I’ve no idea; I saw it once – in French – so many years ago I’ve lost count. All I did was look up Estragon (dare I admit I first read it as Estrogen?), assuming that the name had some relevance.
Vladimir and Estragon. Secondary characters who do appear on stage (unlike Godot) are called Pozzo and Lucky.
Interesting to think of “Estrogen”. In their relationship, usually Didi (Vladimir) is more dominant, and Gogo (Estragon) is more submissive.
They are both wearing masks, meaning that this is set now, during the pandemic. One very common experience during this time, at least among my friends, is the fact that, with sheltering at home and working from home, every day feels the same, and people lose track of time. Like, if someone asks the date, you might say that it’s the fiftysembenth of Maytober.
Not knowing what day of the week it is is a common experience. And one that feels like being in a Beckett play.
A I’ve mentioned, I was ahead of most people. I stopped being a productive member of society in 2018, so I got lots of practice in the “what day is it?” game. I do have certain things planned each week for certain days. Like today is laundry day.
Yesterday I got a haircut. They had a new “touch-free” payment system. I didn’t quite understand how it worked and tipped much more generously than I intended, which I didn’t notice until I got the receipt. But she was so happy, no way could I pull it back. I figure the “quar” has been saving me lots of money, so if I made her day, that’s fine.
I used to know that it was Sunday by two FAT newspapers and color comics. As I no longer read newspapers in dead tree form, I gauge the day of the week by garbage collection/lawn maintenance on Friday. When those are changed due to holiday or weather issues, I feel discombobulated. Been retired since 2005.
It helps that my computer tells me the day of the week, but it still doesn’t penetrate the brain as much as the physical events of a typical Friday.
I have paid my hairdresser and dog groomer for missed appointments, figuring they need the $$$ right now more than I do. Living in Florida, land of the ‘free’, I’m staying home for at least the summer. Guess I’ll go back to being a long-haired hippie again.
B.A. Even though I’m still working (from home), my connection with the day of the week is still pretty weak. I take the weekend off, so still have a sense of weekday/weekend separation, but most of the workdays are pretty hard to differentiate. Before, there were lots of other reasons to keep track of the specific day: weekly cycles (e.g. “today is Monday, so the kids have swim lessons), and specific events (e.g. “we’re having company on Saturday, so I need to get snacks and clean the house on Friday). I imagine a lot of this disorientation would apply to a CEO as well.
@ B.A. – actually, I “remembered” seeing a new cartoon on this theme about ten years ago, but I thought it was two rhinoceroses standing on solid ground, and thinking it was Thursday, not two hippos in the water thinking it was Tuesday. A friend of mine (who also saw the cartoon) and I say “I keep thinking it’s Thursday” at opportune moments.
Maybe I misremembered a reprint of this cartoon, or someone else had done a later cartoon with rhino-Thursday. Anyway, I went looking for the cartoon I remembered and found this ancient cartoon – either what I actually saw the first time round, or more likely, possibly, an earlier iteration of some later cartoon I remember seeing.
I simple cross out the days on my kitchen calendar.
@Andréa: I was wondering what relation is Andreas Vollenweider to Erich, the organist, but the latter is a VollenwYder, so, none.
I was once in a church (cathedral?) in Haarlem (Netherlands) and the organist suddenly began to play (practice, I assume) . . . what a sound! And what a FEELING!!
The remarks about hippos and rhinos suggest an association to Ionesco’s play “Rhinoceros”, which was, along with “Godot”, one of the prime examples of the so-called theatre of the absurd “movement”.
Well, that goes along with tarragon. Altho I read it first as Origami (my eyes read faster than my brain; you wouldn’t believe what I think some signs state before my brain catches up).
I’ve been working from home for 11 weeks now. On my daily todo list (that I prefer to write by hand) that always features the day of the week and date, I’ve taken to adding both the week number and the corona week number just to keep track. We are slowly allowing more and more employers to return to the office, but I can’t say I’ve missed it that much (my department tends be rather empty, anyway, with everyone gone in meetings).
@ Keera – It’s nice to know that Norwegians use numbered weeks too (meaning that it isn’t just a German perversion). I can’t keep track of anything that way: whenever somebody tries to make an appointment with a week number, I always ask for confirmation using a “real” date.
See?? I’m not the only one who knows it’s Sunday by the size of the comic (altho the ‘color’ bit is out of date; I think most newspapers now carry daily comics in color. Don’t they?)
PS. Yes, I realize that most online comics are always in color, altho now that I think on it, I find it interesting that many still adhere to the ‘larger comics on Sunday’ format. Hmmm . . . something to ponder.
WAIT! How does he know what tomorrow’s comic format will be, if he doesn’t even know what day today is? [Realizes she’s having a conversation with herself and goes offline.]
He can just feel somehow that the large format comic is on the way — maybe the scenery is trying to shift around. Then, from that premonition, they (accurately) conclude that today is Saturday.
I’ve been working from home for almost 30 years now. Husband has been wasting time and keeping me company at home – occasionally getting an online counseling session or selling something on Etsy so he can think he is still working – for 13 years now. We had trouble keeping track of what day it was before the corona virus!
I wake up in the early afternoon and think – “what day is it” Hmmm, I hearing “Star Trek Deep Space Nine” – must be Monday or Tuesday or hearing “”Star Trek Next Generation” – must be Wednesday, Thursday or Friday they run the episodes all the day – it was getting annoying some time in April (I think – I have trouble with months in addition to days this days) and they stopped the episodes – but then he watched “Friends” all day and I gained new affection for Star Trek. If I hear neither it is Saturday or Sunday.
Sometimes I think it is one day and then half an hour later think it is a different day – and generally it is neither. I have to keep track of the days to remember things to do – this is Monday, Wednesday, Friday towels changing week or a Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday Saturday week – we are changing hand and kitchen towels every other day now – shower towels are pulled fresh for use always.
Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays I walk out our side door through an entry porch and to go the front door to take in the mail – wearing a plastic sandwich bag as a glove – and put it in a plastic zip bag – stop in the porch on the way back in and spray inside the bag with Lysol, seal the bag and set it aside. I had to wait a week before opening, but he saw a science reporter he trusts on a news show say that the latest info is drops are active for 72 hours so now can open the bag in 4 bags. I also have to keep track of how many weeks have past since last call to the Post office to mail our box mail to us – due to a peculiarity most of our mail cannot be forwarded (temporary change of address) – hopefully this will be soon be resolved. (Yes I get mail that has been sitting in the box up to 3 weeks and then have to wait another week until I can actually open it.)
We actually have much less garbage than before so many weeks we don’t even put same out as it is too little. Our township had stopped recycling pickup for a month, maybe more due to being too shorthanded to deal with same. I have not had chance to put out since they restarted until this past Monday – I put out almost 2 months of cans and a handful of bottles plus cartons from Walmart food delivery.
Comics I Don't Understand 
They’re both wrong.
Estragon is one of the two main characters from Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot. His name is the French word for tarragon.
LikeLike
When they were feeling friendly and informal they called each other Didi and Gogo.
LikeLike
Andréa, I never saw the play. Was his friend’s name Origan?
LikeLike
I’ve no idea; I saw it once – in French – so many years ago I’ve lost count. All I did was look up Estragon (dare I admit I first read it as Estrogen?), assuming that the name had some relevance.
LikeLike
Vladimir and Estragon. Secondary characters who do appear on stage (unlike Godot) are called Pozzo and Lucky.
Interesting to think of “Estrogen”. In their relationship, usually Didi (Vladimir) is more dominant, and Gogo (Estragon) is more submissive.
LikeLike
They are both wearing masks, meaning that this is set now, during the pandemic. One very common experience during this time, at least among my friends, is the fact that, with sheltering at home and working from home, every day feels the same, and people lose track of time. Like, if someone asks the date, you might say that it’s the fiftysembenth of Maytober.
Not knowing what day of the week it is is a common experience. And one that feels like being in a Beckett play.
LikeLike
Waiting for Quarantine to End
LikeLike
More like Waiting for The End.
LikeLike
@ Andréa – I assume that you are not the only person waiting for it, so: “This Is The End.
LikeLike
For those who aren’t familiar with “Waiting for Godot”, or don’t remember it clearly, the best summary I’ve never heard of it goes:
“Nothing happens, twice.”
Which suits the current situation.
LikeLike
At least it’s still “Waiting for Godot” and not yet moved on to “Endgame”…
LikeLike
P.S. Sorry, I should have put an NSFW warning on that link, I had forgotten how creepy the lyrics are.
LikeLike
There is no end….
LikeLike
@Kilby: So now I have to re-watch Apocalypse Now. Choppers everywhere.
LikeLike
That plays on my SONOS at least once a day (“shuffle” isn’t quite as random as I’d like). Which is why it came to mind immediately.
LikeLike
Just in case there are any Andreas Vollenweider fans here, his Wednesday mini-concert begins in 10 minutes:
LikeLike
A I’ve mentioned, I was ahead of most people. I stopped being a productive member of society in 2018, so I got lots of practice in the “what day is it?” game. I do have certain things planned each week for certain days. Like today is laundry day.
Yesterday I got a haircut. They had a new “touch-free” payment system. I didn’t quite understand how it worked and tipped much more generously than I intended, which I didn’t notice until I got the receipt. But she was so happy, no way could I pull it back. I figure the “quar” has been saving me lots of money, so if I made her day, that’s fine.
LikeLike
I used to know that it was Sunday by two FAT newspapers and color comics. As I no longer read newspapers in dead tree form, I gauge the day of the week by garbage collection/lawn maintenance on Friday. When those are changed due to holiday or weather issues, I feel discombobulated. Been retired since 2005.
It helps that my computer tells me the day of the week, but it still doesn’t penetrate the brain as much as the physical events of a typical Friday.
LikeLike
I have paid my hairdresser and dog groomer for missed appointments, figuring they need the $$$ right now more than I do. Living in Florida, land of the ‘free’, I’m staying home for at least the summer. Guess I’ll go back to being a long-haired hippie again.
LikeLike
Would the head of a multi-billion dollar company lose track of days of the week, though?
For that matter, would an unemployed homeless man have any less reason to keep track of days of the week than he did pre-Pandemic?
LikeLike
B.A. Even though I’m still working (from home), my connection with the day of the week is still pretty weak. I take the weekend off, so still have a sense of weekday/weekend separation, but most of the workdays are pretty hard to differentiate. Before, there were lots of other reasons to keep track of the specific day: weekly cycles (e.g. “today is Monday, so the kids have swim lessons), and specific events (e.g. “we’re having company on Saturday, so I need to get snacks and clean the house on Friday). I imagine a lot of this disorientation would apply to a CEO as well.
LikeLike
I actually have reminders in my calendar system for trash/recycling. I don’t want to forget them, especially trash.
LikeLike
One of the earliest of these losing-track-of-the-days cartoons was by Paul Crum in July 1937 in Punch magazine –
https://punch.photoshelter.com/image/I0000Z5IwBbvW7q4
LikeLike
Only here would somebody say “Oh, that reminds me of an obscure 83-year-old comic”.
LikeLike
But it can’t be Tuesday. There are no hippos in Belgium.
LikeLike
We have Wednesday morning garbage pickup, and I learned from experience to set an alarm on my phone that goes off at 11pm every Tuesday.
LikeLike
@ Arthur – I was surprised to learn that “Belgium” was just in the movie title, the comic it was based on uses “Siena”:
LikeLike
@ B.A. – actually, I “remembered” seeing a new cartoon on this theme about ten years ago, but I thought it was two rhinoceroses standing on solid ground, and thinking it was Thursday, not two hippos in the water thinking it was Tuesday. A friend of mine (who also saw the cartoon) and I say “I keep thinking it’s Thursday” at opportune moments.
Maybe I misremembered a reprint of this cartoon, or someone else had done a later cartoon with rhino-Thursday. Anyway, I went looking for the cartoon I remembered and found this ancient cartoon – either what I actually saw the first time round, or more likely, possibly, an earlier iteration of some later cartoon I remember seeing.
LikeLike
I simple cross out the days on my kitchen calendar.
@Andréa: I was wondering what relation is Andreas Vollenweider to Erich, the organist, but the latter is a VollenwYder, so, none.
LikeLike
I don’t know about Siena or Belgium, but I do know with six you get egg roll.
LikeLike
Also some beautiful music – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZagZKEeJXqA
LikeLike
I found this very LP at a yard sale years ago: I just love the sound of the organ.
LikeLike
I was once in a church (cathedral?) in Haarlem (Netherlands) and the organist suddenly began to play (practice, I assume) . . . what a sound! And what a FEELING!!
LikeLike
The remarks about hippos and rhinos suggest an association to Ionesco’s play “Rhinoceros”, which was, along with “Godot”, one of the prime examples of the so-called theatre of the absurd “movement”.
LikeLike
Andréa, Origan is French for oregano.
LikeLike
Well, that goes along with tarragon. Altho I read it first as Origami (my eyes read faster than my brain; you wouldn’t believe what I think some signs state before my brain catches up).
LikeLike
Sounds to me like Waiting for Godot is really a French recipe, or cooking lesson.
LikeLike
In case anyone is interested, the Barney & Clyde ‘Waiting for Godot’ arc continues the entire week.
Even computers are getting confused . . .
LikeLike
.. And in Friday’s strip, notice it’s still Clyde addressing Barney, but now he calls him Vladimir .
LikeLike
I’ve been working from home for 11 weeks now. On my daily todo list (that I prefer to write by hand) that always features the day of the week and date, I’ve taken to adding both the week number and the corona week number just to keep track. We are slowly allowing more and more employers to return to the office, but I can’t say I’ve missed it that much (my department tends be rather empty, anyway, with everyone gone in meetings).
LikeLike
@ Keera – It’s nice to know that Norwegians use numbered weeks too (meaning that it isn’t just a German perversion). I can’t keep track of anything that way: whenever somebody tries to make an appointment with a week number, I always ask for confirmation using a “real” date.
LikeLike
See?? I’m not the only one who knows it’s Sunday by the size of the comic (altho the ‘color’ bit is out of date; I think most newspapers now carry daily comics in color. Don’t they?)
LikeLike
PS. Yes, I realize that most online comics are always in color, altho now that I think on it, I find it interesting that many still adhere to the ‘larger comics on Sunday’ format. Hmmm . . . something to ponder.
LikeLike
WAIT! How does he know what tomorrow’s comic format will be, if he doesn’t even know what day today is? [Realizes she’s having a conversation with herself and goes offline.]
LikeLike
He can just feel somehow that the large format comic is on the way — maybe the scenery is trying to shift around. Then, from that premonition, they (accurately) conclude that today is Saturday.
LikeLike
“. . . maybe the scenery is trying to shift around.”
VERY Pratchettian.
LikeLike
I’ve been working from home for almost 30 years now. Husband has been wasting time and keeping me company at home – occasionally getting an online counseling session or selling something on Etsy so he can think he is still working – for 13 years now. We had trouble keeping track of what day it was before the corona virus!
I wake up in the early afternoon and think – “what day is it” Hmmm, I hearing “Star Trek Deep Space Nine” – must be Monday or Tuesday or hearing “”Star Trek Next Generation” – must be Wednesday, Thursday or Friday they run the episodes all the day – it was getting annoying some time in April (I think – I have trouble with months in addition to days this days) and they stopped the episodes – but then he watched “Friends” all day and I gained new affection for Star Trek. If I hear neither it is Saturday or Sunday.
Sometimes I think it is one day and then half an hour later think it is a different day – and generally it is neither. I have to keep track of the days to remember things to do – this is Monday, Wednesday, Friday towels changing week or a Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday Saturday week – we are changing hand and kitchen towels every other day now – shower towels are pulled fresh for use always.
Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays I walk out our side door through an entry porch and to go the front door to take in the mail – wearing a plastic sandwich bag as a glove – and put it in a plastic zip bag – stop in the porch on the way back in and spray inside the bag with Lysol, seal the bag and set it aside. I had to wait a week before opening, but he saw a science reporter he trusts on a news show say that the latest info is drops are active for 72 hours so now can open the bag in 4 bags. I also have to keep track of how many weeks have past since last call to the Post office to mail our box mail to us – due to a peculiarity most of our mail cannot be forwarded (temporary change of address) – hopefully this will be soon be resolved. (Yes I get mail that has been sitting in the box up to 3 weeks and then have to wait another week until I can actually open it.)
We actually have much less garbage than before so many weeks we don’t even put same out as it is too little. Our township had stopped recycling pickup for a month, maybe more due to being too shorthanded to deal with same. I have not had chance to put out since they restarted until this past Monday – I put out almost 2 months of cans and a handful of bottles plus cartons from Walmart food delivery.
LikeLike
LikeLike