I know. With his comic having dialogue like that, his contribution to this strip is way more interesting than the fact that Dorothy just standing in the background. I mean what is that comic?!? Have we seen it before. Is that line a jest or serious? So many questions!
Leather Jackets, as such, would not, in itself, be a violation of intellectual property. Now if Sal had trademarked and copyrighted her image, it’s possible things could be different. Wearing the leather jacket could be part of her trade dress for trademark purposes. But to prevail, she would need to show that the similarities could reasonably produced confusion in their customers. Joyce’s only customer is the school paper, and it’s unlikely it could be shown they thought they were buying Sal’s comic. Copyright would be the stronger claim, but it would depend on how similar the total look and feel was to Sal’s copyrighted images. A leather jacket worn by a dark skinned young woman would not be sufficient. Even if the similarities were significant, there are fair use provisions for satire, though if they would apply or not is the kind of thing that makes lawyers rich. — I am not a lawyer nor do I play one in virtual reality.
Incidently, life rights are not a thing that actually exist as something protected under the law, but buying them anyway protects you from lawsuits based on defamation, invasion of privacy and the right to publicity. But since not-Walky would actually be a completely different person, that wouldn’t apply anyway. To be safe, a box with fine print, “All characters in this comic are fictional and any resemblance to any individual, living or dead, is completely coincidental,” would not be amiss.
Oh, that is totally a conversation that will absolutely happen on screen.
The real question is whether Joyce starts the conversation, or if Becky finds out from loose lips, say Joe saying something assuming Becky already knew.
I used to read that comic… Kinda got bored with them and the Pibgorn ones because it is kinda repetitive and his obsession with the female form interferes with his ability to tell a story. Didn’t realise that first ran during pride month!
I hadn’t remembered Seth willing himself to sleep and dream every chance he got but this isn’t his first lady-crush. Apparently there was also a 70 year old cellist IIRC. And at one point he tells Edda he wishes he was straight so he and her could make all the babies… I think he’s like a Kinsey 5.9? So practically exclusively gay, but with occasional blips that confuse the hell out of him. But given the artist was too busy focussing on family-friendly syndicatable make-outs and cat gags to actually go into emotions in much depth, and in-comic the person he would logically confide in is a shallow, immature, loudmouth who’s both terrified of commitment and also deeply committed to her childhood best friend/mutual crush with virtually no experience of relationships otherwise – weird and off-putting is probably the best outcome we could have hoped for?
I mean, the Kinsey scale is about where one’s interests lie, so it makes sense that lacking interest would exclude one from that scale.
That’s why we need multiple scales and terms.
Also, as someone who has a higher-than-average sex drive, the fact that a lot of sex-drive scales go from ace to ‘normal’ and either don’t have a category for ‘above normal’ or call it an addiction like enjoying 2+ orgasms per day is a destructive habit akin to alcoholism is a pet peeve of mine.
Just sayin – no scale is perfect. They are merely tools that are good at some things and not at others.
To amend the above – Kinsey works okay for Trans, but it does kinda go weird for fluid or other flavors of enby.
That said, as I stated before, some tools work better for some things than others. The main thing is to not rely exclusively on it. Like the Bechtel test.
Yeah it’s one of those stepping-stone types of concepts.
It was historically essential — when Kinsey was studying and writing, people literally thought that bisexuality didn’t exist. The whole idea of a spectrum of anything in sex or identity, and the idea that people should be studying these things, this was all rather revolutionary.
The Kinsey Scale is still a useful shorthand for binary people with binary attractions. But moreover, it was super great in opening up the field of study for everything that came after it.
Now people can stand on Kinsey’s shoulders (and the shoulders of many other cool thought-pioneers), to make other words and spectrums and models that apply to more kinds of people.
@Rose: I’m sure you meant no offense, but a pet peeve of mine is when people contrast “trans” with “enby.” Not everyone who identifies as nonbinary identifies as trans, but many do, as it does fall under the trans umbrella.
I am nonbinary. I am transgender. They go together in my identity.
If you need to distinguish groups for what you’re saying (such as you might in this case), you can always say “binary trans people.”
Those, and incomprehensible pseudo-philosophical (… I think?) dream sequences and debates about the relative dream sequence-ness of interactions, which were made all the harder by the fact that everything took place in a featureless void unless they were going to fuck in a bath tub – which, I’m pretty sure if my brain has NOT successfully purged all this psychic bullshit, was actually in a dream sequence!
Also a lot of claiming dresses were beautiful when they were the dullest shit ever conceived. All with the boat-loads of ten dollar words and tired homophobic propaganda, obviously.
The strip that line is part of is a parody of 9 Chickweed Lane, a newspaper comic that recently had a plot which can basically be summed up by that line.
God, I’m just imagining the gag potential now. In an early arc, Captain Gray accidentally scratches an additional line at the bottom of the “F” with the wing of her plane. Later, during the “Summation” arc, President Doris draws it in Julia’s blood during their fight atop a Venusian airship in a moment of symbolism.
Trolley Problem time! A Tesla is about to run over and kill a person. By throwing a switch, you can reprogram the artificial intelligence running the Tesla, causing it to run over and destroy Twitter. No people actually die, but a huge social media empire that people rely on for communication, community, publications, notifications, public service announcements, etc might get totally destroyed. (But bad stuff also happens there.) Do you divert the intelligence running Tesla to destroy Twitter?
While I was in my Tesla it ran over my wife and children and then drove into the Twitter server room and somehow caused a major data breach resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. Tbh it’s probably my fault. Still a huge Tesla fan!
Reginald Ullarman, age 47, father of 2. A mechanic by trade, he also plays rhythm guitar in a local ska band. Leans leftish politically, though he’s a little conservative about gun rights and has a slight prejudice against people from Taiwan, which he does acknowledge is his problem and not theirs. Never married, but lives with his kids and girlfriend in a 2-bedroom apartment near downtown. His oldest son is trans, which Reg doesn’t really understand, but he still does his best to support the kid and keep him safe. Received a distinctive scar on his left arm that looks like a duck, back in high school. He was out shopping today when he was suddenly grabbed by two large men in blue jumpsuits, who tied him down to the trolley track.
At first, I didn’t make the Absolutely Correct Life Choice of reading the dialogue bubble from the strip below Julia’s.
Fortunately, I corrected that quickly. Thanks for reminding me again of what was somehow NOT the most cursed 9 Chickweed Lane storyline of 2021.
(… I’m here counting the “sexually charged toddlers” stuff as a storyline in its own right, but also, now I’m not sure how one counts the WWII bullshit. Objectively, it should only be counted as one storyline, but given the lengthy prose interludes in which to drop Historically Accurate And Totally Necessary Slurs*, the meandering plot, the incomprehensible double-crosses, the slowest plane chases ever… it felt like twelve, and all of them were terrible.)
Yeah, she picked me up in the mornin’, and she paid all my tickets
Then she screamed in the car/Left me out in the thicket
Well I never woulda’ dreamed/That her heart was so wicked
Yeah, but I keep comin’ back/’Cause it’s so hard to kick it–Tom Petty
As someone who is not biologically female, just curious: does getting on birth control really solve cramps that quickly? Because that is a miraculous mood turnaround for Joyce.
That’s what I thought as well (that she should be on the placebo pills taken _during_ the period. Does this mean that the horrible cramping is all really in her head?
No, but period cramps aren’t always uniform. It’s not uncommon for the pain to be at its worst in the first few days and then even out towards the middle/end. (Some people get the opposite, some people get killer cramps mid-cycle before the period even starts… it’s variable.)
This can especially be the case if you have some kind of menstrual disorder, which seems very likely for Joyce.
100% not
Even if Joyce is taking the pills in a way that doesn’t interfere with their effects (chugging them down with two litres of soda is….not the best method), there’s no way they’re already affecting her cycle.
Wild swings between “okay” and “dying” are a common with people with irregular periods.
It’s also been a few days since we saw her feeling her worst, and she was doing better toward the end of last chapter. She might be through the worst of it by now.
not only that, once they *do* start affecting her, there can be side-effects. I had three solid months of morning sickness when I first went on the pill – and after taking a break one year, I think it happened again when I went back on them. I was just more skilled at suppressing nausea by then. not having first block PE class probably helped too 😛
Before going on it, I’d get cramps on and off for 3 weeks of my 26 day cycle. They weren’t constant, and were much worse/stronger/longer/more frequent the week before and first week of the 10 days of bleeding, but they were pretty rubbish, and profuse enough for me to seriously think through whether or not losing my virginity and having a baby at 14 or 15 to stop them when they weren’t settling down was a sensible and proportional response before opting for birth control…
After a few years, I started putting on a stone a year as a direct side effect of the pill. When I came off them, a stone literally fell off in a month…
The implant started me on my migraine journey. I have had 5 or 6 days without a migraine this year.
Wow, that’s a lot of migraines. Are you talking with a doctor about other birth control possibilities? And to check if there’s an underlying issue to your rough periods? I know it’s super hard to address medical issues when you’re feeling poorly. It’s just, this is a big deal that has got to be impacting your life a lot.
So I need a bit more lore on president Doris. Is that her name? “President Doris”. Is she already the president of something even as a college freshman? Or is she really arrogant and ordered people to refer to her by that title?
You had it right the first time. Her first name is definitely “President.” Like Fuhrer President King Bradley in Fullmetal Alchemist being [i]named[/i] King.
Thinking about 9CL always makes me yearn for the days when I didn’t know 9CL was a thing that existed, when my mind was younger and less terribly scarred.
Joyce, if you were going to plan the strip 6 months out ahead of time, you should probably have gotten Sal’s permission in advance. Now you’re going to have to change those 6 month plans.
… or, you know, Sal might hurt…
…. actually, no, I don’t think Sal would get violent over that. Furious, yes, violent, no.
Time to see how many of your DoA readers don’t follow you on Twitter by counting how many are confused by the 9CL reference.
That said, I’ve followed your 9CL threads and I’m STILL confused.
Also, I remember people being confused by the term “matchless” in that context. All I can give is that it’s a translation of a word used a lot in Japanese porn titles. So, there ya go. Could be a coincidence.
I think Tennessee accent is pretty charming. It’s still spoken nowadays, huh?
And I don’t know if it’s from this state or it’s just how people in USA are used to speak before.
Yeah, Tennessee is still a place. I assume there’s people who talk there, so they probably have the local accent. Maybe I’ve misunderstood you, but yeah, we still got those.
I’ve asked that because it’s possible some dialects disapear from some places. Like here, where I live, there’s some dialects that have disappeared, and others that are getting mixed with general language.
So, I’m in doubt if this accent is still a thing (like you’ve said) or if it only show in historical films, comics, etc.
Joyce is gonna mix things up. In the comic, Danny-clone will body-slam Dorothy-clone when she dumps him first day of college, and no one will even notice, including Dorothy, because thats totally normal human interactions.
But boy, that 9 chickweed lane thing is messed up, huh…
I wonder, when julia-grey has her date with Moe, will she hire white knight red shirt mike to slug Moe for thirsty thoughts? Or will she personally slug him herself because repeatedly slugging someone for impure thoughts is totally normal behavior one would expect of someone as powerful as a space captain.
I hope julia does it herself. That way, years later, at their wedding, Moe’s vows can say, “I knew by the fourth time you slugged me on our first date, that this was true love”, and everyone will shed a happy tear.
And hopefully by then that 9 chickweed lane nonsense will be gone.
Well, I remember I learned in 5th grade that it is inappropriate to trip a girl I was crushing on, but the principle said next time, just slug her like every other boy and no one would even notice.
Joe might apologize for “the list”.
Joyce can apologize for getting all militant atheist on Becky and calling her dumb for being religious.
But here, no one has to ever apologize for or come to terms with their violent behavior. Its true. Pretty sure Sal told Amber “i forgive you” for stabbing me in the hand when i had never harmed you and was in cuffs and it totally wasnt self defense on your part, before Amber said “im sorry for stabbing you in the hand when it wasnt self defense and you were not a threat to me and it was really my asshole dad i was mad at but i had no way to deal with him and you were cuffed and restrained and i didnt live under your roof so you were safe target for my rage”.
Nope.
Huh. Im not even sure amber actually said the words “im sorry for bkah blah blah”. But all the better! Here we get to violently assault people and never deal with it! Here we live like god intended us to live.
Now find someone your sweet on and give them a black eye so they know you like them.
AS I recall the conversation after darn near 50 years…
“So you tripped Sarah?”
“Yes Sir”
“Did you mean to hurt her?”
“No Sir”
“…” “You like her don’t you?”
Me blushing furiously, “ummm, yes sir”
“Well, next time hit her in the shoulder like all the rest of you cretins do… Now go on, get to your bus”
No detention, no call to the ‘rents, nothing. I remember I had to look up cretins (remember, this was years and years before Wazowski)
Sad, but this is an actual event from my early childhood. Now, as an adult living in the 2020’s, I realize that principle was a misogynistic prick, but then, I was just glad to not get detention.
Sarah danced with me once at the next school dance, then slapped me, hard. We were going steady for 3 months until another boy stole her.
Yeah, and even under the assumption that a person could be “yours”, if they can be “stolen”, they clearly didn’t think they were “yours” in the first place.
“Well, next time hit her in the shoulder like all the rest of you cretins do…”
Wow. Classy dude.
I recall working a concession stand during some school event to raise money. Vice principal asked for. Coke. Another kid got the drink, i looked at vp, held out my hand and said i need cold cash for a cold drink. apparently it wasnt deferential enough. He grabbed my hair and slammed my head into the table. Took his drink and walked away. I domt know if he paid. I was a bit distracted.
The cool thing is Joyces comic is set in the future, so she can have robots and shit. She can have robot doctors!
I can just imagine it. ruth suspemded in a tank of liquid, unconscious, a breathing tube exhales bubbles into the water. Her eyes open. She is lifted up.
Ruth is lying in bed. Robot doctor is checking here vitals. “Well Ruth. You are doing much better. I do have some procedural questions for you. Do you feel safe at home?”
Ruth: sure. My girlfriend Jennifer lives with me. She loves me so much. As i spiraled into near suicide, she spiraled with me. We physically assault each other daily, which is totally normal for loving couples”
Robot doc: “totally normal”
Jennifer walks in.
Robot doc: Jennifer! So good to meet you. Ruth has been telling me how much you two love each other.
Jennifer: we do. We get violent outbreaks once a day.
Robot doc: thats great! And totally normal! I feel completely at ease seeing you to get back togethdr as soon as possible. And i shoukd know, im a robot doctor, and totally useless.
I really think this is at a point where engaging with them will just lead to more frustration/unpleasantness/suffering all around. Not that you have to listen to me, but I’d advise against it.
“The fake Dali lama quote guy has emotional issues”
Do I? I guess i dont like violence being the punchline. Mike punching joe. Amber stabbing sal. Ruth/jennifer. Its all fucked. If thats a mental issue, then i guess i got it.
Since you opened the conversation to state of mind, any idea whats got ahold of you? You felt Joe deserved punching? Or did someone use a fake dala lama quote to abuse you?
If Joe ever haymakers joyce for objectifying another man while on a date with him, lemme know your impressions of it. We can compare notes.
You’re right. Amber stabbing Sal was a punchline. It was meant to be funny. That was the point of it. You’re very good at understanding what you read and what you see. You’re the only one who understand this comic, even though you apparently just binged it in a couple of days recently and have repeatedly shown holes in your understanding. The rest of us are benighted rubes who can’t tell our ass from a hole in the ground and desperately need a giant brain like yours to tell us what happens in this comic. Even the creator doesn’t understand this as well as you.
The whlole bullshit with amber stabbing sal was fucked. It was all fucked. I didnt say it was a funny punchline. sometines the punchline is cruel. Simetimes its mean. Sometimes its robin williams funny. Sometimes its andrew dice clay bullshit. Some times its insult comics like don rickles. Sometimes its Mike punching Joe slapstick.
Amber had 5 years of trauma, not from sal, but from her dad, which pushed her to lash out at sal while hand cuffed. She developed a split personality. Became a vigilante. Started stalking Sal? Even though she did more damage to sal than sal did to her? Fought sal. And eventually sal confronted her and said “i forgive you”. And amber authur fonzerelli’ed out an “im sorry”. And then just like that theyre roller derby buddies???? Thats a fucking joke of how apologies work, right? 5 years of anger at her dad misdirected at sal and all she says is “sorry”? Youre kidding me, right?
“Even the creator doesn’t understand this as well as you.”
Well, willis and quite a few here seem to think they understand 9 chickweed lane better than its author does, kind of a point of todays strip, so a lot of that going around.
Tell me this: Joe goes out on a first date with Joyce, and tells her anytime she looks at another man in a way he deems “inappropriate” he punches her. He ends up punching her half a dozen times. Does thst sound like a fucking punchline to you? Months later Joyce draws a picture of her with hearts over her head with her looking at joe, the guy who punched her so many times months before??? Thats a joke, right, in the worst way, right?
But somehow its funny when the rolls are reversed??? Feel free to explain it to me. You apparently understand and are livid that i dont recognize your insight. So. Spell it out to me. How is joyce having mike punch joe any less disturbing than if joe punched joyce for the same bullshit reasons?
@Taffy: You need a better troll detector. Using their own real opinion to create a contrary opinion that they can shove onto you to waste your time on arguing against it? Thats like Trolling 101.
I don’t actually think they’re a troll. I do think they struggle greatly with nuance and general comprehension in the comments; I do agree with the
wasting time” assessment. Maybe a conversation is possible, but for most of us, especially with the comments on this page, I don’t think it’d go well.
Joyce, don’t let Sal prevent you from writing the worst possible accent. Chris Claremont didn’t let that stop him and he was amazing. Deciphering the text is half the fun.
Jägermonsters are about the right level of accent for me. Once it turns into deciphering the text, I lose interest. Pulls me out of the flow of the story.
Only a few comics have done that. Can’t think of any books offhand.
I was marginally less displeased with the world before Willis introduced me to 9CL than I am now. Thankfully my enjoyment of DoA outweighs the trauma of knowing that other comic exists!
“Your matchless legs cured me of my homosexuality” was so odd I had to google it to see if it was a reference… and it turns out this strip is already up on TvTropes in two different articles.
It basically describes one entire storyline in 9 Chickweed Lane which was apparently once a better comic, turned their main gay character into a straight man because of dream straight sex (because if it is good in a dream, it must carry over to real life… oh wait, no it doesn’t) and an obscene quantity of the strips which start in Pride month and continue for over 2 months in this storyline focus on the woman’s legs that are airbrushed for some reason.
The storyline after it involves sexually charged toddlers so things basically only get worse.
In a world way far away on the total polar opposite end of the multiverse:
Joyce: so, about that drawing of you and i with butts or hearts over your head….
Joe: yeah, uh, i’d like to take you out sometime. Its just…
Joyce: just what?
Joe: just want to make sure there’s no abusive chaperone this time.
Joyce: joe, it wasnt that bad
Joe: thats what you told dinah about your parents using a wooden spoon on you. Even if they meant well, they didnt do well by you.
Joyce: ugh. I mean i get some of it was my messed up religious views on hanky panky that i dont even beieve in.
Joe: and some of it was your parents normalizing abuse to you.
Joyce: but they only did it when i was bad.
Joe: you dont deserve abuse, joyce. No one does.
Joyce: … including you.
Joe: including me. if it happens again, i’ll be extremely disappointed, but im out. I would never hit you. And im not sticking around someone who thinks hitting is ok.
Joyce: …. im sorry i had mike hit you, joe. This sucks. It feels like i just keep finding more parental stuff to unpack.
Joe: yeah well we all have a lot of parental bullshit to unpack.
Joyce: we?
Joe: yeah, well, i dont really know what a healthy relationship looks like. My dad was a role model for tge opposite of that.
Joyce: i thought my i knew. But turned out my parents actually werent good together.
Joe: Speaking of which, im sorry i reduced your existence to a zero minus. Youre so much more than that.
Joyce: th… thank you, Joe.
Joe: you are unstoppable. You have such a big heart. You care about people so deeply. I think i gave up on caring. But you reminded me. And i really like your smile.
Joyce: (blush) i… admired you making amends over your list. It took courage. And you took Amber on and have been a great new brother for her.
Joe: man a LOT has happened in one year of college.
Joyce: its weird. Its not even a year ago, but it feels like a decade
Joe: yeah. Ive definitely changed.
Joyce: i dont recognize myself sometimes.
Joe: hi. Im joe.
Joyce: (big smile) joyce.
Joe: you hungry?
Joyce: do you like soup? Any answer that starts with “no because” is fine.
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to be fair, Sal appropriated it from Tennessee first
no tag for Pat McHoarney?
I know. With his comic having dialogue like that, his contribution to this strip is way more interesting than the fact that Dorothy just standing in the background. I mean what is that comic?!? Have we seen it before. Is that line a jest or serious? So many questions!
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/04-dont-stop-billie-ving/toog/ may help. Somewhat.
Makes sense Pat didn’t get tagged. LOSS wasn’t tagged in the previous one featuring comics either.
appropriate my foot
Tomorrow’s strip, Sal gets a new tattoo: ©
Joyce’s plan is foiled.
Is leather jackets an intellectual property? I think Sal has rights to sue.
She has to get in line behind the cow.
Unless the cow is from the restaurant at the end of the universe.
Leather Jackets, as such, would not, in itself, be a violation of intellectual property. Now if Sal had trademarked and copyrighted her image, it’s possible things could be different. Wearing the leather jacket could be part of her trade dress for trademark purposes. But to prevail, she would need to show that the similarities could reasonably produced confusion in their customers. Joyce’s only customer is the school paper, and it’s unlikely it could be shown they thought they were buying Sal’s comic. Copyright would be the stronger claim, but it would depend on how similar the total look and feel was to Sal’s copyrighted images. A leather jacket worn by a dark skinned young woman would not be sufficient. Even if the similarities were significant, there are fair use provisions for satire, though if they would apply or not is the kind of thing that makes lawyers rich. — I am not a lawyer nor do I play one in virtual reality.
Incidently, life rights are not a thing that actually exist as something protected under the law, but buying them anyway protects you from lawsuits based on defamation, invasion of privacy and the right to publicity. But since not-Walky would actually be a completely different person, that wouldn’t apply anyway. To be safe, a box with fine print, “All characters in this comic are fictional and any resemblance to any individual, living or dead, is completely coincidental,” would not be amiss.
Still do not play a lawyer in virtual reality.
“Purchasing Life Rights” sounds like something from a dystopian SciFi movie…
Huh. Looks like that conversation between Joyce and Becky didn’t happen after all?
Or it happened off-screen. We’ll find out!
Oh, that is totally a conversation that will absolutely happen on screen.
The real question is whether Joyce starts the conversation, or if Becky finds out from loose lips, say Joe saying something assuming Becky already knew.
So does Pat McHoarney go to the school or is his comic just cheap to syndicate?
Yes.
Why would legs that don’t match cure homosexuality?
Context for the horror
@Thag Simmons
I think ‘context’ might be too strong a term for… whatever all that was.
I used to read that comic… Kinda got bored with them and the Pibgorn ones because it is kinda repetitive and his obsession with the female form interferes with his ability to tell a story. Didn’t realise that first ran during pride month!
I hadn’t remembered Seth willing himself to sleep and dream every chance he got but this isn’t his first lady-crush. Apparently there was also a 70 year old cellist IIRC. And at one point he tells Edda he wishes he was straight so he and her could make all the babies… I think he’s like a Kinsey 5.9? So practically exclusively gay, but with occasional blips that confuse the hell out of him. But given the artist was too busy focussing on family-friendly syndicatable make-outs and cat gags to actually go into emotions in much depth, and in-comic the person he would logically confide in is a shallow, immature, loudmouth who’s both terrified of commitment and also deeply committed to her childhood best friend/mutual crush with virtually no experience of relationships otherwise – weird and off-putting is probably the best outcome we could have hoped for?
Wait… Mother of twin toddlers?!! OK so he’s returned to his Fernanda crush long after it first occurred…
I was never fond of the Kinsey scale, because it excludes enbys like me 😑
— during pride month?!?! If that isn’t solid proof this author’s a tool, I don’t know what is.
I mean, the Kinsey scale is about where one’s interests lie, so it makes sense that lacking interest would exclude one from that scale.
That’s why we need multiple scales and terms.
Also, as someone who has a higher-than-average sex drive, the fact that a lot of sex-drive scales go from ace to ‘normal’ and either don’t have a category for ‘above normal’ or call it an addiction like enjoying 2+ orgasms per day is a destructive habit akin to alcoholism is a pet peeve of mine.
Just sayin – no scale is perfect. They are merely tools that are good at some things and not at others.
Fuck. Brain fart. I somehow read enby as AroAce.
To amend the above – Kinsey works okay for Trans, but it does kinda go weird for fluid or other flavors of enby.
That said, as I stated before, some tools work better for some things than others. The main thing is to not rely exclusively on it. Like the Bechtel test.
Yeah it’s one of those stepping-stone types of concepts.
It was historically essential — when Kinsey was studying and writing, people literally thought that bisexuality didn’t exist. The whole idea of a spectrum of anything in sex or identity, and the idea that people should be studying these things, this was all rather revolutionary.
The Kinsey Scale is still a useful shorthand for binary people with binary attractions. But moreover, it was super great in opening up the field of study for everything that came after it.
Now people can stand on Kinsey’s shoulders (and the shoulders of many other cool thought-pioneers), to make other words and spectrums and models that apply to more kinds of people.
So, basically, the Kinsey Scale is the Ocarina of Time of queer culture?
@Rose: I’m sure you meant no offense, but a pet peeve of mine is when people contrast “trans” with “enby.” Not everyone who identifies as nonbinary identifies as trans, but many do, as it does fall under the trans umbrella.
I am nonbinary. I am transgender. They go together in my identity.
If you need to distinguish groups for what you’re saying (such as you might in this case), you can always say “binary trans people.”
You’d think it would be the opposite. Just imagine trying to go straight if your legs didn’t match!
I think they are really trying to say that the legs in question are peerless.
On account of the legs not having eyes to peer with.
The explanation is nothing more than right-wing propaganda masked with a boat-load of ten-dollar words. 😑
Those, and incomprehensible pseudo-philosophical (… I think?) dream sequences and debates about the relative dream sequence-ness of interactions, which were made all the harder by the fact that everything took place in a featureless void unless they were going to fuck in a bath tub – which, I’m pretty sure if my brain has NOT successfully purged all this psychic bullshit, was actually in a dream sequence!
Also a lot of claiming dresses were beautiful when they were the dullest shit ever conceived. All with the boat-loads of ten dollar words and tired homophobic propaganda, obviously.
Fuck. I can’t believe McEldowney still has fans that eat this crap. 😑
The strip that line is part of is a parody of 9 Chickweed Lane, a newspaper comic that recently had a plot which can basically be summed up by that line.
Apparently that was… last year?
*sharply inhales* Being run above McHoarney feels like a bigger pain in the meow meow
Screw making fun of the Leafs, I have the Habs to make fun of now!
Oh shit I totally missed that line on first read.
I love that Willis making fun of 9CL has spread beyond Twitter into the actual comic itself now.
Not the first time either. I’m pretty sure Pat even got a bonus strip.
Yes, we all voted to make Willis suffer that month.
The bonus strip came later? Feels more like a fire sparked under him upon lampooning 69 Mouse-Ear Blvd once again.
He’s also added references to Mary Worth.
So does that make 69 Mouse-Ear Blvd the legs?
It’s only semi-autobiographical for the first few years, after that it’s SEMME-autobiographical.
Pretty good
And The Mean RA’s final installment is semi-auto-biographical.
I really hope the alien-fighting agency in the Grayverse is SEMMF.
God, I’m just imagining the gag potential now. In an early arc, Captain Gray accidentally scratches an additional line at the bottom of the “F” with the wing of her plane. Later, during the “Summation” arc, President Doris draws it in Julia’s blood during their fight atop a Venusian airship in a moment of symbolism.
everyone will feel real bad (for a little while) in a couple of years when The Mean RA throws herself in front of a Tesla.
Trolley Problem time! A Tesla is about to run over and kill a person. By throwing a switch, you can reprogram the artificial intelligence running the Tesla, causing it to run over and destroy Twitter. No people actually die, but a huge social media empire that people rely on for communication, community, publications, notifications, public service announcements, etc might get totally destroyed. (But bad stuff also happens there.) Do you divert the intelligence running Tesla to destroy Twitter?
…. purely hypothetical.
The Tesla still runs the person over anyway, but nobody talks about it because they’re distracted by Twitter shenanigans.
While I was in my Tesla it ran over my wife and children and then drove into the Twitter server room and somehow caused a major data breach resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. Tbh it’s probably my fault. Still a huge Tesla fan!
Which person is that? That’s important information.
Reginald Ullarman, age 47, father of 2. A mechanic by trade, he also plays rhythm guitar in a local ska band. Leans leftish politically, though he’s a little conservative about gun rights and has a slight prejudice against people from Taiwan, which he does acknowledge is his problem and not theirs. Never married, but lives with his kids and girlfriend in a 2-bedroom apartment near downtown. His oldest son is trans, which Reg doesn’t really understand, but he still does his best to support the kid and keep him safe. Received a distinctive scar on his left arm that looks like a duck, back in high school. He was out shopping today when he was suddenly grabbed by two large men in blue jumpsuits, who tied him down to the trolley track.
Reading this from the bottom instead of the top made this an especially interesting comment thread, I must say.
At first, I didn’t make the Absolutely Correct Life Choice of reading the dialogue bubble from the strip below Julia’s.
Fortunately, I corrected that quickly. Thanks for reminding me again of what was somehow NOT the most cursed 9 Chickweed Lane storyline of 2021.
(… I’m here counting the “sexually charged toddlers” stuff as a storyline in its own right, but also, now I’m not sure how one counts the WWII bullshit. Objectively, it should only be counted as one storyline, but given the lengthy prose interludes in which to drop Historically Accurate And Totally Necessary Slurs*, the meandering plot, the incomprehensible double-crosses, the slowest plane chases ever… it felt like twelve, and all of them were terrible.)
* DEEP sarcasm about the necessity there.
Wasn’t that the arc that finally got the strip pulled from a bunch of papers?
Yeah, she picked me up in the mornin’, and she paid all my tickets
Then she screamed in the car/Left me out in the thicket
Well I never woulda’ dreamed/That her heart was so wicked
Yeah, but I keep comin’ back/’Cause it’s so hard to kick it–Tom Petty
If the Toronto Maple Leafs still exist in the future were space travel is a thing then the future is doomed.
They Came From PLANET Toronto
As someone who is not biologically female, just curious: does getting on birth control really solve cramps that quickly? Because that is a miraculous mood turnaround for Joyce.
she should still be on placebo
She’s living on two liters of soda and loooooove
Don’t forget the children’s ibuprofen.
That’s what I thought as well (that she should be on the placebo pills taken _during_ the period. Does this mean that the horrible cramping is all really in her head?
It does not mean that.
No, it means she didn’t get horrible cramping every day of her horrible period.
TMI but I have pretty shitty ones, but my cramps typically don’t last the whole time either.
Depends on the medication. I was told to start with the actual meds on mine.
No, but period cramps aren’t always uniform. It’s not uncommon for the pain to be at its worst in the first few days and then even out towards the middle/end. (Some people get the opposite, some people get killer cramps mid-cycle before the period even starts… it’s variable.)
This can especially be the case if you have some kind of menstrual disorder, which seems very likely for Joyce.
Birth control doesn’t make the pain disappear, it just makes the length of the period more “regulated” and the pain more “normal”.
100% not
Even if Joyce is taking the pills in a way that doesn’t interfere with their effects (chugging them down with two litres of soda is….not the best method), there’s no way they’re already affecting her cycle.
Wild swings between “okay” and “dying” are a common with people with irregular periods.
It’s also been a few days since we saw her feeling her worst, and she was doing better toward the end of last chapter. She might be through the worst of it by now.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2022/comic/book-12/04-dont-stop-billie-ving/pain/
Hopefully she sticks to her meds so they can help for next time.
not only that, once they *do* start affecting her, there can be side-effects. I had three solid months of morning sickness when I first went on the pill – and after taking a break one year, I think it happened again when I went back on them. I was just more skilled at suppressing nausea by then. not having first block PE class probably helped too 😛
Joyce doesn’t have irregular periods, but her horrible ones seem to be every three months.
It happens. I had a while where once in every three I went from ‘well that was shitty’ to ‘I cannot move without feeling like vomiting is imminent’.
Becky said she’d be fine after a few days, and a few days have gone past now, I think.
Before going on it, I’d get cramps on and off for 3 weeks of my 26 day cycle. They weren’t constant, and were much worse/stronger/longer/more frequent the week before and first week of the 10 days of bleeding, but they were pretty rubbish, and profuse enough for me to seriously think through whether or not losing my virginity and having a baby at 14 or 15 to stop them when they weren’t settling down was a sensible and proportional response before opting for birth control…
After a few years, I started putting on a stone a year as a direct side effect of the pill. When I came off them, a stone literally fell off in a month…
The implant started me on my migraine journey. I have had 5 or 6 days without a migraine this year.
Wow, that’s a lot of migraines. Are you talking with a doctor about other birth control possibilities? And to check if there’s an underlying issue to your rough periods? I know it’s super hard to address medical issues when you’re feeling poorly. It’s just, this is a big deal that has got to be impacting your life a lot.
….I thought her period ended?
So I need a bit more lore on president Doris. Is that her name? “President Doris”. Is she already the president of something even as a college freshman? Or is she really arrogant and ordered people to refer to her by that title?
The strip is actually all a flashback just after President Doris was sworn in.
President is actually her first name, but she goes by her family name with friends
So is this a “Sandman” crossover, then?
You had it right the first time. Her first name is definitely “President.” Like Fuhrer President King Bradley in Fullmetal Alchemist being [i]named[/i] King.
Thanks to your Twitter, Willis, I recognize that parody strip!
I wish Sal would show up because it sounds funny as fuck
Pat McHoarney strikes again
“I’m fixed! Your matchless legs have cured me of my homosexuality!”
………..I’m filled with questions that I both want and NEVER want to have answered.
The answer is in Schrödinger’s Sexual Preference Box.
(the box is at the ballet/concert hall)
The answers will only raise more questions
There is not a single 9CL comic that would fail to make me shout “OH FUCK YOU BROOKE MCELDOWNEY” and this one is no exception
Thinking about 9CL always makes me yearn for the days when I didn’t know 9CL was a thing that existed, when my mind was younger and less terribly scarred.
I don’t understand why it’s so important that everyone knows about this shitty comic.
Oh my god this is such a great strip. I love the imposing of the actual DoA inside DoA.
But what will this strip-within-a-strip cause when the timeline gets to Groundhog Day?
Yeah! It’s like a play within a play in Shakespeare’s works, no?
Don’t be silly, Sal. You can’t appropriate people.
But if you could, it wouldn’t be apropos.
It would be very ina-pro-pro.
Not when you are an amateur. Only after you turn pro.
Joyce, if you were going to plan the strip 6 months out ahead of time, you should probably have gotten Sal’s permission in advance. Now you’re going to have to change those 6 month plans.
… or, you know, Sal might hurt…
…. actually, no, I don’t think Sal would get violent over that. Furious, yes, violent, no.
But you’ll still lose a friend, so don’t do it.
She goes all-in on making Grayverse Not-Sal a wholesome, bubbly ray of sunshine, accidentally recreating Roomies!-era original Sal.
Time to see how many of your DoA readers don’t follow you on Twitter by counting how many are confused by the 9CL reference.
That said, I’ve followed your 9CL threads and I’m STILL confused.
Also, I remember people being confused by the term “matchless” in that context. All I can give is that it’s a translation of a word used a lot in Japanese porn titles. So, there ya go. Could be a coincidence.
Other words for matchless would be peerless, without equal
I needed a light but your matchless legs failed me again.
Goddamn i need a smoke. ANYONE GOT SOME LEGS MADE OUT OF FUCKING MATCHES!?!?
one of the nice things about mastodon is the lack of “suddenly 9CL” in my timeline. 😂
Who is the Mean Ra? An egyptian goddess?
All hail the mean Ra!! – else she starts to do powerfully mean things to you and the world.
She is the SUN God.
She is the FUN God.
HA! HA! HA!
There is, however, Julia’s sexy and suave love interest, Hal Runnerton and his food-obsessed twin sister, Dahlia.
But her friends just call her runny
I think Tennessee accent is pretty charming. It’s still spoken nowadays, huh?
And I don’t know if it’s from this state or it’s just how people in USA are used to speak before.
It’s gonna be so hard to find her a voice actress 🥺
“Still spoken nowadays”? 🤨
Yeah, Tennessee is still a place. I assume there’s people who talk there, so they probably have the local accent. Maybe I’ve misunderstood you, but yeah, we still got those.
No, no. Is exactly like you’ve said.
I’ve asked that because it’s possible some dialects disapear from some places. Like here, where I live, there’s some dialects that have disappeared, and others that are getting mixed with general language.
So, I’m in doubt if this accent is still a thing (like you’ve said) or if it only show in historical films, comics, etc.
Well, all language varieties change over time, so yes, 100 years down the line the Tennessee accent won’t sound like it did 100 years ago.
I looked up “Tennessee accent” on YouTube, so you can find out if the accent of the brunette from this video matches the accent you’re familiar with.
The accents don’t line up with states in the US.
Yeah, I would guess it’s just the dialect of a region that mostly overlaps with Tennessee.
Joyce is gonna mix things up. In the comic, Danny-clone will body-slam Dorothy-clone when she dumps him first day of college, and no one will even notice, including Dorothy, because thats totally normal human interactions.
But boy, that 9 chickweed lane thing is messed up, huh…
I wonder, when julia-grey has her date with Moe, will she hire white knight red shirt mike to slug Moe for thirsty thoughts? Or will she personally slug him herself because repeatedly slugging someone for impure thoughts is totally normal behavior one would expect of someone as powerful as a space captain.
I hope julia does it herself. That way, years later, at their wedding, Moe’s vows can say, “I knew by the fourth time you slugged me on our first date, that this was true love”, and everyone will shed a happy tear.
And hopefully by then that 9 chickweed lane nonsense will be gone.
I now pronounce you husband and wife. You may suplex the bride and dick-punch the groom.
Cue music and rice.
Well, I remember I learned in 5th grade that it is inappropriate to trip a girl I was crushing on, but the principle said next time, just slug her like every other boy and no one would even notice.
sigh, true story that… it was in 1973… damn
Huh. I always wondered where proto-flirting went after schools no longer had inkwells to dip pigtails into.
“where proto-flirting went”
Its right here!
And remember, never apologize for proto flirting.
Joe might apologize for “the list”.
Joyce can apologize for getting all militant atheist on Becky and calling her dumb for being religious.
But here, no one has to ever apologize for or come to terms with their violent behavior. Its true. Pretty sure Sal told Amber “i forgive you” for stabbing me in the hand when i had never harmed you and was in cuffs and it totally wasnt self defense on your part, before Amber said “im sorry for stabbing you in the hand when it wasnt self defense and you were not a threat to me and it was really my asshole dad i was mad at but i had no way to deal with him and you were cuffed and restrained and i didnt live under your roof so you were safe target for my rage”.
Nope.
Huh. Im not even sure amber actually said the words “im sorry for bkah blah blah”. But all the better! Here we get to violently assault people and never deal with it! Here we live like god intended us to live.
Now find someone your sweet on and give them a black eye so they know you like them.
Pow! Zoom! Straight to the moon, Alice!
Remember when it was a running joke for one spouse to threaten the other with physical violence?
Glad to see relationship-violence found a place to be normalized again.
Can we “normalize” using just one comment to spew unhinged nonsense? You’re making up problems that don’t exist and it’s gotten uncomfortable.
“principle said next time, just slug her”
Did he specify head or gut?
Or did he leave that to personal preferences?
AS I recall the conversation after darn near 50 years…
“So you tripped Sarah?”
“Yes Sir”
“Did you mean to hurt her?”
“No Sir”
“…” “You like her don’t you?”
Me blushing furiously, “ummm, yes sir”
“Well, next time hit her in the shoulder like all the rest of you cretins do… Now go on, get to your bus”
No detention, no call to the ‘rents, nothing. I remember I had to look up cretins (remember, this was years and years before Wazowski)
Sad, but this is an actual event from my early childhood. Now, as an adult living in the 2020’s, I realize that principle was a misogynistic prick, but then, I was just glad to not get detention.
Sarah danced with me once at the next school dance, then slapped me, hard. We were going steady for 3 months until another boy stole her.
We were going steady for 3 months until another boy stole her.
Sounds like you have not fully erased the misogyny from your upbringing. People do not “steal” other people, unless we’re talking literal abduction.
Yeah, and even under the assumption that a person could be “yours”, if they can be “stolen”, they clearly didn’t think they were “yours” in the first place.
“Well, next time hit her in the shoulder like all the rest of you cretins do…”
Wow. Classy dude.
I recall working a concession stand during some school event to raise money. Vice principal asked for. Coke. Another kid got the drink, i looked at vp, held out my hand and said i need cold cash for a cold drink. apparently it wasnt deferential enough. He grabbed my hair and slammed my head into the table. Took his drink and walked away. I domt know if he paid. I was a bit distracted.
Gotta love the old school education….
The cool thing is Joyces comic is set in the future, so she can have robots and shit. She can have robot doctors!
I can just imagine it. ruth suspemded in a tank of liquid, unconscious, a breathing tube exhales bubbles into the water. Her eyes open. She is lifted up.
Ruth is lying in bed. Robot doctor is checking here vitals. “Well Ruth. You are doing much better. I do have some procedural questions for you. Do you feel safe at home?”
Ruth: sure. My girlfriend Jennifer lives with me. She loves me so much. As i spiraled into near suicide, she spiraled with me. We physically assault each other daily, which is totally normal for loving couples”
Robot doc: “totally normal”
Jennifer walks in.
Robot doc: Jennifer! So good to meet you. Ruth has been telling me how much you two love each other.
Jennifer: we do. We get violent outbreaks once a day.
Robot doc: thats great! And totally normal! I feel completely at ease seeing you to get back togethdr as soon as possible. And i shoukd know, im a robot doctor, and totally useless.
Ruth: you really are useless arent you.
Robot doc: i know, right?!
They all laugh.
And scene.
I’ve only run into 9 chickeeed lane by accident, but not once did i see someone lovingly bodyslam their love. Does that comic even people?
Jesus Christ get over it already.
Jennifer: stop punching me in the gut
Ruth: Jesus Christ get over it already
Jennifer: i’m pregnant
Ruth: do i have to kill myself to show how much i love you???
Jennifer: if you’re thelma, Im louise.
Ruth: (raises fist)
Jennifer: IN THE FACE! MY FACE!!
Ruth: (punches Jennifer in the face)
Jennifer: you… you DO love me.
Ruth: fuck you too
Jennifer: lets take a famiky picture and use it for christmas cards.
Ruth: this is totally normal
In this single strip you’ve left several comments harping in the same issue even though it has little to nothing to do with anything here.
I really think this is at a point where engaging with them will just lead to more frustration/unpleasantness/suffering all around. Not that you have to listen to me, but I’d advise against it.
The fake Dali lama quote guy has emotional issues and writes a lot of text, yeah.
“The fake Dali lama quote guy has emotional issues”
Do I? I guess i dont like violence being the punchline. Mike punching joe. Amber stabbing sal. Ruth/jennifer. Its all fucked. If thats a mental issue, then i guess i got it.
Since you opened the conversation to state of mind, any idea whats got ahold of you? You felt Joe deserved punching? Or did someone use a fake dala lama quote to abuse you?
If Joe ever haymakers joyce for objectifying another man while on a date with him, lemme know your impressions of it. We can compare notes.
You’re right. Amber stabbing Sal was a punchline. It was meant to be funny. That was the point of it. You’re very good at understanding what you read and what you see. You’re the only one who understand this comic, even though you apparently just binged it in a couple of days recently and have repeatedly shown holes in your understanding. The rest of us are benighted rubes who can’t tell our ass from a hole in the ground and desperately need a giant brain like yours to tell us what happens in this comic. Even the creator doesn’t understand this as well as you.
“Amber stabbing Sal was a punchline.”
The whlole bullshit with amber stabbing sal was fucked. It was all fucked. I didnt say it was a funny punchline. sometines the punchline is cruel. Simetimes its mean. Sometimes its robin williams funny. Sometimes its andrew dice clay bullshit. Some times its insult comics like don rickles. Sometimes its Mike punching Joe slapstick.
Amber had 5 years of trauma, not from sal, but from her dad, which pushed her to lash out at sal while hand cuffed. She developed a split personality. Became a vigilante. Started stalking Sal? Even though she did more damage to sal than sal did to her? Fought sal. And eventually sal confronted her and said “i forgive you”. And amber authur fonzerelli’ed out an “im sorry”. And then just like that theyre roller derby buddies???? Thats a fucking joke of how apologies work, right? 5 years of anger at her dad misdirected at sal and all she says is “sorry”? Youre kidding me, right?
“Even the creator doesn’t understand this as well as you.”
Well, willis and quite a few here seem to think they understand 9 chickweed lane better than its author does, kind of a point of todays strip, so a lot of that going around.
Tell me this: Joe goes out on a first date with Joyce, and tells her anytime she looks at another man in a way he deems “inappropriate” he punches her. He ends up punching her half a dozen times. Does thst sound like a fucking punchline to you? Months later Joyce draws a picture of her with hearts over her head with her looking at joe, the guy who punched her so many times months before??? Thats a joke, right, in the worst way, right?
But somehow its funny when the rolls are reversed??? Feel free to explain it to me. You apparently understand and are livid that i dont recognize your insight. So. Spell it out to me. How is joyce having mike punch joe any less disturbing than if joe punched joyce for the same bullshit reasons?
What the fuck are you talking about? I didn’t say any of that shit.
@FDLQG: You need a better sarcasm detector.
@Taffy: You need a better troll detector. Using their own real opinion to create a contrary opinion that they can shove onto you to waste your time on arguing against it? Thats like Trolling 101.
I don’t actually think they’re a troll. I do think they struggle greatly with nuance and general comprehension in the comments; I do agree with the
wasting time” assessment. Maybe a conversation is possible, but for most of us, especially with the comments on this page, I don’t think it’d go well.
Fair enough, then. Hard not to read bad intent, sometimes.
Seconded.
How many levels of meta is this? and by meta I don’t mean that f’tard
Yuckerberg’s company.
I genuinely love Joyce “leaning around the doorframe”-ing the edge of the strip.
Joyce, don’t let Sal prevent you from writing the worst possible accent. Chris Claremont didn’t let that stop him and he was amazing. Deciphering the text is half the fun.
Needs more Jägermonsters.
Jägermonsters are about the right level of accent for me. Once it turns into deciphering the text, I lose interest. Pulls me out of the flow of the story.
Only a few comics have done that. Can’t think of any books offhand.
I have that problem with Pixie Trix comics, sometimes, especially when DiDi is talking.
Avoid “Feersum Endjinn” by Iain M. Banks.
And the l33t spe@k sections of “Megatokyo.”
WHAT!? So no Space Captain Julia Gray’s secret evil twin sister? Kinda disappointing.
Just put on some Spock ears, Julia! Or, uh, the hockey fan equivalent of Spock ears. (Also, as long as I’m calling back to ancient Roomies! strips, here’s the 1997-era creation Willis is semi-autobiographically referencing today.)
love the 9CL reference under Joyce’s comic. <3
Hey, is that the famous “8 Hempstead Blvd.” comic on the bottom? 😀
“69 Mouse-ear Blvd”, from the previous appearance.
Absolutely diabolical to withhold from us the payoff of that Joyce/Becky confrontation, Willis
Joyce trying to speak in Sal’s accent reminded me of this Roomies! comic
I was marginally less displeased with the world before Willis introduced me to 9CL than I am now. Thankfully my enjoyment of DoA outweighs the trauma of knowing that other comic exists!
yeah Joyce, appropriating your cool black associate isn’t good.
“Your matchless legs cured me of my homosexuality” was so odd I had to google it to see if it was a reference… and it turns out this strip is already up on TvTropes in two different articles.
And apparently it’s a 9 Chickweed Lane reference.
Ever reliable, that TV Tropes.
Which articles? (Love me some TV tropes)
It basically describes one entire storyline in 9 Chickweed Lane which was apparently once a better comic, turned their main gay character into a straight man because of dream straight sex (because if it is good in a dream, it must carry over to real life… oh wait, no it doesn’t) and an obscene quantity of the strips which start in Pride month and continue for over 2 months in this storyline focus on the woman’s legs that are airbrushed for some reason.
The storyline after it involves sexually charged toddlers so things basically only get worse.
In a world way far away on the total polar opposite end of the multiverse:
Joyce: so, about that drawing of you and i with butts or hearts over your head….
Joe: yeah, uh, i’d like to take you out sometime. Its just…
Joyce: just what?
Joe: just want to make sure there’s no abusive chaperone this time.
Joyce: joe, it wasnt that bad
Joe: thats what you told dinah about your parents using a wooden spoon on you. Even if they meant well, they didnt do well by you.
Joyce: ugh. I mean i get some of it was my messed up religious views on hanky panky that i dont even beieve in.
Joe: and some of it was your parents normalizing abuse to you.
Joyce: but they only did it when i was bad.
Joe: you dont deserve abuse, joyce. No one does.
Joyce: … including you.
Joe: including me. if it happens again, i’ll be extremely disappointed, but im out. I would never hit you. And im not sticking around someone who thinks hitting is ok.
Joyce: …. im sorry i had mike hit you, joe. This sucks. It feels like i just keep finding more parental stuff to unpack.
Joe: yeah well we all have a lot of parental bullshit to unpack.
Joyce: we?
Joe: yeah, well, i dont really know what a healthy relationship looks like. My dad was a role model for tge opposite of that.
Joyce: i thought my i knew. But turned out my parents actually werent good together.
Joe: Speaking of which, im sorry i reduced your existence to a zero minus. Youre so much more than that.
Joyce: th… thank you, Joe.
Joe: you are unstoppable. You have such a big heart. You care about people so deeply. I think i gave up on caring. But you reminded me. And i really like your smile.
Joyce: (blush) i… admired you making amends over your list. It took courage. And you took Amber on and have been a great new brother for her.
Joe: man a LOT has happened in one year of college.
Joyce: its weird. Its not even a year ago, but it feels like a decade
Joe: yeah. Ive definitely changed.
Joyce: i dont recognize myself sometimes.
Joe: hi. Im joe.
Joyce: (big smile) joyce.
Joe: you hungry?
Joyce: do you like soup? Any answer that starts with “no because” is fine.