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The Unorganized Township of Bootstuck
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The Unorganized Township of Bootstuck

Author: Richard Vandentillaart / Nick Vardon

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The Unorganized Township of Bootstuck is a documentary-style audio descent into a place that shouldn't exist—but very much insists that it does.


Once a forgotten military outpost in the depths of Northern Ontario, Bootstuck has taken on a life of its own. Discovered only through a pile of mislabeled cassette tapes at a Sudbury garage sale, the story of Bootstuck slowly unravels through scattered interviews, cryptic clues, and increasingly bizarre residents. The deeper you listen, the more you realize — this isn't just a town. It's a puzzle. And somewhere in that puzzle? 

A plane crash that changed everything.


Somewhere between folklore, found audio, and fever dream, Bootstuck blurs the line between documentary and delusion—offering listeners a place to get lost in, over and over again.


59 Episodes
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A routine call to Bootstuck quickly turns into a tour of the town’s rapidly expanding art scene. With Caleb busy hanging pictures “upside down but sideways,” it’s revealed that Bootstuck has recently welcomed an artist — and the results are… unconventional. Caleb’s latest project involves painting the outside view on the inside walls of the house and the inside of the house on the outside, creating what may be either a groundbreaking artistic statement or a logistical nightmare. Elsewhere in ...
A noticeable drop in “whoops” leads to the revelation that Dave’s bout of whooping cough forced a temporary ban on celebratory noises — and some very questionable problem-solving methods. Bootstuck turns its attention to spring entertainment, including a seatless bicycle race through the forest and ongoing recruitment efforts to lure visitors north using a maze of travel instructions and social media flyers. Local “discoveries” include dream-inducing mushrooms, mood-enhancing campfire plants,...
Tape 65 kicks off with excitement over an incoming Dropbox delivery, triggered into action by a green flag that probably means “go.” Spring maintenance follows, including rotating the tires on Dave’s car — which hasn’t moved — with a confident “half quarter turn.” Bootstuck (now officially rebranded as “The Stuck”) also unveils its next big attraction: a travel show where visitors are blindfolded, spun around, and released somewhere in town or the woods. Along the way, Georgian renovations ar...
When asked a simple question about rain, Bootstuck responds the only way it knows how: with large-scale tarp engineering and aggressively sticky-tacked grocery bags. Why spend $800 on a rain shell when you can fashion one from leftover Piggly Wiggly plastic and optimism? Spring has arrived, which means it’s time to string up old military tarps between trees, relocate the outhouse five feet to the left (or left), and reconsider the town’s 72-foot-deep sewage strategy. Along the way we meet Ric...
Tape 63 begins with an earnest attempt to advocate for dark matter, quickly pivoting into a passionate defense of Pluto, now rebranded as “Dwarfy,” a misunderstood ice dwarf traveling the wrong way and apparently deserving emotional support. A surprise interruption by Neil deGrasse Tyson does little to clarify matters, as Pluto’s size, temperature, and relationship to the sun are debated with mixed metaphors and diminishing patience. Back on Earth, attention turns to Bootstuck’s latest infras...
Tape 62 opens with a discussion of silliness that quickly spirals into confusion over string, strength, and a much-anticipated “stripper” coming to town—revealed to be strictly for removing paint, not clothing. From there, spring preparations begin in earnest, including plans to repaint fallen leaves and reattach them to trees with Caleb’s help, sometime between now and mid-May. Seasonal activities in Bootstuck include off-leash Caleb time, group “adventure rallies” involving shouting in the ...
Tape 61 begins as a rambling voicemail about making a very urgent personal decision, before veering into a rescue operation involving a lost baby raccoon, an upside-down milk container, and Caleb acting as both lookout and chair. Along the way, concerns are raised about Caleb’s homemade cigarettes, soup sandwiches, and whether bagels are named for what they are or the bags they come in. The conversation drifts into ambitious plans to grow sesame “trees” across Bootstuck following a small fire...
In this episode, Bootstuck checks off another major cultural milestone after finally finishing Who’s the Boss—though it takes some time to determine whether the title refers to the vacuum man, the working woman, or the elderly authority figure who “likes a lot of sex and tells everybody what to do.” Confident they’ve solved it, the group prepares to move on to Perfect Strangers, pluralized for safety. The conversation shifts to springtime and snow removal, which in Bootstuck does not involve ...
The episode opens with a chaotic voicemail and quickly spirals into a very Bootstuck conversation about frozen rivers, rubber-banding birds to make them quieter, and the town’s proudly nonsensical “fish maze.” As the caller tries (and fails) to get a coherent answer from Bootstuck’s resident rambler, the discussion veers into Valentine’s Day preparations, including a contest involving hearts hidden around town — some carved, some hung, some written in the snow in ways that probably shouldn’t ...
This tape begins as an attempt to discuss traffic conditions in Bootstuck and immediately collapses into a strange meditation on Dave’s “back 40,” which turns out not to be land at all, but a graveyard of empty bottles and 14 immobile cars. Before the conversation can gain any structure, Jonathan Frakes drunkenly bursts into the recording, mutters something unintelligible, and disappears—an event the Bootstuck resident barely acknowledges before resuming his ramble. From there, the narrator i...
In this tape, two residents attempt to solve problems they clearly do not understand, beginning with the collapse of the township’s food supply and spiraling into Dave’s catastrophic “shed incident” involving a porcupine, several gallons of maple syrup, and far too much confidence. What follows is a wandering, deeply unhelpful conversation covering toilet paper hoarding, black licorice optimism, dangerous transportation ideas, and a revolutionary invention meant to help men fake childbirth em...
This tape opens with what sounds like a cheap local radio ad for World of Bowling — a chaotic pitch about “hard or soft balls” that fades into a conversation so derailed it feels like a hallucination in real time. The interviewer tries to talk about bowling, but in Bootstuck, “bowling” apparently involves rolling people down a hill and occasionally throwing Caleb at the problem. From there, the discussion drifts through roosters in boxes, gardens full of “purple kush lilacs,” and the revelati...
The tape begins with a voicemail — a jumble of static, mumbling, and the distinct sound of someone explaining how to “fix” a cassette with a pencil and a wiggle. From there, the conversation slides straight into Bootstuck logic: juice made from pinecones, acorns, and possibly corn itself. Soon the townsfolk are preoccupied with a new community effort — putting up lost cat posters around town. The posters, placed two feet high so the missing feline might “see them,” are an act of optimism more...
Bootstuck receives another baffling shipment — one that somehow contains blank coins with holes, six violins (or possibly chair parts), an unidentified handled object, and an alarming number of beans. Between coughing up a real frog mid-conversation and debating how to “screw violins together,” the townsfolk attempt to make sense of their new supplies. They even claim to have a refrigerator — though it doesn’t run and functions mostly as a bookshelf. Somewhere between food safety and symphony...
A confused caller accidentally goes live on the air and immediately loses his composure, setting the tone for another chaotic dispatch from Bootstuck. Between jam jars, smoke-filled air, and impromptu fire dances, the locals’ musical ambitions get derailed by missing spoons, homemade concerts, and a mysterious old man who may—or may not—have threatened someone’s life. When the tape recorder clicks on, we hear the chilling voice of a stranger offering a pocket rummage before the narrator bolts...
A torrential downpour hits Bootstuck, and the townsfolk treat it like an Olympic event. Our narrator excitedly describes his tactical methods for “dodging raindrops” and “putting out buckets,” before proudly announcing the formation of a brand-new body of water—Bootstuck Lake—created (apparently) by the rain itself. In between weather reports, Hat Guy makes a slippery return after tumbling down the stairs on a pile of sports magazines no one can read. These glossy imports inspire a new commun...
In this installment, the documenteur’s patience continues to erode as Bootstuck introduces yet another baffling innovation: the Personal Walking Association (or “PWA”). According to the locals, it’s an organized fitness initiative led by a man named Uber who walks people around “places.” Membership numbers stretch into the millions, and no one seems entirely sure what it’s for — except that it involves walking, sometimes sideways, and occasionally into trees. From there, the topic of physical...
The documenteur, once again hanging by a thread of patience, tries to have a reasonable conversation while the residents of Bootstuck crawl around town “looking for scraps” and debating the difference between beets and beats. What begins as small talk about sore knees quickly dissolves into confusion about dance parties, water suppliers named River, and the discovery of Bootstuck’s newest local celebrity — Waving Tony, a man whose entire existence revolves around the art of waving. Tony waves...
The documenteur once again attempts to establish a thread of logic in Bootstuck, only to be derailed immediately by talk of sleep aids — ranging from chamomile tea to the rather more concerning chloroform and carbon monoxide. Dave, it seems, has been missing for six weeks, but nobody’s alarmed; apparently, he was just “sleeping under a tree." When pressed about education in Bootstuck, the locals reveal their belief that everyone simply “comes with the knowledge,” meaning there are no schools,...
The recording begins with confusion over who’s actually speaking—Dave has stepped away to rescue yet another burned pot of porridge, leaving the conversation in the hands of Hat Guy. What follows is an increasingly unhelpful brainstorming session about Post-it notes. Dave has been scattering them across fields, hoping the mysterious “Dropbox guy” might deliver peanuts. Suggestions arise that maybe, instead of begging for legumes, they could use the notes to ask where they actually are. Caleb ...
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