Update: changed the dialogue rendering of Te Fahn’s vocalization to match a little more closely what it should sound like.
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November 4 2018: I apologize everyone, but there won’t be a Selkie update today. Next comic will be Wednesday. I’m ashamed to say this but I don’t like bullshitting people with made-up reasons, I fell asleep midway through drawing it last night. I don’t even consciously remember doing it, just one minute I’m drawing the next my morning alarm is going off. >_>
OOOOOOOOOOO
That poor girl.
That’s even worse than the transplant student from the South that entered grade school back when I still attended. I don’t know if schools in the south still do this, but it took her forever to stop standing up from her desk every time she was called on to give an answer.
What country was this if you don’t mind me asking?
I grew up in north Texas, United States of America. We stood like that from kindergarten to grade 2 (ages 5-7). we didn’t have desks before grade 3. We sat cross-legged on the floor for lessons.
My experience may not be typical, as I also changed schools three times over the six years of ‘elementary'(Age 5-10) school and twice during ‘middle’ (age 11-13) school as closer institutions were built to my home. My little sister changed also changed elementary schools 3 times, as hilariously they redistricted us away from the school she and I WALKED TO for one she had to take a bus.
The United States. I can’t remember what state the girl was from but she was definitely from one of the southern states.
Needless to say, this wasn’t something us Yankees did, so she spent a few weeks being embarrassed for no reason. :/
Lots of places in the USA, did that, especially places where “Yes, Ma’am” and “Yes, Sir” were expected. I asked about it; it is supposed to reduce stage fright and build confidence. And I suppose inure students to standing up and speaking out.
One can then suggest that it makes making a mistake even more humiliating. Which may or may not have been the point.
Standing to speak was def a southern thing, you also had to call teachers sir or ma’am, and at least at my school you had to also stand with right hand over heart and recite the Pledge of Allegiance every day. But that was also over twenty years ago so things might be different now.
I’m from Michigan, but my first grade teacher sort of did that– sometimes she would have kids stand to speak. She always made me stand.
I did not like her.
Is she making some weird noise or just trying to say okay?
I think that she is answering in Sarnothi.
Tehk speaks to her in Sarnothi and it’s translated for us. That isn’t, so it isn’t even “Me! Me!” I think the Sarnothi school custom must be to volunteer by making a particular kind of noise which is not an actual word.
It’s a vocalization. Closest real-world analog to what it would sound like would be a dolphin cry, with a tonal undulation followed by some brief clicks.
Makes sense…You can’t see everyone in a 3D arena, and if people have echolocation or similar things…you’re basically sending out a ping.
Thanks for clarifying, Dave. I thought she was struggling to say “ok”.
I’ve taught elementary age kids. To be fair, the noise they make when they want to be called on can sound an awful lot like tonal undulations. “Oohoohoohmememeoohhhh!”
That was adorable and that poor girl is going to get teased for a while.
I certainly prefer a quick ‘yo!’ to a hand raise.
That poor girl. My heart just breaks for her…
These are clearly wonderful kids. I don’t ever remember anyone volunteering for anything. The teacher would point and say “you”, and you were helping. (This was 1970s Wales.)
My experience as a substitute teacher now is that kids LOVE volunteering for things. This applies to middle school and elementary school, though it does start to tapper off in middle school depending on what it is.
Like, sure, kids will be jumping over each other to take attendance down to the office, but kids are also begging to be the next one to read to the class.
I have no idea where you are, but clearly you are not on Planet East Coast, cause on MY planet kids only volunteered for tasks, not for questions or to read; unless you were one of the pretty girls, those ones who had new shoes every month? Us boys, unless we had shined shoes and creased pants legs, we could forget about any attention from the teacher that was positive. Out of the 180 day school year, if I got to carry the lunch money or attendance down to the Office twice — it was a banner winning year.
It’s weird to me too. As a substitute, I don’t want to just cold call on kids to have them read– I don’t know their comfort or proficiency levels, and it’s not like I could be assessing their progress– so whenever there’s a class reading, I’m generally prepared to just read it aloud myself, but I still ask for volunteers, and usually get plenty so that I don’t read aloud at all.
As a student, I HATED being called on, especially when I didn’t raise my hand (which, granted, was most of the time). In third grade my teacher used popsicle sticks with our names on them to call on people, and at one point I stole my popsicle stick out of the cup. I didn’t get called on for weeks, it was great. There are still quiet kids, of course, but it seems like kids these days are more willing to participate, at least before they reach high school.
That is true and admirable initiative!
I don’t recall wishing to volunteer, but desire was irrelevant. It wasn’t an egalitarian approach- several students were more favored than others, several more victimized- but at least no-one had the opportunity to “Martin Prince” themselves.
Whatever the selection process was to get called upon, it was indecipherable.
We raised hands waved hands, Ooo-Ooo’ed, I know, I know, PLEASE! I know the answer, the correct answer, please call on me just once this month, please? And the month would go by and I’d be ignored. Test scores show that i DID know the material, but it was like all the boys were invisible and the homely or the kids in non-new clothes were just not in the same class with the well dressed kids. My clothes were new, just not very fashionable.
As you can tell, I still havent figured out how it worked. It remains a mystery.
I think kids would like making that vocalization much more than simply waving their arm around. Your arm gets tired doing that and c’mon, what kid wouldn’t enjoy making noise to get someone’s attention?
Holy crud, Dave! Falling asleep like that? Your HEALTH is on the line! When your body takes over, it’s over due to have been listened to. Take it easy. Take better care of yourself. Please? Take a break and “build” a buffer, maybe? Go to Monday/Thursday posts, at least for awhile? With the holidays coming (insert creepy, ominous music here) life is likely to get even MORE intense. Be careful!
Please?
8>}
-KOKO
I appreciate that, thank you KOKO. I’m going to try to make some changes to rectify the problem, and I’ll most likely take a Holiday Sabbatical at the end of the year anyway. Maybe I can actually keep a buffer run-up for once. >_>
I hate to say it, but maybe put Sue and Kathryn on an announced hiatus for a bit, as well? At least it’s at a decent pause point (if a bit cliff-hanger-y). Use the S&K days to help build up a buffer for Selkie, but ONLY if you have the time AND energy. Still take a sabbatical at the end of the year and, like last year, I’m sure that you could successfully ask for fan art to fill in, and you can continue building your buffer. Then, once you have a month or so of buffer for Selkie, start up S&K again, maybe get a buffer going for that, but don’t let your Selkie buffer drop below 2 weeks’ worth, so that falling asleep partway through won’t matter, except as a signal to you to take a few days off…
I’ve actually been thinking of doing exactly that after the current Adventure is concluded, since this one has been so much longer than the past ones (a two-parter!). It’s not a bad idea.
I thought it felt like this arc (on S&K) was winding down 🙂 I think it’s safe to say that most of the people that follow there are also here, so an announcement saying that you want to build up a Selkie buffer wouldn’t go amiss.
I agree with AmyP. I enjoy S&K but Selkie is still the best. I’m pretty sure we’d all be willing to accept a hiatus from S&K if it meant a buffer for Selkie.
And no matter what, you’re still the most important part of this equation.
Take care of yourself, Dave!
I will add my voice of concern, blacking out like that is NOT a good sign. Sleep! Take care of yourself! Eat holiday food and talk to cool people and take naps and chill! We’re not going anywhere.
I just want to jump on the *Dave we’re not angry please take care of your health* train
Jump on. It’s a big train. There’s enough room for all of us!
Take care of yourself, Dave.
Actually, I AM angry, mostly because someone, anyone, intelligent enough to create a plot line like this should be smart enough to be in bed when passingout-tired. I tend to go to anger to cover up being scared, but I will admit to being scared that you passed-out rather than were too tired, and so, went to bed. And I feel scared discovering/finding that this happened to you.
Please, Dave, if you work yourself to death I’ll call in angels to bring you back to life so I can murder you myself, just for the satisfaction of rage-destroying the guy who wasted your fine and formidable talents.
…or are you wallowing in self doubts? Are you afraid that we will en masse go to read “Slaves of the Chambermaid-Online!” comic, or “The Butler’s Toe Servant” or some other puerile prons, if you don’t get a comic out by 5:00am? You’d better be nice to Dave, or there will be whining and complaining and gnashing of teeth!
Speak for yourself, I’m this close to demanding a refund. /jk
Could do another guest strip or fan art week, too. In fact, if you got enough submissions, could do that for all of December, giving you plenty of time to recoup and then, when you’re feeling better, start building up that buffer.
Could also do, like, once a week text updates of behind-the-scenes details, like the whole “Todd was going to have powers too” thing, or other bits that didn’t make it into the final plot, or a little bit of info about the side characters that hasn’t made it to the main stage.
Or character sheets (the one where you have the character drawn from multiple angles, to keep later drawings consistent), or floor plans! I’d love to see the floor plans for Todd’s apartment, or his parents’ house, or the orphanage or part of the school. Anything that doesn’t take near as much effort to throw together than a regular update does.
We want you to be healthy! It’s difficult to get consistent, worthwhile content from our creators when they are running themselves ragged! So take whatever time you need to get back on a good, even keel.
How about a thematic guest strip/art week, like “Selkie is too tired to X” or “Selkie has her first sleepover”?
Chiming in with the “please take care of yourself” crowd. I can recall this happening to you at least three times within the past year, not a good sign! Definitely hope you figure out what’s going on.
Dude, get some sleep and rest! Health first.
If you focused your efforts on _one_ comic, this would happen less.
Yes, and if I chose YouTube OR fanfic writing OR research for upcoming projects, I’d feel less stressed and would probably be more productive on the one thing I focused on.
Sometimes creators like to focus on more than one thing at a time! It’s a balancing act to find the right amount of energy to devote to each pursuit, and a Wisdom check to decide if some of the pursuits ought to be dropped for the moment. (There’s a reason I’m not currently pursuing Unreal Engine skills, Blender 3d modeling skills, Inform7 text engine skills, writing the actual project I’m idly researching, and learning how to record my own sounds like a Foley artist. Can’t do everything at once! Most of those will have to wait a year or two.)
But also, the things I could cut out of my life that would make more sense wouldn’t be the creative ones — it’d be the too much time I spend on social media (several hours last night! all over one thing I was mad at!), or random browsing of YouTube, and so on. So that’s a thing: The factors taking up too much time might not be related to creativity at all.
I did once hear the principle that for university, during any given quarter/semester, you could Study, Sleep, or Party, any two of the three….
You’ve been working too hard. Postpone everything—and get a decent night’s sleep, dude.
You’ve been working too hard. Postpone things—and get a decent night’s sleep, dude.
I agree: take care of yourself! Heck, go for a holiday hiatus, even. Maybe post a few doodles now and again to reassure us that you’re not, y’know, in the hospital, but get some SLEEP!