TAPE 24 - "Airshow and Crash"

It starts innocently enough: Hat Guy claiming there’s going to be an airshow. This, naturally, turns out to mean one plane seen from very far away, a helicopter that might’ve been a goose, and a deflated rainbow-shaped hot air balloon salvaged from wherever such things land when they've had enough. Still, it’s more organized than the ski hill.

Things then veer into a community talent show where Caleb will be judged — possibly for sport, possibly for population control. No prizes, just the chance to stay. Scorecards are involved. Posters are planned. The standard unit of measurement is “a wooden board.”

And then, just as I’m starting to feel like I’ve adjusted to Bootstuck’s rhythm, they casually mention a plane crash.

Apparently, the entire town may have formed around it. Over 200 people survived and… stayed. No one’s clear on when. Or how. Or why. But they’ve got a sign, a map, and plans to turn it into a movie, so it’s real enough for them.

If this was fiction, it’d be bad exposition. But it's not fiction — it’s a tape. And that’s honestly worse.

www.bootstuck.com

Transcript

Speaker: 0:07

Hello. It's me again. Didn't know if you remember me from the last time. Yeah. I remember me too. too. Okay, then. So, I was talking about a few things and I wanted to tell you about them, 'c you're getting real excited around here in Bootstuck So first thing that's happening is an air show. An air show? An air show. Yeah, how'd you know? Woo! There's, right? Oh, Think about this now. Yesterday, we had a warm-up show. We had one aeroplane fly by, very far away, leaving white scratches in the sky. We're thinking a helicopter. An air show? Yeah, I saw an airplane and then you see a helicopter. You tell me how that's not an air show. That's pretty impressive. Com by real close together like that. Well, I guess if you've never seen airplanes.. What else would you need to make it a proper air show in your books? Hot air balloon? We got one. You have a balloon? We do! Hold on, I have it right now. Blow it up! Blow it up! Sorry about that. You have a balloon? It floated down to us the other week. It's in the shape of a rainbow, slightly less air than probably originally had. So it has a basketballasket and and a burner on the top, and you fill it with hot air. Hey, look, a goose! That could be part of the air show, too. Go on, goose! Go on! We got a goose, now. We got a whole bunch of things in the air over here. Throw Up a pine cone Look at all the things in the air for the air today. airshow usually has a lot of airplanes flying in formation. Yeah, whoop, saying it yesterday. Told you about it today. Well, that's great. Maybe I'll come up next year for the show. It sounds like a lot of. Well, it doesn't happen every year, but that's okay. You should just come up for the regular things, like the Carv and the judging contests. We're going to be judging Caleb tomorrow.. Judging Caleb. Yep. Sounds like a movie. Yeah, I could be. Dave will make a poster. Dave, get the crayons So you're judging Caleb some sort of talent show, I assume? Well, we'll see what his talents are. I don't really know what he's going to do, but we told him we'll hold up scorecards out of four. If he gets a couple of fours, then that's pretty good. That'd be like a two by four, but we don't make two by four for around here. No, we make the wooden boards about the size of a wooden board. The size of a wooden board. Wooden board. I assume you have some sort of standard measurement there. Tree is about this high, the the board should be about this high also, and if a tree is a little bit taller than that, think about it., Gonna need a ladder, got to get up top, that high, also. Make a wooden board about the size of a wooden board. What does Caleb win for this judging thing? Win? Oh, he gets to stay. I see. So it's like Survivor then? Oh, you's that that is? Yeah, it's a show about people that go to a place, it's remote, and one by one, they're asked to leave so they can win money. Oh, yeah, we call that far away. You go to far away and you get there and they say, where are you from? And you say, you're up there, down there, yonder bootst? and you everybody's like, they're going to tell you, go away now. So you got to go to go away. Go away is not far from far away, down the hill from yonder. That's all right a little bit. I've never seen any of these cities on a map. Oh, yeah, we got a map. Well, of course. It's marked. Also got a wooden sign. So how many people live in Bootstock then? I don't know. Last time we counted, it was after the plane crashed, there was 264. Plane crash? Most of them ended up getting scattered and taken away. Well, this is interesting. We're making some progress here. Plane crash? Yeah. Woo! Yeah, long time ago. First bootst stuff wasn't a place of many people knowing about it. Kind of like a potato crumb chip on the map. If you put your finger on it, it would go away. Woo, for now it's here to stay. Yep, plane crash created a population spike happened to be the day that they were does'n the census yup count them all counted some twice Caleb's knew wasn't on the list so you can say we've kind of evolved. So there was a plane cra-- Okay, so hang on a second. You'll forgive me... I'm a little conf. Nobody died Don't get all jumbled about it. We don't have a gift shop or nothing, and it ain't no movie. We're going to make a poster, actually. We'll make our own movie about it. Not sure yet. There's so many questions. So what kind of a plane? And how many people were on board? plane. Airplane in the sky. There was over 200 people on it, and they all lived to tell the tale, and some probably don't want to talk about it because, you know, trauma. cross it off the board Didn't think of you that one, did you? Woo, got it, got it good. Hello? Sorry about that. We're crossing words off the board. You know about our board? We have talked about your board before. Put big words up on the board.. Cross them off when you get it done I got to go anyways. The bathroom's going. Hello. Are you there?