Hey, chin up! At least this one ended up Ruth being alive and not on Blaine’s creepy as all hell face that gives puppies nightmares while causing babies to scream in terror
Yeah, “frankly I’d rather have died” and “I long for the peace of the grave” are somewhat worrisome but far less scary than the stuff she was saying before Carla turned her in. At least her eyes are more than dots now.
Could it really, though? Can we actually break down #RaptorGate so even a legally-illiterate individual is able to understand exactly why purchasing a gigantic plush dinosaur can result in Bad Consequences and specifically which ones?
Alanari
To quote becky, it’s “baby’s first campaign finance violation”. Basically, she stole money from her employer to buy her girlfriend a gift.
I’d at least be fired for that.
Needfuldoer
But it has “vote for Robin” embroidered somewhere on it, so technically you could justify it as very specific lobbying to the almost-19-year-old-aspiring-paleontologist demographic.
Campaign finance laws are so loosely interpreted and poorly enforced in the US…
Eldritch Gentleman
They can totally spin it as being nice to the autistic community.
ajm5007
Using campaign money to buy a gift for one specific voter is stop a violation, even if the gift is campaign merch. That said, it won’t be obvious from the paper trail that that’s why the item was purchased, so she might get away with it.
Doubtful the purchase of a plushie would be an issue even if discovered, unless there were sufficient political points to be made and it was perceived the race was _that_ close. And then Robin pulls out the sympathy stops as others in this thread have detailed or alluded to, and if she’s savvy enough (or, more likely if Becky is), The Hon. Ms. DeSanto makes the dino-plushie equivalent of Nixon’s “Checkers” speech. It works.
Only to find out that Becky went full science hog and what she thought was a plushie was a Jurassic Park style mosquito blood clone bred using ostrich eggs.
They’re undoubtedly still attracted to each other. Whether or not they will ever *court* each other — I wouldn’t take that bet at any odds. But I would take a bet on whether or not they ever have sex.
Marsh Maryrose
That first line was supposed to start with (left angle bracket Jeph) and end with (slash Jeph right angle bracket).
I’m tired of having to remember so many fucking different standards for marking up text. We have fucking regressed on that front even more than we have fucking regressed in — so many fucking areas.
Needfuldoer
HTML is the OG, Markup and BBCode are just pale imitations.
[fake] Brackets should work. [/fake]
Marsh Maryrose
I know a philologist who was marking up text in SGML years before HTML was a gleam in Tim Berners-Lee’s eye.
However, I fucking see that the fucking use of the f-bomb as a fucking catch-0all adjective and as a fucking random fucking punctuation substitute fucking proceeds with all possible fucking speed.
**reads shadowcells’ post**
**FUCKING DIES**
Oh shit. These are usually pretty good, but they don’t normally put me on the fucking floor. I have literal tears in my eyes from laughing and I think I might have peed a little.
Bravo, shadowcell. You have officially made my evening.
I gotta say, as someone that is currently going through therapy, and has come waaay too close to killing himself, I really understand what Ruth means in her hatred of platitudes.
Platitudes are those things you say that you know wont make people feel better, but you feel like you need to say them because the alternative is being quiet.
Your ___ love(s) you
____ needs you
you are wanted
you are special
It’s just another step on the road to recovery.
Those movie/comic lines that make the listener tear up from the knowledge that he/she is loved or cared for. but they don’t work that way in real life.
The listener hears those lines and thinks “Oh, so you’re out of ideas…” because it sounds like it’s coming from a prompter, or it’s being read off a cue card.
they gave me meds that made me feel angry, sad, unable to eat, and suicidal. i told them i didn’t want anymore, but they told me “there are so many meds out there! One of them is bound to work”
I know this was meant to be inspirational, to say “there’s still hope” but all i heard was “we’re gonna keep chucking random pills at you and maybe one of them will work.”
all these goddamn platitudes….. they all have a hint of selfishness or uncaring in them
Your family loves you: dont die, they will be sad.
they need you: you can’t die, you have to live for their sake. suffer so they don’t have to go through your death
you are wanted: other people need you
suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem: we don’t know if its temporary or not, but you should still keep living anyway, even though each day is painful and worse than death.
I REALLY hope I’m not being offensive or disrespecting anyone’s experience by posting this. I am clinically depressed and have been suicidal in the past. Sometimes I *need* to hear those “platitudes.”
When I “backslide” and self-sabotage in one way or another, I tend to immediately start metaphorically beating myself up and thinking I’m a complete and total failure. It sometimes helps to hear that back-sliding can be part of the process of working on mental wellness and I don’t have to start all over, crawling up from the bottom of the pit, again.
While I know that I have people in my life that would be hurt and miss me if I checked out in one way or another, my traitorous brain sometimes insists on telling me that I don’t matter to anyone and that everyone in my life would be better off if I just wasn’t around anymore. At those times I really do need to be told that people care about and value me.
I know that not everyone feels that way and, again, I hope I’m not dismissing or disrespecting anyone’s experience. I apologize if I am.
I mean, to be fair, Billie technically tried to have a second date that wasn’t like this. …on the other hand, since there was drinking, she apparently succeeded.
Nah, it’s pretty normal. If you’re suicidal long enough, it stops being a serious thought and more just an idle “no coffee this morning? Why don’t I just die?”
Do you guys not get powerful, sincere urges to lie down in front of a lorry whenever a situation becomes sufficiently inconvenient? Or like, slap your head in the fryers at work because hey, it’s right there and in a few seconds none of it could be your problem anymore?
For real, though. If I don’t get that extra reserve of energy before work, my spoons are gone halfway through the shift. A body and mind can only run on empty for so long before the whole operation shuts down.
not someone else
I think a more useful way to put it might be “when someone is able to joke about their depression, chances are good they are actually feeling slightly less terrible that second”. It’s when someone gets quiet about it and acts like it’s not there that it’s a problem, because that means they’re no longer seeking help and reassurance.
how did I just notice that Willis puts serifs on the letter I only if it’s the word “I” itself or a derived contraction, and I’s in words like “it” are sans serif
Perhaps it’s one of the subtleties of good fonts in comics.
Chris
Yup. I’ve been involved in the creation of a few professional manga translations, and capital I (the one that’s printed with serifs) is only used for the pronoun. All other i’s are lowercase (printed sans serif), even at the start of a sentence.
123 thoughts on “Antihistamine”
Ana Chronistic
ANOTHER YEAR CLOSER TO THE GRAVE
fire_daws
Sorry, another awful birthday comic for you. Still, you have the 2016 one.
Yet_One_More_Idiot
Ouch, this comment…and my birthday is only 2 days away, too.
Michelle J. Caboose
Another year over; a new one just begun.
Icalasari
Hey, chin up! At least this one ended up Ruth being alive and not on Blaine’s creepy as all hell face that gives puppies nightmares while causing babies to scream in terror
Needfuldoer
Could be worse, this could have been another Blaine and Asher comic.
Abel Undercity
You have the same birthday as my girlfriend. Clearly it’s a day that produces awesome people.
Ana Chronistic
also a significantly less terrible president than the current one
Clif
God speed, Ana Chronistic. God speed.
Oh, wait.
Deanatay
God Slow, Anna. God slow.
FIFY
Rabid Rabbit
I like Dr. Beverly’s complete refusal to take Ruth’s longing for the grave seriously. The lady gets when it’s just rhetorical.
AntJ
Yeah, “frankly I’d rather have died” and “I long for the peace of the grave” are somewhat worrisome but far less scary than the stuff she was saying before Carla turned her in. At least her eyes are more than dots now.
Deathjavu
Oh right, the other train we were watching was also in the middle of a crash.
…is there anyone we can check in on right now that isn’t a friggen trainwreck??
Yumi
Dina sleeping on her new plush, maybe?
AntJ
probably turns up in the end-of-book bedtime montage strip
Alanari
You mean, the plush that could cause all kinds of trouble for becky?
Delicious Taffy
Could it really, though? Can we actually break down #RaptorGate so even a legally-illiterate individual is able to understand exactly why purchasing a gigantic plush dinosaur can result in Bad Consequences and specifically which ones?
Alanari
To quote becky, it’s “baby’s first campaign finance violation”. Basically, she stole money from her employer to buy her girlfriend a gift.
I’d at least be fired for that.
Needfuldoer
But it has “vote for Robin” embroidered somewhere on it, so technically you could justify it as very specific lobbying to the almost-19-year-old-aspiring-paleontologist demographic.
Campaign finance laws are so loosely interpreted and poorly enforced in the US…
Eldritch Gentleman
They can totally spin it as being nice to the autistic community.
ajm5007
Using campaign money to buy a gift for one specific voter is stop a violation, even if the gift is campaign merch. That said, it won’t be obvious from the paper trail that that’s why the item was purchased, so she might get away with it.
ajm5007
*still a violation
DSL
Doubtful the purchase of a plushie would be an issue even if discovered, unless there were sufficient political points to be made and it was perceived the race was _that_ close. And then Robin pulls out the sympathy stops as others in this thread have detailed or alluded to, and if she’s savvy enough (or, more likely if Becky is), The Hon. Ms. DeSanto makes the dino-plushie equivalent of Nixon’s “Checkers” speech. It works.
David
Only to find out that Becky went full science hog and what she thought was a plushie was a Jurassic Park style mosquito blood clone bred using ostrich eggs.
jeffepp
Amber and Walkie are… oh, yeah, they’re train-wrecking each other right now. On the roof.
Undrave
Is that what the kids are calling it now?
Zach
Ethan. Is he still courting Danny, or have they both moved on?
Marsh Maryrose
Let them fuck!
They’re undoubtedly still attracted to each other. Whether or not they will ever *court* each other — I wouldn’t take that bet at any odds. But I would take a bet on whether or not they ever have sex.
Marsh Maryrose
That first line was supposed to start with (left angle bracket Jeph) and end with (slash Jeph right angle bracket).
I’m tired of having to remember so many fucking different standards for marking up text. We have fucking regressed on that front even more than we have fucking regressed in — so many fucking areas.
Needfuldoer
HTML is the OG, Markup and BBCode are just pale imitations.
[fake] Brackets should work. [/fake]
Marsh Maryrose
I know a philologist who was marking up text in SGML years before HTML was a gleam in Tim Berners-Lee’s eye.
DSL
However, I fucking see that the fucking use of the f-bomb as a fucking catch-0all adjective and as a fucking random fucking punctuation substitute fucking proceeds with all possible fucking speed.
DSL
Sorry, I meant “fucking f-bomb.”
thejeff
You’re missing the true beauty of the f-word by reducing to the adjective. Proper usage covers nearly every part of speech.
Fuck it! The fucking fuckers fucking fucked.
DSL
See, that kind of comprehensive creativity I can appreciate.
Zach
Fucked fucking fuckers fucked fucking fucking fuckers
Marsh Maryrose
I can’t be the only person who’s ever wondered if the Love Boat cruised on the Fucking Sea.
shadowcell
Dumbing of Age Book 9: It’s Excruciating, and I Long For the Peace of the Grave
King Daniel
Dumbing of Age Book IX: It’s a Step on the Way to Success
Chris
Dumbing of Age Book 9: Frankly I Think I’d Rather Have Died.
LeslieBean4shizzle
**reads shadowcells’ post**
**FUCKING DIES**
Oh shit. These are usually pretty good, but they don’t normally put me on the fucking floor. I have literal tears in my eyes from laughing and I think I might have peed a little.
Bravo, shadowcell. You have officially made my evening.
Clif
Is the best title so far.
BBCC
Well, this is gonna be a needed conversation.
I’ll keep the broom right here just in case.
Meagan
Agreed, Ruth. Platitudes may be a leading cause of suicide.
zombycow
I gotta say, as someone that is currently going through therapy, and has come waaay too close to killing himself, I really understand what Ruth means in her hatred of platitudes.
Platitudes are those things you say that you know wont make people feel better, but you feel like you need to say them because the alternative is being quiet.
Your ___ love(s) you
____ needs you
you are wanted
you are special
It’s just another step on the road to recovery.
Those movie/comic lines that make the listener tear up from the knowledge that he/she is loved or cared for. but they don’t work that way in real life.
The listener hears those lines and thinks “Oh, so you’re out of ideas…” because it sounds like it’s coming from a prompter, or it’s being read off a cue card.
they gave me meds that made me feel angry, sad, unable to eat, and suicidal. i told them i didn’t want anymore, but they told me “there are so many meds out there! One of them is bound to work”
I know this was meant to be inspirational, to say “there’s still hope” but all i heard was “we’re gonna keep chucking random pills at you and maybe one of them will work.”
all these goddamn platitudes….. they all have a hint of selfishness or uncaring in them
Your family loves you: dont die, they will be sad.
they need you: you can’t die, you have to live for their sake. suffer so they don’t have to go through your death
you are wanted: other people need you
suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem: we don’t know if its temporary or not, but you should still keep living anyway, even though each day is painful and worse than death.
AntJ
If there was a like button, I’d click it.
Jaime
@zombycow: I am so sorry.
Jaime
I REALLY hope I’m not being offensive or disrespecting anyone’s experience by posting this. I am clinically depressed and have been suicidal in the past. Sometimes I *need* to hear those “platitudes.”
When I “backslide” and self-sabotage in one way or another, I tend to immediately start metaphorically beating myself up and thinking I’m a complete and total failure. It sometimes helps to hear that back-sliding can be part of the process of working on mental wellness and I don’t have to start all over, crawling up from the bottom of the pit, again.
While I know that I have people in my life that would be hurt and miss me if I checked out in one way or another, my traitorous brain sometimes insists on telling me that I don’t matter to anyone and that everyone in my life would be better off if I just wasn’t around anymore. At those times I really do need to be told that people care about and value me.
I know that not everyone feels that way and, again, I hope I’m not dismissing or disrespecting anyone’s experience. I apologize if I am.
Kyrik Michalowski
Alt text: Yes. So, when will you two have a date that isn’t like this?
Jamie
I mean, to be fair, Billie technically tried to have a second date that wasn’t like this. …on the other hand, since there was drinking, she apparently succeeded.
DailyBrad
Got an attitude about platitudes
m-m
When a monotreme has attitude is it a platy-tude?
Stephen Bierce
*plays the Bee Gees/Peter Frampton version of “Getting Better” on the hacked Muzak*
newllend(henryvolt)
Ruth: I think I would have preferred to die. Me: Yeah that’s the fucking problem
Viktoria
Nah, it’s pretty normal. If you’re suicidal long enough, it stops being a serious thought and more just an idle “no coffee this morning? Why don’t I just die?”
MatthewTheLucky
Yeah that’s the fucking problem
Delicious Taffy
Do you guys not get powerful, sincere urges to lie down in front of a lorry whenever a situation becomes sufficiently inconvenient? Or like, slap your head in the fryers at work because hey, it’s right there and in a few seconds none of it could be your problem anymore?
Uh, me neither. >.>
Clif
I don’t know. No coffee is pretty serious.
Delicious Taffy
For real, though. If I don’t get that extra reserve of energy before work, my spoons are gone halfway through the shift. A body and mind can only run on empty for so long before the whole operation shuts down.
not someone else
I think a more useful way to put it might be “when someone is able to joke about their depression, chances are good they are actually feeling slightly less terrible that second”. It’s when someone gets quiet about it and acts like it’s not there that it’s a problem, because that means they’re no longer seeking help and reassurance.
Eldritch Gentleman
A suicidal person’s brain gets really good at being suicidal thanks to neuroplasticity… that’s friggin scary.
Sporky
Any time Billie looks at Ruth like that my heart melts even though it really shouldn’t
Clif
Love. Twu Love.
Yeah, me too.
He Who Abides
Well, this is fucking depressing.
Bagge
🙁
fire_daws
Your Gravatar couldn’t be more opposite to your comment.
Clif
I’m not sure I want to see the version of the gravatar that isn’t.
Bagge
That’s a pretty common problem with my gravatar.
AntJ
how did I just notice that Willis puts serifs on the letter I only if it’s the word “I” itself or a derived contraction, and I’s in words like “it” are sans serif
JessWitt
Whoa I didn’t catch that either til you pointed it out. That’s interesting.
mrnoidea
Perhaps it’s one of the subtleties of good fonts in comics.
Chris
Yup. I’ve been involved in the creation of a few professional manga translations, and capital I (the one that’s printed with serifs) is only used for the pronoun. All other i’s are lowercase (printed sans serif), even at the start of a sentence.