I won’t say how long ago, but two idiots, each armed with a bullhorn, decided to get into some screaming match from bedroom windows on opposite sides of our quad (with four-story dorm buildings on all sides). At three in the morning, on a weekday.
Well, then you know their opening sentence will be ‘why did you break my window!?’ and as soon as you know that, the flow of conversation will come naturally. But knocking on a DOOR? They could say ANYTHING. They could say a nonsense word like ‘kashmirga’ and you can’t be having that kind of unlimited choice in your life that you can’t be prepared for. Take control of your life and smash people’s windows instead. Never be unprepared for the conversation that follows again.
But what if you break their window, and they say “kashmirga” as their opening sentence anyway?
Clif
Kashmirga isn’t a nonsense word. A Kashmirga is a goat. It is the Nepali name for the mainland serow, Capricornis sumatraensis, also known as a Thar.
Don’t you people know how to abuse the Internet?
Sam
Is it actually called that? I have looked up the mainland serow but I can’t find it being referenced as that. I just took the word from a Caleb City video where it is part of the nonsense being said when the guy’s not got his glasses on.
King Daniel
“On the Internet, 110% of what you read is completely and factually correct.”–P. T. Barnum
Sam
So what you are saying is. That Clif IS the mainland serow and has been all along.
Sam
You knock them unconscious immediately with your next rock and make their next sentence ‘Where am I? What happened? Why did you hit me with a rock?’ If they say ‘kashmirga’ again however, you have to start over with a new friend.
I mean, it’s a gag from Roomies! but Sal routinely climbed in her own window until Billie forbade it in their roommate agreement. I guess she kept honoring the clause when Becky moved in. Of course, Malaya also wouldn’t tolerate that kind of thing either.
A) You’re trying to get to someone who lives in a multi-room domicile whose…
B) Housemates you don’t want to attract, or disturb, or know that you’re there at all, and….
C) Cell phones don’t exist.
It’s less nerve wracking for the same reason Sal kept biking around McNutt trying to run into Asher and why she stole a flower from the bouquet Danny was giving to her.
What you actually want to throw is stale bread rolls. Their hard enough to make an impact and get his attention but soft enough not to damage the class.
Scoop up a rock or some ice by mistake, and you’ll most likely break the window.
Disclaimer: I am from the South and have no actual proof of whether or not an icy snowball will break a window. I also hope to never be in a climate where I could figure it out, since it means that I will be spending an inordinate amount of time trying to stop the women in my life from licking anything metal because they want to know what it’s like to get stuck like that.
Delicious Taffy
I’ve got a couple of questions about the women in your life.
Thag Simmons
Are they going to try it more than once?
He Who Abides
@Delicious Taffy – feel free to ask, I’ll let you know if I can’t answer anything.
Delicious Taffy
Crap, you followed up. Uh, questions, questions. Uhhhhh.
Why they lickin’ cold metal so much? Are they, y’know…[homunculus-making gestures]?
He Who Abides
Nah. Ms. Abides just wants to see if it actually works (Reltzik provided a way to do that below, thanks), and Mrs. Abides . . . well, her reason is actually kinda sad, and I’m not really comfortable talking about it right now.
BBCC
Eh, just have warm water ready to go just in case.
Reltzik
Just persuade them to put a spoon in a freezer for a day and then lick that. Same effect, but far easier to thaw than some unsanitary lamppost.
Clif
You never know where the spoon has been before it was put in the freezer.
Reltzik
But you can know if it’s been washed.
Clif
You can know the lamppost has been washed if you plan ahead.
Reltzik
Not reliably so, unless you want to camp out next to the lamppost non-stop between washing and freeze and somehow account for exhaust deposits from nearby cars.
Thag Simmons
Most of the time it’s fine if you’re mindful to not do that.
Personally if a girl did that for me I’d be won over. Back I’m the day it’s usually a romantic gesture that came from a guy but I don’t know if it would fly as not being a creeper. But really I’d love for someone to do this for me.
It’s less that it was a romantic gesture that time has changed and more like, you’re making this big, sweeping, dramatic gesture in front of someone’s house, presumably in their neighbourhood, is this actually something they’d appreciate?
‘Cause you totally can, and they totally can, but what about all those times someone did it at the wrong time to the wrong person?
thejeff
“You shouldn’t come around here singing up at people like that
Anyway, what you gonna do about it?”
157 thoughts on “Knocks”
Ana Chronistic
and to think he’s on the fifth floor, too!
(j/k idk but that’s still some precision aiming)
Ana Chronistic
a gentleman knocks before entering, Alt-Text
…idk about Sal, tho
Clif
She’s knocking on the window before entering. She’s just using (hopefully small) rocks to do it.
Librain
Although depending on what one is… *ahem* entering, one might prefer to “ring the doorbell” instead.
Doctor_Who
She’s doing it wrong, she’s not holding a Boom Box.
…Maybe she could find one in an antique store, shut up.
Regalli
Doesn’t work in a dorm, not at this time of morning. The rest of the wing would be furious.
Thag Simmons
Yeah, harder to aim the boombox at a specific target.
. . .
Maybe you could throw the boombox.
Jeremy Betts
But you could use an audio spotlight, like the ones by holosonics :p not quite the same though…
Clif
An audio spotlight is even harder to throw and hit a specific target.
ValdVin
I won’t say how long ago, but two idiots, each armed with a bullhorn, decided to get into some screaming match from bedroom windows on opposite sides of our quad (with four-story dorm buildings on all sides). At three in the morning, on a weekday.
The good old days!
ValdVin
Oh, and let’s not forget:
Boys will be boys!
They’re just letting off some steam!
And (today, decades later) campus PC is out of control!
Regalli
That is grounds for murder.
He Who Abides
Murder? What murder? These two loudmouths clearly each stabbed themselves in the back, no other possible solution.
Librain
Probably threw themselves out the window afterwards, too.
Ragingagnostic
Why would she care? She’s about to commit vandelism by throwing rocks!
Clif
I choose to believe that you are replying to Regalli’s comment.
GeekRyuu
But what would she play? The kids aren’t really into Peter Gabriel anymore.
Wagstaff
Woah! Just where did she get that alluring jacket?!?!
Doctor_Who
Shops at the same motorcycle store as Rosa Diaz?
Hey, she may have given up the bike, but that doesn’t mean she has to give up the sweet style.
Thag Simmons
a store, probably
BBCC
She looks so GOOD in red. I love that she’s wearing it more.
Reltzik
It’s Sal. She either paid for it herself or she “stole” it.
Clif
It’s a jacket. What makes it alluring? Other than the fact Sal is wearing it I mean.
Thag Simmons
It’s a nice red jacket.
Those are cool
Needfuldoer
Isn’t that the red leather jacket she’s always had? The one Becky borrowed that one time ca. Joyce’s dorm party?
https://www.dumbingofage.com/2015/comic/book-5/03-the-butterflies-fly-away/painful-2/
BBCC
No, this one is darker, with a smaller collar and a seam going up the side of the sleeves.
Needfuldoer
I don’t know, those changes could be chalked up to art style evolution too.
Clif
Art style evolution is not a thing. Comic artists just kill old characters off and sneak new replacement characters in and hope no-one notices.
David M Willis
Sal actually has six nigh-identical red jackets. When we see the final red jacket, the strip will end.
Needfuldoer
Okay I don’t care if you’re joking or not, as far as I’m concerned that’s canon.
@Clif: But this isn’t a strip about a quiet mill town where the population is 50% sapient AIs and 50% quirky townies (there’s some overlap)…
BBCC
I guess but when other outfits show up in the new art style, they still look the same shades-and-seams wise.
Rectilinear Propagation
Why is throwing rocks less nerve wracking than knocking on the door? Easier to pretend you’re just trying to annoy someone?
Sam
Well, then you know their opening sentence will be ‘why did you break my window!?’ and as soon as you know that, the flow of conversation will come naturally. But knocking on a DOOR? They could say ANYTHING. They could say a nonsense word like ‘kashmirga’ and you can’t be having that kind of unlimited choice in your life that you can’t be prepared for. Take control of your life and smash people’s windows instead. Never be unprepared for the conversation that follows again.
King Daniel
But what if you break their window, and they say “kashmirga” as their opening sentence anyway?
Clif
Kashmirga isn’t a nonsense word. A Kashmirga is a goat. It is the Nepali name for the mainland serow, Capricornis sumatraensis, also known as a Thar.
Don’t you people know how to abuse the Internet?
Sam
Is it actually called that? I have looked up the mainland serow but I can’t find it being referenced as that. I just took the word from a Caleb City video where it is part of the nonsense being said when the guy’s not got his glasses on.
King Daniel
“On the Internet, 110% of what you read is completely and factually correct.” –P. T. Barnum
Sam
So what you are saying is. That Clif IS the mainland serow and has been all along.
Sam
You knock them unconscious immediately with your next rock and make their next sentence ‘Where am I? What happened? Why did you hit me with a rock?’ If they say ‘kashmirga’ again however, you have to start over with a new friend.
Roborat
Just panic and say: “Burma”.
TheLurkerAbove
This is Sal, she doesn’t like conformity.
Also a bit of a running gag from the Walkyverse; see alt-text.
Dr. T
I mean, it’s a gag from Roomies! but Sal routinely climbed in her own window until Billie forbade it in their roommate agreement. I guess she kept honoring the clause when Becky moved in. Of course, Malaya also wouldn’t tolerate that kind of thing either.
Matthew E Davis
This is why the red jacket is giving me Semme vibes.
Reltzik
It makes more sense when…
A) You’re trying to get to someone who lives in a multi-room domicile whose…
B) Housemates you don’t want to attract, or disturb, or know that you’re there at all, and….
C) Cell phones don’t exist.
Sal’s just a traditionalist at heart.
Spencer
It’s less nerve wracking for the same reason Sal kept biking around McNutt trying to run into Asher and why she stole a flower from the bouquet Danny was giving to her.
Deanatay
Because normal people HATE windows.
Citizen Octopus
Remember kids, “normality” is subjective!
Clif
Remember kids, “normality” is boring!
Fixed that for you.
Opus the Poet
Normal is at right angles to the current reality, it’s an engineering term.
Vukodlak
What you actually want to throw is stale bread rolls. Their hard enough to make an impact and get his attention but soft enough not to damage the class.
Thag Simmons
Or maybe a snowball? There’s a lot to go around.
He Who Abides
Scoop up a rock or some ice by mistake, and you’ll most likely break the window.
Disclaimer: I am from the South and have no actual proof of whether or not an icy snowball will break a window. I also hope to never be in a climate where I could figure it out, since it means that I will be spending an inordinate amount of time trying to stop the women in my life from licking anything metal because they want to know what it’s like to get stuck like that.
Delicious Taffy
I’ve got a couple of questions about the women in your life.
Thag Simmons
Are they going to try it more than once?
He Who Abides
@Delicious Taffy – feel free to ask, I’ll let you know if I can’t answer anything.
Delicious Taffy
Crap, you followed up. Uh, questions, questions. Uhhhhh.
Why they lickin’ cold metal so much? Are they, y’know…[homunculus-making gestures]?
He Who Abides
Nah. Ms. Abides just wants to see if it actually works (Reltzik provided a way to do that below, thanks), and Mrs. Abides . . . well, her reason is actually kinda sad, and I’m not really comfortable talking about it right now.
BBCC
Eh, just have warm water ready to go just in case.
Reltzik
Just persuade them to put a spoon in a freezer for a day and then lick that. Same effect, but far easier to thaw than some unsanitary lamppost.
Clif
You never know where the spoon has been before it was put in the freezer.
Reltzik
But you can know if it’s been washed.
Clif
You can know the lamppost has been washed if you plan ahead.
Reltzik
Not reliably so, unless you want to camp out next to the lamppost non-stop between washing and freeze and somehow account for exhaust deposits from nearby cars.
Thag Simmons
Most of the time it’s fine if you’re mindful to not do that.
Roborat
Wouldn’t the teacher get mad if you are throwing stuff in class?
Sirksome
Stay cool Sal.
Clif
When has she not?
Disastroid
Sal, you hopeless romantic. Next thing you know she’ll be out there blasting Peter Gabriel from a boom box.
newlland(Henryvolt)
Personally if a girl did that for me I’d be won over. Back I’m the day it’s usually a romantic gesture that came from a guy but I don’t know if it would fly as not being a creeper. But really I’d love for someone to do this for me.
Spencer
It’s less that it was a romantic gesture that time has changed and more like, you’re making this big, sweeping, dramatic gesture in front of someone’s house, presumably in their neighbourhood, is this actually something they’d appreciate?
‘Cause you totally can, and they totally can, but what about all those times someone did it at the wrong time to the wrong person?
thejeff
“You shouldn’t come around here singing up at people like that
Anyway, what you gonna do about it?”
Reltzik
This sounds more like a Danny move than a Sal one.
Kravis