Grrl Power #431 – Manual censorship
This sort of hyper-vigilance may be the best way to mitigate Sydney for a while. She’s obviously not ever intentionally trying to be hurtful, but her track record of absent mindedly saying the first thing that comes to her mind speaks for itself. Ok, sometimes she is trying to be hurtful, but someone has to actively incur her wrath for that to happen.
Lucas appeared one time before, (and actually I should go back and put Specs sitting next to him) Really as I introduce new Archon regulars characters I should retroactive them into that page. Arc-LIGHT obviously consists of more than a half dozen people, and Arc-SPARQ is more than just Digit and Omar.
Lucas is tooling around on the cruiser equivalent of a Segway. (The little wheel in the back is connected to steps that swivel out.) Something he’s designed and added to over time. I always thought if I was stuck in a wheelchair, I’d want some mobility solution that put me at eye level with everyone else. It doesn’t seem like it’d be too hard to make – basically a wheel high chair. Tipping would be an issue as the center of gravity went up, but I think you could design around it, and also make it so it would fold back down in to regular chair height. A little person doesn’t have the sudden loss of height to adjust to, but being able to converse at eye level is probably something that crosses their minds on occasion, and Lucas’s solution was to pimp out his ride. There’s a iPad on the dash, probably a horn, headlights, drink holder, miscellaneous storage, and a sound system, cause why not?
Now that I look at this page I think I actually made him too short. He’s slightly taller than Sydney here, at least while on his chariot, but really he’d probably shoot for 5′ 8″ – 6′. Also he’s supposed to be about 4′ 4″ but he looks closer to 3′ 6″ or something. Oh well, blame it on perspective and move on I guess.
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Personally I would have liked to see Sydney break her own trope and have her reply be something like
“Oh my gosh it is so good to see another NORMAL person around here. I have about had it with trying to relate to people who fly or teleport, or shoot lightning or catch fire or have Skittles colored skin or hair colors, or are the size of my house. Not to mention the ones who look like they wandered out of a Goth convention. Oh and by the way, nice ride. You can call me Sydney.”
This.
Please do this.
Yes. This. So. much. this. :)
This would have been good.
Especially being tired I’d expect her to be more “Oh hey, someone normal! Nice to meet you!” than spewing out random silliness.
Actually, even for people who don’t have ADHD, being more silly due to sleepiness is normal…Some are more cranky, but most get more silly.
My brother recently told me about an interesting vehicle he saw. He was shopping in a supermarket, and an older lady was doing likewise, in her mobility scooter. Going out to the car-park, he saw a bizarre sight. Her scooter slotted into the back of a motorised chariot. Putting on her helmet, she looked like Boadicea, riding on her chariot.
She then proceeded to ride off down the road in her chariot!
About 15 years ago the man who would go on to invent the Segway created a standing chair called the iBot that would let a person stand up as well as climb stairs. It failed because it was really expensive. Well he wants to start making them again.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7otewMk9pc
Just remember, Sydney was heading off for a nap. If what Lucas has to say to her proves to be even half-way interesting we can write-off the nap idea.
They REALLY should intercept Lucas earlier and escort him through. Sydney aside, they were talking about top secret super hero stuff in the next room (like the fact they have a limited understanding of Halo’s spheres).
Lucas is from Arc-Light. Ie he is a spy with top-secret clearance. He has every right to be where he is.
Lucas does not need an escort. Of all the people on the base who have access to classified information, I am sure he is on the ‘short’ list.
Ba-dum… tiss!
a midget named lucas that looks like george lucas. hm
That’s something I noticed too…
“Wow, you look bigger on TV. Why did you create Jarjar Binks? Is he the REAL Sith Lord, controlling Darth Sidious from behind the scenes?…”
*Poor Lucas doesn’t get the chance to reply to Sydney…*
nah…he don’t have the bloated turkey neck that George Lucas has…looks more like that guy from Mens Warehouse…I gaurantee it!
I must not understand engineering as well as I think I do, because that chair looks like it should be tipping back. Maybe there’s a weight in the front?
Yeah, I’d say more weight hidden up front, additional batteries perhaps. It’s rigged for going over rougher terrain, with those off road tires, so it’s need more torque to get over that kinda stuff, which means a bigger, stronger motor, which means bigger batteries to feed said motor…
What? I used to work on a spaceship basically. Had to know about that kinda thing…
And you never cleaned the restrooms properly.
Always messed up the BLTs.
Kept trying to screw the toaster.
And what you did with the drills was just so disturbing.
Hey I would trust Kryten over the combined skills of Rimmer, Lister and The Cat! Plus, if I remember right, there are two people behind that avatar.* Or were… before it evolved into a velociraptor!
* And two heads are smarter than one. Not to mention all the spare heads, in the storage closet.
Lucas really went all out to customize his ride. Let’s hope he didn’t use the same type of batteries that went into the hoverboard scooters sold last Christmas. He won’t have to paint flames on the side of his cruiser. He will HAVE flames on the side of his cruiser.
It is clearly battery powered, and such batteries are disproportionately heavy. They make good counterweights for vehicles. Electric fork-lift trucks often use their batteries as part of the counterweight that is raised and lowered, to offset the unbalancing that would otherwise occur from a weighty load being lifted.
However you are perfectly correct. The big wheel should be more under Lucas’s centre of gravity. His weight is increased by the leverage created by his height. Whereas the counterweight would have its effect decreased by clearly having to be just barely in front of the centre of gravity, and with no leverage to help.
The small castor wheel would be insufficient to offset the problem. Very cool looking device, but, yea, it does fail engineering scrutiny. Ergo there is only one solution.
A tiny demon, in the shape of a turtle, is holding up a miniature, but very dense, counter-weight continent in the front section.
You sir, win the internet!
Yorp – I love you. You made perfect reference.
Do you prefer your sausages inna bun, or onna stick?
A true connoisseur will only eat rat onna stick!
Catsup is extra…
And that’s cuttin’ ‘is own throat!
Or it’s one of those with a gyroscope that automatically moves the axel under the center of gravity.
Dave,
One question on Peggy’s body art. Do you have to draw it from scratch each time, or do you have it as a 3D overlay that you can paste to a standard wireframe model seen from different angles?
Actually I was thinking the same, especially for more complex ones like Varia has around her arm for example.
Sydney really needs to install that brain-to-mouth filter.
Where’s the fun in that…
Unfortunately, that requires uninstalling the mouth-to-brain filter, which comes as part of Syd’s mandatory ‘under the hood’ hardware. The dangers of fiddling with it include, but are not limited to: loss of limbs, frying of user’s brain through inability to process levels of swearing, getting launched by the tongue, and being stung by capsicum wasps. Installing alternate filter will result in the summoning of Cthulu and obliviation of this planet. You have been warned.
Judging by his expression, I think Lucas wants to hear what she comes up with.
Yeah. By this time, Sydney’s reputation will surely have preceded her throughout the entire ARC organization.
Yeah, the bank robbery video is probably on loop on all the tv’s and monitors in the building.
As a warning and comedy relief.
Hmm… did his hair color change between appearances?
The standup segway needs to be a real thing! (even for us taller people) Somewhere to put down things when you open a door so you don’t need to do as a multi-stage process or try and act like you have a third hand. Probably would also be useful restocking shelves. Mobile mini-latter.
Please forgive me for being reminded of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAjPOpws0eE
Peggy stepped in before it got to that, but that’s still a funny scene… :P
The funny part is that I’m betting Peggy is worried Sydney would comment about his dwarfism, but my money is on her commenting about his resemblance to George Lucas.
…
Oh, who am I kidding, she’d probably manage to fit both into one comment.
R2D2’s cat* lived in my village, here in Bulgaria!**
* Ok, I admit it was the actor who played R2D2, and it was a family cat, rather than just his. But, due to the quirks of modern life, it ended up emigrating with a family that I got to know here.
** Err this was my best attempt at segueing in an anecdote of a short person associated with George Lucas.
Just an historical note, the Segway was derived from a stand-up motorized wheelchair designed to get handicapped people at normal head height for conversations.
So he’s an industrious guy that researches magic?
…And light…
He works for Arc-Light…
I actually went back just to check – Peggy refers to herself as the shortest person in ARC-SWAT.
Sorry, but I thought of this: https://theunrecordedman.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/captain-pike.jpg
Could someone remind me who’s standing next to Peggy? She doesn’t appear to be exceedingly tall, so maybe not a super?
That is Specs, who Sydney was introduced to recently. She is a patron-designed character, who does have super-powers.
Ah. Sure enough, thanks! It kinda seemed like she was taller before, but I think it’s just that Peggy’s taller than Sydney, and I kinda think of them as being the same height. Anyway, thanks again!
Speaking of such custom wheelchairs, I know a company that makes them (the chair can rise or fall between a range of heights that allow the user to have face to face conversations with other people whether they’re seated or standing): https://dragonmobility.com/
When did Peggy get the rainbow sleeve on her right arm?
Peggy has loads of tattoos. It is just that the gun was covering up her right arm in that one. However we have seen that tattoo before.
I prefer the non-camo version, which lets you see all of her tattoos. Not linking it here because of the nature of the picture.
I believe that the “eye level wheelchair” was the original intent behind the creation of what we call the Segway. It was made into a mass market ride-on toy to bring costs down for those who would use the wheel chair version.
Now WHY in the world did I just have the “Diggy Diggy Hole” song pop to mind?
Because, were it not for Peggy’s intervention, Sydney would have been digging a hole for herself.
Mind you the lyrics are:
Sydney is short, but not that short!
All a matter of perspective. To some people, she really could be that short.
because Simon probably has the same brand of Brain-to-Mouth Filter that Sydney has… only his hasn’t been set to ‘zero’, like Sydney’s filter is…
Okay, see, MY comment would be to go off of “Lucas” and mention how he looks like the George of that surname. o3o
Yeah, I was thinking “you look a little short for a stormtrooper” myself…
I just want you to know that I dreamed I had super powers last night, and I’m decently sure it’s your fault.
It was pretty cool though, I had this super power that allowed me to pick one specific power at a time, like flight, super strength, shrinking, etc… but when I first picked them they would be super weak. Like if I picked flight I would only be able to fly at the rate I could walk, and only up to about tree level. It would get stronger over time. If I picked something else and then went back I’d start right back at super weak and have to build up again.
I hereby give you permission to use this if you want to. It’s a cool idea, but I have no idea what I’d ever do with it.
You have cool dreams.
With that power I would pick something versatile, like shapechanging, and stick to it. Unless something insurmountable required changing to a more specific, if weaker, power. There are not too many problems which cannot be solved by a very powerful shapeshifer.
I do have cool dreams sometimes. I do the writerly thing, and I have gotten more than one story idea from a dream I had, often modified to be less bizarre. My brain is a pretty weird place.
I’d probably change powers every day, maybe several times a day. I love variety. Shapeshifting sounds fun, or flying, but I wouldn’t want to have just one of them forever and never get to do or try anything new.
Sounds like that guy from the Legion of Super-heroes: he had pretty much all the powers of Superman, but could only use one at a time (or cheat and have two if he used his ring instead of Flight)
Later that day Lucas walks into the security office with a request.
“I was just looking over the security tape of me meeting the new recruit HALO. I don’t think it has quite the visual effect I am looking for. Do you think you could add some flashy GCI effects for those things orbiting her head and maybe some pictures on the wall of the hallway to fill in some of the boring blank spaces?
Is it just me or does the camo pattern shift between panels? Look at panels 3 and 4 for one comparison (side of Sydney’s right leg), and 6 and 9 for another comparison (front of Sydney’s right leg). The patterns don’t seem to match… or maybe it’s my eyes.
It is made out of the same material used by the character Rorshach in Watchmen. It slowly changes its pattern over time.
+1
You know, that could probably be a good idea for camoflage, so that the “pattern” is even less consistent.
For one aspect of concealment yes. However we are very sensitive to movement. So having a moving pattern could actually draw attention.
Although O.B. Juan indicates that Rorschach’s pattern changes slowly, in the animated versions that I have seen it is still fast enough to be over the threshold where it draws our eyes. Deliberately so, as the effect is meant to be disconcerting, rather than subtle.
Slightly slower than that and the pattern would not stand out, if there was a slight breeze and therefore moving foliage in the area. If there was no movement at all a very slow rate of change would probably have the effect you suggest.
So a camouflage system as you suggest would probably be best designed to have some sensor, to detect ambient movement and alter the rate of shifting to blend in. Given that a static pattern, surrounded by other things moving, can potentially be picked out. Likewise if the camouflage movement was badly out of synch with the background’s.
Good idea, all things considered.
Bad, bad, BAD, Peggy! You lost your weapon in panel 7. That is a serious NO-GO!
She is testing the new ‘inviso-holster’ set up by Arc-Sparc. It is having some bugs that need to be worked out. That is why she is having Specs scan her equipment in panel two. It keeps cutting in and out (like between panels 7 and 9).
Lucas is a pick-pocket?
:-O
All Halflings are thieves.
Kender are not thieves, they just find lost items* and hold on to them until their owner
notices that they are gonecomes back*even if said item was behind ten feet of reinforced steel at the bottom of a shaft surrounded by killer bees with razor sharp teeth
In a game of AD&D that I ran waaaaay back in college, one of our players had a Kender. I saw a button at a convention that I bought and gave him as a gift.
“Anything not nailed down is mine. Anything I can pry loose is not nailed down.”
It just seemed oddly appropriate for a Kender.
Yup, can remember that phrase associated with Kender, or something similar :D
That guy should attach a Voltron lion head to the base of of his ride for because.
I KNEW IT! Lucas had originally intended the Ewoks to be Wookiees, so he could play the role! That explains that whole stupid Ewok *SILENCED*
Will Peggy jump to the occasion whenever Sydney starts to open her mouth?
Hopefully it’ll get to the point that Peggy will turn up at Sydney’s apartment building and her comic shop prompting Sydney to toss her out of both.
The next day Sydney would be court martialed for assulting Peggy,unless Maxima gives her resident sniper a verbal reprimand…???
Peggy must have taken the long shot in the “Sydney Meets Lucas For the First Time” pool, with “Peggy intervenes before Sydney can blurt out anything, stupid or otherwise.”
Pay up, suckers!
BAH! No fair! You know that everyone on the staff has already gotten the down-low on Sydney. Of course, Peggy was probably saving Sydney from another visit under the “Desk of Shame”.
Self-imposed, that is…
Wait a minute… where did Peggy come from? she wasn’t there the last three pages…. New Super Power! to show up when needed?!
Two pages ago Specs was in the meeting room (with a conference table and whiteboard). In the last page, Specs had left the meeting room.
This page is not actually set there, it is in the common room. In panel 2 you will notice Specs and Peggy chatting in front of a couch and table. If you recall that is where we saw Leon playing his game, when Sydney stopped to chat with him, late last night.
You could always make the excuse that his ride has an adjustable height so he can always converse at eye level. This fixes height issues here and later for continuity purposes.
Smart move by Peggy given Sydney’s nerd out moments. Keep up the good work on this series.
I’ll tell ya, I like Peggy a little more every time she shows up.
There is a reason she is my favorite character throughout the series… This just adds to it.
I feel much the same, albeit that Sydney is clearly my favourite, despite her flaws. Peggy though has everything stacked on the good side: Her personality is top notch* ; Peggy has a great, dry, sense of humour; her ethics and morality are solid; she literally has pin-up look; Peggy’s skills are clearly upward of Olympic level; and her bravery is beyond compare.**
I totally agree, every time you see her, she just gets better and better.
* I loved how easily forgiving she was to Sydney for her repeated peg-leg faux pas.
** Peggy is a non-super who has to compete with super-powered colleagues and fight against super-powered opponents. Unlike Math though, her skills do not grant her capabilities better than even typical supers. Nor does she get to strap on powered armour, like the space marines. It is just her and her gun against enemies who could crush her like a grape.
Not to mention loosing her lower leg to a helicopter crash, yet still coming back, to fight on.
To be fair, the amputees i know actually are the first ones to make jokes about their prosthetics. One of the guys at my comic shop has a prosthetic leg, and he almost always plays a peg legged druid-monk in D&D who casts Shillelagh on his leg… and calls his spell ShilleLEG… and since i’m currently in a wheelchair for long distance mobility due to surgery.. he always starts “cripple” fights with me by repeatedly kicking my chair with said leg. Its actually quite fun. especially to see the horrified looks on people’s faces when he screams cripple fight
As for Peggy’s “power level”, I’ve been assuming — without much in the way of supporting evidence, I hasten to add — that in the grand tradition of supers RPGs, she was built with an equivalent (or roughly equivalent) number of points as other named characters. I wouldn’t be surprised to find that her ability as a sniper is literally top 10 in the world, *and* she’s got a global network of contacts and allies, *and* she’s also a world-class driver, world-class pilot, world-class mechanic, and world-class athlete.
This is just my take, and as mentioned, comes from more an RPG sensibility than a comic book sensibility. But in all the games I’ve been in, that guy in the corner who doesn’t seem to be especially powerful? *Keep an eye on him.* He spent those character points *somewhere*.
Heh.
Not all RPG systems work like that. Especially in the super genre. Just think you often have Clark Kent hanging around with Lowis Lane and the dorky guy from their office. And more often than not, they are still there when all hell breaks loose.
Yet they are playable characters. They just need to have achievable goals, for their far more limited capabilities. They certainly are not built on anywhere near the same points as Super Man. Yet every time someone starts waving around a green rock, they become more powerful than him. So all players can have fun.
All dependent on whether some or most of the players are willing to only have regular normal’s around supers. Which is fine for hard-core role players. That is the more challenging situation, so can be more fun. But many groups do indeed want balanced points. And no problems with that.
If you want to see the points Peggy was built with, and any of the other central characters, just go to the cast page. Peggy is a lot lower than the other heroes. But you are right that she is more than just a sniper. She is also a helicopter pilot. However she is only a 4 star (out of 5) sniper. So there is still room for a super who can shoot around corners, due to having supernatural skill.
I’ve always read the listed power level as (if you’ll allow a Championsism) “active points of overt powers”. As Tony Stark likes to point out, take away the suit and he’s still a super-genius billionaire playboy philanthropist — not so much in the way of active-point power, but still oodles of in-game potential, depending on the obstacles the team has to overcome.
Still, though, yes — it looks like Peggy has a lower point total (even accounting for non-power spend) than most of the rest of ArcSWAT. I’m still fully expecting her to single-handedly pull the team’s ass out of the fire at some point.
I have every confidence that she will too. Peggy is a firm favourite of mine. Plus she has been a long-time friend and colleague of the world’s most powerful super hero, fighting by her side in more than one war. Peggy has got to be one of the most capable normal humans in the world.*
It is worth bearing in mind that it was Peggy who drove off Concretia. A villain who is so powerful that no super on the team could beat her. The most they could do is slow her or delay her, by destroying a body. But she then just forms another.
With hindsight we can even deduce how Peggy beat her. By setting up a sniping position well away from the car park, she was using distance and concealment to protect herself. And shooting Concretia each time she formed a new body.
For Concretia to retaliate, she had to move away from the main battle and track down Peggy. Who then destroyed her body with a claymore mine. In comic we only saw her body broken up into rubble, next to Peggy. But the author confirmed how she did it, either in his blog or in reply to a reader question.
This, of course, would not stop Concretia. She could simply form a new body again. But, at this point, she was well outside of Vehemence’s aggro aura. We can assume that she, like most of the other victims of the aura, was just a regular citizen, who had been manipulated by the power.
Without the aura to enrage her, Concretia would suddenly realise that she is attempting to kill a cop/soldier, for no good reason. So clearly fled the scene.
* Math being an exception to the rule, due to having learn secret martial arts techniques which give him skills comparable to super heroes.
Fuck it all, I’m in love with Peggy.
Be careful of what you wish for… Dabbler is around the next corner… and will ‘conveniently’ forget to hear the LAST portion of your sentence, and only hear the first half…
And how is that a bad thing?
A valid question, and indeed it’s relevance is questionable, since I’m pretty sure that’s her entire plan to begin with.
There is a powered wheelchair that can stand up, I don’t think it is mobile when it is standing though. I think it failed due to price. Sorry, I can’t remember it’s name
Picturing more a Bob Vila than anyone really.
While I did think of Star Wars when I saw Lucas, the first thing that came to my mind was “Holy Carp! It’s Davros!”
Peggy, if Calemyr visits Archon, you will need to stand ready.
They make these rather interesting Segway-ish contraptions, wherein a paraplegic doctor essentially straps themselves in and it can actually extend upwards to allow said doctor toperform surgery on his patients. Saw in on Discovery Channel a few years ago and I thought it was the most amazing thing ever. Add some tool arms, light arms, even a few monitors to plug into diagnostic stuff around said patient, you could eventually see a one-man operating theater.
They do make stander mobility devices. My niece has one, and it allows her to be more part of the world around her.
Given George’s resemblance to a certain movie maker, I expected Sidney to more readily make a comment about Star Wars than about height. Though I guess she’s volatile enough that precaution was necessary.
The main thing that keeps popping into my head is “How does someone with only one leg move that fast?”
Modern prosthetics are highly sophisticated. In one Olympic games an attempt was made to block an athlete with prosthetic legs from competing. Due to the sophisticated engineering it was claimed [irony] “to give him an unfair advantage over his able bodied competitors” [/irony].
Sadly Oscar Pistorius is now more famous for having shot his own girlfriend.
Peggy does have a nice selection of prosthetics to choose from, and does not wear a dedicated sprinting one, at work. However you can guarantee that the one she has on at the moment will be optimised for her role as a sniper. Which includes being able to move really fast, in an emergency.
Balanced with the more normal needs a sniper has for stealth and crawling to remain concealed, of course. One final point is that Peggy is only missing the lower part of one, below the knee. As such she retains enough functionality that her role as a sniper is feasible. Certainly in a comic context.
Although I would not presume to make such an assessment for a real world soldier, who had suffered such a loss. Having to clamber over obstacles, whilst under fire, may stretch current capabilities too much. However we can assume that Peggy has been equipped with ‘bleeding edge’ prosthetics. Thus I do not suffer a sense of disbelief at her capabilities.
However I do know that Douglas Bader lost both his legs (one above the knee, the other below), in an era with primitive prosthetics, and yet still went on to become one of the most famous Battle of Britain pilots. This when aircraft were not fly-by-wire and did have leg-operated controls!
FBW aircraft still have ‘leg operated controls’ aka rudder pedals, however the rudder tends not to get a great deal of use in flight, it’s job is to yaw the aircraft around the direction of travel, which isn’t an efficient means of turning (you use the ailerons and horizontal tail for that). The rudder is mostly used during take-off, and during close-in manouevering (aka dogfighting, which you want to avoid) when you do want to point the nose off-axis. Helicopter foot pedals get much more use as they’re used to counter the torque of the main rotor as well as yawing the fuselage, which a helicopter, especially a gunship, gets more use out of than a fixed wing aircraft, but amputees can have gone on to qualify as helicopter pilots as well.
WRT prosthetics, there have been somewhere around 60 amputees who’ve gone on to make return combat tours in Afghanistan, including at least one 82nd Airborne officer who requalified as a paratrooper before deploying.
Duly noted. However the significance is that Spitfire era planes needed a lot of effort to use the rudder, as it was done manually. His muscles were what was turning the aircraft, not a machine being given instructions via the legs.
As regards dogfighting, Douglas Bader’s combat ethos included holding your fire until you were very close, to maximize the chances of getting a kill. Which, of course, meant an experienced foe (if they spotted him) would attempt to evade. Meaning he was a dogfighter first and foremost. And a notable ace at that! So will have needed to use those rudder controls well and often.
Your comments about helicopters do have particular significance for Peggy though. We have only seen her in her sniper role, but she is also a helicopter pilot. So she will face similar challenges to Douglas’s.
Thank you, in particular, for your information on the return tour amputees. They show an inspiring degree of dedication to duty.
Below-knee amputees tend to have a much easier time in regards to walking and running, because they still have the use of the knee to extend the leg. In comparison, above-knee amputees… at least those without cutting-edge prosthetics, like the C-Leg Microprocessor Prosthetic… have to use the hip to swing the entire leg forward. This burns a lot more energy and makes some activities, like climbing stairs, more difficult.
In Peggy’s case, the only real hindrance is if she needed to crawl using her right foot only (that is to say, a very slow crawl, moving just the foot to push herself forward). Fortunately, her left leg is fine for that.
Three-Legged Man
Shel Silverstein
Well now friends you’ll never guess it so I really must confess it
I just met the sweetest woman of my long dismal life.
But a friend of mine said, ‘Buddy, just in case your mind is muddy,
Don’t you know that girl you’re fooling with is Peg-Leg Johnson’s wife.
And that man is big and rough and mean and grim,
And he’ll brain you with his artificial limb.
But next morning bright and early I stole old Peg-Leg’s girlie,
And I also took his wooden leg just to play it safe.
But there weren’t no time for laughter ’cause he started hopping after,
And I keep on running faster but he won’t give up the chase.
And I’m running through the mountain with his bride,
And I got his wooden leg here by my side.
REFRAIN:
I’m a three-legged man with a two-legged woman
Being chased cross country by a one-legged fool.
Though he’s huffing and he’s puffing and he shows no sign of stopping,
I tell you, boys, this life is hard and cruel.
‘Cross the deserts and the valleys and the dark Chicago alleys
‘Cross the mighty Mississippi to the hills of Caroline.
Through the mountains of Montana and the swamps of Louisiana
Everytime that I look back he’s JUST one foot behind.
And I know he must be cold and wet and sick,
But in spite of all his woes he can kick.
I’m a three-legged man &c.
Now he’s ragged and he’s filthy, and I’m feeling mighty guilty
‘Specially in the evenings when I hear him plead and beg.
He says “In spite of all your stealing, friend, I bear you no hard feelings.
You can keep that darned old woman but please give me back my leg.’
‘Cause although the one you meant to take was wooden
In the dark by mistake you took my good’un.”
I’m a three-legged man &c.
Lol.