2014-11-29
Explanation
The Joke
A boss announces to employees: "We are announcing that henceforth Fridays will be causal." An employee asks, "Don't you mean casual?" The boss clarifies: "No. On Fridays, effects will follow from cause in a logical, clockwork manner." When asked about the other days, the implication is that causality does not normally apply.
The "LATER" panel shows the aftermath on a non-Friday: reality has broken down into chaos, with bizarre physics-defying events happening (strange distortions, impossible objects), and an employee sighs, "God I hate Mondays."
The Humor
The entire comic hinges on the one-letter difference between "casual" (as in "Casual Friday," a workplace tradition of relaxed dress codes) and "causal" (relating to causality -- the principle that every effect has a cause). By taking the typo literally, the comic creates a world where the laws of physics only apply on Fridays, and the rest of the week is governed by pure chaos.
The final panel's "God I hate Mondays" is a reference to the classic Garfield catchphrase, but here it carries far more weight -- Mondays are not just boring or unpleasant, they are days when the fundamental laws of the universe do not apply. The comic satirizes both mundane office culture (where a one-word memo can reshape everyone's week) and the taken-for-granted nature of causality itself.
References
- Casual Friday: A Western workplace tradition where employees are allowed to dress less formally on Fridays.
- Causality: The philosophical and physical principle that every effect is preceded by a cause. In physics, causality is a fundamental assumption underlying all scientific laws.
- "I hate Mondays": A catchphrase associated with Garfield, the comic strip cat created by Jim Davis.