Metapost: Finger-quotin’ winners
Well, the suspense is over and I’ve picked the winner. I have to say that it was incredibly hard and part of the reason that I’ve taken so long to pick the winner is that they were all so good. In a very real sense, you’re all winners! But in an even realer sense, only one of you is the winner, and that one of you is “Lucy Van Pelt,” whose entry just seemed to exude a certain je ne sais Margo to me. For mug purposes, I’ve filled in her word balloon:
And yes, this mug is now available at my store at CafePress! Click here to order yours! Lucy herself will of course be getting a free mug in the mail.
In addition, as promised, Dave Willis’s super-awesome Margo Warhol graphic is going on a t-shirt:
The colors of this graphic seem to work perfectly with CafePress’s new black t-shirt. They’ve just introduced black tees at CafePress and say they can’t guarantee delivery times. Hopefully it won’t take too long, as I’m definitely ordering one of these for myself!
Again, judging this contest was really, really hard for me, and of course my final decision was to a certain extent arbitrary. Perhaps you’d like to see one of the other contestants on a mug or garment of your choice! If so, just e-mail me and I’ll send you a high-quality image of any of the other photos and drawings submitted. (Here’s the lot of them, for reference.) You can then upload them to CafePress yourself and make your own counter-winner. You’ll stick it to the man! (Meaning me.)
Since I was updating my store anyway, I took the opportunity to do a little housecleaning. I’ve added a couple of new shirt styles. The first is for anyone who loves double entendres and public domain clip art.
Work it, people, work it! (If this baffles you, click here and scroll down for the context for this quote.) This shirt is available for the gents and the ladies.
And, finally, if you want to cement your status as an above-it-all hipster with a t-shirt bearing an incomprehensible slogan, check this out:
Wear this shirt to remind you where to find more information about licorice. (Again, you can click here to learn more about learning more about licorice, but it doesn’t make a ton more sense in context.) This t-shirt is great fun for a boy or a girl.
There are still classic Comics Curmudgeon garments at the store, of course: Brick House exercise gear, a Fence Post Frank hat, Canadian Jive-Talkin’ intimate wear, and, of course, “More Zippers, Mule!” Check it out!
AwfulArt
July 2nd, 2006 at 10:25 pm
The COTW says it all.. We need a Josh’s Top shirt made to buy at the store….
Mary Brandt
July 2nd, 2006 at 10:33 pm
Finally! Sheesh…
-MB
monkeyhawk
July 2nd, 2006 at 10:40 pm
I just ordered my “More information…” t-shirt.
Life is good.
Dji
July 2nd, 2006 at 10:45 pm
From the cold depths of bitterness, I strike at thee!
Not really. Congratulations, Quotin’ Van Pelt.
And, while we’re on the subject… I saw Superman today, and I call finger-quotin’ on Lois. It was just a glimpse, a passing moment, but during the airplane interview scene, she struck a palpable finger quote.
Bad Lois. Margot Van Pelt will now kick your ass.
Canaduck
July 2nd, 2006 at 11:13 pm
Aw man, I could really go for a More Information shirt.
Scumbaggioni
July 3rd, 2006 at 2:31 am
Oh, Lord. There’s a FOOB reference in Sally Forth and it’s the worst one imaginable.
SURELY THESE ARE THE END TIMES.
Luban
July 3rd, 2006 at 2:54 am
Gee, I was really hoping Ozzie Guillen would win the finger-quotin’ contest. (He deployed air quotes when he “apologized” for people he “offended” by calling a reporter a fag.) Guillen’s a serial air-quoter, too– check out this photo from last year.
Ianscot
July 3rd, 2006 at 7:04 am
7/3/06 — I believe we have another B.C. shot across the bow of the Muslim world. If there’s another explanation for the “joke” about the crescent moon today, I can’t think of it…
BigJoe
July 3rd, 2006 at 7:49 am
FC: Whoa! I can’t believe it, I thought this strip was always so cleancut and wholesome. Today’s strip shows a baseball player blatantly flipping the bird on the television that the kids are watching. Disgusting!
http://www.chron.com/apps/comics/showComick.mpl?date=20060703&name=Family_Circus
dre
July 3rd, 2006 at 8:14 am
i like mary worth’s badass balsa airliner – she symbolically tosses jeff to the wind as he, through charitable medical service, attempts to bring some sort of value to the strip. any guesses as to her summer plans?
yellojkt
July 3rd, 2006 at 8:15 am
The WaPo used a substitute strip for BC, also dated 7/03. I guess the syndicate knew the crescent moon joke was going to get pulled.
Jimmy
July 3rd, 2006 at 8:15 am
That licorice shirt is amazing.
dre
July 3rd, 2006 at 8:18 am
also, looks like plugger’s old lady is making “plugger spaghetti” again tonight.
anonymous
July 3rd, 2006 at 8:22 am
We don’t get Pluggers here, what is their idea of spaghetti?
grinderman
July 3rd, 2006 at 8:52 am
Don’t forget this idea for a shirt:
OH YEAH!
Dennis Jimenez
July 3rd, 2006 at 8:55 am
FBOFW – A foob and their mountie are soon parted.
RMMD – Hey finger print lady – you might have more luck IF YOU OPENED YOUR EYES!
yellojkt
July 3rd, 2006 at 9:13 am
There is a rash of billboard defaming going on and it’s not all directed at Mary Jane Parker.
http://www.defamer.com/hollywood/disney/that-thing-on-the-pirates-billboard-explained-184713.php
Given comic lead times, is this life imitating art or vice versa?
dre
July 3rd, 2006 at 9:18 am
plugger spaghetti: ketchup on spaghetti noodles
Justafoob
July 3rd, 2006 at 9:19 am
A day late. . .
I was hoping for some real down and dirty foobimation on the fooberverse’s web site on Sunday. A little T n A jiggle or Grandpa’s hand a stroking.
Something….
Bitter Scribe
July 3rd, 2006 at 9:25 am
OT, today’s Dilbert got bounced out of the Chicago Tribune for offensiveness. Having accessed the strip online, I can understand why they did it. But I was especially charmed by the Trib’s explanation:
“Today’s strip is a substitute. The original did not meet the Tribune’s standard for taste.”
Yo. Col. McCormick, can that rod up your butt get a little stiffer?
Chet McCord, Wildlife Defender
July 3rd, 2006 at 9:34 am
Why is there a taste standard, but no humor standard?
Today’s Dilbert would fail on either count. OK, there’s this stinky guy at the office, see…
Bitter Scribe
July 3rd, 2006 at 9:38 am
Oh, Chet, if there were a humor standard, the Trib would regularly lose Hagar the Horrible, Broom-Hilda, Sylvia, Prickly City and maybe half a dozen other strips.
treedweller
July 3rd, 2006 at 10:39 am
Is Dilbert really so offensive? Is it just because it mentions sewage? Or did our local paper edit out the word s*** and replace it? I’m not saying it’s a great effort or anything, but who would be so offended by this thing?
Especially in light of the “fecal” reference just a few days ago.
MossMoses
July 3rd, 2006 at 10:42 am
Maybe the Phantom really is a ghost after all. How else could you explain his crouching with his wolf 3 feet away from Chatu in plain sight (to readers) and Chatu ranting about going up in the chopper to find him? These are by far the sissiest terr’ists ever. Chatu should put on a shirt and find a job. He is an abject failure as a terr’ist.
Is it normal to wave at a jet that is already at least 1,000 feet above the ground or is Mary Worth tripping?
Nada
July 3rd, 2006 at 10:43 am
Way to be “the decider”, Josh. :) Seriously, though, Lucy Van Pelt makes an excellent Finger-Quotin’ Margot, complete with sparkling toothy grin, so big ups and congratulations to her.
Joan
July 3rd, 2006 at 11:03 am
#4 Dji: I saw that, too! I wanted to stand up in the theater, point, and yell “Finger-quotin’ Lois!”
Hogenmogen
July 3rd, 2006 at 11:08 am
#8, #11 – I wanted to be the first one to mention it, but I have this job thing that delayed me today. Darn. Anyway, I didn’t see a substitute when I went to the WaPo site, I got the bigoted original. Yeah, Hart, why don’t you just draw Mohammed with a bomb in his turban or something equally alarming. The Muslim world doesn’t hate us enough, I think. We need to instigate them a little further so that the half that’s not already burning the American flag can start. That way you can call yourself a patriot by making noise about a constitutional amendment.
Stuff like this makes my head hurt.
Mysterio
July 3rd, 2006 at 11:16 am
#23-I’m betting the part the CT had trouble with was Asok shoving his face up his own rear end.
(And why does Stinky Pete have whiskers? Is he meant to look like a cat or other animal that would be inclined to roll in sewage?)
BTW, I don’t think today’s BC was meant to be offensive-unlike the outhouse strip, I can see where there is an attempted joke
(See, ticks bite people, so a luna-tic(k) would leave a bite that looks like a half moon.) Yuk yuk. The joke is more than a bit strained, but it’s there.
Eric
July 3rd, 2006 at 11:18 am
I think the BC gag is that the turtle got a moon-shaped bite from a “lunatic” or “Luna-Tick.” So it could just as easily be a horrible pun as an offensive bit of hate speech. Given that it’s B.C., certainly either is possible.
If he had said “What kind of blood-sucking arachnid makes a…” it might have been better, or worse.
Why am I defending BC?
dlauthor
July 3rd, 2006 at 11:23 am
Curtis: Oh my God! Curtis has a funny joke in it! Alert the media! And I want to go to his block party now, too.
GF: The use of the word “stool” in the context of this strip will have a special resonance for anyone who has been witness, as I have, to the reason why kitty shouldn’t eat rubber bands. Print that, Trib!
Spidey: All right, is it weird that Peter in the strip is so protective of his secret identity, when the comic-book Peter just had a much-publicized deliberate reveal? Who is this imposter in the comics pages, anyway?
Pluggers: Setting aside the Pluggers-can’t-cook-Italian comments, which were what first occurred to me as well, let’s look at the text for this panel more closely. Because I thought the Plugger emergency happened when his meth lab blew up.
Mallard: Ah, Tinsley. Making the case that arming desperate people is a good thing. And in the snidest possible way!
Heart of the City: No, no, no! You killed the wrong one!
Foob: We interrupt Grandpa’s sexual fantasies to remind you once more why Goosebutt must die.
Stone Soup: Like the hand in the window, and the drowning thus implied.
Prickly: What the hell happened to the coyote-shaped scribble’s stomach in Panel 4? When does the Alien pop out?
Arlo: Even if I’d have to kill the cat were I really Arlo, I do like him. His expression of sheer delight in Panel 3 makes me smile.
TDIET: Fat and Skinny? FAT AND SKINNY? And if only there were some device one could program to record television programs to be watched later! Perhaps that’s the reason the kids have that giant storm-cloud question mark hanging over their heads: they’re both thinking, “why doesn’t he just set the damn Tivo?”
weiser
July 3rd, 2006 at 11:43 am
Nice job with the contest josh, but I think the mug should read:
“Enjoy†your coffee
Ferd Berfel
July 3rd, 2006 at 11:58 am
Congratulations to Ms. van Pelt! The clincher must have been the delightfully maniacal expression she adopted for the original photo. That captured Margo Magee’s “devil-may-care” and “up your’s, Lu Ann” personality wonderfully.
I’m glad it was Josh’s job to make the choice. After re-perusing all the entries, I still couldn’t select a single winner.
9CL – Could it be? Is the plot stirring?
A3G – After walking around hat-less and umbrella-less in a torrential rain like the drip she is, Tommie finds Lucy’s clueless husband Ted on her doorstep. Is this an innocent coincidence? Or have Lucy & Ted decided on persuing an open marriage? Perhaps Lucy’s out helping a hunk from her poetry group straighten out his Longfellow while leaving Ted to look for some hot uniformed nursing action. Cue the 70s porn music, Ronny…
DT – Ya’ know, Lottie really didn’t shoot BO and Gertie. Although if she had this achingly painful story arc would be over now.
FBOW – Yes, Lardass, you must have faith. Just as we all have faith that you’ll throw over Tonto Doo-Wright and marry Granthony. We hold that faith because Lynn Johnston and her crack staff of crack addicts are complete pratts.
GF – As a cat owner I can tell you that the juxtaposition of ‘rubber bands’ and ’stool’ in today’s strip is yet another zinger Conley slipped past the syndicate.
(DT)GT – Okay, who has seen golf carts in use on city streets outside of those senile citizen warehouses in Arizona and Florida? Anyone? Bueller? Thankfully, school is over in Milford-on-Pluto so we’ll be spared those ghastly disjointed game strips for a few months. By the way, what does Marty Moon do in the summer? Collect cans and sleep under the freeway overpass?
MT – Let’s see… I’m camping in the wilderness, have some sizzlin’ eggs & b. bubbling over the fire, and step away to check my trout lines when roughly 2000 pounds of angry grizzly with an arrow sticking out of it’s ass appears. I’d think saving my breakfast would be the last thing on my mind. Grizzlies grow so big they’ve found unopened sardine cans in their scat.
MW – Dr. Jeff Cory makes his escape! Would that we all could do so too…
RMMD – After a loveless night of weeping for the McCheesey’s, Rex and June clean up after a quickie in the kitchen. Rex repairs his dishabille while June hums in satisfaction. Her man may be a swtich hitter but he always brings a bat to the plate! On a side note, it pretty certain that Rex has discounted McCheesey’s kneejerk JRD diagnosis. What will Dr. Gwen Patterson find? Is Lyme still a favorite among our medicos?
SF – Oh goody… If this strip wasn’t bad enough they’ve gone and brought FBOW into the mix! Start copying B.C. and TDIET too. You’ll be sure to have a winner then. Blecchh…
mere cog in the machine
July 3rd, 2006 at 12:06 pm
#8: The truly despicable thing about Johnny Hart is that he always tries to leave his insults open to interpretation, with a nod and a wink to what he no doubt imagines to be his enormous red state readership. I would despise him much less if he just had a cartoon of one of his stupid cavemen beating up Jews and Muslims with a rock, but he always opts for the Rove-like, cowardly method of getting his idiotic “message” across.
weiser
July 3rd, 2006 at 12:08 pm
MW: OK, so where are today’s song-lyric banners?
First thing I thought of was – “It’s going to be a long lonely summer, but darling I’ll promise you this, I’ll send you all my love everyday in a letter, sealed with a kiss…â€
Then “Leaving on a Jet Plane, don’t know when I’ll be back again…†came to mind, but the balsa plane didn’t appear to be a jet so –
j
July 3rd, 2006 at 1:08 pm
#31
I have to emphatically “agree” with weiser!
Harry Worth
July 3rd, 2006 at 1:33 pm
Just something that came up on my Google page-o-the-day:
“Platitude: an idea (a) that is admitted to be true by everyone, and (b) that is not true.”
– HL Mencken
I’mmmmmmm leaving on a jet plane……
Don’t know when I’ll be back again……….
Anonymous
July 3rd, 2006 at 2:17 pm
…oh babe, I hate (can’t wait) to go
Hogenmogen
July 3rd, 2006 at 2:41 pm
If you’ve been following the news, you may have read an article that says the “inner circle” of many Americans is declining. We have no one to share our innermost secrets with. Personally, I like to post my innermost secrets on the internet so that total strangers can dissect me if only they could figure out who I was. Anyway, I would like to confess here today that I am in fact a genuine Snuffy Smith fan. Sunday’s was genuinely funny, and probably the more so because it comes from such an unlikely source. I’m about as elistist as a Yankee can get after being transplanted into the heartland, and yes, I think there’s some wit involved. With all the strips that fumbled and jumped shark after the original writer, Snuffy is actually better than I remember in my youth. I shall now retreat with my secret shame back into anonymity from where I came…
MossMoses
July 3rd, 2006 at 3:07 pm
Can we assume Mary Worth will be sexually active during the three months while Doc Jeff is away? It isn’t like she and the good doctor ever do the nasty anyway but just in case she gets too lonely, what are some good platitudes she could use if caught auto gratifying or will she just indulge in her usual verbal masterbation?
“If a woman looks at a man lustfully she has already committed adultery in her heart.”
Dennis Jimenez
July 3rd, 2006 at 3:13 pm
Ruth Carter Stapleton, right?
Hogenmogen
July 3rd, 2006 at 3:15 pm
TDIET: “Fat & Skinny: Playground Frolics” on at 3 am? Sounds like a Skinemax soft-core deal to me. Showing it to the kids?
I laughed out loud at this one, and not for the intended reasons. My family got a VCR in 1979. Ok, many people did not get one until the 80’s. That’s still decades past. You can rent “Fat & Skinny” from any video store or buy the DVD from Amazon.
Tomorrow’s strip shows a family getting an invite to Aunt May’s Birthday party the next day. Panel 2: But Aunt May lives 35 miles away and use of the internal combustion engine has yet to become widespread!
Strange Brew: Shouldn’t Marco Polo be saying “Marco” and Gengis, Kublai and the horde saying “Polo” and not the other way around?
Devil in the Drain
July 3rd, 2006 at 3:34 pm
#32: Yeah, here’s one vote for Lyme disease in RMMD. No way they’ll give the kid something chronic and debilitating like pauciarticular
mtigwakiarthritis.Shirt: Some things indeed are perfect. Just ordered my bright green Internet shirt.
Hank Kimble
July 3rd, 2006 at 3:44 pm
RMMD–I’m still going for mumps. Why? I dan’t know. I don’t even know why I read Gil Throp.
Hogenmogen
July 3rd, 2006 at 3:47 pm
A3G: Do Lucy and Ted live within walking distance of the chicks? Tommie had to take a train to a house in the countryside when she visited and get picked up after the train by Professor Beardopolis, suggesting that it wasn’t a subway train. That, plus you don’t spend the weekend with friends who live a subway fare away.
And Ted has mastered the fine art of standing in the rain without getting wet.
Adouble
July 3rd, 2006 at 5:12 pm
If there is so much as one rock thrown or one embassy burned over the apotheosis of crap that is B.C., I’m completely giving up on humanity.
anonymous
July 3rd, 2006 at 5:40 pm
#18 – That’s what I thought, thanks.
And they probably refer to it as “Eye-talian spaghetti”.
treedweller
July 3rd, 2006 at 6:20 pm
#46 You may have a “winner” there. Well Plugged.
Upon reflection, I, too want a shirt that says,
“Oh, Yeah!”
In TDIET font.
With the quotes.
Attributed to Scaduto.
That’s what I want.
Oh, Yeah!
Gracie287
July 3rd, 2006 at 6:56 pm
Is it just me, or does Lizardbreath look a wee bit preggers in today’s FBOW? Or is it just her awful fashion taste (see last week’s “fancy occasion dress”)? According to her official “bio” ( http://www.fborfw.com/char_pgs/liz/ ) Liz is about 4 years younger than me. I’m a little offended by the implication that 25-year-old women dress like grandmas. Or is it just Canadian 25-year-olds?
anonymous
July 3rd, 2006 at 8:03 pm
Do you really believe Lizardbreath would get pregnant by Paul in this strip? Not only that, do you actually think she would go about her business without mentioning it, even in her own thoughts?
Ferd Berfel
July 3rd, 2006 at 9:14 pm
#46/Racing J – I must agree with Treedweller, I think you’ve got a winner there with you Plugger submission. Purposely misspelling ‘course’ as ‘coarse’ should count for extra points too.
Chet McCord, Wildlife Defender
July 3rd, 2006 at 9:50 pm
Alternatively, draw four pluggers in their overalls, gobbling up their meat and potatoes, and call it a Pluggers’ 4-coarse meal.
Maughta
July 3rd, 2006 at 10:23 pm
Is anyone else worried about Mary and Jeff’s relationship? I mean, we spend weeeeeeeeeks on Kelly and …ummm… Mr. Kelly (who’s name I have somehow banished from my conciousness…well done, I say), and we only get two days between, “Mary, I’m leaving town,” and “Sayonara”? I feel somewhat let down.
And what airport do they live near that they can go to the gate without a ticket?
Maughta
July 3rd, 2006 at 10:24 pm
Ooops, I meant “whose” (not who’s). Now I’m going to grammarian’s hell.
Mibbitmaker
July 3rd, 2006 at 11:49 pm
A belated 7/3:
Sally Forth: Ces, you’re toying with us, aren’t you?
FC: Baseball player looks like he’d taking his own arm off. Either that, or it’s the configuration in my paper: the “Lockhorns” are next door to the left, and the bowler on their TV is aiming a bowling ball at the baseball player on the FC TV.
FOOB: Those too “met for a reason”? Unlike the other 567 suitors in the last 5 years or so? It’s Lizard and the Moustache, LJ, get on with the trainwreck already!
Spiderman: On “Late Night with Conan O’Brien”: “PARKER! Seeeeeeecretssssss”
FW: Worst Calvin & Hobbes patented fantasy sequence rip-off ever.
Dilbert: All the sub-Lynn Johnston bad taste lately. Yeesh.
MG&G: I love the gag in this one. However, in the color version, they look more licorice than chocolate. Good grief! More information on “chocolate” covered Peanuts can be found on the internet.
Crankshaft: Chill out, fellahs; Cranky’s just puttin’ on a Plugger fireworks display!
Mallard: Gee, Tinsley, that’s reactionary even for you! …Naw, that’s just par for the course for that guy, sadly. Gun nutty ducky (hey, that’s a good name for a band).
rich
July 4th, 2006 at 12:33 am
56 – It’s Lizard and the Moustache, LJ, get on with the trainwreck already!
Well put, Mibbit … COTW-worthy.
Grendell
July 4th, 2006 at 11:30 am
# 51: The only place Liz would be likely to mention something a impotant as a pregnancy is the monthly retcons.
Which can be found on the internet.
Badly_Computer_Animated_Boy
July 4th, 2006 at 2:51 pm
Congratulations, Lucy. Well done!
Additional dialogue missing from Family Circus:
BILL: Well you see, Dolly, ‘Dodgers’ is actually short for ‘Trolley Dodgers’, which was the team’s nickname in Brooklyn before they moved to Los Angeles, where there are no trolleys. Just like how their basketball team is named ‘Lakers’, even though there are no lakes to speak of in Los Angeles, unlike Minnesota which is where THAT team moved from.
DOLLY: Owww, daddy, my head is starting to hurt…
BILLY: Utah Jazz! Utah Jazz!
DOLLY: (head explodes)
Frank Drackman
July 4th, 2006 at 6:16 pm
The “old Bomb in the Turban” cartoon was actually Funny, even if a bit racist. Serves them right, as they love depicting Jews the same bigoted way. The best was the “What would Mohammed Drive” cartoon, it was just a funny pic, Muhammed in the Uhaul.