I think 42 is closer to Tennessee’s shape. It’s just stretched out a bit, probably to fit in East Indiana. I don’t see a good North Carolina. 50’s western side is good and 51’s south-eastern side is good. 50 does have the Outer Banks and the Pamlico Sound, though.
As far back as the 80s, I’ve seen the meme going around that #7 isn’t a real place. Do we have any dopers claiming to be from there?
Supposedly, there’s a town called Moscow there. Really? I once read a a story in which a young protagonist from California was preparing to go to college in Moscow, and being away from home for the first time, etc. The writer never actually named the college, just assumed the reader would know? I’d been absolutely sure they meant he was going to Russia, but why was there nothing else in the story about everything else that an underage kid would need to be doing to get ready to spend their first semester abroad?
I’m in #4 and I can confirm, #7 isn’t actually real. Once you get about 50 miles east of Portland, there’s nothing.
Well, 25 is pretty close to real Nebraska in shape (the odd southeasterly hook in the Missouri River has been transplanted to 24, but other than that the shape is correct). And there has to be a Kansas between Nebraska and Oklahoma, so 26 has to be real Kansas (with tweaked borders). So the fake state in the central column of Plains states has to be one of the Dakotas above Nebraska. 24 has the most unrealistic border of the bunch, so that has to be the fake Dakota.)
Because Aunt Alice would only communicate the clue to Uncle Bob.
Another subtle dig at Brian Jacques, perhaps?
If Neal Stephenson had written Redwall, he’d have consulted with a cryptography expert to develop a low-tech but (ostensibly) secure cryptosystem that uses tools available within their universe.
And he’d have used about 600 pages to describe the system before moving on to the plot.
That’s a total exaggeration. At least 200 of those pages would have been describing the optimal way to eat Cap’n Crunch cereal.
xkcd now has a What If? YouTube channel:
Haven’t watched any yet, but I strongly suspect the people on this thread will be interested.
There’s only 3 videos so far, but they’re interesting enough, in the typical xkcd way.
I know about half of those titles, but IMO Randall got those right. Now I need to go listen to the rest and see how he did on them too.
most definatally…
So I thought he was wide of the mark here and missed a trick. It’s not obvious the object of the singers affections hates the singer of Creep, it’s only obvious that the singer hates himself. The diagram needs a third “Do I like me” dimension 
Tough to draw though, even for Randall. Maybe that was just not a good choice of song for his plot.
“She’s running out the door.” Doesn’t sound like she likes him much to me.
I can think of two songs called “Creep.” One by Radiohead and the other by Stone Temple Pilots.
In the STP song, she definitely hates the singer.
I think she’s really neat,
Then she tells me I’m a creep
The Benthic Santas really only had that one good album.