You don’t want to know what a pain it is to get that giant button through the hole
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Shoe, 9/27/24
I guess if all you want to get out of the daily comics is to briefly linger on each little joke and then move on to the next one, you might be satisfied with today’s Shoe, where they spin up “disagree with” as a metaphor for indigestion into a matter of geopolitical importance. But me? The Comics Curmudgeon? The guy who’s blogged about comic strips for decades? I hopefully do not have to explain that I am the kind of person who wants more than that, and after lingering on this joke slightly longer than most would, I have decided I do not care for it. I think it’s the “not only” at the beginning of the first word balloon, which implies that that the second half of this sentence is going to be something new, rather than just an extension of the metaphor. Plus it invites you to contemplate how the peppers got there, suggesting the “ramming [X] down my throat” formulation that is one of the least pleasant phrases in political discourse. So, sorry, Shoe, I’m not on board today. Do better.
Blondie, 9/27/24
Easy for you to say, Dagwood: unlike your wife, who only puts on her formal clothes before a big date night with you, you go through the trouble of putting on your elaborate tuxedo in the morning, before leaving for the office, a place where you wear a tuxedo, for some reason! I guess making your carpool wait for you is preferable to making your spouse wait for you, in terms of keeping the marital peace.
111 replies to “You don’t want to know what a pain it is to get that giant button through the hole”
RMMD:
“So I’m not stuck with this forever.”
“Well, no. Eventually, you’ll pass away.”
MW:
“For someone like Ed to lack remorse makes me lachrymose. So to speak.”
FC: Bil pauses as he enters the yard and wonders who blasted their fig tree.
Welp, Hurricane Helene decided to knock out my power so I’ll be very sporadic today.
Blondie: Like hell does Blondie take longer than Dagwood to get ready. I would say it’s because of her hair but like her sparsely haired husband, she’s been rocking that style for a century now. At this point it’s probably cemented to her head.
MW: Estelle, you moron, you’re missing a prime opportunity to get back at Ed for not showing up to your dinner. It’s not like you’re actually an employee or even care about the animals so you wouldn’t be fired for not showing up. Then again, you can’t expect much from someone who walks their cat outside on a leash as if she needs to go to the bathroom outside just like a dog.
MW:
See, Sheila See saw what she couldn’t see, so now she’s riding a seesaw of emotions.
H&L: Before you deride this strip as having the lamest joke on the funny pages today, please consider that Ditto is saying this because he’s drunk. He’s certainly is drawn that way. A drunken Ditto making lame puns probably right before upchucking on Chip’s guitar is quite humorous, in a curmudgeonly sort of way.
You know what would be fun? A crossover, in which Estelle and Ed get marital advice from Edda and Amos.
Blondie : This old trope.
Look, Dagwood qualifies as “ugly” because of those hair antennae, that weird flesh pocket around his neck, and his legs that bend inexplicably BELOW the knee*************
Crankshaft : …we didn’t need the ENTIRE flashback for this. Heck, Crankshaft should have answered it like this right away ;
Lillian : You’ve been awfully quiet, Crankshaft.
Crankshaft : I was just thinking… I’ve been illiterate nearly my whole life… Only learned to read a few years* ago… Missed out on so much because I couldn’t read… SO I’M NOT GONNA TAKE IT WHEN SOMEONE TELLS ME I CAN’T READ SOMETHING!
*Sliding timescale.
************
Luann : …Tiffany already knew this. She already knew this because she exploited Les’ feelings towards her so she could prolong her convalescence when she broke her arm (because she was afraid of returning to the ‘Manse’). She already knew this because she had developped RECIPROCAL feelings towards him when she met him when Gunther took her to meet Irma and Mr Gray.
…SO WHY IS SHE GETTING THE VAPORS AT THIS “HOT GOSSIP” (“A CRUSH”!? WHAT ARE THEY *TWELVE*!?) WHEN IT’S SOMETHING SHE ALREADY KNOWS!? AND HAS TAKEN ADVANTAGE OF BEFORE!?
*************
Shoe : Birds are immune to capsaicin.
Mary Worth: Dr. Ed’s wants to get married to you, Estelle. The Busby Berkeley-esque wedding extravaganza is what’s killing his buzz.
Pluggers: You’re a plugger if by the end of the vacation you have to use the wide angle lens to fit your carb-bloated body into selfies.
@Baja Gaijin: The way Estelle is acting, she thinks that she only has a week to plan the entire thing. Weddings take far longer than that and what she wants (an animal themed costume ball because she hasn’t emotionally matured past the age of eight) would probably take a year at best.
Shoe: I like how the Perfesser bows his head as if he’s really traumatized by it. “It was terrible: gastric explosions everywhere, innocent meat and vegetables fleeing to the colon, kernels of corn separated from their cob…”
Blondie manages to keep things fresh by taking an old, worn out premise and, uh, removing any kind of punchline? I think that’s what happened here?
Chix (sic): “I’m worthy of love.” Not the worst come-on I’ve heard as she stares into her friend’s eyes.
Mary Worth shatters my suspension of disbelief by reminding me that Ed was held up by a crisis at work and Estelle works there too. In Mary Worth Gaiden Ed is fuming about how Estelle is at the engagement dinner instead of helping with the damn puppies.
Cranky Funkershaft: Uh, Ed? No one was telling YOU what you can and can’t read. This was supposed to be about Les’ student’s. I wouldn’t expect you to know that though, since you’ve only taken any sort of role in this little caper in the past week. (Seriously, where’s Les? Did no one think to call the person who’s singularly repsonsible for all this? Did he sleep right through this “shocking” turn of events?)
JP: ‘Yes, Declan’s father is taking a nap…’ [mutters] ‘a dirt nap….’
SF: Inviting herself and her insane family to spend two holidays with a relative who’s just set herself up with a small business that’s likely to be heavily patronized during said holidays, and is going to be stressed out the whole time? This is our protagonist, ladies and gentlemen. This is ‘Luann’ levels of Inner Beauty we’re seeing here.
MT: So Jules has picked part Dick Tracy (alliterative named villain), part Luann (create new villain when old villain is too good to be a foil), and part Judge Parker (plot point out of nowhere). Now, where and when did we see that the Society was owned?
@The Quiet Man, SF: Jackie will probably have her go-to pop-up assistant do all the work. And Jackie is used to a Holiday Rush when two people come to the store on consecutive weeks.
FC-Good grief!
Blondie-Well Blondie is catering the event after all. Can’t have an event of any kind without food.
CS: Cranky Ed: “Nobody’s going to tell me what to read and what not to read!” Also, Cranky Ed: “This book is garbage! Who could read such crap?!”
DT: The anticipated trap is sprung, but I was expecting Diet, Mysta, and the rest of the security team, not Dick Tracy who is supposed to be investigating the brewing race war in the city. For him to be here at all is straight-up narrative cheating, and it’s not even in service of something interesting. Mysta is the one who has unresolved business with Ro-Zan and has the powers to be evenly matched with him. Meanwhile, Dick has already defeated Ro-Zan with his bullshit plot armor and has now magically intuited himself to this location to do so again. It’s so boring.
JP: As a reminder, Neddy has read a very recent full CIA background-check dossier on Declan and his family, so she should already know if Declandad is dead or divorced from Declanmom or in prison or something similar. Then again, the full investigative powers of the US government apparently uncovered nothing about the big embezzling scandal that Declan’s family was at the center of, so really nothing is off the table.
MW: It sure was nice of Mr. Al(l)ora to install light poles on the Path of Platitudes just for Estelle’s walk tonight. Enjoy them to the fullest, because they’ve never appeared before and they’ll almost definitely be disappearing from the future ambulatory anguish affairs of the Charterstone chumps.
Luann: You can age the Luann cast out of middle school, but you can’t age the middle school out of the Luann cast.
MW: Estelle passes the humping land clams as she sobs bitterly, blindly following the path around a curve to discover Dr. Ed canoodling with his client, Ms. Fitz, on a park bench.
Speaking of the WHOLE flashback of the “Crankshaft missed out on becoming a star pro baseball player because he didn’t know how to read” :
Part One: I like how Skip Rawlings decides to write a fawning hagiography about the raging old asshole who karened into the Centerville Sentinel’s office because his newspaper got wet when HE watered his lawn (breaking a watering ban!)
Part Two: …is it just me, or does Beanball Bushka’s design look more like a younger Crankshaft than the character that’s meant to be a younger Crankshaft?
Part Three: Crankshaft bitterly reminisces on how he missed out on his one big opportunity because he NEVER learned how to read, and promises to himself that even in his advanced age, no matter how long it will take for him to learn how to read, he WILL do it, spurred on by having read an article in the newspaper about what could have been had he-
Wait. Crankshaft got the idea of learning how to read… by reading an article in the newspaper. He read it in the newspaper… BEFORE he learned how to read.
Shoes Off! — I guess getting the word “cleansing” in the second panel was inevitably going to be a little controversial . .
MW: We have a couple of people who walk their cats in my neighborhood here in Chicago and one lady who walks her ferrets. In no way am I actually trying to normalize this, to be perfectly clear, just saying that yeah, these people do exist.
They’re all complaining about someone named Ed too, which is the really weird part…
Ohhhh, Dagwood’s looking at his watch in panel 1, and – as I first thought – not checking out his wife’s ass. (In panel 2, he is absolutely 100% checking out her tits, though)
Crap, crap, crap. I overslept this morning and don’t have time to make a proper joke. Fortunately, so did the writing team at Shoe, it seems.
MW: Estelle, if you want Ed to care about you, grow a tail and walk on all fours.
CS: Ed settles in with his book. “It was a pleasure to burn,” goes the opening line. “Oh yessss,” Ed moans. “Oh God yessss!”
Now I’m really curious about just how long it takes for Dagwood to do whatever is going on with his hair.
SlylickFox and Comix For Kinx: Today’s artist did a great job on that drawing of John Belushi, no snark.
CS – “Sure, I’m still an asshole, but at least I’m an asshole who’s against totalitarianism.”
Shoe: For her part, Roz has skipped the peppers and gone straight to magic mushrooms, the only way she can deal with the Perfesser on a regular basis.
Six Chix: Tuesday Chik is mad that another Chik is stealing her “I’m all depressed” shtick and isn’t even employing the whimsy of giant bread-based foodstuffs.
GT: So what we have this week is a random assortment of Rod Whigham’s Greatest Drawings? I guess? Anybody?
Blondie: Dag’s also sporting his finest Army belt buckle.
9CL – It’s good to see this strip rediscover its roots with “everyone sits around discussing how hot Edda is”
FG: Bones Malone! What an amazing coincidence.
Really, you two should just fuck already.
Shoe – Perfesser undersold this joke. “Severe border dispute” sounds like something the UN is hearing about in arbitration. Go all the way into the gross body humor (We’re engaged in mutually ASSured destruction!).
Blondie – It’s already established that Dagwood and Blondie are still horny for each other after years of marriage. Unlike other comic strips like Shoe, who use clip-art, heavy lidded looks to the audience, and various off-panel substances to get by, these two have decided to use a rather bland “Women take forever to be ready” premise as a way to show off Blondie’s hot bod.
Will this dabbling in exhibitionism lead to the strip challenging 9 Chickweed Lane for horniest newspaper comic? Is it aiming to move from the collapsing newspaper industry into a smart TV-MA send-up of family comics and their tropes? Are they simply hoping a horny fan-art and fan-fic community springs up to keep the property alive and relevant? Who knows, but The Lockhorns are eyeing this warily, because their syndicate may decide they need to throw about their mutual spite and pretend to like each other.
Frazz is good today. (Checks window for flying pigs)
JP: ”Mr. Declandad will not be joining us because he’s serving twenty years in San Quentin for a murder he never committed. Tell your fascinating hot friend to come in, too.”
Shoe: “We have always been at war with Capsaicin.”
Blondie: “Just like a slow-roasted beef brisket.”
“I’m worth the wait?” Sorry Blondie, there’s only space for one worth in the comics page and that’s Mary Worth
(Reading post title then first comic) Josh, NO (continuing on to second comic) oh
9CL: As always, Amos has nothing to say about whether Edda was a talented or a dedicated dancer. All he remembers was that she looked hot.
Frazz: Frazz is a walking A-Bomb flash.
Luann: OMGee!
CS: I’m going to say something nice, here: At least this wasn’t a week of Les Moore bloviating about book banning.
Blondie – I’m frankly just impressed that is isn’t frequently falling over, disproportionately top heavy, as she is.
“So there’s this guy, see, who always wears the same clothes with one big button in the middle. No one ever sees him without it. Even his wife! He tells her, he tells people, you can never unfasten this button. And she wonders. She lies awake next to him at night, looking at the button, touching the button, obsessing about the button. One dark night, as he’s asleep in a sandwich coma – what? oh, he likes sandwiches, really big ones, and they put him to sleep, like a snake, look, that’s really not critical to the story and . . . well, I thought it added color . . . fine, she undoes the button and his clothes and skin slough off into a heap revealing a welter of undigested food around a black hungry maw that never stops chewing, happy? You ruined it. Fuck off.”
MW: I’d still take this over a week of Les Moore bloviating about book banning.
Zits: Et tu, Pierce?
FC: That was an impressive throw, if Jeffy got the plane into the tree from his front door. I’d suggest he try out for baseball, but, alas, his illiteracy will keep him from stardom.
Don Abundio, translated:
“Oh! Another article about illegal spearfishing!”
“I don’t see what the big deal is about killing a few fish”
“All right! Here’s a big ugly one!”
@Ukulele Ike:
Frazz did a rare comic where it’s about something actually relatable and one of the two insufferable leads as the butt of the joke, instead of smugly mugging to the audience of fans about their shared sense of superiority over other people
RIP Dame Maggie Smith.
LUANN: “OHMIGOD! The guy who’s been sexually harassing me all throughout high school has ‘a crush’* on me! Les, the guy who’s feeling I took advantage of for a prolonged stay at his house while injured, has ‘a crush’* on me? Can you imagine?!? The guy who is just usually so subtle and shy about speaking his mind? Anyway don’t spread it around, because a random guy having ‘a crush’* on me is totally something college kids would care about!”
*This most assuredly isn’t the term Les used, but this is a “family paper” featuring people who are 20-going-on-12, so…um…yeah let’s go with “crush”.
@Philip: “Lucky for me, the dad from Dustin has that covered, so I don’t have to do it this time.”
CS: At this point, I want to see Ed Crankshaft, Lillian, Les Moore, and Dinkle get into a fistfight for control of the story. Complete with Batman-style sound effects. “No, this story is about my illiteracy!” (kaboom!) “No, it’s about my brave decision to keep running my unlicensed bookstore despite suffering a tiny brush fire!” (smack!) “No, it’s because Lisa died!” (punch!) “No, it’s about my 11-volume autobiography!” (pow!)
@Anonymous: Does the Ugly Guy Hot Wife trope apply in a comics world where absolutely no recurring guy is drawn as attractive?
I do appreciate how the two of them dress up for date night about once a week, and pretty well dressed up (at least compared to my wife and I). I will chalk that up to their stylized appearances not really having changed for some nine decades, but it works for the Blondieverse.
@Weaselboy: Normally I’m all about the Even Evil Has Standards trope–one of the best iterations is in Rocketeer, where the gangsters join the feds in shooting at Nazis and everyone has a “huh, weird” moment before going back at it. Leave it to Tom Batiuk to ruin for me.
@TheDiva: Joker also has his limits when it comes to Nazis, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this is a riff from “The Rocketeer”.
Prayers/good vibes/whatever works best for you to southeastern US Mudges. Hunker down, stay dry and stay safe!
Blondie: Women, amirite? They take FOREVER to get ready! It’s as if they’re held to a much higher standard of personal appearance than men and are inundated with messages that tell them their value is directly correlated to that appearance, so they spend a lot of extra time and money trying to live up to that impossible standard! What’s up with that?
Bacön: It’s a meal… with a horse… who can’t hold his utensils… because he has hooves… so you have to hold them for him…
Aw, screw it.
GIL THORP: In the words of the late Gary Coleman: “What’chu talking about, narration box?”
I mean Gil has been parading around Beth as a young hot trophy (Thorp-y?) ever since they hooked up. He couldn’t wait to show her off to his ex-wife all “see, what I’m banging?” When has Gil ever worried about “what other people think?”
BLONDIE: Dagwood: “Ugh! It takes so long to get ready when you have more than two outfits!”
love is… trying to figure out how to screw in a love seat.
Shoe – What does RMMD have for an itchy asshole – I’m asking for a friend….
Blondie – Ya got that right!
Adios Amigos, DJ.
@Bob Tice: #2
OMG – that earned a gold star!!!!
@Bob Tice: #5
…okay…that one made me dizzy…
Blondie – I can’t tell if Dagwood is checking out his wife’s boobs or her twat in the third panel. Either way, these two won’t be going out anytime soon.
The Family Circus Spanish to English.
REX MORGAN M.D.: “So I’m not stuck with this forever?”
Truck, wakeup! You’re in the low-stakes world of Rex Morgan M.D. You won’t even be “stuck with this” beyond Saturday. (Don’t worry, this won’t stop The Morgan’s from bilking your insurance for multiple visits though,)
C’shaft: “Let’s see, who should be my viewpoint characters for my soon-to-be award-winning story on banned books, a subject that most directly affects public school students and their parents?….I know! The two oldest, most decrepit characters in the strip, one of whom has never had children and the other who actively works to make children miserable! Oh, I can just taste that Pulitzer!” ~Tom Batiuk, apparently
DT: So the technologically advanced genocidal alien is a mere patsy in all of this? Man, and he wasted all that “obviously evil” cred for nothing!
Dustin: This must be an early strip; Dustdad actually gave a compliment.
GT: I’m not a certified pilot or anything, but I’m pretty sure that the FAA looks poorly on just climbing into a plane, asking your girlfriend “okay, where to?” and flying off based on her answer. It’s not your Corolla and you’re not trying to decide on whether you want to do Chili’s or Old Chicago for dinner.
JP: Dead? In prison? Died in prison, maybe?
Luann: “Giggling,” is that what the kids these days are calling it?
MT:</b. The angry Karen with a goofy hat has been semi-redeemed, so now we need to bring in an older, angrier Karen with an even goofier hat to do her job!
MW: “Woof!”: “She’s been going on like this for hours! Can’t she just pick up the phone and talk to him now?”
“Meow!”: “I know, right? I’d scratch her but I’m trying to get some extra treats out of this…”
@Little Guy: Nice! Thanks for the link! Punching Nazis is high up on the List of Things I Enjoy.
@TheDiva: Is this scene in Rocketeer the movie or the graphic novel? I could dig out the book, which I haven’t read in years, but I’d rent the film to watch that.
@2+2=7 re: GT: “Honey, where do you want to go?”
”To the Land of Younger Men Who Are Better Than You in the Sack. Thanks for asking.”
I see the Seattle Times has added their NEW! annotation to Legend of Bill and Mara Llave, thank for for the clarification. And what’s the deal with this Willy Black, also NEW!? A strip about a weird cartoonist that looks like a mash-up of Charles Addams, Gahan Wilson, and Edward Gorey? I will read the HELL out of that. Anybody here been following it? Opinions?
@Little Guy: Depends on the writer. Joker has made at least one notable exception.
Warning: That link goes to a simple Batman wiki, but the character in question is very “unsubtle” in all of her depictions, so unless your workplace approves of big Nazi titties, consider that link extremely NSFW.
Birds really can’t control their… bodily waste emissions… so I guess he’s warning Roz that she’s going to be working overtime tonight shoveling a massive amount of his poop off the floor which is a disgusting thought and not really a joke at all unless you happen to write and draw the Marvin comic strip.
Crankshaft – An interminable, ham fisted take on banning books, and now he’s dragging out his greatest hits. Forget the Pulitzer – Batiuk’s aiming for the Nobel Prize in literature.
Far Side – I’ll never see centaurs without being reminded of that Oglaf.
Sherman’s Lagoon – I love the turtles dancing in the background.
Pluggers – Pudding? Really? It would more likely be an ice cream bar with syrups and other toppings. And an ice cream machine with questionable sanitation.
@TheDiva, MT: When Mme. Vex is semi-redeemed, I suspect we’ll be introduced to the oldest, angriest Karen, who owns the Lost Forest itself and will turn it into a parking lot the size of Westview.
Pluggers: Pluggers plan their vacations by how many Golden Corrals there are where they’re going.
Earl, if you’re ever passing through Rosenberg, Texas there’s one right on the Highway 59 feeder road between the DMV office and the Discount Tire store.
@OId Man Shadow: Ah, but birds also can’t taste capsaicin, so it would have no effect on his digestion. He’s just making a light-hearted joike. Check and mate. Do not question Shoe on matters of avian biology!
@2+2=7: LUANN: Excuse me, but in this strip it’s “OHMIGAW.”
Greg will show a towel visibly dripping with sexual fluids but he won’t let his characters say the word God.
9CL: I suppose this is why Brooke won’t let Edda age: once her looks fade she won’t have any redeeming qualities left at all. Even her grandmother had some wit at least. Speaking of which, considering we haven’t seen her in years, is Gran even still alive in the strip? Not merely in the “hey the twins are old enough to objectify now” arcs, but the so-called present-day arcs where the twins are still creepy toddlers. Has Gran even been seen since Amos and Edda’s wedding?
You’d think the passing of one of the strip’s original primary characters might warrant a mention.
Blondie: Dagwood smiles in presumed agreement, showing at least elementary survival skills.
Shoe: Nice to know that some guy will soon have evidence of the Perfesser’s internal dispute on his car, if he’s lucky.
@TheDiva: CS: I’ll bet next week features Les teaching his class. The pomposity will be off the charts.
@2+2=7: Luann: The authors really had no idea what to do with their characters when they aged them out of junior high.
@Tom T.: Or back to Montoni’s for Batton Thomas’ “interview”, so can weigh in on the book-burning. Every other character is trying to make the story about themselves, and it feels like his turn.
9CL: Every glimpse at the Burber-Van Hoesen home life reads like the backstory of a pair of notorious identical twin serial killers. The fact that they’re still dressing alike in their teens may be a warning sign too.
C-Shaft: In the Taking a Stand department Crankshaft is going to pretend to read a book while Lillian leaves her shops stairs as a deathtrap because symbolism.
DT: Ro-Zan inadvertently infiltrated Smith Industries’ gag gifts division. “This gun just makes a flatulent sound? I don’t see the point.”
Dustin: Boy will Dustin be flabbergasted when the ex-girlfriend retains his dad as counsel in her intellectual property theft suit.
GT: Yesterday brought a kind of chuckleheaded excitement as Gil’s assistant coach, distracted by talking about Gil’s love life, almost got flattened by one player or another. And I bet you’d never guess in a million years that Barajas and Whigham would cut to…whatever this is.
JP: Mr. Declan’s Dad is out being professionally mummified, then?
RMMD: “We’re sure that your problem will clear up before too long. Unless, of course, the writer really wants to milk the subject, and what are the odds of that happening?”
Ziggy: Assuming this is supposed to be a Warhol, Ziggy is a lot closer to the artist’s intent than is Professor Elbow Patches.
@Ukulele Ike: #66: Never read the graphic novel but the Feds and gangsters teaming up to fight Nazis is in the movie. The battle scene was filmed at the often used Griffith Observatory.
FC: Jeffy, I knew Charlie Brown. I read Charlie Brown. Charlie Brown was one of the first comic strip characters I discovered. Jeffy, you’re no Charlie Brown.
GT: Regardless of what other people think, Gil is going to try and make peace with the fact he didn’t shove Emmet out of the way fast enough, and his assistant coach was trampled to death by a member of their own team.
Look, if Bajaras isn’t ever going to follow through on anything, I assume that gives us carte blanche to make up our own conclusions.
Heath: I am so disturbed by how calm these puffins are. “Welp, that’s Heathcliff abseiling down to kill and eat us. We always knew this day would come.”
JP: Decdad has seen Nothing I’ve Done Can Possibly Be Bad Because I’m a Main Character: The April Bower Story, and as soon as Decmom told him Neddy Driver-Spencer was coming to visit, he said “Oh, hell, no!” and went to a bar.
@Cleveland Mocks:
Don’t give Moy any ideas for future Wilbur daydreams!
Tomorrow in Mary Worth: “WOOF!” “MEOW!”
@Sequitur: Aw, now you’ve ruined the surprise.
MW, panel 2 – Looks like Brigman’s been studying those Roy Lichtenstein panels.
FG: Called it two days ago. Flash wouldn’t go to the shitty part of town unless he was looking for his old partner in crime Bones Mallock. I’ll attempt another prediction. Since Tradetown’s economy seems to be barter based, to get whatever favor he needs from Bones he’ll have to give her his Powerman multiplex Swiss Army all purpose tool and stun gun.
@Artist formerly known as Ben: DT: Ro-Zan inadvertently infiltrated Smith Industries’ gag gifts division. “This gun just makes a flatulent sound? I don’t see the point.”
______________________________________________
Flatulent sounds always have a point.
@I speak Jive: Hey, I thought you would be pleased. Now you may fantasize about centaur sex without the “getting torn in half” part.
@I speak Jive: Yeah, “unlimited pudding bar” struck me as weird, also. “First bowl is VANILLA, then CHOCOLATE, then BANANA, then TAPIOCA….” Who over the age of seven would be so excited about pudding?
@Bryan: Gran is living happily in Vienna with her Nazi Officer. He died ten years back, but she had him embalmed and keeps him in the nuptial bed. After the sex, she goes out to her favorite weinstube for leberknodelsuppe und schnitzel.… and a slab of Sachertorte.
@Guillermo el chiclero: Thanks! Will stream tonight. I’ve always wanted to see it, anyway. Does it include the cameos from a couple of Doc Savage’s henchmen, which was my favorite part of the book? (Read it, it’s GOOD)
We beg to disagree. Mr. Bumstead is merely wearing a black suit with a red bow tie, not a tuxedo. On the occasions where he does wear a tuxedo it is clearly different from his normal attire. In spite of his middlebrow sensibilities Mr. Bumstead does come from Society and he would never even dream of wearing a red tie with a tuxedo. It is just not done.
On the other hand, we are shocked that Mrs. Bumstead, who is normally the best-dressed woman in all of comicdom, would wear white shoes with that lovely red dress (which is not formal by the way), especially after Labor Day.
@Horace Broon: Unlike penguins, puffins can fly. Also their beaks are lined with sharp spines that make it easier to carry fish. Whether they go with the fight response or the flight one, they’re going to come out of it better than Heathcliff.
@Fashion Police: Good to see you again!
In youth, I attended dozens of banquets with the Mystery Writers of America, black tie affairs. Lawrence Block, one of the wittiest of the crew, often showed up in amusing alternates, including red bow ties and dressing as a Catholic priest.
Mrs. Bumstead is dressed appropriately for one of their date nights, which is usually a fancy restaurant with a “funny” waiter. I agree that the shoes are no good.
@Ukulele Ike: I like Willy Black, who’s an amiable sort despite being vampirish. (He also sunbathes, with no apparent risk to his person.) He’s also a cartoonist, according to the web site, and finally scored with Palurdeando, which is a real daily strip on Comics Kingdom. The Willy Black drawings are good and sometimes, like last Sunday showing many levels and rooms of the house, are large and complex. His wife and daughter live with him, along with all sorts of weird and oddball uh, creatures. The strip is in the mold of The Addams Family, where odd, dark and creepy things are the norm.
Large greenish aliens with eyes on stalks seem to the new thing, at least according to today’s Alice and Bliss.
Couple days ago it was suggested Dennis the Menace might consider updating his clothing styles. It could benefit Margaret, too.
Blondie: Yup.
@Dr. Pill: Muchas gracias!
Luann: Okay. I guess we do get to know Les’s dirty little secret. He tells his cat he wants Tiffany, while he plays video games. How does that happen? Les: “Punk, I want Tiffany soooo bad.” Punk: “Mee-meow?”
Ah! The yearly reminder strip that lets us know that Blondie is STACKED! Holy cow.
Blondie: “… and you’re not!”
Late Thread Mary Worth Mashup: It’s pretty much what you expect.
@Baja Gaijin: Mashup – I fear that it’s headed that direction.
@Ukulele Ike: Thank you so much for your comments.
In our view, the tuxedo is like the Model T Ford: it may be any color the customer desires as long as it’s black. That includes the obligatory bow tie (a four-in-hand tie with a tuxedo is no more than an admission that the wearer is unable to properly tie a bow tie). Allowable amusing alternatives include pleat-front or subtly ruffled shirts, white of course, or a satin waistcoat instead of a cummerbund. All else is prom wear. While one may justifiably look down one’s nose at prom wear, one must concede that, however improperly, it has carved a place in the modern way of doing things. One hastens to point out, however, that every man looks dashing in a tuxedo but hardly anyone looks like anything but a pimply teenager in prom wear.
Your colleague Mr. Block may enjoy amusing alternatives to classic evening dress (and remember that at one time the tuxedo, or dinner suit, was the casual alternative; truly formal occasions called for white tie and tails) but he is missing the point, which is not to stand out but to express a certain sophistication.
Now that the era of the stiff shirt front is thankfully many decades in the past, we find the tuxedo to be excellent habiliment for an evening on the town. No need to wait for the engraved invitation to the $300-a-plate chicken breast with cranberry vinaigrette.
In fact, Mrs. Bumstead would be most appreciative if he were to make the extra effort to complement her absolutely smashing dress, which, although it is not “formal” per se it is certainly stylish and sophisticated enough to warrant his paying attention. She didn’t pick it up on sale at Tudbury’s As she so rightly says, she’s worth it.
And we have no doubt that before she gets to the door she will realized the shoes are wrong. Perhaps something in a coppery bronze.
@Ukulele Ike: Mystifyed again about censure of comment #86. Was it “centaur sex?” “Leberknodelsuppe?”
@Fashion Police: I agree with you completely. I’ve worn a tuxedo perhaps three times in my life, once to a high school Senior Prom (powder blue, forgive me, it was 1997) and twice to the MWA banquet. Other times I wore a somber suit with a sedate necktie and shiny black shoes.
Forgive Larry Block. Not only is he an award-winning writer (and the recipient of the Grand Master of the MWA) but an ex-beatnik who attended the renaming of West Fourth Street in Greenwich Village to “Dave Van Ronk Way,” after his old folkie musician buddy. So he gets to be as eccentric as he likes.
And I’ve always considered the tuxedo to be the bourgeois alternative to classic white tie and tails, as you say. Fuck da tux.
@100 Ukulele Ike: “MWA banquet.” The “Mary Worth Assholes Banquet”?
@Ukulele Ike: #89: Dag’s shoes are definitely shabby looking compared to the rest of his ensemble. I remember an old Dick Tracy Crimestopper’s Textbook entry that pointed out one thing that gives away a lot of con artists trying to pass as rich are shabby, well-worn shoes. It’s a fashion element a lot of men overlook.
FG: If it isn’t Flash %#@*!# Gordon! You’re not related to Gil %#@*!# Thorp by chance?
@TheDiva: Lighten up, Butter Britches. It’s a stupid legacy comic. Women have long since overthrown the patriarchy and their higher beauty standards. Don’t believe me? Just go to Walmart. DSOB.
Blondie, 9/27/24: WHAT? NO CAMEL TOE?
@Baja Gaijin: Yeah, it was an honor to introduce the drunk babe who turned up at the last wedding.
(The Mystery Writers of America, you complete boob. Scroll back)
(Oh god. I apologize. Don’t leave me off your list of funny comments next Friday, I just had a BAD dental appointment and I might commit suicide)
@Guillermo el chiclero: Don’t tell Fashion Police, but I currently own two pairs of wearable shoes. One for the summer, and one that can deal with ice and snow. Plus a new pair of Birkenstocks for house slippers and an old pair for neighborhood errands. If I go to the Metropolitan Opera I wear nice clothes and hope nobody looks at my feet.
@Baja Gaijin: Hee hee.
@106 Ukulele Ike: As an old-time (or is that olde-time) editor, you should know you place the acronym you’ll use next to the first time it’s defined. Scroll up to see that rule broken. Don’t make me report you to SCHOOL MANAGEMENT!
@97 I speak Jive:
Ack! Wilbur! Someone I never want to see again! In fact, with the next Wilbur story I’ll be dropping Mary Worth.
But this little ditty was under your mashup.
@Ukulele Ike: Consider Mr. Block forgiven. Anyone who palled around with the Mayor of MacDougal Street in the olden days may be accorded a certain latitude.
I 100% guarantee you that the Shoe cartoonist’s joke was something to the effect of “border dispute with my asshole” but couldn’t figure out a newspaper-comic-appropriate way to say that.