Honestly surprised that toilet lid isn’t carpeted
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Pluggers, 8/29/26
The key to unlocking this scene, to my mind, is the cobwebs. Pluggers now spend all their pooping time doomscrolling just like the rest of us, but unlike the rest of us are letting their long-abandoned late ’00s Reader’s Digests moulder, unread, untouched, and unloved, which really raises questions about when the last time anything in that bathroom was cleaned in general.
Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/29/26
Against all odds and the pressures of the very fabric of their reality, the scam twins were on the verge of talking themselves into doing something interesting like kidnapping Sarah. That’s why the strip had to call in the big guns, in the form of their grandpa Lyle Ollman, inventor of the Ollman Technique, the self-help/brainwashing process now being marketed as the Mirakle Method. I don’t know that we’ve ever actually seen the Technique/Method in action, but based on today’s strip it seems to mostly involve an old man berating you to get your life together and maybe go back to community college, which is frankly a little underwhelming.
Beetle Bailey, 8/29/26
I genuinely enjoy Beetle’s silent body language here. “I’m just gonna … I’m gonna go eat these chips in my bunk, I think.”
143 replies to “Honestly surprised that toilet lid isn’t carpeted”
Pluggers:
But of course, the articles in National Geographic Magazine are timeless.
RMMD:
“Dang it, Grandpa — you’re no fun at all. In other words, you’re just like Rex Morgan!”
RMMD:
“Can’t you, like, bust a move to amuse us, Grandpa? — you know, like ‘Do the Freddy’ or something?”
Beetle Bailey:
“They get intoxicated by eating fermented fruit. That’s what gives them that ‘deer in the headlights‘ look!”
RMMD: “Now get out of here before I use my magic wand on you!”
B. Bailey: “Hmm, I saw some rotten apples in the mess hall dumpster.” Thinks Beetle.
BB: I really thought this was building to a ribald joke – maybe the drunk deer got HORNY! – and I think Beetle did too. Look how underwhelmed he is that Sarge is just busting out the cervid trivia.
Pluggers: The proportions of that toilet just seem off. Do pluggers buy High-Flow models just to stick it to the jerks at the EPA?
RMMD: Just an incredible ending to this storyline. Ocean’s 11 really could have used a scene where Brad Pitt’s grandpa just wandered in and told them not to do that, ending the whole heist then and there.
BB: Sarge finally figures out a use for fruit.
Mary Worth:
“Thomas, something really eldritch is happening in this joint! — someone has insinuated themselves into our first panel today and replaced Mary’s and my regular eyes with crazy eyes!”
Yeah Otto. They can’t hold their liquor, that’s why they’re drunk. You’re the smart one, shouldn’t you be able to think of a pun here?
RMMD “Yes, stop that Con artist nonsense right now and go to school to learn enough to do it _properly_ – those only-work-on-the-brain-damaged schemes of yours are _embarrassing_, and I can’t believe you had to be _told_ kidnapping gets investigated more seriously than dine-and-dash!”
RMMD: Instead of Scared Straight the twins were mildly unbent.
GT Scholarship? Did they forget this is high school? I suppose it could mean available after graduation for college, but a full ride *where*? There are some huge differences in US college costs, and frankly if he plays well the *college* he applies to would be vying for his talent with money, not the *high school* he went to.
MW Actually, vaguely shrimp-shaped lumps *does* look delectable compared to Mary’s usual Beige Balls.
So they kept the Bum Boat going through Saturday. I am still vainly hoping for some Dawn Drama showing up as they bump into her on Sunday, but yeah, it’ll probably be the boat ride platitude fest. Or they’ll still be at the Bum Boat talking about how *exciting* they are as they vary their food order. Yeah, 4 quatloos on Bum Boat “we are *such* rebels” tomorrow
JP Was he really only in jail/ prison awaiting trial? I thought he was convicted of something minor, is this a retcon?
Luann: So after all these years, she’s eleven classes away from getting a two year degree? That’s not even halfway there!
CS: No, Mindy, a South Park character would have said something funny. Or at least something that advances the storyline, a thing we haven’t seen in Crankshaft in at least two months.
@Banana Jr. 6000:
On Luann : she’d probably get it quicker if she took more than one or two classes per semester, but I guess she has to leave time for her part-time job at Weenie World, which leads me to ask : Why is she still working there? And how? She left for several months, and they just saved her spot?
On Crankshaft : It took me a while to understand that Mindy was saying that because she was referring to Pepper’s voice being high-pitched, sped up, and electronically modified. Calling Pepper an “Autotuned Automaton
/Trash Can” would have been better!(also, I won’t drop that Pepper’s debut should have been last week storyline; Crankshaft and Ralph Meckler roll up to Montoni’s, Crankshaft orders, tuesday he’s surprised by something we can’t see, wednesday it’s shown that it’s a robot waiter rolling up to deliver his order, thursday it’s “Meet Pepper, grandpa!”, and friday and saturday it’s Pepper demonstrating that it can keep up with Crankshaft’s malaprops while cutting a few barbs of it’s own. I just think that it’s a better debut than everyone just standing around talking, Mindy constantly whining that getting Pepper is a bad idea, and barely any indication that Pepper can even MOVE)
@Schroduck: I kind of thought BB was setting up any joke at all. “Have you seen this? Have you heard about this?”
RMMD-That’s not Grandpa! That’s Uncle Jimmy in a Grandpa skin suit.
The first panel of Beetle Bailey sounds like the setup for a joke. The second panel reminds you that you’re reading Beetle Bailey and how foolish it is to expect anything resembling humor.
Wary Morth:
“It looks delicious”, Mary says, scarcely able to control her anticipation as she eyes the arguing couple on the far side of the room.
@CanuckDownSouth:
Some of the big sports high schools in the US rival college in tuition costs.
“Did you hear the one about the drunk deer? They get intoxicated on fermented fruit!” – worst joke ever. There isn’t even a way to make it work. “A drunk deer walks into a bar. The bartender says, I can’t serve you any more fermented fruit.”
Six Chix: Women and their clothes! Ammirite? Wait – this is a woman cartoonist writing this?
DtM: “Oh, don’t worry about school, Dennis. I plan to let the rip tide take you out to sea.”
GT: Assault, kidnapping, and unlawful imprisonment may not be major offenses in The Valley, where coaches rule like lords, athletes are akin to knights, and those bound-and-gagged bartenders are mere serfs who exist to only serve and spectate, but having escaped the consequences of his actions, Gerads has moved on to more serious crimes: pay-for-play athletic headhunting at the secondary level!
RxMD: Don’t forget the third element of the
OldmanOllman Technique, Josh: Threatening to call the cops.RxMD Redux: I wonder how many other plots there are against the Morgans that never come to fruition that we never see and they are completely unaware of? I wouldn’t mind if the step entirely considered of those from now on and we never see the Morgans again except in the background.
“Did you hear about the drunk deer? It happened during a stag party!”
Speaking as a retired teacher, I don’t know who I’d rather see LESS in my class; The Dingbat Twins or Luann.
“Sarge? Aren’t we in a comic about military life?”
“Fuck if I know, private. Everything’s a blank for me after the Korean War. Is General MacArthur OK?”
@MKay:
Luann has the “advantage” that she always lets whoever is teaching the class she is attending single her out for humiliation; Mr Fogarty did it, Prof Zebo did it, Mrs Phelps-Fogarty did it, even Mrs Horner did it!
Cyclops Sarge holds Beetle et al. prisoner, to be devoured later. Explains why Sarge is frequently shown mashing up Beetle. Beetle’s too lazy to sharpen and fire-harden a wooden spear for an escape, anyway.
BB: This truly is an extraordinary age: plant-based meat substitutes are readily available, diamonds can be grown in labs rather than excavated from the earth by slave labor, and Beatle Bailey gives us the first completely punchline-free joke.
RMMD: Did Beatty catch an episode of Dora the Explorer and assume most criminals can be deterred with a “Swiper, no swiping!”-style scolding?
@MKay: Definitely the twins. Luann’s an idiot and you’ll have to explain everything to her at least five times, but she won’t make waves. The twins are the type of students who always try to pull fast ones on the teacher and can’t seem to grasp the fact that the teacher is in fact smarter than they are.
@Anonymous was me. Apparently I accidentally unclicked the “save my info” box.
Beetle Bailey: “Did you hear the one about the drunk deer? It’s not a punchline, just a fairly well-known fact!”
Also: Is it bad that Otto the man-dog hybrid has opinions about other animals’ drinking habits? Thinking it through, I’m certain that Sarge gives his dog beer. I just can’t figure out if Otto has enough agency to commit to alcoholism or not.
@pugfuggly: “Do pluggers buy High-Flow models just to stick it to the jerks at the EPA?” Pluggers never replaced the original toilet in the house they bought in 1952 with a VA loan.
FG: Ah, Ming, bless that man. He sure knows how to unite people! Though let’s not confuse winning the battle with winning the war.
FRAZZ: hey, Frazz, “Argyle Sweater” has a new challenge for you today.
JP: Was Alan really acquitted? He was certainly guilty and certainly in prison. Anyone know better?
LUANN: Community College I–She should be able to successfully complete 11 substantive courses in, say 20 years.
RMMD: Community College II– Without a goal to work for, the airhead twins should be able to successfully drop out in one week. Gramps, let them know they’ll then pay their own rent.
PHANTOM: Sure hope Python realized he could tear off his ankle bracelet because realistically Phantom cant dodge all that ammo. Kit knows about drones and should have calculated to take cover from the mind sending them.
S4th: are Sal and Ted going in with their socks on! They’ll be miserable with he rest of the day.
Plugger bathrooms are important to historians and archivists. Rarely do you find complete runs of The New American and The Dearborn Independent.
MW: Thomas uses an old bar towel to serve the platters because he ain’t putting *his* thumb in that slop.
@pugfuggly:
#8 PLUGGERS: We Boomer Pluggers are environmentally responsible as well as cheap. Hence, we keep the old 5 gallon tank but put six bricks or a filled milk jug in the back.
@The Rambling Otter: Oh man! You made the drunk deer joke work!
How about, “Did you hear about the drunk gay deer? He got intoxicated on fermented fruits, ha ha, get it?” nudge, nudge. (NTTAWWT)
@MKay: Less? or fewer?
C’shaft: South Park has never been my thing–too crass, too convinced that transgression and vulgarity are the sum of humor rather than elements which more skillful hands have successfully employed within humor. But I did laugh at the World of Warcraft episode, which is far more than Crankshaft has done in a good long while.
Dustin: See, the problem is the podcast is assuming that “yourself” isn’t a creep who uses tired pick-up lines on random women.
JP: “And of course that means your moral or professional integrity will never be called into question again by anyone.”
Luann: “Or the last fifteen, for that matter.”
MW: Poor Thomas. You know Mary and Jeff demand the same table in his station every time, treat him with the same patronizing civility as he serves them, leave him the same two-dollar tip.
@lynn: The proper joke is “Women and their shoes!” And it could have been close to funny, what with “Galoshes or mukaluks?” And ”Flip flops or espadrilles?” Opening it up to clothes in general dilutes the humor to dishwater level.
Phantom: Another pop culture joke dating back to the 19th century: the bad guys are simply terrible shots.
@Voshkod: AI companies are buying up Plugger bathrooms as fast as they can, to train their models on content old enough to be free of “AI slop.” Pluggers are going to get rich (at least by Plugger standards, which means enough to put another gallon of gas in that 1952 pickup truck)!
@Bob Tice: Do Pluggers wank while looking at all those pictures of topless women?
Rex Morgan, M.D.
Grandpa Ollman’s cane looks more like an enormous magic wand, which leads me to believe is actually a dark sorcerer specializing in enchantment, and the Ollman Technique/Mirakle Method consists of powerful mind control incantations. Right now he’s reforming the twins using his most potent magics: the Browbeat spell.
MW: The salad comes on the side, at the same time as the main? Is the Bum Boat a real sit-down seafood restaurant or a food truck?
See, if you’d ordered the fried seafood platter like normal people, you would have gotten a pile of delicious French fries. Now you have to dick around with the baked potato — butter, salt, pepper, sour cream, more salt, pepper, mash it up, check the butter and sour cream to see if you need more — and by the time you have it right, the fucking fish is all cold. And where’s the tartar sauce? Waiter! Tartar sauce, and LOTS OF IT. Bring the ketchup squeeze bottle, while you’re at it.
MW- “Jeff, you know what Wilbur would be, if he were a fish?” “No,Mary..what would he be?” “A Dum-Bass! “
Pluggers definitely have old issues of Playboy and Hustler magazines in their bathrooms and now I can’t stop imagining what those magazines would look like in the Pluggers universe and it’s really disturbing.
Archie-“Discipline! Lots and lots of discipline! Especially that Veronica. I’ll discipline her all night if I have to.”
Beetle Bailey:
Today’s Beetle Bailey is really just a nature fact, with no joke to speak of, aside from the inherent humor value of animals being drunk—a surprisingly widespread phenomenon, seen in a variety of birds and mammals. Sarge looks absolutely thrilled to share this knowledge, presumably because he feels it justifies his alcoholism. “Don’t worry, it’s natural to get absolutely hammered every day!”
@lynn: #4: I know, it looks weird, but I think “less” is it.
I refuse to believe that Pluggers actually bother to put the roll of toilet paper on the holder. Pluggers would have many empty cardboard tubes scattered around the bathroom and the roll of toilet paper would be sitting on the back of the tank maybe.
RMMD- “You two need to stop the scamming! Now! And for the last fucking time, YES! The Morgan’s refrigerator is running! And NO! The Morgan’s don’t have Prince Albert in a can! If this shit doesn’t stop, You Two are gonna be the ones in the fucking can! Now get back to school before I give you both a good gumming!”
Sarge is excited because he just figured out that there’s another way to get drunk. He can’t wait to go around looking for possible fermented fruit laying on the ground. He’ll soon start testing out other abandoned foods he finds like half eaten hotdogs or pizza. Basically he’ll become a scavenger like a raccoon digging through the trash. If Beetle Bailey was ever going to start a story arc I hope this is it.
RMMD: these ginger nitwits should focus on stealing a braincell or two rather than sticking to stealing souls, or trying.
RMMD: “Grandpa, you’re no fun at all!” Apparently these girls thought it would be “fun” to kidnap Sarah Morgan. Clearly they’ve never met her.
@Anonymous: Luann abandoned her job at Weenieworld to go to summer camp, but they always have vacant positions and they rehired Luann when she applied. Most people would consider this a red flag, but you know Luann.
Crankshaft: South Park? Pepper is completely programmed with all the hip catchphrases from Disney channel comedies of the 20-aughts.
And no, there are no automatic updates. In fact, Pepper’s vocabulary is burned into its PROM–not EEPROM.
GT: Coach Gerards’ track suit and haircut are not exactly cental casting recruitment material, unless we’re in 1990s Serbia scouting for most any football side.
MW: Two questions.
Is that a real candle instead of an LED?
If real, am I a bad person for idly dreaming of The Cocoanut Grove, the Iriquois Theater, or The Stand nightclub?
H&L: Tha hole looks a foot wide. This is already Thirsty’s fantasy: A five foot putt on a perfectly flat green he can make. In two.
DtM: We all know what you’re thinking, Henry. And we’re rooting for you to go with your impulse, as you and Alice can return all those new clothes and school supplies after the medical examiner rules it an accident.
Heathcliff has been breeding with the mice and now there are mutant mice with cat heads? Is that the joke?
@Vulpes:
Sarge is also envious that the deer get to run around unclothed and defecate wherever they want. Nobody criticizes them for not bathing and sleeping all day.
Here’s a fun fact – roughly 30% of women and 60% of men don’t wash their hands after using the bathroom. I would bet real money those numbers are higher in pluggers. Anyway, enjoy handling those magazines.
***
For two people who are really intent on doing crime, these girls are forgetting how easy it would be to keep the old man from ratting them out, magic wand or not. Just grab a knife and scam him into taking up residence in a shallow grave!
***
So Beetle Bailey is just giving up on gags and doing fun facts instead? It’s for the best, and the educational aspect makes it a better swerve from jokes than Hi and Lois’s decision to just be people talking.
@ValdVin: Noah Antwiler (watching a videogame store training video)
Overly exaggerated Nerd stereotype: Getting his Gameboy repaired “I think there’s something wrong with the EEPROM”
“EEPROM? This guy has never been to A Prom…”
Pluggers: Plugger bathroom pr0n is of an era when the Playboy models still wore panties.
@Tabby Lavalamp: These girls would probably just let a person go after scamming/robbing them, without even covering their faces or anything.
Criminals do tend to slip up, a lot though.
One criminal was a serial… um… R-word, after doing horrible things to multiple women. One of the victims noticed something interesting… he held his flashlight above his shoulder, rather than in front. Which is how Cops are trained to hold them.
Which broke the case, as the police force now knew he was a Cop and narrowed it down from there.
@Bob Tice: As are the 1960s articles about women in Africa.
PLUGGERS: Poor Josh. Poor sweet, lovable, naive Josh. He sees those cobwebs and asks when was the last time the bathroom was cleaned. But seeing those intact cobwebs in such close proximity to the toilet makes me ask, when was the last time the bathroom was used. It seems the Plungers have devolved to their natural state. The Pope is Catholic, and the bear…well, you know.
@CanuckDownSouth: Lots of private schools offer ‘scholarships’ to lower income students who show talent in sports.
Pluggers: Pluggers truly will try to smugly brag about anything, huh? What’s next, “you’re a plugger if you forget to take your garbage to the road one week”?
Rex Morgan: I’d make a joke about Lyle trying to turn the Twins over to the authorities and the cops basically just laugh at him at best for wasting their time, but than I remembered this is Rex Morgan and therefore the cops would treat the Twins’ and their incredibly stupid and harmless scams as if they were hardcore gangbangers gunning people down in the streets, or act as if their pathetic kidnapping plan (which never got past the realm of impotent, blustering thinking) was a terrorist attack. “Pretending to play music outsider a grocery store?! You’re getting the chair for this, you sick fucks!”
Beetle Bailey: C’mon, Beetle, leave the art of making strips without jokes to your family over in Hi And Lois.
PLUGGERS :…yet still more up to date then the libraries in a lot of cities (that’s what happens when you don’t approve those bond measures to “pwn the libs” or get back at them for refusing to remove The Color Purple or whatever.)
@TheDiva: My favorite ‘SP’ was the one about old people being stopped from driving and calling in the airborne troops of the AARP to take over the town.
@UncleJeff: I only saw one South Park episode, where there a serial killer going around killing people on Halloween.
The band Korn ended up helping out, as a Scooby-Doo parody.
Forget the toilet lid not being carpeted, what’s going on with the floor?
It looks like there’s no floor at all, just dirt.
@Everybody Posts, Nobody Reads: #63: Or at least before they started showing pubic hair.
JP: Dammit, Dad, *one* of us needs to be Judge Parker. Unless they do a time jump, Charlotte’s too young. And then what, this strip becomes “The Drivers”? I’m not gonna be Barney Googled or Fritzi Ritzed!
@The Rambling Otter: One of my wife’s cousins is a cop and he once expressed to me that – in his experience – criminals trend towards being stupider and more pathetic based on the severity of their crimes. E.G., he described some petty thieves as among the smartest people he had ever seen, but a murderer he encountered was such a complete moron it was a miracle he could tie his shoes together and was further the biggest loser on the planet beneath the tough guy front he tried to project. The cousin’s personal opinion on this observation is that if you’re the kind of person who’s vile, impulsive, self-absorbed and self-harming enough to willfully choose to harm innocent people in horrific ways to get what you want, than you’re likely to also be the kind of person who makes embarrassingly dumb mistakes when attempting to commit those acts expressly because of it.
More poignantly, he also expressed his belief that the makeup of the criminal population reflects humanity’s own trend towards the vast majority of people being good (i.e., that there’s a million pickpockets and bootleggers for every murderer or rapist) and that realizing this is a big part of what’s kept him sane and helped through the hardest parts of being a law enforcement officer.
@Rita Lake: Speaking of crime, Weenieworld is totally a front/shell company, right?
@Anonymous: The idea of someone roving around their neighborhood after, say, Halloween, and eating fermenting jack o’lanterns that were left out too long to get drunk feels like a bit from something like Its Always Sunny In Philadelphia or Curb Your Enthusiasm and I love it.
GT: Has it ever been established that Goshen is a private school that would charge tuition?
GT: Coach Luke gets fired over one on field meltdown but this guy gets to keep his job?
Luann: Ahem, Luann. Since you’re basically going to start all over as a freshman you don’t need an AA degree to enroll in a four year university. All you need is a high school diploma and a decent SAT score.
Gil Thorp – Ye gods, that artwork is atrocious.
Mary Worth – They’re eating with their hands because the waiter forgot the utensils. I hope Dr. Jeff washed his hands after whatever he was doing with it under the table in the first panel.
JP – As others have commented, how could Alan be in prison before being acquitted? Wouldn’t he be in a jail, not a prison, before his trial.
I recall that the charges involved Alan helping April’s father fake his death. Judges aren’t supposed to do that.
Pluggers: You just know there’s an unflushed turd floating in that toilet bowl.
@pugfuggly: Re Pluggers – The seat being higher actually makes sense. Older people often replace their toilets with a higher version because they have a difficult time getting up from low toilets. I’ve noticed that public toilets are almost always of the low variety.
@ectojazzmage: Re: Rex Morgan M.D.: Oh no, it would be even better! The cops would simply show up on their doorstep and ask them in a pleasantly neutral manner (Rex Morgan M.D.‘s favorite flavor!) in all these allegations were true and the twins would immediately cave and confess everything before prostrating themselves into prone arrestable positions. I mean they barely stand the relentless assault of their grandpa gently seeking confirmation of their plans after all. I guess it makes sense, since just because they’re proud con-women doesn’t mean they’d ever do something so untoward and shameful like lie to authority figures and deny everything. Even these girls aren’t that far gone!
I’m sorry. I’m just giggling like a madman and how hard Beatty managed to trip over his own moral self-righteousness here.
Luann-What are these eleven classes? I know you would need a science, history, literature, language, and art class. Luann’s Italian class and one of her art classes would qualify.
@Vulpes: This one does feel a bit like the sort of “animal fun fact” that something like Mark Trail would do. Maybe Beetle Bailey’s crew is trying to butt in on the market.
@Anonymous: I’m pretty sure he’d actually be a blowfish. Because he’s rotund and toxic.
@Charterstone: Dune: Knowing Gil Thorp, this really will be what actually leads to Gerad getting sent to prison.
@I speak Jive: On JP …as I recall, the story totally conflated pretrial detention and prison. While that is obviously bad in a strip that’s supposed to be about legal professionals, it’s a pretty common trope in popular entertainment.
Beetle Bailey: I suppose Beetle is Gen Z and Sarge is a younger millennial. But it’s sad that this is how everyone watches TV now: on a surplus bus-station bench in front of a computer monitor.
Rex Morgan: This is apparently one of those families where Grandpa holds all the power because he has most of the money, and he could change the terms of his will at any time. But he’d better be careful, because we know those twins aren’t above “pranking” him by replacing his heart medication with Skittles.
Pluggers: That plugger stopped getting new magazines when he realized that a print subscription to The New Yorker now costs $75 per year. Ha-ha, just kidding! I meant Model Railroader magazine. Wait, that’s $55 per year, for just 12 issues? And it doesn’t even have cartoons? Welcome to 2026, when even plugger culture is way too expensive.
LUANN: Luann: “Camp Sky got me stoked to be a teacher I couldn’t wait to get started on my credentials! But once I found out I have to, like, actually do stuff to get them, I was sooooo over it!”
LUANN (2): I love that apparently walking and chewing gum at the same time is too much for Luann. “Oh no I can’t possibly do things like concentrate on schoolwork while, working and doing chores and the like, even though all my friends and rivals around me have been doing that with little fuss for years now!”
@Liam:
What are these eleven classes? I know you would need a science, history, literature, language, and art class. Luann’s Italian class and one of her art classes would qualify.
a) Mrs Fogarty is incompetent, and stupidly dismissed classes whose credits would transfer as “not counting”
b) It is SUPER IMPORTANT for the narrative that NONE of Luann’s classes she’s taken during her “Blank Slate” phase, or even before that, count towards getting her degree. The idea is that Luann is only getting serious about actually graduating college NOW.
@Guillermo el chiclero:
Luann: Ahem, Luann. Since you’re basically going to start all over as a freshman you don’t need an AA degree to enroll in a four year university. All you need is a high school diploma and a decent SAT score.
It’s also important for the narrative that Luann getting to attend Moony Uni be a near-insurmountable obstacle for her. Because apparently the place doesn’t let just ANYBODY out of high school in, even though it seems like it does (Alan, Bernice, Gunther, Bets, PIRO…)?
@Guillermo el chiclero:
Well she’s fucked!
@Liam: that was an “Italian Menu” language class. Luann once ordered “scungilli” when she meant linguine and by god she is going to make sure THAT never happens again.
Italian waiter: “Contorni, signorina?”
Luann: “Pickles will do.”
@Rube: #83: What I remember Alan wasn’t actually acquitted. Norton pulled some strings or blackmail and got the presiding judge to resign and the case was miraculously dropped. In reality judicial wrongdoing would only get a mistrial but a new trial would still occur under a new judge.
Crank: Who says all Batty’s pop culture references are fifty years or more out of date? Here’s one that’s only thirty years out of date! That’s nearly this century!
HtH: Someone inform Walker-Browne LLC that the version of Betty Boop who entered the public domain this year is a) in black and white and b) a dog. No, really.
JP: Which I guess contrasts with … whatever Randy’s deal is? Gosh, it’s almost like it would be helpful in following the story to know what exactly happened to Randy before, after and indeed during being locked up in a prison somewhere snowy that may or may not have had any legal standing!
(Then again, we’re being told things we did see happen didn’t happen that way, so I guess we just have to accept that what happened to Randy is whatever it’s currently convenient for the story to have happened.)
MW: “And all this time, I thought ‘flounder’ was just what Moy did halfway through a storyline!”
RMMD: We have actually seen the Mirakle Method in action, and it’s even lamer than yelling at people to stop being scammers, but I guess Lyle Ollman, The Little Old Man, reckons that to imagine a swing-set on the moon, you need more brainpower than these two have between them.
Speaking of the Mirakle Method, it still annoys me that the Dumbermint Twins apparently had the opportunity to get in on this — aka exactly what their hero Uncle Jimmy was doing before he got locked up — and were all “But if it works then it’s not a scam any more! That makes it legitimate work that helps people! Eww!” Because they’re eeeeevil. And stupid. Mostly stupid.
SH: Speaking of Alex’s mountain climbing hobby, I don’t usually go in for these “it’s all a hallucination and/or the characters are dead” theories, but have we considered the possibility that the whole wedding story is his dying dream as he suffocates under tons of snow, because he was dumb enough to think tying himself to a tree made him safer during an avalanche?
@Anonymous: 86:
“Because apparently the place doesn’t let just ANYBODY out of high school in”
And Tara only got thrown out because of thievery.
@ectojazzmage: 72- Not to mention a bottom feeder. I stand corrected.
Pluggers: The saddest part is, Sporf magazine folded five years ago.
RMMD: Imagine the consequences when the scam twins learn what murder is. “Let’s go stab someone over and over again with a knife.” “Why would we do that?” “So they won’t be alive anymore! We’ll be alive, and they won’t be.” “That sounds like fun! I’m in!” Half an hour later, they show up at someone’s house and ring the doorbell. “Hello? Wh-who are you?” “You don’t know us. We’re here to murder you.” “Would you mind standing still? It makes it easier to stab you that way.”
BB: 76 years into its run, Beetle Bailey is still capable of surprising me. I was sure Sarge was about to make a terrible pun. Nope. Just going to flatly relate something he saw on TV.
@Guillermo el chiclero: Yeah, I think you’re right, there was no actual acquittal. Still, Alan doesn’t have a criminal record, although it seems unlikely he could pass whatever the character requirements are for this position. My wife is a part time judge, and it’s not like getting a fishing licence.
Are… are people seriously using touchscreen phones while on the toilet? I thought that was a joke! That’s absolutely disgusting. You guys can go ahead and infect yourselves, I’ll stick to old copies of “Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader”, and if that makes me a plugger then so be it.
@Anonymous:I got some bad news for you about how many germs are on that old Reader…
@The Rambling Otter: Wow, there’s a name I haven’t heard in a while. I wonder if he ever managed to get his head on straight…
@The Rambling Otter: Broke as in hushed up and never mentioned again?
@Rube: And since one’s hands are washed immediately afterwards, and you don’t take the book around with you to use during mealtimes, it makes no difference.
@The Quiet Man: Seeing as there was a huge manhunt for this guy, and they strove to catch him, even after the fact they learned he was a cop.
He was put away for a long time.
@The Rambling Otter: You don’t mean Spoony, right?
Crankshaft-It’s finally been confirmed to me that Batiuk is completely checked out of reality.
@lynn: And why the long, narrow face?
Pluggers – Those ain’t cobwebs; they’re fresh!
♪ Spider-Plugger, Spider-Plugger,
We all hope he’s not a hugger
He’s a hairy, big galoot
Hygiene’s not his strong suit
Hey there!
There goes the Spider-Plugger
@Anonymous: Hahaha ^^
Beetle – That’s Little River Band, isn’t it?
♪ Have you heard about the Drunken Deer?
Intoxicated by fermented fruit every time
Have you heard about the Drunken Deer?
Can’t hold their liquor, but they still keep on tryin’
Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh
Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh
Don Abundio, translated:
“What’s wrong, Flora?”
“My feet are killing me!”
“But you’re still required to wear high heels”
“I understand”
“Some of the files may be a little damp”
MW – Dang it, Mary Worth, slow down and stop glossing over important plot details. What kind of salad dressing did they get!?
@ectojazzmage:
Your cousin in law’s data is biased by the dumb ones who got caught.
@Joe Blevins:
The world I grewed up in is gone.
@Peanut Gallery
What did the snail say while riding on the back of a turtle? “Wheeee!”
Alternate suggestions for outdated Pluggers reading material? Supermarket tabloids. Guideposts. Maybe an old Mack Bolan paperback.
@Tonio: Your Horoscope: 1977.
Or, in general, the kind of stuff non-pluggers put in their Little Free Libraries.
@Abomynous:
If criminals were smart, they’d have honest careers and not need to be criminals.
@Joe Blevins: Astonishingly similar to the Leopold and Loeb case.
PLUGGERS: Josh, I’m surprised the toilet lid is that clean.
@Bob Tice: Who reads the NG for the articles?
One thing missing from that Pluggers tableau is the “Whacking Material” sign from “Airplane!” Next question for Josh ….. Is Captain Ovuer a Plugger?
Sex Organ V.D. : “Darn It, Obi Wan! Stop waving your light sabre at us! We know your Jedi days are way behind you and you couldn’t hit the broadside of a Death Star anymore.”
@Joe Blevins: Pluggers: The saddest part is, Sporf magazine folded five years ago.
_______________________________
That’s the issue with the Dorf centerfold. If it wasn’t so “used”, the Plugger could get a decent price for it on Flea Bay.
BB: Sarge looks like he thinks he’s telling a joke, but it’s not a joke. Neither is what’s in Otto’s thought balloon. Sarge should get a goldfish or a rabbit. Maybe third time would be the charm.
RMMD: Grandpa Lyle’s cane looks like a wand today, creating the impression that the Scam Twins are the result of a “saw the lady in half” trick gone wrong.
9CL: Is this the best orange cat in the comics? Neither Heathcliff, Garfield, nor Bill the Cat have ever shut Thorax up.
C-Shaft: After a little shy of three decades, Batiuk has learned that something called “South Park” exists, but he knows nothing else about it. Hint: Mindy would be using as much angry profanity as I have going on in my head.
Dustin: Note that Dustin’s tiny black eyes grow to normal size when he’s particularly filled with self-loathing.
GT: Coach Gerads should show this presumably Milford athlete a spreadsheet on college tuitions to remind him that he plays to win AND for money.
HtH: Stay in your lane, Lucky Eddie. You like fish-women, not time traveling flappers with papier-mâché Mardi Gras heads.
JP: Prison is where Alan learned to pomade his hair back until it could be used as a blunt force weapon.
MW: The weird cat eye effect on Mary’s face makes me suspect this is turning into another remake of Cat People. If it has less nudity than Paul Schader’s version, that’s all right.
Phantom: Oh George, not the livestock.
I wonder whatever did become of those old copies of Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader. Probably mom gave them to the local charity resale shop.
Low and Hi-Less: For a split second, Thursty could see himself drinking PBR out of the FEDEX Cup.
The Familliar Mucus: “Mommy usually gives me five shot glasses of NyQuill™ to get me to sleep, you only gave me three,Daddy!”
Phantom: Stupid drones, don’t they know that Stripey’s plot armor makes him impervious to bullets?
Phantom: The point of the drones peppering the ground with gunfire isn’t intended to kill Stripey. Invictus/Shmusk had seen too many old grade B westerns in his formative years and just wants to make Stripey dance. Dance, you varmint!
@Guillermo el chiclero: Strictly speaking it would make the horse (Hero, I think?) dance. Which, I admit, would be entertainment.
And of course Hero the Horse dances the waltz….
@Guillermo el chiclero: I recall right around when The Simpsons was starting to suck…
One Treehouse of Horror episode, had the town taken over by zombie cowboys.
They turn Moe’s Bar into a Saloon and Zombie(!) Billy the Kid points to the piano and orders Homer at gunpoint to “Play Pian-nee!”
So Homer starts playing Mozart
“That’s Piano… I said Pian-nee”
Homer starts playing Ragtime.
“That’s better!”
That was the only joke that got a chuckle out of me in that entire episode.
Not that it wasn’t enjoyable (at least compared to how it is now)
@The Rambling Otter: Good, I’m glad to hear that.
Pluggers … use old magazines instead of store bought TP? Because that’s how gramps taught them when they used pages from the Monkey Ward catalog?
RMMD: I don’t blame the Doublenut Twins. I wouldn’t want to go to community college with LuAnn either. Do some crimes! Order sushi then not pay! And blame society!
Introducing the scam twins with their insidious plot to pretend to play music for those big busking bucks kept expectations low enough that everything just ending with a good talking to work. Well played, Rex. If anyone got excited it might exacerbate someone’s irregular heartbeat.
Pluggerz: I replaced the original toilet in my house. It was wall-hung, or hung from the wall, I should say, and used seven gallons per flush. The bowl would fill and empty twice. Anything you flushed was well on its way to the treatment plant by the time the flushing process was over.
JP: Cripes, after the past few weeks, I’m thinking The Return Of Bogdan would have to be an improvement.
@White Rabbit: It was hanging on the wall? You must be one hell of an acrobat.
@Ukulele Ike: Yeah, that was the main reason to replace it.
@75 ectojazzmage: “Weenieworld is totally a front/shell company, right?” After hours, Weenieworld is a bottomless gay disco.
@Artist formerly known as Ben: 9CL: Is this the best orange cat in the comics? Neither Heathcliff, Garfield, nor Bill the Cat have ever shut Thorax up.
A way that works for me to shut Thorax up is by not clicking on the comic.
@Rita Lake: Luann abandoned her job at Weenieworld to go to summer camp, but they always have vacant positions and they rehired Luann when she applied. Most people would consider this a red flag, but you know Luann.
Conversely, when WW is looking to fill a vacancy on the front line, wouldn’t you just know it, Luann happens to be available. Red flags, red flags everywhere.
“Did you hear about the hoatzin? It burps because it ferments leaves in its crop!” And so bit by bit the comic turned into Mark Trail, except the only one who gets beaten up is still the poor title character.
So Beetle Bailey is like Hi & Lois now where they just abandoned all attempts at anything resembling an actual “joke”. They just say random stuff now. Yes, animals eat fermented fruit sometimes and it intoxicates them. OK.
Nelly Fenely just needs a little sugar in her bowl.