100% agreed. Great analysis. Dorothy’s had the experience of being in a serious relationship with an expiration date but Walky is not going to understand what she means without further explanation. Hopefully that’s coming, especially since I’d also like to see Joyce’s reaction to the idea.
I want Walky to feel comfortable expressing his ignorance, but again his cartoonish view of Machismo might get in the way of that.
I really like Walky, and his upbringing on cartoons may have given him a solid desire to do good, but it’s also left him stunted in more subtle encounters.
Eh I wouldn’t blame it entirely on the cartoons. My impression is that Walky is just generally a late bloomer. He’s in college but his mental maturity is still somewhere in high school. Nothing wrong with that, in and of itself, IMO.
Man, trying to read the lessons in cartoons really F’d up my world view. I was always so sure the writers must have known what they were talking about.
She will either be horrified or inexplicably burst into a hitherto unplanned, unrehearsed, yet highly choreographed Disney style musical number involving everyone else in the dorm.
I think he might think the same thing Danny did and assume she’s changed her mind about Yale and will stay with him. I hope this time she states things up front rather than waiting too long.
I doubt that – Walky has always been more intelligent and perceptive than he behaves. He knows that Dorothy’s self-image is wrapped up in overachievment, and that giving up her future plans of greatness for love would be painful for her. I think that’s why he’s been pushing her away lately – he sees their relationship, as much as he enjoys it, to be detrimental to her plans for the future. He knows he’s a lazy, slovenly dork, and that, long-term, he’d be an anchor around her neck.
In short, I suspect he’ll respond to this cute, hesitant declaration of love by crushing it in the bud.
I’m betting that this, coupled with all her attempts to make him study more, is her hoping that she can make him come with her to Yale later or something.
Kernal Panic or Stop Error, same basic set of problems. The OS has become unstable and rather than lose data, it just shuts everything down. Although usually you have to manually kill power to restart.
Walky.DoA may require a forced reboot by hard boots. Joyce… you’re up again. ;P
Yeah, but Walky’s running on Windows 3.1. Or maybe Windows 95, I dunno. xD
I think Joyce is about to start squeeing and then will maybe hug Dorothy. Or maybe even jump in with an extremely inappropriate “I love you too Dorothy!” :3
Anywho, I don’t experience time dilation due to the early strips. I’m a rather impatient person at times though, and not being able to discuss tomorrow’s comment is KILLING me!
I mean, the new ‘feels’ definition makes sense, in a sorts of first-grader-attempting-to-deduce-logic-into-english way, but I’m unable to do a similar juvenile extrapolation about what ‘jelly’ could mean.
I like Pizza, but I don’t wanna eat it every day. Pizza and I agreed that it would leave school and that we’d break up. Pizza told me this was just a fling, damnit.
She pushes him to do better, he helps her make time for fun. They share common interests and haven’t had any major ideological clashes revealed. They seem like a reasonable fit in most ways.
They are actually a really good pair over all – I believe Dorothy’s parents were right and that this ‘for fun’ has become a ‘for real’ relationship. I think they actually could handle a long distance relationship because Dorothy is now better at making time for people (still not the best as Joyce still gets very little).
She pushes him to do better against his will, towards a ‘better’ he does not want. This is only a good thing if you think it’s okay to utterly dismiss the thoughts and opinions of one half of a relationship.
What’s good in a parent or military instructor is not necessarily good in a partner.
Really? I haven’t seen that.
I mean yes, Walky is being “matured” by Dorothy, but he broke up with her over the pajama jeans. If he didn’t want to “grow up”, he would do it again in a heartbeat, Joyce’s hysteria notwithstanding.
I’m not completely sold on them as a couple either still…. but I really loved Joyce and Walky in ‘Its Walky’ soooo I think I’m gonna be left disappointed :/
Here’s hoping something shiny distracted her.
She is looking away & keeping her distance in panel 2; perhaps she senses that Dorothy’s gonna talk about something private-ish and has ambled away.
Whoa. It’s like as if, in an alternate universe, they were made for each other. The things that could have been if things were different…
Anyone else get a sense of deja-vu?
Everyone who’s saying it hasn’t been all that long, I don’t know that they’ve had someone who wasn’t family say that to them. I was dating my fiancee about a month when she said the “L” word. Same goes for the girl I was dating before her. You can get feelings really quick, and want to express them.
It really fuckin’ trips me up. My ex said that too. It took me a while to say it back cuz words have a meaning. You can’t just say shit like that. If you just say “I love you” and then don’t mean it with your whole heart then you’re doing yourself and them a disservice. It’s like saying “I hate you”. These words have meaning, and it’s SO offputting to me when people use words like that and don’t understand the power behind them.
That’s definitely a matter of personal opinion and something a couple would need to discuss amongst themselves. I use the word love a lot. I love family and friends and when I’m dating someone it’s because I love them. But I’m also a bit cynical, because I think the feeling of whole-hearted “being in love” is different from whole-heartedly loving someone. When people talk about “being in love”, I usually view it as kind of… their relationship is still young or such? As opposed to simply, we love each other. I feel like… you fall in love and THEN you build something lasting out of it. So it’s okay to tell them you love them when you feel it’s the right time to say it. But if you’re going to say it, you have to understand they might not be ready to say it back.
Huh. I dated my first steady girlfriend for about a week when we planned her moving in (which we completed about a month later). It took about 8 years until we separated. I don’t remember ever hearing the L-word. I should be surprised to hear that my successor (or intermediates) would have heard anything like it.
You say “You can get feelings really quick, and want to express them.” But I don’t call everything a “badger” that might happen to run around, either.
Words have meaning. If you don’t have any other word for “feelings” than “love”, chances are that you cannot verbalize or identify your feelings to any useful degree.
Yeah, I told my boyfriend I loved him a few weeks into dating and we’ve now been together for 6 years. Maybe I was just a dumb teenager that wasn’t interpreting my feelings right, but I felt really strongly that I loved him and so I said so.
Ah, thank you. I don’t have the official White House style guide handy… but I suppose that makes sense as “Gentleman” is oft the male equivalent of “Lady.” (“Lord” might have been another equivalent, but obviously, “First Lord of the United States” would be rather a funny and easily misconstrued title.)
“I am the First Lord of the United States, you fool! Now bring me my bejeweled ceremonial katana, that I may behead one of President Wife’s many enemies.”
Of all the wonderful swords out there, why a katana?
I think he’d look rather dashing with a saber, or a maquahuitl, or a guan dao, or a gladius, or –
Wait, I’m just listing my favorites. A guan dao should be good for beheadings, though, considering its effectiveness at cutting through iron plate armor.
This is Walky we’re talking about though. He’d totes think that a Katana is THE BESTEST SWORD IN THE UNIVERSE!!!!!111!one!11! and request, nay DEMAND that he has one. With a taco dispenser.
what are you talking about all the couples are happy right now…oh no, all the couples are happy, that means a entire new wave of dramatic problems are going to come in everything is going to go to shit!
I never use “psych(e)” because it reads like I’m talking about schoolwork, and anyway language is fluid and dynamic and actually needs GREATER distinctiveness in word meanings, amirite
No I think Dorothy is in love with Walky. I don’t think that love is the most important thing in the world to her, but I absolutely believe her when she says she loves Walky.
Yales just sitting one the sidelines with a freshly broken heart screaming,”NOOO! we could have had all , we could have made something no one has ever seen before but you gave it up.
It always bugs me that a mention of Yale throws off my suspension of disbelief, given how small of an issue it is over the course of the comic. But since you’ve mentioned it, I just drop this fun trivia fact for you: Yale doesn’t take transfers. I don’t know why I know that, and I don’t know why I let it bug me literally every sing time Yale is mention, but now you can share this burden with me.
Willis is taking the look of specific ROOMS at the college they’re at in this comic. The fact that Yale doesn’t take transfers might become a future plot point, and he’s just kind of sitting on it until it comes up. Just think of it like… potential foreshadowing!
Yale says they do, although it’s super competitive: http://admissions.yale.edu/transfer
I’ve honestly forgotten why Dorothy had the 2 years at IU, then transfer to Yale plan anyway. Money?
How does this indicate she’s forgetting about Yale? She can love him and still switch school, even if they don’t break up they can just do a long distance thingy.
“It’s a good thing I started this relationship with the implication that it would end as soon as something better came along, amiright? BT dubs I love you and stuff”
Nothing is. While it is surprising, there is nothing wrong with “loving” a “fling”. The problem here is the overuse of the word “love” in English vocabulary. It’s one of our largest lexical gaps and isn’t unique to the language.
See I didn’t interpret that as a bad reaction. I interpreted it as an “Oh. She loves me! She said I was a just a fling but shit she loves me!” But I could be wrong.
Mine was a very angst-filled confession; The first time I’d confessed to someone, you see, that friendship instantly fell apart, and we both got very hurt.
But the next time I fell in love, I could not allow myself to know that I loved this person, and not tell them, it was too big an emotion for me to feel comfortable hiding. It felt dishonest. So half an hour after meeting them, 3 months into our friendship, the first time we met after I realized I was in love, I told them.
Their response? “I’ve loved you since 3 days after we first met.” Completely floored me 🙂
I’ve never understood the whole “waiting to tell someone you love them” thing. Of course, I was engaged by day 8 of my one and only romantic relationship, so my experience is rather limited in those terms. (That was back in ’96. We’re still together, despite doom and gloom predictions by family members.)
Congrats to you all for your happy and lasting relationships.
Sometimes I think people should wait especially if you’re dealing with that one person who is in love with being in love rather than the person. I had a friend like that in high school and it became an annoyance of her crushing on then dating one guy and less than a month she’s crying the blues of having lost her ‘one true love’ before the cycle repeated.
This mindset ended up in a lot of bad relationships. Although holding back from saying ‘I love you’. wouldn’t have helped in her case.
I’m not against people saying it early, but I’m against people just saying it because they think that they should without really knowing/feeling it.
Ok, seriously, who are you going to kill?! Is it the squirrel? Joyce(please no)? Superman? MY HEART?! TOO HAPPY! I WANT IT TO LAST BUT THERE ARE WARNING SIGNS OF PAIN! AHAHWAKLHAWLHlKAWHLKWAHLH!*more over the top paranoia from this person*Love the happiness a whole, darn you sir! Gosh Darn You Willis and your playing heartstrings like harps!
Really? After how long has this been, a few weeks of dating? A month? You can be infatuated with someone after that long, but I have trouble seeing how you can love them when you still don’t even know them that well and you haven’t had time for deeper feelings to grow. An ex of mine told me he loved me after 3 weeks of dating and it just made me uncomfortable. I liked him but I was still getting to know him… And he barely knew me.
It happens. Maybe especially when you’re young, and it’s one of your first relationships. Plus, we can sit back and ask if it’s love or infatuation; in the middle of it, sometimes, they’re exactly the same thing.
Some people fall in love in a day, or a week. For others, it takes 18 months.
There isn’t just one way to love someone, to fall in love, and there isn’t a specific time limit on when “real” love can happen, applicable to all people, ever. There will be people who will say that they have fallen in love at a point in a relationship long before you have ever experienced yourself falling in love. In the same token, there will be people who will say that they have fallen in love at a point in a relationship long after the point when you no longer thought it could be found.
This does not automatically mean that they are wrong. This does not automatically mean that they are misinterpreting their emotions. This does not automatically mean they are lying.
It just means they fall in love in not quite the same way you do. And that’s how love is: It happens to people differently.
Now, to paraphrase one of my favorite comic artists: How to get off this high horse without hurting myself…
Willis is gloating on his tumblr and Twitter about the angst he’s currently causing his fanbase since everything is going so well. Plus we know Mary is out to cause trouble.
On the other hand, maybe Walky won’t screw this up too badly, and we’ll get at least ONE happy ending. Dotty & Walky’s relationship has kinda been that all this time. The one time they had a fight, it was resolved rather quickly. Since Joyce is right there, she’s lokely going to help Walky over the hump that is his foot in his mouth.
Maybe everyone feels angst because Joyce is dressed like Velma, indicating that at any moment the scene will shift to an amusement park haunted by the ghosts of the tiki tiki coal miners.
It’s funny to me that so many people are debating whether she can really be in love yet, or ought to be, after only 18 days. Does no one recall that they’ve already performed a sex? 😀 Not that those are the same thing—or even necessarily related—but it is hard for me to find her declaration a total shock… And beyond that, there’s so much to love about Walky!
Sex and love are certainly not the same thing, but you’re right in that the hormones and feelings produced in the former enhance the feeling of the latter. I’m not all that surprised she said it either.
For Dorothy, “love” is not important. She has routed around giving it any particular importance. There has not been any significant event that would change that.
On the other hand, she noticed that Walky cares about things more than he likes to admit.
Right after realizing that, she states “I love you, you know”. The “you know” insinuates that he should have realized that she “loves” him according to his metrics and care accordingly.
Where is the point in springing something like that on him? It is cheap for her to say that, and either answering or not answering is expensive for him because he takes things seriously.
He already stated previously that he saw no point in committing himself when she didn’t, and now she is forcing the issue nevertheless.
Well, now he can see a point to commitment. And Dorothy might find love very important, so she wasn’t going to talk about commitment until she saw that Walky was emotional enough to deal with it. The “you know” is not necessarily pushy – it is a commonplace way to mean “Did you know,” or “Do you know too,” in a grammatically awkward place in a sentence. Around my personal bubble, “You know…” means “I just remembered this thing, do you think it applies to our situation?” Or even, “I’m warning you.” And half the time, it’s funny.
Dorothy wants to exchange the word “love” on her side for commitment from Walky. She has not at any time indicated that she wants to commit herself to anything. But love is cheap: it is just what she feels at the moment. Commitment, in contrast, is exactly the willingness to go through when things stop being cheap.
She did not stick with Danny either though I have little doubt that she justifies her belief in the currency “love” with “I just realized I never really loved him” mind voodoo. Make no mistake: that realization might feel profound, but Dorothy is smart enough to know a rationalization when she thinks one.
Willis. Are you being completely cinnamon toast crunch honey-not cheery-0s right now. I feel the end.
Also, Joyce. What’s up with that?
*Ques laughing sound effect* *director uses crying sound effect instead* Yeah that would be more appropriate. But Joyce. Seriously. Her feels will be BrOKEN like my old computer.
Oh, now I get it.
There will be an ebola outbreak soon. Everyone dies a horrible death but only after insufferable pain, except for Joyce because she has divine protection. She will also get a halo, because fuck shit, when everybody around you dies you’re allowed to hallucinate a bit to keep your sanity.
When my parents confessed to each other my father told her ” I love you, but I don’t want you to say it yet just cause I said it. So don’t say it, or it’ll feel forced.”
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Man, I feel like Walky’s cartoonish view of the world isn’t ready for a declaration of love that’s not intended to end in perpetual monogamy
100% agreed. Great analysis. Dorothy’s had the experience of being in a serious relationship with an expiration date but Walky is not going to understand what she means without further explanation. Hopefully that’s coming, especially since I’d also like to see Joyce’s reaction to the idea.
I want Walky to feel comfortable expressing his ignorance, but again his cartoonish view of Machismo might get in the way of that.
I really like Walky, and his upbringing on cartoons may have given him a solid desire to do good, but it’s also left him stunted in more subtle encounters.
Eh I wouldn’t blame it entirely on the cartoons. My impression is that Walky is just generally a late bloomer. He’s in college but his mental maturity is still somewhere in high school. Nothing wrong with that, in and of itself, IMO.
They are *freshmen* still, so in fact it’s going to be the norm for everyone here.
Plus science has recently confirmed that our brains don’t stop developing until about 25 y. o., so.
Man, trying to read the lessons in cartoons really F’d up my world view. I was always so sure the writers must have known what they were talking about.
Walky is likely about to grow up real fast.
Or, you know, implode.
She will either be horrified or inexplicably burst into a hitherto unplanned, unrehearsed, yet highly choreographed Disney style musical number involving everyone else in the dorm.
Make this happen, please.
new slipshine, i think
It would be the best thing EVER.
I think he might think the same thing Danny did and assume she’s changed her mind about Yale and will stay with him. I hope this time she states things up front rather than waiting too long.
I doubt that – Walky has always been more intelligent and perceptive than he behaves. He knows that Dorothy’s self-image is wrapped up in overachievment, and that giving up her future plans of greatness for love would be painful for her. I think that’s why he’s been pushing her away lately – he sees their relationship, as much as he enjoys it, to be detrimental to her plans for the future. He knows he’s a lazy, slovenly dork, and that, long-term, he’d be an anchor around her neck.
In short, I suspect he’ll respond to this cute, hesitant declaration of love by crushing it in the bud.
I’m betting that this, coupled with all her attempts to make him study more, is her hoping that she can make him come with her to Yale later or something.
D’awwwwwwaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!
I friggin’ hate you, Willis. I hate you for making me do this, but
SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Opps.
And here’s the drama. 🙁
It’s not drama yes until Walky screws this up tomorrow
He already screwed it up in that last panel.
No, no, not yet. That’s just his brain getting Blue-Screened. Give him a bit ta reboot.
Walky runs on Windows?
And he uses Internet Explorer.
Internet Explorer 1.1 even.
That was largely a modified version of Mosaic. It was around version 3 that Internet Exploiter started sucking balls big time.
He’s gonna need Internal Explorer, for that remark.
Kernal Panic or Stop Error, same basic set of problems. The OS has become unstable and rather than lose data, it just shuts everything down. Although usually you have to manually kill power to restart.
Walky.DoA may require a forced reboot by hard boots. Joyce… you’re up again. ;P
I have always been partial to “Guru Meditation”.
Yeah, but Walky’s running on Windows 3.1. Or maybe Windows 95, I dunno. xD
I think Joyce is about to start squeeing and then will maybe hug Dorothy. Or maybe even jump in with an extremely inappropriate “I love you too Dorothy!” :3
I don’t think Walky will know how to respond to this, which in itself will cause Dorothy to worry
:'(
Aaaaaaahhh!
It got better!
It got better!!!
Aaaaand cue the freak-out
and cue Walky hyperventilating
Oh shi-!
We’ll find out if that was a good or bad ‘Oh shi-!’ tomorrow (unless Willis jumps scenes).
*psst* If you back Willis’s Patreon, you will be able to see tomorrow’s comic today!
I gotta say, it was hard not to spill the beans on this one all day today.
Yes but than you will have a need to see the comic for day after tomorow and so on.
And there the hover text is missing… Damn you Willis 😉
I love being a patron, but it really messes up my sense of time
Love the new gravatar.
Anywho, I don’t experience time dilation due to the early strips. I’m a rather impatient person at times though, and not being able to discuss tomorrow’s comment is KILLING me!
Walky is in danger of feels overload.
This is 2014, where even your elderly family members have that kind of foul mouth.
I can assure you that my grandmother has never used the words like feels and jelly in the same way you youngsters do.
Wait, ‘jelly’ means something different now too?
I mean, the new ‘feels’ definition makes sense, in a sorts of first-grader-attempting-to-deduce-logic-into-english way, but I’m unable to do a similar juvenile extrapolation about what ‘jelly’ could mean.
It’s short for “jealous”.
well, Dorothy DID use the L-word.
It was love. I wasn’t trying to trick you or anything.
TECHNICALLY she used “like” also
Lunch?
Lesbians?
Lycanthropy, obviously
Lesbian lycanthropes love lunchtime.
Ludicrous.
lilacs.
Oh God, take cover, explosion imminent!
I fully expect a ‘this was supposed to be casual, YOU said it was casual’ explosion very soon.
the best* 11 words to hear from someone you’re into:
“we’re just having fun, right? I mean, aren’t YOU having fun?”
*worst
It’s sweet but… they’re all wrong for each other.
Really? They seem to like each other enough.
I like Pizza, but I don’t wanna eat it every day. Pizza and I agreed that it would leave school and that we’d break up. Pizza told me this was just a fling, damnit.
That’s more of a situational flaw in the relationship. Personality-wise, they seem fine.
She pushes him to do better, he helps her make time for fun. They share common interests and haven’t had any major ideological clashes revealed. They seem like a reasonable fit in most ways.
Not to mention both are independent and perfectly capable of being happy on their own. It’s good not to be overly dependent.
They are actually a really good pair over all – I believe Dorothy’s parents were right and that this ‘for fun’ has become a ‘for real’ relationship. I think they actually could handle a long distance relationship because Dorothy is now better at making time for people (still not the best as Joyce still gets very little).
She pushes him to do better against his will, towards a ‘better’ he does not want. This is only a good thing if you think it’s okay to utterly dismiss the thoughts and opinions of one half of a relationship.
What’s good in a parent or military instructor is not necessarily good in a partner.
Really? I haven’t seen that.
I mean yes, Walky is being “matured” by Dorothy, but he broke up with her over the pajama jeans. If he didn’t want to “grow up”, he would do it again in a heartbeat, Joyce’s hysteria notwithstanding.
Wait. You don’t want to eat pizza every day?
Words fail me, right now.
Also, the drama is going to be Joyce realizing no one loves her.
I’m not completely sold on them as a couple either still…. but I really loved Joyce and Walky in ‘Its Walky’ soooo I think I’m gonna be left disappointed :/
*peers out of blinds fearfully*
things are going too well..
Story of our lives.
“When Somebody Loved Me”
Hmmm. Is anybody really sure whether this is a cute or a dramatic thing?
cumatic?
for once, I think it’s not that
for once, I think it’s not that
That sounds like some automatic cumming machine. Like some sort of megadildo.
Automatic Cumming Machine? like this for example?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ye5Jo1I4XXc
Warning: Not sure if safe for work or not.
I don’t know why that movie was ever made.
I think…..I think I need a cigarette. And I don’t even smoke…..
I thought that was gonna be this.
D’aww.
Also, Joyce’s eyes probably just shot out like corks.
Here’s hoping something shiny distracted her.
She is looking away & keeping her distance in panel 2; perhaps she senses that Dorothy’s gonna talk about something private-ish and has ambled away.
Eh, looks like she just has a wistful “Everything is awesome” look on.
Everything is cool when you’re part of a team
Aaand Walky’s brain just came to a screeching halt, like an SR-71 at full burn hitting the Hoover dam.
First panel Walky face. Best face.
I prefer second panel Joyce
It’s almost like they’re smiling at each other, defying logic and panel boundaries 😉
Whoa. It’s like as if, in an alternate universe, they were made for each other. The things that could have been if things were different…
Anyone else get a sense of deja-vu?
And then Walky screams, “I AM AFRAID OF COMMITMENT!” and jumps out a window.
and crashes straight into Sal, Amazi-girl, and Billie(Billie attempting to get back into Ruths room because she forgot something)
“NUUUUUUU I DON’T WANNA WEAR A TIE”
Please be ‘d’awwww’ not ‘oh no’.
How long have they been together? It feels like it’s been just a few weeks.
Yeah, I don’t get why everything in this comic has to happen so suddenly.
Can’t there be, like, a week between storylines?
http://rocktavian.tumblr.com/post/97864604872/ive-seen-some-confusion-about-the-doa-timeline-in
Right, so they get together in Choosing my Religion. And today is the day after The Whiteboard Dingdong Bandit.
18 days.
Everyone who’s saying it hasn’t been all that long, I don’t know that they’ve had someone who wasn’t family say that to them. I was dating my fiancee about a month when she said the “L” word. Same goes for the girl I was dating before her. You can get feelings really quick, and want to express them.
It really fuckin’ trips me up. My ex said that too. It took me a while to say it back cuz words have a meaning. You can’t just say shit like that. If you just say “I love you” and then don’t mean it with your whole heart then you’re doing yourself and them a disservice. It’s like saying “I hate you”. These words have meaning, and it’s SO offputting to me when people use words like that and don’t understand the power behind them.
That’s definitely a matter of personal opinion and something a couple would need to discuss amongst themselves. I use the word love a lot. I love family and friends and when I’m dating someone it’s because I love them. But I’m also a bit cynical, because I think the feeling of whole-hearted “being in love” is different from whole-heartedly loving someone. When people talk about “being in love”, I usually view it as kind of… their relationship is still young or such? As opposed to simply, we love each other. I feel like… you fall in love and THEN you build something lasting out of it. So it’s okay to tell them you love them when you feel it’s the right time to say it. But if you’re going to say it, you have to understand they might not be ready to say it back.
The word love needs some linguistic love, it is too overloaded.
(Naturally I blame the diamond mining industry.)
You can totes *LOVE* someone you’ve known for eighteen days. (eros)
But the foundation of a solid relationship is *LIKING* that person. (genuine friendship, stronger than philia)
Don’t go defining love as lust now. This is confusing enough as it is.
I didn’t define it as in “LURVE TOTES ONLY MEANS HOT HOT SEXENGS” but gave one possible interpretation.
Giving hints that the “L-bomb” is (probably) only radioactive to people who call it the L-bomb.
Huh. I dated my first steady girlfriend for about a week when we planned her moving in (which we completed about a month later). It took about 8 years until we separated. I don’t remember ever hearing the L-word. I should be surprised to hear that my successor (or intermediates) would have heard anything like it.
You say “You can get feelings really quick, and want to express them.” But I don’t call everything a “badger” that might happen to run around, either.
Words have meaning. If you don’t have any other word for “feelings” than “love”, chances are that you cannot verbalize or identify your feelings to any useful degree.
Yeah, I told my boyfriend I loved him a few weeks into dating and we’ve now been together for 6 years. Maybe I was just a dumb teenager that wasn’t interpreting my feelings right, but I felt really strongly that I loved him and so I said so.
So it came to pass that someday Walky shall be First Man of the United States of America.
The White House’s official style guide uses First Gentleman.
For Walky, it’d have to be first Dude.
But does he abide?
Ah, thank you. I don’t have the official White House style guide handy… but I suppose that makes sense as “Gentleman” is oft the male equivalent of “Lady.” (“Lord” might have been another equivalent, but obviously, “First Lord of the United States” would be rather a funny and easily misconstrued title.)
“I am the First Lord of the United States, you fool! Now bring me my bejeweled ceremonial katana, that I may behead one of President Wife’s many enemies.”
Of all the wonderful swords out there, why a katana?
I think he’d look rather dashing with a saber, or a maquahuitl, or a guan dao, or a gladius, or –
Wait, I’m just listing my favorites. A guan dao should be good for beheadings, though, considering its effectiveness at cutting through iron plate armor.
This is Walky we’re talking about though. He’d totes think that a Katana is THE BESTEST SWORD IN THE UNIVERSE!!!!!111!one!11! and request, nay DEMAND that he has one. With a taco dispenser.
I would think that the title of “First Lord” would require you to wear black life-support armour and be a Sith.
Bright side; you’d be able to summarily strangle people with no consequences.
I was going to say that Walky would be the first non-white First Spouse, but then I remembered the current one. THANKS OBAMA
They haven’t said ‘I love you’ yet?
Well, this was only supposed to be “for fun” until Dotty went to Yale in a year or two. They weren’t supposed do have feels.
That’s right, it was a “For fun” fling. So it may transition to “For glory”?
For the Empire!
For love!
…
What?
FOR CAPSLOCK!!!!
For Victoryglory?
For great justice!
For Pete’s sake!
For the future!
For pony!
Launch Every Zig!
For the Royalty!!
This was the best variant.
For Harry, England, and St. George!
For the Shire!
FOR THE EMPRAH!!!
Why would they have?
Oh fuck
Now he’s gonna get all Mid-Life-Crisis-y and dump her.
Because no two couple in DOA can be happy at the same time.
what are you talking about all the couples are happy right now…oh no, all the couples are happy, that means a entire new wave of dramatic problems are going to come in everything is going to go to shit!
“When Somebody Loved Me”
………
shit
Uhhhhhh.
One month or so into the relationship?
Maybe.
It has already progressed fairly quickly.
its been only one month but its strange it feels like its been two years
The lack of hover text concerns me
The hovertext says d’awww.
That reminds me of one of those See ‘n’ Say toys we all had a kids.
“The cow says MOOOOOOOOO”
“The hovertext says d’awww”
Friends of ours, he taught the kid “what does the mama say?” — “baa-a-a-a”.
She was not amused. At least she wanted to be not amused.
“When Somebody Loved Me”
This arc title is looking mighty relevant right about now.
I do not like how that is phrased in the past tense, however. It does not speak well of tomorrow’s comic.
Tomorrow’s comic cuts to Ethan/Danny
sike, it’s Galasso
Just as long as Galasso isn’t going into the ‘feels’ territory.
*THUD*
Pamela? Pamela?!
Not sure that’s possible. Unless it’s the feels of anger and destruction.
*psyche.
The wife of Eros? What does she have to do with this.
Wait….
I never use “psych(e)” because it reads like I’m talking about schoolwork, and anyway language is fluid and dynamic and actually needs GREATER distinctiveness in word meanings, amirite
schoolwork and/or mental studies/therapy
Like a lot of the arc titles, it applies to multiple characters.
The last time someone told me they loved me that soon in a relationship, I dumped them. And then I realized I was aromantic.
Totally misread as “aromatic”.
I’m sure Raibean smells just fine.
Raibean has no nose!
How does he smell? Terrible!
Same here
Someone calling himself “butt-lord” misreads “aromantic” as “aromatic”. [Brushing teeth]
Oh. I got the threading mixed up. How unfitting. Carry on.
Jacob the hovertext is actually ‘dwaaaa’
How many more of these lovely love days will the readers get before @damnyouwillis earns his name?
Hmmm I’m guessing this isn’t an “I’m in love with you” I love you just a general “I care very deeply for you” I love you.
No I think Dorothy is in love with Walky. I don’t think that love is the most important thing in the world to her, but I absolutely believe her when she says she loves Walky.
And the L bomb has been dropped ladies and gentleman
Also why is my icon Sarah now!? What is this madness!?
Do you want to talk about it?
It is a gift! Treasure it!
this is very sweet and I’m all for love but Dorothy you broke the Taboo this changes everything.
Damn, Dorothy fell hard didn’t she?
Once you go Caramel you never go…. farewell?
Oh, this is going to end well.
Uh-huh. Sure.
Noooo, Dorothy, NOOOOO! Don’t forget about Yale! DO NOT FORGET ABOUT YALE!
Maybe this is the universe she convinces him to get off his ass and make something of himself.
Walky isn’t dumb, remember. He’s just lazy.
I think it might be better to categorize him as being “willfully childish.”
Yales just sitting one the sidelines with a freshly broken heart screaming,”NOOO! we could have had all , we could have made something no one has ever seen before but you gave it up.
It always bugs me that a mention of Yale throws off my suspension of disbelief, given how small of an issue it is over the course of the comic. But since you’ve mentioned it, I just drop this fun trivia fact for you: Yale doesn’t take transfers. I don’t know why I know that, and I don’t know why I let it bug me literally every sing time Yale is mention, but now you can share this burden with me.
Willis is taking the look of specific ROOMS at the college they’re at in this comic. The fact that Yale doesn’t take transfers might become a future plot point, and he’s just kind of sitting on it until it comes up. Just think of it like… potential foreshadowing!
a) It doesn’t matter if they do, all that matters is that Dorothy thinks they do.
b) http://admissions.yale.edu/transfer
Yale says they do, although it’s super competitive: http://admissions.yale.edu/transfer
I’ve honestly forgotten why Dorothy had the 2 years at IU, then transfer to Yale plan anyway. Money?
Probably she just didn’t get accepted the first time around and drove herself into a furied frenzy of achievement-hunting to prove herself to them?
Dorothy is that ambitious – she plans to be the first.
How does this indicate she’s forgetting about Yale? She can love him and still switch school, even if they don’t break up they can just do a long distance thingy.
I agree. It’s not like it’s the 50s and young women who fall in love in college are supposed to get married and give up all their career ambitions.
Says the Joyce avatar.
“It’s a good thing I started this relationship with the implication that it would end as soon as something better came along, amiright? BT dubs I love you and stuff”
exactly
Oh noes, people change their minds in response to what happens around them!
Error. Error. Walky Pagefault. Rebooot Walky.
“It’s so sweet.”
“It’s the last deep breath before the plunge.”
dorothy what the fuck could be wrong with you
Nothing is. While it is surprising, there is nothing wrong with “loving” a “fling”. The problem here is the overuse of the word “love” in English vocabulary. It’s one of our largest lexical gaps and isn’t unique to the language.
And it begins…………….the end.
See I didn’t interpret that as a bad reaction. I interpreted it as an “Oh. She loves me! She said I was a just a fling but shit she loves me!” But I could be wrong.
Everyone’s happy. Love is being thrown around. I smell disaster in the air.
Love is in the air, like flammable dust in a grain elevator.
*Preps remote incendiary device*
I can see what’s happening.
And they don’t have a clue.
She’ll fall in love, and here’s the bottom line.
Our trio’s down to two.
I sense bad shit happening soon.
Too soon for the L bomb
If this was a TV show, this would be where they put a dramatic music sting.
Everyone, assume crash positions.
Hold on tight, take a deep breath for a new kind of cartoon show.
THIS HAS GONE ON LONG ENOUGH HOW MANY ADORABLE FEEL GOOD COMICS CAN WE HAVE IN A ROW??
WHAT’S GOING ON ANYWAY???
THANK YOU, DOROTHY! Jesus Christ I thought she’d never say it
“Ohmigod, I love you too, Dorothy, so much! I was afraid to say it, because I didn’t know if you felt the same way, but ever since we met, I-”
“I…I was talking to Walky, Joyce.”
You owe me a new keyboard. (Not really, but ROTFL, my sides, &c.)
pfffffffffffff hahahahaha
–they Joyce cries because Dotty doesn’t love her, too
That sucked
Man, the first time you hear THAT from a girl it’s kind of like a mini seizure. I’ll never forget it.
Me either.
Mine was a very angst-filled confession; The first time I’d confessed to someone, you see, that friendship instantly fell apart, and we both got very hurt.
But the next time I fell in love, I could not allow myself to know that I loved this person, and not tell them, it was too big an emotion for me to feel comfortable hiding. It felt dishonest. So half an hour after meeting them, 3 months into our friendship, the first time we met after I realized I was in love, I told them.
Their response? “I’ve loved you since 3 days after we first met.” Completely floored me 🙂
Well Dorothy.. that is probably going to go sideways abit…
so… Is it bad I’m 100% more curious what caught Joyce’s attention so effectively? She doesn’t seem to be staring at Billy’s closed door..
i think she’s just averting her eyes from walky and dorothy.
of course we have NO IDEA why she might do that…..
That word is soo, sooo loaded with drama …. and I speak from bitter experience.
just testing to see if I figured out this gravatar thing
nope 🙁
whoa now it just starting working retroactively /
That’s a sweet-ass dog.
No, Joe. No!
(Gravatars are fun, aren’t they)
Yes, they are. But I’m not sure that Dina’s mind would go there, even with Joe in the picture…
Dina read that as “sweet ass-dog”, and is informing Joe that there are, infact, no donkey-dogs.
But what’s Jason thinking, though?
that was pretty quick, considering how little time passed in-comic
This doesn’t seem like “d’awww” so much as “DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNNNN”
Dang, and I thought I was quick to tell my girlfriend I love her.
After checking, it seems the L bomb got dropped 18 days after we started dating. Dang. O.o
You beat Dorothy by about two days, then.
Interesting. Hopefully no horrid drama comes of this as other commenters seem certain of.
Nope. This is their 18th day too, apparently.
I’ve never understood the whole “waiting to tell someone you love them” thing. Of course, I was engaged by day 8 of my one and only romantic relationship, so my experience is rather limited in those terms. (That was back in ’96. We’re still together, despite doom and gloom predictions by family members.)
My wife and I knew halfway through our FIRST date….before the food even arrived.
And it was a blind date at that!
The conversation boiled down to…”okay how long do we wait to tell our parents so they don’t think we’re crazy?”
Just celebrated 17th anniversary this summer
Sometimes it happens. My partner and I made a life commitment after 3 months, which was very short to me (but long compared to first date!).
Congrats to you all for your happy and lasting relationships.
Sometimes I think people should wait especially if you’re dealing with that one person who is in love with being in love rather than the person. I had a friend like that in high school and it became an annoyance of her crushing on then dating one guy and less than a month she’s crying the blues of having lost her ‘one true love’ before the cycle repeated.
This mindset ended up in a lot of bad relationships. Although holding back from saying ‘I love you’. wouldn’t have helped in her case.
I’m not against people saying it early, but I’m against people just saying it because they think that they should without really knowing/feeling it.
Thou shalt not fall in love so easily
EMERGENCY ALERT! EMERGENCY ALERT! INTIMATE WORDS HAVE INFILTRATED THE BASE! ALL HANDS ON DECK! DON THOSE PAJAMAPANTS! MAN THE MCNUGGETS!
Oh dear…this might be a brown trousers moment for Walky.
They may be drawn as black dots, but you can see the panic in Walky’s eyes.
I would be more impressed if this didnt take me back to the sweet romantic moment that Dorothy declared her love — and dumped Danny anyway
Something absolutely horrible’s about to happen, I know it
i thought it just did
More horrible. Walky’s going to do something really, really bad, I know it
Wooph, this won’t end well.
Awwwwwww….. SNAP!
Ok, seriously, who are you going to kill?! Is it the squirrel? Joyce(please no)? Superman? MY HEART?! TOO HAPPY! I WANT IT TO LAST BUT THERE ARE WARNING SIGNS OF PAIN! AHAHWAKLHAWLHlKAWHLKWAHLH!*more over the top paranoia from this person*Love the happiness a whole, darn you sir! Gosh Darn You Willis and your playing heartstrings like harps!
Well, Willis’ plan has finally come to fruition. I read “I love you, you know,” and my immediate reaction was “Oh shit, that’s not good.”
This is beginning to look like “D’awwing of Age”! Brace yourselves, folks: the Willis must have something reeeally nasty in store for us this time 🙁
Really? After how long has this been, a few weeks of dating? A month? You can be infatuated with someone after that long, but I have trouble seeing how you can love them when you still don’t even know them that well and you haven’t had time for deeper feelings to grow. An ex of mine told me he loved me after 3 weeks of dating and it just made me uncomfortable. I liked him but I was still getting to know him… And he barely knew me.
It happens. Maybe especially when you’re young, and it’s one of your first relationships. Plus, we can sit back and ask if it’s love or infatuation; in the middle of it, sometimes, they’re exactly the same thing.
This is going to end badly.
Ahhhh this is going to go horribly, I can just see it now. Aaaaa
The correct response for Walky is “I love you too.”
He’s not going to say the correct response, though.
That’s only the correct response if he feels it to. If he doesn’t then that’s the absolute wrong response.
I think at this point Dorothy will understand if he doesn’t have the correct response, though.
So. Love. It doesn’t have just one form.
Some people fall in love in a day, or a week. For others, it takes 18 months.
There isn’t just one way to love someone, to fall in love, and there isn’t a specific time limit on when “real” love can happen, applicable to all people, ever. There will be people who will say that they have fallen in love at a point in a relationship long before you have ever experienced yourself falling in love. In the same token, there will be people who will say that they have fallen in love at a point in a relationship long after the point when you no longer thought it could be found.
This does not automatically mean that they are wrong. This does not automatically mean that they are misinterpreting their emotions. This does not automatically mean they are lying.
It just means they fall in love in not quite the same way you do. And that’s how love is: It happens to people differently.
Now, to paraphrase one of my favorite comic artists: How to get off this high horse without hurting myself…
“I know.”
“As well you should.”
(This is why Calhoun is my favourite Star Trek Captain.)
Pfft your precious Calhoun wouldn’t last ten nanoseconds against even Daimon Bractor.
Bold, fate-tempting prediction: This storyline will have no angst-inducing drama bombs, just to screw with our expectations.
And then at the last moment, Walky gets struck by a rocket!
Willis is gloating on his tumblr and Twitter about the angst he’s currently causing his fanbase since everything is going so well. Plus we know Mary is out to cause trouble.
On the other hand, maybe Walky won’t screw this up too badly, and we’ll get at least ONE happy ending. Dotty & Walky’s relationship has kinda been that all this time. The one time they had a fight, it was resolved rather quickly. Since Joyce is right there, she’s lokely going to help Walky over the hump that is his foot in his mouth.
Maybe everyone feels angst because Joyce is dressed like Velma, indicating that at any moment the scene will shift to an amusement park haunted by the ghosts of the tiki tiki coal miners.
It’s funny to me that so many people are debating whether she can really be in love yet, or ought to be, after only 18 days. Does no one recall that they’ve already performed a sex? 😀 Not that those are the same thing—or even necessarily related—but it is hard for me to find her declaration a total shock… And beyond that, there’s so much to love about Walky!
Sex and love are certainly not the same thing, but you’re right in that the hormones and feelings produced in the former enhance the feeling of the latter. I’m not all that surprised she said it either.
See that can of works right there, Dorothy? You just opened it. You can never close it again. EVER.
Dorothy is handing Walky glass beads after realizing that he has only gold to offer in return.
Pretty shitty thing to do, knowing their respective values.
He can now choose to be the villain or the sucker.
What.
For Dorothy, “love” is not important. She has routed around giving it any particular importance. There has not been any significant event that would change that.
On the other hand, she noticed that Walky cares about things more than he likes to admit.
Right after realizing that, she states “I love you, you know”. The “you know” insinuates that he should have realized that she “loves” him according to his metrics and care accordingly.
Where is the point in springing something like that on him? It is cheap for her to say that, and either answering or not answering is expensive for him because he takes things seriously.
He already stated previously that he saw no point in committing himself when she didn’t, and now she is forcing the issue nevertheless.
How is that not being shitty?
Well, now he can see a point to commitment. And Dorothy might find love very important, so she wasn’t going to talk about commitment until she saw that Walky was emotional enough to deal with it. The “you know” is not necessarily pushy – it is a commonplace way to mean “Did you know,” or “Do you know too,” in a grammatically awkward place in a sentence. Around my personal bubble, “You know…” means “I just remembered this thing, do you think it applies to our situation?” Or even, “I’m warning you.” And half the time, it’s funny.
Dorothy wants to exchange the word “love” on her side for commitment from Walky. She has not at any time indicated that she wants to commit herself to anything. But love is cheap: it is just what she feels at the moment. Commitment, in contrast, is exactly the willingness to go through when things stop being cheap.
She did not stick with Danny either though I have little doubt that she justifies her belief in the currency “love” with “I just realized I never really loved him” mind voodoo. Make no mistake: that realization might feel profound, but Dorothy is smart enough to know a rationalization when she thinks one.
It’s getting pretty heavy around here. I don’t know what those words mean, and I doubt Walky does either.
Willis. Are you being completely cinnamon toast crunch honey-not cheery-0s right now. I feel the end.
Also, Joyce. What’s up with that?
*Ques laughing sound effect* *director uses crying sound effect instead* Yeah that would be more appropriate. But Joyce. Seriously. Her feels will be BrOKEN like my old computer.
L bomb confirmed. Quick everyone to the feels bunker.
Oh, now I get it.
There will be an ebola outbreak soon. Everyone dies a horrible death but only after insufferable pain, except for Joyce because she has divine protection. She will also get a halo, because fuck shit, when everybody around you dies you’re allowed to hallucinate a bit to keep your sanity.
Well, that relationship is over now.
Curse you for hitting me right in the feels! Stupid webcomic.
Walky is going to do/say something incredibly stupid tomorrow, isn’t he?
O_O Well, that was….somewhat-almost-not-really-out-of-the-blue…But sweet.
Is that a “Gasai Yuno”-face I see from Joyce in the 2nd panel?
CHILLS. Oh god.
I’m starting to see why Danny was so certain him and Dorothy were perfect.
Everything will explode
that’s gonna be a bad choice
What have you gotten yourself into, walky?
Dorothy no you guys have been dating for like 2 weeks. Why.
When my parents confessed to each other my father told her ” I love you, but I don’t want you to say it yet just cause I said it. So don’t say it, or it’ll feel forced.”