Familiar Ground

Why do people get all existential only when they’re bored?

I remember first reading the word existential from Calvin and Hobbes when I was in my early teens.  I recall needing to look up the word in a dictionary and subsequently feeling slightly embarassed that I had to, when this 6 year old kid is using it in casual conversation.  Then I recall wondering whether or not the nature of Hobbes was a comment on existentialism.  Is he real?  Did it matter?

But then transformers came on and I promptly forgot about the question…until today when writing this.