Big Al's Comic Blog

Happy Thanksgiving and news

2006-11-21T16:48:00.000-05:00

Tap, tap, tap . . .Anyone out there?

So, yes, I've almost completely given up on the blogging. I am working from home, taking care of the baby . . . just not enough time. I guess I could find the time to blog, but I've sort of cut reading the comics out of my daily routine. I mean, I really, really dislike them, so why spend the time . . .

However, I couldn't let some momentous news from the News & Observer pass without comment. We are getting Pearls Before Swine!!! Hip, hip, hooray! Maybe I'll find time to read the funnies after all. We're also adding Frazz, and two others . . . I can't remember. My brain don't work so good as it used too.

Anyway, to make room, we are losing Cathy, Hagar the Horrible, Drabble, and The Boondocks. I hate Cathy, Hagar, and Drabble, love PBS, and love the fact that some other strips are getting a chance. I feel personally vindicated. I am also a Boondocks fan, and hate to see it go, but Aaron McGruder has been on an extended hiatus, so . . .

Charles Shultz has also been on an extended hiatus six feet under, but they continue to run Peanuts. Can't win them all, I guess.

Now I get to stay tuned for all the complaints about losing Hagar and Cathy! Can't wait!!!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

But I Didn't Order Any Pizza

2006-10-06T19:57:00.000-04:00

But as I see it, it's really the ONLY possible excuse. What other excuse could there be? Well, OK, "I really like the middle" is another possible excuse, but it's really just the yin to "I don't like the crust's" yang.

And aren't they ancient Vikings? And they can have pizza delivered? Maybe it's not delivery -- maybe it's Digiorno's. Or maybe Helga actually made it -- she is wearing an apron, after all. But, then why did she put it in a box? These ancient Scandinavian cultures baffle me.

And here's some liberal propaganda courtesy of Beetle Bailey:

Then, where would Beetle and company be? That's right! In Camp Swampy, just where they've always been. These guys need to be sent to Iraq. The Army needs all the help it can get (although the Administration says it is doing fine, so maybe I've got it wrong). Anyway, I think the denizens of Camp Swampy could use some thinning out, and Iraq is the place to do it. Who wouldn't make it back? My money's on Zero. Just too dumb. Then again, Lt Fuzz doesn't seem to be brimming with street smarts.

It's Dick Tracy Day!

2006-10-04T12:27:00.000-04:00

In my paper, Shoe, Gil Thorp, and Beetle Bailey are all celebrating Dick's 75th Anniversary! Too bad we don't also get the Dick himself!

Apologies for the sporadic posting . . . the little one sleeps a lot less now that he's more alert and interested in the real world. He does get the comics read to him every day. He seems nonplussed. Good for him -- they really are nothing to get worked up about.

Misc.

2006-09-28T13:33:00.000-04:00

A friend sent me a link to something called the Marmaduke Project. Check it out, because it is most excellent. My favorite part is what the New Yorker would be like if Marmaduke appeared in every cartoon.

Speaking of Marmaduke, is it just me, or is there a hidden message to the American Association of Retired Persons in this strip?

It's a shout-out to the strip's most loyal readers, no doubt.

And, imagine my joy at yesterday's Gil Thorp:

A Gil Thorp character may attend my alma mater?? AWESOME. Just great. I can’t imagine anything I’d like better. Even the return of Brick House would pale in comparison (although I still really, really want Brick to show up again). Actually, I know what I'd like better: If Brick House would go to the Naval Academy! Not in real life -- he'd be eaten alive -- but in Gil Thorp world, it would be nirvana for me. Still, it will be cool if Stormy heads off to Annapolis.

Stormy? Brick? Love the names!

Looney Tunes in Kudzu

2006-09-25T11:35:00.000-04:00

It's been a long time coming, but the News & Observer has finally printed another letter to the editor re: the comics. My guess is that with The Boondocks on hiatus, the paper has gotten fewer letters complaining about the comics. So, yesterday's paper had this letter:

Malpracticing 'Kudzu'
I have enjoyed Doug Marlette's work for years, but am very disappointed in his Sept. 17 "Kudzu" comic. It appears to equate depression with an "addictive personality." While the the disease of depression can co-exist with addictive disease, most persons suffering with depression are not addicts. I consider this irresponsible on the part of Marlette and The N&O to misrepresent an illness that so many Americans battle every day of their lives, and further perpetuate the stigma of mental illness.
Mary Bracey, R.N.
Raleigh

I think it is important to point out that Ms. Bracey is not the one accusing Kudzu of malpractice. That's just the letters editor having a little exaggeration fun. But Ms. Bracey does say that it is “irresponsible” of the artist and the paper to print this mis-information about mental illness. Really? You’d have to be totally off your rocker to get your mental health information from the comics. I mean, you’d have to be a total lunatic. Oh, wait. . . maybe that’s her point!

OK, for all my liberalness and PC-ness, I can’t help poking fun at the mentally ill. Actually, no I can. They definitely deserve our consideration and shouldn’t automatically be lumped in with drug addicts, that’s for sure. But it doesn’t seem to me that this comic is equating depression with addictive personality. It seems to be making the joke that the patient in question is now reliant on drugs to control his depression. And, I do believe I have read somewhere that many of the most effective anti-depressants are addictive. Stopping them can cause severe headaches, exhaustion, and other withdrawal symptoms.

I think that the drug manufacturers would have more of a beef with this strip than mental health advocates would. It seems to be implying that anti-depressants are addictive, NOT that depressed people are drug addicts.

But it’s Kudzu, and I think if you are going to get your mental health education from a comic strip, it shouldn’t be Kudzu. Kudzu is where you should get your religious teachings. For mental health education, I think I'd recommend Cathy.

Symptoms

2006-09-20T12:21:00.000-04:00

Are you surprised that Popeye still runs as a strip? I sure as hell am. We don’t get it here in the Raleigh News & Observer. So, I have absolutely no idea what is going on here. Swee’pea gone? Gone where? Did Bluto take her? Or him? Or . . . who exactly is Swee’pea? Olive Oyl and Popeye’s baby? I have no idea.

I just thought I’d point out that the problem in Panel 3 probably ISN’T that Popeye is so touchy. The problem is more likely that Popeye is succumbing to the devastating effects of E Coli O157:H7. I think I heard on the news that some of the signs of infection include a sweaty brow, stars and spirals circling your head, and shaking feet. Also, Popeye’s hat fell off, but he kept that pipe clamped tightly in his maw. Way to go Popeye!

Mold, Pac-Man, and Cathy's Purse Mom

2006-09-19T10:02:00.000-04:00

First of all, thanks to everyone who wrote in to explain the "green plate" B.C. joke to me. I agree: it is a "joke" about mold! Aha! But, I do want to say something in my defense: when food gets old, the food itself turns green and moldy, but the plate usually stays the same color. I just want to point out that that is probably why I didn't "get" the "joke" right away. That, and 3 weeks with no more than 3 hours consecutive sleep.

But! Last night I had a good long 3 and a half hour sleep, so found great humor in one of today's comics. Normally, this is a site for complaining and "I don't get it," but I would like to praise today's Bizzaro, which struck me as very, very funny:

Lest you think I've gone soft, I do want to complain about Sunday's Cathy:

Given Elektra’s presence in panel 3, you are tricked into thinking Cathy is going to carry her dog around in her purse a la Paris Hilton et al. I guess this wouldn’t make any sense from the joke-telling standpoint, because why give away your punch line so early?

Instead, we are given the old switcheroo, and find out in the last panel that Cathy is really going to carry her mother around in her purse. The switcheroo is a typical Cathy joke. You will think she and Irving are talking about having children, but no – HA HA – they are really discussing adding more electronic gadgets to their household! Or, you will think Cathy is talking about going on a new weight loss program, but no – HA HA – she is going to get a smaller purse!! HA HA HA. So, we shouldn’t be surprised at the old switcheroo here.

But, while having the “reveal” be that she is going to carry her dog around in the purse wouldn’t make sense from a joke-telling standpoint, carrying her mother around in her purse doesn’t make sense from a sense-making standpoint. Stated a less roundabout way: It makes no sense. No offense to my mother, or mothers worldwide, but why would you want to carry her around with you everywhere? A) she would get heavy and B) what would you do with her all the time? Would you take her in the bathroom stall with you? And, come to think of it, as much as you probably wouldn’t want to carry your mother around with you everywhere you went, why would SHE want to go everywhere with YOU? Does she not have her own life? What is she going to do at Cathy’s work? Will she hang out with Mr. Pinkley and Charlene and look at co-workers' vacation photos? Help Cathy sort through her in box?

So, I guess this is a metaphor (or simile? Whichever one doesn’t take “like” or “as”): Cathy just likes the thought of her mother to be with her wherever she goes -- her words of wisdom, her slight nags, her joy at spending time with her daughter. Good for Cathy and good for Cathy’s mom. But, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Cathy has the lowest self esteem of anyone in the comics. Are we sure her parents did such a great job raising her?

Speaking of mothers, time to go tend to my little one. If he carried a purse, it might make sense for him to carry me around in it. He does seem to need me A LOT. Just like Cathy and her mom! But for a slight age difference in Cathy and my three-week-old. Also, he doesn't carry a purse because #1 that would be gay, and #2 he is too little to carry anything.

How Green was My Valley

2006-09-16T11:42:00.000-04:00

Today is a milestone day! The News & Observer comics were in color! Their section (on Saturday's it's "Home and Garden") was tabloid-style, and they were on the back 3 pages -- teeny, teeny tiny, but in color! Even so, it didn't help in my understanding of B.C.:

Yes, that's black and white, but, trust me, the color doesn't add to the "joke." Or maybe it does. The thing is, I don't know what the joke is. I am sleep-deprived, so, please, if you do get it, don't feel bashful. Feel free to explain it to me.

The "Green Plate" is a "Blue Plate" that doesn't move fast enough. Yes, I know about a "blue plate special," but what's the story with green not moving fast enough? Is green slower than blue? Is this about wavelength? Visible blue light has a wavelength of about 475 nm, while visible green light has a wavelength of about 510 nm. Hmmmmm . . .

Or is this a poke at environmentalists, who are typically labeled "green" activists? Or does it have to do with money? Or vegetables? Gah! I don't get it! If you get more than 3 hours of sleep a night, does that help? You know what baseball players (used to) take to get them "up" for their games? Greenies! (aka amphetamines!). Just sayin'.

Gag Me with a Spoon

2006-09-12T14:19:00.000-04:00

I no longer hide my secret love for Angry Jeffy. Angry Jeffy is reason enough to read The Family Circus. Poor Jeffy, really he has all the reason in the world to be angry. Think of his place in the family: he's not the baby, not the oldest, not the only girl. He's just plain Jeffy. And, he's the only one with curly hair. Since neither Thelma nor Bil has curly hair, that's got to make you wonder just a bit.

Anyway, Angry Billy just doesn't do it for me like Angry Jeffy does:

Still, though, a few points: I can't believe the Keanes have bit on that liberal bugaboo, global warming. Who's writing this strip these days, Al Gore?

More importantly, what sort of nasty slop do they feed those kids? Just recently, Jeffy was eating this nastiness. I'm way too lazy and tired to look for the post, but does anyone else remember when Jeffy was fed the black, shiny hot dog -- the one that looked like it was staring at you? Gross. Why is all Family Circus food black? It is obvious from this very panel, that the colorists do indeed have the ability to use the color red. So, why couldn't Billy's popsicle be a cherry popsicle? Why does it have to be a licorice popsicle? Tar popsicle? Seriously, what kind of food is black? Burned food, I guess, and maybe the Global Warming burned his food, in addition to melting it? Who knows. All I know is that it is grody to the max.

Apropos of nothing:
Q: Name a task that would be difficult enough, even if you weren't busy taking care of a newborn.
A: Collecting a urine sample from your cat. No kidding. This is not easy, and you've got to wonder why it's never featured in Garfield or Mutts.

Family Circus Isn't Funny

2006-09-10T18:57:00.000-04:00

Apparently, motherhood saps some of your brain power. Or, at least, lack of sleep does. Today that was most obvious when I did not get the Sunday Family Circus. I can never find them online, so I will have to describe:

Panel 1: Daddy Keane is driving the car, looking to his right and his mouth is open. It looks a little like he may be singing along with the radio.

Panel 2: DK is still driving, but now looking to his left and seems to be shouting in anger. Looks like a road rage incident.

Panel 3: DK still driving, now shouting angrily to his right and gesticulating with his right hand (no, he's not flipping anyone the bird). It looks like the road rage incident may be escalating.

Panel 4: Still driving, but this time he seems to be happily shouting . . . maybe singing again, or shouting hello to a neighbor (the background shows that he is now in a neighborhood).

Panel 5: Daddy Keane is in the driveway, and opens up the door, letting one of the dogs (Barfy?) out.

So, I didn't understand. Did DK not know the dog was there? What was the joke? My husband had to explain it to me. See, all along he was talking to the dog. That bit of humor gold isn't revealed until the last panel. According to the hubby, "The point is you think he's a weirdo for talking to himself in the car, and then -- HA HA HA -- you find out that all along he has been talking to his dog." I had to ask, "Do you think it's really that weird to see someone talking to themselves in the car?" And the answer, of course, is no. He could be on a hands-free cell phone, singing to the radio, yelling at fellow drivers, etc. People talk to themselves ALL THE TIME in their cars. So, it's not funny.

It's actually just strange. Where was he with the dog? He looks like he is coming home from work. Was it Take Your Dog to Work Day? Why is he so angry with the dog? Did it pee on the back seat? Poop? So many unanswered questions.

One thing I love about the Sunday paper is the Parade insert. I love to read the ridiculous questions people send to Marilyn Vos Savant, Parade genius-in-residence. My favorite today was a question asking her what would happen if an asteroid hit the Earth. Anyway, in today's insert, there was a list of books that had been banned by school libraries. Along with the usual suspects (Huck Finn, To Kill a Mockingbird) there were also some newer entries (i.e., the Harry Potter books - SATAN!). But, most intriguing to me . . . some school, somewhere, has banned a collection of Garfield cartoons! Why? The column said I could go to parade.com to find out more, but unfortunately, that site is down right now. Well, I will wait and wonder, and report back when I find out more.

Katie Couric and the Menace

2006-09-06T17:20:00.000-04:00

So, I watched Katie Couric's debut on the CBS Evening News last night. Not because I'm a huge K.C. fan or really particularly cared what was going on in the world yesterday, but because I guess I am a lemming for media-driven "events." And, you know what? Katie's news interested me. Not because of Katie, but because she (and CBS) are trying different things with the news. Longer segments, interviews, other views. . . I liked it! And, no reports on social security, the Aging Baby Boomers, or prescription drug benefits. Thank you, Katie! Not that these aren't important issues, but we don't have to hear about them EVERY night do we, NBC?

Point? Sometimes a stale genre that is losing audience needs a shake up. And it doesn't have to be a massive shake up. I mean, Katie didn't swallow fire between segments or read the news standing on her head. There were no musical numbers and as far as I could tell, no nudity. Maybe when she's done at CBS, Katie could take on the job as News & Observer comics page editor.

Her first step could be to axe Dennis the Menace, please Katie.

Yes, now that I have a precious little Menace of my own, I realize I am supposed to be more sympathetic. And I will be! I promise I will, Mr. Hank Ketchum. Except for today. You can't ask "what's new?" about Mr. Wilson's attic because I assume he keeps a bunch of old stuff up there . . . like everybody else in the attic-having world. Who puts new stuff in their attic? I guess if you buy new Christmas ornaments, you put them up there, but generally speaking, the whole point of attics is old stuff. Right?

Man, poor Joey. He spends his whole life listening to the Wisdom of Dennis.

Hiatus began . . .

2006-09-02T22:02:00.000-04:00

MONDAY

So, yeah, the hiatus, which was really supposed to begin sometime in mid to late September suddenly arrived on Monday. I haven't read the comics since! But, I did just look at Marvin online.

Awwwwww . . . I think Marvin is the greatest! Isn't he so cute? He's like a little baby T.O., and that is just soooo precious. I hope that my son starts acting like Barry Bonds!

And Jeffy eating this prison slop? I secretly love Angry Jeffy.

What a funny and precious child! All children are God's gifts, especially those witty and big-headed Keene kids.

Motherhood is softening.

Hope and Hiatus

2006-08-27T21:33:00.000-04:00

THAT'S it????? This is the wisdom of the noble savage dispensed with heartfelt serenity?? I mean, not only is the guy a Native American, and therefore filled to the brim with ancient wisdom, but he also wears a Yin/Yang t-shirt, for crying out loud! Wisdom of the North American First Peoples coupled with the ancient teachings of the mystical Far East and we get . . . "Live with hope"????? Wasn't that Bill Clinton's slogan in the '92 campaign?? I mean, didn't James Carville or someone come up with that?? I gotta believe that the Native American father/daughter combo has more to impart to us than that. I will live with hope that this is so.

Now, here is a blog announcement: Sometime in the near future, I will be taking a hiatus of indeterminate length. So, yes, a hiatus of unannounced length to be taken at an unannounced time. You will just all of a sudden notice . . . no posts for a week? What's going on?

Mr. Big Al and I are going to be welcoming a Little Big Al into our family shortly, and as we don't know for sure when the blessed event will occur and how frazzled we'll be in the immediate aftermath . . . blogging will likely be put on hold. Who knows? Maybe I will be so frazzled that I will need to harp on the comics even more. As an outlet for my stress and frustration I will post five times a day. Perhaps motherhood will soften me up a bit, and I will find joy and peace in the crazy antics of Dennis the Menace. Maybe our little guy will remind me so much of Marvin that I become the World's #1 Marvin Fan. Maybe "Big Al's Comic Blog" will be no more, and instead you all can read my thoughts at "Family Circus 4-Eva." Who knows? I certainly don't. Until the time comes, though, I will be here.

Ancient Coaching Secret

2006-08-24T19:02:00.000-04:00

Funky Winkerbean has added these two new folks: a Native American father-daughter duo taking graduation photos at the Grand Canyon in traditional dress. To what end? So that poor, dissatisfied teacher Les can be reminded of his soul sucking job as a high school teacher? So that poor, hairless Lisa can be reminded of her strength sapping chemo treatments? Perhaps. My guess: these two are getting ready to drop some of that noble savage wisdom on good ol' L&L. Maybe a little something of a folk cure? Stay tuned.

Boy, Gil Thorp pulls a switcheroo surprise ending of Sixth Sense proportions on us here! All along, we thought that Coach was using Riya to distract Keri, but in reality, Coach was using Riya to distract Riya. Brilliant psychological tactics! What a coach!

"I see scarred gymnasts. They're everywhere. Walking around like regular people."

Cutting Loose in Sin City

2006-08-22T17:48:00.000-04:00

So, I never pictured the Drabbles as the WholesomeWear demographic, but clearly I was wrong. Her STRAPLESS APRON is IMMODEST! HA HA. He's so concerned that she looks like a "showgirl" that you can see the worry on his face in Panel 3.

But, it does all sort of make sense. Mrs. Drabble, in her sensible shoes and Alice-the-maid house dresses, her gray bun, and her Wilma Flintstone-sized pearls HAS always looked more like kindly, frumpy, elderly Mrs. Wilson than, say, the more sensibly dressed modern mammas like Wanda MacPherson and Andy Fox. She's certainly a lot more dowdy than Mrs. Alice Mitchell (who today looks to be entertaining a friend while wearing her best little black dress), or the Queen of Housewife VA VA VOOM, Mrs. Blondie Bumstead.

It's why for the longest time I assumed Mrs. Drabble was the grandma. Now I see that they are just of the "cover yourself up woman!" school of thought.

P.S. Where do the Mitchells live that their guest brings a coat to the house? It's August.

Office Supplies and Sunscreen

2006-08-17T15:34:00.000-04:00

Have you ever noticed that when Lt Fuzz has something to complain about, or make suggestions about, it is inevitably and invariably paper clips? It is. Why is this? I get the "joke," such that it is, but aren't there other minor details he can focus on from time to time? Staples? Post-its? Detailed procedures for the procuring of copy paper? Why must it always be paper clips???

At least he's not working up a good case of skin cancer, Margaret. I'd think she'd know better considering a) she's a know-it-all and b) she's a redhead, and therefore more susceptible to the dangers of the sun's rays.

Cosmo Fishawk, Meet Mel Gibson

2006-08-14T20:54:00.000-04:00

Woah ho ho . . . a political Shoe! And what do we find? Is Shoe as anti-Semitic as B.C. tends to be? What makes me ask? Well, "foreign aid" = "helping the enemy" = "treason" seems to be the gist here, no? And what country does the U.S. provide the most foreign aid to????

Well, OK, Iraq, and technically, we ARE at war with Iraq. Well, we aren't at war WITH Iraq, but IN Iraq or whatever. Doesn't matter. Traditionally, the largest amount of U.S. foreign aid goes to . . . ISRAEL! And, even now, Israel is second only to Iraq. State Dept. figures here. (page 17)

So, what's the political commentary going on here? That we shouldn't provide aid to Iraq? Is this an anti-war strip? Or is it anti-Semitic, and the artist is hoping we don't realize how much aid we provide to Israel? Or is it a plea for isolationism? I will say that there are some real doozies on that list of aid -- Sudan, for instance. I'm just not entirely sure of the point here. It could be an anti-Peruvian screed . . . Peru's on the list, and you know, that damn Peru and its Shining Path -- crazy, mixed up Maoist leftists. . . yeah, that's the point here. I'm sure of it!

Chutney's One Crazy Ass Bizzotch

2006-08-10T14:21:00.000-04:00

The Curtis-Michelle-Chutney love triangle is tiresome to me. Although is it really a triangle? I could graph it. I think a triangle is typically when two people are in love with the same person, right? Something like this:

I don't if it should be just like that or if it should look more like a carat (^), because while Arthur and Lancelot both love Guinevere, it's not like they are in love with each other. Although there is that father-son type relationship there, complicating manners somewhat. So, the triangle fits. But what we have in the Chutney loves Curtis loves Michelle relationship is this:

Chutney >>>> Curtis >>>> Michelle

Not a triangle at all! It's a line. Yet, still tiresome. By the way, if there IS a triangle going on in this strip, it is diagrammed as such:

Because, you see, Michelle loves herself as much as Curtis does (if not more).

Now, that is an awful lot of diagramming and explaining just to make a real simple observation:

EYIIIIIKES! Chutney has always seemed sort of harmless and sweet. But now she has reached a Gollum-like obsession with Curtissssssss, her precioussssssss . . . Geez, Chutney, chill out. Just because you are named after a South Asian condiment doesn't mean you can go around scaring little boys.

Hagar Needs Two Weenies

2006-08-08T15:48:00.000-04:00

Hagar the Horrible "humor" is based on you recognizing your daily plight in the daily plight of a hard-nosed ancient Viking warrior. So, you've got the harridan/battle axe wife, the cowardly and slightly effeminate personal assistant, the golf-playing quack of a doctor, the government taxmen out for your very last dime . . . you know how it goes. Same as it ever was.

Except today:

Here we have Hagar interrupting his sacking of a castle in order to order 2 dogs with the works . . . from a conveniently (and humorously!) located hot dog cart. And I don't see why it's funny. Is it the anachronism of the hot dog cart? Is it the fact that Hagar is distracted enough by food to ignore the raging battle? Some combination of those two?

It's the same thing that bothers me with B.C. (well, ONE of the things that bothers me with B.C.) In B.C. they write on stone tablets and live in caves, and yet when the BASEBALL team gets INTERVIEWED, the guy uses a MICROPHONE. Question: since it takes place in the olden days, are they traditionalists, or do they use a designated hitter?

What the hell is the point in setting your strip in the past if you are just going to use random things from the present? A hot dog cart? Why not just arm the guys in the castle with Katyusha rockets while you're at it??

Mallard, Mallard, Mallard

2006-08-06T21:02:00.000-04:00

Easily the best part of my exposure to the Wilmington Star-News for the past week was the lack of The Family Circus. Just imagine! No big-headed cutesy kids sayin' the darndest things. How wonderful! But the worst part of my exposure to the Wilmington Star-News? Mallard Fillmore! Yugh.

First, major props to Austin, who actually wrote his paper to complain about Mallard. Read about it here. Even better -- in his letter of July 6, Austin writes "The problem with Mallard Fillmore is by the time he draws the strip and submits it and it’s published, whatever he was writing about has vanished off the political radar. In about three weeks we’ll get the first batch of North Korea missile test 'jokes'." And, here is the Mallard Fillmore of July 24:

Wow, Austin, it's like you have some sort of "in" with the Mallard people. Is there something we need to know?

So, the problem with Mallard (as I see it) is not that it's normally so conservative (although, I'll admit, that's what gets under my skin). The problem is, you have a duck reporting an event, then a commentary on said event. No character development, no plot, no change in the setting, just the same thing day after day after day. Duck, comment, editorializing. But, OK, I would probably just write it off as another lame strip if it didn't offend my liberal sensibilities. So, I think it is doing its job where I am concerned.

The Mallards I got to enjoy over the past week were a series of back to school tips, which essentially pointed out the liberal and nefarious nature of schools today. To wit:

OK, now something I learned in school (maybe because I didn't sleep) is the First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." If this kid ain't disruptin' class by his prayin', no one can tell him otherwise. As I see it, you can pray silently (as would be the case when mistaken for sleeping) before every class, test, meal, whenever. Any teacher who tries to stop you is in the WRONG. The problem we liberals have is with organized, sanctioned prayer. Pray away, students. Although, this guy here is cutting a serious log, so why the teacher might think that is praying is beyond me.

Another reason not to sleep in class is because you won't learn anything. Also, it is disrespectful to an authority figure. Learning and respect. These would seem to be conservative values, no?

Well, I don't have much to say about this one. I think the point is that we liberals are all too sensitive and worry too much about offending people. Probably true. Still, not funny.

Yay, Mallard! Good work! While the other strips were just sort of eye-rolling and dumb, this one actually managed to make me mad! I know for a fact that in Mallard's world, I would be considered a liberal. This despite the fact that I am a married white woman living in the suburbs. Despite the fact that I served in the military, and my husband continues to serve in the reserves. Despite the fact that we are both Christians. And, oh no! We have been allowed to marry each other. Raising kids? Well, stand by. Ugh. We're good people. I know a lot of liberals who are darned good people who make wonderful contributions to society (like, for instance, teaching your kids for low pay). And you know what? I know a lot of good conservative people too. Can't we just all get along? (what a namby pamby pinko liberal thing for me to say).

That's not the point. The point is that mankind's. . . ooops . . . humankind's actions are speeding up and/or slowing down the natural warming and cooling trends. . . Oh, I just don't even have the energy.

Game, set, match: Mallard Fillmore. You have worn me down, you righteous, unfunny duck, you. Thank God I am back to the Raleigh News & Observer. Bring on the cute Keane kids because they are a hell of a lot better than this damn duck!

Vacation Comics Update

2006-08-05T17:54:00.000-04:00

Ahhhh . . . a nice week at the beach, enjoying the comic stylings of the Wilmington Star-News. What goes on in the WS-N comics pages, you ask? Well, there's no Garfield, no Mutts, and no Marmaduke. Do the good folks at the WS-N have something against pets??? Not that any of this is a great loss, but I did leave Garfield on such a high note -- Jon's triumphant pairing with Liz, the vet -- that I wonder what went on in the interim. I see today that Garfield is going to use an acetylene torch to open a can of cat food. HA HA HA! I am too lazy to see what went on all week.

While I did get to read FBOFW daily, I see that the Liz -n- Anthony storyline is on hiatus while we get a week of April's band followed by April-goes-to-the-farm. Snooze. Come on, enquiring minds want to know -- will Liz ditch Mr. Wright in favor of Mr. Milquetoast?

There was no Funky Winkerbean, so I am completely flummoxed at today's hospital scene. What happened here? Food poisoning is my guess. Can anyone confirm for me? I am almost interested enough to go back and catch up on what I missed.

What was the best part of the Wilmington Star-News comics? No Family Circus! In past years, the FC was shoved into a random part of the Classifieds. I looked one day, but didn't see them. HA HA HA! Way to go WS-N! And -- no Peanuts! Thank you, WS-N, for not bowing to the "MUST HAVE PEANUTS" mindset.

The paper did have a daily dose of that horrendous Mallard Fillmore -- in fact, my next post will likely be a ranting, raving, anti-Mallard screed. Plus, the paper had Pluggers, which is a strange strip. I've got to think about Pluggers for awhile.

Hasta La Vista! (for at least a week)

2006-07-27T11:37:00.000-04:00

I leave tomorrow for a week-long beach vacation. Yay! So, let's just take a snapshot of the "State of the Funnies" and I'll check back in a little over a week, and see what's what:

OH my! Elizabeth and Anthony! And he rattles her nerves. If you did not see this coming from the VERY MINUTE Liz decided to leave Mtigiwatsit . . . well, what the HELL is wrong with you??? More to the point, what the HELL is wrong with Liz?? Has she not seen her hot boyfriend the cop, Mr. Wright? Warren the hot helicopter pilot? Anthony?? The divorced, single-dad, milquetoast used car lot accountant with the push broom mustache and 1980s-era glasses? HOTTTT, Liz!

ARGGGH! More power to the powers-that-be behind Blondie if they are going to turn a quick buck on a chain of Dagwood Sandwich Shoppes. But, here we see the "art" "suffering" for the quick buck. Not that I will miss the diner jokes any more than I'd miss ANYTHING that ever happens in this strip. No more jokes about the cook's heart-burn inducing, ultra hot, pungent, and greasy foods? I think I can survive. But, geez, as stated before . . . I have a problem with the strip changing to service the sandwich shop. Hate it, in fact.

We leave Garfield with a major turn of events. A girl ACTUALLY LIKES JON! Jon, who is portrayed as such a loser in love that the only date I've ever seen him on is one with an amnesiac who thinks Jon has gone on space walks. Now, the long-time object of his desire seems to like him. And her name is . . . LIZ!

Lesson: If you appear in the comics, and your name is Liz, you will be attracted to dorks.

Yes! Child abuse storyline upcoming! Funky was getting too uplifting with the tennis-playing and teen-dating storylines. Now can we have some harrowing flashbacks to a childhood spent cowering from a belt-wielding, enraged, drunken father? Please?

So what is it, coach? She "underachieves," but she "has fun" AND is the "hardest worker." So . . . now what exactly is her problem? And what does it have to do with her interest in non-parent-coached sports? Is her underachieving part of a subconscious desire to not out-perform her parents? Well, Coaches Thorp . . . take a lesson from Funky Winkerbean: Beat Keri -- beat her senseless, until she, too, becomes a high school coach.

More Garfield

2006-07-26T18:32:00.000-04:00

So, there are indeed two obviously different women: Liz, the vet Jon has been crushing on for years, and amnesia woman who had gotten up to go to the bathroom. I find it mildly troubling, to say the least, that I can't follow the plot of a week's worth of Garfield without getting confused.

In my own defense, I'd like to point out that I missed this vital strip -- the strip upon which the whole Liz subplot rests:

But honestly? Had I seen this, I would have just assumed (as I did in the strips that appeared after this one) that amnesia chick had just forgotten who her date was. Are we really supposed to recognize Liz?

What's the deal here? A Garfield with a plot? A Garfield that expects us to follow along and remember what happened in previous days? All with an amnesiac playing a central role. Funny.

And . . . whoah: Panel 2 today: Liz really likes Jon? Since when? How? Whuh? Strange things are afoot in Garfield world, people. Strange things . . .

A Quartet

2006-07-25T17:58:00.000-04:00

Hey, what do you know? A Garfield sans Garfield! Never thought it would happen. But, wait . . . doesn't Liz have amnesia? How does she recognize Jon in disguise and remember that his "social calendar was all booked up?" Logical inconsistencies are only acceptable when they improve the whole. This just doesn't make any sense. What's supposed to be funny here? That the guy is sitting right there? That Jon looks so ridiculous? More ridiculous than his normal plaid jacket/polka dot bow tie date ensemble?

Don't worry, Coach, we realize you aren't gay! Although . . . what in the world would make you think Les would ask you to rub sunscreen on the back of his neck? Can't Les easily reach back there himself? Is there any indication that Les can't reach the back of his OWN NECK?? Coach, methinks your imagination is running away with you, and that makes me start to question, just a little bit . . .

Cathy, do us all a favor: if it bothers you so much, why don't you try something a little more flattering and less revealing than that teeny tiny monstrosity? Can I again suggest WholesomeWear?

Riya: you are a gymnast. Scar or not, they'd be staring at you during your routine. That's the point. If you are so worried about it, TRY ANOTHER SPORT! Besides, it's not your scar that bothers me, but your Ken-doll-like lower anatomy.

SWF Seeks Cat Loving Man

2006-07-20T15:41:00.000-04:00

This is actually kind of funny, in a sad kind of way. The "joke" of course, is that Jon continues to take advantage of this poor woman's amnesia, first by getting a date with her, and now, talking about his space mission. HA HA. But, really -- he brought his CAT with him on a DATE. And, Garfield is just sitting there, watching like he's at a tennis match. It's so absurd. So ridiculous. And yet, actually a teeny tiny bit funny.

I wonder if Jim Davis realized this? Or if, well, the strip is called "Garfield," so you can't have a strip without Garfield. It would be like watching an episode of House without Dr. House.

Or a Blondie strip with no Blondie:

Or a Luann with no Luann:

Or a Dilbert with no Dilbert:

Or a Funky Winkerbean with no Funky Winkerbean:

Or a Cathy with no Cathy:

Or a Gil Thorp with no Gil Thorp:

It just can't happen, so Garfield must always appear. And Jon doesn't get to go on a date sans cat. But wouldn't there have been some humor in the maitre'd trying to seat Garfield? In the woman's realization that her date BROUGHT HIS CAT? That could have been some funny stuff. But, no . . . the fact that a cat is in these absurd situations is not Garfield's humor niche. Although maybe it should be, because lame puns, making fun of amnesiacs, and "Beware of Dog" jokes just don't cut the mustard.

Swimsuit Issues

2006-07-17T21:25:00.000-04:00

Oh, ho ho! In Cathy's world, men have body issues, too! Does this strip portend a week of bathing suit issues ahead? I certainly hope not! And please note, despite all of Cathy's agonizing over bathing suit choices, she does choose to sit poolside wrapped in a towel.

However, since it's likely that Cathy's bathing suit issues will NEVER be worked out, may I suggest WholesomeWear swimsuits? Here is an example of one of their "slimming styles" (click the link above for more lovely options available):

No, that's not a joke or a bogus site, as far as I can tell. According to the owner, these suits are designed to focus on the face. She considers her swimsuit wear a ministry for Christian people who love the Lord. More here.

Anyhoo, as I once posited, Cathy might really only be happy in a Taliban-type regime where she was forced to cover up all day long. But, really, I see she may be equally at ease in a Christian fundamentalist society. You men will have to wait. Apparently, WholesomeWear has not come up with a line of modest men's swimwear, sorry to say.

Meanwhile, in Crazy Town . . .

2006-07-16T14:55:00.000-04:00

So, how do comic strips let you know when action is shifting from one location to another? Well, sometimes, they just make the background obvious. So, for instance, if Chip Flagston is in school in Panel 1, there's a blackboard and a teacher's desk and an apple, but if he's home by Panel 3, you see the Flagston's refrigerator, stove, and other home accoutrements. But what if you want to also give a sense of time? For instance, what if two important events are happening simultaneously? Then you use the very handy "Meanwhile . . ." For instance Tony Montoni and Funky Winkerbean are filming the pizza shop's Food Network spot, but MEANWHILE . . . Lisa Moore is praying to the porcelain god after a grueling round of chemo.

Now what if you are the ever-bizarre and inscrutable Gil Thorp? Well, you just sort of put your location and time indicators wherever the hell you damn well please:

Now, I could be wrong, but I don't see any change in time or place between Panels 1 and 2. In each, it looks to me that Keri and Riya are sitting in the park discussing that ho Hayley. But only Panel 2 tells us that the action is taking place "After Practice."

Was Panel 1 taking place "Before Practice?" I don't think so, because it was DURING practice that Hayley made the bitchy remark about the scar. Since I don't think Keri and Riya are seers, I don't think they could discuss the events of practice BEFORE practice.

Was Panel 1 taking place "During Practice?" Again, I don't think so, because they are gymnasts, and although I never was a gymnast myself, I gather that gymnastics practice does not take place sitting on your ass in the park.

So, it is my assertion that Panel 1, like Panel 2 takes place "After Practice." But for some reason, the powers that be at Gil Thorp felt it necessary to clue us in before Panel 2 . . . just a friendly little reminder. While reading Panel 1, they believe we are sufficiently aware of the time and place of this conversation. But, they fear that in shifting our eyes an inch to the right to read Panel 2, we may have forgotten. So, voila! A reminder! My guess is that Panel 3 ALSO takes place "After Practice," for the same reasons as listed above for Panel 1 -- that they can't discuss the events of practice before practice and that gymnastics practice doesn't take place in the backseat of a car . . . despite what the teen boys likely try to tell poor Keri . . . they probably don't try to get Riya to practice gymnastics in the back of the car because of that God awful scar (which I would never even notice -- it just looks like crazy GT art). And how old are these girls supposed to be anyway? If they aren't even high schoolers, well, I will cease and desist with the backseat jokes.

Getting Back into the Swing of Things

2006-07-14T21:21:00.000-04:00

Thank goodness the News & Observer printed more comics snarkiness in today's paper, or I'd be at a loss as to what to post. I haven't read the comics since Monday. My hotel in Boston, oddly enough, delivered the New York Times. So, needless to say, I was totally out of sorts reading today's funnies. Hilary Forth and Goth friend Faye have had a musical "falling out?" Tony's Pizza is being featured in some sort of food network show? Drabble's back is better, and they are now hanging out at a ball game? Dennis spills the beans that Mr. Mitchell isn't a very good golfer? (Gotta watch what you say around the kiddies, eh?). Of course, I could use the magical Internet to look at the comics I missed, but I am too tired and lazy.

So, from today's News & Observer:

Donna, CIO contributor emeritus, writes: "I know I've really got to get a life when I start reading the funnies this closely, but hey -- it's summer.

"Apparently, the family in the Jump Start comic strip has a genius in its midst. In the Saturday strip, the twins are getting their obligatory naked-baby photos taken. When the boy twin objects to this invasion of his privacy, his sister deviously plans to save the snap and show it to his prom date -- in 2018.

"Hello!" observes Donna in that annoying tone popular with today's youth, "it's 2006 right now. If this kid's going to the prom in 2018, he'll be a prodigy, graduating (and dating hot teenage girls) at the tender age of 12. Or do they have prom in sixth grade now?"

Might could.
+++++++++++++++++++
That's one of two ways they age in the comics, Donna. Either a) not at all or b) at an accelerated rate. That's just the way it is.

Shocking!

2006-07-09T20:30:00.000-04:00

First, a little administrative note: This will probably be the last post until Friday at the earliest. As always, I will get to peruse the comics of another great American city; Boston in this case. Now I have to hope that my hotel isn't a USA Today hotel, or else I have to make a special effort to get the local paper.

Here's one that requires some splainin':

OK, now comment one (re: Americans not being shocked by cartoon characters anymore) I GET. I don't AGREE, but I UNDERSTAND. Why don't I agree? Well, it wasn't too, too long ago that newspapers pulled FBOFW strips when Lawrence (Laurence?) came out of the closet. Plus, at least once a month, my paper publishes a letter to the editor where someone is shocked (shocked!) by the Boondocks, by Doonesbury, by Get Fuzzy . . . And when we think about ANIMATED cartoon characters, aren't the Southpark boys whipping up a kerfluffle every other year or so? So, it seems to me that the "American People" CAN be "shocked by cartoon characters."

Now, the thought balloon "after having seen an actual conservative journalist" is what I don't get. I guess Mallard, the conservative journalist in question (or I see those are two different ducks? Or what? The one on the right has a green face.), is supposed to be so shocking (shocking!) to us (more shocking than lesbian superheroes, smart-mouthed suburban black kids, and foul-mouthed suburban white kids) that it shocks the shock right out of our system. Right, that's the joke, right?

So the joke is there is no such thing as a conservative journalist? Because what about Rush Limbaugh? Bill O'Reilly? Tucker Carlson? Do the talking heads not count as "journalists?" That would be fair, I suppose, but it's hard to tell the political leanings of the non-talking heads. Sure, they seem to do a lot of questioning and investigating of the current administration, but that is what journalists do: question those in power.

But maybe the joke is that there is no such thing as a conservative journalist cartoon character? But what about Doonesbury's Chase Talbot III? He's conservative. Gay, but conservative.

So, I'm not really sure what the deal is here.

Rob Wilco: Friend of Dorothy?

2006-07-05T19:58:00.000-04:00

The News & Observer's Check It Out column was back to harping on the comics today. Good thing, because I'm not up to saying anything original about them myself. The crux of today's column: Is Get Fuzzy's Rob gay? Literally gay, not in the 7th-grade "He's so gay" sense.

Column here, and please let me know if the link doesn't work.

I Heart Dilbert

2006-07-03T18:55:00.000-04:00

From late 1999 through mid-2002 I worked at a job where my colleagues and I would read, discuss, and obsess over the Washington Post. This included the front page primarily, but also sports, the wedding section, the crime blotter, the crossword puzzle, and the comics. This is where my daily comics reading passed from mild interest to obsessive compulsion.

One of my favorite pastimes back in the day was to cut out a nonsensical Broom Hilda strip, and label the characters with people from around the office. You often see this with a particularly funny Far Side, or a spot-0n Dilbert skewering of workplace dynamics. Obviously, it makes little sense with a Broom Hilda that didn't make sense in the first place. Visitors to my cubicle would stare at the Broom Hilda. They'd perhaps wonder why my cubemate had been labeled as Nerwin, and the Commander upstairs had been labeled as Gaylord the Vulture. Especially when Broomie, Nerwin, and Gaylord were arguing over who gets around the Enchanted Forest the best. Every so often, a visitor would chuckle, pretending to "get" the joke, and that always made it worth it. Plus, I could decide right away that the visitor was a sycophant, and I wasn't even worth sucking up to!

What brings on all this nostalgia? WELL! We also had a boss who went for runs at lunch. He would shower afterwards, of course, but he would also wear the same running clothes every day for a week. These he would store in a locker in his office. Boy, it could get riiipe! His name? Well, let's just say we had a nickname for him, and here it is:

HA HA HA HA HA!!! See, now, THIS we could have cut out and put up in a cubicle, and it would have made total sense! (FYI, before we figured out where the stink was coming from, we had building services come in and check our vents and air filters for rot and mold!) Ahhhhh . . . excellent. Rarely is there a comic that speaks to me so directly. I mean, yes, when Dagwood goes to Herb's house to get his tools back, OF COURSE. And when Dolly utters yet another malapropism. And, well, OK, when Garfield smashes a spider. But don't those incidents speak to all of us? Stinky Pete? He is like a little Valentine to me and to my former colleagues.

Baseball -- Gil Thorp Style

2006-07-02T17:07:00.000-04:00

Gah! Gil Thorp -- why do you continue to vex and haunt me so?? Let us recap the events of the past week, shall we?

As you may know, New Thayer enters the game against Milford with an unsullied record. No team in the conference has ever run the table, and obviously, Coach Thorp and the gang want to play spoiler to the New Thayer juggernaut. Let's check in during the 6th inning:

A bold move indeed from Coach Thorp! A suicide squeeze to tie the score at 2. Baseball is the game of second guessing, and you wonder if they may have had a bigger inning if Coach had allowed "Big Trey Davis" to swing away. Davis is in an 0-for-the-season slump, so probably a wise move on Coach's part. Will it pay off?

We go to the 7th (which in many high school leagues is the last inning). The tension is palpable:

New Thayer scores a run in the top of the inning to take the lead, 3-2. Can Milford pull off the upset in the bottom of the inning? A single by Hughes and a double by the incomparable Rap Dawg Brent Raptor puts runners on second and third with only one out. A deep fly ball should easily score the tying run, but it looks like Bernal's fly is only hit to medium right. Can Jimmy Hughes tag and score?

A collision at the plate! Complete with bright light and a secret force field around the players! The umpire has yet to make a call, and Brent Raptor rounds third -- the potential winning run! What will the call be? Is Jimmy Hughes the third -- and game ending -- out, or is he the tying run?

HE IS OUTTA THERE!!! Big brother hangs on to the ball after little brother's crushing blow at the plate . .. it's like an anti-League of Their Own.

And, New Thayer's perfect season continues, as they defeat Milford by the final score of 2-1!!!! Now, of course, the score to begin the half inning was 3-2, but as you know, in baseball, when there is a play at the plate to end the game, each team loses a run. Or something. Why did the score change? Why did each team LOSE a run? I do not understand. Were those runs nullified earlier? Is this how New Thayer wins all its games? By some hoodoo voodoo over the scoreboard?

Gah! Gil Thorp -- Gah! And where the HELL is Brick House? You KNOW he'd have the score straight, and since baseball is the sport of Sabermetricians and stat geeks, don't you think Brick could provide some useful insight? Or at least keep the damn score straight!!! GAH! GAH!

The Big C Strikes Back

2006-06-28T17:18:00.000-04:00

Oooh, yippee! Back to the rollicking cancer-return storyline. Enough of those crazy kids hanging out at the mall, hooking up with cheerleaders, etc. Give us what we all turn to the funny pages for -- potential death at the hands of an insidious disease whose cure is as agonizing as the disease itself! Woo hoo!

Seriously, this conflicts me to no end. My biggest objection to Hi & Lois, Hagar, Family Circus, Dennis, et al is . .. well, my BIGGEST objection is that they're never funny, but second only to that is that NOTHING EVER HAPPENS. Nothing happens so actively that their attempts to sell us on the fact that they take place in present day are laughable. And Gah! They're just so PERFECT, and the women so slim, and the kids so gosh-darn cute, and blah blah blah blah!

So, here we have a strip where things DO happen. Where all is not always happiness and light. Where the artist attempts to mine some humor out of the darkest patches of life -- something we should all strive to do. All sounds good, right? And yet it . . . bothers me. There, I said it. This really shouldn't bother me. I should be thankful that SOMEONE is trying something different with this God-awful stuck-in-the-mud medium.

I am not a cancer survivor, nor am I am one-armed pregnant woman raising an Afghan war orphan while my husband fights in Iraq. Maybe the people in these groups really do appreciate seeing their lives portrayed in the funny pages. Lord knows, is there anyone out there who sees Blondie Bumstead and says, "Yep. I know how it is Blondie!"?

For all these reasons, I find it hard to outright criticize the artistic and creative choices being made in Funky Winkerbean, but . . . well, gosh, it just bugs the heck out of me to see such pathos in the funny pages. It's OK on TV, it's OK in the movies, it's OK in novels. Heck, it's even OK in small doses in the funnies -- B.D.'s war storyline in Doonesbury comes to mind immediately. But Funky can be so dark, so pessimistic, so often . . . it's too much for me. I can't explain it, and I guess I shouldn't have to.

Lighten up, Funky!

Rock, Paper, Kung Fu!

2006-06-26T19:12:00.000-04:00

From Friday:

Heeeeeeyyyy . . . MY boss is a dentist and MY boss is going on a "CRUISE TO ALASKA THIS SUMMER." Coincidence??? I think not! And this is why I didn't post over the weekend -- when you think the comics are sending personal messages to you, it's time to take a break.

And from today, Rock, Paper, Scissors, as imagined by the Keanes:

The boys (and particularly Billy) have some Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon-type Rock, Paper, Scissors moves. Seriously, what kind of R,P,S game is this? A Falun Gong version, that's what! Don't let General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, President of the People's Republic of China, and Chairman of the Central Military Commission Hu Jintao find out, he'll shut that shit down post haste.

And now that crazy Dolly thinks she actually needs these items to play the game. HA HA HA ZZZZzzzzzzz

Misc. Comic Musings

2006-06-22T15:12:00.000-04:00

Of course the "Norm Drabble As Incompetent Frozen Yogurt Server" storyline continues! Yippee! Here is the "punchline" (no, you don't need to see the first three panels, the setup is the same as it ever was -- customer requests an order Norm can't provide):

Oh HA HA! It's funnier now that instead of ice cream on his face and body, it's all piled up in a little bitty cup (and looks a little bit like a turd). ARRRGGGH! Oh so not funny. . . FOR THREE CONSECUTIVE DAYS! What, oh what, will happen to poor Norm tomorrow? Will someone ask for sprinkles?

Speaking of continuing storylines and "ARRRGGGH!," the "Dagwood Pimping His Sandwich Shop" storyline continues:

When Ye Olde Dagwood Sandwich Shoppes DO open, will the strip give us some info? A prompt to go visit one of these fine establishments? The longer this continues, the angrier I think it makes me. "Angry" is probably a strong word. It's a strip I already hate, so it's not like it can drop any further in my esteem. Still . . . using the strip to pimp the shop. That's weak, man.

In other news:

So, the high school hi-jinx continue. No pregnant war brides, orphaned Afghan toddlers, or metastasizing breast cancer to deal with. But is this as straightforward as it seems? Is this super hot cheerleader chick Jess all of a sudden hot for Darren? (Darren is his name, right?) Or is she setting him up for a big fall? Stay tuned . . .

A friend wrote to tell me of her creepy experience with For Better or For Worse. I read it in my morning paper. Apparently, she reads it on the website, and today . . . their eyes move! Here is the link (although I'm not sure this link will work after today -- so make sure you click the 6/22 strip if you are checking this). Yeah, so check out panels 3 and 4 -- blinking eyes. Do they always do this in FBOFW?

And, just because:

HA! And I think the best part is the googly-eyed dog (which I am guessing is a doll of some sort) on the monitor! Hey, Doggy, stick your God-damned tongue back in your mouth!

Lots to Say

2006-06-21T23:11:00.000-04:00

A few comments from today's strips, so let's just get right into it, shall we?

Norm Drabble is an idiot. That's the basis of this "joke," and the basis of every Norm-centered strip. Idiots can be funny (cf: Falstaff, Homer Simpson). But this just isn't funny. Those soft-serve ice cream machines are fairly easy to operate. In fact, they need no training to operate, and are often left to customers to use in some of your finer dining establishments -- cafeterias, Western Sizzlin' buffets and the like. So, ooh boy, he's an idiot. Funny, no? I guess the "funny" part of this is the visual of Norm having ice cream all over his face? OK, but it was the EXACT SAME "JOKE" yesterday, and it wasn't all that funny then. To "wit:"

Are we going to have to watch this joke all week?

Next:

But in the winter, it would be OK to scold them? Look, I see the "joke" here: at some point in time Jeffy has been scolded for sticking his tongue out. In his idiot/child brain, he thinks this also applies to the dogs. HA HA HA! But dogs stick their tongues out ALL THE TIME. Not just in the summer. So he's never noticed their tongues out before? Lest you think the "in the summer" bit is necessary to remind us that this strip is timely, and indeed takes place in summer, guess again. The shorts, tank tops, wagging tongues, and last, but not least, broiling-to-the-point-of-vibrating sun clue us in. Take "In the summer" out of the caption here, and you have the same, lame joke. At least make some sense, though, and follow some sort of internal logic. Jeffy sure is pissed at those dogs, though.

And then:

What's the joke here? Are carrots actually bad for the disposal? I put carrots down our disposal all the time and have never had a problem. Maybe the joke is that Alice has carefully chopped those carrots, and now Dennis is shoving her hard work down the drain to a steely death. That must be it. And it's just not funny. Is the sink stopped up? Why is there standing water in the sink? If he's running the disposal, the water should be draining along with the carrots. So, maybe he IS ruining the disposal with carrots?? I just don't know. But, Alice has a lovely shirt-dress with a beautiful print. Perfect for those little household chores like chopping carrots!

And then?:

Hagar has new lettering this week. Compare the lettering on today's strip (bottom) with one from last week (top). The lettering this week has been larger, and less closely spaced. I see that the creative team behind Hagar must have felt "Our comic is getting stale. The same characters doing the same things and making the same lame jokes all the time. How to fix? I've got it! New lettering!" And voila! Vive le difference! NBC execs take note: I know that since the loss of Friends, your primetime ratings have fallen into the toilet. Solution: better fonts on your promos.

Or could it possibly be that the biggest fans of Hagar need/want larger type? That they complained Hagar was getting too difficult to read? No, that couldn't be it.

I Like Big Butts and I Cannot Lie

2006-06-19T21:43:00.000-04:00

Rhymes with Orange will probably never be noted for its artistic skill. But ask Scott Adams if that is necessary for a great strip. I don't know if I'd classify RWO as "great;" in fact, I probably wouldn't. That said, I think it is enjoyable, never cliche-ridden, sometimes groan-worthy, but in a good, Pearls Before Swine kind of way. Still, the quality of the drawing made today's strip funnier than it would have been otherwise:

Aw, yeah, a bubble-butt old white guy! Of course, it's really those padded-butt bike shorts, but what it looks like is some J-Lo quality curves.

Sir Mix-a-Lot needs to be rollin' up here right quick with some immortal words of wisdom: My anaconda don't want none unless you got buns, hon!

Even white boys got to shout: Baby got back!

Happy Father's Day!

2006-06-18T14:11:00.000-04:00

Good day to all you fathers out there. This is another of those holidays that the funnies love to celebrate. Father's and Mother's Days are probably two of the funnies favorites, and my guess is that it's because, like Easter, they ALWAYS fall on a Sunday. Still, in many respects, it was a disappointing comics holiday. There were no hideous tie gifts in the News & Observer, and, just like on Mother's Day, no ruined, breakfast-in-bed-disastered kitchens. Kids today, I tell ya. The ruined kitchen on Mother's and/or Father's Day is an unfunny comic cliche that I count on. You know what it means when you can't count on the cliches? Well, it COULD mean that mothers-in-law are decent, fun people; bosses are understanding; doctors don't like to golf; children aren't cute . . . you get the picture.

Here's a Father's Day rundown (as seen in the Raleigh News & Observer):

FBOFW: April and Elly team up to give John a gym membership and a massage (no, not that kind of massage). So, this is a nice enough gift, a fairly original comics concept, nothing too FBOFW-treacly. Good deal.

Sally Forth: The Forths are sitting around with newspaper hats. No mention of Father's Day at all. Poor, overlooked Ted. This one is pretty funny, as the 4 consecutive panels of Forths in newspaper hats make them look 100% throw-away-the-key nutty.

FunkyWinkerbean: It features Les and Lisa, but no mention of Father's Day. Poor Les. Not to fear, after several weeks of high-school hijinx, it looks like we are back to the fun, fun cancer storyline! No mention of Becky and Wally, and Wally's impending fatherhood. IF he can make it back from Iraq alive! Maybe he won't, and when Lisa kicks it from the cancer return, Les and Becky can hook up.

FoxTrot: Father's Day is never mentioned, but Roger does get to go golfing, so maybe that was his gift. He's a terrible golfer, but we see, for the first time ever, perhaps a hint of where Jason's math geekiness comes from?

Hagar: No mention of Father's Day, but I don't think they had the holiday back in ancient Viking times, did they?

Luann: Luann's over preparation for the holiday leads the dad to say "No gifts necessary." Which was Luann's goal all along. Poor Brad with a stack of gifts. My guess? Brad comes out looking better than Luann in the end. That "your company is good enough," is about as true as "it's the thought that counts."

Cathy: Isn't Cathy's dad a great man? He's taught her songs, stories, jokes, etc. You know, they say a father's relationship with his daughter has a lot to do with her self-esteem, her view of the world, and her relationships with men. So, don't try to pull this "Cathy's dad was great" stunt. HE RAISED CATHY. He must have been one f'd up dad.

Zits: Another one that ignores the holiday. Poor Dr. Duncan.

Blondie: Also ignores the holiday. Poor Dagwood. At least he gets to play ball with Elmo. Elmo must have some really bad father if he has to play catch with Dagwood on Father's Day. Maybe it's Cathy's dad.

Hi & Lois: Ah, the infamous "job jar.' But, it's full of fun things for Hi to do, including GOLF, which we know is a big favorite of all men in the funnies.

Wizard of Id: The King threw his father in the dungeon years ago. Does this surprise us? Do we care? Is it funny? No. No. No.

Jump Start/Baby Blues: Again no mention of the holiday. WHAT THE HECK IS GOING ON? These strips both center around the kids. Gah! And Jump Start has spent the last several weeks building up Marci's relationship with her step-dad. A wasted opportunity.

Non Sequitur: When Baby Blues ignores Father's Day, but Non Sequitur doesn't, that's some weird stuff going on. And, they celebrate Captain Eddie, who is NOT a father, which is the point of their celebration. OK.

Family Circus: Billy filling in today, and it's as lame and stupid as ever. My favorite bit was his drawing of "Ho, Ho!" With this kind of hoe, not this kind -- which would have been so much funnier.

B.C.: Tells us that Father's Day is just "a commercial ploy to sell greeting cards 'n' stuff." No duh.

Dennis the Menace: Mr. Mitchell does get a tie, but he calls it "lovely," so our one great chance for a terrible tie is missed.

Rhymes with Orange: Dad is grilling hot dogs, son is grilling cocktail wieners. Cute.

Pimpin' the Deli Meat

2006-06-15T16:15:00.000-04:00

I did not know that Dagwood's Ye Olde Sandwich Shoppe would stir up such a hornet's nest of controversy and opinions! Let it be known that I had no idea there was to be such a thing. I just thought the strip had gone a little haywire. So, thank you Anonymous #1 for sharing the truth behind the strip. Truth be told: I am not a comics expert, do not keep up with the latest news in comic-stripping and syndication, have no involvement whatsoever. I'm just someone who reads the comics every day and have appointed myself to write this blog. I also sit on the couch and drink coffee almost every day, but haven't felt the urge to do a "Sitting on the Couch Drinking Coffee" blog . . . yet! Stand by, because that sounds like a WINNER!

Temporarily at least, Dean Young has turned his strip into a shill for a chain of sandwich shops. They will convince me to eat at a sandwich shop because it appears in a lame comic strip? I do not like this manipulation one bit! You know, Mattel did the exact same thing to my little brother in 1984. They made this tv show, He Man, which convinced him to go out and buy (well, technically, my parents to go out and buy) He Man action figures. They manipulated him! (Mattel, not my parents.) Of course, in 1984, my little brother was 7. It's 2006, I'm 33, and I do NOT like being manipulated in this way.

I should point out that He Man action figures came two years before the show, so really the show was conceived as a shill for the toys. What we've got here is a long-running (and we all know it's been 75 years thanks to last year's big anniversary hoo-hah) creative enterprise being used (and perhaps repurposed somewhat -- although until he actually starts a shop, I will hold out hope) to shill the product. Yep, it's good, old-fashioned capitalism, but the creative enterprise should come first, any possible commercialism second.

I firmly believe these legacy strips are around for the sole purpose of making money through the sale of greeting cards, mugs, and other tscotchkes. Peanuts greeting cards, Cathy panties (good lord, Ianscot, can this be true??), Dagwood sliced meats, Marmaduke dog toys . . . it's all well and good. If I could make a mint selling Big Al's Comic Blog mousepads I'd be on that like Garfield on a pan of lasagne, like Hagar on a flagon of beer, like Elly Patterson on some words of wisdom, like Gil Thorpe . . . can't stop . . .

See, if Dagwood opens his own sandwich shop, how can we live without strips like these:

I mean, really. He's so freaking lazy at work. And he runs to his boss to get his Internet access back up . . .so he can play poker online. HA HA HA! Can you live without this brand of "Dagwood is a horrid employee" humor? Of course, if Dagwood DOES open a sandwich shop, he can have his own horrid employee, and the tables will be turned! But then we lose the "tech support"/"messing around on the computer at work" aspect . . . and no more Mr. Dithers??? Except as a possible customer? All in the name of a quick buck at a sandwich franchise that's not exactly needed. Boo.

Will Jared Become a Regular Character?

2006-06-13T21:46:00.000-04:00

He's been mentioning this possible future sandwich shop for awhile now, so I think it's time to mention it here, too. What is going on? Will he quit his job with Mr. J.C. Dithers? Will he really open this shop? If so, it would be a sea change in the life of Dagwood Bumstead. Even more importantly, a sea change in the daily enjoyment of comic readers everywhere. Or those that get daily enjoyment from Blondie, whoever they may be (yeah, yeah, all you sick pervs who think 1940s hairstyles on top of a great rack on top of a tiny waist are HOTT!)

If Dagwood does indeed quit his job to open a sandwich shop, does that mean the end of the "Dagwood is lazy/sleeping on the job" jokes? The end of Mr. Dithers threatening to fire him? The end of his lunches at the greasy spoon diner? The end of his carpool? The end of "Dagwood made the carpool late" jokes? The end of Dagwood rushing out the door smack dab into the mailman? (Who has a mailman, Whoops I do beg your pardon, post person, come that early?)

How can this be? How can Blondie function without those staples? Without them, we are left with: Dagwood taking a bath and Elmo interrupting him; Herb borrowing Dagwood's tools and not returning them; Dagwood needing a bite to eat in the middle of the night; Dagwood hovering over a plumber or other repair person; Dagwood and Blondie making witty remarks in front of their TV; Dagwood sharing old Bumstead family stories with Alexander and Cookie . . .

OK, so there are still other "humor" options in the strip, even if Dagwood quits his job to open the sandwich shop. I still think it is an odd choice to make. Blondie already runs a catering outfit, so the "pissy customers/life as a small business owner/member of the service economy" jokes are already covered. So are the food prep jokes. So, what's the point of him opening a sandwich shop? How does this expand the horizons of Blondie? Now if he retired, or became a male nurse, or a high school coach . . . but what's the point of him quitting his job to do THE EXACT SAME THING Blondie already does??

Hate hate and more hate

2006-06-12T19:43:00.000-04:00

Feeling a little uncreative (is that even a word?) lately, but I had time to post, so figured I'd better.

Now THIS is timely! Those politically correct feminazis, wanting us to change everything from "policeman" to "fireman" to "history" (should be herstory, natch). Let's make fun of that trend! Did the P.C. folks go too far? Do womyn sit to pee? Is it still funny? No, it is not.

Besides, isn't the correct term "mail carrier"? I've never heard "postperson" in my life. Yes, "postman" I have heard of, but I think "mailman" is more typical. Does Fred Basset take place in the UK? Seriously . . . I don't follow it at all. Does he always think in such a fancy font?

While we're on the subject of politically correct, here are some "Politically Correct" cartoons. According to the home page, the are "political" and "correct" (i.e., conservative). The one currently on the home page equates hating Bush with hating soldiers. Hey . . . I hate Bush, so I guess I hate soldiers, which is weird because I have a handful of friends in Iraq, and I don't hate any of them. But, I guess actually I do. And I don't hate my husband, and he's in the reserves, but maybe I DO hate him? Thanks for setting me straight, conservative cartoon! Although, technically, I don't "hate" Bush. I've never even met him!

Hey, speaking of hate, poor Cathy has really been bashed in the last few days. The full entries are here, but let's see . . . she's died as the result of an infected face transplant, died providing sexual favors to Mr. Pinkley, been eaten by a shark, had her husband run off with her boss, been pulled from every U.S. newspaper, and. . . grown a nose "and suddenly realizes she stinks." HA! Poor Cathy . . .

Dog Gone Funny? Not Funny. Not True?

2006-06-11T13:20:00.000-04:00

Marc gave the head's up on this yesterday. Since I don't get the Sunday funnies until, well, Sunday . . . I had to wait and see, but here it is! Miriam Murdock of Chapel Hill has sent her dog gone "funny" story to Marmaduke.

I guess it's sort of cute -- not really laugh out loud funny -- and begs the question: who sends these in? And for that matter, how do the powers that be at Marmaduke decide which ones to publish? How many get sent in every week? Is there any sort of verification procedure? How do we know this so-called "Miriam Murdock" actually exists?? I don't have a dog, but I sure as heck could sit here and think up a funnier story ABOUT a dog than this one Miriam submitted.

(Although, probably, according to the judges at Marmaduke, I couldn't. Which reminds me of the time Mr. Big Al and I attempted to make some big bucks from Reader's Digest. They have these columns where readers can send in funny stories and earn up to $300!!! One of the columns is "Humor in Uniform." And the "jokes" or "funny" stories are . . . AWFUL! I mean, this may be where Mort Walker goes when he desperately needs an idea for Beetle Bailey. Well, since the hubby and I have 21 years combined "in uniform," and since we both pride ourselves on our keen wits and sharp senses of humor, we saw dollar signs! Of COURSE we could tell funnier stories than the lame ones Reader's Digest publishes. . . wrong! Although we stuck to purely PG stories . . . not a single one chosen, and every time I read "Humor" in Uniform, I gag a little. "Humor" my ass! Some of them are clearly recycled jokes we've all heard 100 times before. Damn you, Reader's Digest!)

So, no, I won't be attempting to get published in Marmaduke's "Dog Gone Funny," with a fake "funny" story about my fake dog. But, really, how do we know this Miriam is for real? Does she REALLY have a cocker spaniel named Taffy? Did this alleged incident of the "no leash" actually ever happen? When Marmaduke picks your story to publish, do they send people out to verify that the incident ever actually occurred? Do they interview you, your neighbors, potential witnesses? Do they at least require you send a picture of your so-called dog?

I don't trust "Dog Gone Funny." No, not one bit.

Speaking of made up stories, let's hear it: What terrible things do you want to happen to Cathy?

When Awful Things Happen to Awful People

2006-06-09T16:51:00.000-04:00

Like a phoning-it-in comic strip artist, I'm not even going to bother coming up with original material for this post. Instead, a suggestion from Braniff, which I repeat verbatim:

Has anyone posted a Top Ten list of bad things they want to have happen to Cathy? (Such as being bitten by her dog with rabies, finding out that her new husband is having an affair with Charlene, who is HIV-positive, etc.) That could be lots of fun!

And already one entry, from Nick:

Cathy is mauled by her dog [Big Al says: I believe that would be Elektra] and her face is horribly disfigured. She undergoes a face transplant, which includes a NOSE! Unsure what this new organ does, Cathy is unprepared when hay fever season hits. She drips snot all over her new transplant, which becomes infected. The infection spreads to her brain and she dies.

Don't have enough hatred for a cartoon character to wish ill will on her? Well, I do. And if you don't, here are some more observations to help you out:

AACK! Just when I think she can't be any more vain and self-obssessed.

More proof that Irving's never actually seen her naked. I mean, he knows what she's going to look like in that thing, right? Apparently not, because he's never seen her naked. Ah, poor body image and low self esteem, two components of a rockin' sex life.

No wonder, as suggested by Braniff, Irving may have had a little sumthin' sumthin' going on with Charlene.

So go ahead, what's the worst thing that can happen to Cathy? You know you hate her, let's hear it!

It's Satan's Day!

2006-06-06T18:31:00.000-04:00

That's right everyone, it's 6/6/06! Spoooookkky! Do you all think any strip in my paper recognized this event? Well . . . only one did and it is none other than that Christ-centered cartoon ministry, B.C.:

OK, so I've never heard it referred to as "The Devil's Trademark" before. I've heard it called Satan's Mark, The Mark of the Beast, The Number of the Beast, Devil's Mark ... just never "Trademark . . ." as though the Devil had gone out and taken a patent! Ha ha. Which is exactly the joke B.C. is making! So, it's a stretch that they had to use a lame phrase like "The Devil's Trademark" to make this joke work, but . . . it's kind of funny. And the fact that he says "Hell, no!" Ha ha!

Mark it down: 06/06/06 the day I found B.C. moderately funny. If that's not a sign of the devil's work, I don't know what is. Well, Harry Potter -- duh. And homosexuals, of course . . . you knew that (first time readers: I am KIDDING).

Hey, speaking of fighting the devil . . . did you know Pat Robertson can leg press 2,000 pounds??? Yeah, apparently, that breaks the all-time Florida State record by over 500 lbs -- and when the guy at FSU set HIS record, he burst all the capillaries in his eyes!! Read about Pat here and here. Hey, when you are fighting for Jesus Christ . . .Jesus gives you strength. Look out Hugo Chavez!

Shut Your Trap, You Whiny Broad!

2006-06-01T21:07:00.000-04:00

Memorial Day has come and gone, which means that summer is here! Ah, summer . . . it's a time of late afternoon thunderstorms, long days, baseball on the radio, dripping ice cream cones, and, of course:

Cathy buying bathing suits!

So, in case you've avoided Cathy for decades (and, if you have -- SMART MOVE!) here's the joke: Fashionable bathing suits are skimpy and unflattering, especially under the harsh lights of department store fitting rooms. Cathy's annual bathing suit shopping trip shatters her self esteem and makes her question, once again, her body image. Often these results are chalked up to the unfairness of life as a woman. Men don't have to go through this ordeal! If women were in charge, bathing suits would be more flattering!!

No, that's not the explanation of this week's bathing suit jokes. That sums up all Cathy bathing suit jokes, EVER. So, some questions:

Why does Cathy need a new bathing suit EVERY YEAR? We rarely see her at the pool or beach. She doesn't seem to need a new one every year.

Has she not heard of Lands' End? They have a wide selection of suits meant to flatter every body type.

Why does she stick with the skimpiest, trendiest suits? They ARE unflattering to her! Cathy -- stop beating your head against the wall!

Go to LandsEnd.com, and find a suit that flatters you! They have a generous return policy. If you are intent on only wearing the skimpiest suits, then get thee to a gymnasium. Stop your whining and complaining and DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT! Good lord, woman, I am tired of your carping!

Take charge, Cathy! Year after year after year after year you experience this same EXACT problem. And yet, year after year you do nothing about it. Put up or shut up, and stop bugging me with your shit.

Technology

2006-05-30T20:24:00.000-04:00

Me too Zero, you googly-eyed, buck-toothed ignorant bastard! I, too, love technology! What a twist on the standard "Technology is Difficult" line of "joke."

And while we're on the subject of difficult technology, those funny dots and dashes at the top of the comic? Some of you have commented on this before. It's because I have had trouble with Blogger picture uploading. I've resorted to taking snaps of the pictures with screen capture software. The Houston Chronicle comics site has the date centered at the top of each strip. Sometimes I am careless and leave the bottom part of the date. And some of you thought it was something devious! No, it is not Morse code or secret messages to the NSA (Hi, there Gen. Hayden!). HA HA! Isn't it funny when technology kicks your ass even just a little bit?

Hey, you know who must NOT love technology?

Why, it's Mr. Mitchell! Of course, it depends on your definition of "technology," because Mr. M does have an electric desk lamp and a Texas Instruments-sized calculator. Join the 21st Century, Mr. M! While fraught with their own frustrations, Quicken, online bill paying, and Internet banking will at least keep you from being hunched over your graphing calculator, stamps, and checkbook. That, in turn, will save you from the back and neck pain that little bottle of non-gelcap aspirin is there to ease.

Of course, he probably doesn't want a computer for fear of leaning in too close. That sharp beak of a nose would probably do a number on his screen!

Mallard says: "White Kidz is Stoopid"

2006-05-25T20:24:00.000-04:00

We don't get Mallard Fillmore in the Raleigh News & Observer. That means I have to actively seek it out. So, I usually miss it. Too bad, because its blend of conservative politics and lame jokes are two of my least favorite things.

Word is that most papers run Mallard to counteract the liberal Doonesbury. LIBERAL BIAS ALERT: Doonesbury is nuanced, with finely drawn characters confronting a wide range of issues from geo-politics to where to go to college. Mallard Fillmore has a talking duck. It's the conservative comic strip version of an AFLAC trivia question.

Also? Someone thinks the comics need to balance out all the liberal views going on there? Have these people not enjoyed the 1950s stylings of Blondie, Beetle Bailey, Hi&Lois, Dennis the Menace, The Family Circus . . .? Heck, I know Hagar takes place in Beowulf-times, but its cheesy blend of "doctors are quacks/ women are nags/ men like beer humor" seems like some of the same jokes that kept Baby and her family entertained during summers at Kellerman's.

So, anyway: Mallard Fillmore. This week has been a "Kennedys are bad/drunk drivers" joke week. Ah, Kennedy bashing! OK, so not particularly funny, but . . . well, it's kind of true. I don't plan on getting into a Kennedy-powered vehicle any time soon. And I am sure this will be followed by a week of "Rush Limbaugh is a pill popping freak" jokes, right?

So, imagine my surprise at today's strip:

Nary a Kennedy to be found.

So, this bashes U.S.-born Caucasians? More likely, it's just a "damn those slant-eyes and dot-not-feather-Indians and their smart, geeky ways." Or, maybe Mallard really is hating on the white males! Could it be?

I think they may not major in "Math and Science," because "Math and Science" isn't really a degree. Well, "Math" is, but "Science?" Mallard, FYI, nowadays they break that down into, you know, physics, engineering, chemistry, computer science, biology and the like.

And what the hell is he talking about? I went to a fine undergraduate institution where 2/3 of the student body (predominately "U.S.-born Caucasians") majored in a science or math discipline. Not me, no sir, I'm just a crazy, lazy, liberal poly sci gal, but there are others who did. And my brother, and his wife, and my best friend from high school, and all the kids at the dental school where I work . . . Shut up, Mallard. I know lots of U.S-born Caucasians majoring in science and math. There are probably a lot fewer U.S.-born AFRICAN AMERICANS majoring in science and math. Maybe that would have been a more logical joke, huh? But, you wouldn't want a diatribe like that letting your readers confuse you with The Boondocks. I understand.

Besides, are you sure this is something you want to push? You get a lot of Caucasians majoring in things like biology and environmental science, next thing you know they start believing in the "science" of "evolution" and the "facts" behind "climate change," and the "idea" that "condoms" can prevent the spread of "disease." AND WE ALL KNOW THAT'S NOT TRUE.

WHITEY DON'T NEED NO STINKIN' SCIENCE!

Oops, I Did it Again

2006-05-23T20:34:00.000-04:00

Here's further proof that the Keanes have not spent any time near real children since the turn of the century: Dolly, while nicely buckled in, is not sitting in any sort of car seat or booster seat. While not mandated in every state, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends booster seats for all children between 40 and 80 pounds (about 4 to 8 years old). And since we know Dolly isn't 8 yet . . . OK, she is hefty, but over 80?? Nope. The Keanes just aren't aware of the current state of child-rearing.

Thelma, you are a careless mother, but, hey . . . when have you and Britney Spears ever had anything in common before?

And, boy, does Mama Keane have some high-backed front seat or what?

This is from yesterday, but I didn't have time to post:

Can someone please explain? That's not a rhetorical question. I really don't get it. OK, I get the "joke" in Panel 2. The team is soooooo bad you can't even assume they will catch a pop fly. HA HA HA! That's a really bad team! HA HA.

Stop calling me UMP? Huh? I do not get it. Is this some kind of movie quote or cultural reference that I'm not catching? I mean, she IS an ump. So what's wrong with calling her that? They call her "The Fat Broad" all the time, but she draws the line at "ump?" Seriously, what? I am so confused. What does she want him to call her? If the "joke" (remember: the team is really bad) is in Panel 2, what's the point of Panel 3?

Someone please explain. Even if the explanation is "Big Al, you idiot the joke is so obvious . . ." Whatever. The "joke" doesn't even have to be funny (see Panel 2), I just want to know what the joke IS. Thank you.

TAP-TAP-TAAP-TAP TAP-TAP-TAAP TAAP-TAP-TAAP-TAP TAAP-TAP-TAAP

2006-05-21T16:45:00.000-04:00

SOME DAY I WILL RULE YOU ALL.

I commend Foxtrot on its creativity. It often makes you think, and in this case, it makes you translate. It's very rarely your standard "dads like golf," "teenagers are lazy" tired cliche.

That said, this isn't particularly funny. Some day I will rule you all. Huh. Probably. Jason Fox is such a brain that he's surely a future Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. Jeff Bezos at the least. More than likely Jason Fox will indeed one day be vastly more successful than the Randy/Paula/Simons of the local middle school talent show.

I guess I expected a little more. A hidden message. It's an interesting way to do a strip. I think it could have been a little more subversive. Not profane, per se, but just a little more . . . sneaky?

Get You're Wurds Write

2006-05-15T21:17:00.000-04:00

"Now comes New Thayer and my bother Danny!" What?? New Thayer MAY BOTHER Danny? If so, why?

Or does he mean "my BROTHER Danny?" I can't really tell most of the Gil characters apart -- there's Gil, Brent (fat guy/rap dawg), the beat poet-looking announcer, and of course, Ursula, errrr . . . Mrs. Raptor. Other than those folks . . . sorry, I don't know who's who. Oh wait! How could I forget the inimitable Brick House?!?!? I loved that guy. What's he been up to, I wonder?

This guy may indeed have a brother Danny. I wouldn't know, even though I read the strip every day. It just doesn't really ever sink in.

I don't mean to harp on the typographical (or lettering-ographical or whatever) errors of baseball-themed comic strips. . . Oh, who am I kidding? It's what I live for . . . it's what I do. To help poor, innocent mer-folk, like yourself . . . ACK ACK ACK! I've been taken over by Ursula (yeah, I know the lyrics to songs from The Little Mermaid, what of it??)

Those in glass houses, I know . . . I shouldn't be harping on this if I can't go several posts without a typo myself, right? Screw that! Gil Thorpe and B.C. are syndicated nationwide. They get PAID to do what they do every day. Thousands of people read them every day. They SHOULD have a higher standard than I do.

PROOFREAD your comics, people!

And I apologize profusely if that's NOT a "typo" and should, indeed, read "my bother Danny." Maybe it's a pet name. Maybe I am just that dense, and this makes perfect sense to everyone else. I will eat my words if that's the case.

Happy Mother's Day!

2006-05-14T12:47:00.000-04:00

Mother's Day is a red-letter day for the comics, and today was no exception. However, I am shocked, and more than a little saddened, to report that in my paper there was nary a burnt piece of toast. No destroyed kitchen, dripping with the gloppy leftovers of a young child's pancake experiment gone awry. In short, no ruined breakfast in bed, which is a staple of the Mother's Day humor genre. What is the world coming to? It would be like a Father's Day funny page with no heinously ugly ties.

Does that mean that there was no "ruined breakfast in bed" printed today? Egads! I hope not. Please let me know if your paper printed one, but there wasn't one in the News & Observer. We don't get Curtis on Sundays. Maybe the boys surprised mom with breakfast in bed?

In addition, there was no example of any poor, addled dads/doofus husbands forgetting the event entirely. But, we don't get Drabble on Sundays, either, and Drabble seems a prime candidate for that. Daryl MacPherson (Baby Blues) did leave his three kids in the flower shop, but he did buy Wanda jewelry and flowers, and made dinner reservations!

Happily, there was an example of an ill-conceived, but well-intentioned Mother's Day gift -- Jason Fox gave his mother glow-in-the-dark nail polish. And in my favorite for the day, the moms in Rhymes with Orange brought their bath beads to a paint ball arena. HA HA! They even set up a "Tea Roses vs. Lily of the Valleys" contest.

Hi & Lois and B.C. both imparted this fascinating lesson: everyone has a mother. You don't say!

Happy Mother's Day!

I Hate B.C.

2006-05-11T18:18:00.000-04:00

What are these ster-i-ods of which he speaks? Why do they make you split your bat when you take your practice swing?

There are two issues here. First, is the use of the word "steriod," which I will just assume is a mistake, and the misspelling ISN'T key to the understanding of the joke. Second, is the fact that well, I don't get it. It seems to be saying you will be so strong that even when you swing on a practice swing, you will break your bat. Uhm, OK. I can't really picture that, but I think it is called "EXAGGERATION," and it is supposed to be funny. But it's not. Not funny at all.

And why, why, why is this strip set in prehistoric times? They play baseball and conduct interviews with microphones. I also think that is part of the humor. HA HA! Cavemen (except Johnny Damon) didn't play baseball! But I don't think that's funny, either.

There seem to be more candidates for Mrs. Raptor's true identity:

Elton John?

Divine?

Mimi from The Drew Carrey Show?

Come on, people? Do any of those suggestions make ANY SENSE? Why would any of these folks disguise themselves as a high school mom in a small town stuck in the 1950s? No reason. Only World Domination, which is of course why Ursula is doing it.

Those Poor, Unfortunate Souls

2006-05-09T23:35:00.000-04:00

So, I have a theory about Brent's Mom who has played a rather prominent role recently in Gil Thorpe:

The theory is that she is none other than Ursula, the half-octopus witch from Disney's The Little Mermaid:

As you can see it is a rather thin (ba dum dum) disguise. One key difference is that Brent's Mom has man hands, while Ursula has tentacles (not pictured here).

I believe that she is ultimately trying to steal Gil's voice, so that she can use it to lure Lebron James/OJ Mayo-caliber high school basketball recruits to her lair. For evil purposes or attempted World Domination, no doubt. How this evil plan will actually work, I'm not sure. But, any time you get a disguised half-octopus witch with man hands threatening the high school coach, evil is sure to follow.

BWAH HA HA HA!

Honorable Manchu Wok Now Presiding

2006-05-08T18:41:00.000-04:00

Oh, Family Circus, why do you torture me so? Not just your lame-ness and your too-cutesy by half children, but why can't you put your Sunday strips online in a timely manner? I just want to make fun of them as soon as I can without resulting to scanning in an unreadable copy. Is that too much to ask?

HA HA! He's taking them to the FOOD court. Get it? They all look so worried in the first panel that you might think they are concerned he actually IS going to take them to a real, actual court of law (and you could tell this if this weren't just a crappy scan). OK, so the kids fall for his stupid joke, but, Thelma? Does she really think he's going to sue the pants off the lot of them?

Noisy and unruly I get -- they're kids for crying out loud. But "extravagant?" What does that mean Daddy? It means you are going to be VERY POPULAR when your ass is sitting in prison, Jeffy. Gah! Family Circus really does bring out the demons in my soul.

Hey, why isn't the dad offering to help carry something? Even little P.J. has his arms full. And dad can't carry a thing? Oh, that's right:

It's because he has his camera. On a trip to the mall. Yeah. Wants to make sure he gets a visual record of the day spent at the Baby Gap and Kay-Bee toys. Seriously. Why does he bring his camera on a trip to THE MALL? To the zoo, circus, park, baseball game . . . these I'd understand. The mall?

Of course, it's not just any old mall. It's the

Reading this in my paper I thought it was the Blossom Mall, but, no . . . it's Blessem. The Family Circus, God Blessem!

George Gershwin and the Baha Men

2006-05-04T15:44:00.000-04:00

The comics today brought a smile to my face and a song to my heart. It was as if they had their own little soundtracks. I wish I could link these strips to their respective songs, but, alas, I am not so tech savvy. Plus, I only have one of these songs in my CD collection.

Who let the dogs out (woof, woof, woof, woof) !!!

And for good measure:

So, it's a bit more of a stretch, but "One of these days I'm going to rise up suddenly . . . " had me humming Gershwin's "Summertime" all morning:

Summertime,

And the livin' is easy

Fish are jumpin'

And the cotton is high

One of these mornings

You're going to rise up singing

Then you'll spread your wings

And you'll take to the sky

And I love how Hagar's "I'm home Helga" in Panel 1 is so exciting, or boisterous, or loud (and we know loud = funny) that the word balloon itself is vibrating.

Pimentos: Not Funny

2006-05-03T22:12:00.000-04:00

So, the "little red part of the olive" isn't TECHNICALLY "part of the olive." It's a pimento stuffed in there. And I don't think it is particularly fattening or high in calories. Which I guess is the joke: taking out the pimento doesn't make the martini "diet!" HA HA HA! The pimento is probably the lowest calorie thing in the whole drink. HOO HOO, I get it now, ooh boy that's funny. It's about as funny as hard of hearing ducks!

Unfortunately, in yesterday's list of things that aren't funny, I left out both olives and pimentos. Neither are particularly humorous. Not necessarily UN-funny, just, you know, random things. Here are some OTHER things in the category: page numbers, sweat bands, scented candles.

Loud Things: Not Funny

2006-05-02T20:21:00.000-04:00

It's been almost a two-week hiatus (thank you very much for your patience . . . that is, if there's anyone still out there), and you'd think I would have saved up all sorts of complaints and annoyances to share. Not so much. I didn't even read the comics most of the days I was on the road. So, it has taken me two days to catch up with what's going on. I mean, in today's funnies alone, so many confusing things:

Dagwood feels animosity toward Mr. J.C. Dithers? WHEN DID THAT HAPPEN??
Jon can't get a date!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
Dolly Keane mis-interprets Grandma's wise aphorisms? IS THIS STILL FAMILY CIRCUS?
Cathy has money troubles, and no willpower?? The HELL?? What is going on?
Gen. Halftrack doesn't understand technology?? SINCE WHEN?

Since forever, right? Just like all the above. Forever, and forever, and forever. They are the same as they ever were.

Now, I did miss John Patterson's car purchase in FBOFW and Daryl's telescope purchase in Baby Blues. And Ted and Sally's neighbor died? Woah. And since Funky Winkerbean has moved along to wacky high school hi-jinx, I am guessing that Wally didn't die in the path of an IED, never getting to know his unborn child?

Oh yeah, also not new -- Hagar isn't funny:
So, the joke here seems to be "Loud Things are Funny"? Or is it "Watching Lucky Eddie Suffer is Funny"? Or is it "Hagar is an Asshole"?

It's not even a bad pun. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Slapstick is funny. For whatever reason, watching someone fall on their ass is humorous. Watching people crash into each other is funny. Slapstick worked for Ed Norton in the Honeymooners and for Cosmo Kramer on Seinfeld. IT DOES NOT WORK IN THE COMICS. It's the actual motion and crashing and cringe-worthy possible pain that triggers the laugh. Seeing a drawing of this . . . just not funny. The stars and bubbles, and whatever that "s" looking thing is don't help.

Plus, loud things aren't funny. They aren't necessarily un-funny, either. I can think of a lot of things in this category: batting gloves, for instance. Not funny. Not really un-funny either. Tundra, TiVo, NFL game tape, shoe laces, hospital bracelets . . . see, there are a lot of things that aren't funny.

Apologies for the Delay

2006-04-25T21:52:00.000-04:00

I have been traveling and haven't even gotten a chance to read the funnies lately. I hope to post again real soon, but foresee a busy week ahead, and more traveling this weekend. I will try to post tomorrow or Thursday, but if not, check back again early next week.

Until then, let's hope there are no drastic changes in the funnies. I assume that a week from today, Dagwood will still like big sandwiches and Dennis will still annoy the crap out of Mr. Wilson, but who knows . . .

Things I Don't Get, Things That Make Me Mad

2006-04-19T20:44:00.000-04:00

One day late, it is time for another "I Don't Get B.C." installment:

So, his uncle is a burglar, and he obviously likes to steal clothes . . . but why does he get them from his nephew's dry cleaning ruse? He is a "burglar," which means he actively goes in to houses (or caves or whatever) and steals them. He is not an "embezzler" or whatever you are if you take clothes from your nephew's dry cleaning business. Does the dry cleaning nephew just hand over the clothes to the uncle? Or, does the uncle actually come to "burgle" the dry cleaners every twelve hours? If so, why doesn't the nephew get better security?

And can someone please explain again why this strip takes place in caveman times? And the answer "Because its name is B.C." doesn't count. Really, half the time it is ants and snakes and rocks and flowers, and we have all those things now, and then whenever it's got cavemen they have dry cleaners and baseball and things of that ilk.

I have a theory: B.C. actually did begin in the caveman times (you can see it at Lascaux), and Johnny Hart (who has gotten the strip from his great-many-times-over grandfather) tries to keep it "up-to-date" with references to dry cleaners and the like. We're hip to his jive, though . . . those are definitely cavemen there. It's sort of like how Dennis the Menace is nominally set in the present day, but we all know it is really set in the 50s when there is a joke like, "I hate it when bridge club causes me to miss The Ed Sullivan Show, but I'm going to Tivo it."

Short notes from today:

Here's where we learn that Dagwood doesn't know about ATMs:

See, Dag, you don't actually have to deal with rude clerks when withdrawing small amounts from your account.

And from the "girls don't know about sports, aren't they dumb?" file:

Grrr . . . OK, no more references to Casey Stengel or Johnny Damon or George Mikan from THIS girl, I clearly have no idea what I am talking about. Now pardon me while I go check on my fantasy baseball team, you male chauvinist bird!

And finally, this makes about as much sense as the dry cleaning burgling uncle nephew duo:

Nobody was home . . . so they just let themselves into the house? Did Marmaduke let them in? And did they assume that the flat panel TV was to be mounted for the viewing pleasure of the dog? And did they also assume that he would be lying down at all times? And did the owners not realize this until they turned on the TV? Why don't they just fix it themselves? Those panels are not very heavy. I don't get it.

You Could Look it Up

2006-04-15T11:26:00.000-04:00

Aside from the fact that a Sid Vicious visit to Nancy would be totally awesome, we must again confront facts: "Kids don't read comics anymore." Why, oh why, not?

Let's take Peanuts for example. A great strip in its day, yes. In any list of all-time greats, Peanuts has to be at or near the top. It really set the standard for a lot of the better strips we see today. Personally, I think The Boondocks is the closest thing in the comics today to the legacy left by Peanuts. Blasphemy, I know. But it's little kids doing and saying things you don't expect for them to do and say. Same goes for South Park on tv. A little edgier than Peanuts, yes, and a little more crass, too. But it's 2006, and what was edgy in the early 60s just ain't edgy today.

So, for the record: Peanuts WAS great. Note the past tense. It is no longer great, because it no longer technically exists except in memory. Joe DiMaggio was great, but if we exhumed him and trotted him out to play outfield for the Yankees, chances are we'd wonder why they were letting a dead guy play in the place of Johnny Damon. And, yeah, Johnny D looked like a gross caveman, and some people don't like the "edginess" of a player looking so unkempt, but he's a good player, and, well, Joe D is, you know, DEAD. Speaking of Peanuts and baseball, this was the week for some Peanuts baseball strips:

That's right, Lucy, I bet Casey Stengel doesn't yell at his players. In fact, I guarantee it, seeing that he last managed in 1965, and there's also the little problem that, you know, he died in 1975. In fact, Microsoft Word doesn't even recognize "Stengel" (it suggests "stingily").

Why don't children read the comics today? A joke with a punch line about someone who died when I was two years old is a clue. Do people under the age of 30, or for that matter 40, really know who Casey Stengel was?? I am a raving lunatic of a baseball fan, so, yeah, I get it. But your random 12 year old? 25 year old? 37 year old? Replace "Casey Stengel" with "Joe Torre" and, while not hilarious, must of the country under the age of 50 would "get" the joke.

(And I hate the Yankees, I don't know why I keep bringing them into my baseball arguments).

It's things like this, and the recent results of an Orange County Register comics poll (details here if you care to be totally bummed about the tastes of today's readers) that lend credence to the fact that, although the comics are nominally for the kids, they are really for old people. I have NOTHING against that. All segments of our society need their entertainment niche. I only posit that when the funny pages are CLEARLY geared toward the 75+ crowd, you have an answer to why kids don't read the comics today.

It's Shagadelic, Baby, Yeah!

2006-04-12T22:12:00.000-04:00

How about the doctor's eyebrow-waggling, Austin Powers' "Yeah, baby!" expression in Panel 2? It's so suggestive it makes Becky blush in Panel 3!

Question: Your doctor is going to tell you are pregnant. How would you like this news delivered?
a) With a congratulatory grin
b) With a dispassionate yes
c) With a lascivious leer

Becky! Get a new OB! Dr. Leery McLeerfield's thinking, "You may only have one arm, but the REST of you seems to be working just fiiiiine. Yeah, baby!" And: ew.

A Blue Funk

2006-04-10T20:29:00.000-04:00

Uhm . . . they have these newfangled things called home pregnancy tests, and you can see for yourself at home (hence the name, although I suppose you can take them anywhere you want). That IS how Becky found out. They aren't cheap, but they're cheaper than a copay to the doctor. Or maybe all these people, including the frightened-out-of-her-wits teenager, have REALLY good insurance. Or maybe they just don't know better. We need Sassy Black Woman to show up and explain to them how their HMOs work.

Summing up Funky Winkerbean: We have a one-armed pregnant lady raising an Afghan war orphan single handedly (ba dum dum!), while her husband is off fighting in the Army, where he last suffered a horrific helicopter crash and spent time recuperating among Afghan tribesmen. We have a young mother, lawyer to the downtrodden, champion of women fighting breast cancer . . .who now has a recurrence of her cancer . . . which has metastasized! And we have a band director who is obsessed with making his band the greatest. HA HA HA! Good times all around in Funky.

I'm all for comics exploring all the things that happen in life, the good, the bad, the ugly. I mean, the big problem with Family Circus (OK, one among MANY) is that nothing bad ever happens to them. My God! They're just so damn happy and perfect. But once you have one-armed pregnant women raising Afghan war orphans . . . throw in some breast cancer here, some alcoholism there, a dash of suicide attempt, and splash of eating disorder . . . is it possible that Funky has gone too far?

B.C. and the Cable Guy

2006-04-06T16:38:00.000-04:00

Sorry for the delay in posting, but let's get started with some B.C. news:

First, Yay! As always, I love the letters to the editor about the comics. We had one earlier this week:

Simply put, the April 4 "B.C." comic strip comparing the "cute chick" to the "fat broad" as "apples to watermelons" was unfunny, sexist and a horrible disservice to those who have long battled with body image problems such as bulimia and anorexia. The N&O should consider pulling "B.C." from the Comics pages due to its repetitive negative themes and its consistent lack of humor/comedy.
Alan Hamm
Raleigh

Heeeeyyyyy . . . calling for the removal of a strip because of its "consistent lack of humor/comedy?" All right, Mr. Hamm! Speaking of humor, isn't it funny that someone named "Mr. Hamm" would complain about weight issues? Hey, Mr. Hamm, you want the N&O to pull B.C.? FAT chance (ba dum dum).

Because A). Fat people are ugly and we should make fun of them (the Bible says so) and B). My guess? Mr. Hamm hates Jesus Christ and is a soulless, Godless, heathen. We call these people "scientists:"

Hey, you "scientists" out there reading this blog . . . and I know who you are! Repent and repent soon. The end-times are near. Don't give me any "logical" mumbo jumbo about God gracing man with the ability to reason.

And what is this "scientific acclaim?" Meaning scientific praise? Like the Nobel Prize for physics? Is that what he is talking about? Or does he really MEAN "any scientific CLAIM that omits God." You know, like evolution, the Earth revolving around the Sun, etc.? Ooops . . . I am letting reason and logic interfere. Let me say a quick prayer. . . .

OK, I am back. And check out the LIBERAL mainstream media questioning the infallible doctrine of Mr. Johnny Hart:

As you know, the MSM is always trying to marginalize Christians, and the funnies are no exception!

And now to a non-sarcastic comment: I don't know why Mr. Hart's version of Christianity has to be so hateful to fat people, scientists, and non-Christians. Oh well.

Here's a funny observation from today's comics: you sometimes have to wait a long time for the cable guy to show up. It's true! Ha ha ha!

I think it's probably SCIENTISTS who are behind this waiting for the cable guy annoyance.

Star-Crossed Lovers

2006-04-03T14:44:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, I was confronted by King Features Syndicate's assertion that "Prince Valiant represents America's lasting contribution to Arthurian legend, one of the most persistent folk and literary traditions of Western civilization." And I made the stupid little analogy that that was like saying "Gilligan's Island is America's lasting contribution to the Homeric epic, The Odyssey." And, when you are writing about comic strips and talking about epic poetry, and specifically, one very important epic poem, you expect it to be left at that. Oh well:

Next up: Dennis the Menace makes a lasting contribution to the works of the great American storyteller, Mark Twain. Meanwhile, Hi & Lois puts its stamp on the tragic love story, Romeo and Juliet.

But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the East, and Lois is the sun!

O Hi, Hi, wherefore art thou Hi?
Deny thy drunken neighbor and refuse thy awful hairstyle,
Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,
And I’ll no longer be a realtor.

It has a nice ring to it.

Proud to be an American

2006-04-02T16:03:00.000-04:00

You don't need to read this, but:

Did you know that Prince Valiant appears in my newspaper every Sunday morning? Prince Freakin' Valiant! I never spend one second on it, although sometimes the drawings are a little weird. Are there people here in the Triangle who eagerly await each week's installment? I should note that the space it takes up is more than any strip, save Opus. The strips on the facing page are Foxtrot and Hagar. And, it takes up the same amount of space as all of Foxtrot and the first row of Hagar! Why?

Well, maybe it's because, according to the "About Prince Valiant" page, "Prince Valiant represents America's lasting contribution to Arthurian legend, one of the most persistent folk and literary traditions of Western civilization." Oh my. Oh my, my, my,my. Read that again:

This strip represents our country's lasting contribution to one of the most persistent literary traditions of Western Civilization.

Is it true? It seems sort of like saying "Gilligan's Island represents America's lasting contribution to the Homeric epic, the Odyssey . . ." And if it's true, God Bless the U.S.A. Our contribution is some weirdly drawn strip, wherein Pete Rose gains hair styling tips. I'm so proud.

Alice Mitchell: Her Clothes and Her Laundry

2006-03-30T21:00:00.000-05:00

In a twist on the "Alice goes visiting" standard, Alice is visiting with a woman who seems to be her own age (or even younger!). Typically, Alice gets all dandied up to visit with an older, stouter woman. She brings Dennis along and he says something "cute" like, "Mom, I don't see any battle axes here!" HA HA! It's hilarious, and it's a Public Service Announcement (Parents: Watch what you say around your kids).

I always just assumed that Alice's super duper dressing up was because the older lady she was visiting was snooty. Here, though, she is sitting, having tea (from a tea service!) with a woman her own age. Who are these people, and why are they so fancy? Are they royalty? I mean, what stay-at-home mom do you know that will get dressed up in skirt, blouse, pumps, jewelry . . . to go sit on the couch and have tea with a friend? Is it a job interview? Is it a bigger party or something that requires dressing up -- it's just these two that we get to see?

Now, OK, living in a granola-ish college town, my idea of what is casual and what is fancy may be skewed. 75% of the people at my grocery store wear gym clothes or jeans. No one looks askance if you show up at the movies in jeans and a sweatshirt. When I wear blue jeans and a nice blouse to my neighborhood book club, I rank with the best-dressed there. HOWEVER, I have discovered that my parents' town is fancier than mine. At Thanksgiving, I wore jeans and a sweater to the movies. My parents wore slacks, blazers, coordinated outfits, etc. Who fit in better at the movies? Not me. So, it is possible that Alice lives in one of these less casual towns.

Still, Alice and her friend are just so darn fancy here! Am I out of the loop? Do women really have little get-togethers with their friends, serve tea in fancy dishes, and expect their friends to show up dressed to the nines?

Or is it that Hank Ketchum can't draw slacks? No, that's not it. Mr. Wilson wears slacks all the time. I just think that in Dennis the Menace, women don't wear slacks outside of the home. And that's the way it should be, people! Don't let the feminazis tell you otherwise!

And, besides, what the heck does she mean? She separates her laundry into "whites, darks, and Dennis." So, she puts his clothes in a different pile? What's the big deal? Ooooh . . . 3 separate piles! Maybe she doesn't have a washing machine? Or does she mean she washes DENNIS with the laundry?

Shoe Size

2006-03-28T21:20:00.000-05:00

Well, Shoe, you're right about that. More often than not, you and your bird friends are part of the problem, but I'll give you the points on this one.

Of course, it's possible that he's being literal. The comics actually ARE smaller than they used to be. Hence, for instance, the cutting of the first 2-3 panels in most Sunday strips (in the paper at least). From wikipedia:

"Early daily strips were large, often running the entire width of the newspaper, and were sometimes three or more inches in height. At first, one newspaper page only included one daily strip, usually either at the top or the bottom of the page. By the 1920s, many newspapers had a comics page on which many strips were collected. Over the years, the size of daily strips became smaller and smaller, until by 2000 four standard daily strips could fit in the area once occupied by a single daily strip."

And that's your comic strip history lesson for the day. Thank you, Shoe.

Hagar and the Solid Gold Dancers

2006-03-26T12:44:00.000-05:00

Hoo Hoo! Oh boy! ROTFL! Disarmament talks! See, it's so, so funny because Hagar is an ancient Viking warrior, with the evil, menacing Attila the Hun as his foe. And it rings so true with us, because in the here and now we are going through the same sort of thing with our current foe, the Red Soviet Menace! Commie bastards! It's even funnier, because Hagar and Attila are talking about swords and spears and the like, but we know in the present day that President Jimmy Carter and Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev are negotiating the SALT II Treaty about NUCLEAR WEAPONS!!!

And this is the brilliance of Hagar the Horrible. It puts an ancient Viking warrior in a situation that sheds light on the events we are facing today, in 1978. Brilliant!

Bil Keane has Never Seen a Child

2006-03-23T21:12:00.000-05:00

Joly shit! That's one large-ass animal cracker!

OK, maybe he has SEEN a child, but no way has he spent significant time with one, and even less a chance that he's ever actually seen an animal cracker. Because? They aren't that big, Bil, and I don't know if they ever were. That seal wouldn't fit in your typical animal cracker box that looks like a circus train car with the little handy string for carrying it around like a purse. And? There's no seal.

So, nice . . . make a lame joke on "the seal is broken," and make it worse by showing a gingerbread man-sized, non-existent animal cracker seal. The joke is barely forgiveable, and the execution is outlandish. Lame, lame, lame.

More Reasons Why

2006-03-22T22:07:00.000-05:00

Still attempting to discover why the bad comics still appear. Daily. Let's look at some other possibilities:

4) THE INTERNET. Now, I don't normally spend much time dwelling on the God-awful soap opera strips. You know, your Rex Morgans, your Mary Worths, etc. They're actually much, much funnier than most of the funnies. Only, unintentionally so. Or is it intentional? Come on. As I see it, these things ONLY exist because of the online communities that have grown up making fun of them. Don't believe me? Check out my (newly updated) links list. Even slightly modern comics like For Better or For Worse are ripe for the snarking.

5) IT'S JUST BUSINESS, MAN. Jon suggested this idea, and I will just quote directly: "Maybe the big syndicators (can we call them "Big Syndi" like Big Oil and Big Pharma?) package their good comics with the crappy old ones. For instance, United Syndicates may sell Dilbert to a paper but only if they buy Nancy and Marmaduke. Of course, the United webpage lists Marmaduke as a "beloved reader favorite" so that may be part of the problem right there..." First, Jon, damn you, I had managed to forget all about Nancy until now. Second, hmmmmm. . . maybe he is on to something? You know, these syndicates have spun their "beloved reader favorites" into major logo and licensing deals. You can get your favorites on greeting cards, mugs, mouse pads, etc. I guess they must be big money makers for the syndicates, and therefore, they need to use their pull to keep them in the public eye. Just think, if Marmaduke were pulled, who in the world would go out and by a Marmaduke-logoed dog bone? It doesn't really explain Tiger, though. Or Hi & Lois. I'm not sure I've ever seen any Hi & Lois paraphernalia. Thank goodness.

6) THE FUNNY PAGE EDITORS ACTUALLY THINK THESE THINGS ARE FUNNY.
Hmmmm . . . Could it be true?

Uhm, in a word: NO.

Today's culprits: The Internet, Big Business, and Unfunny People. Are there more? Certainly. Feel free to theorize. I'll be thinking of other reasons.

The Great Question

2006-03-20T18:11:00.000-05:00

The question that really plagues me, that plagues most of us, is “Why?” And maybe for some of you the full question is “Why am I here? What is my purpose?” Or “Why is my life this way?” But what I mean is “Why is (Garfield/Dennis the Menace/Family Circus/Hagar the Horrible/Etc – Choose one or all) still in newspapers? Why, does Tiger still appear in ‘120 newspapers worldwide’ when its creator is dead, and it was never really all that good in the first place? There has to be a reason, right? Let’s examine some possibilities, in no particular order.

1) TO PISS ME OFF. You may not be aware of it, but the world does, in fact, revolve around me. Accept it and get used to it. In this world, everything is done to please or displease me, and clearly the funny page editors like the spike in my blood pressure every morning at 8:15. “WHAT? HOW IS THIS FUNNY? WHY? WHY?”

2) THE FUNNY PAGE EDITORS ARE SCARED OF THE PEOPLE WHO LIKE MARMADUKE, HI & LOIS, ETC. From time to time I get emails from blog readers who will say, “My paper cancelled Marmaduke, but then they started getting letters from all these Marmaduke fans, and so they had to put it back in.” Question: Who are these Marmaduke fans and what power do they have over the funny page editors? Gotta be blackmail, right? Or, could it be violence? Are they the Russian Mafia? In the world of Law & Order, if you cross the Russian Mafia, you usually wind up dead. There may be a Marmaduke Mafia, and, really, the editors have to do what they say.

3) OLD PEOPLE. I hate to offend, but this particular brand of Catskills, 1950s humor seems to be geared toward, well, older Americans. Those who can read a strip about a dad who can’t figure out the oven, and say, “Ah, yes, men can’t cook things, that’s true!” Those for whom “Take my wife . . . please!” is still a knee slapper. And, hey, do you know who reads newspapers these days? Well, let’s just say that as a thirtysomething newspaper subscriber, I am probably in the minority for my age group. Young people don't read the newspaper anymore. Hey, don’t take my word for it:

Notice the dad is getting a hearty laugh from an article (not the funnies).

I’m not saying young people don’t read the paper solely because the comics are so lame. But, when the editors of your local paper put the wishes of the people who pine away for Dennis the Menace (of course, assuming it’s not the Russian Mafia), ahead of the people who would like to “TRY SOMETHING NEW PLEAAAAASE!” you get the sense that the newspaper editors don’t really care what you want or think. It’s the same reason people my age and younger don’t watch the evening news. “Oh, great. They are doing another segment tonight on prescription drug benefits, and tomorrow . . . a segment on advances in hip replacement therapy!”

Hey, I think there need to be outlets in the U.S. entertainment/information community that DON’T cater to every whim of the youngest, hippest, and coolest among us. That’s fine by me, and if the funny page editors want to make their realm a bastion of older folks, good for them. They should just realize that we are ALL going to be older folks one day, and I doubt my generation is going to suddenly find Marmaduke funny, once we hit our 70s. So, funny page editors: just think about what you plan to do in 40 years when your readers are all dead.

Well, the other "answers to why" will have to wait on another post. We have gone too long already. Not to fear, there are other possibilities. But for today, our three main culprits for the continued appearance of Hi & Lois in your paper are: Big Al, the Russian Mafia, and Old People.

Good Morning, Tiger

2006-03-16T18:24:00.000-05:00

Well, as Marc promised, the comics in my Florida paper WERE in color! The hotel paper was USA Today, but I did get Florida Today on Saturday and Sunday. And yes, all the Saturday comics were in full, riotous color.

The "highlight" of the comics page for me was my re-introduction to Tiger. I recall this strip from my distant past. Maybe it was in the Nashville paper in the 80s? I do not remember, but this is not my first exposure to Tiger. I had wiped my memory of the strip, like you do anything that isn't worth the brain cells to remember. Here is Monday's strip in case you are unfamiliar with this particular brand of "humor:"

OK, so Tiger, the main character, is the chap in the black ball cap. The other dude is Tiger's best friend, Hugo. I learned this on the "About the Characters" page. There, I also learned about the two primary girls in the strip. Bonnie is "Hugo's outspoken yet brutally honest 'girlfriend'." Then there's Suzy: "She's everything that Bonnie isn't — blonde, feminine, innocent and liked by everyone. That makes them rivals!" And ZZZZZZZZZZ. . . . What is WITH the Betty and Veronica-ization of the funny pages? Dennis has Gina and Margaret; hell, even Curtis has Chutney and Michelle. It's the ultra-feminine pretty girl vs. the tomboy. ZZZZZZZ

When I was in Florida, the strip I saw included Tiger's brother "Punkinhead." Here he is in today's strip:

As you can see, he looks remarkably like Alfalfa from the Little Rascals gang. Of course, any humor modeled after 1920s-1930s childhood characters is cutting edge, and always funny. You think I am being sarcastic, but need I remind you of Eddie Murphy's Buh-weet? You can get a laugh just reading this.

Shockingly, Tiger isn't as funny as Eddie Murphy.

This strip first appeared in 1965. The creator retired in 2004 and died in 2005. He didn't have a son or friend take over, but the strip, much like Peanuts, is now in reruns. This is, according to toonopedia, because the gags are, ahem, "timeless." Hey, just like the Little Rascals!

And, oh my God. Why is this still taking up space in the funny pages? THE CREATOR IS DEAD. THESE ARE ALL RERUNS. I am ALMOST willing to make an exception for the seminal and often brilliant Peanuts. But Tiger? Really? This takes up space that could be given to other, new artists? Why? There are people who would complain if it were taken away from the funny pages? Can't they accept that the artist is not creating NEW stuff? That he is DEAD???

What if other entertainment venues followed the same logic as the comics? So, Mickey Mantle retires. But, the Yankees just keep sending him out to play. Then, he dies. So, all Weekend at Bernie's-like, the Yankees send his corpse up to bat (this may be what Ted Williams was up to with the whole cryogenics freezing thing). Better yet, when the Mick's turn to bat comes, they could just play a rerun of a previous Mantle at bat from the 1950s or 1960s.

Then again, I do listen to the Beatles from time to time, and half of them are dead. And, you go to an art museuem to look at say, Rembrandt. And he's dead, too. So, are the comics supposed to be like fine art? Or oldies music?

WHY OH WHY OH WHY OH WHY ARE THE COMICS SO HOPELESSLY FROZEN IN TIME? THEY SUCK. THE WHOLE MEDIUM IS JUST BACKWARDS AND STAGNANT.

Grrrrrrr . . . Tiger is my new nemesis. Too bad it's not carried in my local paper. Then, I could work up a real sense of righteous outrage.

Apologies for the Delay

2006-03-15T23:14:00.000-05:00

I am having some difficulty getting images to post, and haven't had the time to sit and figure it out. A new post is ready to go, and will be up once I get the time to get the image issue worked out.

Tuba, Tuba, Tuba Chameleon

2006-03-07T20:20:00.000-05:00

As we all know, there are a handful of comic truisms: teenagers borrow money, short order cooks make food that gives you indigestion, men like to golf when their wives think they should be doing chores, a mother-in-law visit is always a surprise and huge imposition. Any of those scenarios is not only true-to-life, but also hilarious, right?

So, imagine my surprise at today's Heathcliff:

And what's weird about this? Well, of course, in the comics, cats play the harpsichord, NOT the tuba! Duh. No, not really. What's weird is that Heathcliff actually wants to get in to see the vet. See, in the comics (and in real life, quite frankly) pets, and especially cats, DON'T like to see the vet. I'm not a regular Heathcliff follower. Is it possible that he likes the vet? I know Marmaduke, that big lovable lug, HATES the vet.

So, here's my theory on what's behind this one. The Heathcliff "writer"/"artist" was recently stuck waiting for the doctor. OK, that's true to life. You really do have to sit in the waiting room and read their magazines for a long time (but, where else are you going to keep up on the details of Nick and Jessica's divorce, huh? The grocery store line, duh). So, the Heathcliff guy, and it looks like his name is Gallagher, thought, how could I get in to see the doctor quicker? And, Gallagher thought, "I know! I will hammer some watermelons with a big wooden mallet!" HA HA HA! Nooooo . . . what he thought was "What if I happened to have a tuba, and I just went right up to the receptionist and started playing it?" Then, he chuckled to himself. Boy! What an idea for a strip, right? So, he just RUINS the whole concept of "pets hate the vet" and sticks Heathcliff in his spot. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb.

Surprisingly, Heathcliff looks to be a fairly decent tuba player. You can tell this because the musical notes coming out of it are straight and unbroken. The comic convention for bad music is broken, wavy notes. But, this strip here is messing with all kinds of comic conventions, so we really have no clue what goes on in Heathcliff world.

This may be the last post for awhile. I am leaving town soon, but am quite excited to see what wonderful comics the Orlando Sun Sentinel shares with its readers!

Hi and Lois Have a Junk Drawer!

2006-03-06T22:50:00.000-05:00

Did you know it? Hi and Lois have a junk drawer (and, no, that's not a euphemism, despite the obviously smoldering H&L love). They actually do have a junk drawer, the basis of today's "joke:"

You may be wondering what exactly makes this funny. You may have a junk drawer in your very own home! Have you ever realized how funny it is that you have a drawer filled with random stuff? No? Think about it . . . there is a drawer in your kitchen that has scissors, Scotch tape, pizza coupons, string, a Maglite, and some stray batteries! HA HA HA! Isn't that funny? Still not?

Hmmmmmm . . . what if your husband asked for a AA battery and you said it was in "The Battery Drawer," but really, of course, it's not "The Battery Drawer," but the junk drawer! HA HA! Right? No? What if your husband asked you where the extra battery was, and you said "The Bronx is up and The Battery's down!" HA HA HA. No.

Although . . . if you type the word "drawer" enough, it does start to look kind of funny. Drawer. It's like a person who draws, but not. Drawer. That's a funny word.

P.S. Hi seems to be a vampire or other mystical creature. His reflection in Panel 1 doesn't jive with the "real" Hi. Spoooooky.

You Go, Girl!

2006-03-04T19:05:00.000-05:00

If you watch any amount of television, you are more than likely familiar with the character archetype, "Sassy Black Woman." Sassy Black Woman can be counted on to dispense street wisdom to the white folk. She's typically overweight, and gives her advice in a no-nonsense, take-no-guff style. She uses exaggerated hand gestures and often punctuates her advice with a cock-eyed "girl, please" kind of look. Also: she is sassy. Don't cross Sassy Black Woman!

Loretta Devine is a fine actress, and, for my money, the greatest SBW out there. Just last weekend, I got to see her as Sassy Black Woman in both Grey's Anatomy and the movie Crash. You think there's a better SBW out there? Pfffffft. Girl, please.

Ironically, in the midst of the nagging wives, sniveling bureaucrats, meddling mothers-in-law, short-tempered bosses, lazy teenagers, and extremely cute children, the Sassy Black Woman is a stereotypical character archetype the funny pages actually DON'T traffic in. Hooray for the funnies! Perhaps the closest to an SBW is Curtis' teacher, Mrs. Nelson:

But, Mrs. Nelson isn't particularly sassy. Besides, she's more of the hard-ass teacher archetype, and less of the SBW. Interestingly, the great Loretta Devine (mentioned above) managed to combine the two in her role of Mrs. Marla Hendricks in the late, less-than-great Boston Public.

That very long-winded introduction out of the way, I am pleased to note that a wonderful SBW graced my Funny Page this morning, courtesy of Funky Winkerbean's breast cancer support group. Ladies and gentlemen, the Sassy Black Woman:

Girl! Please. She' got the patented SBW look DOWN! Look at her providing that sassy street wisdom to the white ladies! Girl, don't be frontin', you funky and you IN Funky.

Excellent. Another stereotype covered in the funnies! Keep it up funnies!

A Tale of Woe

2006-03-02T15:28:00.000-05:00

Guh-ross! That "cold dog" is one of the grossest things I believe I have ever seen. YUCKY.

It's all black and shiny and it looks like it is staring at me. It also looks a little bit like it is wiggling. Those lines around the outside of the cold dog are supposed to be the flat part of the plate, but they make it look like the cold dog is ALIVE.

AIEEEE! It is staring out at you from its charred, grimacing, mouth-like bun. It wiggles in its captivity: the gaping maw of the mouth bun has trapped it, and now this seemingly innocent kid wants to subject it to more punishing heat rays. "Help me!" the cold dog's one eye implores you. But you cannot possibly help the cold dog; its very nature is hideous to you. You look away, pretend not to notice. Thelma will reheat the cold dog for Jeffy. This is inevitable. This is life.

You glance away in the nick of time. Oh look! There's that cute little Dennis fellow bothering grumpy Mr. Wilson.

The Islamic Republic of Cathy

2006-02-28T21:12:00.000-05:00

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.

2006-02-26T20:31:00.000-05:00

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

2006-02-22T16:47:00.000-05:00

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

2006-02-19T20:39:00.000-05:00

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

2006-02-15T19:55:00.000-05:00

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

2006-02-12T16:23:00.000-05:00

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!

2006-02-11T15:32:00.000-05:00

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

2006-02-09T16:03:00.000-05:00

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

2006-02-05T16:41:00.000-05:00

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.

SARGE IS A BIG FAT JERK!

2006-01-30T20:58:00.000-05:00

Good question, Killer. And, let me just say, it's not easy to find the answer (through Google at least). I Googled "aerial advertising" and "banner towing," and 9/10ths of the sites I found asked me to inquire for rates. They wanted to know where I wanted it towed, and what message I wanted. Too bad I didn't want to email the following: "I would like to know how much it costs to tow a sign reading 'SARGE IS A BIG FAT JERK!' over Camp Swampy, USA. No, I don't know where that is EXACTLY. So, what do you think?"

Luckily, I found The Flying Circus, and they listed some rates: $5 per letter per hour (maximum 45 letters, symbols, and spaces on banner), $100 per hour for pilot and airplane. Now, we can't answer Killer's question exactly, but we can get an estimate. I don't know if The Flying Circus would make Beetle pay for the exclamation point, but let's say they did. That's 19 letters at $5 per = $95 + $100 per hour for pilot and airplane = $195 (if Beetle got the sign for 1 hour). That's not too bad! I really did think it would cost more than that.

Essentially, Beetle's claim that he will "get even with Sarge no matter what it costs!" costs only 195 Frosties (as the Wendy's Super Value Menu commercials say). That's not really all that much, Beetle. Of course, maybe he had the sign for more than an hour.

And, he is a private in the US Army, and they don't make a whole lot of dough. Maybe this is a veiled commentary on the state of pay in today's armed forces? More likely, the Walkers didn't expect some MORON to go looking up the cost of banner towing.

While we're at it -- clams don't have feet!

2006-01-29T14:13:00.000-05:00

Ah, evolution! Let's begin with a mathematical theorem:

1) The existence of evolution is controversial.
2) The Christian Right is the group most vocally opposed to the validity of the theory of evolution.
3) Johnny Hart is a member of the Christian Right.

Therefore, Johnny Hart is vocally opposed to the validity of the theory of evolution. This should come to the surprise of no one who regularly reads Mr. Hart's work.

I will start with an admission: I believe in evolution. I think you see it all over the place, all the time: from anti-biotic resistant diseases to huge-eyeballed octopi in the deepest parts of the ocean. Shockingly, I also believe in God, and have never quite figured out how believing in evolution means we can't believe in God (as Mr. Hart is insinuating in the first 2 panels). So, you all know where I am coming from.

Are there holes in the fossil record? Yes. Does the theory of evolution need further study and refining? Yes. There are holes in the theory, and if you ask an Intelligent Design proponent, you can hear an earful of them. If a Christian Right comic artist wanted to pound away at those problems, more power to him. But, Mr. Hart has the theory COMPLETELY WRONG. He isn't even arguing his cause on its merits.

In panel 2, after hearing that evolution doesn't really mean re-incarnation, the fish says, "Then when you die, who turns you into something else?" Well, see . . . that's not how evolution is purported to work. Evolution works through the miracle of reproduction, and has nothing whatsoever to do with death (unless you die before you can pass along your genes).

What a terrible argument, Mr. Hart. There are holes in the theory of evolution to poke at. If you want to poke at them, then do so. Don't make up a false theory of evolution, then poke holes in the false theory.

Spirit and Opportunity

2006-01-24T15:22:00.000-05:00

Boy, kids are damn dumb. He's so dumb he doesn't realize that it will likely be centuries before civilians can take a trip to Mars. And, he's so dumb he thinks he, an eight year old, can save enough money to go to Mars. When it will likely take millions, if not billions, of dollars. Moron.

Of course, let's say it takes 150 years for us to have regular vacations to Mars. Although, you know, it is 2006, and if you were to believe Cold War pop culture, we'd have a Sea World on Mars by now. But, whatever, let's just say we go there in 150 years. In 150 years, I will be 182. So, more than likely, dead. But do you know how old Billy will be in 150 years? That's right! He will still be eight. So, no matter if it takes us decades, centuries, or millennia to get to Mars, Billy will always be eight, so he has a decent chance of making the trip, once it's opened up as a vacation spot. If he saves enough money.

But here, Billy: NASA knows kids want to go to Mars. You know, Billy, when I was eight, we didn't have the Internet, and didn't have cool things like Mars rovers. You remember, don't you? You were eight then, too. Remember Voyager when it took pictures of Jupiter and Saturn?

Self Hate and Flagellation

2006-01-23T14:38:00.000-05:00

Bloggers: Socially blighted creeps, living in basement apartments hoping for some glimmer of respect and recognition. Sigh. I sort of knew that blogging about the comic made me a loser, but now it is official!

January 23, 2006: A red-letter day; the official "I-Am-A-Loser" day. Yippee.

I Heard It Through the Grapvine

2006-01-22T14:12:00.000-05:00

Friday's comics brought to you by the California Raisin Marketing Board:

First, the California Raisin Marketing Board, along with SunMaid Raisins, would like you to know that all is not lost with stale raisins: "You can reconstitute them in hot water and drain." Also, keep in mind that stale raisins are good to use in oatmeal raisin cookies. Finally, did you know if you dream about looking at stale raisins, it means that forgotten things from the past are burdening your mind? True.

Additionally, while Beetle Bailey seems to insinuate that raisins look like ants, bugs, and grubs, keep in mind that raisins are not that gross! Try not to think about ants, bugs, and grubs when you eat raisins. (EDITOR'S NOTE: I think raisins are gross, and avoid them at all costs).

Hey, everybody! FYI, the Raisin Administrative Committee is holding a Sales and Marketing Committee meeting this Thursday at 2 PM in Fresno, CA. They will perhaps discuss getting more raisin-themed comics in the funny pages. To see the agenda, click here. Then click on "Meetings and Events," and scroll to the sales and marketing meeting.

The California Raisin Marketing Board thanks you for your attention, and reminds you: raisins are a nutritious, healthy snack! (And what they don't tell you: they are an absolutely shitty Trick or Treat item).

Butt, Butt, Crap

2006-01-16T14:22:00.000-05:00

Seems I'm not the only one paying attention to the letters to the editor:

Darby Conley has obviously read a letter from "some nut complaining that a comic stripp used the word 'butt'." Now he baits the bear by using the word crap . . . TWICE! I would question whether someone really did complain about the innocuous use of "butt," BUT (heh heh, one t) remember, Mrs. Probert did complain about the St. Peter joke. Who used "butt" in the comics today? Kudzu, the strip about the preacher!

Not just "butt," but "bubble butt!" That is soooooo offensive, I can't even tell you. Time to write a strongly worded letter.

So, St. Peter Walks into a Bar . . .

2006-01-14T18:02:00.000-05:00

. . . and says, "Ow. That hurts!" AH HA HA HA HA. Ahem.

Yay! A letter to the editor in today's News and Observer about the comics. I love these things! In fact, I read the letters column only because I like it when people complain about the comics, and I don't want to miss one. Here we go:

Unsuitable comics

I am very unhappy with some of the "comics" you have published lately. The Jan. 10 "Non Sequitur" strip was, I felt, sacrilegious and very offensive. The "Boondocks" strip addressed gay marriage. Neither of these "comic" strips are suitable for the Comics page. I hope you will move these strips to an adult part of the paper or, I hope, remove them completely. Please use a little better judgment on what you print.
--- Mrs. R.H. Probert

Ok, first of all, the N&O isn't so proper that it only uses last names and salutations (for example, the letter directly above Mrs. Probert's letter was signed by a Cyrus King). My guess is that Mrs. Probert is the ultra-proper one. Good on, ya, Mrs. Probert! Things are becoming all too casual in this day and age, don't you think?

I like her first sentence. I could also write a letter to the N&O that starts the exact same way: "I am very unhappy with some of the "comics" you have published lately." I like how she puts "comics" in quotes. Oh, Mrs. Probert, I agree. They are not funny, and never do they make me laugh. When was the last time that Family Circus, or Hagar the Horrible, or Dennis the Menace even remotely tickled your funny bone? I hear ya!

Oh, wait. She's not complaining about Family Circus, or Hagar the Horrible, or Dennis the Menace. Oh. She's complaining about the Boondocks and Non Sequitur, two of my favorites -- two that are most often comical.

Have you been following the Boondocks? First Granddad went to see Brokeback Mountain, thinking it was a standard cowboy flick. Aghast at the gay cowboys, he's been back home trying to talk to the boys about gay marriage. Granddad is REALLY against gay marriage and finds it very difficult to talk to the boys about it. It's been pretty funny. And, it's not like Granddad is portrayed as some sort of raving homophobic lunatic. He's just a sympathetic older guy -- someone very uncomfortable with the topic, but realizing it's something he should probably discuss with his children. It's funny precisely because it deals with the unease we all feel when discussing things we feel very uncomfortable about. It's the same joke, pretty much, as Hi and Lois trying to tell Chip about the birds and the bees. But, it's funnier.

So, Mrs. Probert thinks the 1/10 Non Sequitur was "sacrilegious and very offensive." Was it? Let's check:

Oh my God (while we're being sacrilegious). This is what offended her??? Gay marriage, I can see. But this??? This is nothing more than a "St. Peter at the Holy Gates" joke. This joke set up is as old as "a priest, a rabbi, and a minister" in a lifeboat, or "knock knock," or laywer jokes, or 2 guys stuck on a deserted island. I just Googled "St. Peter jokes" and got over 2 MILLION hits!

What do you suppose Mrs. Probert finds so offensive? The comic (*@!!!!!) cursing? Calling St. Peter an "activist judge?" I am 100% baffled. I absolutely understand someone being uncomfortable with the gay marriage comic. In fact, that's even the premise of the joke in the strip -- people are uncomfortable with it. How in the world can you be offended by a "St. Peter at the Holy Gates" joke?? How can you not have heard one of these or seen one of these before? Mrs. Probert, where do you live? And how are you so isolated?

There's No Snow Shoveling in Clearwater

2006-01-09T22:13:00.000-05:00

Heyyyy. . . doesn't Dagwood live in Clearwater Florida????? So, I just checked on weather.com, and the high today in Clearwater was 71 degrees! The low was a bone chilling 44! Brrrrr! Dagwood is right! Snow made in those conditions IS "perfect for packing!"

Here is your lesson for today folks: It doesn't snow when the low temperature is 44 degrees. Write that down; there will probably be a quiz. Water freezes at 32 (Fahrenheit) at sea level.

OK, so I guess we came to the conclusion that Dagwood doesn't live in Clearwater. Howard even told us it was some sort of in-"joke." Fine, I guess Dagwood lives up north somewhere. I guess all the comic strip characters live up north. I realize, of course, that it does snow from time to time down here in the South. HOWEVER, it doesn't snow every year, and it doesn't go up to our knees, and it doesn't always stick around long enough to do fun stuff with. And yet, in all the comics . . . it does. Calvin makes his snowmen and sleds with Hobbes, Jason Fox writes complex equations in the snow, Lucy Van Pelts poor Charlie Brown with a snow ball . . . EVERY SINGLE YEAR. If any of these people lived in the South, there would be some off years. But then:

Oooh, HA HA HA! We couldn't have the funny, topical, and insightful "Shoveling Snow is a Pain in the Ass" jokes. Without the "snow" jokes, the comic strip artists would be stuck with the vastness of January and February . . . with no material! YIKES!

Challenge: There WILL BE another "Shoveling Snow is a Pain in the Ass" joke in a comic strip before spring arrives. It may not be quite as literal as this one, where Hi actually STATES that it is a "pain in the back," but we will hear again, from someone, about how much it sucks to shovel snow. If I am wrong about this, my punishment will be to write a glowing letter of appreciation to Bil and Jeff Keane, thanking them for their wonderful work as cartoonists. The challenge begins with tomorrow's comics. Wish me luck!

Dolly Keane: Kooky Flat Earther or Misinformed Little Kid?

2006-01-07T14:25:00.000-05:00

This is from Wednesday, and I am sorry I haven't been able to post on it yet -- busy, you know!

Is it funny? No -- it is not! I'm not even sure what the joke is supposed to be -- that people thought the Earth was flat because of maps? Or that Dolly's addled little girl brain thinks that it was only just months ago that the world's true shape was discovered? Or that little children have no real sense of time so that it is easy for them to confuse a few months with several centuries? To her credit, she really just says it "was months ago" that people discovered the earth isn't flat. And, she's right -- I mean, it's something on the order of six thousand months ago, but still . . . she's not wrong.

Plus, there are still people who believe the earth is flat. Visit their website, which is so kooky, I believe it's a joke. But, you can read about the historical origins, and more official stuff about the Flat Earthers on wikipedia. I found the most interesting thing there to be this tidbit:

"The last world model propagated by the Flat Earth Society holds that we live on a disc, with the North Pole at its center and a 150 feet high wall of ice at the outer edge. Curiously, the resulting map resembles the symbol of the United Nations, something Johnson [he's the last flat earth president or something] used as evidence for his position. " Hmmmmm . . .

Finally, if you would like to chat with the Flat Earthers (and maybe even Dolly Keane!) you can do so here.

Check out the map Dolly and Jeffy are looking at. It's some wacky, distorted version of the U.S., I think. It's like one of those old maps you see in history books where they haven't really accurately mapped North America yet. I've always suspected the Keanes were stuck in the 50s, but maybe I was wrong to think it was the 1950s. Maybe it's the 1550s?

Disposing of Your Tree

2006-01-02T16:00:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year, everybody!

Helpful hints, courtesy of The Middletons:

Hee hee hee!
Dogs like to pee!
They like to pee on trees!

Also, bulldogs like to wear sweaters!

How do you dispose of your tree? Do you put it curbside on a specified day? Well, it depends on your location. Here are the details for Christmas tree disposal in my neck of the woods. Looks like we need to have our tree curbside by Friday.

But, wait! Should I take it down before then? Is it tacky to have it up too much longer? Well, etiquette says that the tree should come down on the epiphany - or the Twelfth Night. This is the 6th of January (Friday). You can learn that and more at this handy Christmas site. Bookmark it for next year. You can learn all sorts of helpful tips, and other things like . . . did you know mistletoe is "quite toxic"??? I did not know that! Also, good information on how to buy gifts for left handed people. Yes, I know every year you agonize over those lefties on your shopping list. I know I do!

Best wishes to everyone in 2006!

Obesity -- It's Why P.E. is Important

2005-12-29T19:14:00.000-05:00

As I am sure you are well aware, Hi and Lois is one of those "topical" strips, always commenting on the important issues of the day. We often get letters to the editor asking H&L to be moved to the Opinion Page. You know the "topical" stuff I'm talking about: slobby neighbors, truculent teens, messy babies, etc. Take today's strip for instance:

Yes, children's tv shows market sugar-fueled confectionary treats to children! In fact, in early December, the Institute of Medicine, an advisory arm of the National Academies, issued a report that linked the proliferation of junk-food advertising to the growing incidence of childhood obesity. You can even buy the report. Or, you can read about it in the Baltimore Sun.

In some corners, the report's conclusions were controversial. And they're right -- there's more to childhood obesity than pervasive marketing, but doesn't marketing of crappy food at least have SOMETHING to do with it?

And here, Hi and Lois jumps directly into this hot-button issue, as it does with all the important issues of our time. Dot and Ditto are simply watching their favorite Frankenstein's monster cartoon, when they are bombarded with entreaties to buy Super-Slammin' Blasto-Pops Frozen Treats. YUM! And, lookie there, Ditto went IMMEDIATELY to his mom to ask her to buy it. Marketing doesn't affect children? I beg to differ! Thank you, Hi and Lois for weighing in with your take.

Graduate Level Course: African American Studies

2005-12-28T18:40:00.000-05:00

Someone with actual knowledge of African American Studies could probably do real justice to explaining the Boondocks daily. There's a lot of good stuff there. As it is, you are going to just have to stick to the stuff I found by Googling.

Googling racial overtones king kong led to14,600 results. Racial undertones king kong resulted in 836 hits. What does that tell us? That the racial component to King Kong is more of an "overtone" than an "undertone." I'm not really even sure what the difference is in those words. "Undertone" is "a quality underlying the surface of an utterance or action," and "overtone" is "a secondary effect, quality, or meaning." A linguist might be able to sort that out for you.

THE END.

Are you kidding me? I'm not touching this issue with a 10 foot pole. Do the Googling yourself! Or, enjoy the highlights: an NPR interview, comment in the London Times online, there's even a skinheads forum, but I think I won't link to them (Google it if you really want to find it). Being a "skin" "head" makes no sense to me anyway.

In other news, Kitty has made it through the year:

Yep, Sally, it's true, but you can resolve to be a better pet owner in 2006!

Human sacrifice, dogs and cats, living together... mass hysteria

2005-12-27T14:31:00.000-05:00

It's still Christmas break, so we won't start our lessons again. Instead, a few words of helpful advice:

It's the time of year when many people are adding pets to their families (never mind that the ASPCA does not really recommend this -- it's too late now, right?). So, what if, like Luann (and, please note: Luann did NOT get Kitty for Christmas), you are adding a cat to your family? And what if that family already includes a dog?

First, let's hope that Puddles does not attack Kitty, because "Cats and rabbits rarely survive dog attacks," according to Willa's Ark. Here's what you should do if you are adding a cat to your family: Put the dog away, and allow the cat to sniff around and become comfortable with her surroundings. After the cat becomes comfortable, "introduce" the dog to the cat: keep the dog on a leash, and allow the dog to sniff out the cat. The cat may run off, but try this as many times a necessary. Also, you could keep the cat in a cage or box, and allow the dog to sniff around the cat as long as it takes for them to become comfortable with one another.

Finally, there is more info here. Did you know that according to humane society studies, these are some combinations of animals that tend to work well?

two kittens
an older kitten and a puppy
a pair of mature neutered animals (although this did not work for Liza Minnelli and David Gest)
two cats
two dogs

While doing research for this posting, I found this "Awful Plastic Surgery" blog. No, nothing to do with dogs and cats, but everything to do with the Cat Lady. GUH-ROSS!

Merry Christmas!

2005-12-20T21:01:00.000-05:00

First, to everyone -- Happy Holidays! Or Merry Christmas . . . whatever it is I am supposed to say that pays homage to the blinged-out celebration of consumerism and overindulgence we enjoy every winter solstice! Peace on Earth! Goodwill to men!

Over Christmas, er . . . the holidays, you only have one homework problem, provided by Baby Blues:

While Hammie's answer is insightful, it doesn't actually answer the question: How much money DOES Dan have left? It's a word problem. You can get your mom to help you if you need it.

Seriously, everybody, enjoy the holidays! See you all next week!