Friday is for the elderly
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Mary Worth, 10/4/24
Look, Stell, you’re clearly a vibrant, attractive woman with an active romantic and sexual life. Nevertheless, you’re a woman of a certain age, with “certain” meaning “not young,” as evidenced by the fact that you fell for an extremely common elder scam not that long ago. There’s nothing wrong with being on the older side, of course, but it’s important to have some self-awareness and not try to deploy unfamiliar youth slang, OK? Take “ghosted,” for instance: this describes a situation where you’re seeing someone with various possible degrees of seriousness, or are at least gearing up to do so, but then they abruptly cut off contact with you and stop replying to your texts/emails/DMs/other communication attempts. It very much does not describe a situation where your fiance cancels on you for a social event at the last minute, but does so by sending you a text at the time explaining why he’s doing it. You used the word wrong and that’s just how it is! Mary doesn’t know any better, but the youth of today do, so please choose your words more carefully next time in case they overhear you. We would’ve allowed the use of “ghosting” in this context if Ed had died (for instance, by doing emergency surgery on a corgi while exhausted and accidentally slicing his femoral artery with the scalpel and bleeding out on the floor of his own clinic) and, desperate to still make the engagement dinner, he showed up as a ghost. That’s not the usual use of the term but I don’t think anyone would’ve given you trouble. But he didn’t do that either, he did the first thing I said (didn’t show up but explained why and then you saw him not long afterwards, which is also antithetical to the whole “ghosting” concept).
Dennis the Menace, 10/4/24
Ha ha, it’s funny because Mrs. Wilson is admitting the sad truth: she and George are just going through the motions, living but going no further, not experiencing the style and verve that make life worth living. It’s like it only took a few minutes of respite from Dennis’s low-key menacing for them to look the true existential menace square in the face.
71 replies to “Friday is for the elderly”
Mary Worth Mashups
MW:
“As a result, he doesn’t have a ghost of a chance with me, Mary. So to speak.”
DtM: “Not experiencing the style and verve that make life worth living”?
I don’t subject myself to legacy comics like many here, but:
Is this the most intimate physical contact we’ve ever seen the Wilsons have? It looks like more ‘verve’ than I’ve ever seen from them.
DtM: Why does good old Mr. Wilson use good old Mrs. Wilson’s rouge on his nose?
The pose tells us that Mr. Wilson just propositioned Mrs. Wilson. The dialogue tells us that he used the word “lifestyle.” Therefore the previous line was “I think we should adopt the swinging lifestyle.” This is a mathematical truth and there is nothing we can do about it.
RxMD: “What’s a cellphone?”
Mary is in full gaslighting mode! “But you do love each other!” Do they? Estelle is in love with the ideal of boyfriend, regardless of what Ed actually does or feels (so it’s the scammer all over again). Ed might fancy Estelle, but he is obviously unwilling to transfer any attention and time devoted to the animals to his fiancée — the concept of not being on call and asking someone else to cover him baffle and confuse him. They are a good match in the sense they are both self-centred narcissists, but, uhm, those do not make great couples.
MW: I won’t be happy unless Mary slaps that whiny liar upside the head and yells at her to get a freakin’ grip. So, I won’t be happy.
GT: I’m only medium-good at drawing, but I would have figured out how to give Keri two complete legs.
H&L: “You can’t blow leaves now, Chip, because a sinister miasma is rising from the very earth upon which we stand.”
Hey Mrs Wilson, I hear there’s a newly single elderly vet available.
MW: I mean, you’re almost a ghost already Stell, so why are you surprised?
GT: This is Marty’s favorite sport to cover because it’s closest to Chez Marty AKA: the equipment shed by the track
MW: I’m really enjoying Pierre’s smug little face in the last panel. Like all dogs, he enjoys a day at the park and a good chew toy, but what Pierre is really all about is that spilled tea, girl!
DtM: Once again, Mr Wilson’s attempts to convince his wife to try swinging have come to naught.
RMMD:
“…but are you really okay with that?”
“His name is ‘mud’, as far as I’m concerned!”
“Well, his name is Mud!”
MW: “I was stressed about wedding planning…now I’m stressed that you brought over a dozen muffins just for the two of us.”
MW – Pierre caught the “ghost” thing too, eyeing Stell with utter contempt. “That is so embarrassing. I can’t live with a woman who doesn’t know relationship slang. I think I’ll ghost her the next time we go for a walk…wait, that’s wrong, too. Damn!”
MW: Ah yes, ghosting, that notorious behavior of keeping your partner fully apprised of your current situation, even during life-or-death emergencies. Estelle also claims she’s been stressed about the wedding planning, but that’s similarly false; she was just mildly irritated that she was doing couple activities by herself and it wasn’t as much fun. She’s always been really stupid, but when did Estelle become such a liar?
DT: Sure, guys, just hop in your ugly flying thermoses and take off. No need to file flight plans or acquire licenses or register your vehicles or anything. You’re Dick-approved major characters, so it’s all fine.
JP: “Calm down” is perhaps the most counter-productive word pair in the English language, but Reena #2 really puts a special flair on it to get that extra torque of hostility-escalation assholery. At this rate Neddy and Ronnie will be leaving very shortly, having raised several new questions (and plot holes) while learning nothing. Francesco Marciuliano really cannot stand just letting characters talk to each other in any meaningful way.
RMMD: After his trip to the vet, Mud has a kinder outlook on the world and healing stitches where his testicles used to be, but does that mean he’s been redeemed enough to be allowed to do a lengthy series of highly-inconveniencing favors for the wonderful and perfect Truck Tyler? I don’t know. After all, he did mix up Wanda’s name a couple times and that’s really rude. Not smashing-up-your-girlfriend’s-place-of-work-in-an-unprovoked-fit-of-rage-before-storming-off-without-explanation rude, but still not cool.
CS: Of all the plagiari- excuse me, “homages” Batiuk could have gone with, this is easily one of the lamest and most situationally inappropriate. Luckily it’s really easy to get a screaming crowd of infuriated protestors to quiet down and listen to someone who talks down to them and then starts reciting from a book, so this should go pretty well. Meanwhile, the protestors are still faceless and nameless and have not been permitted by the writer to properly express their perspective, let alone a position shared by any actual human being ever. When someone tries to say something you don’t like, it is your duty to assert your authoritarian control to dehumanize them and deny them a voice; that’s the message of Fahrenheit 451 as Tom Batiuk understands it.
MW – Point to ponder: Does Moy not know what ghosting means, or is she merely writing Estelle as someone who doesn’t know what ghosting means?
MW – Well, if you don’t find his commitment to small animal euthanasia and incineration attractive…I just can’t begin to explain all the pain things that are wrong with your thinking. Of course I have to try, though….
DtM – I think the Wilson’s would be so much happier if they were gay. Tough break for both of them….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
RMMD – Murphy doesn’t rate a place in my contacts list, he rates a place on a folded up post-it next to the condom I’ve been carrying around since high school.
Tina’s Groove: That woman diner is spitting her food all over. That’s the main focus of today’s episode.
MW: Either Moy doesn’t know what ghosted means or what I’ve been speculating on for the last couple of weeks has been correct: Only the Sunday strip where Estelle received the text that Ed couldn’t make it ever actually mentioned the dead puppies and surgery. Immediately after that, it was never brought up again, culminating in the next Sunday strip when Estelle asked Ed why he didn’t show up at dinner, even though he texted her exactly why.
Moy realized that having Estelle pitch a fit over emergency surgery following a stillborn litter of puppies made Estelle look irredeemably callous, but she realized it too late to actually change it, and so now she’s just hoping we forget if she doesn’t bring it up again.
This is similar to the retcon in the Keith plot where we went from Keith and Kitty being in an exclusive relationship for a few months twenty years ago to apparently Kitty having multiple paramours so we could have two weeks of “SoNiA’s NoT mY dAuGhTeR” whining.
JP: Is there any character in this strip who doesn’t turn into a shrieking marmoset at the drop of a hat?
CS: Saying that a book banning storyline is going to end with someone reading to a crowd from a book is like predicting that the sun’s going to come up, but I needed an easy win this morning. It’d be just my luck if Lillian picked a different section to read from, though.
RMMD:
“Um, Truck, why is it you have one of those looseleaf equilateral triangles that kids use to play paper football using table edges in your wallet?”
“Because it summons words to live by in the title of roots country pioneer Charley Pride’s biggest hit!”
“No. Don’t say it, Truck.”
“Yep. ‘Kiss an Angle Good Morning’ !”
DtM: North American syndicate drops hints to the new anime style the art department will soon introduce to attract a younger audience.
MW:
Pierre and Libby chillax, coprophagous grins on their faces, as the animal gummies begin to take hold.
Mary Worth: And by “Stell,” Josh really means “Karen Moy,” right?
@Hibbleton: “Well, dear, the opposite of stressed is dessert.”
FC-“You have a beard other than Mommy?”
RMMD-Mud is not the sort of person who you save their number to your cellphone.
MW-Doesn’t ghosting mean no contact with a person? Ed clearly sent Estelle a text.
Dennis the Menace: George and Martha Wilson are a 99-year-old male and 95-year-old female being admitted to hospice services jointly with a terminal diagnosis of E.905.1 Lack of Style. They currently reside at 2253 Pine Street, next to Alice and Henry Mitchell and the Mitchell’s five-year-old son Dennis, who serves as the Wilson’s Power of Attorney.
@Lauralot: JP: Is there any character in this strip who doesn’t turn into a shrieking marmoset at the drop of a hat?
Yes, the ones who turn into screech owls and howler monkeys.
9CL – Not only are the characters just dolls for the author to mash together (“they are kissing!”), but they are also action figures who can stick their legs out at a 180 degree angle and then cross them behind their back. Oh, sure, you have to get a new action figure because the legs pop out of their sockets, but it’s still fun!!
Except for Alistair, who has to flail his arms around in the classic 9CL “I never expected her to do this, I’d better turn around on the piano bench before she … too late! Aaaaaa!!!!!” pose.
@Bob Tice: Coprophagous? I get what you’re trying to say here, but I think you’re libeling Libby.
@Baja Gaijin:
MW- The second one definitely. Am I showing my ignorance if I suggest that the cat could have said “word!” ?
MW: The incorrect use of the term “ghosted” leads to a significant loss among this strip’s younger readership demographic — all half-dozen of them.
CS: And Ed continues to just stand there looking stupid. It’s a good look for him.
JP: “And who are you?!”
“I’m this strip’s compulsory DEI female sidekick of color who has way more sense than the nitwit she’s sidekicking for, that’s who!”
“He ghosted me, Mary.”
“No cap, Stell?”
“Based, Mary!”
“Skibidi toilet!”
Frazz: Hmm, I wonder where she learned that behavior.
Luann: This is very unsubtle, as one would expect from the Evanses. Still, in comparison to the next strip I’m about to read, it’s absolutely sublime in execution.
CS: I’m going to watch one of those Very Special Episodes of Blossom to erase this garbage from my memory.
9CL: Oh, look, it’s the same gag with different people. Haw haw. However, I want to know if legs can bend that way. It seems like you’d have to break multiple bones to achieve that position.
MW: I hope Mary can somehow redirect Stelle’s anger to Pam.
DtM: “Menace fetish doesn’t really do it for me any more.”
Mary Worth – Next week Mary will confront Ed about “ghosting” Estelle, and while explaining himself, he’ll release he scheduled the Nielson’s elderly poodle, and have to cut Mary off. So busy!
Dennis the Menace – Look, Estelle, Ed is apparently an incurable workaholic and working for him for free didn’t solve, but only enabled his behavior.
Move on and try something new, like the Wilson’s just a few panels away on the comics page. Mrs. Wilson is absolutely hinting at a return to their brief period in the 1970s when as newlyweds they engaged in the hedonist excesses of the time, including free love and swinging. Invite Mary. She’s more of a watcher, but she’ll bring muffins.
FC: “Jesus! And here I thought Jeffy was the stupid one.”
Zits: It’s all fun and games until someone gets pulled through the drain of a kitchen sink.
@Baja Gaijin: I like the second option where we get a glimpse into the translated conversation between Pierre and Libbi. Stelle’s expression in the third option when Mary is yelling at her is pretty great too.
JP: Nice subtle touch by the artist to illustrate the chaos of the situation by having Neddy’s Tefillah shift awkwardly on her head.
MW:
“He ghosted me, Mary! — so I told him, ‘Love is kinda crazy with a spooky little churl like you.’ ”
“Spooky?”
“Spooky!”
“Estelle, the line from that song is one of those Classics for which no introduction is needed!”
Curtis: This week’s lesson: “There are assholes out there.”
@taig:
When Frazz first published as a strip it was actually funny and appealing to the smart kids who liked books, museums, and learning experiences. This story, about a trip to The Henry Ford museum, would then have been done as a class trip, with a great chance for Mallet to draw the cars and historic village, and give the characters a new place to express themselves and generate humor.
Now? Mallett is so lazy and curmudgeonly that he’s satisfied with just drawing Frazz and Child-Who-Is-Not-Caulfield to talk about the drive to the unseen museum, and to put the words of a 60 year-old cartoonist in a child’s mouth. At this point Mallett could go full Pluggers and just publish complaints to the editor as Frazz comics, and nobody would notice.
MW: When Estelle refers to the engagement dinner “thrown” by her cousin, Mary reacts instinctively and lets fly a southpaw fast pitch of her apple cinnamon muffin, right to Estelle’s face.
@32 Unca Bob: Good catch. Look at the second image now.
@39 taig: Thanks. An eyewitness to Estelle’s witlessness should tell Mary what really happened.
@richardf8: I’m going to go with both.
CS: I shouldn’t be surprised that Batiuk can’t keep details straight even in such a thuddingly simple story, but would it make any difference in this mob’s level of anger if they knew Lil n’ Les were GIVING away the books, and not selling them, to the students? (Unless Les was actually expecting high school students to compensate him for the costs of acquiring several crates of the special hardback anniversary edition with gilt lettering?)
MW: no, Stell, Ed d not ghost you. He told you what he was doing.
@Baja Gaijin: Thanks, BG, for giving Pierre and Libby a chance to show their fluency in the contemporary vernacular! They’ve been pretty frustrated lately… being limited to the generic “Meow” and “Woof” of the scripted narrative. This whole storyline has been a real slog for them, and they appreciate a little freedom of expression here! Pierre is sending you a coded eyeroll.
@I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV: “George and Martha Wilson are a 99-year-old male and 95-year-old female being admitted to hospice services jointly with a terminal diagnosis of E.905.1 Lack of Style.”
I’m not a gatekeeping sort, but as someone whose late wife had hospice care, I love your gallows humor in this.
That said, I would have been the Lack of Style patient rather than my spouse.
Rex Morgan: Bulimia – It’s rough on the teeth, but your hurdling game will never look better!
@Bob Tice:
“He ghosted me, Mary! — so I told him, ‘Love is kinda crazy with a spooky little churl like you.’ ”
“Spooky?”
“Spooky!”
“Estelle, the line from that song is one of those Classics for which no introduction is needed!”
Far be it from me to gild the lily, but you missed an excellent opportunity for Stell to say she was “yosted”.
MW: We are in for some TOP NOTCH meddling here along with what appear to be moldy, 6-week old muffins.
Mary’s gloop from earlier in the year with Keith for dinner was unappealing, but these muffins might be a war crime…
Also no one has ever held a muffin like Mary is with the end result being eating it. Period. She’s about to throw it or shove it in Stell’s face
@MKay: Merrill is really piling it on poor ol’ Keri. First the nonbinary thing, then an abortion, and now the new artist’s taken off her right leg at the knee. Seems like quite a handicap for a track athlete, but I’m no sports guy.
@MKay: re GT: Yes, Keri’s amputation looks a little rough. Was Rex Morgan her surgeon?
Crankshaft-Then she reads about the wife’s overdose on sleeping pills.
MW-“Here you go, Stell. This man will take care of any physical troubles you may have,” Mary says handing Estelle a card that reads “Wilbur Weston: Male Gigalo”.
RMMD: If there’s one thing Truck has learned from the Epstein case, it is to keep all his incriminating phone numbers on flash paper.
“He ghosted me! That’s right, he entered an unphysical state through the manipulation of gauge theory, and Mary . . . I can’t . . . I can’t even observe him now to resolve the quantum paradox! He has negative kinetic energy and there’s nothing I can do for him!”
CS: Not even the most patronizing “very special episode” of a sitcom dealing with the issue-du-jour was as ham-handed and condescending at this storyline.
Dennis – “And that’s the part that has the movie listings, too! Oh well, I guess I’ll see if there’s anything good in the business section…”
9CL: Lolly’s day job is being the India Rubber Girl at the Coney Island Freak House.
JP: ”I’m the Magic Negro in the strip, or maybe the Magic Mexican, Magic Lebanese, or Magic Navaho. Ces is a cagey fella.”
MW – “I’m sorry, Stell… I recommend you take all those bad feelings, wad them up into a tight little ball, swallow them, and then stuff muffins on top of them so they can’t get out.”
“Mary! Muffins aren’t going to solve this problem!”
“I’ve got A LOT of muffins.”
Don Abundio, translated:
“Claudia is a brilliant inventor. She’s made a real breakthrough in long-distance communications”
“Yeah? Really?”
“Come see”
“Even as we speak, she’s transcribing telepathic messages from alien spacecraft”
@I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV: I agree with @ValdVin; I really enjoy the way your work sometimes inspires your comments here!
He yeeted me, Mary! Yeeted me to the curb!
love is... feeding your baby giant acorns.
DTM. If you think about it, due to shifting comic book time, George and Martha could be as old as their 80s (unlikely) or as young as their 60s (more likely). In either event, this means their generation grew up with rock and roll, watched TV shows like SNL, Miami Vice and the Sopranos and potentially wore clothes as diverse as bell bottoms, parachute pants and Doc Martins. And yet, here they are, dressed in classic, well maintained clothes from roughly post-WWII America. In other words, they don’t just have style they more than nearly anyone else in comics! Well done, you hipster icons!
Maybe Estelle meant this definition of “ghosted”.
Fred Basset Spanish to English.
The Family Circus Spanish to English.
@1 Baja Gaijin:
You got that French bulldog accent down perfect.
CS: if Batiuk does get a Pulitzer for this putrid storyline I’ll know civilization is finished.