Editing 1089: Internal Monologue

{{comic
| number    = 1089
| date      = August 1, 2012
| title     = Internal Monologue
| image     = internal monologue.png
| titletext = Oh right, eye contact. Ok, good, holding the eye contact... holding... still holding... ok, too long! Getting weird! Quick, look thoughtfully into space and nod. Oh, dammit, said 'yeah' again!
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] attempts social interaction at what looks like a party owing to the fact that several people have drinks in their hands.  His internal monologue is just Cueball trying to make sure he is doing the right things in the conversation, reacting appropriately, and not saying "yeah" too much.

The title text is a continuation of the internal monologue.

This is common case of anxiety for people who are usually not very skilled in navigating social situations like parties. It can become a vicious cycle in which the fear of handling the encounter badly makes one even more uncomfortable, which in turn results in behaviour as awkward as first feared. Also, for some people it's common to want to map out a pre-planned course of action that should produce desired results, a strategy that is usually doomed to failure when dealing with sufficiently complex and unpredictable scenarios like conversations with other people. This painful, and all too common, situation has been mined for comedic effect since the beginning of human civilization.{{Citation needed}}

This situation is especially common and difficult for autistic people, and the learned (conscious or automated) effort to appear neurotypical is known as masking and is a near-constant source of mental drain for many.  Small talk and appropriate eye contact, both mentioned in this comic, are well known to be difficult for many autistic people.

==Transcript==
:[The scene is a party. Six characters are talking - the entirety of the text is a thought bubble of one of the two.]
:Cueball: Am I smiling enough? Should I be leaning on something? Where should my hands go? I hope he doesn't ask me what his name is. I've said "yeah" too much; what are some other agreeing words? Oh crap, his story just got sad ''stop smiling stop smiling''

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Social interactions]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]