1424: "En Garde"

[philip1201]

'Touch!' 'Nope, I sighed and stared at you with resignation, so I regained emotional right-of-way.'


I hope I did this correctly...

Reminds me of Diode.

[Eternal Density]

Emotional right-of-way? I don't know what that means.

[Envelope Generator]

Without the emotionality it's a fencing term. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/right_of_way#English

[Eternal Density]

Without the emotionality it's a fencing term. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/right_of_way#English

And with the emotionality, I'm lost.

[Envelope Generator]

Without the emotionality it's a fencing term. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/right_of_way#English

And with the emotionality, I'm lost.

And that is why

[MostCynical]

I found this:

http://books.google.com.au/books?id=cKL ... ay&f=false

it doesn't help.

[Patrik3]

This comic feels really similar to the last one - apart from with the extra pun of "en garde". The middle panel is someone responding to a common question which actually sometimes causes awkwardness/tension...

[speising]

'Touch!' ? isn't it touché, normally? he started out in proper french.

[The Moomin]

"What are you thinking?"
"You fight like a dairy farmer."

[Soup]

'Touch!' ? isn't it touché, normally? he started out in proper french.

"Touch" is the term for a hit in fencing.

[orthogon]

This comic feels really similar to the last one - apart from with the extra pun of "en garde". The middle panel is someone responding to a common question which actually sometimes causes awkwardness/tension...

The distance in relationship space between "What do you do in your spare time?" and "What are you thinking?" is quite large, though.

Having said that, there's another sense of "What are you thinking?" that could be used between colleagues, acquaintances etc. In this sense, it means something like "you clearly have an idea about how to proceed in solving this problem: please explain", and the expected answer would be something like "We could expose an HTTP API", "Maybe we can run the cable up the outside of the building" or "the short might be somewhere on the lower PCB". Answering "I really wish I'd asked that girl out in 1997", "You're beautiful" or "I've wasted my life" would indeed cause awkwardness and/or tension.

[cellocgw]

"What are you thinking?"
"You fight like a dairy farmer."

Yeah, well, you walk like an Egyptian!

(ok, that was beyond off-topic)

[AEB]

'Touch!' ? isn't it touché, normally? he started out in proper french.

"Touch" is the term for a hit in fencing.

In English. But if you say "en guarde... alle" you should continue with French term "touché". If you start with "Ready... Fence" then it would be "Touch". So speising is correct.

I always look for when my opponent is a little less guarded, that's the best time to score a touch. Or when they attempt to guard a feint, that's a good time too.

[O-Deka-K]

"What are you thinking?"
"You fight like a dairy farmer."

"How appropriate. You fight like a cow."

[Quicksilver]

what a coincidence, I'm making a flash animation fencing scene.

[Bounty]

Without the emotionality it's a fencing term. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/right_of_way#English

And with the emotionality, I'm lost.

In fencing, you're trying to 'wound' one another by poking them with a sharpened stick. When, in the sport version, you wound your opponent, the judge calls out "Touch". But, you are only allowed to score a point if you held 'Right of Way' when you made your strike.

The characters are engaging in an emotional confrontation. The final frame's closing line of "No Way. I've been hurt before." Would normally score an 'emotional wound' on his partner. Hence, the call of "TOUCH!"

But, the opponent replies that the quip did not wound him, because he sighed and stared with resignation. He has, in essence, reclaimed the 'right of way' in the emotional battle. This of course increases the humor of the strained analogy because you need to do more than simply 'deflect' to prevent emotional wounds.

[Xenomortis]

When, in the sport version, you wound your opponent, the judge calls out "Touch".

Not in my experience...

[Coyoty]

So if you don't have the right of way, it's an inappropriate touch?

Maybe framing sexual harassment and abuse as fencing will encourage more people to be on their guard. But then it could encourage more people to consider it a sport.

[scotty2haughty]

Reading this comic made me realize I miss fencing.

Then I thought about timeghost and the fact that I haven't fenced in NEARLY 10 YEARS.

Yet every year I say "this is the year I get back into fencing."

[Jackpot777]

"What are you thinking?"
"You fight like a dairy farmer."

"How appropriate. You fight like a cow."

Your mother was a horse trough wiper.

[fashionguru]

"What are you thinking?"
"You fight like a dairy farmer."

"How appropriate. You fight like a cow."

I've spoken with apes more polite then you.

(I love it when two of my favourite worlds collide!)

[Pfhorrest]

"What are you thinking?"
"You fight like a dairy farmer."

"How appropriate. You fight like a cow."

Your mother was a horse trough wiper.

And your father smelt of elderberries!

Now go away, or I shall taunt you a second timea!

[Plutarch]

When people use 'touché' in conversation, it usually refers to a rejoinder, something like 'OK, you got me back with that one.' Does it have that meaning in fencing? Or can a 'first strike' be called as touché?

[Xenomortis]

When people use 'touché' in conversation, it usually refers to a rejoinder, something like 'OK, you got me back with that one.' Does it have that meaning in fencing? Or can a 'first strike' be called as touché?

Touche, meaning touch, is used by the ref to indicate a scoring hit - both fencers may hit each other at the same time but only one may score (in foil and sabre - with right-of-way rules).
The initial attack may score, so the ref might say "attack (from the left/right), touche".
Of course the attack may fail and the other person might score (e.g. "attack, parry riposte touche" if the receiver parried).

[orthogon]

When people use 'touché' in conversation, it usually refers to a rejoinder, something like 'OK, you got me back with that one.' Does it have that meaning in fencing? Or can a 'first strike' be called as touché?

I agree that it tends to be used in response to a rejoinder, but thinking about it that's probably because the fencing metaphor only really suggests itself in a situation where there's some conversational sparring going on. If it's a "first strike", like "you're late" or "that shirt is hideous", it's more like an unprovoked attack, however fair it might be as a comment. I don't know anything about fencing, but I always assumed that you had "friendly" fencing matches without a ref, and saying "touché" was a sporting way of conceding the point; using it in conversation conveys the same sense of sportspersonship.

@Xenomortis: does the ref actually say "touche" (prn "toosh") or "touché" (prn "tooshay")? The former means "touch" whilst the latter is the past participle, i.e. "touched". And is the English version "touch" actually a shortening of the difficult-to-pronounce "touched"?

[Xenomortis]

@Xenomortis: does the ref actually say "touche" (prn "toosh") or "touché" (prn "tooshay")? The former means "touch" whilst the latter is the past participle, i.e. "touched". And is the English version "touch" actually a shortening of the difficult-to-pronounce "touched"?

The former - tuʃ ("toosh").
Even the French refs - I've never heard touché (tuˈʃe) in a fencing context.
(I don't know what the rule book prescribes; it's in French I seem to remember that the English translation uses translated terms that are infrequently used).

Edit:
Nobody says "touch" / "touched".

[AEB]

I've heard "Toosh" and "Touch"... always present tense.

At least in Foil, the ref also typically describes how the touch arrived. At high level tournaments, this might be in French, but at the salle (club) or at lower level tournaments the explanation is usually in English. Sometimes the ref only gives the last action - so instead of "attack left, perry reposte right, counter-perry reposte left, touch left" he or she might skip to the end and drop the word "perry" (since it's implied by the word reposte; absent the perry, the action would be a counter-attack). That is, the ref might say:

"counter reposte left, toosh"

Hopefully, I'm on the ref's left.

[rmsgrey]

Yeah, my, admittedly entirely second- and third- hand knowledge is that touché was used in "friendly" fencing bouts to acknowledge a hit without the need for third-party adjudication.

[Quey]

Nobody says "touch" / "touched".

I'm offended. I'm not nobody, nor are my friends at my university, local club, nor a couple of directors I met at NCIFL and Tucson nationals... "Touch right". "Attack, parry, riposte, touch." "Halt! This is the attack. Touch!" Lots of people say that.

But thanks for getting me to register, finally.

[Xenomortis]

I was in the process of writing a post clarifying my statement.
But no! You're all nobodies!