One-Sided

by submission

Image Text: He continued, 'Okay, Bernanke is uncontaminated. Find a crossbow and get him into position behind one of the columns at the Fed entrance. This is gonna get ugly.'

This explanation is written by Harm. Harm is a reader of xkcd and explainxkcd. Harm writes explanations. Harm wrote that sentence mentioning that he writes explanations. Harm didn't write the previous sentence.

This comic pokes fun at the way-too-common occurrance of someone saying "hi" while talking on their phones (and lately headsets) and someone thinking that they are the one being spoken to. It usually only takes a second for the speaker to say that they are on the phone, but occasionally it goes on for a few lines.

The graph shows that the longer the conversation, the less it happen, and that anything after the peak in the graph is awkward (presumably because several lines were spoken). The broken line in the graph symbolizes that it's no longer to scale, and implies that the author's second relationship was an impossibly long awkward conversation that wasn't really with him.

"The Fed" likely refers to the Federal Reserve, which is the central bank of the United States. The way the comic is worded implies something out of a zombie movie (contamination), but being outside the bank implies a robbery is about to take place. Alternate interpretations are welcome.