Tamaura, wrested into a world 300 years in the future, must find a way to save the magic fading from her country.
The Otherknown
Lorian Merriman
Chandra is a 12-year-old accidental time traveler with a reluctant new dad, who happens to be a member of a feared galactic crime syndicate.
Mac Hall
Matt Boyd
The legendary early-aughts webcomic that inspired a wave of webcomic creators.
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Iris Black is a self-proclaimed inventor with the curious ability to bring his drawings to life, and yearns to find a space where he can use his powers freely.
Cyanide & Happiness
Explosm
Satire, dark humor and surreal humor.
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!
Namesake
Isa, Meg
There's ghosts at your heels and fairy tale worlds ahead. What do you do? Jump down the rabbit hole!
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.
2 Slices
RJ Morel
After a case of mistaken identity, will awkward Daisuke find help from excitable Mamo, or will his love life be thrown completely off track?
Fantomestein
Beka Duke
Desperate for companionship, Frankenstein's Monster pretends to be the Opera Ghost. A grave mistake.
Beeserker
TJ Cordes
This comic is about a robot powered by bees, but it's also about the kind of people who think filling a robot with bees is a good idea, and why they're wrong.
Slightly Damned
Chu
Rhea Snaketail returns from the dead, befriending a Demon who falls in love with an Angel. The afterlife ain't what it used to be!
Paint the Town Red
Windy, Winter Jay Kiakas
Winona runs a werewolf shelter with partner in crime, Odile in the Gothic city of Merlot. One day they take in an injured vampire, and soon unravels many of the dark secrets of Merlot.
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“Driving Under the Influence”. It can apply to alcohol or other drugs, depending on the area in question where the subject is pulled over by the police.
Or puking on a Saturday/Sunday morning.
I was going back home when I got sick, after I finished, a cop arrives and start to test me to see if I was drunk or not.
Damn those sexually inhibited iguanas. Why do they have to make such a big deal out of a woman forgetting her toys in plain view? It doesn’t matter if she was using them at the time, it’s her home, her toys, her sexuality, and the iguanas could just leave if that was too much for them.
And even if it didn’t, Being a cheerleader is a major part of her identity, even now. It doesn’t matter if other people don’t view her as a cheerleader, to herself, she’ll always be one.
Depends on how important it is to you, I think. And how you lose it. Quitting the team’s one thing. Losing it because you did something stupid….that’s another.
“Not that losing your cheerleader status is particularly setting traumatizing.”
Well, this might be true on the surface. But look at what we know about Billie. She’s made mention of being a cheerleader a *lot*, and was willing to risk breaking into the apartment of the big scary TA girl to get back a uniform that doesn’t even fit anymore. Now look at how she acts around people- she has made huge pains to distant herself from people she considers “nerds” and the like, even though recent storylines show she isn’t *uncaring* towards people she knows (this one being just the latest example).
So what am I getting at? Status is important to Billie, but not in the sense that she will shun or mistreat those “beneath” her (though she admittedly can be kind of a bongo even at the best of times). More like what people think of *her* is the important part. She validates her self-esteem based on what everyone else thinks. And clearly the way she defined herself and got all that validation was by being a cheerleader.
So, don’t think of it as a DUI costing her being a cheerleader. Think of it as a DUI costing her social standing, her sense of self-worth, her identity, everything.
I know people who are like that, and the loss of status that comes from being booted off the team is traumatic. Yes, basing your self-worth off of the value you believe others put on your achievements is shallow, but it’s a bit like being a child actor. I was a cheerleader in High School… I’m not one, anymore. What the hell do I do now?
TPman, cheerleading may be unimportant to us, but central to Billie’s identity, so central that she still holds on tightly to it even after she has finished highschool.
Hey… you need the FULL joke for it to be hilarious, Aras! Maybe there’s a middle section Billie hasn’t gotten to yet! (Also, you’re not drunk, so that’s part of it.)
This could be the beginning of an… acceptable friendship. Hopefully Ruth doesn’t forget what happened and revert to type. Or revert to type out of embarrassment.
You know, if all these people just wore hats while drunk to stop the bubbles getting out, they’d probably get away with their drunken shenanigans/misdemeanors/felonies.
All the sudden I have this image of these hats catching the bubbles and lifting them up like a hot air balloon. Imagine: FLYING DRUNK PEOPLE! It’d be like the laziest ballet ever.
…And of course my brain took ‘Fizzy Lifting Drinks’ and ‘adult version of that scene’ to come up with that being the name you’d give to a carbonated liquid version of Viagra. -facepalms-
Which definition applies depends on what you are modifying. In chemistry, it means what Jacob said it means. He was being pedantic (and what nothri meant was clear enough) but he wasn’t wrong.
volatile (ˈvɒləˌtaɪl)
— adj
1. (of a substance) capable of readily changing from a solid or liquid form to a vapour; having a high vapour pressure and a low boiling point
2. (of persons) disposed to caprice or inconstancy; fickle; mercurial
3. (of circumstances) liable to sudden, unpredictable, or explosive change
Billie apparently considered being a cheerleader the highlight of her life. On the other side, I’ve met a few guys in their 30s who still re-live their high school running back days as big stuff. We all have our delusions I guess.
Maybe, if Billie lost her cheerleading and self esteem and all that with the D.U.I., she can see what Ruth is headed for and is trying to stop it. That would maybe explain why she is there at all, after what Ruth did to her. Could be a mistake covering for her, if Ruth doesn’t get help she’s gonna drink herself to death.
And I hope to Hell Mr. W. , that you never ‘ship’ these two.
I know this isn’t a real emergency and all, but firefighters probably would check the bathrooms to make sure no one’s passed out on the toilet or whatever.
Depends if they first do a quick pass through the building and determine there’s no fire. I’d imagine that they’re a lot less through on the way down if that happens.
Well, if DOA operates under porn rules, the firemen would definitely find the two barely legal college girls, explain just how much trouble they could be in, and work out an “arrangement.”
Not as such, but many coaches will throw people out who they feel dishonor the team. This isn’t limited to crime, either – think of all the pregnant cheerleaders who’ve been thrown off squads.
It’s also possible that Billie’s drinking was interfering with her performance as a cheerleader, and the D.U.I. was the final straw. True, her drinking problems have probably gotten worse since she was booted from the team (i.e. lost her primary reason to keep the drinking under control), but you don’t just wake up one day as an alcoholic.
This is usually the time when I’d say something suggestive about two skantily clad girls hiding in an enclosed space together. But character development is taking place, which makes me more interested in just commenting on the story and characters and stuff. My one kryptonite. I’m sorry Joe Avatar of the suggestively raised eyebrow ™. I have failed you this night.
I don’t know that it’s bad, but Ruth should really wash out her mouth first. And hopefully sober up first because informed consent and all. And Billie also has a lapful of vomit that’s probably soaked through by now.
So, it’s okay if they make up sexy, as long as they do it later.
I think it’s kinda neat from a writerly standpoint that Ruth’s sentences don’t end with periods right now. It’s a nice touch that implies that her sentences are just sort of blending together and petering out instead of definitively finishing.
Will shoving the bottles under the bed do any good? The room seems to be pretty much soaked in booze. It was leaking out the front door, with Ruth and her Booze all the way at the other side of the room. I imagine when the firefighters step in the room and the carpet starts making squishy noises they’ll know that something’s up.
Though now that I think of it I’m not really sure why they’d care. They’re firefighters. They’re here to do their job, not narc on college students.
If they had any reason to connect Billie and Ruth to the alarm-pulling, they might be pissed enough to report it: “We don’t have time to be dealing with drunken pranks from your damn students. Deal with it.”
A bit. Until this point, it was possible that she was simply known as a lush, and that she’d been able to conceal the true depth of her drinking problem (or that a high schooler might not take it as seriously as it deserves), in which case Walky’s remarks might have been just a bit of ribbing. If Billie had a DUI, though, there’s no way he could not know it was serious, and his remarks become genuine hostility.
I can’t help but wonder if there’s an old bitterness there. Billie has been very vehement that she and Walky are not in the same social circle…moreso than you would expect if he was just a nerd from the old hometown. Perhaps they were friends once (as they were in the Walkyverse), but she cut ties when she had a chance to become popular.
Hmm. Of course, there’s also Walky’s comment that they don’t release the names of minors involved in crimes. Billie didn’t know that Sal had been holding up liquor stores; it’s possible Walky didn’t actually know that Billie’d been busted for DUI, and was just giving her shit about the, y’know, drinking like a fish.
Good point. You’d think word would get around, but if Billie didn’t know about the robberies, there’s enough plot cover to pull it off. If in fact the DUI and the reason Billie “left” the cheer squad were kept hushed, that brings Walky’s remarks at the beginning back around to simple bustin’ chops…or at least, that would be how he intended it.
Still, until Jossed, I hold to the “Friends When Younger” hypothesis.
Also called DWI – Driving While Intoxicated. I’m not sure just which jurisdictions use which (checking, apparently some use both, what Billie did being a DWI, DUI referring to other drugs), but both are in use, and it’s mostly a location thing.
And isn’t THAT a brand new bit of information, that Billie was kicked out of cheerleading in high school? That there’s a second layer to her constant “BLAH BLAH I’M A CHEERLEADER” talk
Yeah – among other things it explains how she’s so good at the whole “I’m still a chearleader (even though I’m obviously not)” thing: she’s had practice.
I just wonder if it was the DUI or the fact that in order to be DUI she had to be breaking the rule against underage drinking first. Either one would get her booted off the cheerleading squad.
My first prediction was that Billie would kiss Ruth when the fire department busts in, hoping to use the shock of lady-make-outs to distract and confuse the emergency responders.
But that’s way too sitcommy to follow on the heels of “This character is an embattled alcoholic struggling with serious emotional problems.”
The way I see it, she broke in because – abuse or not – she didn’t want Ruth to die, and she’s hiding her now, because the whole alcohol issue is hitting pretty close to home. In other words, she’s helping her because she’s decent human being
On her way to becoming one, anyway. It’s a very good start, but it may be a while before she can change her head around enough to think of people as people instead of props to her status.
Once she does that, we still have to see what she does about the people she’s wronged in the past. Fortunately, Walky is right here as a representative.
I’m not sure about ‘representative’. Witness, maybe? It depends on how severe the wrongs were, of course, but Walky doesn’t seem too bothered about it.
Walky does seem to have a brass hide, it’s true. Either that, or he’s completely oblivious. I seem to remember a confrontation where Billie was giving Walky a rather nasty lecture on how people of her social class didn’t interact with people of his…and then he wandered away in a Dorothy-trance.
My money’s on the brass hide. His sarcastic streak shows he knows what ‘cutting’ is. Plus, he does seem to consider slobbishness, nerdery, dorkishness and so on a point of identity and pride — Billie insulting him with any of those things wouldn’t even dent him.
In a shocking twist, Sal turns out to be one of the former goth kids.
I kind of get the impression she’s one of those people who divide everyone into “important” (her social superior) and “unimportant” (her social inferior). She considers Ruth important, so she acts decently to her, in the hope of decent treatment in return. Walky, however, she considers unimportant, so she treats him badly because she doesn’t care how he acts towards her.
…aaand some months from now, Ruth learns Billie got on a car while drunk, so she gets on other car after her, eventually acting with integrity… no regrets. Damn you Willis.
I know Billie is helping Ruth because she’s worried about her, but I can’t make up my mind about whether this worry is founded partially in guilt. Guilt that maybe her run-ins with Ruth made her emotional state worse, or because she considered checking up on her previously but didn’t and that may be why it’s gotten this far.
Either way, this shows that she can be empathic, and now I’m wondering — has she actually hung out with anyone else? She went on that outing to the beach, but that was for Joyce and included Sal, which meant other people would get more attention than her. She might have gone along with it, but kept herself distant/isolated herself from the others. Then there was that party, but it seemed she went there for about the same reason — more for the event’s sake than for social contact.
Walky’s the one who’s talked the most to her, and, right or wrong, she seems to have known him as “that annoying guy” for so long that she can’t think of him any other way. Walky’s an okay guy, but his gestures of kindness seem mostly to be getting people to laugh with jokes or silliness, and Billie just finds that embarassing.
Ruth, who’s dominating and brash and holds a position of social power, may remind Billie of how she used to be back at high school. The revelation that she used to bully goth kids seals that further — she’s not a stranger to picking on those beneath her. Ruth does it to secure a reputation, and that’s one of the many reasons for why Billie could have done it.
Ruth’s also the one person who’s hung out with her. The beach no one invited her along for, she just sorta came with — the party she invited herself along to. Plus, they were both pretty big, flashy occurrences, with lots of people along. Watching TV and drinking beer alongside someone is a much more intimate thing. (The hostile atmosphere may have invalidated this, though.)
Long, rambly post, but the basic point is this: Billie may feel a lot closer to Ruth than it seems, and this may be because Ruth is closer to Billie personality-wise than anyone else at the school. (Possibly due to envy that they all seem to be doing better than her, thus placing themselves ‘above’ her? Billie finds Walky annoying but he’s so crazy confident there’s nothing she can do to make him less annoying, since there’s no way she can get to him — Sal’s the same, but with apathy instead — Sarah’s a misanthrope and as such has disassociated herself totally from the social scene that Billie cares so much about — Joyce, naïve though she is, keeps on keepin’ on.) Man, I don’t know, but I talk a lot about it.
I kind of agree, but I’m not sure it’s guilt. As I said in reply to an earlier comment, I think it’s a status thing: she thinks of Ruth as important, i.e. worth hanging out with, and worth helping. Her going on endlessly about nerds makes me think she’s looking for people to despise.
Oh yep, I saw that, and that may definitely be it. That fits in with how she feels about Sal, too — Sal hasn’t done much for her (except get on Ruth’s case a few times, and she has her own reasons, the dislike of authority, for doing that), but Billie still wants to impress her. I guess it’s her reasons for classifying people as important/unimportant that interest me right now. Does it all hinge on their confidence or on how much power they have over people or on how much other people like them?
‘Looking for people to despise’ fits too — can’t be very high on the social ladder if there aren’t many rungs under you.
I think this is her big worry: in high school, she knew what the pecking order was, and she expected it to be just the same in college. But here, everything’s different: most people don’t care about footballers and cheerleaders, swots like Dorothy are respected, nobody treats Walky badly, and the ultra-cool Sal despises social conventions and won’t go to parties.
I think Billie’s mainly confused because what’s the point of climbing the social ladder if nobody else cares about it?
I decided Freshman year that regardless of how much peer pressure involved, I would not drink or smoke. This isn’t because I have high moral standards, nor do I tend to be the guy who it morally upheld all the time. It’s because I took my biology class Freshman year and they showed me two things:
1) Smoker’s lungs
2) A chart showing that one of the main side-effects of alcohol was breast enlargement in men (hair growth in women)
Congratulations, drinkers and smokers, you’re future is hairy, lonely, and filled with moobs.
Me if I ever see Tony Hawk: Hey you’re Tony Hawk the famous skateboarder. That’s right I recognise you. Won’t be able to get any content out of this will you, you piece of shit
How to read all 28 issues of my Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane run on Marvel Unlimited:
1: The first four issues were published as the miniseries "Mary Jane."
www.marvel.com/comics/serie...
today in #9chickweedlane i learned we have to be shown children learning and relearning what sex is, for Reasons, even though they already clearly know and have prepared nuanced questions about it!
also that Gran must hate, if she's still alive, how Old Juliette is the same but with gray hair
one of my favorite things is when a commenter explodes WHEN DO THESE CHARACTERS GET THERAPY but directed towards a character who canonically has a regular therapist
Hot Toys Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith 1/6 Scale Darth Vader Deluxe ($495) & Standard ($315) is up for preorder at Sideshow - shrsl.com/4wcx6 #ad
If you preorder make sure to hit the Exclusive versions since they include a commemorative plaque and cost the same.
btw if you're one of those rando bluesky weirdos who doesn't know me but sees me in the wild being sarcastic and don't know i'm being sarcastic because you haven't taken like 30 seconds to, like, maybe look at my user profile or something, keep walking, you're not going to score internet points here
Here's an entertaining cite at the bottom of the first page
Josh Gerstein@joshgerstein.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
JUST IN: Milwaukee Judge Hannah Dugan moves to dismiss federal criminal case against her for allegedly helping immigrant hide from ICE. Her lawyers say she's protected by official acts & judicial immunity and 10th Amendment. Doc: storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
Where did Hollywood go so wrong? I thought movies were supposed to be an escape from reality, a chance to put your worries aside and not have to think about any underlying ideas or concepts. Well, not anymore.
theonion.com/you-can...
It's not a new argument, of course, but Chesterton dismissed it effectively in 1908.
"You will hear everlastingly... this argument that the rich man cannot be bribed. The fact is, of course, that the rich man is bribed; he has been bribed already. That is why he is a rich man."
Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com ⋅ 2d
Hawley dismisses Trump lining his pockets with his memecoin: "Listen, I think nobody believes that Donald Trump can be bought. I mean, what does Donald Trump need more money for?"
preternia @preternia.com ⋅ 1d
Josh Gerstein @joshgerstein.bsky.social ⋅ 2d
Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com ⋅ 2d
Pavel
@spavel.bsky.social ⋅ 12d
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Billie is the true superhero in the Dumbiverse.
BILLIE’S AMAZI-GIRL!
Her whole newspaper thing is just a cover. Just look at how mild-mannered she is.
So she’s like spiderman? Taking candid pictures of herself saving the day?
Exactly, but in this case J. Jonah Jameson is a lesbian who hit on her.
Are you reading this, Holywood!? THIS is how you bring back a franchise!
I need fanart of this STAT!
If it exists, there’s porn of it.
Yotomoe – soooooooooooooooooooooooo +1!!!!
Is “saving the day” what we’re calling masturbating now?
Or were we not going there yet and I’m a filthy, filthy person?
Both. And there’s nothing wrong with that.
Hiding…in the closet.
You trying to tell us something, Willis?
They will come out together.
Actually, they’re in the bathroom…
Water closet. Sure, let’s go with that.
That’s like being in the closet together. Only more wet.
it’s a closet involving water sports?!! err, sorry…
Dammit, I specifically put them in the bathroom and not the closet so nobody would make these dumb jokes!
You thought you could stop the internet, Willis? Ah, the hubris of man.
Every “Damn You, Willis!” shall haunt your dreams as you realize that you cannot stop us from making closet jokes, no matter HOW hard you try!
MUAHAHAHAHA!
Willis: DAMN YOU COMMENTERS!
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/water_closet
I’m not illiterate.
That’s what she said.
…
Am I using it wrong again?
THAT’s what she said!
No.
They’re going to come out of the water closet?
You don’t know your forum very well then sir.
Well, that explains a bit…
That she’s helping Ruth because she knows what it’s like to lose doing her favourite thing due to alcohol?
That, and why she’s been trying to cling to/regain her cheerleader identity.
…without just becoming a cheerleader again.
I’d guess she didn’t lose her cheerleader identity.
But only due to someone else covering for her. Maybe stuffing her in a bathroom.
I have to ask:
What is a D.U.I.? Can I eat it?
Driving under the influence. It means she got caught drunk driving.
Drinking Under Influence. And yes, why not?
Drinking Under Influence sounds like the most cruel crime to put on the books….
“Driving Under the Influence”. It can apply to alcohol or other drugs, depending on the area in question where the subject is pulled over by the police.
and she’s in a bathroom not a car so how is a D.U.I relevent to the situation
Billie probably GOT a DUI which is why she wasn’t a cheerleader anymore. She’s saying that to say that you don’t wanna get caught drinking.
Or puking on a Saturday/Sunday morning.
I was going back home when I got sick, after I finished, a cop arrives and start to test me to see if I was drunk or not.
That would explain why her alcoholism was in her record when she got here
Oh wow, hadn’t thought of that.
Oh, yeah, I kinda forgot about that tidbit… this explains that, too.
Well given that this is most probably a story about Billie, I don’t think the cheerleader was driving high. Maybe doing a high kick, but not high.
Driving under the influence.
I just wanted to continue the chain.
No its Drinking Under Inebriated you can’t be a cheerleader unless you’ve had a few
Dumbing Uf Iage
It means Driver Unider Influence.
…
Wait, what?
Dildos Upset Iguanas.
Billie was really drunk.
Damn those sexually inhibited iguanas. Why do they have to make such a big deal out of a woman forgetting her toys in plain view? It doesn’t matter if she was using them at the time, it’s her home, her toys, her sexuality, and the iguanas could just leave if that was too much for them.
Nope, but you can eat whatever does it. It may be frowned upon in most societies, however.
Shouldn’t it be M.I.P. not D.U.I?
Only if she was in current possession. If its all gone, or she’s on the way home from a party, then there is no possession, only intoxication.
Nah, it’s still “in possession” if it’s inside of you. She presumably got both.
Billie who are you kidding you may have been a cheerleader in high school but really you arn’t one anymore
This may have been in high school.
I hope not because it would not be as comfortable with the situations willis throws at us if everyone was jailbait
…Th-The DUI was in highschool. DOA is definitely in college.
It would have to be, because we’ve only covered less than a month in story time.
And even if it didn’t, Being a cheerleader is a major part of her identity, even now. It doesn’t matter if other people don’t view her as a cheerleader, to herself, she’ll always be one.
And if you think that’s pathetic now, come back when she’s turning forty and has a teenage daughter.
I think you need to re-read the last panel.
Yes. And the last panel heavily implies that hadn’t been one for some time before she graduated.
Traumatic Back-story? How Surprising!
No, I’m sure it’ll turn out to be something non-traumatizing. Willis wouldn’t do that to us.
Not that losing your cheerleader status is particularly setting traumatizing.
Depends on how important it is to you, I think. And how you lose it. Quitting the team’s one thing. Losing it because you did something stupid….that’s another.
“Not that losing your cheerleader status is particularly setting traumatizing.”
Well, this might be true on the surface. But look at what we know about Billie. She’s made mention of being a cheerleader a *lot*, and was willing to risk breaking into the apartment of the big scary TA girl to get back a uniform that doesn’t even fit anymore. Now look at how she acts around people- she has made huge pains to distant herself from people she considers “nerds” and the like, even though recent storylines show she isn’t *uncaring* towards people she knows (this one being just the latest example).
So what am I getting at? Status is important to Billie, but not in the sense that she will shun or mistreat those “beneath” her (though she admittedly can be kind of a bongo even at the best of times). More like what people think of *her* is the important part. She validates her self-esteem based on what everyone else thinks. And clearly the way she defined herself and got all that validation was by being a cheerleader.
So, don’t think of it as a DUI costing her being a cheerleader. Think of it as a DUI costing her social standing, her sense of self-worth, her identity, everything.
+1.
I know people who are like that, and the loss of status that comes from being booted off the team is traumatic. Yes, basing your self-worth off of the value you believe others put on your achievements is shallow, but it’s a bit like being a child actor. I was a cheerleader in High School… I’m not one, anymore. What the hell do I do now?
TPman, cheerleading may be unimportant to us, but central to Billie’s identity, so central that she still holds on tightly to it even after she has finished highschool.
THIS ISN’T FUNNY AT ALL, BILLIE. BOOO!
HEY! THAT’S NOT NICE!
Billie heard Joyce mention hat Drunks find everything hilarious and decided to test it out.
wait, Billie is taking drunk advice from Joyce? wut
Don’t you remember “Joyce Brown, Queen of the Drunks”?
Hihi … hic!
Maybe it’s set up for a really good punchline next strip?
“and boy are my arms tired!”
THAT’S ISN’T FUNNY AT ALL, YOTOMOE. BOO!
Hey… you need the FULL joke for it to be hilarious, Aras! Maybe there’s a middle section Billie hasn’t gotten to yet! (Also, you’re not drunk, so that’s part of it.)
I love the way Ruth doesn’t have punctuation while she is sobering up.
Wait, what does that have to do with any-
Oh.
Ohhhhhhhhhhh.
Well, this puts a slightly different spin on some of Billie’s actions.
I don’t remember Billie spin-
Ohhhhhhh.
“Billie, I think I hate your stories.”
“and also your face.”
I think it’s because you’re fat.
This could be the beginning of an… acceptable friendship. Hopefully Ruth doesn’t forget what happened and revert to type. Or revert to type out of embarrassment.
She’ll revert to type out of sobering up. She’s just a moody drunk.
So, is Billie Rick or Louis in this scenario?
I googled that out of confusion, and all I got was “the story of a man who taught his cat to use instant messaging”.
Go watch Casablanca.
You know, if all these people just wore hats while drunk to stop the bubbles getting out, they’d probably get away with their drunken shenanigans/misdemeanors/felonies.
All the sudden I have this image of these hats catching the bubbles and lifting them up like a hot air balloon. Imagine: FLYING DRUNK PEOPLE! It’d be like the laziest ballet ever.
Also it’d be terrifying when we get to the inevitable FALLING DRUNK PEOPLE.
Well they would fall when the bubbles stop, so it would probably be falling tipsy/hungover people.
They’d be HUNGOVER lampposts and electrical wires, amirite?
This is my favorite thing today.
It’s like an adult version of that fizzy soda scene from Willy Wonka.
Erm, well, adult beverage version… Not sure I want to think about the ‘adult’ version of it.
Yay! Fizzy Lifting Drinks. The reason Charlie almost lost the game.
…And of course my brain took ‘Fizzy Lifting Drinks’ and ‘adult version of that scene’ to come up with that being the name you’d give to a carbonated liquid version of Viagra. -facepalms-
I don’t want to think about the “adult” version of anything involving Willy Wonka.
Oops, too late.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-
Willy Wanker and the Cockolate Factory.
I weep for the synapses that died coming up with that.
It might be the “adult” version. Depends on how drunk they got.
What? All those bubbles collecting in the hat are probably highly volatile! I’d rather be drunk than caught in a gas explosion!
Pretty sure that by already being gas, their volatility means nothing.
Volatile [vol-uh-tl or -til]: evaporating rapidly; passing off readily in the form of vapor
I think you meant flammable.
Alternate definition:
tending or threatening to break out into open violence; explosive
But then, since it was on the line directly under the one you quoted, I’m sure you knew that.
Which definition applies depends on what you are modifying. In chemistry, it means what Jacob said it means. He was being pedantic (and what nothri meant was clear enough) but he wasn’t wrong.
volatile (ˈvɒləˌtaɪl)
— adj
1. (of a substance) capable of readily changing from a solid or liquid form to a vapour; having a high vapour pressure and a low boiling point
2. (of persons) disposed to caprice or inconstancy; fickle; mercurial
3. (of circumstances) liable to sudden, unpredictable, or explosive change
Ruth i can’t let them find you where else where else would I get my booze and lesbian boosts of self esteem
Billie apparently can get her lesbian boosts of self-esteem from any woman.
I read that as lesbian boots of self esteem, which needs illustrating. Pity I can’t draw.
Lesbian Boots of Self Esteem
Class Restriction: Amazon
Billie apparently considered being a cheerleader the highlight of her life. On the other side, I’ve met a few guys in their 30s who still re-live their high school running back days as big stuff. We all have our delusions I guess.
Maybe, if Billie lost her cheerleading and self esteem and all that with the D.U.I., she can see what Ruth is headed for and is trying to stop it. That would maybe explain why she is there at all, after what Ruth did to her. Could be a mistake covering for her, if Ruth doesn’t get help she’s gonna drink herself to death.
And I hope to Hell Mr. W. , that you never ‘ship’ these two.
I know this isn’t a real emergency and all, but firefighters probably would check the bathrooms to make sure no one’s passed out on the toilet or whatever.
Depends if they first do a quick pass through the building and determine there’s no fire. I’d imagine that they’re a lot less through on the way down if that happens.
(I have no idea how firefighters do their work.)
Well, if DOA operates under porn rules, the firemen would definitely find the two barely legal college girls, explain just how much trouble they could be in, and work out an “arrangement.”
Well, Ruth’s not wrong.
So…this totally ends with the fire department busting in on them while they’re making out right?
Right after Ruth threw up?
eeeeewwwwwwwww.
I concur.
Well this explains a lot of Billie current situation… and is really, really sad in hindsight.
I didn’t know that you could lose your cheerleading licence the same way you lose your driver’s licence.
Not as such, but many coaches will throw people out who they feel dishonor the team. This isn’t limited to crime, either – think of all the pregnant cheerleaders who’ve been thrown off squads.
It’s also possible that Billie’s drinking was interfering with her performance as a cheerleader, and the D.U.I. was the final straw. True, her drinking problems have probably gotten worse since she was booted from the team (i.e. lost her primary reason to keep the drinking under control), but you don’t just wake up one day as an alcoholic.
“many coaches will throw people out who they feel dishonor the team.”
Dishonor! Dishonor on your whole squad! Dishonor on you, dishonor on your mascot-!
At least they didn’t require seppuku.
This is usually the time when I’d say something suggestive about two skantily clad girls hiding in an enclosed space together. But character development is taking place, which makes me more interested in just commenting on the story and characters and stuff. My one kryptonite. I’m sorry Joe Avatar of the suggestively raised eyebrow ™. I have failed you this night.
… is it bad I want them to make up… all sexy like?
No I am hoping for this too.
I don’t know whether it’s bad or not. But at the very least, you are not alone.
Yes. It’s terrible, and you should feel bad.
I don’t know that it’s bad, but Ruth should really wash out her mouth first. And hopefully sober up first because informed consent and all. And Billie also has a lapful of vomit that’s probably soaked through by now.
So, it’s okay if they make up sexy, as long as they do it later.
All of this.
I think it’s kinda neat from a writerly standpoint that Ruth’s sentences don’t end with periods right now. It’s a nice touch that implies that her sentences are just sort of blending together and petering out instead of definitively finishing.
From one writer to another, nice touch Willis!
Also, her question has no question mark which makes me think of sleepy/drunk people who ask questions that sound like statements.
I’m ashamed. 74 comments and not one about how Billie’s totally cupping a full-on arm feel right now.
They learned their lesson from a couple days ago.
Just when you thought it was safe to make sexual innuendos again…
Will shoving the bottles under the bed do any good? The room seems to be pretty much soaked in booze. It was leaking out the front door, with Ruth and her Booze all the way at the other side of the room. I imagine when the firefighters step in the room and the carpet starts making squishy noises they’ll know that something’s up.
Though now that I think of it I’m not really sure why they’d care. They’re firefighters. They’re here to do their job, not narc on college students.
I’m pretty sure that that was just some being split as she tried to get into her room in a drunken state.
If they had any reason to connect Billie and Ruth to the alarm-pulling, they might be pissed enough to report it: “We don’t have time to be dealing with drunken pranks from your damn students. Deal with it.”
Does Walky’s comment from the start of the series seem mean-spirited to anyone else in retrospect?
That this is an AU and not a sequel and the characters may be a bit different? No, not particularly. Or perhaps you were talking about something else?
I was referring to the third strip of DoA, specifically the “reputation” comment.
I had observed that DoA Walky seems to be rather more of a dick than Walkyverse Walky. I guess that’s what not being abducted by aliens does to you?
A bit. Until this point, it was possible that she was simply known as a lush, and that she’d been able to conceal the true depth of her drinking problem (or that a high schooler might not take it as seriously as it deserves), in which case Walky’s remarks might have been just a bit of ribbing. If Billie had a DUI, though, there’s no way he could not know it was serious, and his remarks become genuine hostility.
I can’t help but wonder if there’s an old bitterness there. Billie has been very vehement that she and Walky are not in the same social circle…moreso than you would expect if he was just a nerd from the old hometown. Perhaps they were friends once (as they were in the Walkyverse), but she cut ties when she had a chance to become popular.
Hmm. Of course, there’s also Walky’s comment that they don’t release the names of minors involved in crimes. Billie didn’t know that Sal had been holding up liquor stores; it’s possible Walky didn’t actually know that Billie’d been busted for DUI, and was just giving her shit about the, y’know, drinking like a fish.
Good point. You’d think word would get around, but if Billie didn’t know about the robberies, there’s enough plot cover to pull it off. If in fact the DUI and the reason Billie “left” the cheer squad were kept hushed, that brings Walky’s remarks at the beginning back around to simple bustin’ chops…or at least, that would be how he intended it.
Still, until Jossed, I hold to the “Friends When Younger” hypothesis.
… I will admit that that thought had not even crossed my mind.
Possibly, but it’s not as if it isn’t her own damn fault anyway.
Sexy. Time.
for the german reader – whats an D.U.I. ?
Thanks
driving under influence [of drugs or alcohol]
billie apparently has past experience
It stands for Driving Under the Influence, and means she was driving while drunk.
DUI =driving under the influence = drunk driving, in this case.
Driving under influence (of alcohol or other drug)
Driving Under the Influence. Driving drunk.
Also called DWI – Driving While Intoxicated. I’m not sure just which jurisdictions use which (checking, apparently some use both, what Billie did being a DWI, DUI referring to other drugs), but both are in use, and it’s mostly a location thing.
And isn’t THAT a brand new bit of information, that Billie was kicked out of cheerleading in high school? That there’s a second layer to her constant “BLAH BLAH I’M A CHEERLEADER” talk
Yeah – among other things it explains how she’s so good at the whole “I’m still a chearleader (even though I’m obviously not)” thing: she’s had practice.
I just wonder if it was the DUI or the fact that in order to be DUI she had to be breaking the rule against underage drinking first. Either one would get her booted off the cheerleading squad.
You guys need to start a barbershop quartet.
My first prediction was that Billie would kiss Ruth when the fire department busts in, hoping to use the shock of lady-make-outs to distract and confuse the emergency responders.
But that’s way too sitcommy to follow on the heels of “This character is an embattled alcoholic struggling with serious emotional problems.”
Also, Ruth just threw up. Kissing? EWW.
Perfect avatar for that statement.
See, that was the idea: not a kiss as an emotional connection but as a terrified ruse.
Will Billie get busted for this?
Will Ruth overcome her emotional problems? Find out next time, same Bat-time, same Bat-channel!
Na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na… GRANDMA!
Er, wait….
That’s whyt I’m asking. Why is she helping her. Apart from verbal abuse she even harassed her sexually.
Ever hear of the expression “this is something I would not wish on my worst enemy?”
Sometimes, it is not a cliche.
The way I see it, she broke in because – abuse or not – she didn’t want Ruth to die, and she’s hiding her now, because the whole alcohol issue is hitting pretty close to home. In other words, she’s helping her because she’s decent human being
Despite some claims.
*Waves hello to Crumplepunch*
On her way to becoming one, anyway. It’s a very good start, but it may be a while before she can change her head around enough to think of people as people instead of props to her status.
Once she does that, we still have to see what she does about the people she’s wronged in the past. Fortunately, Walky is right here as a representative.
I’m not sure about ‘representative’. Witness, maybe? It depends on how severe the wrongs were, of course, but Walky doesn’t seem too bothered about it.
Walky does seem to have a brass hide, it’s true. Either that, or he’s completely oblivious. I seem to remember a confrontation where Billie was giving Walky a rather nasty lecture on how people of her social class didn’t interact with people of his…and then he wandered away in a Dorothy-trance.
It’s just that none of the Goth kids are here.
My money’s on the brass hide. His sarcastic streak shows he knows what ‘cutting’ is. Plus, he does seem to consider slobbishness, nerdery, dorkishness and so on a point of identity and pride — Billie insulting him with any of those things wouldn’t even dent him.
In a shocking twist, Sal turns out to be one of the former goth kids.
I kind of get the impression she’s one of those people who divide everyone into “important” (her social superior) and “unimportant” (her social inferior). She considers Ruth important, so she acts decently to her, in the hope of decent treatment in return. Walky, however, she considers unimportant, so she treats him badly because she doesn’t care how he acts towards her.
…aaand some months from now, Ruth learns Billie got on a car while drunk, so she gets on other car after her, eventually acting with integrity… no regrets. Damn you Willis.
I know Billie is helping Ruth because she’s worried about her, but I can’t make up my mind about whether this worry is founded partially in guilt. Guilt that maybe her run-ins with Ruth made her emotional state worse, or because she considered checking up on her previously but didn’t and that may be why it’s gotten this far.
Either way, this shows that she can be empathic, and now I’m wondering — has she actually hung out with anyone else? She went on that outing to the beach, but that was for Joyce and included Sal, which meant other people would get more attention than her. She might have gone along with it, but kept herself distant/isolated herself from the others. Then there was that party, but it seemed she went there for about the same reason — more for the event’s sake than for social contact.
Walky’s the one who’s talked the most to her, and, right or wrong, she seems to have known him as “that annoying guy” for so long that she can’t think of him any other way. Walky’s an okay guy, but his gestures of kindness seem mostly to be getting people to laugh with jokes or silliness, and Billie just finds that embarassing.
Ruth, who’s dominating and brash and holds a position of social power, may remind Billie of how she used to be back at high school. The revelation that she used to bully goth kids seals that further — she’s not a stranger to picking on those beneath her. Ruth does it to secure a reputation, and that’s one of the many reasons for why Billie could have done it.
Ruth’s also the one person who’s hung out with her. The beach no one invited her along for, she just sorta came with — the party she invited herself along to. Plus, they were both pretty big, flashy occurrences, with lots of people along. Watching TV and drinking beer alongside someone is a much more intimate thing. (The hostile atmosphere may have invalidated this, though.)
Long, rambly post, but the basic point is this: Billie may feel a lot closer to Ruth than it seems, and this may be because Ruth is closer to Billie personality-wise than anyone else at the school. (Possibly due to envy that they all seem to be doing better than her, thus placing themselves ‘above’ her? Billie finds Walky annoying but he’s so crazy confident there’s nothing she can do to make him less annoying, since there’s no way she can get to him — Sal’s the same, but with apathy instead — Sarah’s a misanthrope and as such has disassociated herself totally from the social scene that Billie cares so much about — Joyce, naïve though she is, keeps on keepin’ on.) Man, I don’t know, but I talk a lot about it.
oh my christ I need to set some sort of text limit
I kind of agree, but I’m not sure it’s guilt. As I said in reply to an earlier comment, I think it’s a status thing: she thinks of Ruth as important, i.e. worth hanging out with, and worth helping. Her going on endlessly about nerds makes me think she’s looking for people to despise.
Oh yep, I saw that, and that may definitely be it. That fits in with how she feels about Sal, too — Sal hasn’t done much for her (except get on Ruth’s case a few times, and she has her own reasons, the dislike of authority, for doing that), but Billie still wants to impress her. I guess it’s her reasons for classifying people as important/unimportant that interest me right now. Does it all hinge on their confidence or on how much power they have over people or on how much other people like them?
‘Looking for people to despise’ fits too — can’t be very high on the social ladder if there aren’t many rungs under you.
I think this is her big worry: in high school, she knew what the pecking order was, and she expected it to be just the same in college. But here, everything’s different: most people don’t care about footballers and cheerleaders, swots like Dorothy are respected, nobody treats Walky badly, and the ultra-cool Sal despises social conventions and won’t go to parties.
I think Billie’s mainly confused because what’s the point of climbing the social ladder if nobody else cares about it?
Man, all that vom on Billies lap dried fast
From the looks of things, it mostly hit her shirt.
Wow O_o
If I’d known cheerleaders were cool with keeping things on the DL I may have attempted to befriend one or two back in the day xD
I decided Freshman year that regardless of how much peer pressure involved, I would not drink or smoke. This isn’t because I have high moral standards, nor do I tend to be the guy who it morally upheld all the time. It’s because I took my biology class Freshman year and they showed me two things:
1) Smoker’s lungs
2) A chart showing that one of the main side-effects of alcohol was breast enlargement in men (hair growth in women)
Congratulations, drinkers and smokers, you’re future is hairy, lonely, and filled with moobs.
There’s a flaw in your reasoning.