#micro horror

"Don't listen to your grandmother, she has all these quaint 21st century notions about romantic love. She'll tell you that you don't need a dowery since if a man really loves you he wouldn't care. It's all very fantastical."

"Do you think they really lived like that? No marriage brokers? No IPO for the new couple?"

So I've told you about the dangers in many types of restaurants and retail, so you've come to the conclusion (possibly over an ice cream cone), that way to go is to order in via a restaurant's app or a delivery service that dashes to doors or is a hub for grub or promises to be without seams (although for most foods, one hopes not to find seams in any case).

Much like online shopping has its perils just as IRL does, however, ordering food online is not without...unappetizing possibilities. Most of these apps prompt you to tip, conversely, I'm here to offer the following tips:

Typically, a food app will have a range that they deliver in. If you're in a city or suburbia, this is good news, less so in a rural area. Some of these apps let you get food delivered out of range for an extra fee - just make sure you're in the range of beings the restaurant caters to.

If you live on the border of zip codes, there might be some minor issues delivering to your address. If you live (or "live") on the border between worlds, expect major issues.

If you're the deliverer of sustenance: if the being who ordered tacos at the witching hour tips well but something seems off about their home, take the tip and don't tip off local hunters of such beings. You don't want to be their next meal.

If you're the (ultimate) acquirer of sustenance, all the usual rules about tipping decently apply - much as I've previously discussed fae types being attracted to diners and sorcerer types being into coffee shops, shapeshifters seem to find something joyous in shifting their location and the type of food they're delivering. Do you really want to be dealing with an undertipped werewolf?

It is perfectly normal for menu items and even restaurant availability to fluctuate. It is not, however, perfectly normal to suddenly have an overflow of off-brand restaurants (MickDanold's, CookOn, DarvoQueen, etc.)

Beware any menu items listed in quotation marks. If it's in quotation marks, I would urge you to read the ingredients if you must order it at all.

Related to #4: it's truly best not to ask who or what would be willing to dash or avoid seams at 2:12 a.m. for a measly $12.50.

Most apps will let you track a driver's progress. If the app begins to show them traversing different dimensions, I beg of you, cancel the order.

It's pretty par for the course for delivery apps to cost more than if you bought the food in person. Just read the fine print in the terms and conditions to ensure that's the only additional cost.

Bear in mind what is the responsibility of the restaurant vs the deliverer vs the app. If the fries didn't have enough salt, that's not on the entity who brought it to your hovel. Don't hold the deliverer responsible for the behavior of the restaurant - they might decide to hold you responsible for something in return.

Use the rating system honestly, but with the kindness and patience you might hope that, um, beings, may rate you with when they have the power over your income (or worse).

If you find you consistently cannot order garlic in a particular area, or food is never salted, that might be a hint about the sort of orders your local Entities might be avoiding.

There is a new Shepherd in the valley. The flock is unremarkable, gentle beasts spending lazy days in lush pasture. There is no reason to be uneasy. You walk faster when you see them.

The increase is slow, at first. You dismiss it, no one will talk to you about the Shepherd, or the flock, anyways. Alternate routes to town are easily found- not that you’re avoiding them, you would say if pressed. You never are.

The numbers swell, the flock becomes a lake of moving bodies, then an ocean, oddly silent. Unnatural. You swear, when your back is turned, that there are thousands of whispers, the shuffling of many, eerily human feet. It is likely just the wind, and an overreactive imagination.

You can no longer avoid the flock, or its ever-watchful Shepherd, who, despite the rolling waves of little bodies, can always be seen, and you think, can always See. When fear relaxes its grasp from your mind, and that is rarely, you think about how long its been since you’ve seen anyone else, about how few people there had been, each time your returned to town, but the flock only grew. 

Anxious, your pulse pounding in your ears, you think about how you should have arrived in town by now, days ago, though its only a few miles on the dusty road... 

Or have you been standing there, all along?  Was it when the Shepherd noticed you, noticing it? When, unblinking, the gaze turned on you and held.

The heavy, hungry, staring eyes of the Shepherd. 

Your Shepherd.

You are unremarkable, a gentle beast, spending lazy days in lush pasture. There is no reason to be uneasy.

“Growth Clown”

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“They just wont stop growing! They’ve taken over the barn!”

As my first-ever Ruleshorror list might have implied, I'm not much into Christmas, but a longstanding tradition of my people (particularly in the U.S.) is the creation of Christmas-related content - songs, movies, and more. As I'm in the habit of writing shopping survival guides, it's only fitting that my contribution to this legacy is a guide to find the Best Christmas Tree Ever - I suppose I might take my own advice come Tu Bishvat.

Shop early, but not too early. At least if you want a mundane tree. If you're too early, the tree isn't ready and may react poorly, and if you're too late, then there's a reason that the tree was still available. I can only hope, for your sake, that it the reason is something like size or injury to the tree - not its ability to resize at will or cause injury to others. 

If you can hear the trees talking, you don't want to buy a tree there. If you can hear trees talking everywhere you try, you've got much bigger problems than finding a pine. 

I'm not saying it's not cost-effective to find a tree on the side of the road or with bulk trash night - I'm just saying that the people threw it out for a reason, and it might not have been an ugly pre-Christmas breakup. Or hey, it might have been a really ugly pre-Xmas breakup, and now the tree knows too much. 

If two trees are entwined, they don't want to be separated. Get neither or both. 

Pine trees are a little spiky, but you know they shouldn't be but so point. If its too spiky, that tree doesn't want you. 

You also probably know how a Real TreeTM is supposed to smell. If it smells like fire, this is a problem. If it smells like cookies, it's a very different kind of problem, but still a problem. If it smells like ash, I can't help you. 

Make sure the tree is sturdy enough to hold all the ornaments, pictures, gifts, and/or candles that are going to be hanging off of it. Maybe even take your heaviest ornament tree shopping, so you can see if the tree can and will hold it for you. 

Plenty of Beings celebrate too (and not just Christmas!) - you do not want to get in between the Wild Hunt and where they're going, and that might just involve a path through the tree farm. 

Relatedly, places with lots of trees just tend to have a lot of mostly-human hang arounds. Be nice but don't follow anyone anywhere, especially if they aren't staff. 

If the roots are weird, the tree may lead you down some weird routes. 

Fake trees have their merits and problems too. If you have a new artificial tree you're safe from many dangers, for sure. Not all of them, but definitely safer than a hand-me-down. Hand-me-down trees have a magical tendency to open portals to previous owners, so if you want to see your folks in the '50s and '60s... 

Trees should have shadows. If there should be a shadow and there isn't, that tree isn't for you.