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Abby and Norma
from 2014
Comic #1340
January 4 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: these people's mood would be improved by eating some of the fresh-baked cookies.
Hours later: "Who left the window open? We were only gonna open it long enough to cool off the room. Now I'm freezing!" "What do you mean, who left it open?" "I mean who didn't freakin' shut it!"
TEXT OF COMIC:
Who left the oven on?! You guys finished baking cookies an hour ago! It's so freakin' hot in here I can't believe it's January.
I don't understand, Norma. What do you mean, who left the oven on?
What do you think? I mean who didn't freakin' turn it off?
Well, nobody turned it off, so technically every creature in the entire universe left it on.
I think the question you want to ask is, whose responsibility was it to turn it off?
And that is a highly subjective matter of opinion, so you'll likely get different answers from different people.
You guys are brilliant in a completely useless way.
Comic #1341
January 5 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: The first name Arnold means 'born about an hour ago in the Farscape universe.'
From what I've heard, the name Schwarzenegger only coincidentally sounds like a racist slur, and actually means a person from Schwarzeneck, which means "black corner." Perhaps his family came from a place by that name?
TEXT OF COMIC:
Okay, I'm off to take my history test.
Good luck. May the Schwarz be with you.
You pronounced that wrong.
I pronounced it exactly the same way it's pronounced in the original German.
What does "Schwarz" mean in German?
Black.
Really? The color or the race?
Both, although there are also some other, less sensitive terms for the race-- like "Neger," which is equivalent to "Negro," and if you add another G it's pretty much equivalent to the N-word.
Seriously? Those are both pronounced the same?
Pronounced slightly differently. A German speaker can tell the difference.
This must have made life hard for Arnold Schwarzenegger.
It's probably why he ended up so racist.
Comic #1342
January 11 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I used to think dropping the F-bomb meant farting
On a similar subject to the S-word/sword confusion, I find it amusing that whenever I see the word "Menswear" my mind puts a space after the n.
TEXT OF COMIC:
I think we're approaching an era when the only words too obscene to say in public are racial and other prejudicial slurs.
I like that idea. Saying swear words isn't morally wrong by my standards, but it should be frowned on to say words that indicate you're a prejudiced jerk.
But on the other hand, it could lead to an arms race, where people are coming up with more and more hideously offensive slurs as fast as the world can get used to them.
I mean, that's what currently happens with swear words. And it seems the growth in offensiveness is exponential.
The S-word is a sword, and the F-word is a bomb. Compare that to any real arms race.
I question the aptness of that analogy, but okay.
Comic #1343
January 12 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Maybe the harpoon is used to spear fish, though. Fish such as the... Tang!
Further material in Abby's comparison of dirty words and weapons?
TEXT OF COMIC:
Dirty Word Definitions, with Abby
Word of the day: "Poontang."
It's the piece of metal that connects the blade at the tip of a harpoon to its handle.
Why is this dirty?
Hunting whales is an obscenity against nature.
Comic #1344
January 18 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: drac'ing off
nice guys finish last IN BED
TEXT OF COMIC:
Dirty Word Definitions, with Abby
Word of the day: "Premature Edraculation."
It's when some overeager jerk turns into a vampire before you can even bite him.
How unsatisfying.
Comic #1345
January 19 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: chick pee
It just means it involves humans.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Dirty Word Definitions, with Abby
Word of the day: "Humus."
Abby, humus is just a type of dirt.
It's a dirty word in the most literal sense. But it must not be confused with "hummus," which has multiple alternate spellings, including "houmous," "hommos" and "hommus."
I'm a humusexual.
Does that mean the sex you have is dirty, or that it involves garbanzo dip?
Both.
Comic #1346
January 25 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I honestly don't know why I have so many 'dirty word definitions' ideas. Maybe some part of me is tired of Abby and Norma not offending everyone.
When you're destitute, you don't get laid at all.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Dirty Word Definitions, with Abby
Word of the day: "Stitute."
It means "a sexually active person." Thus, a pro-stitute is a person who has sex professionally.
A sub-stitute is, I think, a person who plays the submissive role in BDSM sex play?
Con-stitution means consensual sex, and I guess the opposite is non-con-stitution, also known as stitut-ory rape.
Very bad. Don't ever do that. No-stitute means no-stitute.
In-stitute is someone who likes all penetrative sex acts.
Re-stitution just means doing it again and again.
Comic #1347
January 26 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: short for fart bone
For some reason, I find myself muttering Abby's second line to myself almost every time I look for my phone, and since I find it weirdly amusing I decided to put it in a comic.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Dirty Word Definitions, with Abby
What was I going to talk about today?
I think you made a note of it on your smartphone.
Okay, where is it? Where the F is my F'ing F?
... That last F was supposed to stand for "phone."
"Fone." Somehow that sounds dirty enough to be our word of the day.
Comic #1348
February 1 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Someone once told me that chewing up your food and then spitting it out is considered a type of bulimia. If so, then all gum-chewers are bulimic.
TEXT OF COMIC:
How do you define bulimia?
Why do you even want to think about that?
People usually think of it as throwing up to lose weight, but some bulimics do the same thing with laxatives.
My question stands.
But if using laxatives to get thin is considered bulimia, then how do you define a laxative, for purposes of this diagnosis? Is anything that makes you poop more a laxative? If you eat high-fiber vegetables in hopes that they will help you lose weight, does that make you bulimic?
My question stands stronger and stronger with each moment of this conversation.
Comic #1349
February 2 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: on the seventh day, sloth is okay
Can't think of any biblical sin to go with Groundhog Day. Except maybe witchcraft, in the form of using animals to divine the future? (Or, if you celebrated it with a meal of ground hog, that would be the Leviticus 11:7 sin of eating pork.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Doing anything for Valentine's Day?
Valentine's Day is a sinful holiday.
I've never heard that one before, even from religious fundamentalists. What sins do you see in Valentine's Day?
For couples, it's about lust. For singles, it's about envy.
Thanksgiving, on the other hand, is a celebration of gluttony. Black Friday and the whole Christmas shopping season are mostly about greed, these days.
For wrath, we have September 11th and Pearl Harbor Day; for pride we have the 4th of July. And sloth, of course, is celebrated on every national holiday, plus weekends.
So all holidays are a tribute to the seven deadly sins?
They should be called UNholy-days.
Comic #1350
February 8 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: the diet that gives you buns of adamantium
Serves her right for writing fanfic in the cafeteria.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Hey, can we sit here?
No. I require solitude for important fanfiction-writing purposes.
No you don't. C'mon, please, the only other table with open chairs is full of drunk fraternity guys.
If you invade my solitude I will claw your face off.
You don't even have claws.
SNIKT.
What?
SNIKT. It's the sound effect when Wolverine's claws come out.
Snikt! Atkins!
What was that supposed to mean? Is that how Wolverine loses weight?
If Wolverine lost weight, he would grow it back immediately.
Comic #1351
February 9 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: remy and jake find creative ways to repossess various parts of each other's bodies, in the latest slash story by acclaimed author abby
As of the time I write this, archiveofourown.org actually does show no fanfiction of "Repo Men," though there are 195 fics for "Repo, The Genetic Opera."
TEXT OF COMIC:
So what are you even writing fanfiction for?
"Repo Men."
What? The 2010 film with Jude Law? Does anyone even remember that existed?
My goal in life is to write things that have never been written before. Fanfiction of "Repo Men" has not been written.
"Repo Men" itself was basically fanfiction of the world that was portrayed two years earlier in "Repo, The Genetic Opera."
A repo opera?
Opera repo?
Opera-tion Repo?
Maybe we don't want to sit here after all.
Comic #1352
February 15 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I like how Valentine's day can be abbreviated to VD. #NeverKissAFrog #You'llGetWartsOnYourLips
Maybe I'll make a Valentine's Day tradition of showing some love to the most unloved animals. Last year it was spiders, this year it's toads. What shall I do next?
TEXT OF COMIC:
(princess kisses frog)
(frog becomes prince)
(they fly away together on a unicorn)
My love, I'm so happy! I can't believe this fantastic adventure all started when I kissed a humble frog!
I have something to tell you, my dear. Back on that day, you were not really kissing a frog...
you were licking a toad.
(everything fades)
Aw crap.
Love is always a hallucination.
Happy Valentine's day to you too.
Comic #1353
February 16 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I dunno, for a math major, Hans still seems to be more of a risk-taker than is usual
Playing the lottery becomes illogical when the chance of winning the prize is less than the chance that playing the lottery will cause something that is at least as bad as winning the prize is good-- for example, if you're more likely to get killed on your way to buy the ticket than you are to win.
Which I guess is pretty much all lotteries.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Apparently scientists think most people have "irrational loss aversion."
Hmm.
Their example is that, if someone offers to flip a coin and give you $200 if it comes up heads, and take $100 from you if it comes up tails, most people wouldn't take the bet.
But why is that irrational? Why should people take that bet? You have a 50% chance of losing $100. What if you couldn't financially handle losing $100?
Well, assuming you could afford to take that risk, you should, because you have the same chance of winning as of losing, and if you win you get twice as much.
So what if the chance of winning was lower? Would the potential prize just have to be higher for the bet to be rational?
I suppose so.
So would you take the bet if you had a 25% chance of winning, and the prize was $400 but the cost of losing was $100?
I would, yes.
So I guess, according to you, the rule is: If the percent chance of winning a bet is A, the prize for winning is B and the cost of losing is C, taking the bet is the rational choice if C is no more than A% of B.
I guess that's fair.
So would you take the bet if the cost of losing was $1, the prize for winning was $1,000,000, and the chance of winning was 1 in 1,000,000?
Sure.
Hah! I just got a math major to say that playing the lottery makes sense!!
No, you didn't, because that's not a lottery.
In a lottery, the chance of winning is the number of prizes divided by the number of people entering the lottery, and that number is always less than the cost of the ticket divided by the prize money, because otherwise there wouldn't be any money left over for the people running the lottery to make a profit.
And even if someone did run a no-profit lottery with tickets costing $1, the dollar value of winning would still be less than the number of entrants, unless you got your $1 ticket fee refunded if you won.
I got a math major to say that playing the lottery is only illogical because of a difference of $1.
Whoop-de-doo for you.
Comic #1354
February 22 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: sadly no puns managed to get a free pass into this particular strip
This is pretty much my view of humor. I do try to avoid making certain jokes around certain people, though, even if they are jokes that don't offend me personally.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Is there anything you can't joke about, Abby?
Hmm. Calculus, maybe? I can't think of anything funny about calculus. But maybe that's just because I've never studied it.
I mean, is there anything too heinous or upsetting for you to joke about?
Nope.
That's not to say that I enjoy all jokes about heinous or upsetting things, though. They have to be aimed right. I mean, I can laugh at a joke about the Holocaust, if it's making fun of Hitler, but not if it's making fun of the people he killed.
Same goes for any tragedy or atrocity. Humor is one of the ways we deal with terrible things, and that's okay as long as you're not ridiculing someone who doesn't deserve it.
So what if your jokes aren't taking either the victim's or the criminal's side, and you're just, like, making puns about some word involved in it?
Puns ALWAYS get a free pass.
*sigh*
Comic #1355
Feb 28 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: gee, Abby's bigoted against Neanderthals
Totally unintended slashy subtext: Abby in this strip seems more offended by the dude's homophobic comment than anything insulting he said about her specifically. (But then, I probably would be too.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Hey, that seat's taken.
Every other seat in the cafeteria is taken, too, and they're taken by actual people, not... potential people or whatever you're talking about.
You can't sit here. I can't be seen with you. I have a reputation.
I'm not here to try and make out with you. I just want to sit down and eat.
If you're that desperate for a boyfriend, go over there and hit on Kevin. You'll like him. He's a pretty cute guy-- no homo.
That phrase is very offensive.
Hey, I don't mean it to insult gay people. It just means I'm not one. I mean, not that that's relevant to you!
Sounded pretty insulting to me.
Listen, some people might mean it as an insult, but we all use words our own ways.
I use those words my own way too. I use them to mean "I don't think you're a member of that genus."
What?
Like this. "You, sir, are a Neanderthal... no Homo."
Comic #1356
March 1 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: One imagines that a professor who considers time an illusion would be pretty laid-back about assignment deadlines.
Are there any science-fiction shows that focus primarily on traveling between alternate universes? Every show I can think of is mainly about regular space travel and/or time travel, and alternate universes show up only in occasional episodes. But come on, there's so much potential for interesting stories there!
TEXT OF COMIC:
Argh, I need to stop trying to talk to my philosophy professor about temporal physics.
Yes, you do. Why did you start in the first place?
Well, philosophy class just poses so many great opportunities for thought experiments about what you'd do if you could change the past, or see the future.
But with this prof, if I even mention time, he just starts going on about how it's an illusion created by people.
I guess maybe he's confusing "time" with "measurements of time," and he thinks we made up time because we made up hours and minutes? But that's like saying "humans invented gallons and quarts, therefore liquids are an illusion."
He can't seem to understand it when I explain that there would be obvious, tangible differences between a universe where time passes and a universe where time doesn't pass. In the universe with no time passing, nothing could ever HAPPEN.
Ha, and as soon as you entered that universe, you've always been there?
No, you're just THERE, because that universe doesn't have the concept of "always." It only has one frozen moment. Nothing moves. Nothing changes. In fact, you couldn't actually enter that universe.
So if you stick your hand through your trans-universal portal into it, your hand becomes unable to move, and you're stuck?
No, because even sticking your hand in would take some time. The portal to it is just an impenetrable wall, and the inter-universal explorers never find out why.
Comic #1357
March 3 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: sine penis is a palindrome, too
Why must we assume we know what the last word of line two was going to be?
TEXT OF COMIC:
Okay, everyone, poetry slam! Challenge: finish Data's limerick from "The Naked Now." Go!
Um... "She had only one eye,
with which she would cry
Salty tears every time she had seen us."
Haha, eww. Okay: "The favorite lass
Of the males from each class,
And each family and order and genus."
Hahaha. My turn. "She wasn't as fine
As if she was Orion,
'Cause guys really go for the greenness."
Bahahaaa! We have a winner!
"Sine E.T.A., sad,
As Satan gone bad,
Abe, no gnat as sad as a teen is."
Ron must be a great poet, because no one understands his work.
Comic #1358
March 8 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: among many other reasons
Moral relativism makes good cop/bad cop a tricky game.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Abby, your little cousin won't leave. Her mom called saying she needs to be home for dinner, but she insists on sitting over there and playing with your computer. I don't want to know what filthy things she's looking at.
Okay, OKAY. I'll get her to leave if you'll help. You have any insights on child psychology?
Children basically have criminal minds, right? Always trying to evade authority, never thinking much about the consequences of their actions. Good cop/bad cop should work on her. I'll be bad cop.
Hey, Sharon, your mom says it's time to go home.
If you don't get out the door this minute, you little twit, you're probably gonna end up grounded for a week.
You know, if I say I'll be bad cop, that implies you are supposed to be good cop.
Um... by the moral laws I know, a good cop would be the one who wanted to put the criminal in jail.
Good cop/bad cop refers to the criminal's definitions of good and bad, Abby.
That would imply that it was invented by criminals, when in fact I believe it was invented by cops.
You are the worst at this EVER.
That's why we don't have kids, Sharon.
Comic #1359
March 9 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: it doesn't require magic powers, Abby turns people into snails by changing the definition of 'snail'
To see an eclipse of the sun by the moon, you look up, but to see an eclipse of the sun by the Earth, you look down. You'll be amazed at how the Earth completely obscures the sun from your view.
TEXT OF COMIC:
If you don't go home, Sharon, I'll turn you into a snail.
That's the dumbest threat you've ever made. I know you don't have any magic powers, Abby.
Yeah I do. I'll prove it. I'll put out the sun and darken the sky.
That's an old trick, and it won't even work because there are no solar eclipses coming up.
Sure there are! There's one just five hours from now!
Five hours from now it'll be dark out, Abby.
Exactly-- due to a total eclipse of the sun by the planet Earth!
That's a weird way to describe night.
Comic #1360
March 15 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: 'Redundantly repeated'... yeah, Abby's just on a roll with the hypocrisy today.
The most frustrating thing about people texting "kk" instead of "ok" is that you can never be sure: sometimes it really is a repeated abbreviation similar to "bye-bye," and sometimes it's just a typo for "ok."
TEXT OF COMIC:
Did she seriously just say that?
What?
I can't believe it. My aunt just sent me a reply to my text, and it says "kk."
She clearly meant "ok," but for some stupid reason she decided to substitute an "abbreviation" that wasn't actually any shorter, and just redundantly repeated the second half of what she meant to say.
I've got to go to class, Abby. I'll leave you alone with your unendurable suffering.
Oh, all right. Bye-bye.
Did you seriously just say that?
Comic #1361
March 16 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: orthopedists straighten feet and children
they all have different orientations, they point all sorts of directions, my mouth is a rainbow of diversity
TEXT OF COMIC:
Sharon, your teeth are starting to stick out. Just what I need-- before I know it, I'll be having to pay for your orthodontist appointments.
Orthodontist?
Yes, to give you braces, to make your teeth straight.
Yeah right, like those "making you straight" doctors ever accomplished anything good.
I'm talking about your TEETH, Sharon!
My teeth are HAPPY with their orientation!
MOUSEOVER TEXT:
orthopedists straighten feet and children
Comic #1362
March 22 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I think she is a fake geek because she is a fictional character who is a geek
Hans in this strip is based on my mother. Decades before the current "fake geek" controversy, I grew up being constantly and subtly fake-geek-shamed for liking all the things that define geekdom today. My mom was the last geek on earth who was a geek for ACTUAL SCIENCE.
(Also classical music, and literature from a hundred years ago. I had high standards to live up to.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Well, it finally happened. Some random guy in the computer lab called me a "fake geek."
I like Doctor Who and Star Trek and Naruto, but apparently I don't like them quite enough to have real nerd cred, in his opinion.
Well, you ARE a fake geek.
What? I can't believe you agree with him!
No, I don't. He thinks you're a fake geek because you don't like Doctor Who and Star Trek enough. I think you're a fake geek because you like Doctor Who and Star Trek at all.
I keep telling you, real geeks wouldn't watch science fiction that has inaccurate science.
I don't think real geeks by your definition even exist.
Comic #1363
March 23 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: It's always bothered me that two 50% chances don't necessarily add up to a 100% chance. I don't think my mind could handle a statistics class.
If the two people you're dating are also dating each other, that's one more relationship that could fail, and when you get into foursomes and fivesomes, I'm pretty sure laws of mathematics play a much bigger role than jealousy in the likelihood of breakup.
Actually, I suspect that polygamous relationships are less likely to end over jealousy than monogamous relationships are, because the people entering into them are already not the jealous type.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Why does it bother me so much when Hans teases me about stuff?
'Cause you love him and want to marry him?
Oh, shut up. I've told you, I'm not getting married until...
Until you can marry Spock and the Tenth Doctor at the same time. Yeah, but I don't think that's gonna work for you, though. Even if they were real.
People get jealous. Most polygamous relationships don't last.
I'm not sure that's got much to do with jealousy.
Most romantic relationships, in general, don't last. If you're dating one person, you've already got more than a 50% chance that you'll break up someday.
And if you're dating two people, then even without taking jealousy into account, that doubles the chance that you'll break up with at least one of them.
Which means a MORE THAN 100% chance your polygamous relationship won't last.
I don't think probabilities add like that, Norma.
Comic #1364
March 29 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: yay story arc
Could be someone trying to frame Cathy, but I don't think so.
TEXT OF COMIC:
They've kidnapped Lapitoptera!
What?
My computer's been stolen! I had all my notes for three different classes on it!
In my empty laptop bag, someone left a note saying, "If you want to see your computer again, come to..."
"...Cathy's dorm."
Not transparent at all.
Comic #1365
March 30 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Cathy is a bit hazy on what sorts of things could malfunction on a polygraph machine.
"...Best-case scenario, it electrically shocks you enough to torture you into telling the truth, THEN kills you."
TEXT OF COMIC:
All right, I'm here. What do I have to do to get my laptop back?
We just need you to answer a few questions. Truthfully.
Where did you get a polygraph machine?
Ebay.
Are you sure that thing even works properly?
If it ends up working as an electric chair, I won't be too disappointed.
Comic #1366
April 5 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Could also just be a faulty polygraph machine. Or Becky and Cathy have no idea how to read a polygraph.
When I wrote these strips, I wasn't thinking about when they would post, but I realize you could see this as Cathy's ultimate April Fool's joke on Abby.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Okay, Becky, start with the simple questions to establish a baseline or whatever.
What is your name?
Abby.
What day is it?
Saturday.
What school do you go to?
This one. Duh.
I don't get it. These don't look like the sample readings in the instructions. It looks like she's lying for all of these.
I'm pretty sure the polygraph doesn't detect lying, it detects fear of being disbelieved.
And that's why it's mostly effective at detecting lies-- most people only fear disbelief when they're lying, because most people are totally self-absorbed and never look at anything from another person's perspective.
So you're in a constant state of being afraid people will call you a liar?
It's because I'm so weird that nobody ever believes anything that's true about me.
Comic #1367
April 6 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I hate the kinds of test questions that are designed to test honesty, where an affirmative answer admits some kind of guilt, but it is assumed that no one can honestly give a negative answer. I always answer them honestly, but half the time my answers trip the dishonesty alarm because I'm so abnormal.
I ride my bike on the sidewalk sometimes too, but I get off and walk if I see pedestrians coming. I have virtually no understanding of traffic, and I know that I'd cause accidents if I rode in the street. Sometimes breaking a law is okay when it is done to save innocent lives.
Besides, for every pedestrian who hates cyclists on the sidewalk, there are about twenty drivers who hate cyclists on the road, and they're the ones who have giant mechanical weapons capable of crushing me into a pulp, so I'm inclined to try and please them.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Okay, so this is what Abby telling the truth looks like. Whatever. Keep going.
Have you ever broken a law?
Yes.
Hey, stop it!
What? I have. I ride my bike on the sidewalk sometimes.
But that question was designed to find out what your readings look like when you're lying.
So the polygraph doesn't work right if you answer all the beginning questions truthfully?
It just means we'll call you a liar if we see ANY deviation from what we've seen so far.
Oh joy.
Comic #1368
April 12 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Now Becky will start to doubt Cathy's honesty. There are some things she is unable to believe, even about Abby.
Whether she's lying depends on interpretation. Has she ever skipped a class? Well, she tested into English 341 and didn't have to take the prerequisite course.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Okay, next question. Have you ever skipped a class?
No.
Have you ever gotten so drunk you peed yourself?
No.
Have you ever cheated on a test?
No.
I don't understand it. No variation. She's able to fool the machine perfectly, on all the questions designed to elicit an untrue answer.
Actually she never HAS done any of those things, Becky.
You gotta ask me different questions.
Comic #1369
April 13 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: somehow 'nerd-screwer' reminds me of 'nerf-herder'
Maybe it looked like a lie because of her increased nervousness, or maybe because she was in a deceptive frame of mind, even though her actual words weren't a lie. Or it could just be Becky and Cathy's ineptitude at using a polygraph machine. (I'm sure the Abby/Cathy shippers can come up with a fourth option, but don't listen to them, they're crazy.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Okay, time for the big question. You lie about this, Abby, and your computer goes down the trash chute.
Ugh. I can feel myself getting way more nervous all of a sudden. I'm shaky. My pulse is skyrocketing. Whatever I say next, it's totally gonna look like a lie on that machine.
Um... Please believe me. I have never, under any circumstances, had sexual relations with Cathy.
WHAT?
What? CATHY!
That wasn't what we were going to ask!
Cathy, you filthy nerd-screwer!
I have created a diversion. Excellent. Time to make my escape.
Comic #1370
April 19 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Laptopnapping and polygraph coercion are always a more respectable option than doing homework, in Cathy's opinion.
That's Cathy's current boyfriend, but their days together are numbered. She's about to dump him for suggesting homework, but he pre-empts it by dumping her over the suspicious Abby rumors.
TEXT OF COMIC:
So while they were fighting, I got up, rescued Lapitoptera, and ran back to my dorm.
Haha, wow. Well, if I notice any weird rumors going around about you and Cathy, I'll know where they come from.
What do you suppose she wanted to ask you, anyway?
Who knows? I don't care.
Arggh. Now I'll NEVER find out the date of the Battle of Waterloo for my world history test.
You could maybe look it up in your history book.
Um, hello, that would be DOING HOMEWORK. Duh.
Comic #1371
April 20 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Don't wanna know what she put in that pie.
I celebrate it on April Fools' Day because anything is better than actually celebrating April Fools' Day.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Here, Norma! Have some chicken pot pie.
What? I'm not hungry. And why did you even make chicken pot pie? You don't eat chicken.
Yeah. I made it for you, in honor of Pot Pie Day, but then I couldn't figure out when Pot Pie Day was, so I put it in the freezer until now.
What?
See, Pot Pie Day should be exactly halfway between 3/14 and 4/20, but there's an even number of days between the two, so there is no exact halfway date.
I'd ask if you were high on something, but I know this is your natural state.
Comic #1372
April 26 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: don't know why Abby cares what the difference between magic and miracles is; she doesn't believe in either
Chrissy has a point. A god that granted all prayers indiscriminately would probably be worse than no god at all.
TEXT OF COMIC:
What exactly is the difference between magic and miracles?
Magic is performed by humans, and miracles are performed by God.
So if a human prays to God for a miracle, and God answers it, is that magic?
No, because the human isn't controlling it. God chooses whether or not to answer the prayer.
It's still the same thing, though. When people practice what you would call witchcraft, it's basically just their way of praying to whatever supernatural forces they believe in. Those don't grant prayers any more often than your God does.
And actually, if they did, wouldn't that make them MORE worth praying to?
No. God is picky about whose prayers he answers because most people are JERKS.
Comic #1373
April 27 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: #ToonerizedSpookBitles
The parasites that live on your dog, and what they do for fun on windy days. #Flea'sKite
TEXT OF COMIC:
Another memoir about life with a cute dog-- this one's a Doberman named after Mickey Mouse. #DobieMick
A day in the life of the world's most meticulous beauty product inspector. #FiftyGradesOfShea
A passenger plane is about to crash, when an immortal bisexual seizes the controls and saves the day. #TheDeftLandOfHarkness
If you're going to tweet those, you should add the hashtag #SpoonerizedBookTitles.
It won't always fit.
Comic #1374
May 3 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: say 'Friar Tuck's fire truck' six times fast, in a public place
A friend of mine once asserted that if humans are like spoons (round) and Vulcans are like forks (pointy), then the hybrid Spock is actually Spork, and Spock's offspring with a human would be a grapefruit spoon (which was funny since grapefruits were an inside joke in the fandom at the time, because of a very silly grapefruit-related scene Shatner had filmed for the SciFi channel... yeah, I guess you had to be there.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
So is "papal tower" really a Spoonerism for "paper towel"? Is it still a Spoonerism if the switched letters are at the end?
I dunno, I like to call that a "Forkerism."
Ha. So "fruit flies" and "flute fries" would be Sporkerisms, then.
What about "Friar Tuck" and "fire truck"?
That's just moving a letter from the interior of one word to the interior of another, and NOT swapping it with any other letter.
So, halfway to a Sporkerism. Grapefruit-spoon-erism?
I don't think every eating utensil can be used as an analogy for transposition errors.
Comic #1375
May 4 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Abby is the master of misanthropy
It's probably not just infertility, but lots of other health problems that are facing this issue. Most of us wouldn't have been born, or at least wouldn't be alive now, if we and our parents had had to rely on good genes for survival.
For instance, I could not have been born without the invention of the double-headed microscope. (A microscope that two scientists can look in at once. My parents met over one. In med school. Very nerdily romantic.)
Then again, I'm not sure both Abby and Norma aren't full of crap here. The conversations in my head that get turned into comics aren't always between the most logical parts of my brain.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Arggh, fertility treatments.
What? We weren't even talking about fertility treatments.
But I was thinking about them. Angrily.
Explain to me again how having a baby is an unselfish act? Billions and billions of people in this world, but parents want to make one that has THEIR GENES, so they spend thousands of dollars they could be using to save existing children's LIVES--
Actually, Abby, you should be supporting fertility treatments.
No! I--
Because they increase the rate of infertility.
...What?
You want to stop overpopulation, right? Think about it. If infertility is caused by a genetic flaw, it would usually keep itself under control, in nature. From time to time the flaw arises through random mutations, but it never spreads far, because it isn't passed to offspring.
With drugs that greatly increase reproductively-impaired people's chance of having kids, that system's ruined. And those drugs have been in use for decades.
Think how many families today are full of the genes for infertility-- each family line hanging by a thread, just waiting to be cut off as soon as too many of its members hit a patch of financial bad luck and can't afford their baby pills and in-vitro fertilization.
Wow.
Just... wow. How do you do that? You've just convinced me to admire both fertility treatments AND the corporate overlords who are driving the majority of families into financial ruin.
I learned twisted logic from a master.
Comic #1376
May 10 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: All I've heard about the show 'Doomsday Preppers' depresses me, but mainly because they are not prepping competently enough.
Being at peace with the thought of all or most of humanity dying out someday is okay as long as that "someday" is in the undefined future. I expect that being at peace with it when it's imminent will be far less socially acceptable.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Subject: A person who refuses to believe that war, epidemics, natural disasters and other increasingly dangerous events could lead to large-scale collapse of civilization.
Diagnosis: delusional; in denial.
Subject: A person who believes that societal collapse could happen, and devotes constant effort to preparing for that eventuality.
Diagnosis: paranoid; obsessive.
Subject: A person who has accepted that such a collapse could happen, and that nothing he can do will stop or mitigate it; he has come to peace with the impermanence of the world as we know it.
Diagnosis: suicidal; lost the will to live; also sociopathic, since he's okay with the thought of billions of others dying too.
In a pre-apocalyptic world everyone's crazy.
Is your constant morbid thinking a type of mental illness?
Comic #1377
May 11 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: now the word 'flowers' has been added to the long list of words that look weird to me
Abby is a terrible daughter. Great gift, but for the wrong reasons.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Did you get your mom flowers for Mothers' Day?
Yeah. I got her a potted dahlia plant.
Because it was cheaper than a bouquet of flowers?
No! Because if you give a mom a flower, she has a flower for a day, but if you give a mom a flowering plant, she has flowers for a LIFETIME.
The lifetime of the plant, I mean. But depending on the plant, that could still be a pretty long time.
You do know that doesn't absolve you from giving her flowers again next Mothers' Day.
Aww man.
Comic #1378
May 17 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: It's fascinating how much human beings love to think about scenarios that are not what is really happening. How much of our mental lives do we spend in alternate realities?
Sometimes I have thoughts like this about my own childhood, even though my mom was a hundred quintillion times better than Abby's.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Ugh. This show reminds me of childhood.
Ugh?
Childhood is a horrific experience for anyone who has the natural human hatred of being in captivity of any kind, even benevolent.
But it's worse if you're a weird kid with weird behavior problems, being raised by a mom who HATES the fact that you can't be normal.
Would you rather not have been born?
That's kind of a nonsensical question.
How so?
"Would you rather...?" implies "do you think you would be happier if...?" Obviously I would be neither happier nor unhappier if I had not been born.
Okay-- if you could choose to change the past so you didn't exist, would you?
No. I'm happy with who I am now. And I don't have to think about my childhood very much, now that it's in the past.
I'm out of that bad place, and I accept that it happened, as long as I don't have to go through it again. But I'm still not sure it was worth going through that childhood to get to where I am now.
Well, what if you died, and your soul was given the choice to either stop existing, or go through your childhood again?
That's another nonsensical question.
If I were reborn in my child body with all the knowledge I have now, then I wouldn't be living through my childhood again-- it would end up totally different. And if I were reborn without my knowledge and memories, then the mind I have now would stop existing, so it would be exactly the same as the other choice I was given.
Apparently this question doesn't lend itself well to thought experiments.
Some thoughts were not meant to be experimented on.
Comic #1379
May 18 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Despite the inherent hypocrisy in a eugenic plan to weed out non-open-minded people, I think it's a great idea.
Abby's attempts to control the gene pool have largely failed. She's still stumped in her quest to encourage the genes of people who don't reproduce and discourage the genes of people who do.
TEXT OF COMIC:
They're making more and more progress on connecting genes to disabilities. Only a matter of time before parents can choose embryos by their genes to prevent the birth of kids on the autism spectrum.
I don't like this sort of eugenic plan.
But are the alternatives any better? Wouldn't it be cruel for an autistic child to be born into a family that doesn't want an autistic child?
Families that don't want an autistic child should just decide not to have children.
But that does the exact same thing as letting them gene-test and reject their embryos-- it prevents the birth of any autistic children they might have.
Except it ALSO prevents the birth of any NON-autistic children they might have, too.
Ahh. I see. This is all part of your plot to fight overpopulation.
No, it's my own eugenic plan to weed out non-open-minded people from the gene pool.
Comic #1380
May 24 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Also, why does she imagine she has a boyfriend in this scenario?
If prostitution isn't a victimless crime, then the prostitutes are the victims. And if the prostitutes are the victims, then prostitution isn't a crime at all-- being a pimp or a john is the crime.
Unless it's possible for the victim and the perpetrator of a crime to be the same person? I guess that's the case with suicide (that is technically a crime, and when successfully committed, it always gets the death penalty).
TEXT OF COMIC:
You ever think it's weird that prostitution is illegal and making pornography is legal? They're both people getting paid to have sex. It's like filming the act makes it more legitimate.
Well, unless the people having sex are really young. The age of consent for sex is as young as 16 in some states-- but you can't legally be in pornography until you're 18. In that case, the act may be legal, but filming it makes it illegal.
You know, if I was a teenager who was distrustful of my local clothing store for their pervasive camera surveillance, I'd totally grab my teenage boyfriend and go have sex in the store.
They'd be like, "Look at the surveillance tapes, you're guilty of public indecency," and we'd be like, "Well, YOU'RE guilty of making CHILD PORN!"
And then they couldn't prosecute us, for fear of revealing their own, much more severe crime.
I think your idea of how justice works is overly idealized.
Comic #1381
May 25 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: It's getting harder and harder to tell which groups are more oppressed. Everyone claims to be the underdog.
Abby's mom seems to have a pretty good understanding of social life, actually.
TEXT OF COMIC:
How are those Hans and Ron boys doing?
Fine. We're still very good friends.
You know, if you've been spending time with a young man for years and he still considers you a "friend," you should know you're doing something wrong.
Ugh. Old people have such a messed-up idea of social life.
Goodness, Abby, keep your hateful stereotypes to yourself!
What? You say awful things about young people all the time.
It's okay to make fun of a privileged group of people, Abby. It's not okay to make fun of an oppressed group.
Hate to tell you, Mom, but old people are the ruling class. Practically every politician in Washington is over forty.
But that's just RICH old people.
Look, here's the pecking order: Rich old people at the top, then rich young people, then poor young people, then poor old people at the bottom. If you make fun of someone below you on that scale, you're a bully.
You're richer than me. You're paying my college tuition.
All the more reason to do what I say.
Comic #1382
May 31 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Abby's mom in the previous strip inspired this one somehow.
The "argument to moderation," also known as "fallacy of balance" or "middle ground fallacy," is clearly a real problem, but try to find two people who agree on which situations it applies to.
TEXT OF COMIC:
It's been said that if you're neutral in a case of oppression, you are taking the side of the oppressor.
But sometimes it seems that's not true. People who still believe the Earth is flat are clearly an oppressed minority. They aren't taken seriously anywhere; everyone calls them stupid and crazy, and almost no one speaks up on their behalf. If they answer their geography test questions according to their own beliefs, their teacher even has the right to flunk them.
But if I edit the Wikipedia page for "the planet Earth" so it's neutral on that subject, I'll be seen as taking the side of the flat-Earth believers, not the side of their oppressors.
Well, if there really are people who believe the Earth is flat, they are wrong. Their opinion is "oppressed," as you call it, but that's how it should be.
But the fact that you and I believe that just means that we're part of the oppressive majority.
Maybe that saying should be reworded: "If you're neutral in a case of oppression, the oppressed will feel that you are taking the side of the oppressors, and the oppressors will feel that you're taking the side of the oppressed."
Not as catchy.
Comic #1383
June 1 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: happy 33rd birthday to me
Only reason I know about this is 'cause my parents are doctors and they broke the Hypocritic Oath.
(Okay, I made up the Hypocritic Oath, but everything else Abby said is what I heard from my parents.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Rrrgh, sinus infection again. I hate how antidepressants dry out my mucous membranes.
That sounds awful. Hasn't your psychiatrist taken the Hippocratic Oath?
No, Norma. Nobody has taken the Hippocratic Oath since the time of Hippocrates, and maybe not even then.
Have you read the thing? If you took the Hippocratic Oath, you'd have to swear never to perform surgery-- because, back when it was written, surgeons weren't doctors, they were, like, barbers or butchers or something who did surgery on the side. Doctors weren't supposed to do it.
And you'd have to swear not to teach medicine to anyone but the sons of your colleagues-- because back then, professions were passed from father to son, and it was unacceptable to learn to be a doctor if you weren't the son of one.
Plus, you'd have to swear all this by a bunch of ancient Greek gods, which would violate the religious freedom of any doctor who doesn't believe in ancient Greek gods. So, NO, doctors aren't required to take the Hippocratic Oath, and any doctor who does take it is probably at a party with his friends, reciting the thing as a joke to illustrate how ridiculous it is.
Wait, but then why does everyone think doctors take the Hippocratic Oath?
Because doctors do take another oath, in which they promise never to let anyone know the truth about the Hippocratic Oath, and to give everyone the impression they've taken it, even though they don't and can't actually follow its ludicrous requirements.
This other oath, of course, is called the Hypocritic Oath.
Ha ha.
Comic #1384
June 7 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I bet the patent on patent leather has expired by now
I'm not sure this would work, though. I heard about some company that's going around suing people for violating a patent that it claims to have on the concept of scanning and then emailing a document.
If publishing an idea makes it unpatentable, you'd think that could only be a valid patent if they could prove they registered it before anyone on the internet ever mentioned scanning and emailing a document. So either they got in really, REALLY early, or there are ways around that rule against patenting publicly available knowledge.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Arggh, I have so many great ideas for inventions-- but there's no way I could afford to register a patent.
Yeah, I feel you. It's pretty impossible to get anywhere selling a product these days if you don't have a patent.
I mean, I read this article about a scientist who invented a medicine that performed really well in clinical studies, but then those studies got published in a medical journal.
And because information about this med had been made available to the public, he couldn't legally get a patent, so no drug company wanted to sell his product, because patented drugs are where the real money is. So this life-saving treatment never went on the market, because people were greedy.
Ugh, that's... Hey, that's what I'll do!!
Huh?
I'll post my ideas on the internet! Make them available to the public. If I can't get patents on them, then no one else can either!
Does that really help you sell your inventions?
Well, it means my competitors can't make it ILLEGAL for me to sell them.
True.
Comic #1385
June 8 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: bird law in this country is not governed by reason
Even worse, the majority of protected birds that are "taken from the wild" are fallen babies that had to be taken in to save their lives (or fledglings that were old enough to live on their own, but their "rescuers" didn't know that, in which case widespread education would be a much better deterrent than laws enforced with euthanasia.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
This time of year is so depressing.
Spring? Really?
Yeah. So many dead babies.
Wh-what?
Dead baby birds. On the ground.
Oh.
And if you find one that's still alive, and manage to keep it alive until it grows up-- then it's gotten used to humans, and it doesn't know how to live as a bird, and you can't release it into the wild.
Which is fine if it's an unprotected species like a starling or sparrow. But if it's a protected species like a robin or bluejay, then you have to turn it over to the authorities to be killed.
That's kind of backwards. They have to kill it because it's... protected?
Well, see, with unprotected species the government doesn't care what happens to them. But with protected species they want to discourage taking them from the wild and keeping them as pets.
If people could legally take any bird from the wild and keep it, that would be bad for wild populations of native birds. So the law says you can't keep them. And if you can't let them go, the only other option is killing them.
It's a law that only works as deterrent. It accomplishes its purpose only through the public's knowledge of it. Every time it's actually enforced, individual members of the species it's meant to protect receive the exact opposite of protection.
And the scary thing is, I'm not sure the public actually knows much about those laws.
Thanks a lot. Now I'm depressed too.
Comic #1386
June 14 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: butt butt butt
I have now sat here for about ten minutes trying to think of some words that are worth saying about this strip, but my mind is blank. So no commentary down here today.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Mmf. My pant leg is tight.
Only one leg?
Yeah. I think my left leg is fatter than my right leg.
Or rather, it has more muscle. I use it more than the other one.
I'm right-handed, but when I walk, I'm pretty sure I do more work with my left leg. And I mostly kick with my left foot. And when I sit down, most of the time I put my left buttock down first.
Seriously? You have a dominant butt-cheek?
I'm left-behinded.
No child should be that way.
Comic #1387
June 15 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Galileo's idea about the planets orbiting the Sun was rejected for the same reason as evolution-- it contradicted a Bible passage.
Abby's insinuation that Chrissy hasn't read the first page of the Bible is untrue. Chrissy has mastered the art of reading every single word of the Bible without actually noticing what any of them say.
If you read closely, you see weird stuff. Like, the first few passages of the Bible make it look as if water was around before God started creating things.
(Well, if God created everything except water, I guess that explains why its chemical properties are so out of line with the rest of creation.)
"On Youtube, there are starling-haters who go around posting trollish comments on any cute videos of pet starlings. Things like "I'd shoot it if I ever saw it."
Fine, so they think wild starlings are a menace to the ecosystem... well, so are humans. Anything they accuse starlings of doing, humans do a hundred times worse. How would you like it if that tired old science-fiction trope played out in your home: an alien appears, recites a list of atrocities committed by humans, and threatens to execute you for the crimes of your species?
Hey, Youtube trolls threatening to shoot someone's cute pet starling-- you are that alien."
There's a new blog post at Erikahammerschmidt.com ! A year of Sirius Marley Black: Starlings in review.
TEXT OF COMIC:
I hate my biology professor-- trying to "teach the controversy" about evolution. How did he get to teach a college science class?
Evolution hasn't been proven.
It's been proven about as much as we've proven where rain comes from.
Rain? Rain comes from clouds.
Yeah, and clouds come from water evaporating out of lakes and oceans. At least, according to science.
But it hasn't been absolutely proven. When we measure humidity and temperature and pressure, our eyes COULD be deceiving us. Some unknown force we don't understand COULD be causing our instruments to give the readings that we assume are caused by the weather.
When we fly up in airplanes and get a close look at the clouds, God COULD be altering them at that moment so they look different from their true form. You know, to test our faith. It's no more implausible than your ideas about evolution.
But it's not the same. The Bible doesn't SAY rain happens a different way.
Actually it does. In the Book of Genesis, the first thing God did after he made light was to "separate the water above from the water below." According to the Bible, the sky is a vault full of water, and that's where rain comes from.
Do you memorize passages of the Bible just to torment me?
Hey, you only have to read THE FIRST PAGE of the Bible to learn that passage.
Comic #1388
June 21 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Walt Disney smoked until he died of it, but Disney wouldn't let the biographical movie about him show him smoking.
If cigars are smoked exclusively by men because they are phallic symbols, that raises interesting questions about what the average man likes to put in his mouth.
TEXT OF COMIC:
I dreamt I was watching Disney's "Finding Nemo," except Nemo and his dad smoked cigars.
Hmm. Maybe your mind was trying to visualize what modern Disney movies would be like if Disney hadn't vowed to remove all tobacco references in their films, back in 2007.
You're not even going to try and look at the cigars in Fruedian dream-interpretation terms? You surprise me.
Hmm... now that you mention it, that brings up an interesting point. Freud thought cigars were smoked exclusively by men because they were phallic symbols. But clownfish are sequential hermaphrodites; they can change from male to female.
Perhaps your subconscious was defying society's assumption that phallic symbols are only for males, or perhaps defying the whole idea of gender duality itself.
Nemo cigar: tragic omen.
I tend to agree with Ron. Cigars in dreams are portents of disease and death.
Comic #1389
June 22 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: If they're Lego, their pants actually do come off, but they take the whole lower body off along with them. What is this teaching our children??
Kids have more imagination than we give them credit for. Teach your daughter that the pirate doll with short hair and pants could still be a girl: that's far more valuable than convincing a toy company to make a pirate doll with pigtails and a skirt.
"He still had insanely overgrown scales when he started living with us. In July of 2013, he looked like some monster from a video game."
There's a new blog post at Erikahammerschmidt.com ! Curing hyperkeratosis.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Where's your cousin Sharon? I thought she was visiting today.
She's in the other room playing with my old pirate ship playset.
I thought she came here to spend time with you. Doesn't she have toys at home?
Yeah, but not a pirate ship. Her mom only lets her have shopping playsets and fashion playsets.
Poor kid. The world is so full of sexist gender stereotypes. Even if her mom did let her have the cool adventure toys, none of them have any female dolls in them.
Why do you say that?
Because they don't.
Norma, those dolls are basically blocks with legs and heads. They're not anatomically correct. Their pants don't even come off.
Are you assuming they aren't female because they don't have dresses and long hair? 'Cause THAT'S a big old sexist gender stereotype right there.
Hey, Cousin Abby! What do you think... should Arabella the Pirate Queen be the bald lady with the eyepatch and missing tooth, or the bearded lady with the hat?
Don't worry about her, Norma. She's got this.
Comic #1390
June 28 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: she was a bit of an adrenaline junkie
more like NoraPUNephron.
TEXT OF COMIC:
A few days ago was the one-year anniversary of Nora Ephron's death.
I didn't know you even had any idea who Nora Ephron was.
Sure I do. She was married to Sean Penn.
What? That is not even close to true.
They hyphenated their last names, and their daughter was named after her.
Little Nora Penn-Ephron grew up to have a wonderful career in neurobiology.
Why do I even talk to you?
Comic #1391
June 29 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Feel free to read Norma's last line as 'One can make puns better than yours.'
Initially I meant to imply that Abby was about to make the pun "it's an i-ball," and was crushed when Norma came up with a better pun than that. But now I'm kind of leaning toward the interpretation that Norma assumed Abby was going to say "i-ball," but Abby was actually about to make the same pun Norma made, and in the last panel she's cursing Norma for beating her to the punch line.
"In the world of autistic adults, we keep hearing about the challenge of 'living independently.' This is used to mean such things as cooking one's own food, shopping, cleaning and maintaining a household, as well as holding a job to support oneself.
But, somewhere in the back of my mind, a little voice keeps telling me that this traditional idea of being 'independent' is just another way of being dependent."
There's a new blog post at Erikahammerschmidt.com ! Living Independently: The farm in my window.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Hey, Norma! You know what this is?
Um, it's the one-ball from a pool set. Why?
Okay, but suppose that little line on it isn't the number one.
What, you mean it's the letter I?
Yeah. If it's an I and not a 1, then this isn't a one-ball, it's...
It's the I-on-a-sphere.
See? I can make puns better than yours.
Curse you to the deepest pits of purgatory.
Comic #1392
July 5 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Please, children, don't swear in front of the poor sensitive adults.
The circle of life.
TEXT OF COMIC:
What's that word?
Which... Ugh, Sharon, stop reading my Facebook feed. Sorry, I can't tell you what that word is.
Why?
Because it's a swear word, and your mom would kill me if she found out you even saw it.
How come?
Well, most people feel that swear words are inappropriate for children.
Why? Do most kids get upset when they hear swear words?
No, not in my experience.
Mine either. Do swear words cause some horrible brain problems if kids hear them?
As far as I know, there has been absolutely no research on that.
So why are they inappropriate for children?
Well, if I use a swear word in front of you, you might learn to say it.
Why would that be bad?
You might say it in public.
And what would happen then?
Adults would be shocked and upset.
Why would they?
Because they feel that swear words are inappropriate for children.
Is adult society always this full of circular reasoning?
Pretty much.
Comic #1393
July 6 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Alanis Morissette is an anagram for 'Lame-asset ironist'
Maybe he sarcastically thought "Well, isn't this nice," not knowing that it really was one of the nicest things to ever happen to the world, because another passenger on the plane was a genocidal madman who would otherwise have gone on to start a planet-destroying nuclear war.
In that case, his words had a deeper meaning of which he was unaware, which would have fit within the category of the "dramatic irony" that my high-school English teachers talked about.
"Fat is the body's stored fuel, and if you stop adding more fuel, your body has to burn up that fuel in order to keep functioning. Otherwise you would be a perpetual motion machine, which is physically impossible.
But that doesn't mean weight loss isn't affected by genetics. Every machine will exhaust its fuel source if it runs long enough, but some machines are more fuel-efficient than others."
There's a new blog post at Erikahammerschmidt.com ! The cost of good mental health, and my fuel-efficient body.
TEXT OF COMIC:
...And as the plane crashed down, he thought, "well, isn't this nice!"
See, that's the one part that doesn't fit with the rest of the song.
Hmm, really?
We all know Alanis Morissette has this really weird definition of "ironic," right? Going by her examples, she seems to think it means "something that would be really good, but, due to the wrong circumstances, is rendered unpleasant or worthless."
Chardonnay that you can't enjoy because there's a fly in it. A wedding that's no fun because it's raining. Ten thousand spoons, which would be worth a lot to someone who wanted spoons, but is useless when you just need a knife.
The only part that doesn't fit that pattern is the verse about the guy who's afraid to fly, takes one plane ride at the end of his life, and crashes. A plane crash isn't a good thing made useless by bad luck. It's just a plain old bad thing.
It's not even ironic in the way most people use the word... an event having the opposite results from what is expected or intended. If he'd taken a boat because he was scared of planes, and then the boat sank, THAT would fit the common usage of "ironic." But a plane crash is just the exact same thing happening that he was afraid of. It's not ironic in any sense.
Well, unless... Unless you take him literally at the end, when he thought, "Well, isn't this nice."
Wha?
Maybe he actually found it nice. Maybe he spent his whole life afraid of plane crashes, and then found that he actually enjoyed being in a plane crash.
Hahaha! Holy crap, that is twisted. Yeah, that would fit with the common usage of "ironic." Hadn't thought of that.
And if you don't take that thought literally, then it's verbal irony.
Comic #1394
July 12 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: remember, abstinence is murder
Not existing might be better than being raised by someone who would make a terrible parent, and/or doesn't even want to raise you. That's why my mind is so torn about the idea of selecting embryos for certain genes, or selective abortion when an embryo or fetus tests positive for a disorder. Eugenics sucks, but if parents don't want to raise a certain kind of child, they probably shouldn't be having that kind of child. (Or any child at all, but they're never gonna listen to THAT advice.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Do you really hate children that much, Abby?
What? No, Mom, I am not bigoted against an entire group of people.
But unlike you, I see them as people, who have their own meaning in life besides passing on your genes and letting you put tiny clothes on them.
And also unlike you, I really remember what it felt like to be one. It's not an experience I would wish on anyone.
So you're saying you'd rather give them the experience of NOT EXISTING?
Well, I don't remember what it was like when I didn't exist, so it must not have been as horrible as being a kid.
Are you sure? Maybe it was so traumatic you blocked it out.
Comic #1395
July 13 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: For some reason I always say 'vicious diarrhea,' and John called me on it once... this is my answer.
I guess Abby had another encounter with the woman from strip 1095? Her explanation for that woman's assumptions is perhaps more realistic this time... but I still think Abby's experience with diarrhea is due more to her consumption of sugar than her consumption of vegetables.
"It's like Spock and his mind-meld in 'The Devil in the Dark.' How could that blobby creature tell him telepathically that it was called a Horta? How could it be called a Horta? Did it have a spoken language with human-pronounceable words, and did it, for some reason, just never attempt using that language with the humans? Did it have a sound-based language that wasn't human-pronounceable, and was "Horta" just as close as Spock could get to saying its word for its species?"
There's a new blog post at Erikahammerschmidt.com ! The Alien F-Word, and other twists of science-fictional linguistics.
TEXT OF COMIC:
...So I told her that the only reason normal people can hold their bowels for so long is because normal people are freakin' constipated, and I referred her to a few articles about how 70% of people don't get enough fiber.
Could you remind me just how our conversation ended up on this subject? So I can avoid it in the future?
I told her to try actually eating as many fruits and vegetables as the FDA recommends, and see how long it takes to get vicious diarrhea.
You mean "violent diarrhea."
Um, news flash: I can put whatever adjective I want before "diarrhea." Are you seriously criticizing me for NOT choosing the cliched one?
If you use the cliched one, it's easier for me to tune out.
Regularity is good in your bowels, but not in your vocabulary.
Comic #1396
July 19 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: who could ask for any more, there's a spider on the floor, on the floor.
In this system of reincarnation, the gods didn't make the rules about being reborn as a spider after you squish a spider, so you can't say that being cruel to animals is a form of offending the gods.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Eesh, there is a spider on the floor by my foot.
Don't hurt it, Norma. If you squash a spider, you'll be a spider in your next life.
I don't think the idea of reincarnation is really that simplistic.
Yeah, I guess not. But imagine if it was! Imagine if the only rule of reincarnation was that you had to be reborn as whatever you harmed in this life.
After being a human, you'd have to go through about a hundred different species in your next lives, to make up for all the animals that humans eat, squish, displace from their homes and so on.
But what if you harmed something in one of those lives? What if you were a human who ate cows, pigs and chickens, and squished cockroaches, wasps, ants, and flies, and you had to be reborn as all those animals in your next lives--
--but then suppose you stung a cat when you were a wasp, don't you have to be reborn as a cat then, instead of finishing the list of critters you harmed as a human?
Yeah, and of course once you're reborn as a cat, you have to do it nine times.
I can imagine some people abusing the system to get what they want. If you assassinate a president, will you be a president in your next life? If you offend the gods, will you be a god in your next life?
Ha, yeah. And once you're a god, your journey is over, because gods don't die.
So what stops everyone from being really offensive to the gods all the time, just to be reborn as one?
Well, of course these gods avoid the problem by not being very easily offended.
Only a few things hurt their feelings, and those are really obscure and random things that most people would never think of doing anyway.
Like eating a Waldorf salad with semi-cooked olives and overcooked meringues on top.
Or wearing your shirt backwards and wearing earrings in the belt loops of your pants at the same time.
And they don't publish these rules anywhere, so nobody knows.
Man, I wish I could believe in the supernatural, because this would be awesome.
Whenever I wish something were true that sounds really cool but really implausible, I take comfort in parallel universe theory.
Comic #1397
July 20 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: one month until wedding anniversary time!
This happens a lot where I work. It's amazing how much tunnel vision people have, especially when looking for something on a shelf.
"A sweet-flavored snack was something they got very, very rarely, if at all. A snack as sweet as modern cookies was unheard of. An eight-ounce bag of cookies with 20 grams of sugar per serving, sealed and guaranteed germ-free, for an amount of money that you could earn in not just less than a day's work, but less than an hour's work-- absolutely unimaginable.
But today we take it so much for granted that a person purchasing such an astonishing luxury will complain and demand something better because the box has a dent. "
There's a new blog post at Erikahammerschmidt.com ! Spoiled by unspoiled food: The modern world in context.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Where did you put the books by Carol O'Connell? They're all gone!
You didn't notice? I moved all the O-apostrophe names in crime fiction to the beginning of the O section. I heard that's actually the standard method of alphabetizing O names.
You should have told me right away! I had to tell a customer I couldn't find them!
Um, Carol O'Connell only got moved up one shelf from where she was before.
And I was looking for her books in the place they originally were!
And how exactly do you function in life, if you're unable to see anything that's six inches away from where you expected to see it?
Refusing to see things that aren't the way you expect them is a normal part of being a human.
Well, it does make it easier for me to eat cookies on the job without getting snide comments from you.
Comic #1398
July 26 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I had constant back pain throughout college, but these days almost never. Books are deadly.
normal human capacity to understand probability SUCKS.
also, I am losing my appreciation for the Garak interpretation of the Boy who Cried Wolf. Maybe the moral really was "don't tell the same lie twice," but that moral sure drives home the realization that humans are really bad at knowing what's believable.
TEXT OF COMIC:
You're late again.
Yeah, I had to wait for the ibuprofen to kick in. My back hurt like crazy this morning.
That's the same excuse you gave the last five times you were late.
Yes, because it's the same thing that always happens to me. It must be all the books I carry to class.
Abby, if you want the boss to believe your excuses, you can't give the same one every time.
But I have heavy textbooks. And a somewhat vulnerable spinal column. I can't really change that.
You have to alternate stuff like, "I was sick to my stomach," "My bus was late," "I couldn't find my purse," "My mother needed help with her computer," "The weather was bad," and so on. If it's always the same reason, he won't believe it, because that's too much of a coincidence.
Really? The boss will believe that five unrelated problems just happened to make me late in the same month, but he thinks it's too much of a coincidence if I have one long-term problem?
Yes, Abby, because he has a normal human being's capacity to understand probability.
Thanks, now I'm sad about humanity again.
Comic #1399
July 27 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: that cafe has expensive cake
Norma's plan actually failed, because when Abby calculated whether eating the granola bar was worth it, she factored in both the $5 she would save AND the $5 Norma was going to give her. She did not agree to eat the granola bar for less than a total of $10, so Norma is now honor-bound to pay her the promised $5.
"On this re-reading of the study, you might conclude that the factors it had previously identified as "genetic" were actually responses to the genetic traits that make up appearance. Maybe the happier twins weren't happy because they had genes for happiness, maybe they were happy because they had genes for beauty."
There's a new blog post at Erikahammerschmidt.com ! Twin genetics, cancer and God: 90% of statistics are presented without context.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Well, I'm off to the cafe to buy a piece of chocolate cake.
Abby, no. You promised yourself that you were going to try and eat healthier this summer.
Eh, that was months ago. The person who promised that doesn't even exist anymore.
If you're hungry you can have my granola bar.
Nope, I don't want a granola bar, I want a piece of cake.
I'm just trying to be a good friend and keep you on track, okay? Listen, what if I promised you five dollars to eat this granola bar instead of eating cake from the cafe?
Hmm. Five dollars?
Hmm. Okay, I guess it's worth it. Give it here.
Well, this is totally... not a piece of chocolate cake. All right, now the five dollars.
The five dollars was the amount you saved by not going and buying cake.
I HAAAATE YOU.
Comic #1400
August 2 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: yes this is how we celebrate 1400 strips
Nyah, nyah, I put it on the internet, so now no one can patent it.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Today on Abby and Norma, we're going to learn how to make your own wash-rinse-dry bidet.
What? I didn't agree to this.
how to make your own wash-rinse-dry bidet
Gorilla tape
Foil baking pan
3 tall plastic containers
Shells
Mild soap
Water squirter toys
Cut pan in half and tape edges
Tape rolls on one half, holes in the other
Attach container lids to one half
Place containers on them
Fill containers
Soapy water (for washing)
Plain water (for rinsing)
Air (for drying)
Place other side of pan on top
Remove foam from squirt toys
Replace the decorations
And now you know how to use the three seashells.
THIS WHOLE THING was just a DEMOLITION MAN JOKE?
Maybe you'd rather teach crafts on Martha Stewart's show?
MOUSEOVER TEXT:
yes this is how we celebrate 1400 strips
Comic #1401
August 3 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: actually whatever happens IS God's plan, otherwise he wouldn't be omnipotent
Abby thinks that if you see death as something to be sad about, then deep down you really DON'T believe in God.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Okay, kids, have fun with Cousin Abby. And Abby, be sure not to make any ANTI-RELIGIOUS comments around my children this time.
Um, okay.
Just remember, deep down you really DO believe in God. If you didn't have any faith in an afterlife, what would be stopping you from doing all the terrible things you could get away with?
Gee, I don't know. If you really do believe in heaven and hell, what's stopping you from killing Sharon and Karen?
What? Um, besides the fact that they're sweet innocent CHILDREN, and I'm their MOTHER and I care more about their well-being than anything else in the world?
But if that's really true, wouldn't you want them to go to heaven right away? Then they'd have instant, perfect and everlasting well-being, instead of having to suffer the hardships of life any longer.
Plus, the older they get, the less innocent they are, and the more chance they'll go bad at some point and NOT end up in heaven. From a religious perspective, you're being a very irresponsible parent by leaving them alive like this.
But being killed isn't God's plan for them. So if I did that, I'd still be committing a terrible sin, and I'd be sent to hell.
Yeah, but if you really care more about their well-being than anything else in the world, why aren't you willing to make that sacrifice for them?
Well, heaven and hell aren't technically "in the world."
Please, Abby, don't try and give her any ideas. She's crazy enough already.
Comic #1402
August 9 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: yes, why does she?
The New Testament's use of the word "soon" is probably the broadest use of that word in human history (except maybe for a few astronomers describing the predicted time of our sun's death in the context of the expected lifetime of the universe).
TEXT OF COMIC:
Why do you think we have to be so mean to gay people?
Because the Bible says so. In fact, the Bible says they should be stoned to death.
That's in the Old Testament, though. The same part that says people should be stoned for all sorts of random weird things. Doesn't the New Testament basically say we don't have to live by all of the Old Testament anymore?
Yes, but the Apostle Paul also condemned gay people in the New Testament, so that's one part of the Old Testament we still have to live by.
So did Paul say we should stone them?
No, but he said they were sinning.
And if they are, won't God take care of punishing them? Aren't we playing God if we try to take the task of judgment into our own hands? Isn't it the New Testament that says "Judge not lest ye be judged"?
I mean, the New Testament says a lot about punishment from God, but it says pretty much nothing about what humans should do to punish other humans. Which I guess makes sense; it was written at a time when people believed Judgment Day was coming really soon, 'cause Jesus had basically said so. When the world's probably gonna end in a matter of weeks, you don't worry much about law enforcement.
So if you really want to be true to the spirit of the New Testament, you shouldn't support any course of action that assumes the world is going to last more than a few years.
Why do I even talk to you?
Comic #1403
August 10 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Being unrepentant for a crime should be grounds for forgiveness, because it means that you genuinely believe you did the right thing
Ignorance of the law is no excuse. It is impossible to learn all the laws in a single lifetime. Most of the laws are common sense. People have no common sense.
TEXT OF COMIC:
How do you define the insanity defense?
If "being not guilty by reason of insanity" means you were unable to tell right from wrong, then couldn't every crime have that defense?
I mean, it's literally impossible to make a choice without feeling that it's the right thing to do, or at least that its benefits outweigh its detriments.
What if you kill someone that you think deserved to be killed? What if you steal money because you think that you being wealthy is more important than other people being wealthy? You're technically doing what you think is right.
That's why the insanity defense doesn't use the words "right" and "wrong," it uses the words "legal" and "illegal."
So if an insane person isn't aware that something is illegal, they can't be found guilty? But don't you always hear people say "ignorance of the law is not an excuse"?
If you're sane, it isn't. But if you're insane it is.
So the legal system is biased in favor of insane people!
You should be happy about that.
Comic #1404
August 16 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Art school might have prevented both the war crimes AND the crappy art. A win-win.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Hahaha, look at George W Bush trying to do paintings.
Bahahaaa. Why didn't we let him get into art school BEFORE he became a war criminal?
Ha, I see what you did there. You know Hitler's art sucked, right? And W's art sucks even worse.
Well DUH, that's why he needed ART SCHOOL.
Oh. Good point.
Comic #1405
August 17 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Also possibly the term 'bullfighting ring'
When I was a kid, I told the other girls that their pierced ears were against nature, because aside from the digestive system, no animal naturally has a hole that goes all the way through any body part. (I dutifully stopped making this claim when someone demonstrated to me that you can stick a noodle up your nose and pull it out your mouth.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
The digestive system is the only hole that goes all the way through a mammal's body.
Therefore, a bull is topologically equivalent to a ring shape.
Which explains both the similarity between the words "taurus" and "torus," and the fact that a bull wears a ring in his nose.
You do realize the fact that he HAS a nose ruins your argument.
Comic #1406
August 23 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: happy 9th anniversary to john and me
I like existing, but I feel deeply troubled by the thought of anyone having children in this overpopulated world. So, like most people, I have had to come to terms with the fact that I exist because of something I consider distasteful and perhaps wrong.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Mmm, yum yum. That guy is almost as hot as David Tennant.
Ugh, too much information, Abby. I'm your mother, not some slutty friend of yours. I don't want to know about all your sexual attractions.
If parents like grandchildren so much, then why the heck are they so squeamish about the idea of their kids having sex?
If kids like EXISTING so much, then why the heck are they so squeamish about the idea of their PARENTS having sex?
Hmm. Good point.
Comic #1407
August 24 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: kudos to Hans for not being offended, I guess
Goodness, why do we even have third-person pronouns if they're only used for such impolite actions?
TEXT OF COMIC:
I'm trying to stay up-to-date on what the most acceptable words are for transgender people, but it's complicated.
Even the pronouns are hard to keep track of. If someone is wearing clothing that looks stereotypically masculine, that doesn't necessarily mean they want to be called by male pronouns. If someone is wearing traditionally feminine clothes, that doesn't mean they want female pronouns.
You can't assume anything, even if a person DOESN'T appear to be trans. You have to ask people what pronouns they prefer.
And if you ask, some non-trans people will be offended because they think you're implying that they look like trans people. It's overwhelming.
What pronouns do you prefer for yourself, Hans?
"You" is fine.
Yeah, but I mean third-person pronouns.
I'd rather you not use third-person pronouns about me, because then you're either talking about me behind my back, or talking about me in the third person when I'm right there.
Comic #1408
August 30 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: emphasis on little
I was born into a rich family, and although I work at a retail pharmacy and am not currently rich, I fully recognize that my privilege of being born wealthy was a big part of what has allowed me to get by. If my parents hadn't been able to afford college for me, I might not have gotten a job; even menial retail jobs discriminate in favor of college graduates. If I'd had to take out a student loan, I would be forced to give away a big chunk of all the money I earned, even if I did have a job.
I can attribute some of my success to my own intelligence and interpersonal skills, but then I realize I have to attribute those things, in part, to having well-educated parents, which in turn is attributable to wealth.
I know I'm privileged in some ways, so I try to put my privilege to good use. I can't make it go away, but I can try to use any wealth and influence it gives me for the purpose of helping others.
TEXT OF COMIC:
I don't see why poor people complain about rich people. Anyone can become rich! You just have to work hard.
Easy for you to say when you were born into a rich family. What, you actually think there are enough six-figure-salary jobs out there for everyone?
If there isn't a high-paying job for you, you just work hard and start your own business and MAKE one. Otherwise you're lazy.
So why aren't you a lot richer than you are? If anyone can get more money than they have, what's stopping you from being a multi-millionaire?
Poor people taking my tax dollars.
Your mind is a weird little world.
Comic #1409
August 31 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: or imagine money as a lighter-than-air gas
Another way of interpreting the analogy is imagining a pyramid with the rich at the top, because there are fewer of them, and they would collapse without the labor of the poor at the base.
But on the other hand, the rich have a lot of power to make the poor collapse, too... and an upside-down pyramid, about to fall, is probably a better picture of our economy.
TEXT OF COMIC:
See, if we make sure the rich have plenty of money, they create more jobs, and then everyone has more money.
You seriously still believe in trickle-down economics?
Well, you can't deny the law of gravity, right? It'd be nonsense to believe in trickle-UP economics. Things don't just flow upwards.
But your analogy assumes that rich people are at the top and poor people are at the bottom. Perhaps you visualize it that way because the rich have larger amounts of money and our language uses the word "high" for large numbers.
But, you know, our language also uses the words "high" and "low" for morality. If we arranged them by moral fortitude, the rich would be the lowest of the low.
And in that model, trickle-down economics is exactly what happens.
See? I was RIGHT.
Comic #1410
September 6 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: maybe they assume women won't want an alarm going off at a fancy party
This is based on various conversations I've seen on Tumblr. I've actually become a little scared of Tumblr. One of my biggest phobias in life has been that someone will think I'm prejudiced or closed-minded, so I've spent my life becoming very, very liberal and learning how to project very clearly that I am. But sometimes I fear that, by Tumblr's standards, I'm still ableist and misogynistic (which, as an autistic woman, I understandably find disturbing).
TEXT OF COMIC:
What is it with watch companies?
Have you noticed that it is IMPOSSIBLE to find a women's watch that is nice enough to wear with an evening dress, but also has a alarm?
Do people just assume women never need an alarm? What's the deal? Women are the MOST likely to be on medications that they need to take at a certain exact time!
Abby, I know you mean well, but don't promote that misconception that women are more likely to be emotionally disturbed! It's hurtful to feminism.
Norma, are you saying it's an insult to imply that someone is taking psychiatric medication? Because as a person with an autism spectrum disorder, I find that very offensive!
You two need to CHILL OUT, because I was obviously talking about BIRTH CONTROL.
Oh.
Comic #1411
September 7 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: this IS my homework, I am taking a marketing class
I have actually seen a soda can labeled "No artificial flavorings" that listed aspartame in the ingredients list. I think it was Diet Coke. Do other people have a different definition of "flavorings"?
TEXT OF COMIC:
I love it. This soda says "No artificial flavorings," but look at the ingredients list. Is aspartame not considered artificial?
It doesn't say "No artificial INGREDIENTS." It says "No artificial FLAVORINGS."
Are you saying aspartame isn't a flavoring?
It's a sweetener.
Sweet is a flavor!
In fact, sweet is one of only four or five things that really ARE flavors, as opposed to smells! See here where it says "Natural lemon-lime flavoring"? That should say "Natural lemon-lime AROMA."
I'm glad to see that proofreading pop cans takes precedence over your homework.
Comic #1412
September 13 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: this is how Abby ended up being 50 percent Swedish in strip 196. yay continuity!
I dunno if I'd kill Hitler. If he hadn't done what he did, someone else would have... maybe even someone more competent, who might have actually SUCCEEDED at taking over the world. You can know what was horrible, but you can't be sure the alternatives wouldn't have been worse.
TEXT OF COMIC:
What would you do if you had a time machine?
You mean, a machine that measures time? I have a bunch of them.
No. A machine that can take you backward or forward in time to any point you like, in a matter of seconds.
I'd wake up, because I'd obviously be dreaming. Not possible.
I mean, hypothetically, if it WERE real.
I would destroy it, because nobody needs to be going and messing up the fabric of reality.
You're no fun. You wouldn't even kill Hitler?
I'd never do that, Norma. My great-grandfather on my paternal grandfather's side was German.
You cannot possibly think that having a German great-grandpa gives you such a feeling of kinship with Hitler that you can't bear to kill him!
Besides, I think you've mentioned that great-grandpa before. Wasn't he also Jewish?
Yes, Norma. He was a German Jew, and the great-grandma he married was a Norwegian Jew. They met in Sweden, where they had both moved to escape the Nazis.
My father's father was born there. He came to the USA, married another Swedish immigrant, and had my father, who met my mom and had me.
As much as I'd like to prevent Hitler's atrocities, they are indirectly responsible for my existence. If I went back in time to kill him, I'd prevent my own birth, thus creating an impossible temporal paradox.
It can't be done. The fact that I exist proves that no one will ever go back and kill Hitler.
He didn't exactly die surrounded by reliable witnesses. You could go back and kill him in 1945.
Hmm.
Comic #1413
September 14 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: This is not how Norma ended up being one-third Irish in strip 140. That was just Norma's bad math.
I dunno if Hitler caused me to exist in any way. Maybe he stepped on a butterfly that would otherwise have found a way to break up my Austrian great-grandparents.
Like, it would've gotten into the cake batter and started a fight about how my great-grandma was a terrible cook, or something. "You stupid wench, the recipe called for BUTTER, not butterflies! No way I'm marrying you!"
(except that pun doesn't work in German, so bleh.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
You got me thinking. I'm trying to figure out if Hitler is in any way responsible for MY existence.
But I don't think I have any ancestors who fled the Nazis and met their spouses in their new homes. Most of my ancestry was in the really far northern bits of Scandinavia.
You have any grandparents in the Low-Photon Islands?
Lofoten Islands, smartypants.
Hey, if your ancestors lived so far north that it's night half the year, I'll call them what I freakin' want.
Comic #1414
September 20 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Norma is not using 'baby' as an endearment; she says it specifically because she knows Abby will take it as an insult.
Going by the relationship of how much it warms the house to how good it feels to stand in front of it, I guess a fan and a fridge are about the same. (Or maybe I just have a crappy fan.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Abby! What are you THINKING?
You're sitting in front of a FAN! Don't you know that a fan doesn't actually make the room cooler?
Air from a fan FEELS cooler because it's blowing hard against your face. But it's a lie! The kinetic energy of all that moving air is actually making the room slightly WARMER!
You're heating your dorm by leaving that fan on! Just because it feels great where you are, that's no reason to cook the rest of us!
Are you still mad at me for when I yelled at you for standing in front of an open refrigerator last summer?
You know it, baby.
Comic #1415
September 21 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: yes it absolutely is worth it
have you heard of the gymcar, a vehicle with a built-in exercise machine that lets you use your commute time to get a lower-body workout and burn several hundred calories? it is also called a bike.
TEXT OF COMIC:
I'd like the convenience of having a car, but I hate driving. All those lives in my hands. Any second I could accidentally get myself and a bunch of other people killed.
And I couldn't get anything done on the way to anyplace, because I'd have to be focusing on driving the whole way. So much time wasted.
I wish I could afford a chauffeur.
Have you heard of discount chauffeurs?
What?
You just pay them a couple dollars each time they drive you someplace. Like, usually less than three bucks.
There has to be a catch.
Well, they usually take a pretty roundabout route.
And they have quite a few limitations on when and where they'll drive. And they won't stop and wait for you if you get out somewhere along the way.
And you have to share the vehicle with about thirty other people.
I meant something that's NOT a bus, Abby.
Hey, it's worth it to be able to read a book instead of driving.
Comic #1416
September 27 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: also prohibits smoking up to 50 feet underground and in the air
If she really does it, she'll prove she has only half a mind.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Look at that sign. "No smoking within 50 feet of this building."
Good. I don't want anyone smoking around me.
But that sign isn't gonna fix that problem!
"Within 50 feet of this building"? That's an area that includes the other side of the street! And people in cars on the street! And the interiors of OTHER buildings! Are they really claiming they can police smoking on someone ELSE'S property?
They're just covering all their bases.
But they're doing it by posting a rule that is so obviously unenforceable that no one would ever bother to follow it.
I dunno. You're following it.
I have half a mind to take up smoking just to teach them a lesson.
Comic #1417
September 28 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: probably the only way
Funny thing is, I wrote this just a few days before seeing the ending of the anime "Fate/Zero."
TEXT OF COMIC:
If you found a genie that granted wishes, would you wish for world peace?
Hmm. How do you define peace?
No war.
So if a dictator conquered the world, and killed anybody who tried to start a revolution, would that be world peace?
Um... I guess not. Killing people isn't peaceful, even if it prevents war.
So world peace would be if no one ever killed anyone, in war or otherwise.
Maybe. But what about enslaving people, or abusing them, or imprisoning them for no good reason? If those things were still happening, could it still be called peace?
I don't know. Are we stretching the definition of peace now? Does peace mean "nobody doing anything bad ever"?
Regardless, is it possible to have peace of any kind without fundamentally changing human nature?
I guess one way to create world peace would be destroying all life on earth.
Comic #1418
October 4 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: when abby's head hurts, her solution is to make everyone else's head hurt too
I looked up the etymology of aspirin once, and I remember it being something really unexpected that wasn't even related to breathing, but I've forgotten it now.
TEXT OF COMIC:
My head hurts.
Have an aspirin.
Are you kidding? Aspirin is deadly! It makes you stop BREATHING!
What? No, it...
Oh. Negative prefix "a"... "spir"... respiration... This is another episode of Abby's Creative Etymology, isn't it.
No, I just mean you might stop breathing eventually if you get a bad enough ulcer from it, or something.
Comic #1419
October 5 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: cathy would rather believe teleportation than abby being able to sneak past her
I have this same superpower, and it messes with my coworkers so much.
TEXT OF COMIC:
How did you get here, Abby?
Um, I walked here?
But you were just in the other room a few seconds ago!
Well, guess what... it takes just a few seconds to walk into this room.
I would have seen you!
People often don't notice when I walk past them. I move very quickly and quietly... and not along the routes that people would expect me to take.
I think it's because I have a fairly exaggerated concept of personal space. The area I consider my personal space is quite large, and I tend to make the overly cautious estimate that other people's personal space is as large as mine.
So, to prevent mine or anyone else's from being invaded, I take roundabout paths that don't pass close to anyone. And if I absolutely must pass near someone, I do it as unobtrusively as possible, without a greeting or eye contact.
Humans are self-centered. They are pretty much incapable of noticing something that doesn't glaringly announce its relevance to THEIR lives. So when I pass by them, I'm effectively invisible.
I'm not that stupid! I don't just NOT NOTICE someone walking right in front of me!
Okay, you got me. I have teleportation powers.
See, was that so hard to admit?
Comic #1420
October 11 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I had contact lenses as a teenager, and they came in tiny dollhouse-sized jars. My dollhouse had jars from then on.
My childhood dollhouse was similar, but I wasn't quite as focused on functionality or as disregarding of aesthetics.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Ooh, email from my mom. She knows how to use email now?
"Hi, Abby! I was cleaning the attic and found your old dollhouse. Do you want me to bring it the next time I visit?"
You had a dollhouse when you were a kid?
Oh my gosh, yes. I loved it.
Well, I loved making stuff to put in it. Over the years I made almost all the furnishings myself.
I hated dollhouse miniatures that didn't actually work. So I replaced the toilet with a chamberpot, and the blender with a set of knives that I personally ground to usable sharpness.
I printed tiny books in font size 3. I replaced the lamps and ceiling lights with glow-in-the-dark stickers and toys that gathered light during the day and illuminated the house at night.
I think I made the sinks out of soap dispensers, plastic food containers, and waterproof tape... you pumped the soap dispenser to run water, and then it drained back into the bottle when you pulled the drain plug. I was pretty obsessed.
I threw out the toy fridge and stocked the shelves with teeny jars of food that didn't need refrigeration, like millet seeds, cracked corn, spices, oil, vinegar and flour. My dolls had real edible FOOD.
The stove had a candle underneath the burner. A candle. With a match in an umbrella stand nearby. I never lit it, but it gave me a good feeling to know that I COULD boil a tiny pot of water on that dang little stove if I wanted to.
Nothing in that dollhouse actually looked like anything in a real house, but if I somehow ended up doll-sized and had to live in it, by god I was gonna be able to.
Was that a thing you were actually afraid of as a kid?
Isn't everyone?
Comic #1421
October 12 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: of course there are pigs in purgatory; all pigs go to purgatory
I lost my dollhouse in a different way. When we were moving, the new tenant of our apartment got impatient and took our stuff out of our storage unit before we were ready. Someone apparently found the dollhouse in the hallway, assumed it was free, and took it. We never found out who, but I hope some kid got to enjoy it.
TEXT OF COMIC:
So, you're saying you could bring my old dollhouse over here the next time you come to see me?
Sure, honey. It'll be a relief to get some space freed up at home.
You sure you have room for it? I'd forgotten how huge it was.
I've got an empty space near the window. It'll fit, unless it's bigger than a dresser, which I don't remember it being.
Nope. Close, but not quite. Okay, I'll bring it over when I visit for the holidays!
Thanks. Remember to use bubble wrap for some of the miniatures, though, okay?
Miniatures...?
There wasn't anything in it. Just some random pieces of garbage that I tossed out.
Mother, parents like you go to a special cell in purgatory where your breakfast every morning is mistaken for kitchen scraps and thrown to the pigs.
Comic #1422
October 18 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: according to Wikipedia the population of Alderaan was 1.97 billion
I think it's more an issue of association. People who dress up as Hitler for Halloween tend to be people who are racially insensitive, so dressing up as Hitler has come to be seen as a racially insensitive thing.
Maybe during World War II, when he was less universally hated, dressing up as him was seen differently, maybe even as a form of ridicule. I don't know. I do know it used to be considered somewhat more acceptable to make jokes about Hitler. (In 1940, when the US wasn't at war with Hitler yet, Charlie Chaplin made a whole movie making fun of him.)
In any event, I wouldn't dress up as either Hitler or Columbus, because I don't follow the older tradition of dressing up as horrible scary things; I follow the newer tradition of dressing up as things I like.
(...okay, I guess that doesn't excuse this Dalek costume... maybe deep down I DO like genocidal maniacs. Yikes.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Why is it so unacceptable to dress as Hitler for Halloween?
Um, 'cause he killed millions of people?
But Darth Vader killed the entire population of at least one PLANET, and it's okay to dress as him.
He's fictional. There are no real-life survivors of his atrocities to be offended by it.
What I don't get is, why would dressing as a bad person for Halloween be taken to mean that you support that bad person?
Aren't Halloween costumes supposed to be evil, deadly, terrifying things? Wasn't their original purpose to be so horrible they could scare away actual DEMONS?
Yes, but nowadays there's an element of lightheartedness to it, so dressing up as something is, essentially, making light of that thing.
Okay, suppose I dress up as Christopher Columbus?
And suppose I tell everyone that I'm doing it because Columbus started a worse genocide than Hitler's, which is said to have actually inspired Hitler to do what he did, and therefore it's the scariest costume I can possibly think of?
Hmm. Then you'd probably be seen as making a noble and laudable political statement against Columbus.
So why isn't dressing as Hitler seen in the same way?
I guess if you dress as someone people hate, you're seen as supporting that person, but if you dress as someone people like, you're seen as ridiculing that person.
But I'm not sure anyone actually likes Columbus anymore.
Comic #1423
October 19 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: guess what, long hair isn't a sex organ
men who have kids are only 0.0000000004% less genocidal than men who don't
TEXT OF COMIC:
Hey, Norma, look at me!
Look at what?
I was trying to think of the worst genocidal maniac to dress up as.
Stalin, Mao and Columbus all caused more deaths than Hitler. But I realized that causing deaths isn't really taking lives; it's just taking PART of them.
The only way to really take people's lives is to take their WHOLE lives: in other words, prevent them from being born or even conceived.
And guess what: I'm already doing that by deciding not to have children!
So you just dressed up as yourself.
Well, actually, I realized that I'm female, and I can only produce 500 to 600 eggs in my life. I don't have as many potential babies to destroy as a man has, with the billions of sperm his body produces in his lifetime. Only a man could be the ultimate mass murderer.
So, I dressed up as a MALE version of me.
I can't tell.
The parts that make the sperm aren't showing.
Comic #1424
October 25 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Abby seems to be implying the male version of her would be attracted to women; let the Abby and Norma shippers have their fun with that idea
Dressing up as Charlie Chaplin is almost as suspect as dressing up as Hitler, I think. You go into it knowing full well that someone could steal your hat.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Hi, Norma!
Hi... Abby? You dressed up as Hans?
Yeah. I realized that a male version of myself wasn't enough of a mass murderer to dress up as.
A male version of me would still possibly want to have sex, so there's still a CHANCE he could accidentally create a human life.
Hans has no sex drive, so he's guaranteed to eliminate billions of potential people.
Wait, if you're dressed up as Hans, how can we tell you apart from...
Really??
I'm CHARLIE CHAPLIN! Abby stole my HAT!
Comic #1425
October 26 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: 'conceivably,' ha ha
This is assuming that genetics is what makes you the person you are. I've often thought about how staggeringly unlikely it was for the exact sperm and egg that created me to come together. But it's somewhat less unlikely that a more generally similar situation would occur: that my parents would have a child (not necessarily from the same gametes as me, but around the same time and place) and raise that child the same way they raised me.
If personality comes from nurture, that less-unlikely child could still be said to be me; if personality comes from nature, then there's only one egg-sperm combination that could have become the person I am. The reality is probably somewhere in between.
TEXT OF COMIC:
You took off your costume?
Yeah. I realized I was wrong about men being able to commit greater genocide than women.
I realized that your number of potential children isn't just the number of gametes your body produces in a lifetime. It's your number of gametes MULTIPLIED BY the total number of OPPOSITE-SEX gametes that exist in the world during the years that you are fertile.
Any one of those gametes could, conceivably, join with any one of yours and make a baby. Those combinations couldn't all happen in the same universe, but at the present moment they ARE all potential human lives.
And if I have 500 eggs in my life and every man in the world has billions of sperm, my potential kids are more numerous than those of a man with billions of sperm to be multiplied by each woman's 500 eggs.
And that's not even counting all THEIR potential descendants.
Even just as myself, I am already committing the most enormous genocide possible! I am erasing GOOGOLS of humans from existence, for no reason but an arbitrary genetic trait they can't control: the fact of being biologically descended from ME!
You seem way too happy about that.
Humans are a plague on the earth anyway.
Comic #1426
November 1 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: you could get a ruler tattooed on you, but make sure you don't grow any more, or it'll stop being accurate.
I'd get Ryan North's Time Traveler Essentials shirt tattooed on me, just in case time travel doesn't work on clothes, like in the Terminator franchise.
TEXT OF COMIC:
If you could get any tattoo you wanted, what would it be?
I CAN get any tattoo I want. I'm an adult with an income. I just don't want a tattoo.
Fine. If you HAD to get a tattoo, what would it be?
A single one-millimeter dot. If I'm ever cruelly forced to get a tattoo, that's the least possible expense and pain.
You're no fun. Is there any kind of tattoo you wouldn't mind having, if expense and pain weren't an issue?
Okay, okay. I'd get the entire metric conversion system, a multiplication chart, and the twenty mathematical equations I need to use the most.
Well, that's one way to get banned from ever taking any standardized test.
That's my goal. Standardized tests suck.
Comic #1427
November 2 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: kind of like the Fight Club interpretation of Ferris Bueller
I thought up this interpretation in a dream one night, which is so meta I can hardly expect you to believe it.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Remember my theory about the movie "Groundhog Day"?
Yes. The reason he stopped living the same day over again was actually because he bought insurance from the salesman who'd been bugging him, because the insurance companies had figured out how to trap their target customers in a temporal loop so they'd hear the sales pitch over and over until they finally accepted.
Exactly! Well, now I just watched the Ben Stiller version of "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty."
And you have a head-canon for that too?
Yeah. You ever wonder why Ben Stiller's Walter Mitty is able to get cell phone reception in ridiculously remote areas of the world? Or why the movie includes several covers for Life magazine that never actually existed?
Um, because it's a movie?
Yes, but for it to be a REALISTIC movie, there's only one possible explanation.
Those things didn't ever happen! Those parts were all in his imagination too! None of the "adventures" he had were real at all! They were all daydreams like the ones earlier in the movie!
Hmm. That would be more true to the original story it's based on.
EXACTLY!
Comic #1428
November 8 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: me too; I feel bad for how snakes are portrayed in the whole series
I was fairly confused by the movie because, right up until the end, every conversation about the Elder Wand's ownership assumed it was always passed to whoever killed its previous owner, and then all of a sudden, at the end, the whole thing about "disarming" came up. Perhaps it was clearer in the book, which I never read, so feel free to discount my theories, since I'm definitely not a "true" HP fan.
TEXT OF COMIC:
I also have my own interpretation of the last Harry Potter movie.
Okay, so at the end, you remember Harry's big explanation of why Voldemort couldn't wield the wand? It considered Harry its master because he had disarmed its previous owner, and apparently Voldemort had thought the wand's ownership was passed by killing, but it was really passed by disarming?
Yeah?
Well, I think ownership really WAS passed by killing. That explanation was all conjecture on Harry's part, because he wasn't aware that Voldemort didn't actually kill Snape.
Yeah he did.
No he didn't. He forced Nagini the snake to kill him.
Huh.
So Nagini became the rightful master of the wand, but Voldemort assumed it would be his, and kept trying to use it.
That's why he was never able to wield it properly: his own arrogance in assuming that his snake wasn't capable of owning a wand, just because he was using her as a weapon and had a part of his soul hidden inside her.
Well, that doesn't explain why Harry is the wand's master at the end. Logically Neville should be, because he killed Nagini.
There's no proof that Harry WAS the wand's master at the end.
Well, he was capable of wielding it. He used it to repair his own wand.
Not in the movie. And I'm analyzing the movie, not the book.
Let me get this straight. You're saying the movie's decision to omit that scene means that everything behind the scenes worked differently in the movie?
I'm saying I like the story better with a pro-reptile-rights subplot.
Comic #1429
November 9 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: actually, do they count as relatives since Olaf was made by Anna's sister?
I'm a little tired of all the celebration over "Frozen." Sure it was revolutionary for Disney. But compared to many other stories by less famous authors and producers, it was still kind of old-fashioned and uncreative. I've seen much more original books and movies that gave much more enlightened messages, produced long before "Frozen." Really, the only thing that made that movie remarkable was that Disney made it.
You want diversity and representation and healthy messages and truly original ideas? Stop putting pressure on the mainstream, already-famous-and-powerful sources of entertainment to include such things. Start consuming your entertainment from the less-powerful, less-famous sources that are ALREADY doing the right thing of their own free will, and help them BECOME more famous.
(this has totally not been an advertisement for kea's flight.)
TEXT OF COMIC:
Any other movies you want to ruin for me?
Well, there's "Frozen."
What weird assumptions can you possibly make about "Frozen"?
Remember when Olaf the snowman kept watch over Anna by the fire, and was willing to melt for her?
Yeah?
You can't tell me that wasn't an act of true love.
Hmm.
Her curse was supposed to be broken by an act of true love. So why didn't she immediately get better after that happened? The only logical explanation is that an act of true love takes several hours to take effect.
Therefore, the act of sisterly love at the end cannot have been the cause of her recovery, because it wouldn't have taken effect that fast. It must have actually been a delayed reaction to Olaf's act of love.
That's horrible! The wonderful and revolutionary thing about "Frozen" was that it was the first Disney movie to focus on sisterly love between women instead of a woman being saved by a man! Your interpretation ruins it!
No, my interpretation simply reveals the way that Disney wrote it. If it's ruined, they're the ones who ruined it.
But really, my interpretation could be seen as equally enlightened! Olaf and Anna didn't have romantic love, nor were they blood relatives. Perhaps the movie is celebrating non-romantic love--- deep friendship--- and breaking the stereotype that says it can only occur between those who are related and/or of the same sex.
Do snowmen have sexes, anyway?
See, that's another excellent point.
Comic #1430
November 15 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: in reality, no one knows how presents end up in stockings; it is one of the great cosmological mysteries
Yet another reason I'm not interested in having children. If you don't like the idea of being the doctor who tells a patient his life is gonna be twenty years shorter than he thought, try being the parent who tells a kid his life is gonna be finite when he thought it would be infinite. In terms of difference between the subject's wrong idea and the bad news you're breaking, being a parent is infinitely worse.
TEXT OF COMIC:
You young people don't know how good you have it.
Well, I sure have it better than I did when I was under 18 and it was still legal for you to hold me captive like some sort of weird pet.
But I don't know if I have it better than you. Your generation has messed up the world so much that my generation will have to deal with crap you'll never see.
So are you saying I'm better off because I won't be alive to see it?
I dunno. I'm not sure exactly WHAT sort of crap is gonna happen in the future, and I can't know for sure what's worse than being dead.
Well, nothing in YOUR life is worse than going to the doctor and finding out that you're going to DIE.
Has that happened to you?
No, but it happens to a lot more old people than young people.
Um, actually, going to a doctor is never how you find out you're going to die.
You already know you're going to die. Going to a doctor can only tell you when, and how.
"Finding out you're going to die" is actually something that happens in childhood.
Well, would you rather I had hidden that whole issue from you until you were old enough to handle it?
I dunno. You did it for the issue of how presents end up in stockings on Christmas morning. Death seems pretty non-kid-friendly compared to that.
Comic #1431
November 16 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: is it still vegetarian to eat your boogers after you've smelled meat?
If you didn't already know how smelling works, I just made bad smells an EVEN WORSE experience for you than they already were! You're welcome!
TEXT OF COMIC:
My scratch-and-sniff book wore out!
Sorry to hear that.
How did that happen? It hasn't lost its color or its texture or anything. How could it lose its SMELL?
A smell isn't like a color or sound or texture. It isn't just our senses perceiving what's there.
Some matter has to leave the object in order for you to smell it. When you smell something, it's because tiny particles from that thing are floating through the air and into your nose.
So when Sharon's in the bathroom and I can smell her pooping, it's because tiny bits of her poop are ending up inside of my nostrils?
Yup, pretty much.
NEVER POOP IN MY NOSE AGAIN!
I can tell when you've been hanging out with Abby because her weirdness rubs off on you.
Comic #1432
November 22 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: America is the only country that exists; other countries are just America from the past
TEXT OF COMIC:
You ever see that video about how many galaxies there are in distant space?
Yeah, and wow, it does make you think about how big the universe is.
But maybe it's not quite as big as you think.
Why?
Because the far-off galaxies that it shows might not all be different galaxies.
Space is curved. If you could look far enough in the distance, you'd see past the edge of the universe, and because of spatial curvature, your line of sight would continue at the other side of the universe, and you'd see things that are actually behind you.
Of course, you'd be seeing those things the way they were many millions of years ago. So if you notice three galaxies and they all look different, maybe you're just seeing the distance to the edge of the universe repeated three times, and they're all the same galaxy from different years.
I dunno, I'm not sure that works.
Sure it does. Hey, let's take the idea to an extreme. Maybe our galaxy is the only one that even exists. Maybe the universe's edge is right outside the Milky Way, and everything we see out there is just older versions of our own galaxy!
Screw it--- maybe Earth is the only planet that exists. Maybe Jupiter is what the Earth looked like 43 minutes ago! Maybe the Sun is what the Earth looked like 8 minutes ago! Can you disprove me? Did you look at the Earth from outer space, eight minutes ago? Do you know what it looked like then?
In fact, I'm the only object that exists! The edge of the universe is a few inches outside my body! When I look at you, or a street light, or a sandwich, I'm just seeing how I looked a few nanoseconds ago! I'm ever-changing! It's great!!
I think you're on a sugar high. You shouldn't have eaten those two handfuls of chocolate chips.
Oh, no, did I eat my past self? How does that even work? Time paradox!!
MOUSEOVER TEXT: America is the only country that exists; other countries are just America from the past
BOOKMARK
Comic #1433
November 23 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: dreaming of a white-hot christmas
climate change isn't just warming; hell is also freezing over
TEXT OF COMIC:
So you're staying on campus for Christmas break again?
Yeah. Aren't you?
Not this year. My parents moved, and now they're close enough that visiting them would be totally affordable. I'm going home for the holidays!!
Awwww, I'll be all alone.
Your mom didn't invite you home?
I can't stand more than a few hours with my mom. She insists on coming to visit for a day, but it'll be 90 degrees in December before I go and stay with her for Christmas.
Don't make that sort of ultimatum in this day of global warming.
I know, I know.
Comic #1434
November 29 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: I can kiss myself under the mistletoe!
:(
TEXT OF COMIC:
Should I ask my parents if you can join us for Christmas?
No. I'd rather be alone than with parents. Even yours.
You know, you've got some serious issues that you'll need to work through some day.
Not your problem.
Well, I'll see you later, then.
Don't die in a plane crash.
...Wow.
I'm actually alone. I'm gonna be alone until after New Year's.
It feels weirder than I thought.
Comic #1435
November 30 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: spider plants hang their own ornaments
Awwwwwww.
TEXT OF COMIC:
There. My spider plant's all decorated.
The stupid holiday socks I got last year are hung by the air vent with care.
Time to make cookies and frosting, and revel in the joy of the season--
Hey! Abby?
Hans?
Yeah. I guess I'm the only one left on campus who's as estranged from his parents as you.
Can I hang out for a while?
I guess. I WAS gonna bake enough cookies to make myself sick if I didn't share 'em.
Comic #1436
December 6 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: it does make family relationships easier
Abby's past the cheerful stage of cookie intoxication, midway through the morose stage and approaching the sentimental stage. Sugar is a versatile drug.
TEXT OF COMIC:
It's weird, isn't it, how you're supposed to love your family, regardless of what they're like.
You're not usually supposed to base your treatment of people on genetic traits that they can't control. But if that genetic trait is "being related to you," then you're allowed all the prejudice you want.
You can discriminate against non-relatives when hiring for your family business. You can justify helping and supporting an absolutely terrible person just because he's family.
And if you don't like your relatives, if you don't want to spend the holidays with them, YOU'RE considered a terrible person.
Well, when it comes to parents, I guess you're expected to be grateful to them because they put so much work into raising you.
But I never asked for all that. And while it was happening, it was mainly awful. I mean, it was better than having no one to raise me, but there is no pleasant way to be a child.
Even if it's benevolent, it's captivity, not freedom. It's a gilded cage. Adults look back on it and think they SHOULD have been happy, but I've never known a kid who was actually satisfied with the arrangement while it was going on.
Why weren't most kids totally traumatized by childhood? Is it just that most people are capable of developing Stockholm syndrome, and I'm not?
Maybe.
I don't wish I'd never been born. If I hadn't had to go through all that crap, I wouldn't be here now. And having an adult controlling my childhood was kind of an unavoidable necessity. But I sure don't see it through the rose-colored lenses that make most adults wish they were kids again.
And whenever I see my mom, I think of how awful it was to be a kid, and that always overshadows any happiness I have about the fact that she got me to where I am now.
Maybe I'm lucky that my parents are violently opposed to all human social interaction.
Comic #1437
December 7 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: my spellchecker doesn't respect the word 'unrespected'
It does take some of the pressure off you, if you realize that nothing you do can actually make a significant change relative to the staggering size of the universe.
There are times when I find that thought comforting, but lots more times when I find it terrifying as hell.
TEXT OF COMIC:
So you're really bummed out about not having any other friends here for Christmas, because Norma and Ron and I are like the family you never had?
Yeah. You're like a family I can actually enjoy the holidays with, because you're not all tangled up in my mind with the crappy memories of being someone's caged, unrespected pet monkey.
That's a weird but somewhat accurate way to describe being a kid.
I dunno. Norma says I have serious issues about family and childhood. I think she's right.
Yeah, but your issues are side effects of being able to see the world realistically. You hate childhood because you haven't forgotten what it was like. You're depressed because you can see how messed-up the world is. Most people avoid having issues by having delusions.
Maybe. But sometimes I wish I could have the delusions instead.
It's irrelevant what you want. The universe works the way it works, and your concerns are tiny and inconsequential on its enormous stage.
I have no idea why I found that comforting.
Glad to help.
Comic #1438
December 13 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: being willing to break the law for your friend is the best gift
Those who would accuse me of "queer-baiting" with the interactions of Abby and Norma... don't worry, I straight-bait too. I'm an equal opportunity baiter. No romances are canon in this comic, except Cathy's, and she doesn't count.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Thanks for keeping me company over the holiday break.
Thanks for the cookies and stuff. Hey, I got you a present.
Gee, this is a small box.
Doesn't mean it's a bad present.
Whoa.
It's just a piece of paper.
Read it.
"Dear Abby:
Doctor Who is even less scientifically accurate than Star Trek. But as it turns out, that means I don't hate it quite as much, because I can think of it as a fantasy show. Open your computer. I transferred a couple Christmas specials onto it. Enjoy."
Awww! You're the best.
I downloaded them illegally.
Comic #1439
December 14 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: at least she didn't knock four times
Cookie-eating games are worse than drinking games: they end with lots of vomiting AND you're fully conscious and able to remember every second.
TEXT OF COMIC:
New game, okay? Eat a cookie every time the Doctor tells someone to "shut up."
Urrgh. I'm gonna barf. Soooo many cookies.
See, that's why Donna's the best companion; she wouldn't take that "shut up" stuff. She didn't idolize him, she stood up for herself.
I'm gonna eat a cookie every time you cite something as evidence that Donna's the best companion.
Don't think we have that many cookies. Ooh, next episode.
*knock*
*knock*
Abby! Merry Christmas! Open up!
Barricade the door! It's Daleks.
Close.
Comic #1440
December 20 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Abby, Abby could eat no ham/ and Hans could eat no pie/ And so betwixt the two of them/ They made her mother cry.
I don't even study math, and those jokes are so overused they make ME sick.
TEXT OF COMIC:
Hi, Abby! Oh, my goodness, you have a BOYFRIEND staying with you for Christmas!
No, Mom. This is Hans, remember?
I'm so happy for you! You'll make ugly grandchildren, but at this point I'm afraid I can't be picky.
Anyway, I brought a Christmas pie and a ham. We can ALL share it.
I don't eat ham.
I don't eat pie.
You don't eat pie?
All the pi jokes ruined it for me. You can't imagine how annoying that gets after a few years in mathematics classes.
Comic #1441
December 21 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: it's a paper plate
happy palindrome number
TEXT OF COMIC:
Merry Christmas, Abby!
Thanks, Mom.
I brought you your old dollhouse, too! It's in the car; we can bring it up in a moment.
Thanks. I made you some cookies.
Hmm. You'll have to do better next year, but okay.
What? Are cookies not a good present?
Not when I went to all the trouble of bringing YOU a DOLLHOUSE for your present!
Wait, the dollhouse is my present? Seriously??
You give me a dollhouse in childhood, then when I leave home, you THROW AWAY all the miniatures in it because you think they're worthless... and THEN you RE-give me the SAME PRESENT, MINUS all the miniatures, when I'm in college?
You know, forget the cookies. I'm tossing them and giving you the plate.
Were you ever this ungrateful to YOUR parents, Hans?
Comic #1442
December 27 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: uh oh.
to be continued
TEXT OF COMIC:
Well, the worst is over.
Christmas Day has come and gone.
Your mother has left, and you have a giant empty dollhouse now.
And my stomach isn't hurting QUITE as much anymore from the cookies I ate.
And Norma and Ron will be back soon.
All in all, not too bad a way to end the year.
*knock*
*knock*
Um, hello?
Hans? Haa-aans! I was told that someone saw Hans enter this room. Hans, are you in here?
M-mom??
Comic #1443
December 28 2014
MOUSEOVER TEXT: Sometimes I think Hans's parents had a point.
to be continued some more
TEXT OF COMIC:
Mom? You came out of your hermit hole in the woods? When's the last time you talked to ANYONE?
Even with everything you've done, Hans, I still can't believe this. Shacking up with a classmate!
We're not "shacking up."
I don't care what you call it. You are in the same dorm with her. Haven't you seen any news lately? Wars, police brutality, genocide, slave labor, domestic abuse, corporate takeovers?
Um, Abby and I aren't doing any of those things.
It all starts somewhere. It starts with people thinking that there's anything acceptable about two human beings COHABITING for any reason other than procreation.
And by "cohabiting" you mean "spending any time in the same room whatsoever."
Of course! Do tigers have wars, Hans? Do pandas have wars? Do any SOLITARY animals have wars with their own kind? NO. They meet only to reproduce, and then go their separate, PEACEFUL ways.
This is what I tried to teach you, Hans, from the time you were a small child. Humanity will know peace only when we leave behind the sinful indulgences of social interaction.
Mom, I can't help it if I can't live up to your expectations. You put too much pressure on me!
You found the most solitary loner you could find, met him once to collect a sperm sample, and then bred me in the hopes that your combined genes would create some ultimate asocial human who would save the world.
But I'm only human. I'm not a tiger. Mom, it's hard enough being the geek that I am in this world. I'm less social than ninety percent of humanity. Isn't that ever going to be enough for you?
Hans, it's hard enough for ME to justify speaking to YOU this long. Please put the OTHER HUMAN in a different room until we're finished.
Um, no problem. Leaving now.