The Old Hack

...this is not good. Apparently all the 'useless' artifacts are coming alive in a cascade. Somehow I suspect that each new one will somehow cause yet another one to awaken like a really chaotic and terrifying row of dominoes falling.

It is official. From now on, @mlooney is the authority we go to when we need something canonized.

I remember we once had a late April blizzard in Denmark. Not the worst ever but it was pretty impressive. Just two days later the temperative jumped overnight to low 50s and the whole mess melted. Getting to work during that was... interesting. O.O

Add in that I felt really uncomfortable when people around me started to drink -- and yes, I am aware of the irony that I didn't understand why until much later -- and I had less than zero motivation to start.

This is so important. Thank you for saying it. For example, the mass murder of the disabled is so often erased or glossed over. They, the Rom, and so many others deserve to be remembered.

Churchill wrote about that in his history of WWII. He, FDR and a lot of other brass were gathered at a large meeting at the Pentagon. But there was so much arguing and disagreement that FDR actually lost his temper and told everybody to leave and wait outside until they had calmed down. So only FDR, Churchill and maybe three or four of the very highest rankers remained, I think Marshall was one of them. So, to pass the time, FDR told about this special mixture of ice that they had tested. Churchill reasonably wanted to know how tough it was. FDR said very, then sent out for a block of the special ice and a block of regular ice. One of the remaining generals was very big and muscular and in good shape for his age. He was handed an axe and was instructed to try it. He split the regular block of ice with it easily enough but could not even make a dent in the special ice block. Next, they tried to shoot the special ice with a Browning .45 handgun. Barely a scratch. The funny part was the effect this had on all the brass waiting outside. They were first wondering at the blocks of ice that was sent in there, then got worried when someone brought in an axe, and really worried when they heard the gunshots. When FDR let them in again, they were in a far more subdued mood and things proceeded more peacefully.

I am really glad he succeeded. And I am sorry you had to go through that.

Somewhat more subtle than one Danish police commissioner's chosen method of flooding a huge area with tear gas and then using water cannon on anything still standing, I suppose.

Mph. As a kid I never did see the attraction. I was the social outcast and responded in the very mature way of taking pride in never doing what the other kids thought was cool. Drinking was one of these things. Also, my mother was an alcoholic and drank enough to ruin four lives. This led me to a conclusion I have not once had any reason to change. If I don't begin, I don't have to stop.

I dunno, eyewitnesses at a safe distance might get them nominated for a Darwin. I heard a story about three supergeniuses who found an old land mine. They dragged it to their favourite cafe and started a 'hilarious' drinking game. Each of them would give the mine a kick, then take a drink. The other guests and the owner of the cafe desperately tried to talk them out of it and then fled. A few minutes later, one of them won. Precisely whom remains uncertain as no pieces of the contestants large enough to identify survived. Amazingly enough, they only made a runner-up spot for the Darwin Awards that year.

I don't know. I certainly don't know of any way they could possibly get more bang for the buck.

Yeah, I know how that works. A friend of mine comes from a family of deep sea fishermen. One fine day as his uncle and his crew were merrily trawling the Baltic they caught a mine in their net. Some people might have cut the lines and gotten the blazes out of there. Some people aren't my friend's uncle. They secured the mine as best they could and tugged it back to Danish territorial waters where a naval explosives detail could get at it and disarm it. My friend's uncle spent that entire trip IN THE WATER holding the mine secure so it wouldn't accidentally bump the side of their boat and go off. I swear that man must have had nerves made of stainless steel. The mine got safely disarmed and my friend's uncle took his crew off for a drink. I'd say they had all earned one. Admittedly the man himself was closest but with a mine intended to sink a warship that wouldn't have mattered. Their little boat would have been absolutely pulverised if the mine had gone off.

The librarians in the big city library of Aalborg where I used to live (yes, I do mean I lived in that library) had over time developed a language consisting entirely of raised eyebrows, pointed stares and the occasional slight shrug. Unlike ASL or ESL, it did not involve hand gestures. The hands were used for holding and shelving books.

That particular line is an urban myth. Neither the engineers nor the White Star Line's publicists ever called the Titanic 'unsinkable.' It was the publication 'Shipbuilder's Magazine' which started that one and even it used the expression 'practically unsinkable.' Also, to be fair to the Titanic and her sisters, they were extremely well constructed by the standard of the times. It took hitting an iceberg in exactly the wrong way to sink the Titanic as well as a number of other circumstances aligning just right (or wrong). And when the Britannic sank, it was due to hitting a mine and someone leaving a porthole open that was supposed to have been closed at all times when not in use. I feel that once military munitions become involved, the challenges in making a ship 'unsinkable' start to approach the prohibitive.

Small aside. I just watched the pilot episode of Black Lightning. There was a scene where two cops decided Black Lightning was a bad guy and they both tased him repeatedly. It developed that as brilliant plans went, shooting a superhero several times with a weapon that just made him stronger wasn't among the top ten on the list.

The Moderator: We are getting very close to certain political hot buttons here. Please note that I would prefer these to remain untouched so I request that you be careful of this when discussing this topic.

http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=2483

Yeah, this is a Friday the 13th comic all right. http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=2485

This is possibly the best NP strip I have seen for quite a while. Susan being able to even temporarily overcome her inhibitions for some reason fills me with contentment.

Yes, but I don't seem to have Dan's imagination. For some reason I am stuck with just my own.

Plus quite a few things it can't. Those are the ones I am really worried about.

Eh, don't worry too much about it. I have it filed in the category of past glories. I am certainly not disputing that. I am the worst time traveller I know.

You need to have some manner of realistic claim or the title will not mean anything. I, for example, am an actual Time Lord. I am the undisputed ruler of October 13, 1982.

It is a much milder offshoot of the more serious Youngblood's Disease. If the characters in your comic contract Youngblood's, it will totally destroy their irises and pupils, leaving only a white nothingness that makes it appear as if the sclera is obscuring everything. The main effects seem to be that your characters look really stupid and they also start to snarl all the time. (This may be somewhat understandable. If my vision got screwed over like that, it would probably put me in a bad mood, too.) Furthermore, because they lose the visual ability to keep track of their belongings, the characters start to wear massive amounts of pouches on their clothes so they can keep everything they think is important near at all times. If it is left untreated, it will soon spread uncontrollably to every character in the comic. Worse yet, it makes the victims act completely irrationally as if there were no coherence or meaningful consequences to their actions. It is not uncommon for advanced cases to begin to carry improbably heavy weaponry and sociopathically kill anyone or anything that in even the slightest way impedes their illogical course of action. Approach sufferers with caution. If you observe this begin to happen to anyone in your circle of friends or family, do not wait. Contact a professional penciler or inker immediately while there is still time. Don't let Youngblood's spread to more victims.

That... that has the potential to turn into a "Little old lady that swallowed a fly" type scenario real fast.