Thus begins the shift to a full-time bowling comic
Freemage
From here on out, the format will shift to an ever-changing cast of characters, sitting on the benches, making small talk and occasionally commenting on the off-screen character whose turn it is. As DoA can carry on for quite some time as a successful comic on the strength of everyone’s enjoyment of the characters themselves, this will inspire imitators.
And thus, “Bowling Comics” will become the new Gamer Comics, replacing the soft sofa with hard benches, and video game references with obscure bowling rule references.
Alternately: when the university slowly over decades subsumes the city it’s in so that by a century out the entire city *will* be the University
OngoingConversation
And when it meets with other towns, other cities, it takes them into itself, absorbs them until soon there is no land left …
Corey C.
That is basically my old college of SCAD and how a good quarter of the buildings in Savannah belong to the college. Last time I visited Savannah in 2019 the college had bought a whole city block and was going to demolish it to make dorms, which greatly saddened me because one of the buildings on the block was this awesome sushi restaurant that I went to whenever I had a bad day. RIP Wasabi’s.
clif
On the other hand, back in the day having a bowling lane in the student center wasn’t at all uncommon. I have no idea nowadays.
Allen Alberti
feels like that here in Raleigh sometimes
Wizard
Over half of Bloomington’s population consists of IU students, faculty and employees. Then there’s all the businesses that exist mostly to serve students. They do have some other significant businesses, but many of them were attracted precisely because of IU. The town would a wide spot in the road without the university
I didn’t know about a bowling alley when I was a grad student there, or I don’t remember it. But there were 28,000 undergrads (even more now), plus 7,000 grad students; it’s basically a small town inside the town. So I’m not shocked that it would have some town-like amenities.
That’s not that unusual. There was one at the University Center where I went to school.
I say was because they decided the building wasn’t fancy enough a decade or so ago and bulldozed it. The new building does not have one.
I went to a big university (not IU) and rumor has it that there was a bowling alley deep in the bowels of the student union. But you needed, like, a membership to go there, I guess. I never saw it with my own eyes.
Also: Bowling, rollerskating, AND trampolining? Joyce’s youth group sounds lit.
The University of Arizona student union has been totally redone since I was a student back in what the kids call, “The Late 1900s”, but back when I went there we had a bowling alley and pool hall.
Accurate, one of the only times I went bowling (outside of birthday parties) was when my freshman roommate, who did a Youth Group thing, had a bowling event and she invited me with. Which is a shame cause I honestly enjoy bowling… I’m shit at it, but it’s fun.
Bowling is absolutely one of those things that can be very fun, even if you’re utter crap at it. I’ve bowled on rare occasions since my 20s (did a bit more as yout’), and I’m not sure I’ve ever broken 150. But I’ve enjoyed every game I ever played, just because it’s a good option to socialize with a small group of friends.
That’s very true, bowling makes for a great lax environment to get together, enjoy some tasty food, and shoot the shit while waiting for your turn to bowl.
You know, it occurs to me that I’ve gone roller skating easily a dozen times in my mife, and I still can’t skate. I was always the guy slowly going around the room within arms reach of the wall.
And awkwardly trying to participate in the Chicken Dance.
Keep your knees bent, your toes pointed outward in a V, and shift your weight from one leg to another without lifting them! Keeping the knees bent is the single best step to start skating, personally. It’s easier to keep balance and control your fall if you start to lose. (There are also youtube videos with cool ladies demonstrating how to skate).
More related to the comic, I feel like rollerskating and bowling are somehow connected activities? The smooth, smooth floor and high probability to smash a finger.
Rollerskating I learned quite easily, even though I only started as an adult. Rollerblading too.
Iceskating? Not so much.
Tried four times, injured myself falling three of them. It looks so effortless and fun. *sigh*
Huh. That’s the weird combination to me. Because I’d ice skated for forever once I tried rollerblading and rollerblading was exactly the same. Then I tried non-inline skates and absolutely could. not. move. Rollerblading and ice skating for me are identical other then temperature and Do Not Snowplow Stop on rollerblades. Roller skating, though? Completely different animal.
Very possible. I don’t know if we’re out of the stage where Asma/Raidah comics are being inserted into an already written buffer, and even if we are, assuming the joke is that they asked Sal instead I see the sense in structuring it so we get the punchline during the date.
Who but the audience is relevant?
Those characters are all just narrative vehicles, painstakingly constructed for us readers. They are not people, just mirror-neuron induced transissible memes meant for us to empathize.
And yes, this… “morality question” resulting from an indecisive, interrupted talk was very deliberately meant to make readers question and fight.
Y´know, good art making people engage, think, exchange reception…
It’s amusing that for so long people were arguing that Joyce was straight and just acted gay because Becky warped her idea of what friendship was supposed to look like, and now Dorothy’s admitting that actually applies to her.
I doubt they forgot to ask Sal, since the mix up of having her come is more interesting than her not coming, but it does seem odd not to put a strip showing that in somewhere.
We just had three strips with Sal in them where Joyce and Dorothy were being discussed, and she didn’t mention being invited to hand out with them that evening, which seems more than a bit strange. It’s not impossible, but it’s strange.
This is the sort of thing that makes sense to happen offscreen, especially if there’s going to be a switcheroo. If Sal is the punchline, having that be revealed when Asma learns it makes sense.
Yeah but people ask about it a lot because the comic shows us stuff that could easily be skipped and skips over stuff that could be juicy plots on their own.
The switcheroo is so obvious and so easily-guessed that I don’t think it’s worth holding close to the chest – and I think that Dorothy and Joyce inviting Sal could easily have been worked into a gag.
Thag Simmons
It’s the sort of thing you can get away with holding close to the chest, especially if you don’t have a good joke about it.
The other factor is that I’m pretty sure this entire plotline was introduced in revisions after the buffer was complete, which probably encouraged being economical with how much strip-time it got.
187 thoughts on “Outings”
NGPZ
BOWLING!!!!! LET’S GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!
clif
You know, Joyce is way ahead of Dorothy on regular platonic female friendships. She had Becky as an example.
Time Sage
That’s an equally bad example….
StClair
That’s The Joke, I believe.
Pocky
the bowling arc is finally started
Kirt
Thus begins the shift to a full-time bowling comic
Freemage
From here on out, the format will shift to an ever-changing cast of characters, sitting on the benches, making small talk and occasionally commenting on the off-screen character whose turn it is. As DoA can carry on for quite some time as a successful comic on the strength of everyone’s enjoyment of the characters themselves, this will inspire imitators.
And thus, “Bowling Comics” will become the new Gamer Comics, replacing the soft sofa with hard benches, and video game references with obscure bowling rule references.
Throwatron
this was a psyop from big bowling ball all along
Björn
Oh no, it became a sports manga.
I Know Why The Mowed Lawn Screams
happy birthday to me i just learned that IU has their own friggin’ bowling alley i guess
I Know Why The Mowed Lawn Screams
There’s nothing wrong about that btw, i just always find it funny whenever a university has the means to function as it’s own city-state
Lanz
Alternately: when the university slowly over decades subsumes the city it’s in so that by a century out the entire city *will* be the University
OngoingConversation
And when it meets with other towns, other cities, it takes them into itself, absorbs them until soon there is no land left …
Corey C.
That is basically my old college of SCAD and how a good quarter of the buildings in Savannah belong to the college. Last time I visited Savannah in 2019 the college had bought a whole city block and was going to demolish it to make dorms, which greatly saddened me because one of the buildings on the block was this awesome sushi restaurant that I went to whenever I had a bad day. RIP Wasabi’s.
clif
On the other hand, back in the day having a bowling lane in the student center wasn’t at all uncommon. I have no idea nowadays.
Allen Alberti
feels like that here in Raleigh sometimes
Wizard
Over half of Bloomington’s population consists of IU students, faculty and employees. Then there’s all the businesses that exist mostly to serve students. They do have some other significant businesses, but many of them were attracted precisely because of IU. The town would a wide spot in the road without the university
NGPZ
Happy birthday to you!
The world is a zoo!
We wish you a great party!
And some bowling balls too!
🥳 🪅 🎉 🎂 🎈 🎊 🎁 🎳
Dot
IU has its own bowling team! Idk how well-regarded they are.
KtBear
Indiana Tech is 7th amongst collegiate bowling teams nationally, so pretty good. Bloomington on the other hand don’t feature.
drs
I didn’t know about a bowling alley when I was a grad student there, or I don’t remember it. But there were 28,000 undergrads (even more now), plus 7,000 grad students; it’s basically a small town inside the town. So I’m not shocked that it would have some town-like amenities.
Victor Mortimer
That’s not that unusual. There was one at the University Center where I went to school.
I say was because they decided the building wasn’t fancy enough a decade or so ago and bulldozed it. The new building does not have one.
Leadsynth
I went to a big university (not IU) and rumor has it that there was a bowling alley deep in the bowels of the student union. But you needed, like, a membership to go there, I guess. I never saw it with my own eyes.
Also: Bowling, rollerskating, AND trampolining? Joyce’s youth group sounds lit.
Poewar
The University of Arizona student union has been totally redone since I was a student back in what the kids call, “The Late 1900s”, but back when I went there we had a bowling alley and pool hall.
Caro
FSU does too
Doopyboop
Accurate, one of the only times I went bowling (outside of birthday parties) was when my freshman roommate, who did a Youth Group thing, had a bowling event and she invited me with. Which is a shame cause I honestly enjoy bowling… I’m shit at it, but it’s fun.
Freemage
Bowling is absolutely one of those things that can be very fun, even if you’re utter crap at it. I’ve bowled on rare occasions since my 20s (did a bit more as yout’), and I’m not sure I’ve ever broken 150. But I’ve enjoyed every game I ever played, just because it’s a good option to socialize with a small group of friends.
Doopyboop
That’s very true, bowling makes for a great lax environment to get together, enjoy some tasty food, and shoot the shit while waiting for your turn to bowl.
AshleyMagica
Oh shit. Didn’t think we’d get to this bowling alley until September.
Doctor_Who
You know, it occurs to me that I’ve gone roller skating easily a dozen times in my mife, and I still can’t skate. I was always the guy slowly going around the room within arms reach of the wall.
And awkwardly trying to participate in the Chicken Dance.
Yumi
Oh yeah, I preferred to roll over to the carpeted arcade area where I was less like likely to fall and also could play arcade games.
EmCaCo
Keep your knees bent, your toes pointed outward in a V, and shift your weight from one leg to another without lifting them! Keeping the knees bent is the single best step to start skating, personally. It’s easier to keep balance and control your fall if you start to lose. (There are also youtube videos with cool ladies demonstrating how to skate).
More related to the comic, I feel like rollerskating and bowling are somehow connected activities? The smooth, smooth floor and high probability to smash a finger.
ResRam
Rollerskating I learned quite easily, even though I only started as an adult. Rollerblading too.
Iceskating? Not so much.
Tried four times, injured myself falling three of them. It looks so effortless and fun. *sigh*
Dara
Huh. That’s the weird combination to me. Because I’d ice skated for forever once I tried rollerblading and rollerblading was exactly the same. Then I tried non-inline skates and absolutely could. not. move. Rollerblading and ice skating for me are identical other then temperature and Do Not Snowplow Stop on rollerblades. Roller skating, though? Completely different animal.
Taeryn
The first, and last, time i went roller skating i broke my arm, and have been terrified of skates ever since
Nono
The moment when Dorothy realized that this is one area of society where Joyce was more well-adjusted than she was.
Doctor_Who
So you’re saying she;s out of her element?
What, it’s a bowling arc, Big Lebowski quotes are inevitable!
I’m just trying to…get the ball rolling!
Slartibeast Button, BIA
Who ends up with Mike’s ashes blown back in their face?
Thing 2
Dunno, but I got my first partner’s ashes back in the face despite carefully throwing them to leeward.
clif
I approve of the Mike reference, with no idea where it came from.
Needfuldoer
Those Mike references really tie the comments together.
NGPZ
iiirc Mike was buried? :0
brionl
One of these days I want to do Indiana Lebowski as a Halloween costume.
“Like, it belongs in a museum, man!”
“This rug ties the whole tomb together.”
Dandi_Andi
All these years and i never noticed the easy “out of your league” joke that movie never made until now.
Sirksome
Real question. Do they remember why they were going bowling in the first place? Did that stuff happen off panel?
Thag Simmons
Very possible. I don’t know if we’re out of the stage where Asma/Raidah comics are being inserted into an already written buffer, and even if we are, assuming the joke is that they asked Sal instead I see the sense in structuring it so we get the punchline during the date.
clif
But did they even remember to invite Sal. Last we saw Sal she was talking to Joe.
Rosicrucian
Dorothy put it in her planner, put a post-it note on the cover of her planner, and put a reminder in her phone to check her planner.
Byron Orpheus
Like Dorothy and Joyce don’t already have a shared calendar.
Nono
Also the talk with Joe that Joyce keeps putting off is going to be over her head like a Sword of Damocles every time she appears in a strip isn’t it
She’s going to be making dinner and people are going to be all “before talking to Joe?!?? Hisssss”
apocryphascribe
I don’t think that talk is going to make much of a difference at this point to anyone except the audience.
Lumino
True, but that’s the point. Seeing Joyce being willing to have the conversation, regardless of what comes from it, is her respecting Joe’s feelings.
Every time she ignores it is her ignoring his feelings, for sometimes reasonable (usually not) reasons.
ResRam
Who but the audience is relevant?
Those characters are all just narrative vehicles, painstakingly constructed for us readers. They are not people, just mirror-neuron induced transissible memes meant for us to empathize.
And yes, this… “morality question” resulting from an indecisive, interrupted talk was very deliberately meant to make readers question and fight.
Y´know, good art making people engage, think, exchange reception…
Thing 2
Good Lord, you mean they are not real?
Needfuldoer
They’re never getting to the
fireworks factoryserious talk. :(thejeff
Unless somethings already been deleted, you’re the first (and only?) person to bring it up.
RedComet
I just realized that if Sal does come she’s bringing Danny with her. It’s karaoke all over again!
Morrison
Wow
Astariel
Last panel Joyce is adorable and very funny.
It’s amusing that for so long people were arguing that Joyce was straight and just acted gay because Becky warped her idea of what friendship was supposed to look like, and now Dorothy’s admitting that actually applies to her.
They forgot to ask Sal to come, didn’t they?
Stormtide Leviathan
I doubt they forgot to ask Sal, since the mix up of having her come is more interesting than her not coming, but it does seem odd not to put a strip showing that in somewhere.
Astariel
We just had three strips with Sal in them where Joyce and Dorothy were being discussed, and she didn’t mention being invited to hand out with them that evening, which seems more than a bit strange. It’s not impossible, but it’s strange.
Slartibeast Button, BIA
Has she ever been to Spain?
Did she kinda like the music?
Dot
So uh did thy tell Sal that this was happening or did they just bail on doing the one thing Asma asked of them
Dot
Or Alice but they probably think Asma meant Sal
Sirksome
What are the odds of some convenient and or wacky development that absolves them here?
Dot
For a couple of atheists, they’ve sure got the big guy upstairs looking out for them
Thag Simmons
This is the sort of thing that makes sense to happen offscreen, especially if there’s going to be a switcheroo. If Sal is the punchline, having that be revealed when Asma learns it makes sense.
Shepsquared
Yeah but people ask about it a lot because the comic shows us stuff that could easily be skipped and skips over stuff that could be juicy plots on their own.
Dot
The switcheroo is so obvious and so easily-guessed that I don’t think it’s worth holding close to the chest – and I think that Dorothy and Joyce inviting Sal could easily have been worked into a gag.
Thag Simmons
It’s the sort of thing you can get away with holding close to the chest, especially if you don’t have a good joke about it.
The other factor is that I’m pretty sure this entire plotline was introduced in revisions after the buffer was complete, which probably encouraged being economical with how much strip-time it got.
Sirksome