That Night Felt Like Months - Television Tropes & Idioms

Webcomic stock phrase lampshading Webcomic Time .

Examples:

Web Comics

Trope Namer: At the end of Chapter 8 of Gunnerkrigg Court, the author notes "That night seemed to go on for months".
Heard every so often in Dominic Deegan; Spark is prone to saying "I feel like I've slept for months!" when he hasn't been part of the action for a while.
Freefall: "I know a day is just 24 hours, but that one felt like it took a year and 37 weeks to get through."
Schlock Mercenary: On an imminent battle, Tagon says that "The waiting is always the hardest part," to which Ennesby replies "Yeah. It'll be over in fifteen seconds, but it'll feel like an entire day," with an Aside Glance (and Aside Grin).
Inverted in this Order Of The Stick, where Thog doesn't quite get the idea.
- Played straight here, here and here
Bob And George: "For having been hanging there for months now, you're awfully cheery." This is from the end of the Mega Man 3 parody storyline, which would presumably take at most a few days of in-comic time. (Presumably. With how much the Fourth Wall got abused, it sometimes seems like the characters are more aware of real time than in-comic time.)
Too Much Information: when a main character who had been in a wheelchair finally got to start walking again, he commented on how it felt like he'd been stuck in it for months, even though (in webcomic time) it had only been a few days.
When Dan And Mabs Furry Adventures returned after a year-long absence (in the middle of a storyline!), Miss Mab used a similar phrase.
That was a long-ass walk! -From a comic with a long name.
This installment of Irregular Webcomic.
Twice in Midnight Macabre. Upon leaving after a stressful visit in the first comic posted after a hiatus, Celia declares "That was the longest tea ever. It feels like we were in that house for seven months!", and Gaspar says in his speech to a group of Midnight Macabre fans "I know the changes seem harsh and sudden ... even if it's felt like three years for me ..."
Dragon Mango, although it doesn't happen in the present time. Breaks the fourth wall, too.
Girly: "My, it seems like so long ago! It felt like it's been two years, six months, and seven days when it's actually been two months and five days!"
Experimental Comic Kotone
NeverNever
Killroy and Tina
Angel Moxie here
Antihero For Hire:
Shadehawk: Sigh, that took altogether too much time. Felt like months.
Nine Planets Without Intelligent Life:
Ben: I feel like I've been on that floor for five months.
MSF High had one of the characters spending the entire arc waiting to use the bathroom. While he stood outside, the comic underwent a hiatus, prompting one of these lines.
Nowhere University has this early on, combines the lampshade hanging with a literal breaking of the Fourth Wall.
Lampshaded with a bit of a Fourth Wall nudge in this Sluggy Freelance strip.
Variation in And Shine Heaven Now, in which a continuity reboot meant that one character's death was retconned. In her first appearance thereafter, she says "It's good to be back," leading another character to observe that she hadn't gone anywhere.
One episode of "vaguely paintball webcomic" The Whiteboard has the group get back from a paintball game, notice the Halloween decorations (which weren't there when they left), and one of them comments, "Wasn't it summer when we left?" Or something like that.
This Tsunami Channel comic, following a hiatus.
Flaky Pastry here.
Ctrl Alt Del here, lampshading both Webcomic Time and Limited Wardrobe into the bargain.
Russell's Teapot. "Don't give me that! It's been like six weeks since the last comic!"
When a ''Roomies!'' story ran through Christmas Break, Danny and Joe notice that they're still studying for finals in January.
The Inexplicable Adventures Of Bob—Bob in 2009, upon being reunited with Ahem for the first time since the first story arc, originally printed in 1993.
- Also Jean, when she punches Voluptua at the end of the strip's ten year hiatus. "That was worth waiting a decade for!"

Live Action TV

The 2nd season opener of How I Met Your Mother started with the kids whining about how dad was dragging the story out, and one said, "It's like you've been telling this story for a year."
The first season of 24 had the Opening Narration of "I am federal agent Jack Bauer, and today is the longest day of my life," presumably because the day in question took about half a year. This was later dropped, perhaps because later seasons were split across days.
- Or perhaps because only one day can be the longest day of your life, and he'd have seven by now.
  - Or because the first series started and ended at midnight, so his day (if he got up at, say, 9am) would have lasted 39 hours. Later series deliberately avoided repeating this.

Western Animation

A similar joke appeared in an episode of Futurama: Leela says "If only we had three or four minutes to formulate a plan," right before a commercial break.

Web Original

Yu-Gi-Oh: Cr@psule Monsters:
Tristan: It feels like we were falling for months. Fifteen months to be exact.
This exchange from Metal Gear Solid: The Abridged Snakes, which also Lampshades the Lampshading:
Snake: God finally! It took forever to find that sniper rifle. In fact, it almost felt like it took seven months.
Otacon: Snake! You can't steal jokes from Little Kuriboh. His fanboys will rape you up teh butt.

Comic Books

From one of the last, long-delayed issues of The Tick: "I dreamed I stopped existing for eight months!"

Anime

Hayate The Combat Butler: "It felt like I did three weeks of work in one day."
- Another sign that this story has messed up fans with the timelines. The anime has one line, the manga another and neither of them seem to have any correlation to real-time. And with the fourth-wall breaking, you can never tell which one is used.

Radio

Adventures In Odyssey: After spending several months overseas, Whit receives an unexpected commission from the Universal Press board that forces him to reschedule his flight. Eugene has trouble believing this.
Eugene: You've been gone for what seems like years to the Middle East! What more could they ask you to do?!

Video Games

Two Telltale series, Sam And Max and Strong Bad's Cool Game For Attractive People have made jokes about events that chronologically happened only hours before, but occurred in the previous episode, released a month earlier. "I can't believe it took us a whole month to drive back from the North Pole!" and "Strong Mad's room should be cleared out in about a month" are among the more obvious examples.
- An egregious example is in Sam And Max Episode 204, Chariots of the Dogs: Max's personality is completely altered due to changing the past, but he claims that "By next month, I should be completely back to normal!"

Real Life