Happy Lunar New Year! XD
Following relatively closely in the steps of the regular New Year’s Special, here’s a second, separate one for the Lunar New Year – demonstrating clearly what kind of a double-edged sword knowledge can be. Biff has been suffering under his inexplicable problem of causing random, implausible bursts of fireworks for many, many years – but at least it used to be restricted to only one such incident per year. But that was owed only to his ignorance, apparently – now that Biff is smart and knowledgeable, his horizons have broadened and include the fact that there is more than one calendar out there, and thus more than one “New Year” in every orbital period. As a natural consequence of his horizons being so broad now, they’re also far more frequently lightened up by fireworks…
On the other hand, intelligence and knowledge should give Biff get a much better chance at finding some effective way to ‘deal’ with his problem…but there’s no sign of that, so far. Literary traditions/running gags tend to have a huge amount of inertia, unfortunately (for him).
Yeah, and now for a look behind the scenes: The truth is, I wasn’t originally planning a separate strip for Lunar New Year. I made a mistake in the Excel-sheet I’m using to keep track of the update schedule, which screwed up some of the dates. When I discovered and corrected that, I failed to realize that the New Year’s strip I already had done (today’s) was now scheduled for the wrong day. And then, in late December, when I checked the schedule, I thought I had forgotten to do a New Year’s Special – and did a new, actually second, one. ^_^; When I discovered that, I thought at first I’d simply have to discard one of the strips…but then I did remember that there are actually several different New Year’s dates around, and that that fact could save me from having wasted the work on one of those strips. As luck would have it, the displaced original strip still fits the situation at this point in time, coincidentally well in line with the Lunar New Year. And now you know… the true story. XD
More on Monday.
You’re a wizard, Biff
Biff, wide-eyed: “I’m a what?” XD
“Where’s the kaboom? There was supposed to be an Earth-shattering kaboom!”
Oh… there it is!
The anticipation is the best part, anyway. XD
I wanted to make comment about “Russian New Year,” but it’s better if Biff never learn about it.
Yeah – if I wanted to, I could easily have 5 or 6 New Year’s strips per year. And with some research into the more obscure corners of the history of calendars, I could probably have 2 or 3 dozen. XD