Betty by Gary Delainey and Gerry Rasmussen for January 21, 2021

A wastrel in training.

He must want an OLED TV to hook it up to, a premium surround sound system, and a 4 TB SSD. Even still, I don’t think that would equal a house full of appliances.

How old is he? I ask because at a certain point in life you can get a part-time job and earn money for these things. I recall my older sister holding down a couple of jobs during her teen years and she was able to afford things without asking our parents. Of course, this was in the 80’s so it was less tech and more fashion and music though she did get herself her own phone line and tv set in her bedroom. I was 7 years her junior so that blew my little mind!!

A new large appliance should last for decades. I new computer system will last for days.

Mom could just take the computer away. Problem solved. When he can afford his own stuff he can get what he wants. Gaming is way out of hand.

Want prime gaming years? Go outside and play.

This is pretty fascinating, because you don’t normally see this tackled in a comic strip. Consoles (NES, Genesis, PlayStation, etc.) were once thought by PC-fans to be soon-obsolete because PCs were “so much better” and getting cheaper… and then suddenly “Gaming PCs” rocketed up in price and became well outside the bounds of a normal person who just wanted to casually game. And so consoles are still big and only a subsection has the super-powered PCs.

This does reminds me of Junior wanting a DreamCast (actually called that in the strip), which marked it to be around 2001 or so.

I like that Betty is giving him perspective on what his gaming system would cost. Kids don’t know those things innately.

I was looking for a new PC with a blu ray drive; seems like only the $5,000 gaming systems have them.

Maybe he could use it to mine Bitcoin as well, thus negating at least some of the cost…

I’m not sure that Junior is getting the right message is based in making the comparison of what Betty could get for herself, vs. what Betty could get for Junior. It frames as an “I’m bigger than you so you can’t have what you want” – which, I hope, isn’t the point she is trying to make.

We found our that a fridge is only expected to work for about eight years! They used to last for 20!

Depends on which side of the controller you’re on.

Years ago, when my son was about ten, he told me that “we” needed a new X-Box. I smiled and told him that he “needed” air, water, and food. Clothing and shelter are optional depending on a families resources, referencing living conditions in certain parts of the world. To his credit, he saved his money for a year and bought his own. :-)

all I can say is that must be one heck of a system..