Headscratchers / Something*Positive

• The first time we meet Pamjee, it's a flashforward, she's fifteenish and Aubrey chews her out for having wine coolers in her room - in this house we drink seriously, young lady! - and is implied to insist Pamjee drink hard alcohol until she learns to like it, or something. Okay, very S*P humour, fair enough. But then we find out later that little Pamela Jocelyn was given up for adoption by a mother who had a history of problems with drugs, which could very likely include alcohol. Her older brother was born addicted to cocaine. Aubrey and Jason accept that although no problems have manifested with Pamjee yet, they could turn up at any point, and go ahead and adopt her anyway. This makes the earlier comic one hell of a lot less funny.
  • I wouldn't be entirely certain that Aubrey's stated reason for making her drink hard liquor is the true one. She may be trying to scare Pamjee off of alcohol the way parents sometimes do. After all, it's way in the future, and we don't really know how the characters are going to be until we get there.
  • After seeing their methods of parenting the infant Pamjee, I wouldn't be surprised if teen Pamjee has had shots growing up.
    • Yeaaaaaah, I'm pretty sure that's the OP's problem, as "Giving shots to your adopted daughter who's quite probably genetically predisposed to substance abuse" is kind of monstrous.
      • Maybe not so monstrous, some families in the south will allow their children to drink with the family. Seems wrong at first but one effect is generally such children drink less. After all what's rebellious about drinking when you drink with your parents? Also it kills the allure of the forbidden. Not saying it's a perfect plan but that could be the logic behind it.
• How can a neutered cat still impregnate another cat? Does Choo-Choo Bear just have extra balls hidden somewhere?
  • He's practically a shapeshifter. Why not?
  • Some cats are weird and some vets are incompetent. We had a cat that had to be neutered 3 times before it took.
  • Choo-Choo Bear already has impossible physiology. I just took it as an extension of that.
  • Davan's one step ahead of everyone. Choo-choo is one step ahead of him.
• It doesn't piss me off, but this is something that bugs me a little. PeeJee's nickname is a shortening of Penelope Jennifer. PamJee is a shortening of Pamela Jocelyn. But going by the names, shouldn't her nickname be PamJo?
  • I don't think there are any "rules" regarding nicknames - remember, PeeJee chooses to go with "PeeJee" instead of her father's nickname for her - "Penny-Jenny". PamJee is probably "PamJee" because that's what her parents choose to call her.
• What was Fred's job? At one point he was a barber and another he worked in a factory.
  • I think he worked at the factory until he retired (forced into early retirement?) and then took the barbershop job for amusement/extra money/to pass the time.
  • I thought it was the other way around. I seem to recall one flashback (edit: found the link) that showed him working as a barber when he first started dating Faye (which occurred before they moved to Texas) which would imply that he worked at the Factory later in life. Possibly he was unable to make it as a Barber in Texas so he took a job at the local factory.
• Does Fred have the best Alzheimer's medication in the world or something? It's been eight years since his diagnosis and if I recall it's only ever shows at all in two speech bubbles (times that he fakes it to mess with Daven aside) one of which was a guest strip. You'd think by now he'd be showing symptoms more regularly, having trouble coming up with the right words sometimes at least. Heck, eight years is the average life span of people diagnosed with the disease, to have made it that long and still be just as sharp as ever would be incredible in a real person.
  • Well that is just the average, some people have deteriorated pretty quickly, others take longer. We also have to remember that we are only seeing brief snippets of Fred's life. There have been strips which have suggested that we are mostly seeing only the good points. He's confessed to having forgotten he had IRS as a pet, briefly forgotten Monique existed, Davan has been uncertain whether Fred is screwing with him or whether it is his disease at times, and as of Dec. 2014 he's been falling a lot. The art has shown he has gotten a lot frailer. Fred was always a cantankerous sort, mostly by choice rather than natural inclination, so it is difficult to measure whether his grumpiness has increased or not, but he has been showing less impulse control. So his disease is progressing, it is just hard to measure how quickly. More than anything else though, it just isn't funny to see an old man sundowning. We get to see where it is funny or unsettling, not when it is just plain pathetic.
• I wonder if Bian is ever going to end up joining the main cast. He teased her years ago, and promised that she would eventually be linked to some previous characters. But after some backlash and worrying, he seems to have dropped it, and I can't remember the last time we saw her. I know Randy has a tendency to tease new stuff for long periods of time and then it fades away in importance (remember when Monette teased her TV show off and on for months, then it only became important for a couple of strips?), but this is a long haul even for him. Did he just drop the character?