A cute webcomic about fanservice, video games, and... love. Mostly video games, though.
Hazy London
Scotty
A story about messy relationships. From friendly foes to crazy families. Nothing is black and white, just full of color. But, all colors can get a little hazy...
Lilith's Word
inkPangur
If you had the power to make any wish come true using just one word, what would you say?
Star Trip
Gisele Weaver
Jas is a human taken from her home planet on a trip across the galaxy she will never forget.
Star Impact
Jack McGee
A young, energetic woman fights her way up in the world of super-powered boxing after discovering the mighty gloves of her missing idol!
Go Get a Roomie
Clover
Experience the queer journey of an upbeat hippie and the friendships she makes along the way! A tale of self-discovery and love of many forms.
Sufficiently Remarkable
Maki Naro
Two young women living in Brooklyn discover that you're always coming of age.
Jailbird
Charlie Davis
An all-ages comic about a recently escaped prisoner's struggle to understand the outside world, and vice-versa. Also, a magic cape!
Awaken
Koti Saavedra/Flipfloppery
Superpowers, monsters and conspiracies. Piras, the spoiled Dameschi heir, fights to recover his identity after becoming a terrorist!
Kochab
Sarah Webb
A YA F/F fantasy comic about Sonya, a lost skier trying to survive a snowy wilderness and find her way back to her village; and Kyra - a fire spirit trying to fix the home that she let fall apart around her.
Dumbing of Age
David M Willis
Joyce has been homeschooled her entire life until now, when she's suddenly a freshman in college! Things don't go well.
Atomic Robo
Brian Clevinger, Scott Wegener
The robot punches monsters and bad robots and one time he was a cowboy.
Tigress Queen
Allison Shaw
A barbarian warlord and a pampered prince try to avoid a marriage alliance that could end decades of violence.
Sister Claire
Yamino
In the troubled aftermath of a great war between Witches and her fellow Nuns, novice Sister Claire just wants a purpose.
Cut Time
Juby
Rel and her trusty avian friend Fugue are on a quest to save a world that's lost track of time. Follow them and their new recruits, in a story written with help from the stars.
The End
August Brown, Cory Brown
Two aliens crash a sci-fi convention and accidentally take seven nerds on an adventure that spans the galaxy!
The Witch Door
Anni K.
Katariina Lehto discovers her neighbor is a witch called Jousia Muotka. Jousia introduces Katariina to the strange people and places beyond the witch door...
Fireweeds Moors
Gato Iberico
A cat-headed man and a girl with a sandwich hankering accidentally end up in a myth-infused country where magic chalices are a really big thing.
Cyanide & Happiness
Explosm
Satire, dark humor and surreal humor.
Ghost Junk Sickness
Studio CARTRIDGE, Laura Lee
Two hunters try to survive and end up being pushed to pursue a deadly bounty dubbed "The Ghost".
Goodbye to Halos
Valerie Halla
Cuddles, gay flirting, weird feelings, and magic-fueled knife fights - it's an adventure across the queer multiverse!
Never Satisfied
Taylor Robin
Lucy Marlowe, a magician's apprentice, competes against other apprentices for an important, magical, Goverment Job.
Sam & Fuzzy
Sam Logan
Troubled by gangster rodents, lovesick vampire stalkers, or confused ninja assassins? Don't panic! Sam and Fuzzy are here to help. (For a reasonable fee.)
Stand Still, Stay Silent
Minna Sundberg
A few generations after the end of the world, a small, poorly financed research crew is sent out to rediscover whatever is left of the forbidden old world in the south.
This is Not Fiction
Nicole Mannino
What do you do when the person you're in-love with is an anonymous romance novelist? Get your best friend to hire your worst enemy for help!
The Sanity Circus
Windy
Magic, monsters and mysteries await in the odd city of Sanity. It's up to Attley and a colorful group of characters to find out just what is going on.
Between Failures
Jackie Wohlenhaus
The low stakes adventures of an assorted group of 20 somethings trapped in the declining years of American retail. They are naughty and say lots of swears.
Cassiopeia Quinn
Gunwild, Psudonym
A cute, pantsless thief is pursued across the stars by a buttoned-up military officer in the spacey, laser-filled future.
Real Science Adventures
Brian Clevinger
Spin off stories and other adventures from the world of Atomic Robo!
The Lonely Vincent Bellingham
Diana Huh
Vincent is an unkind man looking to disappear, and finds himself in the care of a vampire and her two wicked children.
Starhammer
J.N. Monk, Harry Bogosian
A teen girl inherits a powerful alien artifact and proceeds to make a series of increasingly poor decisions
Monsterkind
Taylor C
Wallace Foster, a young, bright-eyed human social worker, has his entire world view rocked when he's suddenly relocated into a city primarily inhabited by monsters.
Knights Errant
J.R. Doyle
Wilfrid's humble quest for revenge becomes bigger and bloodier by the day.
Empowered
Adam Warren
A sexy superhero comedy (except when it isn't) about the never-ending struggles of a plucky but very unlucky young superheroine.
Love Not Found
Gina Biggs
Abeille is on a quest to find someone who wants to do it the old-fashioned way in a time when touching has become outdated.
Girl Genius
Phil Foglio, Kaja Foglio
In a time when the Industrial Revolution has become an all-out war, Mad Science rules the World...with mixed success.
Caramel Corn
Potchimew
Sarah is the only human left in a world full of mythical creatures and monsters. All she wants to do is live a quiet life, but everything changes when she meets her guardian angel, Jacob.
Guilded Age
T Campbell, John Waltrip, Florence Machina
Welcome to the saga of the working-class adventurer! Enjoy the complete story with new annotations daily!
Wychwood
Varethane
When Tiara's pyrokinesis is finally noticed, she is captured by a magical research organization for study. If she cooperates, she could be helping to save humanity from a dire threat - but can she trust them?
Anarchy Dreamers
Emily Ree
Sparkly undead kids fight society's worst Nightmares in this pastel-punk urban fantasy coming-of-age!
Widdershins
Kate Ashwin
A series of light-hearted Victorian-era adventure stories featuring grumpy bounty hunters, accidental thiefkings, and more, in England's magical capital city Widdershins!
Lighter Than Heir
Melissa Albino
A young Volant woman joins the military in an effort to upstage her war-hero father.
Monster Pulse
Magnolia Porter Siddell
Four kids run afoul of a creepy secret organization's experiments, which turn their body parts into fighting monsters. Part sentimental coming-of-age story, part monster-training shonen manga, with just a bit of sci-fi body horror.
Wilde Life
Pascalle Lepas
Oscar decided to rent an old haunted house, and that's when things got weird...
Devil's Candy
Rem, Bikkuri
A lush fantasy about boy genius Kazu Decker, the girl he constructed for his 9th grade science project, and the world of devils and monsters they live in.
Paranatural
Zack Morrison
Superpowered middle schoolers fight evil spirits in their rural hometown. Come for the jokes, stay for the cast, the creatures, and the mystery that ties them all together!
El Goonish Shive
Dan Shive
WARNING: This comic often ignores the Laws of Physics
Astral Aves
Moon Cabal
A fantasy coming-of-age following the adventures of Astra The Black and friends, as they navigate the mysterious world around them. It's politics, adventure, and the supernatural; oh, and crazy hair.
The Automan's Daughter
Mike Stamm
Aisha Osman and her uncle Siddig outwit bikers, spies and kidnappers while gearing up for a showdown with the formidable Widowmaker mecha.
Alice and the Nightmare
Misha Krivanek
Alice finally attends University to learn to collect the dreams of humans, meet new friends, and deal with a pesky reflection along the way.
[un]Divine
Ayme
A highschool senior thought giving up his soul for a demon was a good idea. It wasn't.
Kiwi Blitz
Mary Cagle (Cube Watermelon)
Steffi thinks she can use her kiwi mech to become a superhero. This idea turns out to be very stupid.
Whomp!
Ronnie
A depressed, portly, hirsute anime fan stumbles through life in the ever-pursuit of chicken nuggets and other life-shortening indulgences.
Godslave
Meaghan Carter
Edith has been thrown into the dangerous world of modern-day Egyptian mythology. Fighting monsters and dealing with family drama of godly proportions.
Demon's Mirror
Harry Bogosian
Based loosely off of "The Snow Queen", a story by Hans Christian Andersen, we see things take a different turn as the demons become central characters, and the side characters stick around. Yup, that's the only differences. Enjoy!
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“I have teh internet! That makes me worldly and knowledgeable about everything, ESPECIALLY what I’ve never remotely personally experienced!” – too many people
I believe what you meant to say is that you are paid to maximally leverage crowdsourced solutions. Or at least, that’s what you would say in the pay equity review.
No, the ability to convincingly bullshit on demand is a highly valuable skill in almost any profession and the college courses that foster and provide practice in this ability are worth their weight.
Yes even the intro to computers.
Some of us techies took it as an easy bird course and ended up teaching the class AND the instructor assigned to teach it. She tried to give us failing grades right off the bat.
Consternation and a short walk to the Technical Programs Deans office fixed that little runaway ego right quick.
Between the three of us we covered all the shortcuts and hotkeys one actually needed to be productive in front of a computer terminal PLUS we actually knew how the damn things work so we learned how to translate what we knew into something arts/business students could understand.
Sadly the admins pulled the course from the approved list for those in the technical program thereafter.
Such fragile egos pushing personal opinion as facts to be parroted.
Google is tech support’s friend, but it feels like half the “answer” threads I find fall into three categories:
– Many replies, no closure from the OP as to which solution fixed it. No posted solutions work for me.
– OP just posts “never mind guys I fixed it” and the thread falls into obscurity.
– There’s only one reply, and it’s someone else asking for help with the same problem.
It’s even worse with some of the professional video production equipment I support. I wish there was a StackOverflow for this stuff, information is so thin on the ground.
It is the same for a number of other industries.
I find that manufacturers go out of their way to purge the net of any useful information, especially on legacy products.
I have a reputation for knowing stuff and knowing how to find out. Even people who know I often just Google it have told me I’m better at web searches than they are.
The writers were SO ANGRY at that joke. In an interview one of them said “I hated that joke so much… not because of the joke but because I didn’t write it. The funniest thing I’ve ever heard and he improv’d it”
I dunno about idle hands, but withdrawal fucking sucks and I didn’t have anywhere near as bad as Billie when I went off my seizure meds. I don’t even wanna imagine.
Yeah, mine was mostly headaches, irritableness, having a hard time sleeping, and forgetfulness (that last one’s not uncommon with the kind of medication). Not the worst thing in the world, but there were days it was not fun to live with me that year.
When I went off my migraine meds a bit too fast, I somehow thought a pain in my chest was a broken rib, and then had trouble getting to the doctor because I couldn’t make sense of the buses. Even after we slowed down the tapering it was still bizarre, and the final month was just a weird blur I didn’t clearly remember at all.
Billie is in the easy stages. Alcohol withdrawal doesn’t get bad until after hour 12. The tremors and seizures can be controlled pretty well in a professional environment. The hallucinations are where it gets weird.
Joyce can return to her happy go lucky self even after questioning the existence of god and the morality of her parents. Now she just need to respect the private space of others.
It’s not. I guess it is a joke. Caffeine withdrawal can give you a headache and make you tired for a day but that’s it. And you have to drink quite some amount of coffee or be extra sensitive to notice it.
It is probably a joke, since alcohol withdrawal can be fatal (meaning it is objectively worse), but caffeine withdrawal actually can be quite bad. And it does not necessarily require a high amount of caffeine. The length of addiction matters tooIf someone is drinking alcohol on a daily basis, always has at least some amount of alcohol in their system 24/7, that is very severe alcoholism. But for caffeine users? Quite normal. Some people have multiple cups of coffee a day, every single day, for years and years. It’s a perception thing. Very few people would view constant coffee use as a problematic behavior, while constant alcohol/drug/tobacco abuse is EASILY identified as substance abuse/addiction by the average person. People actually brag about coffee addiction! I personally own a shirt that says “Well Dressed and Coffee Obsessed” on it, though I don’t actually drink coffee – my caffeinated poison of choice is actually soda.
Depends on your consumption level. If you don’t drink much, say a cup or two of coffee or a liter of pepsi a day it will be just mild sleepiness, headache, some irritability. But if you are a heavy drinker… I once tried to quit cold turkey after consuming lots of caffeine I was having real difficulty not falling asleep and no amount of naps helped, I literally felt half-dead.
I used to drink way too much pop, like 3 Mountains Dew a day or so (internal pluralization for extra English credit). Not as bad as coffee addicts with their ridiculous amounts of the devil’s drink, but still bad. Managed to get off the habit by giving up pop entirely for Lent. Which also lowered my fast food consumption along with it, so now I don’t spend nearly as much money and can actually save quite decently. Luckily for me, I didn’t get the backlash other caffeine addicts get since caffeine never really stimulated me all that much.
I’m kind of proud of Joyce for connecting the dots. Like, it’s pretty obvious and almost spelled out, but I feel like she might not have been taught much about alcohol withdrawal even being a thing? As ultimately unhelpful as she’s being here, I find her cute in this strip.
I have never been anything more than tipsy in my life, but I feel like I’d react a lot like Billie here. (I say that even though I love and relate to Joyce a lot. Also, good on her for figuring out it’s withdrawal way quicker than I would’ve.)
The funny thing is it’s clearly the logo of the Cedar Valley Roller Derby of Waterloo, IA. No in-comic explanation. I assume Willis just liked the logo and put it in, but who knows, maybe Malaya is a huge Cedar Valley fan.
It seems to me that they would be inviting later revenge from Sarah. It strikes me that if she wanted Joyce to know her birthday, she would have told her. That probably means that she doesn’t want how Joyce would likely react to that information on the day in question!
Of course, I might be misreading Sarah. Maybe Joyce does know and is planning a surprise party about which she’s told everyone and told them to keep quiet. Of course, Joyce herself has all the subtlety of an avalanche so Sarah worked out what was going on about a week previously!
It’s also possible that Sarah told Joyce that today was her birthday, but that she doesn’t want her to do anything, as a way of heading off Joyce’s inevitable discovery of said fact and subsequent attempt to hold a surprise party. This would most likely result in Joyce trying to help other people as a way to distract from Sarah’s birthday, leading to this scene.
For her birthday, Joyce let Sarah use her as a scape goat for Halloween decor. The surprise will be Joyce throwing Sarah a “Halloween” party with balloons and cake and 7up and settlers of catan.
That’s really nice. I like the little details like the fingers digging into the shoulder, the blushes, the toes curling, the abs tensing, and the breast being lifted up. They make it seem very alive and show what’s going on without cluttering things. I can’t draw people anywhere near that well myself and mostly stick to more abstract things or landscapes with pencil, but I recognize a well done picture when I see it.
Ruth seems to be really stepping up the healthy partner-ning. Happy and in love seems to really suit her. These two are so far from the suicide pact they made! Yay, anti-depressants, going sober, and (eventual) communication!
I believe hangovers are the opposite of withdrawal. The hangover is caused by the alcohol (or – I don’t know- other stuff in the drink) being in you body, where withdrawal is caused by your body missing it.
Hangovers are mostly a complex mess of various ways the alcohol futzes with your body…not really the alcohol itself, most of which will have been metabolized by the time the hangover kicked in, but what it left behind.
Weird thing is, there’s a lot of overlap between hangovers and the less dangerous symptoms of withdrawal – irritability and anxiety, nausea and vomiting, headaches and so forth.
If I was to try to summarise the character of Joyce Brown in just a few bullet points, one of them would be: “I just want to help!” She’s not always good at it but her heart is in the right place!
I want to be annoyed, but I guess nothing about Joyce’s upbringing has taught her a deep empathy for other people and their situations. Her siblings seem to be gaining awareness about seeing other perspective es.
If she starts trembling uncontrollably at all times and seeing spiders and snakes crawling everywhere she’s in trouble. She should be fine, though, because it takes more years than she’s had time to be drinking to get to that point.
She has been drinking constantly in her developing years. I mean, this is a comic. She’s as safe as she is supposed to be. In real life, I’d really advise talking to a doctor. (it’s basically impossible to not have an insurance in my country, so the visit is covered anyway..)
It’s most common in those who have been drinking for a long time. It isn’t always only in long term drinkers though. The more and more often you do it, the more likely and worse it could be.
Yeah, cold turkey is never a good idea for anyone. Best to drink a little less than average per day and steadily decrease until down to zero. Also replace the alcohol with a healthier beverage (maybe coffee?).
Except that’s hard to do for those with a serious problem. It’s much easier to plan to do that and not really cut back at all than it is to stop entire. In therapeutic setting where someone else can dole out the alcohol to you, that’s more likely to work. If you’re the type who’s just going to have one drink and winds up finishing the bottle, not so much.
It’s likely better for the physical withdrawal, but not so much for the psychological addiction.
Those are a pain to find in every one of the States I’ve ever been in.
Pretty ubiquitous over in Germany, by my experiences, however.
That’s not to say you can’t order them online (to mixed results), just that it’s unlikely Joyce’d have one on-hand or be able to find one easily in stores.
But then, I don’t know anything about Indiana, so perhaps it’s different up there. Google results don’t seem to indicate such, though.
[Mind you, if you’ve had contrary experiences anywhere in the US, I’m interested in hearing about them. ^.^]
To be clear: Not saying you *can’t* find them in stores *at all*, just that they’re rather uncommon, and most people’d be hard-pressed to know off-hand which stores do carry them.
How does Joyce even know that withdrawal is a thing? Not really what you’d expect out of an over-sheltered freshman with a strict Protestant upbringing.
A. Strict Protestants need to know what happens when someone quits alcohol works so they can successfully help other people do it.
B. withdrawal can be a good scare tactic; you either don’t stop drinking and die or you do stop drinking and suffer. So just don’t drink ever.
I never went through alcohol withdrawal, but I have helped friends who have, and Joyce left out the body and muscle aches. I don’t know if it’s a common symptom, or if all my friends were drinking because they had chronic pain from injuries, or if they got those injuries because they were half-drunk, but all of the people I helped through withdrawal had body and muscle pain as a symptom.
Granted 3 people is not a large enough sample group to draw statistical conclusions.
And FYI the 18th anniversary of my death is in 9 days.
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“I have teh internet! That makes me worldly and knowledgeable about everything, ESPECIALLY what I’ve never remotely personally experienced!” – too many people
Every dude who hears someone has a problem—”Ah, yes, I will solve this for you with my unique expertise. *Runs to Google*”
I work in IT and am literally paid to google stuff half the time.
The other half is StackOverflow.
I believe what you meant to say is that you are paid to maximally leverage crowdsourced solutions. Or at least, that’s what you would say in the pay equity review.
You’re right. Google and SA make up only a combined 95% of what I do.
The other 5% is bullshit.
…. but you can google bullshit.
No, the ability to convincingly bullshit on demand is a highly valuable skill in almost any profession and the college courses that foster and provide practice in this ability are worth their weight.
But add to that a modicum of Google-fu and the ability to pick up things on the fly and you’ll go far in life.
Computer Science grad, here. All my classes taught the opposite. Which classes teach how to bullshit on demand? It does sound useful.
Any class with essay questions on the test.
So, my degree in maths wasn’t useful for teaching me how to bullshit on demand then? That figures. xD
Pretty much all under the Humanities Banner.
Yes even the intro to computers.
Some of us techies took it as an easy bird course and ended up teaching the class AND the instructor assigned to teach it. She tried to give us failing grades right off the bat.
Consternation and a short walk to the Technical Programs Deans office fixed that little runaway ego right quick.
Between the three of us we covered all the shortcuts and hotkeys one actually needed to be productive in front of a computer terminal PLUS we actually knew how the damn things work so we learned how to translate what we knew into something arts/business students could understand.
Sadly the admins pulled the course from the approved list for those in the technical program thereafter.
Such fragile egos pushing personal opinion as facts to be parroted.
Bunch of fertilizer websites.
Google is tech support’s friend, but it feels like half the “answer” threads I find fall into three categories:
– Many replies, no closure from the OP as to which solution fixed it. No posted solutions work for me.
– OP just posts “never mind guys I fixed it” and the thread falls into obscurity.
– There’s only one reply, and it’s someone else asking for help with the same problem.
It’s even worse with some of the professional video production equipment I support. I wish there was a StackOverflow for this stuff, information is so thin on the ground.
https://xkcd.com/979/
It is the same for a number of other industries.
I find that manufacturers go out of their way to purge the net of any useful information, especially on legacy products.
I have a reputation for knowing stuff and knowing how to find out. Even people who know I often just Google it have told me I’m better at web searches than they are.
New Nickelodeon reboot: “Joyce Googlesplains It All.”
Being able to use the internet to quickly learn things, or at least confirm things you’re unsure of, is a useful skill that not everybody has.
Billy probably didn’t need Joyce’s help with it, though.
Leslie, I typed your symptoms into the thing up here and it says you could have network connectivity problems.
The writers were SO ANGRY at that joke. In an interview one of them said “I hated that joke so much… not because of the joke but because I didn’t write it. The funniest thing I’ve ever heard and he improv’d it”
And I think another cultural reference just went over my head.
Join the club. I hardly get any of them.
It’s from an episode of Parks and Recreation.
I’ll use my context clues to divine that’s stupid TV bullshit.
You need to calm down dude
yikes
https://youtu.be/LinpRhB4aWU?t=20 What they are referencing!
Thank you and Needfuldoer
Billie’s not so ill she can’t make a fist.
She’s still got a ways to go to catch up to Ruth, who threw an evil dad while in alcohol withdrawal.
Not yet anyway
Joyce. Not. Helping.
She’s training for her future career as an Alexa.
*plays “You Be Illin'” on the hacked Muzak*
boundaries
“Thing that Joyce does not acknowledge”
If she sticks with math she’ll have to eventually.
That’s not a good way to learn about boundaries because its not a good idea to get as close as humanly possible without touching someones boundaries.
Everyone should know their limits.
Okay, Joyce. Think of Billie’s personal space as a steak, and you as mashed potatoes.
Withdrawal symptoms, at least this means she is actually trying this time.
I said it before and I’ll say it again – withdrawal is the devil’s work.
Idle hands go into withdrawal?
I dunno about idle hands, but withdrawal fucking sucks and I didn’t have anywhere near as bad as Billie when I went off my seizure meds. I don’t even wanna imagine.
D: I’m glad it wasn’t as bad as Billie’s at least?
Yeah, mine was mostly headaches, irritableness, having a hard time sleeping, and forgetfulness (that last one’s not uncommon with the kind of medication). Not the worst thing in the world, but there were days it was not fun to live with me that year.
When I went off my migraine meds a bit too fast, I somehow thought a pain in my chest was a broken rib, and then had trouble getting to the doctor because I couldn’t make sense of the buses. Even after we slowed down the tapering it was still bizarre, and the final month was just a weird blur I didn’t clearly remember at all.
That sucks. Can med withdrawals just fucking not?
Billie is in the easy stages. Alcohol withdrawal doesn’t get bad until after hour 12. The tremors and seizures can be controlled pretty well in a professional environment. The hallucinations are where it gets weird.
Joyce can return to her happy go lucky self even after questioning the existence of god and the morality of her parents. Now she just need to respect the private space of others.
Yeah. Baby steps.
I’ve been here before, Billie. Not a good idea to quit alcohol cold turkey.
Still, not as bad as quitting coffee.
Certainly not without a doctor supervising, it’s not.
Is caffeine withdrawl crazy bad?
Severe headaches and irritability. More I don’t know.
It’s not. I guess it is a joke. Caffeine withdrawal can give you a headache and make you tired for a day but that’s it. And you have to drink quite some amount of coffee or be extra sensitive to notice it.
Your coffee genes must be way stronger than mine, if your withdrawals only last a day.
It is probably a joke, since alcohol withdrawal can be fatal (meaning it is objectively worse), but caffeine withdrawal actually can be quite bad. And it does not necessarily require a high amount of caffeine. The length of addiction matters tooIf someone is drinking alcohol on a daily basis, always has at least some amount of alcohol in their system 24/7, that is very severe alcoholism. But for caffeine users? Quite normal. Some people have multiple cups of coffee a day, every single day, for years and years. It’s a perception thing. Very few people would view constant coffee use as a problematic behavior, while constant alcohol/drug/tobacco abuse is EASILY identified as substance abuse/addiction by the average person. People actually brag about coffee addiction! I personally own a shirt that says “Well Dressed and Coffee Obsessed” on it, though I don’t actually drink coffee – my caffeinated poison of choice is actually soda.
Depends on your consumption level. If you don’t drink much, say a cup or two of coffee or a liter of pepsi a day it will be just mild sleepiness, headache, some irritability. But if you are a heavy drinker… I once tried to quit cold turkey after consuming lots of caffeine I was having real difficulty not falling asleep and no amount of naps helped, I literally felt half-dead.
I used to drink way too much pop, like 3 Mountains Dew a day or so (internal pluralization for extra English credit). Not as bad as coffee addicts with their ridiculous amounts of the devil’s drink, but still bad. Managed to get off the habit by giving up pop entirely for Lent. Which also lowered my fast food consumption along with it, so now I don’t spend nearly as much money and can actually save quite decently. Luckily for me, I didn’t get the backlash other caffeine addicts get since caffeine never really stimulated me all that much.
Yeah, Billie is not in for a fun day. This is gonna suck.
At least Joyce and Ruth are trying to help.
Several days, at least.
Sure, but it’s gonna start with this being a not fun day.
ThJoyce should change her major to nursing. I think it would suit her.
Would suit her instincts. And give her some training so her attempts to help might even be useful.
I’m kind of proud of Joyce for connecting the dots. Like, it’s pretty obvious and almost spelled out, but I feel like she might not have been taught much about alcohol withdrawal even being a thing? As ultimately unhelpful as she’s being here, I find her cute in this strip.
I have never been anything more than tipsy in my life, but I feel like I’d react a lot like Billie here. (I say that even though I love and relate to Joyce a lot. Also, good on her for figuring out it’s withdrawal way quicker than I would’ve.)
What is that thing on top of Ruth’s head in the third panel? I’m assuming it’s a door decoration but I can’t be sure.
It’s a roller derby logo sticker on the door of Malaya’s and Sal’s room. You can see it clearly here.
The funny thing is it’s clearly the logo of the Cedar Valley Roller Derby of Waterloo, IA. No in-comic explanation. I assume Willis just liked the logo and put it in, but who knows, maybe Malaya is a huge Cedar Valley fan.
Also, at the top right of the first panel, you can see another sticker on the door with the logo of Bloomington’s own Bleeding Heartland Roller Derby.
“DID SOMEONE SAY TOO SUNNY?????”
At least Joyce isn’t Sola Flare.
*Taiyouken, ahckschewally.
That’s Yamcha’s move!
PRAISE THE SUN!
It’s always sunny in Joyce’s world (except on recent Sunday mornings, and that day she smashed her toe, and the other weekend when she visited home…)
And the day she smashed Becky’s toe
Gah! Someone turn that smile down, it’s too early in the morning for that brightness.
Quick, Ruth and Billie – distract Joyce with Sarah’s birthday!
Poor Sarah
It seems to me that they would be inviting later revenge from Sarah. It strikes me that if she wanted Joyce to know her birthday, she would have told her. That probably means that she doesn’t want how Joyce would likely react to that information on the day in question!
Of course, I might be misreading Sarah. Maybe Joyce does know and is planning a surprise party about which she’s told everyone and told them to keep quiet. Of course, Joyce herself has all the subtlety of an avalanche so Sarah worked out what was going on about a week previously!
It’s also possible that Sarah told Joyce that today was her birthday, but that she doesn’t want her to do anything, as a way of heading off Joyce’s inevitable discovery of said fact and subsequent attempt to hold a surprise party. This would most likely result in Joyce trying to help other people as a way to distract from Sarah’s birthday, leading to this scene.
For her birthday, Joyce let Sarah use her as a scape goat for Halloween decor. The surprise will be Joyce throwing Sarah a “Halloween” party with balloons and cake and 7up and settlers of catan.
Got a comm for sexy time with Sierra and Guns. Anyone wanna see?
… I mean, sure. Why not, right?
I’m hoping my love of Sierra will outweigh my apathy for Guns.
And outweight the stoic backdrop
Here you go.
Oops that was the thumbnail
Indeed, quite nice. Saved to my David Willis Related porn folder.
I’m not sure I’d call the backdrop stoic so much as non-existent, though.
That’s really nice. I like the little details like the fingers digging into the shoulder, the blushes, the toes curling, the abs tensing, and the breast being lifted up. They make it seem very alive and show what’s going on without cluttering things. I can’t draw people anywhere near that well myself and mostly stick to more abstract things or landscapes with pencil, but I recognize a well done picture when I see it.
Oh… um…
I…
I notice there is no strategically-placed Dr. Pepper
I’ll be in my bunk.
Joyce’s trolling game is coming along nicely
Ruth seems to be really stepping up the healthy partner-ning. Happy and in love seems to really suit her. These two are so far from the suicide pact they made! Yay, anti-depressants, going sober, and (eventual) communication!
Ruth used the P word!
. . . I actually forgot that Alcohol withdrawal was an a thing. Like outside of days long hangovers.
I believe hangovers are the opposite of withdrawal. The hangover is caused by the alcohol (or – I don’t know- other stuff in the drink) being in you body, where withdrawal is caused by your body missing it.
Hope I did the tags right this timemmm
Hangovers are mostly a complex mess of various ways the alcohol futzes with your body…not really the alcohol itself, most of which will have been metabolized by the time the hangover kicked in, but what it left behind.
Weird thing is, there’s a lot of overlap between hangovers and the less dangerous symptoms of withdrawal – irritability and anxiety, nausea and vomiting, headaches and so forth.
And a little hair of the dog that bit you fixes both right up.
So if you just stay a little drunk at all times, you’ll be just fine!
(You will not be fine.)
“It’s worked so far” /Billie
If I was to try to summarise the character of Joyce Brown in just a few bullet points, one of them would be: “I just want to help!” She’s not always good at it but her heart is in the right place!
“Too sunny” might find a place on the list as well.
Cover your face, Joyce.
That could be a book title. “I Can Help!” Followed by a series of comics wherein Joyce does not actually help.
I want to be annoyed, but I guess nothing about Joyce’s upbringing has taught her a deep empathy for other people and their situations. Her siblings seem to be gaining awareness about seeing other perspective es.
I think that Joyce’s sense of empathy is just fine. It’s just that her upbringing has taught her all the wrong responses to her empathetic feelings.
Joyce is probably the most empathetic of anyone on the main cast. Which really doesn’t help when combined with her general naivety.
Okay but is quitting cold turkey safe for Billie? She seemed to be a pretty heavy drinker and just quitting alcohol like that may mess her up…
Or kill her. No, it’s not safe.
If she starts trembling uncontrollably at all times and seeing spiders and snakes crawling everywhere she’s in trouble. She should be fine, though, because it takes more years than she’s had time to be drinking to get to that point.
She has been drinking constantly in her developing years. I mean, this is a comic. She’s as safe as she is supposed to be. In real life, I’d really advise talking to a doctor. (it’s basically impossible to not have an insurance in my country, so the visit is covered anyway..)
It’s most common in those who have been drinking for a long time. It isn’t always only in long term drinkers though. The more and more often you do it, the more likely and worse it could be.
Yeah, cold turkey is never a good idea for anyone. Best to drink a little less than average per day and steadily decrease until down to zero. Also replace the alcohol with a healthier beverage (maybe coffee?).
Except that’s hard to do for those with a serious problem. It’s much easier to plan to do that and not really cut back at all than it is to stop entire. In therapeutic setting where someone else can dole out the alcohol to you, that’s more likely to work. If you’re the type who’s just going to have one drink and winds up finishing the bottle, not so much.
It’s likely better for the physical withdrawal, but not so much for the psychological addiction.
It might be possible if you have a friend you can trust and who is willing to do slightly illegal things for you.
Joyce. in cases like these a true friend would offer herself for be punched.
Or at least hold her hair out of the way whilst she vomits and then get a hot water bottle for her stomach.
Those are a pain to find in every one of the States I’ve ever been in.
Pretty ubiquitous over in Germany, by my experiences, however.
That’s not to say you can’t order them online (to mixed results), just that it’s unlikely Joyce’d have one on-hand or be able to find one easily in stores.
But then, I don’t know anything about Indiana, so perhaps it’s different up there. Google results don’t seem to indicate such, though.
[Mind you, if you’ve had contrary experiences anywhere in the US, I’m interested in hearing about them. ^.^]
To be clear: Not saying you *can’t* find them in stores *at all*, just that they’re rather uncommon, and most people’d be hard-pressed to know off-hand which stores do carry them.
At least, don’t bother people with headaches.
Thanks. Now I have “alcohol withdrawal” in my browser history.
I may be too Joyce, because her last response is exactly what I was thinking.
How does Joyce even know that withdrawal is a thing? Not really what you’d expect out of an over-sheltered freshman with a strict Protestant upbringing.
Alcoholism is a ‘godpertunity’ remember?
Maybe through Jordan?
A. Strict Protestants need to know what happens when someone quits alcohol works so they can successfully help other people do it.
B. withdrawal can be a good scare tactic; you either don’t stop drinking and die or you do stop drinking and suffer. So just don’t drink ever.
Thank you guys I genuinely appreciate these answers
I think that the most important lesson from this strip is the fact that Joyce really has no ability to detect sarcasm worth mentioning.
At least Joyce is aware that she can be agitating. Agitative? I dunno im only abour 2/3s done with my English degree, dont expect me to know this crap
I never went through alcohol withdrawal, but I have helped friends who have, and Joyce left out the body and muscle aches. I don’t know if it’s a common symptom, or if all my friends were drinking because they had chronic pain from injuries, or if they got those injuries because they were half-drunk, but all of the people I helped through withdrawal had body and muscle pain as a symptom.
Granted 3 people is not a large enough sample group to draw statistical conclusions.
And FYI the 18th anniversary of my death is in 9 days.
I’m glad you got better.
You did get better?
Come to think about it irritability is seems like it should be covered under the other side effects.