I think a lot of adults Hate snow because their only interactions with snow are shoveling it, or getting it off their car, or trying to drive in it, instead of being open to also engaging with snow in a positive way sometimes-- which, as a lifelong Snow Defender, is annoying to me because one of the ways you can have a positive experience with snow is by looking at it with your eyes
forgot what I was doing and started thinking about traditional gnomish food culture again literally in the middle of normal grocery shopping for myself
4, 13, & 24 for felix, indigo, nyssa, and mel pleeeaaaaaase
4. Do they have an accent or dialect?
Felix: So-- above-table, in practice, no-- but with the caveat that I DID very much think 'he should have an accent... he'd have a very noticeable gnomish accent' while I was building him, but I couldn't settle on what, specifically, a gnomish accent would sound like :') To this day he's still much more comfortable speaking gnomish than common, and I think he'd carry the kind of accent where a person in the know could pinpoint the exact neighborhood of his warren where he was born and raised, but it doesn't come through in play, alas
Indigo: [squints] they've got something going on. they've got a different accent than I do but I have no idea what it is. they're doing something with their vowels. this is the kind of thing where other michigan relatives will talk about my aunts' Really Obvious kansas accent and I'm like what are you talking about. they've also got a particular drawling delivery and cadence that's a bit weird, and muddles the question further. it's Something for sure. in-world I think they do have kind of a weird accent and manner of speaking because it's got strong influences from an ancient dragon, and then from traveling all over the damn world with a bunch of weirdos from all over the place
Nyssa: Not really! Her voice can be a bit lilting but not all the way into an accent per-se, although in-world I suppose she would probably have an elvish accent since her people's elvish neighbors would likely be the ones who taught them common
Melliwyk: Naw. Voicing her, I'm doing Other Stuff than accent work; in-world, she grew up in a major city in the heart of the country, in a neighborhood but more particularly with parents who were highly educated and did regular business with non-gnomes, so her common would be the most default-ass accented you can get. Like I guess not 'no accent' but 'the normal sounding accent you hear on TV' if TV was a thing
13. Any food they avoid for reasons other than taste?
Felix: yeagh :') he's got a variety of Textural Difficulties. he Cannot do anything slimy; he can't do tomatoes or cooked mushrooms; he can't do any meat fats that are gristly or fatty. there's a lot of foods that he prefers, frankly, overcooked, because a dry and chewy textural experience is better than Too Wet, by and large. If he has to touch poultry skin that's not COMPLETELY crispy he's going to crawl out of his own skin. eggs can be Problematic. he's totally yucked out by all seafood and fish, just conceptually-- even just the smell grosses him out. in theory he's an adventurous eater willing to try most things at least once, but in practice he really hates eating anything in front of other people because the social risk of possibly making a face or having to spit something out is worse than just straight up not eating anything at all. he's also got some cultural and religious taboos, although they rarely come up; you Don't eat squirrel, any songbird, crow, or raccoon, which are particularly ordained among other small animals as messengers, allies, and friends for forest gnomes. There has to be completely mutual safety and trust for these relationships to work, and besides, making enemies of crows is just plain stupid, and raccoons are the Wildwanderer's particular favorites; not eating them is a courtesy, to say the least. Luckily other peoples mostly don't eat any of those either but the squirrel thing can be an issue sometimes. It'd be like being offered dogmeat :\
Indigo: not really! they tend to avoid very rich and heavy foods because they make them feel kinda gross, but that's still more down to personal taste than, like, lactose intolerance or a particular diet or something. They also lack the lad's aforementioned cultural/ religious taboos because rock gnomes have a different relationship to small animals than forest gnomes, who can talk to them natively and live much more collaboratively with them
Nyssa: she's an herbivore! culturally, she Won't eat meat-- the idea is extremely gross and upsetting to her-- but also if she DID eat any actual meat it would make her physically sick. eggs and dairy are okay! the problem is killing something and eating its flesh, not that it came from an animal in some way
Melliwyk: There are relatively few foods she'll avoid even for taste if slapping a Prestidigitation Flavor into it would help. On the other hand she'll avoid any food that interrupts her work if she's in the flow. Big fan of foods that aren't messy and don't take much if any prep. Big fan of 'a sixth coffee counts as a meal if I'm busy'. she's put on a healthier amount of weight since zhartook started following her around and just physically putting a plate of food in front of her and a fork in her hand once in awhile
24. Other sleeping habits?
Felix: his most natural sleep schedule is to sleep around four or five hours at night and then another two or three hours in the middle of the day, around noon. he can adjust to just sleeping fully through the night if need be, but he still very much prefers to get a nap in after lunch. he can fall asleep almost anywhere, and he always pulls the covers completely over his entire head to sleep; if he's napping without something like a blanket or his coat for some reason, he'll pull his scarf up over his head, or at least throw an arm across his face. if you're sharing a bed with him he WILL steal all the blankets and turn them into an impenetrable cocoon completely in his sleep whether you like it or not
Indigo: they're one of the few crewmembers aboard their ship with their own private cabin and a full bunk-- human-sized, even, so a bit of a luxurious one at that as far as ship's accommodations go-- but they end up sleeping in a hammock almost more often than not cause they find em so comfy. the bed is for other stuff
Nyssa: there's nothing you can do to stop her from sleeping naked. if she has to sleep alone she's swaddling herself in the blanket and wrapping herself around a pillow koala style
Melliwyk: old news but she has a magically-induced condition that causes her to fall asleep at random and without warning, usually only briefly as if via the sleep spell but sometimes for longer stretches; consequently, she kind of hates going to bed on purpose because she feels like being asleep is enough of a waste of her time as it is. the reason she literally never takes off her nightcap-- enchanted to give the wearer pleasant dreams-- is that she never knows when she might fall asleep, and she's unusually prone to nightmares.
it probably wouldn't work out like that because of how eyes work and how much light there is during the day for a creature adapted to low-light conditions but I am rather taken with the idea of someone having the impression that felix has brown eyes because his pupils are so dilated (with interest, delight, etc) every time they see him that it's hard to tell how bright yellow they actually are
the way Ye Olde Fantasy and particularly modern dnd wardrobing is so vibes based is funny to me personally in that I've historically gone a bit anachronistic (so to speak) when I look for historical inspiration for gnomish clothing, pushing out of the middle ages and into 18th century outfit construction, but right now I'm looking into the actual middle ages for a basis for a culturally distinct vibe for forest gnomes, and somehow that feels even more anachronistic (in the opposite direction) compared to how most people design dnd characters
[thinks about desert gnomes' semi fossorial lifestyle developing independently as a means of survival in a desert climate] no.... [thinks about gnomes with big ass fennec fox desert hare ass radar ears] I CAN'T
