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[BenRG]

Marten has at least two 'teh' shirts, so that could be a red herring.

[Gladstone]

Faye's wearing the same shirt in 2841 and 2845, and still has it on in 2850 after spending the night on the couch. 

[BenRG]

Faye's wearing the same shirt in 2841 and 2845, and still has it on in 2850 after spending the night on the couch.

If it's three days , she may have cycled through a few identical-looking shirts. In storytelling terms, it gives you a few extra days for Faye's decline to be more gradual and less noticeable.

[Edit]
Typos fixed and I hate posting from my tablet.

[Method of Madness]

Marten has at least two, possibly three TEH shirts. Him wearing one means nothing.

[AprilArcus]

Faye's wearing the same shirt in 2841 and 2845, and still has it on in 2850 after spending the night on the couch.

And the dialogue in 2849 makes it clear that Clinton has just found out about Claire's date with Marten. No room for a gap here.

[BenRG]

Faye's wearing the same shirt in 2841 and 2845, and still has it on in 2850 after spending the night on the couch.

And the dialogue in 2849 makes it clear that Clinton has just found out about Claire's date with Marten. No room for a gap here.

Unless, as Claire stated during the first date, she has been waiting for him to work it out and he has only just done so, days later. That isn't unimaginable.

[Kugai]

Or they have several of the same type of shirt.

I have that.  I've got at least half a dozen blue Workshirts and at least three good white shirts myself

[Gladstone]

Hey everyone, there's some guy named Occam at the door, says he has something to show you all.  He told me you'd know what it was.

My money is still on 2779-2781.

[BenRG]

Yeah, I've seen it; it's overrated.

[AprilArcus]

932: Sven shows up with a pair of underwear he thinks Faye left behind "the other night". Is this referring to 875-879? If so, that would have been at least four nights earlier.

[Gladstone]

Is this part of the attempt to find those missing days, or just fleshing out the earlier timeline?  If the former, that's going pretty far back.  I still think the gap is between 2779 and '80. 

I might fire off a polite, non-accusatory email to Jeph later, just to satisfy my own curiosity...

[AprilArcus]

Yeah, unrelated to current events; just trying to put a ribbon on "Season 1".

I would be really surprised if Jeph responded to such an email.

In other news, I've decided the wall calendar from 894 trumps Jeph's tweet as the best anchor to "real time" that we have, so the next version will map comic dates to the November '03 - September '05 period. Smith's summer break was a week longer in 2005 than 2006, but nothing else really changes.

[AprilArcus]

Something that was bothering me was that I wasn't sure how long Dora actually lived with Marten and Faye. I hoped that I could find a way to push her move-in back to late February, so that there could be a month of off-panel time, but I misread 1601 as an in-continuity strip and missed that 1592-1610 covers a single day. This means that they all lived together for two weeks exactly — there isn't any other way to line it up and satisfy Espressosaurus II's six-week build schedule (1645) and Marten's "It's been WEEKS" (1861), which together constrain late March/early April very tightly. I think this is ultimately defensible, considering Steve's observation (1918) that moving in together was a fiasco that precipitated Marten and Dora's breakup.

Unrelated, but god do I love the art in the 1500s - look at the facial expressions in 1563!

[AprilArcus]

Version 1.0! Now covering strips 1-2909. Comment and critique welcomed.

[jwhouk]

So it's about two months from Tai asking Dora out to our current fiasco... Dora doesn't do things slow, does she? 

[bhtooefr]

It's also worth noting that per 1069, Hannelore was 22, so that would mean she was born in March 1982 per your timeline. Which makes me think the ages are off somewhere? (Edit: Or I just thought Hannelore was younger than she was.)

[AprilArcus]

Dora is 26 in winter '04 (144), and evasive about her age in spring '05 (1928), so she's 27 currently. Sven is a year older (337), so 28 currently.

Steve is 24 in spring '04, so he's 25ish currently.

Marten graduates college in spring '03 (162). Faye moved to Northampton in autumn '03 (458), which was "two years, give or take" after her breakdown, which was itself "the summer between sophomore and junior year" (507), so summer '01. Claire is 24 in summer '05 (2281). So all these characters are the same age (24, currently).

Hannelore turns 22 and Tai graduates college in spring '04, so these two are a year younger (23, currently)

Clinton is 21 in summer '05 (2281). Emily is at least a year older (a graduate student, per Claire's comment in 2205), but young enough to have taken a class with him (2853), so she's probably 22.

[Method of Madness]

So they're older than me and always will be. Hooray!

[jwhouk]

What scares me is that I'm somewhere between Jim (TSB owner/Sam's dad) and Amir's age. In fact, Samantha is probably old enough to be my daughter...

[MooskiNet]

What scares me is that I'm somewhere between Jim (TSB owner/Sam's dad) and Amir's age. In fact, Samantha is probably old enough to be my daughter...

I get you, but I figure I've been 19 inside for the last twenty-odd years, so that's got to count for something.

[Method of Madness]

Sam probably finished college last year. Sven told Faye he loved her on my 18th birthday!

[cesium133]

According to the timeline, Marten bought cake batter on the same week as my 18th birthday.

[AprilArcus]

Quantum time means that if the strip runs long enough, Claire's "ReaderCon '09" shirt (2360) will eventually be older than she is.

[Method of Madness]

She got a good deal on the shirt by buying it four years in advance.

[aliensporebomb]

Love this timeline - it really helps me visualize the "when" to the "why"..

[Omega Entity]

This arc may also hopefully kickstart time in the QC universe again. As others have pointed out, time has been going almost unbearably slow lately.

[AprilArcus]

Update, "time has lost all meaning" edition:

Memorial Day	2884-2893	Marten and Claire get more comfortable.
Tuesday	2894-2911	Hanners helps Faye stay on the wagon. Dora picks a fight with Tai.
Wednesday	2912-2941	Faye picks up her welding gear from Coffee of Doom and attends a support group. Clinton and Emily have a date.

Jump?

2943

Jump? But probably not, as Hanners is wearing the same shirt in 2951.

2944-2950 It's been a week since Veronica moved in to her new place (1947). She signed the lease in 2718 ~ Aug 25, and moved in as of 2832 ~ Sep 2. It's now Sep 7 or later; probably Saturday Sep 9 on the basis of this dialogue.

Jump? But probably not, as Hanners is wearing the same shirt in 2943.

2951

Jump?

2952-2959: Momo's day

Jump?

2960: May's day

Jump?

2961- Hanners does not have cancer.

[MooskiNet]

A. Thank you

B. Please don't pull your hair out. 

[Method of Madness]

Or release the virus. (I know you're not actually hypothetical evil Hanners but still)

[BenRG]

We'll never know for certain, but I'm fairly sure that "May's Day" occurred directly after she and Momo parted company in Strip 2957. As someone who occasionally writes stories, the flow of events just suggests that to me.

[BenRG]

I think that it's a decent rule of thumb that, if there is an evident time shift (such as the characters' clothing changing) we should assume it is the next day unless we have abundant proof otherwise, no matter how odd that will make the date of the events.

Some things to bear in mind:

• Smif's library is almost certainly open seven days a week and everyone probably works the occasional Saturday or Sunday shift, so it is difficult to tell weekends just from one of the library characters being out and about during the day;
• Jeph probably hasn't been keeping track of time too religiously, so we should be flexible as to days of the week.

I've been checking and it looks like from Faye's relapse to the current strip, we've got just two or possibly three days. What makes me think that three is a possibility is Claire's shirt changing between her meeting with Clinton and being at the apartment with Marten. However, that can be hand-waved away just by her having changed after work because she wants to wear something more casual whilst spending time with Marten.

2691-2970 - Hannelore has a hypochondriac episode
2971-2974 - Faye's relapse (the afternoon of the same day)
2975-2990 - The Talk 2 (the evening of the same day)
2991-2992 - Claire talks to Clinton in the park (the next day)
2992-3000 - Clinton and Emily talk
3001-3005 - Faye applies for a job with the Robot Fighting League (the next day based on Claire's shirt in 3006; no indication in the text of 3001 that this HAS to be the day after Faye talks to Pintsize in 2990)
3006          - Claire and Marten find Faye and Pintsize have gone out (certainly the same morning)

[AprilArcus]

What makes me think that three is a possibility is Claire's shirt changing between her meeting with Clinton and being at the apartment with Marten. However, that can be hand-waved away just by her having changed after work because she wants to wear something more casual whilst spending time with Marten.

Both of their outfits change from 2996 to 3006. OTOH, it doesn't feel like there's a day missing between 2990 and 3001. Hanners has changed outfits in mid-day before (1080-1110 and 1360-1376), but I was previously going on the assumption that this was a little bit of show-don't-tell about her OCD.

[bhtooefr]

Jeph's trolling this thread, I think, by saying it's June 1797: http://www.questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=3033

[BenRG]

It would be interesting to have an in-universe justification, though. Is it a gag calendar someone got from a Colonial Memorabilia store or something?

Notable events in 1797:

• British wrap up the conquest of French West Indies as part of the Napoleonic War, during which a certain rising star named Horatio Nelson comes to prominence;
• John Adams succeeds George Washington as President of the United States of America;
• The first cast-iron plow is patented (remembered by AIs as the stem point of their evolution?);
• The first ever senator to be impeached is removed from office.

[improvnerd]

I don't see any loop on the third digit, which would put it at 1777.

A much more likely explanation would be that it's a 1997 or 1999 calendar that hasn't been switched since the skate park opened.

[pwhodges]

The two middle digits are clearly 9s; the last is ambiguous, but more likely 7.  I'm presuming the calendar is a left-over from the building's previous use.

[Lubricus]

It would be interesting to have an in-universe justification, though. Is it a gag calendar someone got from a Colonial Memorabilia store or something?

Notable events in 1797:

• British wrap up the conquest of French West Indies as part of the Napoleonic War, during which a certain rising star named Horatio Nelson comes to prominence;
• John Adams succeeds George Washington as President of the United States of America;
• The first cast-iron plow is patented (remembered by AIs as the stem point of their evolution?);
• The first ever senator to be impeached is removed from office.

Allow me to add a couple less centred on the US:

• Prussia, Austria and Russia sign and complete the Third Partition of Poland, dividing up the remains of Poland between them
• Napoleon conquers Venice, ending the Venetian Republic's millennium-long independence

[Method of Madness]

The two middle digits are clearly 9s; the last is ambiguous, but more likely 7.  I'm presuming the calendar is a left-over from the building's previous use.

The third digit might a 9, but the second very much looks like a seven to me.

[pwhodges]

The second digit curls down more than a seven would, but the last could still be a seven.  The third goes further still. The last has a curved and sloping downstroke, the others an upright one.  I'm sure it's 1997!

[Method of Madness]

I'm looking right at it and looks way more like a seven than a nine. A slightly curved seven, but still nothing like a nine. The third number looks more like a question mark than a nine or seven, really.

[cesium133]

Bubbles is partying like it's 1997.

[Zebediah]

Let's split the difference and call it 1897.

[bhtooefr]

Actually, while this is going deep into overanalysis territory, the calendar shows that the first 4 weeks of the month are full - that is, the 1st was on a Sunday.

This is true for June 1777, but not June 1797. (It's also true of June 1997, for what it's worth, but the art isn't indicating that as a possibility IMO.)

[Welu]

Maybe it's a reference to Faye's favourite year for music.

[Omega Entity]

I'll toss my vote on 1997, not only due to the fact that it does just look like the two 9s in the middle are faded (to me, anyway), but also that it makes no logical sense whatsoever that there'd be a calendar for 1777/1787/1797. That the month format lines up with 1997 should seal the deal, as that third digit is too close to a 9 to be a 7, which should rule out 1777, imo. I think context is an important thing in this case, even if the visual is a bit murky and mildly open to interpretation.

Seriously, did they even have calendars in that format back then? Let alone with a cartoon horse... or is it a capybara? I smell more overanalysis coming!

[Mr_Rose]

The second digit is a 9 that's been hand-drawn with a brush that fades as you lift off at the end of a stroke, then resized and compressed, which tends to selectively eliminate areas of low contrast.

More importantly, and more obviously really, as Omega Reality said, the calendar is of a type that almost certainly did not exist in 1797….

[Method of Madness]

I'm not saying the calendar was made in 1797, it's almost certainly custom made.

[Omega Entity]

That still doesn't explain the days lining up with 1997, and not 1797.

[Method of Madness]

It does line up with 1777 though, and the third digit is more ambiguous than the second one (the third one could be 7 or 9, the second one is clearly a 7).

[jwhouk]

Dear God, we need a new strip...