That...that makes much more sense... [6/13/2012]

[LookingIn]

OH! Weeklong missing plot connecting again! Hello there.
So I guess...Ronnie here took more than a day to send Jade's message? Or we have some sort of time skips here, inbetween the beginning of the strip, Temperance's search, and Michael and Marie?

The three stories(four if you count Hank's strips) going on concurrently, over the course of several hours, and are interconnected to the others...

[retrophrenologist]

Still, at least he doesn't seem to have reacted worse than usual to Lisa's "caught it juuust a mite too late" slip-up. His expression in the last panel is his customary "Is this person mocking me?" one, as opposed to "Oh God, she's saying I'm too horribly ugly to sleep with; I want to die."

My guess is that Ronnie hasn't understood Jade's message- either because he didn't read the note, or because he didn't get the reference. Hell, I probably wouldn't have gotten a musical reference at his age- and Ronnie's existence has convinced me that T is a witch who is stealing my thoughts.

[Alice Macher]

Yeah, his usual "slightly suspicious" face was my clue that he either hadn't read the message at all, or if he had, didnt get it.

[Captain LeBubbles]

Also, the opposite of nice is ugly, huh. While in this case the nice part would mean 'pleasant' or 'good'.... Hmm. Am I reading too much?

Well I know when my nieces misbehave my parents tell them not to 'be ugly'. My brother and I got the same treatment. (I actually approve of it*; it raises the kid with the constant perception that attractiveness comes from actions, not appearance.)

Nice to see he's still needlessly unpleasant for no real reason.

On the one hand, I agree with you - I feel bad for Ronnie, but it is very difficult to be around someone who is so constantly negative about both himself and the world around him.

So he's Fukawa? (Oh no, please don't let him be Fukawa. D:)

*I don't approve of all of the things my parents say to my nieces because I know from experience how potentially damaging they can be, but I haven't yet found a way to make them realize that because despite what I say, there's the counterevidence of how stable I appear to work against me.

[Artemisia]

I just wanna hug Ronnie. :/ Poor thing.

I don't, but maybe buy him something to cheer him up.

[LookingIn]

Yeah, his usual "slightly suspicious" face was my clue that he either hadn't read the message at all, or if he had, didnt get it.

See Panel 4...it all but shows either he didn't know or didn't understand what the note meant...

The suspicious face may be in reaction to her shocked face, he changes to his apology reading face in the next panels

[NobodySpecial]

(Unrelatedly, Ronnie is not really any more or less than average, but Iiiii doubt that that perception of himself developed in a vacuum.)

For the purposes of male/female interaction, I have about 25 years of anecdotes that say the second half of your statement is much more accurate than the first.

[brasca]

Still, at least he doesn't seem to have reacted worse than usual to Lisa's "caught it juuust a mite too late" slip-up. His expression in the last panel is his customary "Is this person mocking me?" one, as opposed to "Oh God, she's saying I'm too horribly ugly to sleep with; I want to die."

My guess is that Ronnie hasn't understood Jade's message- either because he didn't read the note, or because he didn't get the reference. Hell, I probably wouldn't have gotten a musical reference at his age- and Ronnie's existence has convinced me that T is a witch who is stealing my thoughts.

That's not all that unusual. I think Randy Milholland has been taking things from my mind which is fine by me as long as someone gets some mileage out of it.

Personally I can identify with some of what Ronnie is feeling, however, my paranoia eventually came full circle to the point that I believed everyone was conspiring against me including myself and as long as I was the best conspirator of all I could live with everything else.

[SomeCanadianWeirdo]

Just watch. 3 or 4 years from now we'll be discussing how Ronnie is the only truly happy character m the strip.

[Arky]

Frankly I think it's pretty mean of Jade to make Ronnie her go-between on this. Either he doesn't get the reference and feels like he's locked out of the loop, or he DOES get the reference (or looks it up afterwards) and knows he's being used to set up a booty call for Jade. Either way it reinforces Ronnie's feelings of being a second class citizen in the cool kids' world.

In a vacuum, however, a note like that is SUCH a perfect way to ask Lisa out.

[CEOIII]

Nice to see he's still needlessly unpleasant for no real reason.

IT'S NOT FOR NO GODDAMN REASON.

You get enough people, on a daily basis, mocking and belittling you, your looks, your dress, your speech, any and everything about you, I'd like to see your ass force a smile onto your face and pretend everything's booze and hookers in your life.

[Adrishiana]

Nice to see he's still needlessly unpleasant for no real reason.

IT'S NOT FOR NO GODDAMN REASON.

You get enough people, on a daily basis, mocking and belittling you, your looks, your dress, your speech, any and everything about you, I'd like to see your ass force a smile onto your face and pretend everything's booze and hookers in your life.

While there is, most likely, a reason for Ronnie to be the way he is, there is still the fact that he is taking that reason out on the wrong people.

[DudeMyDadOwnsADealership]

On a more serious note, I do feel bad for Ronnie.

Seconded. The way he aggressively advertises his insecurities isn't helping, however.

[Adrishiana]

On a more serious note, I do feel bad for Ronnie.

Seconded. The way he aggressively advertises his insecurities isn't helping, however.

Nope.

[Tamar]

Agreeing strongly here with Adrishiana and Dude. That certain behaviour (in this case, surliness, excessive suspicion and rudeness) may be understandable does not make it justifiable.