Why Do You Love Me?

Explanation:
Cueball asks "Why do you love me?" to Megan , a fairly common question that couples ask each other. She responds by saying, "My heart never gave me a choice," a seemingly very sentimental, romantic answer. However, after a beat panel , she effectively kills the romance of the moment by adding, "I wish it had," indicating that she would rather not have loved Cueball.
Scott appears to be a friend of Randall Munroe . Comics 57 through 59 all have the title text Opening dialogue by Scott , forming a sort of informal mini-series inspired by him. They are:
As there already was a comic released on Monday that week, the first of these three was released on Tuesday, then Wednesday and Friday. This may be related to the fact that this was the first week were the comics were not also released on LiveJournal .
[Cueball and Megan are having a conversation. The same scene is shown for all panels.] Cueball: Why do you love me? Megan: I don't know; my heart never gave me a choice.
Cueball: Aww.
[Beat panel.]
Megan: I wish it had.


Graduation

Explanation:
Megan and a young Blondie (in her first appearance) discuss their plans for life after college.
Megan has taken the increasingly unusual choice of pursuing a career as a lighthouse operator , a path that has become increasingly less traveled, as lighthouses have become ever more automated and supplanted by other solutions. Before GPS technology, lighthouses were invaluable markers of where dangers to marine navigation, such as shallow reefs or coastal headlands, were located. Megan likes the idea of subverting the trope of the helpless maid in the tower who needs saving, by helping to save seafarers by operating a lighthouse that helps them to find their way safely back home.
When it comes to her turn to answer her own question, Blondie answers that she plans to pursue postgraduate education , but admits that she has no purpose for doing so. After obtaining an undergraduate / bachelor's degree, graduate school is the next level of education, where students pursue a master's or doctoral degree . Augmenting one's education with post-graduate studies is a conventional career path, and would imply that the student has a definite plan for their career, yet some people may attend grad school only because it is conventional, without having any definite plan for their career. This appears to be the case for Blondie, contrasted with Megan's choice of a seemingly blue collar / unskilled career — one might expect such a career to indicate someone who has no specific career plan, yet Megan seems to know her exact purpose, unlike Blondie. The fact that Blondie then accepts an invitation to spend her breaks at Megan's lighthouse suggests that she finds this a more attractive prospect than her more conventional path.
Other comics with a similar theme about finding or taking unexplored paths, instead of fitting into the mold, include 137: Dreams and 267: Choices: Part 4 .
Scott appears to be a friend of Randall Munroe . Comics 57 through 59 all have the title text Opening dialogue by Scott , forming a sort of informal mini-series inspired by him. They are:
As there already was a comic released on Monday that week, the first of these three was released on Tuesday, then Wednesday and Friday. This may be related to the fact that this was the first week where the comics were not also released on LiveJournal .
[Megan and Blondie are talking.] Blondie: What do you want to do when you graduate?
[Same scene as before.] Megan: I want to become a lighthouse operator. Blondie: Oh? Megan: Yeah.
[Cut to scene of lighthouse with text overlaid.] Megan: Lighthouses are built on interesting pieces of coast, so I'll have an interesting place to walk and swim, and great views of all kinds of weather. I'd feel good about myself and my work every single day.
[Cut back to Megan and Blondie. Megan has her arms up.] Megan: I'd get to be the girl in the tower, only I'd be the one rescuing people.
[Megan now has her arms down.] Megan: Why, what do you want to do? Blondie: I'm going to grad school. I don't really know why.
[Same scene as before.] Megan: Wanna come hang in my lighthouse over breaks? Blondie: ...yeah.


Super Bowl

Explanation:
The third in the " My Hobby " series. The Super Bowl is the championship American football game of the National Football League , which is usually played each February, and the final game of the 2006 season, Super Bowl XL , was played on the evening of 2006-02-05, the day before this comic was released.
As the game is one of the most watched television broadcasts in North America, advertising during the game has become increasingly expensive (among the most expensive advertising rates of any broadcast) to the point where corporations produce their best, most expensive advertisements to air during the game, to ensure that they would get value out of the expensive spots. The Super Bowl has thus become notorious for the "best" commercials, with some viewers purportedly tuning in solely to see the commercials, rather than the actual football game. News reports the next day often highlight the best and worst Super Bowl commercials, as do websites devoted to Super Bowl commercials.
Realizing that the Super Bowl is viewed by a large percentage of the population, Randall , somewhat tongue-in-cheek, states that those people would be quite distracted during that time, and therefore it would be possible to steal cars without fear of being caught. The title text takes this even further, suggesting that the entire Super Bowl was invented entirely for the purpose of being a distraction for car thieves. Naturally, the addition of the ads would make this even more effective, as it would attract even more viewers and ensure that they stayed in front of the TV during commercial breaks as well as the game.
The phrase "I steal cars" also provides a contrast to the fact that many viewers are only watching for the advertisements, making their smug sense of superiority seem petty compared to the fact that they but not Randall are not stealing cars and that they therefore are morally superior to Randall in this respect. This calls into question whether or not they really are significantly superior by comparing this marginal superiority to not being criminals. Alternatively, Randall may resent these people for feeling superior even though they aren't actually superior (at least in the eyes of Randall) and therefore steal their cars as punishment. Or Randall might be implying that they have no reason to being smug as they are being duped into having their cars stolen, and the thief is the one in the best position to be smug.
Randall may have chosen to use a car as a reference to the large number of car commercials that play during the Super Bowl, in addition to the ease of stealing a car at that time.
[A green car with text above and next to it.] My hobby: While everyone is watching the Super Bowl, feeling smugly superior because they're "Only watching for the ads," I steal cars.
In a distant future (2015), Randall (or Cueball ) spends his time differently during the Super Bowl - see 1480: Super Bowl . (This was the second time that two xkcd comics have shared the exact same name .) In between this comic and the one nine years later, no other comics came out related to the Super Bowl. The year after (2016), there was a comic ( 1640 ) about the Super Bowl, and in 2018 a comic ( 1951 ) appeared about a Super Bowl watch party.


Stacey's Dad

Explanation:
This comic refers to the song " Stacy's Mom " by Fountains of Wayne (See the music video on YouTube). As the background singers repeatedly say, "Stacy's mom has got it goin' on." Although Randall has used the wrong spelling of 'Stacy'.
The song is from the perspective of a young teenage boy who has a crush on his best friend's mother — 'Stacy's Mom' — and has deluded himself into thinking that she might like him back. In one verse, he tells Stacy "I know that you think it's just a fantasy, but since your Dad walked out your Mom could use a guy like me," and this is the line the comic is referencing, with Stacy's Dad (drawn the same way as Hairy , making this his first appearance) directly echoing the line and explaining why he left Stacy's Mom, suggesting that the singer do the same.
The line "Stacy's Mom has got it going on" is repeated throughout the song, and in context simply means that Stacy's Mom is very attractive. Here, however, Stacy's Dad changes it, saying that she "has a lot going on," which means that she has issues that would make a relationship difficult.
The humor comes from the fact that, in the song, it is very clear that the singer does not actually have a chance with Stacy's Mom and is merely kidding himself, as he is still just a kid. But in the comic, Stacy's Dad appears to be taking the situation completely seriously, and is worried enough about the possibility of Stacy's Mom and the boy getting together that he feels the need to warn him away.
The title text is referencing the second verse, which begins: "Stacy remember when I mowed your lawn." Mowing the lawn is the sort of chore that a kid might get paid to do for a friend's parent, and in the song, this is meant to emphasize that Stacy's Mom sees the singer as a child, not as a potential partner. But here, Stacy's Dad seems to be implying that mowing the lawn is something that Stacy's Mom made him — and possibly all her previous partners — do for her, and so her getting the boy to do it is actually a sign that she is interested in him.
The song Stacy's Mom was again referenced in 575: Tag Combination .
[A hairy man.] Man: Look, I know you think that since I walked out she could use a guy like you. But trust me. That woman has got a lot going on, and you want none of it. Man: Get out while you still can.
[Printed across the bottom of the panel.] Stacey's dad.


Valentine - Karnaugh

Explanation:
A Karnaugh map is a Boolean algebra tool that is used to simplify expressions. The final picture, the one that looks like a crossword puzzle, is similar to the way that a Karnaugh map is used on a Boolean truth table, to identify areas that can be simplified. This PDF document shows how the process is used to simplify logic circuits. The lament of the Valentine is that feelings don't yield themselves to the same kind of analysis.
This comic has four pictures with lines of text alongside them. The text can be used to understand the picture. The first three pictures show love to become more coherent and well-defined but yet complicated. The last picture and text alongside it show Cueball 's desire that there should be a way to simplify complications in love, just like Karnaugh maps for Boolean expressions.
The first line means that love is such an overwhelming feeling that it is hard to understand it and even harder to explain. The picture alongside has incoherent lines depicting the feelings of someone in love and hearts represents the overwhelming love.
The second picture and related text mean that the feelings are now identified to some extent but are numerous, and there are too few words to explain them. The picture depicts Cueball and Megan on separate side of his heart crisscrossed by many feelings. It shows that his inability to explain his feelings is like a barrier between them.
The third picture shows that Cueball has a much better understanding of love and now sees it as a matrix of desires and tangled relations, but it is still very complex to fully understand love.
The fourth picture shows a Karnaugh map that Cueball wishes he could find in the future to solve the matrix of desires and tangled relations that is love.
[Squiggly heart design.] You make me feel so much it all runs together I wish I could tell you [Crisscrossing heart design. Cueball and Megan on opposite sides of big heart.] So few words for so many feelings crisscrossing my heart [Heart matrix design.] A matrix of desire Tangled relations I can't simplify [Karnaugh map of hearts.] I wish I could find the Karnaugh map for love.


Valentine - Heart

Explanation:
The comic shows a Valentines card that starts off nicely, but then " escalates quickly " becoming very unromantic although probably very honest, that the only purpose of this card is getting the receiver into bed. It says that if this is not the case, if she (or he) doesn't want to go naked after receiving this card, then it is not really meant (i.e. their heart is not in it).
The title text implies that this is being offered as a Valentine that someone might give and then "pretend" that they were kidding. Which seems to imply that they would not, in fact, be kidding, that this represents their real feelings.
A funny thing is also that the text on the card implies that if the card indeed does get the receiver naked, that the action of giving it was truly meant. In that case, the giver would always deny that it was not meant and claim he/she is truly in love. Of course this cannot be true, since getting laid was the main motivation of appreciating the 'loved' one. "In it" could be an intentional sexual innuendo.
[A Valentine's Day heart bordered with wavy red lace-like pattern with text:]


Solar Plexus

Explanation:
The solar plexus is a network of interconnecting nerves that is centered in the area of the abdomen near the stomach. A blow to this area is painful and the cause of the feeling called "getting the wind knocked out of you" and is prevalent in media.
The trick "An[incomprehensible mumble]sayswhat" is a juvenile taunt that tricks a person into calling themselves a name.
Black Hat resolves the solar plexus joke with a punch to Cueball in the solar plexus as opposed to a normal punch(line).
The title text mentions truthfully that it hurts to be hit there.
[Black Hat and Cueball are talking to each other.] Black Hat: Asolarplexussayswhat? Cueball: What?
[Beat panel.]
[Beat panel.]
[Black Hat punches Cueball in the solar plexus.]


Banter

Explanation:
Two guys are trash-talking each other with homophobic comments and your mom jokes . It goes somewhat astray and becomes awkward when the first guy makes a pass at the second guy and is rejected.
Part of the element of the humor in this comic stems from a common assertion that the most-homophobic of men are the most likely to be a closeted homosexual . Another element is the incredible awkwardness of the end conversation.
Fag , ass pirate , fudge packer , and cock jockey are all insults for a homosexual man. Cum dumpster can apply to both men and women (usually conveying sluttiness ).
Randall's title text, that he mock-held this conversation with a friend in a TGIF restaurant, indicates how awkward this would be in real life. Even the waitress, a bystander, is put off by it.
[Two Cueball like characters have a discussion. They are drawn the same in all eight panels.] Guy: Man, she's hot Friend: Whatever, you are so gay.
Guy: C'mon, everyone knows you're the gay one. Friend: Hey, your mom's pretty masculine, but sleeping with her doesn't make me gay.
Guy: Fag. Friend: Ass pirate. Guy: Fudge packer Friend: Cock jockey Guy: Cum dumpster.
[Beat panel.]
Guy: Okay, seriously, are you gay? Because if you've been holding out on me, we're missing out.
Friend: No, it's cool. Guy: OK, me neither.
[Beat panel.]
[Beat panel.]


Abusive Astronomy

Explanation:
An asterism is a pattern of stars that forms some sort of perceived shape in the night sky. Some of these are patterns used to name regions of the sky, as constellations. Modern astronomy organizes the sky into 88 constellations, but different cultures saw different patterns in the same night sky, going back at least as far as the Babylonians, and there are many other patterns and grouping of stars. The Pleiades (or Subaru ), Orion's belt , and the Big Dipper are among the most common asterisms that we recognize today and are among the first taught to people with an interest in astronomy. The Pleiades is an open star cluster in the constellation of Taurus. It is a group of stars that formed from the same nebula and are moving together. Orion's belt comprises three stars that appear close in the sky, but are in fact at great distance from each other. The Big Dipper is part of the constellation Ursa Major. It can be used to help find the north pole star Polaris , which is an aid to night-time navigation.
During planetarium tours, the tour guide will point out popular constellations and stars; sometimes they will ask a question to get the audience involved in the presentation. Usually these people are big on showing the wonder of the galaxy and are all smiles, but people have bad days. The comic is presenting an especially aggressive way of introducing the night sky.
When astronomers in the Northern Hemisphere are showing stars to people, there will frequently be someone who points to the Pleiades and says, "There's the Big Dipper!" (both appear as a trapezium of stars, with a handle, though the Pleiades is much smaller). This gets frustrating about the 100th time that you encounter this error. So, this comic could show someone releasing their frustration on the misinformed public by pointing out that what they just pointed at is actually the Pleiades, then, pointing out that you can always locate the Pleiades by following the line of the stars in the belt of Orion, then, pointing out the REAL Big Dipper.
In the title text, Randall explains that he drew this comic as a line drawing on white paper, using only a pencil. The image was later inverted for publication.
Identifying star clusters: [Image of a star cluster.] This is the Pleiades , asshole.
Orion's Belt: [Image of Orion's Belt.] Only a moron couldn't find it.
This is the Big Dipper : [Image of the Big Dipper.] What the hell is wrong with you?
As noted in the title text, the drawing for this comic was originally done in pencil, then inverted. Here is a re-inverted version of the file, to show (approximately) what the original drawing looked like.
Alternatively, Randall may be using sarcasm when saying that the medium is pencil on paper, since it would be incredibly impractical and nearly impossible to draw the uniform black background while leaving white gaps for stars (assuming it was not inverted).
At the very bottom of the about page on xkcd, Randall answers the question What is your favorite astronomical entity? with The Pleiades .


Nerd Girls

Explanation:
The stereotypical nerd is socially inept and has an obsession with a non-mainstream hobby such as Dungeons and Dragons . Nerd males are also typically represented as treating all women (including female nerds) with reverence and awkward fawning due to their supposed inexperience and lack of female company in comparison to other males. In the comic, the nerd girl uses this as an excuse for her social ineptitude.
The T-shirt the girl is wearing contains the text "Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons," which is an actual text used for T-shirts, continuing with "for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup!" This text is a modified version of a quote from Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring : "Do not meddle in the affairs of Wizards, for they are subtle and quick to anger."
To all the high schoolers who are at the stage when they begin to find dates, Randall is saying that it is nothing personal, i.e. he is not trying to insult them by pointing this situation out.
[Girl with shoulder length brown hair and glasses, wearing a shirt which says "Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons".] Girl: At least, thanks to your constant fawning, we have an excuse for our social ineptness. What's yours ?


Five Thirty

Explanation:
At 5:30 AM, one's sleep-deprived or prematurely-roused mind sometimes comes up with things that seem like nonsense later.
None of the twelve panels in this comic seem to have any correlation with one another, each one being its own "story," and none of them really make any sense. It is unknown whether Randall really wrote this comic while awake at 5:30 in the morning, or if he wrote it while completely alert and is trying to pass off his rejected ideas by saying what one's mind may experience when trying to process information at an hour when the person is not used to being awake.
The title text could actually refer to two different panels. If a person chooses to read the comic left-to-right, top-to-bottom (which is more likely given that this is the order in the official transcript), the eighth panel could be the one with where Cueball asks "Does being a mermaid for five minutes make you gay?" However, if a person chooses to read the comic top-to-bottom, left-to-right, the eighth panel will instead be the one with Cueball hanging upside down shouting "Bachelor party!"
Comics from 5:30 AM [A succession of unrelated and completely random panels.]
Cueball: It's 80's night at the club. Wanna go?
Friend: There is no Tuesday. Cueball: Jack the Ripper or Jack Black?
[Cueball in this panel is holding a glinting sword.] Friend: You crashed my helicopter! Cueball: Verily!
[A small figure is talking with a larger figure.] Figure 1: Basically, neither of us have shins. Figure 2: Over and out.
[Two men are shown: one with three arms, and another with just two. All arms have round appendages at their ends.] Men: shitshitshitshitshitshitdaylightsavingsshitshitshitshitsh
[Two figures with pumpkins (carved with faces) for heads.] Figure 1: You're out of ointment and out of time!
[A diagram of a right-angled triangle, with a theta at the smallest angle.] FUCK THE COSINE
Friend: Does being a mermaid for five minutes make you gay? Cueball: I hope so!
[The friend is holding a gun to Cueball's head.] Friend: Barbershops are for pussies.
Friend: My hair is bleeding. Cueball: √3
[Cueball seems to be walking on the ceiling.] Cueball: Bachelor party!
[Warning sign with picture of an ant.] WARNING: STRETCHY DEATH


Pillow Talk

Explanation:
The Bellman-Ford algorithm is an algorithm that calculates the shortest path(s) through a weighted digraph or collection of connected nodes or vertices. The "Wexler" in the title text refers to Wexler's algorithm, which is used to deal with the inverse problem of electrical impedance tomography , or simply stated: the electrical conductivity of an (inhomogenous) object.
Both of these would make terrible pillow talk . Pillow talk is the conversation made by lovers after they have had sex, and is usually relaxed and intimate instead of technical.
Cueball: Staring at the ceiling, she asked me what I was thinking about. Cueball: I should have made something up. Cueball: The Bellman-Ford algorithm makes terrible pillow talk.


Guitar Hero

Explanation:
Guitar Hero is a series of video games (originally a single game) distributed by Activision . In the game, players simulate playing the guitar on famous guitar songs using a plastic guitar-shaped controller with five color-coded buttons on the neck representing guitar frets and a rocker bar on the body simulating a strumming motion. The game now includes other instruments such as drums and vocals, although not at the time this comic was published.
While the player plays the game, an animated band is shown on the upper half of the screen, and an extended guitar neck is shown vertically on the bottom half of the screen with horizontal frets, often called the "note highway." As the song progresses, coloured markers or "gems" indicating notes travel down the screen in time with the music; the note colours and positions match the five fret keys on the guitar controller. Once the notes reach the bottom, the player must play the indicated notes by holding down the correct fret buttons and hitting the strumming bar in order to score points. The image in the comic is similar to what is shown when playing Guitar Hero .
In this comic, Randall suggests that, were he in a real rock band, he would perform a mellow song, but intentionally put a complicated guitar solo in, not for musical value, but solely to antagonize Guitar Hero players with an impossible solo. As the comic suggests, a random flailing would likely make for a very difficult passage to play in Guitar Hero . This is highlighted by the previous statement that the song would otherwise be mellow, lulling the player into a false sense that the song was easy to play and relaxing. Even worse for Guitar Hero players, if there was anyone who is good enough to play the solo, they would still have no fun playing the song if it is otherwise very mellow.
Probably, the "impossible solo" proposed here would turn useless, as there are some songs where the artist actually flails the guitar, and the developers translated that in gameplay as a bonus where the players can freely spam their controller/guitar for extra points.
The title text refers to a mechanic in Guitar Hero called "Star Power."  Normally, when a player misses too many notes in a short time, their character is booed off the stage, and they have to restart.  Using Star Power temporarily boosts the score from each note, so the player can clear a difficult section of the song even if they haven't hit most of the notes.  So, when faced with Randall's impossible guitar solo, most players will immediately use Star Power to survive it.  However, it takes time to build up Star Power, and it all gets expended at once, so if the song has a second stretch of wild flailing, the player won't be able to escape and will fail. (Also note that in Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock and many other titles of the series, a full meter of Star Power lasts for eight measures, so as long as the song is mildly fast (80BPM would more than suffice for a 4/4 or 12/8 time signature), 30 seconds would be enough already.)
[On a stage, Megan is in the background as a singer holding a microphone. In the center is Hairy with an electric guitar. The catwalk has bumps to resemble the tracks of Guitar Hero.] [Caption above the stage]: When I'm in a rock band, I'm gonna do a cool, mellow song. Then in the middle I'll stop, announce "this part is just to be an asshole to people playing Guitar Hero," and then flail wildly on the strings for 30 seconds.


In the Trees

Explanation:
This comic focuses on dark humor. In the first panel, the viewer is led to believe that it is a comic lamenting on the loss of love, as it states, "We made it so far together, but then I lost you in the trees." However, when we read the second panel ("Finally"), it becomes clear that the joke is that the loss of this "love" is what he had been hoping for all along. The supposed pain that came from such losing a long relationship came not from lamenting the loss of something he put so much effort into, but instead into the fact that it took so long to get there. The title text just furthers this idea.
There is a similar twist in comics 334: Wasteland and 1042: Never .
[Cueball is standing in a forest.] Cueball: We made it so far together but then I lost you in the trees.
[A closer view of Cueball.] Cueball: Finally.


Classhole

Explanation:
The subject of this comic is Black Hat himself. He admits to being an asshole, a profanity that describes someone who does things that antagonize, irritate, or anger others (either intentionally or incidentally). While a common example might be someone who weaves in and out of traffic, or someone who parks across two parking spaces, Black Hat is "more creative." This also suggests that, while most people described as assholes are either ignorant or selfish, Black Hat seems to intentionally behave this way strictly to be an asshole and not for any self-benefit. He claims to be a "classy asshole," or as he coins the portmanteau , a "class-hole." He seems to equate creativity with class, although that seems like a leap. In any event, this is another early Black Hat strip that, for the first time, explicitly sets out that he goes out of his way to wreak havoc.
Among his "pranks," he suggests poking holes in grocery noodle cups. These are pre-packaged cups filled with dried noodles and dried soup mix (either in a separate pouch, or loose in the cup) to which one adds boiling water, which both boils the pasta and dissolves the soup mix to become the soup/broth. By poking holes in the cup, Black Hat ensures that someone pouring boiling water in the cup would have it leak all over them, causing them great surprise and pain.
He also suggests poking holes in condoms , which could cause even more serious consequences. This form of contraceptive sabotage is a way to cause unintended pregnancy or sexually transmitted disease infection. Sabotage may be by someone acting maliciously at random (such as poking holes at the store pre-purchase) or by one of the participants to attempt to cause a pregnancy when the other partner does not want it, often occurring as part of reproductive abuse. [1] The 2013 movie The Priest's Children describes a similar campaign.
The title text explains that the word was first introduced to Randall (and probably to the world) by a friend of his named Beth.
Cueball: How did you spend your morning? Black Hat: Feeding rocks to children in the park.
Cueball: Your sociopathic abuse of random strangers staggers me. Black Hat: I aspire to have more creativity than the common asshole.
Black Hat: I'm more of a classy asshole -- A class-hole, if you will. For example, I like poking tiny holes in styrofoam noodle cups at the grocery store --
Black Hat: Thanks to me, someone gets surprise boiling water in the lap. Cueball: I am in awe. Black Hat: It's even more fun to do to condoms.


Zeppelin

Explanation:
A Zeppelin is a type of rigid dirigible aircraft, used in the early part of the 20th century for commercial airline traffic. They were well known for being the most luxurious, comfortable air travel of the time. The Hindenburg disaster, as well as World War II, led to the end of their use as commercial airliners. Also associated with the Zeppelin name is a particular design of wristwatches, [1] notable for having the word "Zeppelin" at the top of the dial, at or under where the number 12 would be. In this comic, Randall implies that, since the hour hand of the watch is pointing to the word Zeppelin, it is time for a Zeppelin to appear in the sky.
The title text refers to the webcomic Buttercup Festival , which, at the time of this comic, was defunct. It was later revived by the author then defuncted again in 2015 and revived, again, in 2019. As of 18/07/20, the comic is running its third series. It is a tribute to Buttercup festival in the way it interprets things in the world naïvely and literally to achieve humour, in a simple yet effective and uncontrived way.
Cueball: What time is it? [Picture of a Zeppelin style watch, indicating the time about 12:13 o'clock.] [Cueballs look up at the sky.] [A huge Zeppelin is visible in the sky.]


Su Doku

Explanation:
Su Doku (Japanese for "single number," and now usually written as "sudoku") is a type of number puzzle, in which the player must place digits in a matrix field in the correct arrangement, such that they do not repeat within given domains. The most common arrangement is a 9×9 grid subdivided into nine 3×3 grids, into which the nine non-zero digits of the normal decimal counting system must be inserted, with no digit being allowed to appear twice in a horizontal or vertical row or in each individual 3×3 grid. The number and combination of pre-filled squares determines the difficulty of the puzzle.
However, Randall presents a 2x2 binary sudoku puzzle which isn't subdivided. The joke is that the binary system has only two digits (0 and 1), and as a result binary sudoku puzzles would be trivially easy and thus pointless. The puzzle in the comic would be completed by filling 0 in the top-left and 1 in the bottom-left empty box. The only other possible grid would have the 0s and 1s swapped. This fulfills the criterion of having no repeated digits in any row, column or cell.
The title text appears to reference a series of published sudoku puzzle books called "Martial Arts Sudoku". The difficulty of each book is denoted by a martial arts belt color, with each color representing a certain skill level. A red belt is a rather high level, second only to the black belt. When applied to binary sudokus, a sudoku with one number given would be the most difficult one (though still trivial) and thus be a black belt. This sudoku has two numbers given, hence the medium red belt level.
[A square divided into 2×2 squares, the top-right one has an 1 in it, the bottom-right one has a 0, the two left ones are empty.] Binary Su Doku


Curse Levels

Explanation:
In this fourth " My Hobby " strip, the hobby is mixing curse levels. Curse words (aka: swear words/profanities) are disrespectful words that are typically impolite to use in public. As noted in the strip, there are "levels" of curse words ranging from those "mild" words that are more acceptable to use, to those "severe" words that are considered very impolite (the milder curse words can be used on network television in the US, for example, while severe ones can not). Although they cannot be exactly defined, they roughly fit into "safe"(heck, gosh, dang, etc.),"mild"(d*mn, s**t, h*ll and so forth) and "severe"(those that refer to more suggestive things than the others, as well as racial slurs and such). One usually uses milder cursing ("safe") because either they personally don't feel comfortable using the more severe words, or because it would not be appropriate in the context (such as on network television, in the presence of children, etc.) Thus, mixing mild and severe curses in one usage does not usually occur, as the effect achieved by keeping the one curse word mild is negated by using another that is severe.
In a mild curse, "gosh-darned" is typically used as a minced oath of "God-damned" when the latter would be inappropriate. This is mixed with " cunt " — a vulgar term for the female genitalia, considered the most offensive swear word in many English-speaking countries.
My hobby: mixing curse levels Cueball: What a gosh-darned cunt.


Familiar

Explanation:
Megan tells her boyfriend ( Hairy ) her reservations about their relationship: she's happy with him, she thinks he doesn't compare to anyone else, and they have a strong connection built up over the course of years, but she's worried that all this is just because they've been dating so long that she hasn't had the opportunity to experience potentially better relationships. However, she recognizes that what she has should be enough, and resolves to stop worrying. Hairy responds to this by saying that he doesn't even like her, recognizing that it's relatively poor timing to say so after her expression of love (albeit a rather ambivalent one).
The title text is a sad-face emoticon, representing either Megan's sadness about his dislike of her, his (possibly disingenuous) sympathy for her, or the narrator's recognition that he's depicted a sad situation.
[Hairy and Megan are talking] Megan: I worry that I'm just with you because it's familiar. Of course no one else compares. I've known you for so long that I'd have to spend years with someone to build up this kind of connection and I daren't let you go of you long enough to let that happen. Megan: But I guess this is really all I can ask for. I'm happy with you; I should stop worrying. [Megan takes Hairy's hand.] Hairy: This is probably a bad time to bring this up, but I don't actually like you.


Bored with the Internet

Explanation:
A character who has hair (not to be confused with Hairy ) suggests to Black Hat that he is wasting his life on the Internet, and they should go explore the world. They appear to walk a great distance, through what appears to be a swamp or perhaps a forest in winter, across a plain, and down to a river valley. Despite traveling so far and through such varied landscapes, in the last panel, Not-Hairy admits that all he can think about is what a great Livejournal post their trip would make. It appears that the plan to get the Internet off their mind has failed.
Livejournal is a website on which users can make accounts and, effectively, blog, although the site is designed around the premise that the blogs ought to be used as personal journals, with the ability to privatize the journal or only let certain friends see certain entries. Livejournal was an early social network and an early blog platform, and was a good way for people to let others know what was going on in their lives. As of 2020, Livejournal still exists, although sites like Facebook and Twitter have become far more powerful and popular sites for sharing one's daily life.
Unlike most of his appearances (especially later ones), Black Hat does not exhibit any of his signature Classhole tendencies.
The title text suggests that Randall has overcome a tendency to think about how he will document what he has been doing, rather than concentrate on the thing itself.
[Black Hat and Not-Hairy are talking in a room with a computer on.] Not-Hairy: I feel like I'm wasting my life on the internet. Let's walk around the world. Black Hat: Sounds good. [The two men are shown walking through trees.] [The two men are shown walking on flat stretch, with mountains in the distance.] [The two men are shown in a magnificent canyon. They stand, silently looking at the scene.] Not-Hairy: And yet all I can think is, "This will make for a great LiveJournal entry."


Garfield

Explanation:
The newspaper comic strip Garfield , which features an orange cat as the main character, has increasingly been known for repetitive, quality-lacking strips. In the past, this was because the creator, Jim Davis , prefers to explore the same subjects he is comfortable with but in different ways — or from a less charitable view, because the strip is intended for a wide audience and thus becomes homogenized and inoffensive by nature. This attitude has only become more pronounced in the 21st century, as the aging Davis becomes less and less interested in the franchise. Regardless of the reason, these strips are now ghost written with little input from Davis and rarely explore the unconventional. The comic is challenging Davis to do something unexpected and surprise us all. The comic also accuses Davis of being a "sell out", sticking to bourgeois/commercial logic, something that dadaist artists challenged.
Dadaism was an artistic movement in the early 20th century marked primarily by chaos, irrationality, and surrealism. Some of the artists believed that the bourgeois logic made human beings unhappy and therefore led to war.
Randall leads by example by featuring a strip that parodies the style of Garfield, with multiple colors (xkcd usually contains only black and white, with some few containing an additional color like red or yellow) and a character that is not a stick figure breaking the normal xkcd pattern. Another dadaist aspect is the fact that while Garfield is smiling, he is communicating something that could be considered terrifying.
The title text explains that xkcd is exercising legal use of Davis's intellectual property, namely the title character of his comic. The Supreme Court case mentioned, Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music , confirmed that parody is legal even when there is commercial gain as a result, and also referenced the Copyright Act of 1976 , 17 U.S.C. § 107, for the same reason.
While this is normally understood by most anyone who questions such matters, Randall includes it as a reference to the lessening of strict copyright law, which many comics also mention, usually in the context of open-source software and those who promote it, like at the comics featuring Richard Stallman .
I want to see something unexpected in comics. Just one strip could make up for it all. [Garfield is standing on hind legs facing and looking directly at the camera. But is off-center in the frame, about 1/3 from the left, rotated very slightly clockwise.] [Zoom in on Garfield, still to the left, now rotated slightly counterclockwise.] [Zoom in again on Garfield, now the frame clips off the left side of his face.] Garfield thought bubble: The world is burning. [Final zoom in, the frame is ripped like a page, offset, and Garfield's eyes are half closed on the right half.] Garfield thought bubble: Run. Jim Davis, throw off your commercial shackles. Challenge us. Go out in a blaze of Dadaist glory. There is still time.


Iambic Pentameter

Explanation:
In this part of the My Hobby series, the hobby is responding to casual questions using iambic pentameter . Iambic pentameter is a form of poetic verse defined by the number of syllables per line. In this form, a line contains exactly five (penta means five in Greek) " iambs " per line. An iamb is a unit of two syllables with the stress falling on the second. The actual breakup of the words is unimportant; the definition is based solely on the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables. One line of strict iambic pentameter will have ten syllables, with the stress falling on the second, fourth, sixth, eighth, and last.
In this comic, Cueball (i.e. Randall - the one with the hobby) is replying to his friend's questions. (The friend also looks like Cueball, but are here differentiated by who has the hobby.) Cueball's responses are each one line of iambic pentameter, just visually broken into two lines for space reasons. They read (adding the emphasis):
"Well, I can meet the plane at ten of six " and "I'll meet him at the stairs be fore the gate "
with a sort of bouncing rhythm.
Shakespeare was one of the most famed users of iambic pentameter in his plays. This is the "strict form" of iambic pentameter. In practice, poets often strayed from the strict count of iambs as the image text suggests. Wikipedia offers two Shakespearian examples being "Now is the winter of our discontent," in which the first iamb is reversed ("Now" is stressed rather than "is"), and "To be or not to be, that is the question," which adds an extra unstressed syllable at the end. As the comic suggests in the title text, without such exceptions, it can be very difficult to stick to strict iambic pentameter for every sentence.
[Two identical Cueballs are having a conversation. The latter is identified as Cueball, since he represents Randall who has the Hobby.] Friend: What time can you pick Michael up? Cueball: Well, I can meet the plane at ten of six. Friend: Do you know where to find him? Cueball: I'll meet him at the stairs before the gate. [Below the two Cueballs are the following text:] My hobby: answering casual questions in iambic pentameter.
Iambs and other types of poetry " feet " are the subject of 1383: Magic Words .


My Other Car

Explanation:
This comic refers to a popular form of bumper sticker that follows the template "my other car is a ____." Sometimes the blank is a fancy vehicle like a Porsche or a Ferrari ; sometimes it's related to the person's job (e.g. "My other car is a fire truck"); sometimes it's an even more expensive form of transportation like a " yacht " or " private jet ," or even something joking or in fiction (like a " TARDIS ").
The premise was to jokingly imply that someone driving in a less fancy vehicle was wealthier than they looked, as they could afford a fancy car (they simply chose to drive the clunker that day). The designer of the first stickers might even have intended them for serious use by wealthy drivers. The form of sticker ultimately became so well known that the phrase entered the pop-culture lexicon.
Due to their popularity, these stickers also have been parodied in various ways, like the one Randall has invented here. Randall's sticker is a more "honest" sticker that admits "this IS my other car;" in other words, this is the nicer of the two cars.
This sticker could probably be used on an expensive car to mirror the traditional sticker's use on a cheaper car. However, the car in the strip is a Mitsubishi, which is not a particularly expensive brand, though the presence of a spoiler indicates it may be one of the top-range models, or at least has had a little extra paid for some sports 'extras'. Thus it appears that Randall is using the sticker for contrasting purposes: while others would drive a modest car but joke that they have a really nice one at home, Randall's car is the one you see, and, as he noted in the title text, his other one is much worse than this one.
It's also possible that this is a play on meta-levels; by definition, the car that you're driving can't be your other car, as it's your car you're driving now. Your other car is the one sitting at home.
[The back of a blue Mitsubishi with a spoiler is shown.] Bumper sticker: This IS my other car.


Attention, shopper

Explanation:
A common trope (often referenced in TV and film) is a loudspeaker announcement in which a store employee (or anyone else in charge somewhere where people gather, like church or a school) announces that a certain colour and model of car has its lights on, or is blocking another car, or is about to be towed, or similar. A licence plate is sometimes included to allow the owner to identify that it is specifically their car that is involved.
In this case, Black Hat is up to his old ways as, in addition to announcing that an SRT-10 has its lights on, he also announces that it has had its windshield smashed with a golf club. Black Hat is, of course, holding a golf club, frustrated at the owner’s revolting arrogance. The lights are probably on because the attack triggered the car's alarm system.
The Dodge Viper SRT-10 was a version of the Dodge Viper available on the third and fourth generations of Viper from 2003-2010. It was a very expensive sports car.
The two license plates in the comic are personalized license plates. The one in the comic-proper is clearly "My Toy"; the plate in the title text is most likely "Dad's Money," which Randall suggests is a real plate on a car outside his building, suggesting that the driver's father paid for the car, bragging about how rich their family is. This car will likely also soon earn Black Hat’s wrath.
[Black Hat is holding a golf club and speaking into a P.A. system.] Black Hat: Attention, Black Hat: To the owner of a Dodge Viper SRT-10 with license plate "MYTOY," your lights are on and your windshield was just smashed with a golf club.


Frame

Explanation:
Cueball is standing in the middle of the first square panel, but then the panel's frame starts warping away from being square and starts to form into tendrils that move toward him, then slowly wrap themselves around him, and finally retract, reforming the frame again, but pulling him apart in the process, in a rather macabre comic.
Typically, the frame on a cartoon is used to separate different periods of the action. Here, this has been subverted by the frame becoming a character, the main protagonist, and sole survivor of the strip.
There is some indication that Cueball is also just part of a drawing, since his upper torso, with parts of each arm, is left hanging in the air without any tendrils touching it. If it was not stuck in the center of the image, it would fall down, but more importantly, even if all tendrils pulled very fast at the same time, it is highly unlikely that they could pull so precisely that the body would split in four pieces around this remaining body cross, and one of the tendrils should have pulled this part along with either an arm, the head, or the lower torso. This could be some comfort for those who think that this is too much. Of course, it could also just be something that Randall did not think was important in such a surreal comic.
Comics often use artifacts on the frame to add mood to the comic. This comic then makes those artifacts a major feature of the comic, like a Chekhov's gun ("If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off.")  The use of creative panel layouts and effects was first made possible in newspaper comics at the insistence of Bill Watterson, author of Calvin and Hobbes (which it is known that Randall has been influenced by), requiring lengthy negotiations due to the printing technology of the time. The creative use of panel layout and effects is thus part of the artistic legacy of Calvin and Hobbes. xkcd, among others, has continued along that path of pushing the boundaries of the medium.
The title text "..." could indicate that Randall wasn't being very serious about this comic. But perhaps it was an idea to creatively use parts of the comic nobody thought about, and it spoke for itself and needed no extra comment. The three dots also indicate that something more will happen soon. The reader may visualize the final result and empty square panel, ready for the next unfortunate person to walk into this trap. Alternatively, it could mean that Randall found the comic so bizarre, even he couldn't comment on it (see Trivia section ).
[Cueball stands alone in the center of this almost normally framed panel. But there are four small indentations two both left and right and maybe also one top right.]
[Tendrils from the frame develop and grow inwards while breaking the outer frame down. The tendrils comes close to Cueball. There are 13, three from three of the four sides and four from the right.]
[The tendrils have now completely broken the outer frame down and 11 have reached Cueball and these begins to wind themselves around him. There are tendrils around his forehead, neck, cheek, left arm, left wrist, left hand, right wrist, right hand, lower torso, left leg and right leg. Those around his legs spiraling almost up to his crotch. 14 other tendrils have not reached him yet. All those reaching him was among the 13 from the previous panel. Only the two from the bottom right corner did not make contact. The other 12 not reaching him where new.]
[Finally the 11 tendrils that have reached Cueball retract along with the other 14 tendrils back to the frame, tearing Cueball apart in 9 pieces, leaving one central piece (his upper torso with a part of each arm) floating in the center without tendrils on it. His head has been split in two by three tendrils, that keep the parts close together. The left arm with one tendril has been split from the hand with two tendrils, whereas the two holding the wrist and hand kept their part of the arm in one piece. The two legs have been separated from the lower torso at the crotch, and they as well as the lower torso is all being pulled away by one tendril. The other tendrils have almost reached the frame, three of them are already gone leaving 11 near the frame. The frame has also nearly reformed it self again.]


Katamari

Explanation:
Katamari Damacy is a Japanese game in which the player must roll around an infinitely sticky katamari ball, cottoning up objects and terrain to increase the ball's size. In this comic, Cueball uses the katamari as an analogy for his love for Megan , pushing it to such embarrassing extremes that Megan feels the need to remark whether he could "possibly get any gayer." At this point, Cueball wins the level he is playing and is transported by a "Royal Rainbow," an in-game occurrence at the completion of each level. The rainbow is a symbol of gay pride, in addition to being just a generally happy (i.e. gay) idea.
Cueball also only takes up such a stand after Megan requests that he help her. This is possibly a criticism of male selfishness (perhaps Randall's self-criticism), in that males do not discuss romantic ideas, except as a way out.
The King of All Cosmos , mentioned in the title text, is an instructive character in all of the Katamari games. The title text points out that perhaps we either like or love video games not because they are fun, but because they let us forget our problems and retreat into someone else or an intricate fantasy.
[Megan stands on the left. Cueball is sitting on the floor with a game controller in his hand. He is looking at a TV on the floor connected to a game console, also on the floor.] Megan: Can you pause for a moment and help me with something? Cueball: You know, our love is like a katamari. We travel along, rolling up more and more of the world into our shared experience, taking it and making it our own.
Megan: I, you... wow. Geekiness aside, that was actually incredibly sweet. Cueball: The clutter of everyday life, with a simple core to tie it together, eventually becomes something grand as the world itself.
[A rainbow extends outward from the TV, with "ROYAL RAINBOW!" above it. Cueball raises his hands in victory.] Megan: Okay, also sweet, but now I'm wondering if you could possibly get any gayer.
Katamari Damacy is also a subject of 161: Accident and 851: Na .


National Language

Explanation:
This comic is about the concept of nativism , which is the view that those who are native to a place should have more rights than immigrants. A frequently expressed view in the U.S. (and in other countries) is that immigrants should learn English, which is the primary language in the United States.
In the comic, one character is arrogantly arguing the nativist position. However, the woman next to him interrupts him and says a phrase in the Cherokee language - "Hello, my name is Sarah" - which is an Iroquoian language used by the Cherokee Native American people. Although Cherokee seems to be a relatively young culture , it is much more native to America than any European culture, such as English.
The woman is therefore effectively suggesting a "what's good for the goose is good for the gander" argument, that if the Europeans did not have to learn the native language, why should current immigrants learn English? She points out that even the English speakers are immigrants who did not learn the native language. Alternatively, she is saying that the term "national language" has no clear meaning, especially in the United States, where there is no official language; therefore, the "language they speak there" can be any of the languages spoken in the country: English, Spanish, German, Cantonese, or Cherokee, to name a few.
The title text reveals that Ponytail is in fact Randall's friend; in the comic it is unclear who his friend is.
[Caption on top:] This happened to my friend:
[Three men and two women are standing in a row.] Cueball: English should be the national language. These immigrants should have to learn English when they come here. Megan: Yeah.
Cueball: When you go to live somewhere, you learn the language they speak there. Cueball: English is the language of the land.
Ponytail: Excuse me, but osio Sarah dawado.
Cueball: What the hell was that? Ponytail: Cherokee.


Paths

Explanation:
This comic centers around the consideration of what is the shortest path available to a person traveling by foot. Cueball has to travel across a rectangular distance, which has an established path around the periphery. When Cueball follows these paths, he has to walk for 60 seconds. He realizes that by ignoring the paths and taking the desire lines from corner to corner, his route will be shorter, and he calculates that he could cut up to 26% of his time.  As a result, every time he has to travel this rectangle, he worries about the extra time taken as a result of following the path. There are downfalls to this plan, however. This is convenient for Cueball but probably not for the building owner, as many rectangular lawns have delicate decorations such as flowers on them.
[Blueprint of a campus. Two buildings in the upper and lower left corners, respectively, and a rectangular lawn. A road encloses the lawn, another road traverses horizontally through the center of the lawn. The character is in the lower left and the upper right corner, where it says "my apartment".] [Dashed line 1, from the lower-left along the road to the top-left corner, then to the top-right corner.] 60 seconds [Dashed line 2, from the lower-left along the road up to the center crossroads, then diagonally over the lawn to the top-right corner.] 48 seconds (80%) [Dashed line 3, diagonally from the lower-left to the top-right corner.] 44.7 seconds (74%) My apartment 1=t 2=(t*(1+√2))/3 3=(t*√5)/3 When I'm walking, I worry a lot about the efficiency of my path.


Digital Rights Management

Explanation:
Digital rights management (DRM) is a class of methods for controlling digital files, such as by preventing media from playing on any device besides the device from which the purchase is made. It is used by several major companies, as it makes it more difficult to pirate media, which they claim cuts into their profits. Those companies typically also lobby for laws forbidding circumvention of DRM techniques, like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).
However, DRM is usually disliked by consumers, as it makes it difficult to use their purchased media. For example, if they buy a new computer, there's no guarantee that their DRM-covered media will be usable on the new computer. Thus, Black Hat is suggesting to the pro-DRM organizations Sony , Microsoft , the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), and Apple that they stop their DRM-fiddling and lobbying, and he'll stop his inexorable ice-wall.
The title text refers readers to law professor Lawrence Lessig 's book Free Culture .
[Black Hat is standing on an advancing glacier] Black Hat: Dear Sony, Microsoft, the MPAA, the RIAA, and Apple: Let's make a deal. You stop trying to tell me where, when, and how I play my movies and music, and I won't crush your homes under my inexorably advancing wall of ice.
There appears to be a larger version of Black Hat, drawn in pencil and erased, behind him. The smaller figure makes the inexorably advancing wall of ice appear correspondingly larger.


Velociraptors

Explanation:
This comic refers to the film Jurassic Park , a 1993 movie based on the 1990 novel by Michael Crichton . The film depicts a billionaire who buys an island and opens a zoo/theme park for dinosaurs cloned from DNA recovered from blood found in fossilized mosquitoes. Naturally, everything goes haywire, and several of the creatures, among which are the velociraptors subject of this comic, try to devour every human in the theme park.
Velociraptors (often shortened as " raptors ") are a species of relatively small, carnivorous dinosaur that play a central role in the original film and its sequels. In the film, packs of Velociraptors attack the main characters at various points, even entering buildings; they play a large role in the climax of the film. According to Wikipedia, the velociraptors in the film were erroneously based on Deinonychus . The movie depicts the velociraptors as having scaly reptilian skin, though dinosaurs of this type are now theorized to have been feathered.
As we see in this comic, and will see in future comics, even though it had been approximately thirteen years since he presumably first saw the film, Randall apparently has lived in perpetual fear of a real raptor attack. Specifically, in this comic, he worries how a building would stand up against the creatures. The main risk posed by the house depicted comes by the large window in the living room, through which a Velociraptor could break-and-enter (believing that the bathroom window is too high for them to reach, and the door too secure to break through).
The image text points out what he presumes is the reader's disbelief that Jurassic Park had (as of 2006) been released so long ago (thirteen years prior). This is another classic xkcd premise that will later be the subject of 891: Movie Ages five years later, which includes Jurassic Park again. This is the first in a long line of comments and comics Randall has made about how realizing the release dates of things in popular culture can make us feel old.
[Picture of a suburban house, with lines pointing to various aspects.]
High bathroom window: probably secure.
Outer door: secure.
Picture window: VELOCIRAPTOR ENTRY POINT!
It's been over a decade since Jurassic Park opened, and I still size up buildings for their potential as shelter against Velociraptor attacks.
This comic marks the first reference in xkcd to Jurassic Park , and specifically to Randall 's fear of velociraptors . The fear will continue to be a subject of future comics and running jokes.


Escher Bracelet

Explanation:
This image parodies "WWJD" bracelets, which is an acronym for "What Would Jesus Do?". Christians (primarily) wear such bracelets (or other "WWJD" paraphernalia) as a reminder to act in a way that Jesus would act, which presumably is the "Christian" way to act. It is not entirely clear, but this particular bracelet appears to be the rubber type most famously popularized by the yellow ones of cyclist Lance Armstrong's Livestrong charity, which later became a popular fad for all sorts of charitable and non-charitable causes.
In this comic, the "J" has been replaced by an "E" for M. C. Escher , a Dutch graphic artist (1898–1972) best known for art containing imagery that would be impossible in the real world (often referred to as impossible constructions or optical illusions). Among his most famous works are " Drawing Hands " – two hands drawing each other on paper; " Relativity ", in which a series of staircases and arches come from the floor, ceiling, and the walls in all directions, each with people standing on them as if each direction is "down"; and " Ascending and Descending " – a building with a staircase on its roof that is a closed square that appears to ascend or descend infinitely, depending on the direction that is walked.
In keeping with Escher's art, the WWED bracelet has a single half-twist in it, creating what is known as a Mobius strip . Although this is not an impossible construction, it is still an apparently confusing structure that Escher used in his art. Most notably, his work "Mobius Strip II" depicts ants crawling around a Mobius strip. One can create this shape simply by taking a strip of paper (or any bendable material), making a half twist, and attaching the ends together. If you draw a single continuous line starting down the centre of the bracelet from the middle of the "W" going left, you will end up drawing from the "WWED", going around again on the "inside" of the bracelet, before coming back around to the front again and ending up at the "D". In other words, the surface of the bracelet has only one side (the front and the back are the same side). The phrase "the only downside" in the image-text may be a pun referencing this one-sidedness. As the title text suggests, the twist in the bracelet might make it uncomfortable to wear.
[A Livestrong-type bracelet is featured, but with an Escher twist in it. The band is a Mobius strip. The band has the letters "WWED" printed on it.] What Would Escher Do?


Gravitational Mass

Explanation:
Black Hat launches into what appears to be an in-depth exposition about the relativity of gravity and inertia. However, it transpires that this is just a convoluted build-up to a Yo' Momma joke along the lines of "she's fat and not that attractive." Black Hat then can't be bothered with, or can't figure out, the lengthy route to his punchline, so just goes for a straightforward insult instead.
A well known joke format goes: "Yo' momma's so fat, when she X, she Y." For example: "Yo' momma's so fat, when she sits around the house, she sits around the house!" Variations play with the format, for example: "Yo' momma's so fat, she fell in the Grand Canyon and got stuck!"  A "Yo' Momma" joke also appears in comic 681: Gravity Wells to the right of Jupiter.
The title text is a play on the law of gravitational attraction, which diminishes as the square of the distance, so if the distance between two objects doubles, the attraction is reduced to a quarter, and if the distance is halved, the attraction quadruples. Black Hat is saying that the attraction goes up as the cube, so if the distance is halved, the attraction increases eight-fold, and decreases eight-fold when the distance doubles. This implies that "your momma is so fat, she breaks the laws of physics (and does so in a way that she isn't as attractive as physics would dictate, given enough distance)." The title text is slightly ambiguous; it seems to say that as distance increases, the attraction increases, but it doesn't explicitly state whether the distance is increasing or decreasing.
Note: Contrary to Black Hat's explanation, and as per Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity , the reason that objects have equal gravitational and inertial mass is that anything with mass or energy causes a warping of space-time that causes all other objects (including such objects that classically shouldn't be affected, like photons) to experience the same gravitational acceleration.
[Black Hat standing.] Black Hat: Gravitational mass is identical to inertial mass. That is, the amount of inertia something has and the amount of gravity it has are effectively the same. What's interesting is that there doesn't seem to be any reason this should be true. One could imagine an extremely large object with lots of resistance to force and no gravity (or vice versa), but this is never observed. [Black Hat still standing. The panel is now shorter.] Black Hat: You know what? I'm just gonna skip the rest of the buildup and say it: Yo mama's fat.


Jacket

Explanation:
Cueball clearly means to use fucking as an intensifier. However, the friend (likely intentionally in response to the unnecessary swearing) takes fucking to be an identifier of which jacket is being discussed, and gives a smart-aleck response. His counterpart gets confused by the sarcasm, and the topic is dismissed.
The title text states that this often occurs in Cueball/Randall's apartment.
[Two men stand and talk to one another.] Cueball: Where's my fucking jacket? [Friend indicates something behind him.] Friend: Over there, next to your regular one. Cueball: My what? Friend: Never mind.
This comic is the second comic to use an all-caps lettering, the first being 78: Garfield , where the all-caps lettering may have been based off of the lettering in the actual comic strip.


Pwned

Explanation:
In the days of early personal computers, such as the IBM-XT, Atari, or C64, games were largely text-based adventure games . Those games were based on an interactive story, and the player had to solve a puzzle on this by communicating to the application using only a keyboard or, later, a mouse. Play was turn-based (like chess): the computer displayed some textual context, you entered a command (GO <direction>, TAKE <object>, KILL <person>, LOOK AT <object>, etc.), and the computer responded by giving the outcome of your command. This sparse context arose from the fact that games in the 1970s and 1980s needed to run on limited memory and microprocessor capacity, and on basic displays.
Over the following 20 years, technical advances allowed games to run in a real-time graphical context. Adventure games were largely displaced by other genres, including Role Playing Games (RPG) , where the player navigates a character through a graphical environment to achieve goals or gain in abilities, often involving a combat component. While the broad structure of these has a lot of similarity to adventure games, the experience is very different.
Zork is a classic example of a text-adventure game franchise. In the Zork games, players have to evade predators known as grues, which fear light, but love to devour adventurers entering the dark. Therefore, you cannot win the game without owning some light source.
"Counterstrike" is a reference to the Half-Life mod Counter-Strike and its subsequent sequel. In the Counter-Strike series, you are either a terrorist or a counter-terrorist operative, and your goal is to stop the other from completing their objective. On a dark map, players would generally use night vision goggles, which don't produce light that would give away their position to the enemy.
Randall imagines a version of Counterstrike played in the text-context of Zork. Ironically, the outcome is not so different to what might be a typical experience of Counterstrike gameplay, particularly for inexperienced players: on starting the game, the player moves to another room and is immediately " pwned " (a typical online gaming term meaning beaten, killed, or trapped/tricked) by an enemy.
In the title text, Randall suggests that a comparison of the genres, analyzing the reasons why RPGs have proved more popular, would make an interesting study. His imagined example suggests that what has been gained in immersive environments may have been lost in complexity of story and gameplay.
Welcome to text-only Counterstrike. You are in a dark, outdoor map. > GO NORTH You have been pwned by a grue.


Sunrise

Explanation:
This comic is about the desire for an intimate connection with another, and the compromises we make to not be alone.
Hairy finds a certain beauty in the way the world looks without billions of humans crawling around on it. He thinks of this as a secret place that thrills him. He is excited about the remote chance of finding someone like him who appreciates its beauty. But he realizes that it's the very thing that makes this time beautiful to him that makes his imagined chance encounter exceedingly unlikely. Reconciled to the fact that he will not find a kindred spirit outside this morning, he heads back home.
At the house, he gets ready and drives to a club to meet people. The club is drawn using an inverted color scheme (white people, black background) to emphasize that it is the opposite of the 4am outside world. The club is dark and full of people, who are the lightest things present, where outside, the natural beauty shines without interruption by human forms. Hairy is seen alone in the middle of the crowd.
The title text is a reference to a common music video scene (sometimes country music videos) where people play the guitar on parking garages as the sun rises.
[Hairy is on the street. Behind him is a house with a lawn.] Hairy (thinking): I love the time just before sunrise. It's quiet; no one is ever just walking about. Hairy (thinking): It's like a secret Hairy (thinking): I always hope that I'll find someone else quietly hiding from sleep, and we'll see each other and sit and talk. Hairy (thinking): I guess this is a bad place to meet people. Hairy (thinking): I wish it weren't.
[Hairy goes into the house, brushes his teeth, shaves his head (?), and leaves the house again.]
[Hairy is at a club, disco balls in the ceiling and a giant woofer. Many people are dancing around him.]


Jeremy Irons

Explanation:
Similar to the " My Hobby " series, this comic depicts one of Randall 's goals in life: He wants to hire Academy-Award-winning actor Jeremy Irons to deliver all of Randall's dialogue in life (while Randall, perhaps, lip syncs it). He is apparently basing this desire on the fact that Irons, a classically trained English actor, portrayed Scar, the main antagonist in the 1994 Disney animated feature The Lion King .
The line spoken in the comic is from the song " Be Prepared ", which Scar sings in the film. Thus, it's not entirely clear whether Randall enjoys Irons's deep, rumbling British-accented voice, or whether it's Scar's dialogue in the film that Randall truly would like to be speaking.
The title text suggests that Randall knows the dialogue of The Lion King from memory; it also suggests that there are others he knows as well. He is around the appropriate age to have been in the target market for the film (he would have been around 10 at the time) and probably saw it many times.
[Cueball points at Megan with his mouth open. Jeremy Irons stands behind him.] Jeremy Irons: But as THICK as you are, pay attention Jeremy Irons: My words are a matter of PRIDE!
My goal: To make enough money to hire Jeremy Irons, the voice of Scar from The Lion King , to follow me around and do my dialogue.


Profile Creation Flowchart

Explanation:
AIM (short for AOL Instant Messenger, now defunct) offered its users profile pages to share info about themselves or their friends. Randall notes that these pages fall into one of three categories:
Both AIM and LiveJournal were known for their teenage user base, as shown by the title text's fictional AIM screen name.
The title text seems to reference the kind of behavior someone with a tribute page would display, but is actually an example of an inside joke, for cartoonists.  The text comes from Natalie Dee Comic 956, from January 8, 2006 , a few months before this XKCD comic was published on April 26 of the same year.
[A flowchart is shown.]
Have Friends? → No → Link to your LiveJournal Have Friends? → Yes, and want to alienate everyone else → Inside jokes! Have Friends? → Yes → Have Boyfriend/ Girlfriend? → No → Angsty about it? → Yes → Link to your LiveJournal No → Yes you are → Angsty about it? Yes → A profile tribute is the greatest possible expression of love.


The Sierpinski Penis Game

Explanation:
The Chaos Game is a method of generating a fractal by repeatedly applying randomly-chosen transformation functions to a point and plotting the position of the new point each time. The transformation functions are randomly chosen from a small, predefined list. The surprising result of this is that, even though the functions are picked randomly, a distinctly non-random fractal image emerges. The exact nature of this image depends on the list of transformation functions used.
One such fractal that can be produced by the Chaos Game is the Sierpinski Triangle , which is the fractal pictured in this comic. See details in this video .
The Penis Game, on the other hand, is a childish activity where people (usually schoolchildren) compete to shout "Penis!" increasingly loudly in the presence of an authority figure (usually a teacher) without getting in trouble.
The two games could be said to be similar in that they both involve iterations of transformations; in the Chaos Game, a point's position is transformed (moving it closer and closer to the attractor set of the transformations); in the Penis game, the volume of the phrase "Penis!" is transformed (becoming louder and louder). The difference is that the Chaos Game works by negative feedback (eventually settling down into a well-defined image) whereas the Penis Game involves positive feedback (at some point, the cry of "Penis!" will become loud enough that the culprit will get in trouble and the game will end). Nonetheless, they could be vaguely considered inverses of each other, and Randall appears to be conflating the two in this comic.
The title text mentions two inappropriate places to play the Penis Game. A baby shower is supposed to be a celebration of childbirth or pregnancy, so it would be an inappropriate place for such crude humor. A terrorist attack is typically a time in which lives are lost, so it would be very immature to play such a crude game. The title text may also be calling attention to the fact that a mathematical object such as a fractal is also an inappropriate place in which to be playing the Penis Game.
[A large triangle, point down, is shown, with many smaller triangles inside all pointing up. There is one large triangle in the middle, with 3 medium triangles on either side and three triangles on either of their sides as well, for a total of 9. This trend then continues three more times, with 27 around the nine and 81 around those. Finally, there were supposed to be 243 (3x81) very small filling out all the space outside the larger triangles, but staying inside the original triangle. But there seem to be missing three of these near the top. Two of those are on either side of the first (top left) of the nine triangles of size 3, as well as one to the left of the top of the top right second largest triangle. But there is also one extra triangle just below the P in the bottom triangle with a sentence. That would have been the first of the next level of 3*243=729 triangles in level 7. But it is the only one. So 240 small triangles plus 1 even tinier for a total of 362 inside the largest framing triangle.]
[There is a word inside the largest of the triangles and a sentence in the largest triangle below that triangle.] Penis! Haha, penis.


Mail

Explanation:
Cueball 's interlocutor is working their way through a list of increasingly impractical or impossible suggestions for things to send through postal mail. The pay-off is that they have already somehow sent a package of time through the mail, and this is taking a while to arrive, presumably because the amount of time it will take to reach the recipient is equal to the amount of time being sent. By the time it reaches Cueball, the time will have passed, and therefore not be of much use.
The reference to a 'package of time' could refer to quantizing time ("discrete packets of time") - a theory that time is not continuous as particles in the quantum mechanics . It could be one of the big mistakes in modern science, but feels as if there's more to it, in the world of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.
A no-fly list is a list of people who are not allowed to use commercial airlines for travel. In the United States, it is maintained by the Terrorist Screening Center . According to the title text, the person sending strange objects through mail is on a no-fly list for the United States Postal Service (USPS). While the USPS has a list of items banned from being shipped in the mail, which includes most consumer electronics with lithium batteries, it does not have such a list for people. This could suggest that this person has attempted to send so many strange items that USPS will no longer accept mail from him, or it could imply that they attempted, at one point, to send themselves via air mail, and have been banned from doing so again.
This comic might be related to W. Reginald Bray , an Englishman from the turn of the 20th century, who was famous for mailing unusual objects (including himself) to experiment with the postal system.
A list of the things:
[Cueball is talking to someone through a phone.] Phone: Do you think I could mail a running chainsaw to someone? Cueball: I doubt it Phone: What about a baby's first word? Cueball: Look, your obsession with sending strange things through the mail is getting out of hand.
Phone: Can you mail a blank stare? Phone: A dizzying height? Phone: Pi? Cueball: ...
Phone: Well, did you at least get that package of time I sent you? Cueball: I... you... no, I didn't. Phone: Well, there was a lot of it, so it will probably take a while


A Simple Plan

Explanation:
The song on the radio is " Welcome to My Life " by Simple Plan (not A Simple Plan), which was released in 2004 as a first single from the band's second album " Still Not Getting Any... " The lyrics of the song mainly deal with the frustration of adolescence and the stress of newfound independence. Many, if not all, adolescents go through a phase where the ongoing realization of becoming fully responsible for their body, mind, and personality frightens them.
Simple Plan's lyrics seem particularly inappropriate and ridiculous, given that the members of the band are all in their 30s. The absurdity of middle-aged men expressing teen angst could be interpreted as a spoof or parody, which Cueball mistakenly believes to be the truth. In the comic, Cueball slowly comes to the horrifying realization that the members of the band are actually seriously whining about the typical life of a spoiled teenager, rather than parodying them.
In the title text, Randall states that this was his own reaction to the song, and that he now considers it ridiculous.
[Cueball, standing in front of stool with a radio on it.] Radio: You don't know what it's like to be me! [Caption below the panel:] At first, I loved A Simple Plan . Then I realized, with creeping horror, that they were serious.


Fall Apart

Explanation:
Despite Randall being enthusiastic about receiving ink pens, his first experiment with them has resulted in a rather bleak comic.
Instead of multiple panels, the entire comic is a single drawing, with an apparent passage of time as we travel down the page. The frame, which represents the world of the characters, gradually disintegrates and leaves them falling helplessly. At the top, we see some people standing alone, apparently happy enough, and a couple. As we descend the page, we see examples of a couple split by a narrow chasm, someone huddled isolated and alone on their own world fragment, a couple desperately trying to hang on to each other, and a single figure falling chaotically and without control.
The comic seems to be expressing what it feels like to someone when a relationship breaks up — their world falls apart, and one of the implications is that the process cannot easily be reversed. In short, it is catastrophic.
The identity of '#pugglewumper Tashari,' the supplier of the pens, is not known. Judging by the use of the hash sign, it is someone with whom Randall communicates in IRC . In fact, 'pugglewump' appears to be an IRC channel. Although hashtags later came to be strongly associated with Twitter , this was not true at the time the comic was drawn.
[Various people struggle as the comic disintegrates. Toward the top, people are standing calmly, some holding hands. As the parts of the comic break apart, people try to reach for each other, hold parts together, or curl up into a ball. By the bottom, a Cueball is falling, surrounded by pieces of the comic.]


Binary Heart

Explanation:
An array of zeros and ones is depicted, 21 across by 23 down. Some of the zeros and ones are red instead of black to form the shape of a Valentine heart.
The digits themselves are an ASCII bit stream reading:
The final octet is incomplete, but the three bits that are present are consistent with the start of an "e".
The mixture of upper-case and lower-case "O"s is presumed intentional to avoid a repeating pattern.
[All the numbers are black except for a heart-shaped red section in the middle.]


Family Circus

Explanation:
The Family Circus is a comic characterized by single-panel round comics with a caption below the comic. Jeffy is a character in Family Circus , and dotted lines representing his wanderings are a frequent theme of Family Circus comics. Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a mental illness that compels the sufferer to perform repetitive actions. Common symptoms include, but are not restricted to, excessive hand washing and repeated opening and closing of a door.
The comic depicts the character Jeffy as having Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and traces his movements over a period of time. The dotted line that depicts his movements returns frequently to the kitchen sink, presumably to repeatedly wash his hands.
In the title text, Randall attributes this idea to the unknown friend David . He did the same in 42: Geico and 51: Malaria .
[Picture shows a pathway winding through trees to a sink inside a house, out to some swings and back to the sink, out to a ball and back to the sink, then on into the house.] Jeffy's ongoing struggle with obsessive-compulsive disorder


Laser Scope

Explanation:
This comic plays on the homonymic relationship between "miss" (to feel sad due to the absence of someone) and "miss" (to fail to hit – in this case, with a gunshot). "Miss your loved ones?" is a question that would generally use the former "miss." However, its use on the package for a laser scope implies the latter "miss."
A sighting scope can be attached to a firearm to aid in aiming the weapon. The addition of a laser improves the accuracy of the weapon by making it easier to aim consistently. The model number RJX-21 does not appear to be a reference to anything, and this comic is primarily a play on a common marketing technique of adapting a common saying to your own product by use of homonym or homophone ; in this case, it is perhaps an inappropriate use, as one would not be expected to be aiming a firearm at their loved ones.  In real life, this would imply a serious family breakdown with extreme feelings of pain and revenge, which is actually a tragically sad story, not the normal fodder for a light-hearted joke.
The title text hammers it home with the dual use of the word "miss," as the writer wishes he had missed (failed in his attempt to shoot) someone so they would not miss them (feel bad that they are not there), implying that he shot a family member, and is now feeling the grief. The humor here is that the writer apparently still cares about his loved one, despite having attempted to shoot them in the past.
[Box with a mailing label on one side, and in the front:] Miss your loved ones? [Picture of a laser scope.] YOU DON'T HAVE TO. RJX-21 Laser Scope


Back to the Future

Explanation:
This comic is a reference to the Back to the Future film series (specifically the first film) in which the protagonist, Marty McFly (played by Michael J. Fox ), travels back from 1985 (present day for him) to 1955 and accidentally interferes with his own parents' first meeting. He must then arrange for them to fall in love before he ceases to exist due to the paradox of his own parents never having children. An unintended side-effect of the way events occur is that his dad gains self-confidence in the past and becomes "less of a loser" in the present.
As noted in the comic, the time machine Marty uses is built by his professor friend, Doctor Emmett L. Brown ( Christopher Lloyd ), out of a DeLorean DMC-12 (a 1980s-era sports car).
Hairy ( Cueball in the last two panels, as the art is inconsistent in this early comic, and his hair is removed in the last two panels) has had a very similar experience. He suggests that the aforementioned changes to history are what he really needed to do. After a frame of awkward silence, Megan reminds him that her father was in the World Trade Center (WTC) North Tower – implying that he died along with several thousand others in the North Tower on September 11, 2001 at the time the tower collapsed due to a terrorist-flown passenger jet crashing into the building. Megan is therefore implying that saving her father's life (and perhaps the lives of the other 9/11 victims, or even preventing other disasters in history, such as the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, or the holocaust) might have been something else of importance he "needed" to do — perhaps something of significantly more importance than just helping his father. He seems completely oblivious to what she is trying to suggest. Megan starts to explain, but apparently decides that there's no point even trying to get through to him.
The title text is calling Marty McFly an asshole for not doing something more benevolent for humankind when he travelled back in time, just as the comic implies of Hairy/Cueball. It can also be seen as someone (presumably Hairy/Cueball) trying to justify the choice, by saying that Megan's dad was "kind of an asshole."
As a side note, for the comic to make sense, the events in the comic must take place after September 11, 2001 , and not 1985 as it is in the movie. Since no dates are mentioned, Hairy/Cueball probably went back by thirty years, because that's how far back Marty travels in the film.
[Megan and Hairy are standing, talking to one another.] Hairy: This weekend, my professor friend built a time machine out of a DeLorean and I went back in time! I helped make sure my parents got together and helped my dad to be less of a loser.
Megan: Wow! Do you still have the time machine? Hairy: Nah. But I did what I really needed to do. Megan: Uh huh.
[Beat panel. Hairy's hair isn't drawn in this panel or the next one, making him a Cueball.]
Megan: Okay, you remember that my father was in the WTC North Tower, right? Cueball: Yeah...why? Megan: I...nothing.


Moral Relativity

Explanation:
This comic plays on the similar sounding terms relativ ity and relativ ism .
Moral relativism is a position in the philosophical field of ethics that holds that moral judgments are not absolute, but vary depending on the circumstances involved and the person (or people) making them. Philosophers who hold this kind of position are often mischaracterised as believing that 'it's OK to be self-serving, steal, and murder.'
The scientific theory of relativity predicts (among other things) that measurements of an object change the closer to the speed of light it travels: length contracts, observed time slows down, the notion of separated simultaneous events is relative, and so on.
Randall claims to have created a new philosophy called "Moral Relativity," which appears to be a mash-up of the two ideas, where things that are typically considered unethical become more acceptable as the subject's speed increases. This supposed theory of ethics is cited to explain why rap music, perhaps particularly Gangsta rap , which often has lyrics describing rape, murder, and substance abuse, is better when traveling at speed. Music videos for Gangsta Rap also frequently feature cars speeding on the highway. The graph is a parody on that of the Lorentz factor , which is the factor by which time is dilated and length contracted.
Note that relativity in the Theory of Relativity (in physics ) came from the principle of relativity : the idea that equations describing the laws of physics have the same form in all admissible frames of reference (as opposed to moral relativity).
[A graph, rationalization as a function of speed, increasing asymptotically at c .] Related to moral relativism, it states that ethics become subjective only when you approach the speed of light. That is, it's okay to be self-serving, steal, and murder as long as you're going really, really fast. (Note: This is why rap sounds better on the highway at 90 mph)


Find You

Explanation:
This comic depicts Cueball climbing on a rope in a cavern. The text indicates that one of his loved ones used to be afraid of being taken away from him and being forgotten. It is not explicitly made clear whether the loved one in question is a woman with whom he is in love, a family member, or a relation of some other kind, but presumably the loved one is his partner.
Cueball had promised that he would always come looking for this person, but then they were actually taken from him. He reiterates that he was serious about his promise, and that he hopes they are not afraid, because he's coming to find them.
It's not clear exactly in what manner his loved one was taken from him, only that they were torn from his arms and vanished from this world. Though there are many other possible interpretations, this might be read to indicate that they have died and that Cueball is descending a cavern in search of the underworld where they have been taken.
The title text compares Cueball to the apparently unstoppable Terminator, from the 1984 film of the same name, in which Kyle Reese, talking to Sarah Connor, gives the following description of the Terminator: "It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead." The implication is that Cueball, motivated by love, can't be persuaded to stop looking for his loved one by any means, and that he will never stop looking until he finds them.
[The panel is black with rough-edged white passages running down through it. Cueball is climbing onto a rope that is dangling down one of these passages. White text is in the black sections.] You were afraid that you would disappear, that you would be lost and forgotten. I held you tight against the dark and said that I would always come for you. Then one day it happened. You were torn from my arms and vanished from this world. Maybe you don't remember my promise. But I meant every word. I hope you're not afraid, wherever you are. You don't need to be. I'm not. I will find you.
For technical reasons (see discussion, below) the image may display inverted.


Parallel Universe

Explanation:
Cueball has (by some ritual, judging by the pentagram ) summoned himself from a parallel universe . Hairy suggests that Cueball should take advantage of this rare opportunity and make out with his other self.
In the third panel, Cueball seems to turn his head in response to the unexpected response. Hairy suggests that Cueball should make out with him instead, since he could also vanish at any moment. This indicates that Hairy may be attracted to Cueball, and he may have made the previous suggestion with the ulterior, voyeuristic motive of observing two attractive people making out with each other.
The title text is ambiguous. It could mean that Cueball should not risk his other self disappearing, or it could mean that the risk is Hairy disappearing.
Alternative explanation
By a very big stretch of imagination, we can think that the other person is Megan instead of Hairy (i.e. a female instead of a male).
If the character is Megan, the third panel is her having reconsidered that she would rather Cueball not make out with anyone other than her, by threatening that she would leave him.
The title text does not help in deciding if this alternative is correct or not. If it is Megan, Cueball should stay safe and not make out with himself. If it is not, he should play it safe and make out now, before his alternate self goes back to the parallel universe.
All this ambiguity suggests a third joke. Perhaps there are two universes that this is playing out in: in one of them the character is Megan; in the other it is not.
It could also be that the parallel universe that the comic takes place in is not that of the normal comics, and that the Cueball summoned could be of the standard comics. In this universe, Hairy could be the replacement for Megan.
Making out with yourself is also mentioned in 267: Choices: Part 4 .
[Cueball and Hairy are standing next to a large pentagram with candles at the points. A figure is hovering above it in a wave of energy.] Cueball: Sweet. I summoned myself from a parallel universe. Hairy: You know, he could vanish at any moment. Hairy: You should take this chance to make out with yourself. Hairy: . . . You know, I could vanish at any moment.


Wright Brothers

Explanation:
The Wright brothers are Orville and Wilbur Wright, who are credited with the invention of the airplane and  the first "controlled, powered, and sustained heavier-than-air human flight" in 1903.
Cueball mentions to Megan that the Wright Brothers would sometimes argue each other's point during debates in order to "encourage a more balanced debate" – presumably so both brothers would explore all of the arguments on both sides. Megan is initially against the idea, stating that treating emotionally-charged personal issues as if they were academic debates would not work. Cueball argues that it would force each person to consider the other's point of view. However, when Megan reconsiders, accepts his argument, and appears to agree that they should try it, Cueball abruptly switches his position to thinking that it's a terrible idea. The joke is that once Megan agrees with him, he employs his Wright Brothers suggestion and takes her initial position that the idea was bad. Thus, the two have switched their arguments and are now exploring the other sides. They may continue in this way to form a well balanced conclusion on the proposal or continually switch sides without ever concluding the argument.
The title text suggests that Randall may either be misremembering the fact that the Wright brothers used this technique, or not be convinced that the source is reliable, but has decided to assume it is true just so that he could make the joke in this comic.
[Cueball and Megan are talking to each other.] Cueball: I've heard that when the Wright brothers argued, they periodically switched sides in the debate to try to encourage a more balanced conclusion. Cueball: We should try that in our relationship!
Megan: It's a neat idea, but I think treating personal issues like a debate will only engender hostility and hurt feelings.
Cueball: No, I think it would help, by forcing us to consider the other person's point of view.
Megan: Hmm, maybe you're right. Cueball: Am not. It's a bad idea.


Snakes on a Plane! 2

Explanation:
Snakes on a Plane is a 2006 movie starring Samuel L. Jackson . It features (surprisingly) snakes, on a plane, attacking the passengers. This comic proposes a sequel, taking the idea to the next level, making things infinitely worse: snakes on every plane!
To have snakes on every plane is much worse than snakes on just one, [ citation needed ] as many more innocent bystanders would be injured or killed, and the entire aviation industry would be destroyed. Plus it would be difficult, as there were hundreds of snakes in a single plane in the first movie, so finding enough snakes would be a challenge itself. Since the original movie was generally considered to be quite bad, there is an implied double meaning in the suggested poster, that the movie itself would be "Much Worse Than Last Time."
In the title text, Randall credits James with the idea.
[A sky full of jumbo jets is shown in movie poster format.] Top of the poster: From the creators of last summer's hit thriller Snakes On a Plane comes: Superimposed on the sky and planes: Snakes... on EVERY Plane! Much worse than last time.


M.C. Hammer Slide

Explanation:
The base part of the comic is self-explanatory: Girl attracts Boy, Boy notices Girl, Boy approaches Girl, Girl reacts positively, Boy falls in love, Girl decides to answer lovecall, happily ever after, etc. The quirk in this comic is that the way Girl catches attention of Boy is through the signature move of 1980s rapper MC Hammer (the slide). To watch MC Hammer doin' the slide, click here .
The title text indicates that Randall once saw a girl go by and regrets that he did not speak with her as Boy does in this comic. It is possible that the girl Randall is referring to was actually doing the slide.
[Two guys stand next to each other talking.] Hairy: I just feel like somewhere out there is the girl for me. Cueball: Yeah. Hairy: Someone loving and caring. Cueball: I know what you mean. Hairy: A girl whose only mode of transportation is the M.C. Hammer Slide. Cueball: Yeah. Cueball: ...Wait, what? [Megan hammer slides past.] [Hairy sees Megan hammer slide and it's love at first sight.] [Megan hammer slides over into Hairy's waiting arms.]