422: A Better Idea
| A Better Idea |
 Title text: It's *almost* enough to make me want to redo high school. |
Explanation
In the United States prom (short for promenade) is a semi-formal (black tie) dance or gathering of high-school students. They normally are awkward experiences for nerdy people.
A LAN party is a temporary gathering of people with computers or game consoles, between which they establish a local area network (LAN), primarily for the purpose of playing multiplayer video games. They are normally very informal.
Cueball is likely taking the girl to Prom, but stops when he sees there's a LAN party in formal attire, meaning they wouldn't be out of place. The comic title is likely what Cueball is going to say to the girl, since the LAN party is probably much more appealing for him than a formal ball.
The title text indicates that Randall would have loved for such a thing to be possible, so much that he very nearly would redo high school just to participate.
Transcript
- [Cueball wearing a bow tie stands holding hands with Megan wearing a dress. On the left, there is a sign pointing left, which reads "PROM"; on the right, there is a sign pointing right, which reads "LAN PARTY IN FORMAL ATTIRE".]
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Why almost? 173.245.55.217 16:39, 4 December 2013 (UTC)BK
- Maybe because Cueball realizes that this prom brings him to an ordinary life, no LAN parties any more, but he just wants go back to that parties.--Dgbrt (talk) 21:58, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
- My guess is it's because high school itself isn't necessarily all that pleasant (though your mileage may vary); would you really enroll in four more years of high school just for a single LAN party in formal attire at the end? Even if you could be the appropriate age for the duration? The title text indicates that he doesn't quite consider the trade-off likely to be worth it. Nyperold (talk) 20:00, 27 June 2016 (UTC)
This could be looked at as exactly the reverse as well, and I don't see any clear way to pick one over the other as the intended meaning of the strip. Cueball could have simply dumped his date and gone to the LAN party. Now in hindsight he regrets that he chose the LAN party over the possibility of a continued relationship with his prom date. (Who we assume would have dumped him on the spot!)ExternalMonolog (talk) 21:27, 21 January 2014 (UTC)ExternalMonolog
- Why are we assuming Cueball is the one interested in the LAN part instead of Megan? The comic gives no indication whether Cueball, Megan, or both are enticed by the prospect. 162.158.69.169 21:19, 26 September 2017 (UTC)
I always assumed that "LAN party in formal attire" was a joke that combined "LAN party" and "lawn party in formal attire."Birdsinthewindow (talk) 02:32, 25 April 2022 (UTC)
if you can find more than one use of "promenade" outside of a dictionary or name then i'll believe that "prom is short for promenade" is something worth including Me[citation needed] 02:13, 6 May 2024 (UTC)
- What? I mean, wiktionary's 'prom' says outright "a clipping of 'promenade'". I can understand why you might not accept that if you're descriptivist and not prescriptivist. But not accepting a "name" (if I understand you correctly; I'm sure you miswrote that, somehow) sumultaneously makes you a prescriptivist and not a descriptivist. Where does that even leave you?
- And what even is the problem? Checking the edit history, it looks like you just didn't believe that "prom" was a shortened form of "promenade". If it isn't (and there's no good reason to believe that, as there's no obvious alternate etymology given to explain it or any sign of mystery/argument amongst etymologists) all the professional and crowd-sourced analyses of it that one can check appear to have been misled. If you have proof of it coming from "promotional", or whatever alternative you think it is, then add that.
- Or are you just wanting not to explain "Prom"? Perhaps you think 'everyone knows' (well, maybe everyone does, having seen countless US teen-focussed TV shows, if not actuallybbeing from the US and steeped in that culture already), but that's not necessarily true in other cultures. Tell me at a younger age ahout "the prom", and I'd think of something else derived from "promenade", not "the end of year school disco" (or, if I had been born only slightly earlier, possibly the invitational school tea-dance that alternated between the Girls' Grammar and the Boys' Grammar and was probably much more like a US prom than the merged/non-selective school's disco ever was).
- I'd never put all the above in an explanation, as it's too wordy and experience-specific, but I would expect not to lack the basic link onwards for anything that perhaps a reader might need a little nudge to explain. There also seem to me to be no good reason to remove a quick aside/link that might be helpful and doesn't really expand the basic explanation appreciably. As long as it's right, and (waiting to be proven wrong...) I think that's established, and perhaps even you believe it now? 172.69.194.95 08:59, 6 May 2024 (UTC)
- ...all that too, but as the reverter in question, I was mostly responding to the basic disbelief expressed in the original change, demonstrating it with a (I thought/still think) acceptable source to satisfy them. Maybe it was a mis-reason by them, and they really thought it was excessive information. (No, I don't think so either. Also never attended a prom, myself. Back then '70s Disco Nights just being called "Disco Nights". :P But thank you to Buffy The Vampire Slayer for explaining the concept to me!) 162.158.38.216 09:56, 6 May 2024 (UTC)
