Dress

A three-panel SMBC comic set at a party. In the first panel, a woman looks dismayed and says, "Oh my god this is embarrassing. She's wearing the same dress as me," while a companion replies, "She's... not?" In the second panel the woman, now angry and gesturing, insists, "Can you count? It's clearly a 4-holed sphere just like mine," framing dresses in topological terms (number of holes) rather than appearance. A caption reads: "This is why topologists never go to parties." Votey aftercomic: a grinning man's face says, "Oh, wait! I just have to stab her in the back and we can be seen together" - punning that adding a hole (a stab wound) would change her topology so the two dresses would no longer be topologically equivalent.