Worries

Oh? Oh… Apparently, she had something different on her mind… Be glad Rob, you are off the hook!

How was that last week for you? I find myself frustrated. I wanted to take part in Nanowrimo but the concept for my new story isn’t quite ready yet. So no Nanowrimo for me this year. I don’t have enough time for it. But it does frustrate me, that I have time only for work, this comic and sleeping. I wish I could do more than that but the day just doesn’t want to have more hours, sigh…

I also started looking into books for learning Japanese. Any recommendations? It’s hard to pick something, harder than I assumed it would be. And I really, really want to finally learn the language. My heart aches every time I go into a bookstore and see all those novels I’m unable to read. Soon, my babies, soon…!

I watched the second season of Stranger things and I liked it~! Normally it’s hard to find more interesting relationships between adults and kids than “adults are awful, kids are awful, we’ll never understand each other” so in a way this series is kind of different. And I like the monsters. You can probably tell from Replay alone hah. With reading, I’m still somewhere at the beginning of the third book of the Liu Cixin’s trilogy, didn’t find much time for reading this week.

And finally – thank you for the votes and comments! Thanks to your dedication Replay’s on the top, which is awesome, and I’m motivated to draw, which is even better! So huge thanks and I hope you’ll enjoy this week’s page!

42 comments on “Worries”

  1. Ian Reply

    OMG HELL YEAH first baby!!!
    :3 nice page keep the good work going im curious for what’s gonna happen next

      • JW Reply

        Everybody that visits this website cat get a cookie if they want. It’s the default in most browsers to accept them, after all.

    • Rateus Camp dweller Reply

      I thought of another thing now I’m more awake. I love the way you portray the inner monologue in the first panel, though I’m nosey so I’d love to be able to see the rest of it. Maybe that sort of extra detail could be a TWC voting reward sometime for us nosey folk?

      • NotImportant Reply

        Hmmm I’m not sure I even have the full text! I mean… I’m not sure those are complete sentences. I’ll check and post it as incentive, no problem!

  3. Doom Reply

    As we saw in chapter 1, Ada is not good at talking about how she feels. Rob might be right that Ada’s unbothered by the Sofia situation, or he might be jumping to conclusions prematurely.

  4. bitflipper Camp dweller Reply

    Warning, Warning!! Rob, Ada is *also* thinking about what Filip said, and which book she has, etc. Now, take a guess what *else* is on her mind?

    Listen. If Ada raises the topic of Sofia, right now, then (1) she might look bad, and (2) she might get hurt. Safer, from her standpoint, to talk about something completely unrelated, yes? Which puts the ball firmly in your court even though you don’t want it. The worst thing you could do, right now, is feed Ada’s insecurities by avoiding the subject of Sofia, yourself; that makes it look like you’re hiding something, and confirms to Ada that she was right not to broach the subject. (I know it doesn’t make sense; you’ve got to think with your heart, here, not with your head or your fears.)

    Eh, it’s your choice, bud. But, I’m telling you now, if you want to build a relationship with Ada beyond friendship, you need to spend some time talking to her about that relationship! And, if it’s uncomfortable for you, good! Ada will see that discomfort and see that she matters more to you than your own comfort zones do. That really encourages her to take the matter seriously, and to respond in kind.

    Alright; enough relationship advice to fictional characters. You two are about due to having some demons to skewer in your near future. ;-p

    Lovely artwork, as always, NI!

    • antrik Reply

      Taking the matter more seriously won’t make her respond in kind — *unless* she was already interested, and only suppressing it because he didn’t seem serious enough… While this is definitely a possibility (which I did consider in the past), right now it seems more like she just isn’t interested in him in that way at all? Possibly in fact because he is being too blatant about it — in which case talking about it more, most likely would be counter-productive.

  5. ForlornFoe Reply

    I hear you about the day not having enough hours, especially when the daylight is dwindling…

    About useful books: I happen to have some of Kodansha’s bilingual books, which provide Japanese and English side by side. For example “Japanese History: 11 Experts Reflect on the Past” is pretty dry and weak as a history book but has useful words to learn in Japanese, so it ought to fit for learning the language.

  6. th Reply

    would be funny if they have one of their future-vision things and see who ends up in a relationship with who before it happens and it causes super-awkwardness

    • Refugnic Reply

      These visions are only very short glimpses of the future and may be as misleading as they might be helpful.

      Let’s assume Ada has a vision of Sofia hugging Robert.

      That would most certainly get her jealousy going, however let me state a few examples, where she might getting it ‘the wrong way’.

      1. It’s a good bye hug, because Robert is going with Ada and Sofia cannot bear it.
      2. Ada died and Sofia is comforting him.
      3. Ada dumped Robert and Sofia is comforting him.

      To be continued…context is important after all.

      Another example:
      Let’s assume Ada is with Adam, acting all cuddly with him. (Wait with the stakes until I’m done talking, please).

      Possible context:
      Adam actually captured Ada and now she’s acting like she actually likes him to catch him off guard…in order to off him the first chance she gets.
      Or to escape, though considering her temper, she’d probably off him (or worse) before making her getaway.

      Another possible context:
      Ada is enchanted to do his bidding. (Magic does exist in their world, so why not mind control magic?)

      Yet another possible context:
      She’s distracting him, while the rescue party is trying to get through to her. (Compare: Jasmine and Jafar)

      And, to cater to the shippers, yet another context:
      She has realized that she has no future with the survivors, which is why she’d rather side with the winners instead…this would imply however, that most of her companions (most notably Robert) are most likely dead or at least captured or MIA…this scenario I don’t see happening easily though, I don’t peg her to be this calculating or opportunistic.

      But yeah, it could lead to a few interesting situations, which also fully depend on who has the vision.
      Thus far, it’s always been visions of places where the one with the visions has been present…unless I’m mistaken.
      Which means that about any AdaxAdam vision would most likely appear with Ada, who would not speak a word of it…unless of course, Rob is chained to the wall or something in the vision, helpless to watch his greatest horror unfolding. 😀

      • antrik Reply

        It’s not even clear I believe that these are visions of things that will actually happen, as opposed to hypothetical situations?…

  7. Refugnic Reply

    Good morning, Replay.

    Now, Sofia certainly did NOT look like that, when she gave you that boxed lunch.
    How about considering how she must have felt when she gathered her courage and approached you…in front of Ada, no less.

    Heh, as if Rob didn’t have enough on his plate yet…though really, Ada has no reason to be angry about that…at the very least not towards him.
    After all, from the looks of it, Rob is the ‘victim’ in this, she was approaching him, not the other way around.

    Sure, he could have rejected it at the time, but he’d be a fool to reject perfectly good food in times like these.
    And don’t even get me started on the emotional backlash.
    If he had openly rejected Sofia’s present (and therefor: Sofia), it MIGHT have gotten him some points with Ada…note the ‘might’, she might as well as stamped him off as a stupid idiot who rejects perfectly good food, but for sure it would’ve pit Sofia against Rob or, even more likely, Ada, cause she’s the obvious reason for rejection.

    Long story short, by accepting the present and acting (?) clueless, he’s done the best he can, considering the circumstances.
    If push comes to shove, he can truthfully claim, that there’s nothing between him and Sofia to Ada (because there isn’t, she’s just a girl who happens to live in the same shelter) while not hurting Sofia’s feelings…at least not straight away.

    But phew, he sure got himself in a bad spot right there…I most certainly wouldn’t want to be in his shoes.
    Kinda bad for him now, that he isn’t the classical oblivious young (Japanese) male all the girls his age fuss over without him ever realizing what’s going on…would be a heck of a lot easier. For him that is. 😀

    Regarding NaNoWriMo…don’t worry too much about it, NI.
    I’ve decided for myself to not participate this year either, simply because of family and work and all that jazz…they almost skinned me alive last year, I don’t need that again. 😀

    IMO, NaNoWriMo is for people who actually do have plenty of time on their hands, which excludes almost everyone who has an actual day job and those who have a family NEXT to the day job even more so.

    You may not have a family to tend to (yet?), but you’ve still got yourself a baby that requires your attention…so you still fall in the ‘people with (social) obligations which keep them from writing’-category. 😀

    What I’m trying to say: Don’t feel bad, for you are not alone. 🙂

    Keep up the good work! 😉

    • JW Reply

      Kinda bad for him now, that he isn’t the classical oblivious young (Japanese) male all the girls his age fuss over without him ever realizing what’s going on…would be a heck of a lot easier. For him that is.

      Except for all the physical abuse. Though there are few houses here for them to punt him over. And few bathrooms for him to accidentally run into them at.

      • Refugnic Reply

        Well, to be fair, physics seem to be ticking in his favor in this world.
        I doubt any of them would have the physical capacity to punch him anywhere but to the ground…though I would see THAT happening quite a lot.
        With quite a bit of kicking too.

    • antrik Reply

      I’m not sure the “in front of Ada” part matters at all: It doesn’t seem like Sofia is even considering Ada as competition at this point. I doubt she would make a move otherwise.

      (Whether that’s lack of perception — failing to see that there is *something* going on; or acuteness of perception — seeing that it’s not getting anywhere — I don’t know though…)

      As for Ada, it doesn’t seem like she’s actually jealous — nor do I remember any clear hints in the past that she might be? But even if she *was*, I doubt Robert would have gotten any points for humiliating Sofia: Ada doesn’t strike me as the sort of person craving such shows.

      (Also, if Robert actually *did* have the power to make Ada jealous, most likely he would be better off making use of that, rather than avoiding it…)

      • JW Reply

        Ada seemed jealous enough when Robert first met Sofia (when Ada was going around the camp before the last big demon attack).

      • antrik Reply

        Was she, though? It *does* look like that at first; but on closer examination, all we really know is that she was angry at him for “abandoning” her to “chase a skirt”… That doesn’t necessarily imply that she minds him being interested in other women in general. In that particular case, it was detrimental to her own (non-romantic) interests though, which was the reason for her anger, at least ostensibly. Now whether there might be other reasons too, we don’t really know 🙂

      • antrik Reply

        Well, the situation certainly allows for different interpretations: but in view of everything else we have seen so far, the most *plausible* scenario appears to be that she doesn’t show any romantic interest, unlike him.

        Now it certainly *is* more than just regular friendship: she seems to be pretty much *emotionally dependent* on him… But knowing that he has a romantic interest seems to make her uncomfortable, which is why she is wary of him getting too close — though she let it slip in this case after some hesitation, apparently deciding in this exceptional situation to just enjoy a reassuring hug, ignoring any other implications…

        Now I’m not ruling out the possibility that she *does* actually have some deeper feelings that she is suppressing for some reason — and I won’t deny that I’m totally shipping that, just like the next guy 😉 — but if so, she seems to be hiding it very well.

  8. Alex Reply

    It’s ok, don’t be sad. *pat* *pat* Maybe you will be able to participate next year. I know that drawing takes such a huge amount of time that I would never have the patience to learn it. As for days refusing to have more hours: We recently hat out DST give us an additional hour. 😉

    As for learning Japanese:
    I recently downloaded the Kawaii App (cf. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=de.mardukcorp.kawaiinihongo&hl=en), because I wanted to learn the Kana, and since I like their teaching style, I bought all of the expansions after a while for a total of 4$, plus some optional fluff for 1$ (i.e. new layouts for the learning cards), because if you pay 4$ you get 1$ for free. In addition to that, I used a book I bought quite a few years ago that teaches the Kana by telling weird stories around each of them. It’s a German book, but I found a book from an author with the same name (James W. Heisig) and the book has a similar title and a fitting description:
    https://www.amazon.com/Remembering-Kana-Reading-Japanese-Syllabaries/dp/0824831640/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8
    I didn’t read that one, but I believe it should work just as well.

    So I am using both of these in parallel, because the book has WAY better stories to remember the Kana and the App has way better excercises, e.g. listening comprehension, games, and after a while you’re supposed to be able to draw the Kana as well.
    And in some rare cases I use associations of my own, e.g. the Hiragana “ro” looks kinda like a 3, so I associate it with “rotation”, because of “three-field crop rotation”. Also “ru” looks almost like “ro”, except that the line goes on a little further, so I don’t need any association for it.

    So far I only learned the Hiragana, but I still need to pratice them before I can read them fluently. And then it’s on to the Katakana, Kanji, Grammar and Vocabulary (not necessarily in that order).

    • Klorix Camp dweller Reply

      I didn’t find Kana so difficult to remember, with some practice. But I remember our teacher giving us a trick how to tell apart nu and ne: nu looks more like noodles than ne…
      But I did not have enough patience or endurance for the Kanji…

      • Alex Reply

        ne and nu? If they are too similar for you, try typing ne, re and wa into Google translate. 🙂 The left part is literally the same for all of them.

        I remember them like this:
        ne looks like a lady who gets their mink coat ripped away (mink is “Nerz” in German). This one I got from the book I talked about.
        nu looks like an X (which is the female chromosome) that gets its clothing ripped away, and “Nugi” is Japanese for “undressing” (which is the actual example word in the Kawaii App, but note that they never actually associate their example words with the shape of the Kana :D).
        wa looks like the clothing gets blown away, which causes a person to exclaim “whoaaaaa”. This one’s my own example.

        Also in case of “re”, I think of “revenge”, because this time the clothing gets ripped away from the guy instead of a lady. The difference is that in contrast to “ne” the right part doesn’t have a hole, but an erection. 😉 That association is mine again. Neither the book nor the App have a dirty mind like me, but if you read those examples while looking at the kana in Google translate, you won’t be able to forget them again even if you want to. 😛

    • NotImportant Reply

      Those are funny tips! xDD Luckily for me I already know both hiragana and katakana, even managed to memorize some kanji with Wanikani (it’s really cool!). My main problem is practicing vocabulary and grammar right now.

      • Browser Reply

        My suggestion (further up the page) does focus on grammar & sentence structure first. “Learn the use in context” or something… the guy I got my copy off at PAX Australia has a much better way of saying it all.

        • Klorix Camp dweller Reply

          Context really is everything, because – if I remember correctly – those §%& Kanji change how you need to read them depending on context…
          It’s also literally the best practice. Learning lists of vocabulary is pretty tedious in my opinion, but if you see the words in use, it makes it much easier.

        • NotImportant Reply

          Haha yeah, I actually agree. I’m going to learn the basic grammar and build my vocabulary and switch to just reading novels and manga in originals. Games work as well so thanks for your suggestion!

      • Alex Reply

        Wanikani sounds interesting. Maybe I’ll check it out later. 🙂 So far my vocabulary is limited to a couple dozen words I learnt from watching Anime, but many of them aren’t suitable for a polite conversation. ^^

  10. Dragoncat Reply

    Hello… So, you are trying to learn Japanese, too? Might I recommend Duolingo. I mainly use it to learn German, but it also has a link to “Tinycards”, and I find them ideal for learning Hiragana and Katakana. I will eventually look for tiny cards to do Kanji, but I want to make sure I master the other two first.

    That’s my two cents on the matter. Good luck!

    • NotImportant Reply

      Tinycards look useful! I use Wanikani, which is quite similar in essence, but the flashcards are created and managed for you, alongside reviews, levels and everything. Wanikani has both kanji and vocabulary. Link for interested: https://www.wanikani.com/ (I think 5 first levels are free).

  12. Regis Earsquake Reply

    I learned it with the “Genki” books. I’m not an expert, though. There might be better ones out there, but that is what we used in my class.

  13. Tzaphqiel Reply

    I wonder what Sofia would think right now if she could see Robert’s thoughts.
    On one hand, he is sort of thinking about her.
    On the other hand, he seems to have confused her for a snack food mascot.

  14. Jordan Reply

    Dude has got the wrong idea. lol
    How has this friend zone situation managed to be stable for so long? This guy obsesses over her.

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