Grrl Power #1305 – Save 50% on roller skates
Is there anything a bossomy hug can’t fix? Well, yes, but that’s no excuse not to keep trying.
I struggled with the layout of this page because I really wanted to include the above group hug panel on it, but I just couldn’t figure out how to fit it all without shrinking other panels to unacceptable levels. So it’s a bonus panel. Still totally canon though.
I don’t know how it works when you have a catastrophic accident and you require surgery and all that. Sure, in civilian life, the hospital would contact family members and presumably you’d probably have someone waiting there for you to wake up, assuming you weren’t in a coma. But in the military, I don’t know if they would assign someone to sit there so you get a SitRep the moment you wake up or not. If it’s a busy day and there’s people rushing around because there was an ambush or something unexpected exploded, they might not have the staff to have someone sitting at your bedside – and I don’t even know how critical it is to do that, but I’d think that if someone is going to wake up missing a limb, finding a way to ease them into that new reality would be preferable.
Realistically, I assume in a military setting, you’d probably have a row of cots where a few people can keep an eye on multiple patients, but Maxima pulled some rank as the commander of a dark and mysterious special ops unit, and got Peggy a private room. She obviously didn’t drop her off at a field hospital. Max flew Peggy back to Camp Bastion, and not some Combat Surgical Hospital, which is a big half-pipe tent. The modern version of a MASH unit.
I would also fully believe that the military would allow Peggy to wake up by herself, and the only explanation for her situation would be a clipboard with Form MF-40156-b, requisition to replace missing boot.
Of course you really only save 50% on footwear if you know someone missing the other leg. And they have the same taste in footwear. And the same size foot. Not for socks, but it wouldn’t help Peggy if she knew a 6′ 3″ dude missing his left foot. Presumably he’d wear something within ±1 of a U.S. 12, and at 5′ 4″, Peggy’s probably rocking a 6 – 8? Plus women have about a million times the shoe options that men do. Most of which are more painful than most men’s shoe options, but still.
I suspect if I was a woman I would have a decent size collection of cool boots. Every time I google women’s boots for Maxima reference, there are a ton of cool and/or sexy results. 90% of which Maxima would never wear, but they make me regret not being a transvestite.
Okay, not really. Is it weird that I think about my “if I was a girl” wardrobe? It just occurred to me one day how different most of my life would be if that 50/50 coin flip that determines our sex came up the other way. Not the broad strokes, of course. Me being a boy or girl wouldn’t affect where my dad moved our family due to his job, or what schools I went to – at least not through high school. But would I have been into sci-fi and fantasy movies, video games and comic books and D&D if I’d been a girl? It’s not impossible, certainly, and I might have appreciated the physique of my He-Man action figure in a different way, but it’s probably a lot less likely. All of my drawing came from wanting to draw my own superheroes and Vallejo/Frazetta/Elmore/Parkinson/Caldwell style pictures. Would this comic exist? I think there’s like a 10% chance. Of maybe it would be called Man Power, and it would feature a bunch of muscular, shirtless dudes with effeminate faces and dazzling cum-gutters. Sydney would still be named Sydney, but he’d be built like an 11 year old boy… Okay, Sydney wouldn’t change much I guess.
The new vote incentive is up!
Dabbler went somewhere tropical, in a very small bikini. As you might guess, it doesn’t stay on for long, which of course, you can see over at Patreon. Also she has an incident with “lotion,” and there’s a bonus comic page as well.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.
SuperheroThey're super, thanks for asking!
Meatspace ComicSeriously these are awesome. Check 'em out!
Not UpdatingNo longer updating or only updates sporadically, but definitely worth reading.
SeriouslySeriously you guys. If you like Grrl Power the check these out.
"Mature"Mature subject matter and occasionally something explicit but usually safe. Can't guarantee the ads are safe though.
Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
Sometimes I forget just how emotional Sydney gets. Honestly the extra pick of the entire crew hugging her and her going for 1 minute to 5 minutes is just priceless
Amazing job on layout. You really nailed the emotion here without the need for dialog.
Agreed
Oof. It’s like a kick go the shin, but I took it right in the feelings.
We all need a sympathy hug sometimes.
“Where’s the rest of me?”
There was a college friend of mine (a LONG time ago…) who had feet that were 1-1/2 sizes different in size. He was a member of a nationwide group that matched people with different-sized feet. He had a list of people who had the same size differential in their opposite feet, and if anyone wanted new shoes, they would post it to their group, and one who wanted a pair like that would buy a pair in the one size, and the other in the other. Then they would swap appropriate shoes.
Was this the Odd Shoe Exchange? I knew somebody who worked on technology to support that. I think it was actually pre-Web but Internet era, so the comm infrastructure was there but nothing fancy.
dazzling cum guttters hahahahahahahaha
Awwww~! T_T
*Adds Hugs!*
There were a few television series to drop out of the Afghanistan war. One was Bluestone 42, about a team of British combat engineers tasked with disarming/destroying IED’s. Action/Comedy.
Another was Combat Hospital. Multinational Hospital ER Drama. Flatlined.
I low-key love that Garamm is immediately getting in there for the hug.
Welp, I get the joke at the bottom. Haven’t heard that one in a while. The IHOP bit is new for me though, we don’t have them over here
Now I’m wondering if Dave chose the name Peggy because of the pegleg thing.
Outstanding work on Peggy’s expression, Dave. Wow.
My stepson just recently (as in, a month ago) had a bi-lateral amputation of both legs about 6″ below the knee. (For him, he knew it was coming because both his feet had become largely necrotic due to his Type 1 diabetes, which killed off his kidneys, and put him on dialysis as well.)
No matter the cause, and I’ve met a number of people who had had limbs needing amputation for a variety of reasons, there’s always going to be a lot of anger and resentment at first (even when you’re in the military and know the risks). You’ve just had your life drastically altered and have to adapt to a new way of life. There’s a lot work going into making sure a prosthetic fits properly after the site heals. There’s having to work with the site and getting it used to feeling tactile sensations again (we’re using those foam paintbrushes with different materials attached to them so that he learns how things feel in that area).
Then there’s the PT and OT. You’re going to be bedridden for a while at first and suffer a bit of atrophy, so you have to work on the muscles again. For him there’s also learning to self transfer from a bed to a wheelchair, or a bedside commode, or from a wheelchair to a regular chair, and so on. And trips in a car can be difficult… for us I’m the one who often has to physically lift him from his chair and put him into the passenger seat because his upper body isn’t re-developed enough.
We expect that he will be able to learn to stand in his prosthetics in about another 4-6 weeks, but then there comes learning how to walk again almost from scratch. He’s fortunate that the amputation is below the knee so there’s only the “ankle” joint to deal with, where above the knee means learning to walk with a fake “knee” and “ankle.”
There’s also psychological trauma that goes past the whole “phantom limb” issue. Not just in having your body almost be a stranger or not working the way you’re used to… but also adapting as well to how other people are likely to react to you and see you. So there’s also learning to deal with that a lot of people in general will likely have at least some pity in their expression, people who’ve known you for a while may take it in stride for the most part while others will have to adjust a lot.
As strong as Peggy is… she’s still in for a rough ride for about the next 4-6 months at least.
A friend of mine had some car trouble, and learned the hard way that you don’t lay down on the shoulder to take a look under your car; Above the knee, and ended up in a wheelchair. By the time I met him he was pretty matter of fact about it.
ok, that extra panel there must be colored, it’s a crime not doing it to such a cute momment
Pretty much any recovery-from-anesthesia situation requires constant monitoring, and she’d have waaaay more wires and such hooked to her than a single IV drip and oxygen tube. Knocking someone unconscious and keeping them there without causing permanent damage / death is serious.
Usually this would be a staffed recovery room with lots of unconscious patients, who are removed as soon as they wake up. If Max did pull rank and get Peggy a private room (why?) there would have been someone in there with her the entire time she was recovering from anesthesia.
Yeah, I’ve recovered from anesthesia more times than I like to think about, and there has ALWAYS been somebody sitting next to me when I wake up, or at least I’m in a crowded room with people walking about. Even when I was single. OTHO, I think I generally was just on an IV and O2 by the time I woke; They know you’re stable long before you regain consciousness.
Under the circumstances, maybe a field hospital with very limited staff? But it’s awfully spacious for that.
I will validate this comic plus add that while “the military” may seem uncaring, those in it are not. Even if I hated Peggy with a passion because she had stolen my girlfriend and she had won fifty bucks from me by cheating at poker, I would be in the rota to be there when she woke up, because you don’t allow a fellow soldier to face that alone.
I read this as the reality, you can see one of those dividing curtains to Peggy’s left, implying that she is in a ward, versus the feelings of isolation and loss that we can see in panel nine.
Hey, fun fact: your odds of being a guy are not QUITE 50/50.
There are approximately 105 male births to every 100 female births, meaning around 51% of babies born are boys and AFAIK no one is quite sure why, yet.
Pretty much every health outcome after that though favors females, so that’s why women live longer. I’m not sure at exactly what point the ratios even out again.
According to CIA.gov it pretty much levels out from age 15 through 64. There are variations from country to country.
If I recall correctly, when comparing age groups by gender it is at around 35+ where due to higher male mortality that the gender ratio evens out, then starts to cross over into more women than men alive. One can look up recent census data to verify if they want. Granted, this is probably going to be accelerated in areas and eras in the middle of warfare.
So just for reference, Dave, ‘transvestite’ is an older term we don’t really like to use nowadays, as it’s considered derogatory. Someone who dresses in clothes associated with the opposite gender without being transgender is a ‘crossdresser’ (or possibly a ‘drag queen’, if they’re a man who crossdresses for the purposes of performance), while someone who was assigned one gender at birth but identifies as and optionally dresses as a different gender is ‘transgender’.
Yeah, I know it’s annoying to keep track of this stuff. I sometimes get annoyed and I’m actually trans!
A surprising number of webcomic artists I follow on social media have come out as trans. I don’t *think* it’s me.
The timeline of a gender-bending webcomic artist:
https://www.reddit.com/r/traaaaaaannnnnnnnnns2/comments/1bnybz9/when_youve_got_about_9_years_of_history_denying/
Haven’t seen a counterexample yet ;p
Yes, thank you! I was going to say just that, but not nearly so eloquently.
I assumed if Eddie Izzard can call
himself, sorry, herself an Executive Transvestite, then it’s probably okay. Of course, that sketch was recorded almost 30 years ago. Oh, well, times they a’changin’.the depressing thing is.. sooner or later waking up alone without the limb happens. but, it does not make the morning any easier. so day one or day nth, this is going to be her experience. Hugs are good, get permission first.
Peggy’s private room is apparently an auditorium. I suspect Max invoked ‘RHIP’
@Dave in regards Comment:
You DO realize being a girl there’s no reason to assume you wouldn’t be a lesbian, and nearly every lesbian I know plays D&D and video games. So yea… not much would change.
Awww, Sydney is sweet X3
That reminds me, back when I was in rehab after some serious spinal problems (cauda equina), there was another patient who had had a similar rude awakening: he had gone under for (IIRC) some exploratory or knee surgery and woke up to find himself short one leg. When they had opened up his leg, they had discovered that it was completely rotten inside…
I know we just saw something awesome/poignant/emotional and I love Dave and this story all the more for it but I can’t help but have this intrusive thought.
” OH! Peggy is a brunette!”
There’s no rule against wearing cute boots while being a guy, you know. I know plenty of folks who traded up for more interesting clothes and many of them have even kept being guys afterwards. (Unlike me, I admit.)
Should probably check out information on the Warrior Transition Unit (WTU)Dave- they are specialists that handle that sort of thing, and Maxima probably pulled rank to ensure Peggy’s case was seen asap. Additionally there is usually a support liaison assigned to the soldier who solely has the duties to be there for the soldier, attending to needs and wants and acting as a buffer against both family drama and any in battalion drama that might occur. Typically that Soldier would be there as soon as the soldier awakened, and it’s taken extremely seriously. Unless the hospital itself was attacked there would be someone there for support. (They’ve learned the hard way that the extra support is super important)
The next step is “the hundred fucks,” each covering an emotional arc. From shock, to realization, to loss, to disbelief, to anger…it cycles as necessary. Often repeated. Then there’s the flood of fucks, followed by the long final fuck… It can take minutes to weeks for the fuck cycle to run its course.
Most common in soldiers.