Sorry for the lateness the past couple days. Can’t blame Windows for this one, unfortunately. >_>
I’m gonna need a goat, a scape, and no questions.
-EDIT- made a tweak to panel 4, to help Selkie’s glove stand out a bit. Pink on Pink may have been a silly idea. XD
is "scape" even a word? I didn't check
It’s neat to see them realizing that they may not hate each other after all.
Can’t help but notice Amanda didn’t say no hugs, just no SURPRISE hugs.
She also didn’t say what torment she would employ should Selkie attempt any other form of hugs.
Surprise-hugs get orthodontic toothpicks.
Could Amanda be any worse?
Yes.
Hugging someone without prompting is kind of a no no in general and we’ve already seen Amanda has her own particular problem with it due to her abuse so yea for once I think she can be forgiven.
I would think sibling relationships are an exception to that no no.
Siblings you grew up with, sure. The kids that were her siblings in the orphanage? Or in that foster family? No way, I can see that being OK with her, Amanda is PTSD from the horror that those two situations inflicted on her.
If you’re close with said sibling, perhaps, but familial relationships do not transcend boundaries. At least, healthy ones don’t.
It’s not commonly taught to young children — actually, the opposite is often taught instead — but bodily autonomy should be something that even little kids understand.
“I don’t get touched unless I say it’s okay, unless Mommy/Daddy/etc. need to help me or discipline me” is the more strict version.
“If I say I don’t want it, it stops (unless Mommy/Daddy/etc. need to help me or discipline me)” is the lighter version.
Basically, teach kids early that they don’t have to hug Grandma, they don’t have to accept being hugged, they don’t have to participate in games like Slugbug (and if someone hits them when they don’t want that to happen, they can seek help, be believed, and get the behavior to stop), etc. It’s vital practice for when they get to dating age, or fighting age, or even helping them establish good touch / bad touch to avoid Tricky People.
Keep in mind that Amanda was abused by her former siblings.
Triggering is triggering. It’s a sign of progress that she kept it verbal, and didn’t lash out!
That’s pretty harsh to say over a kid not wanting to be hugged without being told beforehand. Especially when they’ve been abused like Amanda has been. Heck, I didn’t like it when I was her age either.
Same. To the point where my instinct is usually to forcefully break out of the unwanted hug. Physical contact, especially from behind, is another no-go for me except people I know, and I can count on one hand, family included, the number of people permitted to touch my hair.
Which is a big deal that Amanda didn’t just hit her. Like she would’ve done months ago. People forget that progress in cases like this isn’t going to happen over night. It’s gonna take Amanda a long time to treat others nicely.
She could have chosen to join the other kids in picking on Selkie, for starters. This is actually a pretty fecking reasonable reaction to being given a surprise hug from someone you dislike.
*facepalm*
How does one go about pulling teeth via toothpick?
It will be a long and painful process I’m sure.
It’s like dislodging a boulder with a lever
Not as painful as carving out hearts with spoons, probably.
Here you go, Dave:
One goat, one landscape, no questions
Have a good weekend!
(I hope my href encoding worked…)
I love it
Don’t worry about the late comics so much, Dave. You are doing the Lord’s work, so if you ever deserve a break to build a buffer, feel free to do so. I guarantee you that 9 out of 10 of your readers not only understand, but will support you in whatever you need!
I agree with the not worrying about late comics, but the hug panel is making me really wish you had time to redraw it. The color scheme makes it difficult to tell that that’s not just part of Amanda’s outfit (Selkie’s mitten), which made me wonder what the heck she did (shoulder bump?) that got Amanda mad at her, and it only made sense once I got to the words.
(P.S. Extra Life Charity Fundraiser today (Saturday Nov 2)! So much for resting after a stressful Octoberfest….)
I’m glad you said that, because I e been looking at the pink-on-pink and wondering if it needed some tweaks. Might clip her glove over the panel border so it isn’t being cut off.
The zipper(black line) in Selkie’s jacket seems to be a bigger problem in that frame. It looks like that line is there to separate her arm from her torso and makes it seem like she is facing away from Amanda and shoulder bumping her like Kilyle says.
Actually, making use of panel-breaking might be just the thing you need to call attention to the “intrusion” going on. Sometimes you need to play with the conventions to make people take notice.
I still recall a page in Order of the Stick where one of the characters was in the middle of combat and got blasted *all the way through the border and off the page*.
I still wonder how that played out in the printed version….
As Mork (Bast keep you, Mr. Williams) once said, “Lack of hate is a many-splendored thing.” These two are going to rattle a lot of stars, one day…
For insects, a scape is the part of the antennae near the head. <<> Probably not useful in this context, but random knowledge never hurts.
A scape has two definitions in biology:
Botany: a long, leafless flower stalk coming directly from a root.
Entomology: the basal segment of an insect’s antenna, especially when it is enlarged and lengthened (as in a weevil).
So you can take your pick.