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Powers Of Ten

It seems we’ve hit the season of accomplishments.

  • About six weeks back I was doing a mini-crawl through the Gunnerkrigg Court archives and noticed that the current strip appeared to be the 983rd one in Tom Siddell’s exploration of consciousness, myth, technology, friendship, plus bozos, jerks, numbnuts, doofs and jabronis¹.

    Making a mental note to scan the archive picker a bit more closely over the ensuing month, it appears that the pages are, in fact, numbered sequentially. That means that today marks the 1000th update of Gunnerkrigg Court, which as we all know is the hallmark of quality in the struggle against a sea of schmendricks and crumbums. One should also note that this most recent ninnyhammer-heavy story is going to look great when volume 4 hits the shelves; so that you’re all caught up by then, mayhap you ought to pick up the earlier books?

  • Likewise, if my math (and a helpful note from Bill Barnes) may be trusted, tomorrow would appear to be the tenth anniversary of Unshelved, which began its long march to dominance of the library science departments of the world on 16 February, 2002. They were younger then, Bill Barnes and Gene Ambaum, a little freer, a little more lighthearted perhaps.

    But in the passing of their youth they have gained wisdom, the sort that only comes from hitting the ALA convention floor and having a crowd of librarians threaten to tear their clothes from their bodies so as to absorb some of their mighty essence. If this makes Ambaum and Barnes sound like a sort of thinner and less musical Tenacious D, well, there are merits to the analogy. Unlikely superstars within a specific milieu, varying degrees of bald and middle-aged, but still able to pull down the groupies like nobody’s business?

    Yeah, okay, I ain’t buying the groupie thing either², but the Unshelved Crüe remain the epitome of niche appeal, which makes for a pretty comfortable environment when an underserved cohort decides you’re their #1 favorite entertainment provider. Congrats to Ambaum and Barnes for not only having one of the long-term successful webcomics, but also one of the long-term successful webcomics partnerships. If the library thing ever grows old, they could take what they learned from dealing with each other for a decade and hit the marriage counseling circuit.

  • Okay, it’s not a power of ten, but how about 200 comics over at All New Issues, with an extra-special Jamie Noguchi guest strip? You don’t need to know anything about the fictional comic book character of Lobster Boy, or the various relationships and infatuations (requited and not) in the strip to get the message of today’s strip. It’s all there in the last panel.

Some other quick numbers, with thanks to the Harpers Index:

  • Likelihood that Rich Burlew will clear $US800,000 and 10,000 backers in the five days left to his Kickstarter project: 100%.
  • Likelihood that the George Rohac conspiracy (okay, okay, “Benign Kingdom”) will hit US$50,000 and 1000 backers in the nine remaining days of their Kickstarter project: 100%
  • Likelihood that Rich Stevens will have to take a road trip to deliver a Pac-Man arcade machine to Wil Wheaton in the twenty two days remaining in his Kickstarter project: 100%
  • Further likelihood that somebody will make Rich eat at least one more pound of bacon (that would be the second) and/or force him to do a month of strips on a Windows machine instead of his beloved Mac and/or give up coffee for a month: 2/33, 4

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¹ Especially jabronis.

² It’s not like they got Brad Guigar in the band.

³ Unlike the other Kickstarter items noted, which are based on uplifting possibilities of joy and happiness, this one has only the potential for schadenfreude. Shame on you person(s) that make it happen, and bless you at the same time.

4 That “3” is a footnote, not a mathematical exponent. Likewise, so that I can avoid an infinite series of footnotes explaining that yes, the previous footnote was also a footnote, the “4” is a footnote and not an exponent.

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