Is Monica’s discomfort based on that music device getting pressed into her ribs, or the fact that this Gorgon has no concept of personal space, speeds other than zero and 100, or clothes?
I don’t usually go for political jokes on my webcomics, but I have to admit…I’d laugh at that one no matter what group was lumped into the “sawdust for brains” category.
‘S cool. Just needed a third, highly implausible thing. I’m not very political, I don’t think I know what a red-stater is. Anyway, back to the semi-nekkers lady….
Meh…I’m from Texas, and I say “hun” all the time. Also, you can find some very fun southern/Texas blend accents that sound similar to Euryale once you get into East Texas…but I have to admit there is a better chance of catching her particular accent in other southern states.
I think that the “as’n” and “if’n” are actually more telling about the region her accent comes from. That’s not a Texas thing. I think I’ll throw Georgia into the ring on this one. I keep hearing Paula Deen in my head.
Julie,
The “as’n” and “if’n” sound like an Ozark accent. They also say “you’ns” instead of y’all. For those who don’t know the Ozarks, they are in southern Missouri and Northern Arkansas.
as’n and if’n are used in the coal country, especially in the less well known areas by the older people. I think it’s died out in the younger (under 30) people.
The holiday is “La Dia de Los Muertos”, or the day of the dead. At the same time, “La Dia de la Muerta” would be the day of the dead woman. Both could work in their own ways, I suppose.
“La Dia de la Muerta” is celebrated in many English-speaking countries, under the name “Saint Tina’s Day”. She’s the patroness saint of college students (during finals), long-haul truck drivers, and all insomniacs.
ya know… I’ll bet that’s why our world has seen so very few “mythological” creatures for the last fourteen hundred or so years (the period of the CM Loops)… after the first few loops, i guess that somebody that was still in the library when it actually looped back to the past went out and told all the rest of the patrons about the loop and they all started hanging out at the Library! (it is outside the effect of the loops)… now that the CM loops are done with and time is continuing, they’ll be popping up like crazy, since this is a new time for all of them, not just reliving an old one.
Could be, but as far as we know, the Library only receives books, not creates them.
Heck, Shelinx might have written the whole thing up while she languished in the TTF. Nothing much else to do. Perhaps even embellished it a bit from sheer boredom. Monica is probably a demi-goddess on a quest. With her god-like trio of protectors, she bravely battles the forces of Maya, wresting the galaxy from the clutches of the CM monster. She saves the latest would-be sacrificial maiden to the monster by cleverly causing devine light to reflect through the 4 power crystals she collected in her quest.
And, of course, the titanic struggle with the vast horde of demons in which she personally hacks up dozens hundreds of them while the golems are frozen in place. In the end she rips open her bodice and sucks up the rest using her two huge black hole vortex generators! Provided by Zeus Inc. on her last visit to Olympus.
Then consider Death’s Auto-Biographies, books that constantly update themselves – each one records every detail of one person’s life, and there is one for every future client.
Combine the characteristics of L-Space, the Biblioteki and the Auto-Biographies …
Apparently the library does get the printed editions of Wapsi Square. I suppose if they’re out where people can find them easily, that means Phix approves of how Pablo draws her.
Not me. I’ve been accused of being a heating unit far too many times to have the power to turn someone into ice. (That and my enjoyment of nudity ends beyond my front door.)
I’ve read books in the nude and have already admitted owning an MP3 player that looks just like that. But a quick self examination that my hair does not look like Euryale’s (nor does my chest). But this is the internet; you only know what I claim.
You bring up an interesting side point there. We know the Library gets a copy of every book every printed (and hand written journals, apparently, as in Brandi’s case). But how does the Library deal with modern digital publications and online formats like web comics that don’t necessarily publish in hard-copy books or newspapers? An ancient library system in a modern world.
if the Library can transform Papyrus Scrolls into “modern” regular bound-cover Books, then i don’t think it would be any more difficult to have an online version transformed into books in the same way, after all we aren’t actually reading a changing medium right now are we. the monitor is only showing a static non-changing picture of what it is… yes we can refresh the screen and get new info, but it isn’t changing “as we are reading it” so I’ll bet that if you check in such a book, then check it back out right away, it would be the newest version of that website it shows you just like hitting refresh would to the website itself.
The library is “magic” so it can do whatever it wants to.
I am old enough to remember watching Star Trek and laughing at how impossible some of their devices were. Now we have stuff that makes their communicators and tricorders look like 30 cents.
Point being that the library is outside of “normal” time, receives all knowledge and makes it available in a format that is user friendly–it is wikipedia incarnate.
Having an accent does not exclude having a needle-sharp, academic brain. Even a southern accent doesn’t exclude a sharp mind. (Although some crazy, screaming loons on the tube do seem to indicate the opposite.. )
That’s true, but one would expect a learned scholar to have a better vocabularly. Not sounding as if she just stepped out from a rental unit in a trailer park in the outskirts of the southern Elysian plains.
Don’t mistake dialect for a lack of erudition. I have seen people switch modes from casual to formal, changing vocabulary, word choice, and even accent, between one sentence and the next.
Too true. One cannot help where they are born and raised and intellect is not always affected by that either. I know people with the roughest accents that are the most intellectual people that you could ever meet, It is just that people have a preconceived notion of what an intellectual should sound like.
Paul seems to be playing on a few themes simultaneously here. A Li’l Abner accent doesn’t mean you’re brainless. It also doesn’t mean you have folk wisdom or common sense. Being a hugger is great. Being a naked hugger on a stranger is not so great.
Being famous doesn’t mean you aren’t a fan. It also doesn’t mean you’ve learned how not to act like one.
Having a secret admirer can be less creepy than having an open admirer. Mary Shelley, Poe, Lovecraft, etc. will never know how adored they are in the 21st Century. We would also all freak the {@€& out of them.
People like to fit in. Using educated language in inappropriate settings will get you harassed. Just like using common vernacular in educated circles will lead to disdain and a stalled career path. You have to use the right one to get anything accomplished.
FatUncle- Yes I’ve encountered that to, and I found it to be most common in people with english as a second, or third language. They speak each in their head as a different language in some cases.
Ans it can ruin that perfect come back you were getting ready to.
Wow…everyone jumped on your comment in a hurry, SoWhyMe.
I was going to say something to the effect of “get me buzzed or catch me sleepy and have an intellectual conversation with me…then enjoy the show while I slip from lazy casual speech to vocabulary nut/book fiend and back again”.
That said, it’s a very understandable double-take when someone with a thick accent and dialect (especially one frequently used to illustrate idiocy) either claims or proves to be an intellectual dynamo.
I loved it in Battlestar Galactica when Baltar was accused of not being a ‘commoner’ from one of the farming moons and he slipped from his posh accent into his ‘common’ drawl to prove his point that people are more concerned with how you speak instead of what you say ^^
There’s a somewhat fourth-wall-breaking instance of this in the early space-opera “Skylark of Space” series by EE “Doc” Smith.
The lead character Richard Seaton, a brilliant scientist, had a tendency to talk with a sort of college-sophomore style and sloppiness. At one point his wife remarked on this, contrasting it to his perfectly good writing style. (Some SF readers had criticized Smith’s dialog-writing as crude, over the issue of Seaton’s language.)
Seaton immediate shifted verbal gears and vocabularies, and explained to her in a perfectly formal and intricately pedantic grammatical structure that he felt that since the spoken word was ephemeral it was most efficiently used in an informal stying, while conformance with the more slavish dictates of the arbiters of the language was best saved for…
During the last hundred years are so (and many eras prior to that) most major US intellectuals have been Southerners (may have something to do with a somewhat retarded economy leading intelligent men and woman more likely to head into academia than business or law as they tend to in more intensely developed areas up north . . .)
What gets me is that she has an American regional accent, when she is originally from southern Greece. She should have an accent more like Bud’s. But when you consider that Phix has what appears to be a British accent, Euryale having an American accent isn’t so far-fetched.
No! You don’t want to hear me sing!
Try to imagine an alley cat, in heat,
impaled on a broken coke bottle and
being dragged across a chalkboard.
(Actually I may be giving myself to
much credit for being even that good)
bmonk- I’d need something like Royer Heavy lifter spacecraft- then you could get far enough away to only hear the screech-screech in the distance. Note to all the cargo container of a heavy lifter is over 600 meters across.
She should be in charge of book returns. Get it back on time or be turned into a statue out front for a week. Naked. Do it again and it’s a month. Naked and in an awkwardly embarassing pose. Do it again and it’s 6 months. Naked and used as a bird feeder.
Yes, we know that now. Makes me wonder though, if she didn’t kiss them right away, would the victim simply melt into a puddle of unrecoverable dna and water? Or if tipped over, would they shatter, thereby also being fatal?
Just out of curiosity … what happens when a gorgon attempts to ‘ice’ a golem? ( I also wonder if “ice” isn’t an euphemism. Think of how many ways there are to describe someone being killed.)
The ice effect makes perfect sense, as does her scholarship: Euryale’s name means “Far Ranging” (think explorer or wanderer) and she was associated with waters and ocean reefs.
So — why not a wanderlust maiden learning about the world as she goes? And none of those pesky statues lying about later, assuming the battle was somewhere reasonably warm! A bit like the old stab-them-with-an-icicle murder plots….
Yep — Euryale is a charmer, no doubt, but not to be trifled with either. Monica, I think you’ve just made a friend!
Anyone else besides me feel that that would be just about the most uncomfortable way to wear an ipod you could come up with? I mean, I know you gotta figure out a way to keep it PG and all, but, “Ouch!”.
Well, that is awesome!
I have never been prouder to have been wrong. =)
WapsiSquare is my favorite thing on the intertubes for just this reason.
It is continually getting more detailed, compounding its depth, becoming more addicting all the time. =)
I’ll probably get a some flame… Looking at the Gorgon in the last panel; to me it looks like she’s bald with a flat wall of hair sitting at the back of the head. Is it just a artistic style or something that was missed?
Over all I’ve liked the series and this is a first time posting.
I’d venture it’s artistic style. To be honest, I didn’t see it that way until you said so..and now I can’t see it any other way. I’d be mad at you, but it’s kind of amusing now.
This is what I dislike about being this far out from civilization. Now I want to take a piece of foam-core board and some tempra paint and make a gorgonesque hair piece…
So, the snakes are not simply part of a defensive reaction. They come and go… possibly in reaction to any strong emotion or excitement? Perhaps they appear whenever Euryale is not making a conscious effort to suppress/cloak them?
The implication for her romantic life seem interesting… per Jabberwonky’s little ditty a few comments age.
Oh, well ICE saw this comin’ a mile away! They just met, and she’s givin’ Monica the COLD shoulder already? But good ol’ Monica just CHILLS about it all. It looks like I’ll have to pay FREEZE to the pun jar now. Is everybody COOL with it?
I don’t think we’ve met an immortal yet who isn’t invulnerable to cold weather (and Minneapolis has plenty of that). Jin didn’t like the cold, but it didn’t hurt her.
Nudie-ness aside, I like her. Like the Urban Spaceman, her natual exuberance is just all over the place. And she’s as cute as a button. I hope she sticks around for a while.
Phix could walk among humans and pass as one; so could Nudge, with a little practice. I’m guessing that Euryale will find it easy enough if there’s anything in Minneapolis to attract her.
Me, I suggest a girls’ night out at Club Cerberus.
Can someone post a link of how her accent probably sounds? Having trouble putting my finger on it. o.o;
Kinda southern belle but an academic one is what I’m thinking… but I’m usually REALLY off with accents.
While at it – anyone know Monica’s accent? o.O Or any of the girls?
REALLY happy Monica is getting some credit for stuffs – especially with how she’s been feeling so useless really.
Nice to know she has a fanbase. I don’t think all the mythical creatures are here – she states she’s an academic which would explain why she’s there. And Phix doesn’t seem like the type to allow parties in the library… She’d be the librarian shushing everyone with ONE GLARE. O_O
Ok. Does that mean someone frozen by her would eventually thaw out anyway, kiss or not? If so, would they live through the experience? You freeze a living human solid now, even slowly, they won’t survive to tell the tale.
I would expect the change to be a full molecular metamorphosis into ice, not just being covered in ice so a defrost would most likely be the end … Unless she kisses the left over puddle (And we assuming that the magic ice melts). We are talking Waspi-physics here anyway so only Paul knows for sure.
Well, since we now know authoritatively that Euryale does not turn people into stone, most of the earlier suggestions for what she might have on her iPod are probably off-target.
Golems…slinky Sphinxi…and now gorgeous Gorgons? what’s next Paul, Centaurs? (if so; being one myself, I volunteer to be first) And also, THIS MEDUSA CHARACTERS A KEEPER!!!
Well, if she’s as close to snakes as her head (and mythology) describes, her ribs would be like that of a snake, super flexible for swallowing large carcasses and the like. I don’t think the similarity to snakes would just end up with the creepy crawly hairdo. But the one thing that has had me wondering this entire time….Do the carpets match the drapes?
If they match I would guess that would put a serious damper on the amount of action she gets. A single trouser snake is one thing but a whole nest of them would be a definite mood killer for either gender. OTOH, I could be wrong given the level of sexual depravity in the world. I suppose one person’s sexual depravity is anothers fun.
I don’t think we’ll see a snake tail… rather, humanoid legs. Two lines of reasoning:
First: In Wednesday’s panel 2 we see Euryale from behind, and she appears to have a behind
Second: Monica came upon Euryale from this general direction, probably had a full view of her, and did not react as if she noticed anything unusual about her fellow scholar. It was only when the startled Euryale turned around that Monica reacted to anything unexpected. I thing she’d have been more cautious in her approach to Euryale if she had seen a snake tail!
Jabberwonky, I don’t think Solbet was referring to hips in his comment regarding the carpets matching the drapes. Rather features only visible from the front.
Now using an Underground storage cavern on the moon – with automatic “poiting” – keeps the rif-raf from the funds and – with 107 cubic miles of storage – should last until mid 2013 .
We could just start a deposit at L4, 60° from Earth in the same orbit–it would only be a few years until its mass approached that of earth, and then we’d have a nice new planet to expand into.
Oh no, not me. I would never be attached to a female *ugg-pooey-spit-gag!*. Though it would be just like the Olympian gods to do something like that to me.
I’ll point out that this loving-to-hug applies even to herself, and has a very useful and money-saving benefit… clothing.
People have remarked on her going nude. What they haven’t realized, is that her ophidian shape-shifting powers take care of part of this for her.
When she wants to go out into the human world, she just has her outermost two large snakes slither downwards, wrap around and hug her… and voila! Instant bikini top, entirely in character for her.
Of course, one snake cannot do the job itself. It takes both… they are cobras.
Several people have commented above about the size of the Pun Jar, and the danger that it may break or overflow.
Rest easy, folks. I understand that the management of Wapsi Square has an arrangement to take care of this problem, in an excellent and socially-conscious way.
The Pun Jar contributions are collected periodically, and are donated to a worthy cause – the International Childrens’ Paranomasia Fund. This charitable organization is dedicated to helping make sure that children across the world grow up with the opportunity to appreciate puns, as all people should.
The Fund addresses the world-wide problem of pun impairment from numerous angles:
Educational: The Fund has supplied DVD players, and a complete set of digitally-remastered episodes of Rocky and Bullwinkle to over 1000 small rural villages.
Nutritional: The Fund has distributed the equivalent of 2500 freight-train cars of nutritious, high-protein vegetarian meals (all sourced from small, family-owned businesses in India’s Punjab region, of course).
Medical: The Fund has been supporting research into a vaccine and possible cure for monoknowcleosis, a dreadful viral disease which attacks the language centers of the brain and prevents the victim from interpreting words in more than one way.
Supportive: The Fund has supported “pets for injured children” programs by supplying a large number of shaggy dogs to clinics and hospitals.
You can all be proud of your contributions. Keep those puns coming!
I FRIGGIN’ LOVE THIS CHARACTER!! 8D
The eyes, the gap in her teeth, the Southern accent, the hugging!! She’s so CUTE!!
Great work Paul!!
What’s not to love about a gorgon who talks like a truck stop waitress and studies wearing only her iPod?
The not-wearing-clothes seems like a way to keep men at least from looking her in the eyes right away…
Certainly an effective method for entrancing her prey or keeping the attention of an audience if she’s giving a dissertation.
Previous days’ comments provide links to gorgons running into that, not all of which are safe for work.
Judging from Monica’s expression, she isn’t too enthused about this!
Agreed!
I was thinking the same thing. Every time Paul introduces a new character, I end up thinking “Okay, I’ve got a new favorite.”
Oh, ICE.
Great, she’s got a fan club.
Awww … let the gushin’ happen.
She is a keeper and sooo cute .. with her little snakes coming and going in her hair although Monica seems to need a short out time ^^
Is Monica’s discomfort based on that music device getting pressed into her ribs, or the fact that this Gorgon has no concept of personal space, speeds other than zero and 100, or clothes?
Not that I’m complaining, mind.
I would say the nudity, followed closely by personal space. Awkward!
Had to be a python in their somewhere!
Python? 2.7 or 3.0?
As Bud said to May during the access-hatch incident, “Boundaries! Boundaries!!”
Personal-space distance is to some extent a cultural convention… who knows what Euryale grew up with?
As Willow said to Willow, “Hands! Hands!”
And, oh, did the fans applaud that scene. You rarely get to ship a character with herself…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkmiefoRcfU&feature=relmfu
Check out Amy Pond playing a scene with herself.
Euryale will take some getting used to. I think she’ll be worth it. But it may take a while to come up to her speed…
I’m sure being turned into a lawn ornament also plays a small part in M’s discomfort as well.
Euryale clearly a constrictor. LOL
Sounding more and more southern belle to ME….
Also, multi-phasic hair! And turning people to ice – and does she do that to herself there for a second in the first panel?
Now, guesses on what the third sister turns people into? Wood? Sand? Red-staters?
I’d say wood, with sawdust brains, basically turning them into liberals.
Scarecrows don’t have hearts.
Stheno, whose name means “forceful”, probably just blasts people apart. So sand might be more accurate. Or maybe just ribbons.
Doesn’t sound like a lady that gives out second chances. But you can only know a person based on their own voice.
Oh, contraire the scarecrow had a heart; the tin woodman is the one without one.
I don’t usually go for political jokes on my webcomics, but I have to admit…I’d laugh at that one no matter what group was lumped into the “sawdust for brains” category.
Not cool, SoWhyMe. Not. Cool.
@SoWhyMe – Hahahahaha!! Oh, that’s a good one. XD
Guys, is this the place for political discussions? I think not.
…oh, wait. Internet. Never mind.
This was a reply to NOTDilbert, by the way.
[end MerchManSpam]
‘S cool. Just needed a third, highly implausible thing. I’m not very political, I don’t think I know what a red-stater is. Anyway, back to the semi-nekkers lady….
It’s not a political discussion, simply a counterpoint to NOTDilbert’s political comment. I try not to let these things go unchallenged.
I thought the comment was just a joke not a political commentry
it was funny
(and yes he could have used any political leaning in that comment and i would have still giggled at it ^^)
SowhyMe- And I found both comments funny. But then I come from Kentucky originally, and most people think we is all crazy.
Darn right there’s no political discussion, because I cut it off at the pass, so to speak. You’re welcome, everyone.
I’m thinking Texas with the “wrangler” term in there.
That’s not how people from Texas talk. Based on the speech pattern, it’s coastal. ‘Hun’ is something people from Maryland and the Carolinas say.
I’m from coastal Carolina. And that’s sho’ nuff the way we talk … hun.
Meh…I’m from Texas, and I say “hun” all the time. Also, you can find some very fun southern/Texas blend accents that sound similar to Euryale once you get into East Texas…but I have to admit there is a better chance of catching her particular accent in other southern states.
I think that the “as’n” and “if’n” are actually more telling about the region her accent comes from. That’s not a Texas thing. I think I’ll throw Georgia into the ring on this one. I keep hearing Paula Deen in my head.
People from Asia Minor used to say “Hun” all the time, too. Of course, they tended to say it while screaming and fleeing in abject terror.
Here in the US it seems to be more of a southern thing but I’m not sure it’s more strongly diagnostic than that.
…the one thing we Texans love the MOST is talking about Texas.
I don’t think i can recall the last time i heard “as’n” around here. (North Georgia)
@txmystic – DING! DING! DING! You are correct!
Julie,
The “as’n” and “if’n” sound like an Ozark accent. They also say “you’ns” instead of y’all. For those who don’t know the Ozarks, they are in southern Missouri and Northern Arkansas.
This here Ozark hillbilly’s always used y’all, only place I’ve seen y’unz used is western Pennsylvania . . .
as’n and if’n are used in the coal country, especially in the less well known areas by the older people. I think it’s died out in the younger (under 30) people.
The more I read Euryale’s lines the more I hear her accent like in the movie ‘Fargo’
“So that was Ms. Guzman in the car out there.
And I guess that was your half-sphinx in the wood grove.
And those three golems in Lanthis.
…and for what?
…for a little bit of power.
There’s more to life than a little bit of power, ya know.
…don’t you know that?
And here ya are.
And it’s a beautiful day.
…well…
…I just don’t understand it.”
*roll credits*
In Wapsi Square: Dia Los Muertes, she will be voiced by Dolly Parton.
Arleen Sorkin
And while we’re at it, throw in Christopher Lloyd as Monica’s boss…
And, of course, it should be Wapsi Square: Dia de la Muerta
Depends entirely what you’re trying to say.
The holiday is “La Dia de Los Muertos”, or the day of the dead. At the same time, “La Dia de la Muerta” would be the day of the dead woman. Both could work in their own ways, I suppose.
~D.
“La Dia de la Muerta” is celebrated in many English-speaking countries, under the name “Saint Tina’s Day”. She’s the patroness saint of college students (during finals), long-haul truck drivers, and all insomniacs.
Quack.
Eek.
Which leads to the question, who is penning the Chronicles of Monica?
My guess is that it’s more like word-of-mouth. And of course, ending the time loop is a big deal, so all the mythic creatures must have taken notice.
ya know… I’ll bet that’s why our world has seen so very few “mythological” creatures for the last fourteen hundred or so years (the period of the CM Loops)… after the first few loops, i guess that somebody that was still in the library when it actually looped back to the past went out and told all the rest of the patrons about the loop and they all started hanging out at the Library! (it is outside the effect of the loops)… now that the CM loops are done with and time is continuing, they’ll be popping up like crazy, since this is a new time for all of them, not just reliving an old one.
Now that makes a lot of sense.
The Library.
Or, alternatively, Death’s Library of Auto-Biographies.
Could be, but as far as we know, the Library only receives books, not creates them.
Heck, Shelinx might have written the whole thing up while she languished in the TTF. Nothing much else to do. Perhaps even embellished it a bit from sheer boredom. Monica is probably a demi-goddess on a quest. With her god-like trio of protectors, she bravely battles the forces of Maya, wresting the galaxy from the clutches of the CM monster. She saves the latest would-be sacrificial maiden to the monster by cleverly causing devine light to reflect through the 4 power crystals she collected in her quest.
And, of course, the titanic struggle with the vast horde of demons in which she personally hacks up
dozenshundreds of them while the golems are frozen in place. In the end she rips open her bodice and sucks up the rest using her two huge black hole vortex generators! Provided by Zeus Inc. on her last visit to Olympus.Well..yeah, that sort of encapsulates it quite succinctly I’d say…
Win.
Brandi writes.
Just because a book hasn’t been written yet doesn’t mean this Library doesn’t have it…
Italics fail… =.(
fair point, although it takes things a bit far – there might be a security mechanism in place blocking books from the reader’s future…
Yes there is a security system in place–they call it “The Librarian” who just happens to be a Sphinx.
Check out this explanation of L-Space.
Then consider Death’s Auto-Biographies, books that constantly update themselves – each one records every detail of one person’s life, and there is one for every future client.
Combine the characteristics of L-Space, the Biblioteki and the Auto-Biographies …
Published by the Historical Pre-Enactment Society. “Because the best history has yet to happen…”
Apparently the library does get the printed editions of Wapsi Square. I suppose if they’re out where people can find them easily, that means Phix approves of how Pablo draws her.
See, there you go, Fourth Wall broken.
Not really news. Brandi’s been doing that all along. Wapsi Square is merely internally consistent.
But this does raise one important question.
Which one of you is Euryale?
Not me. I’ve been accused of being a heating unit far too many times to have the power to turn someone into ice.
(That and my enjoyment of nudity ends beyond my front door.)
I’ve read books in the nude and have already admitted owning an MP3 player that looks just like that. But a quick self examination that my hair does not look like Euryale’s (nor does my chest). But this is the internet; you only know what I claim.
Not me
Though i want her snakes
Not on my head though…
You bring up an interesting side point there. We know the Library gets a copy of every book every printed (and hand written journals, apparently, as in Brandi’s case). But how does the Library deal with modern digital publications and online formats like web comics that don’t necessarily publish in hard-copy books or newspapers? An ancient library system in a modern world.
if the Library can transform Papyrus Scrolls into “modern” regular bound-cover Books, then i don’t think it would be any more difficult to have an online version transformed into books in the same way, after all we aren’t actually reading a changing medium right now are we. the monitor is only showing a static non-changing picture of what it is… yes we can refresh the screen and get new info, but it isn’t changing “as we are reading it” so I’ll bet that if you check in such a book, then check it back out right away, it would be the newest version of that website it shows you just like hitting refresh would to the website itself.
The library is “magic” so it can do whatever it wants to.
I am old enough to remember watching Star Trek and laughing at how impossible some of their devices were. Now we have stuff that makes their communicators and tricorders look like 30 cents.
Point being that the library is outside of “normal” time, receives all knowledge and makes it available in a format that is user friendly–it is wikipedia incarnate.
It’s also possible that this part of the library is a bit outside time as well. It may have chronicles that haven’t been written yet.
Eurayle may be from a different time or from a place outside time as well.
I too was wondering if she was native to our timeline …
hey, ‘dont blink’ – timey whimey, stringy wingy…. stuff….
havent you seen that one?? to google with you!!!
True about the hugs, tho.
I wouldn’t mind the music player that much, either
For an academic one she’s got a very heavy accent.
Having an accent does not exclude having a needle-sharp, academic brain. Even a southern accent doesn’t exclude a sharp mind. (Although some crazy, screaming loons on the tube do seem to indicate the opposite..
)
That’s true, but one would expect a learned scholar to have a better vocabularly. Not sounding as if she just stepped out from a rental unit in a trailer park in the outskirts of the southern Elysian plains.
Don’t mistake dialect for a lack of erudition. I have seen people switch modes from casual to formal, changing vocabulary, word choice, and even accent, between one sentence and the next.
Too true. One cannot help where they are born and raised and intellect is not always affected by that either. I know people with the roughest accents that are the most intellectual people that you could ever meet, It is just that people have a preconceived notion of what an intellectual should sound like.
Paul seems to be playing on a few themes simultaneously here. A Li’l Abner accent doesn’t mean you’re brainless. It also doesn’t mean you have folk wisdom or common sense. Being a hugger is great. Being a naked hugger on a stranger is not so great.
Being famous doesn’t mean you aren’t a fan. It also doesn’t mean you’ve learned how not to act like one.
Having a secret admirer can be less creepy than having an open admirer. Mary Shelley, Poe, Lovecraft, etc. will never know how adored they are in the 21st Century. We would also all freak the {@€& out of them.
People like to fit in. Using educated language in inappropriate settings will get you harassed. Just like using common vernacular in educated circles will lead to disdain and a stalled career path. You have to use the right one to get anything accomplished.
FatUncle- Yes I’ve encountered that to, and I found it to be most common in people with english as a second, or third language. They speak each in their head as a different language in some cases.
Ans it can ruin that perfect come back you were getting ready to.
see the interviews of Travis S. Taylor, he’s a multi-doctorate/master’s degree Sci-fi author that co-authors the “Looking Glass” series with John Ringo ( ) and even he says that accent ain’t everything, and that it still amuses him when people hear him talk like a redneck (paraphrased by me)
Wow…everyone jumped on your comment in a hurry, SoWhyMe.
I was going to say something to the effect of “get me buzzed or catch me sleepy and have an intellectual conversation with me…then enjoy the show while I slip from lazy casual speech to vocabulary nut/book fiend and back again”.
That said, it’s a very understandable double-take when someone with a thick accent and dialect (especially one frequently used to illustrate idiocy) either claims or proves to be an intellectual dynamo.
I loved it in Battlestar Galactica when Baltar was accused of not being a ‘commoner’ from one of the farming moons and he slipped from his posh accent into his ‘common’ drawl to prove his point that people are more concerned with how you speak instead of what you say ^^
There’s a somewhat fourth-wall-breaking instance of this in the early space-opera “Skylark of Space” series by EE “Doc” Smith.
The lead character Richard Seaton, a brilliant scientist, had a tendency to talk with a sort of college-sophomore style and sloppiness. At one point his wife remarked on this, contrasting it to his perfectly good writing style. (Some SF readers had criticized Smith’s dialog-writing as crude, over the issue of Seaton’s language.)
Seaton immediate shifted verbal gears and vocabularies, and explained to her in a perfectly formal and intricately pedantic grammatical structure that he felt that since the spoken word was ephemeral it was most efficiently used in an informal stying, while conformance with the more slavish dictates of the arbiters of the language was best saved for…
She threw a pillow at him to shut him up
During the last hundred years are so (and many eras prior to that) most major US intellectuals have been Southerners (may have something to do with a somewhat retarded economy leading intelligent men and woman more likely to head into academia than business or law as they tend to in more intensely developed areas up north . . .)
What gets me is that she has an American regional accent, when she is originally from southern Greece. She should have an accent more like Bud’s. But when you consider that Phix has what appears to be a British accent, Euryale having an American accent isn’t so far-fetched.
Yeah, well, i figure Phix learnt her spoken English from Tommies stationed in Egypt
Euryale is older than the English language. She’s had plenty of time to pick up new accents.
Then again, they’re in the Library; she might be speaking casual Ancient Greek while Monica is listening in English.
OK, the lil’ happy-snake is hilarious.
And the other one’s looking at it like,
‘Ohmygod, it’s REALLY her!’
‘I know!’
I kinda saw it as that snake is letting the back ones know what is going on
Either way – i love the snakes <3
Disgorging another earworm…(I think I need to see the vet)
Help Me Snake it Through the Night
With apologies to Sammi Smith
Take the serpents from your hair,
Shake them loose, let them crawl.
Tryin’ hard to avoid your glare,
And become a statue in the hall.
Come and lay down on the bed,
‘Til Eos’ early morning light,
I have overcome my dread,
With a careful line of sight.
I’m a man who’s fond of snakes,
And you’re herpetologically over-endowed.
You have more than what it takes,
To keep me as an ornament in the yard.
Our lips meet for a kiss,
I’m feeling dizzy, a little bit love-stung
A nip at my ears a gentle hiss
Please tell me that’s your tongue
Mm mm m m mm mm mmm…
Hm mm m m mm mm mmm…
Our lips meet for a kiss,
Please tell me that’s your tongue.
Our lips meet for a kiss,
Please tell me that’s your tongue.
The good news. It is my tongue. The bad news, it is also a snake.
MP3 link, please??
That’s funny enough that I’m almost tempted to try singing it myself… and trust me, you do not want to hear me sing.
The incomparable Sammi Smith…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFomOCT71L4
No! You don’t want to hear me sing!
Try to imagine an alley cat, in heat,
impaled on a broken coke bottle and
being dragged across a chalkboard.
(Actually I may be giving myself to
much credit for being even that good)
One of those who couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket, a wheelbarrow and a moving van?
bmonk- I’d need something like Royer Heavy lifter spacecraft- then you could get far enough away to only hear the screech-screech in the distance. Note to all the cargo container of a heavy lifter is over 600 meters across.
Hehehe!
She should be in charge of book returns. Get it back on time or be turned into a statue out front for a week. Naked. Do it again and it’s a month. Naked and in an awkwardly embarassing pose. Do it again and it’s 6 months. Naked and used as a bird feeder.
Do it again, and you’re flagged as too damn stupid to learn, and the Librarian eats you.
I doubt she would. I think Phix would shunt you to the time forest and let the other Apos eat you.
One problem: either her sister should turn them to stone, or they need refrigeration so they don’t melt. . . .
Yes, we know that now. Makes me wonder though, if she didn’t kiss them right away, would the victim simply melt into a puddle of unrecoverable dna and water? Or if tipped over, would they shatter, thereby also being fatal?
Just out of curiosity … what happens when a gorgon attempts to ‘ice’ a golem? ( I also wonder if “ice” isn’t an euphemism. Think of how many ways there are to describe someone being killed.)
The ice effect makes perfect sense, as does her scholarship: Euryale’s name means “Far Ranging” (think explorer or wanderer) and she was associated with waters and ocean reefs.
So — why not a wanderlust maiden learning about the world as she goes? And none of those pesky statues lying about later, assuming the battle was somewhere reasonably warm! A bit like the old stab-them-with-an-icicle murder plots….
Yep — Euryale is a charmer, no doubt, but not to be trifled with either. Monica, I think you’ve just made a friend!
And Paul puts paid to that speculation (see below). Ice means ice.
She’s a southern accented gorgon that seems relatively pacifistic, reads books and turns people to ice and not to stone.
Way to think outside the box.
I want to hug this character.
Her accent reminds me of Templar, AZ.
A Georgian Gorgon?
A grateful and gregarious Georgian Gorgon to boot!
Not to mention gorgeous; gently gushy, but generally good-natured.
Gee !!
Golly!! XD
Anyone else besides me feel that that would be just about the most uncomfortable way to wear an ipod you could come up with? I mean, I know you gotta figure out a way to keep it PG and all, but, “Ouch!”.
Did you notice the brand new PG-13 tag in the header?
Mike as your avatar goes so well with that comment
Was that sarcasm, because I see no such tag?
You don’t? Go google Wapsi Square. You should see it.
Well, yeah, ok, I see it there in the search results, but Yhelta said it was in the header.
She doen not mean ice, as in frozen water. She means ice as in slang for being turned to stone.
I agree.
Nope she means ice as in frozen water. In the Wapsiverse, Medusa = stone, Euryale = water/ice, Stheno = sand/glass. *from the horse’s mouth*
Sounds Taylor-made for the story to me…
Well, that is awesome!
I have never been prouder to have been wrong. =)
WapsiSquare is my favorite thing on the intertubes for just this reason.
It is continually getting more detailed, compounding its depth, becoming more addicting all the time. =)
I just looooooove reading it!
The demon wrangler and chimera-keeper?
Clue-finder, Web-cutter, Stinging Fly, Ringwinner, Luckwearer, and Barrel-rider? Oh, wait, that was some other short person.
I reckon you pegged the bluegrass on the iPod, though!
You forgot the Crimson Mantis
http://wapsisquare.com/comic/crimson-mantis/
Crimson Mantis needs a bluegrass theme song!!
I’ll probably get a some flame… Looking at the Gorgon in the last panel; to me it looks like she’s bald with a flat wall of hair sitting at the back of the head. Is it just a artistic style or something that was missed?
Over all I’ve liked the series and this is a first time posting.
I’d venture it’s artistic style.
To be honest, I didn’t see it that way until you said so..and now I can’t see it any other way. I’d be mad at you, but it’s kind of amusing now.
Oh my gosh! The ultimate comb-over! Makes me wonder if it’s detachable as well? Maybe a symbiotic relationship?
This is what I dislike about being this far out from civilization. Now I want to take a piece of foam-core board and some tempra paint and make a gorgonesque hair piece…
So, the snakes are not simply part of a defensive reaction. They come and go… possibly in reaction to any strong emotion or excitement? Perhaps they appear whenever Euryale is not making a conscious effort to suppress/cloak them?
The implication for her romantic life seem interesting… per Jabberwonky’s little ditty a few comments age.
I do hope she keeps getting excited/happy
Beautiful work on the shadows in frames 2 and 3!
Is it just me or is the “hair” having a whole conversation in panel 2?
They seem to be
<3
I like that the snakes seem to have minds of their own.
Oh, well ICE saw this comin’ a mile away! They just met, and she’s givin’ Monica the COLD shoulder already? But good ol’ Monica just CHILLS about it all. It looks like I’ll have to pay FREEZE to the pun jar now. Is everybody COOL with it?
*points to the pun jar*
I think we have a pun storage room from yesterdays contributions
Why are we storing puns now? Are we afraid the supply will run out?
[clink]
No we’re afraid of an avalanche burying us.
bmonk- and they don’t burn well in the furnace.
She is positively adorable! I’m surprised she doesn’t get cold walking around like that.
Not that I’m complaining, of course.
She turns people to ice.
Likely she likes cold.
I don’t think we’ve met an immortal yet who isn’t invulnerable to cold weather (and Minneapolis has plenty of that). Jin didn’t like the cold, but it didn’t hurt her.
well. She seems… nice.
Not creepy in any way.
Nudie-ness aside, I like her. Like the Urban Spaceman, her natual exuberance is just all over the place. And she’s as cute as a button. I hope she sticks around for a while.
Ditto!
I’m actually curious to see what her clothing preferences are once she ends up putting them on (assuming she ever does).
Perhaps something between Isadora Duncan and a tubetop with Daisy Dukes. Maybe even topped off with a cowboy hat to hide the wigglers.
Phix could walk among humans and pass as one; so could Nudge, with a little practice. I’m guessing that Euryale will find it easy enough if there’s anything in Minneapolis to attract her.
Me, I suggest a girls’ night out at Club Cerberus.
I do believe I’m in love . . .
I think Euryale is one of my favorite characters to date.
http://home.comcast.net/~ccdesan/Emoticons/Old_Wolf_Guh.gif
Like your gif!
She’s fun.
OMGOSH! NEw fave character FOREVEEEEEEEEEEERRR!!! <3 <3 <3 <3
This is adorable and AWESOME! ^___________^
Can someone post a link of how her accent probably sounds? Having trouble putting my finger on it. o.o;
Kinda southern belle but an academic one is what I’m thinking… but I’m usually REALLY off with accents.
While at it – anyone know Monica’s accent? o.O Or any of the girls?
REALLY happy Monica is getting some credit for stuffs – especially with how she’s been feeling so useless really.
Nice to know she has a fanbase. I don’t think all the mythical creatures are here – she states she’s an academic which would explain why she’s there. And Phix doesn’t seem like the type to allow parties in the library… She’d be the librarian shushing everyone with ONE GLARE. O_O
Maybe Dixie Carter on speed?
I have GOT to get Euryale’s phone number. Hse has an astonishing amount of charm.
Someone needs to introduce Eurale to Grace from EGS.
http://www.egscomics.com/?date=2008-07-04
They also have similar views on nudity.
Casey- and an equally unavailable ‘OFF’ button.
Ive mentioned it before
but those darn snakes are adorable
<3
Oh and i dont think i have read it previously
but people call ‘diamonds’ ice also
She means ice as in frozen water. In the Wapsiverse, Medusa = stone, Euryale = water/ice, Stheno = sand/glass. *from the horse’s mouth*
Ok. Does that mean someone frozen by her would eventually thaw out anyway, kiss or not? If so, would they live through the experience? You freeze a living human solid now, even slowly, they won’t survive to tell the tale.
I would expect the change to be a full molecular metamorphosis into ice, not just being covered in ice so a defrost would most likely be the end … Unless she kisses the left over puddle (And we assuming that the magic ice melts). We are talking Waspi-physics here anyway so only Paul knows for sure.
Well, since we now know authoritatively that Euryale does not turn people into stone, most of the earlier suggestions for what she might have on her iPod are probably off-target.
Here’s an alternative possibility.
She might also include some Coldplay…
maybe…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_1XdSqBQUg
Or…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_-nYA5BWDA&ob=av3n
There’s also http://youtu.be/rog8ou-ZepE
To quote ‘Something, grabs a hold of me tightly.’
That song is evil. It tricks you into thinking it’s “Under Pressure,” but it’s just a lie.
Vanilla Ice?
yea – queen sued him i believe
oh dear. worlds-and-multi-dimensionally famous.
have fun, monica! D:
Golems…slinky Sphinxi…and now gorgeous Gorgons? what’s next Paul, Centaurs? (if so; being one myself, I volunteer to be first) And also, THIS MEDUSA CHARACTERS A KEEPER!!!
And here I just thought you were a Sagittarius born in 1971. Didn’t know you were and actual centaur.
I’m liking Euryale more and more.
I’d totally buy her a ipod armband thing for xmas, though; that chest-rubberband looks super painful. :/
Well, if she’s as close to snakes as her head (and mythology) describes, her ribs would be like that of a snake, super flexible for swallowing large carcasses and the like. I don’t think the similarity to snakes would just end up with the creepy crawly hairdo. But the one thing that has had me wondering this entire time….Do the carpets match the drapes?
Ooh, talk about a mind worm! I can’t THAT image out of my head.
Then don’t click this link (safe for work).
Very appropo, good sir. The subsequent strips are classic examples of paranomasia. His jar must be overflowing.
If they match I would guess that would put a serious damper on the amount of action she gets. A single trouser snake is one thing but a whole nest of them would be a definite mood killer for either gender. OTOH, I could be wrong given the level of sexual depravity in the world. I suppose one person’s sexual depravity is anothers fun.
That’s way too true.
(I’ve seen pichers on the interwebs.)
I wondered that but we still cannot see!
I’m hopeing for a snake tail from the hips but still unsure
I don’t think we’ll see a snake tail… rather, humanoid legs. Two lines of reasoning:
First: In Wednesday’s panel 2 we see Euryale from behind, and she appears to have a behind
Second: Monica came upon Euryale from this general direction, probably had a full view of her, and did not react as if she noticed anything unusual about her fellow scholar. It was only when the startled Euryale turned around that Monica reacted to anything unexpected. I thing she’d have been more cautious in her approach to Euryale if she had seen a snake tail!
Maybe, like the herpetological coif, her hips go from two-legged to snake hips with her mental state…
Jabberwonky, I don’t think Solbet was referring to hips in his comment regarding the carpets matching the drapes. Rather features only visible from the front.
I was commenting on M not reacting as if she’d walked up on someone with a snake like body from the hips down…
The Snakes! The Snakes!! They are SOO cute.
Mine! all mine
Even those two on the end
Yes they are cute
<3
Oh… goody.
Hey, are we left with a cliffhugger this weekend?
I’m glad that at least it won’t be a Face Hugger!
The pun jar is approaching the cubic volume of Scrooge McDuck’s money vault at this point — but keep tossing those donations in!
Any ideas as to what we’re going to DO with all that wealth that has accumulated in that darn jar?
It got us dibs on the confusion corner at Tina’s Mucho Mocha.
I love it when snake hair has expressions
We should name them!
I’m the one at the back behind the one who is happy
I would put Julie as the happy one
I would think they might have names more like Ssssara, or Ssssam. Maybe Hisssteria and Hisssashi, or even Anasssstassssia.
What was that I was told about a pun storage room when I last posted? *lol*
Now using an Underground storage cavern on the moon – with automatic “poiting” – keeps the rif-raf from the funds and – with 107 cubic miles of storage – should last until mid 2013 .
as363, I think that’s an optimistic calculation.
We could just start a deposit at L4, 60° from Earth in the same orbit–it would only be a few years until its mass approached that of earth, and then we’d have a nice new planet to expand into.
bmonk: Well, that would tend to solve the other problem. With that last set of puns, I had to flush three times before they all went down.
as363- optomystic aren’t we.
you be the one closest to her nose
sure they can have ‘normal’ snake names but far better to pick your own snake and name it after you
Oh no, not me. I would never be attached to a female *ugg-pooey-spit-gag!*. Though it would be just like the Olympian gods to do something like that to me.
I wanna be the one looking back instead of looking at Monica. Looks like me with my ADD. XD
And nobody’s said anything about snakes loving to hug things… yet!
Come on people! Let’s not miss the obvious here! There’s a whole ‘nother horse to beat to death before Monday!
Very well… if you must insist…
I’ll point out that this loving-to-hug applies even to herself, and has a very useful and money-saving benefit… clothing.
People have remarked on her going nude. What they haven’t realized, is that her ophidian shape-shifting powers take care of part of this for her.
When she wants to go out into the human world, she just has her outermost two large snakes slither downwards, wrap around and hug her… and voila! Instant bikini top, entirely in character for her.
Of course, one snake cannot do the job itself. It takes both… they are cobras.
(darn… Paul, the Jar needs emptying again!)
Ahh, but it takes more than two! I suspect that a conspiracy is being perpetrated for a complete coverup.
Several people have commented above about the size of the Pun Jar, and the danger that it may break or overflow.
Rest easy, folks. I understand that the management of Wapsi Square has an arrangement to take care of this problem, in an excellent and socially-conscious way.
The Pun Jar contributions are collected periodically, and are donated to a worthy cause – the International Childrens’ Paranomasia Fund. This charitable organization is dedicated to helping make sure that children across the world grow up with the opportunity to appreciate puns, as all people should.
The Fund addresses the world-wide problem of pun impairment from numerous angles:
Educational: The Fund has supplied DVD players, and a complete set of digitally-remastered episodes of Rocky and Bullwinkle to over 1000 small rural villages.
Nutritional: The Fund has distributed the equivalent of 2500 freight-train cars of nutritious, high-protein vegetarian meals (all sourced from small, family-owned businesses in India’s Punjab region, of course).
Medical: The Fund has been supporting research into a vaccine and possible cure for monoknowcleosis, a dreadful viral disease which attacks the language centers of the brain and prevents the victim from interpreting words in more than one way.
Supportive: The Fund has supported “pets for injured children” programs by supplying a large number of shaggy dogs to clinics and hospitals.
You can all be proud of your contributions. Keep those puns coming!
Interesting. You are the first person other than a paronomasiac friend of mine that I have ever heard use that word. Your erudition becomes you.
Thanks. I learned it from one of the canonical sources – Jake, in Spider Robinson’s “Callahan’s Bar” series.
The gang who hangs out around here (Wapsi-space) can give the Callahan’s bunch a good run for their money!
Oh boy oh boy, my very own gorgon! And I will love her and squeeze her and pet her and call her “George”.
My name is Euryale!
But I can’t *say* “Euryale”, George.
(see, cause she’s… um… Georgian…)
Great Loony Toons reference! And, an Abominable Snowman might very well be immune to an icegorgon’s curse-powers.
Ah…door…ah…bull !!! *squee* ♥