Spacetrawler, audio version For the blind or visually impaired, November 19, 2021.
Who will win this fierce battle of wits?!!! 😉
Apologies that the strip wasn’t updated last night. It was done, but my regular laptop in the last month has stopped speaking with my website, and so I upload the strip to Patreon, and then I need to upload it here from another laptop, and it is a new ritual I’m still trying to get used to. (I’ll be buying a new Macbook Pro soon. My old one has lasted for about 8 years, but it is time)
I love how this has built up. At first I wasn’t digging this thread, now it’s accidental Eeb like power and no idea by the creature who wields it that they have it.
I suspect that they will try to put Ruddock to long sleep state when he sleeps. Still unexpected turn.
Hehe, my one year old plott hound/black norwegian elkhound mix is like that. If it moves, and if it can be chewed, it’s food.
Thankfully, she lacks a sneeze-operated laser.
Don’t think I haven’t noticed that there weren’t any mice seen in the most recent Ruddock sequence until you mentioned them in this strip.
Ha! I forget so many things. Don’t think I haven’t forgotten that I have to go back through every strip and see which strips I forgot to put mice in. 🙂
Continuity is the demon of all writers, illustrators, and moviemakers. It’s not easy.
Not everybody can just say “to heck with it,” like Rex Stout or the writers of “Doctor Who.”
Four of the unfinished strips 3/22 to 4/1 are candidates.
Yes! Ruddock is back!
Yes! He has his robotic mice!
Leave the back strips the way they are — it’s better to have Ruddock point them out as he does here!
didn’t see any mice in previous strips but saw 1-0-0-1-0 today
Oh, wonderful! The Stribs apparently have no concept of ‘innocence,’ they just lump it in with other aberrant mental states. It’s very convenient that they reveal their emotional/conceptual limitations this way. Revealing, to those who can see.
I can appreciate your mysterious laptop problems, Christopher; I used to do tech support and there were times I swear I wasn’t doing technology so much as I was doing sympathetic magic. I mean, I have actually laid hands on a malfunctioning piece of equipment and it started working again.
My favorite technology quote from Moondog, c. 1969:
“Machines were mice and men were lions, once upon a time.
But, now that it’s the opposite, it’s twice upon a time.”
I recall a story from some years back where a worker kept calling up IT support to fix his PC, which began working properly as soon as the tech appeared. After a few times of this, the tech made the joke about the PC working so long as you kept watching it. As a joke, he glued a small photo of himself over the CPU.
The PC never failed again.
I suspect the user was habitually careless and was more careful when IT had an eye on him.
My favorite tech support story – not mine – users complained that they could only email people less than 500 miles away. Turns out that a recent upgrade to OS included a downgrade to email. So the current INI file did not work, was using all defaults. Timed out at 500 miles.
Pre windows.
It’s not really innocence here though. Ruddock has been killing them without realizing, but even when it’s pointed out he does not put two and two together and realize that he has been doing it. Whether it’s delusions or simply a lack of object permanence the Stribs now realize that they are dealing with an alien that is missing what they would consider logical though processes.
@Arcanestomper are those processes which look for logical alternatives?
Oh, I absolutely love Ruddock, even more than I loved Binkie (now, I’m not sure I remember the kangaroo’s name properly). There’s an innocence and naivety to Ruddock that’s especially endearing. As for battle of wills, the Stribs would lose out due to sheer frustration. It wouldn’t even occur to Ruddock that there was a contest of wills happening.
Madness is really just a lack of context.
The Stribs are just going to have their young raised by coyotes, aren’t they? Totally worked out for Emily.