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(with us, all the kids VANISHED upon reaching college-age–it was like the Southern Water Tribe but in a giant tobacco field, and reverse the ratio of elderly to little kids)
Something about money disappearing or getting stolen and I think losing the building and having to relocate to Willis’s mom’s house. He’s talked about the story a couple times outside the comic, I believe.
Oh, sorry, I misspoke, I meant an intentional reference to said pastor’s embezzlement. If I remember the series of tweets right, the pastor basically used the money he got bilking people out of their life savings “for the good of the church” to buy himself a shiny new sports car and then let the church go bankrupt before opening it up again somewhere new.
I’ve never been to a church that actually died out, but it has to happen. The same churches don’t exist forever.
And, being a non-denominational church, it may have broken up into different people saying the others were all sinners and such. No one group can afford the building and its upkeep and bills, and so they sell it to some other church.
To be honest, it’s lucky it’s still a church. I’ve seen old churches become lots of different things. I know there’s one out there that became a strip club.
That’s kind of a depressing thought… There’s a storefront in my town that is now a church, and as an atheist, I’d still actually be sad to see this one go.
When I was little, our church was in a store front. They finally raised the money for a nice big church. It was another church, last time I was home.
(I was raised Christian Science. You’ve heard of them, the ones that don’t use band-aids)
Yeah. My grandmother used to pray for healing, but she was pretty healthy. At least she didn’t scorn if mom took us to the doctors. I used to refer to the devout ones as Orthodox CS. I didn’t know anyone like the ones that end up in the news. I stopped going to church when I was 13-ish.
You can find all sorts of things in old churches…deathclaws and synths, for instance.
In all seriousness, none of the churches I used to go to ever died out (at least while I attended them), they just ended up moving to bigger or smaller church locations. Then again, I *was* pretty young for most of them, so I suppose it could have happened without me realizing it–my parents were extremely good at reframing the narrative of anything bad that happened at church, so now that I think of it some of those moves might well have been breakups.
Bristol in the UK where I live, used to be the center for methodism. Lots of empty methodist churches which have become exercise centers, tool shops, car sales etc etc. They tend to be have been built in the 19th century, so they can be recognised easily as ex-churches. I have a feeling that may not be the case so much in the US.
In some areas, mosques have built. The surburban churches tend to be like the one Willis pictures but mostly brick.
The town I live it used to be ridiculously religious. in the space of 2 blocks were a Catholic, Anglican, & Baptist Church, a Methodist chapel and a non-conformist chapel. The only one still open is the Baptist Church.
I know the Ali Forney Center (a homeless LGBT youth center in NYC) has been recently trying to buy out the ATLAH hate church that was so close to it once its foreclosure is finally official to use it as space for housing LGBT youth who have been kicked out of their homes. They raised a bunch of money for it back in February and now it looks like they’re just waiting on the final hearings before it is placed up on auction.
Our synagogue is in the old building of an church. Said church moved into the old building of another synagogue.
We have our High Holy Day services in the church whose building we took over (their new building, the old synagogue) and our choir director, who also works with the other synagogue always tells stories about the old synagogue in the church that used to live in the building of our synagogue.
In my class in school there were 4 other kids with my name.
And you couldn’t even call us all “[First name] [Initial]” because two groups of two of us had the same last initials.
…. I wish I’d been old enough to realize how creepy it would be for all of us to turn our heads slowly and answer in a cold tone, “….yes?” when the teacher yelled just our first names. Cuz man that would’ve been funny.
Two of my closest friends are named Jessica, and their last names start with the same initial. We usually either have to use their full last name or nickname to specify which one we mean when everyone’s together.
My older daughter had a high school class where she was one of four Katherines (all spelled the same). The teacher started with the girl whose last name was first alphabetically and named her “Katherine.” The second became “Katie” and the third “Kate.” My daughter was the last and spent the year in that class as “Kat.”
I once interned on a political campaign. When I started, there were five or six interns—and three of us were named Jon, all with the same spelling. To make things worse, one of the other Jons had a last name beginning with R, too. We later got more interns, but still, 3/10 or so is still pretty unlikely.
I said it was a huge missed opportunity that the three of us never practiced speaking in unison when someone said our name(s?).
In one of my classes in high school, there were four Johns, three of us John C.s, and two of us John Campbells. (Neither of us the webcomic John Campbell. Or the science fiction editor.) It was always entertaining when we had a sub.
At one point my gaming group was entirely made up of Jo(h)ns. We went by SCA or Dagorhir names to differentiate.
When I was in Kindergarten, we had 3 Jims. The teacher sorted them. The taller, serious one was James. The younger-looking smaller one was Jimmy, and the middle one was Jim. The names stuck. They were still going by them at our 30 year HS reunion.
To this day I will not notice one of the common shortened versions of my name because because when a phone call came into the office, that one meant the other guy.
Also, on my floor in the dorms in Freshman year, the floor was made up of two groups, each of whom had one class together. Between us, we had four Jacobs and three Andrews. For some reason, the Jacobs each got a qualifier in front of their name, like “Fluffy Jake (reference to his hair),” but nobody ever seemed to come up with a similar thing for any of the Andrews.
That’s pretty much how I wound up as “thejeff”. I was the first Jeff in that immediate circle of college friends. The others picked up distinguishing qualifiers.
If they were all homeschooled they might have effectively been in the same class. I have a couple of homeschooled who were part of a group. (I don’t know what percentage of what they did was with the group vs at home, but there definitely was group stuff.)
It was when the little imps were talking to Hades and trying to convince him this was a different Hercules. “You remember when the boys were all named Jason and the girls were all Brittany?”
Barack*? Also why the black kids? ‘Malia’ was in the top ten names for all races for awhile.
I’m sure celebrities have something to do with it, but sometimes a name just gains steam and doesn’t stop rolling for awhile. If you’ve had kids or going to have kids in this current decade, they will meet their share of ‘Sophia’s’ ‘Emily’s ‘Ava’s ‘Lily’s and ‘London’s in their lifetime (if they aren’t one themselves)
Naively, It struck me as he’s a black president and he might be popular amongst the black community? But the most popular baby names according to Today are:
I believe that I heard on the radio at some point recently that Khaleesi was on the top list of most popular names last year (I don’t remember what place though.)
People, that isn’t even her NAME! That’s her TITLE. Sheesh.
Not that Daenerys doesn’t sound cool at first, but she’ll probably be a Dani all her life.
But what do you do with Khaleesi? Kal? (That makes me think of Kumar, not a girl.)
At least do your research before you inflict something like a weird name on your child. That’s like preemptive child abuse.
Turning it into “Lisa” sounds like the best option to me. Or going by your mundane middle name (If you have two weird names, considered killing your parents.)
Let me tell you, it really sucks to share a first AND last name with someone you can’t stand, and have a well-meaning but incompetent person grading classwork merge your grades. Especially when they seem to have somehow cherry-picked each person’s worst-scoring assignments.
When your grade drops from an A to a D minus overnight, you tend to notice.
Fixing it was tricky, but eventually the instructor made time to go through her paper records and re-input our grades for the whole year.
How does that even happen? Did the person just forgot you both existed, or did they outsource grading?
And even if they didn’t know, why the hell would their first thought be “Huh, there are two grades for every assignment under this name. Better make no inquiries as to why and just delete half of them.”
Outsourcing. It was high school, and there were parents volunteering.
I have no idea why they just deleted half of them. Least of all MY high test scores, and HIS on-time homework.
Aw, cheer up, Joyce. I’m sure you had some younger friends. My church was big enough to have two Sunday Morning services, and I don’t think we even had 10 people my age by the time I was a senior. That would be like my entire Sunday School class, which includes juniors.
Yeah, I was thinking that too. She must have known somebody who was a year behind her.
Especially with the home schooling, where I’d expect even less separation by grade level.
I have former high school classmates that did exactly that and are quite happy with how their life turned out, 10 years later. It’s certainly not for everyone, but that doesn’t make it something to scoff at.
My view is unfortunately informed by the community I had high school in, where most of the teen moms were impregnated by their “boyfriends” (read: statutory rapists) who were a decade or more older. And who promised them the world, but were actually just looking for a piece of ass, or for a handle to lock the girl (and by “girl” I do mean girl, as in sub-18 and way more often than not sub 15 in age) into an abusive relationship. Which the parents approved of because marriage and woman’s role and all that nonsense. Nothing wrong with a 33 year old going after a kid 20 years his junior – it’s tradition! And nobody would’ve said boo about it 100 years ago so why are we so up in arms now? (gee, I dunno, maybe because we know how fucking harmful that is to the kid now?!)
The one exception to that is one of my sibs, who for her part seems to be repeating my mother’s life trajectory – and my mom’s life trajectory is a very bitter, unhappy one where she blames me as the eldest for all of her failed aspirations. Cuz, y’know, I had to come along and be born and ruin her body, so she couldn’t finish college or work or etc. Said sib repeats it with her eldest, who is a great kid is held to impossible standards and set up for endless failure as a result.
… sooo yeah. Not too keen on people who are not fully into the adulting thing yet having kids or getting married or what have you. Or, for that matter, on folks who are not absolutely certain they want kids having kids. And I fully admit that a big chunk of that is due to my own life experiences. But I’ve seen it go bad way more often than I’ve seen it turn out good. :\
On the other hand, the old ladies who pinch your cheeks and tell you you look adorable are still there. They have always been there and always shall be. They are eternal.
They are why I don’t go to the same church as from when I was a kid. I just couldn’t deal with it. Not to say I go to church much these days, but they are a contributing factor.
Depends on HOW old the doting old ladies are. The median age in my synagogue’s seventy-something, so my 60-something parents still get the “you’re getting to be a lovely young lady/gentleman” from all the little old ladies in their nineties.
That’s how you feel until you reach your early 30’s. Then they start dieing off in frighteningly short order from one another and it starts being surreal.
either that or the “pastor makes a VERY SPECIFIC sermon lambasting a particular congregation member’s recent actions without naming names and yet everyone still knows EXACTLY who he’s talking about” trope
Yeah, everything so far has been feeling way too much like ironic setup for this sermon to just be a happy thing about how awesome love is or the like. Not to mention there’s that bawling face Joyce preview panel. I’d lean towards expecting the worst, but Willis has quite a bit more direct experience than me with actually being in those types of churches, so he’s probably got a worst that’s actually worse than the ones that come to mind.
Oh, man, that reminds me of a time when a friend of mine took a bunch of us back to her house in a tiny town in east Texas (Olney) for a weekend during college. It was me and three guys, one of whom was an atheist. Well, my friend’s dad was the pastor at their church and he did a sermon on atheism that Sunday. And she chewed him out afterward. Bless.
I have thought that this is a setup from the first time it was announced. This is some kind of intervention. Like I said, glad Joyce called Joe so that he knows where to start looking when she doesn’t come back.
I think Carole set Becky up deliberately in that pink dress, only because she didn’t have a red dress.
Anyone remember the Gone With The Wind scene where Rhett insists that Scarlet take off her ‘widows weeds’ and wear her bright red dress and then drops her at the dance and leaves her.
Lots of puns there Scarlet, the Scarlet woman in the red dress. And I think that’s Carols plan – Becky the scarlet woman, the lesbian, the sinner.
Oh, don’t worry. From my memory of being dragged to church, their parents will be happy to fill you in on everything they’re doing, along with the latest on people you’ve never met but they assume you know.
First, while the plural of mongoose is sometimes mongeese, much more often it’s just mongooses.
Second, a group of mongooses is called a “pack” or a “mob”, not a crowd. Similarly, a group of plasma is called a cloud or a flash. I think this makes multiple plasma mongooses a flash mob.
Oh my no. First declension? That can’t be right. “Jennifer” doesn’t look anything like an a-stem word.
Now, while we don’t know for sure, given that “Jennifer” wasn’t in Latin, I think we’d probably see it treated as a third declension -r stem word. (As opposed to a second declension -r stem word, since those are mostly masculine – and the rest neuter other than a few irregulars. Third declension words are a far more even assortment).
So assuming it’s a typical third declension feminine, you’d be adding -es for Nominative, Vocative, and Accusative, where the e is pronounced like a long E in English, or い in Japanese if that’s helpful. Jenniferēs, or Jenniferiis, perhaps. Genitive plural would be –um, and the rest –ibus.
Now, look up the singular forms and write the full declension down 100 times so you remember.
If you can memorise tables, Latin is actually not difficult. The grammar is not interesting (which means not difficult), a lot of the vocabulary made it into French and from there English, so word acquisition is relatively easy. For me, two out of those three made it a terrible choice.
Japanese was a much better idea, on the whole – I like the grammar a lot, it doesn’t do insane things like decline (conjugate, sort of) nouns and adjectives, and while the vocabulary is a problem, that’s kind of a problem in anything but Latin or French, so. Plus, the vocabulary is small, so that helps.
Really, the only fun thing for me about Latin was that you can literally arrange the words in most sentences in any order you want and it’s still completely comprehensible. There were conventions about this, of course, but while it would be weird to rearrange every word into random order? It would still be understood.
A bit of quick googling and an ability to trust everything I find on the internet tells me that “Jennifer” is Welsh in origin, and spelled Gwenhwyfar, because Gaelic people spell everything in a way that would and possibly did drive Cthulhu insane.
Pluralization is complicated by the fact that Welsh doesn’t HAVE a single standard rule for pluralization. Every pluralization is irregular (again, Gaelic language and insanity), but the most common forms are -au, -iau, -ion, -ydd, -i, and -od, with -au and -iau being the most common for nouns. That gives us Gwenhwyfarau or Gwenhwyfariau as the most likely candidates.
All this is further complicated by the fact that they are referred to with the definite article “the”, which for a feminine noun beginning with a consonant is “y”. HOWEVER, this changes the pluralization of Gwenhwyfar by mutating the first letter of the noun, depending on what that letter is. Since the first letter is a G, it’s eliminated entirely, giving us “y Wenhwyfarau” or “y Wenhwyfariau”.
Adapting these changes to English, I think that means the proper plural form is “the Enniferiau”.
I studied Latin, Classical Greek, Italian and Linguistics at university. And I knew about Jennifer / Gwenhwyfar (which is also Guinevere). I don’t know enough Welsh to comment on the pluralisation, unfortunately, but even if it’s wrong, it’s funny.
From my knowledge, more for romance language speakers, so French Spanish Portuguese Italian and Romanian, and any dialects there of. English I’m quite sure is more related to German than Latin and French, and as such not English.
English has Gaelic, Norse, French and Latin as is major contributors. Gaelic from the native Britons, Norse from the invading Anglo-Saxons (read Danish Vikings), French from the invading Normans (read French Vikings), and Latin from an ‘inkhorning’ craze during the Stuart dynasty. Gaelic is responsible for our ‘weird’ grammar and the vast majority of our simple vocabulary. The invasions (especially the first, or rather second (Julius Caesar anyone?)) were responsible for the simplifications, and a good chunk of our vocabulary (‘window’ is Norse, ‘air’ is French), while inkhorning gave us such beauties as ‘simplification’, ‘responsible’, ‘second’, ‘native’, ‘invasions’, ‘majority’, ‘contributors’ and ‘vocabulary’. English might not be as Romance as French, but it is certainly close enough to be a boon to English speakers learning Latin.
Also, it’s logical. Ending the universe makes them no less real than the totally not-real that they already are. If anything, it makes them MORE real, to the point where they are as real as anything else.
In other words, bringing them to LIFE by ending the universe makes infinitely more sense.
(And by “infinitely”, I mean you’re multiplying the logic of destroying the universe by infinity. Since zero times infinity is an indefinite form, it might still be 0.)
The more I think about it, the more I want this spinoff comic. Farming the land, making their own clothes, raising all their children communally, it’d be great.
….modern-day detective fundie yet sexually-liberated Amazons? Is that what y’all’re going for? Because I’d watch that. Or read that. Or listen to it. Or consume it as some other form of entertainment not yet invented.
Five minutes each episode is spent making “everyone is named Jennifer” jokes.
Jennifer: “Jennifer!”
Jennifer: “Yes, Jennifer?”
“Not you, Jennifer. Jennifer!”
Jennifer: “That’s what I said, Jennifer. I’m Jennifer.”
Jennifer: “Yes, I know your name is Jennifer, Jennifer. But I wanted to talk to Jennifer.”
Jennifer: “Aaaaah, JENNIFER!”
Jennifer and Jennifer: “JEEEEEENNIFER!!!!!”
Jennifer: “Yes, Jennifer?”
Mine did the same. Sold the house and took off on an extended sailing vacation.
They kept paying for school and brought me to visit them on breaks, so I couldn’t really complain.
Good, so i am not the only one. When Willis first posted pictures, I was confused as to what they were supposed to be besides the first thing to get ripped off in a tornado until I realized the buttress connection)
of course! don’t you remember the Tristan arc? When Dina was kidnapped by Blaine and Toe Dad. Causing the main characters to team up with Tristan to rescue her! I can’t believe you’ve forgotten about that part!
Damn it Time Traveling Willis. First you go back in time to rewrite things to win Twitter arguments and then you erase the brilliant insanity of the Tristan arc. I’m gonna bet the archives don’t even have the Assault on Banana Hammock Mountain Dream Sequence anymore!
I do wonder, did everyone in the group went to college? how are the posibilities that one went very close to study and returns home on the weekend, hmm
Which makes me wonder how many of the gang who are at Andersons. It only takes one Jenifer to get five minutes alone time with Katline for the REAL story, not ToeDad-aproved propaganda, to be whispered among the young ones.
Maybe Joyce is not the only one to be not very happy with fun, goofy Becky being thrown out by her father.
Another fun fact: La Porte is actually one word. Willis just has a fancy computer algorithm or whatever that makes it into two words of matter how you type it.
I’m originally from Sacramento, and I assure you, we don’t all think like that. I’ve heard of some really scummy things said in the name of religion, but that’s got to be close to the top 10 that I’ve come across in my lifetime. I’m a bit ashamed that my city’s name is associated with that… garbage.
I always thought sympathy was supposed to be a virtue. No virtue there – certainly not leading by example.
Oh, I spent the earliest part of my life up in that region, so I know that well, more pointing out the thought process of this type of church rather than making some classist smear against the region.
I’m glad you just had this thought, some commenters figured on that happening from when we found out that Joyce was going home for the weekend. This is a plot that been coming for a while.
Well, I was raised agnostic. Sunday, to me, means “Football”, or at least “cringing as the local teams fail miserably”. Sure, I’m aware that Church happens on Sundays, but it’s just… kinda that thing that those other people do, it’s not an instinctive part of my life.
It’s been well built up. Just different perspective means not everything hint rings as clearly for some :).
What if we’ve got this all wrong? After all, everyone’s predicting that this will be a dreadful, soul-destroying direct assault on Becky; it would be a shame if the plot was so predictable!
What if, instead, the pastor denounces Ross for planning to use violence, something that The Lord forbade even in His own defence? What if he counsels the congregation that no-one has the right to force repentance and conversion on anyone because (a) such a thing is spiritually worthless and (b) there is no human perfect and sinless enough to claim the right to do so without being a hypocrite.
I’d pay to see the look on Carol’s face during such a sermon!
I’m thinking more on the pastor will give a nice sensible sermon not condoning violence but then he’ll have a guest speaker or whatever they’re called, bring in Joyce’s brother and HE will stir the shit pot by acting like a classy Westboro Baptist Church member and preach a lot crap directed subtly at Becky.
Ah, shit, that… I could actually see how that would happen.
“Ah, man, how do I start a sermon on something like this. Oh, what? Some kid pastor from our sister church wants to say some words because his sister was one of the one’s threatened, by all means, let ’em speak.”
Theoretically possible. I can definitely see the sermon being of a style at least not intending to be hateful (just coming from a culture where hateful is sadly the default that reasoning is coming from [see the terms Joyce defaults to when she’s initially trying to be supportive about something outside her box]).
I don’t see it being as awesome as that (or even overall pleasant for the attendees), but I will gladly give you a major kudos if it does.
Ah, yes. Without a specific event to tie you all back (and even then, better hope they’re all going to it at the same time you are) it’s just “hey I’m back home from college alone” and also everyone has different spring breaks.
Aw, cheer up, Joyce. I’m sure you had some younger friends. My church was big enough to have two Sunday Morning services, and I don’t think we even had 10 people my age by the time I was a senior. That would be like my entire Sunday School class, which includes juniors.
(Sorry about the repeated post. Messed up earlier.)
So your church, huh? So are the obviously non-structural flying buttresses supposed to be a metaphor for how the “faith” of the people in attendance is no more than a facade for sincerity/hiding they are horrible people? (Architecturally, I get the whole let’s evoke gothic cathedral imagery but not so obviously Catholic, but the engineer in me can’t help but look past how those things aren’t doing the job of flying buttresses.)
I guess if you had some pictures of the whole thing I could make a more accurate guess. It reads pseudo-gothic cathedral to me, but there are a few gothic examples of universities so the school is possible as well? Mostly I was just making light fun of modern architecture. It’s cathartic for me. (Engineer, and my job is to make stuff like this work)
Although I do kinda want to know what the substructure is on those things because the wind on cantilevered open walls like that is a huge bongo, and based on the scale you’ve drawn them at, I can’t imagine it being much thicker than 8″ studs+stucco.
yeaaaaaah welcome to the cargo-cult futurism of the 1970s. The future wasn’t getting there fast enough, so they decided if they made the buildings look futuristic, maybe the future would actually arrive.
Okay that’s not what they were trying to do but it may as well have been.
There is one church in my city that when anyone is giving directions, they refer to it as “the ugly church.”
And tourists ask, “What do you mean, ‘ugly church’?”
And we say, “You’ll know it when you see it.”
And they do.
Because you see the building, and it just the epitome of godawful 80s postmodern construction. Among other things, it is designed so that no matter which direction you’re facing it from (including from above!) you see a cross made up of building wall. Except also 80s style so imagine if Rob fucking Liefeld designed a church and decided that sticking crosses everywhere wasn’t enough it also needs a fish silhouette.
It is truly a hideous building.
Everyone who I’ve driven with when I give directions including “now go past the ugly church” has first asked what I mean about ugly church and then, when it came into sight, said, “Holy shit. That’s an ugly church. I see what you mean now.” or something along those lines.
I’ve been tempted to show up for a service just to see if it’s as awful on the inside, buuut given that I’m an atheist I kind of think that’d be rude. :\
Okay if we are griping about horrible church architecture now… Not an asthetics case, but I came across one recently when I had to go out to Dallas for work back in April, I think? Early spring. (This does matter)
We were walking to get from one meeting to the next and walked down a street that went through a church, like they owned the buildings on both sides of the street. The street between was part of a courtyard area they had between the two. Ultramodern architecture, all glass, sleek and silver, and the walls at street level were radiused to form a large circle around the courtyard. Pretty “meh” asthetically; clearly a cas of a church trying to be hip in the time it was built though.
The issue though was that the glass walls acted as mirrors to reflect light, and the curves trapped heat in. It was early spring, NOT hot by Texas standards, and we were overheating walking half a block through there. We joked around a bit about how it seemed counterproductive; nobody was going to want to stick around afterwards, and strangers walking through would want to get through as quickly as possible. I speculated that they were trying to mimic hell, and get people to “turn from sin” and seek the church’s AC. (Or really, they just wanted something that looked cool and didn’t think of the consequences)
To make matters worse, there was a giant cross-shaped fountain in the middle of the courtyard. I can only imagine how much water was wasted due to evaporation. Okay, Dallas has had the opposite of the drought CA has had in the past few years, but still… It just seemed wasteful.
One of the reasons I like living in New England. We’ve got some really nice Church architecture around here. From the classic white steepled church to some really nice larger stone churches.
There are some horrible modern things, that seem mostly to look like warehouses with a bit of steeple tacked on, but they’re easy to overlook.
New England churches can be really nice. Architecture of spiritual buildings can be some of the coolest architecture around. I love a lot of the old 1800s era wood churches. It’s some of the modern ones where they are clearly trying to make an architectural statement that get …questionable…
That ugly church sounds truly awful. Curious to know if that was the architect’s idea or the church’s who owns the building. I started studying architecture before I switched over to engineering, and one of the first things we learned was that if you have to be literal in your imagery, you are doing it wrong.
Ok, obviously the person who made the first list has no sense of what architecture is and only thinks it all needs to be neogothic…
Because I find many of these churches evoking of something more than juste a cross (and the fact I was born a fex kilometers from number 34 doesn’t give me any bias!)
I’m not sure if those are more annoying… than the random elipses… that separated all of the sentences everywhere… on the church programs when I attended church in that building… I don’t think I ever saw any sentence terminate… in a period… it drove me wild…
Idly troll through their page. See the section of sermons labeled “Living OUT”… nervously click through, see the video labeled “Coming Out”: http://subsplash.com/roadchurch/v/bfb5bbd
Eyes get even wider. Get to the part where the pastor says that young people shouldn’t be afraid to “come out” of hanging with sinners and letting their unbeliever sin juice “pollute you” (around 2:30ish in the video)
What are the odds that Kelly, Melissa, Tristan, and steve, as well as all 6 Jeniffers are now all ALSO officially over 18 and ready to go to college? I mean, Joyce didn’t have ANY friends that were exactly her age or older?
I’m betting from Becky’s reaction and general ‘people they would both know and associate with’ that a lot of them were in the same home school group. In which case: probably the same grade, and therefore they all finished at the same time.
Plus, most of them would’ve been at Anderson, too. Close enough to come home, after hearing about the “shooting at that heathen school” (from their parents) They are there- with popcorn.
I’m guessing some of the girls didn’t go to college and Joyce will run into some who instead of going to college decided instead to “stay home, get married and tend to husband and children (which I’m guessing they don’t have yet) as god mandates.” Then, they’ll shame her for having independent thoughts.
Neither, I’d think. Not enough time has gone by to have actually convicted him, even if he pled out, which seems unlikely since he doesn’t think he did anything wrong. Appeals can’t happen ’til after a conviction. And I don’t see a church like this openly conspiring to commit a crime, which organizing a jailbreak would be.
Possibly a collection for bail, if that’s going to be granted, or a general legal fund to pay for his defense though.
While I was being facetious at 1:00 in the morning I ended up spending part of my lunch break dwelling on what was realistically going to happen. I don’t even know if arraignment’s taken place (it probably should have by now).
Gosh, it isn’t assumed that the kids went to work at the local factory. What a nice town. No wonder they didn’t leave and never turn back. Nooo, I’m not bitter.
Those days are over, my friend. Towns the size of La Porte, the kids with any potential clear the city limits ASAP, and you’re left with a residue of people bitter (or unwilling to acknowledge) that the 1950s, and the days of stepping from high school into a job capable of supporting you, the wife and 2.3 kids and the boat in the driveway are gone.
… You forgot “and middle-aged people and older who don’t realize that the 1950s are over, and blame the kids for being selfish and irresponsible for not having settled down and started popping out their 2.3 kids by their mid-20s.”
What if your religion is focused on having a strong sense of community, uplifting and helping each other to overcome obstacles and make a better life for everyone involved?
You were talking about it differently, weren’t you?
ANY verb-noun combination sounds like a Terry Pratchett plot.
Seriously, I just used an ap to generate three random verb-noun combinations. With some slight explanation, tell me which of these could NOT be a Terry Pratchet plot:
Verb… Noun… Proposed plot
Grease… Equinox… The Celestial Spheres need regular greasing to keep the sun from freezing in the sky at equinox and burning the entire Discworld to a crisp. It’s up to a luckless orphan adopted by a god to do the job. Hopefully she doesn’t get distracted from her duties by a cute guy.
Succeed… Gemsbok… With Vetinari apparently dead, the nobles of Ankh-Morpork decide to elect a new king from their own number by lottery. Due to a series of events not-at-all-contrived by the actually-still-living Vetinari, somehow the name of a noble’s pet gemsbok (a type of antelope) gets into the bowl and drawn from the hat. And so a gemsbok succeeds to the Ankh-Morpork throne, and much hijinks ensue.
Buzz… Heron…. The newest addition to Discworld’s bloated cast is The Heron, who…… dammit, okay, it’s late and I can’t come up with anything. But it works MOST of the time.
I can just imagine how Sir Pterry would have handled the second one. It would definitely have included Captain Carrot, Lord Vimes, and the City Watch. Hijinks would ensue, indeed!
It sounds a bit like “Small Gods”, only on a smaller scale. Or whenever mrs. Cake leaves one of the congregations she’s previously joined and taken over.
I’m sorta expecting Joyce to, in her mind’s eye to remember Tristan looking like one of those guys from the covers of bad romance novels with their long flowing blonde hair and wearing no shirt and then when she meets Tristan again, the reality sets in that he’s just some random dude that looks nothing like how she thought she remembered him.
Eh, we probably got more empty churches in this city than active ones. A few got turned to condominiums, at least two, if not more, are public libraries, two got demolished, I think there’s a couple of museums, one is a circus school… Only old people go to church on sundays :p
The synagogue near my university used to be a church. Then it was another church. And I think it was a third church before it became a synagogue. One of the old congregations graduated to a new, larger building, though, so we’re pretty sure it’s not cursed.
There’s an empty church in Lake City (the Seattle one, not the Vancouver/Burnaby one) that’s pretty much crying out to be turned into some sort of show venue or nightclub. All I need is a lotto win!
Pastor: “And the deviants and the lesbians that poison our-”
Becky: “I’M A LESBIAN!”
Pastor: “…”
Congregation: “…”
Joyce: *whispering* “I think if I make a distraction, you can sprint for the door.”
Quick! Accuse one of the Jennifer of having a baby out of wedlock, then dash out while everyone is trying to figure out which of the six Jennifer it is!
I found the 6 Jennifers thing especially amusing, because back in 7th grade, I played this girl also named Jennifer who had an identity crisis. The girl was going insane because almost every girl she knew was named Jennifer, and she felt that it hindered her individuality. I especially liked playing this role since I got to scream and act psycho. Ah memories. (If she stepped foot in this church, oh Lord…)
I have thought that this is a setup from the first time it was announced. This is some kind of intervention. Like I said before, I’m glad Joyce called Joe so that he knows where to start looking when she doesn’t come back.
I think Carole set Becky up deliberately in that pink dress, only because she didn’t have a red dress.
Anyone remember the Gone With The Wind scene where Rhett insists that Scarlet take off her ‘widows weeds’ and wear her bright red dress and then he drops her off at the dance and leaves her to face the town alone.
Lots of puns there: Scarlet, the Scarlet woman in the red dress. And I think that’s what Carol has in mind – Becky the scarlet woman, the lesbian, the sinner.
Oh, I hadn’t thought about that. If this is a church of the “faith healer” style of megachurch, then it actually is possible that the pastor might call her up in order to “intervene on behalf of her soul”…
Or rather more likely if this was to be the case, something where they brought her up to the front to “pray” for her in a super public shaming passive-aggressive style.
Though in general, my money is still down on sermon either slagging on homosexuality or more likely on the duty of one’s children to their parents (this one would be a twofer in hitting both Joyce and Becky close to home).
Doesn’t have to practice laying on of hands to feature public shaming, though. When one of the congregation at my erstwhile boyfriend’s church was discovered to be having an affair with another man, he was called up to the stage, outed, and told he could either confess his sin to the entire congregation and apologise to everyone or be banned from the church and church community immediately and permanently.
A long time ago my grandmother told off the town’s priest because he wouldn’t play her father’s favorite song at his funeral. They got a different pastor to come and take care of the funneral. My family doesn’t take SHIT from authority figures. Grandma also got in trouble with the nuns running the school and would spend a bit too much time hanging out on her dad’s merchant ship :p
I… I think I got Carol all wrong – she didn’t try to be mean to Becky, she just tried to dress her for her church date with Joyce and it went out of hand.
No? Yeah, OK, but Becky and Joyce DO make a fine couple here, and the dress helps.
Becky wouldn’t mind seeing the old gang again now that Joyce will FINALLY stop trying to set her up with Steve so she can go on double date with her and Tristan.
Now I am wondering if all the other teenagers knew that Becky was gay and in love with Joyce but never said anything because you don’t talk about that sort of thing in their church.
Once again, we see that Joyce’s ultimate goal for this weekend was to come home. Unfortunately, her planning didn’t exactly take in how hard it is to do that so she didn’t make the necessary arrangements!
It will be interesting to see what the service is like for her without the presence of her friends from the home-school program.
PASTOR: “Hello, Carol!” ((Turns to BECKY)) “And this must be your daughter, Joyce! She looks so much like you!” ((Turns to JOYCE)) “And this must be Becky! You’re in a lot of trouble, young lady!”
HANK: “Still not got the new spectacles prescription?”
Becky is dressed for church in an actual dress — a LONG dress, yet; and Carol appears to be wearing an ankle-length skirt and top. But Joyce is allowed (?) to attend in her usual outfit of above-the-knee skirt, top, and vest; about the only addition I can detect is the long stockings. Why wasn’t she forced to “dress modestly” (as I assume Carol would put it)?
I suspect it’s a sin thing. I could be wrong in this reasoning since it’s only anecdotal but I’m gonna try.
We were a churchy family. I remember when my mom got divorced (not on par with being a lesbian but it’s all I got) she got a short haircut, started dressing more like a normal human instead of everything covered but face, and was still active in church.
However, my grandmother used to always harass her to dress kind of how Becky is dressed, because “we already know you committed a major sin (divorce) you don’t have to flaunt it.” She’d guilt my mom into abandoning perfectly sensible outfits (think a tropical version of what Joyce is wearing), including pants, because it’s flaunting your sin.
I’m guessing it’s the same logic here. “Since I HAVE to bring this ultimate sinner to church, I need to tone her down.”
Eventually grandma gave up on both, me and mom, since just to piss her off I’d encourage my mom to wear nice blouses, and the priest and I would actually bet on my grandma’s reaction anytime I wore a pair of hideous red pants to church (“that is Satan’s color!”)
I feel like it’s the same with gender non-conformity if your parents already suspect you’re queer or trans. Like, girl with short hair might be allowed, but if they suspect you’re gay or actually a boy, it’s suddenly all long hair all the time.
Interesting: I am surprised that Carol let Joyce out of the house wearing a short skirt. When my mother was trying to churchify me, I had to wear a dress or a skirt, and it had to fall below my knees.
Are Carol’s standards looser, or is she just picking her battles, I wonder?
Lol I was thinking about the skirt thing too! I’m actually kind of sad Joyce doesn’t have an array of church-ready dresses at her disposal. Or at least something other than a fancier version of her usual sweater vest top.
Man Joyce is busty. Surprised no one tried to lead her to sin with that figure :o’
I’m struggling to work out the reference to “countryside” in the title. It doesn’t look very countryfied in the pictures. Can anyone clue me in please?
Well first attempt at Google-Fu:
“June 22, 2008”
Link to “Countryside Church” is dead (see alt-text of todays’ comic).
“It has a small group mentality with two Sunday morning services”
“They support missionaries through out the world” (remember John?)
And suddenly I am super happy I never developed a social circle around my fellow church goers. It helped that during that brief time in which I attended Sunday school everyone my age was pretty much a giant asshat all the time.
I’m kind of surprised David hasn’t explored a bit more of Becky and Dina texting or calling each other. Theirs is a new relationship, the romance and excitement would still be strong.
Not in general, but frequently new churches will use preexisting buildings or build whatever is really cheap until they grow enough to build a proper church-looking church (which can vary enormously).
The original building that my church originally
used was used by various businesses sorta divided up after they moved out and then finally developers bought it and some surrounding property to build hotel.
Around here when a business is vacated, a church starts growing inside. Y’know, like mold.
Eventually, it’s swept away to make room for a new business. Or the building is demolished.
Y’know, like mold.
A minor plot point in Vernor Vinge’s True Names is that, by some point in the future, “Jennifer” has become the sort of unfashionable old-lady name now represented by the likes of Gertrude, Ethel, etc.
I once had a class in my student teaching where there was a Kaitlyn, Kathleen, Katie, and Katie all in one class. And somehow when I did the seating chart, I inadvertently put them in one row. That got confusing quickly.
I’m thinking of an ancient Married… with Children episode with a store with three guys all named Habib, who didn’t bother to differentiate between each of their names but instead said “Habib” and pointed at whichever one they meant
That church looks a lot like a city library from the outside architecture. I wonder if it was originally built to be a church? Places my parents would go to were generally more like large-roomed square houses or some kind of really simple town hall, with a dining hall, a room with pews, some little entrance areas and offices, and not much else. But I’ve also seen weird fancy architecture for like, old catholic cathedral type places, and horrifying televangelist mega-churches (they also made me go to one of those once)… like the giant golden satellite thingy Oral Roberts University. Or as I like to call it, the “Christian Doom Laser”.
Fun fact: La Porte actually has a very LGBT friendly church with two gay pastors. It’s called New Life ConnectPoint, and it has an attached restaurant called Holy Macaroni that they use for fundraisers. http://Www.nlcch.org
I remember when our minister announced we were going to be marching in support of gay rights and against the bigots trying to get the marriage law prevented (it was awhile back). There was a definite generation divide on how people reacted to this but mostly everyone was in favor.
“Remember when there was only one set of footprints, David? That’s when I popped off to get some fettuccine Alfredo. The sauce is so good, it’s sinful!”
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maybe there’ll only be three Jennifers
(with us, all the kids VANISHED upon reaching college-age–it was like the Southern Water Tribe but in a giant tobacco field, and reverse the ratio of elderly to little kids)
wait, alt-text, how does church DIE, I thought that was the point of church D=
RUINED FOREVAR
Probably just pining for the fjords….
The church isn’t dead, he’s just stunned.
He’s… resting!
Judas personally comes and kisses them
Something about money disappearing or getting stolen and I think losing the building and having to relocate to Willis’s mom’s house. He’s talked about the story a couple times outside the comic, I believe.
According to the story, it seems like it was embezzlement for Jesus and by Jesus I mean expensive sports cars.
He saved space for Jesus in the expensive sports cars! Specifically, the passenger’s seat.
Jesus returns fire at the cops as the sports car jumps the police barricade, I get it.
The Rolling Stones did a song about it. “I ran 25 red lights in His arms. Thank you Jesus. Thank you Lord.”
well, you hear it all the time… Jesus is my co-pilot
I don’t care if it rains or freezes
‘Long as I got my plastic Jesus
Kinda puts Jonathan’s car in perspective then?
I’m pretty sure that was an intentional reference.
Not if you knew Willis’ Church history.
Oh, sorry, I misspoke, I meant an intentional reference to said pastor’s embezzlement. If I remember the series of tweets right, the pastor basically used the money he got bilking people out of their life savings “for the good of the church” to buy himself a shiny new sports car and then let the church go bankrupt before opening it up again somewhere new.
I did too. I missed the second ‘not’ operator in my reply.
I’ve never been to a church that actually died out, but it has to happen. The same churches don’t exist forever.
And, being a non-denominational church, it may have broken up into different people saying the others were all sinners and such. No one group can afford the building and its upkeep and bills, and so they sell it to some other church.
To be honest, it’s lucky it’s still a church. I’ve seen old churches become lots of different things. I know there’s one out there that became a strip club.
All I ever see are store fronts become churches, and then die out because reasons…… And then the storefront remains empty with a church sign above it.
Meanwhile there’s a dead church in my neighborhood we use as a landmark for dog walks.
That’s kind of a depressing thought… There’s a storefront in my town that is now a church, and as an atheist, I’d still actually be sad to see this one go.
When I was little, our church was in a store front. They finally raised the money for a nice big church. It was another church, last time I was home.
(I was raised Christian Science. You’ve heard of them, the ones that don’t use band-aids)
Aren’t they the ones who think you can pray a broken leg away?
That totally works, though!
… not measurably faster than a broken leg heals on its own, but it works!
Yeah. My grandmother used to pray for healing, but she was pretty healthy. At least she didn’t scorn if mom took us to the doctors. I used to refer to the devout ones as Orthodox CS. I didn’t know anyone like the ones that end up in the news. I stopped going to church when I was 13-ish.
… a strip club? *inappropriate snorting*
*snorting laughter* is what I meant, sorry for any confusion!
Is “laughter” some kind of drug traditionally snorted off the backs of strippers?
Let’s be honest, that works pretty well either way.
You can find all sorts of things in old churches…deathclaws and synths, for instance.
In all seriousness, none of the churches I used to go to ever died out (at least while I attended them), they just ended up moving to bigger or smaller church locations. Then again, I *was* pretty young for most of them, so I suppose it could have happened without me realizing it–my parents were extremely good at reframing the narrative of anything bad that happened at church, so now that I think of it some of those moves might well have been breakups.
“Prisons are built with stones of Law, Brothels with bricks of Religion.”
– William Blake
Bristol in the UK where I live, used to be the center for methodism. Lots of empty methodist churches which have become exercise centers, tool shops, car sales etc etc. They tend to be have been built in the 19th century, so they can be recognised easily as ex-churches. I have a feeling that may not be the case so much in the US.
In some areas, mosques have built. The surburban churches tend to be like the one Willis pictures but mostly brick.
The town I live it used to be ridiculously religious. in the space of 2 blocks were a Catholic, Anglican, & Baptist Church, a Methodist chapel and a non-conformist chapel. The only one still open is the Baptist Church.
it has always (for like 5 years) been my dream to open up an LGBT community center in closed down church.
I know the Ali Forney Center (a homeless LGBT youth center in NYC) has been recently trying to buy out the ATLAH hate church that was so close to it once its foreclosure is finally official to use it as space for housing LGBT youth who have been kicked out of their homes. They raised a bunch of money for it back in February and now it looks like they’re just waiting on the final hearings before it is placed up on auction.
that is pure awesome.
Our synagogue is in the old building of an church. Said church moved into the old building of another synagogue.
We have our High Holy Day services in the church whose building we took over (their new building, the old synagogue) and our choir director, who also works with the other synagogue always tells stories about the old synagogue in the church that used to live in the building of our synagogue.
YES IT GETS CONFUSING BUT I FIND IT HILARIOUS.
Making a gratuitous Alice’s Restaurant reference because someone has to do it.
Well, another church did take its place.
I wouldn’t call it a resurrection though, certainly not if it took more than three days to re-open for
businessservices.It came back somewhere else after three days
Everything changed when the Devil Nation attacked….”
“Except the sea. The sea never changes.”
“The sea turned to blood.”
“Yeah, but it was very watery-blood. You know, it’s always changing but always the same?”
“All the fish and whales died and it worse than month-old seaweed.”
“Okay, fine. But Switzerland
“*but Switzerland managed to stay out of the war, so it’s pretty much still the same.”
“Point.”
*slow clap*
The six Jennyfers, hahaha.
Now that must have been fun in class.
It’s okay, they’re all spelt differently #notok
I think the best I got in the same class was 3 Fabrice *and* 4 Julien.
In my class in school there were 4 other kids with my name.
And you couldn’t even call us all “[First name] [Initial]” because two groups of two of us had the same last initials.
…. I wish I’d been old enough to realize how creepy it would be for all of us to turn our heads slowly and answer in a cold tone, “….yes?” when the teacher yelled just our first names. Cuz man that would’ve been funny.
Two of my closest friends are named Jessica, and their last names start with the same initial. We usually either have to use their full last name or nickname to specify which one we mean when everyone’s together.
My older daughter had a high school class where she was one of four Katherines (all spelled the same). The teacher started with the girl whose last name was first alphabetically and named her “Katherine.” The second became “Katie” and the third “Kate.” My daughter was the last and spent the year in that class as “Kat.”
It’s funny when you have more colleagues with the same name. Total confusion!
I once interned on a political campaign. When I started, there were five or six interns—and three of us were named Jon, all with the same spelling. To make things worse, one of the other Jons had a last name beginning with R, too. We later got more interns, but still, 3/10 or so is still pretty unlikely.
I said it was a huge missed opportunity that the three of us never practiced speaking in unison when someone said our name(s?).
In one of my classes in high school, there were four Johns, three of us John C.s, and two of us John Campbells. (Neither of us the webcomic John Campbell. Or the science fiction editor.) It was always entertaining when we had a sub.
At one point my gaming group was entirely made up of Jo(h)ns. We went by SCA or Dagorhir names to differentiate.
When I was in Kindergarten, we had 3 Jims. The teacher sorted them. The taller, serious one was James. The younger-looking smaller one was Jimmy, and the middle one was Jim. The names stuck. They were still going by them at our 30 year HS reunion.
To this day I will not notice one of the common shortened versions of my name because because when a phone call came into the office, that one meant the other guy.
Also, on my floor in the dorms in Freshman year, the floor was made up of two groups, each of whom had one class together. Between us, we had four Jacobs and three Andrews. For some reason, the Jacobs each got a qualifier in front of their name, like “Fluffy Jake (reference to his hair),” but nobody ever seemed to come up with a similar thing for any of the Andrews.
That’s pretty much how I wound up as “thejeff”. I was the first Jeff in that immediate circle of college friends. The others picked up distinguishing qualifiers.
In *my* day we’d have a duel to death over the rights to the name. With Star Trek music.
I hope one of the combatants had to sing the music.
We have so many people in my office with the same name (mostly straight white men, because West Texas) that we all tend to just go by last names.
Joyce was home schooled & I bet a lot of her peers were as well. Including possibly the Jennifers.
Fine. Must have been fun in group bible teachings.
If they were all homeschooled they might have effectively been in the same class. I have a couple of homeschooled who were part of a group. (I don’t know what percentage of what they did was with the group vs at home, but there definitely was group stuff.)
I once had a class with four Brittanys. And another with four Jasons.
What the fuck was up with people naming their kids Brittany and Jason for a couple of years?
…so THAT’S the source of that joke from Hercules!
It probably went over my head because I was one of the Brittanys. (Only ever met one Jason, though.)
I don’t remember that joke.
It was when the little imps were talking to Hades and trying to convince him this was a different Hercules. “You remember when the boys were all named Jason and the girls were all Brittany?”
We had the Brittanys. Managed to avoid the Jasons. Heathers and Jennifers we had in spades.
People name their kids after celebrities. Or saints which I suppose is a similar deal.
I’m betting there will be a *lot* of black kids being called Obama right about now.
Barack*? Also why the black kids? ‘Malia’ was in the top ten names for all races for awhile.
I’m sure celebrities have something to do with it, but sometimes a name just gains steam and doesn’t stop rolling for awhile. If you’ve had kids or going to have kids in this current decade, they will meet their share of ‘Sophia’s’ ‘Emily’s ‘Ava’s ‘Lily’s and ‘London’s in their lifetime (if they aren’t one themselves)
Ah, Barack indeed.
Naively, It struck me as he’s a black president and he might be popular amongst the black community? But the most popular baby names according to Today are:
http://www.today.com/parents/most-popular-baby-names-2016-so-far-are-t85261
Not a Barack amongst them.
The current UK crop.
http://www.goodtoknow.co.uk/family/544585/baby-names-for-2016
There’s an Ezra (from the pop star George Ezra?) Look down, and there’s an Augustine. I’m pretty sure they’re not named after Augustine of Hippo:)
I believe that I heard on the radio at some point recently that Khaleesi was on the top list of most popular names last year (I don’t remember what place though.)
People, that isn’t even her NAME! That’s her TITLE. Sheesh.
Not that Daenerys doesn’t sound cool at first, but she’ll probably be a Dani all her life.
But what do you do with Khaleesi? Kal? (That makes me think of Kumar, not a girl.)
At least do your research before you inflict something like a weird name on your child. That’s like preemptive child abuse.
Turning it into “Lisa” sounds like the best option to me. Or going by your mundane middle name (If you have two weird names, considered killing your parents.)
[/joke]
Ah, yes. A boy named Sue:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xp5gwi_johnny-cash-a-boy-named-sue-live-at-san-quentin-jail-1969_music
In the UK list, names like Xanthe and Artemis are starting to appear.
Artemis would probably get shortened to Artie. But yeah, I’m with you on the strange appellation.
Yeah, only a jerk would name their kid something like Earl or Duke.
Actually, I dread the day I actually meet a Khaleesi since I hated that character enough to quit reading the books.
I know an Earl the 4th who just named his son the 5th.
Duke just sounds weird. I knew a dog named Duke and that was it.
You’d be surprised, my parents almost named me Beda because of St.Bede.
There’s some great online graphs you can find of names over time. Rihanna suddenly appears out of nowhere with a huge spike in like 2005.
Actually, no. That era of American history (naming babies for presidents) is firmly in the past.
Cheers.
That was genuinely enlightening.
Jennifer B, Jennifer F, Jennifer K, Jennifer S, other Jennifer S, and Jennifer W.
Now, now, be fair: one of the “Jennifer S”s would’ve gone by their middle name instead of “S,” like “Jennifer Jo.”
And of course, Jenny Sekwa, who got her last named said out because some was special in some way we never understood.
It just had that certain something, I guess.
Tigerbunny? *nods* Tigerbunny.
As long as you don’t use numbers and get to Jennifer 8.
we had Jasons
The Argonaut and the Jasons?
Like me!
Let me tell you, it really sucks to share a first AND last name with someone you can’t stand, and have a well-meaning but incompetent person grading classwork merge your grades. Especially when they seem to have somehow cherry-picked each person’s worst-scoring assignments.
Ouch! How’d you figure out what was going on, and how’d you solve it?
When your grade drops from an A to a D minus overnight, you tend to notice.
Fixing it was tricky, but eventually the instructor made time to go through her paper records and re-input our grades for the whole year.
What kind of lazy grader goes by name? Especially since, in a case like that, it’s got to be fairly obvious that name isn’t a unique identifier.
How does that even happen? Did the person just forgot you both existed, or did they outsource grading?
And even if they didn’t know, why the hell would their first thought be “Huh, there are two grades for every assignment under this name. Better make no inquiries as to why and just delete half of them.”
Outsourcing. It was high school, and there were parents volunteering.
I have no idea why they just deleted half of them. Least of all MY high test scores, and HIS on-time homework.
I never heard of outsourcing grading. Interesting.
Aw, cheer up, Joyce. I’m sure you had some younger friends. My church was big enough to have two Sunday Morning services, and I don’t think we even had 10 people my age by the time I was a senior. That would be like my entire Sunday School class, which includes juniors.
Yeah, I was thinking that too. She must have known somebody who was a year behind her.
Especially with the home schooling, where I’d expect even less separation by grade level.
In the 250 person marching band, I was the only one with my name.
In my 30 person calculus class, there were three of us.
And Duckgalrox isn’t even that common a name.
friend’s story:
“Emily A.?”
“I prefer Emma.”
“Okay. Emily B.?”
“I prefer Millie.”
“Alright. Emily C.?”
“I prefer Emwy.”
“Jesus Christ. Emily D.?”
“You can call me Emily.”
“Oh thank God. Boyd Y.?”
“I prefer Emily.”
Look on the bright side, Joyce- some of them might be pregnant instead of at college!
…yay ?
The two of you are awesome. Thanks for the laughs.
I was going to say, so long as it’s what they truly wanted, they’re happy and not with someone like Ross. Then I remembered their age. Yeah.
I have former high school classmates that did exactly that and are quite happy with how their life turned out, 10 years later. It’s certainly not for everyone, but that doesn’t make it something to scoff at.
My view is unfortunately informed by the community I had high school in, where most of the teen moms were impregnated by their “boyfriends” (read: statutory rapists) who were a decade or more older. And who promised them the world, but were actually just looking for a piece of ass, or for a handle to lock the girl (and by “girl” I do mean girl, as in sub-18 and way more often than not sub 15 in age) into an abusive relationship. Which the parents approved of because marriage and woman’s role and all that nonsense. Nothing wrong with a 33 year old going after a kid 20 years his junior – it’s tradition! And nobody would’ve said boo about it 100 years ago so why are we so up in arms now? (gee, I dunno, maybe because we know how fucking harmful that is to the kid now?!)
The one exception to that is one of my sibs, who for her part seems to be repeating my mother’s life trajectory – and my mom’s life trajectory is a very bitter, unhappy one where she blames me as the eldest for all of her failed aspirations. Cuz, y’know, I had to come along and be born and ruin her body, so she couldn’t finish college or work or etc. Said sib repeats it with her eldest, who is a great kid is held to impossible standards and set up for endless failure as a result.
… sooo yeah. Not too keen on people who are not fully into the adulting thing yet having kids or getting married or what have you. Or, for that matter, on folks who are not absolutely certain they want kids having kids. And I fully admit that a big chunk of that is due to my own life experiences. But I’ve seen it go bad way more often than I’ve seen it turn out good. :\
*giant hugs*
And yeah, I’m a big fan of people having kids when they are fully prepared and ready for all that means and not a day sooner.
Hence my age comment. Not normally read then, and given the culture here, quite possibly forced on them.
whoops
On the other hand, the old ladies who pinch your cheeks and tell you you look adorable are still there. They have always been there and always shall be. They are eternal.
And now, the weather.
This sounds vaguely like a “Welcome to Nightvale” reference. It’s been too long; I should revisit it.
Me too. Who knows what Lovecraftian horrors he’s nonchalantly reported in the interim?
It was a Night Vale reference!
(And yessss, go back and listen!)
They are why I don’t go to the same church as from when I was a kid. I just couldn’t deal with it. Not to say I go to church much these days, but they are a contributing factor.
Yeah, but at least they stop doting on you and focus on someone else by the time you turn 50.
Depends on HOW old the doting old ladies are. The median age in my synagogue’s seventy-something, so my 60-something parents still get the “you’re getting to be a lovely young lady/gentleman” from all the little old ladies in their nineties.
That’s how you feel until you reach your early 30’s. Then they start dieing off in frighteningly short order from one another and it starts being surreal.
is it time for the ‘whispering in the back row of pews turns into a large public scene’ trope
either that or the “pastor makes a VERY SPECIFIC sermon lambasting a particular congregation member’s recent actions without naming names and yet everyone still knows EXACTLY who he’s talking about” trope
or both, there’s room for both
Yeah, everything so far has been feeling way too much like ironic setup for this sermon to just be a happy thing about how awesome love is or the like. Not to mention there’s that bawling face Joyce preview panel. I’d lean towards expecting the worst, but Willis has quite a bit more direct experience than me with actually being in those types of churches, so he’s probably got a worst that’s actually worse than the ones that come to mind.
Gotta’ say, I’m not looking forward to this one. Oh well… the show must go on.
Oh, man, that reminds me of a time when a friend of mine took a bunch of us back to her house in a tiny town in east Texas (Olney) for a weekend during college. It was me and three guys, one of whom was an atheist. Well, my friend’s dad was the pastor at their church and he did a sermon on atheism that Sunday. And she chewed him out afterward. Bless.
I have thought that this is a setup from the first time it was announced. This is some kind of intervention. Like I said, glad Joyce called Joe so that he knows where to start looking when she doesn’t come back.
I think Carole set Becky up deliberately in that pink dress, only because she didn’t have a red dress.
Anyone remember the Gone With The Wind scene where Rhett insists that Scarlet take off her ‘widows weeds’ and wear her bright red dress and then drops her at the dance and leaves her.
Lots of puns there Scarlet, the Scarlet woman in the red dress. And I think that’s Carols plan – Becky the scarlet woman, the lesbian, the sinner.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gd9ltJGykYc
Oh, don’t worry. From my memory of being dragged to church, their parents will be happy to fill you in on everything they’re doing, along with the latest on people you’ve never met but they assume you know.
I believe the appropriate plural of “Jennifer” is “Jenniferae.”
the six Jenniferae
If any of the Jenniferae get in relationships with each other, then they immediately become Gallpalifrey.
The secret of the Time Lords: Lesbians.
But then lesbians are the secret of everything, really. Those passages under the floorboards are the best, aren’t they?
Turns out that was the ultimate question all along. 42 was just the number of lesbians to invite to the party.
“Jennifer” is a variation of “Jennie”. A plural of “Jennie” is “Jennies”. “Jennies” has 7 letters. 7 x 6 = 42.
COINCIDENCE??????? I THINK NOT!!!
My chalkboard on wheels confirms it! Now, we finally have unlocked the fabled love dodecagon.
This series of comments shall provide amusement for the entire day. Many thanks.
I think Jennifers/Jenniferae/Jennies/etc needs to have a movie now, like… “Heathers”.
The plural of a name is still that name.
Not true. A flock of you becomes a flock of Plasma Mongeese!
Wait, really?
First, while the plural of mongoose is sometimes mongeese, much more often it’s just mongooses.
Second, a group of mongooses is called a “pack” or a “mob”, not a crowd. Similarly, a group of plasma is called a cloud or a flash. I think this makes multiple plasma mongooses a flash mob.
Have an internet, that was great.
That went in a different direction I was expecting. Seconded.
One goose, many geese.
One moose, many moose.
One mongoose, many polygoose.
http://i2.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/992/401/e37.png
Oh my no. First declension? That can’t be right. “Jennifer” doesn’t look anything like an a-stem word.
Now, while we don’t know for sure, given that “Jennifer” wasn’t in Latin, I think we’d probably see it treated as a third declension -r stem word. (As opposed to a second declension -r stem word, since those are mostly masculine – and the rest neuter other than a few irregulars. Third declension words are a far more even assortment).
So assuming it’s a typical third declension feminine, you’d be adding -es for Nominative, Vocative, and Accusative, where the e is pronounced like a long E in English, or い in Japanese if that’s helpful. Jenniferēs, or Jenniferiis, perhaps. Genitive plural would be –um, and the rest –ibus.
Now, look up the singular forms and write the full declension down 100 times so you remember.
It’s shit like this that makes me eternally glad I took a language other than Latin. @_@
If you can memorise tables, Latin is actually not difficult. The grammar is not interesting (which means not difficult), a lot of the vocabulary made it into French and from there English, so word acquisition is relatively easy. For me, two out of those three made it a terrible choice.
Japanese was a much better idea, on the whole – I like the grammar a lot, it doesn’t do insane things like decline (conjugate, sort of) nouns and adjectives, and while the vocabulary is a problem, that’s kind of a problem in anything but Latin or French, so. Plus, the vocabulary is small, so that helps.
Really, the only fun thing for me about Latin was that you can literally arrange the words in most sentences in any order you want and it’s still completely comprehensible. There were conventions about this, of course, but while it would be weird to rearrange every word into random order? It would still be understood.
Why Latin or French?
A bit of quick googling and an ability to trust everything I find on the internet tells me that “Jennifer” is Welsh in origin, and spelled Gwenhwyfar, because Gaelic people spell everything in a way that would and possibly did drive Cthulhu insane.
Pluralization is complicated by the fact that Welsh doesn’t HAVE a single standard rule for pluralization. Every pluralization is irregular (again, Gaelic language and insanity), but the most common forms are -au, -iau, -ion, -ydd, -i, and -od, with -au and -iau being the most common for nouns. That gives us Gwenhwyfarau or Gwenhwyfariau as the most likely candidates.
All this is further complicated by the fact that they are referred to with the definite article “the”, which for a feminine noun beginning with a consonant is “y”. HOWEVER, this changes the pluralization of Gwenhwyfar by mutating the first letter of the noun, depending on what that letter is. Since the first letter is a G, it’s eliminated entirely, giving us “y Wenhwyfarau” or “y Wenhwyfariau”.
Adapting these changes to English, I think that means the proper plural form is “the Enniferiau”.
BECAUSE FUCK SANITY, THAT’S WHY!
Are you a linguist, or is it a hobby? Or Welsh? The fact that you know all this is damn impressive.
Like I said. Google. Took me about 5 minutes. Is properly completely wrong, but no less awesome and/or insane for it.
*Probably. Danm, I can NOT type tonight.
… and yes, I saw that typo before I posted but left it in anyway to prove the point.
Reltzik, Dara, you are my favourite people this evening.
Mine too!
I studied Latin, Classical Greek, Italian and Linguistics at university. And I knew about Jennifer / Gwenhwyfar (which is also Guinevere). I don’t know enough Welsh to comment on the pluralisation, unfortunately, but even if it’s wrong, it’s funny.
I… don’t… even.
… … @_@
Only thing I can do is applaud at this point. THIS is why I read the comments. A glorious ride into seemingly random yet fluid apropos.
“the Enniferiau” sounds like some fantasy epic series to me.
I should say, for English or French speakers. Probably also for Spanish.
From my knowledge, more for romance language speakers, so French Spanish Portuguese Italian and Romanian, and any dialects there of. English I’m quite sure is more related to German than Latin and French, and as such not English.
English has Gaelic, Norse, French and Latin as is major contributors. Gaelic from the native Britons, Norse from the invading Anglo-Saxons (read Danish Vikings), French from the invading Normans (read French Vikings), and Latin from an ‘inkhorning’ craze during the Stuart dynasty. Gaelic is responsible for our ‘weird’ grammar and the vast majority of our simple vocabulary. The invasions (especially the first, or rather second (Julius Caesar anyone?)) were responsible for the simplifications, and a good chunk of our vocabulary (‘window’ is Norse, ‘air’ is French), while inkhorning gave us such beauties as ‘simplification’, ‘responsible’, ‘second’, ‘native’, ‘invasions’, ‘majority’, ‘contributors’ and ‘vocabulary’. English might not be as Romance as French, but it is certainly close enough to be a boon to English speakers learning Latin.
And, of course, a good chunk of French is Latin, so English got two doses of it, one with more distortion than the other.
Feminine r-declension noun… I’m going with:
nom.: Jennifer Jennifru
acc.: Jennifer Jennifru
gen.: Jennifer Jennifra
dat.: Jennefer Jennifrum
I just had flashbacks to highschool.
And if they all enter into an actually conspiracy, it’s Jenniferaeous
“The Jenniferaeous Era, when vast beds of cuteness deposits were laid down…”
All paleontologists who work with it are adorable.
Heh, I got that one.
I remember learning what Joyce learned today. Unlike Joyce, however, I didn’t have a guardian Becky to tell me the lesson on day one.
Everyone should have a Guardian Becky. She can stand on one shoulder and give advice, while Guardian Mary stands on the other.
Though mostly they argue about which one is supposed to be the angel.
Then why did we even COME? *kicks church building, whispers “Tristan”*
She’s been Tristan-blocked.
I wonder if New Joyce could bring herself to say “cockblocked” or is that still Forbidden
I like to think that if Joyce could even understand the concept, she would call it “Ding-Dong Denied”.
I know I’m going to from now on.
OH MY GOD I WISH SHE’D HAD TO SAY THAT
THAT IS THE BEST JOYCE SWEAR SHE NEVER USED
and there was such potential for a trist
+1
*groooan*
Now she’s left out in the Isolde.
That left a Mark.
You really CAN’T go home again, huh?
Does that section with the tree swing up to reveal a launching ramp?
“The Six Jennifers” sounds like a singing group. Probably one of those Christian rock groups.
Sounds more like the subtitle of a crime novel to me.
Why don’t we have both?
A crime novel about the murdered lead singer of The Six Jennifers?
I suspect Priss.
But in reality, the murderer is their understudy, Yennifer.
With or without the Replicants?
The Jenifferae are the replicants.!
I believe it is the low budget version of https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1nN_5kkYR6k
Joyce now has beady eyes, all she needs now is black hair and a potty mouth and her transformation into Sal shall be complete.
Still missing the badarse bike.
And the leather jacket.
And the smoking habit.
And the [Insert Wholly Insensitive, Possibly Racist Joke Here].
And the awareness of outer-world social norms that would allow her to only make that kind of comment intentionally?
Was that in direct reply to my comment or just a continuation of the thread?
Continuation, she said, realizing that no one would ever read her response.
Smoking habit? Did Sal have one of those when she was in Catholic school?
Well she did say “shit” a couple of days ago, does that count?
Funny, I thought with the little eyes she was starting to look like her Mom. Next, the judgemental scowl.
Oh, may the lord have mercy upon them for what’s about to happen.
Awww man. The sinking feeling of a disappointment you hadn’t considered. Who hasn’t felt this way? *hugs Joyce*
unite the seven jennifers
Seven is too many. It could cause a space-time dimensional disruption that could destroy the entire universe.
but then thered be no more toedad, and no more blaine
Im sure there are better ways to deal with toe dad and blaine then destroying the universe!
nope! destroy the universe!
Also, destroying the universe to kill fictional characters, is just irresponsible!
bah, being responsible isnt fun! embrace the irresponsibility!
Is it? Is it really?
yes
*sad face* Awww, we never get to destroy the world… *pout*
There’s a saying, about bad apples or something.
Also, it’s logical. Ending the universe makes them no less real than the totally not-real that they already are. If anything, it makes them MORE real, to the point where they are as real as anything else.
In other words, bringing them to LIFE by ending the universe makes infinitely more sense.
(And by “infinitely”, I mean you’re multiplying the logic of destroying the universe by infinity. Since zero times infinity is an indefinite form, it might still be 0.)
It’s NOT logical. Grr. My keyboard hates me tonight. AND I’M NOT EVEN DRUNK! Stupidkeyboardhidingmywhiskey…
Oh universes get destroyed and rebooted all the time. Just ask Marvel or DC.
Not to mention how they sometimes kill some of the heroes and then bring them back to life through different means.
Great, you spoiled the next season of my show. The Jennifer Junction was going to be awesome. Now I’ll have to do it with Tylers!
there wouldve been executive meddling anyway
And summon Shenron?
I still think this is the strangest looking building. I wouldn’t believe it actually existed if Willis hadn’t posted the old picture he found of it.
There’s a similar building on my school’s campus.
So how long did it take for the new church to go up? Three days?
We will soon find out the 6 Jennifers are all lesbians.
With each other
They ran off to form a commune.
Aw, yay poly lesbians.
No, the Perennial Pollys are down the sttreet.
The more I think about it, the more I want this spinoff comic. Farming the land, making their own clothes, raising all their children communally, it’d be great.
And solving crimes. Everything is better with crime solving. *nods*
CBS?
….modern-day detective fundie yet sexually-liberated Amazons? Is that what y’all’re going for? Because I’d watch that. Or read that. Or listen to it. Or consume it as some other form of entertainment not yet invented.
Five minutes each episode is spent making “everyone is named Jennifer” jokes.
Jennifer: “Jennifer!”
Jennifer: “Yes, Jennifer?”
“Not you, Jennifer. Jennifer!”
Jennifer: “That’s what I said, Jennifer. I’m Jennifer.”
Jennifer: “Yes, I know your name is Jennifer, Jennifer. But I wanted to talk to Jennifer.”
Jennifer: “Aaaaah, JENNIFER!”
Jennifer and Jennifer: “JEEEEEENNIFER!!!!!”
Jennifer: “Yes, Jennifer?”
We will call them the LesbiJens
They are diversifying out of the PI niche with their line of LesBiJeans™.
Later they’ll be called Mama Jennifer, Handy Jennifer, Brainy Jennifer, Clumsy Jennifer, Jokey Jennifer, and Jennifette.
To worship Carla!
See Also: The problem whenever you visit your parents in your hometown after you graduate college. They’re all gone.
Yep, one of the bad parts of growing up.
My parents were the ones to skip town after I left for college.
Mine did the same. Sold the house and took off on an extended sailing vacation.
They kept paying for school and brought me to visit them on breaks, so I couldn’t really complain.
That building’s attempt at buttress architecture hurts my eyes.
Buttless architecture
The church’s culture has changed a lot since Joyce was last there.
Good, so i am not the only one. When Willis first posted pictures, I was confused as to what they were supposed to be besides the first thing to get ripped off in a tornado until I realized the buttress connection)
That’s a buttress supporting by a building.
It’s about to fly off into space.
Six Jennifers? No wonder Joyce likes Billie; between her name and her religion she must have been a beacon of relative familiarity.
You are the fabled seventh Jennifer, the one the prophecies foretold who will unite the lands of Jennifer in a hundred years of peace!
IT HAS BEGUN! The time of legends is upon us!
She’s the seventh Jennifer of the seventh Jennifer.
i think i live close to a church with architecture similar to this
So Joyce was looking forward to seeing Tristan again huh?
For bible study…ing of his abs, I mean text. I said text, you all heard me say text.
I thought you were going to say something about absolution. Or maybe abs-solution. Something about anointing with oil?
wait, did we meet Tristan previously?
of course! don’t you remember the Tristan arc? When Dina was kidnapped by Blaine and Toe Dad. Causing the main characters to team up with Tristan to rescue her! I can’t believe you’ve forgotten about that part!
Many people have blocked out the memory of that horror.
Willis went back and wrote him out of that arc, because people disliked him too much.
Damn it Time Traveling Willis. First you go back in time to rewrite things to win Twitter arguments and then you erase the brilliant insanity of the Tristan arc. I’m gonna bet the archives don’t even have the Assault on Banana Hammock Mountain Dream Sequence anymore!
Or the part where Dina rides a historically accurate transforming raptor to come to Becky’s aid?
Wait wait wait…If Willis is going back and erasing things, how to we remember them!?
To erase indicates that it existed. Makes you wonder what never existed for us, huh?
Willis look…I really need to stop the androids!
Screw you! I have comics to fix!
No, but Joyce mentioned him a few strips ago while texting Joe.
Becky sure has a lot of hair in panel 2. Panel 5 is a little more reasonable, if she must spontaneously grow it back.
In a surprise twist the sermon doesn’t mention anything about lesbians or honouring fathers and no one gives Becky a second glance!
That would be surprising!
Highly.
If only “safety in numbers” meant two people…
Two is a number!
Two can be as bad as one.
Yeah… but two is just as bad as one, it’s the loneliest number since the number one! D:
GMTA
I thought seven was the loneliest number?
I watch too much anime.
No, seven is the scariest number.
Because 7 8 9.
I do wonder, did everyone in the group went to college? how are the posibilities that one went very close to study and returns home on the weekend, hmm
Well, Anderson was apparently not all that far away, given what Becky said.
Which makes me wonder how many of the gang who are at Andersons. It only takes one Jenifer to get five minutes alone time with Katline for the REAL story, not ToeDad-aproved propaganda, to be whispered among the young ones.
Maybe Joyce is not the only one to be not very happy with fun, goofy Becky being thrown out by her father.
Kaitlin is busy making out with all six Jennifers. “Why does this keep HAPPENING to MEEEE?!”
HEADCANON!!!!
That’s gonna cause a bit of confusion. Mind if we call you Jennifer just to keep it clear?
Anderson is about 3 hours from La Porte.
Another fun fact: La Porte is actually one word. Willis just has a fancy computer algorithm or whatever that makes it into two words of matter how you type it.
3 hours? that is too long to commute but I think is short enough to visit some weekends if there is money and desire to do so.
So. I just had a terrible, terrible thought.
It’s been… what, a week comic-time since the whole shooting incident happened?
And they’re going back to their hometown church?
And the church is probably full of hyper-conservative types, because of how Joyce was before college?
And this is still really big news for a small town?
And… we’re seeing this, so Conservation of Detail?
Yeah. The whole bloody sermon’s going to be about how noble Becky’s father was for trying to save his daughter.
*grabs the popcorn*
i need popcorn, and a umbrella
Ayup… it’s gonna be “fun”.
On the plus side, I don’t see it as being worse than similar churches of that particular sect responded to the Orlando shooting:
http://www.abc10.com/news/local/sacramento/sacramento-baptist-pastor-praises-orlando-massacre/243211965
But that’s only because that’s such a low bar to clear.
That particular bar is low enough to trip on, I think.
Ain’t nobody but James Cameron gonna trip over that bar.
the bravest pioneer!
Yet no matter how low it goes, somehow someone is ALWAYS able to limbo under it.
it is already under the ground, but I see people bringing shovels for these things
I’m originally from Sacramento, and I assure you, we don’t all think like that. I’ve heard of some really scummy things said in the name of religion, but that’s got to be close to the top 10 that I’ve come across in my lifetime. I’m a bit ashamed that my city’s name is associated with that… garbage.
I always thought sympathy was supposed to be a virtue. No virtue there – certainly not leading by example.
Oh, I spent the earliest part of my life up in that region, so I know that well, more pointing out the thought process of this type of church rather than making some classist smear against the region.
Ooof, this is going to hurt to watch.
I’m glad you just had this thought, some commenters figured on that happening from when we found out that Joyce was going home for the weekend. This is a plot that been coming for a while.
Well, I was raised agnostic. Sunday, to me, means “Football”, or at least “cringing as the local teams fail miserably”. Sure, I’m aware that Church happens on Sundays, but it’s just… kinda that thing that those other people do, it’s not an instinctive part of my life.
It’s been well built up. Just different perspective means not everything hint rings as clearly for some :).
And again, good for you.
What if we’ve got this all wrong? After all, everyone’s predicting that this will be a dreadful, soul-destroying direct assault on Becky; it would be a shame if the plot was so predictable!
What if, instead, the pastor denounces Ross for planning to use violence, something that The Lord forbade even in His own defence? What if he counsels the congregation that no-one has the right to force repentance and conversion on anyone because (a) such a thing is spiritually worthless and (b) there is no human perfect and sinless enough to claim the right to do so without being a hypocrite.
I’d pay to see the look on Carol’s face during such a sermon!
Still condescending and insulting, though. I wonder if Leo is the pastor.
I’m thinking more on the pastor will give a nice sensible sermon not condoning violence but then he’ll have a guest speaker or whatever they’re called, bring in Joyce’s brother and HE will stir the shit pot by acting like a classy Westboro Baptist Church member and preach a lot crap directed subtly at Becky.
oooh, now that! That would be an interesting turn indeed
Ah, shit, that… I could actually see how that would happen.
“Ah, man, how do I start a sermon on something like this. Oh, what? Some kid pastor from our sister church wants to say some words because his sister was one of the one’s threatened, by all means, let ’em speak.”
Theoretically possible. I can definitely see the sermon being of a style at least not intending to be hateful (just coming from a culture where hateful is sadly the default that reasoning is coming from [see the terms Joyce defaults to when she’s initially trying to be supportive about something outside her box]).
I don’t see it being as awesome as that (or even overall pleasant for the attendees), but I will gladly give you a major kudos if it does.
I suspect it’ll be treated as a godpertunity.
Ah, yes. Without a specific event to tie you all back (and even then, better hope they’re all going to it at the same time you are) it’s just “hey I’m back home from college alone” and also everyone has different spring breaks.
Aw, cheer up, Joyce. I’m sure you had some younger friends. My church was big enough to have two Sunday Morning services, and I don’t think we even had 10 people my age by the time I was a senior. That would be like my entire Sunday School class, which includes juniors.
(Sorry about the repeated post. Messed up earlier.)
Well, that was a nice, fleeting Joyce Smile.
All smiles are fleeting in the Dumbiverse.
Joyce issok, just… uuh don’t be consumed by anger when you realize everyone you have ever known are also bigots.
Let your anger flow through you and then turn to see the anger’s path. Only you will remain.
Yeah. After Joyce’s anger flows through her, only she will remain.
Everything else in the area will be destroyed.
So your church, huh? So are the obviously non-structural flying buttresses supposed to be a metaphor for how the “faith” of the people in attendance is no more than a facade for sincerity/hiding they are horrible people? (Architecturally, I get the whole let’s evoke gothic cathedral imagery but not so obviously Catholic, but the engineer in me can’t help but look past how those things aren’t doing the job of flying buttresses.)
Well, that part of the building used to be a school. I guess you’d hafta ask the folks who built the school.
EDIT: or…. maybe it didn’t? maybe that entrance is where the add-on started, i dunno
I guess if you had some pictures of the whole thing I could make a more accurate guess. It reads pseudo-gothic cathedral to me, but there are a few gothic examples of universities so the school is possible as well? Mostly I was just making light fun of modern architecture. It’s cathartic for me. (Engineer, and my job is to make stuff like this work)
Although I do kinda want to know what the substructure is on those things because the wind on cantilevered open walls like that is a huge bongo, and based on the scale you’ve drawn them at, I can’t imagine it being much thicker than 8″ studs+stucco.
yeaaaaaah welcome to the cargo-cult futurism of the 1970s. The future wasn’t getting there fast enough, so they decided if they made the buildings look futuristic, maybe the future would actually arrive.
Okay that’s not what they were trying to do but it may as well have been.
There is one church in my city that when anyone is giving directions, they refer to it as “the ugly church.”
And tourists ask, “What do you mean, ‘ugly church’?”
And we say, “You’ll know it when you see it.”
And they do.
Because you see the building, and it just the epitome of godawful 80s postmodern construction. Among other things, it is designed so that no matter which direction you’re facing it from (including from above!) you see a cross made up of building wall. Except also 80s style so imagine if Rob fucking Liefeld designed a church and decided that sticking crosses everywhere wasn’t enough it also needs a fish silhouette.
It is truly a hideous building.
Everyone who I’ve driven with when I give directions including “now go past the ugly church” has first asked what I mean about ugly church and then, when it came into sight, said, “Holy shit. That’s an ugly church. I see what you mean now.” or something along those lines.
I’ve been tempted to show up for a service just to see if it’s as awful on the inside, buuut given that I’m an atheist I kind of think that’d be rude. :\
Okay if we are griping about horrible church architecture now… Not an asthetics case, but I came across one recently when I had to go out to Dallas for work back in April, I think? Early spring. (This does matter)
We were walking to get from one meeting to the next and walked down a street that went through a church, like they owned the buildings on both sides of the street. The street between was part of a courtyard area they had between the two. Ultramodern architecture, all glass, sleek and silver, and the walls at street level were radiused to form a large circle around the courtyard. Pretty “meh” asthetically; clearly a cas of a church trying to be hip in the time it was built though.
The issue though was that the glass walls acted as mirrors to reflect light, and the curves trapped heat in. It was early spring, NOT hot by Texas standards, and we were overheating walking half a block through there. We joked around a bit about how it seemed counterproductive; nobody was going to want to stick around afterwards, and strangers walking through would want to get through as quickly as possible. I speculated that they were trying to mimic hell, and get people to “turn from sin” and seek the church’s AC. (Or really, they just wanted something that looked cool and didn’t think of the consequences)
To make matters worse, there was a giant cross-shaped fountain in the middle of the courtyard. I can only imagine how much water was wasted due to evaporation. Okay, Dallas has had the opposite of the drought CA has had in the past few years, but still… It just seemed wasteful.
One of the reasons I like living in New England. We’ve got some really nice Church architecture around here. From the classic white steepled church to some really nice larger stone churches.
There are some horrible modern things, that seem mostly to look like warehouses with a bit of steeple tacked on, but they’re easy to overlook.
New England churches can be really nice. Architecture of spiritual buildings can be some of the coolest architecture around. I love a lot of the old 1800s era wood churches. It’s some of the modern ones where they are clearly trying to make an architectural statement that get …questionable…
We also have a ton of fresh water. It’s awesome.
That ugly church sounds truly awful. Curious to know if that was the architect’s idea or the church’s who owns the building. I started studying architecture before I switched over to engineering, and one of the first things we learned was that if you have to be literal in your imagery, you are doing it wrong.
ischemgeek: THIS NEEDS STREETVIEW OMG I NEED TO SEE THIS IT SOUNDS HILARIOUS
Your description prompted me to search for “ugly church”.
I doubt I found the one you’re writing about, but these two links are to be treasured:
The Ugliest Churches in the World, and Even More Ugly Churches
Ok, obviously the person who made the first list has no sense of what architecture is and only thinks it all needs to be neogothic…
Because I find many of these churches evoking of something more than juste a cross (and the fact I was born a fex kilometers from number 34 doesn’t give me any bias!)
I’d like to see the CD-ROM that fits in this drive slot:
http://www.realclearreligion.org/lists/the_ugliest_churches_in_the_world/iglesia_de_la_consolacion.html
On the other hand, I don’t even like Christianity, but this interior is pretty fuckin’ neat.
http://www.realclearreligion.org/lists/the_ugliest_churches_in_the_world/christus_hoffnung_der_welt.html
Here is the entire building, as seen from SPACE
https://twitter.com/damnyouwillis/status/743890680125227008
I still like my Thunderbirds-style underground base theory.
oh gods they have a website
i am aware it’s a different church now but it doesn’t look _that_ different from what I’m expecting
http://www.roadtolifechurch.us/
i’ll be nice and not link to the facebook pages.
*reads the “our beliefs” page*
yeah that’s basically the same
Though all the images are of the new auditorium that wasn’t finished when I went there, so it may as well be any other church building.
Sometimes the correct response to “you can’t go home again” is “and thank god for that.”
Augh. The capitals.
I’m not sure if those are more annoying… than the random elipses… that separated all of the sentences everywhere… on the church programs when I attended church in that building… I don’t think I ever saw any sentence terminate… in a period… it drove me wild…
Idly troll through their page. See the section of sermons labeled “Living OUT”… nervously click through, see the video labeled “Coming Out”:
http://subsplash.com/roadchurch/v/bfb5bbd
Eyes get even wider. Get to the part where the pastor says that young people shouldn’t be afraid to “come out” of hanging with sinners and letting their unbeliever sin juice “pollute you” (around 2:30ish in the video)
Nooooope. Also, poor Becky.
Also, they apparently have a section titled Armed and Dangerous… I don’t even want to know what tortured metaphor that’s supposedly for.
My favorite is “ARMED AND DANGEROUS: HUMILITY”
I am glad I am not an epileptic because that page would have given me an attack >.>
What are the odds that Kelly, Melissa, Tristan, and steve, as well as all 6 Jeniffers are now all ALSO officially over 18 and ready to go to college? I mean, Joyce didn’t have ANY friends that were exactly her age or older?
I’m betting from Becky’s reaction and general ‘people they would both know and associate with’ that a lot of them were in the same home school group. In which case: probably the same grade, and therefore they all finished at the same time.
Plus, most of them would’ve been at Anderson, too. Close enough to come home, after hearing about the “shooting at that heathen school” (from their parents) They are there- with popcorn.
I’m guessing some of the girls didn’t go to college and Joyce will run into some who instead of going to college decided instead to “stay home, get married and tend to husband and children (which I’m guessing they don’t have yet) as god mandates.” Then, they’ll shame her for having independent thoughts.
readying myself for if someone in the church throws out a homophobic slur
Calling it, they’re raising a collection to get beckys dad out of jail
Would they be funding an appeal, or a jailbreak?
/glares
Neither, I’d think. Not enough time has gone by to have actually convicted him, even if he pled out, which seems unlikely since he doesn’t think he did anything wrong. Appeals can’t happen ’til after a conviction. And I don’t see a church like this openly conspiring to commit a crime, which organizing a jailbreak would be.
Possibly a collection for bail, if that’s going to be granted, or a general legal fund to pay for his defense though.
I can definitely at least see the church ladies on the side asking all to give to his legal fund.
While I was being facetious at 1:00 in the morning I ended up spending part of my lunch break dwelling on what was realistically going to happen. I don’t even know if arraignment’s taken place (it probably should have by now).
There’s no one a gunman is gonna have a bail set.
Last panel: Yay! Joyce has automatically reverted to the mental state appropriate for this church!
((Sorry, couldn’t resist.))
….
((Not actually sorry.))
Gosh, it isn’t assumed that the kids went to work at the local factory. What a nice town. No wonder they didn’t leave and never turn back. Nooo, I’m not bitter.
The local factory probably got closed down and outsourced overseas.
Those days are over, my friend. Towns the size of La Porte, the kids with any potential clear the city limits ASAP, and you’re left with a residue of people bitter (or unwilling to acknowledge) that the 1950s, and the days of stepping from high school into a job capable of supporting you, the wife and 2.3 kids and the boat in the driveway are gone.
… You forgot “and middle-aged people and older who don’t realize that the 1950s are over, and blame the kids for being selfish and irresponsible for not having settled down and started popping out their 2.3 kids by their mid-20s.”
The moment you realize you’re going to church to interact with humans instead of god is the moment you realize religion is bullshit.
What if your religion is focused on having a strong sense of community, uplifting and helping each other to overcome obstacles and make a better life for everyone involved?
You were talking about it differently, weren’t you?
It’s one way to be social like another. Well, before and after the service itself, that is.
Also Tristan.
Dying churches sounds like a terry pratchett plot
Here’s a secret for you.
ANY verb-noun combination sounds like a Terry Pratchett plot.
Seriously, I just used an ap to generate three random verb-noun combinations. With some slight explanation, tell me which of these could NOT be a Terry Pratchet plot:
Verb… Noun… Proposed plot
Grease… Equinox… The Celestial Spheres need regular greasing to keep the sun from freezing in the sky at equinox and burning the entire Discworld to a crisp. It’s up to a luckless orphan adopted by a god to do the job. Hopefully she doesn’t get distracted from her duties by a cute guy.
Succeed… Gemsbok… With Vetinari apparently dead, the nobles of Ankh-Morpork decide to elect a new king from their own number by lottery. Due to a series of events not-at-all-contrived by the actually-still-living Vetinari, somehow the name of a noble’s pet gemsbok (a type of antelope) gets into the bowl and drawn from the hat. And so a gemsbok succeeds to the Ankh-Morpork throne, and much hijinks ensue.
Buzz… Heron…. The newest addition to Discworld’s bloated cast is The Heron, who…… dammit, okay, it’s late and I can’t come up with anything. But it works MOST of the time.
*mind blown*
I can just imagine how Sir Pterry would have handled the second one. It would definitely have included Captain Carrot, Lord Vimes, and the City Watch. Hijinks would ensue, indeed!
Arguably, it’s the basis of the plot of ‘Small Gods’.
And the reason for the existence of Dunmanifestin.
It sounds a bit like “Small Gods”, only on a smaller scale. Or whenever mrs. Cake leaves one of the congregations she’s previously joined and taken over.
Yes, the book is called Small Gods
I am now worried we will never know the hotness that is Tristan.
Unless he happens to be there, he might be Gudot.
We know there is some sort of youth minister. Is it too much to ask that that’s Tristian?
I’m sorta expecting Joyce to, in her mind’s eye to remember Tristan looking like one of those guys from the covers of bad romance novels with their long flowing blonde hair and wearing no shirt and then when she meets Tristan again, the reality sets in that he’s just some random dude that looks nothing like how she thought she remembered him.
Or worse. That Tristan looks exactly like the party dude who drugged her.
Maybe he looks like a boy version of Dorothy, leading to a series of jokes at Joyce’s expense that privately ends with “So uh… is Joshua available?”
Joyce hasn’t been gone that long. She remembers exactly what he looks like.
Joyce writing: Tristan slowly removed his shirt as his tight abs glistened with sweat….
Carol: Joyce are you writing stories about that boy you have a crush on again?
Joyce: Don’t come in!
IT’S NOT TRISTAN IT’S…. EDWARD!! THAT’S RIGHT, I’M WRITING FANFIC, NOTHING ELSE.
The synagogue my family used to attend died out. There were barely enough men left for a minyan when we were there.
It stood empty for years, then got turned into a museum.
There’s also an abandoned church down the street from me. There was talk of turning it into a community theater, but that fell through.
Eh, we probably got more empty churches in this city than active ones. A few got turned to condominiums, at least two, if not more, are public libraries, two got demolished, I think there’s a couple of museums, one is a circus school… Only old people go to church on sundays :p
The synagogue near my university used to be a church. Then it was another church. And I think it was a third church before it became a synagogue. One of the old congregations graduated to a new, larger building, though, so we’re pretty sure it’s not cursed.
There’s an empty church in Lake City (the Seattle one, not the Vancouver/Burnaby one) that’s pretty much crying out to be turned into some sort of show venue or nightclub. All I need is a lotto win!
You have my sympathies, and I did go back and reread it properly, but I must admit that the first time, I saw “barely enough men left for a minivan”.
How long until Becky happily proclaims “I’M A LESBIAN!” to everyone?
Pastor: “And the deviants and the lesbians that poison our-”
Becky: “I’M A LESBIAN!”
Pastor: “…”
Congregation: “…”
Joyce: *whispering* “I think if I make a distraction, you can sprint for the door.”
Quick! Accuse one of the Jennifer of having a baby out of wedlock, then dash out while everyone is trying to figure out which of the six Jennifer it is!
I found the 6 Jennifers thing especially amusing, because back in 7th grade, I played this girl also named Jennifer who had an identity crisis. The girl was going insane because almost every girl she knew was named Jennifer, and she felt that it hindered her individuality. I especially liked playing this role since I got to scream and act psycho. Ah memories. (If she stepped foot in this church, oh Lord…)
I have thought that this is a setup from the first time it was announced. This is some kind of intervention. Like I said before, I’m glad Joyce called Joe so that he knows where to start looking when she doesn’t come back.
I think Carole set Becky up deliberately in that pink dress, only because she didn’t have a red dress.
Anyone remember the Gone With The Wind scene where Rhett insists that Scarlet take off her ‘widows weeds’ and wear her bright red dress and then he drops her off at the dance and leaves her to face the town alone.
Lots of puns there: Scarlet, the Scarlet woman in the red dress. And I think that’s what Carol has in mind – Becky the scarlet woman, the lesbian, the sinner.
Oh, I hadn’t thought about that. If this is a church of the “faith healer” style of megachurch, then it actually is possible that the pastor might call her up in order to “intervene on behalf of her soul”…
Luckily they can’t legally take her anywhere she doesn’t want to…
I wasn’t thinking taking her somewhere, I was more thinking this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9v2uk99o2E
Or rather more likely if this was to be the case, something where they brought her up to the front to “pray” for her in a super public shaming passive-aggressive style.
Though in general, my money is still down on sermon either slagging on homosexuality or more likely on the duty of one’s children to their parents (this one would be a twofer in hitting both Joyce and Becky close to home).
Doesn’t have to practice laying on of hands to feature public shaming, though. When one of the congregation at my erstwhile boyfriend’s church was discovered to be having an affair with another man, he was called up to the stage, outed, and told he could either confess his sin to the entire congregation and apologise to everyone or be banned from the church and church community immediately and permanently.
Same thing happened to a friend of mine after she was raped at church camp. She had to apologize for being a bad “example of a child of god.”
Fuck fundies.
Doesnt fit the trendy pastor image that Willis has portrayed … although that could be a whole lot of other fireworks …
BECKY: “I warn you now, brother: If you try slapping me on the forehead to ‘drive out the devil’, I’m going to clock you one!”
PASTOR: “Play with me here, kid. I only want to stamp your forehead with UV-fluorescing paint to make it look like the Spirit is in you.”
A long time ago my grandfather, who was a long-serving churchwarden, told a new priest off for wearing sandals.
Ah, how times have changed!
A long time ago my grandmother told off the town’s priest because he wouldn’t play her father’s favorite song at his funeral. They got a different pastor to come and take care of the funneral. My family doesn’t take SHIT from authority figures. Grandma also got in trouble with the nuns running the school and would spend a bit too much time hanging out on her dad’s merchant ship :p
I… I think I got Carol all wrong – she didn’t try to be mean to Becky, she just tried to dress her for her church date with Joyce and it went out of hand.
No? Yeah, OK, but Becky and Joyce DO make a fine couple here, and the dress helps.
Hmm, they do kind of have a suburban gay soccer mom vibe going on there, now that you mention it…
One usually is expected a minimal dress code when going to church.
It might mostly be that the dress doesn’t look so horribly wrong when we only see it from the waist up.
Becky wouldn’t mind seeing the old gang again now that Joyce will FINALLY stop trying to set her up with Steve so she can go on double date with her and Tristan.
Jennifer#3 on the other hand…
Ironically enough, this frees up Steve to finally muster up the courage to ask Tristan out.
Poor Joyce, all alone. Especially since Jennifer#5 doesn’t dare asking her out now when cool, brave, Becky already made a move on her.
Now I am wondering if all the other teenagers knew that Becky was gay and in love with Joyce but never said anything because you don’t talk about that sort of thing in their church.
Maybe it’s just me, but I feel like Becky herself didn’t know she was gay until she went to college.
I had the same impression.
Which doesn’t mean that others didn’t see her and Joyce and assume.
Billie is no longer the only Jennifer in the Dumbiverse! Realism++!
Once again, we see that Joyce’s ultimate goal for this weekend was to come home. Unfortunately, her planning didn’t exactly take in how hard it is to do that so she didn’t make the necessary arrangements!
It will be interesting to see what the service is like for her without the presence of her friends from the home-school program.
Joyce did not think of this.
Yep, still feels weird, Joyce.
Sorry, Tristan. Joyce has moved on. (I hear she already dated TWO BOYS in college).
It was probably never meant to be. I hear Joyce is, y’know, a friend of Dorothy.
Oh, look.
Carol and Becky wearing similar dresses. Who’d’a thought it?
PASTOR: “Hello, Carol!” ((Turns to BECKY)) “And this must be your daughter, Joyce! She looks so much like you!” ((Turns to JOYCE)) “And this must be Becky! You’re in a lot of trouble, young lady!”
HANK: “Still not got the new spectacles prescription?”
PASTOR: “No, I haven’t! How did you guess?”
Becky is dressed for church in an actual dress — a LONG dress, yet; and Carol appears to be wearing an ankle-length skirt and top. But Joyce is allowed (?) to attend in her usual outfit of above-the-knee skirt, top, and vest; about the only addition I can detect is the long stockings. Why wasn’t she forced to “dress modestly” (as I assume Carol would put it)?
I suspect it’s a sin thing. I could be wrong in this reasoning since it’s only anecdotal but I’m gonna try.
We were a churchy family. I remember when my mom got divorced (not on par with being a lesbian but it’s all I got) she got a short haircut, started dressing more like a normal human instead of everything covered but face, and was still active in church.
However, my grandmother used to always harass her to dress kind of how Becky is dressed, because “we already know you committed a major sin (divorce) you don’t have to flaunt it.” She’d guilt my mom into abandoning perfectly sensible outfits (think a tropical version of what Joyce is wearing), including pants, because it’s flaunting your sin.
I’m guessing it’s the same logic here. “Since I HAVE to bring this ultimate sinner to church, I need to tone her down.”
Eventually grandma gave up on both, me and mom, since just to piss her off I’d encourage my mom to wear nice blouses, and the priest and I would actually bet on my grandma’s reaction anytime I wore a pair of hideous red pants to church (“that is Satan’s color!”)
That’s pretty much how I read it.
I feel like it’s the same with gender non-conformity if your parents already suspect you’re queer or trans. Like, girl with short hair might be allowed, but if they suspect you’re gay or actually a boy, it’s suddenly all long hair all the time.
“The Adventure of the Six Jennifers” by Arthur Conan Doyle.
Is that like the six (originally seven) Debbies from “The Oblongs”, or the four Ashleys from “Recess”?
Interesting: I am surprised that Carol let Joyce out of the house wearing a short skirt. When my mother was trying to churchify me, I had to wear a dress or a skirt, and it had to fall below my knees.
Are Carol’s standards looser, or is she just picking her battles, I wonder?
See my post a couple entries above, two minutes earlier. GMTA.
I think that Joyce cussing may have actually intimidated Carol a bit and she doesn’t feel able to approach her about her dress and grooming right now.
Picking your battles IS a smart thing to do in a sticky situation such as this.
Not picking on Becky WOULD be even smarter.
Lol I was thinking about the skirt thing too! I’m actually kind of sad Joyce doesn’t have an array of church-ready dresses at her disposal. Or at least something other than a fancier version of her usual sweater vest top.
Man Joyce is busty. Surprised no one tried to lead her to sin with that figure :o’
The Joe avatar is perfect for that comment. Watch out for Mike’s fists.
xD
I’m struggling to work out the reference to “countryside” in the title. It doesn’t look very countryfied in the pictures. Can anyone clue me in please?
There’re a number of “Countryside Churches” in Indiana. Maybe that’s Willis’s old church?
Well first attempt at Google-Fu:
“June 22, 2008”
Link to “Countryside Church” is dead (see alt-text of todays’ comic).
“It has a small group mentality with two Sunday morning services”
“They support missionaries through out the world” (remember John?)
Lots of versions of their website on archive.org, but quite incomplete.
https://web.archive.org/web/20011215010831/http://www.countrysidechurch.org/
Jen, Jenn, Jenny, Jeni, Jennifer and Jennifer, but she’s a goth and so doesn’t really count….
She goes by ‘Moira Thistlecrown’ now, so definitely doesn’t count.
She goth away?
Thankyou, thankyou. I’m here all week.
You I LIKE
*bows*
How long as it been since we saw a full-on, happy Joyce Smile?
She came pretty close yesterday
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2016/comic/book-6/03-when-god-closes-the-door/chat/
And suddenly I am super happy I never developed a social circle around my fellow church goers. It helped that during that brief time in which I attended Sunday school everyone my age was pretty much a giant asshat all the time.
I’m kind of surprised David hasn’t explored a bit more of Becky and Dina texting or calling each other. Theirs is a new relationship, the romance and excitement would still be strong.
But maybe he’s about to get to it.
is it normal for american churches to look like normal buildings?
Not in general, but frequently new churches will use preexisting buildings or build whatever is really cheap until they grow enough to build a proper church-looking church (which can vary enormously).
The original building that my church originally
used was used by various businesses sorta divided up after they moved out and then finally developers bought it and some surrounding property to build hotel.
Around here when a business is vacated, a church starts growing inside. Y’know, like mold.
Eventually, it’s swept away to make room for a new business. Or the building is demolished.
Y’know, like mold.
A minor plot point in Vernor Vinge’s True Names is that, by some point in the future, “Jennifer” has become the sort of unfashionable old-lady name now represented by the likes of Gertrude, Ethel, etc.
Hey, Gertrude is a programming language!
I once had a class in my student teaching where there was a Kaitlyn, Kathleen, Katie, and Katie all in one class. And somehow when I did the seating chart, I inadvertently put them in one row. That got confusing quickly.
So yeah, poor six Jennifers who probably got home schooled together…
I’m thinking of an ancient Married… with Children episode with a store with three guys all named Habib, who didn’t bother to differentiate between each of their names but instead said “Habib” and pointed at whichever one they meant
I kinda want to do this IRL
That church looks a lot like a city library from the outside architecture. I wonder if it was originally built to be a church? Places my parents would go to were generally more like large-roomed square houses or some kind of really simple town hall, with a dining hall, a room with pews, some little entrance areas and offices, and not much else. But I’ve also seen weird fancy architecture for like, old catholic cathedral type places, and horrifying televangelist mega-churches (they also made me go to one of those once)… like the giant golden satellite thingy Oral Roberts University. Or as I like to call it, the “Christian Doom Laser”.
Willis says above the the building was originally a school, but he doesn’t know if that part was part of the school or added when it was a church.
Is this some kind of future space church?
our church was very Nike-swoop
I mean, presumably it still IS, but it’s not “our” church anymore, ’cause I left as one of the components of “our”
Fun fact: La Porte actually has a very LGBT friendly church with two gay pastors. It’s called New Life ConnectPoint, and it has an attached restaurant called Holy Macaroni that they use for fundraisers.
http://Www.nlcch.org
Pro-gay AND a macaroni place?????????????
hey god i’m back
I remember when our minister announced we were going to be marching in support of gay rights and against the bigots trying to get the marriage law prevented (it was awhile back). There was a definite generation divide on how people reacted to this but mostly everyone was in favor.
And God says, “That’s fine, David, I hadn’t gone anyplace”.
“Remember when there was only one set of footprints, David? That’s when I popped off to get some fettuccine Alfredo. The sauce is so good, it’s sinful!”