.jpg)
The Unorganized Township of Bootstuck
An old box of randomly labelled cassette tapes is liberated from a garage sale and into the hands of a journalist who begins sifting through the contents and discovers random interviews with the citizens of a remote town known only as Bootstuck, a distant former military base in Ontario's northernmost region. The characters that occupy this abandoned outpost are colourful to be polite, unstable, unpredictable, or erratic to be direct but have all bypassed their obvious intellectual shortcomings to suss out an existence in this wild and challenging place.
The Unorganized Township of Bootstuck
Tape 1- A Box of Tapes
Every mystery starts somewhere—and for Bootstuck, it begins with a box of old tapes from an estate sale in Sudbury, Ontario. Some are labeled, some barely scratched with cryptic scrawls, and others completely blank. Most are in rough shape, but this one feels like the starting point.
The voice on the recording—unidentified, possibly on a boat, and drenched in radio static—will be known for now as Hat Guy. The interference sounds like shortwave or HAM radio, suggesting this might be how Bootstuck's strange transmissions were broadcast. But as for where, when, or why this was recorded? Nothing.
One thing's clear: Bootstuck isn’t just isolated—it’s got something massive swimming in its waters.
Cue the static. Let’s dive in.
www.bootstuck.com
I hate
SPEAKER_01:pain. Hey, how you doing? Oh, there
SPEAKER_02:he is.
SPEAKER_00:Hello? Oh, hello.
SPEAKER_01:Where is it? I can't talk.
SPEAKER_00:Hey, who are you? My name is Mike. I'll let
SPEAKER_01:you
SPEAKER_00:answer in a minute.
SPEAKER_01:Anywho, I would like to tell you another story about something different.
SPEAKER_00:What's the name of your town?
SPEAKER_01:Boat Stubs.
SPEAKER_00:And where is it located?
SPEAKER_01:On the map. Wait, I'm looking for it. I'm looking for my John Deere hat. It's green. I have my DeWalt hat. That's for the barbecues. I have my Bass Pro Outfitter hat. That's what I wear, you know, for fancy stuff like funerals and weddings and such.
UNKNOWN:Well, of course.
SPEAKER_01:I've got my First Descent hat. That's for when I'm outside, doing outside things. I can't find my damn John Deere hat. I what? I ain't rushing. I'm on a lazy river. Rolling down a lazy river. ho ho ho ho ho ho ho ho Did you say alligator? Sorry about that. You were saying about your hat. Oh, yes, that reminds me. There was this time, well, I had this hat, and it was a beauty. So it was a John Deere. It had a little dare-dare tractor. Was it your good hat? It was my everything hat. I took that to the wedding show. I took that to the funerals. I took that to the hiking trips, to the
SPEAKER_02:pools.
SPEAKER_01:I took that to Arkansas when I went twice, six times, packed away, and the bottom of a Piggly Wiggly bag, so it fit me perfectly.
SPEAKER_00:You're very interested in hats.
SPEAKER_01:Well, it was a John Deere. It was my everything hat.
SPEAKER_00:How do you feel about fedoras?
SPEAKER_01:I used to know a man, he wore a white one, it had a brim on it, and inside the brim was a ribbon, and the ribbon was a silk ribbon, and I'd do it from a mile away, it was a silk ribbon. Some people are like, that looks like a polyester ribbon. I said, no! this fedora all the time, except when he didn't, then he put it on his hat rack.
SPEAKER_00:What are you on about?
SPEAKER_01:I'm gonna have a, can I have a sip of this here coffee?
SPEAKER_00:Hello, are you there? Hello?
