OK, pay attention because there might be a quiz on this!
First off, Phil Smith III sent in this Brewster Rockit as a CIDU. “I was OK until the last panel,” he writes, “and have NO idea what it’s supposed to mean?!”
And I couldn’t make sense of the last panel as a punch line, either.
Meanwhile, DanV sent in both the above Brewster Rockit and the Betty below as a synchronicity pair.
“Two different ways of experiencing the same situation,” writes DanV, “I confess I’ve had both of these things happen to me. 🙂 Not a laugh out loud, more of a rueful chuckle.”
What could he mean, I wondered; how are these the same joke? Oh wait, aha! The Brewster joke is not in the final panel, but the penultimate. Oldbot and, uh, Bub have done the parallel sort of oblivious overlooking.
That leaves the final panel of Brewster unexplained. Well, which Monday does he mean? Is he making it sooner or later? I don’t know, and I’m even more tired of writing this than you are of reading it…
Comics I Don't Understand 
Brewster would have been clearer if he’d changed the day from Friday to Thursday instead of Monday. “Monday” sounds like “let’s wait until after the weekend” which makes no sense.
Or better yet, “Let’s make this afternoon.”
So you guys seem to be taking it as “You really need help! Let’s make it sooner”. But the days involved sound more like putting it off to later, like he’s had all he can take of Brewster for now.
He has an opening next Friday, as in “the end of next week.” After the conversation, he wants to see the patient four days sooner on Monday.
Ahhhh…now I get it. Yeah, or “Tomorrow” would have been even clearer, since he’d said “next Friday” before, clearly several days away.
But how many days away must “next Friday” be? I contend “at least three”. If it’s Tuesday, “next Friday” might mean this week, might mean next. On Wednesday or Thursday, it means “over a week away”. But where’s the cutover for you? Does having a weekend in there matter: is “next Monday” on a Friday more likely to be in three days than “next Friday” on a Tuesday? I’ve Googled and found some discussion but nothing satisfying.
The “Brewster Rockit” strip was published on Sunday, Jan. 16th, so it would seem that the date he meant in the first panel would have been Friday the 21st, but by the last panel he believes that the issues are more urgent, and wants to meet on the 17th. If the strip had run on Tuesday or Wednesday, then the “delay” hypothesis (to Monday the 24th) would have been better. In this case, the rationale would be “This is so ridiculous that I don’t want to face it until I’ve had a couple of extra days off.” I think the logic works in either direction. I would have favored the latter reading, but I think the publication date indicates that the former reading was intended.
I agree with Max C. Webster, III; it’s 4 days earlier than next Friday.
My first thought was that the exam might take a long time, so starting the week with it would be better than on Friday. shrug But I agree that it was probably meant to move UP to Monday.
I meant to say – on the “putting it off to later” reading – it brings to mind Bob Mankoff’s famous “How about never? Is never good for you?”.
Works either way; delay to later because more time will be needed, or move earlier because it’s clearly serious. The joke is that the loss of the phone being talked on was significant enough for the appointment to be changed. “On second thought, I’m referring you to a specialist” would have worked too.
MJSR: How would later make sense? Just gives Oldbot more time to forget about it. I think it has to be earlier.
You don’t have to be old to lose your phone. A friend of a friend lost her phone at my house. Looked everywhere. Could not find it.
I dialed her number so it would ring.
She was very well endowed in the chest area. In effect she had a shelf up there on which she could store things under her blouse. The phone was on that shelf.
I’m not a woman but I was under the impression that those particular parts of a woman are somewhat sensitive, and things stored on top of them do not suddenly become unnoticed.
Depends, sometimes, on how long they’ve been there – if that pressure and shape is “normal”, the fact that it’s the phone could get lost. I haven’t lost things in my bra, but I’ve lost them in odd pockets even though, once I found them, I realized the shape (of, say, a bunch of keys) was pressing into my side/leg/whatever.
Mark in Boston — You reminded me of a Firesign Theater line: “She has a balcony you could do Shakespeare from!” But I’m curious about the “shelf” you mentioned. Was that a physical platform built into her bra, or do you just mean her natural “balcony”? If the latter, I suspect she just got so used to feeling the phone there that she just didn’t notice it anymore.
It isn’t that the phone was lost, it’s that it was lost “in hand”.
Good reminder from Brian. Oldbot’s inability to find his phone (info lookup device and calendar keeper) is because he is talking on his phone (telephone) and doesn’t see it as available outside its current role. The match for the “Betty” is less complicated but still similar – her husband just can’t find his glasses because he has parked them in his default temp storage location, dangling from his shirt.
The last panel joke in Brewster isn’t what’s in the balloon, it’s what’s not there: any acknowledgement of what went before.
Boise Ed: If she had taken off all her clothes she could have rested two kittens on her two shelves. Plus two more on her shoulders, but most people can do that.
Phil Smith III, later works from at least two points of view – the opening on Friday is too short for the apparently greater need than an annual checkup (as I said in the earlier post, “delay to later because more time will be needed”); or he doesn’t want to spoil his weekend with a challenging appointment right before he’s done on Friday. I’d probably rate the first more likely, and not just because I already said that one.
As for oldbot forgetting the appointment, note that he was able to answer the phone and check his calendar once he found the phone he was talking on, so reminder calls would probably work. And he might enlist someone to assist with getting oldbot to the scheduled appointment.
MiB: The whole idea of a claw-armed kitten there is cringeworthy.
Before the pandemic came along we had a weekly Saturday night date – dinner out (originally at a diner, in more recent years/budgets at Wendys) and a movie. It was movies which brought us together.
One Saturday night a few years ago we went out as usual. We go to the last show of the night. When we got home Robert could not find his cell phone. He checked on his computer and it was – yes – at the movie theater or in its parking lot. We drove back there and checked the parking lot – called it – could not find it. We figured knowing the staff there the phone would still be there the next day for the first show.
Only problem was that we had a reenactment the next day. Theater would not be open until just before first show at noon. Had to be at the event at 8 am. So only logical solution – we dressed in our 18th century clothing and went to the event. At 11:30 I got back in the car and drove to the movie theater – event on north shore of LI just into Suffolk County, movie theater just into Nassau county on south shore of Nassau County – luckily there is a main road which almost connects the two locations – dressed in my 18th century clothing. Before going into the theater I thought to take off my cap, but did not think to change my eyeglasses from my tiny lens reproduction ones to my modern ones. The employee barely gave me a second look for my odd clothing (and it was the same person who was there Saturday nights) as she waved me in to look for it. I was then in the low light of the theater with the tiny lens glasses on and could not see his phone on the floor. (Luckily no customers in that theater yet.) I finally had the thought to call his phone and found it and went drove back to the 18th century.
At least it was not my phone which had gotten lost – I would have HEARD about if it was mine.
(We are hoping that theater will be opening again in the future it is sort of like home. I know exactly how long it will take me to run from each theater to the ladies room and back when I have an emergency.)
I once spent an unconscionably long time wandering about the house looking for the newspaper tucked under my arm.
And as someone whose distance vision has, as is common, improved with age, I’m just about to make the transition from varifocals to reading glasses. I just know I’ll always be losing them.
Mike P –
Robert says that I should write down where I put things when I do so, as he says he does, so I will know they are when we need them. I pointed out that if I wrote down every item I touched the list would be too long to check and that would assume I would remember where I left the list.
Generally when I cannot find something it means my logic has changed since then or it means it is where it belongs and I don’t think to look there. Example – At the start of the pandemic I put a small manila envelope on top of the sorter on my desk to hold checks received (cash not being mailed by anyone)for us and the 2 clubs of which I am treasurer so I would not lose any of them. Anything else to be done at banks is also put in the envelope (and those for us are clipped together with a paper marked “pers” so I know it ours and the other categories are similarly marked). We have some business that has to be done with a platform person at our credit union. We had to make an appointment with the employee who had started helping us. Where was her card? Name and phone number not in either of my computer phone books. Not with the papers to take with us. Not in the checkbook…. I found her name in my appointment book’s (Lotus Organizer – use old software) completed tasks from when we met with her as I keep a record there when we do things – including household chores. Then Robert suggested I look in – yes – the envelope of things to go to the bank – and there was her card. Made sense originally to put it with things to go to the bank, but did not occur to me that was where I put it as it no longer made sense – now sense said that it should be with the papers we were to take with us.
Then again – I can reach into my dresser drawers, closet, kitchen cabinets and just about pull out things without looking and know what it is in each of the Christmas decoration boxes.
Meryl, I also experience the failure of past logic you discuss. Or maybe it’s better understood as failure of future logic. “This will make me remember.” Oh sure….
We just spent 3 days looking for the new bottle of daily vitamins we bought. “Must be someplace logical!”
In the downstairs medicine cabinet? (We take them the vitamins with meals.) NO. With the food and other spare bottles of vitamins on my work table in our studio (which has not been usable for work since Nov 2020 when we moved the excess food there from the dining room table so we could have Thanksgiving dinner). NO. With the medications in the kitchen cabinet, the upstairs bathroom, the linen closet – all NO. Three days later as I checked my blood glucose it hit me – I put in the Diabetes supplies drawer!