The Comics Curmudgeon

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Death cat

Hey, kids! Before we tackle today’s comics, we have to go back to yesterday’s TDIET:

They’ll Do It Every Time, 8/27/07

Why this trip into the wayback machine? Well, it turns out that “the good daughter” is faithful Comics Curmudgeon reader TaxiGirl! She provides the real story behind this little drama:

In the interests of strict accuracy, my mother usually isn’t arranging a bridge meeting (I’m not sure if she’s ever played bridge in her life) — but “My mother demands that I call her back urgently … and then inevitably has to go to the bathroom as soon as she picks up the phone” apparently doesn’t suit this sort of a family feature.

The first panel, however, is right-on.

Sadly, this does not appear to give me “The Urge.”

I’m just amazed that Luluna’s phone is a wireless handset that could have actually been sold in a store in the last ten years.

And now on to today:

Baldo, 8/28/07

“Hello, there! We’re the cast of Baldo! We know that you normally turn to us for gentle humor about family life, teenagerhood, and the Latino experience in the United States. But did you know that we wouldn’t be able to bring you this enjoyable thirty seconds of the day if it weren’t for … newspapers? That’s right! They aren’t just repositories of day-old stories, stock prices you could look up on the Internet, news about city politicians you’ve barely heard of, and incomprehensible legal notices — they also keep cartoonists gainfully employed! So, for the love of God, please, keep subscribing to the damn newspaper! You don’t want Baldo’s creator to have to go back to a real job, do you?”

Funky Winkerbean, 8/28/07

And so the trip straight to the heart of death-flavored madness … begins! At first, I thought this might be a reference to that hospice cat that always seems to know when the patients are going to die, but clearly it’s seeking out Les, not Lisa. So it has a different kind of ability: namely, the ability to tell when someone is about to begin a booze-fueled descent into depression!

Also, it can talk, apparently? Yeah, sure, what the hell, why not.

Hi and Lois, 8/28/07

Not being a golfer myself, I use the comics as a sort of anthropological window into the golfing lifestyle, since so many comics artists seem to be obsessed with the game. For instance, it never occurred to me that you’d put on sunscreen to go play nine holes, though having read this of course that’s obvious. And it also never occurred to me that, if it were sunny enough to require sunscreen, you’d still leave on your ink-black, presumably wool suit, because they like formal attire on the course. And I never would have guessed that, if you skip out on work once in a while to do something you enjoy, you wouldn’t tell your wife, the person you’re ostensibly closest too, unless there was some other way that she’d find out. And finally, it was never so clear to me as it is now how “putting on sunscreen to play golf” would be a great cover for putting on sunscreen to go to a nude beach. The comics: so educational!

Pluggers, 8/28/07

Yup, ever since the Wal-Mart opened the next town over, there’ve been some changes in this plugger’s local neighborhood. Not to complain: now milk’s thirty cents a gallon cheaper, and isn’t that worth an extra twenty minutes or so of driving? But you can’t blame him from talking in the past tense: “take a left at the huge, empty, greyish husk of a building, go a couple of miles and it’s on the right across from the mid-sized yellowish burnt-for-the-insurance money husk of a building, next to the Dollar Store” just sounds depressing.

Mary Worth, 8/28/07

Mary’s “Uh-oh!” can’t be about Dr. Drew’s two-timing, since she doesn’t understand or care about ordinary human concepts like “love.” No, she’s more worried that he’s stealing her patented schtick: talking in annoying aphorisms with quote marks around them even though they don’t really appear to be quotes from anything. Also, he’s apparently been taking fashion advice from Ian Cameron — always a very, very bad sign.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 28, 2007 at 09:39 am and is filed under Baldo, Funky Winkerbean, Hi and Lois, Mary Worth, Pluggers, They'll Do It Every Time.

450 responses to “Death cat”

Roger
August 28th, 2007 at 9:45 am [Reply]

Funky: What is Les drinking there, anyway, from that tiny little bottle? Ice wine imported from Quebec? I suppose it looks a little like NyQuil, which is perfectly sensible. And explains the talking cat.

Mary Worth: From his outfit, Drew is obviously happy because he just won the Masters tournament.
Inspector Dim
August 28th, 2007 at 9:45 am [Reply]

Wow, Les’s Booze Cat even looks kinda like Oscar the Death Cat. Cool!

I also was unaware that cats could smirk like that. …Disturbing.
Chris
August 28th, 2007 at 9:46 am [Reply]

I want me a green suit like Dr. Drew’s…awesome!

And Funky Cancerward is descending into utter madness…Batiuk is clearly unmoored and drifting into unchartable waters.

Nice boob shot in JP today, by the way. They’d been slacking on that score for a while. Wonder what’s going on with Big Red and Sam the Pile Driver behind closed doors.

Hi looks like the most depressed suburban wage slave ever.
Moonbeam McSwine
August 28th, 2007 at 9:49 am [Reply]

Drew is parroting what Dawn said to Mary on August 3.
Sister Sestina
August 28th, 2007 at 9:49 am [Reply]

Memo to good daughter: Get Mom a cordless. Why cheat yourself of all the telephonically-transmitted flushing activity?
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 9:49 am [Reply]

Either that’s the teeniest, tiniest bottle of Jim Beam around, or Les is gettin’ all ‘tussined out for the grande finale. I can only hope he starts unconsciously drooling sticky liquid at the funeral, imagining the sensation to be kisses from his unseen cat friend. Then Funky stages an intervention at the wake, and ten years later they reminisce about rehab as they ready for the Lisa “My Life’s Meaning Has Been Officially Reduced Entirely To The Disease That Killed Me” Moore “Mammorial” Fun-Run, stretching their hamstrings beneath the tree planted where the one-armed conductrix was electrocuted during a storm the day before her husband returned from Iraq.

That would be more tasteful than focusing on Lisa coming to terms with finding out about her new son right after she decided to stop chemo, right? I thought so, kitty. I agree, this strip has improved so much since you started scripting it a few years back. I like the coy, Hitchcockian “ca-meow” you’ve pencilled in for yourself today, too. Now were’s the bottle? I need another nip from my Rob-Rob…
Chris
August 28th, 2007 at 9:49 am [Reply]

Gasoline Alley is also on a demented roll. Slim in the padded cell, unable to escape the pounding din of Negro boys bouncing basketballs.

Who comes up with this shit, anyway?
scan
August 28th, 2007 at 9:54 am [Reply]

Looks like Dr. Drew’s dressed to do the Jitterbug with Mary Worth. Zootsuit riot indeed!
seanman
August 28th, 2007 at 9:54 am [Reply]

Is Les’ cat wearing a Ringo Starr wig? Makes as much sense as anything else…

“La Chat Bleu”? Heck, the whole STRIP blew!
Hank
August 28th, 2007 at 9:55 am [Reply]

You know, the way that FW has been I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s actually about to slip Lisa a fatal dose of something, so we can be treated a long drawn out “mercy killing” storyline.
Sister Sestina
August 28th, 2007 at 9:58 am [Reply]

#6 SecretMargo –
The final sentence of your first paragraph is… is…
(breaks down into sobbing with rapturous delight.)
man behind the curtain
August 28th, 2007 at 9:58 am [Reply]

#1 Roger — Maybe he’s won the Master’s twice and that’s why he has the green pants too. But we may have to wait to hear from Vera to see if he has the matching boxers.
will
August 28th, 2007 at 9:58 am [Reply]

FW: well this means that the title character should be along soon, to tell Les that there are “no answers in the bottom of the bottle.”
Mack
August 28th, 2007 at 10:02 am [Reply]

Drew’s suit reveals the truth that Mary has suspected all along – Dawn was really just after his Lucky Charms.
Les
August 28th, 2007 at 10:02 am [Reply]

I have been shouting “hot cup of monkey” intermittently all day to my very patient domestic partner. When / where can I buy this T shirt? I MUST HAVE IT!!
Joe
August 28th, 2007 at 10:03 am [Reply]

FW:
Cancer ShavedHeadBean is so morbid these days. I remember when I was a kid back in the 80’s, then it was funny. Now I think Batuik has just lost his mind. And I hate that stupid talking cat, I need to chuck a shoe at it. But nothing is worse than FBOFW. Now there’s a comic worth all the snark we can muster. Bald CancerBean is just simply……..depressing.

FOOB:
Well, it looks like April’s two-day trip to the Farm will be the last time we see Manitoba before we’re stuck in golden-boy-assclown-St.-Michael’s photo album of foobiverse hell.

I think that Laura is perhaps a couple of years younger than Elizaloser, yet the Great Eye of Sauron Lynn draws Laura a bit plain, much more so than the 16 year-old April and her older sister, Miss Fat-Ass-Droopy-Tits.

Note the goofy hair and full lipppps on April. Look at the Ethereal way Loserbreath is drawn. In comparison, Laura is drawn much more realistic.

It’s a good thing that Laura’s name is Cruikenshank, as opposed to Patterfoob, and that they live so far away from the gravitational pull of that Black Hole Hell which is the Foobland Milborough.

I would like to think that when Laura goes to Foob-Central for the final mating of the Lizthony, she is overcome with rage and kicks Blandthony in the balls with the force of a thousand sledge-hammers, forever rendering him unable to spread his cursed sperm into the Temple of Lizardblech (if he hasn’t already, hopefully she isn’t knocked up yet!) and then slaps Little Miss Grendel silly until she wakes up and realizes what a marraige-wrecking, smut-puppy foob-assed moron she’s become and dumps Fuckthony like yesterday’s dirty bathwater.

I would then hope that Laura then takes April back to the Farm for good, far, far away from the Patterson-Sawney Bean family. At least then, April will have a chance at a normal life.

We can only hope!
Maughta
August 28th, 2007 at 10:05 am [Reply]

Wow, TaxiGirl, I didn’t realize my mother had two daughters!
man behind the curtain
August 28th, 2007 at 10:06 am [Reply]

MW — And look at this suit i made from a used set of hospital scrubs.
Laura c
August 28th, 2007 at 10:06 am [Reply]

I guess St. Patrick’s Day came early this year.
Today’s Get Fuzzy seems like a CC shout-out…or gibe.
AhClem
August 28th, 2007 at 10:07 am [Reply]

I never thought that there could be a strip about talking animals as miserably lame as Buckles, but it looks like Batuik is going to give it a shot.
TaxiGirl
August 28th, 2007 at 10:07 am [Reply]

#5 SisterSestina: She has one of those headset phones. When I go to her house and make a phone call I get to feel like a customer service rep. But she still has this sense that the toilet is a one-person job… go fig.
Joe
August 28th, 2007 at 10:09 am [Reply]

FW:
Cancer ShavedHeadBean is so morbid these days. I remember when I was a kid back in the 80’s, then it was funny. Now I think Batuik has just lost his mind. And I hate that stupid talking cat, I need to chuck a shoe at it. But nothing is worse than FBOFW. Now there’s a comic worth all the snark we can muster. Bald CancerBean is just simply……..depressing. Batuik needs to find himself again.

FOOB:
Well, it looks like April’s two-day trip to the Farm will be the last time we see Manitoba before we’re stuck in golden-boy-assclown-St.-Michael’s photo album of foobiverse hell.

I think that Laura is perhaps a couple of years younger than Elizaloser, yet the Great Eye of Sauron Lynn draws Laura a bit plain, much more so than the 16 year-old April and her older sister, Miss Fat-Ass-Droopy-Tits.

Note the goofy hair and full lipppps on April. Look at the Ethereal way Loserbreath is drawn. In comparison, Laura is drawn much more realistic.

It’s a good thing that Laura’s name is Cruikenshank, as opposed to Patterfoob, and that they live so far away from the gravitational pull of that Black Hole Hell which is the Foobland Milborough.

I would like to think that when Laura goes to Foob-Central for the final mating of the Lizthony, she is overcome with rage and kicks Blandthony in the balls with the force of a thousand sledge-hammers, forever rendering him unable to spread his cursed sperm into the Temple of Lizardblech (if he hasn’t already, hopefully she isn’t knocked up yet!) and then slaps Little Miss Grendel silly until she wakes up and realizes what a marraige-wrecking, smut-puppy foob-assed moron she’s become and dumps Fuckthony like yesterday’s dirty bathwater.

I would then hope that Laura then takes April back to the Farm for good, far, far away from the Patterson-Sawney Bean family. At least then, April will have a chance at a normal life.

We can only hope!
louder
August 28th, 2007 at 10:09 am [Reply]

Is it just me, or has the free-fall of FBoFW completely overshadow 9CL now being absolute crap. It’s a prime example of how change is not always for the best — the best characters have disappeared, and all that is left are characters who could make a guest appearance in FOOBville quite easily; they’re that boring.
Edgy DC
August 28th, 2007 at 10:09 am [Reply]

I searched this interweb thingy and it told me that Drew’s quote was from

Happiness is
Something to do
Something to love
Something to hope for.

– Author:Chinese Proverb

There’s also apparently a feelgood self-help book of the same name out there somewhere.

I actually have to congratulate Dr. Feel-Up for having the tact to edit that proverb down, and not describe poor Vera as “Something to do.”
bats :[
August 28th, 2007 at 10:09 am [Reply]

4. Moonbeam: dang if Drew isn’t stealing Dawn’s lines…wow! two-timing her and using her own words for someone else!
Or is it just two-timing?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9545446@N07/1255768990/

(I did this late last night…I can’t remember if I posted the link here. Gotta stop these midnight PhotoShop hours!)
Katherine
August 28th, 2007 at 10:11 am [Reply]

Oh God. I….I am a plugger. I still give directions which include the no-longer existent trailer park near my house (it was a good landmark, OK?). I’m still less plugger-like than my grandparents, who have been known to give directions that involve the gas station that my uncle burned down in 1957. although I guess it was a memorable location for them…
Dik-Dik Vendetta
August 28th, 2007 at 10:12 am [Reply]

I have a cat. He likes fish and fowl of the raw and bloody kind. He has learned that when I am sharpening my kitchen knife, it means that I may be preparing to prepare a piece of raw and bloody flesh of which he might obtain a slice. Thus, when he hears the scrape of the blade along the whetstone, he comes running.

It strikes me that Le Chat Bleu may be similarly trained. However, rather than the scraping of metal against stone, he’s attuned to the clink of bottle against tumbler. And thus, when Les prepares to embark upon yet another bender, LCB is ready to roll alongside and partake of that sweet demon licker…
Lynngineering
August 28th, 2007 at 10:13 am [Reply]

Hi and Lois: Or: Another strip that stayed around so long past its sell-by date, that it returned to become “trendy” in an ironic way.

There must be a secret “Hi and Lois” strip out there, somewhere, in which today Lois just turns around and responds to Hi’s confession of 9 holes with: “speaking of which, I’m having an affair…” Just once. This woman has so much physical energy apparent the other day after selling one lousy house, there is no way she’s satisfied just hanging around some drunken neighbor, the kids and Hi.
The Avocado Avenger
August 28th, 2007 at 10:13 am [Reply]

Maybe I shouldn’t say this in a public forum, but Les is obviously drinking a liqueur. You can tell by the small bottle and the double-shot sized glass in his hand. He’s gonna go all Hercule Poirot on your ass and get liquored up on creme de menthe.
willethompson
August 28th, 2007 at 10:13 am [Reply]

As a golfer, I can categorically state that Hi’s ‘confession’ is completely bogus. The ’sunscreen’ he’s waving under Lois’s nose is the aroma of the mango-coconut love butter that his nooner used to ’stroke’ his ‘putter’ and his ‘90-compression balls,’ hence the ‘golf’ excuse.

Umm…not that I’d know about such things.

MW: Fellow ‘Mudges, let me introduce the work of a lurker who truly belongs here (let’s call him [M]adman for now) who appreciates the unfunnies as much as we do. Please examine his take on Dr. Drew and encourage his more active participation…

And on a personal note, GO, DINGO!
Jamus The Bartender
August 28th, 2007 at 10:14 am [Reply]

COMICS CURMUDGEON POINT-COUNTERPOINT
Today’s commentator, Les Moore from Funky Winkerbean.
Hey. Ish okay. I just need a liddle drinkie. I mean I want a liddle drinkie.
Don’ tell Funky, okay? He’sh got real prollems…
Hey…shuddup stupid cat. I can have a drink if I wanna. My wife hash cansher goddammit.
Goddammit, I dropped my likker….c’mere likker…

And for the counterpoint, from Anchorage Correctional Facility, former detective Dick Tracy.
Hey. Les. It’s okay ,buddy. Enjoy your drink. God knows it’s gotten me through more than one tough spot in my life. My own recent run-in with the law has informed me were it not for the booze keepin’ me going, i’d be a goddamned mess right now. Still, i’m in prison,three squares of blubber a day, I get to use the weight room. I DON”T use it, but I could…
And, it’s like i’ve said. Life is tough, life is harsh, with disappointments around every corner. So, it’s not only okay, but MANDATORY that you turn to good ol’ Mr Alchohol when times get tough. And they will get tough. I myself cannot drink right now, but they give me these meds to calm me down. Not as tasty, but they’ll do. Believe me, they’ll do.
So, you tell that damn hallucinogenic cat to go to hell. And bottoms up.

The views expressed in Comics Character Point-Counterpoint do not reflect those of Comics Curmudgeon, Josh Frulingher, Jamus T Bartender, Jim Beam, Jesus Christ, Jack Daniels , Wordpress or the American Cancer Society. Please drink responsibly.
The Avocado Avenger
August 28th, 2007 at 10:14 am [Reply]

Maybe I shouldn’t talk about liqueur in a public forum because it makes me sound like an alcoholic wussypants, is what I meant to say. But you all probably knew that.
Poteet
August 28th, 2007 at 10:15 am [Reply]

# 9 — I agree, seanman, that cat is wearing a wig. I’ve seen many black and white cats, but nothing like that headgear. Jeebuz. And if a talking cat in a wig is going to make inscrutable remarks to Les for the next several weeks, I’m going to buy more booze myself.

Please pardon, Pope Josh, but I think there may be an error in the first line of your Baldo comment, plus a possible excess “and” in the fifth line of your Pluggers comment. *retires genuflecting*
Dik-Dik Vendetta
August 28th, 2007 at 10:15 am [Reply]

bats :[ #23

Shouldn’t Drew actually say “Wink!”?
Allie Cat
August 28th, 2007 at 10:15 am [Reply]

FW – Cats suck the breath out of babies, as we all know – but can they suck the breath out of Cancer Patients as well? At the very least, the cat has sucked the remaining plausibility out of the strip.
I Hate Ann Arbor
August 28th, 2007 at 10:17 am [Reply]

The whole Les/cat/booze incident is really reminiscent of the accounts of french artists and various other druggies about drinking absinthe. However, they called the hallucinogenic creature that visited them la fée verte (the green fairy) not the le chat bleu (the blue cat). I geuss a green liquor fairy would be just a little too upbeat for FW.
See the similarities here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Oliva.jpg
Windier E. Megatons
August 28th, 2007 at 10:20 am [Reply]

Is this FW storyline going to be like on Studio 60 when out of nowhere, Matthew Perry’s character was a drug addict? And, if so, could that please result in FW also getting swiftly canceled?
Anomaly
August 28th, 2007 at 10:21 am [Reply]

The black liquid Les is pouring seems to look like chocolate syrup. Maybe he just convinced himself it’s really alcoholic, and his mind is now acting like he’s drunk. Then again, it doesn’t even look like he’s drunk any so far.
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 10:21 am [Reply]

Okay, I know Baldo is doing one of those break-the-fourth-wall things in the last panel, but what is Tia What’s-Her-Name talking about as her husband smugs like a maniac at us over her shoulder? Aren’t “newspapers” — insofar as they have any use at all besides as a conveyance for comics and updates on the marital and/or morbitity status of acquaintances you’ve lost touch with after graduating high school — useful primarily because they teach you “new” things? Is Tia accidentally reading a newspaper she saved from the day her daughter was born? Or does the omitted last panel show her ripping the paper in half down the fold and saying “I can’t read in English because I was denied a proper education due to my illegal status growing up. Vive la revolución!”
Moonbeam McSwine
August 28th, 2007 at 10:22 am [Reply]

#32 Dik-Dik Vendetta

Or “Schwing!”?
essteess
August 28th, 2007 at 10:23 am [Reply]

Rather disappointed to see the direction this Gasoline Alley arc is apparently headed. I thought that we might get a “Slim flies over the cuckoo’s nest” interlude, in which he meets an inmate with a striking resemblance to Jack Nicholson — or perhaps at least a very large, silent Native-American. And wouldn’t you have just loved the “Slim undergoes electroshock therapy” or “Slim is subjected to a very invasive form of hygienic maintenance by Nurse Ratched” episodes?
Non Compost Mentos
August 28th, 2007 at 10:24 am [Reply]

I’m really, really embarrassed to admit that I know this (OK, that I sort-of-know this…), but as I recall, “Le Chat Bleu” appeared several years back in FW. I think she was the main player in an alcoholic Funky’s hallucination…details escape me, and trying to use the google rendered up a fair bit of information on a 1972 film and a 1980 album by Mink DeVille, both titled “Le Chat Bleu,” but not much about FW apart from a brief mention on some blog where a fan praised Batiuk for the “slightly surreal episodes of Funky’s meetings with the ghostly LeChat Bleu.”

As I remember, very, very dimly, she was some sort of Edith Piaf-y chanteuse/succubus or something. I do remember that, like pretty much everything else in FW since it became a soap opera, it sucked.

So now it looks like Les is having Funky’s DT’s. Oh, the hilarity.

More information on this character might be found on the internet, but I haven’t managed it.
Dik-Dik Vendetta
August 28th, 2007 at 10:24 am [Reply]

Blondie: Does anyone else find it odd that Blondie wants to stop for a “snack” and they end up at a sit-down restaurant with table cloths and potted plants? Seems like Tastee-freez or White Castle might just as adequately have filled the Big D’s voracious gorge.
Robert Whitaker Sirignano
August 28th, 2007 at 10:25 am [Reply]

The cat’s been in the strip before? Has it?

I thought that alcohol was only for the Funky Winderbean and no one else.

As for BALDO, recall that it took two people to dream up this lame strip today. Maybe the writer was drinking and talking to cats.

in Delaware, where constuction is a normal everyday thing, people have talked for years in direction giving by pointing out you need to go to the “place where the Hobby Art store” used to be.

My wife hated this kind of direction giving and when we go somewhere she always refers to street and numbers, and not past tense references, though IF she’d give them to me, I’d know where something is—she’s from the NYC area, where places have been pretty stable.
Kiesha
August 28th, 2007 at 10:25 am [Reply]

The only section of the paper that the Baldo Mom could be reading for her comment to make ANY SENSE would be the obituaries.

“Ohhh, Susan Smith died! I completely forgot I went to elementary school with her!”
bats :[
August 28th, 2007 at 10:26 am [Reply]

The Avocado Avenger’s comments on Le Chat Bleu (yesterthread):
“I suppose the cat will last one strip and then disappear like everything else has lately, but it would be marvelous if he turned out to be some wise dispenser of helpful platitudes.”

Suddenly, I’m struck by the very idea of a dazzling duo of meddling mavens, making the world a better place by their very existence: Mary Worth and Le Chat Bleu!
You NEED this cat, Mary…no place would be safe from the likes of you: Charterstone, Santa Royale, California, the planet Earth!
Well, right up until the time you forgot to buy cat food, and LCB shreds your support-hose in displeasure.

(Bob Barker says to spay and neuter your pets! And Mary’s lookin’ at YOU, Drew!)
The Avocado Avenger
August 28th, 2007 at 10:26 am [Reply]

SecretMargo, I think Tia has been reminded by the smug one that Newspapers Are Fun and Educational ™, something that she had forgotten years ago.

The more you know… ::music sting::
PunchMonkey
August 28th, 2007 at 10:27 am [Reply]

I swear that damn cat has a comb-over.
Josh
August 28th, 2007 at 10:28 am [Reply]

Poteet #31 — you’re right! I fixed. Thanks!

Josh
Enchilada
August 28th, 2007 at 10:28 am [Reply]

Re “Funky”: Actually I think Les is so far into his alcoholism that he is hallucinating. Wet brain will surely follow….
Lynngineering
August 28th, 2007 at 10:28 am [Reply]

FBOFW: Yet another example that Lynn isn’t writing anything anymore, Michael’s coma is: All the stories where April has had a chance to show or come to terms with some deeper side of her conciousness, are those which basically related to animals. Now given the chance for some April-time up on the farm, that all gets compressed to two days. Day one she is compared to a horse’s ass. Day two she is already finished with the whole experience, and we are simply told she apparently had some incredible hands-on vet experience. Wow, so much for exposition and build-up. Instead of that being developed in order to watch the ways April may have changed since the last arc with animals (and death), to show how she is becoming an adult by what she says and does, we are just provided some identikit cousin TELLING it outloud, and even that is only used to provide another occasion where April freaks on the same old point: “I am not a kid!”, and in such a dumb way that surely raises a smile upon Michael’s pale, drawn face, as he continues with his cat and mouse game…
smacky
August 28th, 2007 at 10:29 am [Reply]

What’s amazing is how Drew is channeling the ghost of Bobby Darin! Compare Drew’s panel 1 pose to these:

Bobby Darin album cover

Bobby Darin book cover

He’s Mack the Knife!
Herro!
August 28th, 2007 at 10:32 am [Reply]

Ahem, Josh, those of us of the pastier persuasion wear sunscreen pretty much everywhere. I have to wear it on my mile-long walk to classes or I get burned…no, not tanned, burned. I spent half a cloudy day in Monterey, and my scalp burned. But I understand. I’m from your neck of the woods, where the sun isn’t ubiquitous, and moving out to California made me invest in a very large bottle of sunscreen.

Re: Drew’s outfit…once you get past the super awesome greenness of his suit, you’ll notice that he still has that home plate shoved down the front of his pants.

I promise to only post once!
Allie Cat
August 28th, 2007 at 10:34 am [Reply]

MW – Drew Cory, MD – he’s magically delicious, but also tragically malicious. Wink!
Inspector Dim
August 28th, 2007 at 10:35 am [Reply]

Today’s Housebroken is pretty funny. It’s often pretty funny.
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 10:37 am [Reply]

#26 Katherine Hey, I guess, like you, I’m a bit of a plugger too. I once gave directions by saying, go past where the stop sign used to be (which would make perfect sense if you had lived in the area for at least 5 years.

And I finally came up with a caption for the NYer contest. “The gods must be having a bang-up time”.
mop
August 28th, 2007 at 10:38 am [Reply]

What Les really needs is a HOT CUP O’ MONKEY!!!
Joseph J. Finn
August 28th, 2007 at 10:39 am [Reply]

Yep. Read this morning’s FW and immediately though “the Curmudgeon has to be all over this.”
SmartPeopleOnIce
August 28th, 2007 at 10:40 am [Reply]

Clearly, Batuik is doing a Mark Trail crossover here. The question, then, becomes: how will Elrod respond? The cartooner’s code of honor demands it.

Look out Mark, here comes fist cancer.
BigTed
August 28th, 2007 at 10:40 am [Reply]

When you’re depressed and a cat shows up, that’s symbolism. When the cat talks, that’s anthropomorphism. When the cat is white with a little black but calls itself “the blue cat,” that’s surrealism.

And when you try to get drunk on a tiny, airline-size bottle of whisky, that’s just sad.
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 10:40 am [Reply]

Can anyone explain 9 chickweek to me. I only started reading the strip when Josh made fun of it, and I have no idea why Monty is scaring the proposing guy.
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 10:41 am [Reply]

40: NCM: The other allusion that popped into my head was the famous (in Japan) poet Hagiwara Sakutaro’s poem “The Blue Cat” [Aoneko], which is a free verse cri de coeur about losing one’s way in the modern world. It was alluded to in the recent Iwai Shunji movie “All About Lily Chou-Chou,” in which one of the troubled teens uses “Blue Cat” as an alias on the internet.

All of which is to say: everything else in the world you can think of is more interesting than what Batiuk intends by inserting this cat into the proceedings.

43: AA, I think you’re totally right. Blecch. Maybe the missing last panel reads, “My husband is a condescending ass who thinks I can’t decide for myself whether or not to read the newspaper.”
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 10:43 am [Reply]

#45 Kiesha well, it’s actually the Baldo Aunt, but yeah, that makes sense. I couldn’t figure out what the heck she was talking about.

Me, I read the paper to find out things like who died in the local fire.
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 10:47 am [Reply]

OK, TDOET is just plain bizarre. Does anyone really stand in a supermarket looking at soap boxes? Don’t they just buy what they’ve always bought?

I think the only time I read packaging is when I want to see what the ingredients are.
Chert the Chort
August 28th, 2007 at 10:48 am [Reply]

B.C. This one right here was funny.

9CL: I officially stopped reading this strip after this one. I just cannot bear the thought of Amos pussing out on this dripping sex-addled beast once more. Like that dumb-ass Darrin in FW with Jessica, the hot cheerleader with the shaggy Wing’s chick hairdo, when she’s begging him?? I can’t deal with it… just too much…. I’m not even trying for a COTW, I’m just pissed.

Where is my coffee?
Edgy DC
August 28th, 2007 at 10:49 am [Reply]

Wow, Funky has us posting about art movements, film-making, psychology, rock ‘n’ roll, Edith Piaf, mixology, and feline zoology, and everybody still hates it.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 10:49 am [Reply]

61: I have been reading 9CL for about a year now, and I don’t get it either. Something about unemployed unicorns humping pianos. Plus the occasional gay guy.
Darkefang
August 28th, 2007 at 10:50 am [Reply]

Archie: This is probably too nitpicky for a strip that considers eating a lot of hamburgers hilarious, but you don’t cover the bird’s cage after it’s asleep. You cover it when it’s awake to make it go to sleep.

DT: All the good jokes have been made already so:

Dick Tracy shrink in big car! Har-Har!

FC: What doctors call “hunchback syndrome” is only one of many problems parents face when having children that are only five inches tall.

FW: Les has an absynthe rack in his basement?

Garfield: Jon’s crotch is touching the chicken and cat ass is on the ice cream. Remind me to never go to the Arbuckle house for dinner.

GF: If someone were to create actual “Hot Cup ‘O Monkey” t-shirts, I’d buy one.

GT: Do any Curmudgeons have any real life boxing experience? Gil’s advice doesn’t sound particularly helpful. Or do real-world cornermen just shout random sentence fragments at the boxers?

Luann: This plot might be funny if it weren’t completely implausible that the teacher would write the assignment in that manner. Why not say “Read Chapter 5, 7-9″?

Also, what teacher assigns five chapters and gives a test on it the next day? I’ve never had a teacher so hardcore that they didn’t devote even one class period to the material covered on the test.

If Luann really knows chapters 6-9 that well, she should get a C at the worst. Assuming the questions are evenly distributed through the assigned chapters, she knows 80% of the material. And she might know even more than that, if later chapters call back information from chapter five.

MT: If I’m remembering the first panels of this storyline correctly, they’d barely started pushing around dirt on this project. There wasn’t even a road leading to the site. Even if they don’t want to disturb that duck, there’s no reason why they can’t continue working the rest of the lot.

MW: Three points:

1. Never tell the Meddler about your love life.

2. Nice suit, Pimp-Daddy.

3. Could you pull your pants up just a little further?

Phantom: Tennie used to be fun when? Before she contracted progeria? What’s up with the grey hair and old face?

RMMD: I’d like to see the middle cop’s thought bubble in panel one. I think it’d go something like this:

“Must… stop… looking at chest… Can’t… turn… away…”

S-M: Poor Shocker. JJJ and Maria are leaving to rent a hotel room. Who’s going to pay attention to you now?
colorado
August 28th, 2007 at 10:50 am [Reply]

SecretMargo, That’s not Tia Carmen’s husband
in Baldo, that’s her nephew…she came to help out with the kids after his wife died in a car accident…
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 10:51 am [Reply]

(note, according to my friend, 9CL used to be quite funny. Back when the lead ballerina creature was in high school. I dunno.)
Burning Prairie
August 28th, 2007 at 10:51 am [Reply]

I think I got retinal damage from staring at Dr. Drew’s suit. I think he’s raiding Herb Tarlek’s closet. And you know who doesn’t wear Kelly green Sans-a-Belt trousers? Young, successful doctors engaged in love triangles with two beautiful women, that’s who.
Crawdad
August 28th, 2007 at 10:52 am [Reply]

Checked but didn’t see anyone reference this quotation (in all likelihood cribbed from the ancient Chinese):

“The grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.”
– Joseph Addison
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 10:53 am [Reply]

Fang: As a guy who (obstensibly) trains in kickboxing, the advice is sound, if a little sparse. He could have also thrown in “don’t let him get set, find your rhythm, etc.
SmartPeopleOnIce
August 28th, 2007 at 10:54 am [Reply]

PS: Confidential to Shauna: Psst, sweety: Independent.

Waving a typo at the talent in this crowd is like waving a red flag to a bull, or dangling a participle, or using a nonunitary probability density function.

Though we are, to a fault, rockin’ and super nice, so any thrashing would probably take the form of, say, a tickle fight. Some of the more comely among us might even strip down to thier undies before proceeding. (Oh, hush. I can dream can’t I?).
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 10:58 am [Reply]

68: Oh, [margo], that’s right. That explains why she spent a grocery trip flirting photorealistically via kumquats a while back as well. The part of my brain that knew that was apparently annexed by the part devoted to keeping all the identical men in A3G straight [too late for Blaze, though! *rimshot]
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 10:59 am [Reply]

Yes, it sure is annoying how Wal*Marts offer people a place where they like to shop and can save a pretty good buck, too, despite the sniffy disapproval of others. Jerks.
Bunnë
August 28th, 2007 at 11:01 am [Reply]

I too want a “hot cup of monkey” t-shirt, more than I’ve wanted any t-shirt before.

So on to Pluggers… the submitter may be from Virginia, but these are known as New England-style directions. To really be New England style directions, of course, you also have to A) give a set of directions that won’t be followed, preferably because the road no longer exists (”used to be you could take route 6 there”), B) send the person down an unmarked shortcut, and C) tell them to turn left at a Dunkin Donuts. Bonus points if you tell them to break the law: “turn left at the no-left-turn sign.”

A real conversation with my Dad:
“Turn right where the fish store used to be.”
“I don’t know where the fish story used to be. Is that just past the hill where the Lechmere was?”
“Yes”
“That’s where there used to be a roller rink.”
“I don’t know where the roller rink was.”
I still got there in the end.

Meanwhile, I know someone who worked for the Peace Corps in Grenada, where they give directions like this, but without the “used to.” “Turn left at the Coca Cola Factory” is just understood to mean the vacant lot that had a factory before the hurricane 20 years ago. If you don’t know this, you might find yourself looking for a left turn near the current factory, like a chump.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 11:03 am [Reply]

Ken: Um, who’s cracking on Wal*Mart? Josh? It was a pretty innocuous joke, not a sign of his cultural elite east coastism.

After all, we all like getting our 12 packs of tube socks for 1.99!
Chert the Chort
August 28th, 2007 at 11:04 am [Reply]

#61 Monty is God, according to the crazed old man and patriarch of the Burber (sp?) clan who keeps a quantum anomaly in his shed. He talks to Monty frequently. And Francis used to be a priest, hence his fear of Monty eavesdropping on their tryst.

I didn’t say it made sense. Most of us just read it because McEldowney’s artwork is semi-pornographic (see his Pibgorn, its been censored a few times), and we all want to see Edda get plowed by something – she wants Seth the huge gay dancer, Amos wants her but he’s a pussy, Edda wants Amos but can’t quite convince him, I think. Edda basically wants it, big time, but no one will give it to her. Realism? No. But there you go.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 11:05 am [Reply]

My favorite direction I ever got was “turn left right past the house with the three-legged dog on the porch.”

Damn it if they weren’t perfect directions.
Tweeks_Coffee
August 28th, 2007 at 11:06 am [Reply]

So is Dr. Drew “Luck O’ The Irish” Corey’s line maybe supposed to be ridiculously over the top? I don’t think it is, but I just find it incomprehensible that someone would actually think this is what you would say when you’re confessing your love. Especially when you’re doing it to the aging, meddling, biddy of a woman who’s dating – but totally not doing – your dad.
Poteet
August 28th, 2007 at 11:06 am [Reply]

Foob — Apologies if this has been pointed out, but isn’t it rather weird that Apwil, having presumably stayed at Auntie Bev’s house during her visit, is only now telling Auntie, as she packs to leave, that she spent most of her work time in surgery? And isn’t it also weird that Laura has a chin that could cut paper? And what’s the friggin’ hurry to get Manitoba over with in just two strips anyway, since this strip is apparently going to continue until hell freezes over? Methinks Lynn has maybe been conversing with a cat in a wig.
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 11:09 am [Reply]

72 Bunnë I have converstation like this with my mother, but it’s about neighbors. I refer to who the neighbors were when I was living there. She has all the new neighbors.

“Is that where Linda used to live?”
“No next do to that.”
“Where the Palino’s used to live?”
“No, on the other side”
The Divine O’F
August 28th, 2007 at 11:10 am [Reply]

30 willethompson: OMG, your pal M]adman simply must stop lurking. I spit half my remaining coffee on the laptop at his art.

60 Big Ted: Brilliant.
commodorejohn
August 28th, 2007 at 11:13 am [Reply]

9CL – Add to the list of things Brooke learned from the Japanese: annoying, impossibly drawn-out relationships that are continually on the verge of advancing before being set back by the stupidest possible things. Because, y’know, character development is for the proles.

Archie – The ALGJU3K has developed dramatically in the time we’ve been monitoring its output, but I find that I like its occasional slip-ups best. Like today.

Curtis – Yeah, clearly, year-round school is the way to go. Just ask the Japanese. (Well, okay, technically they get a summer break, but only technically.)

DT – Wow, something’s actually happening!

FC – Ah, the Patterson Model of parenting!

FOOB – “Here, let’s tell you about April’s accomplishments you didn’t get to see because we were too busy focusing on the important Pattersons!”

FW – Everybody’s taking this the wrong way. This isn’t the Death Cat, nor is it the Booze Cat. This is just a random talking cat, the herald of Batiuk’s latest torment, Les’s progressive insanity.

GA – And so ends the most wonderful storyline in the world. Farewell, Derle, we hardly knew ye.

GT – In the future, one-legged battles will be a matter of life and death.

MW – He looks like he’s about to break into a musical number. Is there anybody in this strip who isn’t disco-dancing or Sound Of Music-ing?

Marmaduke – In the absence of a Joe Mathlete post: Marmaduke is preparing for an elaborate ritual killing of the children to extend the summer; hence the summer-themed ritual equipment.

NS – Gee, we’ve only had emoticons in popular usage for thirteen years or so. Good to know this strip is on the cutting edge.

RMMD – “Chief Head-Bobble recently transferred from Apartment 3-G. He’s damn good at his job, but they say he got things done way too fast for them.”

SM – Actually, that would be a great time to mention it, because then you’d be adding modesty to her list of perceived virtues. But whatever floats your boat, JJ.

Zits – Ew.
Poteet
August 28th, 2007 at 11:13 am [Reply]

# 26 & # 77 — BWAHAHA! Katherine and Bunne, thanks for the great stories. Rural Iowa directions can be similar. “Turn left at beer trucks” means “turn left at the building that used to house a business that painted beer trucks twenty-two years ago, though nothing in or on the building and nothing in the name of the long-gone business would tell you that, so even if you’d gotten these directions twenty-two years ago, you’d still be SOL.”
Josh
August 28th, 2007 at 11:14 am [Reply]

#76/78 — Well, maybe it was a little bit of a slam. Wal-Mart doesn’t really affect me, as I live in a city large enough to support all sorts of retail, but in a lot of small-town and rural America, when a Wal-Mart opens, most of the other retail (and thus retail employment) within a half-hour drive shuts down. Now, you can argue that this is an entirely fine and desirable state of affairs, or you can argue that lower prices available make the downsides worth it, and I can see the merits to those arguments, but to argue that it doesn’t happen (and the only point of my Pluggers joke was that it happens) would be dishonest.

Josh
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 11:14 am [Reply]

Gabe: I just don’t get the whole Wal*Mart thing. It’s a *store*. People like to shop there, and yes, you save money there. Yet it’s constantly referred to as it if it were this font of evil. It’s not Josh, so much, as me seeing these little (or big) digs all over the place. And yes, I’ll admit they strike me as more than a bit smug and elitist.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 11:17 am [Reply]

No offense meant, Josh. Just standing up for the Man. After all, somebody has to.
AlmostAGhost
August 28th, 2007 at 11:17 am [Reply]

I have finally realized why I have struggles in the romantic department. I DON’T HAVE A BAD-ASS GREEN SUIT. Problem solved. Look out ladies!
Poteet
August 28th, 2007 at 11:17 am [Reply]

# 82 — Sorry, I meant to say that Foob itself is going to continue until hell freezes over. *sob*
Original Lee
August 28th, 2007 at 11:18 am [Reply]

I’ve come up with 3 for the NY CCer contest, and can’t decide which to submit, since everybody else’s here are so brilliant, but:

1. Here, kitty, kitty, kitty…
(Really lame, but based on past experience, it could be a winner.)
2. Pumpkin, I’m pretty sure Julie Brown wasn’t writing a song about dress codes.
(Just in case the judges had aspirations to being cool during the 1980s.)
3. Harry, I don’t think this is what they mean when they say “fully loaded”.

Which one should I submit? I’m leaning toward #3.
AlmostAGhost
August 28th, 2007 at 11:19 am [Reply]

as for wal-mart, before you defend it, watch this movie: Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price.
Nekrotzar
August 28th, 2007 at 11:19 am [Reply]

About 12 years ago, I adopted an adult cat that had been abused by his original owner. Apparently she was an alcoholic and put a collar on him as a kitten, but didn’t loosen it as he got older. Eventually the collar had to be surgically removed.

I think that would be an appropriate subject for a very funny FW series.

The cat died last week. That would also be an appropriate subject for a FW series.
Foobar
August 28th, 2007 at 11:20 am [Reply]

Un chat andalou. Is that absinthe he’s sipping or what?
Kate
August 28th, 2007 at 11:23 am [Reply]

#26 Katherine, #56 Rainbird: the “giving directions in past tense” riff has a lovely variation by Laurie Anderson:

Hey Pal!
How do I get to town from here?
And he said:
Well
just take a right where they’re going to build that new shopping mall,
go straight past where they’re going to put in the freeway,
take a left at what’s going to be the new sports center, and keep going until you hit the place where they’re thinking of building that drive-in bank.
You can’t miss it.

I’m not sure what relevance this has to Pluggers, but I’m dang sure it has more relevance to me than Pluggers does.
Bunnë
August 28th, 2007 at 11:23 am [Reply]

9CL explanation:
Thorax, the big fella in the overalls, who claims to be from another planet, told Francis, the squirrely ex-priest, that God was named Monty.

So I’m assuming the “Monty” headline is, for Francis, a sign that he should be a priest again. Or something.

I’m just glad that damn unicorn is gone.
mattt
August 28th, 2007 at 11:23 am [Reply]

JP So how old is that kid? What’s with the Granny Librarian glasses?
Poteet
August 28th, 2007 at 11:23 am [Reply]

# 30 — wille, that Drew link is EXCELLENT. My compliments to the chef.
FreshHell
August 28th, 2007 at 11:24 am [Reply]

This may be simple convention in the MW universe, but it’s a little sick-making that a young hotshot doctor brimming with unspent man-juice feels it necessary to knock on the door of a frigid senior citizen to prate about his love life. What’s really going on here? Is this a convoluted play for some sweet sweet Worth lovin’? An indirect strike at his father, the old bastard! What?
Mumbles
August 28th, 2007 at 11:24 am [Reply]

FW: is this strip set in the present? Why is Les drawn like he could be Keith Partridge’s social studies teacher?

MW: I see Smacky’s point on Drew’s Darin comparison. I’d love for him to sing “If I Were a Carpenter” to whichever fair lady he decides to mack on.

Still, I can’t shake the Donny Osmond comparison. I half expected him to break into song to Mary: “May tomorrow, be a perfect day, may you find love and laughter along the way…” Good night, everybody!
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 11:25 am [Reply]

95: Foobar – I don’t know (I’m still leaning toward the ‘tussin, as is my wont), but I agree that FW makes my eye feel like it’s being slit open when I read it.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 11:25 am [Reply]

“as for wal-mart, before you defend it, watch this movie: Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price.”

OK, and then watch the Penn & Teller Bullshit episode about Wal*Mart. Then you’ll hear from two different perspectives and can make a more valid judgment.
Krazy Kat
August 28th, 2007 at 11:30 am [Reply]

FW-The cat came back! That’s bad ‘mews’ for Les!
As Non Compost Mentos and others mentioned-Le Chat Bleu has appeared before, though I can’t remember if it was a Funky hallucination or if this is Les Moore’s muse and he will start writing again. Either way it’s bad news–Lisa dies and Les sinks into alcohlism or Lisa dies and we have to go through the whole thing again as Les writes a novel based on his experiences, etc. Either way the cat came back and that’s bad news for us.

Hi and Lois-sunblock also covers the smell of stripper perfume when you slip out of the office early to take in happy hour at the local gentlemens club.–or so I’m told.
Seamus Gentz
August 28th, 2007 at 11:32 am [Reply]

Has it really not occurred to anyone that Oscar the cat can sense death the same way that David Berkowitz could?
Original Lee
August 28th, 2007 at 11:33 am [Reply]

Re: rural directions. My dad still says the best directions he ever got ended with “… and after you pass the farm stand with the glads, except they don’t have any this year, after about 2 miles you’ll pass a field of really fine corn. Turn left after the corn, and you’re there.” And he was.
Chet McCord, Wildlife Defender
August 28th, 2007 at 11:34 am [Reply]

I see I’m not the only one compelled to comment on Dr. Drew’s jolly green suit. Nothing more need be said.
just desserts
August 28th, 2007 at 11:35 am [Reply]

103: My aunt loves to rail on Wal-Mart for how they screw over their employees and host towns. Then I gently remind her that she made most of her fortune by selling land to the local Wal-Mart to build on.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 11:38 am [Reply]

My main beef with Wal*Mart was it was the only way to buy music in my home town as a kid (until my senior year when we got a real record store), and they don’t carry Parental Advisory stickered albums (which, of course, are the best kind).

I could however happily purchase a rifle. This amused me to no end.

Other than that, I don’t really care. Capitlism is capatilism, and I choose Target because I prefer their selection.
Foobar
August 28th, 2007 at 11:39 am [Reply]

Dr. Drew is a wild and crazy guy.
Calico
August 28th, 2007 at 11:40 am [Reply]

FW – the cat is so French Symbolic Weird Movie I can hardly believe it.

Absinthe in that glass, perhaps?

The Blue Shot…

OMG #95 – just saw your post, but in the name of synchronicity I will still post the above.
Jym
August 28th, 2007 at 11:41 am [Reply]

=22= Foob (Joe): Being one of those down-home country folk, Laura’s settling into a sturdier build, earlier in life. Unlike those effete Thërëse-types who prefer to live in the decadent cities.

=88= Pluggers (Ken Begg): I ain’t always been one of them big-city Thërëse-ogling types; I grew up in one of them there Pluggervilles. And I have to say, Josh’s description of post-Mall*Wart Pluggerville is dead on — and, more importantly, funny!
He Brought Queenie Baby Jesus
August 28th, 2007 at 11:41 am [Reply]

42, 46, 104: The only time I’ve seen Le Chat, she appeared to Les when he was trying to write. Also apparently she has a human form, I think? Anyway, this is all just an indication that Les has the booze-madness (or brain cancer).
Krazy Kat
August 28th, 2007 at 11:42 am [Reply]

MW-I’ve actually seen a suit like that, with shoes and a hat no less, on the dodgy end of King Street in Charleston. Now I’m compelled to buy it. Drew and Ian are both playas–going for the young stuff–yeeeah, boy!
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 11:45 am [Reply]

I have to admit, I find it weird people even buy music at Wal*Mart anymore, what with the Internet and all. And since the people who most crave mature-content albums are young and hence almost uniformily likely to have mad Internet skillz and access, luckily this shouldn’t be an impediment to anyone. And choosing not to personally shop at Wal*Mart is one thing. I’m just bewildered by the animosity it draws.
bats :[
August 28th, 2007 at 11:46 am [Reply]

34. Dik-Dik: well, Drew should actually be winking, too. Hey, it was late! I was tired! It was the Ny-quil talkin’!

36. IHAA: wow! Very cool painting…I’ve never seen it before, and I have a passing interest in absinthe culture. Thanks!
Calico
August 28th, 2007 at 11:46 am [Reply]

#36 – my apologies to you too for not reading back.

But not ever to Baz Luhrmann!
Sal Paradise
August 28th, 2007 at 11:47 am [Reply]

FW: Knowing Les, he’s probably just drinking grenadine or Tom Collins mix. He and the blue cat just think it’s alcoholic.

I predict Le Chat Bleu will eventually start talking backwards and rambling on and on about The Black Lodge and doppelgangers.
Dingo
August 28th, 2007 at 11:47 am [Reply]

I see Dr. Drew is matching his suit jacket to the trees. Very touching. Can’t wait to see his outfit when he visits the Painted Desert.
Artist formerly known as Ben
August 28th, 2007 at 11:48 am [Reply]

Josh, Dr Drew seems to be quoting 18th century English humorist Joseph Addison, as seen here http://www.cultureofpeace.com/quotes/hope-quotes.htm. (Sorry I didn’t neaten the link via HTML.)
As Moonbeam McSwine notes, Dawn said the same thing a couple of months ago real time. Addison must cherish the esteem from fictional condo dwellers.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 11:48 am [Reply]

I’m not arguing with Josh’s take on the store. But more than once I’ve mentioned Wal*Mart (where I rarely shop, by the way) in a conversation, and gotten a rather foaming response about it. Surely that’s weird, that people can’t even hear the name without starting to rant about it. Maybe my experience is atypical, but that’s where I’m coming from.
anonymous
August 28th, 2007 at 11:48 am [Reply]

Wal*Mart’s business practices have been questioned by many groups like labor unions (who have legit gripes with W*M’s illegal activites aimed at union busting), and just as importantly, the manufacturing sector, for driving small producers of the goods they sell into bankruptcy. The people who most benefit from low pricing and availablity of goods are also, conversely, those in the long run hurt by it.

They also have a history of leaving their big taxpayer-financed box stores behind in a wasteland of concrete when they close stores.

Some quibble with alleged labor practices like the practice of dsicrimination against female employees, parsimonious pension plan financing, and firing employees in violation of the FMLA.

But tube socks for $1.99. Hard to resist.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 11:49 am [Reply]

There was no internets when I was a kid. I had to get my hardcore death metal stuff through tape trades (penpals met through magazines) and Columbia House (poor selection), and the once a year trip to the big city of Jonesboro, AR.

Things are certainly different now. Also, Wal*Mart I believe still have the PMRC policy, but sells M rated video games (to those over 18). Bwuh?
Matt Algren
August 28th, 2007 at 11:50 am [Reply]

Mary Worth: Not only is this referencing a horribly outdated ancient quote that nobody knows except Mary Worth and Google, it’s referencing the August 3rd edition of Mary Worth, in which Dawn uses the same quote to talk about Drew. (This link will die in a few weeks.)

So the question is, did Dawn tell Drew that he’s her “something to blah blah blah” and he stole the line to talk to an old woman about his next dame, or is there some other reason that we’ll be wondering about until sometime in 2009?
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 11:52 am [Reply]

Anonymous: You’re right. Wal*Mart *is* evil (after all, labor unions say so, and they certainly have no axes to grind), and I’m evil for wondering that other people recognize this.

$1.99 tube socks, though….MMMMMM.

“The people who most benefit from low pricing and availablity of goods are also, conversely, those in the long run hurt by it.”

That’s a bit silly. Obviously Wal*Mart benefits *many* more people than it hurts, or it would go out of business.
Calico
August 28th, 2007 at 11:53 am [Reply]

#118 – the Blue Cat will soon start to say, “Let’s go to Wal-Mart.”
Josh
August 28th, 2007 at 11:54 am [Reply]

OK, now I’m sorry I brought the damn thing up. If people want to continue to have a discussion of the merits of Wal-Mart, please have it in this thread in the forums. I’m not going to remove any existing posts, but I will move future posts on the subject to that forum thread. Thanks, it’s my fault, but I still think it’d be better to talk about it over there.

Josh
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 11:54 am [Reply]

This post removed to this thread in the Cockpit. Please continue said Wal-Mart-related discussion there. Thanks.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 11:54 am [Reply]

This post removed to this thread in the Cockpit. Please continue said Wal-Mart-related discussion there. Thanks.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 11:57 am [Reply]

This post removed to this thread in the Cockpit. Please continue said Wal-Mart-related discussion there. Thanks.
commodorejohn
August 28th, 2007 at 11:57 am [Reply]

This post removed to this thread in the Cockpit. Please continue said Wal-Mart-related discussion there. Thanks.
The Avocado Avenger
August 28th, 2007 at 11:58 am [Reply]

The conversation is giving me lulzitis. Every other post is “Hey, is Les drinking absinthe?” What’s sad is that no one can tell what Les is drinking or what’s going on with the cat, because the strip sucks so very much.

Instead, I think we need to spend our energy figuring out how to get a Hot Cup O’ Monkey t-shirt franchise.
M. Iscariot
August 28th, 2007 at 12:00 pm [Reply]

#6 – Either that’s the teeniest, tiniest bottle of Jim Beam around …

I’m guessing that there will be a strip where Les is at Alcoholics Anonymous saying “I realized I had a problem after I drank a whole bottle of whiskey/wine/rum/whatever when the cat started talking to me…” and no one will question his descent into madness because no one ever questions how BIG a bottle was, especially when there’s a smirking feline.

But on the other hand, maybe it’s the colourist’s fault & it really should be a bottle of absinthe. Now THAT would explain the talking cat.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 12:00 pm [Reply]

Well, I’m not the Ken Begg who runs an Australian tree nursery. But please, I just want to live a private life!
The Avocado Avenger
August 28th, 2007 at 12:01 pm [Reply]

Holy cow, commodorejohn, that article you linked to is about Marthasville! I am always amazed when I see some teeny tiny town I’m familiar with mentioned. You should have seen me when I found out Purina was in Gray Summit (Missouri).

You know you’re a Plugger when really stupid things amuse you.
DrBear
August 28th, 2007 at 12:02 pm [Reply]

Around here, directions are:
“Take a left at the payday loan store with the green sign, two blocks past the payday loan store with the red sign, hang a right at the payday loan store with the blue sign and the payday loan store you want is the one between the one with the gold dollar sign and the one with the dancing Mr. Moneybags.”
Dean Booth
August 28th, 2007 at 12:02 pm [Reply]

Congrats, TaxiGirl! CC dominates!

Work is slow today, so I’ve got a couple of MW:

* Drew juggles his love life

* Thanks, Mary!

Yesterthread: Funny story, CG! …I’ve got some more, too, but I want to save them for the forum on plugger.com.
Ghost Riders in the Foob
August 28th, 2007 at 12:04 pm [Reply]

“Le Chat Bleu” was Les’s muse while he was writing his novel. She was/is a cat/chanteuse shape-shifter who would come to visit him when he was pulling Michael Patterfoob all-nighters. There was a whiff of emotional adultery about their encounters, which makes her reappearance just now more than a little interesting.
Chloe The Cat
August 28th, 2007 at 12:04 pm [Reply]

This post removed to this thread in the Cockpit. Please continue said Wal-Mart-related discussion there. Thanks.
ararararrrar
August 28th, 2007 at 12:05 pm [Reply]

funky winkerbean: the heartbreaking story of a man and his potato
TK
August 28th, 2007 at 12:06 pm [Reply]

This post removed to this thread in the Cockpit. Please continue said Wal-Mart-related discussion there. Thanks.
commodorejohn
August 28th, 2007 at 12:07 pm [Reply]

This post removed to this thread in the Cockpit. Please continue said Wal-Mart-related discussion there. Thanks.
Bootsy
August 28th, 2007 at 12:07 pm [Reply]

Damn, where does my name go? I have to go through a firewall b/c I work for a non-profit with schools so they’re really strict about what I can see. One time they blocked me from this site but when I showed it to the ~~Nazis~~ IT people who are in charge of it they liked they liked the site so much they gave it back to me!

I’m not liking where Phantom is going. This has Afterschool Special written all over it.

Brick, you were almost upstaged by that falling wall of crumbling masonry in Spider-Man! You gonna change your nom again? I hope not.
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 12:08 pm [Reply]

#92 Original Lee I would go with number 3 for the NYer, but who knows how they choose their captions. I hate the ones they chose for the current one with the road test dummy. Sheesh.
Josh
August 28th, 2007 at 12:08 pm [Reply]

Hey, kids, take the g-d WalMartism to the forum. I don’t know how much clearer I can make it.

Josh
commodorejohn
August 28th, 2007 at 12:09 pm [Reply]

#138 Ghost Riders In The FOOB – Boy, I thought Funky Winkerbean was just morbid. Now it turns out that it is and was insane as well.

Someone put Luna from Sailor Moon in today’s FW, stat.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 12:09 pm [Reply]

Avacado– I recently found out my small home town of Des Plaines, IL, was where they had always made Chuckles candy. However, it was in an article noting the plant was closing and moving out of state!

We’re still the home of the first McDonald’s, although I wouldn’t necessarily consider that a bragging point.
migellito
August 28th, 2007 at 12:10 pm [Reply]

I enjoy Mary Worth even more if I mentally substitute Dr. Drew with Drew from Toothpaste for Dinner.
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 12:10 pm [Reply]

Kate #96, which Laurie Anderson album was that on? I don’t recall that song.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 12:10 pm [Reply]

Sorry, didn’t mean to start a tussle!
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 12:16 pm [Reply]

Wal*Mart! WAL*MART! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAALL*MART!

*runs in a circle around Josh, screaming*
Non Compost Mentos
August 28th, 2007 at 12:16 pm [Reply]

Master Soft Heart feels really bad about all the small businesses that have been unable to compete with Wal-Mart. But Master Soft Heart really likes his inexpensive tube socks, so he feels torn.

Master Soft Heart’s cat never says anything interesting to him, so he’s going to go see if they sell absinthe at Wal-Mart.
Chloe The Cat
August 28th, 2007 at 12:17 pm [Reply]

Dean Booth, I love your cartoons!
Josh
August 28th, 2007 at 12:19 pm [Reply]

#150 Ken — I was the one who started it, really. That’s why I get to end it — or, more accurately, move it to a more appropriate location. Go on over! Declaim away!

#151 Gabe — Random, content- and value-free bellowing of proper nouns shall be deemed acceptable.

Josh
Dik-Dik Vendetta
August 28th, 2007 at 12:20 pm [Reply]

This post removed to this thread in the Cockpit. Please continue said Wal-Mart-related discussion there. Thanks.
Buck Ripsnort
August 28th, 2007 at 12:21 pm [Reply]

Gawd help me, I work at WalMart. And yes, it is one of the bottom circles of Retail Hell.
More on-topic, wasn’t there a “Blue Dog” in the Real Art world awhile back? Jeez, even Batiuk’s attempts at whimsy suck.
Sam Elliott's Moustache
August 28th, 2007 at 12:24 pm [Reply]

Come on Josh…go sweep # 155 into the Recycle Bin of the Cockpit.
The Avocado Avenger
August 28th, 2007 at 12:24 pm [Reply]

#138 Ghost Riders – An explanation! Hooray! So is it possible that Les isn’t even drinking Le Hooche? I think we all assumed he was downing the booze and hallucinating the cat, but if the cat is his muse, then who knows what’s going on.
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 12:24 pm [Reply]

Some of these comments have me wondering: What’re the age demographics of the readers here? How many people, for instance, are old enough to remember the first year or two when Garfield was actually a very funny strip?
Deborah
August 28th, 2007 at 12:25 pm [Reply]

Dr. Romulan actually is quoting something:

The grand essentials of happiness are: something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.
–Allan K. Chalmers

I don’t know who Chalmers is/was, but I suppose Google could solve that, too.
Non Compost Mentos
August 28th, 2007 at 12:26 pm [Reply]

#148 Kate, that would’ve been the title track from Big Science. (I know, I’m not Rainbird…but I thought of those directions when I read Pluggers, too…)

Incidentally, Gail Martin toured briefly with Laurie Anderson, who briefly considered adopting Gail’s hairstyle. Fotunately for early-80’s hipsters everywhere, she decided against it.
Devlesa
August 28th, 2007 at 12:26 pm [Reply]

#14: Drew’s suit reveals the truth that Mary has suspected all along – Dawn was really just after his Lucky Charms.

You almost made me spit out my root beer!
Smokey Stover
August 28th, 2007 at 12:26 pm [Reply]

I pretty sure Dr. Drew got the quote here:

http://www.aawmag.com/2006/stories02_02/feature_1.php3

“Le Chat Blue”: wasn’t that a poem by Rimbaud made into a film with Jean Gabin in the role of “Le Rat”?
Brent
August 28th, 2007 at 12:29 pm [Reply]

Allow me to explain golf to you Josh. You go out to the private course you belong to after a hard day of work. It has to be a private course because if it were a public course you’d be lining up today to start playing tomorrow. Once you’re at the course you change into your clothes because no one since the late great Bobby Jones has ever golfed wearing a tie, and he never wore a suit. So you “slip slop and slap” (as the Aussies say – slip on a shirt, slop on some sunscreen, and slap on a hat) and go out and shoot your nine. Then you go back to the clubhouse and head for the 19th hole – the bar – where you have a couple of Budweisers to celebrate/commiserate about your round. Then you go back to the locker room and change back into your work clothes and go back home. Then you tell the little woman that it’s your fault that dinner is ruined and that at least this time you made it home without being pulled over for a DUI and because you were out drinking and golfing you really don’t have the energy for your weekly attempts at getting the sex thing right for once. And you smile to yourself because you weren’t really out golfing, you were in a no-tell motel playing hide the canolli with your secretary.
Dik-Dik Vendetta
August 28th, 2007 at 12:31 pm [Reply]

Sorry Josh, posted #155 before #154 was upon my screen. No more posts from me on the topic…
T. Chicana
August 28th, 2007 at 12:32 pm [Reply]

FW: The small bottle? The brown color? I really think it’s vanilla, guys. The alcohol of choice to show you are desperate!
commodorejohn
August 28th, 2007 at 12:34 pm [Reply]

I sense a “STOP TALKING ABOUT WAL*MART” metapost coming up…
SmartPeopleOnIce
August 28th, 2007 at 12:34 pm [Reply]

Perhaps we should introduce TaxiGirl to TurtleBoy (heh heh – little joke for the math nerds joining us today. Yeah, I don’t get it either).

Jym (#112) Giggles for the umlauts. Doubly so if they were unintentional.

And add me to the stentorian demand for a “Hot Cup of Monkey” shirt (my only problem is that when Bucky speaks, in my head I hear Michelle Malkin’s voice).

Josh, can’t you bring your swift and terrible fame to bear on Darby for the rights?
Eats Shoots And Leaves
August 28th, 2007 at 12:34 pm [Reply]

PROPER NOUNS! PROPER NOUNS!

Also, I’d like to see thought-ballooning Garfield meet the FW speech-ballooning cat. Ha!
Mushuweasel
August 28th, 2007 at 12:36 pm [Reply]

I’m enraptured by Hi and Lois’ magical door with knobs on both sides. The left hand one opens onto their hellish minigolf lawn. The right hand one opens the gateway to the actual Hell. Some mornings, I’m sure, it must be difficult to decide which to open.
Brent
August 28th, 2007 at 12:36 pm [Reply]

Allow me to explain golf to you Josh. You go out to the private course you belong to after a hard day of work. It has to be a private course because if it were a public course you’d be lining up today to start playing tomorrow. Once you’re at the course you change into your clothes because no one since the late great Bobby Jones has ever golfed wearing a tie, and he never wore a suit. So you “slip slop and slap” (as the Aussies say – slip on a shirt, slop on some sunscreen, and slap on a hat) and go out and shoot your nine. Then you go back to the clubhouse and head for the 19th hole – the bar – where you have a couple of Budweisers to celebrate/commiserate about your round. Then you go back to the locker room and change back into your work clothes and go back home. Then you tell the little woman that it’s your fault that dinner is ruined and that at least this time you made it home without being pulled over for a DUI and because you were out drinking and golfing you really don’t have the energy for your weekly attempts at getting the sex thing right for once. And you smile to yourself because you weren’t really out golfing, you were in a no-tell motel playing hide the canolli with your secretary. Who probably finds you as boring in bed as your wife does which explains why Lois “works in real eastate.”
Brown-eyed Girl
August 28th, 2007 at 12:38 pm [Reply]

So the cat is back, possibly to encourage Les to write about his anguish rather than drowning his sorrows in worcestershire sauce. Why would she want to do that? Does she need something to line the bottom of her litterbox?
Brent
August 28th, 2007 at 12:40 pm [Reply]

Sorry, 169 should read “you change into your golf clothes.”
Hal Jordan
August 28th, 2007 at 12:40 pm [Reply]

I’m not touching the WalMart topic…

FW: But is it really necessary to make the jump from Les is having a drink because he’s had a long, tiring day watching his wife die to Les is a raging alcoholic? Umm, some people can have a drink – even in stressful moments – without becoming alcoholics. For Christsakes, the guy’s shown himself to be a caring, responsible adult. If he wants a drink, let him have one.
Chloe The Cat
August 28th, 2007 at 12:40 pm [Reply]

Mouthwash would be the desperate choice for alcohol.
Sister Sestina
August 28th, 2007 at 12:40 pm [Reply]

Dear TaxiGirl: I sympathize. Even when you can get ‘em to use the new technology you can’t get ‘em to abandon the old sense of manners. (Which all in all is not a bad thing, I suppose.) Forgive me for jumping to the wrong conclusion. It’s just that my mom’s habit is to take her cordless WITH her to the bathroom — a place where she is often, thanks to diuretics compounded with chronic UTI, so I’ve heard plenty of porcelain echo and Archie Bunker surf action in my time.

As to the identitiy of the small bottle of dark liquid in Funky Winterbean — could it be that he’s taking the classic route of the alcohol-dependent in a teetotaller’s place and swiping the vanilla extract?
YTT
August 28th, 2007 at 12:42 pm [Reply]

Perhaps nobody has yet noticed that Drew is obviously getting his fashion sense from Babar the elephant. And you know how well Babar did with little old ladies.

As for Les, he appears to be drinking soy sauce, perhaps to overcome a chemical imbalance of some sort.
WonderCat
August 28th, 2007 at 12:42 pm [Reply]

Of course Dr. Drew was taking fashion advice from Ian Cameron. I mean, he IS the only role-model in Charterstone for How To Date/Marry A Younger Woman. And let’s face it, why would anybody want to consider life outside the hallowed walls of Charterstone? That would be like a Patterson moving outside of their sheltered hometown existence. And that’s just crazy talk.

(Anyway, I’m pretty sure that this time around Liz has been fitted with one of those ankle monitors so even if she figures out that she should stop eating or drinking any of the food prepared by her family or Anthony, she’s still not getting away.)

(Basically, I’m not complaining about the recent strips about April because at least they have stopped the pro-Anthony, anti-Therese bitch-fest.)
commodorejohn
August 28th, 2007 at 12:43 pm [Reply]

#172 Hal Jordan – You forget that this is Funky Winkerbean. Any consumption of alchohol indicates raging addiction or impending raging addiction.
WonderCat
August 28th, 2007 at 12:44 pm [Reply]

#175 – It’s been a while since I have read Babar… But didn’t he marry his cousin?
Tweeks_Coffee
August 28th, 2007 at 12:46 pm [Reply]

Seems to me that GT is rushing to wrap up their stories now. After the horribly anti-climactic end of Coach Kaz: PI they return to Milford to end Bill Ritter’s story as quickly as possible. Of course that happens to involve him losing and not advancing any further. Presumably we’ll all learn a lesson in the next four days before football stories start up on Monday. Heck, even FC beat these guys to football season, that’s pretty sad.
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 12:47 pm [Reply]

#127 THANK YOU JOSH!
Non Compost Mentos
August 28th, 2007 at 12:49 pm [Reply]

#166 SPOI: Funny, when I read Get Fuzzy to my kiddo, I always read Bucky with a sort of Wallace Shawn voice.
SmartPeopleOnIce
August 28th, 2007 at 12:49 pm [Reply]

Hal (#172) I’m not touching the WalMart topic…

Stop! Stop, will you?! Stop that! Stop it! Now, look! No one is to cockpit anyone until I blow this whistle! Do you understand?! Even – and I want to make this absolutely clear – even if they do say ‘WalMart’.
Girl Reporter
August 28th, 2007 at 12:49 pm [Reply]

#165 commodorejohn says: I sense a “STOP TALKING ABOUT WAL*MART” metapost coming up…

It could be like the “cling peaches with heavy syrup” episode of ALL IN THE FAMILY. Continue telling the story, but say “Mmmm * Mmmm” whenever you come back to the subject. As Josh does a mime russian roulette routine in the background.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 12:52 pm [Reply]

#67 Gabe- Your brief summation of 9CL had me busting a gut laughing!…And then I humped my unicorn on my piano, and I’m not even gay! Haw! x at least 19, Gabe!
Lettuce
August 28th, 2007 at 12:54 pm [Reply]

You know, you can get legal Absinthe at the local Rite Aid here in the gentle, largely Orthodox Jewish burg of Highland Park, NJ, just off exit 9 of the turnpike. And though it lacks the pyschoactive effects of the real deal, this fake stuff retains the taste, by which I mean it’s disgusting.

But don’t tell Les, otherwise he may be forced to smoke some Salvia Divinorum (also available within walking distance of the local synagogues) or snort Nyquil or some other over-the-counter cat-talking plot device.
andreavis
August 28th, 2007 at 12:54 pm [Reply]

J’aime le chat bleu du mort! I especially love her strange markings, so like a tuxedo cat I once knew. It belonged to our neighbor/landlord and I used to feed it, until it ran away. If I’d have know it would end up in Funkyland, I might have tried harder to hang on to it, poor thing.

So what’s the origin of “Hot Cup O’Monkey?” Not that it needs one. The phrase is eloquent on its own.

Oh, and #157 Sam Elliott’s Moustache– love your name! My hubby’s favorite movie is Roadhouse, where you are prominently featured.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 12:56 pm [Reply]

Red Green: Glad to be of service!
Lettuce
August 28th, 2007 at 12:58 pm [Reply]

Oh, and related only to the “Stop Talking About Walmart” post — everyone here is invited to start SINGING about WalMart as my friends Andrew and Cat’s new musical “Walmartopia” opens this upcoming Monday at the Minetta Lane theater in the Village. (NYC.) It’s likely not okay to plug something like that here, except its very comical, curmudgeonly, and the authors visit the site regularly (though I don’t believe they post. Shrug.)
Girl Reporter
August 28th, 2007 at 12:59 pm [Reply]

Or was it a hanging himself with his tie routine? Except, I don’t remember Archie ever wearing a tie with his white dress shirt. Unless he was miming wearing a tie in order to mime hanging himself with it.
SmartPeopleOnIce
August 28th, 2007 at 1:02 pm [Reply]

Andrea – here

PS: And for the record, I only said I bought a piece of whitefish at Walmart.
Saxman
August 28th, 2007 at 1:02 pm [Reply]

This just in:

Newspaper comics stopped my house from getting burgled…

No really. Police just arrested my Houston Chronicle newspaper delivery person for burgling several subscribers’ houses. It seems that when folks went on vacation and had their newspaper deliveries cancelled, the carrier and her accomplice would burgle those now-empty houses. According to talk radio (NOT the disingenuous snipple published in the Houston Chronicle) the pair were photographed while trying to use a stolen credit card. Local Crimestoppers asked the Chron to run the picture and somebody at the paper recognised the carriers.

The kicker is, I was on a 10 day vacation to Colorado at the time. The only reason I didn’t have my papers cancelled was because I wanted to stack them up and read the missed comics in one, non-electronic session. So I had my pet feeder snag and store them for my return.

OK, OK, so maybe it was to comics AND my hungry cats. And Prince Valiant (not on the Internet).

BTW, ten Chrons and ten Wall Street Journals are still stacked on the drier in my utility room waiting for me to have time to get caught up. I can’t wait to see the look on the faces of those basketball players in Gasoline Alley when the meteor hit their court.
Dr. Mabuse
August 28th, 2007 at 1:02 pm [Reply]

lyngineering: “Now given the chance for some April-time up on the farm, that all gets compressed to two days. Day one she is compared to a horse’s ass. Day two she is already finished with the whole experience, and we are simply told she apparently had some incredible hands-on vet experience.”

That’s because it doesn’t matter. One detail in the strip tells me that April’s fate is sealed: she’s got the dreaded Fat Lips of Glamour! This means that the minute she gets off the bus from Manitoba, there’s going to be a guy waiting for her, around whom she will quickly twine herself. The only reason a female has fat lips is to attract a mate, and April will be paired off with some guy just as Liz heads to the altar.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 1:03 pm [Reply]

adreas: Hot Cup of Monkey’s from today’s Get Fuzzy.
Bootsy
August 28th, 2007 at 1:08 pm [Reply]

#156, Buck Ripsnort, yes, George Rodrigue, who never got much play in the fine art world, went back to earlier paintings and superimposed a really stupid blue dog on them for no reason than to make money. Then he got all famous and put the damn thing on everything, including an Absolut vodka ad.

I hate the blue dog, but more information can be found about the blue dog, screw it, you know where.
Cedar
August 28th, 2007 at 1:11 pm [Reply]

I hope I’m not repeating what anyone else just said, but, boy I am excited about knowing this! When Funky himself was in an alcoholic stupor years and years ago, it was this same talking cat that helped pull hum out of it and get on with his life.
Cedar
August 28th, 2007 at 1:13 pm [Reply]

#194 Oh April can’t just be in a relationship. She must be in some tiresome on-again-off-again high school bullshit relationship with at least two different men for the remainder of the strip. And then she married Gerald after his divorce from Becky.
kingdead
August 28th, 2007 at 1:14 pm [Reply]

Not being a regular Mary Worth reader, I have to ask: does our friend Drew often enter a room like one of the Festrunk brothers? Charterstone Party certainly screams “wild and crazy guy” to me . . .
cheech wizard
August 28th, 2007 at 1:14 pm [Reply]

FW – Why is the cat wearing a wig? Does it have cancer, too?

Le Chat Bleu sounds suspiciously like pidgin French for “This shit blows.”

FOOB – It was nice to see in yesterday’s strip that April has become part of the horse. Hopefully, on her next ride, she can become part of a mountain lion as well.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 1:14 pm [Reply]

Thanks to all of you for explaining what the cat in FW was today. I have about a 10 year gap in my FW reading before starting on this site.
cheech wizard
August 28th, 2007 at 1:19 pm [Reply]

3, 35, 105: In the case of Oscar the Death Cat, I think it’s pretty obvious that we have a case of a cat that can no longer be sated with the sweet breath of infants and instead feeds upon the departing souls of the dying.

Just more evidence that cats are the spawn of Satan.
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 1:22 pm [Reply]

159 Ken Begg Well, I know Huntingbyrd, my daughter who just turned 13 reads this, and I, who will turn 49 soon, also read it. So, yes, I do remember when Garfield was funny, heck, I remember Pogo being in the newspaper as well as when some of these Peanuts cartoons ran the first time.
Bunnë
August 28th, 2007 at 1:28 pm [Reply]

#181- A while back I was thinking, what if they made Get Fuzzy into a cartoon? Who should do the voices? And I had a really hard time with that. The only thing that I came up with is the ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY that Buck had to be voiced by Wallace Shawn.

By I drew a blank on Satchel and the others.
Artist formerly known as Ben
August 28th, 2007 at 1:28 pm [Reply]

#159, Ken Begg,
I’m in the upper thirties bracket, and can remember laughing at quite a few Garfields when it first came out. That could be because it was funnier, or because I was a kid. I’m guessing a little of both.

Statistically, I would say there are more people 35-60 here than you would expect on a snark site.
Bunnë
August 28th, 2007 at 1:30 pm [Reply]

#193 Saxman, that’s an awesome story.
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 1:32 pm [Reply]

* grumble, grumble*
For weeks now we’ve seen refererenes about April’s yearly trip to The Farm in Manitoba. A real buildup, the kind we usually see this time of year, so April can go justify her claims of interest in animals.

But THIS year, what with the coming of the Foobocalypse and the annointing of Lord Angstony Liverlips as the Consort for Her Royal Foobishness, Elizabeth of Cocktease, Lynn broke the cardinal rule. In a medium that rejoices and flaunts its ability to SHOW, she chose to TELL, and tell badly.

It would have been fun to see April’s expression in her eyes as she observed surgery. It would have been nifty to see for ourselves how cool under pressure a 16 year old girl was, while a veterinarian operated on someone’s family pet. Even showing April reassuring a worried pet owner would have been cool. And think of all the puns that could have strutted their stuff! Pet surgery is custom-made for corniness!

But Lynn didn’t go there. For some reason she didn’t want to fool with it, despite it being 1000x more interesting than the ridiculous annointing of the Scarlet Pimple, or John standing by being “handy” in his money pit of a house (and trains, don’t forget the trains!) or Elly making another fucking cassarole that has the same stench lines emanating from it as Robin does when he fills his Pull-ups with poo.

Or Michael, Prince Michael. Not the baby claimed by the pop star, this Prince Michael is the new Lord of his Castle, and we’ll have months of regurgitated stories about when he was a nasty, messy, spoiled, stupid little brat so he can compare himself to his own nasty, messy, spoiled, stupid little brats of his own. Instead of going out with a positive note for April, we’re rushed through two days of “yeah, yeah, April went to the farm and still think s being an animal doctor is cool, check that off the list, hurry up, we’ve got to get back to the dreary shit the readers have been served.”

Damn it, Lynn Johnston. You show us the hall where the banquet is to be served and then usher us into the kiddie room where peanut butter and jelly sandwiches await.

/rant
Razmytaz
August 28th, 2007 at 1:34 pm [Reply]

Master Soft Heart still gets his underware shipped overseas from Marks and Sparks, but now has to get all his tube socks from Walmart.
Kate
August 28th, 2007 at 1:35 pm [Reply]

#149 Rainbird, see #161 Non Compost Mentis.

Thank goodness Non Compost Mentis remembered the title. I remembered huge swathes of the lyrics, but the title or the album? Nah. I’m like Mr. Magoo, who asked for “World’s Finest” when he wanted Budweiser, or whatever the heck he wanted. Talk about old comics.
Razmytaz
August 28th, 2007 at 1:36 pm [Reply]

Re: Oscar – Doom Feline: Any one who reads Terry Pratchett (Discworld) knows that Death and cats have a long term relationship.
TaxiGirl
August 28th, 2007 at 1:37 pm [Reply]

#176 Sister Sestina — “Archie Bunker Surfing” is now my new favorite euphemism. Thanks very!

I just spent a lot of time trying to figure out if somehow I’d managed to create a conditioned response in my mother — “Hear daughter’s voice! Bladder control… gone!”
Kate
August 28th, 2007 at 1:37 pm [Reply]

#207, True Fable: Please, please, please c&p that to Coffee Talk. Please. That was genius. It won’t be published, and probably it won’t even reach Lynn’s desk, but … dayum.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 1:44 pm [Reply]

Plugger Directions—Mark Trail Edition: “Make a left turn where those guys with moustaches were going to build an airport because they hired that Buzzard fella to orchestrate phony bird strikes at the existing airport, then hang a left at the talking potato field, I think it’s a Wal-Mart now. Hey! I hear they have a great deal on “I can’t belive it’s not vinegar” Anyhoo, about a half mile or so down the road you’ll see a construction crew wearing 50’s hard hats, look for the fella wearing the baseball cap, his name’s Homer (nice guy!) He’ll probably tell you to hang a louie another klik up the road (’Nam vet, too!) Have a nice day!
Ken Begg
August 28th, 2007 at 1:45 pm [Reply]

I think a lot of younger people would be amazed to hear that there was a time when Garfield was the “big strip,” in the way Calvin & Hobbs, Dilbert, etc. were.

The strip started rough, got better, then got so successful that Jim Davis gave up writing and drawing it to handle all the merchandising stuff. He created a factory to create the strip, and there you have it. He’s sort of the anti-Bill Watterston.
bats :[
August 28th, 2007 at 1:46 pm [Reply]

60. Big Ted: truer definitions were never spoken, or at least written down for Net-consumption.

120. Artist: maybe fictional condo owners have only one book that they pass around amongst themselves. Lucky Addison, to be the author in residence!

177. YTT: I thought that suit looked familiar…all Drew needs is a little gold crown, and he can be the King of Love!

Well, I’ve desecrated the memory of a fine Czech artist, but at least there’s a good chance his lawyers won’t come after me. The only thing that kept me going was remembering Ewan MacGregor in Moulin Rouge:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9545446@N07/1259370813/
Chris
August 28th, 2007 at 1:47 pm [Reply]

#161 Non Compost Mentos, #209 Kate, I bought Big Science way back when it first came out…but not at Walmart…I think that Les needs to just let x=x and all will be well for him.
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 1:49 pm [Reply]

#212 Kate – From your lips to my enter key! Word for word, Lynn’s minion will get an eyeful. :-)

Thank you. It’s kind words like yours that keep me from swallowing the whole bottle. Not that a mere comic strip would drive me to do such a thing, but it’s been one of those weeks.
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 1:56 pm [Reply]

#217A – and no, I don’t imagine the FBOFW site will EVER print another letter to it from Truman F., not after that first really long letter I sent her (and have copies and preserved in Rant Extravaganza in the Forums.) I was nice and polite and was well aware of the “attract more flies with honey than with vinegar” dictum, but I spelled out my displeasure in no uncertain terms, only minus the raw language. I even told her I didn’t write it for print, I just wanted her to know how I felt about her squandering her talent as she does.

This time I didn’t give a damn.
Non Compost Mentos
August 28th, 2007 at 1:58 pm [Reply]

#204 Bunne (umlaut…i’m too lazy to look up the HTML, but I I really like your umlaut): When I’m reading the comics with my kid, Satchel usually gets a dumb-guy voice that’s somewhere between Bullwinkle and Homer Simpson. Simply because I have no imagination, Rob sounds exactly like me.

Also, any chance that your nom de snark is somehow related to “Bunnee”?

Yes, I spend too much time online.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 2:01 pm [Reply]

Regarding animated Get Fuzzy: It’s weird, because Rob has described Bucky’s voice as being “high and scratchy” which I guess is how Conley hears him in his head.

It’s just that…my parents have siamese. They are LOUD. They are the Barry Whites of cats. Whacky.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 2:06 pm [Reply]

#207 #217 #217A #218-Truman: Can I send it (#207) in to the mighty CT? I don’t think the Lynnions know me…That is some potent rant, Brother!
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 2:10 pm [Reply]

#221 Red Greenback – Oh no, I just sent it in as myself! Sorry, I would have happily let you send it.
Kate
August 28th, 2007 at 2:10 pm [Reply]

#216 Chris, with FW, it’s more like “let cancer = cancer.” And while we’re always falling when we’re walking, only in FW do you see people hit the sidewalk like a trout.

#217 True Fable, I ate a pint of Ben and Jerry’s on Sunday and half a box of Cookies-n-Cream ice cream yesterday. Clearly it’s that kind of week all across the land. Let us celebrate FOOB, then; it gives us an outlet that doesn’t involve absinthe or heavy cream.
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 2:12 pm [Reply]

#223 Kate – Unfortunately I am lactose intolerant, but on the upside I’m diving into Lime Sherbert and have been really hitting the Oreos lately. Yeah, the hard stuff. :-)
Inspector Dim
August 28th, 2007 at 2:13 pm [Reply]

I actually owned a few of the original Garfield books (and took a bunch of others out of the library), and yeah, it was pretty funny.

Then it got so crappy and over-merchandised that Berke Breathed felt compelled to create Bill the Cat. God, I love Bill the Cat.

Felines in the Comics – In order of their coolness as determined by me, Inspector Dim:

1. Hobbes (damn right)
2. Bucky
3. Felix
4. Bill the Cat
5. Cassandra Cat
6. The evil Cat Next Door from Peanuts
7. Solange from 9CL (I actually wish the strip was more Solange, less unicorn and everyone else)
8. Sgt. Louise Lugg’s cat, who hates everything
9. The lions in PBS
10. Mooch
11. Le Chat Bleu (who at least represents altered states of mind)
12. Shiimsa
13. Heathcliff
14. Garfield
15. That little white cat from Rose is Rose
16. Kittycat, doomed to Family Circus for all eternity
17. Nermal. God, I hate Nermal.
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 2:20 pm [Reply]

Lynn baby… you drove me to it, my little frostline pet. I send a blunt, some might say vulgar, rant to you and yours, but I feel no compunction for my actions. Your increasingly shrinking grasp on sensibility simply snapped that thread of decency in me. I only wish your minions did not have to bear witness to my wrath, only YOU, my pungent little dollop of polar bear poo.

Not that you’ll want it now, but… you can Never have The Fable, baby. I know you wanted this hot hot body and my awe-inspiring passion, but this Fable will never be yours.

Suffer, bitch!
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 2:21 pm [Reply]

#222 Truman- Next time you have a good one, I am at your service! (Although I did submit a super treackly, Lynn, your the bestest cartoonist on the planet, your characters are so well fleshed out, yada blah blah)…I think I may have effed up by signing on to the CT as “Soylent G”….go figure?
rich
August 28th, 2007 at 2:24 pm [Reply]

210, re death and cats: Yep — just like in the Sopranos finale.
mattt
August 28th, 2007 at 2:29 pm [Reply]

#174 Hal Jordan: We have to jump like that because this is Funky frickin’ Winkerbean. Nothing happens without it being the start of a long slow slide into something despairing.

#214 Ken Begg: I read somehwere–and I’m sure someone with more interest than me can Google up just where–that this was Davis’ intention all along. He designed everything about the strip–a talking cat specifically, a cute cast of auxiliary characters, everything…–for maximum commercialization. So he wanted it, he got it, and, well, there you go. FWIW.
essephreak
August 28th, 2007 at 2:33 pm [Reply]

#68 Luann: Chapter 5, 6-9? That would just be chapter 5-9 right? At least he could have made it plausible with Chapter 5, 7-9?
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 2:34 pm [Reply]

I hate Fucking Winkerbeans…And Garfields too, I daresay!
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 2:40 pm [Reply]

Luann: Remember “Rainbow Man”? Dude would have a great seat at various sporting events holding up a sign that he Magic Markered the stirring words “John 3:16″ onto. I sure do!
Calico
August 28th, 2007 at 2:41 pm [Reply]

#203 – Re: comics from years past, I was wondering if anyone here knows what happened to the cartoon “Motley’s Crew.”

I was pondering this several days ago, but never posted my inquiry until now. I could look it up on the you know, but I’d rather hear it here first. : )
Brown-eyed Girl
August 28th, 2007 at 2:43 pm [Reply]

230 essephreak. A dumb idea poorly executed. That pretty much sums up Luann.
Saxman
August 28th, 2007 at 2:44 pm [Reply]

233: Motleys Crew…

The Y2K bug got it.

or if you want to cheat:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motley’s_Crew
Zen Doggies
August 28th, 2007 at 2:46 pm [Reply]

#94 Nekrotzar: Very sorry to hear about your cat. Sounds like you gave it a good life after its rocky start.
Bunnë
August 28th, 2007 at 2:47 pm [Reply]

#229 I read that too. Where did I read it? Could it have been the New Yorker? Or the New York Times? Or some non-New-York-related publication?
Harold
August 28th, 2007 at 2:48 pm [Reply]

Pluggers is dead-on today. i have always called that “giving directions like a hick.” “Go past where the big oak was before they cut it down three years ago, then take a left at where the Johnson farm was before the house burned down…” A local annoyance is a thing called “The Cross-Valley Expressway.” Everyone gives directions relative to this – but nowhere is there a sign that indicates which road is considered the “Cross-Valley Expressway”! (In reality there are two, a North and a South, separated by about 10 miles. Neither has a sign identifying it as such.)

Funky Winkerbean reminded me a lot of the ending of the French film Betty Blue. Anybody else familiar with that movie?
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 2:48 pm [Reply]

I obviously have never seen this “Luann” comedy strip.
Hey Dingo! go for the gold!
Bunnë
August 28th, 2007 at 2:49 pm [Reply]

#225 – the evil cat next door to Snoopy was named “World War II”, as I recall.
brb
August 28th, 2007 at 2:52 pm [Reply]

#174 Hal Jordan I think it is the cat himself who is implies that Les is sliding into alcoholism. My reading of the cat’s comment was that Les has been having a nightly hot chocolate with some added alcohol, and is now imbibing directly.

Eh, who knows?
odinthor
August 28th, 2007 at 2:54 pm [Reply]

#235 — Saxman — The Y2K bug?!? The Y2K bug!?! [foams at mouth, in a macho, sexy, but elegantly understated way, for a moment] I think I’m the only person on earth whose computer really did crash on first booting that fateful morning. The tech said, “Just a coincidence.” HAH! I should have put Coach Kaz on the case long ago.
Chris
August 28th, 2007 at 2:54 pm [Reply]

#223 Kate: Or, “Let Death=Death.”
Jamus The Bartender
August 28th, 2007 at 2:55 pm [Reply]

174. I don’t disagree, Hal, but…this is Funky Winkerbean we’re talking about here. Les could be at an AA meeting in a month. Maybe two. That’s the way things work here. It makes the Lemony Snicket books look like Bozo’s Circus.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 2:55 pm [Reply]

Harold, haven’t seen that one, but I did have the rare misfortune of seeing “China Blue” starring Kathleen Turner. The “human penis” schtick almost had me blowing kibbles n’ bits , but Tony Perkins made up for that booshit by being truly creepy and weird.
Aloha, Oy!
Sugar and Spike
August 28th, 2007 at 2:57 pm [Reply]

mwarrrple oomgwagggle fwessh*

*Mark Trail: …”with Special Guest Star Michael Ontkean as John…”

Does Jack Elrod get his ideas for characters’ hair styles from 1970s or earlier vintage magazines he finds in dumpsters behind barber shops?
Motorposus
August 28th, 2007 at 2:59 pm [Reply]

FW: The upside to drowning your sorrows in cod liver oil: a lustrous head of hair. The downside: powerful fish breath attracts talking cats.

Inspector Dim – I think the Rose is Rose cat is called Peekaboo.The name alone makes it less cool than even Kittycat (but still cooler than Nermal).
andreavis
August 28th, 2007 at 2:59 pm [Reply]

Thanks to all who explained about the cup o’monkey– that’ll teach me to come here before I read the day’s comics (d’oh!)
Dean Booth
August 28th, 2007 at 2:59 pm [Reply]

FW: Yabba Dabba Cancer.
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 2:59 pm [Reply]

Gimme a big D! (”D!”)
Gimme a big I! (”I!”)
Gimme a big N! (”N!”)
Gimme a big G! (”G!”)
Gimme a big O! (”O!”)

What does that SPELL? DINGO, DINGO, DINGO!

All right, Chicagoland ‘Mudgeons, go out tonight and really cheer for our man Dingo as he sings for a trip to lovely Austria for him and John! Go out and yell for those of us who can’t be present! BE THERRRRRE…!

If good wishes were cheers, I’d deafen those judge bastards!
MC
August 28th, 2007 at 3:01 pm [Reply]

Get your HOT CUP O’ MONKEY right here!
MC
August 28th, 2007 at 3:03 pm [Reply]

Let’s try that again:

Get your HOT CUP O’ MONKEY right here!
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 3:05 pm [Reply]

Din Go …
Din Go …
Din Go …
Girl Reporter
August 28th, 2007 at 3:06 pm [Reply]

Hot Cup o’ Monkey [slaps forehead] That’s what Les is having instead of hot cocoa tonight.
Sunny Mel Blatherscythe
August 28th, 2007 at 3:08 pm [Reply]

Mary Worth –

“Damn, I love that dress Mary !!” – signed the year 1988

Pluggers –

Apparently Pluggers also like to fondle themselves in the present while giving directions to strangers in the past tense.
Saxman
August 28th, 2007 at 3:11 pm [Reply]

292 Odinthor:

I remember that Y2K created a lot of angst for the newspaper comics crowd. How to handle? The strips had to be in weeks before anyone knew whether it would be a bust or a burning. What tone to take?

Personally, I stayed in a corporate disaster bunker waiting for the disaster that never came (and a good thing, since I’d spent the last 3 years helping redo all their code).

By then, when midnight came, we were all pretty sure nothing would happen. Imagine our surprise when we got reports from Dallas that electrical power went off at 12 sharp!

Seems that when fireworks went off, a flock of birds woke up and flew into a transformer farm, causing widespread and cascading shorting. All was back to normal in 20 minutes. Mark Trail would have been upset though.
Harold
August 28th, 2007 at 3:12 pm [Reply]

This is what I get for disappearing for so long. Obviously something good is happening in Brother Dingo’s life. But what? I’ll have to check earlier posts for more information!
Jamus The Bartender
August 28th, 2007 at 3:17 pm [Reply]

Who’s hoooouse…..Dingo’s hooooouse….who’s hoooooouse…..Dingo’s hoooooouse….
Jamus The Bartender
August 28th, 2007 at 3:19 pm [Reply]

Long story short Harold…Dingo is singing in some kind of Sound Of Music themed contest which extols the virtues of Chicago, and there are many, in the form of the My Favorite Things song. Dingo is one of the finalists. He’s gonna win too. First prize, trip to Vienna for two.
Red Lion
August 28th, 2007 at 3:32 pm [Reply]

What I’m really confused about in today’s Hi and Lois is the “kiss” in the second panel–it’s obvious that he’s supposed to be giving her a kiss on the cheek, but, erm, well…he’s not. He’s just got his arm around her to prevent her from running, leaning in scarily close with his lips puckered like a fish, his eyes wide open, staring into the eyes of his wife, whose face is a mix of confusion and pity at her husband’s pathetic attempt at affection.

What the hell is going on?
Chert the Chort
August 28th, 2007 at 3:36 pm [Reply]

#123 Gabe – Jonesboro? Another AR person here I see. The big city shopping place for us wasn’t even in Arkansas, we had to cross the state line by 50 feet in Texarkana. SW AR, closer to Shreveport or Texarkana than Hot Springs. Gave birth to a lifelong hatred of TX and LA.

Now I’m in Boston, and wish I were back. Heheheh.
Bootsy
August 28th, 2007 at 3:41 pm [Reply]

D – I – N – G – O, and Dingo was his name oh!

Make us proud! Wait, we already are. Ok, then, win one for the Gipper. No, that won’t do, I hate gippers. Ooh, I got it.

*finger quotin’ like Margo* Go Dingo!
Pendragon
August 28th, 2007 at 3:42 pm [Reply]

Cancer Shavenbean: Absinthe makes the heart grow fonder.
Joe
August 28th, 2007 at 3:43 pm [Reply]

#207 True Fable:

Way to rant on the Foobiverse. Excellent!

“……..Lord Angstony Liverlips as the Consort for Her Royal Foobishness, Elizabeth of Cocktease……”

Priceless!
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 3:44 pm [Reply]

Chert: I’m orginally a Georgian, got trasplanted to Ash Flat, AR in high school. Got the hell out of there at 18, joined the Navy, went around the world, yadda yadda.

Now I’m stationed in Memphis, only a hop skip and jump from my old home. Bit surreal when I go home and visit.
Pendragon
August 28th, 2007 at 3:46 pm [Reply]

#85 – In defense of Non Sequitur’s reference to emoticons, it should be mentioned the strip is currently in reruns until September. So he is really only ten years out of date.
Big Sims, The Good Natured Roadblock
August 28th, 2007 at 3:48 pm [Reply]

Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo Dingo
D I N G O !

ahem, pardon my shouting all, but

DINGO!
Harold
August 28th, 2007 at 3:49 pm [Reply]

Thanks, Jamus! My research just brought me up-to-date!

GO DINGO, GO DINGO, GO, GO, GO DINGO!

Pack your hat that snaps up on one side and your digeridoo and your drop bear repellent! You are totally going to…

…oh, that’s Austria? Well, Austria’s nice, too.
Hal Jordan
August 28th, 2007 at 3:49 pm [Reply]

FW: I guess my point is that (contrary to MADD propaganda and Funky McDrunkerbeen) alcohol can be a handy, short-term way to handle stress. Wait – give me a chance – When my brother died a couple years ago, I had to go to Seattle to close out his affairs: box up and ship home (my home – Colorado) family heirlooms, drop stuff off at Goodwill, cancel utilities, etc. This took about a week and I ended each day (back at the hotel – no way was staying alone in his apartment) with a REALLY STRONG drink – sometimes more than one. You know what? They really hit the spot.
Now, three years later, I have no regrets, not even a little bit. Did I use alcohol as a crutch? Damn right! Were there any lasting effects? Not that I can tell. I flew home, rejoined my family, got back in my routine – life went on.

As Homer Simpson said, “Alcohol! The cause of – and solution to – life’s problems!”
benro
August 28th, 2007 at 3:59 pm [Reply]

#263 – I believe it’s “Absinthe makes the tart grow fonder”
Bootsy
August 28th, 2007 at 3:59 pm [Reply]

Hal Jordan, # 269, perhaps I didn’t read all the comments, but surely no one here is suggesting that alcohol is a poor way to deal with stress?!

Jeez, everybody I know drinks to excess. Tomorrow, which is the anniversary of The Thing (this year the dickwad in chief is here, as is every news anchor whose expense account affords him/her dinner at Galatoire’s) and I plan to drink. To excess. And not watch TV unless Rio Bravo is on.
mattt
August 28th, 2007 at 4:03 pm [Reply]

#269 Hal Jordan: I was snarking on FW with my #229. I actually agree with you: Sometimes things are going on where you just need a good stiff drink to unwind.
cheech wizard
August 28th, 2007 at 4:04 pm [Reply]

228/Rich – Personally, I always thought the cat in the Sopranos finale belong to Mr. Schrodinger – we don’t know if Tony is alive or dead, so he’s both until we learn otherwise.

Besides, the extra in the Members Only jacket was smirking as walked into the diner in his big on-screen moment – if this was a significant character, Chase would have done another take.
Michael Farris
August 28th, 2007 at 4:05 pm [Reply]

Am I the only lonely voice willing to admit that I like the idea of Le Chat Bleu? A bitchy, alcoholic-muse talking cat is more interesting and charismatic than all the reportedly human characters in FW put together and the first character in the strip I actually like (so far).

I know, I know, it’ll just devolve into lame, preachy-assed banality (you can’t drown your troubles in alcohol, troubles can swim, blah, blay wrrrrettch) but if Batiuk had any artistic balls, Le Chat Bleu could totally rock my world.
Jamus The Bartender
August 28th, 2007 at 4:07 pm [Reply]

Vienna….Austria…either way….
Big Sims, The Good Natured Roadblock
August 28th, 2007 at 4:11 pm [Reply]

If anybody has read my posts (has anybody read my posts?)they should know all about my mad hatred of all things Batiuk. It’s even so bad (and this is the classic CC Moment when my neighbor and I were checking out his handy work on his new/used car and I asked him why he replaced the starter motor. He replied “The Crankshaft was acting a little Funky.” I almost fucking floored him.
Now before every auto mechanic / car aficionado / engineer who posts here jumps all over my poor innocent neighbor for confusing the flywheel shaft for a crankshaft and using funky to describe incorrect timing ratio or whatever the hell goes wrong with starters, please know he was trying to make a gentle joke which was pretty damn funny (to me anyway) after my sputtered beer had quit sizzling off the hot manifold.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 4:17 pm [Reply]

Dingo!
Hal Jordan
August 28th, 2007 at 4:21 pm [Reply]

271 – No Bootsy, our fellow snarkers are completely aware how silly this FW plotline is. I just got fed up with Batuik’s ham-fisted way of dealing with important life issues and started to sputter indignantly. I’ll retreat now to the sweet, sweet caress of my opium pipe and let my rage slip beneath the waters…
Will Cate
August 28th, 2007 at 4:22 pm [Reply]

re 274 – Michael

But why is the cat wearing a Beatles wig?
Dik-Dik Vendetta
August 28th, 2007 at 4:28 pm [Reply]

Upon further consideration of FW, I have determined that the cat is not only wearing a wig, but it is a rat tail wig.
Anonymous
August 28th, 2007 at 4:28 pm [Reply]

Is it a solidarity shaved bald and wearing a cancer wig?
Trilobite
August 28th, 2007 at 4:31 pm [Reply]

Whatever it is that Les is drinking (and I tend to agree with SecretMargo that he’s hitting the ‘Tussin), the fact that he’s drinking it in Funky Winkerbean is really all anyone needs to know.

No one does ANYTHING in FW that isn’t a signpost on the road to disaster. In the twisted little ant farm of agony that Batiuk has created, the only reasons the characters have to do stuff is so that it can be a horrible problem for them which makes their lives infinitely worse.

Hell, Les is getting off easy: I don’t know if he’s sucking down whiskey or vanilla extract or codeine-laced cough syrup, but at least he’s got a hallucinatory talking cat to keep him company while he’s doing it. Fact is, Batiuk could just as easily have had him swigging poison, just so their daughter could be tragically orphaned.

And even now, I wouldn’t put that past him; for all I know, the strip where Les goes on a week-long bender after Lisa’s funeral and ends up grabbing a bottle of drain cleaner in a blind stupor is already on its way to the coloring sweatshop.
Dynamite XI
August 28th, 2007 at 4:34 pm [Reply]

Heh, the guy who writes Baldo used to be a newspaperman, so without newspapers he’d be out of a job completely.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 4:41 pm [Reply]

#280-Dik-Dik Vendetta: Have any of us Mudges seen a rear or profile shot of Pope Josh? I bet Homeboy’s sportin’ rat!
Dingo’s in it to win it!!!!
Dagger
August 28th, 2007 at 4:46 pm [Reply]

Regarding Luann, I think Luann’s teacher must have gotten his degree from some popup ad at tweedteach.com, considering his inability to realize that five goes next to six. Then again, had he written Chapter 5-9, it’s entirely possible that Luann would have spent all her study time trying desperately to find the hyphen chapter.
fishmorgjp
August 28th, 2007 at 4:47 pm [Reply]

Garfield was never funny. Never. Anybody who says it was is suffering from some dreadful manner of false-memory syndrome.
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:51 pm [Reply]

Still catching up on weekend comments, but I wanted to post a few things:

Dingo: Good luck with the sing-off! I just hope that you haven’t chosen to wear play clothes that you’ve shrewdly and economically fashioned from castoff curtains. Well, unless that sort of thing will help you win; in which case, Godspeed!

With regard to other forum-related topics, I was really blown away by commodorejohn’s Dark Side of the Foob from this past weekend. (If you missed it and you dig the Floyd, you should check it out. You might have to scroll down a little. And dim the lights. And smoke a big, fat reefer. But only if you have that sort of thing around for medicinal purposes, naturally.)

Anyway, reading through the Pink Foob parody made me recall how Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys was inspired by the Beatles’ Rubber Soul, and I thought I’d try my hand at a Pet Sounds “Foob remix.” The results are pretty meh, so it’s probably just as well that it’s going to be buried in the middle of what’s probably going to turn out to be an enormous thread. Oh well. We’ll start with . . .

Track 1: “Wouldn’t It Be Nice”

Wouldn’t it be nice if I were older,
And I didn’t have to live with Dad?
And wouldn’t it be nice to live with Mother?
She says city life ain’t all that bad.

You know it’s gonna make it that much better
When I won’t always be locked in the cellar . . .

Oh, wouldn’t it be nice if I could wake up
And not have to see Dad’s liver lips?
And not to have to put up with his mooning
Over his new girlfriend’s great big hips?

All my life with losers I’ve been spending;
It seems my days with them are never ending . . .
Wouldn’t it be nice.

Maybe if I think and wish and hope and pray,
I’ll get to leave.
‘Cause I know, that they’ll ignore me totally
Once she conceives.
I’ll catch the ferry,
And then I’ll be happy.
Oh, wouldn’t it be nice?

You know, it seems the more I think about them,
It makes it easier to live without them;
Yes, I’ll live without them . . .
Wouldn’t it be nice.

(Good night, my Francie . . . Sleep tight, my Francie . . .)
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:52 pm [Reply]

Track 2: from “You Still Believe In Me”

I know perfectly well I’m not where I should be.
I’ve been very aware you’ve been patient with me.
When I grew my mustache, they said I looked like a schmuck.
But even after shaving it, how can it be,
I still completely suck?

I try hard to be more what you want me to be.
The least that you could do is give me a baby.
I got married before, but it seems that all went amuck.
And after all the retconning, how can it be,
I still completely suck?

I wanna cry . . .
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:52 pm [Reply]

Track 3: from “That’s Not Me”

I tried to prove that I could make it alone,
But that’s not me.
I wanted to show how independent I’d grown now,
But that’s not me.
I had tried to break free and leave my family
I had gone as far as the forests of Mtigwaki . . .

I’m a little bit scared
‘Cause it’s wrong not to live in the suburbs.
I need Anthony
‘Cause he’s got the good will of my mother.

My folks, when I wrote them and said what I was up to,
Said that’s not me.
I went through all kinds of changes, took a look at myself
And said that’s not me.
My boyfriend cheated; and though the Cree were kind,
They told me I should stay with my own kind;
Let Paul be . . .

I once had a dream, but it’s wrong not to live in the suburbs.
I soon found out I should live my life just like my mother.
I’m glad I went now, I’m willing to take being smothered . . .

I once had a dream, but it’s wrong not to live in the suburbs.
I soon found out I should live my life just like my mother.
Mibbitmaker
August 28th, 2007 at 4:52 pm [Reply]

FW: All this stuff about “Blue Cat” (said in FW like pretentious Diane Chambers dialogue, of course) reminds me of the ’50s Tom & Jerry cartoon “Blue Cat Blues”. Although I like it alot as a dark story, it is, ultimately, a very depressing cartoon, ending with Jerry joining Tom on the train tracks, commiting (post-ending) a suicide without any of the comedy of a Bob Clampett “Well, now I’ve seen everything!” bit

Seems right up Batiuk’s alley(cat).

#263, 270: In FW, the saying is, “Absinthe makes the heart grow cancer”.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 4:53 pm [Reply]

#284- My dumb ass: Joshua, I kid because I love!… I sported a mully back in the early 90’s (with my brunette tresses streaked with purple, beige and red, for crying out softly!) Anywaysiedoodle, Go DINGO!
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:53 pm [Reply]

Track 4: from “Don’t Talk”

I can hear so much in your sighs,
And I can see so much in your eyes.
There are words we both could say . . .
But don’t talk; get your ass in the basement;
Go down into your fenced-off pen.
Don’t talk; if you’re good, I’ll let you eat some raw meat.

Poor Thérèse did not know my needs.
I’m so glad I forced her to breed.
Maybe you can play tomorrow.
Now don’t talk; get your ass in the basement;
Go down into your fenced-off pen.
Don’t talk; if you’re good, I’ll let you eat some raw meat.

Raw meat . . . raw meat . . . raw meat . . .

Don’t talk; get your ass in the basement;
Go down into your fenced-off pen.
Don’t talk; get your ass in the basement;
Go down into your fenced-off pen.
Don’t talk; get your ass in the basement . . .
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:54 pm [Reply]

Track 5: from “I’m Waiting for the Day”

You stood by me when I had my stroke,
That’s when I needed someone to help wipe drool off of me.
You gave me love when I didn’t croak;
That’s what I needed the most, and also help when I pee.

I know you cry; that’s how you are;
But when I could, I told you, “Boxcar.”
I’m waiting for the day when I [boxcar] again . . .

I said “no” to tuna casserole,
‘Cause Elly stuffs it with lard, and then she deep-fries it whole.
I just can’t wait for my cute therapists,
‘Cause I can ogle their breasts while they help me to stroll.

And I can’t stand my fool grandson;
I guess I’m saying you’re the only one.
I’m waiting for the day when I [boxcar] again . . .

And I can’t stand my fool grandson;
I guess I’m saying you’re the only one.
I’m waiting for the day when I [boxcar] again . . .

You didn’t think
That I would eat that tuna casserole!
You didn’t think
That I’d put up with [saturns] any longer!
You didn’t think
That I would eat that tuna casserole!
You didn’t think
That I would eat that tuna casserole!
You didn’t think . . .
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:55 pm [Reply]

Track 6: from “Let’s Go Away for Awhile”

(Instrumental for acoustic guitar, hoseaphone, and “ka-floompa” toilet plunger)
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:55 pm [Reply]

Track 7: from “Sloop John B”

They call me the Foob John P;
To switch homes we agreed.
From just down the block we did roam.
Picked up and left.
The deal wasn’t so deft.
But I can set trains up
All over my home.

So load up my H-O train.
See how the engine sits.
Lay tracks all over the floor
Of my new home,
Of my new home.
I love this engine’s bright chrome; yeah yeah.
Well, I’ve set my trains up
All over my home.

Now April, she did pout.
Said she would not move out.
The wife and I had to go and drag her away.
It’s only fair
To keep her locked up downstairs, yeah yeah.
I can still set trains up
All over my home.

So load up my H-O train (load up my H-O . . .)
See how the engine sits (see how the engine . . .)
Lay tracks all over the floor
Of my new home, (of my new home)
Of my new home, (of my new home)
This set looks like ancient Rome (load up my H-O train)
(load up my H-O)
Well, I’ve set my trains up
All over my home.

Our Mike is a perfect boy,
Fills all our lives with joy.
And when he takes a crap, it turns to gold.
I love my home.
I love my model train home . . .
I’ll set more trains up
All over my home.

So load up my H-O train.
See how the engine sits.
Lay tracks all over the floor
Of my new home, (of my new home)
Of my new home . . .
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:56 pm [Reply]

Track 8: from “God Only Knows”

I might be a sheet shaver,
And over fatty foods, I’ll slaver.
You never need to doubt me,
‘Cause you will never live without me.

God knows I’ll always control my children . . .

If they should ever leave town,
They’ll find the outside world a let-down.
The world has nothing to sell them;
They’ll live exactly like I’ll tell them.

God knows I’ll always control my children . . .
God knows I’ll always control my children . . .

If they should ever leave town,
They’ll find the outside world a let-down.
The world has nothing to sell them;
They’ll live exactly like I’ll tell them.

God knows I’ll always control my children . . .
God knows I’ll always control my children . . .
God only knows . . .
God knows I’ll always control my children . . .
God knows I’ll always control my children . . .
God only knows . . .
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:57 pm [Reply]

Track 9: from “I Know There’s an Answer”

I know so many people who think they’re a genius like me.
They isolate themselves, and write prose delicately.
Now I hate to tell them
And point out that they’ll never be as good as me . . .

I am Mike Patterson,
I’m perfect, and I wish I could French kiss myself . . .

I have made my first novel; it will set the world alight.
I got a big advance for page after page of shite.
My bona fide genius
Absolves me from having to deal with my children . . .

I am Mike Patterson,
I’m perfect, and I wish I could French kiss myself . . .
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:57 pm [Reply]

Track 10: from “Here Today”

It starts with lying ’bout his pornstache,
Pretty soon, Thérèse’s rep has been trashed.
We know the Lynnions’ decision
To change the past with trite revisions.

The Granthony affair is a despicable thing;
And they don’t care about the pain that Blandthony brings:
He makes us feel so bad,
He makes our hearts feel sad,
He makes our days go wrong,
He makes our nights so long,
They ought to keep in mind

That he’s bland today,
He’ll be bland tomorrow,
He’s bland; God, he’s so bland!

Right now they think that he’s perfection;
To that, we really take exception.
Well you know, we hate to cause a ruckus,
But we’d like to kick him in the tuckus;

Well, we’re not saying that he couldn’t find love with Liz,
But she could do much better than the simp that he is:
He’ll make her feel so bad,
He’ll make her heart feel sad,
He’ll make her days go wrong,
He’ll make her nights so long,
She ought to keep in mind

That he’s bland today,
He’ll be bland tomorrow,
He’s bland; God, he’s so bland!

Keep in mind that he’s bland today,
He’ll be bland tomorrow,
He’s bland; God, he’s so bland!
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:58 pm [Reply]

Track 11: from “I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times”

I keep looking for how I can stand out,
And how to speak my mind.
I’ve been trying hard to make sure my folks
Don’t leave me behind . . .

They say I got brains,
But they keep pushing me aside;
I should go roadside.

Each time things start to happen again,
And when I try saying something in my own defense,
They put me down:
They say that I’m such a brat,
They say that I’m such a brat,
(Can’t find no one who will sympathize a little)
They say that I’m such a brat,
(Can’t find no one who will sympathize a little)

I guess I’m just not the same as these foobs.

Every time I raise my voice a little,
And every time I vent,
My folks say that I should just be grateful
To stay in the basement.

Where can I turn
When my uppity friends talk down,
And put me down?

Each time things start to happen again,
And when I try saying something in my own defense,
They put me down:
They say that I’m such a brat,
They say that I’m such a brat,
(Can’t find no one who will sympathize a little)
They say that I’m such a brat,
(Can’t find no one who will sympathize a little)

I guess I’m just not the same as these foobs.
I guess I’m just not the same as these foobs.
I guess I’m just not the same as these foobs . . .
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:59 pm [Reply]

Track 12: from “Pet Sounds”

(Instrumental, with archival recordings of Farley barking)
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 4:59 pm [Reply]

Track 13: from “Caroline, No”

Where did your moxie go?
Where is the girl we used to know?
How could you hook up with that schmoe?
Elizabeth, no . . .

Why get with that big bore?
He can’t give you mustache rides no more.
You say he’s a good guy, but that’s not true;
Elizabeth you . . .

. . . Dump that jerk
Before he locks you in a pen.
He’s a creep; he’ll be a creep again.
Elizabeth, why . . .

Could we ever find in you again
The affection that we had back then?
Could we ever bring you back, or are you done?
Elizabeth, no . . .
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 5:00 pm [Reply]

Paperback Rifler @ all of yer posts and parodies. Dayum! you’re GOOD!
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 5:00 pm [Reply]

Track 14 (bonus track): from “Kokomo”

Out in Ontario
There’s a place called Milborough.
That’s where you wanna go
If you don’t want your own life . . .
Women have big rears,
And they don’t dare have their own careers.
And you won’t be fulfilled
‘Til you have babies up to your ears
There in Milborough.

[chorus]
Don’t wanna be pregnant and kept in the basement?
You will have to endeavor — don’t be trapped forever —
Escape from the treacle; baby why don’t we go . . .
. . . Hoooo, you gotta get away from Milborough;
And get out fast or else you’ll never go.
Life has much more to show
Than what’s in Milborough.

(Just say adieu before they catch a clue)

You’d be settling;
To be a martyr would be your thing.
And you’ll find that in time,
Your dreams you’ll be abandoning . . .
Was your first love nice?
You’re stuck with him for life.
Your independence denied,
You’ll watch your hips grow double-wide
Up there in Milborough.

Don’t wanna be pregnant and kept in the basement?
You will have to endeavor — don’t be trapped forever —
Escape from the treacle; baby why don’t we go . . .
. . . Hoooo, you gotta get away from Milborough;
And get out fast or else you’ll never go.
Life has much more to show
Than what’s in Milborough.

(Get out; don’t wait; or else you’ll be too late)

Girl, you oughtta know
Your future’s dead in Milborough.
Now if you wanna go
And get away from it all —
Get out of Milborough.

Don’t wanna be pregnant and kept in the basement?
You will have to endeavor — don’t be trapped forever —
Escape from the treacle; baby why don’t we go . . .
. . . Hoooo, you gotta get away from Milborough;
And get out fast or else you’ll never go.
Life has much more to show
Than what’s in Milborough.
Paperback Rifler
August 28th, 2007 at 5:01 pm [Reply]

Track 15:

Just kidding. There is no Track 15.

Belated apologies to the Beach Boys and to everybody everywhere.
Krazy Kat
August 28th, 2007 at 5:02 pm [Reply]

Dingo GOT the baby!
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 5:07 pm [Reply]

Paperback Rifler, so good in fact that I’m just gonna crawl into that big The New Yorker caveman gun barrel with my talking pussycat in tow. Safe and restful sleep…sleep…sleep.

Krazy Kat: Dingo done did it!? Forget the gun barrel and talking cat booshit!…Life is GOOD!
Hal Jordan
August 28th, 2007 at 5:08 pm [Reply]

Paperback Rifler, that was genius! I kept hitting refesh to catch the latest release
Brown-eyed Girl
August 28th, 2007 at 5:12 pm [Reply]

Paperback Rifler. Wow. That is amazing.
J.Noble
August 28th, 2007 at 5:14 pm [Reply]

Funky Cancerbean: Oh for God’s sake, DIE ALREADY!!!!
Kate
August 28th, 2007 at 5:14 pm [Reply]

PAPERBACK RIFLER STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT NOW I HAVE BEACH BOYS STUCK IN MY HEAD HOOOOO!
Al Scaduto
August 28th, 2007 at 5:22 pm [Reply]

Paperback Rifler Adulation Dep’t:

I’ve just come in at Number 25
I’m oh so happy, so glad to be alive
And everybody says it’s going to get to the top
Life is so easy when your record’s hot.
Go tell my mamma and my sister too
To press my trousers and polish my shoes
I might even end up a rock-and-roll god
It might turn into a steady job.
And my agent said to me: “Son, I always told you so.”
Now my record’s number 11 on the BBC
But number seven on the N.M.E.
Not the Melody Maker want to interview me
And ask my view on politics and theories on religion.
Now my record’s up to number 3
And a woman recognized me and started to scream
This all seems like a crazy dream
I’ve been invited to a dinner with a prominent queen
And now I’ve got friends that I never knew I had before.
It’s strange how people want you when you record’s high
‘Cos when it drops down they just pass you by
Now my agent just called me and said it me:
“Son your record’s just got to Number One.”
And you know what that means…..
Wanders
August 28th, 2007 at 5:24 pm [Reply]

It may have already been pointed out, but the irony of today’s MW is that Drew is using the same ridiculous platitude that Dawn had used a mere 25 days ago!

It’s taken the entire summer, but I think we’re finally going to get down to some good old fashioned Mary Worth womp-ass meddling.
Anonymous
August 28th, 2007 at 5:25 pm [Reply]

#287 Paperback Rifler – Wow. I’m honored to have inspired such brilliance.
commodorejohn
August 28th, 2007 at 5:25 pm [Reply]

#313 was me. College computer, you know.
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 5:29 pm [Reply]

I am anonyus!
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 5:30 pm [Reply]

Annoyouse, I daresay!
Pendragon
August 28th, 2007 at 5:37 pm [Reply]

…now you can make some REAL money
bats :[
August 28th, 2007 at 5:38 pm [Reply]

274. Michael Ferris: oh, I like the surreal idea of talking cat, too. It just seems that FW is in such a tailspin that introducing one is merely grasping at straws to keep the readers’ interest — cripes, we all know Lisa is going to die, and we even know what Batuik has outlined for the rest of the strip (for a while at least — the ten-year jump into the future)!
I do like an element of surprise, though…probably why I put up with Pibgorn. It can be really vexing at times, particularly since it’s published only three times a week, but it’s kind of (dare I say it?) fun not to know what’s going to happened next. lio wanders here and there, and rarely goes the route of a multi-day storyline (although lio goes to camp was pretty entertaining). Get Fuzzy is fun, with Bucky, even if he’s always looking for a way to make a buck, does it in new and bizarre ways. Even Mary Worth is strangely engaging, with the dopey premise of Who Will Drew Choose? (and the tangential Who Will Kill Drew?).
I don’t know why LJ and Batuik feel the need to give us these huge trailers (with huge chunks of the plot exposed, like a movie trailer that shows the best parts of the film!).
I like Le Chat Bleu, but I suspect it’ll have a shelf-life about the length of April’s summer in Manitoba…
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 5:39 pm [Reply]

Holy Mother of Glock! Just call me Skippy, or Samsonite!!..Yeah I don’t know if I’m dead or sleepy, but I plooked Alice Mitchell back in the day. And think I hit Martha Wilson, too!

Dingo!
bats :[
August 28th, 2007 at 5:47 pm [Reply]

Geeez…first the Dark Side of the Foob, and now the Lake Erie Beach Boys (is that the Great Lake closest to Toronto? I live in Tucson…big bodies of water frighten and confuse me).

The next thing you know Dingo’ll have won the Chicagoland Sing-Off, jetted to Austria, returned to record both Dark Side of the Foob and the Beach Boys albums, and be hawking them with personal appearances at a Wal-Mart near you!!

Dingo, Dingo, he’s our man!
If he can’t do it, there’s no justice in the world!

Best wishes!
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 5:49 pm [Reply]

NYer CC: I am totally stoked and barreled (that’s a surfer term, my friends) Anyway, my caption is “Get out the way, anonymous cavemen, I am cleaning” Go Dingo!!!
Catbus
August 28th, 2007 at 5:49 pm [Reply]

#159: Yes. I am in my upper 30s and I remember thinking that Garfield was funny. My brother had book #2, I had book #3, we read both books numerous times. But then
I was about 12. I’d like to think that my taste in just about everything has improved since then.

About a year or two after that, I converted to the cult of Bill the Cat. Ah good times.
deeelightful
August 28th, 2007 at 5:51 pm [Reply]

Am I the only one who thinks that “Vera Shields” sounds like the name of a feminine hygeine product. Pretty good tagline too….. “For those you love and care for, try Vera Shields.”
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 5:55 pm [Reply]

We’re strapped, We’re proud…and, um, er….Something about guns…Boxcar! Margo you all to Hell!
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 6:04 pm [Reply]

Gee….what comic has finally become like old French Cinema ?

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1026/1261914376_e7cc9a87f1_o.jpg
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 6:08 pm [Reply]

I hired an illiegal to do some work around my compound. Javier(illegal) told me about “choda” And I told Javier “that’s where I pack my heat, feels real good in there” pretty boring, but that’s one of my AA steps, I think, shorry!
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:08 pm [Reply]

#82 Poteet:

isn’t it also weird that Laura has a chin that could cut paper?

Poteet, I admit that I have a bidduva Master Soft Heart-On for Laura with her strapping ways and firm handshake, sinuous flanks and sensible shoes. Ah, that rangy country girl competence, with chiseled chin, too! Yum!

Well, then again, Laura’s situated next to her mom and a FOOB. But I think she’s cute.

#213 Red Greenback

hang a left at the talking potato field, I think it’s a Wal-Mart now.

Hoo! Yeah, a Wal-Mart was built there. That’s what I believe happened!
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 6:09 pm [Reply]

Écoutez, mon cher Dingo: HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Good thoughts are presently winging their way to Chicago from up north. Hopefully they’ll cancel out any wayward Pattervibes that may stray south. Godspeed!
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:09 pm [Reply]

Charleton Heston, if I could afford it, I’d smoke two, three of these a day!
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 6:10 pm [Reply]

Dingo—Video please!
Gagott68
August 28th, 2007 at 6:13 pm [Reply]

#286: Speaking of false memory syndrome, I rented the Ultimate Underdog Collection #1-3 on DVD (there was no way I was going to that movie that just came out). Unfortunately, after watching 2 Underdog episodes and the accompanying short inserts (Klondike Kat, etc.), I realized that I must have fondly remembered the cartoon because of it’s kick-ass theme song (marvelously covered by the Butthole Surfers). But the cartoon itself blew chunks. Badly drawn with dialogue so ham-handed that it could have come straight from FOOBville with none of the tongue-in-cheekiness of Mighty Mouse. (Another great theme song but with a cartoon to back it up).
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 6:15 pm [Reply]

You say Cohiba, and I say banana…I’ll be back
bats :[
August 28th, 2007 at 6:18 pm [Reply]

325. AeroSquid: Well. That explains why I hate old French cinema.

(Knock-out parody! Bravo, Sépia de la souffle!
Charlton Heston
August 28th, 2007 at 6:20 pm [Reply]

Word up on homeslice Dingo? Did he win? I’m not really Charleton Heston, but America’s Favorite Mudge, Red Greenblat!! HAHA! See what I did? I don’t.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 6:23 pm [Reply]

Chipnun=Female Chipmunk that peed in your Pepsi™
fahrenheit451
August 28th, 2007 at 6:23 pm [Reply]

Paperback-

Absolutely brilliant! But what can the FOOB’s do to “Smile?”
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 6:24 pm [Reply]

Kill me now!!
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:30 pm [Reply]

Red, I penetrated your disguise while misspelling Charlton Heston. Go figure.
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:32 pm [Reply]

Red: Kudoes to me for getting past your inscrutable inscrutability! Pass the Lea and Perrin’s!
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 6:34 pm [Reply]

I”m fucking losin’ it, but not like the Tom Cruise vehicle, more like the John Travolta Battleship Earth losin’ it.
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 6:37 pm [Reply]

333 bats :[ Thanx ! I really should have done the black screen at the end.
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:38 pm [Reply]

Red: Rumor has it that John Travolta would do a sequel to Battleship Earth in a heartbeat, a heartbeat!

So, if I were you, I’d aspire to losin’ it in a BE2 vehicle.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 6:39 pm [Reply]

What’s a kudo? I saw a candy wrapper that said KUDO on the street a while back and I took it home and put it in my “recyclables” can, Done deal, I daresay!
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:40 pm [Reply]

Christ, you’re an asshole!
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 6:42 pm [Reply]

Never ask Hi Flagston about his work !

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1410/1262152090_14ab9a7cf8_o.jpg
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 6:42 pm [Reply]

Momma!
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:42 pm [Reply]

I mean, Christ, what an asshole! And I forgot the emoticon saying, It’s all good! You know I loves ya Red!
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:44 pm [Reply]

I’m gift wrapping a head-bobblin’ Tommie for ya, Red!
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 6:46 pm [Reply]

Anal warts are now a thing of the past!
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 6:49 pm [Reply]

Allah, what a bung!
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 6:52 pm [Reply]

And with that, I’ll take a time out, trying to wrap my mind around Tommie’s, ah, bung. And remind myself to see it before I say it! Hoooo!
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 6:55 pm [Reply]

I smell another hastily catered Charterstone Funeral/Pool Party !

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1342/1262238190_a137218050_o.jpg
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 6:58 pm [Reply]

Death to the infidels, except Meryl Streep…Danged fine actress, I daresay, Loved her in “The Devil Wears Prada!” And “102 Dalmations” That movie made me shed the tears of my ansestors a thousandfold….I…I…wish a had a Charlie Hodge to don me a cape right now, ;cuz I really need it!
AhClem
August 28th, 2007 at 7:11 pm [Reply]

I’m not only old enough to remember when Garfield was pretty good, but I can also remember when SNL was actually funny (Back in the days of wood-fired TV sets and vacuum-tube computers).

FW – Being FW, Les is already on his way to severe alcoholism, complicated by his fast-growing liver cancer. The infected cat scratches won’t help matters either.

Red Greenback – You’re in fine form tonight, my friend. Whatever you’re smoking, please send me some.

And finally — GO DINGO!!!
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 7:12 pm [Reply]

AeroSquid: I love both your recent parodies, but L’Histoire de Winkerbean dans le Funque Éternelle is among my favourite that you’ve done.

353: Red: My personal favourite Streep movie is Sunset Boulevard. Or maybe Basic Instinct II
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 7:14 pm [Reply]

355: That should be la Funque Éternelle. Damn my hypothetical French genders!
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 7:16 pm [Reply]

355 SecretMargo: Thanx *Le Kiss/Le Purr*. Like I said earlier: If I hadn’t drank so much malt liquor after work, I would have had the cat say more and THEN put up the black screen with the word: FIN.

Or I would have done it in some obscure eastern european language. Heh…..mebbe tommorrow !!!
Lame Name
August 28th, 2007 at 7:21 pm [Reply]

DT: I thought last week’s somersaulting guy being thrown out of the car was awesome … but I love, love, LOVE the somersaulting car in today’s strip!

GF: I am so down with Les and Darkefang on the Hot Cup o’ Monkey shirts!

MW: That suit is so … flamboyant. It makes me think both Vera and Dawn are in for heartbreak. Who wants to bet Drew uses a wide stance in the airport bathroom?

Woo hoo! Two posts about embarrassing Idaho congressmen, two days in a row!

Slylock Fox: The six differences are: 1) The alien on the left likes mustard on his hot dogs, whereas the alien on the right prefers his with ham gravy and chocolate sprinkles. 2) The alien on the left plans to take the cat back home with him to be his bride, whereas the alien on the right will merely make the cat his concubine. 3) The alien on the left will eat an eclair for dessert, while the alien on the right will gnaw on the toenails of the grill master. 4) The hovitron system in the UFO on the left is about to short-circuit and send it crashing into the house behind it; the hovitron in the right UFO is in perfect working order. 5) The blonde person in the panel on the left is a man; the blonde on the right is a hermaphrodite. 6) The crow in the panel on the left works for the National Enquirer; the one on the right, the former Weekly World News.
Big Sims, The Good Natured Roadblock
August 28th, 2007 at 7:39 pm [Reply]

#325 AeroSquid,
Magnifique! As our Gallic Cousins would say*, “That’s the Tits!”

*roughly translated, after plenty of drinks. No talking cats however.
Happy Happenstance
August 28th, 2007 at 7:44 pm [Reply]

I know everyone is tired of hearing about this but here’s what Les is drinking: http://www.undergroundchicago.com. (Scroll down to the section “The Cheapest Alchohol.”) I hope Dingo remembers to pick some up on his way back from Chicago. Yuuummmm…
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 7:44 pm [Reply]

I like the idea that Charlton Heston yelled Dingo’s name during sex with Alice Mitchell.
Gabe
August 28th, 2007 at 7:46 pm [Reply]

LameName: I think that’s a blurry area. I’d think their’s an argument that the idea of a shirt saying “Hot Cup O’ Monkeys” is the intellectual property of Darby Conley.
Happy Happenstance
August 28th, 2007 at 7:47 pm [Reply]

#360 — Oh, well. I just tried to check out the link that I put to Underground Chicago and it is wrong. Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! Anyway, the link was to a display of Frango Chocolate Liqueur. I’ll go back into my hole now.
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 7:49 pm [Reply]

HOT CUP O’ MONKEYS !!!!!!!

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1286/1261708603_fa9690e209_o.jpg
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 7:51 pm [Reply]

364: Okay….NOT monkeys…..just one monkey.
Chuck W
August 28th, 2007 at 7:56 pm [Reply]

Mary’s “uh-oh” is actually in reference to the fact that Dr. Drew has metamorphosed into Perry Como in panel two, and Perry needs a drink NOW.
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 7:56 pm [Reply]

363: Happy! Don’t be sad! You just have a stray period at the end of the linked address! Live to post again!

Les always did strike me as a wussy-type drunk, not whiskey or tequila but liquers, cough syrups and the like. You may be onto something.
Non Compost Mentos
August 28th, 2007 at 7:59 pm [Reply]

282 Trilobite: I must say, you’ve got me seriously thinking of changing my snarkonym to “Ant Farm Of Agony.”
Squid Countess
August 28th, 2007 at 8:02 pm [Reply]

Fine. So I employed the advertisement that opened along with Josh’s comments to find out “the exact name of my perfect lover.” It went all weird on the first and middle names, listing 10 or 12 names over and over- some of them girls’ names, some of them historic place names, and then ghghghghghghgh, whatever that means. The last name was clear, though:TrueRedLumpyBrickHorseWille. I’m not changing from “Countess.”
Spotted HØrse
August 28th, 2007 at 8:16 pm [Reply]

#369 Squid Countess: Wow, not only is that weird, but it’s oddly compelling. Maybe I should change my name to Spotted BrickHØrse.
Citric
August 28th, 2007 at 8:20 pm [Reply]

Pluggers: My dad ACTUALLY DOES THIS. He once directed me to pick him up at the “old hospital”, which was torn down when I was two. And then he was confused when I got lost and had to get directions from someone else to the building that didn’t exist anymore. However, he is not an obese dog.
Big Sims, The Good Natured Roadblock
August 28th, 2007 at 8:24 pm [Reply]

Hallucinations are not shared. Les and Funky cannot have the same muse/monkey-on-back/vision/daemon/whatever the fuck that cat is to them. What sort of Universe is Batiuk running here? I must admit that I thought I was having a flashback when I saw that hirsute kitty on the counter, but I carefully read every post and triple-checked the comic, and yep there was that damn cat. So I tried to make the cat come to me. Two bottles of NyQuil® (I think it’s cough medicine too SecretMargo) later and no pompadoured pussy. Based on my extensive scientific research I’ve arrived to the possible conclusions: A, The cat does not exist. B, I do not exist C, Tom Batiuk is fucking with all of us or D, The NyQuil® got me so trashed that I’m not really posting on this blog, but face down on the kitchen floor smashing my fingers on the waffle iron in a vain attempt to communicate with y’all.

I leaning towards D
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 8:25 pm [Reply]

#369 Squid Countess – Bee mine! :-)

Paperback Rifler You magnificent bastard! That entire string of brilliance was worthy of the classics! And by classics I mean Pet Sounds, Revolver, Blond on Blond and that sort. I bow to you, sir!

Red Greenback Has anyone heard yet? How’d our guy do? Lift those banners, wave those pompoms! Grab some June Morgan rack or Trudi ass! W00t!

Aerosquid – What wonders you perform! I love the monkey in the cup!
How are you with goats?
jamoche
August 28th, 2007 at 8:27 pm [Reply]

#238 – that is not just a rural thing. Every highway in Dallas has a name. Apparently these are, in fact, official names. However, not one freeway sign uses these names. I lived on the Ft Worth side of things and rarely went east of the airport, but I had to go there once and didn’t think anything of it when I was told stuff like “take the LBJ freeway” – until I was over there and saw signs for I-20 and I-30 and 35E and not a one for the LBJ freeway.

In Ft Worth, we called them I-30 and I-20 and 820 and 35W. None of those fancy-schmancy names for us.
heynoni
August 28th, 2007 at 8:27 pm [Reply]

RE: Plugger’s directions:

Reminds me of our trip to Ireland a few years ago to find the ruins of our ancestral home. Getting directions was a process of gradual progression in the right direcition; Each person we asked said the same thing:

“Aye, I know where that is … Just go down that road and ask someone for directions. They’ll tell you.”
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 8:39 pm [Reply]

I want to see Dingo Goes Austrian at the Starlight drive-in sooo bad. Instead of Deborah Walley and James Darrin as Gidget and Moondoggie, it’ll be John and Dingo, surfin’ the Alps and dancing in the streets of Salzberg or Vienna! I sure hope he wins, his parodies deserves the adulation.

Meanwhile, Batiuk’s Blue Cat continues to talk to me.

You know, it’s not that drinking during stress is unhealthy per se; #269 Hal Jordan was spot on, a good belt now and then is not harmful and can relax you and get you past the pain.
However… I can’t see Batiuk just letting Les take a belt or two in order to steel himself for what is to come. No, he’s going to race to the extreme and make the guy a total alcoholic after just eight drinks. That’s just how Batiuk seems to ride. Why cut your pinkie finger when you can lose your left arm? Why get a cold when you can get cancer? Why be able to draw when you can tell a really fucked over story with the artwork?

Yeah.
Slither
August 28th, 2007 at 8:40 pm [Reply]

TDIET: I’ve come to the conclusion that Al Scaduto has his iPod endlessly repeating “Paint It Black” while he draws his strip.

Luann: Had most of my thunder stolen by other posters, but the unthinkable lameness of the gag really gives Greg Evans a black eye. About the only way he can redeem himself now is if Luann challenges the discontinuity in the reading assignment, and demands a re-test based on the teacher’s error.
chemprof
August 28th, 2007 at 8:41 pm [Reply]

So, I don’t know if anyone will read this, but I have to vent. I’m a long time lurker on CC, but I have never posted.

Here it is: Thanks a bunch, Bautik, you asshole. I really, reallly enjoyed reliving the stress of watching my mom die of cancer in today’s strip. It was so enjoyable, I think I’ll delete my Chron page, and stop reading CC until you get over whatever bug you’ve got up your ass that makes you think that it’s important to inform people of the incredibly obvious fact that it really,really sucks when people (especially younger people who are parents of small children) die of cancer. I’m sure that no one realized that this was a sad thing until you gripping saga.

Personally, I didn’t mind the cancer storyline too much until you decided that you needed to kill Lisa, apparently in the stupidest, most futile way possible, and then, as a bonus, you need to turn Les into a alcoholic as he’s dealing with it. I look SO MUCH forward to the jump ahead ten years when Les is an alcoholic abuser of his daughter, Summer because of his traumatic experience with Lisa’s death. That’ll be yet another ABC afterschool special storyline.

And finally, what the F*&% was all the “live with hope” storyline from last year? Were you just bored with killing off Lisa? My mom died in 9 months. Is that not fast enough, you asshole?

Sorry for the vent. Thanks for listening.
Frank Parsnip
August 28th, 2007 at 8:42 pm [Reply]

Fucky Cancerbean: Knowing Batuik’s penchant for bad puns, Les will describe the experience to a friend or coworker who will make the play on words about conquering “demon liquor” versus the “demon licker”. Wry smiles will ensue to close out the final panel with great smugness.

But we shouldn’t be too harsh on Batuik. “Garfield” got a similar start in its earliest strips, back when Jon was struggling with the impending demise of his wife by pounding the juice. Sure, these strips are not often seen because they don’t have the uplifting feel of a Hallmark card but that’s how we got to where we are. In a few months, Les will be having a lovely time feeding Le Chat Bleu lasagne and giving us all good yuks about lazy fat cats who really like food.
thecrizzle
August 28th, 2007 at 8:45 pm [Reply]

This is not the first appearance of this ridiculous French feline in in Funky Winkerbean. I very specifically remember it from the late 90s (though it was only referred to as ‘le chat’ at that point and actually played a much more sinister seduciton role: ew) and a quick search of the good old internets show some spotty evidence that this may have occurred as early as 1986….
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 8:48 pm [Reply]

Pulp Blondie:

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1048/1262933486_6c327aff6f_o.jpg
Rainbird
August 28th, 2007 at 8:50 pm [Reply]

374 jamoche No, not rural by any mean.

In fact in L.A., although it has been years, so I don’t remember the numbers anymore, you could take the Hollywood Freeway and change which number freeway you were actually on. However, there they had signs.
True Fable
August 28th, 2007 at 8:52 pm [Reply]

#378 chemprof The thing about the CC community is that there are a number of people who share your pain and commiserate with you, chemprof. I lost my mother and brother to cancer in swift succession, and have done battle with the Big C myself, so I know what you’re saying.

FWIW, I find it very therapeutic to unleash the hounds of Rant at Batiuk (and my lovely little caribou turdlet Lynn as well!) now and then. It makes no difference to them, of course, but it sure feels good to shake my fist at the open sore they sprinkle with salt. I get in my licks and feel I’ve won somehow. A hollow victory is still a victory.
Carmichael the Polar Bear
August 28th, 2007 at 8:53 pm [Reply]

DINGOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
bats :[
August 28th, 2007 at 8:54 pm [Reply]

364. AeroSquid: ya know, suddenly I’m not really interested in a Hot Cup o’ Monkeys. Or even a Hot Cup o’ Monkey. I’m feeling vaguely sick to my stomach…
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 8:55 pm [Reply]

385 bats :[ : It was the sad monkey eyes…wasn’t it ? it’s ok.
Big Sims, The Good Natured Roadblock
August 28th, 2007 at 8:57 pm [Reply]

#378 chemprof,

I think that was one of the best ‘first posts’ I’ve ever read. I am so terribly sorry for your loss and even more sorry you have to have that asshole Batiuk force you to relive it daily.

I’m taking a page from Mr. T Fable’s book;

Allright Batty-Boy, me n’ you. Masticate them mukluks till they’re supple with spit, I’m calling you out to finish it man to man in the frozen tundra. Two men enter, one man leaves. And pack a lunch buddy – I ain’t going out without a fight.
Happy Happenstance
August 28th, 2007 at 9:00 pm [Reply]

#367 – Secret Margo, thank you for pointing out the extra period. I didn’t notice it before; but, now I see the error of my way. I’ve got to say, hot chocolate made with Frango chocolate liqueur is marvelous. The only thing better is chocolate mint cocoa. (That’s where you mix in some NyQuil, too. Deeelllish!)
Brown-eyed Girl
August 28th, 2007 at 9:02 pm [Reply]

AeroSquid. Oooo! Funnies! I love the monkey in a teacup.
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 9:06 pm [Reply]

Brown-eyed Girl : Evidently it made bats :[ queezy.
Big Sims, The Good Natured Roadblock
August 28th, 2007 at 9:11 pm [Reply]

Did anyone else think that; “It puts the lotion on it’s skin or it gets the hose again.” a better punchline for todays Crankshaft? The flesh colored sweats are coincidental – right?

No? Just me? Sweet Jesus I’m a sicko.
Happy Happenstance
August 28th, 2007 at 9:11 pm [Reply]

#378 — Chemprof, I’m very sorry to hear about your mother. Your rant is so cogent, you should send it to Mr. Batiuk. He needs to hear that he isn’t actually giving his readers what they want (as he claimed in an article sometime back). I hate to wish ill luck on anyone, but I hope Mr. Batiuk gets cancer of the ego, so that it can be surgically removed.
AeroSquid
August 28th, 2007 at 9:24 pm [Reply]

Chemprof: Understand the rant. My dad died of cancer in 92. It took about a year from diagnosis. The FW storyline has become almost like an OCD for Batiuk. What is he trying to do ? Make us aware ? Geez. We all got the message a long time ago.
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 9:28 pm [Reply]

378 chemprof: I am so sorry for your loss. Know that you are among like-minded folks.

Batiuk’s defense has always been that he is making the non-afflicted uncomfortable for the benefit of the afflicted, by which he basically means himself (he had and beat some sort of cancer that escapes me at the moment). If you think it’s distasteful, this line of reasoning goes, then you need to be educated out of this distaste and “realize” that you are being ennobled by Batiuk’s bracing truths. What you and I and many here know and have demonstrated through our responses is that the opposite is actually true: those whose lives have never been touched by cancer are made to feel that the pity they feel for the characters makes them better people somehow and are willing to give Batiuk the benefit of the doubt due to his experience, while those who have had their share of cancer-related experience see through the charade to the exploitative, cheap tawdriness that squirms beneath.

Here are some rants you may have missed from the thread in May that greeted the revelation that Lisa’s tests were switched and Batiuk gave that self-congratulatory interview revealing her doom:

me

Avacado Avenger

True Fable

Trotzenbonnie

whoamitoday?

And if you need a palate cleansing laugh after all that, here’s willethompson’s Autobiography of Oki Merlot, since Lisa’s descent into the Valley of the Shadow of Batiuk coincided with the rather giddy introduction of our favourite Asian Minx of the Boardroom.

You’ve probably already read all of this, but it did me good to revisit this thread, actually, and remember the eloquence and sharing that took place.

Well, anyway. You are not alone.
Old Man Muffaroo [Kip W: way behind]
August 28th, 2007 at 9:30 pm [Reply]

MW – Mary’s thinking “Uh Oh” because Drew obviously thinks he’s Bobby Darin and is singing all his dialog while striking arch-casual “swingin’” poses. At the hospital, he probably calls himself “Doc the Knife” and finds reasons to refer to post-surgical procedures as “Beyond the C-Section.”
Harry Paratestes
August 28th, 2007 at 9:39 pm [Reply]

SecretMargo:
Batiuk had prostate cancer; he appears to have beaten it.
Chemprof: I understand your rant, my dad died of misdiagnosed cancer some years ago.
Our Boarding House with Major Hoople
August 28th, 2007 at 9:41 pm [Reply]

No snark, just feeling good ’cause it’s my birthday. (13×4)
Big Sims, The Good Natured Roadblock
August 28th, 2007 at 9:41 pm [Reply]

Hey, not to toot my own horn, but I totally called this twist in the Mary Worth story line. I’m so cool. Not everyone can predict Mary Worth. I’m almost ashamed to be chilling with y’all. I’m gonna call up Dr. Drew and see if he won’t mind if I make a pass at Dawn. ‘Cause I’m just that cool. Super cool.

I think it’s time to give up the CC when you can call a Mary Worth plot twist. I’m off to the desert to eat locust.
Poteet
August 28th, 2007 at 9:42 pm [Reply]

# 327 — Spotted H0rse, while my Foobloatharian vows do not allow me to actually like Laura, she’s way at the bottom of my loathe list. And I kinda like chiseled chins myself. But when Lynn takes a chin to an actual point, it’s too much for me, and I also think it doesn’t do justice to Laura, who has had a nicely-chiseled but not pointed chin in the past.

I suppose I should be grateful that Lynn is making the Manitoba storyline so brief this year, because after what’s been happening to Candace, Laura is safer away from the Foob action, lest Foobish dialogue be forced upon her.
Stranger…
August 28th, 2007 at 9:44 pm [Reply]

I can’t believe Josh didn’t comment on JP today! It seems that we have more talking anatomy.
Poteet
August 28th, 2007 at 9:47 pm [Reply]

# 94 — Nekrotzar, your cat was very lucky to have you. I sympathize.
FortyTwo
August 28th, 2007 at 9:56 pm [Reply]

You know, April is the only character in FOOB whose storylines I even want to follow anymore.

Mike and Deanna are dull,
Jim and Iris are depressing,
Elly and John are disgusting, and
Liz and Anthony are disturbing.
skankmonkey
August 28th, 2007 at 9:56 pm [Reply]

Wow, miss out reading CC at work (because, can you believe it, they actually wanted me to DO work?), and you get stuck reading 400 posts…

When I saw the wussy little schnapps bottle Les was pouring from, I immediately thought, “Les is a girl drink drunk! http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=girl+drink+drunk

Then I saw the cat and decided I must be drunk…
LTBF
August 28th, 2007 at 10:15 pm [Reply]

How are Laura and April cousins? Is John Beverly’s brother?
Anythingbutwork
August 28th, 2007 at 10:18 pm [Reply]

#159 and others, on the golden age of Garfield:

I was a teenager around 1980, working at a Honey Baked Ham during the Christmas rush: 14 hour days, everyone stressed out & underpaid & exhausted, and the mix of silly suburban high-schoolers and odd-jobbing dead-ender townies making for nasty little daily squabbles. The best memory I have of that time is everyone sitting around during a coffee break, passing around a copy of Garfield book #1 (the strip wasn’t in the Portland Oregonian yet), and all laughing until we wept. Maybe it was just sleep deprivation, but it really was like nothing else in the funnies at the time. I’d planned on making the book someone’s stocking stuffer, but it was so grimy when we finished that I kept it.

So, yes, there are people on this forum too old to sincerely enjoy hiphop, tattoos, piercings, “you suck!” as an endearment, etc.. AND we had to walk ten miles in the snow to school every day. Uphill. Both ways.
Old Bean
August 28th, 2007 at 10:26 pm [Reply]

#378 Chemprof – That’s terrible. Sorry to hear it. And yeah, I don’t feel Batiuk has any genuine interest in helping people deal with cancer.

For an example of how you can actually tell worthwhile stories about cancer, check out the Aussie film Look Both Ways. I saw it last year when my family was going through its own cancer fun, and it’s a humane, surprisingly hopeful look at the crap life throws at you.

There’s a pretty clear test of character in there somewhere: while fighting breast cancer, Sarah Watt makes a film charged with compassion and hope; meanwhile Batiuk survives his brush with cancer and gains no insight whatsoever, using it as artistic justification for his unimaginatively bleak and emotionally bankrupt world-view.

There are a lot of bad comics out there, but Batiuk may be the only one doing actual harm.
Garrison
August 28th, 2007 at 10:32 pm [Reply]

I’m ashamed to admit it, but I know for a fact the cat HAS appeared in FW before. I know because I actually clipped and saved the storyline which appeared about 10 years ago. The reason I did that was because FW was doing a crossover with a then defunct strip called “John Darling” which took place in a television station. I grew up reading JD and enjoyed it despite the obvious jokes and stereotypes on tv people. Appearing in the mid to late 80s the strip centered on John Darling, egotistical host of a local talk show, and branched out into other characters such as the Channel 1 News Team, the station owners, etc.
Anyway eventually the strip folded, so the FW people killed off John Darling and made it a murder mystery with all the other characters being suspects mainly because no one could stand him. Les starts his own investigation into the case, hoping to get a best seller out of it. I clipped and saved the comics because it was nice to see those characters one last time.
To make a long story short (Too late!) The cat appeared at one point as some sort of muse to urge Les on. She also appeared in human form at one point I believe, so that might happen here too.
Our Boarding House with Major Hoople
August 28th, 2007 at 10:41 pm [Reply]

What Batiuk’s done to human charactors. he’s going to do to anthropomorphic talking animals. Make them sick & boring!
Buck Ripsnort
August 28th, 2007 at 10:42 pm [Reply]

Wha–? My VERY tangenital WalMart comment gets deleted, and it doesn’t even get listed on the page?
And like so many of you, yep, the Big C took my mother about 115 years ago, so Fuck You Batiuk. But on a gentler note, does Le Chat Bleu have anything in common w/ The Blue Dog art gimmick a few years back?
There, Josh. Now if you disappear my post, you’re not only stifling debate, you’re DEPRIVING ME OF AN ANSWER! (Kidding. Really.)
Herro!
August 28th, 2007 at 10:45 pm [Reply]

Who wants to bet Drew uses a wide stance in the airport bathroom?

Tee-hee-hee. I’m glad I went to the gym today and watched the news, because if I’d cloistered myself in my TV-free apartment, allowing myself only the occasional comfort of a little ‘Mudge here and there, I would not have gotten this joke. ;-)
LTBF
August 28th, 2007 at 10:58 pm [Reply]

April was at her mom’s birthday party Sunday. Now she’s packing up from a long visit out of town?

Did Mike and Liz ever visit this farm or do John and Elly only dump their suprise child on the kin folk so they can hurry their empty nest and have wild mid-afternoon sex?

I’ll love to see their faces when they discover April will be 16 forever and they’ll never get rid of her.
Red Greenback
August 28th, 2007 at 10:59 pm [Reply]

I always thought Glenn Close was that dood what played Alan Shepard in “The Right Stuff” And ultra macho Texas playa “Wes” in “Urban Cowboy” How’d our boy Dingo do?
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 11:04 pm [Reply]

409: Buck, isn’t this your comment (undeleted)?

and your answer?

I only remember because I was interested in the blue dog thing. The things you learn on this site….
LTBF
August 28th, 2007 at 11:08 pm [Reply]

Wednesday’s Foob is up on Yahoo! April says “Bring on the Future”. Pretty funny considering she will never get any further into the future than five more days.
Frank \
August 28th, 2007 at 11:12 pm [Reply]

Yeah, worms are gnawing at my cadaver and yellow-tinted cartoon characters are pissing on my grave, I daresay! But I had to return to the earther dimension to ask how Dingo did.
Frank Grimy Grimes
August 28th, 2007 at 11:15 pm [Reply]

No special characters, eh what?
Frank Parsnip
August 28th, 2007 at 11:19 pm [Reply]

Fucky Cancerbean: Knowing Batuik’s love of punnery, I am confident he will find a way to have one of Les’ friends or coworkers make reference to the booze/talking-cat situation by reference to the obvious “demon liquor/demon licker” scenario. A wry smile will ensue in the final panel to bring closure.

However are we being a bit harsh in condemning this new direction for the FW strip? In the earliest of the Garfield strips, often not included in the popularly published collections, we picked up the story with Jon Arbuckle caring for a wife dying of cancer and starting to engage his cat in conversations. In a few weeks, we may face the rather pleasant prospect of Les similarly dealing with a Le Chat Bleu’s insatiable appetite for lasagne and distaste for Mondays. There will likely be no comment from Heathcliff, but Batuik will ultimately reach great commercial success with the T-shirts, plush toys and coffee mugs generated from his Le Chat Bleu comics.

Great strips move on — that’s why Barney Google had to cede eventually to the popularity of Snuffy Smith and Sparkplug… why Robotman had to make way for Monty… why Judge Parker had to make way for Sam and his collection of balloon-chested sexdolls. Soon there will be no more story lines in FW involving band camp, Iraq, Montoni’s Pizza, etc. — and we will be able to look forward to tales about 2-3 panels long that exist solely within the confines of Les’ home and perhaps even only Les’ kitchen.
Cobra
August 28th, 2007 at 11:23 pm [Reply]

Seeing Drew in that green suit gave me a flashback to Jimmy Wah, the restaurateur in “Good Morning Vietnam”.
Frank Parsnip
August 28th, 2007 at 11:24 pm [Reply]

oops had computer problems and basically retyped the same concept twice thinking that it had gotten lost. many apologies.
SecretMargo
August 28th, 2007 at 11:26 pm [Reply]

8.29 Momma: Well, this is inscrutable. She was hoping he was a transvestite? So he wouldn’t be alone; rather, as a recent theatrical piece put it, he could “be his own wife”? Is that really preferable to him having a girlfriend steady enough to leave a dress but unsteady (or wise) enough not to move in? Or is she just hoping that if he has to be the wife, too, maybe he’d learn how to keep house a little better? I’d kind of like to see subsequent strips with Francis dressed in his housedress leaving passive-aggressive notes for Francis dressed as a filthy hobo/hipster to ignore, escalating until there’s a dramatic confrontation involving a mirror, some lipstick, and a curling iron that results in the entire trash heap going up in flames.

It’s hard not to think that Momma herself might like that too.
Rex Morgan, M.D.
August 28th, 2007 at 11:28 pm [Reply]

Dingo, Can you and John come in for a complete physical before your Vienna/ Salzburg adventure? My Nurse Practitioner “Hekkie” has a very soft touch….I will be observing, and how!
Herro!
August 28th, 2007 at 11:31 pm [Reply]

9CL: WHO IS MONTY? Is that that priest guy? And why do we care about his orifices? Please, please…bring back Solange.
Brown-eyed Girl
August 28th, 2007 at 11:42 pm [Reply]

Herro! Thorax says that Monty is the name God likes to use among friends.
Francis
August 28th, 2007 at 11:47 pm [Reply]

God, that Baldo strip makes me want to punch something. It doesn’t end. It just peters out. I am left with the inescapable feeling that those characters are still, even now, talking about the wonders of newspapers. And then for maximum insult, the cartoonist throws a Funky Winkerbean-esque half-smirk at us in the last panel. This is too much.
commodorejohn
August 28th, 2007 at 11:57 pm [Reply]

#378 chemprof – Wow. Well said.

I can’t say I’ve been in your shoes, but I did nearly lose one grandmother and a close family friend to cancer (and have it batter the hell out of my beloved other grandma before a heart attack took her,) so I know at least some of the fury you feel. I wouldn’t be so angry with Batiuk if he were just ineptly trying to “raise awareness,” but that’s not what he’s about. No, Tom Batiuk has experienced misery in his life, and even though he pulled through his bout with cancer, he still wallows in that misery and will not rest until everyone else shares in it.

He’s not trying to give hope. Nor is he trying to comfort in loss. He desires only for everyone else to be miserable.
Frank Parsnip
August 28th, 2007 at 11:58 pm [Reply]

A3G: Good to see that she was able to retrieve her husband’s “Grail Diary”. Now if only Eric can keep it out of the hands of Adolf Hitler long enough to rescue her husband from the S.S. …

MT: If Homer is smart, “Shirley” is the name of the Betty Page lookalike working for the construction company’s boss whom we met a couple of days ago. If so, then there ain’t no way construction’s going to start until the babies are hatched.

MW: Drew can’t guess that Dawn might have told Mary Worth? This is Mary Worth we’re talking about … the closest thing Charterstone has to Lindsey England when it comes to interrogating ~~prisoners~~ residents. And now we know that if only Drew had stuck by Dawn they would have been perfect for each other … quoting from the same sappy quotes to characterize being in love to the same old biddy.

Slylock Fox: Slylock asked the doctor what sort of magazines were stolen and, upon finding out that the periodicals were ones like “Gent” and “Juggs”, had the doctor take Smitty’s pulse… from Smitty’s engorged member.

RMMD: Panel 1 has security camera footage of June Morgan… uniquely unsatisfying.

Mallard Fillmore: The selective memory of America’s past continues…

THEN: “Nigger don’t let the sun set on you in this town” (common “welcoming” sign from the 1940s and 50s in towns located in present-day reliable “red states”)

NOW: “Boy the good ol’ days were really a high point in America.” (common bullshit foisted by MF in its effort to try to appeal to readership in “red states”)
Brown-eyed Girl
August 29th, 2007 at 12:05 am [Reply]

9CL I really want to rant about this comic, but I am just too tired to be coherent. Maybe tomorrow the words will come. Or, better yet, maybe tomorrow I won’t care anymore.

FW. I lost both my parents to cancer within a year of each other. It’s been a while since that happened, but I’ve been missing them both a lot lately. Batiuk is a self-absorbed, manipulative hack. He survived his cancer, but I don’t think he has a clue about how this disease really affects a family. I think it’s been said before, but skipping ahead in time ten years after Lisa dies is a cop-out. That angers me more that the grotesque way he’s engineered her death.

Ok, enough. now I really need to go to bed.
Godzooky
August 29th, 2007 at 12:14 am [Reply]

JP, panels 2 and 3: I’d double-check that family tree if I were you, Trudi. No argument Keith’s a moron, but is there even one skin cell’s worth of family resemblance?
Godzooky
August 29th, 2007 at 12:22 am [Reply]

Single and Looking: Maybe it’s because it’s late and I’m sleepy, but Jackie’s starting to look kinda hot to me. WWJTBD? (What Would Jamus The Bartender Do?)
Red Greenback
August 29th, 2007 at 12:24 am [Reply]

Spotted HØrse…Right back atcha…Twelvefold!
bats :[
August 29th, 2007 at 12:27 am [Reply]

FW: I come to bury h-h-hACK!! writers, like other things in the litter box:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9545446@N07/1264275596/

G’night, folks! Hopin’ that our Dingo is Euro-bound!
Frank Parsnip
August 29th, 2007 at 12:28 am [Reply]

Jugs Parker: Trudi’s ta-tas are the star of today’s strip, while Flattop McMullet continues his very adept Milton Dammers imitation, repelled by her shouting. But all want to know what on earth is going on back behind closed doors between former classmates Busty Duncan and Sam …
Frank Parsnip
August 29th, 2007 at 12:34 am [Reply]

godzooky — the scary thing is the bad case of “Predator mouth” that the person in the third panel has. Does it really open up at all four corners like that? Yikes…
Razmytaz
August 29th, 2007 at 12:35 am [Reply]

MT: Shirley the Duck clearly has l33t hacking skillz, since she was able to break into the firm database and promote homer from “construction worker” to site foreman, able to shut down the entire effort. More insidious are Shirley’s mnem-warping powers, so that everyone thinks of Homer as a foreman (next step, Attorney General). These same psychic powers were responsible for Homer stopping his dozer in the first place, and now or bringing John-boy close enough to give Shirley a tasty five fingered treat. No one, not even John or Homer, will notice the bloody stump remaining.
Herro!
August 29th, 2007 at 12:41 am [Reply]

Thanks, BeG :)
Mibbitmaker
August 29th, 2007 at 12:49 am [Reply]

When’s Daze comics:

FOOB: April doing Liz’s entire to-Mtigblinkandyou’llmissit-and-back storyline in one strip! Cheer and feel betrayed quickly, people.

FW: Funky Weirderbean:

1: Les, Batiuk… it’s not a good metaphor if you have to plainly spell it out!

2: Les, your cartoonist will do all the (self) indulgence for you. Trust me.

3: In this strip, it’s the Batiuk that’ll do you in. And why on earth is the feline Albert Pinkham Ryder talking to Cher all of a sudden?? (Okay, there’s a treasure trove of songs to parody. “And the Beat Everyone Over The Head with Death Goes on”? “Really Really, Really Dark Lady”?…)
Herro!
August 29th, 2007 at 12:50 am [Reply]

OK, I’m confused again. Lisa died really fast? Batiuk has fast-forwarded ten years? I’m lost. All I see is a talking cat.
Poteet
August 29th, 2007 at 12:59 am [Reply]

Stone Soup — A friend has explained to me at great length that from what she’s heard and read, the state-of-the-art medical opinion is that any concussion is serious, and that the damage caused by head trauma is cumulative over a lifetime. Dunno if she’s right, but one way or another, I think it’s time to kill Max before anything else bad can happen to him. Poor little tyke. A large boulder from a great height, that’s what keeps coming to mind.
Frank Parsnip
August 29th, 2007 at 1:07 am [Reply]

MW: Eddie Munster’s green velvet suit is priceless. Proof that with a little tailoring to remove the lace “little lord fauntleroy” collar, he can wear that suit anywhere.
Helena Handbasket
August 29th, 2007 at 1:29 am [Reply]

#331, Gagott68: I remember a Mighty Mouse from the very brief Ralph Bakshi period where MM rescues a female mouse who is sobbing in terror, and he proceeds to reach into his underoos, pull out a chunk of cheese, and offer it to her in an attempt to comfort her. She looks at it briefly, shakes her head, and he puts it back in his crotch!

Now there’s a classic cartoon with a sense of humor.
Helena Handbasket
August 29th, 2007 at 1:35 am [Reply]

Ha! Pluggers routinely die of botulism!
Dr. Marion
August 29th, 2007 at 10:58 am [Reply]

Funky: Batiuk, who is secretly cool, is an obvious Mink DeVille (”Le Chat Bleu”) fan. Indeed, he’s killing Lisa slowly on the posthumous advice of Edgar Allan Poe.

And when shall Lisa actually practice her attorney’s craft again for anyone but herself? Quoth the Chien, “Nevermore!” Then again, that’s as many billable hours as she had before, too.

Fact: Lisa never, ever practiced law. Fact: She sleeps around – hence Darrin. Maybe a fellow lawyer has been waiting a “reasonable” interlude then tossing some iridium in Lisa’s latte.

MaryBoringWorth: Yes, Mary, I know I have to let her call me Von in bed. You know what? I like kink. And so do you. So let’s cut the crap.
Dr. Marion
August 29th, 2007 at 11:54 am [Reply]

Actually I think Batiuk is really after “Pollux et le Chat Bleu/Dougal and the Blue Cat” – a sinister 1970 movie based on a 5-minute long cartoon series (really!) called the Magic Roundabout, but very different, and much darker, than the original (sound familar?)

This could even be postmodernism on Batiuk’s part. It’s as if he had a bunch of snarky critics over his shoulder all the time, and he was acknowledging that he took the original funky winkerbean, and when he transitioned them to adult life, turned his light strip dark.
Skullturf Q. Beavispants
August 29th, 2007 at 1:02 pm [Reply]

444th!
Ralelen
August 29th, 2007 at 2:19 pm [Reply]

In Hi & Lois, if you changed “and played 9 holes” with “had an affair” and “sunblock” to “sex”, you would have a much better comic.
Jon the Myrmidon
August 29th, 2007 at 2:42 pm [Reply]

Wow, I get it, she has cancer. Funky Winkerbean is funnier than I thought!
Mountain Mama
August 29th, 2007 at 6:54 pm [Reply]

#136–DrBear–Are you in Mesa, AZ, too?
Frank Parsnip
August 29th, 2007 at 11:15 pm [Reply]

There was always that classic joke about the guy who comes home from a sweaty Saturday of pounding his secretary and fesses up to his wife who immediately counters with something along the lines of: “Don’t bullshit me — you were with your friends playing golf again!!”
Monster Jamz
August 30th, 2007 at 11:01 am [Reply]

i actually like this Pluggers (for once). i just got back from southern Virginia visiting old (and very old) family members and folks really talk like this. also, i remember when Comics Curmudgeon comments did threaten to top 500. those were the days.
karimah
October 4th, 2007 at 5:48 pm [Reply]

what are the tags.

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