I love you, dammit.

... That not as sharp as he used to be line is actually a little scary. I hope he gets that checked.

Dragonus45

Sorry I'm late to the party, but I'd posit that they're BOTH right, just about different things. Pumpkin is right about the fact that messing up what your daughter's are or being dismissive of her hobbies isn't a good look. Herb is right about the fact that her dissatisfaction has made her indignant enough to cross the line: she has dismissed a genuine attempt at bonding and attention. His following advice is pretty spot on though. A bitter pill to swallow, but spot on nonetheless

nekobash

You never get used to it and you never approve, you just hope the partner makes her happy and are ready to dispose of the debris if it becomes necessary... my granfather (11 kids, 6 girls) used to say that daughters were Gods punishment for people being 17.

The Lurker

In creative mode yes. In Survival mode it's a first person adventure game. You have to gather resources to build items. Which are needed to defend yourself from monsters, feed yourself, build portals to the other realms, and do many other things. It's kind of open ended and deserves the title "open world sandbox game" more than a lot games that claim it.

JackFrost

I'm not so sure he's against his daughter dating. Haven't gotten that impression myself, especially with him having so many daughters, he's likely gotten used to it by now.

BrandX

Yes, but very one playerish in the terms of building something. It's just not fun to watch (admittedly imo) compared to watching a fight game or fps if it's fast moving.

BrandX

Isn't Minecraft just electronic Lego's of a sort?

Mr. Blue

Nope, I meant tuned in... at least in my experience. As a D.A.D.D (five girls age range 40~26) an as a Sib (3 bro 2 sis, I'm the middie) mom usually has/had at least an idea of the emotional state of her children, but it was strongest with the girls. And in my household, there were times when I would know something was not right with one of the kids and SWMBO would tell me not to get into the situation too early, waiting would fill....

The Lurker

Well of course. I thought the way I posted meant from my perspective :) Though, I know my daughter has two parents who play games and have watched her play Minecraft and have both gone "OMG can't do this anymore" :p If she was a Call of Duty fan like my daughter, I could see him possibly getting into that or a fighting game like SF or MK. Mindcraft is just kinda mind numbing to watch others building things. IMO of course.

BrandX

Depends on the people and the game. I've got one friend that through grade school our main activity was one of us would play a relatively low attention-required one player game and we'd sit around and talk and drift into silence kinda' half watching the game and back to talking again. Sometimes we talk about what's going on with the game, sometimes not. On the other hand, put me and a friend in front of a TV with a sporting event on and I'll be wandering around the house, moved elsewhere and doing something solitary, or gone in under 30 minutes. I don't really see a lot of difference, myself (other than video games being less likely to have as much yelling, from my experience anyway). However I know a lot of people who do the second one and that seems to be considered normal. Not that I suspect Herb would be much for the first one, though. However I've certainly seen parents try playing games with their kids as a bonding activity.

That One Guy

Compiling webcomics into a book appears to be a heck of a lot more work than I would've thought based on how long it takes some other webcomic authors, and that's ones that know when they create the comic that they want to do a book and keep more consistent comic sizes too. I can't imagine how much more of a pain it'd be for Rusche with the various sizes and irregular panel layout, which looks great, but would really make it more of a pain to juggle how to split longer comics between pieces of paper. But yeah, this request shows up in the comments on the main site a lot, and I'd definitely buy a book too.

That One Guy

Interesting hypothesis. I thought the standard was Moms:Sons, Dads:Daughters. Most of my experience agrees with that. Unless you mean "controlling" instead of "tuned-in".

shedemon

I'll give her the wig and convention, but watching someone else play a video game is boring :p

BrandX

Not true. He knew she was there (see the November conversation with Rosey <a href="http://shotgunshuffle.com/comic/down-the-internet-hole/)" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">http://shotgunshuffle.com/comic/down-the-internet-hole/)</a> but, like most D.A.D.D.s with multiple daughters, he is on auto-pilot until there is a need to act. Usually Mom tells him when to act because she is more tuned-in with the girls, like now. But donot mistake being tired with being uninvolved.... And as always Chris GREAT story. worth every nickel. wish I had more to send you.

The Lurker

That and being the youngest with not too much of an age gap pretty much guarantees there'll be always at least one sibling around. Which can make for fun, but sometimes also harsh times. And I'm not sure whether Pumpkin actually tried hard enough (or at all) to get their parents to know, what prime Pumpkin time would encompass and spend it with her. She strikes me as a bit timid there, a bit intimated by her sisters impact. At least when confronted with the likes of Ginger or Tarra. And it took this meltdown for her to finally get that out of her system.

Lukas Buergi

And all Pumpkin hears is: "Blah blah blah... Pumpkin... blah".

shedemon

Do you have plans to eventually compile these into a book of some sort? I'd totally pay money for that.

I suppose that having a smart ass is one thing, but I was picking up on Pumpkin picking on her self. Reading everyone else's mind to determine what she should be. However, I blame kat (whoops, capitalized it on the first pass. She doesn't deserve that respect) for the ambivalent levels of self contempt. I'm not going to call it a smack down, more of an attitude adjustment.

Mr. Blue

Right on Herb! Teenager will remain with head-firmly-stuck-in-posterior but good to say something because it just might sink in later.

Theophrastus Bombastus

Very nice page, not what I was expecting....but better. I like it. Herb laying down some needed smack...I wonder how Pumpkin will react.

Felli

Hah, I like Herb's reply. Pumpkin sure needed that little verbal smack with the way she was assuming not very nice things of her parents. I'm going to guess that we can at least partially blame Kat for how Pumpkin is thinking right now. Wouldn't be surprised if 'Unaccepting Parents' came up quite a bit in her rants, and Pumpkin probably heard a lot of them before Rosemary got rid of her.

Parenting and growing up. Two things that are waaaaay more complicated than they should be.