The Angst-O-Meter: Day 3 or Conclusion

(From Ctrl+Alt+Del. Click for full-sized surprises.)

 

This will be the last Angst-O-Meter, at least for now... I'm about to launch into something big and webcomics posts are about to be curtailed sufficient to force me to stop. Neither of the conditions I set when I started are extant; I just need to save time.

 

Last time, I set the Angst-O-Meter at 62%. Since then:

• Ethan met Shannon, Christian's representative in absentia, and established her competence. I was concerned when Shannon announced her hatred of Christian that, despite the opening this now opened up for Ethan to escape some angst, it also opened up an opportunity for Ethan to find a little love and escape Lilah, offsetting those gains. So far, though, their relationship is purely strategic.
• Meanwhile, Lucas attempted to get back on the dating scene, with disastrous results.
• Ethan, post-strategy session, challenged Christian to find out who could run the store better. This was sort of a big bet on the strip's angst: if Ethan won, the status quo would be restored; if Christian won, Ethan would "work for me for free for the rest of your life." So a lot of the strip's standing was at stake here.
• Lucas managed to recover some semblance of normalcy by getting back in with Kate. So it looks like the strip is managing to bounce back from the dark days of earlier in the summer.

And then came today's strip to shoot the Angst-O-Meter through the roof.

Ethan just lost everything he was counting on on the flop (Shannon won't help even in subtle ways) and Christian just pushed him all-in (trying to get back with Lilah).

(Pardon the poker metaphors. I've just been trying to catch up on WSOP episodes.)

At this point, if Ethan loses this bet, it would send the Angst-O-Meter straight up to 100% and it would be game over anyway. There are only two reasons I'm not sending the Angst-O-Meter well over 75%: Lucas getting back with Kate and the fact that somehow, someway, Ethan has to win this bet for the sanity of the strip.

Yet I wouldn't be surprised if Christian won, given what Buckley has said in the past.

So the Angst-O-Meter, for now, jumps up to 72% on its last edition until at least after the election... and even if I would otherwise feel like picking it up afterwards, I might not under the ground rules I set for it anyway.