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April, 2006
For Better Or For Worse, 4/28/06
One think I respect about this particular installment of FBOFW is its determined adherence to its original vision. Consider: Clearly John’s statement in panel one is meant to be “she goes like a bat out of hell,” and, just as clearly, you can’t say “bat out of hell” in a family paper. But did they give in to The Man? Did they replace that mildly profane phrase with a completely new phrase that worked in context and made sense in and of itself? They did not. “Goes like a bat” it was, which implies that John’s sweet new ride navigates by sonar, eats insects and fruit, and dangles headlights-first from the garage rafters at night. That’s dedication!
Also, John’s emotional adultery with his cars: creepy. Also also, Gordon’s transformation into a doppelgänger of the soon-to-be-indicted Karl Rove: creepier.
For all of you who participate in the forums: I’m changing the permissions so that you will only be able to read messages if you are a registered user. Apologies in advance if this is an incovenience, but I am having some mysetrious server issues that I hope this will fix. Feel free to write me if this puzzles you. Registering as a forum user is still of course free.
Update: Sorry for any confusion: when I talking about the forum, I’m talking about the Comics Curmudgeon community forum, not the comments you can add to individual blog posts of mine. You don’t need to register to put comments on the main part of the site; you do have to register now to view the forum site.
Update 2: I’ve also updated my install of WordPress (the software that runs the blog part of this operation) from 1.5 to 2.0.2. This appears to have gone remarkably smoothly (much more so than the last big upgrade), but if anyone out there notices problems with the blog, please let me know. I’ve also installed a new, much more powerful comment-spam removal package, called Spam Karma, which for the most part allows me to dispense with the “see it before you say it” screen. If your post is suspected of being spam, you may be asked to prove that you’re a real person by entering a “catchpa” code — basically, you’ll be shown a series of numbers and letters and asked to enter them into a box. This shouldn’t happen too often, as Spam Karma learns over time, and it will figure out that you’re not a spambot in short order.
If you’re curious about the motivation for this flurry of late-night activity (warning: technical geekery aheady), my ISP just told me that either my blog or my forum software was apparently eating up a lot of PHP resources on the server. I took some steps to reduce the amount of work PHP had to do — that’s where the more effective spam-killing comes in, and the restriction of the forums site to registered users (since every time a non-registered user looked at the forums, PHP had to work to render everything). As a precaution, I also updated PHPBB and WordPress to the most recent and secure versions. I’m not sure if this actually has solved the problem. If anyone is experienced on why WordPress and/or PHPBB might suddenly be forking a lot of PHP processes, I’d love to hear it.
Update 3: OK, I’ve re-added the ability to “See It Before You Say It” because some people liked it. It’s no longer mandatory, however.
Rex Morgan, M.D., 4/26-7/06
Well, no wonder she’s sick all the time, with these quacks for parents. I guess they’re trying to conclusively settle the “feed a cold and starve a fever, or vice-versa?” argument. Maybe they can convince Dr. Troy to open an all-dessert-based clinic, with Lou from Mary Worth as a silent partner.
Abbey, as always the smartest one in the room, looks like she’s unconvinced about the effectiveness of this protocol. She also looks to me disturbingly like a whacked-out Axl Rose (like there’s any other kind). But then, in panel two in Wednesday’s strip, Sarah looks a lot like Angela Lansbury, so I may be seeing things.
Beetle Bailey, 4/27/06
That’s funny, I think my initial response to “Beetle didn’t open his chute” would have been “If he isn’t careful, he’ll plummet to a terrifying, painful death.” Guess that’s why I’m not in the army!
Apartment 3-G, 4/27/06
“Yeah, your art, your passion, your life’s work … snoresville! It’s good thing you’re so dull yourself, so you don’t notice. I’m going to go do something more interesting now, like listen to myself talk. Ta!”
Judge Parker, 4/27/06
Oh, yuck. Is that what they’re calling it these days? I hope for his clients’ sake that he isn’t treating this time as billable hours.
For Better For Worse, 4/25/06
Mark my words: Thérèse’s having humiliated and cuckolded Anthony is only the beginning. My prediction is that, despite the fact that this evil, baby-hating hussy vowed that the nine months little spawn-of-Anthony spent in her womb would be the sum total of the energy she would expend on it, she’s nevertheless going to take the Mustachioed Milquetoast before a bewigged Canadian judge and demand custody. Why? First, she’s a FBOFW villain, and therefore exists to make the sympathetic characters as sympathetic as possible; and second, there is no need for any other reasons.
Meanwhile, if Liz gives up her exciting, fulfilling life in the north and her romances with Paul the ass-grabbing mountie and Fly-Boy Warren to come home, marry the chump, and start popping out babies, then I for one will be very depressed (though not Anthony-level depressed, don’t worry). Mock her First Nations travelogue life if you must, but she’s the one Patterson that escaped the suffocating middle-class suburban life that has Mike in a death-grip, and nothing about Anthony says to me that he’s worth sacrificing a whit for.
Mary Worth, 4/25/06
The only way Kelly could look any more depressed than she does in panel two would be if she actually had a gun barrel in her mouth. “You sat through the same awful dinner as I did last week, and now you want me to spend more time with that force-feeding loon? And you’re the biddy that people come to for advice in this town?”
Apartment 3-G, 4/25/06
Aaaand thus endeth the Tommie storyline.
Pluggers, 4/24/06
I have tried — I mean, really, really tried — to restrain my college-educated, East Coast-dwelling, liberal urban elitism while reading Pluggers, holding my tongue as I am lectured day after day about how simple, down-home folks are morally superior to me. But this one really just pushed me over the edge, and I’m not what you’d call particularly clean. All right, Pluggers, listen up: If your response to spilling something on the floor is to aimlessly push it around with your sock, you live in filth, OK? I know your kitchen tile is already invisible under a layer of grime and sticky Fanta residue, but try to make a goddamn effort, for Christ’s sake. I hope social services comes and takes away your undernourished kids, the Humane Society comes and takes away your chained-up dogs, and the dentist comes and takes away the last of your meth-loosened teeth. And don’t try to tell me that you represent the “real America,” because I live in America and we have these things called paper towels.
Judge Parker, 4/24/06
Meanwhile, in the other America — the rich, white, freaky-red-haired-fright-wigged America — Sam and Abbey have turned from ruining Ned’s love life to cramping Sophie’s academic style. See, earlier this morning (by which I mean two weeks ago, JP-time), Abbey’s youngest received praise from her teacher on her latest school paper, which praised the concept of outsourcing. Today, the upcoming conflict is being telegraphed with a total lack of subtlety: Sophie is outsourcing her homework to India! This presumably includes the aforementioned paper about outsourcing, which may be a desperate attempt on the part of this strip that it does too understand the concept of irony.
Who’s to blame for this sad state of affairs? Evil, greedy CEOs, who have set a bad example to the nation’s youth by demonstrating that labor should be sought at the lowest possible prices, wherever you can find it? The Indians, for being so smart and yet working so cheaply that good old fashioned American fraudulant-paper-writers can’t compete? My vote goes to Sam and Abbey: I don’t care how many acres your estate is and how many pretty, pretty horses frolic prettily on it, nobody Sophie’s age (which is indeterminable due to crappy artwork, but is surely somewhere between 8 and 13) needs access to international wire transfer capabilities.
Sally Forth, 4/24/06
Boy, is Hillary in luck! She’s bonded with a moody goth girl just in time to learn about death!
Family Circus, 4/23/06
This may be the first time ever that I’ve appreciated the Family Circus in a non-ironic fashion. Then again, this may be the first time that the Family Circus featured the aftermath of a ghastly parody of a religious sacrament that quickly descended into child-injuring violence. My favorite aspects: the discarded bible, face down in the grass, its pages no doubt scratched to ribbons by Kittycat in a desperate attempt to escape salvation; and the dripping water and anger-produced steam emanating from the aforementioned still-unsaved feline. I am a bit curious about the transistor radio — tuned to some cheesy contemporary Christian channel, no doubt. I also think that it was overkill to use the hose and the bucket and the water already in the birdbath. They really tried to baptize the hell out of that cat.
Anyway, the only way this cartoon could have been improved would have been to dress Jeffy up like Robert Mitchum’s evil preacher from Night of the Hunter.
Luann, 4/23/06
Criminey, DeGroots, this is the ghetto-ist replacement for a TiVo ever. Join the modern age, already!
This next joke, on today’s Rex Morgan, is courtesy of Mrs. C.:
You know, for someone whose parents are a doctor and a nurse, Sarah sure is sick a lot.
