrooms.)

To find what one is looking for online, one must game the search engine with filters that only show content predating 2021, or, even better, use existing resources (or those previously discovered) both online and in print. In the physical world of interiors, to find what one is looking for one must also now lurk around obscure places, and often outside the realm of the domestic which is so beholden to and cursed by the churn of fashion and the logic of speculation. Our open world is rapidly closing, while, paradoxically, remaining ostensibly open. It's true, I can open Zillow. I can still search. In the curated, aggregated realm, it is becoming harder and harder to find, and ultimately, to look.

But what if, despite all these changes, datedness was never really searchable? This is a strange symmetry, one could say an obscurity, between interiors and online. It is perhaps unintentional, and it lurks in the places where searching doesn't work, one because no one is searching there, or two, because an aesthetic, for all our cataloguing, curation, aggregation, hoarding, is not inherently indexable and even if it was, there are vasts swaths of the internet and the world that are not categorized via certain - or any - parameters. The internet curator's job is to find them and aggregate them, but it becomes harder and harder to do. They can only be stumbled upon or known in an outside, offline, historical or situational way. If to index, to aggregate, is, or at least was for the last 30 years, to profit (whether monetarily or in likes), then to be dated, in many respects, is the aesthetic manifestation of barely breaking even. Of not starting, preserving, or reinventing but just doing a job.

We see this online as well. While the old-web Geocities look and later Blingee MySpace-era swag have become aestheticized and fetishized, a kind of naive art for a naive time, a great many old websites have not received the same treatment. These are no less naive but they are harder to repackage or commodify because they are simple and boring. They are not "core" enough.

As with interiors, web datedness can be found in part or as a whole. For example, sites like Imgur or Reddit are not in and of themselves dated but they are full of remnants, of 15-year old posts and their "you, sir, have won the internet" vernacular that certainly are. Other websites are dated because they were made a long time ago by and for a clientele that doesn't have a need or the skill to update (we see this often with Web 2.0 e-commerce sites that figured out how to do a basic mobile page and reckoned it was enough). The next language of datedness, like the all-white landlord-special interior, is the default, clean Squarespace restaurant page, a landing space that's the digital equivalent of a flyer, rarely gleaned unless someone needs a menu, has a food allergy or if information about the place is not available immediately from Google Maps. I say this only to maintain that there is a continuity in practices between the on- and off-line world beyond what we would immediately assume, and that we cannot blame everything on algorithms.

But now you may ask, what is, exactly, datedness? Having spent two days in a distinctly dated hotel room, I've decided to sit in utter boredom with the numinous past and try and pin it down.

II.

I am in an obscure place. I am in Saint-Georges, Quebec, Canada, on assignment. I am staying at a specific motel, the Voyageur. By my estimation the hotel was originally built in the late seventies and I'd be shocked if it was older than 1989. The hotel exterior was remodeled sometime in the 2000s with EIFS cladding and beige paint. Above is a picture of my room, which, forgive me, is in the process of being inhabited. American (and to a lesser extent Canadian) hotel rooms are some of the most churned through, renovated spaces in the world, and it's pretty rare, unless you're staying in either very small towns or are forced by economic necessity to stay at real holes in the wall, to find ones from this era. The last real hitter for me was a 90s Day's Inn in the meme-famous Breezewood, PA during the pandemic.

At first my reaction to seeing the room was cautionary. It was the last room in town, and certainly compared to other options, probably not the world's first choice. However, after staying in real, genuine European shitholes covering professional cycling I've become a class-A connoisseur of bad rooms. This one was definitively three stars. A mutter of "okay time to do a quick look through." But upon further inspection (post-bedbug paranoia) I came to the realization that maybe the always-new brainrot I'd been so critical of had seeped a teeny bit into my own subconscious and here I was snubbing my nose at a blessing in disguise. The room is not a bad room, nor is it unclean. It's just old. It's dated. We are sentimental about interiors like this now because they are disappearing, but they are for my parents what 2005 beige-core is for me and what 2010s greige will become for the generation after. When I'm writing about datedness, I'm writing in general using a previous era's examples because datedness, by its very nature, is a transitional status. Its end state is the mixed emotion of seeing things for what they are yet still appreciating them, expressed here.

Datedness is the period between vintage and contemporary. It is the sentiment between quotidian and subpar. It is uncurated and preserved only by way of inertia, not initiative. It gives us a specific feeling we don't necessarily like, one that is deliberately evoked in the media subcultures surrounding so-called "liminal" spaces: the fuguelike feeling of being spatially trapped in a time while our real time is passing. Datedness in the real world is not a curated experience, it is only what was. It is different from nostalgia because it is not deliberately remembered, yearned for or attached to sweetness. Instead, it is somehow annoying. It is like stumbling into the world of adults as a child, but now you're the adult and the child in you is disappointed. (The real child-you forgot a dull hotel room the moment something more interesting came along.) An image of my father puts his car keys on the table, looks around and says, "It'll do." We have an intolerance for datedness because it is the realization of what sufficed. Sufficiency in many ways implies lack.

However, for all its datedness, many, if not all, of the things in this room will never be seen again if the room is renovated. They will become unpurchaseable and extinct. Things like the bizarrely-patterned linoleum tile in the shower, the hose connecting to the specific faucet of the once-luxurious (or at least middling) jacuzzi tub whose jets haven't been exercised since the fall of the Berlin Wall. The wide berth of the tank on the toilet. There is nothing, really, worth saving about these things. Even the most sentimental among us wouldn't dare argue that the items and finishes in this room are particularly important from a design or historical standpoint. Not everything old has a patina. They're too cheaply made to salvage. Plastic tile. Bowed plywood. The image-artifacts of these rooms, gussied up for Booking dot com, will also, inevitably disappear, relegated to the dustheap of web caches and comments that say "it was ok kinda expensive but close to twon (sic)." You wouldn't be able to find them anyway unless you were looking for a room.

One does, of course, recognize a little bit of design in what's here. Signifiers of an era. The wood-veneer of the late 70s giving way to the pastel overtones of the 80s. Perhaps even a slow 90s. The all-in-one vanity floating above the floor, a modernist basement bathroom hallmark. White walls as a sign of cleanliness. Gestures, in the curved lines of the nightstands, towards postmodernity. Metallic lamp bases with wide-brimmed shades, a whisper of glamor. A kind of scalloped aura to the club chairs. The color teal mediated through hundreds if not thousands of shoes. Yellowing plastic, including the strips of "molding" that visually tie floor to wall. These are remnants (or are they intuitions?) of so many movements and micromovements, none of them definite enough to point to the influence of a single designer, hell, even of a single decade, just strands of past-ness accumulated into one thread, which is cheapness. Continuity exists in the materials only because everything was purchased as a set from a wholesale catalog.

In some way a hotel is supposed to be placeless. Anonymous. Everything tries to be that way now, even houses. Perhaps because we don't like the way we spy on ourselves and lease our images out to the world so we crave the specificity of hotel anonymity, of someplace we move through on our way to bigger, better or at least different things. The hotel was designed to be frictionless but because it is in a little town, it sees little use and because it sees little use, there are elements that can last far longer than they were intended and which inadvertently cause friction. (The janky door unlocks with a key. The shower hose keeps coming out of the faucet. It's deeply annoying.)

Lack of wear and lack of funds only keep them that way. Not even the paper goods of the eighties have been exhausted yet. Datedness is not a choice but an inevitability. Because it is not a choice, it is not advertised except in a utilitarian sense. It is kept subtle on the hotel websites, out of shame. Because it does not subscribe to an advertiser's economy of the now, of the curated type rather than the "here is my service" type, it disappears into the folds of the earth and cannot be searched for in the way "design" can. It can only be discovered by accident.

When I look at all of these objects and things, I do so knowing I will never see them again, at least not all here together like this, as a cohesive whole assembled for a specific purpose. I don't think I'll ever have reason to come back to this town or this place, which has given me an unexpected experience of being peevish in my father's time. Whenever I end up in a place like this, where all is as it was, I get the sense that it will take a very long time for others to experience this sensation again with the things my generation has made. The machinations of fashion work rapaciously to make sure that nothing is ever old, not people, not rooms, not items, not furniture, not fabrics, not even design, that old matron who loves to wax poetic about futurity and timelessness. The plastic-veneered particleboard used here is now the bedrock of countless landfills. Eventually it will become the chemical-laced soil upon which we build our condos. It is possible that we are standing now at the very last frontier of our prior datedness. The next one has not yet elided. It's a special place. Spend a night. Take pictures.

If you like this post and want more like it, support McMansion Hell on Patreon for as little as $1/month for access to great bonus content including a discord server, extra posts, and livestreams.

Not into recurring payments? Try the tip jar! Student loans just started back up!

[tgcg]

an open fly walking

i didnt like this one but i thought id finally air it out since its been sat in my folders for months now

TG: hey karkat

CG: YEAH?

===

TG: you ever noticed you like

TG: walk weird

CG: WOW, OKAY.

CG: HAVE *YOU* EVER NOTICED THAT I DON'T GIVE A SHIT?

TG: pff

===

TG: no listen because i got my ears scoping that shit im like a scouter for dude activity

TG: ok maybe me mentioning it to you is gonna fuck up your ecosystem or something but

TG: you have the heaviest feet of the century man

CG: I DO???

TG: just thrust them straight down into the ground like youre trying to homebrew a san andreas fault

TG: viciously tamping on tectonic plates hoping for top score on the richter scale

TG: waging war against solid particles and the basic flow of gravity

TG: i could ID those footfalls out of a million i mean it

CG: SERIOUSLY?

===

TG: i mean theres nothing wrong with it but

TG: yeah

CG: I SWEAR TO GOD IF YOU'RE FUCKING WITH ME RIGHT NOW.

TG: im not fucking with you striders honor

TG: when have i ever lied to anybody about anything

CG: NOT UNPACKING THAT QUESTION WITH YOU TODAY.

CG: BUT SHIT, HOLD ON. LET ME SEE.

TG: yeah take the umbrella go over there and just walk to me

CG: ON IT.

===

===

TG: see you just kinda slam em straight down dude

CG: THIS IS THE WORST DAY OF MY RIOTOUS FUCKING JOKE OF A LIFE.

TG: dont your feet ache

===

CG: MOOT POINT. THIS MIGHT SOUND INSANE BUT I'VE ACTUALLY HAD MY STRUT PODS FOR A WHILE. ANY KIND OF PAIN THIS WOULD'VE BEEN CAUSING WOULD BE TOTALLY FILTERED OUT OF MY SPONGE BY NOW AS BACKGROUND NOISE.

TG: damn i didnt think that through

TG: my shades

CG: ALRIGHT, GET BACK UNDER THE SHITTING UMBRELLA AND THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU'VE DONE TO ME.

TG: look ive fucked myself over here too i dont have shit to clean these with

TG: ugh

===

TG: guess its karma

CG: HOLY FUCK. HOW DID I NEVER NOTICE THIS BEFORE?

TG: i dunno but im gonna assume having a dad thats a literal crab monster is probably a contributing factor

TG: im guessing thats not a great role model for this kinda thing

TG: just conjecture i mean

CG: YOUR ENVY IS OVERWHELMINGLY OBVIOUS DAVE. AS A DISCLAIMER, HE WOULD'VE ABSOLUTELY KICKED YOUR ASS.

TG: yeah probably

CG: THAT'S PRETTY MUCH ALL THERE IS TO SAY ON THE MATTER.

===

TG: but see bro had me stringent on feather feets

TG: i bet i could slip across a bike horn warehouse with nary a fucking toot

CG: HAHA. ASSUMING YOU DON'T MAKE A TOTAL ASS OF YOURSELF, AS PER USUAL.

CG: IF YOU WEREN'T CONSTANTLY RUNNING YOUR GASH ABOUT EVERYTHING AND BEING AN INIMITABLE CLOWN I SERIOUSLY THINK YOU COULD BE ON PAR WITH YOUR CUSTODIAN.

CG: THAT IS A MONUMENTAL "IF".

TG: well look at it this way

TG: im basically doing you all a favor by being a dumbass

TG: never gonna get caught off guard by the bozo patrol

CG: WOW. GOOD POINT.

===

TG: also screw this can i use your shirt

TG: this stupid hoodie is just smudging my lenses up

TG: i cant see dick

CG: UH

CG: SURE, I GUESS.

TG: cool

===

TG: so yeah i could be prowling around like a goddamn verbal assassin sniping convos left and right

TG: but no ive got the decency to go bunp in the night

CG: YEAH.

CG: IT'S DEFINITELY COMPOUNDED BY THE CONSTANT INANE RAMBLINGS.

CG: BUT

CG: IT'S ACTUALLY PRETTY RELAXING, Y'KNOW? IT HAS ITS OWN RHYTHM.

TG: see yeah i sound it off and

===

TG: wait really?

CG: YEAH

CG: I DON'T KNOW

CG: FUCK. HOW DO I EXPLAIN THIS WITHOUT WANTING TO CRAM MY FROND DOWN MY PROTEIN CHUTE.

===

CG: IT'S LIKE

CG: A SALVE FOR MY AGGRAVATION SPONGE.

CG: YOUR VOICE IS THE HUMAN EQUIVALENT OF ASPIRIN.

TG: uh damn karkat hold your hoofbeasts i was talking about the rhythm thing

CG: ALRIGHT, THAT'S IT. I'M TAKING US BOTH THE FUCK OUT RIGHT NOW. YOU HAVE REACHED THE BAD END OF THIS CONVERSATION.

TG: you think thatd be heroic or just

CG: IF I WAS STILL GHOSTING AROUND THE RUINS OF SGRUB'S ARCANE FRIGGIN GAME SYSTEMS, THE COMPLETE LACK OF SHIT AFOOT NOWADAYS WOULD BORE ME TO DEATH.

CG: LIKE. WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME OUR THERMAL HULL LEVELLED UP, DAVE?

TG: hah

===

TG: but uh

TG: i mean we had aspirin on earth

CG: NO, NUMBNUBS.

CG: I'M SAYING YOU ARE MY ASPIRIN.

TG: oh

CG: YEAH, TAKE THAT TO THE BANK AND SHOVE IT UP YOUR 20-KARAT ASS.

===

TG: heh

TG: well get this

TG: i will literally talk at you forever for free

TG: you got lifetime priority seating for the davealogues

TG: never gotta go to the drugstore again you can just get doped up on my dulcet tones for the rest of time

TG: take that and some of this

TG: im packin punches

CG: OW, FUCK! NO! MY MIGRAINES!

CG: SWEEPS OF VEINCLOTTING AND NERVEFRAYING DOWN THE FUCKING GAPER. BECAUSE OF YOU.

CG: YOU ASSHOLE, THIS IS THE WORST THING THAT HAS EVER HAPPENED TO ME.

CG: AND YOU'RE LAUGHING.

TG: chuckle up it only gets worse from here

===

CG: BE HONEST WITH ME. DID FONDLING MY SHIRT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE STREET EVEN DO ANYTHING?

TG: barely but yknow sometimes you just gotta deal the cards youre given

TG: ill just be astigmatic for a while its cool

CG: PFF… OKAY MAN.

[vetyr]

hi, i ireally love your work and i don't know if you've answered this before but, what kinds of studies do you do or how did you learn color theory? i wanna get better at rendering and anatomy but im having trouble TT TT

Hi! Long answer alert. Once a chatterbox, always a chatterbox.

When I started actively learning how to draw about 10 1/2 years ago, I exclusively did graphite studies in sketchbooks. Here's a few examples—I mostly stuck to doing line drawings to drill basic shapes/contours and proportions into my brain. The more rendered sketches helped me practice edge control & basic values, and they were REALLY good for learning the actual 3D structure behind what I was drawing.

I'd use reference images that I grabbed from fitness forums, Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest, and some NSFW places, but you could find adequate ref material from figure drawing sites like Line of Action. LoA has refs for people (you can filter by clothed/unclothed, age, & gender), animals, expressions, hands/feet, and a few other useful things as well. Love them.

Learning how to render digitally was a similar story; it helped a lot that I had a pretty strong foundation for value/anatomy going in. I basically didn't touch color at all for ~2 years (except for a few attempts at bad digital or acrylic paint studies), which may not have been the best idea. I learned color from a lot of trial and error, honestly, and I'm pretty sure this process involved a lot of imitation—there were a number of digital/traditional painters whose styles I really wanted to emulate (notably their edge control, color choices, value distributions, and shape design), so I kiiind of did a mixture of that + my own experimentation.

For example, I really found Benjamin Björklund's style appealing, especially his softened/lost edges & vibrant pops of saturated color, so here's a study I did from some photograph that I'm *pretty* sure was painted with him in mind.

Learning how to detail was definitely a slow process, and like all the aforementioned things (anatomy/color/edge control/values/etc.) I'm still figuring it out. Focusing on edge control first (that is, deciding on where to place hard/soft edges for emphasizing/de-emphasizing certain areas of the image) is super useful, because you can honestly fool a viewer into thinking there's more detail in a piece than there actually is if you're very economical about where you place your hard edges.

The most important part, to me, is probably just doing this stuff over and over again. You're likely not going to see improvement in a few weeks or even a few months, so don't fret about not getting the exact results you want and just keep studying + making art. I like to think about learning art as a process where you *need* to fail and make crappy art/studies—there's literally no way around it—so you might as well fail right now. See, by making bad art you're actually moving forward—isn't that a fun prospect!!

It's useful to have a folder with art you admire, especially if you can dissect the pieces and understand why you like them so much. You can study those aspects (like, you can redraw or repaint that person's work) and break down whether this is art that you just like to look at, or if it's the kind of art that you want to *make.* There's a LOT of art out there that I love looking at, probably tens of thousands of styles/mediums, but there's a very narrow range that I want to make myself.

I've mentioned it in some ask reply in the past, but I really do think looking at other artist's work is such a cheat code for improving your own skills—the other artist does the work to filter reality/ideas for you, and this sort of allows you to contact the subject matter more directly. I can think of so many examples where an artist I admired exaggerated, like, the way sunlight rested on a face and created that orange fringe around its edge, or the greys/dull blues in a wheat field, or the bright indigo in a cast shadow, or the red along the outside of a person's eye, and it just clicked for me that this was a very available & observable aspect of reality, which had up until that point gone completely unnoticed! If you're really perceptive about the art you look at, it's shocking how much it can teach you about how to see the world (in this particular case I mean this literally, in that the art I looked at fully changed the way I visually processed the world, but of course it has had a strong effect on my worldviews/relationships/beliefs).

Thanks so much for sending in a question (& for reading, if you got this far)! I read every single ask I receive, including the kind words & compliments, which I genuinely always appreciate. Best of luck with learning, my friend :)

[mrfoox]

Kinda wish I had more adhd traits in me but alas... I love people with adhd they are my fave...

[luveline]

spencer one shot where he’s angry at somebody else [bc he so does look so kissable when he’s angry >:(] maybe someone at one of the precincts they’re working at said something rude about r and he defends u and maybe he gets a lil kiss <3

im thinking “this is calm and it’s doctor” vibes bc that scene does things to me 😭

ty for requesting ♡ fem, 1.1k

cw for sexual harassment

"Jesus," Spencer says, rushing to stand behind you as you bend over. 

"Mm?" you hum. You're fishing for your dropped change unsuccessfully by the precinct vending machines. "They have your chips, did you see?" 

"Your pants are ripped," Spencer says, hand ghosting your thigh. 

"What?" you ask, shooting up. You turn on the spot to hide, hand leaping back. You feel at the seam. "Where?" 

"Top of your thigh." 

"Shit, really? Can you see my–" 

"Yeah," he says, meeting your wide eyes while you locate the rip. "How did you do that?" He laughs. 

"Don't laugh!" you demand, though you're giggling as you do, hand covering your thigh and the bottom of your butt inefficiently. 

"Do you want my jacket?" 

"Don't cover it up, toots." 

You and Spencer both blink. There's a crowd of grinning beat cops by the door of the cafeteria who've obviously witnessed your misdemeanour. "Toots?" Spencer asks. 

"Sorry, boys, that's the end of the show," you say with a grin. Not because you particularly enjoy having been oggled, but it's always been like this. Men will always make weird comments to you, and you've learned to play nice until they're out of your jurisdiction. 

"Turn back around," one says bravely, though you aren't sure which one. 

Spencer stands in front of you subtly. "Do you know that thirty eight percent of women experience sexual harassment in the workplace?" he asks, quick but measured. "Thirty eight percent, but I'm sure a much smaller number of those women are federal agents, and a smaller number again have the capacity to break your arm. I've seen her give serial killers radial fractures. I've seen her do worse." 

"We were just messing around," one says. 

"No need to get defensive," says another. "Don't get mad, boy." 

"I am defensive, but I'm not mad."

His tone attracts the attention of a precinct sergeant who barks at them to stop messing around and get back to work. "Were they bothering you?" he asks after they've filtered out with their heads down. 

"No," you say swiftly. "Everything's fine." 

Spencer frowns, worse when the sergeant leaves, turning to you to take your hand. A few weeks ago at a company picnic, when the sun was high and your spirits comparatively lower, you'd apologised to him for flirting. You love to flirt and especially with him, puppy eyed Spencer with his head of brown hair and his big brain, but some of the team suggested you were taking it too far. You apologised, but Spencer didn't really get what you were saying sorry for and took your hand to lead you out of the sun. He protects you. 

"You okay?" he asks. 

"I'm fine." 

"You sure?" His voice fries. 

"I'm sure," you say. His hand is an interesting thing on yours. He has long, long fingers that seem to possess their own willpower, moving even as they're sewn through yours. "I don't know what to do about my pants." 

Spencer's eyebrows pinch together. "Well, I'll take care of that. I'll find you something. I can't believe those as–" 

"Oh," you interrupt, taking your hand back in want of a better thing to hold, his cheek a mix of soft and scratchy against your palm. "You're still mad." 

"I'm not mad," he insists, though eventually he relents, "Alright, I'm angry that they'd think it was okay to objectify you." 

"What else?" you ask, letting your voice drop in pitch, the sound smooth as angora silk. 

"I'm thinking about if I hadn't been here." 

"I can protect myself," you murmur, endeared by the heat in his gaze. "You said it yourself, handsome. Radial fractures." 

"You shouldn't have to." 

"We both already know that," you say, the side of your hand slipping down his cheek reverently. He squints gently, his lashes dark triangles, his irises a browned sugar. His jaw clenches under your touch. "You're handsome." 

"Right now?" he asks dryly. 

"Are you handsome right now?" 

"Are you really flirting with me right now?" 

"Why wouldn't I be?" You draw a line under his ear whisper soft to curl a longer strand of his hair around the tip. "You look hot when you're winning." 

"What did I win?" he asks, like he doesn't want to know. 

You grin at him, stickying. "Would you like an itemised list?" you ask, rising on tiptoes to speak into the shell of his ear. "What do you think you deserve, handsome? For such a fearless defence?" 

He's not immune to your whims, but he is used to them, planting his hands on your shoulders to ease you back on sure footing. "I don't want anything. I'll always defend you." 

"Can I give you a small token of my gratitude, at least?" 

His pinking cheeks practically emanate heat. "We don't have time for this," he says regretfully, "I still have to find you a coverup." 

"Just a small token," you say. 

He hums and haws. "Alright. Okay, whatever you want." 

"You sure?" 

He nods once, his jaw working with something unsaid. You touch his neck, fingertips trailing along the underside of his jaw until you're sure it's what he wants before you brace your hands behind his head and press a chaste kiss to his cheek, close enough that the corner of his lips align with yours but don't overlap. His neck is hot in your hands, his hair soft, his breath hooking as you lift your lips just a touch and your nose digs into his cheek. "Thank you, Spencer," you whisper. 

He pulls you closer. 

You shudder as his hand presses into the small of your back, wondering what it is he wants to do. His fingers spread. Your thoughts turn to white noise. Like he can sense it, he breathes out and steps away, but any sense of urgency is gone. 

"As much as I might tease, I really do need some pants," you say. "I'm not very interested in anyone else seeing my panties today." 

He rushes off to find you something and you press the backs of your fingers to your cheeks, feeling the heat there with a resigned embarrassment. He has no idea how much power he has over you, in his stony anger and his eager reception. The phantom of his hand warms your back until he returns, his sweater in hand. "Sorry, this is it." 

"If you want me to wear your clothes, just say so." 

"Hotch is pretty pissed at us." 

"Ah," you sigh, tying his sweater around your waist, "another day in paradise, baby." 

[x-brik-x]

I'm seeing a lot of people say that punk fashion is expensive and inaccessible, which is very wrong. here is a list of some ways you can make punk fashion easier, cheaper and more accessible for you, since that's... kinda the whole point.

others are encouraged to add onto this!! (just don't recommend corporations like amazon. not cool.)

1. patches!! you don't need to buy them. DIY patches are not ugly or boring. in fact, they are encouraged here!! DIY, in my opinion, is always the best thing to do when it is an option and is safe to do so.

2. speaking of DIY, spikes!! you can make them!!

cut the top and bottom off of an empty can. cut down the middle of the cylinder and flatten it, so it's just a flat rectangle of metal.

cut out a shape that is kind of a third of a circle, but around 3/4 of the curved edge is taken up by triangle shapes. (I'm not very good at describing, so here's a badly drawn picture)

roll it into a cone, leaving the 4 triangles sticking out at the bottom. this bit is optional, but you can fill it with hot glue to make it more sturdy, just be careful touching the hot metal. I tend to hold the cone by one of the triangles with a bit of fabric wrapped around my fingers for this bit. cut 4 small holes in your fabric in this kind of shape:

and put the spiky bits of triangle through the holes. fold the triangles in on themselves to secure the spike in place. boom. spike obtained. this is one I made and attached to a little piece of fabric to test this method out:

3. battle vests!! (like the base jackets). the best places to buy these are charity shops and second hand websites in my opinion, but if anyone else knows any better options, please reblog with those!!

a good trick I find works well on eBay is to filter search results to your country (or state? can you do that in the US? idk) so that a: fast delivery because local, and b: all the sellers of everything that shows up are in YOUR TIME ZONE.

why is this important? when people sell something for really cheap, it goes FAST. check eBay at like, 2am or something. all the scalpers in your area are asleep. grab the cheap stuff while they can't.

4. sewing!! want patches, but can't sew for whatever reason? I've heard of a lot of people with joint conditions like arthritis complain about the inaccessibility of patch stuff, and that does sound extremely annoying, however:

safety pins!! while they are still a little fiddly, they're much less work so you don't have to fiddle about for long. if you can, you could even ask a friend to help, since it doesn't take long at all I'm sure someone will be willing to help out!! (I know I would, but that's just me, and I love this kind of thing). safety pins on clothes are also widely considered to be a symbol of solidarity, so if anything, you're adding some extra love and meaning to your patch pants/battle jacket.

if that's still too fiddly, fabric glue is always an option. unfortunately this means you won't be able to remove/reposition patches, at least without leaving a massive patch of residue, but if you're ok with that then fabric glue is probably your best bet.

for people who prefer sewing: as for where to get the thread, I've heard a lot of people recommending dental floss, as it's apparently much cheaper and works just as well. I haven't tried this myself so can't confirm that, but I thought I'd share it regardless.

5. where to get fabric!! old clothes. rip em up. you don't need any kind of fancy fabric from the craft store. my patches are made of old jeans that I grew out of.

don't have any old clothes and you don't want to waste any good ones? I'm not sure about other countries, but in the UK, as long as you're not on private property (trespassing), dumpster diving is perfectly legal.

I definitely ;) do NOT encourage ;) trespassing rich people's land ;) to steal from their dumpsters ;)

or tbh it doesn't matter too much how rich the person is, since it's all going to landfill anyway. if it's in the bin, it's free game, but you didn't hear that from me. ;)

please add onto this where you can!! and if I missed something or got anything wrong, add that on too!!

[maximumzombiecreator]

I've seen a lot of posts recently where people say they can't find players to play non-5e TTRPGs with. As someone who moves countries every few years, I've had to rebuild my roster of local TTRPG players from scratch a number of times. Here's how I do it.

Caveats first: while I've done this in small cities, I have always done it in cities. If you're in, like, a rural environment, you might just not have enough interested people around. You can always do it online in that case. I'm not really going to cover finding players online, except to say you should probably look for communities for the specific system you want to play. Most of them are enthusiastically looking for new participants. Especially game masters.

Okay, first things first, you gotta find people. I generally find I get better results if the search is location first. That is, rather than using city-wide or regional Looking For Group type internet groups, I look for physical locations that host gaming groups. Local game stores, public libraries, gaming cafes/bars, etc.

Being location first helps avoid some common bad behaviours. Online LFG groups often have a few shitty people hanging around who can't find long term groups because they're shitty. They'll jump at the opportunity to join new groups where people don't know them, because everyone else knows better than to game with them. But location-based groups are better at filtering this. Someone who harasses people at an LGS can be banned from the store, but decentralized online groups struggle to handle these situations in my personal experience.

Being location first also solves the next problem, which is giving you a location to play. Eventually, when I have a long term group, I'll host games in my home. But there needs to be a level of trust before that feels safe, and we're looking for randoms, so for now we need a public gaming venue. If, for whatever reason, there aren't dedicated gaming spaces where you can do this, I've had the most success gaming in cafes or restaurants during off peak hours. I've run a bunch of games in restaurants from, like, 2pm-5pm on a Saturday, and as long as you're buying drinks and some snacks or something, and being polite and non-disruptive, it's typically not too hard to get permission.

Now, if that local group has enough interest in a non-5e system that I'm interested in running, I'll happily do that, and it's pretty free from there. Most people who are willing to play one other system will gladly try others if they find they like playing with you. But even in big cities, I feel it's pretty often the case that postings for local games of other systems don't wind up actually finding successful groups.

So, here is the bit where, unfortunately, finding people to play non-5e games with involves playing some 5e. Community groups are always looking for more GMs to run games, so I will set out to run a number of short 5e adventures, each with different groups. These are typically oneshots that I have the option of extending for another 1 or 2 sessions.

I always run adventures that I've written myself for these, because I want my particular GMing style to really come through. Looking for players is a two way street. I'm looking for people I like GMing for, but I'm also looking to make sure they know what they're getting. Especially if I'm going to ask them to play a system they've never tried, they should know that there's going to be something they enjoy. So, these short adventures are full of the types of silly but sincere NPCs I tend to run, the open-ended scenarios I prefer, the tropes I favour, etc. If someone isn't going to enjoy playing with me, I want them to know it from this adventure.

I structure the adventures to give me a lot of flexibility in terms of how long they run. They're nearly always mysteries, but with some active component to the mystery, so that if things drag or dawdle I can have the villain show up and force a final confrontation. They're also structured to have a natural "next thing." You find and defeat the villain, but there's an implied next villain you'll be going after. That way, if the group is working well and I want to continue, it's easy to present the option to the group. But if I'm not interested in continuing with the group, the next thing can just serve as an "and the adventures continue" implied epilogue, and the game still feels complete.

I don't like players just bringing their own character sheet to the table. Someone who brings a disruptive character can ruin a session without me getting much useful information out of it, other than that I don't want to play with that person. And if it ruins the experience for the other players, I'm often out the opportunity to game with those people, through neither of our faults. I've experimented with both asking players to submit their characters in advance or making them choose between a collection of premade characters. The former is a good check for whether people will put in a basic amount of effort and follow instructions, but it can dissuade people who are just looking to dip their toes into playing for the first time. The latter can turn off players who are into crunchy games and are excited about character building. As a result, I'll usually choose the approach based on what non-5e system I'm currently most excited about running. Do I want to get together a group for a rules-light game? Premade characters it is. Looking to run some PF2e? Please submit your character sheet in advance. Some locations also do more drop-in based games, in which case it's premades all day.

As I'm running the game, I'm observing the players. There's a simple vibe check, obviously. Do I like playing with this person? But I'm also looking at how they play. What are they here for, what's exciting them? Are they struggling with finding optimal turns in combat, or do they like mastering a system? Are they curious about the world, or do they glaze over when the spotlight isn't on them? Do they light up in dialogue scenes? Do they want to try crazy things outside of their on-sheet abilities? Remember, later, I'm going to try to persuade this person to try to play a game they've never played before. I need to know what specifically is going to excite them.

I have (always with permission) recorded sessions before to go over in making these choices, but honestly even just a few small reminder notes will help me unravel things later. If a session goes well, I'll ask at the end for people to give me their contact information if they'd be interested in playing again. Non-committal, at their comfort, and it doesn't single out people that I don't want to play with. I can always just not call them. Usually I find I'm interested in playing again with a little more than half of the players I meet this way. In my experience, it's fairly rare for a player to say they're not interested in playing again, TTRPGs rule and there's a DM shortage.

What I usually do is keep running these until I have enough people in mind to run something else, even if it isn't the system I'm most excited about. Probably it would be better to spend more time in this starter phase building up more connections, but after running like 4-5 5e adventures, I'm usually more than ready to run anything else, and if I have to shelve my Lancer ideas because I've mostly found crunch-averse players, I'm usually fine with that.

So, next comes the invites. Now, most players I meet this way will eventually be open to playing most games, but listen: you can put people well out of their comfort zone for their third TTRPG, but you gotta be real careful with their second. Most of the time, the game I'm inviting people to will be their first real exposure to a non-5e TTRPG. If they don't like it, they will run back to the safety of 5e and you will never get them out of it again. So I am very careful in picking the right system for the players I am inviting.

Whatever the new system I want to run is, I will set up a pilot session for it. I am very clear to players that I will teach them the system at the session, they do not need to know it in advance. Eventually, when I have a reliable group of TTRPG people to play with, I'll expect them to be able to pick up systems without a ton of help, but for players that are only used to the complexity of 5e, the idea of learning a new system is daunting. I rehearse the teaching of the game session. It's the only thing for TTRPGs I ever rehearse, but I want to know down pat how I'm going to quickly teach a new system and make it feel approachable and non-threatening. I'm also very clear that this will be a single session, with the possibility of turning into a campaign if we like it. All of this is structured to feel very safe. No initial learning required, no long term commitment, with a GM you already know you like.

But even as safe as that is, you still have to pitch the system. Why should the player be excited about playing this new game? Don't go all TTRPG nerd on them and explain all the details of the system, or use a bunch of jargon. Give them one or two things to be excited about with short, detailed anecdotes to back them up.

"We're going to be playing Blades in the Dark. It's a game where you play a gang of criminals in a haunted, steampunk dystopia. Every session you'll do heists, but instead of meticulously planning them, you start right in the action, and when you need to have planned for something, you can do a flashback scene to explain your preparation. One group I ran this for got busted by guards during an early heist, but used a flashback to create a scene where they had gotten a buddy of theirs a job as one of the guards, and he helped them out of the situation. And for some reason they fell in love with this bumbling goof I improvised to be the buddy, and then on a bunch of future jobs they kept using flashbacks to get him jobs wherever they were robbing. So this one idiot was just a de-facto crew member who worked a dozen different inside jobs despite being about as sharp as an eraser. And eventually they fucked up and got him killed, but they brought him back as a ghost, because you can do that in Blades in the Dark."

I find using a specific example of play really helps get peoples' imaginations going, which is what is going to help them say yes. And that example is tailored to what I know that player vibes with, what it is I think that makes them a good fit for this game.

The last detail about the invites is that I'm telling them, not asking them. It is not, "Hey, are you interested in playing this new game?" It's "I'm going to be running this new game. If you're interested in playing, please let me know what times work for you." If you're asking, you're going to get some "well but can it be 5e?" If you're telling, then they can choose to learn a new game in order to keep playing TTRPGs with a GM they know they like, or they can choose not to play at all.

Once you get enough yesses for a game, you run it, and then from there you're on your own. I think those are basically just friends you have at that point, and I'm not gonna tell you how to have friends.

Hopefully at least one person finds all that useful!