Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode 161: SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
519 Plays2 years ago
Hello, Podwalkers, and welcome back to another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast! We wanted to let everyone know that September is Suicide Awareness/Prevention Month. As promised, we keep Mental Health Links available every episode. But For general Mental Health the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has great resources for people struggling with mental health concerns as well as their families. We also want to draw attention to this article on stigma from NAMI's site.
On today's episode Hobbes has to eat crow (not the literal bird but I mean maybe he should...). Over the past couple of years Hobbes has been known to rant about Squee and comments that Squee has been done dirty. Well with Dominaria United, our lovable friend Squee (and his toy) get their own story. We were fortunate enough to have Dan Sheehan (the writer of this storye and also the cohost of the Commander Sphere podcast) stop by and talk about the responsibility of creating the world around Squee.
Again we would like to state that Black Lives Matter
We also are proud to have partnered with Grinding Coffee Co a black, LGBT+ affiliated and owned, coffee business that is aimed at providing coffee to gamers. You can read more about their mission here. You can use our partner code for discounted coffee!
We also finally have a Linktree with all of our discounts/resources
____________________________________________
If you’re thinking about suicide or just need someone to talk to right now, you can get support from any of the resources below.
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988
- Veteran's can Press 1 at anytime to be taken to the Veteran's Line
- Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741-741
- International suicide hotlines: A comprehensive resource list for people outside the US.
- IMAlive: Click Chat Now to access a live online network of volunteers through instant messaging.
- TrevorLifeline, TrevorChat, and TrevorText (LGBTQ+ crisis support): 1-866-488-7386, or text “Trevor” to 1-202-304-1200
- Trans Lifeline (US): (877) 565-8860
____________________________________________
Opening and closing music by Wintergatan (@wintergatan). Logo art by Steven Raffael (@SteveRaffle)
Goblin Lore is proud to be presented by Hipsters of the Coast, and a part of their growing Vorthos content – as well as Magic content of all kinds. Check them out at hipstersofthecoast.com
Recommended
Transcript
Acknowledging Suicide Awareness Month
00:00:30
Speaker
Hello Podwalkers and welcome back to another episode of the Goblin Lore podcast. Before we get started with today's episode, this is an episode we are going to be coming out in the middle of September. And so kind of at our beginning of all of our episodes this month, we're just wanting to kind of take that moment to recognize that we are in the middle of Suicide Awareness Month or Suicide Prevention Month.
00:00:51
Speaker
September is kind of our other big main month that we oftentimes do a lot of mental health topics. We haven't planned as much this year as we have in previous years around this, but we do want to just kind of acknowledge that. I also, it's just my opportunity to let people know that the main crisis line number in the US has changed. It's actually now 988. It is very easy to get to.
Support from Grinding Coffee Company
00:01:15
Speaker
It's kind of that idea of not wanting people that are having a tough time and might need some
00:01:19
Speaker
some outreach to be able to easily remember it and You can always press one to get to the veterans crisis line just like you could before So welcome to September and we just want to kind of keep that conversation going
00:01:32
Speaker
We also want to give a shout out to the Grinding Coffee Company. So the Grinding Coffee Company is an LGBT and black-owned business that produces coffee for gamers. And we are one of their only, I think, podcasts. They mainly pair with streamers, but they've really believed in kind of our mission and we believe in what they do. They've been very willing to support kind of all the
00:01:54
Speaker
All the events that we do, the charity events, the streams donating coffee for us to be able to give away. So we just really want to make sure that we always give them a thanks.
Introduction to Squee and Guest Dan Shin
00:02:03
Speaker
And so today's episode is one that I am really, really excited about.
00:02:09
Speaker
Anybody who's listened to this show knows that I tend to rant a lot about a certain goblin, a certain goblin and lore that I love and felt had gotten the shaft for a very long time, which we'll be coming back to that because I have to make acknowledgements where I can make acknowledgements. And this is a goblin that we've done an episode.
00:02:28
Speaker
on before, which is Squeak. So Squeak recently returned in a story, Death and Salvation, by Dan Shin, who is a magic writer, comedian, co-host of the Commander Spear podcast. So we're going to be talking about Squeak. We get to return to Squeak. And, Dan, how much have you written for magic so far that's out?
00:02:51
Speaker
This was my debut story with Magic. So that was my understanding and I just wanted to make sure I did not miss anything. So I guess I forgot to introduce myself because I'm pretty bad at that. In typical goblin fashion, you're already a couple of minutes in. If you're new to the cast, I am HobbsQ. I can be found on Twitter at HobbsQ and my pronouns are he, him. So.
00:03:14
Speaker
Dan, we've heard your voice. I'm going to throw out a question to you if you're able to
Dan Shin on Writing for Squee
00:03:20
Speaker
answer it. And if not, I have a backup one. And that is what character would you most like to write now that you've had a chance to write Squeak?
00:03:29
Speaker
Um, I mean, I had a real blast with squeeze, but it was kind of for a first story. It was somewhat of a dream to get to tackle a character that has a such like roots within the lore that I grew up reading and be such like a devoted.
00:03:44
Speaker
fan base still, like people are still very excited about the character. Yeah, we talked about this before, like Mark Rosewater when he was doing his head to head polls, which I mean, that he used to do kind of for a couple of years, he had those going. Squee won like favorite goblin of all time. I mean, and this was when we even had other people like, you know, whether it's Cranko or Kiki, Kiki, I mean, just other goblins. I mean, the one Squee was the one who came out on top.
00:04:13
Speaker
Yeah. And so Squee was definitely on the list of characters I would be most excited to write, especially coming from a lot of my background is in comedy. And so as like a first foray into the fantasy world, getting to do it with kind of a comedic twist was fun. But in terms of characters, I'd really like to be able to write someday. I think Karn's on my list. I'm sure Karn's on a lot of people's lists. And then my niche hit probably would be Norrin the Wary. Oh, my gosh.
00:04:44
Speaker
There's like no Norrin lore. And I have a story in mind, and I keep it to myself just in case they ever come asking. Man, see this, we're already, you know, you've already hit on one of my favorite, like, I always joke that I'm gonna cosplay Norrin, because I don't cosplay. And I'm really just gonna run away whenever anybody approaches me. Just be like, you didn't see it? No, that was my Norrin the warrior cosplay. I love Norrin.
00:05:13
Speaker
Norin's great, Norin's a really fun character.
Dan's Comedy Background and Projects
00:05:16
Speaker
When I was a kid, I tried to collect as many Norins as I could to see if I could make the price go up.
00:05:22
Speaker
because they were dirt cheap when they first came out. And so I was just like, I was going to the store and being like, give me every nor in the wary you have. And they'd be like, all right, that'll be $1.75. I mean, at one point, the foils were were pricey due to a random, you know, the niche deck in modern like a soul style deck, but
00:05:44
Speaker
I think it was like right when I came back to Magic, Rachel Weeks told me, she was like, Noren's like a foil, because I was buying foil Noren's at the time. See? Like not exclusively, but I had a lot of foil Noren's and she was like, that is like a $8 card now, maybe 10. And I was just like, oh, dang, I need to check on that. And I had like a hundred bucks of Noren's sitting in a box, which was so silly.
00:06:10
Speaker
One of my favorite flavor texts of all times is the poking fun back at Magic's original lore with the mix up with the art with Lemurs. So do you know kind of the story behind that? Oh, yeah, the Lemure versus Lemur thing, right? Yeah. Yeah. And so there's a flavor text from Time Spiral where he's like, Lemurs, finally something that's cute or something. And then, yeah, actually Lemure. So that's so funny.
00:06:42
Speaker
Yeah, okay, that's fine. We'll get to Squee. We took a little diversion there. Yeah, just a little one. So you mentioned your comedy background. So yeah, do you want to tell people just kind of who you are, where they can find you? Sure, yeah. I would say if there's anything I've done that people are most familiar with online, it's that I for years have run this Twitter account called Not A Wolf.
00:07:02
Speaker
It is about a wolf pretending to be a man. It is what my eventual first book was based off of. The character is exactly what it sounds like. It is a literal wolf from the woods that wears a little shirt and tie to work and tries to pretend to be a person and is somehow succeeding but also is not good at it at all.
00:07:22
Speaker
And so that Twitter account has been around for a while. It has a fairly sizable following, so you may have seen me from that. I also work for The Onion as a contributor. I've been working for them for a handful of years now.
00:07:36
Speaker
And then beyond that, yeah, my book came out in 2021. I have a show called We Still Like You that we haven't done in a bit because the pandemic brought a lot of live shows to a screeching halt. But when it was running, the concept of the show was that performers would go on stage, tell the story of something that they're ashamed of, and the audience would raise their glass, cheers, and say, we still like you. It was a very fun time.
00:08:02
Speaker
And you mentioned in magic, you mentioned kind of commands fair. So I know you co-host that with Rachel Weeks. Yeah, Rachel and I actually met doing comedy years ago. We met doing the show called Mortified, which is about finding things from your childhood and presenting them to an audience. It's very, very fun.
00:08:21
Speaker
And so the two of us met through that and then Rachel actually hosted the Denver chapter of We Still Like You. So we've been friends for years and when I had just moved out to LA and Rachel moved out slightly after that and got me back into Magic to Play Commander and then the two of us were talking about doing a podcast and that was where Commander Sphere came from.
00:08:41
Speaker
And so we started that in 2019, so we've been around for a bit. And so yeah, it's been really, really fun. It's just the idea is basically magic through the lens of very casual play and putting the experience and the goofs first as opposed to really granular mechanical content.
00:09:04
Speaker
You're not all about making sure nobody ever makes a misplay on camera. You're not, yeah. If I made a misplay on a stream, yeah, of course I made a misplay on stream. That's because I built in a togga tog deck. What do you, what? Yeah, the concept of somehow, that's my favorite, I think YouTube type of comment would be, well, there was a misplay. You are correct, there was. All my plays are misplays.
00:09:34
Speaker
And some of them I even mean to misplay. Yeah. Well, we asked you to come on to talk about Squeak. So I want to let people know we had a previous episode we do our goblin profiles and
00:09:48
Speaker
It
Squee's Character Evolution
00:09:49
Speaker
has been, I was looking back when I sent it to Dan, it's been a while. But when we looked at Squeak before, I just have kind of our brief rundown of what that episode was. It was, we felt that we needed to return to talking about Squeak. And I said, did we know a lot about Squeak? Well, we didn't. And when we looked into it, we were kind of saddened by the amount of Squeak lore that can easily be found.
00:10:13
Speaker
I will say that with your story out now, the Wikipedia, the MTG-opedia entry doubled the length of Squeeze's story. We did not have a lot of story.
00:10:29
Speaker
There was lore. We knew that Squee was involved. He was showing up on flavor text. He was whimsy. We knew more ancillary stuff about him, especially like that he couldn't be killed. And the fact that was like a really just depressing, depressing story in some ways. You had this goblin that was made to be basically just tortured, represented on the card, fire, ecstasy and tyranny. Just his dead body, which Wizards was so nice to reprint recently. So I could see that again.
00:10:59
Speaker
Um, but you know, there, there was kind of not a lot out there above about him. We knew that he was a Nabob, which was like a general. We know that he was a mortal. And our biggest thing was that.
00:11:11
Speaker
We had returned to Dominaria last time before the most recent where the story is set. We had returned to Dominaria. We had basically the getting back together of the band. Well, the crew, we had a weather light, the original ship, we had crew that were descendants or original crew members. And in amongst that story, we got nothing new on Squeak.
00:11:35
Speaker
We got a card and the card kind of moved him from kind of the goblin, the Bob with a similar mechanical feature, uh, except he now was called the immortal. So we knew that he was immortal for sure. Um, but that was it when, when that card came out, we, we, we got, we got.
00:11:55
Speaker
That was it. We had a card. We didn't get any new story whatsoever from Squeak. And when we had gone to look in kind of some of the old books, finding actual passages that Squeak is not just a side character is kind of difficult to do. Now we had cards, so Squeak's Toy, Squeak's Embrace. There's a lot of flavor texts. And we go pretty deep into this when talking about goblins and whimsy. And Squeak is definitely one of our favorites for kind of for that.
00:12:25
Speaker
Um, you know, there's just jokes about his cooking. There's jokes kind of about, um, actually, I mean, there's a, I, it's hilariously he's on goblin bookie. Um, so we had kind of all this like references to him and we had to infer things, but for actual, just like a direct story, we didn't have a ton about squid and.
00:12:48
Speaker
This has been something that I personally have ranted about for a very, very long time.
Challenges and Research in Writing Squee
00:12:52
Speaker
I joke that this is not good precedent that Wizards finally gave us a new story because now I'm just thinking of which other goblins I haven't complained enough about. But that all changed when your article or your story, Death and Salvation, came out. Like I said, it doubled the entry that somebody went in and put in. But I mean, the story itself was
00:13:15
Speaker
the first time that we had squee front and center in kind of a side story, not really the main one, but it is truly a squee story.
00:13:26
Speaker
So I'm curious, how did it come like, I mean, if you could take us through just getting to do this, I know that you mentioned going to look for old war when you were going to write. And I'd like to hear kind of some about the process. Yeah. So I was aware of the character because a lot of my when I played growing up, it was like right on the heels of the first invasion. It was it was a couple of years after this was during
00:13:51
Speaker
I started I think it's hard to say because like a lot of the cards that I was getting I wasn't buying when I started cuz I was like 10 or 11 Other people had that you could get yeah We had a lot of seventh edition cards floating around and the first sets I remember buying and enjoying were onslaught block
00:14:09
Speaker
And so there was still a lot of like, obviously the invasion block was over, but there was still a lot of that flying around. And then also it was very, very recent lore. And so when I started reading the magic books, I started with the onslaught block, then read the mirrored and kamigawa blocks and was like tearing through basically anything I could find at the bookstore. The invasion block was still readily available. That's the important part is so I was, I owned all these old books.
00:14:37
Speaker
Um, and it is, I will say it is much easier to maintain a Wikipedia for a character. I, I assume, uh, in the age of web stories, because it was very hard to like track down exactly where he shows up, what we does. Um, you know, you can't control F a book as much as we, as we would dream that we could. Um, and so I.
00:14:59
Speaker
I was flipping through these old copies, trying to figure out where exactly the change happened. So to answer the question more briefly, I guess the books informed the first part of it, where I was basically just trying to see how Squeak became immortal. Obviously, there's a summary, but I wanted to be in the scene and see what that moment was like. And then also to get an idea for who Squeak was before Squeak was immortal, because a lot of Squeak's story, I think almost...
00:15:28
Speaker
Up until now, like...
00:15:29
Speaker
most of SWE's story was pre-immortality. Um, it happens relatively late in the story. And so it was basically just trying to piece together an image of the character from a number of books that characterized him in a lot of different ways, flavor text, which also kind of had a bunch of different characterizations. Um, and then just like general, like fun facts that had been shared. Like there was a lot of Googling I did in finding of like old way back machine articles that were like, you know, published on magic.com.
00:15:59
Speaker
Back in like 99 or something like probably later than that like a one or two, but like You know stuff where it's like hit meet the weather like crew. This is squee like so I was able to find some of that
00:16:12
Speaker
I remember finding those at one point too and it was like a little like image and like two lines or something. I mean I feel like it was still like you were still getting to know him.
00:16:30
Speaker
um like the lore that is kind of being lost to time like the primary sources uh are are kind of falling apart as the internet advances past a certain type of website uh so it's nice that these wikis exist to kind of uh keep it alive um so i did yeah i it was it was kind of a mixture of everything i had available but it's it's like you said there really was there i mean there's never been a story that focused just on squee there were a handful of chapters where squee was
00:16:58
Speaker
the focus. But even then, they were very short, very comedic, focused more on plot movement than on Squee as a character. So it felt like, especially with there being no story for the 2018 Dominaria, it was a very open playing field for Squee, because we had not heard anything from Squee for 300 years in canon.
00:17:25
Speaker
Yes, and as you were saying, this was, I think, reading back through those books, an era of magic where goblins were, I mean, a legendary goblin and a goblin like Squee was kind of even like an oddity to even have a goblin like that. So there was really no…
00:17:46
Speaker
other goblins even compared to it's you know really starting to move towards like slow bad before we start bringing in more we have like the named goblins you know things like Mons who didn't even get a card until more recently you know we've got goblins and flavor text but having a goblin that there could be a story around Squee was it and yeah we just
00:18:08
Speaker
recorded with spice 8 rack recently and you know, it was saying that one of the hard things was What motivates a goblin and I think that? There's a reason squee was a side character. There was really no clear understanding of what to do with squee like yeah, it was cool Adam is part of the weather like crew, but What is he there for?
00:18:31
Speaker
Yeah, I would agree that I think it's a consistent issue with comic relief characters where when the tone gets serious, the comic relief character is still there.
00:18:43
Speaker
And so it can be a harsh tonal shift, I think, to go from like, this is a goofy guy who eats bugs and talks about kicking butts and stuff to being like, you know, like Yawgmoth, Lord of, you know, the pit has risen and is like, you know, threatening the existence of the entire world. And it's like, but also my goofiest friend is here. So it, I think he has always been a difficult character to get a threat on. And I don't think it's a,
00:19:11
Speaker
Coincidence that he was more of like a background player just because like kind of falling into that classic fool archetype for stories You know, they they usually do kind of exist in the background um those I even kind of put like a light shout out to that in the intro where I talk about like old dwarven comedies marking the end of a second act with a goblin dying Yep, just because usually that is kind of the fate of comic relief characters, especially in horror and action stories where it's usually they sacrifice themselves for someone or
00:19:39
Speaker
They act like a fool and get killed and the audience laughs because they were irresponsible and it was their fault. And you know, it's like that's kind of the old archetype. And so Squeak sort of defied all that just by virtue of surviving and also being fairly capable, despite all odds.
Squee's Journey Beyond Comic Relief
00:19:56
Speaker
Yeah. And I guess there's some of my favorite flavor texts is when they tried to get some of it in there. Like Zap is one of my favorite. So it's basically the weather light pulling up alongside and I don't remember which other ship it is. But it says all this time I thought Squee was useless chuckles to say who knew he'd be such a good shot, right? Like there was some nods to that. You know, if I were actually in tyranny gives us
00:20:21
Speaker
Like I said, he's jaguar's reward. I shall kill him a hundred times a day. You know, you're trying to give him something it's death but This was we're now in an era where I think Wizards is trying to give characters more richness and depth and
00:20:40
Speaker
I think goblins in particular, there has been some better representation. So I have to give some thanks to them because this is something we did talk about with Gavin Verhe way back when he was on the show was, you know, and he was well under NDAs at the time and had to listen to me rant much as Jay and Ellie has had to about, you know, like, when are we getting this? When are we getting this? And then we've gotten it.
00:21:04
Speaker
How was it for you to approach knowing that you said your comedy background was kind of one of the reasons why you got this first foray into magic writing to then take this story and shape something around a comedic relief character in a non-comedic situation? Yeah, I found it to be a cool challenge where I think like a lot of times
00:21:30
Speaker
With comedy in particular, we have a difficult time letting it be more than one thing. When people think of comedies, they think, I should only be laughing. This should just be joke, joke, joke, joke, joke, joke, joke. And in a lot of ways, that can be true. But comedy is also capable of a lot more things. It's capable of relieving tension after a very intense scene. It's capable of
00:21:56
Speaker
dramatically highlighting the hypocrisy of a character. Comedy has so much utility in storytelling that I think it's left on the table when we just think like, oh, and then he falls down and then he gets hit by a car and then he gets up and then he spills soup all over himself, whatever the series of jokes is.
00:22:16
Speaker
And so my approach was basically that I wanted to do the character right first and foremost. And I mean, that's how I write everything. Like most of the work of mine that's made it out and about has been comedically focused. But I don't necessarily consider myself exclusively a comedy writer. I think I do, you know, a lot of work to try and weave, you know, a lot of different
00:22:39
Speaker
tones and, you know, even genres into what I do. I don't have a lot of other fantasy work out there, mostly because there's not a lot of other places that pay and distribute fantasy. So I hang on to it for myself because the internet has this cruel thing where it's like if you put something out on a personal site, you can probably never sell that to anyone ever again because everyone wants something that's never seen the light of day before.
00:23:04
Speaker
Which is a thing I learned like starting my career by doing a lot of writing on the internet. It was I used the medium that was available to me when I got out of college and it was social media. It was free and a bunch of people could see you if you were really good at what you were doing. And I learned very quickly that then people see what you do online, they look at that and they say, well, what else do you have? And I was like, I don't have anything else. I put everything that I write on the internet.
00:23:25
Speaker
Just saw it. So I've learned to start keeping a lot of my favorite things close to the vest, which is very difficult, but I'm getting better at it. Ooh. That's why you threw that little teaser out about Norrin the Wary. I got it. It's like I have it. It's here if anyone ever wants it. We're playing these seeds now on this show. Exactly. If they ever bring back Norrin as the new big bad or something. Just don't complete Norrin, please. That's all I ask.
00:23:55
Speaker
But I do feel like my first approach was basically to look at Squee, figure out kind of who I thought Squee was, who I thought 300 years of immortality would turn Squee into, figure out where the character was at, take the story notes that Wizards had given me, because obviously there's a greater story afoot I couldn't have just been like, and then Squee blows up all the Phyrexians, because I would have ended the set.
00:24:24
Speaker
before Dominaria United even came to a close. So there are limits to what you can write. But other than that, Wizards is very, very open with their writers. They let their writers have a lot of freedom without risking getting into any sort of NDA territory here.
00:24:40
Speaker
Um, I felt like I had a tremendous amount of freedom as a writer, um, to, to do what I wanted with the character. Um, and the team was incredibly supportive. Uh, you mentioned Jay and Ellie, who was like indispensable for making sure that I wasn't creating any sort of like, uh, you know, large plot holes or contradictions in the story. Like they do, like the whole team cares so much about the continuity of this story and like these characters and the future of the story. Uh, so it felt like.
00:25:09
Speaker
Even if I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge of every single story that's ever been published ever, the combined years of magic knowledge just in one or two of those email threads would make your head spin. They really know what they're doing. It felt like they were able to help me take what I imagined for the character, place it within the world as they wanted it to be for the set, and then I was able to just run with the story from there.
00:25:40
Speaker
You took us on an emotional journey. I think you mentioned that there's comedic elements to this. We did not end up with a comedy by any stretch of the imagination. I personally was on quite the roller coaster ride trying to read this, mainly trying to catch up because I will admit I hadn't read the other stories. And I knew this was when I got alerted that the story was out. I knew that it was a side story, but I wanted to have read kind of up till then. I had been waiting in part because
00:26:10
Speaker
of my belief that I was really afraid of that we were going to get nothing or that we were going to get a card and move on. And so I had held back and then it literally was like me trying to stay away before somebody could spoil
00:26:27
Speaker
Like this story that I have been waiting for in a lot of ways. Yeah. And I was still not prepared. So, you know, like you mentioned the joke about completing, you know, nor the wary. And then you decided to go and take me on that that journey with Squeak.
00:26:48
Speaker
Which I thank you for. So I knew the set as it was. I knew that I'm lucky enough to I'm in a golden period right now where everything that I had as privileged information is now out there in the world. So I cannot accidentally spoil anything.
00:27:08
Speaker
But I was aware that Dominaria United was going to be a set that had obviously phyrexian influence and was able to figure out that there was going to be a lot of potential characters that people love getting put in varying degrees of peril. And so I thought it would be a chance for a real genuine fakeout. These days, it's so hard to pull one off because everyone is like,
00:27:31
Speaker
We've all seen so many movies. We've all read so many stories. We all have like the same cultural input that I think we're really good at like spotting the rhythm of like, okay, well, actually it seems like they're going to die, but I know contextually that there's, you know, one more episode left. So they have to be, you know.
00:27:47
Speaker
alive somehow. So I figured it was a decent chance to actually make people think that Squee had been completed and I also thought it was a chance to give a little rhyme and reason to Squee's immortality and then also a chance to just see what that would look like. What would a completed Squee be like?
00:28:06
Speaker
Um, I mean, getting to reface air tie was kind of a, a great emotional moment. Like, you know, um, you, you managed to give us a, an amazing new character, uh, in bulk that we were, you know, you, we, we kind of like see it as squeeze ward. We see it as kind of this, okay. We, we got somebody that's going to be.
00:28:28
Speaker
you know, this just another cute little goblin and then make us think that, you know, Bulp was dead. So you took me on a journey. You know, having Eretai kind of come out of that to basically face off against Squee because one of the things that we talked about in our previous episode was we really think that Squee's main power is being underestimated.
00:28:52
Speaker
Um, is just really this idea that, that what the expectations are for squee are low. Um, and then they get unmet or he, you know, he, he ends up being the one with the salvation sphere that we know is part of the, you know, at that point, we didn't really fully know what it was. So I, I, if you're able to talk a little bit more about that piece, I do want to come back to it, but we know, you know, we knew that it was going, we knew that it was an important tool and he had managed hold onto it. We knew that, you know,
00:29:22
Speaker
idea that he's the one who is responsible for then killing Ertai, you know, and getting his revenge is just it's it's a lot of him being underestimated. And yeah, he uses that to his advantage even to become the king. Like he can't be killed. So his strategy is to just die until the other person basically gives up.
00:29:42
Speaker
Yeah, I would agree with you that I think, I don't know, so many people get hung up on the immortality of Squeak, but so much of the character's best moments were before his immortality. And that was ultimately why I made the choice that I made where I, you know, I felt as though Squeak was
00:29:59
Speaker
The headline was always squee the immortal. But you know, this is a character who helped shoot down the predator like pre immortality. This is not a character who, you know, was useless and then became immortal. This is a character who was tremendously useful and then became immortal. And then, you know, the story ended.
00:30:20
Speaker
And then the character was left with 300 years to kind of figure out what that meant for him. And so I think like a lot of the, you know, choices I made there were based off of trying to highlight that Squee is capable and it was almost kind of a love letter to comic relief characters trying to show that they have the, you know, this depth, they have this, you know,
00:30:42
Speaker
these many facets to them that they're not just there for a laugh that they actually do provide something because you know comedy can be moving comedy can be affecting and I think it was I'm glad it came together as well as it did and I'm glad it resonated with the fans in the way that it has because I'm very very proud of the fact that it was that we managed to give the guy
00:31:03
Speaker
some dignity because it felt like a lot of the story denied Squee some very basic dignity. Yes, because of his role as a comic relief character where it was he was always farting or, you know, cooking terrible food, or like his tongue stuck on a frog. Exactly. Yeah. I mean, like, yeah.
00:31:20
Speaker
or being loud and like, you know, when everyone was supposed to be quiet, like, he sort of played the role of like a troublesome child, which, you know, like he kind of was supposed to be, but this is 300 years later, if I know there are a couple, like, things I've seen of people kind of wanting the character to have more or less be left in Amber. But that's, it's just not how storytelling works. Like a character left for 300 years,
00:31:47
Speaker
to live an immortal life would have changed. Think of how different you know anyone in their 30s is from anyone in their teens and then multiply that by a very high number. A group that has a low life expectancy too right like 300 years is is not just even you know for us going from our teens to our 60s you know yeah this is 300 years of of a goblin. We knew that I think you said I that's why I think it did come back to
00:32:15
Speaker
Alex and I really feel well, Alex is not red. So people that that are listening to the show kind of are aware of this, but I have kind of talked to him a little bit just filled in where I could where he felt comfortable. But he is really the one who's really gone with this, the underestimated part. And I think that it is part of what you're revealing is like, we always had this. And now he's had 300 years to kind of move on and move like figure these things out. And yeah,
00:32:43
Speaker
This to me was where I thought in Dominaria the first time in 2018, that's where I thought it was amiss, was leaving a character out there who was immortal. I think the whole concept of immortality, especially in not in a planeswalker within magic, you know, we have slow aging people with Joira, we've seen it with, you know, like with that, you know, we have even people like Joda,
00:33:08
Speaker
But a goblin who is immortal is different, right? Like, yeah, they can be they can be killed, theoretically. And, you know, obviously, in storytelling, something can always be killed, or we could always find a way to kill the immortal. But he's different than Joira, you know, there's, there's a different set of stakes. And you have somebody who's now been alone for 300 years, it seemed to me, you know, you're, you're returning to find out all these questions about what's going on in Dominaria.
00:33:36
Speaker
and you don't have any, it was such an area to explore to me. Yeah, I wanted to dig a little deeper there. I wanted to, you know, it had been so long, like it's such an incomprehensible amount of time. And so obviously, you know, the character being a king is like reflected on his card and stuff. And so some of the fun parts are figuring out
00:34:04
Speaker
you know, what to do with that change, what to do with the fact that, you know, squee is like so different now. And thank you, Wizards, for letting him be noble. Yeah. Since since Goblin King is still not a noble. But, you know, that idea that, you know, like this is goblins have never had a leader like this because nobody's had a leader like this. Yeah, he is. He is one of a kind. I do believe that. And I think, like,
00:34:33
Speaker
with or without his immortality. Squee is a truly unique goblin among goblins. And I think I wanted to explore what it would be like to spend 300 years without what, by my estimation, would be one of the driving forces of his culture, which is these brushes with death. Like goblins are every depiction we've ever seen of goblins. They are almost dying or actively dying, but having the time of their lives.
00:35:00
Speaker
Yeah. And so what happens when you can't take part in that? It's like, is it as fun if you if there's no risk? My my guess was no. My guess was that
00:35:10
Speaker
I really appreciate the way you found to make that funny though, in the sense of, you know, like, he would just like let himself die just to make things more convenient for him, right? Like, yeah, I'll just out of this window. So I don't have to take the stairs. Exactly. It was I wanted to show that it was like it had weaved its way into his everyday life where he's just like, Oh, the stairs take so long and everybody laughs when I explode.
00:35:34
Speaker
So I'm going to hop off this balcony here real quick. He had this tool that nobody else had access to, and so he found ways to use it in the most goblin-y way that he could. Because I guarantee you an immortal dwarf probably would not jump off a balcony to get down some stairs. But for a goblin, it's like, ah, it saves me time. I can go do whatever goblin thing I was trying to do.
00:35:57
Speaker
Right. As I'm going through kind of story wise, I have to thank you for one of my favorite lines in this, which
00:36:05
Speaker
was a good clever nod, which was when they discovered that the Phyrexians were among them. And you know, Bulp was talking to Squee. And he's like, yes, King fought off an army of monsters. King sent them back from where they came. And it says, Squee had taken some liberties with the tale as payback for his omission from most Dominarian legends.
00:36:31
Speaker
Thank you. I figured he would be, I figured Squeak would not be happy about that. There's a lot of statues of Gerard built places, but there's not a lot of statues of Squeak. And so I felt like he probably would have started telling people, because who else was around? There's not a lot of primary sources left from that era. So Squeak, Squeak can tell it however he wants to. Especially among the people that he's hanging out with.
00:36:57
Speaker
It also was a nice, you know, like, I am sure this is me being myself and being the reader thinking of a subtle fourth wall almost breaking.
00:37:09
Speaker
given how much you're getting to expand on this character here, right? So to me, I really did appreciate some of those lines. I want to take us to kind of, going to jump ahead to, you know, we know Squeak gets completed. However, Squeak being Squeak, basically completion would probably like,
00:37:29
Speaker
Kill him. It doesn't kill him, but a boulder falls on him, right? Like right after being completed. And that is very typical goblin faction. I'm guessing the fire accident had not completed a ton of goblins over the years. It seemed like they were new to it, I would guess. We get to see what happens. You'd already taken us on kind of a little bit about wind-squeed ice, kind of this realm that he goes to. But now we have it changed.
00:37:59
Speaker
Basically, Death had never felt like this before. He didn't really know what's going on. And it's finally like Squeeze Toy decides to talk to him. I am curious, and I guess this is more of a if you can mention it or not. Did you have an endpoint that you had to end up with Squeeze? I feel safe saying that Wizards more or less let me pick the endpoint. Okay. So you could have chosen to end with a completed Squeeze, theoretically.
00:38:28
Speaker
Yeah, they were they were very very flexible about that. I mean, obviously, like.
00:38:35
Speaker
There were other stories being written by other writers, and so there were certain things I couldn't do. Like I said, I couldn't have Squee be like, and by the way, I made it so that they can't do whatever they're doing anymore. He couldn't kill Ertai again right there. Exactly. That's the big one. With Ertai being a big presence in the rest of the set, it was important to respect the other author's stories as well.
00:38:58
Speaker
and let the larger story play out alongside these side stories. And so that was one of the bigger things, but for the most part, the ending was completely something I was able to decide. Okay. Because this is where, to me, the story really took the turn that endeared me to the character that I've...
Squee's Complexity and Artifacts
00:39:21
Speaker
Almost the character I'd already...
00:39:24
Speaker
built up in my head in the sense of I wanted to see what happened with the concept of squeezing mortality.
00:39:32
Speaker
But also, I mentioned a little bit earlier, goblins and motivation. And this is a big one here, because this is goblins and choice. And generally, we think of choice being heads or tails with goblins. I mean, we get so many of our great coin flippers, from kraak to squee young goblin bookie to squeeze revenge. It is this concept of chaotic choice.
00:39:56
Speaker
But this is not. This is squee with intentionality and squee with an actual real decision to make. And. Well, he's presented with a decision basically to die forever or to go back to keep being immortal. Yes. So that's like the original decision that that's laid out for him by salvation is, yeah, that either he can go through one door
00:40:21
Speaker
return to his body and to the loop of immortality that he's been in as he was, or he can go through another door and go into the magic equivalent of the afterlife, essentially, and finally end his very, very long life.
00:40:39
Speaker
And so yeah, his choice is instead to ask for a third option, which is to return to life, but only one more time to have just one life, but to be able to go as long as he can. And so that is the choice that he makes. I really appreciated us getting to, I mean, you, we got so much in this, like we get squee, we get,
00:41:02
Speaker
squeeze toy and actually see it as the salvation stone. So we actually get to see it in kind of what it is, because there's always been a lot of speculation about what squeeze toy really did.
00:41:16
Speaker
unless I am misremembering that we didn't already know. But I had always been under the impression that we had ideas, but we didn't know what it was. I did my reading on it, and it is also very, very Lore Light, where it was part of the legacy weapon, so we know that it's like a very, very powerful artifact. But beyond that, very, very little out there.
00:41:34
Speaker
That's what we actually have a whole episode on, uh, basically, uh, the legacy weapon that's called Ursa's rummage sale. And it's just all the stuff that he had laying around. Um, and just like made a Rube Goldberg machine out of. So that's good. Cause I had always wondered, right? Like, so, so you kind of got to shape a little bit more about this powerful artifact. Um, why salvation?
00:41:59
Speaker
So my feeling was when you're in a position like this where you get to write a story about a character who hasn't had as much ink dedicated to filling in their background,
00:42:13
Speaker
What matters most to me as a writer is filling out these worlds and making them feel lived in and making them feel important. Even the littlest things. Some of the best parts of any fantasy property are when you just see little tiny details that let you know that this whole world is interconnected and there's so much more going on than you think there is.
00:42:35
Speaker
And so a big, big part of that choice for me was that there was no lore about this thing. There was no established story. And for years we wanted to know. And so why not?
00:42:47
Speaker
give it something why not make it more than because we knew it was important we knew it was powerful um and so i thought why not why not now you know why not why not jump in there and try to make something more of it and so i i got you know permission from the team i you know told them my plan and uh that was uh i was very excited i i almost hesitate to talk too much more about it because when it comes to the story i
00:43:16
Speaker
I know where Squee would go from here if it were to go from like, if the next Squee story were to be relatively chronological, you know, within the next handful of months or years. And so I don't want to like, but also they could easily choose to, you know, hand it off to another great writer who wants to take it in their own direction. So I don't want to like,
00:43:37
Speaker
Step on any toes, create expectation, or also, potentially, if I do get to write the character again, you know, spoil anything that I would potentially want to use later, but yeah. Wizards, what we're hearing is he's got another story in his back pocket, right? Just like Norrin, don't worry about it. He's got it handled if you need it.
00:43:59
Speaker
I basically just have like a big file box next to me. This is literal. I literally just have a big file box. And whenever I have an idea for a story, I just work on it as much as I feel like working on it, put it away in the file box. And then, you know, I just sort of have it forever. I know a lot of people do that digitally, but I have to do it manually or else I will lose everything. So yeah, I hang on. I hang on to all the loose ideas.
00:44:28
Speaker
You literally are a goblin. Okay, we've got this. You are one of us. Okay. A couple more things I just was curious about in terms of the process that went into this for you, your own thinking as much as you are able to speculate or talk about. Did you get to see anything of the card or the mechanics for where they were going with the card prior?
00:44:47
Speaker
Uh, no. Okay. So with the card, so I will say, you know, the card, I think depicts in my opinion, squeeze prior to this choice. Um, at least from, if I am looking at a lore building, given mechanically where, what it kind of does, you know, it, it's squee escaping. Um, he's able to keep coming back. He's bringing along basically bulk with them. It's just another one, one, but he's playing this role of the goblin King.
00:45:15
Speaker
He is just mono red still. As I was reading the story and we had not seen the card yet, I was having thoughts of, does Squee pick up a color? So I did put out a poll about this, right?
00:45:32
Speaker
I did do it after kind of the card had been spoiled, but I wanted to know from people, let's say that if we took the story and we were looking at Squeak and saying that Squeak picked up either a secondary color.
00:45:46
Speaker
So the voting basically played out kind of how I thought it would, which was white-black leading, green kind of there, blue off in the distance, which was kind of hilarious given that we had seen Squeeze Revenge and his revenge took the form of a blue card.
00:46:05
Speaker
a lot of the justification that people gave a green was an interesting one and because we have seen now kind of the the red-green goblins so getting to actually see Monza's descendants they are red-green they have a landfall ability even and people took this idea that you know that that he is basically turning coming back to the natural order of things and so kind of taking that that is a green thing um
00:46:30
Speaker
I had it initially in white or black, and I'm curious if you've had thoughts about this, if this is something that you can even speculate on.
00:46:37
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, obviously I get no hand in the card design. I can't really speak to how they do the process on a larger scale, but my assumption for the reasons behind a lot of the confidentiality for this one was that a lot of really big stuff happened in Dominaria United. Yeah. And so they were trying to make sure that authors didn't, anytime you send out something that's, I've worked with a lot of like NDA properties over the years and anytime you send out something that's super, super sensitive, you just always run the risk that somebody's going to
00:47:06
Speaker
leave something sensitive in the wrong place or post a screenshot not knowing that something's in the background. There's so many liabilities. To me, it felt like just trying to keep things as a whole under wraps. But if we were to pick up another color throughout the course of the story,
00:47:26
Speaker
I would also probably be team green. OK. My feeling is that. The choice the character is making, I've seen like, you know, some I largely try to jump out of the conversations online, mostly because I feel like people should be able to feel free to say, like, this didn't work for me without having the author jump in and be like, well, actually, I wrote it. So don't say negative things about my writing. It's like when you write stuff, you
00:47:51
Speaker
give it to people to share their opinions about and so I don't want them to feel like anyone's like breathing down their neck to like it. But my feeling is that, that White would be, I still don't see Squee as someone who cares particularly about the rule of law. Even in his time as a noble, I don't think his Warren was particularly defined by its like, its sense of
00:48:20
Speaker
like rigid law. And, you know, like I think it was a little more free spirited, probably. And I patently disagree with Black because I don't see Squee as a manipulative or selfish character in any way. I feel like green would fit the most. Some more of those kind of ideas that this is kind of a return to the natural order or just with that seems like a more normal place for goblins to end up in a in a secondary color.
00:48:49
Speaker
I think this is more of a return to the natural order for him. I think he even, you know, no matter what he chooses to do from the moment the story ends, um, which interestingly, like based, it's kind of funny how like the story immediately picks up because like there's flavor texts now. And so like, it's sort of implied that Squeak goes on and like does help, uh, command the goblin troops in, in the war. Uh, there, there are a couple of flavor texts that imply that.
00:49:18
Speaker
Which I think rules it's kind of fun to like finish a story and then immediately have updates on this character To be like, oh cool. He's done this. It's it's like weird. It's like it's almost like he's alive. It's like, oh, what's he been up to? Since I've left him I got to check in with my goblin more but it's uh, I I think the reasoning for green for me is that a big part of green isn't just the literalization of nature but also
00:49:44
Speaker
like the natural order and like one's own place within it. And I think this is Squee embracing that he was incredibly capable when he was just a goblin. He was incredibly confident when he was just a goblin and that this magic that has defined centuries of his life so far
00:50:06
Speaker
doesn't necessarily have to or it's not tied to what makes him him. So like my my true thought is that Squee remains mono red. But if I had to add a color, I would say green. OK, I was almost like anticipating initially, I think an activation or something of an inevitability that was going to pick up a second color as I was anticipating or waiting to see what would happen outside of my normal fan fiction that Squee sparks and ends up in the meditation realm with Bolas.
Squee's Loyalty and Speculative Alignments
00:50:34
Speaker
And that's how bolus finally gets out of there, uh, outside of that wild, wild world that is depicted as Calvin and Hobbs in my daughter's room. Um, outside of that in the real kind of world, I was kind of thinking, see, I actually picked, I, I was one of the people who had it as white. Um, and.
00:50:53
Speaker
to me, this speaks to Squeeze loyalty to his clan, but also not just specifically goblins and goblin kind and the Warrens, but to his crew. He's a very like, a very
00:51:09
Speaker
in some ways selfless member of that crew. He very much was on the weather light beforehand. I would have seen if he had returned to the weather light or even in the war. He had that quality of community about him that expanded in a way that we can get from some of the white. And it really is probably that more white that's
00:51:28
Speaker
you know, the overlap that we might see in color pie pieces, less to do with the rule of law, where we're almost swinging to the far side of white, but the fringe of white, the just more to do with that. And I think that that's where, to me, his, his decision and him making that decision and actually.
00:51:49
Speaker
proposing an alternative to that fit more into a white route. I mean, if you want, I could honestly see Squee and Naya colors. Like if we're, if we're talking evolution through time, I feel like I could see, we've talked about this a little bit because on the podcast we do these episodes where we go through each color identity and we talk about like what they mean and like how they would apply to the real world. And so.
00:52:18
Speaker
I oftentimes conflate Boros with Bor, you know, the actual Boros Legion, um, which has like a very militaristic vibe. And then Lorehold has this very like incisive, thoughtful, um, historical vibe that doesn't really feel like it matches Squee either. It feels slightly more thoughtful than Squee is where it's like, Squee is very kind, Squee is very caring and very loyal, but Squee is not particularly thoughtful, mostly in the fact that Squee is all impulse. Um,
00:52:47
Speaker
And I will say, and now I'm arguing, I guess, with the person who just wrote this, but his decision was not. Yeah, no, it was very well thought out. I think it was a rare moment of a well thought out decision. I would not necessarily expect Squee from here on out to be like a more measured thinker. I think like Squee trusts his own instincts.
00:53:12
Speaker
The idea of the immortality piece that we talked about right and doing things for the sake of, you know, it being easier on him is I wonder what impulsivity looks like if there are consequences of impulsivity. Yeah, over this long period of time and
00:53:31
Speaker
I guess that's it is that is where that that realm of where I'm interested in. So yeah, sorry. No, I mean, I welcome I mean, I, once you finish the story, it's it's back. It's we belong to wizards. I don't know. They could, they could tomorrow come out with a Racto squee. And you know, I could have I'd have no say in the matter. They could do is it squee?
00:53:54
Speaker
I am always happy to, especially with color identity stuff. Five color squee, which is always my cheap answer is just glowing eyes. Yeah. He becomes the first sliver except for goblins. Yeah. Oh my God. Just giving goblins sliver abilities.
00:54:13
Speaker
Okay. I really appreciate kind of that thought of more towards the Naya. I guess I interrupt you a little bit just because I was, I wanted to question at least the one thing with impulsivity and, um, not being able to inhibit my own impulses. We just did an episode about Naya. So maybe that's why it's fresh in my head, but Naya is very community driven and it's very natural.
00:54:36
Speaker
Um, and so I feel like a character that's been alive for, you know, 300, 400 years, um, probably has some complexity to them and to maybe justify, uh, being a three color commander at this point. Um, you know, I could definitely see.
00:54:53
Speaker
Squeak in Naya with that green adherence to instinct, that red chaos and that white respect for community. I could definitely see those three interacting really well for the character because we've also talked about how
00:55:11
Speaker
A lot of three color legends are kind of two color legends with a splash. Yeah. So I could almost see that being like Squeeze very gruel, but with a splash of white because he has, you know, kind of Squeeze served in the military and several wars at this point. So, you know, maybe I'm fighting Boros here, but Squeeze, Squeeze has done several tours of duty. So. Rising through the ranks. Yeah. He's right up there with that 10th District Legionnaire, the one goblin that I don't think has ever gotten its own card.
00:55:40
Speaker
No, well, we're its own legend, its own legend yet. That's we that little guy has come up on the show in the past, the evolution of him or her. Actually, we like don't actually know. I bet you're going to get there. I bet you they're they've got a legend. Well, we'll probably go back to Ravnica at some point. So, you know, I always expect that. So but this big mark, maybe they're the linchpin of March of the Machine.
00:56:10
Speaker
The Boros Goblins. Yeah. Well, you know, I really want to thank you for coming on. And Wizards, if anybody here is listening, thank you. Jay, I have to give you a special thank you when you came on the show and other times having to listen to my rants about not having Squeak. And, you know, I always say that I'm then going to correct when I see that, you know, stuff has been done well, and I really appreciate that.
00:56:37
Speaker
Not only the story was done, but the thoughtfulness and care that was given to a character that, as you said, I kind of wrote in here expectations of writing a beloved character. Like there's a lot on you to present in the magic with Squeak.
00:56:52
Speaker
Yeah, I think, and that's part of why I was so honored to be given the character to work with and like honored just to work with magic as a whole is because it is, it's a living story that's been going for 30 years at this point. And it was very important to me when I was growing up and remains important to me. And now to be able to be part of it is so cool. And I think that, you know, to me, the most important thing was maintaining the
00:57:19
Speaker
integrity of these stories and to expand and add my own unique ideas to it, but not in a way that ever tried to take away from what it is, which is this very unique, cool thing that I am thrilled to have been able to contribute to.
00:57:35
Speaker
And like I said, from our perspective on this show and how we really view goblins and the lenses that we see them through, you know, it was kind of nice to see other people kind of, I think, pick up on some of the stuff that we had been feeling just kind of gut-wise about Squee. I mean, just as you kind of, you said, just there's more to him than just the immortality, but like exploring immortality is also something that's really cool to do in magic in a different way. So you being able to wrap
00:58:04
Speaker
that all into a short story and still give me some whimsy. I just from a reader want to say thank you.
00:58:11
Speaker
Thank you. I'm so glad people liked it. The day before it came out, I was on the edge of my seat. I was just like, all right, everybody could hate this. You changed the nature of the core of Squee as a character. How are people going to react to that? But it's been so positive. And I think it's just a testament to how much fans like the character. And I'm glad that we all like the direction that he went in. Yeah. And wherever he goes from here,
00:58:40
Speaker
So I'm very excited, you know, be it from me or somebody else. I'm excited to see what they do with the character next.
00:58:49
Speaker
Also, Dan, once again, if you want to tell people where they can find you, where they can throw money at you, all of these things are very important to us.
Dan's Promotion of Current Works
00:58:58
Speaker
You can find me. If you're looking for more magic stuff for me, me and Rachel Weeks have a great weekly podcast called Commander Sphere. It comes out on Mondays. We're on YouTube, Twitter, all that. Our handle is Command Sphere because there's not enough characters for Commander Sphere.
00:59:13
Speaker
Um, but yeah, we're out there every Monday. Um, in terms of my writing, um, you can find, I do a weekly newsletter called brain worms. It's just about, um, life online, but it's mostly kind of just evolved into a series of pretty writing about whatever's on my mind that week. That's just the way it shakes out, you know, when you write something for long enough.
00:59:33
Speaker
So that's out there. If you're looking to throw me some money, it's $5 a month, you can get that. I've got a Patreon and stuff too for Commander Sphere. You can also find my book, I Am Not a Wolf, wherever books are sold. New York Magazine called it one of their favorite comedy books of 2021, which I'm very proud of. And so yeah, that is available online, indie bookshops, non-indie bookshops, it's everywhere.
01:00:00
Speaker
Uh, and yeah, thank you all for the people that are listening. Um, you know, I know a lot of our regular listeners, I think are going to be very excited by this, uh, squeeze somebody that gets discussed in our discord a lot and has for a long time. So yeah, so we will see you all soon. And that's our show for today. You can find both of the hosts on Twitter. Hobbs can be found at Hobbs Q and Alex can be found at Mel underscore.
01:00:27
Speaker
Feel free to send us any questions, comments, thoughts, hopes, and dreams to goblinlordpod on Twitter, or email us at goblinlordpodcast at gmail.com. If you would like to support your friendly neighborhood gobslugs to our Linktree on our Twitter account and listed in our show notes, this has everything from our discounts for the Grinding Coffee Company to our Patreon.
01:00:51
Speaker
The music for today's show was by Vindergotten, who can be found at Vindergotten at badcamp.com. The art was done by Steven Raphael, who can be found at Steve Raffel on Twitter. Goblin Lore is proud to be presented by Hipsters of the Coast as part of their growing Foreclose content. Check them out on Twitter at hipstersmpg or online at hipstersofthecoast.com. Thank you for listening. And remember, goblins like snowflakes are only dangerous in numbers.