Food for thought
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Beetle Bailey, 9/30/24
Today, most food service in the U.S. military is outsourced to contractors, and one of the military’s most awesome powers is the ability to deploy a fully operational Burger King to a combat zone within 24 hours. But Beetle Bailey remembers an earlier time, when cooks would’ve been soldiers themselves — my grandfather enlisted during World War II and spent the war stateside making meals in bulk for soldiers about to ship out to the Pacific, for instance, and it only occurred to me reading this strip that I never knew what his rank was. Did he outrank a sergeant? Could he, within the bounds of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, have ordered a private to prevent his sergeant from gaining access to the company’s food stores, using deadly force, if necessary? Much to think about.
Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/30/24
Oh wow, Wanda, just casually demonstrating your ability to cross your fingers right in front of your trigger finger-striken boyfriend? Flexible finger privilege much????
82 replies to “Food for thought”
Mary Worth Mashup: It’s pretty much what you think.
RMMD:
“Gotta wear It for two weeks. But the danged clown don’t want to come out of the sewer!”
MW: Estelle is spending a LOT of time “sob!”-bing while blindly driving. Is her karma moment going to arrive in a near-fatal wreck? Running over a dog? Running over Wilbur?
RMMD: “You just sit over there and brood over your finger splint, while I singlehandedly run this diner and support us. Darling.”
If I recall correctly quartermasters can be surprisingly high rank and stealing from supplies is harshly punished. I suspect cooks might slide in here sometimes.
Thrill to the slightly stiff finger drama! Gaze in awe as “just wearing a splint” probably fixes it! Gasp in terror as the slim prospect of surgery still remains! Wonder briefly about the patient’s romantic life!
Wanda is very worried about this finger injury because she owes so much to Truck’s nimble fingers… just kidding, he’s a very selfish lover!
CS: Now I know how the Burnings came to Ohio, from the kindling of all the strawmen Batty put out for this storyline.
GT: I’m looking forward to Gil’s regeneration, when he ends up looking like David Tennant or Matt Smith.
BB What is going on with Sarge’s right hand? I guess he’s meant to be pushing open the door but it almost looks like he’s trying to hold up the speech balloon. “Who is thst back there? All I see is white and comic sans.. ”
RMMD Gotta hand it to the strip: nobody else can portray the tedium of inane chit-chat to such a degree of realism. It’s like I’m right there in the room, getting bored for real.
It is a bold strategy to have a character react to the climax of your strip’s arc with “That’s it?” but Rex Morgan is fearless.
RMMD:
“I can still sing though, honey. So I came up with a song ’bout that newfangled custard dessert you made for me!
“New flan takes you down to her place near the liver
You can hear the oats go by; you can spend a bite beside her
And you know that she’s half-hazy, but that’s why you want to be there
And she feeds you brie and orange juice that come always from Edina
And just when you mean to tell her that you have no grub to give her
Then she gets you on her wavelength, and she lets the liver answer that you’ve always been her grubber
“And you want to babble whispers, and you want to babble whines
And you know that she will muss you
For you’ve touched your burped biscotti with her mind
“And Cheez-Its must avail her when she talks, up on her hauteur
And she spent a long time noshing from her only puddin’ tower
And when she knew for certain only frownin’ men would see her
She said, ‘All men must be flailers then, until the brie shall free them’
But she herself was croakin’, long before the pie was open
Forsaken, almost cumin, she sank beneath your schism like a scone
“And you want to babble whispers, and you want to babble whines
And you think maybe you’ll muss her
‘Cause she’s touched your burped biscotti with her mind
“Now, new flan takes your plans; and she leads you to the liver
She’s sharing bags and platters from starvation army flounders
And the sun pours down like honey on our lady of the larder
And she shows you where to cook among the large eggs and the flours
There are gyros in the free knead; there are children in the Corning
They are leaning out for grub, and they’ll lean that way forever
While new flan holds you nearer
“And you want to babble whispers, and you want to babble whines
And then you know that you can muss her
‘Cause she’s touched her burped biscotti with your mind”
“What’d ya think, honey?”
“Stick to roots country.”
Narration box clearly doesn’t think trigger finger is a real condition.
JP:
“Dead bodies under water, family murders, and Wurst not involved somehow? Wurst call fake!”
RMMD: I’ve been reading that the Finnish do not engage in chit-chat, at all. To them, this strip must seem like science fiction.
I once had to wear a splint after breaking my middle finger. Kind of gratifying, having an excuse to walk around wih it extended at all times.
Message to the Beetle Bailey team: Please, I am begging you, never draw your characters barefoot again. I feel ill.
JP: I’m sorry, are we supposed to believe that the CIA background check never said whether or not Declan’s brother had been imprisoned? Charged? Indicted?
RMMD: That’s some smooth passive-aggression there.
BB: In typical Beetle fashion, he’s standing guard at a supply cabinet. Meanwhile, raccoons have raided the refrigerator he left completely unprotected.
BB: In some of the older strips Cookie is in uniform and has the chevrons of a three stripe buck sergeant.
CS: So what are Pam and Jeff the Eunuch doing while this cacophony is going on next door? Maybe somebody should notify the police to report an angry mob.
CS: No, lady. We’re not here to burn down your bookstore. We’re here to lynch that bus driver whose been endangering the children of our town for over forty years.
RMMD: Just look at that waitress behind the counter. Either she can’t wait to leave this hick town where the height of excitement is a minor finger injury, or the meth’s wearing off.
JP: “What on earth are you talking about, Dear? Who’s Declan?”
Frazz: I’m guessing on the drive there, she learned many different ways to call someone a fucking moron.
Luann: Luann’s mom has got it going on…
CS: Geez, people! Surely, you have better things to protest Loathsome Lillian about than Fahrenheit 451. Also, I guess we’re expected to believe that these weirdos drove/bussed over from Westview in the middle of the night to shout, “Ban the Booksmith.”
9CL: Brooke has confused his characters, but it’s accidentally fitting that Edda would know exactly what never-gay Seth said about her.
MW: Estelle, in her despair, runs over a doberman shepherd, and now Ed has that to worry about.
Zits: It’ll be funny when they have to evacuate the town later.
FC: That looks like an Eagles’ player. If so, they’re not exactly playing football these days.
@Baja Gaijin: If only…
RMMD: Why did this story need to be told, again?
H&L: Did whoever wrote this claim just not look it up or even think about it at all? Apart from the obvious answers of paramedics and home nursing, you can find countless options for primary and urgent care house call services. It may vary locally, but the concept is as far from gone as it gets. Why do the Flagstons of all people even think they particularly need this?
JP: I said a few weeks ago that marrying someone is one of the big exceptions to the “don’t involve yourself in others’ family issues” axiom, and here’s a good example of why. Looks like Declan has some ‘splaining to do, if we can ever get him to appear on page.
MW: After a full week of living inside Estelle’s empty head as she thought the same single moronic thought over and over, we get exactly one day of her talking to Ed and then it’s right back inside the idiot skull for more anti-contemplative reiterations. Writing.
DT: Oh hey, Mysta finally turned up! For no and against all reason, and with no speaking lines, and wearing one of those goofy cavalry breastplates designed to cancel her own powers which you’d think she would absolutely not like, but she’s here! And sure enough, the big payoff is that all the murder and treason and genocide was one thing, but breaking and entering? Now you’re in really big trouble, mister.
Meanwhile, you’d think the Moon Governor would have some very serious and immediate issues with Diet Smith creating mass-producible tech that can thwart the Lunarians’ innate combat advantage, common across history such as how Cold War powers threatened immediate annihilation on each other if they tried to develop completely effective countermeasures to nuclear attack. Guv’s always been pretty wary of humans himself even before this, and you’d think learning about Diet’s Lunarianproof vests has a serious danger of making him say, “Oh shit, Ro-Zan was right, and now my people will soon be defenseless against the humans. If we have to fight, it’s now or never, and I’m picking now.”
@taig: Batiuk has already screwed up so much of his own continuity by first trying to maintain two separate strips on two different timelines and then mashing them together after retiring one strip, though I will always suspect that his ending Funky Winkerbean was not wholly voluntary on his part). Does he just have everyone living in the same town now, like when the Silver Age Flash discovered the ‘Other’ city where the Golden Age Flash lived and kicked off the concept of the DC Multiverse? [light bulb goes on] Good grief, I just bet that’s it….
Beetle Bailey: Does Sarge wander around Camp Swampy barefoot? How does he manage to walk like that, on the outer edges of his feet? One might assume that would be a crippling disability earning him a F-4 status, never to be recalled to active duty. Speaking of which, how has he survived gross bilateral edema, and why have doctors not put him on a regimen of diuretics to preserve cardiac function? These questions and more will not be answered on the next episode of Beetle Bailey!
CS: “They want to burn a book about a dystopia where books are burned. Ironic, isn’t it?”
“No, not really. This storyline is ill-conceived, ham-handed and all in the service of teaching a ‘lesson’ with less subtlety than the most patronizing piece of children’s edutainment programming. In a word, it stinks.”
MW: Estelle is so distraught, her eyes so flooded with tears she ends up driving through a guard rail, located along a stretch of road near what was named the “Aldo Kelrast Memorial Point” years ago.
@jroggs: Moy is trying out her spiritual sequel to Herman’s Head, called Stelle’s Head. I think it will be just as successful.
{Googles Herman’s Head}Holy crap! That show got three seasons?!?
@The Quiet Man: I wouldn’t put it past Batiuk to think he’s doing something that “clever.”
Rex Morgan, M.D.: Joke’s on Truck, Wanda is less crossing her fingers than making air quotes! Poor guy’s about to find out just how true “Six Strings Away” is for a Roots Country guitar picker.
@Little Guy:
“Coach Gil Thorp they used to call me…I am now Gil Thorp the White.”
@taig: Even worse, Moy’s been doing this for two decades.
Today’s Mary Worth
GET OVER IT ESTELLE
HE HASN’T STOPPED LOVING YOU
Meanwhile in The New And Improved (in art) Gil Thorp:
Looks like Thorp is in a coma from being rammed by a football plauyer
The Comic Strip Formerly Known as Crankshaft/Funky Crankerbean:
WE DON’T NEED WATER LET THE MOTHERFUCKER BURN
BURN MOTHERFUCKER
BURN
9CL – Good! Another week of Edda hanging out with her daughters while they quiz her on how fuckable she was before they were born.
Seth used to be gay, I seem to recall. He hasn’t been gay for a while then and it seems he now was never gay in the first place.
Nothing a teenage girl likes more than hearing one of her mom’s friends describe how porkable she was back in the day, before she grew to look exactly the same as she does now!
BB: Today’s soldiers know nothing of the horrors of pulling K.P. for a week straight. Good for them.
CS: And the tedium grinds on.
GT: That TV reporter looks like she just got a good whiff of a Porta Potty or something.
@Calvin’s Cardboard Box: I would wonder if McEldowney aged the twins up to slightly reduce the grossness of them constantly obsessing about their parents’ sexuality, but then again I don’t think he’s stopped reverting them (and their parents) back to their days as little kids and doing more of the same.
At any rate, what’s the use in trying to apply standards of any kind to a writer who uses the phrase “ripsnorting sockdolager goddess” unironically?
@jroggs: Ohhhh. I use that phrase all the time to describe pretty lllladies.
@Dan:
Narration box clearly doesn’t think trigger finger is a real condition.
Yes. It’s pretty bad when your own narration box uses air quotes.
MW: Granting Estelle the grace to be upset about her relationship dissolving. That’s upsetting, even if it comes from an absolutely crazy place.
And while I’m sympathetic to Dr Ed here, him actually saying he has to prioritize the animals over his soon to be wife…man that’s a rookie mistake. Even if that’s true you CAN’T tell her that! You’re lucky she only threw the ring at you, Ed!
My father was in the Marines stationed in Bermuda (!) during WWII. He was made a cook and happily accepted a promotion to corporal. Take that for what it’s worth.
CS: Meanwhile, a panicked Les hurriedly leaves town.
Frazz: “Yeah, my Dad played with his phone the whole time.”
JP: Ha ha, Neddy looked up the mother of a completely different Declan.
RMMD: “Just one thing, Wanda. You’re gonna have to help me wipe my . . . ”
“We’re done. You’re outta here. Pack up you stuff and clear out. Good-bye.”
RMMD – There’s a type of wrist splint used, I believe, primarily in occupational health, for folks with repetitive motion injury. It’s called a Cockup Splint. That I managed to use that example in training classes for a decade without giggling is a testament to my desire to say “cock” in class with relative impunity.
RMMD: No, Truck, it was as recently as Friday when June Morgan distinctly told you that if the splint and medications don’t fix it, then next they’ll try cortisone injections, and only if that fails too then they’ll resort to surgery. Is this story arc so boring that even you don’t bother to read it any more? (Yes.)
BB: Flash forward to the court martial of Sergeant 1st Class Orville P. Snorkel and Private Carl J. Bailey on charges of conspiring to raid Camp Swampy’s food pantry. The prosecution’s key witness, mess sergeant Cornelius Jowls, is testifying: “Ahh, but the strawberries! That’s – that’s where I had them. They laughed at me and made jokes, but I proved beyond the shadow of a doubt and with – geometric logic – that a duplicate key to the mess hall icebox did exist!” [clicks steel marbles together, nervously]
B-B – Remember Pork Chop Hill….
RMMD – I think the next step would be a truss….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
@Cleveland Mocks:
BB- How above a month straight? And back sink! Didn’t have my monthly contribution to pay civilian KPs in Germany so….. Even the (Army) cooks felt sorry for me. Thank goodness there was a window above the sink. Brought a portable radio every day and listened to AFN Stuttgart.
I swear they’re not my thing, but does Walker-Browne Amalgamated Humor Industries LLC have any standards for their depictions of feet or does some middle manager just rubber stamp them as “good enough”? Hi’s naked toes last week were gross but serviceable as human appendages. Sarge’s grotesque tootsies today would send a shudder of revulsion down the spines of even the least discerning readers of (*sigh* I can’t believe I’m referencing this twice in two weeks) Wikifeet.
Dustin: Ripped from the headlines of 1966.
SFx: We can only marvel at the many bizarre and labyrinthine ways Count Weirdly consistently screws up.
MW: Meanwhile back in a clinic exam room, Ed tenderly nuzzles an angora ferret and coos, “Who’s a good girl, huh? Oh yes, who’s a good girl? Now just relax and enjoy this.”
H&L: In keeping with the zeitgeist of this strip, one of the characters must always and must immediately douse any type of good feeling exhibited by another character.
MW – Sobbing while driving is illegal in this state, ma’am. License, registration, proof of insurance.
@27 Fathom Haunt: on Mary Worth: Take a look at the mashup in comment #1.
BB – As weird and gross as Sarge’s toes are, I’m more weirded out by that giant arm reaching out of his stomach.
MW: “At least Wilbur never prioritized his job! He never really had one! Sob!”
Rex Morgan: My Mom’s finger locks up sometimes, it just goes away on its own. No need for splints, no need for surgery.
@astroboy: Don’t make Sarge hungry. You wouldn’t like him when he’s hungry.
Twenty years ago this might have worked. “You mean there is more than one Declan in the world?” The name is pretty common now. But I agree with you – Neddy’s dumb enough to have done that.
BB Those toes will be amputated soon enough.
I’ll bet you often refer to that place in an airplane where the driver sits, too.
Now, how do you gracefully weave “cock ring” into your training?
Pluggers: Wait, no biscuits, grits, or hash browns? Who knew Pluggers had been eating low-carb for decades?
My only hope to attend the parade is the 69 award
RMMD – If that’s his trigger finger, then I really want to see him fire a gun.
@jroggs: Apparently in Brooke’s world, the high brow fine art crowd regularly use words from the 1830’s that the plebes would not understand.
Rex Morgan: Phew! That was close, something almost happened. Now back to our regularly scheduled middle aged people rambling back and forth aimlessly.
Crank: “Burn the witch!”
BB: Cookie’s arm hair does kind of look like epaulettes, so it’s not surprising Beetle assumes he can pull rank.
RMMD: The “Truck Tyler’s occupational injury” storyline is exactly as exciting as I thought it would be.
RMMD. Of course the splint will work. Nothing, not the march of time nor the infirmities of old age, will stop Roots Country from assuming its rightful place as the dominant cultural force, first of this comic strip and then, the entire world.
@taig: 9CL: Brooke has confused his characters, but it’s accidentally fitting that Edda would know exactly what never-gay Seth said about her.
I, for one, think it’s nice that the kids finally got to hear from their dad how he met their mother.
FC-Some large men are going to break Daddy’s kneecaps if the Home Team doesn’t win.
MW-“Breaking up with Ed at his work” It’s Estelle’s work too. She supposedly works there as well unless she quit.
Beetle Bailey-No matter the formal rank structure when it comes to the kitchen the chef outranks everyone.
@Gate keeper: Be sure and watch this:
Austin Hedges milestone home run
Gate keeper – The spot is coming up. Don’t miss it.
Sex bait
@Where’s Rocky?: That is true. It’s kind of sweet, if you don’t think about it too much.
@Liam: #66 Her Tuesday shift is going to be AWKWARD!
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: That was great.
@Bob Tice:
“Stick to roots country.”
“I dunno, you never heard Leonard Cohen sing “Muddy Boots”. . .
JP: I think I’ve got it now. Neddy’s fiancé murdered the *real* Declan and assumed his identity. He made up the whole crime and prison story to explain being estranged from his family. Still undetermined is how he came to be at Ronnie and Kat’s wedding. I’ll have to work on that some more. Would “wedding crasher” be too contrived?
@taig:
It’s kind of sweet, if you don’t think about it too much.
Aw, what’s NOT sweet about how Edda demands near-constant worshipful admiration from Amos, but she herself NEVER found him sexually attractive, and she constantly fantasized about being with Seth instead, up to the moment just after her twins were born?
@Calvin’s Cardboard Box:
Mark’s gonna be pissed. Not that we’ll ever see him again.
As much as I admire Kubrick’s work, the first half of Full Metal Refrigerator, which focuses on the destructive nature of military indoctrination and the horrors of mess hall food services, is much stronger than the second half, in which the boys of Camp Swampy get fed into the meat grinder of Hue. It’s hard to forget the moment that Sarge enters the kitchen, sees Beetle with a rifle, and bellows “Why is Private Bailey out of his bunk after lights-out?! Why is Private Bailey holding that weapon?! Why isn’t you Private Bailey cooking me a midnight snack?!”
C’shaft: I’m baffled by the graffiti artist, who apparently has been toting around a gallon of Sherman-Williams long-lasting semi-gloss and a brush so he can carefully paint a “no” symbol on Lillian’s store sign. Was he having a hard time finding someone at Lowe’s to unlock the spray paint cabinet for him? Many comic strips are stupid, but few have such bone-deep stupidity even in its smallest details like this one does.
Dustin: “Are you telling me the preppies have gangs now?” Yes, they’re called the Proud Boys.
GT: I dunno, seems like GIl is doing all right for someone who’s just suffered a cardiac event severe enough to require the use of defibrillator. No oxygen, no machines, not even an IV. Beth is sitting vigil, but the kids aren’t anywhere to be seen so he must not be in any immediate danger. He’s just resting peacefully, calmly flipping off the Grim Reaper.
Luann: Yes, and if there’s one thing we know about men it’s that they always take a woman’s professed lack of interest in them at face value and never, never attempt to force the issue in any way shape or form.
MW: Estelle’s just waiting until she gets home to rant out loud to her pets. Until then, she’ll have to settle for shouting “SOB!” in her head.
Phantom: No, it came to false conclusions cobbled together from hastily assembled data and churned out clumsy results until it collapsed into irrelevance. Pretty much your typical AI program.
9CL: Seth may be the twinsies’ father, but they didn’t inherit his massive biceps and pectorals.
Mara Llave, Keeper of Yesterday “Revolution” my ass. Dad pants, Dad jacket, Dad mustache— you’re Dad.
Luann – Les rawdogging Nancy DeGroot. Can’t wait.
“Your fingers…” Truck thought, “Yes… your slender, beautiful, younger, WORKING fingers… and Dr. Rex doesn’t ask questions because he wants to be rid of you as quickly as possible… yes, Your fingers would solve my problem nicely.”
Beetle Bailey – I stick by a theory I recently posited that Camp Swampy is a big psychological experiment by the Army to test the boundaries of soldiers under duress from poor leadership. Can a cook order a private to guard the food specifically against his immediate commanding officer? The results will be studied in a dark room of the Pentagon, and the findings will inform future tests.
Rex Morgan, MD – Wanda is really crossing her fingers to prevent herself from doing air quotes to indicate her sarcastic support for Truck’s well-being. There are lawyers to the passive-aggressive sass in this strip