17 days, 28,421 words, a mascot feud, a flip cup contest, and a 'classic pizza': An embarrassment of riches

Many things happened in my novel today, and none of them were of any consequence to the plot- all of heavy consequence to the EsNoWriMo-verse.
First, Phyllis Kessel's take on the infamous mascot feud of 2019:

The Devils fans had already had a difficult summer. After yet another lackluster season, resulting in the team missing the playoffs, again, the only thing the fans had to look forward to was the ongoing feud between the their mascot, NJ Devil, and the unreasonably popular mascot of the Philadelphia Flyers, Gritty. Since both cities were known for being hellish landscapes devoid of joy, fans of these teams had little to get excited about, so they took their mascot feud seriously. Phyllis Kessel, beloved sports writer and underground Twitter hero, had described beginning of the feud thus:

“NJ Devil has taken the opening shot in what is sure to be an epic feud between two mascots who are equal parts beloved and reviled. Just in case you have been living under a rock in some future dystopic wasteland city state, NJ Devil posted a video on Twitter earlier this summer in which the NHL mascot and self-described franchise legend, Ken Daneyko, along with a pair of unnamed underlings recreated one of the more bizarre scenes from Tim Burton’s monster hit, Batman (1989). In the original scene, the Joker and his hired goons vandalized an art gallery- in NJ Devil’s version, the players and mascot destroy several images of Gritty, the mascot for the Philadelphia Flyers.

Why the hatred for Gritty? It’s unclear, but Gritty from Philly has been embraced by anarchists as a mascot of resistance. Anyone who has a beef with him is nature’s asshole. No doubt Gritty will provide a much deserved comeuppance and I’m so goddamn here for it.”

All of the conference attendees are being held in Jackie's Place, which has naturally resulted in a great deal of chaos. The Devils fans were drowning their sorrows in lukewarm beer...

The academics on the other hand, were expressing wildly inappropriate joy and good humour, behaving as though they were attending a Bacchanalia themed college frat party rather than sequestered in a hotel dive bar, under heavy police guard. Evidently they were not let out very often, and therefore did not know how to behave in public. A group of middle-aged white men had pulled a number of tables together (scraping the linoleum in the process, Jackie noted with chagrin) to create enough space for a flip cup tournament. All of the academic conference attendees turned out their pockets in search of prizes, and they had come up with a pack of chicklets, a red whistle, a six-pack of Tang, and a pocket copy of Foucault for Dummies. It was an embarrassment of riches, sure to drive the flip cup tournament into high gear.

Jackie knew exactly where this was headed, and if he didn’t come up with some food to serve these buffoons and offset the rampant alcohol consumption, he was one errant flip cup away from a full on beer throwing contest between the bereft Devils Fans and the increasingly out-of-hand academics.

Jackie was a well-known supporter of the local fresh food movement, whose aim is to connect food producers and food consumers in the same geographic region, in order to develop more self-reliant and resilient food networks, and improve local economies. He was committed to only serving food that had been grown within 10 square miles of his geographic location. This had proved difficult, given that Jackie’s Place was located in the middle of the suburbs of West Orange, New Jersey. Jackie had connected with local residents, however, and begun a community garden initiative. When supplies were low, he simply toured the neighbourhood and bought or accepted donations of whatever food the suburbanites had in their homes. After a hushed conference with the cook, Taylor Kitsch, and David Boreanaz, Jackie had posted the ‘Daily Special’, which was also known as ‘all you’re getting.’ The ‘Classic Pizza’, as it was described, contained all of the ingredients that Jackie had in the kitchen: marinated carrots, white onions, mushrooms, fresh coriander, mozzarella, and avocado sauce. To throw off detractors, he had used the word ‘carottes’ instead of carrots, and ‘sauce a l’avocat’ instead of avocado sauce. It had been a huge success, and had the desired effect of temporarily warding off the seemingly inevitable beer throwing competition.