THE SEVENTH DUMBING OF AGE KICKSTARTER IS GO! Collecting (obviously) the seventh year of Dumbing of Age, this 228-page book’s also got strip commentary and 27 Patreon bonus strips! Also, hey, as always, character magnet add-ons. This year we’re starting out with Sierra, Amber, and Ukulele Danny! If/after we hit $50k, everyone who pledges for a paper book gets a Ruth magnet for freeeeeeeee!
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“of course I smell. I have a nose. Which no longer wants to be near your mouth wind, thank you very much”
Having a nose doesn’t necessarily mean the ability to smell. My boyfriend has no sense of smell. 😛
whereas Walky has no sense *badum-tss*
And Dina has no smell, which assists in her going undetected
She just has to be mindful of breakfast.
Have we just figured out the real reason she always only eats cereal?
The Saruyamas are actually distant cousins of the Zoldycks. This explains a lot more about Dina’s character than it should while simultaneously explaining nothing at all.
Obligatory “taste” joke
he’s filthy and he knows it
Dorothy: “Walky, you dirty dirty boy.”
Walky: “Are we doing sexy talk?”
Dorothy: “No. Go take a shower.”
(I’m assuming this is taking place in a flashback.)
Walky: “Why not both?”
(Now I feel dirty)
Is it really over?
At least until after she finishes her (solitary) implosion.
Isn’t it over?
+4 points.
Bravo! You get a Pearl Point!
Then why can’t she move on?
Going by this analogy, either Walky was right about Joyce or Ethan is about to get a new romantic option. Depends on which one of Dotty & David is Rose (and thus which one is dead).
I choose to believe you’re here and for that, I thank you.
Well that didn’t work. I choose to believe you’re paraphrasing Pearl here and I appreciate that.
The more things I see from the actual show rather than the adverts for it. The more I actually want to give Steven Universe a chance, but then i see ads for it and i’m like… god this looks dumb.
For now, I think. I could see her being able to better balance it after Walky gets his own act together.
Walky’s got his act together a lot better than she does. This isn’t going to be good for either of them.
Mind you, assuming this is actually a breakup I don’t expect it to be any more successful than the pause was.
“Walky’s got his act together a lot better than she does. This isn’t going to be good for either of them.”
Except he’s flunking his math course, and I’m not sure how he’s doing in other classes – that was what started it all, as Dorothy was trying to tutor him in that so he’d stay on-campus.
True, he’s got his own problems, but he’s not working himself into a breakdown, not sleeping and skipping meals either.
And that’s not what started it all either – She only found out about his grades the day before she got her bad one and she was already starting to show signs of stress by then.
Yes, because next Monday Walky will die of toilet bowl nachito poisoning.
Ah, Walky. Sweet and gross in one strip.
So, so gross.
Yeah, that was my initial reaction too.
oh gods, Walky.
Idiots.
Love is such a rare and amazing thing, and these two are just throwing it away.
Never let love or a perfectly good if slightly damp Nachito go to waste!
I don’t think you were intending to convince your fellow readers that the Nachito is a metaphor, but you’ve convinced me anyway.
Some would say that enabling your beloved’s doomed, self-destructive quest – up to and including sacrificing yourself also – is the noblest thing.
These people are idiots.
Clinging to her, and going in against her wishes would also be wrong. By going along with her wishes and trying to make it easy on her, he’s being more mature than a large number of the people on campus.
In a crazy twist of fate, Dorothy is being stupid and immature by engaging in her bizarre self-destructive quest to achieve ALL THE THINGS even if it kills her, while Walky is being the mature adult and trying to make things easier on her.
Nobody saw that reversal coming.
I mean he’s also being stupid and immature by not realizing how self-destructive what Dorothy is doing is.
Yeah, but also… He’s an 18 year old boy. He doesn’t have the knowledge base to know that Dorothy is being self-destructive. *Dorothy* doesn’t have the knowledge base to know that she’s fucking herself over.
Walky did a good. Walky is a good, even if he’s immature and stupid.
Though in this case, and going by what she said yesterday, a protest of “Don’t do this for me” would be reasonable. If she wants to break up with him or feels she needs to make more time, that’s one thing. If she thinks she should because she hasn’t been fair to him and he doesn’t agree, that’s another thing entirely.
In addition to, as Emily says below, missing how self-destructive she’s being.
Check the title.
Something like this?
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2014/comic/book-5/01-when-somebody-loved-me/bestpossiblething/
I would never wish to make Joyce act that way to me. The red panel was entirely called-for.
At first, I misread Walky’s last line as “…one fell in the bowl…”
And I am deeply, deeply thankful that it actually just says “on.”
Oh thank God, you saved me.
I had the same misreading.
…oh…I also misread it and did not reread, and now I feel somewhat better
I think we slipped into an alternate timeline à la Berenstein/Berenstain Bears.
Saw this strip yesterday, can confirm it said ‘in’ last night.
I was honestly pretty sure that it said “in” when it first loaded, but like, reading is weird. And my memory has generally proven to be pretty solid, but I still don’t trust it.
…what?
It was never changed. What on Earth.
Wait shit, that should be ‘on’.
Of all the typos to make.
Was it a typo or was it the TRUTH
It was a typo.
*dramatically suspicious music plays*
But really, hell of a time to typo.
Shit would definitely be in the bowl
Alternate timeline
Of course you would say that. You’re in on the conspiracy.
Really??
That is exactly how I read it, and I was like, no, he’s just trying to gross out Dorothy.
Now, I’m trying to figure out how he could on the “on the potty” and have a nachito fall “on the bowl.” On the seat, sure, and he would eat it. Or if he were peeing, it could fall on the rim, and…ick. But what does it mean for something to fall “on the bowl” in this context?
You really, really don’t want to know. Just take my word for it.
But in case you actually do want to know… (warning, TMI)
Split toilet seat. Very common in men’s restrooms. They leave a gap in front so, in theory, if a guy dribbles while peeing standing up, it falls on the bowl rim rather than on the seat.
…No, it’s not very effective. The gap just isn’t wide enough. Maybe when men’s average height was 5’5″/167 cm…
And yes, that does substantially increase the level of grossness of eating off of the bowl.
also of accidentally touching it with your pants, which makes me paranoid and grossed out every time
“Very common in men’s restrooms”
By my experiences they dominate in gender-neutral ones, as well. And yeah, the design seems crazy in-effective: Neither sex really manages to urinate without to some degree imitating a garden sprinkler, so even if they manage to mostly get it in that split section, the design still encourages an approach that gets urine on the rest of the seat, as well. :S
The pressure-valve toilets in our building splash back onto the seat when flushed, leaving the impression the previous person was careless. Even worse, that means those stains aren’t just urine.
On is still bad. That’s where all the dried, congealed pee is. 😛
noooooooooooo
The Art of Walky, chapter 3: “U SMELL”
I’m calling the police
It’s shameless how they flirt.
Calvin would never eat toilet nachitos!
🙂
Walky NO
hey, honesty is at the heart of a good relationship, even one that’s (temporarily, I hope) ending. 😛
*plays the U2 “Maggie’s Farm/Cold Turkey” live twin-spin on the hacked Muzak*
*Cues up the theme song from “Turkey Television” after U2* (it’s a deeeeep cut)
Plays U2’s Party Girl after that, for the second verse. (Also a deep cut, I think)
Break up! FIND OUT YOU’RE MISERABLE WITHOUT HIM, DOT!
Make up your mind. Unless you just want the drama, in which case I’ll share my popcorn.
Do you just…really not like Dorothy?
I like Dorothy just fine. She’s a frustrating flawed character who I expect will have a heavy dose of the real world ruining a lot of her aspirations but those flaws are part of what make her interesting.
The breakup of the Walkerton/Dot relationship is a story beat I support for, yes, DRAMA. I don’t think they need to get back together but I do think it’ll motivate their character arcs from that point.
Mostly, Dorothy reminds me a lot of me in my Freshmen year. I made a lot of really poor choices that, nevertheless, educated me.
Omg stop being stupid. Dorothy, you need him as much as he needs you. You don’t need to isolate yourself to the point of insanity to be successful. In fact it is counterproductive. And Walky for God’s sake grow up. I feel like you’ve actually gotten worse as the series goes on.
No, he’s largely stayed where he is the whole time. Which is a significant part of the problem.
I find it amusing to see these comments in a strip in which Walky is calmly supporting her, accepting the breakup and trying to make it easier for her, even if he is doing it with potty humor.
The actual behavior here is incredibly mature. Probably more than I would have been at that age – even if I would have left out the potty comment.
Come on Dorothy! You’ve seen Doctor Who, you know that even an extraordinary person needs an ordinary person with them so they don’t forget what it means to be human!
(Not implying that Walky’s not extraordinary in his own way, just not in the way Dotty is.)
Walky is her Manic Pixie Dream Boy who exists for the purpose of making her willing to go out and enjoy life.
He’s a Garden State Natalie Portman!
Yes, because Walky isn’t showing incredibly emotional maturity here.
Was that before or after they screwed because that means she made out with toilet breath that morning. 😵
Am I the only one that assumed he made up a plausible lie for her?
I hope so because damn man that’s nasty.
Walky: “A joke is performed by knowing the target well enough to select for them an appropriate lie.”
Damn, was that him? I thought Becky or Dina came up with that.
It was Becky who taught Dina that, though the phrasing seems obviously Dina’s
All, we can assume he doesn’t think her face is stupid, and it’s doubtful she smells, so if the first two are lies, the last one is probably a lie.
Probably.
A double lie, perhaps.
I THINK he did so…
but then I have to ask myself… did he really HAVE TO make up a lie?
If you are the genuine thing you never have to pretend.
Walky’s got a lot of faith in Dorothy. It reminds me of when he made her beam a little when he mentioned how he and Dorothy had sex to Joe, and said someday, he could say he had sex with the future president. Like, to Walky, Dorothy’s success is in zero doubt.
I am glad that Dorothy has ambition, but her laser focus on it is really not doing her any favors.
Well of course there’s no doubt, she’s trying to make herself overqualified for a job that can be handed to just anybody.
Any natural born citizen 35 or older.
As the current president demonstrates, you don’t even have to be smart or have a clue how the government works to become president.
Well, it also proves that America’s still got some MASSIVE misogyny issues and how a lot of people in america are willing to give a man a pass for something they’d fine unacceptable from a woman.
As an aside note, one who wishes for power and leadership should not be seen to push so hard for it. It it is better to appear to reluctantly take up the challenge, rather than to be overtly ambitious. Dorothy is an incredibly driven and intelligent person, who would make a fine President, one we could be truly proud to have. But she has a lot to learn about the nature politics.
hahahahahahahaha
I wish that were the case. But it is so fucking not the case.
Which part is not the case? If you state from the very beginning that your goal is ultimate political power, people will begin to fear what you will do with it. From a political standpoint, it is better to appear to focus on others, rather than on yourself.
I mean, if you run on a platform of “I want to be the person who gets to make up the rules”, then yeah, I guess, but that’s cartoon villain stuff. Political candidates don’t have to hide their ambition, or at the very least Donald Trump didn’t hide it very well and he’s POTUS now.
Obviously that’s a bit different for women, but that’s a whole other conversation.
Only men are allowed to be ambitious (and for them, a certain amount is just considered the baseline; you have to go above and beyond).
Still pretty mixed signals there, Dotty…
Is anyone in the comic (like, a minor/background character that I could have missed) confirmed as being NB? Thinking of changing my Gravatar and trying to work out who I’d want it to be.
Not yet (that I’m aware of). Although I assume it’s only a matter of time.
What’s NB?
Nota bene
(Actually, “non-binary” in this instance)
Everyone is binary. Or they’re not.
The 10 kinds of people in the world.
Right, the ones that understand base 3, the ones that don’t, and the ones that think it’s a binary joke.
No, it’s those who know binary, those who don’t, and those who know that this joke is in base three. You have to bury the lede. First rule of comedic timing is to never give away the punchline early. There’s more to jokes than selecting the appropriate lie. Today’s impromptu comedy lesson is sponsored by the letter þ and the number 69.
Dorothy… you are making this way more complicated than this needs to be…. If you are half as smart as everyone thinks you are, you can find to make it work, even if you need a break to focus on what you need to, at this point you are just being a drama queen. If you are falling to pieces now, I would hate to see how you would react to a real problem, much less one that a president would have to go through. You gonna do the same thing then? Just give up when things get rough?
Walky, you are being a great guy, but I almost want you to stop it. If you really want her that bad say something. You never hesitated before, why now? I know you want her to succeed and all, but be fair to yourself too man..
At this point, she doesn’t even seem worth it.
So Nachitos are real here too?
Dumbing of Age Book 8: Your Stupid Pretty Face is Dumb
Dumbing of Age Book 8: There Were Too Many Potential Titles, So I Used Them All
(actually I’m pretty sure it’s been confirmed to be Dumbing of Age Book 8: Up Here We Can Be Garbage but yeah)
Their interaction/flirting in this strip alone shows that they should stay together. Damn it Dorothy of all the things to give up to avoid a burnout this is not the right thing.
ew.
Walky.
You could die.
Yeah, I think Walky knows that, based on his expression in panel 7. He seems to be thinking: “Why would I do that? Dorothy, I need you to save me from myself!”
To me it’s an expression of “switching brain off to also say gross things to love interest” – like, he’d just continue rambling stuff until she’d had enough.
I think, before, he must’ve had some measure in his brain intact to filter some of the things he said in Dorothy’s presence.
Though, I doubt he’d even mention something like that in anyone else’s presence – despite him being himself.
They’ll probably be back together in a few weeks. Of course, for us, that’ll take so years.
I had a dream the other night where Willis announced that the next Slipshine was about Walky and Tony.
What the hell, brain.
I had a dream the other night where it was confirmed first that Joyce played Neopets and then that all Neopets were bisexual.
My brain was just like, “Here’s a mixture of things you spend time with online.”
…and now I’m trying to figure out if I could somehow work all of these themes into one drawing. Walky and Tony kissing while Joyce holds up a bi-pride-flag-colored Acara plush in the background?
This nachito thing just really makes me want to see Walky and Ron Stoppable meet each other.
Does anybody suddenly keep getting blocked pop-up notifications on the site or is it just my phone? I’ve got 25 so far and this is the first time it’s happened
Yeah, it started happening for me either yesterday or the day before.
Yeah, sometimes I get redirected to a scam website with one of those new dictionary word TLDs. They’re probably coming from an ad with a redirect payload.
Just tell your browser to request the desktop version of the site. It won’t look any different, but the browser will use its desktop version’s user agent so you won’t see those targeted mobile ads anymore. (I’ve yet to see a pop-up alert with this method.)
Nachos like corn can sometime travel through your body and come out looking much the same as they did going in… just saying…
Thank you for that thought. Pardon me while I price brain-bleach on Amazon. Oh, there it is. https://www.amazon.com/Intox-BRAIN-BLEACH-8oz-Flask/dp/B01M3N6J33/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1523340006&sr=8-1&keywords=brain+bleach
You’re welcome ^_^
That last line from Walky is the sort of thing that will convince Dorothy that she can’t abandon him because she’s the only thing stopping him from killing himself!
Fortunately she recently learnt she isn’t responsible for his actions.
Sometimes it’s a hard lesson to take to heart. Especially when he does stupid shit like that.
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2018/comic/book-8/03-faz-is-great/pushed/
Blech. Slightly less blech that the nachito fell ON the bowl rather than IN it but blech nonetheless.
But WHO even EATS on the potty? I mean, I can understand having candy, eff, maybe even a lollipop, or a chewing gum already IN your mouth and then needing to go, you simply don’t spit it out, but eating something on there.
I mean, yeah, a sponge in the kitchen has more or at least as much bacteria than a toilet bowl, but simply imagining eating food in the toilet or bathroom kinda irks me…
Elvis ate on the toilet all the time. However, it IS regarded as one of the key indicators of slobhood.
Ya gotta replace what’s coming out, ya know?
He always knows just what to say.
He’s lying about the nachitos to gross her out, right?
Please, tell me he didn’t do that.
Dorothy is making a mistake and Walky is taking it better than I would’ve given him credit for right now. A+ nontoxic masculinity there, Walky.
Assuming the thing about the toilet chip was a lie. Otherwise B+ but A for effort.
Eh, I don’t think this is a mistake. The for fun no strings attached relationship she thought she was getting into turned out to have a ton of strings. Dorothy has always been clear on what her priorities are, and clearly they haven’t shifted.
To be more precise, she doesn’t want her priorities to shift but the longer she spends with Walky, the more they’re shifting. She needs to decide whether she’s happy with that.
Yeah, but her priorities are self-destructive and stupid and aren’t going to get her to her goals they’re going to get her to a sleep deprivation induced breakdown.
Her priorities are self-destructive because she has too many of them. She decided that having a boyfriend was lower priority to her than academic success. That is a perfectly reasonable decision.
But that’s because it’s Dorothy. I doubt she’s capable of a “for fun no strings attached” relationship. Walky tried to stick with it, but as she said yesterday, she upped the ante.
She’s not wired that way. She’s not going to do one-night stands and she’s not going to stay in a relationship without getting emotionally attached.
I suppose she can just try to make it through the rest of her time at IU without dating, but it seems like she’ll have trouble with that. Especially given how quickly she turned to Walky in the first place.
She needs to find a way to balance her emotional needs with her goals. Frankly, I doubt she’ll find anyone she can do that better with than Walky. He’s been awesomely supportive of her all along, giving her space, believing in her, even now (grossly) helping her break up with him.
I don’t blame either party for letting feelings creep into their relationship. Dorothy was in a position where the idea of a for fun no strings attached relationship was very appealing, and decided to pursue one. Sadly this wasn’t something she was able to maintain because she isn’t a Vulcan, and feelings are a bongo. At any rate it’s very important to Dorothy to do things perfectly, at least for now. So she can either be the “perfect girlfriend” who supports Walky and helps him through his academic problems, or she can back out. Keeping things in between feels like a failure. I’m kinda agree with her that she shouldn’t be in any relationship. At least not unless her priorities change. It’s possible to maintain good mental health without a boyfriend.
I don’t exactly blame her, though it’s a bit of whiplash for the other party if they’ve been doing a better job of holding back and keeping it light. And she didn’t really address it in a “I know I said this was just for fun, but I’m wondering if we should change that” kind of way, but just jumped in with “I love you”.
More though the point isn’t so much that she isn’t a Vulcan, but that she keeps pretending she is. It’s a flaw and a pattern as she acknowledged last strip. If she doesn’t address that, she’s likely to keep it up – whether turning back to Walky or connecting with someone else, because she wants that emotional connection, even if she thinks she should just focus on work instead.
Nor does this really have much to do with supporting Walky and his academic problems, she’s got her own and she’s currently seeing things like food and sleep as distractions from her studies.
And while it’s certainly possible to maintain good mental health without a boyfriend, breakups are a huge stressor, cutting yourself off from emotional support isn’t good in a crisis and Dorothy is already not in good shape – see aforementioned skipping sleep/food/exercise.
I guess we’ll see. Your right, she certainly can’t maintain the the trajectory she’s on right now, but she probably knows that. She’s trying to work herself out of a hole she dug up be spreading herself too thin. She doesn’t have to keep this pace up forever, just tell the end of the quarter, at which point she’ll get a blank slate. Keeping your head down and powering through does make for a few awful weeks/months, but it is maintainable and pays off so long as you keep your goals clear and don’t let the exception became the new norm. After my brother finished his senior project I think he slept for a week, but he did make the front page of the school magazine and met quite a few private investors as a result. His work pace did just about kill him but it did pay off.
I still can’t tell if this was a good pairing to begin with or not.
In the parallel Walkyverse, Dorothy was an antagonist with an obsession with marrying Walky. I’m thinking that Willis wanted to explore just how these two would have meshed if Walky’s established relationship with Joyce wasn’t in the way.
*to herself*
All right, Dorothy, if you want to break up with Walky…
… AND YOU DO …
… then you just need to focus on his DISGUSTING behaviors, and NOT on his adorkably sweet behaviors that just make you want to ki- STOP THAT!
Remember that he eats day-old McNuggets without reheating them!
Remember that he scoops sour cream that he dropped on the cafeteria floor up and BACK ONTO HIS FOOD!
Remember that he likes to lick your armpits after your runs when they’re all damp and sw- STOP THAT!!
As long as the McNuggets are stored properly in the fridge, why does it matter if you reheat them or not? Cold chicken tastes great.
Walky: Talk to me, Dorothy! YOU ARE TEARING ME APART, DOROTHY! Oh, hi Joyce.
If Dorothy needs time she should quit all her extracurricular and unnecessary courses instead of quitting self care and her love life. She can become president without taking 10 courses in a semester. I am stressed with only 6.
As someone who goes straight from Roomies everyday to DoA, it amuses me to no end for Nachitos to be mentioned in each punchline.
I really want these two to be happy. But being together makes them happy, and they seem like they’re worse off apart. I’m glad they’re handling this maturely, but I also want them to work things out so they end up together again. Mostly I’m trying to be happy for them but I’m just sad.
I’ve been reading quite a while and this is my first comment.
I have now decided. Walky is my favorite character.