Coming soon: LODI ON ICE!
Apartment 3-G, 8/3/09
Margo has already wept a single noble tear over Eric’s heroic death (or at least ostentatiously dabbed her eyes to imply said weeping); now, after having cycled through the Kubler-Ross stages of grief in record time, she has reached the little-known step that comes after acceptance: scratching one’s chin while scheming transparently. “Oh, I can think of some ways we can make my sacrifice worth it — er, I mean, ways you can be worthy of my sacrifice. Look, all the ‘Free Tibet’ hippies and ‘fear the ChiComs’ right-wingers back in the States are going to want to hear your story. I’m thinking instant book — don’t worry, I know a great ghostwriter — followed by a nationwide speaking tour. You’ll need a manager, of course. You know in the U.S. it’s traditional for a manager to take a 75 percent cut up front, right?”
Beetle Bailey, 8/3/09
I was so busy laughing uproariously at this send-up of an old man’s vanity that I almost missed the odd setting, which seems to involve Beetle holding U.S. soldiers at gunpoint. Could the military men at Camp Swampy, long ignored by the Pentagon hierarchy, have launched a coup? The most ill-conceived and incompetently run coup in history?
Cathy, 8/3/09
Why yes, now that Cathy has discovered the Facebook and publicly identified it as the theme of the eighteen million insufferable and near-identical jokes that it will be hammering home over the next six to fifteen weeks — jokes that will, as is typical of this strip, serve as a very thin veneer over a bubbling cauldron of terrifying anxiety about the most minute aspects of everyday social relations — life as I knew it is over forever, thanks for noticing. I and several hundred thousand other comics readers will be committing mass suicide in short order.
Crankshaft, 8/3/09
Even the most dedicated Crankshaft readers have traditionally regarded Crankshaft’s insufferable yuppie neighbor’s yappy little dog with vague irritation, if they were aware of him at all. But now that he has heroically saved Crankshaft from an agonizing death by snake venom, they’ll be even more irritated with him. If he was supposed to have been a hero, he should have gleefully urinated on the fallen, snakebitten ’Shaft while the hateful old man weakly cried for help.
(Seriously, though, little dogs dying in pain in the comics = NOT COOL, MAN. FBOFW at the height of its powers got away with it, barely. You, Crankshaft, are no FBOFW.)
(UPDATE: Faithful reader Chibigodzilla points out that the little dog belongs not to the ’Shaft’s annoying neighbor, but to his daughter’s annoying mother-in-law. I guess we should try to figure what the hell its deal is, now that it’s sacrificed itself.)
Momma, 8/3/09
Ignoring for the moment the wildly incorrect gibberish coming out of the mouths of Francis and not-Francis in this strip, I am sort of charmed by the setting: Francis and his bud hanging out in the woods, or maybe just in that copse of trees behind the gas station, drinking cheap beer out of cans and demonstrating their total ignorance of the North American Numbering Plan and the Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T)’s E.164 recommendation, which defines numbering plans for international telephony worldwide. Good times!
One Big Happy, 8/3/09
But wait, what would a guy do with a horse and a monkOH GOD OH GOD OH GOD
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Crankshaft: I think something like that happened in the 1966 Batman movie. “The intelligence of the near-human dolphin” enabled a school or herd of same to leap in front of some torpedos launched by the Penguin’s submarine…torpedos intended for our masked crime fighters.
If Crankshaft spends the rest of his LIFE at confession, and helping feed orphans, he’s never gonna make up for this.
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:45 pm
First and last time “You’re no FBOFW” has been used as anything but a compliment? First and last time “You’re no FBOFW” has been used as anything but a compliment.
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:45 pm
I think Beetle enjoys the “captive audience” because, for once, he is holding a weapon. No one is beating or mocking him mercilessly. He is in control of the situation, for which Sarge is none too happy.
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:49 pm
BB: I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again: Camp Swampy is a pansexual B&D military fetish camp for the ultra-rich and NOT affiliated with the DoD. Miss Buxley will take your credit card information in the ‘General’s Office’
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:49 pm
I think dog killing is just what the comics pages need right now. For instance, what if Garfield finally pushed Odie off the table, and Odie never came back. And when will we see Mary Worth meddle a dog to death.
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:49 pm
No, not cool. At all.
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:50 pm
Wait, no comments on today’s bizarro?
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:50 pm
Forget Charley-mania, is this officially the Summer of Screwing a Horse?
http://comics.com/wizard_of_id/2009-07-26/
http://www.joshreads.com/images/09/08/i090803obh.gif
http://www.joshreads.com/images/09/08/i090802jp.jpg
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:51 pm
You’re forgetting that Crankshaft is such a jerk that tomorrow’s strip will have HIM unzipping and peeing on the little dog’s corpse before returning to his gardening. When his neighbors ask “Have you seen our dog?” he’ll reply “Eh, I saw him in the garden earlier.”
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:52 pm
If I were doing a comic strip featuring military characters, I would make certain I could actually draw a gun. (In the artistic sense, that is, not the Wild Bill Hickok sense.)
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:55 pm
Wow, for once the Oedipal subtext (here = “The most important consideration in determining where we should live is the amount of difficulty it would create for our omnivigilant mothers to call us”) is not the most disturbing element of the Momma strip. It’s merely in the top three.
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:57 pm
A3G – I thought Magee was just sizing Lodi up as Eric’s replacement. Obviously, he’ll need some work done. But the long, gentle fingers can stay.
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:58 pm
“I wanna marry a man with a horse and a monkey.” This child apparently tried to watch “Hannah Montana” but clicked on The Island of Dr. Moreau instead, and now she intends to conduct unethical DNA experiments that will lead to a horrifying man-horse-monkey hybrid. Won’t somebody stop her? Mark Trail? Anyone?
August 3rd, 2009 at 6:59 pm
Crankshaft calmly rehearses his story to the corpse. Like anybody’s going to believe that another living creature voluntarily sacrificed its life for his.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:02 pm
I… I…. I can’t, just can’t, express the sheer unfettered awe I have for today’s A3G. The Dali freakin’ Lama has slain Eric in the name of pagan sacrifice? That’s one thing. But… to openly tell Margo that she’s next? That man has balls the size of… of… astrophysicists invent numbers like “googleplex” for situations exactly like this one!
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:04 pm
What Slylock Fox doesn’t tell us is that ten minutes ago, that was Billy Beaver. Count Weirdly, indeed!
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:04 pm
Beetle Bailey probably meant to be war games. Opposing team now a “captive” audience. Nothing more sinister than that.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:05 pm
When Cathy signs up for Facebook, she’ll be yet another middle-aged person joining a site that was originally intended for as a flirting method for hot college students. Which is still going on, as she’ll find out if she ever learns Irving’s password.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:06 pm
My mom once beat a snake to death with a spade to protect her children. Our dog, smartly, stayed the heck away from it.
Man, if Crankshaft had been bitten, you know, it would have been on his ankle or foot, and the paramedics can give him antidotes and stuff. But the dog? Right in the CHEST? It’s dead.
Screw this comic.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:07 pm
“You jumped in between me and the snake and took the bites.”
“I know. I was there. And while you were talking instead of rushing me to the vet, the poison made its way through my bloodstream and is now causing my heart to seize up. Have fun in hell.”
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:12 pm
Having added “unreasonable fear of and/or inability to cope with any technology less than twenty years old” to her list of dominant personality traits (the others being “shamelessly embracing an unhealthy diet and lifestyle” and “refusal to adopt even the slightest trace of financial responsibility”), the only things that distinguish Cathy from Pluggers is the word count and a lack of fur and feathers.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:18 pm
I wondered about Tom Batiuk’s motivation for showing this brutality, and I finally had a revelation: this message is not directed to me. No, much like Cheney’s birdshot, this is most definitely a message to SOMEONE, but it is likely not us. We can only surmise that Batiuk’s adversary will get whatever message is intended clearer than we. Though we will never know for sure. If we are lucky.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:20 pm
Now you know that Eric is not really dead – somehow he’ll return to complicate things when Margo moves on to another victim – um, fiance or whatever. Like his brother, he will return.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:24 pm
CATHY: That Hillman Family Reunion was one crazy weekend, wasn’t it? I mean, between the balloons, the semi-gelatinous beverages (with straws!), and the infamous “stiff t-shirt contest,” it must have reached Tailhook levels of debauchery at its peak. Seriously, though, Facebook is so desperate, clingy, and creepy that Cathy would be a perfect spokes-toon for the site.
MOMMA: “Hey, you wanna go up in the woods, drink warm Tab, and talk about our mothers?” “Do you even have to ask?”
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:28 pm
A3G:
Now I’m not one to take issue with His Holiness, but aren’t all avalanches sudden? Sure, it takes a while to build up, but once dislodged from its mountaintop perch, that snowpack comes down faster than a couple of eight year olds on Christmas.
BB:
I don’t know if it’s a coup, but ill-conceived it is not. Not only has the General convinced Beetle to take aim at his fellow soldiers, he’s also levitating a miniature tank in front of them, with its fully functioning 1/700 scale cannon trained on their chests.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:28 pm
Ha! Mel Lazarus dials “0″ first – and then just kinda coasts for the rest of the strip.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:29 pm
There appears to be some confusion about today’s Crankshaft. The dog is not attempting to save Crankshaft from the snake; the dog and snake are rather battling over who gets to bite ‘Shaft first. Further, there is no reason to imagine the dog is suffering from snakebite, as Crankshaft is clearly depicted beating the puppy to death with a hoe in panel two. Are we all clear now?
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:30 pm
CRANKSHAFT — Final snake rant, unless a future Crank strip makes me crazy again. Another of the true stories about real timber rattlers I recently heard was about a snake that did not try to bite even though the human idiot staring at it from a very short distance away was actually sitting on the dead ground squirrel that the snake had just killed and had been preparing to eat.
Snakes, including rattlesnakes, work hard for their food. Most of their hunts end in failure. And they are constantly getting run over by cars, losing habitat to McMansions, etc.
Farewell, snake. You have joined the thousands of other snakes that have been beaten to death by idiots with hoes, many of whom mistook species from bullsnakes to garter snakes for rattlers. I just want you to know that you weren’t the one who deserved to die.
Death to the Crank! Death!!
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:31 pm
The dog actually belongs to Rose, the ‘Shaft’s daughter’s mother-in-law. I predict that her anger at the loss of her beloved dog will push her over the edge and she will administer the savage beating that the ‘Shaft has been deserving all these years.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:32 pm
I think Cathy deserves props here. This has to be the first time a new joke has been introduced to that strip in years. I mean, sure , it’s not *new*, as, for example, Edge City just did a week or so on this theme, but it’s a new joke to Cathy. Compared to “I hate trying on swimsuits,” it’s like a baby just reaching the birth canal.
Of course, it’s Still Not Funny. That’s what makes it Cathy.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:36 pm
I find Apartment 3-G hilarious, if only because “Lodi” is a town just a couple of miles north of where I live. Or is it because the refrain of the CCR song keeps popping up in my head (”Oh Lord, stuck in Lodi again”)?
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:38 pm
Particularly nice work today, Josh. Laughed out loud twice. Ace!
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:38 pm
If readers of Cathy now know about facebook, it’s all over. I say we beat a desperate retreat to Myspace, and hide in that HTML-littered wasteland of sexual predators, fake profiles from the Phillipines, and preteen rexies who claim to be 18. If they find us there, it will be our Masada.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:39 pm
Beetle would look far more menacing if he were holding a bespangled blunderbuss instead of that clarinet-like thingy.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:39 pm
#28 Poteet – You’ll be doing another rant soon, I think. I peeked ahead again, and…I barely even feel like spoilering this, because that would imply that I wanted to save some pleasant surprise for other readers, but mouseover for spoiler.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:40 pm
I honestly thought that the punchline of Ruthie was going to be “A man can’t marry a horse OR a monkey!”
Nobody else was guessing that was coming?
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:48 pm
MT: So I’m guessing that when Mark goes fishing, he says “holy burned-out car, a mackerel!”
BB: Couldn’t Halftrack just order the men to stand there and listen to him? What perverse thrill does he get out of seeing them in fear of being shot?
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:50 pm
Given the rarity of poisonous snakes in suburban Cleveland, I can only conclude that some disgruntled reader painted the snake onto the Crankshaft page in order to take him out once and for all. I would claim credit, but I’m pretty sure I would have just used an eraser.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:51 pm
Hi, gang! I was at a camp weekend with the family. Roasting marshmallows!
Archie – Watch it, Hot Dog, or you’ll turn into Marmaduke.
C2Home – It’s a porn flick, complete with filthy dialog and sound effects.
Cshaft – Wait! It’s not that simple. Here’s Dick Tracy to explain that the dog was first poisoned, then shot, and then the snake bit him.
Mduke – Today we celebrate the one millionth iteration of the “dog watching food ads on TV” gag. Sadly, the inventor of this gag died in the 1950s.
SFox – I don’t know about Count Weirdly, but I own more than one towel. A better ‘clue’ might be that his skin isn’t all pruney, or that he’s wearing a freaking hat, or that Slylock’s remote-controlled camera sub shows he wasn’t there, or that Weirdly can’t take a bath without raping Señor Wences, and yet he is sustaining a visible boner.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:52 pm
Beetle and Co. have been threatened with deployment a rare few times before, and here is another example of Halftrack keeping the spectre of a mission of their heads by engaging them in war games, as suggested. Sadly, everyone at Camp Swampy has been removed from society from so long that they’re unaware that their guns and tanks appear to be decades old and fairly worthless in modern combat. However, this exercise allows Halftrack a sliver of control over the men so they believe they have something to do, but mostly, it’s an elaborate ploy to give him an audience for his shitty stand-up routine.
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:55 pm
buckyswife @y235 – It’s worse than you think. Charley’s not really of this earth. He died years ago, and has gone around the world ever since putting people back on the straight and boring path. Sometimes he talks earnestly to them, sometimes he puts on the smarm and scares them straight. The strip would be called “Charley’s an Angel.”
mollificent @y262 – Here’s something that might help. This is a 1956 radio production of “The Little Prince” from CBS with Raymond Burr narrating, Hans Conried (aka Snidely Whiplash) and Good Ol’ Joseph Kearns, a TV Mr. Wilson, included in the cast, and veteran child-voiced Richard “Dickie” Beals (Speedy Alka-Seltzer) as the Prince. It’s really a very nice version. Much of the output of the CBS Radio Workshop was kind of coy and arch, but this one is quite effective.
Sequitur @y328 – If Wally is Funky’s nephew, then perhaps we can hope — a small hope, I’ll admit — that at some point he’ll start singing
“Shut your funky face, Uncle Funky!
You’re a winker-beaning wanker, Uncle Funky!
You’re a gloomy basterd, yes it’s true
Nobody else brings me down like you…”
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:56 pm
commodorejohn @y331 – I’ve always said it was a leap sideways. A relativistic leap. The present is always the present, but now last year is ten years ago. It bothers me less than most aspects of the strip, considering what a camel we swallow in any amount of thinking about comic strip time versus regular time. (”It takes three months for Spider-Man to live four days — but in that time, the seasons changed like they do here, and current news items were obliquely referred to… AAAIIEEEE!” BLAM!)
moderately selassie @14 – Hey, they bought the story that Eric sacrificed his life to save the Li’l Lama! And Eric was almost as intelligent as that dog.
AlphabetFish @19 – Mom killed a rattler in our yard with a hoe when I was a kid. With four kids of her own, and another dozen running around the neighborhood, it was probably the right call. She told us not to go near the head, because it could live a while. Naturally, I wanted to see that, and wandered as close as I figured I could without it leaping at me, but of course, it didn’t move. Perhaps it was a story invented to keep us from touching it. It was believable to us, because we’d raised chickens and had seen them run around whilst decapitated. (Sorry, Poteet @28. I understand your ire, but she did it for her family, in the 1960s.)
Joe Blevins @24 – “Warm Tab”? Ah, that brings to mind a sequence of increasing gross-outs from the days when Tab made in Canada apparently had -no- sweeteners:
“Tab.”
“Canadian Tab.”
“Warm Canadian Tab.”
“Warm, flat Canadian Tab.”
“Warm, flat, Canadian Tab with a dead rat floating in it!”
August 3rd, 2009 at 7:58 pm
BB: I’m no expert on heavy ordnance, but I’m pretty sure that tanks are supposed to have their main gun mounted on top, not projecting phallicly from the bottom.
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:00 pm
Also, the ’shaft snake appears to live at Count Weirdly’s over in Slylock. I’m pretty sure that if Max got bitten, though, Slylock would just say, “Damn straight you jumped between me and that snake, Max!”
And by “bitten” I mean “swallowed whole.”
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:02 pm
I recently estimated the likelihood that the Lockhorns would be funny more than once in a lifetime as equal to the rarity of a repetition of a comet a la Shuemaker-Levy striking Jupiter in my lifetime.
I regret the error.
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:06 pm
I think the exposition exposition exposition in the third panel of CS is unnecessary (among everything else).
Anyway, I’m still disappointed that Del ran off (again) and ended the story prematurely. But perhaps this really isn’t a case of premature evacuation:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9545446@N07/3787127412/sizes/o/
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:07 pm
I tried to make Funky Winkerbean a little more classy, but equally as despondant:
http://i249.photobucket.com/albums/gg230/hookedoncollies/fw-1.gif
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:10 pm
Given the way Beetle’s holding that rifle, the coup won’t last very long, since the recoil is going to knock him unconscious.
I mention this because the image of Beetle’s skull being cracked open by his own rifle is all that stands between me and contemplating the deliberate placement of that tiny phallic tank.
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:13 pm
#31 — Down in the Valley:
I keep thinking the same thing, because one of my sisters lives in Lodi. (I’ll bet you’re in Stockton.)
And boy, she really did get stuck there. First medical school, then sent to lovely Lodi for her residency. By the time it was all over, she was married, had built a huge house and had three kids. Not to mention her medical practice, as well as that of her husband. They are stuck, stuck, stuck!
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:17 pm
A3G Of course, Margo doesn’t listen to a word anyone dressed in such odd clothes says, assuming it’s all gibberish anyway, but she does realize noone’s said anything about her in the last five minutes, and that makes her sad. It will soon enough turn to anger.
BB Sarge was uncertain from the first moment Beetle suggested ’swinging’, and he’s puzzled why their roleplay involves them pretending to be soldiers, as opposed to firemen, or naughty nurses. But when the General just stumbled right into the middle of things and launched into an impromptu vaudeville routine, well, Sarge is desperate to go back to “Don’t ask, don’t tell,” crawl back into the closet and turn the lights out forever.
Cathy Is there any way to make someone your enemy on Facebook? ‘Cause I want the world to know how much I despise Cathy, and that sounds like a good way to start.
CS The snake had actually exhausted its venom on a rat a half-hour earlier. Crankie, well-meaning for once, tried to suck the non-existent poison out, thus exposing the poor pooch to a lethal dose of bile. “You can’t soften what’s meant to be cranky, Tom. T’ain’t natural.”
Momma Do you realize, Mel, that for me to determine just exactly how bad any given day’s Momma is, I have to expose myself to your horrendous caricatures of the human form, sometimes for more than three seconds? And there’s nothing funny about that, either. Just like your strip.
OBH It’s called a beard, kid, and lots of men have them…
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:19 pm
Thank you, Cathy. Many of my friends have been trying to get me to go to Facebook. But now, now that you’ve joined, Cathy, I know that I won’t need to. For this marks the end of Facebook.
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:20 pm
Given that Beetle is holding a fishing rod, I think the two captives are actually afraid of that miniature hovertank directly in front of them.
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:21 pm
On the plus side, nobody will believe Crankshaft’s story, and he’ll be arrested on charges of poisoning a dog. It’s the break the BTK case squad has been looking for.
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:29 pm
buckyswife: I’m not big on the peat, but it can be an interesting addition to the taste. Ever tried Connemara? It’s the only peated Irish whiskey. And I did say I got rid of my stripey shirts. :) Well, I guess small vertical stripes in dress shirts don’t count…
Jamus: Thanks for the heads-up for the new chapter!
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:30 pm
On the subject of the xkcd/Little Prince controversy – as a fan of a few favorite targets of parodyists, I understand that it can be a little uncomfortable having a favorite work come under snarky fire, and I sympathize in that regard. All I want to know is, were you as upset when Ces puled this last fall?
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:36 pm
Slylock Fox: After Buford Bull doing the not-wet-towel trick with an angry older rabbit trying to barge in and take a peek, we continue to have Mr. Weber cater to both sides of the fence, but now have the odd spectacle of a beaver peeking at a dirty old man.
(he hasn’t taken his bath yet, so he’s not clean, so he’s dirty… right?)
(Apologies to mollificent if I made her spray coffee out her nose. Again.)
Notice how Sly is very carefully looking up at the hat. Only the hat. Stare at the hat, don’t look down. Max also fixes his gaze somewhere safer. And Mr Weber slips in a towel surprise past the censors. :)
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:37 pm
Cathy: Earlier today my sister told me she was the only person left who wasn’t on Facebook. Now that Cathy has joined, I see she wasn’t exaggerating.
A3G: I like the way Tenzin finally intervenes, probably after a long-suffering sigh, and summarizes Lodi’s long-winded explanation. “Damnit Lodi, stop being all mystical!”
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:39 pm
I recently joined Facebook and there has been no interruption in life as I knew it. Of course, I didn’t post photos of myself trying on bathing suits while gorging on donuts, holding one finger skyward and squawking “Ack!”
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:42 pm
Mary Worth today proved something I’ve always known — porn saves marriages!
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:45 pm
54. You bet, Niall. Was wondering if you’d seen it, hope you had a nice trip :)
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:49 pm
MW – Wow. All it took to run Delilah out of town was a bad singer. Except I’ll take odds she is going to the jungles of Brazil instead of home with her husband but I bet Mary finds
her anyway.
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:50 pm
Agh! Josh! I was studiously avoiding that C’shit strip! And I was innocently enjoying your comments, la de da, and boom! There it was! (Yes, yes, it’s just a comic strip, not real—but geez, you have hormonally erratic animal lovers out here!)
#54 Niall—Hmm… not tried it. Got any now? I could use a shot after reading Crankshaft…..
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:52 pm
SlyFox: I’ve always wondered, of just what fiefdom in Weirdly a count, and why doesn’t he just live there where he can depilate all the beavers he wants without Slylock having the legal authority to interfere. Oh, shoot! Slylock doesn’t have any legal authority anyway, so I guess that wouldn’t stop him – but ending up on the giving end of one of the good Count’s impaling spikes might.
August 3rd, 2009 at 8:57 pm
The only thing saddens me about Crankshaft is that I was really hoping the snake would bite Cranky, then keel over. It’s worth the sacrifice of a snake for a good joke. Note: “GOOD joke.” “Batiuk”. Mutually exclusive.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:02 pm
How long will it take Mary—and us—to recover from meddlus interruptus ‘09? Will we switch lickety-split to a new story tomorrow? Or will we be punished for our dirty thoughts and wishes with a full 5 days of platitude-embossed depictions of the joyous, chaste, porn/alcohol/stripeyshirt-free but Rodgers&Hammerstein-filled reunion of Lawrence and Delilah?
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:03 pm
Crankshaft: Maybe some involuntray muscle contortion will allow the heretofore unseen dead snake to extend to its full length and empty its venom into Ed’s scrotum. That would be both hilarious and yet somehow Batiukian.
Beetle Bailey: Only four shapes are ever employed to draw this strip: a circle, square, triangle and cylinder, all dumped into the Cuisinart of Bad Art, pureed and voila! A steaming pile of crap, ca. 1950.
OBH: This strip is generally harmless good fun, like Tiger, and occasionally portrays kids as something other than insufferable little twits uttering Hallmark gibberish or punking adults, Disney-style. So, naturally, my paper doesn’t carry it.
MW: By the way, has anyone else noticed that as women in this strip become enraged their faces grow smaller? Check it out next time Mary gets pissed off. It’s like her face turns into a little fist within the giant parade float of her head.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:03 pm
Augmented, I might add, with a couple days of Mary relating the happy happy resolution to Toby. Or Jeff. Or just her always-appreciative self.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:04 pm
DT: “Best you and Bonnie leave, now … because once I enter my crime-fighting berserker rage there’s no telling who I’ll mangle or why.”
MW: So, basically, she’s going back to Lawrence because she’s terrified of sex (what else is Charley but sex personified?) and life with Lawrence is pretty much sex-free (he’s on the road, they’re not “close” any more, etc.). Dumbest. Mary Worth. Resolution. Ever. And we’ll have to sit through at least three more weeks of it. C’mon, at least have Del’s plane crash in a ball of fire as she tearfully tells Lawrence that she loves him, or let Charley die of auto-erotic asphyxiation, or – better yet – have Mary die of auto-erotic asphyxiation, while her plane goes down in a ball of fire, into Charterstone.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:06 pm
#55, I haven’t seen either comic and I’m not aware of the controversy, but sometimes xkcd comes across as narrow-minded, at least to me. I’d give Ces the benefit of the doubt simply because he doesn’t seem to think that non-math majors are worthless idiots whose opinions must be belittled and mocked whenever they can’t be ignored.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:07 pm
67. buckyswife: and don’t forget at least one narration box with a Suitable Quotation by a Famous Person.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:07 pm
63 Comrade Denny: Are you saying that Slylock Fox is the Mark Trail of his domain?
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:08 pm
OBH: This is the first I’ve learned it’s not just a Sunday-only strip. Damn you, Albany Times-Union!
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:12 pm
#68 “what else is Charley but sex personified?”
He’s actually being portrayed as a Straw Creepy Weirdo who lives in a “sin pad” right out of Anita Bryant’s imagination. Seriously: any guy who gets as much as Charley supposedly gets has to know better than to decorate his apartment as if it were a freshman’s dorm room.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:12 pm
# 35 commodorejohn — Yep. You’re right. Thanks for giving my nervous system a little advance warning.
# 42 Muffaroo — Just to clarify, my rant was not against every snake ever killed by a hoe. A rattlesnake in a yard full of children is a differernt matter than a rattlesnake with an evil expression placed by Batiuk in an Ohio county where rattlesnakes don’t actually occur, in a suburban garden that is very unlikely timber-rattler habitat, specifically so it can try to bite Crankshaft for no particular reason (not that I don’t think biting the Crank isn’t a great idea) and then cause a dog to die heroically so the Crank can kill it with a hoe.
Sorry, there I go again. Anyway, I probably would have liked your mom. So far in life, I’ve tended to like people who raise backyard chickens.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:16 pm
62 buckyswife: I was feeling pretty relieved to have not seen today’s C’shaft, too. *sigh* Well I guess now nobody’s been spared.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:20 pm
You know, that middle Crankshaft panel would make a bitchin’ Communist propaganda poster if it were red instead of black. The Capitalist snake screaming “NOOOOOOOOO!!!!” as it’s hewed to pieces by the agriculturally based proletariat proudly baring their instrument of labor and all that.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:21 pm
With any luck, Crankshaft will be accused by his neighbors of intentionally killing the job, and end up in jail, tragically misunderstood!
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:22 pm
MW — I feel the approach of the dreaded Delilocalypse, in which she and Lawrence look tenderly and cluelessly into each other’s eyes and decide it’s time to make a baby, and Poteet goes nuts (even more nuts, that is) and screams obscenities at the computer screen and adjacent cats flee the room. Maybe if I say it, it won’t happen.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:23 pm
#74 — Poteet:
My brother-in-law raises backyard chickens! In a decidedly upscale suburban neighborhood.
They used to have roosters as well, but the ritzy neighbors got all upset, so those are gone now.
One of my two sons just came back from spending half the summer at my sister’s house, and it was his job to collect the eggs every day. He loved it!
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:28 pm
Beetle may not know how to hold a rifle, but he did somehow manage to impersonate an enemy soldier and presumably slip behind enemy lines to capture prisoners for intelligence. Unfortunately for the prisoners the interrogation methods are only slightly more humane than waterboarding.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:30 pm
A3G:
Will be interesting to see what “worthy of his sacrifice” ends up being.
Pibgorn:
A poster ran what appeared to be abstract art in today’s installment’s upper left quadrant through Photoshop Equalize, revealing what Dru the Succubus is doing, and dropping my jaw through the floor. Then again, it’s what Succubui do. :-)
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:36 pm
Momma: I see Not-Francis has come down with a nice case of poison ivy by panel 2. Curtis must have figured out some Flyspeck Island way of making that shit contagious.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:39 pm
BB- That’s the Chaplain, not the General. The joke is that his stories are so boring, people have to be held at gunpoint to make them listen. Yawn.
Crankshaft- Surely the dog will survive. And yes, it’s Rose’s dog, not the neighbor’s.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:40 pm
buckyswife @ 65: Wow. Probably nothing more than its proximity to your phrase meddlus interruptus, and its association with Mary Worth — but I had never before noticed what a FILTHY phrase “lickety-split” is.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:45 pm
I don’t think Margo is thinking about how to turn this situation to her advantage. She’s a cut yer losses sort of gal after all. I do believe she’s just bored and really thinking; “Has Tommie cleaned all that hairspray up? Is the Prof. layin’ pipe on that hick Ruby? Ugh, I just grossed myself out. Is this old guy really bald, or does he shave his scalp? Why is Lodi this guy crying? Where the fuck am I? Is that a cow? I don’t think lunch agreed with me. I’ve got to fart – does His Holiness fart? Never met a guy who didn’t. What’s with all the grossing myself out? Where can I buy some Beano? Land of lentils and no Beano. Did Tommie pay the phone bill? My feet hurt.”
And so on
We’ve all been there.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:50 pm
My reaction to today’s Crankshaft:
“Yeah, whatever.”
In other words, I found it infinitely more moving than the majority of Crankshaft strips.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:51 pm
Re #81 kurtthecomicreader:
Succubi are supposed to slow the plot down?
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:52 pm
A3G: What I’m tired of are these Tibetan Buddhist monks punctuating everything they say by assuming a “prayer” position, as if they are frequently and randomly overcome by a sort of generic spirituality while speaking.
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:57 pm
Off topic, but I wanted to (belatedly) thank the commenter who gave the pointer to the comicskingdom site. It’s great to read stuff (like Juggs Parker!) at a decent size, rather than all shrunk down.
Hard to resist the temptation to read ahead through Saturday, though 1/2 :). No spoilers here, but I have to admit it’s going to be hard to wait to see what Josh and the peanut gallery have to say about a couple of late-week strips :)
August 3rd, 2009 at 9:57 pm
Judging from the size of those windows, Delilah went to the airport and is catching a bus….
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:02 pm
MW – Well, here’s a first. I feel it is my duty to defend Mary Worth’s good name.
Delilah, you DINK. You’ve been nothing but self-centered and rude since you showed up. You have the communication skills of a Dead Person, and at least they have a scent. This kind (albeit nosy and meddling) senior opened her guest room to you without conditions or deadlines, and how do you repay her? With a frickin’ NOTE? What, you didn’t have ninety minutes to wait for Ms Worth to show up so that you could thank her in person for her kindness? Does Down In The Valley Airlines only run a monthly service?
Bah! Be gone! Stay outta Charterstone if you know what’s good for you. Bring on the next contestant!
I know it’s not really her fault – it’s the way she was drawn. But heavens, even a minor attempt at a backstory and character development for Del would have made such a difference.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:04 pm
“The most ill-conceived and incompetently run coup in history.”
You mean besides the Bay of Pigs?
(Yeah, probably)
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:16 pm
One Big Happy feels like a reference to Michael Jackson. It’s probably not.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:16 pm
#89 Quantum Mechanic – No problem =D It is difficult to avoid reading ahead, but I can usually hold off when I’m looking forward to the developments. When it’s something I’d rather get over with, though…well, I read through both weeks of this Crankshaft storyline in one sitting a week because I just didn’t feel like waiting.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:17 pm
Not to worry, gang, Yippy-yappy will come back to life and take care of business just like a rabbit.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:20 pm
I just love the first monk in A3G. ‘Yeah, to cut a long story short…’. If only he had said it at the beginning of the story, not as a summary at the end.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:24 pm
Josh, main snark
And Ed Crankshaft is certainly no April Patterson.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:26 pm
song parodies from South Pacific to South Park.
man, I love this place.
only one thing was missing from Lodi’s story. Eric’s dying exhortation to “earn this.”
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:29 pm
95: rats. I was hoping it was taking care of business like *this* bunny:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGsHgcB1Xf4
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:30 pm
Snakebite, my ass. Crankshaft did that dog in w/ the hoe. This is the kind of gritty realism I crave in my comics.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:31 pm
when did cathy come out of retirement ??? shes been out of my local paper for years which i guess is good for me .
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:32 pm
OBH: “When I grow up I wanna marry a man with a horse and a monkey.”
Poor Ruthie probably won’t ever meet the man of her dreams.
Kids born like that used to be sent away at birth, and their career options limited to shut-in and circus attraction. Now they get reassignment surgery.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:34 pm
MW:
That’s it?! What a gyp! This storyline showed great promise of becoming 2009’s version of Aldomania, instead it turned into Chestersomnia. At this point the only way to save this turkey is for the pilot to drive that stupid airplane off a very high cliff and auger it into the cold, cold heart of Charterstone.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:34 pm
Momma: francis and friend drink a six pack bought with the money earned from turning tricks in an alley. Mel Lazarus has hit the skids.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:41 pm
Actually, I read today’s One Big Happy as meaning that Ruthie wanted to “marry” (i.e. mate) a man with a horse and a monkey to create a horrifyingly bestial half humanzee/centaur creature. But maybe that’s just me.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:46 pm
It’s gonna be okay, everybody. Crankshaft has just been playing a video game where you play a snake who kills dogs.
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:46 pm
Jamus: That Circus episode of C&C was the usual inspired – and there’s nothing wrong that that “usual” high quality consistency!
I would be so tempted, but will refrain from showing this particular episode to a few artist friends of mine who would have no qualms, and great joy, depicting the particular wading pool activities in loving, colour detail. But I also wish to respect Mr Power and Ms deJesus’ ability to not attract perverts to their strip. :)
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:48 pm
62. buckyswife: I still have all three of the “sample pack” I brought home a year ago: regular 8 yr old, special 12 yr old, and the cask strength. I do like to share…
August 3rd, 2009 at 10:57 pm
107. May be too late for that Niall, but yeah, I hear ya. Good idea, I remember when someone…dammit, can’t remember who…did the Cassandra pic, which, in a way, started me writing the C and C stuff, and he took it down when Bob Weber asked. That’s why I like texutal literature, it lets the READER imagine Ashley Bengal and Maureen Fox making out in the wading pool….
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:08 pm
#106: Hmm, The last week of Crankshaft was some future-randomness, perhaps you are onto something.
Maybe these little stories are just Batick wet dreams. Actually that makes me more horrified.
~Crazy
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:10 pm
Hey, maybe the dead wittle doggie will come back to haunt Crankshaft! He’ll see it everywhere, smiling at him, like Funky-Wink sees his dead wife everywhere, smiling at him.
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:11 pm
Argh, Momma made my head spin, which it kind of always does anyway. Yes, technically the country code for the US is “1″, but… but… I’m having trouble even articulating what’s wrong with this; there’s so much I don’t even know where to begin. OK: I’ll start here. Tahiti’s country code is a three-digit number (689), plus you’d need the international access code 011, so that’s 5 extra digits, which is…. THERE’S NO JOKE. THE PROBLEM IS, THERE’S NO JOKE.
On a related note, explaining why a joke is funny invariably renders it not funny anymore. Here I am explaining why a joke is not funny to begin with, which I think must make it even worse.
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:18 pm
112 Li’l Bunnë FooFoo
On a related note, explaining why a joke is funny invariably renders it not funny anymore. Here I am explaining why a joke is not funny to begin with, which I think must make it even worse.
Or make it funnier! Be positive m’Dear man!
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:24 pm
Big Sims, if I can’t make a joke better, I can at least make it worse. (I think that kind of logic is how people fall into a life of crime.)
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:30 pm
# 38 Sunny — Someone pointed out a few days ago that while FW is set near Cleveland, C’shaft is set in Centerville, a suburb of Dayton. But it’s still not one of the (few) Ohio rattlesnake counties. I think your eraser idea is splendid.
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:36 pm
109 Jamus: that “someone” was our very own KT, now going by kinky turtle. The thread where he was asked down politely by Mr Weber in this very blog was the one that got me hooked on the blog and all its regulars. :) And I don’t think it’s too late, since I’ve seen all of three “adult” fan art pieces for My Cage, none being particularly salacious – more like situational, similar to your setups. And I absolutely agree it’s far racier to see what our own minds can come up with as images.
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:38 pm
# 79 Katya — I was in Poland years ago, staying with friends who raised chickens in their yard. One of my little chores was tossing strawberry hulls into the fenced chicken area (we ate a lot of strawberries from their garden), and it was fun to see the chickens come running. It’s fun to visit people with chickens. And eggs.
August 3rd, 2009 at 11:53 pm
116, thanks Niall, I keep forgetting who it was. I’ll have to check out those pieces sometime.
August 4th, 2009 at 12:06 am
Does today’s “Momma” mean that we can just make up anything we want when writing a joke?
“You know how Belgians can travel through time?”
“They Can?”
“Do you realize they could alter the course of history?”
“I’d be happy with a few lottery Numbers”
August 4th, 2009 at 12:13 am
8/4 Crankshaft — Biological reality must give way when Batiuk wants to make snakes look bad. Soon we’ll find out that the evil rattlesnake was part of a criminal reptile gang that also includes a coral snake, cobra, copperhead, cottonmouth, inland taipan, and pit viper, all intent on killing the inhabitants of CRANKSHAFT. And I, for one, wish them the best of luck.
August 4th, 2009 at 12:20 am
8/4 JP — “If you don’t want me, I know a stallion who does! And I’ve seen more of his equipment in the past hour than I’ve seen of yours in the past year! And it was worth seeing! Really worth seeing! Incredibly worth seeing! This storyline is well past the point of subtlety, and so am I!”
August 4th, 2009 at 12:23 am
How insistent is Ruthie that every detail of her request be fulfilled? I mean, will she require that Pippi Longstocking have the operation, or will she be satisfied with moving to Massachusetts and/or Iowa?
August 4th, 2009 at 12:26 am
I will survive this Cathy “plotline”. Cathy strips, to me, are like a craft-fair table full of home-made pom-pom critters and crocheted tissue cozies; my eyes don’t even focus on them as I rove in search of candied peanuts. Also, I bet Cathy Guisewite has a craft-fair table full of home-made pom-pom critters and crocheted tissue cozies.
August 4th, 2009 at 1:44 am
I realize the characters in Beetle Bailey haven’t gotten new uniforms since Korea, but the muzzle-loading muskets are a bit much.
August 4th, 2009 at 2:01 am
May be I am just a crazy lady but i agree with Poteet and others. Even thou it is a little comic snake i feel bad for him… The dumb B.C. snakes would make me sad let alone something like this.
Like i said may be crazy and i probably should have seen it with all the “uh oooh, evil snakes a’plotting and the garden!” week before hand… I dunno, i just hope no ones chopping up snakes intentionally outside of comic land! (unless maybe they bite your small puppy… but still)
August 4th, 2009 at 2:16 am
I’m with Violet. I see crankshaft whacking that dog to death with the hoe, and then rehearsing his excuse as blaming it on the snake. I mean, like a snake is going to stand there and get hit. Have you not seen how fast a motivated snake just isn’t there anymore?
August 4th, 2009 at 7:29 am
Say, is there any chance that that “fictitious” future husband of Ruthie’s is from South Carolina?
Topical!
August 4th, 2009 at 8:30 am
One Big Happy – re-read the way that Ruthie’s comment is structured AND the way its laid out in the balloon – she wants to marry a man with a horse, and a monkey! My God, she wants to marry a monkey!
August 4th, 2009 at 9:29 am
Luann: Bernice is almost there. . . .
MG&G has been amusing in a mild way this week. The product placement gags are worth small chuckles, at least.
NS: Wiley finally got around to seeing “Watchmen.”
A&J: if the boat is a rockin. . . .
Candorville: I really, *really* hate the Dick Fink character, and the story lines involving him.
August 4th, 2009 at 10:09 am
I remember having to teach Rudyard Kipling’s “Rikki Tikki Tavi” a few years back. The hand-wringingly evil inner dialog of the snakes seemed a bit overdone by today’s standards. But (credit where credit is due) the actions of the snakes was somewhat consistent with the behavior of snakes protecting their young in a threatening situation.
Crankshaft on the other hand…
I’m not sure it earned that overly dramatic silhouette panel-
the rattlesnake like an idol carved out of obsidian, poised to strike –
forked tongue lashing out aggressively
as hesitant Crankshaft wobbles
elbow, hand and hoe
amidst the indifferent stalks of corn
blarg
Hopefully the snake had a chance
to lay a few eggs behind the turnips
before it met its offpanel end.
August 4th, 2009 at 11:35 am
BigTed @ 13: Perhaps she’s been taking Jonathan Coulton’s “Skullcrusher Mountain” as a recommendation rather than a warning:
I made this half-pony, half-monkey monster to please you
But I get the feeling that you don’t like it
What’s with all the screaming?
You like monkeys, you like ponies
Maybe you don’t like monsters so much
Maybe I used too many monkeys
Isn’t it enough to know that I ruined a pony making a gift for you?
Weaselboy @ 20. I’m with you, and I’m not even a dog lover. Converting quickly to the Batiuk hate…
August 4th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
Josh, that dog had CANCER!
August 4th, 2009 at 1:58 pm
So what was up with the Crankshaft “flash forward” anyway? It went for a week with basically the same comic 6 times, and then without any sort of indication, moralizing, or even vague hint about what was up with it, we’re back to the ordinary life of Crankshaft.
August 4th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
LaziestManOnMars: Actually, that’s not a bad joke, comparatively speaking. If I saw it in a comic strip, I’d probably chuckle inwardly and quietly but non-ironically.
August 4th, 2009 at 5:06 pm
To shamelessly steal from Dave Attell, the only thing this Mary Worth storyline needs is Oprah silently nodding.
August 4th, 2009 at 6:49 pm
My God, that’s it!
Instead of being ignored by my family while I’m here in Arizona, I could be ignored by them–in Tahiti! Joy!
Unfortunately, you have to have French citizenship to move there. Damn.
Oh, well. Back to therapy.
August 4th, 2009 at 9:31 pm
Momma: Please make sense in the future. Unless it means more Oedipal jokes, in which case, continue being incoherent.
BB: Are you sure Beetle isn’t holding them at flutepoint? Because that gun doesn’t look quite right.