Hyperbole and a Half (Beware the Excessive Caps Lock)

I LOVE THIS COMIC. IT IS CALLED HYPERBOLE AND A HALF. IT IS BRILLIANCE INCARNATE, AND THERE ARE STICK FIGURES (with a little more flesh on their bones than is usually the case).

The love began in the summer of 2010 (which was a very long time ago, believe you me). I had stumbled across a poll that measured one's approximate maturity and adulthoodliness (the latter of which really should be a word. Yes). How many items could I check off, and so qualify as a mature and responsible adult?

I managed to check off two. For the win! Or not! Whatever, just stop looking at me like that!

Anyway. One section asked how willing the participant was to "clean all the things" - or, pardon me, "clean ALL the things!" - in the course of household maintenance. This was totally one of my two, by the way. The phrase utterly enchanted me. So I went a-scrolling to the top of the page, and clicked on the link that led to the poll's reference, Hyperbole and a Half.

Hours later, I reemerged and found the house around me silent as the grave how original. My family had deserted me and gone to bed. It was one in the morning, my stomach hurt from laughing so hard, and my back ached because leaning over a laptop for three hours straight? Probably not a good thing.

But oh, so very worth it.

The very best thing about Hyperbole and a Half, besides stick arms and sticks legs and epic facial expressions, is how relateable it is. I fail at social situations, period. But to see that failure shared (with sort-of stick figures!) and articulated so exactly - stumbling through a conversation with near strangers (The Four Levels of Social Entrapment), playing at being grown up (This is Why I'll Never be an Adult), responding to someone who isn't talking to you (The Awkward Situation Survival Guide), and the horror of WHAT DO I DO WITH MY HANDS WHEN SOMEONE IS TALKING TO ME AND I HAVE NO POCKETS (Things That Can Make You Feel Like an Idiot Almost Instantly) - makes me dizzy with glee. I don't know why; maybe because I like knowing that social failure does not begin and end with me, xD

Like yesterday, when I had to hand out fliers for some event to a bunch of people who didn't care, D: I needed hyperbolic distraction from my distress, STAT.