Or, you could tag any nameless extra who is given at least one speaking line as, for instance, BounceEmployee1. That avoids confusion, yet makes it clear they’re not intended to be more than a walk-on.
Well, to be fair, it was near inevitable to tell andy at some point what with her+amanda being constants in selkies life and sorta family too….but this is the wrong place and time to introduce her to selkies not-so-human-ness.
lets only hope her scream won´t draw more attention.
on another note, if this ends up ruining amanda´s birthday party, she kinda deserves it and it would be a valuable lesson – teasing is fine, but some stuff is too serious to mess with even while being angry at one another.
(this is very different from being punished bc being punished is a consequence of someone not liking what ur doing which is technically not something u can control. this is Amanda learning Consequences of doing the thing itself)
See, that’s the thing: Amanda learns that just because you were Not Wrong, that doesn’t mean something you don’t want to happen won’t happen. Because she definitely looks like someone who fucked up and not smug here.
Coz like, Amanda definitely made her own decision to throw away the sunglasses. Sure, Selkie was being a butt, but they were the wrong item to take this out on, and Amanda actually knew that beforehand. She could have seen this coming but dismissed the thought, and is now learning that was wrong.
And Selkie has free pass to blame everything on Amanda here if she doesn’t want to blame herself. Amanda has fucked her life up a lot over the years, Selkie isnt going to jump on the “I should have been more gracious to her” train.
Like, if nothing came out of it and Selkie just had to pick up the sunglasses herself, it WOULD have been a good lesson to learn.
But with the situation spiraling out of control like this? She’s 100% going to blame this on Amanda, because the result is very disproportionate to the wrongdoing.
Orrr I guess maybe it’s just my Thing about other people’s possessions. From very tiny age I learned to be very careful about specifically Things, like slugging someone in the face is one thing but breaking something of theirs is Crossing The Line. Maybe that’s why I’m thinking Amanda definitely should have known better.
Or maybe it’s because she admits so in the comic itself. Either-or.
Real world reason: I thought something different from Einstein (whose name has become kind of a generic playground insult) would make it funnier and chose Heisenberg because of Uncertainty.
In-comic reason: she probably just picked it up from her neighbor that’s been teaching her German, or stumbled onto it online.
Better question: He’s talking to a girl with blue skin, a mouth full of pointed teeth, & hands that have three wedded fingers – and it’s her eyes that he questions?
Heh. We are probably going to find out that there’s been a secret government mind control field all along that stops people (or at least adults) from freaking out over blue skin, pointed teeth, webbed fingers, and gills… that forces them to accept or invent even the most absurd rationalizations… but because Echoes are so rare, they forgot to include “glowing eyes” on the list of weird things to ignore.
Um. Question. For my entire life I’ve read selkie as sElkie. But I’ve been rereading the comic and Todd repeatedly confuses it with Sophie, which only makes sense if it’s pronounced like selkIE.
My entire universe is trembling at foundation. Please help.
Relax, it’s just the mind control field at work again!
Seriously, though, part of the fundamental premise of this whole SF story is that adults have a learned habit of normalizing and rationalizing away anything that doesn’t fit their pre-established world view, even if that requires them to make an absurd leap. There are examples of this happening, all over the story.
In the case of her name, the “pre-established worldview” was that normal little girls are not named after mythic Celtic monsters, so her name must be something within the range of normal little-girl names. The fact that everyone who does this, shifts to the same normal little-girl name, that is, Sophie (which, you’re right, doesn’t even sound at all like Selkie!)… I think that is just Dave’s quirky sense of humor at work.
Well, I mean, they could confuse it for… um… Melphie? Okay I don’t know if English has any names with two syllables of which the first one has “eh” as a stressed vowel and the second ends in ‘ee’. But that would have been a logical thing to confuse it for I guess?
I mean…. IDK. I’m not enough for a linguist to say this confidently but it just doesn’t make sense to me???
Also, English is not my first language, so I’m really really grateful to you for confirming I did NOT have this word’s pronounciation wrong 0.0
No, I think they didn’t at first understand that Nei’li was her name. Sure, an adult would be easily able to communicate that something is their name, but a five year old probably couldn’t. So Selkie probably started answering to Selkie before she even learned English, and then never thought to correct people (or never thought they’d listen to her)
Oh, and at least Nei Li has matching vowels. And if you pronounce it with the emphasis on Nei… like Nellie… okay I have no idea why they didnt mistake it for Nelly then. It’s probably the ‘had no idea’ part.
Selkies (also spelled silkies, sylkies, selchies, Scots: selkie fowk) are mythological creatures found in Irish, Scottish, Faroese, and Icelandic folklore. Selkies are said to live as seals in the sea but shed their skin to become human on land.
I had a friend in high school whose name was pronounced “shy” and spelled “chi.” She had a bazillion issues with people getting her name wrong, and eventually started going by a more common middle name. Likewise, author Seanan McGuire has stories about people doing weird stuff with her name. And my kid has an unusual name that virtually no one can pronounce unless I do. Each. Syllable. Individually. And. Slowly. (Kid goes by a nickname based on the first syllables.) My mom tells a story about how a substitute teacher did roll-call and mispronounced ALL THREE of her names. (Lynn pronounced “line”? *headdesk*)
Basically? American Adults cannot pronounce unusual names and dub in something that is vaguely similar but familiar. Seanan to Sharon, Lynn to Line, “name of C-h-i” to “order for S-h-i-i”… Or Selkie to Sophie.
I’m still amazed by the sheer number of people who read my name (Alethia), notice the TH near the end, and immediately jump to the only A+TH name they know, Athena. (At least “Aletha” is reasonable.)
I’ve been amassing this delightful list of misnamings: Alicia, Alyssia, Olivia, Olympia… even Athethia, which I found hilarious as it was from a subscription to a publication that actually should’ve been halfway familiar with the Greek my name comes from. Couple that with the surname Cyrus and you get stuff for Mrs. Cypress, Mrs. Sirius, and, on one memorable occasion, Mrs. Virus. And no matter how patiently you spell it each time (“Cyrus, C-Y-R-U-S”), people will type it in S-Y-R-U-S and then go “I can’t find it in the system!”
When I started donating plasma, I quickly realized that I’d be hearing multiple mispronunciations of my name each and every time if I didn’t take action. It’s one thing to hear it from random strangers — why take much effort to educate a person you’re never going to see again? — but this required some strategy.
So I challenged them that the first time I came in and the crew didn’t mispronounce my name even once, I’d buy them all donuts. I think it took them only two times after that, and I haven’t had a problem since — I occasionally get to update a newbie, generally by referring to the donut story, and on the rare times when regulars mispronounce I’ll go “I need to rescind my donuts!” It’s become a pleasurable joke instead of a repetitious nuisance, and was the first step in befriending the staff, who now all know me and interact well with me.
It may take a little ingenuity, but when you create an incentive, people will learn to get it right. It means more to you than to them, so if you have an unusual name, find a way to make it meaningful ^_^
Assuming it’s pronounced like the mythical creature, it’s sell-key, so Sophie is a stretch but not a long one. My son is Nathaniel but gets called Samuel and Daniel a lot, because people hear the el sound at the end and opt for the more normal shorter el names.
Idea for next time: Selkie should fix wire antennae to her head and pretend she wore cosplay gloves and contacts. Then it wouldn’t matter if she lost something.
She could get in trouble if she had an accident and was hospitalized before Agent Brown or some of his peers could intervene, though.
Werner gets a namecheck! My Christmas is complete.
Happy Holidays Everyone!
I would have expected them to tell Andi and close family at least.
That’s not Andi, it’s an employee.
Confirmed: https://selkiecomic.com/comic/selkie1018/
Also confirmed: I need to start giving the unnamed extras some gigantic elephant ears or something to set them apart. ;P
Or, you could tag any nameless extra who is given at least one speaking line as, for instance, BounceEmployee1. That avoids confusion, yet makes it clear they’re not intended to be more than a walk-on.
To be fair once colored the hair would clear it up anyway.
A name tag on the employee would also work.
“Hello BounceEmployee1. How are you today?”
Glowing contacts!
That’s very good. I support this theory!
They’re all the rage in Japan! In six months, every kid in America will want a pair!
“Selkie! I told you those glowing contacts would hurt your eyes! You are in SO much trouble!”
I support this, too
Well, to be fair, it was near inevitable to tell andy at some point what with her+amanda being constants in selkies life and sorta family too….but this is the wrong place and time to introduce her to selkies not-so-human-ness.
lets only hope her scream won´t draw more attention.
on another note, if this ends up ruining amanda´s birthday party, she kinda deserves it and it would be a valuable lesson – teasing is fine, but some stuff is too serious to mess with even while being angry at one another.
I don’t think that’s Andi, that’s a worker, the same one that explained what this was to Selkie a while back.
That’s not Andi, it’s an employee.
in the words of selkie: OH CRAPS!
this strip: Amanda learns Consequences
(this is very different from being punished bc being punished is a consequence of someone not liking what ur doing which is technically not something u can control. this is Amanda learning Consequences of doing the thing itself)
This one’s totally on Selkie though, so I think that’s who’s learning a lesson. 😀
See, that’s the thing: Amanda learns that just because you were Not Wrong, that doesn’t mean something you don’t want to happen won’t happen. Because she definitely looks like someone who fucked up and not smug here.
Coz like, Amanda definitely made her own decision to throw away the sunglasses. Sure, Selkie was being a butt, but they were the wrong item to take this out on, and Amanda actually knew that beforehand. She could have seen this coming but dismissed the thought, and is now learning that was wrong.
And Selkie has free pass to blame everything on Amanda here if she doesn’t want to blame herself. Amanda has fucked her life up a lot over the years, Selkie isnt going to jump on the “I should have been more gracious to her” train.
Like, if nothing came out of it and Selkie just had to pick up the sunglasses herself, it WOULD have been a good lesson to learn.
But with the situation spiraling out of control like this? She’s 100% going to blame this on Amanda, because the result is very disproportionate to the wrongdoing.
Orrr I guess maybe it’s just my Thing about other people’s possessions. From very tiny age I learned to be very careful about specifically Things, like slugging someone in the face is one thing but breaking something of theirs is Crossing The Line. Maybe that’s why I’m thinking Amanda definitely should have known better.
Or maybe it’s because she admits so in the comic itself. Either-or.
Third graders taught about early 20th Century German physicists? Wow!
Now, if she’d said “Einstein” I wouldn’t have thought a thing about it. Everyone know Einstein. But Heisenberg?
Real world reason: I thought something different from Einstein (whose name has become kind of a generic playground insult) would make it funnier and chose Heisenberg because of Uncertainty.
In-comic reason: she probably just picked it up from her neighbor that’s been teaching her German, or stumbled onto it online.
na, she picked it up from watching sue+kathrin! i´m willing to bet that kat is a fangirl for heisenberg 😉
so much for never learning anything useful from watching cartoons!
Yea, more than half my english vocabulary comes from games and cartoons, and I taught myself german mainly through reading donald duck comics. 😀
“Selkie, we have to cook!”
yea that’s where I expect it was from
Great job Amanda. DX
Though seriously. How can someone get that scared of glowing eyes? It isn’t like lasers shot out.
Well, how would YOU react if someone had the equivalent of Terminator’s eyes (albeit in a different color)?
Considering this is a kid? Not screaming like a little baby. :3
Better question: He’s talking to a girl with blue skin, a mouth full of pointed teeth, & hands that have three wedded fingers – and it’s her eyes that he questions?
Heh. We are probably going to find out that there’s been a secret government mind control field all along that stops people (or at least adults) from freaking out over blue skin, pointed teeth, webbed fingers, and gills… that forces them to accept or invent even the most absurd rationalizations… but because Echoes are so rare, they forgot to include “glowing eyes” on the list of weird things to ignore.
Pretty sure Grrl Power beat that one to the punch.
Trick of the eye! Contacts! You are dreaming! Excuses for glory eyes abound!
Ok, I suspect you meant “glowy” eyes, but “glory” eyes sound like a name that Selkie would embrace with gusto.
Now then, is he reacting to her black sclera AND the glow or just 1 of them?
Eye infection with bioluminecent bacteria.
Add in Symbiotic, and you’re golden.
“You see Sirs, my moms ate a LOT of fishes before I was born.”
I would not have noticed the copypasta if you hadn’t said, and it works great.
“Eye drops. Those special glowey ones, someone must be shining a blacklight this way…”
The worker seems mad in excess.
Doubt Amanda is the only child using the fast way.
Um. Question. For my entire life I’ve read selkie as sElkie. But I’ve been rereading the comic and Todd repeatedly confuses it with Sophie, which only makes sense if it’s pronounced like selkIE.
My entire universe is trembling at foundation. Please help.
Relax, it’s just the mind control field at work again!
Seriously, though, part of the fundamental premise of this whole SF story is that adults have a learned habit of normalizing and rationalizing away anything that doesn’t fit their pre-established world view, even if that requires them to make an absurd leap. There are examples of this happening, all over the story.
In the case of her name, the “pre-established worldview” was that normal little girls are not named after mythic Celtic monsters, so her name must be something within the range of normal little-girl names. The fact that everyone who does this, shifts to the same normal little-girl name, that is, Sophie (which, you’re right, doesn’t even sound at all like Selkie!)… I think that is just Dave’s quirky sense of humor at work.
Well, I mean, they could confuse it for… um… Melphie? Okay I don’t know if English has any names with two syllables of which the first one has “eh” as a stressed vowel and the second ends in ‘ee’. But that would have been a logical thing to confuse it for I guess?
I mean…. IDK. I’m not enough for a linguist to say this confidently but it just doesn’t make sense to me???
Also, English is not my first language, so I’m really really grateful to you for confirming I did NOT have this word’s pronounciation wrong 0.0
“Ellie” could work maybe, it’s a diminutive of Ellen
Even weirder if you remember that they got Selkie from somehow misunderstanding Nei’li.
No, I think they didn’t at first understand that Nei’li was her name. Sure, an adult would be easily able to communicate that something is their name, but a five year old probably couldn’t. So Selkie probably started answering to Selkie before she even learned English, and then never thought to correct people (or never thought they’d listen to her)
Oh, and at least Nei Li has matching vowels. And if you pronounce it with the emphasis on Nei… like Nellie… okay I have no idea why they didnt mistake it for Nelly then. It’s probably the ‘had no idea’ part.
Selkies (also spelled silkies, sylkies, selchies, Scots: selkie fowk) are mythological creatures found in Irish, Scottish, Faroese, and Icelandic folklore. Selkies are said to live as seals in the sea but shed their skin to become human on land.
Think Mammalian version of a mermaid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selkie
I had a friend in high school whose name was pronounced “shy” and spelled “chi.” She had a bazillion issues with people getting her name wrong, and eventually started going by a more common middle name. Likewise, author Seanan McGuire has stories about people doing weird stuff with her name. And my kid has an unusual name that virtually no one can pronounce unless I do. Each. Syllable. Individually. And. Slowly. (Kid goes by a nickname based on the first syllables.) My mom tells a story about how a substitute teacher did roll-call and mispronounced ALL THREE of her names. (Lynn pronounced “line”? *headdesk*)
Basically? American Adults cannot pronounce unusual names and dub in something that is vaguely similar but familiar. Seanan to Sharon, Lynn to Line, “name of C-h-i” to “order for S-h-i-i”… Or Selkie to Sophie.
I dunno about non-american adults.
I’m still amazed by the sheer number of people who read my name (Alethia), notice the TH near the end, and immediately jump to the only A+TH name they know, Athena. (At least “Aletha” is reasonable.)
I’ve been amassing this delightful list of misnamings: Alicia, Alyssia, Olivia, Olympia… even Athethia, which I found hilarious as it was from a subscription to a publication that actually should’ve been halfway familiar with the Greek my name comes from. Couple that with the surname Cyrus and you get stuff for Mrs. Cypress, Mrs. Sirius, and, on one memorable occasion, Mrs. Virus. And no matter how patiently you spell it each time (“Cyrus, C-Y-R-U-S”), people will type it in S-Y-R-U-S and then go “I can’t find it in the system!”
When I started donating plasma, I quickly realized that I’d be hearing multiple mispronunciations of my name each and every time if I didn’t take action. It’s one thing to hear it from random strangers — why take much effort to educate a person you’re never going to see again? — but this required some strategy.
So I challenged them that the first time I came in and the crew didn’t mispronounce my name even once, I’d buy them all donuts. I think it took them only two times after that, and I haven’t had a problem since — I occasionally get to update a newbie, generally by referring to the donut story, and on the rare times when regulars mispronounce I’ll go “I need to rescind my donuts!” It’s become a pleasurable joke instead of a repetitious nuisance, and was the first step in befriending the staff, who now all know me and interact well with me.
It may take a little ingenuity, but when you create an incentive, people will learn to get it right. It means more to you than to them, so if you have an unusual name, find a way to make it meaningful ^_^
Assuming it’s pronounced like the mythical creature, it’s sell-key, so Sophie is a stretch but not a long one. My son is Nathaniel but gets called Samuel and Daniel a lot, because people hear the el sound at the end and opt for the more normal shorter el names.
When did Amanda start cooking meth?
Idea for next time: Selkie should fix wire antennae to her head and pretend she wore cosplay gloves and contacts. Then it wouldn’t matter if she lost something.
She could get in trouble if she had an accident and was hospitalized before Agent Brown or some of his peers could intervene, though.
Maybe I should read the other comments before finally sending a comment on a page I’ve left open for days…
The trouble thing if she was considered human still holds.