Happy spookaween, everybody! Today we're doing something VERY SPOOOOKY: The unfalsifiable fear that your most valued friendships are based on societal politeness rather than mutual interest and they'll drop you in a heartbeat as soon as it becomes acceptable. OOoooooo!!!
I feel like there is actually a potential joke within the information presented here. Something about how we're just putting up with automated alerts? Or like, what if the automated alerts were thirsty for the receiver? Actually, this is a super easy fix: just flip the graph so that "definitely just politely putting up with me" is on the right. That way it'd be the last thing that people read and it'd work as a kind of punchline. Not a very good punchline, but still.
As it is, this comic is almost aggressively bland. Minimalism is one thing, but the almost perfect symmetry and use of phrasing like "automated alerts" would make it boring even if it was funny. C'mon, replace that flat slab of gray in the middle with a nice gradient or something.
By the way, you know what else is SPOOOOKY? Unopposed fascist dictatorships! Go out there and VOTE on the seventh!! The issue's so big that Randall and I are putting aside our blood rivalry to tell you! (I can't prove it cause I'm on a shitty Chromebook thing that can't screenshot but there's a little thing on the XKCD homepage saying "Check your registration and find your polling place at vote.org.")
Oh, and by the way: If you're worried, even if you text first one-hundred percent of the time, they're probably not just putting up with you. It's much more likely that they've just accepted your role as the conversational instigator in your shared micro-society.
