A tough act to follow
Non Sequitur, 3/13/06
Ah, “nitwittery!” A fine addition to anyone’s quiver of invective, to be fired off from the bow of rage in the service of, um, grumpiness.
Still, it’s no jackassery. I don’t mean to be a hater, but I gotta speak the truth.
Nevertheless, I do like the little stars and swirlies emitting from Danae’s mouth in panel two. And the the fact that her grumpy thought balloon has the same Punisher logo that that we can see half of on her chest.
But: not quite a worthy successor to jackassery. I’m just sayin’. Keep working on it.
Chawunky
March 13th, 2006 at 9:13 pm
Eh, she saves it with the “plague me on the morrow” bit.
Chet McCord, Wildlife Defender
March 13th, 2006 at 9:15 pm
That looks exactly like the Phantom’s mark, commonly seen on the jaws of imprisoned villains in Bimbwamba, or wherever it is that he resides.
I much prefer this girl to April Patterson.
cgb
March 13th, 2006 at 9:26 pm
What manner of selfplagiary will devout readers of Non Sequitur be subject to, some 18 months hence?
Cathy
March 13th, 2006 at 9:43 pm
I had to print this one and hang it up next to Danae’s “Shut -Up-And-Leave-Me-Alone Day” strip.
yellojkt
March 13th, 2006 at 10:37 pm
And in Rex Morgan we must endure both foppery and buggery.
Dopey
March 13th, 2006 at 10:52 pm
A skull as also seen on the T-shirt of bad boy Sid in TOY STORY
http://www.pixar.com/featurefilms/ts/chars_pop9.html
Chet McCord, Wildlife Defender
March 13th, 2006 at 11:28 pm
Maybe it should become a “Fun and Sexy Tee.”
mumbles
March 14th, 2006 at 12:36 am
FOOB: Uhm, am I missing something but doesn’t April have a brother in town that could babysit her (or she could stay with them)? Or do they live elsewhere?
Lor
March 14th, 2006 at 12:44 am
yellojkt: not to mention skulduggery. Or at least skull digging, when Pus Boy is involved.
Reminds me of a story Lynne Truss tells in Talk to the Hand about trying to teach kids to say they’re sorry. Teacher says, “Class, there’s a word that is very hard to say in your family, and it ends in a Y. Can anyone tell me what it is?”
In the back a hand goes up: “Buggery?”
Lor
March 14th, 2006 at 12:53 am
Hey Josh, how about grabassery?
Kickassery?
Ball-brassery?
J-to-the-ackass sez, yo.
Anonymous
March 14th, 2006 at 12:59 am
buggery is something to pleasure not endure
Dub Not Dubya
March 14th, 2006 at 1:04 am
Keep working on it. Like a claw. And call it jackassery.
Sarah
March 14th, 2006 at 2:16 am
Mary Worth and Rex Morgan are BORING.
April Patterson is too old to be afraid of staying home by herself. Mumbles: her brother and his wife have already got their hands full, I’d imagine, which is probably why the empty-nester, next door, was called.
I really like the Mimi-Randy-April storyline in Judge Parker. It’s more interesting than spoiled Neddy: should I stay here and be happy with my perfect boyfriend or should I go to Paris and be happy studying art? Oh, woe is she.
Bored with Luann. That’s all I got to say about that. Bring back Aaron Hill! Or have someone hook up with SOMEONE… my GOD, how many times do they have to beat around the bush?!
Sarah
March 14th, 2006 at 2:23 am
The comment about Luann didn’t have anything to do with the current storyline, but on that note, it IS taking them several days to move the old lady. Can’t they just cut to the chase, figure out the money that she was going to pay the kids is missing and have a confrontation between Brad and Dirk already going on, in the background. Brad runs out of the back room, having snatched the envelope from Dirk. Dirk follows him out of the room, nonchalantly saying he found it on the ground and looking BAFFLED that Brad would even CONSIDER accusing him of stealing it. The frustration continues. Face it: Luann needs to be an animated cartoon series or something like Pibgorn, where there is a lot going on in one panel. It’s been draggin’ on for YEARS… Oh, and on a side note, does anyone else remember when Mike and Deanna (foobville) met? I do – is that strange?
Sarah
March 14th, 2006 at 2:24 am
Or rather, reconnected. Didn’t they meet each other when they were kids and then ran into each other, again, in college?
Doug Puthoff
March 14th, 2006 at 6:09 am
OT. Who needs Spidey and Doc Ock when you have Steve Luhm and the transvestite Judy Garland impersonator duking it out in “Gil Thorp.” That’s the most exciting the strip’s been since Jerry Jenkins’ revelation that Marty Moon was the Antichrist.
Doug Puthoff
March 14th, 2006 at 6:17 am
More Gil Thorpery: I just “Googled” playdowns. Most of the webpages that use the word come from Canada, the same country that gave us Canadian Bacon, Ice Hockey, and William Shatner. If that’s not a good reason to stop its spreading, I don’t know what is.
GotFuzzy
March 14th, 2006 at 6:39 am
More Foobery–don’t St. Michael and Deanna and the hellspawn live where he attended college, which I am assuming is some distance from the hometown? His landlord is the same one that he and Weed had when they were in school.
Why do I litter my brain with this?
anonymous
March 14th, 2006 at 7:20 am
FOOB: I admit, I laughed. And cringed. Been there, Apes, alone in the house and hearing those noises. Went to bed and heard…..something…..coming down the hall….Oh, and had to put out the trash at night? Trash can in the dark back yard? Well, after watching alien abductions on TV, that trash can stayed right there because I wasn’t going to go live in any intergalactic zoo.
Lyman Returns
March 14th, 2006 at 8:28 am
Isn’t it weird that the Patterson’s neighbor was staying with April in the first place? She lives right next door! She could check in on April any time she wanted, and April could easily go to her if she needed something. Isn’t it funny that so soon after the April-Dad talk about how he “trusts” her and therefore doesn’t need to monitor her internet usage, the parents leave town and feel the need to give April a live-in nanny?
And I’m sorry, but April is a teenager. She should be capable of cooking her OWN meals, doing her OWN laundry, packing her OWN lunches. At the rate she’s going, she’s going to end up like one of those kids in college who doesn’t know how to boil water.
Did the neighbor get paid for doing this? The Pattersons better fork over some serious cash to make it up to the neighbor for putting up with April’s crabby toolbox self.
Ferd Berfel
March 14th, 2006 at 8:50 am
RMMD – More golf? Huh? This is a really weird start to a story arc. My best guess is a weak one. Dr. McCheesey has something like ALS and refuses to admit it. He plays every day yet “twice a year” Rex is beating him. Hmm, ‘twice a year’? Poor June.
Judge Parker – What’s with April’s hair? Cooks a big dinner, turns the apartment into a romantic love nook, and her hair looks like she caught it in a cusinart. Either that or her vibrator shorted out.
MW – Another ’soft’ take-off like RMMD. Lord knows the Jan Hand arc ended with a wimper and I don’t expect slam-bam action from MW, but power walking? Sheesh…
FBOW – The “suckistry” Her Foobness routinely dsiplays in this strip makes me desire her retirement even more. Junk food and a scary movie? It should have been hard liquor, E, and lipstick party. Am I right?
MT – The story is revealed. Milburn Drysdale just arranged for a road to be blown up, something we all do everyday over the phone and in front of children. Little Boy Lost wants to watch said explosion and the adults in his life pay him about as much attention as one does to plastic houseplants. Sometime in June of 2006, Mark and Andy will save the child from a Lost Forest IED.
(DT)GT – Let’s see… We has a gym full of students dressed as 1930s hobos heckling an homeless kid with the connivance of their coach, the referees lost control of the game, and a physical assault was the result. Never fear, Gil’s worried about the losing his point guard for the rest of the ‘playdowns’.
Monty – I don’t if many read this. I don’t regularly read it but it is in one paper I take. The strip’s story has neatly combined “Lost” and “Gilligan’s Island” over the last few weeks for some laughs.
Hank Kimble
March 14th, 2006 at 8:52 am
Gil Thorp looks like Frankenstein without the nuts on his neck. Maybe he should hook up with RMMD. Troy might not be able to find Gil’s nuts, but I bet he can find his balls!
Devin McCullen
March 14th, 2006 at 9:07 am
Check out yesterday’s Frazz – after saying nothing too exciting, the third panel has Frazz and the young black kid just staring at each other open-mouthed, almost like somebody forgot to put the dialogue in.
dlauthor
March 14th, 2006 at 9:39 am
21: Monty is one of the better strips in my paper. I was starting to lose interest in the “Lost” arc, since it seemed to start as just a way to point out the foibles of a popular show, but I should have had more faith. I mean, today’s strip! GILLIGAN HAS ATTACK MONKEYS. Holy crap!
Mallard: way to stay topical there, Tinsmeister. Seriously, if you’re going to write a strip based on current events, couldja try to do it while it’s still, y’know, current? Or at least make fun of the delay, like Boondocks does? Everyone brace yourselves for several more days of strips about how it’s not a big deal that Cheney shot a man in the face — except to evil liberals, of course. You don’t want to be an evil liberal, do ya? WELL?
Spidey: apparently, no one actually lives in Marvel Los Angeles. This explains why there doesn’t appear to be anyone panicking in the streets after what appears to be a pretty major earthquake. But then, this is a world where, in a city of twelve bazillion people, all the characters in the current arc are descending on the same single restaurant by sheer coincidence (hopefully to bring the interminable Spiderfake arc to a merciful close, but I’m not holding my breath). And don’t get me started about how a half-ton piece of freaking falling masonry can strike a man on the head, neck, and upper back, and just render him unconscious. MJ’s costar should be an ink smear.
Foob: I still feel the way April does after a good horror move, and I’m at least twice her age — an age where you can hurt your back madly lurching up the basement stairs when you hear a sound behind you that makes you imagine the hungry dead in pursuit. So yeah, I sympathize.
BassoGap
March 14th, 2006 at 9:39 am
Devin –
Yesterday’s 3rd panel in Frazz needs no dialogue…but if you need it, add a “What?” for both Frazz and Caulfield.
A&J…we need more of Janis in her lingerie, a la yesterday. The one from January, of her jumping into bed quickly on a cold night, bra/panties flying as she shed them, might have been the hottest comic ever.
Thelonious_Nick
March 14th, 2006 at 9:49 am
I don’t mean to be a stickybeak, but the smatchet’s remark is not very Shakespearean at all. It sounds to me rather Dickensian.
At least she didn’t misuse “thou” or “thee,” as happens whenever stupid people attempt to sound Shakespearean.
Anonymous
March 14th, 2006 at 9:54 am
Anyone who doesn’t regularly check out Medium Large needs to look at it today. It looks like Ces is putting everyone’s fears to rest about Ted Forth’s true calling.
Howard Erk
March 14th, 2006 at 10:00 am
I am downstairs Apwil.
I am coming to get you.
Unfortunately, I suspect that Anthony is waiting in the shawdows waiting to unleash his infamous wet-willy attack on me.
dlauthor
March 14th, 2006 at 10:19 am
17: Oh, and we also gave you basketball, Neil Young, and insulin.
Dennis Jimenez
March 14th, 2006 at 10:27 am
Let’s not forget Molson, Moosehead and LaBatt’s.
Sarah
March 14th, 2006 at 11:11 am
dlauthor: I sympathize w/her, too, and I’m at least 10 years older. I was just thinking ahead: how much you wanna bet that April gets out of bed, now that she’s freaked out, and called up the neighbor, asking her come back to the house?
OTOH, we may find her tomorrow, acting like everything is totally fine with a thought balloon saying something along the lines of thank goodness the ‘rents are home. That seems more like an April thing to do.
Conniving comic strip characters.
Lloyd S.
March 14th, 2006 at 11:37 am
I know some people find that Non-Sequitur lives up to its name too often, but I generally like it. How could one not love the pure evil that is Danae. The over the top no bath Fox News stunt was a classic sequence of comic badassery.
BassoGap
March 14th, 2006 at 11:55 am
#17 — also Sarah McLachlan and Celine Dion…though I’m nearly convinced the pure evil dreck of the latter would more than counter the pure hotness of the former…
back to the comics…Dirk will lose the struggle for the envelope to Brad, who will then be blamed for attempting to steal the money…he’ll be fired from the FD for an ethics violation and will live in his parents’ basement until he’s 45, wearing baggy grey sweatpants and a wife-beater, watching obscure ’90s movies and eating Cheetos…don’cha just love the smiles the comics provide?
Len
March 14th, 2006 at 12:23 pm
Hamhock is filling in for the vacationing Captain Victorious.
http://www.ucomics.com/inkpen/2006/03/14/
I guess that makes him Captain PIGtorious. He’s lucky not to be Spider-Ham.
TEM
March 14th, 2006 at 12:59 pm
Please tell me there will be “jackassery” or “nitwittery” swag coming. Momma needs a cool, new t-shirt and mug.
Jim C.
March 14th, 2006 at 1:28 pm
#17- Doug, I recall seeing an explanation years ago (possibly in the Chicago Tribune, in some celebration of Gil), of the origins of the “playdowns.”
If memory serves, it was because that was the term used in Connecticut, where Jack Berrill lived. (Or it was the term used there when he lived there as a youth.)
I’m not surprised it’s Canadian. It’s so … roadside.
King Folderol
March 14th, 2006 at 1:32 pm
MW: What the hell is going on with Mary today? What are those vile stains on her shirt in panel one? She looks like she left two small irons on her shirt and just forgot to throw out the shirt. Either that, or she’s leaking some sort of old people juice out of her skin and through her shirt. Either way, I don’t want to know. Furthermore, she looks like some blowhard male politican in panel #1 but then reverts back to her “I just love scientology and thinking is for losers” vacuous blue-eyed stare in panel #2.
MT: How is dear old dad going to explain it to his kid when the road is missing? “Sure, son, it was road pixies that made the road blow up. What? No, that conversation I was having wasn’t real – and that’s why the pixies blew up the road. They take crusty old man jokes and bring them to life!”
Bitter Scribe
March 14th, 2006 at 1:43 pm
#24: As far as I’m concerned, Monty is the best strip in the Chicago Sun-Times. Not much a compliment considering the competition (Beetle Bailey, Garfield, Wizard of Id, etc.), but Monty has wonderful comic timing and juxtaposition. It also has perceptibly improved over the last few years, which is not something many strips can say.
Jeaneth
March 14th, 2006 at 1:48 pm
I’m going to do my best to incorporate “nitwittery” into my vocabulary. Truly an excellent word.
I’m concerned about young Tony in the current Mark Trail storyline. His passivity and lack of affect are disturbing. Today he overhears a man planning to blow up a road and he wants to watch. When the man tells him to forget what he heard, he answers flatly, “Okay.” He stares out the window with an odd little half-smile on his face, his hands pressed up against the glass as if trying to decide whether to jump out or fly away. He gazes into a fish tank, pointing at the fish and smiling that same little half-smile, even though no one is paying any attention to him. Is he autistic? Developmentally disabled? So chronically ignored that he’s retreated completely into his own little fantasy world? Or is he in fact Jack Elrod’s ideal of childhood sweetness and innocence? If the latter — yikes.
Goober
March 14th, 2006 at 1:53 pm
JP: Did April shoot up just before Randy showed? She looks Courtney Love stoned.
GT: Both Gil and his assistant look like the aliens in “This Island Earth – gigantic square forheads and all.
MT: Great covert plan, just blow up the road. No one will suspect anything.
RM: Speaking of blowing, get on with it already. Less putts, more putz.
BassoGap
March 14th, 2006 at 2:29 pm
Just read today’s GT…is the X-Men’s Wolverine an assistant coach now?
Occam
March 14th, 2006 at 3:03 pm
#21 Ferd Berfel and #24 dlauthor:
Thanks for the recommendation to “Monty.” I just looked it up and read the last month’s worth–it’s pretty good!
There’s an interesting interview with Jim Meddick, the author of “Monty,” at:
Jim Meddick
He actually mentions being influenced by “B.C” in his early cartooning days. Must have been a different comic way back when.
Sarah
March 14th, 2006 at 3:48 pm
Not even Fox Trot or Dilbert had a tribute to “Pi Day”. I am so very disappointed!
BassoGap
March 14th, 2006 at 3:56 pm
Sarah (#43):
That’s ’cause today’s holiday of choice is:
http://www.steakandbjday.com
yellojkt
March 14th, 2006 at 4:02 pm
Good luck with getting Hallmark to sell cards for that one.
Sassy_Rocks
March 14th, 2006 at 4:07 pm
Now that Mary Worth is on this youth kick, why not find a young boy toy rather than wasting further time with the boring, desperate and decrepit Doc Jeff? He doesn’t really interest her in a carnal way in the first place. At best, theirs is a platonic friendship. If an old, morbidly obese curmudgeon with few redeeming characteristics like Professor Ian Cameron can marry a young blond bombshell like Toby, why shouldn’t Mary Worth shop around a little herself for a virile young stud? First she can get in shape with Toby then see what kind of sweet meat they run into power walking or at the gym. Seems like a plan!
MLH
March 14th, 2006 at 4:15 pm
This “Non Sequitur” appears to be one drawn by Normal Wiley. By Sunday, though, he’ll have transformed back to Nutjob Wiley.
At least Obviousman isn’t on the loose.
Too Cool For This
March 14th, 2006 at 4:17 pm
Re: At least she didn’t misuse “thou†or “thee,†as happens whenever stupid people attempt to sound Shakespearean.
This just as stupid if not more stupid.
Marc
March 14th, 2006 at 4:28 pm
I just like the chutzpah Toby has for basically calling Mary an old, meddling hag in WASPanese.
Mary all sweaty and gross. UGHH. Since we see every little detail, I hope they don’t spend five weeks on Mary getting undressed and her towel color changing every strip. I’m sure there may be plenty of old guys in the Hamptons who may enjoy this WASp undressing. Oh boy.
And…apparently today, Dagwood thinks that “F R E E p3ni$ enLARGEment pills are delicious (which makes him hungry.)
FC: Also, isn’t it irresponsible to let your 3 or 4 year old son walk your dog which who has intentions of releasing his bowels? Oh wait, they hate Jeffy anyways. It shows that Bil Keane is trying to be hip with the younger crowd by making “pee pee jokes.”
Anyone care to explain the last panel in SF? It’s probaby my generation gap that makes me confused.
BALDO: I can’t wait for Tia Carmen to get robbed! And…because it’s right below Mary Worth in my paper, it would be funny if they just so happened to walk through lower-middle class Hispanic California and noticed this mugging.
Sassy_Rocks
March 14th, 2006 at 4:39 pm
“lower-middle class Hispanic California”
Is that the tough part of Santa Royale near the women’s shelter? Maybe a faux hispanic Geraldo Rivera type would match up well with Mary Worth’s waspish sensibilities and the sex would keep her busy so she doesn’t spend all her time minding other peoples’ business. Perhaps Toby should keep her eyes open as well. She can do way, way better than Professor Ian Cameron.
Marc
March 14th, 2006 at 5:07 pm
Yes, it’s the toughest part of Santa Royale, where men plagued with Jaundice roam the streets. Where building show stress mark, and GASP! there are weeds growing in the cracked sidewalk! AND…if you remember what strip I’m talking about, then you’ll remember the part where Mary gazes out of her 4 door electric blue car-no wait orange, no wait electric pink, wait, it changed again-to see a garbage can overflowing!
Toby, (what a WASPy name), needs to help Mary hunt down some meat. Too bad Rex Morgan and the gang don’t swing that way, otherwise I might enlist their help.
Hysterical Woman
March 14th, 2006 at 6:13 pm
#49: With FC, you have to remember it’s probably the real-life Jeffy making the comics. So Jeffy is torturing his comic self, as well as stuffing mommy’s bra.
Ferd Berfel
March 14th, 2006 at 9:38 pm
#42 Occam – Glad you’re enjoying Monty. I have to agree with dlauthor, the strip has actually improved over the time I’ve been reading it. I don’t watch ‘Lost’ so I can’t comment on the ‘cameos’ of that show’s stars. The ‘Gilligan’ cast is just drawn to perfection though. The Skipper in panel #2 has me laughing as did the profile of Mary Ann yesterday complete with those wonderful ICBM nose cone bosoms women of the 1960s mysteriously sported.
Meddick still has his rough patches, but what strip artist doesn’t? Before this story began, with Monty and Moondog mistakenly boarding an AARP cruise instead of a Harp Beer cruise, the strip featured a couple weeks of fairly average one-liners. Most featured Monty’s cat ‘Fleshy’. Meh.
Of all the Monty characters I enjoy Moondog the most. He’s a lazy, shiftless, drunken, ne’er-do-well with whom I feel a great rapport.
Mibbitmaker
March 14th, 2006 at 11:50 pm
#42: It was, Occam……. it was.
#49: Judas was a biblical backstabber. I get the feeling Sally got the job.
Monty… I’ve been displeased with its overuse of gross-outs and bad taste in recent years. But, I’ve always loved the pop culture parodies, since it was Robotman. I don’t watch “Lost”, but I love the current storyline spoofing Gilligan. Like Scooby Doo, I’ve long outgrown it, but it still makes for good satire.
Fred P.
March 15th, 2006 at 12:17 am
#49- Given that Josh has, on occasional, expressed frustration with the lame-ass pseudo-humour some geriatric cartoons employ when dealing with technological innovations of the last decade or so, I got a feeling he’s really gonna LOVE today’s Blondie. What scintillating wit! Spam e-mail makes Dagwood… get this… HUNGRY! Like the meat-based product of the same name! I bet nobody’s ever made that connection before! GOD! I salivate at the very name of it too! Hoo-boy! Ah, good fuckin’ times…
Now that Mary Worth- yeah, walking is soooo extreme! Possibly even “X-treme”! You’d better not Mary! I mean, not before working up to it by, like, walking around non-power fashion for a while.
Mibbitmaker
March 16th, 2006 at 7:29 pm
Knowing Dagwood and his sandwiches, I’ll bet he craves some spam, eggs, sausage and spam.
Monty Python/unwanted e-mails; I bet nobody’s ever made that connection before!