http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/ A webcomic for the weirdo in all of us en-us Nucleus CMS v3.32 © Weblog http://backend.userland.com/rss http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an//nucleus/nucleus2.gif http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/ http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=614 the pain in spain stays mainly on the train

I still remember where I was when I heard about the train bombings. That's because I was studying abroad in Spain at the time. I was in Granada, not Madrid (where it happened), but I'd been in that same train station in Madrid only weeks earlier.

I was also there for the prime minister election and the prince's wedding. It was a very historic time.

TEXT OF COMIC:
Can we have a moment of solemnity? Today is the anniversary of the train bombing in Spain.
I need some time to sit in silence and ponder the reasons behind this sort of atrocity.
The people who did that were terrorists, Abby. They were madmen. There were no reasons for what they did.
Sure there were. Every crime has a motive, even if it's a totally loco one.
Abby, I can't believe you.
What?
Right after you asked for a moment of solemnity, you go and make a pun!
What pun?
A train pun. Loco motive. You even used a Spanish word, to work in the fact that it happened in Spain! You're disgusting.
You sure seem interested in going out of your way to look for puns.
If you hadn't said it, I wouldn't have to look for it.
The pun police have evolved into state terrorists.]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=614 Thu, 11 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=613 mess is lore

Back when we used to watch TV, my husband always hit the mute button and covered his eyes when Charmin commercials came on. He said that they made wiping your butt look cutesy, which made him sick.


TEXT OF COMIC:
I hate these commercials for extra-thick toilet paper.
They start out by talking about how kids always pull too much toilet paper off the roll. And then they offer their solution: use thick cushy paper, so that your kids don't have to use as much. Do you see the inherent logical flaw in this?
If your kids always take too much toilet paper, there are two options that make sense. Number one: teach them to take less toilet paper. Or, number two: buy thin toilet paper that has more on the roll, so that it won't matter that they take so much.
Thick toilet paper accomplishes the exact opposite! It has less square footage of paper on the roll, so kids who take too much paper will use it up way faster! Am I the only person who is noticing this?
Hee hee.
What? What is so funny?
You said "number one" and "number two."
My outrage always falls on deaf ears.
]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=613 Wed, 10 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=612 yay for strip 656. only 10 more until 666.

Yup, that is what happens when you teach children to put up with discomfort for the sake of reward. They brush their teeth, eat their veggies, do their homework... and then become drug addicts. At least that's what Abby's tinfoil hat told her.

In other news, I have a guest comic up at Cowbirds in Love! Thanks, Sanjay! (And I confess that even I have trouble remembering which one is Karen and which one is Sharon. I tried to come up with a mnemonic, but all I can think of is "Karen and Sharon, K and S, Kirk and Spock... wait, that doesn't work because Karen is actually a little more logical than Sharon.")

TEXT OF COMIC:
So you really used to think those sour candy drops were a drug?
I still think all sour candy is designed to prepare kids to be drug addicts.
All dangerous drugs involve pain or discomfort. Even alcohol and cigarettes feel terrible the first few times you use them. Sour candy is teaching kids to tolerate pain for the sake of pleasure that comes along with it-- getting them all ready to be druggies.
And you seriously can't say that Pixy Stix aren't a gateway drug to cocaine. Come on, they even come with straws to snort the powder through.
I bet you were exactly the kind of kid who would think of doing that.
]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=612 Tue, 9 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=611 If you're a crackpot, are you high on both crack and pot?

I think intense citric acid should be handled with caution-- maybe not with as much caution as hard drugs, but some caution at least. I used to eat so much highly acidic sour candy that the skin on my tongue started to peel.

I guess it says something about me that this sort of thing is what I look back on when I think of my wild, careless youth...

In other news:

awesome t-shirt!!!

That is me in an awesome T-shirt designed by an awesome artist. He is not yet selling on Threadless, but he should be.

If you would like to help him reach his dream, go and review his design. If 750 people rate it a "5," he will receive $2,500 for it, and it will be sold on Threadless. Today is the deadline, so vote fast! It doesn't cost you anything and it just might help a gifted young artist get his big break.



TEXT OF COMIC:
...And then we watched a movie, and Mom made us chicken pot pies. It was great.
What are you talking about?
What are YOU talking about? Are you unable to believe that a quiet evening with my family could actually be great?
No, no. I just can't figure out exactly what a "pot pie" is.
Seriously? You don't know what a pot pie is?
Is it a pie made with marijuana? Like a pot brownie?
Oh, good lord.
When I was a kid, I never knew what "pot" was. I was always really confused that everyone made such a big deal over cookware.
I also thought "dropping acid" referred to that sour liquid candy in the eyedropper-shaped bottles.
Sometimes I think you really are high on candy.
]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=611 Mon, 8 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=610 pungatory

Actually, you can have your picture on a postage stamp without being dead if you have the stamps printed with certain photo printing services. That's always seemed kind of weird to me.


TEXT OF COMIC:
I hate it when I come up with a clever one-liner and nobody understands it.
Like what?
Like, "If you kill someone for saying that they want to have their picture on a postage stamp, is it assisted suicide?"
What? Why would you kill someone for saying that they want to have their picture on a postage stamp?
Because legally you have to be dead to have your picture on a postage stamp, so if someone says that, they are basically asking to be dead. That's why it might be assisted suicide. But I always have to explain that joke to everyone!
Well, first, if someone says they want to have their picture on a postage stamp, they're not necessarily asking to have it right away. And second, it's only assisted suicide if you help them kill themselves, by providing poison or something. Not if you kill them.
See, that's what's wrong with everyone! Nobody can take a joke! Everyone analyzes it!
If I told you a joke about a horse going to college, would you just look at me blankly and tell me horses don't go to college? If I told you a joke where a man died and went to heaven, would you point out that the Bible says nothing about people going to heaven immediately after death?
I don't know, but I know there's a special place of torment in the underworld for people who tell jokes like yours.
]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=610 Fri, 5 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=609 Never take it for granted that anyone raising Abby wouldn't want to poison her.

I have a lot of symptoms similar to those of PTSD, but they're all associated with social conflict.


TEXT OF COMIC:
Post-traumatic stress disorder is such a strange diagnosis.
How so?
It's defined by a bunch of symptoms, like nightmares and flashbacks and phobias. But it's also defined by the fact that those symptoms were caused by an experience where you were dealing with death or serious injury, or the threat of it.
So if you have all the symptoms and they're associated with a memory of being beaten half to death, that's PTSD.
Obviously.
But if you have the same symptoms, just as severely, and they're associated with the memory of, like, going to the doctor and getting a blood test when you were five, then you don't have PTSD. You're just irrationally phobic, because that experience had nothing to do with death or serious injury.
But the thing is, the thought processes could be very much the same in both cases. When you're five, a blood test might be the most painful thing you've ever experienced. From your perspective, it IS a serious injury.
And for all you know, it might be a threat of death, too. You have no way of knowing that the blood test isn't going to kill you. Sure, your parents say you'll be okay, but at that age your parents lie to you all the time.
Well, if you've figured out by the age of five that your parents are lying to you about Santa and the tooth fairy, then you're probably smart enough to realize that they have nothing to gain by sneaking ricin onto your doctor's lancet.
With my mother, I never took that kind of thing for granted.
]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=609 Thu, 4 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=608 trouble is, if you don't wanna get ten years older, you have to die.

I am somewhat resigned to the fact that I will someday be replaced with an older person who has a mostly different body, largely different thought patterns, and similar but vaguer memories of the things I remember. It has happened to me several times already, and the death of the earlier self is always fairly painless.


TEXT OF COMIC:
Have you ever thought about whether there's any difference between dying and getting older?
What? Of course there's a difference.
So why are we all so scared of dying?
Because when you die, you don't exist anymore!
Well, same thing happens when you get older.
The body that's sitting in your chair at this moment won't exist ten years from now. There will still be a body, but it'll look and feel a lot different, and a lot of the matter in it will have been replaced with other matter.
Still, it won't be like being dead. At least I'll still have a body.
But how will it be YOU that has that body? What part of your identity will still be there?
My mind. The way I think and feel. That'll still be there.
No it won't. It'll be gone, and replaced with something similar, but certainly not identical. You can't honestly say that the way you thought ten years ago is the same as the way you think now.
But I'll still have my memories!
Your memories will also be replaced with a vague approximation of themselves. Some will be lost entirely. Ten years from now you're not going to remember what you ate this morning, or the plot of the book you read last week.
You'll still remember a lot of the same things you remember now, but many of those memories will be faded and distorted to make room for all the new memories you'll have.
Well, the person I'll be in the future is still similar enough to me for my tastes. I'm okay with it.
So would you be okay with dying if you were going to be replaced with a fairly, somewhat, sorta close facsimile of yourself?
No. And I know that doesn't make sense. But that's the way the human mind works, and space aliens like you will just have to get used to it.
I can't decide whether to stop being terrified of death or start being terrified of getting ten years older.
]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=608 Wed, 3 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=607 Apparently Abby has gotten a little better at living in the present.

Further proof that you are not the same person you were as a child. The tooth fairy carried your childhood self away forever.


TEXT OF COMIC:
I donated $45 to the art center this month.
$45? That's a big donation for a college student.
You're too kind to other people. You should do more stuff for yourself sometimes. When I get money, I always put some away for myself. I have a pretty reasonable balance in my account by now.
I AM doing stuff for myself. Giving money to the art center makes me happy.
But what about your future? You're making yourself happy now, but you won't be so happy when you graduate with no money left.
Norma, you're doing the same thing you accuse me of. You're taking care of others at the expense of yourself.
What?
You're denying your present self all sorts of things for the sake of your future self. And, face it, your future self is another person. Go far enough into the future and your future self doesn't even contain any of the same atoms as your present self.
Yes I will. Tooth enamel doesn't get replaced.
Okay, tooth enamel doesn't. But all the matter in all the cells in the rest of your body will be replaced. Your tooth enamel is the only aspect in which you will be the same person when you get old.
So old people who lose their teeth also lose their identity.
Exactly. That's why they start losing their minds.]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=607 Tue, 2 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=606 The stupid, rich mice would hire Rubik's cube stuntmen.

But then, of course, one is still encouraging mice to evolve a tendency to avoid traps.

Maybe it would be effective if you got them to evolve a tendency to avoid one kind of trap and to seek out another-- perhaps by leaving one kind of trap baited and set while leaving the other kind baited and not set-- and then suddenly you switched which traps were deadly.

But a few mice might survive after the switch, by having a tendency that was previously detrimental but suddenly became useful... and if they were enough to form a breeding population, the whole problem would start over again.

And, since it's March now... just another reminder that, until the end of this month, I will donate 80% of my profits from selling stuff to Doctors Without Borders to help them with their work in Haiti. This goes for Abby and Norma merchandise, Abby and Norma books, and my non-Abby-and-Norma-related jewelry as well.

TEXT OF COMIC:
There are MICE in my dorm.
So set some traps.
I did. And the mice somehow managed to get the bait out without setting the traps off!
Wow. Have you tried sticky traps yet?
Yes, and I found them later with mouse fur and mouse poop in them, but no mouse.
I swear mice are evolving right before our eyes. And don't tell me evolution doesn't happen that fast, because it DOES, when there are really strong environmental pressures.
I mean, if I were breeding pet mice, and I killed all the weak and stupid ones and let the strong, smart ones breed, I'd have noticeably stronger, smarter mice within a few years. That's how breeding animals works. Especially animals with short lives, like mice.
And that is exactly what people are doing with traps: killing every mouse that is not strong and smart enough to escape them. We are breeding pests to be more successful at infesting our homes!
So what do we do? Invent a mousetrap that only kills smart mice?
Maybe it doesn't let the mouse in until he solves a little Rubik's cube.
]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=606 Mon, 1 Mar 2010 01:01:00 -0700 http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=605 Boringer sounds like an awesome last name.

Well, most adults aren't like you, Abby, they can actually tell play screams from murder screams. Nyah.


TEXT OF COMIC:
Eeeeeee!
Yaaaah!
Karen, Sharon, please shut up.
Maybe you guys can answer one of the burning questions that have arisen from my observation of you. Why does childish play so often involve screaming as if you were being murdered?
You'd think evolution would eliminate a behavior like that. If nobody can tell whether or not you're in deadly danger, how can you survive to adulthood?
Well, the main conclusion that has arisen from our observation of you is that adulthood is really, really boring. We're not sure we want to get there.
Being dead is boringer.
]]> General http://erikahammerschmidt.com/an/index.php?itemid=605 Fri, 26 Feb 2010 01:01:00 -0700