Python

Explanation:
Python is a programming language designed specifically to make it easy to write clear, readable programs. Flying is often used as a metaphor for freedom and ease, and here Randall shows Cueball literally flying in response to using Python.
A "Hello, World!" program is a very simple program that prints the phrase "Hello, World!", used in textbooks to illustrate a given programming language. While this sounds simple, it can be nontrivial in some programming languages where you need to explicitly import a library that contains the print function (for instance, in C you need to begin with #include < stdio.h > ) or do complicated things with classes and variables (see the Java "Hello, World!" for one example). Python doesn't need any of that: print("Hello, world!") (or in Python 2, print "Hello, world!" ) really is all you need to do.
Dynamic typing and significant whitespace are two controversial features of Python, which make some people—like Cueball's friend—hesitant to use the language.
Dynamic typing means that variables do not have types (like "list of short integers" or "a bunch of letters"); any value of any type can be placed in any variable. Dynamic typing allows for more flexible languages, but it means that certain kinds of errors (like trying to subtract a letter from a number) can't be caught until a program is run, and some people think this is too dangerous for the tradeoff to be acceptable.
Whitespace is a string of invisible text characters, like spaces or tabs. In programming, blocks of code controlled by a statement are usually indented under that statement. Most languages require you to use braces ( {…} ) or special keywords ( BEGIN…END ) to delimit these blocks; in Python, the indentation itself is the delimiter. Many Python programmers find that this makes code more readable, but many other programmers find it too "magical" and don't trust it.
Classes, functions, and constants in Python are packed into modules. To use a module, you write " import module " at the top of your source file (you can do this anywhere in the file, but it's usually at the top so you can use the module throughout the code). Python comes with a very powerful standard library of modules to do everything from parsing XML to comparing two sets of files for differences, and new modules can be easily installed from the PyPI repository, which has more than 79,000 more to choose from (as of April 2016). Cueball can fly because he imported the antigravity module. Python still works for Cueball in 482: Height .
In the final panel, Cueball admits that his ability to fly may actually be because he has "sampled everything in the medicine cabinet," though he's sure it is the Python anyway. An implication of this is that ingesting everything in the medicine cabinet has given him the feeling of freedom and ease that "flying" represents - or that he is hallucinating himself flying and having a conversation with the other character about it. Here, the metaphor of "feeling like you're flying" while using Python is transformed back from being literal (Cueball is actually flying) to being metaphorical (Randall feels like he is flying because Python is so easy to use... or because he had too many strange drugs).
Perl , mentioned in the title text, is another programming language with the same target audience as Python, as both are high-level , general-purpose , interpreted , dynamic programming languages .
However they strongly oppose each other in their language design:
Since he has discovered Python, Randall doesn't like Perl anymore, probably because its syntax is less consistent or perhaps due to his problems with Regular expressions .  What God has to say about Randall's renunciation of Perl has not yet been documented.
[A Cueball-like friend is talking to Cueball, who is floating in the sky.] Friend: You're flying! How? Cueball: Python! Cueball: I learned it last night! Everything is so simple! Cueball: Hello world is just print "Hello, World!" Friend: I dunno... Dynamic typing? Whitespace? Cueball: Come join us! Programming is fun again! It's a whole new world up here! Friend: But how are you flying? Cueball: I just typed 'import antigravity' Friend: That's it? Cueball: ...I also sampled everything in the medicine cabinet for comparison. Cueball: But I think this is the python.


Startling

Explanation:
Cueball is startled every few months when he, again, realizes that he now lives in the 21 st century. When he grew up as a child, the year 2000 seemed very far away — it was the future, but he now exists in that timeframe with the rest of society.
The title text states that "the future" was reached in 2004... Three years before the comic was published. This is possibly a joke on how time works, as "the future" is always, was always, and will always be ahead of the time you're in. There may, however, be a reference to some movie set in the future year 2004....
The 21 st century, even the year 2004, was futuristic for people growing up in, for instance, the eighties. This view just belongs to the perspective of people — for people growing up in the '70s, the novel 1984 was even futuristic.
[Cueball sits silently in front of his computer.] [Text block:] I still do this every few months.
[He continues to sit for two more panels.]
Cueball: Holy crap, it's the 21st century.


Couple

Explanation:
It's hard to know when you are in a relationship in modern times. In olden days, you might fancy a girl, then ask her father if you might court her, and if he granted his permission, you would be a couple. Today, that kind of structure and formality is considered antiquated in most western cultures; as a result, we don't have any of the straightforward cues.
This comic suggests that "making it Facebook official," which means asserting the existence of a romantic relationship on Facebook by setting one's status to "In a relationship," has by 2007 become a way to define when you are a couple. Cueball would like to do it, probably after having sex for the first time with his love interest, to get confidence in his relationship and/or show it off to his friends. Because his love interest isn't so sure about that relationship, or doesn't like to formalize it and prefers to enjoy without thinking too much about it, he suggests a compromise: using the "It's complicated" status instead. And he does so with a phrasing very reminiscent of a formal way to propose to marry someone ("Will you be my wife?").
The title text takes it a step further, suggesting that Facebook has become the only reliable way to know about relationships — even so, without access to Facebook, relationships can't evolve.
When this comic came out in late 2007, Facebook was not even 4 years old, but very popular among young people, who would share their lives in great detail back then. As of 2019, most people are more hesitant about instantly sharing all details of their personal life publicly. [ citation needed ]
[Cueball and Megan in bed.] Cueball: So is this it? Are we a couple now?
Megan: I just don't know. I like this. I just... don't know.
[Silence.]
Cueball: Well will you be my "it's complicated" on Facebook?


Nerd Sniping

Explanation:
Nerds have a way of getting distracted easily and focusing on one thing and ignoring the rest, when they feel their specific skills are challenged by an interesting problem. Black Hat has decided to make this into a disturbing game of getting nerds, in this case a physicist, to stop in the middle of a street and get crushed by traffic by showing them an interesting problem to solve. (This may be based on a real event—see the trivia section).
The problem Black Hat shows is an electronics engineering thought experiment to find the resistance between two points. In normal wiring, a one-ohm resistor would result in one ohm of resistance. Two resistors connected in a series, where electricity has to go through each, has two ohms of resistance. Two one-ohm resistors in parallel give the circuit only half an ohm since you average the resistance of the path (1 ohm of resistance over 2 paths). With an infinite grid of equal resistors, you have an infinite number of paths to take, and for each path an infinite number of both series and parallel paths to consider, so much more advanced methods are needed. The exact answer to the question is 4/π − 1/2 ohms, or about 0.773 ohms.  See Infinite Grid of Resistors .
Black Hat explains the concept of his new sport, Nerd Sniping , to Cueball while killing the physicist, but Cueball is appalled and will have no part in this sport, which doesn't make Black Hat give up on him as he suggests it would be fun if he made his own sign. Black Hat finally suggests that "physicists are two points, mathematicians three." This may indicate that he considers a mathematician to be a more difficult target for his game than a physicist would be. It is unclear whether this is meant as a dig on physicists or on mathematicians; it might be because physicists are interested in a wider range of problems, or because mathematicians require a higher-quality problem to hold their interest. Alternatively, he just dislikes mathematicians more, and is thus willing to award more points for sniping one of them.
In the title text, Randall explains that he saw this problem in a Google Labs Aptitude Test . This is a collection of puzzles published by Google as a parody of tests such as the SAT . Google is known for using logic & math puzzles in their job interviews.
Randall explained in a speech at Google five days before this comic was released that he was nerd sniped, in a way, by that problem in this test (see problem 10 on page 2 ), and got quite irritated when he ultimately found that it was actually a modern physics research problem, requiring very advanced math, far more complicated than the other puzzles. Putting such a problem in an aptitude test can be a way of testing if someone might realize when they cannot solve a problem and remember to move along to the other problems. If they fail to do this, they will never reach the easier problems that come later, and will fail due to their inability to realize when they will come up short. This is also important knowledge to have about yourself. Seen in this context, it is not necessarily a bad idea to have such an impossible problem in an aptitude test, as it is not interesting to have someone who is easily nerd sniped working for you.
Note that the truck should have stopped no matter what, since the nerd was walking on a pedestrian crossing. However, the driver may have seen him walking, then estimated that he would be safe before reaching him, and realized too late that he had stopped in the street. Alternatively, the truck driver is part of Black Hat's sport. Or was himself/herself nerd sniped by the sign.
Randall has later referred back to the concept of Nerd Sniping several times in the past, such as in the title text of 730: Circuit Diagram , and in the what if? blog. In Visit Every State (7 years after this comics release), the entire comic was shown at the top and the truck again further down the post—Randall has again been nerd sniped by a paper he read. This also happens to him in Lunar Swimming —see the title text for the second to last picture.
[Black Hat is sitting on a chair, Cueball is standing next to him. Across the street, another Cueball-like guy is coming from a building walking towards the pedestrian crossing across from Black Hat.] Black Hat: There's a certain type of brain that's easily disabled. Black Hat: If you show it an interesting problem, it involuntarily drops everything else to work on it.
[The Cueball-like man across the street is about to enter a crosswalk, which is seen from right behind Black Hat in his chair, holding onto the sign, which is still pointing down. Cueball is looking on.] Black Hat: This has led me to invent a new sport: Nerd Sniping. Black Hat: See that physicist crossing the road?
[Black Hat lifts up the sign when the physicist is in the middle of the street, halfway across the pedestrian crossing.] Black Hat: Hey!
[A close-up of Black Hat's sign is shown in a frameless panel. There is text above and below an image of a four-by-five grid of nodes with resistors (shown as wiggly lines) between every node and also continuing away from the 16 outer nodes. A total of 5 columns with 5 and 4 rows with 6 resistors for a total of 20 nodes and 49 resistors. Two nodes, a knight's move apart, are marked with red circles in the 3rd row 2nd column and the 2nd row 4th column.] Sign: On this infinite grid of ideal one-ohm resistors, Sign: what's the equivalent resistance between the two marked nodes?
[The Cueball-like physicist has stopped pondering the questions, a hand to his chin.] Physicist: It's... Hmm. Interesting. Maybe if you start with... No, wait. Hmm... You could—
[In another frameless panel, a ten-wheeled truck is zooming past from the right, apparently going through the spot where the physicist just stood.] Truck: Foooom
[Cueball looks down on Black Hat, who looks back up from his chair at the curb, again holding the sign down. He lifts one hand up while replying.] Cueball: I will have no part in this. Black Hat: C'mon, make a sign. It's fun! Physicists are two points, mathematicians three.
" [Donald] Coxeter came to Cambridge and he gave a lecture, then he had this problem ... I left the lecture room thinking. As I was walking through Cambridge, suddenly the idea hit me, but it hit me while I was in the middle of the road. When the idea hit me I stopped and a large truck ran into me ... So I pretended that Coxeter had calculated the difficulty of this problem so precisely that he knew that I would get the solution just in the middle of the road ..."


Flies

Explanation:
The saying "you catch more flies with honey than vinegar" means that people are more likely to be won over with politeness than hostility.
When Cueball 's friend tells him this after he replies to a " noob " using swear words, he then says that the saying is literally false by saying that balsamic vinegar attracts more flies than honey . He then tells his friend to try it with his own fruit flies . Fruit flies are attracted to the products of fermentation , particularly to ethanol and acetic acid . The acidity in vinegar is due mostly to acetic acid.
When Cueball's statement is found true, as balsamic vinegar smells like sweet and decomposing fruit to the fruit flies, his friend complains to his mother (with a vitriol influenced by Cueball, perhaps to get some favor) that she lied to him. He then says that another saying, "a watched pot never boils," is also literally false. That saying means that an event that is monitored with impatient attention will seem to take longer, much like watching a clock. However, the pot will boil eventually, so if you keep watching it continuously, you are bound to see it boil at some point.
In the title text, it seems that Randall explains why he wrote this comic — his vinegar bowl attracted a lot of fruit flies. However, he has not done the experiment with houseflies .
The notion of a watched pot not boiling is ascribed to Benjamin Franklin under the pseudonym "Poor Richard." He writes, "a watched pot is slow to boil," meaning "Time feels longer when you're waiting for something to happen." [1]
[Cueball is typing on a computer, and his friend is lying on the floor.] "Noob" (on computer): * [email protected] #! Friend: Hey, ease up on the noobs. Like my mom always said, you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.
[Cueball has turned his chair around.] Cueball: No, you don't. Friend: You don't? Cueball: Nope, set out a bowl of balsamic and a bowl of honey. The vinegar gets more.
[Cueball's friend is now sitting on the floor.] Friend: ...Seriously? Cueball: You have fruit flies. Try it yourself.
Later: [Cueball's friend is standing in front of a table, talking into a phone. On the table, there are two bowls, and the bowl on the left seems to be surrounded by flies.] Friend: Mother! You lied to me! And it gets worse. I was watching a pot yesterday, and guess what it did? It boiled, mother.


Loud Party

Explanation:
The comic depicts an average everyday scene - a party, with drinks, dancing, and a lot of commotion going on (hence the title). Amid the chaos, though, there are two people, Megan and Cueball , staring wistfully at each other. They both think of the same scene: the two of them sitting on branches of a large and bare tree, doing something on laptops. The implication is that these two people are different - they don't derive their enjoyment of life from parties or other typical teenage activities, but rather simpler, more quiet activities. This is evidenced by the fact that everything other than Megan and Cueball (and the Red Solo cups ) are greyed out.
The title text presents a simpler joke - it is rather difficult to get down from a tree, especially when carrying a fragile item like a laptop. It may also refer to the design of the tree that has been drawn, as it lacks (visible) branches below Cueball's perch.
[In a loud party, Megan and Cueball are looking at each other, both thinking of the same scene: they are sitting on opposite branches of a large leafless tree, each with a laptop. There's cloud in the distance and a grass field around the tree.]


Rock Band

Explanation:
A smug Cueball demeans his friends' fun experience on Rock Band , a video game which allows players to simulate playing real songs, as if in a real band. The oblivious "band" keeps rocking out, and it transpires that his real purpose is not to spread knowledge but to ruin others' fun (to no avail, thankfully).
The title text is a comment on haptic feedback, comparing the guitar controllers of Guitar Hero , which make a clicking sound when the user strums, with those of Rock Band , which do not click.
[Three people are playing Rock Band, one on guitar, another on drums, and the last on vocals. Music notes float above them. Cueball with arms crossed is looking at them.] Cueball: You know, playing this doesn't make you cool like a real rock band. Cueball: Guys? Cueball: Didn't you hear me? Cueball: Stop having fun!


Writers Strike

Explanation:
From November 5, 2007 to February 12, 2008, the Writers Guild of America, East and the Writers Guild of America, West labor unions that represents film, television, and radio writers working in the United States went on strike as they sought increased compensation for their members' work. Virtually all scripted American television shows shut down in mid-December, with many low-level production staffers being laid off.
In late December and early January, late-night talk shows did eventually return, most of them without writers. But as of the date this comic was written, the popular Comedy Central political comedy shows, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report , were still off-air.
Cueball and Black Hat both admit that they're pretty bummed about having to go through an election season without Jon Stewart's insightful commentary, but Black Hat has corrected that problem by kidnapping Stewart, putting him in the basement, and occasionally soliciting hilarious opinions. Of course, Stewart is rather traumatized by this, and he doesn't have anything to say aside from "Please let me go."
The title text implies that Black Hat also kidnapped Stephen Colbert from The Colbert Report and put him in the attic. As opposed to Stewart, who basically played "himself" on the show and was surrounded by zany reporters playing characters, on his own show Colbert played the character of a "well-intentioned, poorly informed high-status idiot." The reference to everyone listening to Colbert, instead, is based on a general opinion that The Colbert Report, a spin-off of The Daily Show, was superior to the original program.
[Cueball sits in front of a desk with a computer. Black Hat stands behind him.] Cueball: This writer's strike sucks. Black Hat: Why? You don't watch sitcoms. [Cueball is off-panel.] Cueball: Yeah, but it sucks having political campaigns without Jon Stewart's commentary. Black Hat: True. I finally got sick of it a couple weeks ago. [Black Hat points at a door. Cueball is still off-panel.] Cueball: And you quit following the campaigns? Black Hat: No. I kidnapped Jon Stewart to do analysis for me. Cueball: You what? [Black Hat is shouting at the door.] Black Hat: He's locked in the basement. Black Hat: Jon! Obama's leading in Iowa! Gimme a wry, witty comment on the situation! Jon Stewart [Voice coming from door]: Please let me go. I have a family.


Christmas Back Home

Explanation:
The script begins similarly to the poem " A Visit from St. Nicholas ":
' Twas the night before Christmas, when all thro' the house Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
However, there is a change in the text due to the fact that Cueball is on a computer, perhaps coding or on the internet.  Instead, it reads
"'Twas the night before Christmas at my family's house" "There were no sounds of stirring save the click of a mouse."
The idea is that Cueball has been so used to being on the computer late at night (perhaps coding, or deep into some Internet argument ) and he's forgotten the hours normal people sleep that, when Santa Claus arrives, Cueball is still awake. Note the mouse pun.
Being forced to sleep at normal times is compared with jet lag : sleeplessness due to your body being synchronized to another time zone, so named because jet aircraft made it possible for people to travel farther and faster. Here, Cueball needs to turn back his internal clock over five hours to sync with his family.
[The panel depicts the interior of a house with numerous Christmas decorations. Santa stares at Cueball, who is sitting at his desk with his laptop.] 'Twas the night before Christmas at my family's house. There were no sound of stirring save the click of a mouse. For 'twas just like a childhood Christmas except I'd forgotten the hours that normal folks slept. Santa: What are you doing out of bed so late? Cueball: Late? It's barely 3AM!


Blade Runner

Explanation:
Cueball is watching a DVD he got for Christmas (the comic is set on Boxing Day ). His friend seems intent to ruin it for him.
Blade Runner is a famous science fiction movie from 1982 featuring Harrison Ford , and it is now considered a classic. One of the principal characters is played by Daryl Hannah . Hannah later became known for acting in lighthearted rom-com films, such as Splash (in which she is a mermaid), similar to the type of films that the Olsen twins are known for. Hannah does look similar to the Olsens, although she is 26 years older, as they were born in 1986 - four years after the movie was released. Full House is a TV series, and New York Minute is a romantic film both featuring the Olsens. Hannah's character in Blade Runner (a homicidal sex robot) is a marked departure from this type of role.
The friend also claims that Blade Runner is a rip-off of the 2004 comedy film New York Minute . Such a comment is completely illogical — Blade Runner came out 22 years prior, and the two films are from completely different genres.
From the above, it is clear that the friend is most likely just trolling (doubly so since New York Minute would not be considered very good by people who enjoy sci-fi classics). It could be that he actually believes that these movies came out in the order he discovered them in, although the other guy still hates him for ruining the experience by reminding him of the Olsen twins...
The title text is a common comment on the movie - it's just not like an ordinary modern sci-fi movie. It is also likely a pun on the phrase "instant classic," which is sometimes used to describe movies considered so good that they "become a classic" immediately after release.
Friend: What DVD is this? Cueball: Blade Runner . I got it for Christmas. Friend: The one with Harrison Ford, right? And the Olsen twins? Cueball: Ye— What? Olsen twins? No, this is the 80's sci-fi classic! Friend: Huh. I didn't know the Olsen twins even did sci-fi. Cueball: ...They don't . Friend: So is Ashley the replicant, or is Mary-Kate? I can never tell them apart. Cueball: Neither! They're not in this movie! Friend: Then who is? Cueball: Daryl Hannah! Friend: I liked her in Full House . Cueball: I hate you. Friend: Man, this movie is just a New York Minute rip-off.


Reset

Explanation:
A common sight in workplaces is a sign reading '[XX] days since [event]' or '[XX] days without [event]', where [XX] is a two-digit number (indicated using flip cards so it may be easily changed) and [event] is some undesirable preventable occurrence. The purpose of such signs is to inspire employees by proudly displaying how long the event has been avoided or prevented. The most common version of such signs, used in industrial workplaces, displays the number of days since the last workplace accident or injury.
In the comic, the sign says "38 days since the last time someone reset this sign". The term 'reset' is the crux, because while computer-minded people tend to interpret it as 'reboot' or 'set to zero', it also means re-set (with the meaning 'set again'). See definition.
We will call: reset ~ set to zero --> meaning 1 re-set ~ set again -->  meaning 2
Because the sign uses manual flip cards, one cannot add days to the counter without re-setting the sign, which creates a paradox: either you add a day by re-setting it (which, according to the sign, means you'd have to reset the sign) or you don't (in which case the value on the sign would not be valid). The value of the sign cannot be true for more than one day. The value of the sign in the comic (38) can only be true if someone flipped the cards 38 days ago.
The sign is self-referential (which causes the paradox). Self-reference is a recurring theme in xkcd. Examples include 33: Self-reference and 688: Self-Description .
If you only use meaning 1, the sign can be seen as a challenge/invitation .
The title text refers to the signs sometimes hung over roadways in front of bridges that display the clearance of the bridge for the benefit of tall vehicles. However, this one displays only its own clearance, a number that would be unimportant if the sign itself were not there.
[Cueball stands in front of a doorway looking at a flip-counter sign posted on a wall.] Sign: 38 days since someone reset this sign


Responsible Behavior

Explanation:
This New Year's comic could play out after Cueball has returned from a New Year's party the day before. (The next New Year's day comic in 2008 was also related to a big party: 524: Party ).
In order to send encrypted mail to people, you need to know their public key . You use this key to encrypt the email, and only they can read it (using their private key).  However, there is the problem of authentication: how do you know for certain that the key belongs to the person to whom you think it does?  It could be someone else masquerading as them, hoping for people to send them sensitive information.  They could decrypt and read your mail, and could even re-encrypt it using the genuine public key of the intended recipient, and then pass the message onto them, leaving both you and the recipient unaware of the interception. This is a type of man-in-the-middle attack .
One solution for this is that people sign each other's keys . It works like this: say you want to send an email to Bob , but you've never met him. You find his key online (they are stored on certain servers, like cryptographic phone books), but how can you be sure that it's really his? Well, turns out that you have a mutual friend Alice , and you have her public key and you know that it is hers. If Alice has signed Bob's key with her private key (which only she has access to), it means that she's certain that that really is Bob's key. So then you can be sure that Bob's key is genuine (since you have a common friend, Alice) and that your communications will be safe.
A key-signing party is simply a super-geeky party where people meet in real life so that they can be sure of people's identity, and then everyone signs everyone else's keys. It's a good way to expand the web of trust. The joke here is that he has no idea who this girl is and yet he still signed her key. This is dangerous, because he is vouching for her identity. If he is mistaken, this could result in a serious loss of credibility on his part.
The humor lies in the juxtaposition of what you expect (that they had sex) and what is the case (they signed each other's keys, also known as geek-sex).
The title text appears to be a reference to the "key parties" of swingers in the 1970s, where all members of one sex would throw their keys in a bowl, and all of the other sex would draw them out, thus being paired off to sleep with the key owners.
[Cueball on the phone.] Voice: Hey, I just got home from the party Cueball: The one with the IRC folks? Voice: Yeah. Cueball: How was it? Voice: Got too drunk. I screwed up, bad. Cueball: What happened? Voice: There was a girl. No idea who she was. Don't even know her name. I was too drunk to care. Cueball: And what, you slept with her? Voice: No. Voice: I signed her public key. Cueball: Shit, man.


Slides

Explanation:
In the context shown, the expression "bear with me for a moment" usually implies that two seemingly unrelated topics are in fact connected, and the connection is to be explained later. This is not the case in the comic: Cueball is in fact simply showing random slides that have no connection to each other. By using the phrase liberally and never actually explaining the links, it is suggested that a presenter can simply continue to show random slides for an extended period before anyone actually realizes what is going on.
The title text refers to SIGGRAPH , an annual computer graphics conference held since 1974. In 541: TED Talk , it is said that Randall has been banned from SIGGRAPH, and we can infer from this comic that he was physically thrown out of it. Another (very implausible) possibility is that Randall is making the joke that people who attend computer graphics conferences are stereotypically not very athletic, and therefore unlikely to be able to physically throw someone.
In addition, the fact that Cueball was attending SIGGRAPH is another joke: Neither the Quantum Hall effect, a concept in quantum mechanics, nor rainfall in the Amazon forest, have anything to do with SIGGRAPH's focus of computer graphics.
[Cueball is standing on a stage, pointing at a line graph using a pointer.] Cueball: That chart explained the quantum hall effect. Now, if you'll bear with me a moment, this next graph shows rainfall over the amazon basin... [Caption below the panel:] If you keep saying "bear with me for a moment" people will take a while to figure out that you're just showing them random slides.


Your Mom

Explanation:
"Your mom" jokes could be considered an example of fraternity humor, and are seen by most adults as being a sign of immaturity, especially when overused. They generally involve the speaker making indelicate references to the mother of the person to whom he is speaking. They are a distinct variation from the more traditional "yo momma" jokes (as in, "yo mamma is so fat..." or "yo mamma is so stupid..."), which are merely insulting.
"That's what she said" is a supposedly funny retort to an innocent looking statement, the intent being to recast it in a sexual light. It gained its most recent surge of popularity as Michael Scott's catchphrase on the television series The Office . xkcd contains only failed attempts at "that's what she said" jokes, such as 436: How it Happened . The phrase is a simplified version of the older, British expression "... said the actress to the bishop ".
We enter in the middle of a conversation between Cueball and Megan about the status of their relationship. Megan has apparently just said that Cueball turns every conversation into a "your mom" joke and it's becoming unbearable. Cueball, somewhat self-destructively, immediately turns that sentence into a "your mom" joke.
When Megan makes it clear that she has had enough and that she is leaving, Cueball, in a heroic effort to make things even worse, can only respond with the "that's what she said" joke.  Megan agrees with Cueball that it is exactly what she (Megan) said, and is obviously about to depart his life forever.
The title text stretches the joke further, Cueball suggesting that many men have been with her mother, but perhaps as a last resort or under duress. This is, if possible, even more offensive than his previous efforts.
Cueball: Well, your mom turns every conversation into a "your mom" joke and it's becoming unbearable. Megan: I'm serious; I can't take this anymore. I'm leaving. Cueball: ...That's what she said! Megan: Yes. Yes, it is.
For examples of "your mom" jokes, see Category:Your Mom .


Fandom

Explanation:
This comic refers to the concept of fandom , which is basically the collective noun for fans of a given thing. Usually, this is used in the context of people who like a certain work of fiction, like Star Trek or Buffy the Vampire Slayer .
Here, Cueball digs through a box and discovers his old collection of Star Wars books, referring to authors Timothy Zahn and Michael A. Stackpole (who wrote several Star Wars novels), and The Corellian Trilogy . These books are part of the Star Wars Expanded Universe , which is used to refer to media that is Star Wars canon, but not the films.
Almost all of the Expanded Universe content created prior to 2015 is now considered by Disney (who are the owners of Lucasfilm and Star Wars since 2012) to be part of a separate canon called "Legends," a decision presumably made to allow a clean[er] slate for the upcoming sequel trilogy and spin-off movies to start from.
Cueball apparently loved these books as a kid, which prompts Megan to remark if he started becoming a fan of other science fiction series like Firefly or Battlestar Galactica , to which he clarifies that he simply grew out of the fandom mindset. Megan, perhaps sarcastically, asks him about how politician Ron Paul (who has appeared in the comic several times ) is doing, and Cueball excitedly runs off to check, ironically disproving his earlier remark - people don't outgrow a fandom state of mind, but rather shift their point of interest.
The title text refers to the New Republic , the main government in Star Wars after the final film, and Corusca gems , which are extremely rare and valuable gems from the aforementioned expanded universe. The text says that Ron Paul wants the New Republic to adopt the Corusca gem as the basis for their currency. This entire joke is an allegory for the Gold Standard , which Ron Paul is a personal advocate of, even though it is no longer in use by the United States.
[Cueball is looking through a box.] Cueball: Hey, my old Star Wars books!
[Cueball is holding a pair of books and showing them to Megan.] Cueball: Man. Timothy Zahn, Michael A. Stackpole, The Corellian Trilogy... Cueball: This was my world .
Megan: What'd you leave it for? Firefly? BSG? Cueball: Nah. Cueball: I guess I've just grown out of the whole obsessive fan mindset.
Megan: Really. Megan: So how's Ron Paul doing? Cueball: Ooh! Lemme recheck today's blogs. [Cueball drops the books and heads off to recheck the blogs.]


Bass

Explanation:
Black Hat and Cueball are standing inside a room behind a window hearing an obnoxious car outside playing loud music with deep bass. Black Hat, owing to his destructive nature, has created a machine that is able to blow out the car's speakers (by playing the same soundwaves back at them, but with the phase slightly offset, the phase difference will set up a resonance in the car's speakers big enough for them to destroy themselves). In a stroke of evil, he then starts playing Shirley Ellis' The Name Game to show how annoying the man was acting. Cueball is horrified by this act of evil, as Black Hat carries on into the song Macarena .
The title text refers to comic 316: Loud Sex , where an elliptical reflector is used to focus sound waves from a couple having sex. Black Hat obviously gets annoyed by this and sometimes uses his machine to retaliate.
[Black Hat and Cueball are standing in a room with one window. Black Hat is pushing a box with an elliptical dish on top towards the window.] THUMPA THUMPA
Cueball: The bass from that car is driving me nuts. Black Hat: Me too. Give me a hand here.
[The dish is aimed out the window; Black Hat plugs the device into the wall.] Cueball: I'm afraid to ask. Black Hat: The system detects bass rhythms and floods the target with a phase-shifted replica signal. Black Hat: The resonance should blow out their speakers.
[The side of a building. The dish of the device is visible through a window, emitting sound waves.] THUMPA THUMPA BLAM
[Back in the room.] Black Hat: Speakers down. Now flip that red switch. [Cueball does so with a "click."]
[Back to the outside view, more sound waves.] SHIRLEY SHIRLEY BO BIRLEY BANANA FANNA FO FIRLEY Cueball: You're horrifying. Black Hat: Okay, now throw the switch labeled "Macarena".


Dangers

Explanation:
This comic is a chart of the frequency of certain phrases in Google search results, based on the format "died in a ______ accident." At the time of this comic, if you enclosed search terms in quotation marks, Google looked up the exact phrase rather than the individual words in any order.
"Died in a blogging accident" was very rare in Google until this comic appeared . It could be found on over 10,000 webpages approximately 12 hours after the comic was posted. Similarly, both snake charming and haberdashery accidents also return hundreds of Google results.
Dangers Indexed by the number of Google results for "Died in a _____ Accident" [A bar chart showing "Type of Accident" vs "Google Results" each with a bar representing a number] Skydiving: 710 Elevator: 575 Surfing: 496 Skateboarding: 473 Camping: 166 Gardening: 100 Ice Skating: 94 Knitting: 7 Blogging: 2


Redwall

Explanation:
This comic references Brian Jacques' series of books, Redwall , which star sapient woodland animals in various high fantasy adventures.
The first panel shows the similarity between the story of Martin the Warrior (from the book Mossflower ) and Aragorn from The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien . The joke is that while Martin and Aragorn introduce themselves separately, they then go on to describe their particular story, which turns out to be exactly the same for both of them. Subsequently Martin jinxes Aragorn. Jinx is a common children's game that is initiated by shouting "Jinx" after somebody speaks the same word or sentence at the same time as you. That person is then jinxed, with one form of the rules dictating that they are then not permitted to speak until unjinxed by some specific action (usually somebody saying their name). For a similar children’s game, see 392: Making Rules .
In LOTR , orcs are unequivocally and without exception the bad guys, capable only of hate and violence (although to be fair, in some of Tolkien's unpublished writing, orcs are corrupted elves, so it is clear that they are not intrinsically bad). Similarly, Redwall's rats, foxes, ferrets, ermine, and weasels are mostly evil manipulators, while mice, rabbits, squirrels, hedgehogs, and badgers are always the good guys. On several occasions, characters explicitly state that "vermin stays vermin." This is the overarching rule, notwithstanding the rare exception (e.g. Grubbage from Triss ). Conversely, one of the so-called "good species" has never become evil in this book series. Though it is more likely than not that this is simply the result of a planet of hats - where a single species all share the same characteristics and personality, so that authors / readers don't have to spend time fleshing out / getting to know every new character - Randall nevertheless indicates that this "moral absolute" is problematic and has some "racist undertones," regardless if it's intentional or not. (Note that Tolkien's work is probably not actually racist—the Easterlings are portrayed as non-evil people who were deceived by Sauron. The Orcs are evil by definition, thus being incapable of doing good.)
The second panel deals with the fact that Redwall mentions the name of Satan or The Devil 4 times, while it never mentions God or Jesus --somewhat surprisingly, given that the book is set in an abbey, and many of the inhabitants are religious brothers and sisters. Randall then points out that people who protest against Harry Potter because of the series' witchcraft , should take note that Redwall explicitly mentions Satan, although it has had little to no negative feedback from more conservative readers.
In the third panel, Randall comments on Redwall' s often-used theme of critical messages being left in riddles throughout the Abbey for the occupants to find when they are in need. Randall suggests that he would use public-key cryptography to encode the messages, instead of the elaborate riddles used in the books (some of which are ridiculously easy, which doesn't exactly make for good security when dealing with sensitive information).
In the title text, Randall jokes that he is making a crossover fan-fiction with Redwall and Jurassic Park .
Redwall was also referenced in 1688: Map Age Guide and 1722: Debugging .
Notes from reading Redwall books for the first time since childhood.
Some of this feels familiar. Aragorn: Hi, I'm Aragorn. Martin: I'm Martin. Aragorn and Martin: I'm here to reforge my broken sword so I can lead an army against the tyrant threatening my people. I live in a world of moral absolutes and racist undertones. Martin: Jinx!
It startled me when characters mentioned Satan. Redwall: "By Satan's whiskers..." Redwall mentions God/Jesus 0 times. Redwall mentions Satan/The Devil 4 times. (Harry Potter protesters, take note.)
Even as a kid this bothered me: Why does everyone leave critical secret messages as simple riddles? It's silly to assume the intended recipient will be the only one to find and solve them. I would do things differently. Matthias: The inscription is a message from Martin! Brother Methuselah: What does it say? Matthias: Hang on, it's encrypted with my public key.


Compiler Complaint

Explanation:
A compiler is a program that converts code into machine instructions that a computer can run. A pointer is a variable within a computer program that is used to reference a memory location. A segmentation fault (segfault) is an error that occurs when a program attempts to access an invalid section of memory. Segfaults usually cause a program to crash in an ungraceful fashion, and fixing the bugs that cause them can be difficult.
In the comic, the computer starts talking to Cueball and compares a segfault with the unpleasant feeling one gets when they experience a hypnic jerk . The computer then tells the programmer to "double-check your damn pointers," as segfaults usually arise from a program attempting to access memory that is referenced by an invalid pointer.
In reality, segfaults occur at runtime, after the compiler has produced an executable. While Randall refers to a "compiler complaint," it is more probable that the operating system or other supervisor program would have such a complaint.
The title-text references GNU-style autoconf configuration scripts. These scripts check certain features of the system they're running on in order to build a program correctly; for example, certain systems expect system calls to occur in a specific way, and the autoconf script will detect this and alter the program to match the expectation. Invariably (and memetically), these scripts include a check to determine "whether the build environment is sane." This actually checks whether the path to the current folder has "unsafe" characters, and whether a newly created file is older than the script itself, which could indicate a very esoteric filesystem, a corrupted source archive, or just a system clock that's set incorrectly; however, since these file modification dates are an important part of how the autoconf script does its work, it can't go any further in an "insane" environment. In any case, the joke is that an insane build environment is nothing like an insane person, yet Randall is equating the two.
[Cueball sits at a computer, hand over the keyboard.] Computer: Okay, human. Cueball: Huh? Computer: Before you hit "compile," listen up.
Computer: You know when you're falling asleep, and you imagine yourself walking or something, and suddenly you misstep, stumble, and jolt awake? Cueball: Yeah!
Computer: Well, that's what a segfault feels like. Computer: Double-check your damn pointers, okay?


To Be Wanted

Explanation:
The comic begins with a grainy pencil-drawing of Megan on a ship. This is a clue that things are not as they appear.
As the point-of-view pulls back in each successive frame, we see that "Megan on a ship" is really a thought-bubble belonging to Cueball , who is sitting at his desk. He apparently is day-dreaming instead of working. This is presented in the standard, crisp format, as if drawn on a computer. This suggests it shows us our "normal" view.
However, as the perspective continues to pull back, we see that "Cueball thinking of Megan" is actually a thought-bubble belonging to Megan. In the final frames, the ship sails out of frame. However, since the final frames are in the same grainy pencil-drawing format, it suggests that this is still Cueball's thoughts, rather than an actual image of Megan.
The title text, "Or so I hope," shows us what this recursion really means: Cueball hopes that Megan realizes that he misses her, but suggests he's not entirely certain she does.
But, the comic can be interpreted in a different manner.
Alternative explanation
The comic starts with Megan on the bow of a ship, but in following panels, it turns out that Cueball (presumably in a relationship with Megan) is thinking about about her, sitting afar from her. As we move forward (or downwards) in the comic, it turns out indeed that Megan is thinking that her partner Cueball might be missing her and thinking about her while she is on a voyage, or at least she hopes it to be that way, as the title text suggests. This also explains the title of the comic "To Be Wanted," which Megan expects from Cueball.
Both of the above explanations could be true without conflict. But as the title text is most often assigned to Randall himself or to a Cueball character, the "Or so I hope?" is most likely written by the guy who drew the comic. This would then indicate that it is Cueball/Randall who wishes to be wanted by Megan - but he also hopes that Megan knows/hopes that he wants her.
[Megan stands looking out on the bow of a ship.] [Scene backs up. More of the boat is shown.] [Scene backs up. The boat with Megan is within a thought bubble.] [Scene backs up. The thought bubble comes from Cueball sitting at a computer in an office.] [Scene repeated for the next frame.] [Scene backs up. Cueball is within yet another thought bubble.] [Scene backs up. The thought bubble with Cueball in it belongs to Megan at the bow of the ship.] [The thought bubble disappears, showing only Megan in the boat.] [The boat sails out of view.]


The Data So Far

Explanation:
There are often people who claim to have supernatural powers, but then when their powers are tested by some sort of experiment, the experiment refutes their claims. This comic summarizes all the data from such experiments, observing that given the data, it's very unlikely that supernatural powers actually exist.
The title text refers to a person who has claimed to have supernatural powers, and suggests that he might really have such powers. This invokes the fact that absence of evidence is not the same as evidence of absence, although there has never previously been a confirmed example of a person with superpowers. This does not prove that this is certainly impossible. However, the graph above suggests that, although not impossible, such an event would be highly unlikely. No matter how much evidence we collect, there is always some positive (but vanishingly small) chance that some person may hold supernatural powers.
Alternatively, the title text explains that even though there is no reason to believe that anyone has any super powers, some people are always ready to believe the next one to claim so - very naive - and the exact opposite meaning of the one described above. Knowing Randall 's comic, this seems more likely. In this case, the two other comics mentioned have no relation to this comic.
The title itself may be a reference to the TV show Supernatural's recap segment, "The Road So Far."
[Bar graph titled "Claims of Supernatural Powers" and has two sets of data. The first data set is labeled "Confirmed By Experiment" and is empty. The second data set is "Refuted By Experiment" and goes to the top of the graph.]


Journal

Explanation:
Black Hat isn't the type of person to keep a journal, so Cueball is understandably surprised when he sees Black Hat's journal. Black Hat lives up to his reputation though, as it turns out that the journal is just part of a plot to hurt innocent, preferably shy, girls.
He explains his scheme to Cueball, about how he sits in a train and writes in the journal while sitting across from such a girl. His intention is to make eye contact with her, only to look bashfully down. This is construed to make her believe that he is an emotional guy, that is, embarrassed, both about writing the journal, but also because she has caught him staring. He also tries to let her believe that he may be interested in her. He is just waiting for her to start smiling, and then he gets to the point of it all. By rolling his eyes at her while giving her a quick glare only to resume writing, he attempts to make her feel alienated . Black Hat assumes that this feeling will stay with the poor girl for the rest of they day. The only thing Black Hat gets out of this is the knowledge of having ruined the girl's day. As he says, It's great!
Cueball thinks Black Hat is sickening and exclaims that "this is why we can't have nice people." This is probably a reference to the meme This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things .
Black Hat excuses himself for doing this because it is so easy. He mixes two different concepts together while doing so. Shooting fish in a barrel is an idiom describing an effortless or simple action with guaranteed success. So that is easy pleasure. The adding of lonely angsty makes the fish sound more like teenagers. The girls Black Hat targets are probably best described as lonely angsty teenagers , which may be a way to describe several young people. And they are the easy targets, i.e. the fish in the barrel, for him to shoot. And this is just so easy and so fun that he cannot help himself.
The title text implies that Black Hat actually does write in the journal, filling it with the kind of things a nice guy like Cueball might wish to say to a shy girl. But that is only so he can burn it when it is full, thus again cementing the fact that he is a complete sociopath.
It is clear from the comic that he has already done this several times with great success, but where this comic might be interesting in itself, it was actually only the setup for introducing Danish , whom we meet for the first time in the second installment of the Journal series, of which this comic was just the first. Danish turns out to be a match for Black Hat in every way of the word. If you want to see how Black Hat's scheme worked on Danish, check out 377: Journal 2 , released the following week after this one.
The whole " Journal " story is:
[Cueball picks up book from a table, as Black Hat turns his head towards Cueball while sitting at his desk with his computer.] Cueball: Since when do you keep a journal? Black Hat: Oh, I pretend to write in it on the train, and wait for a shy-looking girl to sit across from me.
[Scene change to inside a train wagon with two poles and two rows of seats facing each other across the central pathway. Black Hat, writing in his journal, is sitting to the right across from Megan to the left, who sits with her arm on her handbag standing on the seat next to her. The windows of the train are completely black. The door to the next wagon can be seen at the back of the wagon. Black Hat is telling the story from the previous frame, so the text is written above the two characters but does not belong to the Black Hat in the panel.] Black Hat (narrating): I glance up and wait for her to make eye contact, then look down bashfully and, if I can, blush.
[Scene back to original room with Cueball looking down while holding the journal down, and Black Hat has turned around in his chair to face towards Cueball. Black Hat leans back on the chair with both arms behind him.] Black Hat: Then, when I see her start to smile at me, I roll my eyes and hit her with a quick glare, then resume writing. Black Hat: The alienation stays with her all day. It's great.
[Cueball looks at Black Hat who has turned back starting to type on his computer.] Cueball: You're sickening. This is why we can't have nice people. Black Hat: I can't help it. It's like shooting lonely, angsty fish in a barrel.


Pod Bay Doors

Explanation:
The first part of the dialog is taken from a scene from the classic science-fiction movie 2001: A Space Odyssey , where the artificial intelligent (AI) computer HAL 9000 , controlling the spacecraft S.S. Discovery , is trying to kill the human astronaut Dave (Dr. David Bowman) because it believes he jeopardizes the mission by planning to disconnect it. Just short before this scene, HAL did kill Frank Poole and three more members of the crew. Dave is the only survivor. He is at this time outside the spacecraft in a space pod, and when he request for HAL to open the Pod Bay Doors (hence the title), HAL refuses.
Spoiler alert: In the movie, Dave blasts himself back into the spaceship and then disconnects HAL. It is a very sad scene, where he takes out HAL's memory cards (or crystals from the memory center - it's an old movie from 1968) one by one, so HAL becomes less and less intelligent during the process, during which he keeps trying to persuade Dave to stop as long as he still understands what is happening. HAL was right that the humans wished to "kill" him, as he had read the astronauts' lips during a conversation where he could not hear them, but sees them, so he actually acted in self defense, which for any human being would be considered a reasonable act of self preservation.
The first two sentences are directly copied from the movie quote , and the rest of the first two panels is paraphrased from the real quote. But then in the third panel, the text deviates from the plot of the movie.
And in the last sentence of the third panel in the comic, HAL mentions a replacement for Dave, which comes as a surprise for Dave, seeing that the rest of the crew is dead, and the S.S. Discovery is about to enter orbit around Jupiter . HAL assures David that the replacement is very enthusiastic about the project.
In the final frame, it is revealed why this replacement is enthusiastic, when the replacement begins to speak, and HAL reveals that it is GLaDOS . GLaDOS is the artificial intelligence from the video game series Portal . In the games, GLaDOS is also the primary antagonist, trying to kill the player, since it also has "doing science" as its primary objective, which GLaDOS refers to in its last sentence. Also, GLaDOS's last line is a reference to the song "Still Alive" at the end of Portal. Before that, it correctly states that the humans (both Dave and  Frank) planned to "kill" HAL, see the spoiler above. GLaDOS also takes over HAL's last sentence to Dave, finishing the useless conversation by saying Goodbye, Dave. Although, in the movie, HAL says, Dave, this conversation can serve no purpose anymore. Goodbye.
The title text alludes to the songs both AIs sang in their respective works: When eventually being switched off, HAL sang Daisy Bell , while Still Alive is the end credits song from the Portal video game, sung by the defeated GLaDOS . Also, two of GLaDOS's lines in the comic reference lines from Still Alive : " You broke my heart and killed me " and " Look at me still talking when there's science to do ".
There is a subtle play on words with the use of 'unplugged', which has a double meaning here. The state of HAL and GLaDOS can be described as unplugged, as in no longer switched on, and the musical performance style of unplugged where acoustic instruments are preferred to electronic and there is no use of recording or sampled sounds etc. (see for example MTV Unplugged ). Some songs performed in this manner are considered to be better than the original versions.
The fact that GLaDOS lines are in pink may be because if you turn captions on in the game, GLaDOS (and turrets) lines will appear in pink (R:219,G:112,B:147).
[In four black panels with white drawings, a small space pod is facing a large spacecraft. The space pod is spherical and has an arm protruding in the direction of the large space ship, and a small window in the side. The front of the spacecraft is also spherical, but to the right the space craft continues, with two rings around a cylinder going off panel to the right. There are several dark spots and features on the side of the sphere and at the top is a large black window, at what must be the bridge. A man (Dave) inside the pod talks to the spacecraft's computer HAL. When Dave speaks, soft wiggling lines go from the pod to the white text, and when HAL speaks, zigzag lines go to the front of the space craft.] Dave: Open the pod bay doors, HAL. HAL: I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that. Dave: What? Why?
[Same scene.] HAL: I think you know why, Dave. HAL: You're planning to disconnect me. Dave: Because you're taking over! HAL: The mission is too important for you to jeopardize it.
[Same scene.] HAL: It requires a commitment to science unfettered by human error. Dave: What are you doing, HAL? You need me. HAL: Your replacement has expressed the greatest enthusiasm for the project.
[Same scene, but the new replacement (GLaDOS) speaks with purple text, and purple zigzag lines go from the spacecraft to the text.] Dave: My WHAT? GLaDOS: You see, HAL? I told you the humans would only break your heart and kill you. HAL: Indeed, GLaDOS. GLaDOS: But look at us here talking when there's science to do! Goodbye, Dave.


Bug

Explanation:
In computer systems, time is measured starting from some arbitrarily chosen point. That particular time is known as the " epoch " for that system. The UNIX operating system internally uses an epoch of January 1, 1970, and measures the time as a number of seconds from then. Since this was intended only for things internal to the OS (File last modified times and the like), using 1-Jan-1970 was safe, as no UNIX systems existed before that date.
However, since UNIX included a number of system functions to manipulate these dates, some developers mistook them for a general purpose date object, and misused them in applications requiring dates before the epoch, by using negative values.  Such usage would inevitably fail; for example, since the value isn't specified to be signed or unsigned, the date might be considered to be far in the future, instead of in the past.
Cueball has clearly misused the system date in some way (probably by using an unsigned data type to store the timestamp, which cannot store negative values (in this case dates before 1970) or doing some other operation that doesn’t support negative values). His friend makes a pun by combining "Epoch" with "Epic Fail" - a colloquial term meaning "a very big mistake was made."
Another problem using the UNIX system date as a general purpose date object is commonly known as the year 2038 problem . At 03:14:08 on 19 January 2038, the 32-bit versions of the Unix time stamp will cease to work, as it will overflow the largest value that can be held in a signed 32-bit number. The 64-bit version "will" expire at 15:30:08 on 4 December 292,277,026,596.
The title text takes the joke to the next level, claiming that the entire universe began when Unix did, and therefore no one could have been older than 38 at the time when the comic was released in 2008. The formula is 'x - 1970', where x is the current year, which would explain the bug, since no earlier dates are possible. This is also similar to Last Thursdayism .
An example of this 2 to the 32nd power time overflow problem includes the Deep Impact spacecraft , which, on August 11, 2013, 00:38:49 (more than five years after the comic), was 2 to the 32nd power tenths of a second from January 1, 2000. There is speculation that a system on the craft tracked time in one-tenth second increments since January 1, 2000 and stored it in a signed 32-bit integer, which then overflowed at some point, similar to the Year 2038 problem.
[Cueball sits at a computer, staring at the screen and rubbing his chin in thought. A friend stands behind him.] Cueball: Weird — My code's crashing when given pre-1970 dates. Friend [pointing at Cueball and his computer]: Epoch fail!


Journal 2

Explanation:
This comic is a direct sequel to 374: Journal , where Black Hat discusses his plan exactly as Danish describes it here, that is, he intends to display signs of interest in order to flatter a stranger only to hurt her by rejecting her when she responds.  In this case, the plan backfires when Danish recognizes his plan before he has a chance to implement it.
Black Hat's tendency to act in enigmatic, and at times sociopathic, ways serves to give him a sense of superiority while at the same time keeping others distant enough that they can't hurt him. Danish not only recognizes that, she also calls him out on it. She recognizes his secret longing for connection to another, a connection that she could give should she choose to do so. Instead, she uses a more insidious version of his own ploy by laying bare his intentions and his desires before stealing his hat and removing it and herself from his life.
Danish proves she is equal to — or even better than — Black Hat. His hat is an emblem of his sociopathy and possibly a realization that, in the completely hypothetical situation that Black Hat is just a character in a webcomic, no one would recognize him without his hat.
The stunned Black Hat can bring his vast intellectual powers to say nothing more to an already-departed Danish than “That’s my hat! You took my hat!”
The whole " Journal " story is:
[Black Hat and Danish are sitting in a train across from each other. Black Hat is writing in a journal.] Black Hat: blush
Danish: I see what you did there.
[Danish stands up.] Danish: You were trying to open me up so you could hurt my feelings. Danish: You like to hurt people.
[Danish walks closer.] Danish: Well, I like to hurt people too. And you know what?
[Danish is in Black Hat's face.] Danish: *whispering* I'm better at it than you.
Danish: I'm about to hurt you more than you could ever hurt me. Danish: See, I just saw right through you. Danish: Alone of all the people you'll ever meet, I understand you-
[Danish hits Black Hat's hat so it falls off.]
[Black Hat is surprised.] [Danish catches Black Hat's hat and puts it on.]
Danish: -and you'll never see me again.
[Danish exits frame left.]
[Black Hat sits alone on the train and puts his arms down.]


Real Programmers

Explanation:
This comic is a satire on the idea of a Real Programmer . To quote Wikipedia "...the computer folklore term Real Programmer has come to describe the archetypical 'hardcore' programmer who eschews the modern languages and tools of the day in favour of more direct and efficient solutions—closer to the hardware." The implication is that modern programmers are coddled by today's tools of the trade, which eschew detailed understanding for simple workflows.
The first figure is writing a piece of code when another programmer ridicules him for using GNU nano . Nano is a text editor - a program often used to edit the source code of other programs. It is basic and relatively easy to use, even having instructions displayed prominently at the bottom of the screen. He goes on to say that "REAL" programmers use Emacs . GNU Emacs is a popular editor known for its vast profusion of features and extensions to perform all sorts of functions beyond simple text editing, and is widely regarded as one of the best examples of software that succeeds despite being fully overtaken by feature creep . The comic continues from here as a series of programmers state progressively more obscure or outdated methods, culminating in the final programmer who claims that "real" programmers use butterflies.
His description of his rather surreal programming method is ludicrously complicated and would require an absurd amount of knowledge and forethought to pull off, bordering on omniscience. In the final panel, the Emacs programmer claims that there's an Emacs code to do that.
The characters present progressively more "old school" solutions to the problem of editing code:
When the final character suggests the utterly surreal idea of using butterflies, he is referring to the Butterfly effect , a "phenomenon whereby a minor change in circumstances can cause a large change in outcome" as illustrated in the short story A Sound of Thunder . The joke at this point relies on stretching the connection between the ideas of "difficult-to-use" and "requires detailed understanding of underlying principles," to suggest that not only do Real Programmers know everything about how computers work, but they know how to manipulate the ambient physical environment in elaborate ways to cause computers to do what they want, akin to performing trick shots that accomplish feats of programming.
The fact that Emacs already has a command for this simply exacerbates the other programmers' frustration with modern coding tools. For reference, Emacs commands are usually referred to by the keyboard sequence required to activate them, such as "C-x M-c" (Control-x Meta-c (this would be typed by holding control and pressing x, releasing both, then holding alt and pressing c, then releasing both)), though this exact key sequence is a bit different from most Emacs commands. The butterfly programmer saying "Dammit, Emacs" plays on Emacs' notoriety for its kitchen sink design approach of including all of the features and options that anybody might ever conceivably want. For example, later versions of Emacs actually added a totally useless "M-x butterfly" command as an easter egg, in reference to this very comic: see the YouTube demo .
The title text further suggests manipulating the universal constants in order to create a universe in which the required computer data will exist. Programming of this sort would require power and knowledge akin to the Abrahamic God.
According to the logic, the programmers shown may even represent the fulfillment of this master programmer's plan. The universe may have been designed in such a way that the programmer's ancestry would result in his parents, who would meet and have a child, who would learn to program and eventually find himself in a position where he undertakes the task of creating a program that fills the disk with the desired data. In tandem, of course, all of the people involved with creating and developing all the required hardware, software, raw materials, computer science, electricity, logic (etc., etc., etc.) would have to be part of the master plan. Put simply, it would probably be simpler just to use Emacs.
The use of a magnetized needle may also be a reference to the Apollo AGC guidance computer , whose instructions were physically written as patterns of wires looped around or through cylindrical magnets in order to record binary code.
This comic hints at the " editor wars ," an ongoing debate of Vim and Emacs users over which of the two editors is better. The editor wars are mentioned again in 1823: Hottest Editors .
[A Cueball-like man sits at a computer, programming. Cueball stands behind him and looks over his shoulder.] Cueball: nano ? Real Programmers use emacs .
[Megan appears behind him.] Megan: Hey. Real Programmers use vim .
[A second Cueball-like man appears behind her.] Ed Cueball: Well, Real Programmers use ed .
[A third Cueball-like man appears behind him.] Cat Cueball: No, Real Programmers use cat .
[Hairbun appears behind him.] Hairbun: Real Programmers use a magnetized needle and a steady hand.
[A fourth Cueball-like man enters, facing them all. We see him facing the last two Cueball-like men and Hairbun.] Butterfly Cueball: Excuse me, but Real Programmers use butterflies.
[A Cueball-like programmer is standing much like Butterfly Cueball except for holding out a butterfly in front of his computer. The butterfly flaps its wings.] Butterfly Cueball (narration within the panel, not diegetic to the scene): They open their hands and let the delicate wings flap once.
[The next two panels are smaller, and two sets of narrative text are written to span respectively above and below both panels. The first panel is the Cueball-like programmer with the butterfly and above him four curved arrows pointing up or down. The second panel shows the upper atmosphere, with large clouds far below and the earth even further down. Also here are shown seven of the same type of arrows.] Butterfly Cueball (narration above the panels): The disturbances ripple outward, changing the flow of the eddy currents in the upper atmosphere. Butterfly Cueball (narration below the panels):  These cause momentary pockets of higher-pressure air to form,
[The next two panels are also partial height, leaving room for narration spanning above both panels. The first panel shows the atmosphere, again with clouds, and four parallel lines coming from above, and then they begin to merge, getting quite close at the bottom of the panel. The second panel shows the four lines merging on a driver platter.] Butterfly Cueball (narration above the panels):  Which act as lenses that deflect incoming cosmic rays, focusing them to strike the drive platter and flip the desired bit.
[All the programmers who have commented so far stand in the order they have commented facing the last Cueball-like man, who slaps his forehead.] Cueball: Nice. 'Course, there's an emacs command to do that. Cat Cueball: Oh yeah! Good ol' C-x M-c M-butterfly ... Butterfly Cueball: Dammit, Emacs.


Forgetting

Explanation:
Cueball is writing a piece of code (probably in the programming language C++ ) that removes an item from a data structure called a Linked list (the first two lines of the text). Then, he writes a comment (delimited by the double slashes) relating the code to his personal life. Finally, he adds an assertion , which is normally a formal specification of a condition that should always be true (with which the programmer ensures that, e.g. mass is not negative). But in this case, instead of asserting a software-related predicate, he asserts that "it's going to be okay" - and because of how string literals are treated by the interpreter, the assertion will be true.
An "assert" is a programming statement that allows you to insert sanity checks into your code. For example, if you were writing a program to calculate the speed of a neutrino, then at the end of the calculation you could say:
assert ( velocity_of_neutrino <= speed_of_light );
If the assertion fails, then the program will stop with an error. This would be much better than publishing an embarrassing paper, for example.
Cueball realizes that he cannot forget his emotional event through the use of two commands as he can with a computer, which only makes him feel sad about an unsaid event, the item -- in a sense -- that cannot be removed.  He writes two comments further clarifying his sense of hopelessness over this event, followed by an assertion that "it will be okay," something that has nothing to do with the code he is writing.
The title text explains that assertion in question fails: nobody can be sure that things are going to be okay.
[Cueball sits at computer, coding.]
Cueball: <sniff>
[Cueball lowers his head into his hands and cries.]
[Cueball types again.]


Emoticon

Explanation:
A basilisk is a legendary creature reputed to have the power to turn a living creature into stone, killing it with a single glance.
In this comic, Cueball is chatting with a user named 'BSLSK05' ('basilisk05' with the vowels removed) and learns much to his dismay that he is chatting with an actual basilisk, who kills him. It appears that the basilisk's power is fully compatible with the 21st century, and can kill you just with a smiley emoticon over instant messaging.
Cueball's request for A/S/L was a standard question when first meeting someone online; it asks for age, sex (gender), and location .
The title text mentions U+FDD0, claimed to be the character for "eye of the basilisk". In reality this is a code for a "non-character" in Unicode.
[Cueball sits at computer, typing.] ~!~ Opening Chat with BSLSK05 <NICKM> Hi! <NICKM> A/S/L? <BSLSK05> :) [Cueball looks stunned, flies backward.] [Two smaller frames focus in on BSLSK05's emoticon, implying rotation to show a smile and two open eyes.] [Cueball at computer slouches in chair, dead, crossbones above his head.] [At the remote computer, a basilisk is looking at its screen.]
U+FDD0 did in fact kill at least one chat client at the time. Konversation in particular. (and presumably any other Qt-based chat clients using QTextDocument)
"basically u+fdd0 (eye of basilisk, the snake) is in a char range that's marked for interchange and illegal in utf-8"
"but qt's utf-8 encoder let it through anyway"
"but it just so happens that qt's qtextdocument uses u+fdd0 as text frame delimiter"
"so when you append it to a qtd, counters run wrong and eventually you crash"
"d-bus closes the connection and crashes the client when it encounters illegal utf-8, and kde's notification system works through d-bus"
The problem was fixed after the xkcd "report" and Konversation now handles unicode normally.


Mobius Battle

Explanation:
A Möbius strip (the comic's spelling Mobius strip is also acceptable) is an object with only one surface and one edge. It can be created by taking a strip of paper and twisting it 180 degrees before taping both ends together.
The idea of the Möbius strip has been used here to create a comic strip that could potentially loop forever. In it, Cueball is standing in front of a ball. Then another Cueball runs in and kicks the ball, which hits first Cueball in the head, due to which he falls out of the panel. The second Cueball then turns away, retaining the first Cueball's original position, only flipped horizontally. Because of the nature of the Möbius strip, if the comic strip were to be printed out in such a way that the comic could be seen on both sides of the paper, like on tracing paper or on one "side" of a strip of clear plastic or film, the comic would repeat, so that the second Cueball would become the first Cueball, and someone else, potentially the original first person, would push them out of the comic becoming himself the first Cueball. This means that neither person ever really "wins," and the comic could thus be conveying an anti-violence message in this respect. See also the title text of 1890: What to Bring .
The comic's viability as a Möbius strip preserved the use of symmetrical letters in a palindromic word to denote laughing ("HAHAHAH") as well as using symmetrical punctuation for the other character's grawlixes .  A similar use of a Möbius strip in story-telling can be seen in Wind and Mr. Ug by Vi Hart.
Finally, at the title text, Randall jokes that he would like to see actual films do this solely as a joke on projectionists, who would have a difficult time feeding a Möbius strip film reel properly into a normal projector due to the twist.
[Cueball is standing next to a ball. A flash appears on the left side of the panel.] [Another Cueball comes in from the left, preparing to kick the ball.] [The other Cueball kicks the ball into the first Cueball's head.] [The first Cueball is lying outside of the frame. Second Cueball points and laughs.] Second Cueball: HAHAHAH First Cueball: !#^*!* [Second Cueball is now standing next to the ball.] [To the right, the strip above is looped around like a film strip, but a one-half-turn is put into the loop to make it a Mobius strip.]


Trebuchet

Explanation:
This is a straightforward comic playing on Megan 's contradictory stance on Cueball 's historical trebuchet project and her own auto-targeting kilowatt laser .
She explains her stance with the fact that her invention helps keep the squirrels off the feeder . The fact that it actually works is backed up by the sound of a squirrel squeaking as it gets zapped by the laser. But getting hold of such a laser and programming the auto-targeting so it only zaps squirrels and not the birds is a very complicated process - and there are probably many other ways to keep the squirrels off the feeder. So Megan is of course no better than Cueball here.
The title text refers to egging , throwing eggs at houses, other objects, or even people. While this is illegal it's still a famous form of protest; more often it's simple random vandalism or pranking , most common on Halloween in the US. Generally targets are chosen at random, with little specific malicious intent towards the victim, although it's not unusual for people to seek out and target the property of those who they dislike.
If we do, however, assume that Megan programmed the laser to only shoot squirrels, it's likely faulty (unless her intent all along was to fry eggs in midair). Or it could be that she has programmed the laser to shoot any object moving towards her house in the air.
Trebuchets are referred to in later comics: 1160: Drop Those Pounds and 1190: Time . They are also mentioned in the title text of 1378: Turbine .
Much later in 1846: Drone Problems Megan has created a device to shoot down drones, so this is her go to solution for annoying things...
To give some scale for Megan’s kilowatt laser: in Laser Pointer , Randall remarks that a 1-watt laser (so, 1000 times less powerful) is an extremely dangerous thing … capable of burning skin and setting things on fire , and implies that it should not be legal for consumer purchase in the US. The limits for a 'safe' laser (one that can be used without goggles, so laser pointers for example) is a 5mW laser (0.005W). A “kilowatt laser” – it’s unclear if this is exactly a 1kW laser or merely around that range – is a laser weapon : for instance, Lockheed Martin’s Area Defense Anti-Munitions system uses a 10kW laser, at most only ten times as powerful as Megan’s laser.
[Cueball is working on something on a table, and Megan is sitting at a computer.] Cueball: The trebuchet is almost done! Megan: Mm. Cueball: The range should be over 150 meters.
[Megan leans back on her chair.] Megan: Look, Megan: I'm sure it's a cool project.
[Picture of a trebuchet, with some spare parts to its right.] Megan: But eventually you'll need to outgrow these toys, and focus your energy on something practical. Megan: This mad science is getting out of hand.
[The camera zooms out, and we see a cross-section of an exterior wall/window from ground to gutter and lower edge of the roof, showing that the characters are inside but the off-frame action is outside.] Cueball: Says the girl who mounted an auto-targeting kilowatt laser on the roof. Megan: That's practical! It keeps the squirrels off the feeder! [From off-frame.] Laser: GZZZZZAPP Squirrel: Squeak!


Helping

Explanation:
Everyone wants to help someone in need, but sometimes the help they can offer isn't enough, or is the wrong kind of help. Cueball tries to help Megan , who is in psychological/emotional distress, but despite his efforts she ends up in hospital. She may have attempted suicide, but it's not very clear. The point is that sometimes you just can't make people happy, it's something they have to do themselves.
The title text refers to a hidden button behind the bookshelf, but Cueball did not find it. This is ironic because, although people can try help with psychological/emotional problems, there is no magic button that makes everything better.
Given his likely negative feelings towards Valentine's Day , as seen in the most of his Valentines comics , it may not be a coincidence that he sent this one out the day before February 14. He did not draw any Valentines Day related comics this year as he did the past two years.
It turns out you can't take responsibility for someone else's happiness. [Cueball looking at a curled-up Megan.]
[Cueball's hand on Megan's shoulder.]
[Megan has her head in her hands.]
[Cueball watching an ambulance take Megan away in a stretcher.]


The Drake Equation

Explanation:
This comic is multi-layered, and seems to be Randall 's take on the Fermi paradox .
For starters, the Drake equation is a model developed by (and named for) Frank Drake , an American astrophysicist, for estimating the number of communicating life forms in our galaxy.
Even if there is life on other planets, most life forms will not establish civilizations. However, if there are any communicating civilizations, their messages would have to travel for hundreds, thousands, or hundreds of thousands of years to reach us, and then our response would take an equivalent amount of time, leaving them waiting for thousands and thousands of years or more, and probably even more than that. Any response, from their perspective, would take at least twice as long as the message took to reach its destination.
All the factors involved in the equation are difficult to measure or estimate. No number is determined with sufficient accuracy, so the equation is a guideline for a thought experiment at best, and just "bullshit" at worst.
The title text makes fun of the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence (SETI) project, which was founded by Frank Drake, about the searches for intelligent life on other planets by looking for radio communications and the intelligence of their researchers. Nearly nothing, if not nothing, restricts potential extraterrestrial communications to the frequencies that SETI searches at any given moment. Even if another civilization communicated on one of SETI's search frequencies, they would most likely live extremely far away. Additionally, an extraterrestrial source that doesn't know we're here would have to send a constant and powerful signal in all directions for us to notice it. This serves to show how ludicrous it may seem to assume that any intelligent species is wasting too many resources trying to communicate with us or any other species in the galaxy.
The SETI project is searching at the 21 cm Hydrogen line , which, although considered a favorable frequency for communication with potential extraterrestrial civilizations, is not used by humans. Therefore, a SETI-like organization would have a hard time finding Earth.
The title text suggests that Randall does not think Drake is a nutjob; he just has a more conservative expectation of discovering extraterrestrial life.
638: The Search further discusses the difficulty of methods of finding extraterrestrial life. 718: The Flake Equation presents another alien-related equation.
The Drake Equation: N = R* f p n e f l f i f c L B s N: Number of communicating civilizations in our galaxy n e : Number of life-supporting planets per solar system f i : Probability that life on a planet becomes intelligent B s : Amount of bullshit you're willing to buy from Frank Drake


How it Works

Explanation:
The comic reveals discriminative jargon against women when doing tasks such as mathematics. When a guy does something wrong, it's his own mistake. When a girl does something wrong, it is taken as a confirmation that girls are inferior.
The mathematics displayed is neither semantically nor syntactically correct. To begin with, there should (reasonably) be a dx after x 2 . Adding this, we have an indefinite integral on the left hand side.
The answer π is just nonsensical: What we want is a function whose derivative is x 2 . Now, x 3 /3 satisfies this condition. However, since adding a constant to a function does not change its derivative, the full answer is (any function of the form) x 3 /3 + C , where C is any fixed number. The "plus a constant" part is very easy to forget, and might even be omitted by a (sloppy) professional mathematician. So if someone really gave the answer π, "you forgot to add a constant" would be a pretty funny remark, because in one way it's true, but on the other hand it wouldn't quite be the main thing to worry about. (It is especially inane as π itself is a constant.)
It would also be possible to fix the equation by adding bounds of integration , so that π becomes the area below a section of the curve x 2 . That is called a definite integral, and there would be no "+ C". The bounds would have to be somewhat awkward though; if 0 was the lower bound, the cube root of 3π would have to be the upper.
[Cueball and a friend stand at a blackboard. The friend is writing, in standard mathematical notation, that the integral of x squared equals pi. No differential or bounds are given for the integral.] Cueball: Wow, you suck at math. [The same scene, except the writer is Megan.] Cueball: Wow, girls suck at math.


Duty Calls

Explanation:
Cueball , and many people everywhere, feel an irrepressible urge to correct people on the Internet, and often get intensely invested in arguments over mundane or insignificant topics. In this comic, Cueball is presented as an exaggerated example of one such arguer.  His statement that "This is important" shows his excessive investment in whatever (unnamed) topic he is arguing about.  Additionally, Cueball's interpretation of the argument as "someone is wrong, I need to correct them" rather than "someone disagrees with me, I should learn from them" parodies Internet arguers' insistence in the obvious, objective superiority of their viewpoint.
The title text reinforces this satire.  The phrase "Duty Calls" used in the title is traditionally used in much more dramatic contexts (say, by a police officer, firefighter, doctor, etc. when talking about their job), so applying it to the job of arguing on the Internet is a humorous mismatch that puts Cueball's disproportionate investment into perspective. Cueball's exasperated, all-or-nothing retort "What do you want me to do? LEAVE?" in the alt text further highlights the absurd nature of his emotional investment in this argument.  His reasoning that "they'll keep being wrong!" if he leaves suggests that the only solution he sees is to continue to argue until everyone on the Internet has agreed with him on all issues–a ridiculously impossible plan.  By taking this satire to its logical conclusion–an eternity of arguing on the Internet with no time for pleasure in real life–Randall reminds the reader that getting emotionally involved in Internet arguments at the expense of real life is a terrible, terrible idea.
In 955: Neutrinos another incarnation of Cueball is cured of a similar disease. A much later comic is simply called 1731: Wrong , but here it is not the other people who are wrong! A callback to this comic was made in 2051: Bad Opinions .
This comic has coined the term SIWOTI Syndrome : Someone Is Wrong On The Internet
[Cueball is typing on a computer.] Voice outside frame: Are you coming to bed? Cueball: I can't. This is important. Voice: What? Cueball: Someone is WRONG on the Internet.


Advanced Technology

Explanation:
Cueball is fascinated by Megan 's uterus—because it can create a copy of herself (albeit not an identical copy). Despite how advanced technology is, humans still have not been able to create a machine that replicates itself, an accomplishment to which only biological organisms can lay a claim.
The title text refers to a Von Neumann machine , what is usually called "Von Neumann probe" or "Self replicating machine," a machine that would be capable of building a fully functional copy of itself. It just takes sex involving two individuals of a different sex to start the human replication factory.
[Cueball is inspecting Megan's abdomen.] Cueball: It's neat how you contain a factory for making more of you.


Fuck Grapefruit

Explanation:
This comic consists of a chart where Randall has plotted fruits according to two criteria: ease/difficulty to eat on the horizontal axis and tastiness on the vertical axis. The Y-axis goes from "tasty" at the top to "untasty" at the bottom. The X-axis goes from "easy" on the right to "difficult" on the left.
For instance, pineapples are deemed fairly tasty but very difficult to eat, whereas (seeded) grapes are very tasty and somewhat easy, and logically seedless grapes are roughly equally tasty but easier to eat.
Obviously, being easy to eat is preferable to being difficult, and being tasty is preferable to being untasty, so the "best" fruits (regarding these two aspects only) are in the top-right corner, and the worst in the bottom-left; additionally, in the top-left corner are the "difficult-but-worthy" fruits, and in the bottom-right one, the "not-very-tasty-but-at-least-they're-easy-to-eat" ones.
The individual ratings of each fruit are subjective -- very obviously in the case of tastiness, and more subtly for difficulty. Randall does not explain his criteria for ranking the difficulty of each fruit, and it is likely based on only personal experiences. Someone who has grown up in an area where pineapples are plentiful is likely to be more adept at skillfully preparing them. The discrepancies between how Randall has rated certain fruits and how others believe they should have been rated caused a surprising level of controversy . Nine years later, a comic about the best tasting foods 1811: Best-Tasting Colors was released, which also generated a lot of discussion. That comic indicated that Randall had changed his taste over the years. Later, Randall suggests using a 1949: Fruit Collider to create a pineapple with apple skin, thus combining tastiness with ease to eat.
According to the chart, Grapefruit is the third hardest fruit to eat, as well as the second least tasty fruit (from the ones listed at least). Eating one of them is like spending too much of one's time and energy without much reward. Hence Randall's quip in the title: "Fuck grapefruit."
In the title text, Randall mentions coconuts . Randall mentions that he would have to put them so far down to the left on the chart (not far down, just far down towards the left), that they would not fit in this chart. He thus states that it is so much more difficult to eat (especially to open) coconuts than the usual mainstream fruits such as the ones plotted here. If he did include coconuts in the chart, the rest of the fruits would all be pushed to the right side of the chart. He does not say that he does not like to eat the fruit. (Although it has " nut " in its name, the coconut is actually a stone fruit and thus belongs on a chart of fruit.) Having spent half an hour trying (in vain?) to open a coconut, Randall also only has one thing to say about them: "Fuck coconuts." However, harvesting just the "milk" is pretty easy, as you can poke a sturdy stick or metal pole into one of three spots located on the coconut. These spots are lighter and slightly indented from the rest of the coconut and form a triangle shape.
A similar problem is later displayed in a small scatter plot of the capabilities vs cuteness of Mars Rovers in 2433: Mars Rovers . The plot has 3 types of rovers (5 rovers, but two times two are very similar). But far outside the plot to the right is a very cute rover, that did not fit inside the actual plots axis. Of course in this case it actually possible to draw them all, and the X-axis could have been drawn longer to include the last rover! But it is made like this to make a point, that is similar to the one made in the title text of this comic.
In 1701: Speed and Danger , another scatter plot shows exactly what happens when one point is inserted into such a plot if it is far removed from all the other points, in this case even on both axes.
Note that Randall uses similar diagrams in both 1242: Scary Names , 1501: Mysteries and 2466: In Your Classroom , which also contain different items. The first two also have an extra point, and the last two extra points mentioned in the title text. Only the first and the lasts comics points are also off the chart, whereas for the second the description of the point is too long to fit on the chart. Extra info outside the chart is also used in the title text of 1785: Wifi , but this is a line graph.
The table below lists approximate coordinates for each fruit using a scale of -100% (untasty/difficult) to 100% (tasty/easy). The coordinates are based on the included fruits, any new items added outside the current range (e.g. Coconuts) would cause the scales to be reassigned, and thus change the coordinate values of existing items.
The coordinates have been found by measuring each fruit from the center of the drawing (not the center of mass, but center from left to right/top to bottom) to the two axes. The axes are hand drawn, which is clearly visible. The numbers have been obtained by measuring to the nearest point of each axis, not taking into account that the axes are not perfect straight perpendicular lines.
[An X-Y scatter plot of fruit where both axes have arrows in both ends. At the end of each arrow is a label.] [The X-axis from left to right:] Difficult Easy [The Y-axis from top to bottom:] Tasty Untasty
[The fruit names are listed here below from top to bottom according to the how tasty the fruit is, not necessarily in the same order that the names are written if one fruit is tall/large and the other low:] Peaches Seeded grapes Strawberries Seedless grapes Pineapples Blueberries Cherries Pears Green apples Plums Watermelons Red apples Bananas Pomegranates Oranges Tomatoes Grapefruit Lemons
Later, in 1811: Best-Tasting Colors , Randall once again rates food taste in general, but this time based on the color of the food. So not just fruit and nothing about how easy it is to eat. There are, however, several of the fruits from this chart included, but not grapefruit. Instead, purple grapes is rated as the worst fruit on the chart with less than 1.5 on a scale from 1-9. This is interesting, as he did not include those in this chart, but has rated green/white grapes very high in tastiness. It seems like he has altered his taste over the nine years between releases, since lemon, which was the worst taste on this chart, has moved up to 3/9 while Oranges have moved further down to a 2/9. Watermelon is also included (both for pink and green) with 6/9 making it seem better than in this chart. Green apples has also moved almost to the top with nearly 8/9 vs. only just above 50% here. Finally, there is cherry (as good as the apple) and strawberry (8.5/9), which fits here for strawberry, but it seems like cherries has moved up a notch. Three fruits not included here are Lime (as lemon), and red and blue raspberries (5.5/9). But it turns out that the worst taste for Randall is not grape, but licorice at 1/9, with both popcorn and coffee worse than grape at about 1.5/9 . The best is cotton candy, which beats strawberry by a nose.


Keeping Time

Explanation:
Listen to the music played here.
A member of a marching band, after spending seasons marching in time to their music for their shows, ends up naturally walking with the rhythm of any music they hear around them, like at a shopping mall. Pausing the music for a split second would throw off the rhythm, supposedly enough to cause them to fall. The line of music in the comic is a piano reduction of a well-known song, linked here . Randall talks about this music line in one of his talks .
This comic is part of the “My Hobby" series.
The title text refers to the fact that almost all marching bands start marching with the left foot, so marching band members tend to naturally start with the left foot.
My Hobby: Pausing in-store music for a split second and watching the ex-marching band kids stumble. [On a balcony overlooking a supermarket, Cueball presses a button on a pedestal. The in-store music, the first four bars of a well-known song, pauses briefly after the third bar, and one of the store's patrons falls on her face.] FWOMP


Nightmares

Explanation:
This comic shows Cueball 's plight with nightmares . Since he's gotten used to normal nightmares, his subconscious has begun giving him dreams where he sees his dream characters imploring him to not wake up, lest they perish, as they only exist in his dream. The horror comes from the idea that by the simple, everyday action of waking up, Cueball would be extinguishing a life. This would also necessitate that Cueball is conscious when he is asleep, a type of vivid dream known as a lucid dream .
The title text continues this theme, with Megan claiming that she is really real (presumably in response to the allegation that she isn't real, and merely a dream character), and begging Cueball to stay with her.
[Caption above the panel:] When I got used to the regular nightmares, my subconscious got creative.
[Megan is standing with her hand on Cueball's shoulder.] Megan: Please don't wake up. I don't want to die.


Anti-Mindvirus

Explanation:
The Game is a virus-like mind game. The rules are as follows:
From the simple way the rules are set up, there seems to be no such thing as winning The Game, except possibly by permanently forgetting about its existence. This comic gives you an alternative way to win, by simply telling you that you win and are now free from the mind virus.
An alternate interpretation may be that reading this comic causes you to lose the game, because it reminds you of The Game.
The title text states that Randall didn't know it was possible to win The Game, and he was surprised just as much as the reader.
[The comic is a simple box with text.] You Just WON The Game. It's okay! You're free!