The Islamic Republic of Cathy

To quote the noseless wonder herself, "AACK!" I realize, of course, that Cathy's whole personality -- the simultaneous self-absorption and INSANELY low self esteem -- is meant to be off-putting. Isn't it? We aren't supposed to like her or "identify" with her, are we? I like how Cathy is the funnies' representative of a single (until recently) career gal -- diet-obsessed, looks-obsessed, bat shit crazy. That's how all the career gals are, I tell ya!

If you haven't been following, Irving is looking into ways to help out around the house, but everything he offers to do, Cathy shuts him down. In this case, she shuts down his efforts to do the laundry because he may see her clothes size. And I say, "Cathy, you fucking loony toon, what the HELL is wrong with you?"

When someone offers to do a chore for you, you TAKE THEM UP ON THEIR OFFER. Only excuse not to: it is a chore you are particularly OCD about, and you know they won't do it up to your standards. Unacceptable excuse: they MAY find out what size your clothes are.

NOTE TO CATHY: HE KNOWS WHAT YOU LOOK LIKE. Presumably, he even sees you naked. He has two eyes, and you are right there in front of his goofy face. Plus, he's a guy. Cathy -- they have different sizes than we do! OK, he can probably figure out that a 2 is small, but even if your clothes are a 22 . . . he probably would think that is your waist size. That's how men do it! And even if he did know how women's sizes worked, are you to believe that he would know that, say, a 6 was pretty darn good, but a 26 might could use some work? (and no offense meant to the 26s out there. See, I'm a woman for crying out loud, and I'm not even quite sure what size it is that should take me aback).

And let me reiterate: HE SEES YOU EVERY DAY. Gah! OK, so this joke could perhaps be acceptable if Cathy and Irving lived under a Taliban regime. She'd always have that head-to-toe burqa, and so getting a glimpse of her clothes size might be the only way to know her true size. That's assuming a Taliban guy would a) know jack shit about women's clothes sizes and b) volunteer to do the laundry. Duh.

And not to downplay or mock the life of women under that regime; it is absolutely hideous and abhorrent. But! Come on, don't you think Cathy would be happier living under the Taliban? She wouldn't have to worry about her looks, definitely wouldn't have to go through the bathing suit buying trauma, and basically she could never leave the house without Irving. I don't see Irving making it as a Taliban, though.

THESE are the cartoons I need to be protesting. Give me a freaking break, Cathy. Grow up and get a pair.

So Dumb, She Doesn't "Get" B.C.

Oh goodness. Here's one I did not get. At all. I thought and thought over it all day. "Lymping all over the place"? What? What is that even supposed to mean? Something about lymph nodes? Or what? Why is it funny? I even Googled "lymp" and "lymping" to find out if there was something I was missing. Well, I wasn't "missing" anything other than a brain. "Lymping"? It's a pun on Olympics. Oy. So simple, and yet I was tragically, sadly, and futilely looking for something funny. Lymph nodes or the lymphatic system -- now they are not "funny" in the traditional sense of "make you laugh," I'll admit, but if somehow . . . ugh. I don't know.

But, now, I STILL don't get Panels 1 and 2. The Olympic Rings are an international symbol for "cops?" What? Is the joke that the ant is ignorant? I mean, if so, ha ha, but he could have said it was an international symbol for any damn thing: standardized measurements, human rights, the Lymphoma Society. Why did he say "cops"? and why is it funny? Because of the investigative techniques of the anti-doping crew? Because the rings here look vaguely like a chain or handcuffs? Seriously . . . I'm stumped. I think making the "Lymping"/"Olympic" connection has taxed my poor addled brain to the extent of its capacity.

To wit: Dennis and Gina are supposedly drinking hot cocoa, but it looks to poor me like they are holding unlit fuses of dynamite. Or tea bags (heh heh). And while we're at it, the pillows at Margaret's house look like square paramecia.

Ziggy is the Great Satan

HA HA HA!

You know, the version of "life" portrayed in the funnies is very offensive to me. The neighbors who borrow your stuff and never give it back, the men who can't cook, the mean mothers-in-law, the miserly bosses, the cutesy kids burning toast on Mothers' Day, the lasagna-eating cats, the misery of shoveling snow every winter . . . and the bleak, miserable, soul-sucking institution of marriage. It's all very offensive.

I see now that what I should have done was organize marches outside the headquarters of King Features Syndicate. I should have burned Hallmark stores carrying Peanuts cards. I should have chanted "Death to Bil Keane" slogans far and wide, striking fear in the hearts of newspapers nationwide. Soon, they would be bowing to my concerns and refusing to reprint the Family Circus.

Instead I started a blog. It's the difference between West and East writ large. Not that I am in any way equating Dagwood Bumstead to the Prophet Muhhamad. Although . . .

Funny Funnies

It's a bit delayed, but there were at least two comics last week that were actually, honest-to-God funny. Add in Sojourner Truth and the PopTart, and you have a veritable flurry of funny. Or, perhaps they've worn me down. You read these things enough, then think about them, then write about them . . . next thing you know you get a big belly laugh when Billy says "Not Me" broke the cookie jar.

Here we go:



OK, maybe it's not THAT funny, but I am someone who lives for the crankiest, most outlandish letters to the editor. Like the guy who said the Bible tells us not to smoke. Awesome.

"TODAY I AM OFFENDED BY:" Cartoons! Hee hee. My favorite offense on her board? Facts! "Today I am offended by facts."

I am reminded of my latest favorite cranky letter to the editor. The Carolina Panthers had lost the NFC Championship game to the Seattle Seahawks. The headline read "PANTHERS KNOCKED SENSELESS IN SEATTLE." A fairly clever headline given that the Panthers' running back was, quite literally, knocked senseless. He didn't return to the game, and it was a prime factor in the Panthers' loss. Even more "cute" the headline is, of course, a play on the movie title "Sleepless in Seattle." But, a letter writer wrote to complain that the use of "knocked senseless" makes light of domestic abuse, and the very real fact that women are knocked senseless by abusers all the time. I found this very odd because

#1 we're talking about football, a violent sport that uses terminology like blitz, aerial assault, field general.

#2 while I'm sure women are, indeed, "knocked senseless" by abusive partners, other people regularly knocked senseless include football players, boxers, and car accident victims. None of whom thought to complain.

#3 it was a cute headline, with a play on words to one of the chickiest chick flicks of all time. The headline did not read: "Seattle Tops Carolina. Go Knock Out Your Woman's Teeth." THAT, I can see complaining about.

Moving on:


Hee hee hee. It's funny because it's true. You very much want to look interested in the position, and of course you are -- you want the job. But an interview is an acting job as much as anything, and you want to look REALLY interested without, as Ted puts it, giving off an "In the Market for Human Skin" vibe. It's just so true.

Ted wonders in Panel Tow "what to ask," and if I could give this advice to Ted and all other job seekers, don't ask the question, "Oh wait, is she a great big fat person?" if you want to avoid the "In the Market for Human Skin" vibe. Also, of course, "It places the lotion in the basket or it gets the hose again," is always a dead giveaway. Avoid using in an interview whenever possible.

A Family Circus Classic

Many thanks to abhor, who pointed out that the Houston Chronicle has now posted this:


Yippee! It is the Family Circus from two Sundays ago, and it's just as absurd and inscrutable as it was 10 days ago..

OK, Barfy and Sam are running through the front door (presumably). They are at full speed, as you can tell from the streaking jets of speed behind them, and . . . little puffs of smoke. Now, you could wonder whether these are just dogs having fun, or if they are running for their life, out of fear. But, you see the little sweat beads, so you know it's fear. What could they be so frightened of?

Jeffy on a tricycle! Ba dum dum. I THINK that's the joke -- that they are frightened of Jeffy on the tricycle. He, too, is riding through the front door with streaking jets of speed and little puffs of smoke. He is blissfully happy, so no sweat beads for him.

Barfy and Sam are now safely on the furniture. I think they look sort of surprised. Did they not know what was chasing them? Did they not expect him to come in the front door?

They live in a house with 4 kids, have they never seen a tricycle before? Was Jeffy cruelly chasing them? He seems oblivious to their presence and seems like he plans to keep right on riding.

Aren't dogs faster than little boys on tricycles? What the HELL is going on here? I mean, it's not really a joke, and I can't even call it a cute observation, because . . . well, what is going on? I don't know? Is Dolly somehow behind it all? Why do they call their dog Barfy? I've never seen him throw up.

And, hey, dogs don't sweat, right?

I think this would be funnier if in Panel 2, Jeffy came in riding a monster chopper. Like this. Rock on, Jeffy.

The One Where Beetle Bailey Steals from Friends

Hey, do you know who else went to get a tattoo, but freaked out at the last minute, and only got a blue dot? Why, none other than Ms. Phoebe Buffay, of Friends fame. From the transcript:

Phoebe: Wanna see mine, wanna see mine?
Monica: Yes.
Rachel: What? You didn’t get one.
Phoebe: OK, well then what is this? [shows her bare shoulder]
Richard: What’re we looking at? That blue freckle?
Phoebe: OK, that’s my tattoo.
Rachel: That is not a tattoo, that is a nothing. I finally got her back in the chair, bairly touched her with a needle, she jumped up screaming, and that was it.
Phoebe: OK, hi. For your information this is exactly what I wanted. This is a tattoo of the earth as seen from a great distance. It’s the way my mother sees me from heaven.
Rachel: Oh, what a load of crap. That is a dot. Your mother is up in heaven going, ‘Where the hell is my lily, you wuss?’

Oddly, it was the same joke, only much funnier on Friends than it was in Beetle Bailey. Poor Lt. Fuzz. Even when he does something ridiculous, he's not even the funniest person to do the exact same thing. Guess he needs to get back to paperclip monitoring (ever notice that most of the time Lt. Fuzz has a report for the General, it's about paperclips?).

Sojourner Truth ate the last PopTart!

Every so often, there is a comic panel so funny in and of itself, that it deserves to be celebrated. More often than not, these panels are unintentionally funny, and almost always are more funny than the strip as a whole. See this example (scroll to the end of the post). So, imagine my surprise yesterday, when there was an awesomely funny panel, which also happened to be the punch line of the strip. Brilliant!


HEE HEE HEE. I have been sort of saying this to myself off and on since yesterday. It's very funny.

Amazingly, this is nothing more than the "siblings fight over stuff" joke we see all the time in Hi & Lois or Family Circus, BUT: since Sunny has been going around imitating (of all people) Sojourner Truth . . . it makes it funny!

And it's even a little bit funnier, because Sunny's Sojourner doppelgangering isn't going so far as to not take the last over-processed, highly sugared, American convenience breakfast food. And that's just not something the real Sojourner Truth would ever do. Or at least, that's what I gather. The whole point of this Jump Start Sojourner Truth foray is that we don't know enough about Sojourner. Maybe she WOULD eat the last PopTart.

Heh heh. "Sojourner Truth ate the last PopTart!" He, he, he. It's pretty funny.

Comics Mash Up 2/9

Ho ho ho! See, it is inevitable that Hagar is so full of aches and pains. That is just BIOLOGY'S way of telling him that he shouldn't be such a bloodthirsty, hard drinking, hard living, overweight Viking. HA HA HA! The Viking lifestyle is not a healthy lifestyle! Veranda's shame upset over knowing this answer in Panel 3 makes it EVEN FUNNIER! HA HA HA! Vikings aren't healthy!

OK, so it's not that funny.

Do you want to know what Sunny and Joe were really studying? Sojourner Truth. It's Black History Month, see, so that means the more multicultural strips, or at least the THREE that appear in my paper, will be educating us about Black History . . . which means Sojourner Truth in Jump Start and . . . Shaquille O'Neal in Curtis. Aw yeah. The Big Abolitionist and the Big Aristotle right there in the funny pages.

Curious to know how Dr. Zook answered Hagar? Well, the cause of his problems wasn't really biology, it was that Hagar is "too competitive." See, Hagar had arrows sticking out of his back and was surrounded by sacks of loot. Ha ha - a too competitive Viking. Dr. Zook is such a freaking quack.

Finally, I am sure you are interested in what the hell Veranda was going on about biology for. Seems she flunked her bio midterm in part because she thought boneless chicken was an invertebrate. Ah, a bimbo joke, and as far as the comics go . . . it's not a particularly bad one. Good job, Kudzu!

Help Please

Today's Family Circus was just awful. I didn't even get it, and now I can't find it online. Please, if anyone knows where I can go grab the image, let me know. I tried all my favorites: Houston Chronicle, Seattle Times, Washington Post . . . The Houston Chronicle does carry F.C., but not today's. Their most recent one was yesterday's, where Dolly asks if P.J. is named after his pajamas or vice versa. Yuk, yuk, yuk. . . but at least I get it. Have they never made the P.J-pajama pun after all these years??? Or, are they just recycling?

Well, today's featured Jeffy blissfully riding his tricycle through the front door, chasing the family pets. That is it. Really, really, really. That was the strip. I wish I could show you. I DO NOT GET IT.

Speaking of not getting it, here is yesterday's Drabble:

That took me about five read-throughs to get the dating-intimiDATING pun. And maybe also a pun on intimate? I don't know.

And while I'm on the subject of comics I hate, today's B.C. was typical:


Yep, the only reason to be looking for life elsewhere in the universe, is because "we need help from someone." Read another way, "God obviously isn't doing the job for us here, so I am searching for alien lifeforms to fill the void. I am a scientist/non-believer, and, hey . . . your outfit looks FABULOUS! Have you seen BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN -- I loved it!" Of course, the scientist IS going to church, and man's natural curiosity about the world is part of his soul, right? But, whatever, Mr. Hart.

Let me know if anyone knows where to find a digital image of today's Family Circus. It really is too "good" not to post.