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annie's engagement party

and jack is here too!

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Welcome to Jack's twisted mind... Of fun!

As they planned, Jack will be asking ANNIE SONG to marry him. But not as they planned, he's throwing her a surprise engagement party, because he loves complicated little schemes. Bonus points if he can increase the likelihood of the situation blowing up spectacularly in his face. Please handwave Jack inviting your character to this—assume he just liberally tossed out open invites for a general start of the summer party today. Nobody knows this will be Annie's engagement party but him, CRYSTA WALDINGER, EVAN FINCH, and RAINE RILEY (bet you weren't expecting those three names together, huh?).

Party hours: Noon to six in the evening.

Party venue: Jack reserved a room (with a little bit of outdoor patio space) at the Rec Center. After studying the ancient texts (many Pinterest boards), Jack learned the art of decorating an area moderately nicely for cheap. He's very lucky he's living in a moment where people find wooden clothespins and twine charming. There are lots of yellow flowers (mostly peonies!) everywhere, both real and made of paper (shoutout to EVAN who helped Jack make the paper flowers), because that's pretty much the only visual motif Jack could easily pull from One Hundred Years of Solitude, Annie's favorite book. Yes, this is a themed engagement party. Yes, Jack has decided to be corny. Yes, you may debate him on whether the color yellow signifies good things or bad things in One Hundred Years of Solitude, just not now. Anyway, the vibes are nice, because he tried really hard and things that look clumsily made we call "rustic" these days.

Food: Somewhat themed. vanilla & chocolate ice cream (for the white wash and dirt Rebeca ate in the novel), canillitas de leche (for Ursula's milk candy), bruschetta-style asparagus (for Dr. Juvenal Urbino's obsession with asparagus), baba ganoush (for Fermina's hatred of eggplants), and then Jack gave up on themed food and got fruit and chips and fancy little cookies at the commissary, idk man.

Drinks: Beer, wine, canned cocktails, soft drinks, good ol' H₂O. Jack gave up on the theme two sentences ago.

party

Games:

Ring Toss With No Limits: bog standard ring toss (ring, get it?) with some of Jack's special rules, such as tossing while blindfolded, tossing while doing a handstand (with or without handstand assistance), and tossing with both hands tied behind your back (really throw that neck). His special rules are written on pieces of paper in a bowl by the ring toss—use them or not, he's not a cop. Also feel free to make up ridiculous rules.

Ask Me Anything: because Annie loves talking games. In this game, participants sit in a circle. Everyone takes a turn being "it." While you're it, everyone else in the circle is allowed to ask you ANY QUESTION. You may skip a question, but the penalty is taking a drink.

Find the Guest: with the help of the wonderful CRYSTA, Jack has obtained #facts about people attending. When you arrive, you will get a random, context-free fact about someone else at the party. Your mission is to find out who you've been matched with. The prize? Nine Hundred Quatruple Quatrople Dollars. Just kidding. The prize is a Thinking Monkey Statue Jack found at a garage sale in Colchester. Possibly cursed. **NOTE** If your character did not or was not able to supply a #fact but you'd like for them to participate, please Dropbox me a fact and we'll handwave it.

The Proposal: At 1:00, Jack will ask Annie if he can talk to her in a corner, and then pop the question. He's rigged things so Johnny Clegg's Dela will play as this happens. Why? Because: 1) Jack is trying to make all this look as real as possible; 2) he would actually like Annie to enjoy this to the extent she can; 3) he loves dying on the cross of committing to the bit. But also please don't look at him. And he thinks there's a 13% chance Annie will say "NO! AND NOW YOU'RE UNDER ARREST, BOZO! BOOK THIS CLOWN." and federal agents will rappel in and blast him.

After that's all done, the party will resume on as normal.

volunteer slots

TABY MCLEOD gets really into Ring Toss With No Limits and flings a ring in such a way that it catches perfectly on the drink VOLUNTEER 2 is holding. What is this, some kind of meetcute?

OPHELIA CARDENAL ROY decides they really, really like the asparagus bruschetta and starts to hoard it. VOLUNTEER 4 also really likes the asparagus bruschetta and is determined to get to the bottom of why it's disappearing faster than any of the other party foods—culminating in a The Departed-style showdown on the back patio.

VOLUNTEER 5 doesn't know what One Hundred Years of Solitude is about and decides to Google it. What the hell? Who'd throw a themed engagement party about this????

ZIRA BAILEY is hanging out on the back patio minding their own business, enjoying life, when they're beset by a fly. They try to swat the fly, but end up swatting the ice cream right out of VOLUNTEER 7's hands. Excuse you...

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

He's there to support Rory but is (as always) awkward as hell.

Edited 2023-06-24 17:29 (UTC)

LOU! Jack's spring roll hero! Jack actually does want Lou to talk his ear off about Liminal Midwest emo, but Lou looks a little awkward, so Jack gives him an easy one: "In your opinion, is cereal soup?"

Lou lets out a little sigh of relief that this isn't a personal question. Thank you, Jack! "No, because you can eat cereal dry, while you can't eat the contents of soup dry. The liquid is an integral part of soup, whereas the same cannot be said of cereal," he says matter-of-factly, as though this was the most logical answer in the world.

Oh wow. Lou really dismantled that question with professorial expertise. Jack blinks a few times, surprised. "I never thought about it that way," he replies. This exchange feels oddly profound. "But I guess you're right, yeah. The liquid is the integral part of soup."

Then a thought occurs to him. "Ah, but wait." He squints cannily. "What about freeze-dried soup? That's still soup, but no liquid."

"You wouldn't eat it dry, though? You'd add water and then it'd be soup again," Lou says, feeling a little anxious that maybe he's developed a reputation as the Soup Guy around here.

ASK ME ANYTHING: Lou

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"Yes you can," a tipsy Eureka interjects. "You can eat soup parts dry."

"Yeah and that's soup parts. They're not soup yet. You wouldn't call a raw tomato a salsa, would you?"

Re: ASK ME ANYTHING: Lou

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what do you ask the person you know (nearly) everything about? something to make them look COOL, that's what!

"what's the scariest thing you've done for fun?"

Lou thinks for a moment to try to give Rory a good answer, because the scariest things he can think of would sound mundane to anyone else.

"I went skydiving a couple times. It was all right," he says finally with a shrug, as though this is a perfectly normal thing for a nerd to have done.

"A couple times?" Jack is impressed. He's never been skydiving, but he would dearly love to fling himself out of a moving plane. "Where? When? Why?"

"It was like... 9 years ago? Alaska? I had a fling with a skydiving instructor, but y'know, it's like, kinda less exciting the second time around," Lou explains, not wanting to bore anyone with the specifics.

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"Do you feel like your powers like, suit you? Like if you could go back in time would you be surprised that this is what they are?"

"I dunno? I guess they could be worse. Honestly, I never thought this would happen to me until it did," Lou says, a touch wistfully.

Eden sighs. "Me neither."

"Would you change yours if you could?" Lou asks gently.

"Who is the most annoying person on the station?"

This is an easy one for Lou. "Blaise Allsop, that guy with tickling powers."

"Oh my god I hate that guy!" Noah leans across the circle to cheers Lou.

"I saw him on the way here, gave him the wrong directions," Lou says conspiratorially. Cheers.

A softball for the other sad old man, but also for pride purposes; "What kind of music do you like? Do you...like music."

"Does anyone not like music?" Lou asks, looking a little horrified by the idea.

"I feel like a lot of the rich people I know still like weird classical music only so that counts as boring people." She muses over her highbrow beverage.

"I bet some of them listen to garbage in secret. They just don't want anyone to think less of them."

Oh! This should be interesting. Annie hadn’t even considered the possibility that liminal physiology would impact her stink/no stink asparagus pee study. But Lou’s part plant and maybe his plant body plays nice with other plants??

She’s three glasses of white wine deep and thinks she’s a genius. She should get this study published.

“Lou, do you eat asparagus?” She’ll start there.

"No, I don't—why?" Lou asks, puzzled.