3034: Features of Adulthood
| Features of Adulthood |
 Title text: I don't dig pit traps and cover them with sticks and a thin layer of leaves nearly as much as I expected; I find a chance to do it barely once a month. |
Explanation
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This explanation is incomplete: Unexpectedly created by an adult BOT digging pit traps - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon. If you can fix this issue, edit the page! |
This comic is a graph comparing the (mostly) common ideas of adulthood from a young person's perspective with the sad reality of it. The features that are most expected but don't actually come up (quicksand, grappling hooks, crocodiles, and twins switching place) are common tropes in fiction. At the opposite end, some very mundane activities are common but we don't expect them to be important when we're young: deciding what to eat, dealing with weird noises and smells.
It is clear that many of the things that were imagined more likely than they turned out to be are direct references to fictional scenarios on film or TV, especially with a number of action movie tropes, throughout the 'lower-right triangle'. In contrast, the complimentary 'upper-left triangle' has situations that mostly (though not entirely!) seem to not be portrayed in many fictional depictions.
Events
| Event | Expected frequency in adulthood | Actual frequency in adulthood | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Which fork you're supposed to use for what | 0% | 0% | Different types of forks are used to eat different courses of a meal. Usually, cutlery is arranged in a way that makes it easier to understand which is needed. Learning which fork to use may be a lesson in an etiquette school class. |
| Lit fuses | 40% | 0% | Explosives with visible lit fuses are commonly seen in movies and TV shows. In reality, explosives are more likely to be remotely detonated or have an unlit or concealed fuse (e.g. grenades). Also, most people don't generally have to deal with explosives anyway. |
| Shoving a stick in a crocodile's mouth to wedge it open | 80% | 0% | Placing a vertical stick in a crocodile’s mouth is a popular TV trope to prevent the crocodile from bitting down (usually on the stick placer). |
| Quicksand | 100% | 0% | Quicksand is common in adventure fiction, but it's quite rare in real life, and an average person is highly unlikely to encounter quicksand in day to day life. |
| Car chases | 35% | 5% | Car chases are frequently seen in movies and TV shows involving police, including real-life police shows, but unless you're a police officer or criminal trying to evade them, you'll probably never be involved in one. One actual car chase that attracted widespread attention was O.J.Simpson's white Ford Bronco, which was shown on TV after he was identified as the prime suspect in his wife's murder. |
| Grappling hooks | 100% | 5% | A grappling hook is a metal piece that is attached to a rope. If the person is going up a cliff, the “hook” would be thrown or shot at the top of the cliff and would either snag something, or more commonly, would wrap around something like a tree then hook onto itself, thus securing a way up the cliff. |
| People offering free drugs | 30% | 10% | Typically refers to illicit drugs. The expectation is that a drug pusher will offer you free samples to get you addicted, then start charging expensive prices. |
| Parachutes | 80% | 10% | A large piece of fabric that is tied to you in order to slow a very high fall. |
| Barrels | 95% | 10% | Wooden or metal storage implements, frequently used as concealment, improvised weapons and (sometimes explosive) obstacles in popular media. |
| Middle names | 15% | 20% | A second (or occasionally also third or more) given name, common in some traditions. Sometimes used specifically to honor someone (perhaps the same first name of a grandparent or loved one, occasionally such a person's surname). It can be used as further identification, if one has a common first and last name. In some families, the first name may be traditionally shared with the appropriate parent (and the grandparent, their parent) and reference by the middle name(s), alone, may be more useful to distinguish the person being addressed from within a family situation. In later life, a person may drop the use of middle names (or, conversely, adopt only them as the name they are known by) and the unwieldy complete set of names becomes less common, as they may be considered unprofessional and unnecessary.
Authors and politicians may most obviously buck this trend, as they have to develop an identity far beyond their immediate personal and professional circles, and perhaps need to be more unambiguously individual and free of confusion from others of similar named as "Firstname Surname", but this might also just reflect that the practice of more formally complete names is a tradition that is being dropped from those of Randall (Patrick) Munroe's generation, leaving only the generations before (most represented, in the public eye, by elder statesmen and well-read writers) still using them in the way they always did. |
| Food fights | 50% | 20% | |
| Twins switching places | 90% | 20% | |
| Flat tires | 10% | 25% | |
| Briefcases | 70% | 25% | Frequently used to carry documents and other small office equipment. Often portrayed as a means to carry a large amount of cash or conceal a firearm. The popularity of briefcases has been declining after the 1980s so it's possible that Randall observed grown-ups using briefcases when he was a kid and assumed he would too, only for them to go out of fashion. |
| Martial arts | 95% | 25% | |
| Water damage | |||
| Backpacks | Backpacks of various sizes are a versatile means to carry items. They are almost as popular in real life as in fiction, though the contents may be somewhat different. | ||
| My academic record | |||
| Adhesives | Adhesives such as glue, tape and epoxy resin are used to bond items together, typically for use in arts and crafts. They also have widespread industrial applications. | ||
| Board games | Board games are sometimes used as minigames in video games. The Mario Party franchise is a video game adaptation of the board game formula. | ||
| Tying knots | There are many knots to tie, each with distinct purposes. May also refer to "tying the knot", an expression for marriage. | ||
| Cable management | |||
| Lasers | |||
| Dangerous driving situations | |||
| Pizza | Often thought of as takeout or delivery food. A favorite of Spider-Man and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. | ||
| Star Wars | |||
| Cool toys | |||
| Weather forecasts | |||
| Batteries | |||
| Power tools | |||
| Video games | Often thought of as a childish pastime, adults frequently play video games. | ||
| Figuring out what to have for dinner | |||
| HVAC issues | |||
| Cooking | |||
| Secret passwords | |||
| Laundry | |||
| Taxes | One of two inevitable things in life, the other being death[citation needed] | ||
| Customer service | |||
| Shopping | |||
| Unexplained smells or noises | 100% | ||
| Pocket radio communicators | 100% | Examples include cell phones, pagers and walkie-talkies | |
| Bills | 100% | Most households have to contend with electricity, water and telecommunication service bills | |
| Digging pit traps (title text) | Inside the Star Destroyer in 1608: Hoverboard we see Cueball cover a pit trap with leaves, so this is something Randall actually thinks about sometimes! |
Transcript
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This transcript is incomplete: Do NOT delete this tag too soon. If you can fix this issue, edit the page! |
- [Shown is a scatter plot:]
- Y axis label: How often it comes up in my adult life
- X axis label: How often I expected it to come up in my adult life
- [first row, comes up very often, from least to most expected:]
- Unexplained smells or noises, customer service, pocket radio communicators, bills, shopping
- Figuring out what to have for dinner, HVAC issues, secret passwords, laundry, cooking, taxes
- Weather forecasts, batteries, video games, power tools
- Cable management, dangerous driving situations, pizza, Star Wars, lasers, cool toys
- Adhesives, board games, tying knots
- Water damage, backpacks, my academic record
- Flat tires, briefcases, martial arts
- Middle names, people offering free drugs, food fights, parachutes, twins switching places, barrels
- [last row, comes up very rarely, from least to most expected:]
- Which fork you're supposed to use for what, car chases, lit fuses, shoving a stick in a crocodile's mouth to wedge it open, grappling hooks, quicksand
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No comments yet? Probably everyone's still considering the filling in of the table. As for me, I just put a load of words in about the middle name(s), but perhaps it drifts and could be cut back a lot. However, I think we do know a lot of middle names of people, especially politicians. Or at least use their middle initials (like with "John F[itzgerald]. Kennedy"), even if we don't use their full names (like with "Harry S. Truman"... :p ). Not that I've had much experience with middle names. Don't have one myself. Knew a couple of people at school who would admit to having them (one had "Colin", the other had "Douglas"), which weren't really names given to people our age and location, so they must have been grandparental honorifics (though I'm not sure the names were right for two generations back, either... never enquired further, but maybe they were being traditional middle names, inherited but never really used). To my knowledge, neither the "Colin" nor the "Douglas" ever went on to use those in post-school life, but at least one of them also changed from their first name as their habitual name to be known by, and likely they prefered to go for something altogether new. 172.69.195.27 03:23, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
- In Denmark middle names are common, and Kynde is actually my middle name... Many people use their second name like their first, which can be confusing in work places where the e-mail is auto generated from full name, so no one can find Nicolai, because his first name is Christian... which he never uses. Have more than one of those here at my job. --Kynde (talk) 11:56, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
- In Denmark middle names are necessary. Otherwise we'd be lost in a vast sea of Jens Jensen, Hans Hansen and Niels Nielsen. Min farfar Niels Peder Nielsen, hedde altid Peder, ikke Niels. 108.162.238.139 (talk) 13:58, 7 January 2025 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)
- Not having a middle name is unusual in the UK too, and many people (myself included) choose to go by them here as well.172.70.85.5 12:59, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
- Maybe more in your part of the UK? I can't really say how many people around me have normally 'undeclared' middle-names (there are some, but the rest I wouldn't even know, by definition), but I can pretty much count the number of people I know who ever use such additional forenames (cummutively, along with the 'first first-name') on the fingers of no hands... And I'm not particularly provincial, but of course I realise that some people might have decided to adopt their middle-moniker (or their choice of one, if several are available) by the time I first met them at university (away from the family home and childhood friends who knew what their 'Sunday' name was) or in later life.
- Though, I appreciate that various corners of the Home Counties, Welsh Valleys or Hebridean Islands (for example) might have different name-distinguishing needs to the Inner City, Suburbia, Commuter Village, etc... 141.101.98.54 14:38, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
Unexplained smells or noises: I'm trying to figure out what he means by this. I can't say that this comes up often in my adult life. Am I just deaf and anosmic (I don't think so)? Is Randall worried about gas leaks or his house creaking and falling down? What could he be referencing? Mtcv (talk) 09:29, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
- I often smell something that others cannot or do not. So I'm completely at par with Randall here. Just now my office has a damp smell, after new people moved their things into my office replacing earlier office mates (four in the room). I'm sure it is some of their stuff that smells, but since the hole room is permeated with the smell, it has not been possible for me to find out what could cause the smell. But have tried this many times, for instance when someone leaves a citrus fruit to rot. Some people just cannot smell the fruit whereas I'm getting an instant headache from it. Also in my office, the guy with the rotten fruit, actually destroying his backpack, could not smell it, whereas other people could smell it down the hall. But inside the office it was hard to pinpoint the source as for those that could smell it is was all over the room. I could go on... --Kynde (talk) 11:57, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
- I guess this is in reference to ownership of expensive things that you fear might get broken (houses, cars) as well as in reference to being wary of medical issues. "Unexplained smells or noises" could attribute to both IMHO. (BTW, if you have kids, this would be another source...)--162.158.110.237 21:58, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
"In later life, a person may drop the use of middle names (or, conversely, adopt only them as the name they are known by) and the unwieldy complete set of names becomes less common, as they may be considered unprofessional and unnecessary." -- What? Who says middle names may be considered unprofessional? Never heard of this before. --172.70.55.140 14:55, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
- Yeah - seemed spurious - removed it.172.70.85.5 12:59, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
Just popping in to explain where this comic came from. It's an adaptation of an old John Mulaney bit that makes the rounds every so often on social media unattributed. (Example: Tom Morello stealing the bit over ten years ago on what was then Twitter.) 172.69.58.74 18:23, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
As someone born before 1960 who grew up when espionage shows were prevalent on television and toy spy gadgets were prevalent in toy stores, it is amusing to me the difference in what children thought about passwords then and how we use passwords now.--172.70.83.55 18:42, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
Yeah, I was also born before 1960 and I can attest that flat tires were very common then, and every kid learning how to drive also practiced changing the tire. The tire could go flat when you just hit a pothole or hit the curb. I clearly expected to have to deal with flat tires frequently. However, with the advent of radial steel tires, flats are very infrequent unless you pick up a nail or something. So nowadays, flat tires are almost nonexistent. I can now go for years without a flat. In this case change in frequency was because of changed technology rather than changed perception. Rtanenbaum (talk) 19:45, 7 January 2025 (UTC)
As far as cutlery is concerned, in "special dos" where you might think you might be out of your depth, you generally can't go wrong with "from outside in", for whatever the current course demands. If it's soup for starters then the uppermost spoon, if something that might look like it's something like a "pâté on toast" then the outermost knife and fork. If there's a choice of courses, then the waiting staff who know your preferences will come around to add/swap as necessary (like the extra-serated steak-knife, rather than the simpler one that's sufficient for the chicken or vegetarian options). Including replacing the desert spoon, shortly before you need it, if you did accidentally eat the soup with yours.
In general, a formal meal setting (like your firm's annual Christmas Meal) is probably being attended by others that are as much hoi polloi as yourself. And if you instead seem to have been invited to an official reception in honour of the Grand Duke Of Hapsburg, Burgandy, Luxembourg And San Antonio, surrounded by people with a similar number of titles who can each count the number of unrelated individuals in attendance on one hand (i.e. six!), then you might not pass "The Test" (by using only the crab-claw crackers on the crab-claws and only the lobster-claw crackers on the lobster-claws, etc), but as long as you accidentally don't knock the au jus all over your neighbour to the right (the Crown Prince Of Upper Volta And Lower Ampa, or wattever he happens to be) and take note in which direction the Ne Oublie Tawny Port is being passed around the table then all you really have to worry about is your sparkling conversation.
But pretty much the only thing that I find that I'm perpetually confused about (and pretty much everyone else), in every such meal, is the breadplate. Especially on circular tables, but even on rectangular ones, the question is often whether each person's bread-roll is to their left (their left-neighbour's right) or their right (their right-neighbour's left). I can understand the logic of being sat by your off-hand (leaving your soupspoon hand free) or your dominant one (it's surely rude to dip and spoon, and the knife on the breadplate is for your righthhand too...). Generally, though, everyone who is similarly bothered waits until someone who seems to know (or not care) decides that they are sure which way it is, then follows suit accordingly to keep the direction entirely in synch (easier to solve than the dining philosophers problem!), although I'm not exactly sure that it always flips or flops out the exact same chirality at each occasion, and with just two or three such occasions a year (in my particular social schedule!), I don't get quite so much experience, or even remember to look it up in advance. ;) 172.71.26.42 14:12, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
I love the joke in the fact that so many things ended up in the area of the 1:1 diagonal that no adult would have ever expected to be there in the time when Randall was a kid. I.e., kid Randall might have thought Star Wars would be in the 70ish range, but any adult back then would have laughed it off and given it a chance of not more than 5%. Now, it is in the 50%ish range. Same thing with cool toys, video games, board games, pizza and so on.--162.158.110.237 21:58, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
Should we include "Cluedo", because it is almost always referred to solely as "Clue" in America guess who (if you desire conversing | what i have done) 04:02, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
- In the UK, you'll never hear it called "Clue". So much so that Clue (film) needs to be explained as based on the boardgame of the different original name. You'd also rarely hear of "checkers", you might even more think of "Chequers" if you heard it, or just the check-pattern in general. Possibly the most troublesome one is the Pachisi-derived game, because of its many different names. Might even simpler just to remove those from the list, if you didn't want to admit to there being common (more common?) non-US names. 172.69.43.243 10:02, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
Why was the incomplete tag removed? Cooking, Laundry, Customer service and Shopping still have empty "Notes". 172.70.123.134 19:25, 13 January 2025 (UTC)
Why was the incomplete tag removed? Customer service and Shopping still have empty "Notes". 172.71.8.37 02:11, 26 February 2025 (UTC)
I've modified the table sliiightly, as I think that the first one, (which fork you're supposed to use for what), has a higher (but not high) "expected frequency rate", as it is not as close to the y-axis border as to the x-axis border.Xnerkcd (talk) 13:23, 31 March 2025 (UTC)
- My habit with these kinds of placement-of-labels tables is to consider the exact midpoint of the edges of the label (with or without normalising to 0%..100% or -1..+1, according to best understanding). By this, I'd have maybe have had nothing at all at 0% (or perhaps the leftmost/downmost mid-label point would be, as the rightmost/uppermost is automatically 100%), and perhaps both a few percentage points higher up in the low figures. But it's a matter of inetpretation. And of nothing with ultimate necessity for exaxtitdre. 172.71.241.132 14:39, 31 March 2025 (UTC)
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