2376: Curbside

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
Revision as of 18:02, 24 October 2020 by BlackHat (talk | contribs)
Jump to: navigation, search
Curbside
The state has had so many contact tracers disappear into that shop that they've had to start a contact tracer tracing program.
Title text: The state has had so many contact tracers disappear into that shop that they've had to start a contact tracer tracing program.

Explanation

Ambox notice.png This explanation may be incomplete or incorrect: Created by an ANGRY GHOST. Could use some elaboration; explain title text. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.
If you can address this issue, please edit the page! Thanks.
Beret Guy is making contact with a shop that sells cursed items, only to vanish when the customer tries to return the product. He has previously mentioned doing most of his shopping (including groceries) at such locations in 1772: Startup Opportunity, and visited one (possibly the same one) several months earlier in 2332: Cursed Chair. That visit ended with him trying to stop the COVID-19 pandemic by destroying the cursed chair, but evidently he either failed to destroy the chair or found that doing so didn't halt the pandemic.

After confirming that he has the right number, Beret Guy asks if the cursed store does curbside pickup, as he intends to place an order for bread and a cursed amulet, but does not wish to go inside during the pandemic. Many grocery stores have started offering such services, allowing a customer to place an order over the phone or online, then receive it outside the store, thus minimizing the interaction with store staff or other customers. Closed spaces are understood to pose a greater risk of contagion than the outdoors, where wind and sun can mitigate airborne viral particles.

The store's contact replies that no, they do not offer curbside pickup, but tries to assure Beret Guy that all employees at the location wear masks. (They might be wearing haunted Halloween masks.) When Beret Guy expresses disappointment at the revelation, complaining about the stuffy air of the shop, the contact advises him to consider the virus as part of the curses that come with their products. An angered Beret Guy promptly proclaims that he will not be doing business with the location if they are going to showcase such an attitude towards the pandemic. It's unclear how he will find another store with similar unusual characteristics, although it has been mentioned that there is an entire industry of these stores.

Beret Guy mentions that he wants to buy an amulet in order to 'do battle with ghosts', which is not an ordinary thing to do[citation needed] given that most people cannot interact directly with ghosts. Perhaps he has a ghost-fighting weapon that he has also bought from the shop, although a more likely explanation (given Beret Guy's peculiarity) seems that he is somehow able to engage in martial combat with them. A common argument for how ghosts can exist is that they are in another dimension; given that Beret Guy has extra dimensions in his bones (2310: Great Attractor), he might appear as a skeleton warrior in the ghosts' dimension. Thus, being able to battle ghosts would be one of the many

  • Beret Guy is a very strange person. Sometimes he takes these strange tendencies into the supernatural.
    • Click to expand for a more detailed explanation:


Explanation

In the early comics he was mostly just a strange and naive guy. There is an early start to the strangeness, but that power could also be attributed to Cueball (at least it is a shared power) in 248.

After comic 1099, Beret Guy begins to appear frequently with these strange powers, typically not related to each other, except that he has some issues with electrical sockets and power cords as seen in 1293 and 1395. (See also 509: Induced Current and the title text of 614: Woodpecker, regarding power cords, but not these strange powers.)

Many of these apparent powers manifest as objects behaving strangely around him. It is unclear whether these are in fact powers inherent to Beret Guy or whether the objects are simply cursed; as indicated in 1772, most of his possessions were acquired from shops specializing in cursed items.

Here is a list of the comics where Beret Guy displays strange powers that are beyond the realm of possibility.

List of abilities

  1. 248: Manages to create a hypothetical situation (trapping him and his friend).
  2. 1088: Capable of waiting in the same place for five years, presumably without sustenance
  3. 1099: He has infinite wings.
  4. 1135: Makes spiders weave him a shirt.
  5. 1158: Creates rope to pull & release ball via his imagination.
  6. 1293: Pours soup from power socket.
  7. 1388: Subducts through the floor to form mountains in his room.
  8. 1395: Inflates a laptop through a power cord so that it floats like a helium balloon.
  9. 1422: Makes a phone with an old battery behave like a dying star.
  10. 1486: Uses the vacuum energy to fly and "gain unlimited power" with a vacuum cleaner.
  11. 1490: Sees the individual atoms, and can distinguish the different elements. But he cannot see what they are actually a part of, like a human or a dog.
  12. 1522: Can examine life on exoplanets around distant stars through a magnifying glass just by standing on a ladder.
  13. 1614: A little less clear what his powers are in this. But first he is walking a flying/floating dog, and then he returns flying on (or as) a kite, while the dog holds on to the line of the kite.
  14. 1617: Living by eating newspaper and without breathing oxygen for several years in a sealed and buried box.
  15. 1922: Riding in the air above two small dogs combined into a larger dog through interferometry
  16. 2310: Being able to sleep on the vertical side of walls due to a much higher than normal attraction to the Great Attractor, because of higher dimensional bones.
  17. 2325: Beret Guy attracts water so it flows to him rather than running out towards the nearby oceans. He thus claims he is like an endorheic basin, which is a limited drainage basin that normally retains water and allows no outflow to other external bodies of water.
  18. 2376: Claims to have the ability to do battle with ghosts, although this is not shown because Beret Guy did not have a cursed amulet that makes ghosts angry.
  19. 2446: He creates a huge spike protein outside his body after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine.
  20. 2534: He managed to create a retractable "rocket" that can extend and deliver payload to the ISS and then return to its starting position without the base ever leaving the ground.
  21. 2695: He created volcano seeds which, when planted, create a tiny volcano.
  22. 2710: He created a hydroelectric dam that has achieved Q>1, meaning it has produced more water than has been put into it.
  23. 2805: He flew off into the atmosphere holding a balloon and a basketball and survived for 1500 years, and then proceeded to get the perfect trick shot.


.

The title text explains that due to the more lax precautions in the store, enough people have gotten Covid there that contact tracers were sent to trace contacts. However, because the store is haunted/possessed, all the contact tracers have disappeared, leading the state to create a tracing program to find the missing contact tracers. The joke here is that the contact tracers must now be traced by another tracing program.

Transcript

[Beret Guy talking on a cell phone. The response from the person on the phone is in a jagged bubble.]
Beret Guy: Hi, is this the shop that sells cursed items but when you try to return them the shop is gone?
Phone: Yes, how can I help you?
[A frameless panel. Beret Guy still talking on the phone]
Beret Guy: Do you do curbside pickup? I wanted to buy a cursed amulet that angers ghosts, and some groceries.
Phone: No, but it's okay, we wear masks.
[Zoomed in on other side of Beret Guy's face]
Beret Guy: So you can't bring stuff out?
Phone: I'm afraid not.
Beret Guy: But it's so stuffy in there!
[The callee's response is on the top of the panel. Beret Guy is now holding his phone in front of him, ready to end the call.]
Phone: Why not think of the virus as part of the amulet's curse?
Beret Guy: Excuse me!? I'm trying to buy some bread and do battle with ghosts, not endanger my family and friends in a pandemic!
Beret Guy: I will take my business elsewhere.


comment.png add a comment! ⋅ comment.png add a topic (use sparingly)! ⋅ Icons-mini-action refresh blue.gif refresh comments!

Discussion

A possible xkcd universe? Are there any other in universe references? 172.69.35.119 23:25, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Is this the first time we've seen Beret Guy actually angry? 108.162.210.170 02:03, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

I can think of at least one other time: 559: No Pun Intended BlackHat (talk) 16:28, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Please don't be childish, everyone. (Talking to someone else)

Beret Guy was probably angry in https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/677:_Asshole. 172.69.34.198 16:26, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

I like how Beret guy is trying to get the shop owner to remove a cursed object from the shop... which would probably forever separate the shop owner from his shop & stick the shop owner with the cursed object.

Does the title text actually imply that people are getting COVID at the shop? It says outright that contract tracers are going in, yes, but..? BunsenH (talk) 04:35, 25 October 2020 (UTC)

I don't believe that the comic needs any more explanation. Does anyone else think otherwise? BlackHat (talk) 18:55, 21 November 2020 (UTC)

The importance of a comma. --Char Latte49 (talk) 19:46, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

I think it should be noted somewhere that this is beret guy's only use of "!?" and also arguably the time his motives are most understandable — also, can his mother even catch covid with her plutonium heart? (My first time posting here so I don't know if I'm doing it right) LoquaciousLlama (talk) 18:27, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Retrieved from "https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2376:_Curbside&oldid=200512"