Josh says some nice stuff
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Flash Gordon, 11/7/24
The new-ish iteration of Flash Gordon got a shout-out from Uncle Lumpy a few weeks ago, but I’m here to give it my full-time blogger shoutout! The art is great, and the writing is very fun and captures the fast-paced cliff-hanger-y-ness of old movie serials. There hasn’t been too much to make fun of, but I’m going to start slipping it into the rotation here, I think. Anyway, today there are two important developments: we meet the King of the Lion Men and learn that his crown appears to be made from a wildebeest skull (dark!), and once again have the timeless truth affirmed that any sequential art whose storyline would support it at all eventually trends towards erotic furry stuff.
Beetle Bailey, 11/7/24
There’s been a little bit of an attempt in Beetle Bailey of late to upgrade Zero’s character from “dumb farm boy” to “farm boy with certain legitimate skills and his own point of view,” and today seems to be a big step in that direction. Frankly, I would like to see more depth added to all of this strip’s one-note characters. Lt. Fuzz isn’t just an annoying bureaucratic kiss-up: he’s trying to drag Camp Swampy’s administration into the 21st century while showing respect for the current leadership! Cosmo isn’t just a scam artist looking out for number 1: he represents the sort of individual ingenuity that’s always existed in supposedly regimented structures like the military! And Rocky was … in a gang, I guess? Or is currently in a gang? And gangs represent an alternative form of belonging and identity for those living in economically and socially marginal areas that have been more or less abandoned by the state? That’s what I assume he and Zero were talking about immediately before this strip started, and I frankly would’ve liked to have seen it.
Six Chix, 11/7/24
Folks, have you seen Conclave yet? It’s a banger! Everyone’s got Conclave fever! And by everybody I mean at least me and the Thursday Chik. That’s assuming the movie was the inspiration for this strip, that is, which doesn’t make a ton of sense but makes as much sense as anything else, I guess. Anyway! Go see Conclave today!
128 replies to “Josh says some nice stuff”
Thanks to everyone yesterday for keeping it fun and political free. It can often be a funky day (I’m six out of 12 on how I’ve felt), and it’s nice to have a safe space and focus on what’s really important – snark – with our fellow Mudges.
I have not seen Conclave, but another Josh whose content I enjoy — Josh Way on YouTube — did and did a positive review on it! So I guess we can say that the movie is popular among Joshes. :p
FG:
And she’ll have Thun, Thun, Thun, till her daddy takes her T-Bird away….
Grammar is brutal. Some buildings blocks of language such as pronouns or basic verbs define the language and preserve archaic forms as other more ephemeral words change, appearing to be the eternal foundations of a language. And yet the English language smothered an entire pronoun, abolishing the division between second person singular and plural and English speakers find nothing weird about it. It’s like a village murdered one of its members and everyone pretended the member never existed, to the point that confusing “pie” and “thy” can be used as a pun instead of brutal reminder of elimination
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX:
But always remember — the first rule of Snark Club is “There is no Snark Club.”
Amen to your comment — what a welcome respite.
Beetle Bailey: It’s interesting that this conversation is taking place in an empty white room with a single bed. I assume that’s because drawing a soldier’s barracks is hard — but I’d like to think it’s because this is all actually a dream Rocky is having. In his fantasy, he finally made it to Broadway, and everyone is anxious to hear about his experiences as a singing, dancing gang member in West Side Story (which is why he’s kept that greaser haircut all this time). But soon enough he’ll wake up in a smelly room full of dumb and/or lazy soldiers, and his real day of full-pack hikes and potato peeling will begin.
FG:
I thought Jugrid was Archie and Veronica’s friend.
FG:
The Lion Kids eat up every one of the master storyteller’s quips. Jugrid.
“A neutrino walks in a bar and orders a drink. ‘What do I owe you?’ asks the neutrino. ‘For you, no charge,’ replies the bartender.”
BB: Snorkle’s origin story will be a revelation; the sources of his gluttony and gynophobia, and why, in these enlightened orthodontial times, he still only has TWO TEETH.
RMMD: “Of course I’ll marry you, you intermittent g-dropping old charmer! But only if you promise me we can yodel our vows!”
MW: Muffin cake, ham muffins, muffins au gratin, muffin casserole, mac & muffins, muffins and meatballs, 3-muffin salad. Washed down with a fine muffin wine.
So I guess Jugrid is the Lion People’s mane man? (I’ll see myself out.)
B. Bailey: Rocky was trying to recruit misfits Beetle and Zero into his gang for a Naked Gun style story line, with Lt. Fuzz as Drebin and Private Julius as Enrico Palazzo.
Rex Morgan: That’s a nice drawing of someone throwing up into her hands.
I assumed Rocky was in the hospital for injuries sustained in a turf war between gangs. Because “Beetle is out of bed and someone else isn’t” is a worse violation of established character than “Zero is smart.”
Oh come on, a lame pie pun is downright comprehensible by Mari’lo’ton, I mean Mary Lawton’s, standards.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: Luckily it wasn’t a Funky day! (Although the fact that yesterday’s thread has less than 100 comments suggests either that the people who would be bringing political talk were either too depressed or too busy celebrating to come here, or that it wasn’t as “fun and political free” as you thought and Josh and Lumpy just removed all the political comments.)
I don’t know what pills Josh is taking, but I’ll have a few!
FG: To each their own, but I dislike pretty much everything about this comic’s writing, especially its heavy reliance on tell-don’t-show. For example, today we have the text box triumphantly declaring
the Lion Kingthe King of the Copyright Non-Infringing Lion Men to be a master storyteller instead of, you know, having him actually tell a story and letting us decide for ourselves how masterful he is at it.DT: Sprengstoff must be a foreigner, because an American trying to hide their identity wouldn’t use this many forms of fake ID? I cannot say I follow this logic. Also, calling these cards “fake” is woefully inadequate information. Are they fake as in they’re excellent replicas or they’re authentic but don’t lead back to Sprengstoff’s true identity, or are they fake as in the credit cards are Viza and American Espress?
Luann: “Yes, I have my own mansion in a gated community, but is that really good enough for me?” – a very sympathetic character
RMMD: “Now that I know you’ll take abuse with silent acquiescence, let’s make this domestic.”
There’s character growth and then there’s being expected to believe that someone else is lazing about in bed while Beetle is up and about, and that’s a step too far.
FG: Did anyone esle see ‘Jugrid’ and immediately think “Wow, Archie sure has pivoted hard…”
BB: I like how Zero sat right down to get at Rocky’s level. Is that how you intimidate a pig or something? I don’t have the farm smarts.
6Cx: I guess I’m not the only one who spent time in church as a kid wondering what might be better-tasting than the host (answer: almost literally anything)
Flash Gordon: “NEXT: DOVA“. Wow, DOVA! I can’t wait to see DOVA. The tantalizing hint of DOVA has encouraged me to log into Comics Kingdom and subscribe to Flash Gordon so I don’t miss a second of DOVA action!
Six Chix: I will also say something nice, this is a good pun. I’m fond of the whisk crozier and the tinfoil miter, even if the latter causes me to speculate darkly on what sort of liturgical/kitchen conspiracies Bishop Cook Lady is inoculating herself against. Or is that just so her scalp doesn’t brown prematurely when she sticks her head in the oven?
@pugfuggly: Riverdale did get pretty weird near the end. Frankly it wouldn’t surprise me if there was a storyline where Jughead became king of the lion men.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX:
Right on, Scratchy. It was funky, but a time and place for everything, and this was a nice place to visit yesterday.
@Ettorre: What’s even stranger is that because that form has become archaic, surviving mostly in prayers and hymns addressed to God the Father, many people assume that it is the formal second-person, rather than the casual.
BB The chances of even a farm kid in 2024 having all three of those specific skills are pretty small, but the writers know as much about modern farm life as they do modern military life.
Flash Gordon panel 3 background: it really does look like the FIRE-DANCING lions are not wearing any clothes (they would catch fire, natch). So yeah, erotic furry action it is. “We’ve sort of met already, last month, it was really fun…” Thun and Dale: “WTF??”
MW: Mary’s eyeteeth reflexively start lengthening in P2. She might want to stop staring at the Doc’s neck.
MW: “The buffet is set up in the dining room. I’ve prepared a ten-course meal for eight.”
“What?! This is extraordinary! How on earth did you manage all this?”
“Oh, I just threw it together an hour or so ago. Enjoy!”
They enter the dining room to find that Wilbur has eaten all the pork chops and half the mashed potatoes, and he has already sliced the cake.
“Mmmphh, srrry mm hmphgry.”
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: I’ll scratch to that (scritch scratch)! What a funky week, and I’m not talking about Winkerbeans.
MW: The guests enter the dining room to discover a wide variety of tasty foodstuffs arranged on the floor for Pierre, Odin, Libby, Max, and Greta.
Flash Gordon – The syndicate behind the new Flash Gordon gave a mandate to the new team to renew the intellectual property’s relevance and have it picked up by cosplayers at “the conventions”. While they meant the many Comic-Cons across the nation, the Furry Conventions were also suitable.
Beetle Bailey – On the subject of reintroduction, this feels like the sort of comic that a long-running strip occasionally had to do in order to bring new, younger readers, or readers of newspapers that just picked up the strip, up to speed on the characters and lore. But with the contraction and aging demographics, this is to remind the declining long-time readers who these characters are.
Six Chix – Jesus appears on one piece of toast, and now Thursday Chik thinks she’s God’s gift to baking
6C: Not only is this pie being made just to mock the Lord’s Prayer, but the baker is a woman bishop! Sacrilegiously delicious!
RMMD: ‘Dear God, NO!!!!’ [Wanda’s wig falls off as she runs away screaming]
JP: ‘Okay Sophie, spill. How else am I going to steal him from you if you don’t?’
Zero, if you were really competent at doing agricultural jobs, you would have stayed at home and become a prosperous farmer, not joined the military
@Ettorre: I blame the French.
We all have fun with today’s pun, but tomorrow the “Six Chix” collective will devolve into sectarian violence over the question whether that pie contains God in a material, spiritual or symbolic way
@richardf8: It’s the opposite. The French have a deep respect for the T-V division, formal and familiar. It’s the English that became so obsessed with formality that no one was considered familiar enough to be referred with a thou, despite the good work by Quackers
I blame Rocky ignorance. He could have simply explained that urban communities, just rural communities, have long-term blood feuds, so there is no real difference between Crips-Bloods or Hatfield–McCoy
MW: Mary contributed her specialty, trays full of goop??? Oh man, we’re about to see some carnage here. Or at least, the Charterstone toilets are…
SIMPLE SOLUTIONS
– BF:. Kim, back pain is not a part of getting older. First, check with doctor to make sure you don’t have spine problems. If none, stretch! Do stretches in morning, stretches in the evening, stretches at suppertime.
– BETTY:. Method 1:. Turn off water before changing washers or Method 2:. Avoid cost of home repair by calling a certified plumber.
Let Six Chix eat cake.
New Flash Gordon is perfect, it’s how a reboot should be made, no notes.
DtM: Dennis learns at an early age why henchmen need flunkies and stooges.
Hi and Lois: School lunch debt is actually a serious thing for a lot of families. Kids who don’t have money to pay for their lunch are usually only given a very cheap alternative like maybe a PB&J sandwich and a carton of milk. The Flagston family is in serious financial distress and I appreciate the look of genuine despair on her face here. Finding out Ditto has been running up a tab is giving Lois anxiety.
Marvin: he’s been watching Triangle of Sadness and wants to recreate the vomit scene with poop instead, that’s the only explanation I can think of
Zits: Rodents do not have sweat glands
Curtis: Look at the size of that phone and her skin tight jeans. Was she hiding it in her anal cavity? Is the word “wupsiie” some new kind of slang word to describe electronic devices that teens put up their butts? The face she’s making in the last panel really sells it.
DtM: Dennis inserts a V into the phonological reduction hafta as a symbol of victory. A convoluted menace to be sure but one worth noting.
FG: That’s Dova right there, in panel three. If I remember correctly, she was the lion serving girl at Aura and Barrin’s royal wedding, and the witness to Flash’s “murder” of Ming Junior. So this is Prince Thun’s version of “going home with a waitress.” She is sporting the “just-fucked” look.
“Eat of this pie, for it is my body . . . hey, what are you doing with that knife . . . I was being metaphorical . . . oh my Me, you cut me, Me damn you, it hurts, this pie is my body and you’re eating my body stop . . . .”
FG: I’m glad they cleared up the Prince – King thing I had wondered about. They kicked Jugrid upstairs to the Philosopher-King position, but he’s still honored in their society. I like the way the Lionpeople treat their old folks. I came into the story late and missed Dova first time around, but everyone’s expression says a lot.
I really like the way the comic is structured, with flash (pun intended) backs to earlier events and the narration boxes making it easier to follow the current action. This is the only comic I now look forward to every day since “something” is going to happen.
And I don’t think we need to hear Jugrid’s storytelling to know whether he’s a master storyteller. I can accept that he is. The Phantom got bogged down for two years with Mozz’s storytelling. I’d rather keep the action moving.
Pluggers – I assume I’ve seen of animals with human teeth before in the comics before; I just don’t know if I’ve ever seen them this close up. Probably not, because I’ve never recoiled in horror at the sight of them like I did today.
RMMD-“Keep talkin’ we’ve got two weeks to fill.”
MW-“Muffins!? That’s all we’re eating!?” “A buffet of muffins,” Mary exclaims.
MW-A buffet of Play-Do in various shapes and colors.
Six Chix-Pies!? Oh no! You take those heathen devil pies from here! We only eat muffins here as the Blessed Mary Worth commands.
Hi and Lois-You own Ditto’s teacher your first born male child.
Beetle Bailey-Gang Turf is the PG version of Gangbang.
MW: Will we finally see the cake again tomorrow? Will they do a flashback of Mary and Jeff making the transfer from her apartment to the car, the slow, careful trip to Ed’s, and then to Ed’s dining room? That could take up a whole week of strips.
FG: So juvenile lion-folk are not known as “cubs”, as one might expect, but as “lion kids”. Is this nomenclature at least somewhat flexible, or is a violation of this protocol considered a disgusting ethnic slur, and do the lions enforce the politically correct usage by eating anyone who slips up and says “cubs”? But is the term “kids” then reserved for young lions, and juvenile people have to be known as “human cubs”? And if you accidentally call a young person a “kid”, do the offended humans eat you? There’s so much to keep in mind, when planning your next trip to Mongo!
Jugrid the Master Lion Storyteller: He’s telling the Lion Children about the old Lion Man from Nantucket.
Panel Three: I’m enjoying how, in the midst of nekkid Lion People reveling in the firelight like Maenads, Flash is leading Dale in a sedate foxtrot like they’re at the Yale Prom.
@seismic-2: Meanwhile, one savanna over to the east, the Goat People refer to their children as “cubs.” Mongo is kind of like Bizarro World that way.
Flash Gordon: Flash dates from 1934 which is why it’s nice to see him and Dale doing a period-appropriate Tango while the characters in the background are anachronistically frugging.
6C: Personally I’m a committed Cakeist myself. Down with the pastry heresy!
FG: I’m a little disappointed that the cat people names are just generic, vaguely sci-fi/fantasy-style names. I feel like cat people should either have names that resemble cat noises (Mrar, Prissa), or TS Eliot-esque nonsense that sound like euphemisms for bizarre sex acts (Muffletweezer, Rumblebuffus).
9CL: Do you think we should call for a Wellness Check for Brooke? Something is clearly not right with him.
Don Abundio, translated:
“Don Abundio! The Admiral jumped overboard!”
“He’s sulking because I said his sea stories are boring!”
“What should we do?”
“If you don’t come up we’re going to drink all of your Glenfiddich!”
SC: Well, that’s a lot better than Thomas Nast having bishops as alligators trying to eat American Protestant children.
MW: “Thank you for your wonderful contribution of the food,” says the Edbot.
CS: “Do the ads mention that we can steal kids’ lunches?”
FC: “Yes, you can draw goalposts on the side of the house. And then you can run through them.”
The Family Circus Spanish to English.
FG – I didn’t even know this strip existed until now, but to me it’s got kind of a 1980s movie, the Warriors vibe, Can you dig it. CAN you dig it! CAN YOU DIG IT!!!
BB – The Farriers were pretty tough in the Warriors, with their ball and peen hammers leather aprons….
6-C – Pastry Orthodox….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
FC – We know that he’ll draw the goalposts around a window.
Mary Worth – Here we go. Buckle up for the praise Mary chapter of the story. Mary is encouraging him by patting herself on the back. *Eye roll*
Rex Morgan – Serious question: where will the lovebirds live? Is Truck still living at the Glenwood motel, or does he have an apartment? Will he move into Wanda’s place? I suspect that every inch of her apartment is covered with knickknacks, so she’ll have to clear a space for Truck so they have room to move around the place.
Pluggers – Next week: a plugger with missing teeth. Pluggers pay their other bills before they can fix their teeth.
Speed Bump – Baja should skip this one.
C’shaft: Look, if your job requirements include “must be able to endure Ed Crankshaft on a daily basis,” you gotta expect low turnout.
DT: Sam’s not even waiting until January 21st to get going on the mass deportations.
GT: I hate it when comics make me wonder if something has happened to my language processing abilities.
JP: So the current plot is just going to be recapping the last few dumb plots. Like the world’s worst clip episode.
Luann: Kip’s on the college football team, right? He’s got to have more options than this.
MW: For some reason I’m reminded of H.G. Parry’s Shadow Histories duology, a historical fantasy set in the early 1800s where the African slave trade is facilitated by regularly feeding captives a magical concoction which robs them of free will.
RMMD: “Let me think: slave away all day making food for my customers only to come home and slave away making dinner for you, while you sit on your bony rear end thinking of words that rhyme with ‘hillbilly.’ Decisions, decisions…”
Pluggers: I call foul. A plugger would never spend that kind of money on a vanity project like those effete, urbanite metrosexuals. Pluggers are proud of their missing and rotting, crooked teeth.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: I second that. This site is a respite from politics.
@Ettorre: The Crips-Bloods have more teeth than the Hatfields-McCoys.
@TheDiva: Re 6C – I’m a cookieist. I can roll out cookie dough fine, but I can not do pie crust. It always tastes fine but looks like a wreck.
La Belleza Interior, translated:
“…And to make a long story short, stealing your underwear and listing it on Ebay ended up rewarding no one. I trust this seven dollars will smooth over any hard feelings.”
“Omigosh!”
“Listen here: you accept this settlement and we’ll have fought this legal battle for nothing. As your attorney, I insist you at least hold out for tickets to Weenieworld in France.”
“What? You want to see the Rifle Tower, too?”
“Eiffel.”
“”Not with what we’re packing in our luggage.””
FG: The lion kids are thinking, “Not that old wearing an onion on our belt because it was the style at the time story again!”
FG: Technology works strangely on Mongo. The Lion Men have flying saucers capable of becoming invisible but they can’t build flat screen TVs and video games to keep those lion kids entertained.
@Pozzo: #10
“So I guess Jugrid is the Lion People’s mane man? (I’ll see myself out.)”
HAVE YOU NO PRIDE, MAN??????? (hee hee hee)
@Ettorre: The Episcopal Church here in the US has them e.g. the Right Reverend Susan Snook in San Diego: https://edsd.org/bishopsusan/.
@pugfuggly: I guess I’m not the only one who spent time in church as a kid wondering what might be better-tasting than the host (answer: almost literally anything) Growing up, the church I attended used those thin, dissolve on your tongue wafers for Communion. Pretty bland. One summer, I got the “privilege” of spending a few days at a religious retreat. There was a morning Mass every day. The wafers used in that ceremony were thick, whole-grain, almost poker-sized ones that had to be chewed. The Communion wine helped to get those down. Not much of an improvement taste-wise, but great for jaw muscle development.
JP: I think the fact Glen’s father was murdered and Sophie found the body would be of greater interest to Neddy.
Not-so-fun fact: Gangs are a real problem in the military.
6C: It’s an idea custom made for Pi Day, but that’s four months from now and anyway Maritsa Patrinos will be on call for the day, so #YOLO.
@I speak Jive:
Re 6C – I’m a cookieist. I can roll out cookie dough fine, but I can not do pie crust. It always tastes fine but looks like a wreck.
I don’t know if this is some kind of baking secret or if it’s just common knowledge, but I’ll chime in. My wife lays out a sheet of Saran Wrap on the kitchen table, spreads some flour all over it, and then rolls the pie crust on top of the flour. Works for her very well.
@Ettorre: #41
It took me a while to become used to the new art and narrative flow of the new “Flash,” but I do agree the stories are fun to read. I still miss the intricate, vivid artwork of Jim Keefe’s version, though!
And, speaking of the Shark Men, their offspring are “pups.” What are the Hawkmen’s children called – “hatchlings”??
@Daisy:
Oops – this was in reply to seismic-2, #53!
@I speak Jive: re RMMD: I believe Truck and Wanda are already living in sin. There was a scene when his finger spasms began where she was leaving for work and he was lounging around at her place, hoping to “write some songs” that day.
Dustin: Say what you want about Dustin, at least he’s not the one who decided an arrow sign with the word “pizza” on it was an adequate marketing strategy. Which pizza place, you ask? Details, details.
GT: This Chainsaw Man thing apparently has some heavy significance I haven’t figured out and am not going to.
JP: Of course the actual yes was Glen’s little brother, who has pretty much ceased to exist at this point.
Marvin: Granted, Marvin isn’t the one who took a Sharpie and wrote “BOAT” on the side of this not very poolworthy vessel, but he is depicted as being able to read it, and even that I’m not sure I buy. No, I’m very sure I don’t.
MW: “…and one of my specialties.” The sad part is she’s not kidding.
@I speak Jive: Advantage of crack addiction vs meth addiction
@Dennis Jimenez: FG – I didn’t even know this strip existed until now, but to me it’s got kind of a 1980s movie, the Warriors vibe, Can you dig it. CAN you dig it! CAN YOU DIG IT!!!
Booker T responds: “I CAN DIG IT, SUCKKKKKAHHHHHH!”
@Guy Nerdlinger: My all-time favorite churchman: Manila’s own Jaime Cardinal Sin.
MW: Oh I see, the duet at the piano happened after the ceremony, but before dinner. That explains why no one puked.
GT: @TheDiva: LOL, your language processing abilities aren’t the problem here. With the new Henry Barajas and Rachel Merrill collaboration, it seems like they does a good job when they doesn’t, and the next day they does a good job when they doesn’t. We can’t have both!
Dustin: Watch it, Dustsis. Incessantly mocking a man holding an object capable of bludgeoning you to death isn’t the smartest move.
@Daisy: I’ve become hooked on the new FG with its great idea of a post-Ming world and previous allies now at each others throats. What you’d expect to happen, really. Also some good tech. But indeed as you say Jim Keefe’s classic FG was also good.
Dustin: Shut up, Meg.
@Schroduck: Riverdale did get pretty weird near the end. Frankly it wouldn’t surprise me if there was a storyline where Jughead became king of the lion men.
Yeah, that’s what I had heard. I was thinking that maybe the comic had ditched the corny jokes for that kind of approach.
@Guy Nerdlinger: The wafers used in that ceremony were thick, whole-grain, almost poker-sized ones that had to be chewed…
We only every had the ‘light’ ones, but they still stuck to the roof of your mouth. I used to always wonder how it was actually ‘bread’
Flash Gordon-“We don’t do anything honest! She told me she was eighteen!”
But can he milk a horse, shoe a cow, combine an operate, and make sense out of Six Chix? THEN I’ll be impressed!
@Liam: Flash Gordon-“We don’t do anything honest! She told me she was eighteen!”
____________________________________
She was just eighteen/you know what I mean/and the way she purred was way beyond compare/now how can I make love with a human?/when I sexed that feline there. – Lennon/McCartney, “When I Sexed That Feline There” from Sgt. Puppy’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (aka the Furry Album)
@Ettorre: What’s really brutal about it is that a lot of American English-speakers today seem to be very uncomfortable with having any ambiguity between singular and plural “you,” but outside of regions where “y’all,” “yous[e],” or even “yinz” are available, there isn’t a single word to make this distinction, and all they have to fall back on is “you guys.” This isn’t too bad in the nominative, but in the possessive, it leads to the horribly awkward “your guys’s.”
BB: Zero will have plenty to gloat about when Rocky finds himself in an unexpected gang food fight and needs such food sources as raw milk fresh from the cow to gain the tactical advantage.
@Majicou, @Ettorre: What I find really interesting about how English lost its thees and thous is that the thou/you distinction wasn’t just a singular/plural thing: it also could denote familiarity or respect for someone higher up socially, like the tu/vous or tu/usted distinction in French and Spanish. When the King James Bible has people addressing God as “thou”, it denotes an intimacy between the person and the deity. When Quakers made a point of addressing everybody with “thee” or “thou”, it was a pointed act of social leveling, basically treating everyone you spoke to as an equal even if socially they were above you in the hierarchy.
BUT, because language is an emergent phenomenon, it’s actually pretty hard to change people’s habits like in a top-down fashion, so when we ditched the hierarchical 2nd person pronoun system, we did it by getting rid of the thees and thous, meaning we all address each other like we’re fancy, rather than all of us addressing each other as equals, which I find funny. It also means that because we only encounter thees and thous in the bible and other archaic texts, we’re more likely to interpret it as being “fancy,” which is the opposite of its original meaning.
@Daisy: And, speaking of the Shark Men, their offspring are “pups.” What are the Hawkmen’s children called – “hatchlings”??
______________________
They’re called “Hawkeyes”…….one became famous as a surgeon during the Korean War.
Slylick Fox and Comix For Kinx: In panel 1 the raccoon is more stoned then the cat, in the second, the cat is more high.
Blondie-“Boss, I need to report you to HR for this toxic environment.” “I am HR.”
@48 Weaselboy: A few years ago, a Pluggers strip showed the bear in profile, mouth full of human teeth wide open, preparing to chomp down on a big messy burger. He had a crazed expression. It was even more disturbing than my description.
@94 Josh: I come for the comics snark, I stay for the historical etymology.
GT — No snark, but dang this new art is unviewable. Almost makes me want to go back to Mark Trail for relief.
I will probably never read Flash Gordon of my own volition, but that artwork is gorgeous.
I came at first, for the snark, now I come because I still love the snark, and y’all are the nicest people I’ve never met.
@Guy Nerdlinger: #71: The Methodist church my wife and I go to uses ch’alla bread pieces. A lot of Catholic churches with a predominantly Hispanic congregation use tortillas.
@Guillermo el chiclero: My Baptist-leaning church uses matzah. It is good enough that I usually go for seconds.
@GarrisonSkunk: Add “fill out all the FSA and NRCS forms” and I’ll be uber-impressed.
@jroggs: Re: LUANN: Especially since the backdrop to this poor-little-rich-girl whining is “Tee hee! Stef was right all along and I was trying to steal the dull slab of beef she calls a ‘boyfriend.’ God, what a bitch, huh?!”
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: What you said.
@Old School Allie Cat: It’s actually pretty good. Flash Gordon is one of the few serials I have on my morning trawl.
LUANN: I tried to think of LUANN characters that I’d rather follow than the characters we are following. I settled on Tara’s anonymous cousin, the one who tried to run Tara down and then disappeared. Seems promising.
@I speak Jive: RE: REX MORGAN: It’s pretty obvious that Truck is Wanda’s little boy toy (a toy truck, as it were. Ha ha) so he’ll continue to sponge of her, but now with a marriage license! (At least untill Beehive realized that her “toy” is a cheap poorly-assembled “Made-in-China” knockoff found in the bargain-bin of a 99-cent store and realize that she can at least upgrade to a Tonka, if ya know what I mean?
BB: “But, Rocky, I was confused because I didn’t think there was any turf on the street! Ain’t it all paved and all? No grass there.”
“Damn right there’s no grass there. You see a grass on the street, you cut him, dig?”
“Sure, I know how to cut and dig grass. Uh, we are talking about the plant, right?”
“Oh that kind of grass. Yeah, I don’t know how it got into my kit, and it’s all for personal use. Are you a cop?”
(Immediately after writing this I realised “grass” to mean “narc” or “snitch” is specifically British street slang, but I thought of a pun and I’m going to use it regardless.)
Curtis: Look, Michelle isn’t a very complicated character. Ignoring Curtis’s calls (yeah, kids use phones to make calls) is totally on brand, pretending she’s not decidedly isn’t. Of course, if she said “I didn’t answer them because I have complete disdain for you, as I make clear every time you come round,” there wouldn’t be a joke. Then again, I’m not completely convinced there is this way either.
DT: But … but couldn’t he use his fake ID, if it’s any good at all, to apply for a real library card? What good does a fake library card do you anyway? You try to take some books out, they scan it, it turns out you’re not on the system because it’s not a real library card. Then again, he thought his fake Totten ID card somehow meant the company would believe he worked there if the transit police phoned them, so I guess the same “logic” applies.
GT: Oops! Yesterday I snarked about Lucas suddently acquiring a girlfriend we’d never seen before and the strip not even naming her. Today, I think we learn her name is Gigi, but also, that wasn’t Lucas! It was … Toby’s old partner in vape-crime, probably? Who I’m sure had a name at some point?
As I’ve said before, for all her other faults (and there are plenty) Merrill does a better job of distinguishing the characters than Wrigham, but it doesn’t help because it’s impossible to keep track of anything, especially names! It took me so long to figure out that Coach Martinez thinks his son is named Luke after him, and everyone else thinks he’s named Pedro, and I still don’t really “get” it!
MW: You can tell Dr Ed’s new here, because his immediate reaction isn’t “Is it salmon squares? For the love of God, tell me it isn’t salmon squares!”
Phantom: Oh, we’re back to this bullshit, are we? For a moment, it almost looked like DePaul was telling a story!
@Horace Broon: re: GT: In a cruel twist, Barajas names his new wheelchair-using girlfriend character “Gigi,” after the Academy Award-winning film starring Leslie Caron, the famous….dancer.
Her twin brother in the matching cripcopter was christened “Astaire.”
@Ukulele Ike: re: GT: In a cruel twist, Barajas names his new wheelchair-using girlfriend character “Gigi,” after the Academy Award-winning film starring Leslie Caron, the famous….dancer.
It’s a typo. He meant to name her “Gigli,” after the famous bomb about a jar headed white guy with an Hispanic girlfriend. Which, if you’ve read his GT, makes a lot more sense.
What’s “Gang Bang”, Rocky?
Y’all just wait. Dustin’ll will find his groove with that sign and become an Internet sensation with his spins, tosses and moves. Even Dad’ll have to admit that while he’s not overly excited at this turn of events, he can at least relax a little about his son’s uselessness. And then go in and buy a pizza.
@Daisy: “Gotta go, its time for WHAT’S MY LION?”
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: I agree, thanks for pointing it out.
Dustbin will have the last laugh when Aaron’s Arrow Shaped Pizza® becomes the hot new trendy darling of Baja,Josh, J.Nebus, and all the other Comic World influencers!
@Josh: Languages which preserve the tu-vous distinction have complex rules for when tu use it. Often the use was asymmetrical. With the superior using the “tu” to address the inferior and the inferior using “vous”. We might think that both using “tu” is more egalitarian, but another school is that you should use “vous” to address your inferior, as a way to recognise respect beyond false friendliness. My father always remembered when he first worked with US scientists, the first day, he was surprised to find the boss addressing everyone by their first name. But a week later, the boss fired the very same subordinate he was so familiar with! Anyway, this is a good French guide on the complexities: https://www.reddit.com/r/coolguides/comments/17nrgyp/a_cool_guide_for_when_to_use_tu_or_vous_in_french/
@Josh: However, some direction from above is not impossible, as long as it goes along the grain of underlying developments. For example, up until the mid-twentieth century Swedish had a very complex form of indirect addresses to refer to strangers, using formal titles. This was cumbersome, so in the 1950s they tried to switch to the du-vous system, using the second person plural as the formal style. However, by the end of the 1960s, some groups and companies pushed the universal “du”, the government encouraged this development and the nation went along
Six Chix is just terrible as it almost always is. It’s not even a joke, just sort of a weird pun-like thing represented by the usual art that has been scrawled out in half an hour or so.
MARY WORTH: “It’s my pleasure…and one of my specialties.” Is…Mary flirting very the new groom? “Ed, let me tell you that men love eating my moist fluffy muffin And the thick cakes I have are very delicious!
GA; I’m actually relieved. I feared we were going to see little red men marching around on Mars, a chorus of singing fish on Neptune, lovely ladies lounging around on Venus, etc. And I was bracing myself for Uranus.
Mary Worth Mashup: Missing final panels.
@2+2=7: Not only that, but yesterday it looked like Tiffany was lying about ‘going home’ and instead made a beeline for Kip, who she knew would be alone and possibly looking for some hawt post-breakup action, to secure her shelter for the night.
Instead, we have Kip berating Tiffany for not utilizing the security service that up until now had never been mentioned but *obviously* was available all along.
The Masters of Misdirection strike again! Always remember, Tiffany isn’t just a bitchslutwhore, she’s a STUPID bitchslutwhore!
RMMD: I will forgive this strip almost everything if Wanda pulls off her beehive hairdo to reveal a mop of pink hair confirming she’s been Mindy all this time. ‘Compared to Buck and that greasy stickboy of a son of his, marriage to you would be an improvement…’
The horns being so close at the base, i would think more cape buffalo than wildebeest. And a more fearsome beast.
@Baja Gaijin: Awww. Talk about fond memories.
@Cleveland Mocks: Re pie crust – I’ve tried that, as well as rolling the dough on wax paper. I think my problem is the dough itself – I’m never sure if I use too much or not enough water. If I do get the dough right, I think I stop rolling it out while it’s still too thick for a crust. I just have to keep trying.
@Myrtle: Living in sin!? Pardon me while I retire to my fainting couch!
Of course, MW has shown unmarried couples in bed together. It’s no surprise with Iris, Estelle, and their boyfriends, but I never suspected that Wanda is a hussy.
@Baja Gaijin: That’s wonderful. I love the last panel.
@125 Poteet: Memories? This is the first time I muffins were included in the…you know.
@127 I speak Jive: The disembodied Mary head really sells it.