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Meanwhile, back at very far from the ranch…

Apartment 3-G, 1/19/09

That painful feeling in your neck is comic whiplash, the result of a sudden return to Apartment 3-G’s native New York, since obviously five days is all that can spared on Lu Ann’s adventures in flyover country. And we’ve gotten back just in time, as Margo’s low-cut-white-jumper-over-black-turtleneck combo is clearly her most hideous outfit yet, so it deserves plenty of strip time. Since Tommie isn’t trying to sneak into the apartment at six a.m. with mussed hair and smeared lipstick, she clearly didn’t get lucky last night (unless you count a doctor waxing maudlin about his failed marriage to be “getting lucky”), but I am sort of curious as to why she’s still in her bathrobe while Margo is all bunned up and ready to face the day. Perhaps she was up late enough watching syndicated episodes of Diagnosis Murder to push her to sleep in a bit, while Margo got coked up and spent the entire night furiously reading Tim Mills’ diary and planning her fantasy wedding, and hasn’t even gone to bed yet.

In panel two, Margo appears to be not so much drinking out of that mug as just kind of holding it in front of her mouth and nose. She may just be hiding the fact that after listening to a single complete sentence out of Tommie, she’s already so bored that she has to bite her lips just to avoid dozing off right there.

Mary Worth, 1/19/09

Did you ever have someone break up for you by tearfully telling you that it’s not you, it’s them, and that they need time to work on their stuff without you and it’s better this way, isn’t it, only to accidentally run into them on the street a week later totally holding hands and snogging with some other dude/chick? Because that’s pretty much what Frank is going to feel like when he tunes in to the All Skating All The Time Channel today and sees Mary in in Lynn’s corner, meddling her to victory.

Spider-Man, 1/19/09

Oh my goodness! Spidey is about to be unmasked by his most dangerous and powerful super-foe … Bat Boy!

Ha ha, just kidding, obviously. Spidey has actually managed to knock himself unconscious by accident, and will be unmasked by a random child as he lies supine in a fetid alleyway in a puddle of his own failure. It is a hideously ugly child, though, which may count for something.

Cleats, 1/19/09

Here it is: as far as I can remember, this is the first Cleats that ever made me laugh. Naturally it involves a traumatized child flopped onto the ice, possibly with a broken leg. I think there may be something wrong with me.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 19, 2009 at 11:16 pm and is filed under Apartment 3-G, Cleats, Mary Worth, Spider-Man.

50 responses to “Meanwhile, back at very far from the ranch…”

  1. sugarpie
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:25 pm [Reply]

    It also looks like Tommie is going to start chugging directly from the coffee pot.

  2. AtomicDog
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:25 pm [Reply]

    Zits: Celebrating STDs since 2009.

  3. Black Drazon
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:33 pm [Reply]

    Incompetance, laziness, addiction to television… that poor street urchin is sure going to be traumatized when he pulls off the Spider-Mask and sees the cold, hard face of a man-dog Plugger staring up at him.

  4. NoVan
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:35 pm [Reply]

    The following must be said about today’s Spiderman: Dy-no-mite!

  5. BigTed
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:36 pm [Reply]

    Clearly, Mary’s way of “encouraging” self-doubting Lynn is to give her a good, hard shove onto the ice. Which is why you should never, ever take her with you on a skydiving trip.

  6. ColetteNicole
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:36 pm [Reply]

    If laughing at the pain and suffering of fictional children is wrong, I don’t want to be right.

  7. Erik
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:41 pm [Reply]

    What sort of child sees his city’s strongest, most able crime fighter lying randomly in the middle of some foreboding alley, and say “Hey, maybe I can look at his face!”

  8. Little Guy
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:45 pm [Reply]

    JP: Uh-oh. Sophie’s is getting in deeper and deeper. Hope Abbey knows a good lawyer.

    *beat*

    I said a good lawyer.

  9. papa zita
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:48 pm [Reply]

    @7: If he’s the city’s strongest, most able crime fighter, I’d move to another city.

  10. Artist formerly known as Ben
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:48 pm [Reply]

    Just a side note about that “Curvy” webcomic that’s being advertised on this page. You have to do some clicking to get to the NSFW stuff, but boy howdy is is there.

  11. Rusty
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:53 pm [Reply]

    MW: Lynn starts off with a negative score just wearing that god-forsaken ponytail.

    SM: I’ve always wondered how his mask kind of suppresses his nose and other features, but when he removes it, it is made of some type of cloth. At any rate, the kid should be checking him for any valuables in secret superhero pockets.

  12. Artist formerly known as Ben
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:55 pm [Reply]

    y171 Muffaroo

    MWorth – WHERE’S FRANK? Is he disguised as “Dr. Hoo!”? Is he hiding behind the Moy & Giella box? Nope! He’s in plain sight, wearing a wig, a sensible brown dress, and one of Mary’s discarded skins.

    That’s right. He and Mary go way back. He knows her molting schedule.

  13. Cobra
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:58 pm [Reply]

    SM: Hey, hey, hey! It looks like Dumb Donald finally found a ski cap that fits!

  14. Beatrice
    January 19th, 2009 at 11:59 pm [Reply]

    I’m not sure that’s the real Spiderman, but instead a discarded Spiderman action figure bent into hump-the-air position. And the street urchin is pure Fisher-Price.

  15. Lettuce
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:07 am [Reply]

    Okay, as someone who had to take a boatload of Cipro because my “Mainstream Media” company’s mail had Anthrax spores on it, Mallard Fillmore, at least be honest you stupid stupid duck.

    I know I know, no politics. But this isn’t politics. It’s a factual error involving an event that left me having the trots for three months. Stupid duck.

  16. odinthor
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:16 am [Reply]

    #7. Erik. —

    What sort of child sees his city’s strongest, most able crime fighter lying randomly in the middle of some foreboding alley, and say “Hey, maybe I can look at his face!”

    Quite so, Erik. Any normal child would pants him.

  17. Carly
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:17 am [Reply]

    Please, we all know that Margo stays up all night, sleeps during the day, and never ventures out into the sun.

    I’m also interested in the fact that Mary appears twice the size of her many potential victims at the ice rink. Also that old age appears to have slowed her down so that her response to Lynn is very, very belated.

  18. Lettuce
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:21 am [Reply]

    Phantom: The 21st Phantom! To the Mori: The same Phantom that’s been lying to them for more than 400 years!

    By the way, they’re not cheering his arrival, they’re just the 1/2 of the Mori Tribe that bet he’d still be wearing the stupid striped undies.

    Pluggers: Plugger babies are born knowing the Batman theme.

    Funky Winkerbean: OH MY GOD. I have the ability to reach into comic strips and smack down annoying charactors WITH MY MIND! You’re next, most of Luann…

    Snuffy Smith: You know, I can believe that an Appalachian inbred stereotype can outrun Appalachian inbred stereotype cops, but I can NOT believe that a still in-business newspaper, stereotypically Appalachian or otherwise, couldn’t hire some recently unemployed editors from the New York Times or Chicago Tribune to at least spell “Get” correctly.

  19. John E.
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:22 am [Reply]

    Don’t worry about the Cleats kid on the ice, although her right leg is at an angle not found in unbroken children, and her left heel is pointing up, she won’t die out there.

    You can see by the squiggly line of her mouth that she is about to unleash a kid’s most effective line of defense, a horrible cater-wailing that will force her parent or guardian to get her to a hospital pronto.

  20. Hank
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:23 am [Reply]

    RE: 15, Lettuce, Mallard Fillmore. Aren’t you splitting hairs a bit? While the anthrax attacks occurred after 9/11, weren’t the attacks on the “mainstream media” (NBC, NY Post, CBS, etc.) all within a month or so of September 11? So, while Tinsley is technically off with his dates by a few weeks or so his point that Bush was largely successful in preventing attacks after that first wave in the fall of 2001 is essentially accurate.

    You know, I could probably spend a lot of time here everyday bitching about distortions and the like perpetrated by Doonesbury but, instead, I don’t read the strip. However, if people are going to keep up the political talk under the guise of sniping at MF, maybe I should just go with the precedent.

  21. Simon
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:30 am [Reply]

    I don’t think coke is the problem. I think in panel two our dear Margo is trying to hide the fact that she woke up that morning and in her hazy funk decided to eat the thirty five year old Crunchie bar she bought off of eBay.

  22. Joe Blevins
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:32 am [Reply]

    MW: Yeesh. That’s one unattractive profile Lynn is giving us in panel one. You don’t normally see hairlines like that outside of shrunken heads in old Warner Brothers cartoons. And does her skull actually come to a Conehead-like point? Wow. Maybe Lynn’s dead boyfriend dodged a bullet, metaphorically speaking.

    Notice how Lynn discretely whispers an observation to Mary and how Mary responds by hollering across the room. “I DON’T THINK I SEE HIM EITHER! SURE WOULD BE AWKWARD TO RUN INTO HIM NOW. OH, WAIT THERE HE IS! HEY, FRANK! OVER HERE!!!”

    S-M: Bonus points for recreating a scene from Miller’s Crossing.

  23. Poteet
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:33 am [Reply]

    # 15 Lettuce — I know you weren’t asking for sympathy, but the very thought of three months of trots — gaah, I can’t imagine. I say you are apolitically entitled to punch that duck really hard in whatever part of his anatomy seems most appropriate.

  24. Gadge Cubic, Mole Preener
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:35 am [Reply]

    That’s no kid in Spidey – that’s a “little person”: note the neatly trimmed mustache. And they’re about to form a terrific partnership. But since this is “Spiderman” we’re talking about, Stache will mostly wander about aggrieved while occasionally removing masks and/or clothing from unconscious folks in alleys, while Spidey will augment his usual doing nothing and being knocked unconscious with getting stuff down from the higher shelves for his new dwarf buddy.

  25. Lettuce
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:35 am [Reply]

    20: Please. First off, it says “since 9/11.” Secondly, it’s part of a repeated effort — conscious or not, political or not, ‘Mainstream Media’ as much as anyone — to gloss over a real issue that took the lives of 5 people and sickened many more.

    And, personally, it led to the destruction of all the helpful digestive bacteria in my body, which led to many long nights doing things to porcelain that the porcelain never deserved.

    Again, this has nothing to do with politics. Just everything to do with stupid.

    And if Doonesbury makes an obvious and stupid distortion you should by all means mock it at length. Stupid must be called as stupid, or else stupid prevails! I think the Phantom taught me that.

  26. Lithros
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:38 am [Reply]

    Obviously, Lynn will be too nervous to perform, and Mary will have to don a ponytailed wig and ice skates and hit the ice in her place. Not to mention a leotard. That’s right, Mary Worth in a leotard. And now you can never forget.

  27. AeroSquid
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:39 am [Reply]

    Morning at 3G:

    http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3128/3212046952_c0d307169e_o.jpg

  28. Gadge Cubic, Mole Preener
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:40 am [Reply]

    Lettuce: sorry to hear about that. Hank: If Bush gets credit for “preventing” attacks, then so should you, me, Josh, and hell, Spiderman – you can’t prove who “prevented” things that didn’t happen. ‘Sides, I think Al Qaeda looked at what Bush was doing to this country, and said, no worries – dude’s terrorizing the nation more effectively than we ever could. (Thank god it’s the last day we have to talk about that idiot as president…)

  29. Bookworm
    January 20th, 2009 at 12:55 am [Reply]

    Either I’m the only one who reads The Fug Girls or the only one who reads them and the Wizard of Id, but I can’t believe that no one has commented yet on Paris Hilton’s new idol yet – http://www.chron.com/apps/comics/showComic.mpl?date=2009/1/17&name=Wizard_of_Id

    In my defense, my local paper carries WoI – I don’t follow them online.

  30. NoVan
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:14 am [Reply]

    Gadge, before Josh has to wade into this muck, let me remind you that folks have been banned for going into politics. They have also been called “jerkfaces” by the man himself. In other words, you tread upon thin ice. Kindly let it be.

  31. Josh
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:24 am [Reply]

    I don’t ban for political argument, though I do occasionally banish vitriolic threads to the forums. I do ban for personal attacks, which too often are what political argument leads to.

    For anyone on either side of any issue who is convinced that anything they disagree with simply MUST be responded to, civil discourse and good times be damned, I recommend this comic:

    http://xkcd.com/386/

    Josh

  32. cubiclemonkey
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:26 am [Reply]

    I think the girl is Cleats is actually trapped UNDER the ice. Which makes it even more hilarious.

  33. Anonymous
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:40 am [Reply]

    Early next-day Toosday Toons: I’m not finding too much to snark. Looks like Ken gonna beat on the missus for allowing a tick-ridden deer into the house. Zombielike apathy abounds. I marvel at Lynn’s oh-so-chic-for-1964 skating outfit. Abbey needs to slap the other mother upside the head and then apologize, without really meaning it.

    And yeah, this. I did not know that a Spongebob Squarepants one of of these existed; I thought perhaps Billy would be much too excited by that, so I took the other option…
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/9545446@N07/3211340051/

  34. bats :[
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:41 am [Reply]

    33. Anonymous: and by “Anonymous,” I’m referring to me.

  35. Frinkenstein
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:46 am [Reply]

    I have no doubt that, in that second panel, Margo is mocking Tommie by snottily mouthing her dialogue back to her ala Chevy Chase on SNL.

  36. Jay
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:46 am [Reply]

    I was very concerned about what Michael was doing to the dog in the last panel of Monday’s FBOFW ( http://d.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/uc/20090119/lfb090119.gif ). His hand placement, the dog’s expression, and Elly’s expression suggest something dark and sinister.

  37. IronMouse
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:54 am [Reply]

    You have to appreciate the way Tommie trying to educate Margo about what it means to be a human being. Though after having failed so many times Tommie has decided to dumb down her educational statements in hopes that Margo picks something

    Coffee smells good
    Blue is a color
    Dead puppies are sad

  38. Sarcastro
    January 20th, 2009 at 1:56 am [Reply]

    9CL — I can forgive the weird looking video camera. But I’ve never seen a pro camera that was set up lefthanded. Ever.

  39. Pinky
    January 20th, 2009 at 2:31 am [Reply]

    OH MY GOD! Mary meddled with Lynn until her tits fell off!! She’s flatter than a flapjack! And for the love of your favorite deity, would somebody…anybody…take that poor child to a hairdresser!?!?

  40. Mibbitmaker
    January 20th, 2009 at 2:51 am [Reply]

    #37 (IronMouse):
    Dead puppies aren’t much fun…

  41. dale
    January 20th, 2009 at 3:08 am [Reply]

    Josh -

    Dictionary users everywhere thank you for using “supine” rather than “prone.”

  42. Lolsworth
    January 20th, 2009 at 9:58 am [Reply]

    Am I crazy or are the girls in A3G there talking almost like real human beings might talk?

  43. Pinokeyo's Wife
    January 20th, 2009 at 10:20 am [Reply]

    I am tired of the Toby/ Vera doppelganger that is Lynn.

    I would never have thought that I would ever write this, but I miss the old Charterstone gang.

  44. trey le parc
    January 20th, 2009 at 4:50 pm [Reply]

    #35 Frinkenstein: I thought so, too, until…

    A3G: The way Margo’s covering her face with her coffee cup you just KNOW she’s thinking: “A doctor named Joe? Seriously? IS there such a thing?” and “Of course it wasn’t a date, you retard– who’d date a loser like you?” and, finally “What the hell would YOU know about interesting? I’m the slut in this strip!” She’s just practicing her manners by not erupting in a disbelieving laugh and spewing Tommie with hot coffee.

  45. trey le parc
    January 20th, 2009 at 5:25 pm [Reply]

    MW: Delirious kudos to the artist of the strip for subtly imbuing Lynn with a little Tonya Harding-grade-racoon-eyed-mascara craziness in that last panel. I suspect tomorrow’s installment will begin with an assault upon an unseen, more petite skater, and end with a broken lace. If we’re all really good, it could happen!

  46. Amy
    January 20th, 2009 at 7:20 pm [Reply]

    Seeing as how I thought that the child in Cleats was trapped underneath the ice, I think there is something far more wrong with me.

  47. teenchy
    January 21st, 2009 at 2:23 pm [Reply]

    # 21: It has nothing to do with comics, but I am LMAO at the item and its description. I developed a love of the Crunchie when I visited the UK some years ago and am disappointed they’re not sold here in the US. I periodically have friends bring them back for me, and I’ve found a recipe for making sponge candy that approixmates the Crunchie’s filling, but it’s not quite the same as snarfing one down on a Tube platform whilst minding the gap.

  48. Crankenstank
    January 21st, 2009 at 11:48 pm [Reply]

    Mary Worth: a gold meddl-ist in any olympiad.

  49. Mr. Vorhias
    February 3rd, 2009 at 12:30 pm [Reply]

    From some angles the girl in the Cleats strip looks like she’s trapped under the ice. XD

  50. jkaymartin
    February 14th, 2009 at 3:56 am [Reply]

    I was going to ask if anybody had noticed that Lynn looked like Tanya Harding, then I saw trey le parc’s comment (#45).

    Which means, *of course* we know where Frank is. Frank is off lurking around the locker room, waiting to “micromanage” Lynn’s career by clubbing her opponents in the knee.

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