1117: My Sky

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My Sky
According to my mom, my first word was (looking up at the sky) 'Wow!'
Title text: According to my mom, my first word was (looking up at the sky) 'Wow!'

Explanation[edit]

This comic seems to be a follow up to 1115: Sky.

Here, Beret Guy claims ownership of the sky, which contains or "stores" the clouds. Last panel is a pun on cloud computing and specifically cloud storage, and looks like a follow up to 1032: Networking. The obvious joke is that, instead of “cloud” (Internet-based) storage, Beret Guy's business is literally storage of clouds.

The title text is a further statement, that his first words came while looking up at the sky. This relates to the first panel, where Beret Guy is shown hanging to the grass ceiling of an upside-down panel; the joke is that from an outside perspective not only would Beret Guy appear upside-down, but so would his written-out speech. As a child, Beret Guy would be looking up at his mom, and with a similar flipping of his speech his first word "MOM" would appear as "WOW".

There are some connections with both 908: The Cloud and the title text of 1444: Cloud.

Transcript[edit]

[The panel is upside-down. Beret Guy is holding onto the "ceiling", there is an upside-down cloud at the bottom of the panel.]
Beret guy [to the solitary cumulus cloud.]: Oh—Hello down there! Welcome to My Sky!
[The panel is now oriented in the conventional sense with the ground at the bottom. Beret Guy is standing on his feet too, and the sky now shows a second cloud.]
Beret guy: It's pretty good. I like it. It's not the same color as anything.
[The sky is now blanketed by alto-cirrus clouds.]
Beret guy: "Wow! There are a lot of you! Good thing it's so big.
[The scene now depicts a party, where Beret Guy is talking to Ponytail.]
Ponytail: "And what do you do?"
Beret Guy: "I'm in the cloud storage business."

Trivia[edit]

This comic was referenced in 2765: Escape Speed


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Discussion

I wonder if the "It's not the same color as anything" line is a reference to Microsoft's cloud service which is named "Azure". "Azure" in conventional speech, is a color. Properly, is a shade of Sky Blue. However, the HTML color Azure is incorrect (propagated from an error in the Linux source code), and is set to a shade of Off-White, coincidentally making it the color of clouds. James Curran

Any reference to that? Specifically the Linux and Microsoft connection? #F0FFFF does looks blue to me ... -- Hkmaly (talk) 08:31, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
  1. F0FFFF is really very light cyan: White with a little of Red removed. How it is actually perceived depends of a number of factors like screen calibration, printer calibration, colors and paper used, and - last, but not least - the eye of the beholder. --46.142.23.214 16:05, 8 October 2012 (UTC) madd

Why was the comment taken out about how "WOW" upside down is "MOM"? I thought it was incredibly clever. http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1117:_My_Sky&oldid=13991 Jillysky (talk) 19:06, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

No worries. I just added it back. Mgh (talk) 14:27, 8 October 2012 (UTC)


Jeff suggested that I post it again down here, to see if anyone knew why it was removed.

An alternate explanation for the Title Text is that, if he was hanging upside-down from the earth, then Randall's actual first word would have been "Mom!".

--Carlneely (talk) 20:41, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

  • Well you'd have to flip over the exclamation mark, too (all or nothing). "iMom". 76.122.5.96 02:16, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

I do think that was the point of the title text. The current "explanation" on this part in place is hardly an explanation, as all it does is define "wow". As this (and 1115) have been about perspective on the sky, that would explain it. And the most common word word is "mom," after all. Bobidou23 (talk) 22:27, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

  • I think it should go back up. Nobody *says* "exclamation point", and wow->mom is very much in line with Randall's type of sneakiness. Almost nothing he does is ever on accident or by chance, and since "mom" is definitely one of the top baby words... Put it back up, Carlneely. You have the right, and even the first page says nothing is set in stone. If someone disagrees with it, too bad for them. Jillysky (talk) 17:13, 7 October 2012 (UTC)
For this comic, the title text doesn't seem to be a statement from Beret Guy. Beret Guy usually expresses his feelings in a more abstract way. On the other hand, recently, Randall has been posting many inspirational comics, that are awe-inspiring about the world, so it makes sense that a direct awe-inspired comment would be from him. In the comic, by the time Beret Guy says "wow" he standing "upright" again. The title text doesn't say that he was upside-down, just looking at the sky. Being horizontal doesn't count as being upside-down. Now, if the title text said that he was doing hand-stands, and said wow, absolutely, then the wow-mom joke would work. On a more technical note, it is not a right to edit a wiki, it is a privilege, and other editors have the privilege to go back and edit your work. Let's not feature-creep the definition of the word 'right'. lcarsos (talk) 20:49, 7 October 2012 (UTC)
He doesn't need to be doing a handstand; these two comics are about perspectives, right? If the image of his saying "mom" were depicted as in the first panel here (i.e. with the earth towards the top), if would be "wow", wouldn't it? And the profound statement also works, but isn't a double meaning plausible? — Comment by Bobidou23 (talk) (please sign your comments)
I'm not arguing that there are different perspectives in these two comics. I'm saying that you can't attribute a statement made by one character, to the actions of another. Beret Guy is the one upside-down, Randall is the one saying "wow" with a reference to his mother. If you have a gluten intolerance, it does not mean that your cousin will throw up after eating a slice of bread, that is a logical fallacy, it's a version of post hoc ergo propter hoc. lcarsos (talk) 02:41, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
But the title text, even in the first person, doesn't necessarily have to be from Randall himself. Look at comic 1112 - it's obviously Cueball speaking about editing new rules of chess as a continuation of the comic. Bobidou23 (talk) 12:49, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
What part of "According to my mom, my first word was 'Wow!'" sounds like Beret Guy? You've fallen down another hole, I'm not saying that all first person title texts are Randall's words. I'm saying this title text is Randall and not Beret Guy. You still haven't made a valid point other than the dubious, tenuous, and sophomoric link between wow and mom, that the title text is being said by any character in the comic. And please, for the love of God, if you're going to talk about a comic, link to it, don't make me go to a search box to type in some keywords to get me to a comic that you might be talking about. lcarsos (talk) 20:00, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
Explanations do not need to be wordy to be complete. Being overly wordy is the sign that you are trying too hard, and probably missing the point. That said, this is a wiki, anyone can edit the explanation as they wish to. Sometimes it may spark an edit war, but if you think the explanation is insufficient, if someone who came here for help in understanding this joke still wouldn't get it, then please, flesh out the explanation. lcarsos (talk) 20:49, 7 October 2012 (UTC)
I think the explanation of the title text is complete (there is really very little to explain). I don't, however, think that the explanation of Randall being upside down and therefore saying "mom" makes any sense. Randall is not a comic. If he stood on his head, he would not say words upside down. The whole wow/mom explanation does not seem to be specifically based on the comic, but rather the editor's personal musings TheHYPO (talk) 14:25, 9 October 2012 (UTC)

It's interesting to me that Beret Guy's head and beret both appear to be transparent except for their outlines. Erenan (talk) 15:59, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

I changed the title text explanation - saying "wow" while you're upside down does not make it into "mom". It's clever, but didn't make logical sense the way you phrased it. --Mynotoar (talk) 11:36, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

Hello, I have one small thing to "add" to the comic above, the reason he says "It´s not the same color as anything" could be attributed to the fact that "Sky Blue" is an actual color and people use the phrase "it is as blue as the sky" or similar phraces to refer to a certain blue hue, wich would imply that "It´s not the same color as anything because every [blue color of this hue] is the same as this sky", or at least that's what I get from the joke---My name is HentMas and I have no idea how to edit wikis or stuff like that, so I just wanted to add this here-- 108.162.215.230 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

I am surprised that no one mentioned that Steve Jobs' sister reported that Steve's final words before he died were: 'Oh wow. Oh wow. Oh wow.' ... so it is possible that Randall made Beret Guy's first word to relate it to Steve Jobs' last words. Rtanenbaum (talk) 15:56, 14 December 2016 (UTC)