It’s the tiger ears. They’re leaking into U.N.I.T.Y. the same way she normally flows into other body parts. She’s channeling the mindset of a big cat, consciously or not.
I think he can actually see them just fine. In the first panel he looks like he was about to say “you two young people”, but he realized that A) he has no idea how old they might be, and B) at least one of them isn’t even a person. And his remark in the third panel is in response to Sweetheart, not to Unity, so it’s apparent that he can not only tell Sweetheart is a dog, but he can also hear her talk.
It isn’t strictly “blindness”. It’s seeing or experiencing things that don’t make sense, and the brain trying to explain it away somehow, and not being able to accept more than just a portion of the situation.
Some people will see Sweetheart and treat her like an ordinary dog, and just ignore the fact of her speaking. They might be “deaf” to everything she says, or they might hear it as “talkative” barking and non-linguistic communication from a dog, or they might even hold a conversation with her normally and the fact that they’re talking with a dog just never occurs to them.
Other people will think she must be a human because she’s speaking, and explain away the dog appearance somehow, like thinking she’s just a lady with a very shaggy haircut, or maybe a street artist wearing a costume, or even just an ordinary person with a very “doggish” personality.
The waiter is seeing them, and his brain is just trying to make sense of the weirdness. Sweetheart doesn’t seem to register as a dog to him – we’ve seen other servers in bars and whatnot in the past who did treat her as a dog. He seems to think she’s a person. But he knows something is weird about her. He probably doesn’t even quite know if it’s a “her”. Same for UNITY. He’s not seeing a stitched-together corpse, but just a person with something funny about them which he can’t quite put his finger on.
As for the wine order, there’s no way in hell he gets that actual question regularly. He’s just heard an insane question, and heard Sweetheart objecting to it, and his brain had to cope and translated it into a completely different question which he DOES get asked a lot. He rationalized the weirdness away, and is none the wiser for it.
I dunno; why would he see Sweetheart as a person before she talks? Dis he have a really hard-to-rationalise encounter with a talking dog before, and now his reality blindness edits out all dogs pre-emptively?
“we’ve seen other servers in bars and whatnot in the past who did treat her as a dog. He seems to think she’s a person.”
I think you’ve mean we’ve seen other servers with a prejudice against talking dogs and he seems to recognise that whether she’s a talking dog or not she is a person.
Ever worked as a server? You get asked ALL sorts of weird things, and people tell you stuff you really, really wish they hadn’t. I worked my way through most of my University days by waitressing, and I can’t even begin to count the times couples tried to drag me into arguments and make me take one or the other’s side. Or how many late-night honest-to-gods psychos came in for pancakes. And then there was that woman who told me all about her daughter’s suicide, with accompanying hand-gestures… Or the cubscout pack who left a pile of change (my tip) beneath an overturned glass that just *happened* to be completely full of water, stuck to the tabletop by surface tension until I lifted it up. Or the albino twentysomething with the bad attitude and the live parakeet in his jacket….. After a while if you work in the right place, you become very hard to rattle.
Things will get interesting if Unity keeps acting as HT would. She’ll go on to try to seduce Sweetheart, and she (unlike HT) would be able to succeed just fine.
If Unity can seduce Sweetheart while pretending to be a male tiger, it will be proof that Sweetheart really likes male tigers. And if by some chance it does work better than when HT does it, that just shows that Unity is better than him at channeling the spirit of male tigers. Also, there’s the whole personality thing. HT can be very neglectful of his civic duty, and nobody likes that. We don’t need shippers making this all weird.
Also, maybe someone pointed this out long ago, but according to custom, Sweetheart shouldn’t have gone dumb after Unity kissed her. She should have started speaking in cryptograms.
That’s just your organ meats prejudices talking. There are plenty of European dishes involving brains. (Admittedly not human ones, unless you’re visiting Exham Priory).
You call it prejudice… I call it “I don’t like the taste of brains.” Granted, I’ve never tried human brains. I also don’t like the taste of spinach, champagne, or pig’s feet. There are a great many things that people eat that you could say are acquired tastes.
“It’s a trap!”. ^_~
Unity’s eyes in that last panel forebode.
I’m not sure what they’re foreboding, but there’s definitely some foreboding going on there.
They look *just* like H.T.’s do when he’s being sarcastic.
I was thinking she may also be channeling Remy, given the starting Frenchism and overall tone.
It’s the tiger ears. They’re leaking into U.N.I.T.Y. the same way she normally flows into other body parts. She’s channeling the mindset of a big cat, consciously or not.
…I’m honestly more worried about the waiter. What kind of place is this where they get that question a lot?
Well, H.T. does live nearby.
He does seem like the type to be a wine connoisseur.
Yeah but he’d presumably already know the answer to that question.
Could be reality blindness. He seems to be having a bit of trouble with Sweetheart.
I think he can actually see them just fine. In the first panel he looks like he was about to say “you two young people”, but he realized that A) he has no idea how old they might be, and B) at least one of them isn’t even a person. And his remark in the third panel is in response to Sweetheart, not to Unity, so it’s apparent that he can not only tell Sweetheart is a dog, but he can also hear her talk.
Good catch there! I didn’t even notice that he says ‘You two… you two?’ because he has no idea how to address this situation.
None of that rules out reality blindness.
It isn’t strictly “blindness”. It’s seeing or experiencing things that don’t make sense, and the brain trying to explain it away somehow, and not being able to accept more than just a portion of the situation.
Some people will see Sweetheart and treat her like an ordinary dog, and just ignore the fact of her speaking. They might be “deaf” to everything she says, or they might hear it as “talkative” barking and non-linguistic communication from a dog, or they might even hold a conversation with her normally and the fact that they’re talking with a dog just never occurs to them.
Other people will think she must be a human because she’s speaking, and explain away the dog appearance somehow, like thinking she’s just a lady with a very shaggy haircut, or maybe a street artist wearing a costume, or even just an ordinary person with a very “doggish” personality.
The waiter is seeing them, and his brain is just trying to make sense of the weirdness. Sweetheart doesn’t seem to register as a dog to him – we’ve seen other servers in bars and whatnot in the past who did treat her as a dog. He seems to think she’s a person. But he knows something is weird about her. He probably doesn’t even quite know if it’s a “her”. Same for UNITY. He’s not seeing a stitched-together corpse, but just a person with something funny about them which he can’t quite put his finger on.
As for the wine order, there’s no way in hell he gets that actual question regularly. He’s just heard an insane question, and heard Sweetheart objecting to it, and his brain had to cope and translated it into a completely different question which he DOES get asked a lot. He rationalized the weirdness away, and is none the wiser for it.
I dunno; why would he see Sweetheart as a person before she talks? Dis he have a really hard-to-rationalise encounter with a talking dog before, and now his reality blindness edits out all dogs pre-emptively?
“we’ve seen other servers in bars and whatnot in the past who did treat her as a dog. He seems to think she’s a person.”
I think you’ve mean we’ve seen other servers with a prejudice against talking dogs and he seems to recognise that whether she’s a talking dog or not she is a person.
Ever worked as a server? You get asked ALL sorts of weird things, and people tell you stuff you really, really wish they hadn’t. I worked my way through most of my University days by waitressing, and I can’t even begin to count the times couples tried to drag me into arguments and make me take one or the other’s side. Or how many late-night honest-to-gods psychos came in for pancakes. And then there was that woman who told me all about her daughter’s suicide, with accompanying hand-gestures… Or the cubscout pack who left a pile of change (my tip) beneath an overturned glass that just *happened* to be completely full of water, stuck to the tabletop by surface tension until I lifted it up. Or the albino twentysomething with the bad attitude and the live parakeet in his jacket….. After a while if you work in the right place, you become very hard to rattle.
then go slowly mad – listening to the three-legged cicadas
Things will get interesting if Unity keeps acting as HT would. She’ll go on to try to seduce Sweetheart, and she (unlike HT) would be able to succeed just fine.
If Unity can seduce Sweetheart while pretending to be a male tiger, it will be proof that Sweetheart really likes male tigers. And if by some chance it does work better than when HT does it, that just shows that Unity is better than him at channeling the spirit of male tigers. Also, there’s the whole personality thing. HT can be very neglectful of his civic duty, and nobody likes that. We don’t need shippers making this all weird.
Also, maybe someone pointed this out long ago, but according to custom, Sweetheart shouldn’t have gone dumb after Unity kissed her. She should have started speaking in cryptograms.
“… making this all weird.” Do you have any idea how ridiculous that statement sounds, given the situation?
Seems like Unity is high on brains. She did say the museum was well-stocked, but she didn’t say with what.
I imagine 100 year old brains preserved in formaldehyde is an acquired taste.
I imagine any brain is an acquired taste.
That’s just your organ meats prejudices talking. There are plenty of European dishes involving brains. (Admittedly not human ones, unless you’re visiting Exham Priory).
You call it prejudice… I call it “I don’t like the taste of brains.” Granted, I’ve never tried human brains. I also don’t like the taste of spinach, champagne, or pig’s feet. There are a great many things that people eat that you could say are acquired tastes.
As for Unity’s acquired tastes, anything she acquires she tastes.
Brains taste more or less like eggs, but with a metallic aftertaste.
Well-stocked with zookeepers.
HT, people know your plan!
HT must frequent this place. Unless there are other tigers out there who hate humans and sell turtles.
You called it. I saw tomorrow’s strip.
It’s what H.T. says every time he goes here.
He thinks it’s hilarious.
Every. Time.