Home Artists Posts Import Register

Content

I wonder how long it would take to count to 501,422

Files

Comments

Doug DeJulio

I don't remember the highest number I've ever counted to, but I do remember that I wasn't ten years old yet, and I kept going for something like two to four hours.

Atashkada

I get about 700 hours for the counting at 5 seconds per number (accounting for "counting carefully", especially for the numberspast 100k that account for most of the time).

RadiusUlna

I love Emmet😂

Matt Pedone

Counting for a month straight sounds exactly like something Hanners would do.

Onedavewreckingcrew

Faye is a TERRIFYING diplomat, but she sure gets results

Gary Walker

If you counted once per second for eight hours a day, a bit over 17 days.

TubaGinger

I could read an entire comic that's just Emmett constantly alluding to their history of mildly inconvenient shenanigans.

Thomas A. Dennis

A long-ass time. In grade school, they wanted to give us an idea how big of a number a million was, and the teacher had the idea to make 1000 marks on a piece of paper, copy it 100 times, post them on the wall of the classroom, and go, "OK, now imagine ten of those." We were all like, "whoa."

Anonymous

5 seconds per number is very slow, and I assume Hanners is a fast counter. Doing a simple speed test myself just now, I can average 3.5 numbers per second up to the hundreds. So assuming 3 numbers per second, we're only looking at 46.428 hours, or just under two days without sleeping. If Hanners is an insomniac like me, it's very doable.

William Cole

If negotiations break down, she can always resort to Savannah Punch-Fu.

JourneymanWizard

Didn't Hanners have a job counting things a while ago? Is 500k as high as she got?

CaseyAEC

To all the folks wonder if Hanners slept, ate, etc: Given that Station was mentioned, it's likely that our dear woman was in a highly altered mental state and highly medicated (perhaps poorly medicated). Just some thoughts, and happiness. I love that QC shows us the journeys of people like Hanners.

Miyaa

Just how strong and durable is Emmitt that they can toss 204 quarry sized rocks back into a quarry?

Anonymous

As Atashkada points out though, once the numbers get longer, they take longer to say...

Anonymous

Even 777,777, which just syllaballically is the longest number short of a million, doesn't take a full second to say. I suppose a more robust test would be to take the syllable length of all the numbers in the range numbers and perform a weighted average... Which is just the sort of thing a math nerd like me will do. Be back with you shortly.

Summer Sudbrink

Can Hannelore wrench the train of thought back onto the track? Tune in next time... :)

Christopher Beer

Is it a recent development, or has Faye's speech changed? I mean 'they only been there a day...' and 'thank ya' don't seem like her usual speech pattern.

Ruth Merriam

Jeph, suddenly your brain terrifies me.

Donna Flint

I'm surprised the number is so low. That is less than a week a one per second and given her drumming I'm sure she can count way faster than that. Or are you suggesting she doesn't count every tap of the stick on the drum? Heck for a really quick drumroll she could probably knock out several thousand counts before the reset of the band even joins in.

Donna Flint

Also, if Hanners knows where she stopped, why not pick up again whenever waiting?

Anonymous

Just a bit short of 140 hours, assuming you can count at 1Hz, since most people will have trouble maintaining that at higher character counts, it's probably more realistically around 300 hours. Given that you need to sleep and such, about a month if you also eat etc.

BookBeard

I mean, it's not my area of expertise, but unless quarries are far tidier than I imagined I would assume that the process of extracting "quarry sized" rocks also generates a substantial number of smaller fragments.

Anonymous

I still remember my grandpa sitting at the kitchen table and listening to me proudly count to 100 when I was like 6. The patience my grandparents have for kids is just lovely.

David Paul

Saying it aloud yields somewhere in the vicinity of 2.5-3 seconds per number for six-digit numbers. @Eric Hodge considering that Atashkada is incorporating "counting carefully" as per their original post, while probably still a bit much, could be right. Especially taking rest breaks into account.

Daniel Rydberg

I feel like this would be an interesting topic for Matt Parker and @standupmaths.

Jared Kolbly

After timing myself counting quickly for ten seconds for each position of 0 starting with all other digits filled with 2 (i.e. start counting at 222,221 for 10 seconds to get my average numbers per second for the 100,000 to 501,422 range,) it would take about 324.29 hours or 13.51 days. If you are trying to save time by counting to 100 and adding it to the total number (i.e. 1, 2, ..., 99, 326,400, 1, 2) it would take about 51.6 hours or 2.15 days. If you are counting very carefully like Hanners, good luck. Would double the time at a minimum.

Miyaa

Nah, next week will be Steve being at a petting zoo and then meets his Russian girlfriend dressed in a donkey costume promising him waffles for breakfast tomorrow.

Anonymous

I think this might be one of my all time favorite QC strips. I love it.

Comics Ladybird

Meanwhile, a cartoonist has so far reached up to 5025, and counting still.

Afunnythinghappedtome

"an' then th' principal declared it was 'No Pants Thursday' an' that made it even WORSE"

David Paul

Hunter-killer droids are en route to your location. Please be patient *hold music starts*