Grrl Power #1247 – The ol’ switcheroo
Happy eclipse day if it happens to be basically passing straight over your house like where I am. I’m actually a little south of it but I think we’ll get about 2.5 minutes of total eclipse here. Be sure to check out the weird crescent shadows just before and after.
I hope this page makes sense. Most people have gone into autopilot mode while commuting or cleaning or taking out the garbage or whatever, so hopefully it’s not totally out of left field. I almost put a can of Pam in the fridge recently while cleaning up after making breakfast, and I have picked up the milk after having cereal and made one step toward the pantry instead of the fridge, but usually when you’re autopiloting, I think there’s a part of your brain still alert for deviation, so stuff like commuting home but missing your exit and driving to the neighboring town doesn’t really happen that often.
Obviously, this does happen to Sydney on occasion – the fact that her apartment complex has a procedure for this specific event tells you that the use of the word “occasion” is probably the polite way of saying “kinda often.” With her sleeping at HQ more often than not these days, there are ways this can go bad, as seen here. It’s a good thing Sydney doesn’t have any pets.
Oh, and since I zoom in way too much while I’m drawing and lose sense of how large things will be in the final page, here’s a look at that cereal box in the fridge, since even the Patreon version is too small to realistically read. (click for the full size obviously)
Also, I don’t care about the timeline of when the comic started vs the first season of Rick and Morty. I reserve my right to deploy comic time.
The new vote incentive is up! This is a bit of a weird one as it’s a character that hasn’t appeared in the comic.
It’s my Ifrit Pathfinder 1e monk, Fray! Ifrits don’t really make great monks in Pathfinder, as player characters they get a +2 to Dex and Cha, but -2 to Wis. For monks, Dex is good, Cha is largely irrelevant, but Wis is important as it can add to your AC and also has something to do with Ki points I think. But I didn’t care. I wanted a character with dark blue/gray skin and glowing orange hair, so that’s what I picked. (I don’t think Ifrit even really have dark skin, so maybe she’s 1/4 Drow? Don’t care. I think she looks cool.) Will she show up in the comic? I mean… maybe? Probably in a Dabbler flashback, but who knows?
As usual, Patreon has her in delicto flagrante.
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Yup, I’ve definitely auto-swapped the container of orange juice and the glass before. Fortunately it was after only a couple minutes instead of the next day.
I’m still waiting for Sydney to go to her DC Heroes session that introduced us to her. I’m not sure she’s a Corporal yet though.
She’d need to become an officer for that. I’m not sure she’s the sort of person who would do well in a command position. Not yet, anyway.
Corporal is not an officer, though. Is it not, like, the second level from the bottom once you are no longer a recruit?
Pretty sure, yes; granted that a comic strip likely isn’t the best example (lol), but I remember Beetle Baily being promoted to corporal for maybe a week–Sarge said they had to promote him, due to how long he’d been in the service. He wasn’t happy, because Killer and everyone else resented him for it, so he asked for a demotion. Only way to get it was doing something that would result in a rank change. They had him kick Sarge in the butt–which Beetle made sure to do as hard as he could, while Sarge bent over for it, to make sure the demotion stuck.
Technically, corporals are non-commissioned officers, as opposed to specialists. US Army specialists received higher pay based on skills and length of service but had no command authority, unlike NCOs. The Army no longer uses any specialist ranks except for Spec-4, so all enlisted personnel who reach E-5 or higher are sergeants.
Corporal is a non-comm (non-commissioned officer, =NCO, =sargeant-type), an E-4, and Sydney was promoted from E-1 (private, no stripes) to E-2 (private, one stripe) when she got her medal. She would have to skip over PFC (private first class, E-3), which *can* happen, but usually requires a serious display of leadership skills.
According to that other Dave, Sydney barely passed Basic Training. She will have to go back and pass some of the stuff she skipped/flunked before any kind of promotion will be forthcoming.
No. Corporals have a bit of authority. Army is Private (E-1), Private (E-2), Private First Class (E-3), Specialist (Not a Noncommissioned Officer, E-4), Corporal (is an NCO, E-4), Sergeant (E-5, NCO).
The rank you’re thinking of is Specialist. They’ve been around long enough to get promoted between one and three times (you can enlist as a PFC based on qualifications), and yet are not responsible for others. If you’ve ever seen a meme about a soldier goofing off (Carl, Skippy, “the E-4 Mafia”), that’s a Specialist.
A Corporal is the lowest level of Non-Commissioned Officer. In the Army (as noted by morn_greycastle) the ranks go Private (E-1) (essentially a brand-new recruit), Private (E-2), Private First Class or Specialist (E-3) and then Corporal (E-4), your first NCO. In the Marines the ranks are Private, Private First Class, Lance Corporal and then Corporal, the latter again being the first NCO. Marines do not have a Specialist rank.
Dude…Radar O’Reilly was a corporal.
Dave had said that the opening was based on the idea that the comic wasn’t going to run so long, so he rec-conned the comic to ignore that. Besides, since the comic has run so long, the only way I expect we’d see it is to leave this loooong running recap is when the comic ends, make a nice “full circle” ending(?) I suspect the only reason (giving her already huge contributions) she’s not only ready a e-4 is her randomness and her lack of clear and precise reports.
While working retail, I once started to pocket the money the customer had paid with. Caught myself, but yeah. Autopilot is definitely a thing.
Reverse autopilot: Been there, done that.
Poor Sydney. It sucks to have to go to work at normal hours instead of comic book shop hours. Brain not fully engaged.
She’s part of a paramilitary unit, she doesn’t have regular hours. Sure, she’s suppose to have off-duty hours like any cop or fireman, but what house fire or criminal honors that? I hated the holidays, 4th of July the worst, but any can mean extra work for any civil servant. Thanksgiving for the cooking fires, Christmas for tree/lights fires, Labor day for grill and bon fires, (including a rather nasty fire due to someone trying to recreate the “National Lampoons: The Christmas Vacation” movie house) you name it. One call I got was because some collage kids were having a party and one jock decided he could jump over their bon fire, both a pumper truck and an EMT got called in. To make things worse for him, he thought running into a polluted lake was a good idea. It got to the point that I would volunteer to do firework shows for my neighbors, they’d all pitch in, I set them off in a show for everyone, at one year I had $1,000 apx. in fireworks. It made for a nice local show. And yes I wore my gear for it.
definitely left milk out on the counter before but i dont think ive ever swapped anything like a box of cereal in the fridge lol
Portal the cheese milk to the Alari home world.
Are you suggesting that Sydney use her orbs to make one of the most advance forms of warp in the galaxy to use a dead world as her personal dump? You’re not thinking big enough. She could make some cash doing that.
Would not stay a dead world for long, and it would instantly have culture.
If Sydney could find some of the Tectonese (TV show “Alien Nation”), I’m sure they’d love to take that milk off her hands.
And then the milk would evolve into a new supervillain.
Or a jealous love-interest (or both)
The Geneva convention prohibits the use of bio weapons against an enemy… LETS DO THIS! :P
Once upon a time, my mother asked me to take the laundry out of the washer and put it into the refrigerator.
I complied without complaint or question.
She was a good sport about it. :D
she was cool about it you mean.
zing!
Totally chill..!
I love her d12 lamp.
You get extra nerd credit for recognizing that it’s a D12 and not a D20.
Just noticed that myself and was about to say I liked it too, I would buy that.
Could use the tentacle to do it. More longer reach in cas the cheese bomb goes off.
Reminds me of the year in elementary school our teacher decided to demonstrate fermentation to us by making some beer in the classroom, just before spring break. She had no idea AT ALL what she was doing, and I got tasked with disposing of the result after we returned to class. Man, I wish I’d had one of those remote grabber things back then.
When I was young I worked a Summer helping to prepare a school for the forthcoming year. In late August we found that at the end of the prior school year, the cafeteria workers had unplugged the coolers but had left behind about fifty of those single-serve milk cartons. There hadn’t been any air conditioning either.
My co-workers and I were about to dispose of them like Sidney does here, but for some reason the guy we worked for insisted that we open each carton and “pour” the contents down the sink before disposing of the containers. The sink was in a small utility closet so there wasn’t even a way to get fresh air passing through.
I used to get a milkshake on the way home from work each day to cool off, but after this incident I wasn’t able to stand dairy for about six months.
Surprised she’s not using the lighthook. It’s not like she’s trying to keep her identity secret.
I think it’s kinda funny that she would own one of those claw thingies because she’s so short.
It’s because this is not the first time this has happened.
I’m gonna assume this is someplace Sydney moved into after being hired at Archon, because I refuse to believe anyone could afford an apartment that size on comic shop wages.
Pretty sure Sydney had a source of money other than the comic shop before Archon. Otherwise I doubt she could have afforded the scuba diving trips that led to her finding the orbs in the first place.
She has two living parents, one of whom is a lawyer. She comes from a firmly upper middle class family.
I was tempted to whip out Weird Al’s “Livin’ In The Fridge”, but the milk wasn’t in there, so.
I WOULD argue that, if the milk had been open and in the fridge for as long as the comic suggests, it probably still wouldn’t be safe to drink.
A couple weeks? Not a problem, currently drinking milk that’s a month past its BBD
She has a blue tentacle but bought this grabby hand a few days ago and has been looking for an excuse ever since.
That jug is incredibly cultured and only wishes to say hello.
So the vote incentive has been abadoned completly it seems. Kinda sad for the patreons but at least the comic is still active.
Meh, only one…
When I came back to university for my last year, I came back into a flat I was sharing with two friends. They had gone on holiday two weeks earlier. One of them seemed to consider a pint of milk as off as soon as it had been opened, so he always opened a fresh pint each time for his cereal. As a result, it was common to have several half used pints in the flat, which his girlfriend and I used for tea and coffee.
Before going on holiday, the pair had clearly gone insane. They had taken all the half used pints out of the fridge (presumably to throw away, giving them a hint of sense) but then forgotten they had left half a dozen bottles on the kitchen counter. In August. For two weeks in a closed up flat. Every one of them was now a pint of cheese, overflowing out of the bottles, making the entire flat stink to high heaven.
I managed to hold my breath enough to dispose of them, opened all the windows and went to the local pub for lunch to let the smell fade as much as possible. I was not polite when they arrived back from their two week holiday in Florida paid for by one set of their parents.
Could be worse. My brother was a Marine reservist years ago. Once when he was called up for a week of training, he had the bright idea to turn off the power to his apartment at the breaker. That way, none of those pesky parasitic loads, like cell phone chargers or his TV waiting for him to turn it on, would use any electricity.
Completely forgot the fridge needed electricity.
Needless to say, he had a very unpleasant surprise when he got back home. I suppose it’s a good thing that one of the things they teach Marines in boot camp is how to scrub entire rooms to within and inch of their lives.
I’m absolutely stealing “DEFCON 1 cheese” or “DEFCON cheese.” My house has way too many times where we created “chocolate cheese” by leaving out chocolate milk for days or even weeks.
forget the milk being outside
drinking a 1 week opened package milk is… unthinkable for me! even if it were in the fridge!
Remember when she ‘skipped’ six months in space? I have to wonder who they got to clean out her refrigerator. Probably needed to call in an NBC squad for the task…
This is unreal, as I type this I have been home for 10 min. last week I had a jug of milk at least a week out of date. I took it out and put it on the counter next to the compost bin for garbage day next day… Friday I decided to just take it to work to dispose of as it had gone too far for anything else… it is now Tuesday and I just came home to a miasma. it is now on the sidewalk in front of my house where I have to step over it to miss taking it with me this time. Unlike above where it is mostly jug shaped, mine is almost completely round. God help the Amazon guy shows up after dark today…
For true miasma, though, you can’t beat the time my sis decided to make stock from the Christmas turkey carcass using a slow cooker set on “warm”. All the bedrooms in that condo were upstairs, so we didn’t smell a thing until we got up for breakfast the next day.
The stench was absolutely unbelievable.
It’s really fun when you notice a partial carton of milk in the freezer and realize it’s solid cheese- not milk… My sisters have interesting panic reactions to forgetting the milk on the counter for a couple days.
FYI breyers brand ice cream holds up really well in the fridge instead of the freezer. reverse auto piloted a full container in the fridge instead of the blueberry quart. last summer.
Ice cream soup anyone? :P I’d hate to see what you put in the freezer instead. Don’t worry, I’m at the point where I go to the fridge, open the door, and totally forget why I opened the door in the first place. Then I close it, turn around, and see what I needed, so I turn around, reopen it, rinse and repeat… isn’t getting old such fun?
If you look at the ingredients of Breyers ice cream you will see that it isn’t safe to eat even fresh from the store.
What does DDT stand for?
Pro wrestling move… or an out-lawed pesticide… neither are a very nice to do anyone or animal. ;)
I don’t know what that wrestling move is, but since it’d be very difficult to find that pesticide these days he probably meant the wrestling move. So far, we’ve seen her reflex-attack Mister Amorphous, Harem, and (in a flashback) a mugger.
If I recall it right (I haven’t watched in decades) the wrestler knocked their opponent half out, them grabs their head from behind, turns around, jumps up while their head is pinned to their shoulder, then drops on their ass. The idea is the impact is like the mother of all rabbit punches. More likely break their necks. Don’t forget she leveled Dabbler with (on a human) a punch to the kidney area.
What you’ve described is, I think, usually called a neck-breaker.
Guesticules posted a YT link for those wondering what a DDT looks like:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITPWryhrrwE
The name DDT was given to the move by Jake “The Snake” Roberts, who famously avoided the question whenever anyone ask what the letters stood for.
This is 100% an ADHD thing. I have 100% grabbed the coffee cup from the night before out of my office, walked to the kitchen, made coffee, poured the coffee into a fresh clean cup, walked back into the office, set the cup down, started working…. then went to take a sip from the dirty cup from the night before that I had returned to the office instead of the nice full cup.
Not really, I’m 64 and the memory loss has started for me, or my 90 y/o father, he keeps insisting someone snuck into his bedroom and stole his beard trimmer/remote/any random object. I have a habit of leaving my coffee/soda on the counter…
I would be strongly considering a majordomo or a “Gentleman” (a Gentleman’s gentleman. Think “body servant” or “somebody to manage things in my stead while I’m away, unavailable or otherwise indisposed.” if I were in Sydney’s shoes.
the therapy bills for said person would be excessive. especially since Sydney would insist they do Alfred impressions constantly. also, how many ex-MI6 agents become such and could Sydney afford it?
Or, a batman (Sydney would totally go for a batman, or a Blackadder, maybe even a Jeeves)
As a fellow severe ADHDer, I have, in fact, reverse autopiloted things into way the wrong place, and only realized minutes, hours, or sometimes a day later that I did it.
Yeah- having an agricultural background, but no real exposure to American “reality sports” my first thought on DDT was the insecticide.
– and spraying a snake with an insecticide likely to have long term health impacts on the people in the area seemed well within expectation for someone with an overactive trigger and underactive planner.
(of course where she would get it, consider it has likely been largely out of use for probably as long as she has been alive, is another question…)
I like her lamp.
If she is going about her apartment complex with Orbs out she really should be using the Molestorb to hold the trash safely. Is this even offsite housing though? In an earlier comic her apartment door was exterior –the press waiting for her and her complaint of them ‘camping her spawn’. Of course she might have bumped up in quality after seeing all the extra digits in her paycheck.
It’s a callback to Syd’s first visit to Fusion… “Careful! Don’t anger it!”
Sydney, this is what superpowers are FOR! Get that lighthook going!
In my opinion, that situation called for the lighthook at the very least, if not that and the force bubble.
Sydney forgettimg she has the lighthook for mundane things is such a spazz mood. I love it.
I bring my own food with me when I go to conventions. I accidentally left raw chicken breasts in the toaster oven for the seven days I was gone because I blanked on the task while doing other packing.
I had to buy a new toaster oven.
…Isn’t that what the tentacle is for?
I was under the impression that she lived on-base in the Archon building.
I can’t remember if it’s all one building or there are smaller ones around it.
No, she has a room on base for when she’s on-call, but she has her own apartment on the other side of town (remember when she got lost and had to get directions from the poor helicopter pilot who does traffic reports?)
maybe she thought the lighthook/molestorb risked breaking the (now pressurized) jug of milk
how fine is her control of that thing at this point? can she like pet a cat with it?
also (and nothing to do with this page) i’m calling the unknown orb now:
if she really is a starship and we have shields, weapons, engines (including warp drive), comms & sensors, tractor beam and life support, what’s missing?
what’s missing is sick bay! it would make sense for that last orb to be some sort of healing/medical power