I know for a fact that at least one convenience store next to the Yale campus has a salad bar/buffet. The area goes down in socioeconomic status pretty fast once you leave campus, though. You could probably find tacos pretty easily.
Considering your gravatar, that’s okay. I’m sure Dorothy has done lots of obsessive research on Yale and the surrounding area, and thus knows exactly where to get tacos.
I used to live in Connecticut. New Haven has a Moes Mexican Grill and a Chipotle and tons of taco trucks along the road by the shore. Walky would make it ok.
He would have to kick up some decent studying habits unless he tags along, which would be pulling what Danny would have done… which Dorothy has already strongly expressed she DOES NOT want.
I think you hit the nail on the head there. Sometimes, personality makes a big difference. I love Danny, but I also hate him, because he’s very similar to me in a lot of respects, in that his foot is constantly in his mouth. Also, he’s kind of narcissistic, and doesn’t realize it. Walky, however, knows exactly who he is and is okay with it… for now. Anyways, this is all subject to the word of Willis.
Danny’s one of the nicest, most caring and considerate males we’ve been introduced to; arguably the *only* one who actually makes being nice and considerate a priority. The level of irritating loveydoveyness seen at the start of the comic was deliberately amped up (to the point of seeming like unreliable narration) and hasn’t resurfaced again. And Dorothy dumped him because she’d been obviously planning to do so for months (because she was leaving him behind for college) and instead of actually doing it she instead developed a mindset where he shouldn’t be that interested in her anyway, and got irritated at him for loving behavior that likely was appreciated the year previously. Oh, and he also made one single comment that pissed her off enough to (finally) end it herself. Yeah. Such a bastard.
People around here like dumping on Danny because Willis maneuvered him into a lot of uncomfortable situations based on him lacking information he had no way of knowing, but in reality if there’s any way Danny is inferior to the other boys in the comic, the only way I can think of is that he lacks the unbelievably sexy abs all of the rest of them share.
I don’t think he TOTALLY wanted her to give up her aspirations…. After all, he did make some comment about how after she was president he could hang around the oval office and update the software on her computer.
Perhaps he thought she could become president without going to Yale. (Both Carter and Reagan managed to become president without an Ivy league education.)
Comments from Willis would imply that Danny didn’t believe she could become president, and likewise that’s something she’s heard from a lot of people, so hearing it from her boyfriend is probably extra hurtful. Given what Dorothy said after the break-up, it’s probable that Danny figured that her dream to become president was a phase she was going through, and eventually she’d realize it wouldn’t happen.
More importantly, though. I’m kind of sick of the constant back and forth on their break up, and how anytime any we debate on Danny’s character we have to bring it up. They both acted like dicks (Danny’s aforementioned lack of respect for her ambitions, Dorothy not ending things months ago because she couldn’t bring herself to do it), and they’ve moved on. It was four years ago, guys.
Yale rejects plenty of perfect SAT scores. I think the wealth bias comes mostly from the fact that kids who could otherwise be doing some awesome stuff and studying end up working after school. Only around 8%of the class are legacies.
That’s a misleading statistic. Legacies have an approximate 30% acceptance rate, as opposed to non-legacies, whose acceptance is somewhere around 5%.
And, as a personal anecdote – both of my parents are Yale grads, and pretty much the moment when my sister applied, the college called to ask for money. Nothing was given, and she didn’t get in.
FWIW, only about 3-400 students got a perfect 2400 every year (It’s possible that that number will go up a bit now that we’re back to a 1600 point scale). It’s true that some perfect scores are rejected, but a perfect score with a Yale level GPA is going to be a really rare thing, and they’ll have a pretty great shot at getting in if there isn’t anything wrong with their transcript.
I’m not sure rejecting ‘plenty’ is accurate. The best reference I found is a NYT story saying that “several” students with 2,400s were rejected. If several means 3-7 or so, then that’s still about a 90% admit rate, and it’s likely that some of the several had substandard GPAs.
I’m sure it’s not exactly the same, but I got into Harvard Law with a really unremarkable transcript, but a really good GPA and LSAT score. I can’t imagine schools are that much pickier when admitting 2,000 undergrads than they are when admitting 500 graduate students.
You need to be unique in some way, but it is possible to stand out just by virtue of standardized test scores that literally everyone recognizes are ridiculous as a measure of merit. It’d be great for society if we just got rid of standardized testing as a major factor in school rankings at the very least (although it’d be shitty for me, a thoroughly unimpressive person who is REALLY good at standardized tests).
While a political dynasty may be a powerful thing in terms of connections, having your main role model doing something that important for a living is bound to have an impression.
He got what’s known as a ‘gentleman’s C’ at school, and wasn’t exactly known for applying himself to anything other than partying. The only smarts I see from him is being born into the right area of the gene pool.
No offense to Dotty, but Walky has known her for…what…2 months at most? What’re the odds that this relationship would last? That’s a pretty big life decision for a girl you’ve only known for 1/192 of your life.
I would love for someone to explain this difference.
Because I don’t really see much of one. Danny didn’t have a plan for after high school other then “Go with Dorothy” and she hated him for it, now she’s going to magically think walky’s plan of “going with Dorothy” is… better somehow?
Why? Because she might not fall out of love with him before they finish packing to get to Yale?
The idea is that Walky might grow up a little and realize what he wants in life. Having done that and finally realized what he wants to major, he could realize that Yale is excellent for that. Than that would be killing two birds with one stone. Even if it doesn’t work long term he would not have wasted his education.
The problem with Danny is that he followed Dotty and probably Joe (or maybe Joe in his way followed his main mansince he certanly didn’t have larger aspirations than to bone coeds) to IU even though IU isn’t stellar for getting a degree in computers which are his interest. he put his actual future behind an idealized future that would have never happened with Dorothy.
For starters, Danny was never going to be going to Yale. He followed Dorothy to IU, but IU’s just a stepping stone on Dorothy’s path to the Presidency, and Danny wasn’t ever going to be taking the next step with her. So, as 4th Dimension says, Danny was sacrificing his own future for a storybook future with Dorothy that was not going to happen, long-term, unless Dorothy sacrificed her future as well. And then he made the mistake of hoping for that aloud, which was the point where Dorothy flipped from, “Trying to let him down easy,” to, “Fuck this, I’m out.”
Walky, on the other hand, has been well-established to be a friggin’ genius, underperforming because he’s a slacker with no study skills. If he were to apply himself, and maybe get some help with this “How do study?” thing from Dorothy, he very well could go to Yale, and that could be a good move for him irrespective of what Dorothy does. He wouldn’t be following Dorothy and hoping she sacrifices her ambition so as not to go farther than he can follow her, he would be beside her doing it with her, and could remain beside her all the way to the White House. And he’s not secretly hoping that she fails and has to stay with him; he has implicit faith that she will be President.
The last time Walky applied himself for Dorothy’s sake it ended up with a dimension hopping genocidal madman amassing an army of teenagers in steampunk goggles.
I’m too broke to buy comics, so I’m holding out hope that Willis will decide to continue on through the Joyce & Walky! strips after he gets done the It’s Walky! rerun in four years or so. I don’t think he’s said yet whether he will or not.
Don’t take this as authoritative, but I seem to recall someone saying that Willis has promised that they’ll always be available in some form – and that it will always require first having paid.
But, uh…. It’s of the form “someone said that ____ said”, so I’d be more comfortable if I could find where Willis said it and link that for you.
Eh, Allien overlord did not happen because Walky applied himself, after all after Dorothy incident he went back to his slacker self. The allien stuff happened largely because his mother (at it allways does), Jason’s father and Penny’s boss (of all people) and a gigantic block of cheese.
Because we would totally support a girl who tried to go to a college just to follow a guy she liked.
No. That’s a bad idea. That is like taking a list of your top priorities, setting it on fire, licking the fire, and then doing something that was never on the priority list to begin with. Just don’t
It’s officially pre-retro, which in these times of post-ironic psudo-nostalgia, makes it the perfect age for reintroduction into the near-mainstream. Let the never ending cycle of memes continue!
Since the copyright date on the “original” site is 1997 I think you might be off a bit. By may calculations that makes it 18. How about that, the hamsters can vote this year…
Technically that went badly for Danny because of what he said after following her. Even if he followed her to Yale he’s not going to suddenly lose his faith in her, her goals or give up his own life and goals to cling to her.
Danny never tried to go to Yale tho? He wanted Dorothy to stay behind with him, thus going to a school that can’t further his interests in a way that satisfies him. Yale would work for Walky. If he and Dorothy break up, that’s fine, ’cause he’ll still do well and follow his dreams.
Joe: Lesbians?
Becky: Nah, it was a bust.
Joe: Bummer. High five, Walky.
Dorothy: Why doesn’t anyone want to high five me?
Roz: I’ll high five you. Here, have a free condom.
Mary: PREMARTIAL HANKYPANKY.
Joyce: Hey, that’s my line, and it’s supposed to sound cute and innocent rather than judgmental.
Joe: Tell that to my fa…
Billie: FAAAACEEEEE
Sierra: Can I come in now?
Walky: Wow, that dialogue sure turned out to be a lot of nothing.
Bagge: Sorry, it got away from me.
I’m really, really confused by the alt text. This is like the fourth time today that I’ve wondered if I had a stroke, or ate hallucinogenic mushrooms, or something, and no one told me.
Dorothy’s knowingly pretending that she’ll be able to stop loving Walky when she goes off to Yale. It’s a lie she’s telling herself because the alternative is demoralizing. She is therefore like the doggie in the commercial, who, Willis posits, knows full well that it isn’t bacon but chooses to pretend that it is bacon, in order to preserve their own happiness.
Sorry for ruining the joke by longwindedly explaining it.
Except the explanation doesn’t actually work. If the “that” she’s going to have to be okay lying about is the fact that she won’t be able to stop loving Walky when she goes off to Yale, then you’ll notice that she is in fact not lying about it, not to herself and not to Walky — which would make her statement an actual lie, which is odd because it seems she is going out of her way to be truthful. So you have to use the other reasonable referent for “that” which makes the alt text really odd. If “that” is her future relationship with Walky then being okay with lying about it reasonable. But if Dorothy is by anology the dog or Walky is, then presumably the bacon is also her relationship with Walky which seems to indicate it isn’t the real thing and one of the two of them knows it. And that really doesn’t fit.
I’m not sure. There’s words. Those words are in sentences – intelligible sentences, even. They make sense each on their own. But putting them together, and they deny my eyes the ability to read it all at once. Something is broken in the logic, and it shorts my mental circuits a bit 3/4ths of the way through and my eyes skip to the end unbidden. I think I eventually figured it out… it’s a long way of saying that one is confused by the statement: “this statement is a lie”.
The Beggin’ strip does not represent Dorothy and Walky’s relationship. The Beggin’ strip represents Dorothy leaving for Yale. She will pretend it is amazing like bacon to be at Yale, but it will actually be crappy like dog food to be apart from Walky.
Thanks for explaining that non-sequitur. I sometimes get horribly lost when I miss a step in someone’s logic – yet I’m notorious for doing that to other people as well.
I likes me some Webcomics, Daniel the Human likes his Anime DVDs + some TV shows, problem for him is they’re always showing while he’s at his permanent night shift job… 😛
Had she communicated better with Danny, he may not have followed her to IU like a lost puppy (although Danny was pretty clingy back then, which didn’t help matters). But, you’re right in that she’s usually very good about communication.
I’d go with : allegorical, delphic oracle, enfant terrible, premarital, nontransferable, chimerical, parable, repairable, cerebral,
and of course: Taco-bellical and Presidential
To me, caramel doesn’t rhyme with hardly any of those– only parallel and caravel. A lot of the ones you listed, like allegorical and parable, in my pronunciation, exhibit the syllabic L as their final sound (i.e. the final syllable has no vowel), instead of the “el” sound at the end of caramel, whereas others like cerebral have more of an “uhl” sound.
Apparently Sun City, Arizona is where the llamas run wild (after being taken on a field trip to visit some people for therapeutic reasons and then escaping)
This morning I saw a poster of llamas…. er, having a threesome, while being watched by a dog. It was a student union election poster left over from last week.
I guess llamas are just the meme animal of the month. Before that it was sloths.
Wat? Um, Dorothy, it’s been less then a month. You probably won’t transfer until beginning of sophomore or junior year. Who the hell know how you’ll feel about anyone or anything then?
We’re never going to see their sophomore year, let alone Dorothy going to Yale. In real-time they’ve been dating for nearly three years now, so even thought it might seem fast in-universe, it has to go that way to accommodate the sliding timescale otherwise we’d spend the entirety of DoA dealing with the beginning of their relationship.
It’s kind of like how Billie and Ruth went from enemies to depression hatefucking in the span of a month.
I know the meta reason, but from in story perspective…
Billie and Ruth are both drama hurricanes so I expect this kind of thing from them.
But I feel like Dorothy is supposed to be all logical and down-to-earth, but what I’ve seen is her being very rigid about her plans for the future to the point of inefficiency, while also being easily caught up in momentary infatuation.
I think that discrepancy is a large source of annoyance for herself as well.
What I think she is really doing now is putting effort in being honest with herself and Walky about her feelings, just as she’s saying, and maybe taking it one step too far into overanalyze-everything-mode (not COMPLETELY out of character…). Given how her last relationship turned extremely awkward by her failure to communicate her feelings that is understandable.
Also, Walky is only part of it. Between him, Joyce, Amazi-girl and some of the others Dorothy is growing a bit too fond of IU to be entirely happy about her planned transfer. She uses their relationship to voice those feelings.
What I’ve had a continued hard time with, though, is trying to understand what Willis wants us to think of Dorothy. He’s made indications that we are supposed to think she’s a well-adjusted genius and we’re supposed to take her ambitions seriously. But my impression is that she’s very hard working and intelligent (but possibly less so than her own boyfriend), but in-over-her-head by lightyears and incredibly naive. Am I supposed to feel this way, or is it just unintended consequence because I’m overly cynical D:
My take on “what do Willis want us to think” in most cases is that he wants us to think whatever we want. As I see it, most of the characters are designed to be nuanced with both flaws and strengths. They each have an accessible and believable world view from which their actions are understandable.
As for Dorothy I don’t know if she has what it takes to be president or even to go to Yale, but she most definitely wouldn’t do it without the attitude that she can. I see it as an “aim for the stars” thing. What if she, in a year or so, figures out that she doesn’t want to transfer, or that the workload is too much, or that she doesn’t want to spend her life sucking up to stupid people (like Robin)? Then she would have spent a year or so working hard and getting awesome grades and putting in a lot of extra work… it’s not like that wouldn’t be of use to her or that she wouldn’t be proud of it, and it’s not like she’s neglecting to have fun and get friends in the meantime.
Yeah, I opt for the ‘think for yourself’ take as well.
Dorothy is yet another freshman who doesn’t yet know the limits of her own abilities. She either is one of the few who can achieve what she believes to be non-negotiable, or she is forced to admit her own shortcomings at some point. Saw that a lot with the pre-med and pre-nursing students taking chemistry courses when I was pursuing my undergrad in the subject – those that couldn’t understand the subject had to eventually realize their limit and switch majors. Not to be all smug, mind you – I certainly found my limit as well, and it’s called quantum mechanics.
Not really “hatefucking” so much as “despairfucking in an attempt to cling to something beautiful in this crazy mixed up world in which they find themselves.” The phrase “fight, flight, or fuck” comes to mind but I couldn’t tell you why. Something about instinct or grasping at straws or…idk.
Someone get these students some counseling. Not just Billie and Ruth. Damn near half the cast needs it. Amber, Billie, Ethan, Joe (speculative, likely given hiding from emotions), Joyce, Mary (speculative), Ruth, Sal, Sarah…
… from my experience I would guess that even with competent counseling it would likely take years to for some of those characters to reach something resembling normal … which would still leave LOTS of room for stupidity and drama (that part is of course not from personal experience) 😉
I’d like that as a plot point, starting with the card Roz gave Joyce. Given the pace we could see a character in therapy every four months or so so it wouldn’t swamp the story or anything
i agree, but what with Willis’ worlds waxing realistic not everyone would be guaranteed to get competent help … … oh … I can sort of see Joyce going for pastoral counseling and having a really direct confrontation with an example of the religious insanity she is working to overcome … heh, she could ask Mary for advice for someone to talk to … …
Awwww. Open and honest discussion about feelings and relationships. Come on you guys, where is the dumb drama in that?
Dorothy, you are great and all, and I know you and Danny ran into a problem with this, but you’ve been together for a whopping three weeks. I think you can afford to play it by ear for a while
I don’t know what “infinite chocolate” is about, but the dress thing is actually really interesting. I expect some good popular science articles about it tomorrow.
It’s an older meme – a .gif of a bar of chocolate, with a series of cuts and rearrangements made to look like a violation of the conservation of matter.
But one of the cuts and rearrangements produced the slightest of gaps, not visible with the resolution available. People wigged out for a bit about that one, too.
Yeah I learned about it about 10 minutes ago. Apparently someone put up a picture of a dress and asked people if it was black and blue or gold and white. Teh Interwebz has gone crazy over arguing what color it is.
I think there’s something to be said for early and thorough communication. I think it’s best that everyone understand what’s going on, even if it means you have to have another talk later when things change. Especially when the feelings involved in your relationship are confusing and one of you is going to be moving away to a different place soon! Not… that I’ve experienced anything… like that…
Some people don’t like long distance, on account of wanting to snuggle and have sexytimes and such. It’s a fine model for some people/relationships, but it would be the polar opposite of the temporary-for-fun arrangement that they both initially wanted.
Think the author won’t be interested in working on this till 2070 ? Then again think we’ll all be dead by then and the internet will be replaced with a new world system.
Every time this comes up, I can’t help but think that discouraging thought in the back of my mind: this is going to be resolved when Dorothy gets a rejection letter from Yale regarding her application for transfer. On one hand, she’s motivated and smart. On the other, it’s goddamn Yale and the only people who take such a fait accompli attitude toward it and get away with it were born into the ol’ boy network.
So she’s likely going to work her ass off and still not get in. On one hand, she can be around Walky for longer! On the other, potential crisis of self-worth and derailment of White House ambitions.
Or she resolves to double down, work harder, and try again the next year… but that’s likely to lead to burnout.
Completely agree, I was never really onboard with Dorothy’s whole “It’s gonna happen” confidence. It’s incredibly hard to transfer like that, and do we know why she isn’t currently at Yale? If money, I can understand the confidence, but if she was denied up front, her chances are slim to none.
She can be that confident because Willis can make it happen. He’s said repeatedly Dorothy’s ambition is not a flaw and will not be punished. Whether she becomes president might be up in the air forever but getting into the school she wants is petty much a sure thing.
I never said it was a bad thing. The whole “shoot for the moon, even if you miss you land among the stars (if you’re going fast enough (I had to do science to the idiom, I just had to.))” thing is very applicable.
You can literally just keep trying and trying forever. Not like you get rejected and it’s like “Welp, Yale’s off the table now”. You can perpetually maintain a state where every year is potentially the last year you spend here.
I think long before she gave up on Yale we’d come up against the question of how long Walky’s willing to stay in that sort of relationship.
Well of course she’s not gonna get in; the heat death of our universe will occur before she’s far enough into her school year to even send an application.
I seem to recall Willis saying he only planed to cover their first year anyway, so whether or not she gets into Yale is epilogue territory anyway (and let’s face Willis will probably die of old age before the mid-semester break).
*Watches from building rooftop opposite, watching through scope*
This is Unit 3, target acquisition confirmed. Silencing success, noone believed them. Operation is still good to go, confidentiality confirmed…
Agreed on the first point. On the second, I think Dorothy might find that a bitter pill to swallow… but she might do it.
So, the idea of Yale. Walky will believe in her, that’s a given… but he may not be comfortable reciprocating the love when there’s an expiration date on the relationship. Of course, he could suggest they go long-distance, and that would be the end of this plotline for the next quarter-century of comic updates. Meanwhile, the conundrum might have an effect on Dorothy’s work, or her friendships. She might decide to spend as much of her free time as possible having couple-time with Walky, to the detriment of Joyce. The emotional stress may impact her work, slowing it down, giving her less time for other things. For the near future, though, she’s going to try to ignore it and carry on as usual.
…
And then Walky will tell her about his 26. That’ll be a fun conversation. She might discover she does want him to come along… because she knows it wouldn’t be akin to him clinging to her like a barnacle to the hull of a ship… the way it would have been if Danny tried the same thing. Walky’s confidence is made of sterner stuff, and importantly, it would be her making the offer. But! The grade would get in the way, so she may take it upon herself to whip him into shape. Walky might rankle under this new regiment, and Dorothy is unlikely to use certain motivational tactics that have worked in the past because they would distract him from studying.
And if we’re feeling like schadenfreude, what if, at the end of all that hoopla, Walky gets in and Dorothy doesn’t? We know that the Walkertons have a certain amount of connections… And life is all about who you know these days.
Is Walky’s confidence REALLY made of Sterner stuff’s than Danny’s? Danny was a lot more clingy than Walky and has possible problems with self image, but Walky is also a lot less mature. Walky’s “Confidence” may be a result of that immaturity (i.e. not really knowing when there are problems around.)
And remember, we’ve seen him absolutely panic under stress… when he found out about his failing math grade, and when he thought Dorothy was mad at him.
Perhaps I should categorize the type of confidence I mean. Walky is good with people. He’s personable. He’s the sort of person who can schmooze his way through meeting his girlfriend’s parents while in box seats at a football game.
That’s the sort of confidence he has, the sort which Danny lacks.
Keep in mind he had to be prodded into displaying it– he was in “deer in the headlights” mode until then, and it took quite a bit of luck for him to fumble his way into that competence– to “fail upward,” as he’d put it– without throwing his foot into his mouth at ludicrous speed.
That wouldn’t really resolve anything. A rejection letter isn’t the end of the story. Just means another year of her trying to get in.
That’s even assuming the two options are Go to Yale or Stay Here. The only reason she’s even here is as a stepping stone to Yale. If the Yale plans change then she’s got no reason to be here anymore. Probably goes somewhere else entirely.
I actually applied for Yale out of HS. Had a 4.0 GPA unweighted and was involved in extracurriculars and still got rejected.
I’m not saying that I should have gotten in or that my application essays
weren’t complete shit. I’m just saying it’s very competitive and that it can look like you’re doing everything right and your application still might not go through.
Yet some people are just that smart. I knew one kid in my graduating high school class who was like that. When he was accepted into MIT, no one was really surprised.
I wonder if she knows how rare it is for people to transfer into Yale. There are like 3 per year, most because of connections. Of the two I know, one is a billionaire and the other the star running back (or quarterback, I forget).
I don’t think Dorothy’s ever been shown to be unaware of the difficulties of her aspirations (she wants to be President of the US, you only get one of those every four years). She’s also first year college, which is when lots of people have very high goals which they may not be able to reach (and be happy anyway, but that’s another story).
if accepted, it’s rare to not be able to attend Yale due to money issues. All students have free rides until household income hits $80,000 per year, with a sliding scale above that. As a general rule, families aren’t asked to pay more than %10 of their income until they hit $500,000 per year.
Well, I got accepted to Yale, but had to turn it down for, well, reasons thanks to family and goofy politics and legacies. Even 20 years later, still aggravated about that, although I don’t regret the University and Grad Schools I did go to.
Dorothy isn’t taking into account one nice little factor that could trip her up hardocre. Real life complications tend to disrupt even the best laid plans. And I do have to wonder what she might have as a contingency plan if and/or when Yale says “No Dice.”
This is my real question about Dorothy. When life inevitably throws a wrench at her carefully constructed plans, will she be able to think on her feet and reconstruct a new path to the White House, or will she go down with the ship?
Well, that’s kinda what she’s doing right now. She wanted to go to Yale in the first place and IU is her plan B. I would say that she’s doing pretty well for a plan B. She works and strategizes and plans ahead, but she isn’t bitter over lost opportunities and doesn’t neglect to make friends and have fun.
Did she already apply for Yale and go to her back-up school?
I was under the impression that she hadn’t applied for regular undergraduate admission, due to financial reasons or ??? reasons, but I don’t think it’s been confirmed.
But it’s entirely possible she’s already rolling well with Plan B, in which case she’s doing a splendid job.
Huh, you are right, we haven’t been told. I just assumed she sent in an application and got rejected. Either way, Walky was not in the original plan, and we have seen her adjust to that. So if nothing else she has a certain flexibility.
It’s a lot harder to transfer into Yale generally than to get admitted out of HS. Their transfer class is pretty small, and about 30 of them are Eli Whitney people, and Dorothy won’t qualify for that.
If people are interested in numbers, Yale has about 60 transfers a year counting Eli Whitney students, (non-traditional) and 30 without them. They get about 1,000 transfer applications. 30/1000 vs 2,000/30,000 for normal admissions. Transferring is hard.
Well, in my state, transferring is used as a back door into the UW. But, that’s only because the school has a transfer agreement where they accept a certain number of transfers from local community colleges each year. Left to its own devices, the UW would opt for the more lucrative out-of-state students.
Dorothy’s got her head up her butt if she thinks the change will be superficial. Walky is not going for a long term long distance relationship, he just ain’t built that way.
Dorothy dropped Danny before going to college. He followed her, and assumed they would continue. She tried to be diplomatic. But Danny doesn’t do sublely well, so she had to tell him straight out: you’re high school, you can’t follow me to Yale, you aren’t even motivated enough to be here.
Walky is not stupid, regardless of the 26. He just got the Freshman wakeup call “slide thru HS if you want, it don’t work in college”. He may well be accepted to Yale, if he wanted to try for it that is.
And that brings up a story development not mentioned yet. What if Walky got accepted and Dorothy didn’t?
Actually I don’t think Dorothy broke up with Danny until AFTER they got to college. In one of the earliest comics you can see them in the background holding hands. And when they finally do break up, Dorothy says something along the lines of “I should have done this before we went to university”.
Dororthy didn’t drop Danny until the night he met Amazi-Girl. When he made it clear to Dorothy he didn’t respect her goals and intended to cling to her and throw everything else in his life away.
She’s saying she doesn’t know if saying she loves him will change anything. Nowhere is she implying that her going to Yale will be a superficial change. She is telling him that despite her loving him, she is still going to go to Yale and that will likely be the end of their relationship.
Dorothy was stating that her falling in love changes her Yale plans superficially. In other words, Yale is still priority #1, despite this turn of events.
Oh, man. The dialogue is sad and sweet and mature, and yet Dorothy and Walky spooning is one of the most adorable things ever shown in this comic. I’m getting the old Willis whiplash in between the panels of a single strip. Again.
Women’s magazines told me that in the spooning position the “small spoon” is less devoted to the relationship. Though they also told me [insert bullshit here].
We are in week 5, and Dorothy’s plan is to go to Yale in… two years? Four years?
Assuming we continue at the one-comic-week-per-real-life-year pace, skipping no weeks, Yale in two years won’t be an issue for another… not quite a century.
This means, David Willis, that you need to live to at least age 150 – and continue this comic for that time! – before you shuffle off your mortal coil.
Let’s assume that Willis manages to advance the buffer by two and a half days for each day that he works on average. That means that he only needs to work for 40 years to write & draw the next two years in-story. It’ll take us another 59 years to catch up, but it’s doable, especially if Willis works harder than that.
I’d say Pamela and Leslie. Both are old enough to have caught it in different iterations. Leslie is enough of a geek to disagree with Walky about Monkey master (and a known Trekker in another universe).
Actually mentioned to watch Star Trek: Ethan’s RA, but he doesn’t count as cast until he makes an appearance.
Look what Walky is doing here. Dorothy is asking him to tell what he is feeling, but instead he listens to her telling him what SHE is feeling. He doesn’t miss the point, he doesn’t joke it away, he doesn’t make it about him even when she hesitate how to go about it.
Let’s see the next strip before we praise him, but yes Walky being good, despite Dorothy going off on a different problem than his (even though it’s about them). She is…er, you chances at Presidency and chances with Walky are not mutually exclusive!
Looking back through the archives, I see that Dorothy has met with a guidance counselor on multiple occasions. So she’s not entirely without an informed adult perspective on her future plans, and hopefully her advisor has said, “Yale? Great! Do you have a backup plan?” If Plan A doesn’t work out, there are places with names like Harvard, Princeton, and Georgetown that have also hosted the matriculation of future presidents.
Of course, all of them are elsewhere than Indiana and therefore not equipped to resolve the basic emotional dilemma here. I wouldn’t put it past Willis to leave the precise nature of Dorothy’s future fairly ambiguous when he ends the comic in another ten or fifteen years (at which point the characters will have just completed their finals for the first semester).
This kind of came out of nowhere, but that gravatar of Joyce with a dildo and a condom on her head… does anyone know which strip that came from? I feel I’d remember a strip with that and I NEED TO KNOW
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or Walky could… I dunno… ALSO go to Yale???
[or would that take actually having to make long-term life decisions]
I’m sure Yale has tacos too…
Only the finest tacos.
But are they butt tacos?
I’m fairly confident that the ground meat in the tacos contains at least some butt.
Exactly how fine are the finest tacos?
Thats how fine:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpgjuhJiUbs
I saw Howard Johnson, and not knowing any better thought that you were saying that Howard Johnson taco meat is soo fine!
I know for a fact that at least one convenience store next to the Yale campus has a salad bar/buffet. The area goes down in socioeconomic status pretty fast once you leave campus, though. You could probably find tacos pretty easily.
And now my comment looks like I obsessively researched the likelihood of tacos near Yale.
Considering your gravatar, that’s okay. I’m sure Dorothy has done lots of obsessive research on Yale and the surrounding area, and thus knows exactly where to get tacos.
I actually interpreted the comment as stating, essentially, that as the SES in an area declines, the likelihood of Tacos existing in it increase.
I used to live in Connecticut. New Haven has a Moes Mexican Grill and a Chipotle and tons of taco trucks along the road by the shore. Walky would make it ok.
For the record, all of that is within reasonable walking distance from Yale.
He would have to kick up some decent studying habits unless he tags along, which would be pulling what Danny would have done… which Dorothy has already strongly expressed she DOES NOT want.
He could always work as a Taco Bell cook at the cafeteria..
Yeah that would be pretty hypocritical of her.
It’s always possible that Dorothy broke up with Danny because he’s Danny, and not because he solved the long distance “problem.’
I think you hit the nail on the head there. Sometimes, personality makes a big difference. I love Danny, but I also hate him, because he’s very similar to me in a lot of respects, in that his foot is constantly in his mouth. Also, he’s kind of narcissistic, and doesn’t realize it. Walky, however, knows exactly who he is and is okay with it… for now. Anyways, this is all subject to the word of Willis.
Danny’s one of the nicest, most caring and considerate males we’ve been introduced to; arguably the *only* one who actually makes being nice and considerate a priority. The level of irritating loveydoveyness seen at the start of the comic was deliberately amped up (to the point of seeming like unreliable narration) and hasn’t resurfaced again. And Dorothy dumped him because she’d been obviously planning to do so for months (because she was leaving him behind for college) and instead of actually doing it she instead developed a mindset where he shouldn’t be that interested in her anyway, and got irritated at him for loving behavior that likely was appreciated the year previously. Oh, and he also made one single comment that pissed her off enough to (finally) end it herself. Yeah. Such a bastard.
People around here like dumping on Danny because Willis maneuvered him into a lot of uncomfortable situations based on him lacking information he had no way of knowing, but in reality if there’s any way Danny is inferior to the other boys in the comic, the only way I can think of is that he lacks the unbelievably sexy abs all of the rest of them share.
Here, here! Bravo!
I strongly agree with all of this (and I would still agree even if you didn’t have the Danny grav).
Danny was hoping that Dorothy would give up on her aspirations. http://www.dumbingofage.com/2010/comic/book-1/01-move-in-day/through/ That is not a nice thing to hope for anyone, and particularly not a nice thing to hope for someone you supposedly love.
I don’t think he TOTALLY wanted her to give up her aspirations…. After all, he did make some comment about how after she was president he could hang around the oval office and update the software on her computer.
Perhaps he thought she could become president without going to Yale. (Both Carter and Reagan managed to become president without an Ivy league education.)
Comments from Willis would imply that Danny didn’t believe she could become president, and likewise that’s something she’s heard from a lot of people, so hearing it from her boyfriend is probably extra hurtful. Given what Dorothy said after the break-up, it’s probable that Danny figured that her dream to become president was a phase she was going through, and eventually she’d realize it wouldn’t happen.
More importantly, though. I’m kind of sick of the constant back and forth on their break up, and how anytime any we debate on Danny’s character we have to bring it up. They both acted like dicks (Danny’s aforementioned lack of respect for her ambitions, Dorothy not ending things months ago because she couldn’t bring herself to do it), and they’ve moved on. It was four years ago, guys.
you mean four WEEKS amirite
You beat me to the exact same comment… Darn it. But I agree… Walky could just go with her.
Everybody keeps saying this. I’m pretty sure Yale has damn high standards, y’all.
It’s easier if you’re rich.
Some studies have demonstrated that the SAT, despite being standardized, is in fact biased in favor of people from wealthier backgrounds.
Well that explains why my friend who is just as smart as me did much better on the SAT’she Iis definitely wealthier than me…
Yale rejects plenty of perfect SAT scores. I think the wealth bias comes mostly from the fact that kids who could otherwise be doing some awesome stuff and studying end up working after school. Only around 8%of the class are legacies.
That’s a misleading statistic. Legacies have an approximate 30% acceptance rate, as opposed to non-legacies, whose acceptance is somewhere around 5%.
And, as a personal anecdote – both of my parents are Yale grads, and pretty much the moment when my sister applied, the college called to ask for money. Nothing was given, and she didn’t get in.
FWIW, only about 3-400 students got a perfect 2400 every year (It’s possible that that number will go up a bit now that we’re back to a 1600 point scale). It’s true that some perfect scores are rejected, but a perfect score with a Yale level GPA is going to be a really rare thing, and they’ll have a pretty great shot at getting in if there isn’t anything wrong with their transcript.
I’m not sure rejecting ‘plenty’ is accurate. The best reference I found is a NYT story saying that “several” students with 2,400s were rejected. If several means 3-7 or so, then that’s still about a 90% admit rate, and it’s likely that some of the several had substandard GPAs.
I’m sure it’s not exactly the same, but I got into Harvard Law with a really unremarkable transcript, but a really good GPA and LSAT score. I can’t imagine schools are that much pickier when admitting 2,000 undergrads than they are when admitting 500 graduate students.
You need to be unique in some way, but it is possible to stand out just by virtue of standardized test scores that literally everyone recognizes are ridiculous as a measure of merit. It’d be great for society if we just got rid of standardized testing as a major factor in school rankings at the very least (although it’d be shitty for me, a thoroughly unimpressive person who is REALLY good at standardized tests).
Might I remind you that GW Bush went to Yale?
Yeah, but that fucker was smart enough to be president, which is pretty fucking smart.
That’s actually an excellent point. You’ve got to have at least a certain sort of smarts to manage it.
More to the point, his daddy was smart enough to be President.
And his daddy before him was a governor.
And people say we don’t have ‘royalty’.
Not quite sure about that.
While a political dynasty may be a powerful thing in terms of connections, having your main role model doing something that important for a living is bound to have an impression.
He knew a lot of smart people. As does his brother.
*cough* Reagan *cough*
He got what’s known as a ‘gentleman’s C’ at school, and wasn’t exactly known for applying himself to anything other than partying. The only smarts I see from him is being born into the right area of the gene pool.
He could always apply to the University of New Haven.
They could meet up at Toad’s each week.
And pick up extra power-ups with which to help survive the college experience?
My alma mater!
Walky is probably smart enough to do it though. If he cares enough to do the hard work, or if he would be happy if he did, is another matter.
If people could just randomly go to Yale Dorothy wouldn’t be here.
Anyone CAN go to Yale, though!
Enrolling in classes is a different thing.
No offense to Dotty, but Walky has known her for…what…2 months at most? What’re the odds that this relationship would last? That’s a pretty big life decision for a girl you’ve only known for 1/192 of your life.
That’s more than .5%! Plenty of time.
One one-ninety tooth! that’s tiny.
Actually it’s only been a month
Not even that. It’s been four weeks, or just over a month.
It’s called Dumbing of Age for a reason.
Yeah because Dorothy was so delighted the last time a boyfriend followed her to college just so he could stay her boyfriend.
Or maybe Dorothy realized that she didn’t like Danny and wanted to move on to a more challenging boyfriend.
yeah, Walky can eat FIFTY McNuggets!
Dude, she’s dating Walky “for fun.” That’s like the whole basis of their relationship.
Danny followed Dorothy to IU. Walky could potentially go to Yale with her. There’s a subtle but important difference.
I would love for someone to explain this difference.
Because I don’t really see much of one. Danny didn’t have a plan for after high school other then “Go with Dorothy” and she hated him for it, now she’s going to magically think walky’s plan of “going with Dorothy” is… better somehow?
Why? Because she might not fall out of love with him before they finish packing to get to Yale?
The idea is that Walky might grow up a little and realize what he wants in life. Having done that and finally realized what he wants to major, he could realize that Yale is excellent for that. Than that would be killing two birds with one stone. Even if it doesn’t work long term he would not have wasted his education.
The problem with Danny is that he followed Dotty and probably Joe (or maybe Joe in his way followed his main mansince he certanly didn’t have larger aspirations than to bone coeds) to IU even though IU isn’t stellar for getting a degree in computers which are his interest. he put his actual future behind an idealized future that would have never happened with Dorothy.
The difference is Dorothy wanted to get rid of Danny by going to IU.
For starters, Danny was never going to be going to Yale. He followed Dorothy to IU, but IU’s just a stepping stone on Dorothy’s path to the Presidency, and Danny wasn’t ever going to be taking the next step with her. So, as 4th Dimension says, Danny was sacrificing his own future for a storybook future with Dorothy that was not going to happen, long-term, unless Dorothy sacrificed her future as well. And then he made the mistake of hoping for that aloud, which was the point where Dorothy flipped from, “Trying to let him down easy,” to, “Fuck this, I’m out.”
Walky, on the other hand, has been well-established to be a friggin’ genius, underperforming because he’s a slacker with no study skills. If he were to apply himself, and maybe get some help with this “How do study?” thing from Dorothy, he very well could go to Yale, and that could be a good move for him irrespective of what Dorothy does. He wouldn’t be following Dorothy and hoping she sacrifices her ambition so as not to go farther than he can follow her, he would be beside her doing it with her, and could remain beside her all the way to the White House. And he’s not secretly hoping that she fails and has to stay with him; he has implicit faith that she will be President.
The last time Walky applied himself for Dorothy’s sake it ended up with a dimension hopping genocidal madman amassing an army of teenagers in steampunk goggles.
Stick to to the cartoons, Walky.
…
Okay, that’s another .05 priority slot jump for “Read Old Walkyverse.”
That stuff is all part of the Joyce and Walky line; it’s behind a paywall. Takes place after the end of the It’s Walky series.
🙁
I’m too broke to buy comics, so I’m holding out hope that Willis will decide to continue on through the Joyce & Walky! strips after he gets done the It’s Walky! rerun in four years or so. I don’t think he’s said yet whether he will or not.
Don’t take this as authoritative, but I seem to recall someone saying that Willis has promised that they’ll always be available in some form – and that it will always require first having paid.
But, uh…. It’s of the form “someone said that ____ said”, so I’d be more comfortable if I could find where Willis said it and link that for you.
Also available as a Patreon reward.
Eh, Allien overlord did not happen because Walky applied himself, after all after Dorothy incident he went back to his slacker self. The allien stuff happened largely because his mother (at it allways does), Jason’s father and Penny’s boss (of all people) and a gigantic block of cheese.
Because we would totally support a girl who tried to go to a college just to follow a guy she liked.
No. That’s a bad idea. That is like taking a list of your top priorities, setting it on fire, licking the fire, and then doing something that was never on the priority list to begin with. Just don’t
Worked out pretty well in “legally blonde”, after all! 😀
No but seriously don’t
Awwww. ♥
Never watched that show, so I’m not sure how it would affect a relationship.
OH MY GOD I LOVE YOU
“Um. Dorothy. Are you trying to tell me something?”
“N-no! What do you mean? I just really like the L-Word that’s all!”
Heh. My first thought too:
WALKY: well, it sounds cool, but will it hurt, me becoming a lesbian?
scott pilgrim jokes incoming
Tell the jokes I’m not here *jumps out window*
Which really would make Walky Sal’s brother for sure.
He’s not in lesbians with her, but he’s certainly been around them.
Guys shouldn’t be in lesbians at all, the lesbians do not enjoy it.
Bum-Dum Tiss!
That’s so 2010, it’s all about the llamas now.
But the llama song is like 10 years old!
Wait, does that mean it’s cool again?
Throw in some ducks and we’re golden.
It’s officially pre-retro, which in these times of post-ironic psudo-nostalgia, makes it the perfect age for reintroduction into the near-mainstream. Let the never ending cycle of memes continue!
the Hamster Dance is 15 this year.
Since the copyright date on the “original” site is 1997 I think you might be off a bit. By may calculations that makes it 18. How about that, the hamsters can vote this year…
Have you watched the news today? Today was about net neutrality, llamas, and dress color.
L-word for Latino?
L-word? Lord?
Dotty is so cute without her glasses it makes me physically angry.
Or… you know… Walky could just make sure his grades stay positive and go to Yale with her…
That didn’t go so well for Danny.
This is true…
Technically that went badly for Danny because of what he said after following her. Even if he followed her to Yale he’s not going to suddenly lose his faith in her, her goals or give up his own life and goals to cling to her.
Danny never tried to go to Yale tho? He wanted Dorothy to stay behind with him, thus going to a school that can’t further his interests in a way that satisfies him. Yale would work for Walky. If he and Dorothy break up, that’s fine, ’cause he’ll still do well and follow his dreams.
Positive might not good enough for Yale, those grades will need to be immaculate.
Yeah, I meant Yale positive. Sorry for confusion.
The dreaded L-word… libel??
No. She totally means lesbian.
Lobotomy?
lolocaust?
Lariat? Larakin? Looser? Lobster?
Lounging lazily, licking lolipops lovingly…
Becky bursts through the wall like Kool-Aid Man.
“Did somebody call me? Because I’m totally a lesbian!”
I could see this actually happening… only maybe busting through the door and not the wall… but same premise.
I could see this actually happening… only maybe busting through the door and not the wall… but same premise.
“Oh it’s just you Bony Poindexter…” *walks out*
Joe: Lesbians?
Becky: Nah, it was a bust.
Joe: Bummer. High five, Walky.
Dorothy: Why doesn’t anyone want to high five me?
Roz: I’ll high five you. Here, have a free condom.
Mary: PREMARTIAL HANKYPANKY.
Joyce: Hey, that’s my line, and it’s supposed to sound cute and innocent rather than judgmental.
Joe: Tell that to my fa…
Billie: FAAAACEEEEE
Sierra: Can I come in now?
Walky: Wow, that dialogue sure turned out to be a lot of nothing.
Bagge: Sorry, it got away from me.
For you… http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h252/ShadowStalkerWA/Emoticons/11002499_10200107599568248_3854489698682705222_n_zps1xumqvea.jpg
Awwwww, you shouldn’t have.
Llama, clearly llama.
A blue & black llama, or a white & gold llama?
Teh interwebz. Lolz
Red, gold, and green!
Red! Gold! And! Green!
Lilliputian libertarians leave Leicester late?
Lego? Lava? Laser? Lecture? Legolas?
Liberal, obviously. D:
Love kinda puts a damper on your little plan huh?
Love is often damp and spotty and no-one likes sleeping on the damp spot.
That depends on your kinks.
Love is always inconvenient if it’s not both people’s priority.
Don’t worry Dotty, this comic has a sliding timescale. You’re never going to Yale! You’re never even finishing freshman year!
Wait, that sounds horrible now that I think about it. Do these characters know they are actually in hell?
Hell is other characters. There is no exit
Yeah, bongoes
Thank you, M. Sartre.
The disconnect between your words and your gravatar is striking.
The dark secret of DoA is that it’s actually purgatory.
If 3-ish weeks are 3-ish real-world years, than we have roughly 205 years of comics to come.
I want to get off Mr. Willis’ wild ride.
(Not really, but had to make the reference.)
On Willis’ deathbed, he makes the last comic in which all the characters decide to get associate degrees instead…
[applauds]
And after their degree ceremony, everyone is ushered into a hall where…. Freshman Week begins!
So, judging by the speed with which Willis writes comics, the buffer will hit that point in about 2020.
Joyce and Mary obviously doesn’t, or they’re both in Denial
The reason time seems to be going slower and slower is that DoAverse’s Earth is getting closer and closer to a supermassive black hole.
Or the DoA earth is just accelerating at near-light speeds relative to the reader.
Hell is other people, reading your web-comic.
To the contrary, hell is other idiots commenting on your web comic.
Don’t let time problem get you down. Dorothy’s not going to Yale either way.
It’s an exponential series.
Nope, it’s Xeno’s Freshman year as they approach mid-term. Achilles will never catch the TA with his homework assignment.
I wonder if Dorothy knew this was bothering Walky, or if she just had the same concerns herself.
That wasn’t what was bothering Walky. He was bummed out about failing a quiz.
No, it was bothering Walky earlier, when she said she loved him. SO now he can be bothered by both that _and_ his failing the quiz.
It’s a multi-purpose bum.
Those two aren’t mutually exclusive, y’know.
I’m really, really confused by the alt text. This is like the fourth time today that I’ve wondered if I had a stroke, or ate hallucinogenic mushrooms, or something, and no one told me.
There’s a commercial about fake bacon treats for dogs. It claims that the dogs don’t know it isn’t bacon.
I got that bit. I’m just having trouble adding that to this comic and getting anything that makes sense. I feel like I’m missing something.
Dorothy’s knowingly pretending that she’ll be able to stop loving Walky when she goes off to Yale. It’s a lie she’s telling herself because the alternative is demoralizing. She is therefore like the doggie in the commercial, who, Willis posits, knows full well that it isn’t bacon but chooses to pretend that it is bacon, in order to preserve their own happiness.
Sorry for ruining the joke by longwindedly explaining it.
Longwinded explanations are like bonus jokes in and of themselves. Bonus points for Mojo Jojo syntax.
If you don’t get the joke, it’s pretty ruined already, I’d say.
Except the explanation doesn’t actually work. If the “that” she’s going to have to be okay lying about is the fact that she won’t be able to stop loving Walky when she goes off to Yale, then you’ll notice that she is in fact not lying about it, not to herself and not to Walky — which would make her statement an actual lie, which is odd because it seems she is going out of her way to be truthful. So you have to use the other reasonable referent for “that” which makes the alt text really odd. If “that” is her future relationship with Walky then being okay with lying about it reasonable. But if Dorothy is by anology the dog or Walky is, then presumably the bacon is also her relationship with Walky which seems to indicate it isn’t the real thing and one of the two of them knows it. And that really doesn’t fit.
Oh my god what is going on
Philosophy. Philosophy is going on.
I’m not sure. There’s words. Those words are in sentences – intelligible sentences, even. They make sense each on their own. But putting them together, and they deny my eyes the ability to read it all at once. Something is broken in the logic, and it shorts my mental circuits a bit 3/4ths of the way through and my eyes skip to the end unbidden. I think I eventually figured it out… it’s a long way of saying that one is confused by the statement: “this statement is a lie”.
Needs more Hofstadter.
The Beggin’ strip does not represent Dorothy and Walky’s relationship. The Beggin’ strip represents Dorothy leaving for Yale. She will pretend it is amazing like bacon to be at Yale, but it will actually be crappy like dog food to be apart from Walky.
Thanks for explaining that non-sequitur. I sometimes get horribly lost when I miss a step in someone’s logic – yet I’m notorious for doing that to other people as well.
I thought she was pretending she was going to Yale.
And taking Walky with her.
I mean, neither of those are going to happen, but I figured she fit the analogy best.
Ohhh. Got it, thanks. You miss things like that when you refuse to pay the time and money for TV.
TV isn’t really worth it anymore but certain TV programming such as Steven Fry’s QI series is still worth it.
Hurray Netflix! And Crunchyroll, I guess.
I likes me some Webcomics, Daniel the Human likes his Anime DVDs + some TV shows, problem for him is they’re always showing while he’s at his permanent night shift job… 😛
AFAIK Willis made a mistake and meant to type “Dogs know its NOT bacon”
http://www.amazon.com/Beggin-Strips-Treats-Bacon-Cheese/dp/B005J8UAFI
Or if you are from Australia, this is the treat for dogs:
http://www.schmackos.com.au/imageGen.ashx?Compression=100&width=270&image=/media/3241/bacon.png
Welcome to “The Bacontrix”
Love, alas, does not conquer all.
I’m glad Dorothy is communicating n’stuff. It’s nice to see.
True. Honesty and forthrightness has been lacking in a lot of relationships in this comic lately. Let’s turn that ship around!
But Dorothy’s always been communicative…shockingly so, even. It’s Walky who’s been having that problem….
Had she communicated better with Danny, he may not have followed her to IU like a lost puppy (although Danny was pretty clingy back then, which didn’t help matters). But, you’re right in that she’s usually very good about communication.
Alt-text: huh?
It’s a take on a dog treat called Beggin’ Strips, they look like bacon.
Finish that metaphor for me….
I second that “huh”.
I third the “huh”. The motion passes. We are confused.
I’m thinking maybe Willis accidentally left out a *not* in there.
I just figured that lack of the “NOT” out.
So, Walky is the imitiation bacon here?
No. Dotty believing she can just stop loving Walky when she leaves is the bacon.
Once you go caramel,
You crave a barrel-mel err more.
Rhyming sure is hard sometimes.
marital, parallel, cerebral, premarital, transferable, repairable, apparel, arable, parable, , wearable , caravel,
chimerical, comparable, numerical, satirical,unbearable
allegorical, delphic oracle, enfant terrible, extramarital, nontransferable, oratorical,
I’d go with : allegorical, delphic oracle, enfant terrible, premarital, nontransferable, chimerical, parable, repairable, cerebral,
and of course: Taco-bellical and Presidential
To me, caramel doesn’t rhyme with hardly any of those– only parallel and caravel. A lot of the ones you listed, like allegorical and parable, in my pronunciation, exhibit the syllabic L as their final sound (i.e. the final syllable has no vowel), instead of the “el” sound at the end of caramel, whereas others like cerebral have more of an “uhl” sound.
I say car-uh-mull
But I think those rhymes are stretching it a little. 😉
Don’t forget Pachelbel.
… but we don’t know this is canon …
Walky’s “Canon” is certainly “In D” …orothy.
I was naturally worried that my minor joke would fall flat, so a major thank you for being sharp enough to to take it somewhere!
Pachelbel rhymes with Taco Bell. IT ALL FITS
Let me try:
Once you go caramel:
You crave presidential, nontransferable, uncomparable, wearable, premarital tacobell-ical ,enfant terrible.
*snap snap snap*
“I llama you.”
Seriously, what’s up with llamas today?
Well in the US, there was a pair of escaped llamas that people wound up chasing. Apparently made it to National news program….Maybe thats it?
Huh, well, now I know. I just saw llamas everywhere today and had no explanation whatsoever. Oh internet, you haz so short attent…. SHINY!
Apparently Sun City, Arizona is where the llamas run wild (after being taken on a field trip to visit some people for therapeutic reasons and then escaping)
This morning I saw a poster of llamas…. er, having a threesome, while being watched by a dog. It was a student union election poster left over from last week.
I guess llamas are just the meme animal of the month. Before that it was sloths.
“I am in llama with you.”
“And I thought they smelled bad… on the outside…”
Wat? Um, Dorothy, it’s been less then a month. You probably won’t transfer until beginning of sophomore or junior year. Who the hell know how you’ll feel about anyone or anything then?
We’re never going to see their sophomore year, let alone Dorothy going to Yale. In real-time they’ve been dating for nearly three years now, so even thought it might seem fast in-universe, it has to go that way to accommodate the sliding timescale otherwise we’d spend the entirety of DoA dealing with the beginning of their relationship.
It’s kind of like how Billie and Ruth went from enemies to depression hatefucking in the span of a month.
I know the meta reason, but from in story perspective…
Billie and Ruth are both drama hurricanes so I expect this kind of thing from them.
But I feel like Dorothy is supposed to be all logical and down-to-earth, but what I’ve seen is her being very rigid about her plans for the future to the point of inefficiency, while also being easily caught up in momentary infatuation.
I think that discrepancy is a large source of annoyance for herself as well.
What I think she is really doing now is putting effort in being honest with herself and Walky about her feelings, just as she’s saying, and maybe taking it one step too far into overanalyze-everything-mode (not COMPLETELY out of character…). Given how her last relationship turned extremely awkward by her failure to communicate her feelings that is understandable.
Also, Walky is only part of it. Between him, Joyce, Amazi-girl and some of the others Dorothy is growing a bit too fond of IU to be entirely happy about her planned transfer. She uses their relationship to voice those feelings.
I agree with all of this.
What I’ve had a continued hard time with, though, is trying to understand what Willis wants us to think of Dorothy. He’s made indications that we are supposed to think she’s a well-adjusted genius and we’re supposed to take her ambitions seriously. But my impression is that she’s very hard working and intelligent (but possibly less so than her own boyfriend), but in-over-her-head by lightyears and incredibly naive. Am I supposed to feel this way, or is it just unintended consequence because I’m overly cynical D:
My take on “what do Willis want us to think” in most cases is that he wants us to think whatever we want. As I see it, most of the characters are designed to be nuanced with both flaws and strengths. They each have an accessible and believable world view from which their actions are understandable.
As for Dorothy I don’t know if she has what it takes to be president or even to go to Yale, but she most definitely wouldn’t do it without the attitude that she can. I see it as an “aim for the stars” thing. What if she, in a year or so, figures out that she doesn’t want to transfer, or that the workload is too much, or that she doesn’t want to spend her life sucking up to stupid people (like Robin)? Then she would have spent a year or so working hard and getting awesome grades and putting in a lot of extra work… it’s not like that wouldn’t be of use to her or that she wouldn’t be proud of it, and it’s not like she’s neglecting to have fun and get friends in the meantime.
All of this.
Yeah, I opt for the ‘think for yourself’ take as well.
Dorothy is yet another freshman who doesn’t yet know the limits of her own abilities. She either is one of the few who can achieve what she believes to be non-negotiable, or she is forced to admit her own shortcomings at some point. Saw that a lot with the pre-med and pre-nursing students taking chemistry courses when I was pursuing my undergrad in the subject – those that couldn’t understand the subject had to eventually realize their limit and switch majors. Not to be all smug, mind you – I certainly found my limit as well, and it’s called quantum mechanics.
Not really “hatefucking” so much as “despairfucking in an attempt to cling to something beautiful in this crazy mixed up world in which they find themselves.” The phrase “fight, flight, or fuck” comes to mind but I couldn’t tell you why. Something about instinct or grasping at straws or…idk.
Someone get these students some counseling. Not just Billie and Ruth. Damn near half the cast needs it. Amber, Billie, Ethan, Joe (speculative, likely given hiding from emotions), Joyce, Mary (speculative), Ruth, Sal, Sarah…
Of course, then we’d be out of plot bunnies.
This wouldn’t be a comic about freshman year of college (with some sophomores and grad students) – it would be a group therapy session.
… from my experience I would guess that even with competent counseling it would likely take years to for some of those characters to reach something resembling normal … which would still leave LOTS of room for stupidity and drama (that part is of course not from personal experience) 😉
I’d like that as a plot point, starting with the card Roz gave Joyce. Given the pace we could see a character in therapy every four months or so so it wouldn’t swamp the story or anything
i agree, but what with Willis’ worlds waxing realistic not everyone would be guaranteed to get competent help … … oh … I can sort of see Joyce going for pastoral counseling and having a really direct confrontation with an example of the religious insanity she is working to overcome … heh, she could ask Mary for advice for someone to talk to … …
And not everyone would be receptive to counseling, either. If the patient isn’t really engaged, therapy won’t work. I think.
Awwww. Open and honest discussion about feelings and relationships. Come on you guys, where is the dumb drama in that?
Dorothy, you are great and all, and I know you and Danny ran into a problem with this, but you’ve been together for a whopping three weeks. I think you can afford to play it by ear for a while
If they want drama, just show them a picture of a dress and ask them what color it is.
Did I miss a meme-memmo or something?
It was a whole thing on Tumblr. Basically took the whole website by storm this evening. Memes are becoming frighteningly quick.
It’s about as stupid as infinite chocolate.
I don’t know what “infinite chocolate” is about, but the dress thing is actually really interesting. I expect some good popular science articles about it tomorrow.
It’s an older meme – a .gif of a bar of chocolate, with a series of cuts and rearrangements made to look like a violation of the conservation of matter.
But one of the cuts and rearrangements produced the slightest of gaps, not visible with the resolution available. People wigged out for a bit about that one, too.
If it violates the conservation of matter, then it’s either sleigh of hand or a nuclear bomb…
Just play it safe and run like hell.
Yeah I learned about it about 10 minutes ago. Apparently someone put up a picture of a dress and asked people if it was black and blue or gold and white. Teh Interwebz has gone crazy over arguing what color it is.
Sounds like the debate over how many kinds of colortypes of black there are when it comes to fabric.
That… sounds pretty fun actually.
It was fun, right? There were no camp formation with name calling and hurt feelings and overreactions, right?
Nice. My reaction to that whole fiasco is thusly, “Teh Interwebz. Lolz.”
I think there’s something to be said for early and thorough communication. I think it’s best that everyone understand what’s going on, even if it means you have to have another talk later when things change. Especially when the feelings involved in your relationship are confusing and one of you is going to be moving away to a different place soon! Not… that I’ve experienced anything… like that…
dont talk to me abou this while im sweaty
What, exactly, is stopping them from doing things long distance? We’re living in the future, after all.
Carnal lust? Probably nothing, but if anything, that’s a solid bet.
Probably not worth the hassle for that to just not work out
Because long distance relationships are hard.
And alot of people expect monogamy during the time apart which makes things even harder.
Can’t possibly be harder for them than what I have with my girlfriend in London (I live in Texas, for reference).
Some people don’t like long distance, on account of wanting to snuggle and have sexytimes and such. It’s a fine model for some people/relationships, but it would be the polar opposite of the temporary-for-fun arrangement that they both initially wanted.
Because they live in an Alternate Universe where no one invented Bacon-Bits.
In the Original Walkyverse , Joe Rosenthal was inspired to create them after seeing “the Cheese”.
Too bad we probably won’t see their Sophomore year to know how this ends
Think the author won’t be interested in working on this till 2070 ? Then again think we’ll all be dead by then and the internet will be replaced with a new world system.
Oh, Willis will be done by then.
But the buffer will be uploaded until 2270, and it’ll keep updating long after he’s passed on.
They did use condoms, right?
Dorothy’s birth control system is reputedly impenetrable.
I think you meant to say “impregnable”.
Yep. Really walked into that one, didn’t I.
Retinas were scanned. Keys were turned. All the right buttons were pushed in the right order.
The L-word…
http://guttergeek.com/styled/2008/page241/blackdossier/files/page131_4.jpg
Or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxQlpeD4EKc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WVtZL5O_jQ
https://twitter.com/scottscript/status/567879394343038976
Fuck, that’s where that came from? I need to read those, too. I thought DoA commenters made it up.
The Scott Pilgrim comic is great. Highly recommended for your twenty-something slice-of-life mixed with soap opera, video games and fighting.
Would have worked better as a TV series or miniseries than a movie, but I’m apparently one of few people who think the movie’s pretty alright.
*plays John Waite’s “Missing You” on the Muzak*
*plays Kevin Bloody Wilson’s “Missing You” instead*
Warning: NSFW
I must say I’m surprised Mike isn’t constantly interrupting their sexy times just to be a dick.
Pretty sure Walky’s taking care of all the dicking. (Also that this may be Dorothy’s room.)
I’m pretty sure it is. The sheets are purple, which is (a) “girly,” and (b) not the D&MM pattern that I’m pretty sure Walky’s sheets have.
I got both purple flannelette sheets and pink flannelette sheets IRL.
Part of the plan was to kick out Sierra (she had to go), so yeah.
Every time this comes up, I can’t help but think that discouraging thought in the back of my mind: this is going to be resolved when Dorothy gets a rejection letter from Yale regarding her application for transfer. On one hand, she’s motivated and smart. On the other, it’s goddamn Yale and the only people who take such a fait accompli attitude toward it and get away with it were born into the ol’ boy network.
So she’s likely going to work her ass off and still not get in. On one hand, she can be around Walky for longer! On the other, potential crisis of self-worth and derailment of White House ambitions.
Or she resolves to double down, work harder, and try again the next year… but that’s likely to lead to burnout.
Or she leads a revolution and takes the power by force instead.
Completely agree, I was never really onboard with Dorothy’s whole “It’s gonna happen” confidence. It’s incredibly hard to transfer like that, and do we know why she isn’t currently at Yale? If money, I can understand the confidence, but if she was denied up front, her chances are slim to none.
She can be that confident because Willis can make it happen. He’s said repeatedly Dorothy’s ambition is not a flaw and will not be punished. Whether she becomes president might be up in the air forever but getting into the school she wants is petty much a sure thing.
I never said it was a bad thing. The whole “shoot for the moon, even if you miss you land among the stars (if you’re going fast enough (I had to do science to the idiom, I just had to.))” thing is very applicable.
Well, if you do science to the idiom, missing means drifting alone through space until you expire.
I was thinking about that as well. Everyone is assuming she’s going to get in. That’s not a given.
You can literally just keep trying and trying forever. Not like you get rejected and it’s like “Welp, Yale’s off the table now”. You can perpetually maintain a state where every year is potentially the last year you spend here.
I think long before she gave up on Yale we’d come up against the question of how long Walky’s willing to stay in that sort of relationship.
Well of course she’s not gonna get in; the heat death of our universe will occur before she’s far enough into her school year to even send an application.
I seem to recall Willis saying he only planed to cover their first year anyway, so whether or not she gets into Yale is epilogue territory anyway (and let’s face Willis will probably die of old age before the mid-semester break).
I was assuming she wasn’t, and she’s in denial.
SHE’S THE DOG KNOWING IT’S NOT BACON! SHE’S THE DOOOO-*gets taken away by men in white coats*
*Watches from building rooftop opposite, watching through scope*
This is Unit 3, target acquisition confirmed. Silencing success, noone believed them. Operation is still good to go, confidentiality confirmed…
Well, most importantly that doesn’t matter. What matter right now is that the IDEA of Yale is a factor in their relationship.
And even if she doesn’t get into Yale she might transfer somewhere else she thinks gives her a better career opportunity.
Agreed on the first point. On the second, I think Dorothy might find that a bitter pill to swallow… but she might do it.
So, the idea of Yale. Walky will believe in her, that’s a given… but he may not be comfortable reciprocating the love when there’s an expiration date on the relationship. Of course, he could suggest they go long-distance, and that would be the end of this plotline for the next quarter-century of comic updates. Meanwhile, the conundrum might have an effect on Dorothy’s work, or her friendships. She might decide to spend as much of her free time as possible having couple-time with Walky, to the detriment of Joyce. The emotional stress may impact her work, slowing it down, giving her less time for other things. For the near future, though, she’s going to try to ignore it and carry on as usual.
…
And then Walky will tell her about his 26. That’ll be a fun conversation. She might discover she does want him to come along… because she knows it wouldn’t be akin to him clinging to her like a barnacle to the hull of a ship… the way it would have been if Danny tried the same thing. Walky’s confidence is made of sterner stuff, and importantly, it would be her making the offer. But! The grade would get in the way, so she may take it upon herself to whip him into shape. Walky might rankle under this new regiment, and Dorothy is unlikely to use certain motivational tactics that have worked in the past because they would distract him from studying.
And if we’re feeling like schadenfreude, what if, at the end of all that hoopla, Walky gets in and Dorothy doesn’t? We know that the Walkertons have a certain amount of connections… And life is all about who you know these days.
Is Walky’s confidence REALLY made of Sterner stuff’s than Danny’s? Danny was a lot more clingy than Walky and has possible problems with self image, but Walky is also a lot less mature. Walky’s “Confidence” may be a result of that immaturity (i.e. not really knowing when there are problems around.)
And remember, we’ve seen him absolutely panic under stress… when he found out about his failing math grade, and when he thought Dorothy was mad at him.
Perhaps I should categorize the type of confidence I mean. Walky is good with people. He’s personable. He’s the sort of person who can schmooze his way through meeting his girlfriend’s parents while in box seats at a football game.
That’s the sort of confidence he has, the sort which Danny lacks.
Keep in mind he had to be prodded into displaying it– he was in “deer in the headlights” mode until then, and it took quite a bit of luck for him to fumble his way into that competence– to “fail upward,” as he’d put it– without throwing his foot into his mouth at ludicrous speed.
That wouldn’t really resolve anything. A rejection letter isn’t the end of the story. Just means another year of her trying to get in.
That’s even assuming the two options are Go to Yale or Stay Here. The only reason she’s even here is as a stepping stone to Yale. If the Yale plans change then she’s got no reason to be here anymore. Probably goes somewhere else entirely.
I actually applied for Yale out of HS. Had a 4.0 GPA unweighted and was involved in extracurriculars and still got rejected.
I’m not saying that I should have gotten in or that my application essays
weren’t complete shit. I’m just saying it’s very competitive and that it can look like you’re doing everything right and your application still might not go through.
Yet some people are just that smart. I knew one kid in my graduating high school class who was like that. When he was accepted into MIT, no one was really surprised.
I wonder if she knows how rare it is for people to transfer into Yale. There are like 3 per year, most because of connections. Of the two I know, one is a billionaire and the other the star running back (or quarterback, I forget).
I don’t think Dorothy’s ever been shown to be unaware of the difficulties of her aspirations (she wants to be President of the US, you only get one of those every four years). She’s also first year college, which is when lots of people have very high goals which they may not be able to reach (and be happy anyway, but that’s another story).
if accepted, it’s rare to not be able to attend Yale due to money issues. All students have free rides until household income hits $80,000 per year, with a sliding scale above that. As a general rule, families aren’t asked to pay more than %10 of their income until they hit $500,000 per year.
Sorry, this was meant as a reply to Regina phalange.
Well, I got accepted to Yale, but had to turn it down for, well, reasons thanks to family and goofy politics and legacies. Even 20 years later, still aggravated about that, although I don’t regret the University and Grad Schools I did go to.
Dorothy isn’t taking into account one nice little factor that could trip her up hardocre. Real life complications tend to disrupt even the best laid plans. And I do have to wonder what she might have as a contingency plan if and/or when Yale says “No Dice.”
This is my real question about Dorothy. When life inevitably throws a wrench at her carefully constructed plans, will she be able to think on her feet and reconstruct a new path to the White House, or will she go down with the ship?
Well, that’s kinda what she’s doing right now. She wanted to go to Yale in the first place and IU is her plan B. I would say that she’s doing pretty well for a plan B. She works and strategizes and plans ahead, but she isn’t bitter over lost opportunities and doesn’t neglect to make friends and have fun.
Did she already apply for Yale and go to her back-up school?
I was under the impression that she hadn’t applied for regular undergraduate admission, due to financial reasons or ??? reasons, but I don’t think it’s been confirmed.
But it’s entirely possible she’s already rolling well with Plan B, in which case she’s doing a splendid job.
Huh, you are right, we haven’t been told. I just assumed she sent in an application and got rejected. Either way, Walky was not in the original plan, and we have seen her adjust to that. So if nothing else she has a certain flexibility.
It’s actually easier to get into some schools as a transfer student than as a freshman. Dorothy may just be gaming the system.
It’s a lot harder to transfer into Yale generally than to get admitted out of HS. Their transfer class is pretty small, and about 30 of them are Eli Whitney people, and Dorothy won’t qualify for that.
If people are interested in numbers, Yale has about 60 transfers a year counting Eli Whitney students, (non-traditional) and 30 without them. They get about 1,000 transfer applications. 30/1000 vs 2,000/30,000 for normal admissions. Transferring is hard.
Well, in my state, transferring is used as a back door into the UW. But, that’s only because the school has a transfer agreement where they accept a certain number of transfers from local community colleges each year. Left to its own devices, the UW would opt for the more lucrative out-of-state students.
Remember though, this isn’t real life, this is life controlled by Willis.
I don’t think the point is if she can get in to Yale.
The point is, she is telling Walky she’s leaving him when she gets accepted.
“…it might change things, SUPERFICIALLY” “…it’s non-negotiable..”
Dorothy’s got her head up her butt if she thinks the change will be superficial. Walky is not going for a long term long distance relationship, he just ain’t built that way.
Dorothy dropped Danny before going to college. He followed her, and assumed they would continue. She tried to be diplomatic. But Danny doesn’t do sublely well, so she had to tell him straight out: you’re high school, you can’t follow me to Yale, you aren’t even motivated enough to be here.
Walky is not stupid, regardless of the 26. He just got the Freshman wakeup call “slide thru HS if you want, it don’t work in college”. He may well be accepted to Yale, if he wanted to try for it that is.
And that brings up a story development not mentioned yet. What if Walky got accepted and Dorothy didn’t?
Actually I don’t think Dorothy broke up with Danny until AFTER they got to college. In one of the earliest comics you can see them in the background holding hands. And when they finally do break up, Dorothy says something along the lines of “I should have done this before we went to university”.
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2010/comic/book-1/01-move-in-day/forget/
Dororthy didn’t drop Danny until the night he met Amazi-Girl. When he made it clear to Dorothy he didn’t respect her goals and intended to cling to her and throw everything else in his life away.
She’s saying she doesn’t know if saying she loves him will change anything. Nowhere is she implying that her going to Yale will be a superficial change. She is telling him that despite her loving him, she is still going to go to Yale and that will likely be the end of their relationship.
Dorothy was stating that her falling in love changes her Yale plans superficially. In other words, Yale is still priority #1, despite this turn of events.
Yale time. Yale time! Yale time!!! YAAAAALLLLEEEE TIIIIMMEE!!!
I’m reading that in the same manner as “MORT. FUN. TIME.”
So my dog was just pretending not to know so it wouldn’t hurt my feelings? I will never lie to a dog about bacon ever again!
Dear alt text. No they can’t.
Eegh, what happened to my link? http://skin-horse.com/comic/todays-comic-5/
But that is Bacon. Sweetheart can’t tell it’s not FDR.
Don’t worry, Walky! At the pace of this comic, you still have years to enjoy with Dorothy before you really need to worry about her leaving for Yale.
Oh, man. The dialogue is sad and sweet and mature, and yet Dorothy and Walky spooning is one of the most adorable things ever shown in this comic. I’m getting the old Willis whiplash in between the panels of a single strip. Again.
Women’s magazines told me that in the spooning position the “small spoon” is less devoted to the relationship. Though they also told me [insert bullshit here].
That is so much wrong with that statement.
Except the sarcasm.
Women’s magazines have no idea what they’re talking about, then. Spoons only fit together when they’re the same size. To wit, there is no small spoon.
“Oh, I’m sorry, I thought you were talking about lesbians. Today has been confusing.”
We are in week 5, and Dorothy’s plan is to go to Yale in… two years? Four years?
Assuming we continue at the one-comic-week-per-real-life-year pace, skipping no weeks, Yale in two years won’t be an issue for another… not quite a century.
This means, David Willis, that you need to live to at least age 150 – and continue this comic for that time! – before you shuffle off your mortal coil.
Let’s assume that Willis manages to advance the buffer by two and a half days for each day that he works on average. That means that he only needs to work for 40 years to write & draw the next two years in-story. It’ll take us another 59 years to catch up, but it’s doable, especially if Willis works harder than that.
is it bad if i thought the L word ment lesbian becuase of becky
you might be scott pilgrim
oh yeah i forgot that was a scot pilgrim reference. i also thought the l word was legend of zelda aswell after i realized “it cant be lesbian
Dangit Scott Pilgrim.
scott pilgrim is a really good graphic novel with alot of video game references
Nimoy… 🙁
When you think about it, considering his age and all the stuff he did, he really did live long and prosper
I wonder which of the cast is a hardcore Trek fan. Walky? Becky, who somehow managed to watch TOS despite her family? Galasso?
I’d say Pamela and Leslie. Both are old enough to have caught it in different iterations. Leslie is enough of a geek to disagree with Walky about Monkey master (and a known Trekker in another universe).
Actually mentioned to watch Star Trek: Ethan’s RA, but he doesn’t count as cast until he makes an appearance.
I could see Ethan as one, too – if his parents raised him on that show. Granted, that didn’t exactly work with me.
Look what Walky is doing here. Dorothy is asking him to tell what he is feeling, but instead he listens to her telling him what SHE is feeling. He doesn’t miss the point, he doesn’t joke it away, he doesn’t make it about him even when she hesitate how to go about it.
You are doing good, little buddy.
*Starts taking notes…*
Let’s see the next strip before we praise him, but yes Walky being good, despite Dorothy going off on a different problem than his (even though it’s about them). She is…er, you chances at Presidency and chances with Walky are not mutually exclusive!
This is a good lesson here, if you want to have a heart to heart with your guy then have sexy times first
Long distance relationship? :/ I’ve been in one. It stinks sometimes but it’s not impossible.
Looking back through the archives, I see that Dorothy has met with a guidance counselor on multiple occasions. So she’s not entirely without an informed adult perspective on her future plans, and hopefully her advisor has said, “Yale? Great! Do you have a backup plan?” If Plan A doesn’t work out, there are places with names like Harvard, Princeton, and Georgetown that have also hosted the matriculation of future presidents.
Of course, all of them are elsewhere than Indiana and therefore not equipped to resolve the basic emotional dilemma here. I wouldn’t put it past Willis to leave the precise nature of Dorothy’s future fairly ambiguous when he ends the comic in another ten or fifteen years (at which point the characters will have just completed their finals for the first semester).
This kind of came out of nowhere, but that gravatar of Joyce with a dildo and a condom on her head… does anyone know which strip that came from? I feel I’d remember a strip with that and I NEED TO KNOW
The L-word? You mean Dorothy’s a lesbian too?