#I’m glad they made Telly Monster less scary

[summerreign4077]

On Sesame Street, Big Bird’s teddy bear is named Radar after the lovable company clerk, Walter “Radar” O’Reily, on M*A*S*H who slept with his teddy bear.

In Telly Monster’s first appearance on Sesame Street as the Television Monster (Where he looked creepy AF.), he makes a passing reference to M*A*S*H while naming TV shows that start with the letter “M”. This means that M*A*S*H does, in fact, exist in Sesame Street’s universe.

This means that Big Bird must be a M*A*S*H fan! I can definitely see Radar being his favorite character.

Big Bird isn’t the only M*A*S*H fan in his family either. His rarely-seen cousin, Little Bird, has a teddy bear as well. Little’s bear is named Walter, also in honor of Radar.

I wonder if the Street residents all had a a big get-together at Mr. Hooper’s store the night the series finale aired… 🤔

#big bird #radar o'reilly #teddy bear #sesame street #I’m glad they made Telly Monster less scary #m*a*s*h 4077 #mash 4077 #mash

[detectivejigsawpines]

Hideous Creatures part 5 (Day 1-Stan)

The blonde chick, who introduced herself as Darlene, made herself comfortable in the seat right next to Stan’s in the cart after he’d finished sprinkling it with un-notice powder.  Had they been alone, frankly he wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d tried to sit in his lap, she was gushing over him that much.

And while he enjoyed the attention-Stan wasn’t as big of a sucker for easy flattery as Ford was, but he did enjoy having people compliment him once in a while-part of him knew a con when he saw it, and Darlene was trying to pull one on him.  He wasn’t sure what it was, but something about her reminded him of...of Marilyn. Like she was playing up the flattery and flirting so much because she was planning on doing something nasty as soon as he let his guard down. So while he grinned and flirted back shamelessly, he didn’t let her get too close, and focused on giving the tour.

 For the most part things went like normal; Stan brought the group of monsters to different parts of Gravity Falls to show off human stuff, playing it up as better and more impressive stuff than it really was.  The tourists oohed and aahed over the diner, the Dusk 2 Dawn convenience store, even the freaking mattress store which had recently opened up downtown. They got their pictures taken in front of the Northwest mansion, and (without any encouragement from Stan, I swear) took goofy pictures of themselves with the Nathaniel Northwest statue.  A large red-furred squirrel man who lived in the forest outside the mansion even climbed up onto the statue and wrote “YOU SUCK YOU STUPID TREE-CHOPPER” on his face in bright red pen (apparently the squirrel folk held a bit of a grudge against the guy who’d been responsible for chopping down the part of the forest their parents used to live in before being forced to move thanks to him).  And Stan allowed him to keep the pen, in exchange for a few tufts of his tail fur.

 The problem came in the form of a few tourists who actually wanted more details than Stan knew how to provide, such as what was so wrong about the Northwests asserting their dominance over the rest of the townsfolk-since to the manotaurs that was a perfectly legitimate strategy when you were bigger and stronger than everyone else-or why some teenagers wore long nightgowns and funny square hats at the end of spring.  This question in particular touched Stan on the raw, and he said grumpily that the tradition of high school graduates wearing caps and gowns came from a belief that at the end of their high school education they needed to wear the caps for a full day to keep all their accumulated knowledge from bursting out the tops of their heads. Fortunately, the gnome who’d asked appeared to accept this explanation, and gave his own pointy hat a self-conscious pat.

Stan BS’d his way through difficult questions as best he could, but this crowd of out-of-towners seemed a little more skeptical than the residents.

“I live in Seattle, so I see people inside watching Idiot Boxes all the time,” said a creature that was apparently a troll; his coloring was an interesting gray, with a few yellowy patches that from a distance looked like windows.  Stan guessed that it was so he could blend into the sides of office buildings. “I’ve never heard anyone call them that before-”

“Well of course they’re not gonna be obvious about it!” Stan said quickly.  “The usual nickname for them used by humans is ‘TV.’”

“Teevee?”

“It’s short for ‘television.’”  He sighed on the inside.

“What’s a telly and why do people need a vision of it?” asked a tree nymph, her pretty face pursing in confusion.

“It comes from ancient Greek or something.”  Stan barely managed not to let his tone waver with uncertainty-if he didn’t seem absolutely certain that he knew what he was talking about he was gonna lose them.  He’d learned that lesson the hard way. “And that big screen on the front gives people visions of whatever they wanna see, with over a hundred options!”

Darlene gasped.  “Man, you are so smart, Mr. Mystery!”

Stan waggled his eyebrows.  “It’s a gift, and a curse.”

****

It was with a surprising amount of relief that Stan drove the cart back into the forest, letting the passengers go.

Man, I almost feel like I oughta do some research on stuff so I don’t get stumped like that again.

...Aw crap, I can’t let Ford know I thought that.  I’d never live it down.

To his relief, plenty of creatures still left tips as they exited.  He was just locking up the treasure chest when Darlene put a cool hand on his arm.

“So, handsome, you wanna go for a walk?” she asked.  “You seem kinda tired out after giving us such a long tour!”

...Right.  Follow the pretty lady into the dark, scary woods-that’s not a trap at all.

Stan smiled at her innocently.  “Eh, I’m more hungry than anything else.  You wanna come to the diner and get a meal?  You look human enough ta blend in.”

Her turquoise eyelid twitched a little.  “Oh, I dunno...I am a little hungry, but I don’t think I wanna be around a large crowd of humans.”  She stroked his shoulder. “I think I’d rather have it be just you and me...alone.”

  And it’s right about then that her eyes turned black and pupil-less, and her lower body turned into that of a giant spider.

 ********

Stan felt glad that he’d thought to keep his baseball bat under his seat; it was a cinch to yank it out and thwack her in the noggin with it, before grabbing up the treasure chest and hightailing it towards the cabin.  Behind him he heard a shriek of rage, followed by the sound of eight giant feet chasing him.

He muttered some extra creative swear words as he ran, struggling to hold onto the treasure chest and wishing (for once) that the stupid forest creatures would use paper currency instead of gold, because this thing was really freaking  heavy  and maybe it would be prudent to leave it behind, but he was d_mned if he was gonna abandon his profits-

Darlene came leaping onto him from above, having shed her human guise altogether.

 Stan barely managed to put the chest between them, holding her back; unfortunately, this had the side effect of knocking the wind out of him as he hit the ground.

“Geez, lady, what’s your problem?!” he wheezed out, squirming as best he could while trying to get his breath back.  “The tour wasn’t that bad, was it?”

“It’s nothing personal, honey,” Darlene snarled.  “I just got a real problem with your type of man, except for the fact that you taste delicious-ow!”

Stan slammed his fist into her eye again.

“You’ll pay for that!”  The giant spider woman reared up, sucking in a deep breath.  Stan noticed some kind of green gooey stuff gathering between her mandibles; in desperation, Stan hiked both his legs up and kicked her right in the midriff.  That allowed him to finally get loose, half-staggering, half-running away. As he did, he fumbled in his coat pocket and grabbed out his last possible defense-just as something like a thick, sticky rope caught him around the ankles and sent him falling again.

 Darlene stomped up to him, beady eyes glittering with rage.

“I think your tour’s gonna have a new attraction,” she hissed.  “Gravity Falls’s first mummy exhibit!”

Stan didn’t bother coming up with a witty comeback; he just sat up and slashed with the switchblade.

********

Ten minutes later, dirty, scraped-up, bloody, and in serious need of repairs to his suit and fez after he had a shower and some food, Stan dragged the treasure chest up the steps of the porch and staggered into the house.

Ford looked up from the book he’d been reading in the living room, probably about to make some kind of cutting remark-instead, his jaw dropped in alarm.

“What happened?” he asked.

“I got a disgruntled customer who probably won’t be comin’ back anytime soon.”  As Stan went past his brother to the stairs, he dropped a few items at his feet: a pile of enormous webbing, and a giant, bloody mandible.

********

It's my personal belief that the only reason Stan was fooled by Darlene in "Roadside Attractions" was that he is just that lonely, and maybe looking for options for somewhere to go at the end of the summer. Or maybe it's just that even a professional conman can't see through everyone all the time, and he was drawn in by easy flattery. But my personal preference is the first option. And here, even though he and Ford are kind of fighting right now, Stan is still being loved and validated by someone, so he's less likely to be blinded by unhappiness. If that makes sense.

#flipside au #darlene gravity falls #stan pines #ford pines #mystery tours #stan is awesome