The Phone's Off the Hook, But You're Not [Week of Jul. 26]

[furrykef]

Who else guessed that Miriam would wind up calling the number that had been written on her?

[OzoneSama]

Well, as soon as Miriam was searching through her notes of random phone numbers I thought: hey, I bet she'll finally call what's-his-name-who-wrote-his-number-on-her-stomach. I was surprised by the girlfriend, but relieved he has one and was not waiting for Miriam to call him.

Now, on to the catching up. And a cool beer to all of you who are working this summer !

P.S.: I'm still eager to meet Ari's family...

[tazers]

I knew they wouldn't let that guy just up and disappear like that! I wonder if he'll even remember her...

edit the next day: Well what do you know, the exact opposite happened.

[SAGG]

What's-his-name's girlfriend sure looked like a little girl, didn't she? And her jealous pouting just added to it, didn't it?

[OzoneSama]

Finally! Now is the time the changes Mir' started to find in herself are starting to be noticed, I hope she'll keep on trying to push herself more out of her shell! And that she'll find true-and-lasting happiness doing so.

As for Greg's girlfriend, maybe she's slightly less mature that he is, but that would be in a very reasonable and believable margin, as Miriam's way of trying to "get to the point" was peculiar, to say the least. I think she would be rightly confused by a stranger's voice like Miriam's, that I imagine as a very "suave" voice (maybe something between a "Kim Carnes" and a "Cat Power (Chan Marshall)" kind of voice, at least that's how she sounds in my mind when I read her lines), asking her who is it over the phone.

When Greg started being joyful as he remembered Miriam, she felt somehow disappointed as if he had never took the time to talk to his girlfriend about the young woman whom he previously had a crush on. But I think she has the required minimum amount of maturity that will make her let that aside, or else Greg wouldn't be talking about it so lightly. I take it she wants to remind him that she's with him now and that he shouldn't be feeling regretful about it.

Oh my, I'm rambling again! Bah... Carpe Diem and Please Be Kind To Your Fellow Humans, that's all I have to say.

[SAGG]

Finally! Now is the time the changes Mir' started to find in herself are starting to be noticed, I hope she'll keep on trying to push herself more out of her shell! And that she'll find true-and-lasting happiness doing so.

Are you kidding? Come out of her shell? That's one of the reasons why she's messed up like she is. She's been out (there) too much. Miriam should turn inward some, and like you said, examine herself more. Perhaps the term "coming out" should not have been used...?

[Serge Stiles]

CALL HIM, MIRIAM! THINGS LOOK ROUGH WITH HIS GIRLFRIEND!

[OzoneSama]

[...] I hope she'll keep on trying to push herself more out of her shell! [...]

[...] Are you kidding? Come out of her shell? That's one of the reasons why she's messed up like she is. [...]

The way I see it, she's "messed up like she is" because her previous self was more a kind of self-protecting act. She was beautiful since a very young age and she may have been "acting" her role(s) (the party-girl/look-at-me-I'm-pretty-girl, the girlfriend of X and/or Y, the girl the whole school gossips about, that girl the others are jealous of, the fashion-starter, the girl who seems not to care for hurting other people's feelings...) to suit the desires of people around her. But today, deep down, under that shell, or in the word of Pink Floyd, behind that wall, there's the Miriam who's not craving for attention like she once was, there's the somehow caring, generous and kind Miriam, the one that Cherry might have been the first to discover back then and that was one of the stable basis of their long-lived-but-sometimes-difficult friendship.

She started pulling her humane self "Out There'" in the big-bad-real-adult-mean-world since the first strip of this comics (when she first met him, John was not really the kind of men she would have met at parties and/or felt attracted to), it's a very slow process, and she seems like she's starting to realize more and more what she went through, and more importantly that she won't be as hurt as she thought she'll be when she show her "soft" side. John as been the catalyst that helped that reaction. Okay, now brace yourself for my own poetic-licensed-analogy-so-cliché-and-sugary-it-will-make-you-cringe-and-give-you-cavities : Mir' is like a butterfly slowly going out of it's chrysalid, it's a very vulnerable stage, and John's the patient entomologist who will look at and study it from afar. Why? Because it's not such an horrible world "Out There", and that there's always room for improvement.

Well, that's only my personal opinion, and it's only what I perceived from what I've read from the life of a fictional character, so it's very open to various interpretations, and everyone is welcome in expressing their views about the comics. I'm glad that "Out There" is so well written it makes very good starting points for debates and expression.

SAGG, you said "coming out" might not have been right, but I think time will tell us if the "double entendre" term was fitting or not.

P.S.1: In the light of the more recent strips, Ginny seems slightly less mature that what I presumed. We'll see how it will go.

P.S.2: In the third panel of 08-06-2010's strip, I see Miriam with what I like to call "Miriam's tiger-eyes", but it seems it's also the first time she strikes me with a combination of her feline eyes with a feline body posture. I can't help but mentally add the cat-ears and the agitated cat-tail!

P.S.3: When this arc's over, I hope we'll see a little bit more of James + John + Clayton interactions, I miss that a little bit.

[Ectobandit]

When Greg started being joyful as he remembered Miriam, she felt somehow disappointed as if he had never took the time to talk to his girlfriend about the young woman whom he previously had a crush on. But I think she has the required minimum amount of maturity that will make her let that aside, or else Greg wouldn't be talking about it so lightly. I take it she wants to remind him that she's with him now and that he shouldn't be feeling regretful about it.

Well...keep in mind that Greg and Miriam only hung out for one NIGHT. He doesn't need to tell his girlfriend about every potential date and I think it's rather immature of her to get so upset about something like this. He was consistently nice and reassuring her the whole time, and she still threatened to smack him. B-R-A-T.

[OzoneSama]

Well, that quote was from my reaction to 08-02-2010's strip, and I said later that I realized I was overestimating Ginny's maturity. We'll see how it will turn out for "Greg 'n' Ginny". I'm just foolish enough to hope they won't actively deteriorate their relationship, maybe it will be the kind of "couple's test" they'll pass together?

On an other note, with this wedding coming soon, I'm wondering if we will be witnessing the first sight of James without sunglasses... or was he born wearing those?

And welcome here Ectobandit.

[rcmonroe]

I've always found it a bit repugnant when people casually throw around threats of physical violence (except when it's abundantly clear they're joking—and even then I don't like it if it's done too often). I used this as a way to show that Ginny is a bit less emotionally mature than most of the rest our cast (she IS supposed to be a little younger—not jailbait, but younger).

Re: James sans shades—I haven't decided yet. I've never drawn his eyes. Maybe he doesn't HAVE eyes. Naah, I'll probably have to come up with a pair of peepers for him. This ain't Beetle Bailey or Andy Capp.