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David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 10d
Alejandra Caraballo @esqueer.net ⋅ 2d
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 10d
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 10d
Phil Lewis @phillewis.bsky.social ⋅ 3dDavid M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 10d
David M Willis! @damnyouwillis.bsky.social ⋅ 10d
Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg @theradr.bsky.social ⋅ 23d
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This… may be one of the best storylines yet.
Joyce you’ve changed over the years.
I love it.
Months. This is like one of the weird movies: “For us it has been years, but it’s only been a few months for them.”
Willis is closer to my nephew’s age than mine. I hope to live long enough for Valentine’s Day to get into this comic.
As someone who sees you around on various forums, I too hope you live so long, and longer, in comfort and surrounded by love.
What the fudge?
she’s gotta mean something else, right?
Nnnnooooope.
What the pfargtl?
What the flan?!?!?!
Next comic:
Steve eating cerealJoyce and Dotty falling in a slosh of melting snowNah, next comic is Riley eating cereal
Going to the 7-11, buying the contents of a slurpee machine, and theving a “slushee fight” outside in the snow.
Admittedly, this would probably be a better idea in May, but seize the moment!
What are the odds she just means they’re going out for snow cones or something?
Book title! BOOK TITLE!
Dumbing of Age 14: Cough
CoughCoughIt’s a natural.
Sloshed? What is this earthling lingo?
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sloshed it’s actually in the dictionary rather than slang but idk what would be common these days XD; Since ‘getting smashed’ could also be drunk but some ppl use it as a metaphor for sex too XD;
Joyce pullin out all the stops now huh? And she gonna help her friend! This should be fun >:D
*plays “Apocalypshit” by Molotov on hacked muzak*
I don’t think there are any english phrases that aren’t used as a metaphor for sex
Are you hitting on… Someone? 🤨
LOL i always thought ‘hitting on’ versus ‘flirting’ was a bit rough/violent for the meaning (tho eng isn’t my first language) unless it’s some kinda conspiracy for like “being hit in a relationship is ‘normal'” or so XP [i mean it’s def not but i can imagine it being someone’s excuse]
What?
Ah yeah, let’s use that phrase as a metaphor all night baby
I wonder if sloshed is somehow now a contronym
All meanings here are CORRECT!
drunk, like booze sloshing around the bottom of a jug.
Or maybe it’s a joke, and Joyce means getting Sloshies at the Village Pantry.
Wait is that what slurpies are called in the IU Village Pantry for reals?
Well they can’t call them Slurpees, that’s a 7-Eleven trademark.
Squishee is also off-limits, that’s Kwik-E-Mart.
I don’t know, no website. I didn’t check for the other convenience store chains the corporation owns, I expect the slushy machines end up with the same display though.
new guess: they’re going to a boxing ring and sparring, to slosh can also mean to punch.
They’re going to have clowns throw buckets of whitewash over them?
Hahah yes Joyce!
Joyce comes through! With sloshing fudge!
Are they stopping by Joyce’s room for her coat, or is she planning on sharing Dorothy’s?
It’s moments like these when I wonder where the autobiographical parts of the comic begin and end.
Your mistake is thinking there are parts of this comic that are not autobiographical.
We’re gonna get a repeat of the Becky Visit, aren’t we?
Joyce’s expression never changing is the best. She’s just a silly little guy.
Yeah!
100!
I should be saying “stop girl stop” or “yellow light that a little girl, maybe a beer and quietly talking would be better”, but my sense of shenanigans audienceship is saying “GO GIRL GO”
Fuck yeah, fudging sloshed!
Okay very random question, but would Joyce have been allowed to read The Divine Comedy growing up?
Probably not, because of Purgatory at the minimum.
It’s super Catholic…
Speaking as a former Catholic, it’s honestly shocking, how much of Catholic theology, in practice, seems to come from The Divine Comedy, given that it is not and has never been official canon.
Never underestimate a committed fanfic.
Saints are comfort characters for religious people, change my mind.
Yeah. To me, even more shocking is how much modern Protestant theology seems to be based on The Omen.
So disappointing they don’t go for cool shit, like Evil Dead or 28 days later.
They’re not technically supposed to accept works that involve Christopher Eccleston, for obvious reasons.
It’s the Bible’s expansion pack!
Not just that it’s not canon, but also that Catholic theology had been around for a thousand years before Dante.
Partly it just made use of and elaborated on ideas that were already common, but it’s influence did go well beyond that.
What’s Joyce’s plan for getting alcohol when they are both underage?
Oh, you sweet summer child.
…. I could interpret that question as being “so many potential plans, but Joyce is going to choose a disastrous one isn’t she, what’s it’s going to be?”
I think the point is what is, specifically, Joyce’s plan for obtaining alcohol. It’s not like Joyce is the type of person who has a fake ID or knows how to acquire a fake ID or is probably aware that fake IDs are even things that exist in the pursuit of illicit alcohol.
At least as far as we are aware, anyway. I suppose it’s fully possible that Joyce has made some criminal underworld contacts, entirely off panel, in the same way that Carla and Charlie became girlfriends, entirely off panel.
Or… she could just ask Joe or Ruth or somebody for help, as already suggested. But I prefer to believe, until explicitly proven otherwise, that Joyce has, entirely off panel, secretly made some unsavory ties to the types of people who can provide her with fake IDs. (Maybe not Jennifer.)
Before she got roofied, she found herself Queen of the Drunk People at that party. It’s plausible that she’s had friendly overtures from people who remembered her being awesome, vaguely remembered things going south for her being the reason the party wrapped up, and wanting to check in the genuinely kind, happy person they met was OK and connecting off-screen? Then when all the “not-Ryan: serial date-rapist” thing came out with her at the centre, that blossomed into some off-screen friendships with people with street-savvy…
The fact thar Joyce is a very friendly girl who’ll even befriend your family on Facebook, I wouldnt be surprised if she did have a bigger social circle outside of what we’ve seen. God, Jennifer would be sick with rage if Joyce Brown was more popular (Well liked) than her.
Maybe she’s heard that the barman at Gallasso’s is an absolute pushover who hates any form of confrontation, but not that he isn’t there any more.
(Or is he? I don’t imagine being a TA pays well, given how much we in the Anglosphere value actual educators, never mind their gofers. Maybe he kept that job as well.)
…She’s dating Joe.
Ruth, Jennifer, Carla, Sal, Malaya, breaking into Robin’s house (she probably still has a key). Ruthless’s Not-Jennifer (Mr. T.A.)
but I’m leaning towards malapropism. Joyce seems unlikely to have drank before, and I doubt that’s what she’d think to do with someone as blue as she’s just realized Dorothy is.
This was a very useful comment for me ^_^
Since I’d totally forgotten that 18year olds are under age in america. Pretty wild!
D’oh. In *The US, I mean.
Only when it comes to drinking! If they want to huff cancer sticks, look at naked people, or kill people for Freedom!, they’re totally adults.
Drinking gross rotten grape juice and whatever rotten nonsense beer is made of? No no, too young for that. Gotta wait three more years.
… To do it legally anyway.
That’s weird!
Where I live in the US, smoking is now illegal until 21 too.
Tbh, idk what everyone’s obsession with wanting the drinking age lowered is. Like, I feel like letting teenagers get trashed and incoherent is not actually a flex. None of the exchange students I’ve met in my life seemed any more responsible or better at handling their liquor than any other kid I knew (in fact, they usually were way worse. They committed like serious property damage that resulted in our uni having to fill in our pool.)
But I know that “Hey, maybe the high drinking age is a good thing” is a spicy flaming hot take.
I mean, mostly the issue is whether we respect someone’s bodily autonomy or not, and it is definitely a slippery slope. The more precedent that someone isn’t “responsible” enough to make choices about their own body until they’re 21, the easier it is to argue that really, we should raise the voting age, and really, it should be 25 instead of 21 due to that long debunked but somehow extremely persistent notion that the brain doesn’t finish developing until you’re 25.
And hey, if they’re not mature enough to drink and smoke until they’re 21 (or 25), gosh, why are we letting them choose to have sex, even with an age appropriate peer? Why are we letting them buy condoms or get abortions without parental consent? Jeez! We definitely shouldn’t be letting them go on puberty blockers!!
Like. These are very real arguments that have been made, and recently.
So. While I’m not saying this is what everyone is thinking about when they say a lower drinking age is better or at least fine, I am definitely saying it’s an often unstated part of the argument you’re seeing.
Yeah i somehow doubt this means drinking! Maybe getting sloshed in fridge is some kind of “wholesome” church game where you uh…. Trip to dump buckets of hot fudge on something? Maybe each other? A greased pig? Wait no this is getting sketchier and sketchier
Haha typo but it kinda makes it better. *Sloshed in fudge
Yes, in fact I was also surprised by that response from Joyce, but maybe it means something else… unless she really wants to damage her liver for the first time.
I’ll believe it when I see it.
joyce drunk would be quite the sight lol. i’d assume they’d get drunk /together/ as opposed to get dorothy to loosen up and end up admitting/talking about yale (which would be a sleazy manipulative tactic), which is prolly a convo to have sober
Feels to me like the alcohol may cause Dotty to act on her repressed feelings for Joyce! Make-out time! ^_^
I hope not, assuming such feelings exist which I do not buy – Dorothy doesn’t need to throw herself at someone in a committed relationship and be thus rejected a second time. I don’t think that would help her mental state in the least.
“oh no i cheated on joe, quick, you gotta make out with her too so it evens out” XD
I think it’d be a bit much but it would be pretty amusing if joyce’s first time ended up being a threesome
I’m not sure what option for this is funnier, Joyce somehow being able to obtain alcohol or Joyce having no idea that “getting sloshed” is another term for getting drunk
Assuming she really knows the meaning of that word.
I think she trusts Dorothy to stop her from doing something extremely stupid, which is why I call her, but I remember yesterday’s strip and I think she would take a risk with alcohol for “more confidence.”
i think she would know at this point and using it to troll dorothy but i feel liek jen or someone used the term ‘sloshed’ in front of at least one of them once
She just has to ask Carla! Or Ruth! Or Jennifer!
Or maybe silver-Sharpie a few hair strands and start ranting about how Millennials aren’t buying real estate.
REVENGE!
Nice callback ^^
Damn, I had forgotten
Me too. Nice.
Oh wow, good memory! I’m so glad I get to see this for the callback it is, now.
Love how well this mirrors when Dorothy taught Joyce how to rub one out.
unless sloshed means writing a book, not quite a mirror.
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2023/comic/book-13/02-turning-saints-into-the-sea/gopee/
I think the technical sequence of events is mirror enough heh
Oh come on, they’re just going to get some fudge and … um slosh
Tomorrow we learn “SLOSH” is the in-universe equivalent of SMOSH and Joyce intends on cheering Dorothy up by binging Chosen skits.
Ya know, the Walky Gravatar is very tonally appropriate for this comment. Well done, Dumbing of Age.com algorithm.
I’m pretty sure all Gravatar-integrated wordpress sites use the same algorithm for shuffling them.
I have no idea what a Smosh is, but I have a feeling this is one of those surprising moments when Joyce actually means exactly what it looks like she means.
Or maybe Willis is pulling a bait and switch, and the real drama will come out of nowhere.
ah, paralells. tho usually a drink would come before a laundry room time lol
(cw: linked strip contains ryan)
All hail Joyce Brown, Queen of the Drunks!
I’m assuming my definition of getting sloshed might be slightly different to Joyce’s but on the very off chance it isn’t then I’d suggest Joe comes along as well as chaperone
They probably should have someone to look after them, but I don’t think Dorothy would respond too well if it was Joe. She probably needs a little more time to process that bit of empathy she had for him last time they were in a panel together.
A sober 6ft plus built guy makes for a pretty decent chaperone
Sure. If you trust him. In precisely the way that Dorothy doesn’t.
Also Joyce would probably be distracted from whatever plans she has for Dorothy.
The anti-terminator over here.
You need your clothes, your boots, and Sal’s motorcycle.
I don’t think Joyce is making Dorothy drink, and it’s just a very poor choice of words on her part. If you remember, Joyce has trauma surrounding alcohol and specifically did not want it around her at her dorm party.
I don’t think Willis does cliffhangers like that. Any time Joyce has had a slang term wrong, the misunderstanding has been clear within the strip in which it appears. She hasn’t, to my recollection, used a term that clearly means one thing and then the next day clarified that she meant something else. I’m certain she means drinking.
I hope we get to see Dorothy try to talk her down because she thinks it’s out of character, only for Joyce to remind her of the laundry machines and be like “nope, it’s my turn to surprise you by introducing a new experience to our friendship, and I’m ready for this.” She’s been kidnapped, almost murdered, her parents are now divorced, and her mom is a monster. There’s no one left to disapprove, and she started the semester by swearing to Becky that they’d find out what a keg-stand is.
(And no, I don’t think she has trauma around alcohol; Becky kinda just assumed she did, and Joyce was more upset that Becky brought up the assault. She didn’t hold a grudge against anyone for drinking at her dorm party; I don’t think she ever mentioned it again.)
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/03-the-butterflies-fly-away/buzzed/
Link for context. I agree, I don’t think Joyce was especially upset by the alcohol. She was more distressed by it being passed around behind her back and worried they’d all get in trouble for breaking a rule, which in turn would have risked Becky being found out, since at the time she was very much breaking the rules by staying too long as Joyce’s “guest”.
(Also I imagine if Ruth hadn’t shown up, Joyce would also have wound up with slightly hurt feelings as she slowly realized that what she’d thought was a successful party was actually SO unsuccessful that some of her friends were drinking to get through the night.) (But I don’t think Joyce did fully process that, and I think mostly what she remembers is that drunk!Dorothy seemed more relaxed and happy, which she now seeks to recreate.)
Ah yes, a Chocolate Ale.
“Here we only have one rule —
never ever let it cool!!!!”
YEAH, WE GOT IT
I have it on good authority that it’s very good if you like beer.
i like chocolate but even adding it to beer idk would improve it. tho i have had a chocolate coffee ‘liquer’ cocktail downtwon i remmberl iking
I’m sorry, what?
It’s been an interesting 7 months for these 2.
It’s been an incredibly traumatic seven months.
Hell, just one week was the shooting and the kidnapping and the death.
Packed into 5 months.
Hey, whatever happened to the F-bomb list? Is that still being maintained? I forget who made it
http://www.ci-n.com/~jcampbel/doafbombcount.php
Yay! Thank you, Dana
“Fudgin'” doesn’t count.
Oh yes, of course. I was thinking about it because I thought Joyce had already said fuck before this strip. Someone (not here on the DOA website) pointed out that I was mistaken which reminded me of the list’s existence. Then I wanted to see it again once I remembered it
*eyes panel 1* … wait, did Dorothy drop all her classes or something?
I think she has not so much dropped all her classes, as she has just stopped GOING to all her classes for the past few days or so. That’s something people can do, in college! And even recover from, sometimes!
Or she’s still going, just not putting in the full effort studying that she’s used to.
We did just see her in Robin’s class – though I suppose she could have just been skipping the ones that didn’t have friends who would notice in them.
Mirroring “I’m going to teach you to masturbate” is some fantastic comedy so ‘sloshed’ is almost certainly something innocent and sweet that Joyce thinks will help.
She wants to talk about their problems over frozen lemonade.
“We’re going to build a hecking snowman together!” “Joyce I am existentially depressed and without meaning, but okay — I got a carrot from the communal kitchen and downloaded blueprints on my phone.”
We’re Getting Fudgin’ Sloshed!
The next volume of Dumbing of Age
Look, I understand that Joyce is the writer understanding their role within a number or already established identities that I ALSO undertand but also understand. Having them all pile up at once is strssful. I don’t want to hassle you as an artist but can only acknowledge as a frorm of agony.
Chocolate Wasted™
~ W A S T E D ~
XD
shit Shit SHIT… Drunkenness. And with Joyce a first-timer… PLEASE let this not be one of those things that Billifer has to swoop in and “solve”… by making everything ten times worse because she has to be the Alpha Trashfire.
Let’s not summon her.
She’s the worst.
Honestly, I kind of want Sal along. She’d be a good chaperone (experience with alcohol, knows her personal limit is low), and I think she’d have an interesting (helpful even) take on Dorothy’s current identity issues. And if she didn’t she’d know to keep her mouth shut.
Joyce will actually deliberately invite Jennifer along, on the grounds that Dorothy is a huge mess right now and Jennifer knows ALL ABOUT being a huge mess while drunk. Jennifer will not be terribly happy about this assessment of her, but will reluctantly acknowledge it’s accuracy.
“I want Billie.”
THE CHAOS THEORY IS COMING BACK FROM THE BRINK MY DUCKLETS
‘Sloshed’ to Joyce means drinking five chocolate milks in one setting.
She heard someone mention “malt liquor” once, and Ovaltine is malted…
Disappointed. :(. Even karaoke was a better idea.
Yes, let’s go Joyce and Dorothy friend time!
Alcohol was one of my first steps outside of the religious environment I grew up in. I don’t think it’s out of character for Joyce to want to try it with one of her best friends.
This is Joyce, she 99% means slushies…
What ?
Hmm. I’m one of those very rare non-judgemental teetotallers. I think of alcohol in moderation like I think of roillercoasters; it’s not what I’m into, but that’s just me. On the other hand, I would be quite concerned if someone I knew, or a fictional character I care about, was riding a rollercoaster without a safety bar.
So, I’m reserving my opinion on this until I know if Joyce has a safety bar.
I’m not a teetotaler (I drink way too much when I do drink, which thankfully isn’t often. I commit to the party if it shows up.) but I am a bit concerned with the readiness everyone is introducing and reintroducing alcohol in to fix the Dorothy situation.
Like, I suffered severe depression and still have moderate episodes and burnout frequently. Drinking makes me feel a million times better because it literally removes my ability to feel sadness (except wine for some reason). This Is Not A Good Thing. That’s like, the first step of developing a problem.
That being said, I don’t think Joyce is advocating “let’s get drunk to make you happy” and is instead advocating “let’s get drunk so you’ll tell me about what’s going on with you because you have the emotional vulnerability of a zebra mussel while sober.” I just kinda worry that this isn’t going to end the way she wants it to.
The closest I get is NA beer, and yeah I don’t care if people drink so long as people are responsible and know their limits.
Is it finally time for the Joyce x Dorothy to come true?
Hope not! I don’t personally see the ship (close platonic relationships involving hugging and cuddling do exist) but mainly: Joyce is currently in a relationship with someone she cares about very deeply, and I don’t think she’s the kind of person to hurt Joe like that. She’s demonstrably willing to be a homewrecker, but i don’t think she’d take the wrecker to her own.
Anyway,
I DO think if they wind up getting very drunk together, we will EITHER get an unambiguous indication that yes, that’s what had Dorothy looking so mich like a storm cloud when she was watching Joyce and Joe enjoy the treadmill together, OR… Dorothy will finally come clean about Yale.
(Or both? Could easily manage both.)
(If nothing happens on the “feelings for Joyce” front, I’ll personally be packing it in and not expecting anything canon-wise. Though I’m already not expecting anything canon-wise, because I am so very very very accustomed to disappointment lol.)
Also liking Joyce/Dorothy has nothing to do with liking <i or disliking Joe/Joyce and I have no obligation to think, much less feel guilty, about how Joe would feel if Joyce/Dorothy happened. It is so very much not part of the equation. It would be better for the long-term success of a Joyce/Dorothy relationship that Dorothy not make a Move TM while Joyce is happy with him, so I’ll be glad if it’s avoided in that sense, but also the fantastic dumpster fire that would happen if Dorothy drunk-kissed Joyce and Joyce drunk-kissed her back and liked it…
Like come on, that would be hecka compelling fff.
YES YES YES
Unfortunately, the manufacturing, sale, and consumption of alcohol are all 400% illegal in the state of Indiana, so they’re gonna have to take quite a trip to get some.
On the other hand, ROAD TRIIIIIP!
You have forgotten, that before he was Robin’s T.A., Jason was tending bar, at Galasso’s, so it cannot be THAT illegal.
I’ve forgotten nothing. I remember it so you don’t have to.
Nah, the ban-everything crowd wants to go back to the 1950s, not the 1920s. Their base would go ballistic if their precious beer got taken away, and deflecting blame to the other party won’t parry all of their ire.
They’ll be sll for banning malt liquor though, for “some reason”.
I assume “some reason” involves Jews, Black people, or Islam.
In this case mostly black people I assume. Malt liquor was heavily advertised to “urban youth”, so it’s strongly associated with them.
…Wait, what?
They’ll have to go back to international waters, Monroe Ocean.
So, Joyce has come to the same conclusion that Ruth and Jennifer have, Dorothy needs to get tanked, or get laid. But, since neither will admit their feelings for each other, Joyce has opted for the former, rather than the later.
hot fudge on a snow cone? Sounds kinda messy to me
They’re about to get chocolate wasted
So, even Joyce I suggesting Dorothy what pretty much everyone else already suggested her… Absolutely awesome! Can’t wait to see what Joyce actually means and how this will end.
It’s funny how Joyce wanting to indulge in alcohol is something a lot of the fandom finds more shocking than any of the other adult behaviors she’s experimenting with.
Partly that she’s always been very obviously horny, just repressed, so that’s all a pretty next step. She’s never really shown interest in alcohol. There’s no build up.
I genuinely think it’s folks misremembering earlier strips and thinking Joyce has trauma around alcohol. But as noted above, that was just Becky making assumptions. Joyce was upset by the surprise underage drinking at her party, but I think now she mostly just remembers that Dorothy seemed able to relax and happy under the influence, and wants to facilitate that.
Personally, I look forward to seeing how long people can keep denying that Joyce is referring to alcohol. Based on some of the comments I’m seeing above, I’m pretty sure many will continue insisting that it’s all a hilarious misunderstanding up to and including the strip where Joyce explicitly clarifies “by ‘sloshed’, I mean drunk. With alcohol, that we will obtain illegally for the express purpose of getting drunk.”
“Look, just because they’re here drinking booze, getting sloshed, doesn’t mean that’s what Joyce meant. It’s just a coincidence.”
With actual fudge!
I hope Joyce brings Sarah along too. Two bird with one stone, and double the shenanigans. It’s girls night.
“Alcohol… the cause of, and solution to all of life’s problems!”
– Homer Simpson
certainly didn’t expect the alcoholism path to come via Joyce
“Sooner or later, everyone meets their Homer…scrapbooking, high stakes poker, the Santa Fe lifestyle: just pick a dead-end and chill out til you die.”
— Homer Simpson
Joyce is dangerous when she gets that look. She’s about to put a stick in the spokes of the Universe.
defintely not going to be any problems with this plan at all
Mmmmm, fudgy slosh. *drool noises*
I think the Dorothy’s problem is that she doesn’t know how to be directionless. She’s never experienced what it’s like before and so she feels incredibly lost. In fact, being directionless is part of being at college. You use college to find your real direction. That’s what she needs to figure out.
I think that*
My oldest daughter talks disturbingly like Joyce. Granted, maybe just around me.