2013-02-25
Original: 2013-02-25 on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1: A horizontal double-headed arrow spanning the full width of the panel, with a small bracket marking a span beneath it.
Label (under the bracket): my life
Panel 2: The same long arrow representing "my life." A second, shorter span is bracketed above one section of it.
Label (below, under the lower bracket): my life
Label (above, under the upper bracket): our relationship
Panel 3: A new, much longer double-headed arrow spans the panel, labeled as a vastly larger timescale. The previous "my life" / "our relationship" brackets are now squeezed into a tiny region at the far right end, barely legible.
Label (center): modern human history
Label (tiny, far right): our relationship / my life
Panel 4: The "modern human history" arrow from Panel 3 is shown again at the bottom, with the tiny "our relationship / my life" brackets at its far right. Above it is a wide horizontal color-coded bar acting as a key/spectrum. A legend across the top defines three colors.
Legend (green square): OK FOR ME TO SCREW SOMEONE ELSE
Legend (yellow square): PROBABLY OK FOR ME TO SCREW SOMEONE ELSE
Legend (red square): NOT OKAY
The bar is almost entirely green, with a narrow yellow stripe and then a narrow red stripe near the right end, aligning with where "our relationship / my life" sits on the timeline.
Panel 5: A scene with two people. A man with dark hair in a green shirt stands at left. A woman with reddish hair, glasses, and a red shirt stands at right holding papers and a pencil.
Man: HOW ABOUT WE HOLD OFF ON DECIDING THESE RULES UNTIL AFTER YOU'VE FIGURED OUT HOW TO BUILD A TIME MACHINE.
Woman: BUT I NEED TO KNOW NOW.
Votey:
A close-up panel. An off-panel speaker (only an arm/edge visible at left) addresses the woman, who looks uneasy.
Off-panel speaker: WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO DIE, BY THE WAY? IT'S FOR SCIENCE.
Label (under the bracket): my life
Panel 2: The same long arrow representing "my life." A second, shorter span is bracketed above one section of it.
Label (below, under the lower bracket): my life
Label (above, under the upper bracket): our relationship
Panel 3: A new, much longer double-headed arrow spans the panel, labeled as a vastly larger timescale. The previous "my life" / "our relationship" brackets are now squeezed into a tiny region at the far right end, barely legible.
Label (center): modern human history
Label (tiny, far right): our relationship / my life
Panel 4: The "modern human history" arrow from Panel 3 is shown again at the bottom, with the tiny "our relationship / my life" brackets at its far right. Above it is a wide horizontal color-coded bar acting as a key/spectrum. A legend across the top defines three colors.
Legend (green square): OK FOR ME TO SCREW SOMEONE ELSE
Legend (yellow square): PROBABLY OK FOR ME TO SCREW SOMEONE ELSE
Legend (red square): NOT OKAY
The bar is almost entirely green, with a narrow yellow stripe and then a narrow red stripe near the right end, aligning with where "our relationship / my life" sits on the timeline.
Panel 5: A scene with two people. A man with dark hair in a green shirt stands at left. A woman with reddish hair, glasses, and a red shirt stands at right holding papers and a pencil.
Man: HOW ABOUT WE HOLD OFF ON DECIDING THESE RULES UNTIL AFTER YOU'VE FIGURED OUT HOW TO BUILD A TIME MACHINE.
Woman: BUT I NEED TO KNOW NOW.
Votey:
A close-up panel. An off-panel speaker (only an arm/edge visible at left) addresses the woman, who looks uneasy.
Off-panel speaker: WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO DIE, BY THE WAY? IT'S FOR SCIENCE.
Alt text
A five-panel comic about scaling timelines absurdly. Panel 1: a long horizontal double-headed arrow labeled "my life." Panel 2: the same arrow, with a shorter bracketed segment above it labeled "our relationship" sitting on top of "my life." Panel 3: a much longer arrow labeled "modern human history"; the earlier "our relationship / my life" brackets are shrunk to a tiny sliver at the far right, showing how small a relationship is against history. Panel 4: above that same timeline is a mostly-green color bar with a legend—green = "OK FOR ME TO SCREW SOMEONE ELSE," yellow = "PROBABLY OK FOR ME TO SCREW SOMEONE ELSE," red = "NOT OKAY." The narrow yellow and red stripes line up exactly with the tiny window of "our relationship," implying it's only off-limits to cheat during the relationship itself. Panel 5: a man in a green shirt says, "HOW ABOUT WE HOLD OFF ON DECIDING THESE RULES UNTIL AFTER YOU'VE FIGURED OUT HOW TO BUILD A TIME MACHINE." The red-haired woman in glasses, holding papers, replies, "BUT I NEED TO KNOW NOW." Votey aftercomic: a close-up of the worried woman as an off-panel speaker asks, "WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO DIE, BY THE WAY? IT'S FOR SCIENCE."
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.