Monday is for ends, beginnings, and so on
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Mary Worth, 8/24/26
So, just to bring you up to speed on Mary Worth, last week there was no follow-up to Dawn’s single tear of romantic longing, and instead we got the sort of Mary congratulatory victory lap (Wilbur admitting to her at length that he was wrong to think ill of Dawn and Tommy hanging out and thanking her for setting him straight) that we’ve come to associate with the end of a storyline. So, it’s not clear to me if this BUZZ BUZZ! is Dawn-heartbreak-related, or if we’re starting a new plot, one where the United States has devolved into chaos and Charterstone residents now rely on the supplemental food supply that Mary was wise enough to establish. Sure, everyone seems pretty calm given that background, but you have to understand that Mary decides how many weekly calories your conduct has entitled you to, so nobody wants to get too out of pocket no matter how much panic they’re feeling inside.
The Phantom, 8/24/26
The Phantom was introduced to the world two years before Superman and three years before Batman, and I appreciate the way that he has stubbornly stayed a sort of proto-superhero rather than evolving with the rest of the cape genre (he’s never worn a cape, for one thing). So, for instance, he’s kind of like Batman in that he’s an ordinary human whose “powers” are the result of relentless training, but unlike Batman or just about any other superhero, one of his powers is that he’s really good at shooting guns. And he’ll do it, too! New problem on the horizon, like AI-controlled drones? Why not solve that problem by shooting at it, with guns? Let’s give it a go! Probably can’t hurt!
Herb and Jamaal, 8/24/26
You gotta admit, Sarah is taking a high-risk, high-reward strategy in this conversation. Sure, Jamaal was probably going to reply to her statement in panel two with a question that would allow her to bust out this sick burn, but wasn’t guaranteed by any means. What if Jamaal had been like, “Oh, he keeps saying he’s going to start working out, good for him!” and then, what, she’s going to say, “Uh, yeah, well, uh, guess what kind of exercises he’s doing. Just guess.” “Huh, I dunno, I told him he might want to start with some resistance tr–” “DIDDLY SQUATS”
Pluggers, 8/24/26
A public library is a plugger data center, in the sense that it’s something a plugger will go to a city council meeting to oppose because he thinks it’ll make his taxes go up.
150 replies to “Monday is for ends, beginnings, and so on”
Mary Worth:
In today’s first panel, Iggy Pop prepares to soliloquize the tomato in the style of Hamlet, Act V, Scene I.
Herb and Jamaal: Wow! The turnaround time on this strip is pretty fast: Only yesterday, Pluggers did the exact same gag and in only one panel!
Mary Worth:
The Charterstone residents eye and handle Mary’s crop yield with curiosity, never having seen vegetables before.
H&L Lois reveals she has the most boring bookclub *ever*, as it is absolutely forbidden that they talk about *anything* other than the book
JP With her new role as Imparter of Wisdom to CIApril, Abbey is growing – already she is almost as tall seated as Neddy is standing to pour coffee. Her hand hasn’t caught up yet but this is a minor consideration as she feels the power. You were able to convince the Chaos-character. Yes. Soon you will be ready to challenge The Mary, whose powers grow weak as she gets distracted by gardening and barely meddles her flock…
Mary Worth:
“Sorry — I’ve got to run and squeeze this tomato. Ketchup later!”
The Phantom loves him some Indiana Jones.
I am a HUGE lover of libraries, and I recently saw a button on a real person (not a Plugger), that said “A library is my data center.” I wanted to get one of those buttons until I saw the sentiment appropriated by Pluggers today. Something nagged at me about that. Thank you, Josh, for cogently pointing out what that was.
MW: We laughed at the “supplemental food supply” back in May, but the good residents of Charterstone didn’t spend the summer worried about diarrhea lettuce so maybe the joke’s on us.
Phantom:
Devil, mentally summoning the stark verbiage and imagery of Robert Frost’s The Egg and the Machine, growls menacingly at the newfangled airborne contraption.
Wrecks Moregone:
“For example, I am concerned that you two can’t even dress differently from each other.”
“Oh, Gramps. We’re just practicing for when we’re finally locked up, and won’t have to dress differently from each other or anyone at all!”
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Murky Tail:
Giant Cave Salamander wisely decides to pack his bags and leave town.
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Wary Morth:
Calling? I thought it was a cucumber shaped…toy…in Mary’s bag that accidentally turned itself on.
Pluggers:
You can bet that the title of that tome he’s reaching for isn’t Healthy Eating.
PLUGGERS: They really should abandon use of that top shelf, because Pluggers shrink a little every year. Trust me on this.
MW: Too soon for Dr Jeff’s fawning kiss-ass date, so my money’s on Dawn teetering on the edge of the cliff.
LUANN: So, the counselor automatically assumed that the word “Skye” made Luann want to be a flight attendant? I have a tiny bit more empathy for Luann now.
RMMD: Are Rene and Gramps concerned that the twins are criminals or that they’re not better criminals?
H & J: oddly enough, the “diddly-squats” joke was featured in Pluggers yesterday. Did Tom Calvert of Dallas, TX, send think so much of his suggestion that he sent it to both strips?
“Hmm, I have an idea for a Lockhorns wisecrack, but I don’t write the Lockhorns, I write Herb and Jamaal, so not only do I not write the right comic it’s not even the right format. Eh, I’m sure it won’t be too awkward if I stretch it out to strip length.”
MW: Yipes! Stripes! dress lady appreciates the calm acceptance of her unique condition of having two left arms.
MW: The hot new TikTok trend at the moment is fruit and vegetable shaped sex toys (don’t ask me why – I’m just telling you what the influencers told me) and it looks like Mary’s getting in on the act. Just look at everyone’s sly smiles as they eye up those enormous phallic “zucchini”. BUZZ BUZZ!
MW: I love the expressions of the random Charterstone residents, who look like they want to make a saucy joke about a zucchini but know better than to say that shit while Mary is in earshot.
H&J: If there is one thing I do not want to see in this strip, it’s Herb’s “diddly” getting a workout.
Pluggers: I like the placement of that sign, which suggests that the public library is just a single bookcase in a corner of a building that seems to a severe mold problem.
MW: Considering Mary’s the only one we’ve ever seen working in the “community” garden, I’d say she has the right to control distribution. Though I’d like to see Mary’s reaction when she finds someone else tending it.
Pluggers: [Conceives of 500-acre library campuses dotting the American landscape] [Sobs]
MW: Observe how drippy and gormless every Charterstone resident appears. The better to meddle with, of course.
@Schroduck: Joke’s on them, about the only thing a zucchini that size is good for is a sex toy.
Mary Worth: Mary is a superior human being. She keeps her phone ringer off in public spaces. Be like Mary.
@Baja Gaijin: I feel like H&J’s specialty is is stretching a simple joke across four panels, like a meatloaf that’s half breadcrumbs. Hey, kinda like their diner!
It’s gotten so bad in Charterstone, the residents have to share their arms.
Also, I am reminded of Freddy Cannon’s classic track “Buzz Buzz A Diddle It.” Finally, Mary Worth serves a purpose!
To be fair, data centers are the one issue where conservative grump pluggers stand side by side with crunchy liberal environmentalists.
Phantom: And that’s it. Story over, now for Kit to go around and start punching.
Curtis: P1& P2 – It’s that something Greg would say instead of Curtis, instead of the other way around?
Luann: Try “decades”.
yLuann: “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” did it first. They did it with lists and still screwed up, but they did it first. And better.
yyLuann: Now that’s she’s pregnant, they can wear sleepwear again.
yyyLuann: “After all, I felt adventurous when I finally found the right hole!”
So when did Luann start having little Easter-egg gags like the ones in Fogarty’s diploma?
MW – Would ya get a load of them tomatoes!
Phantom – What? Ya think I’m just gonna stand here and let you drone on?
H&J – They were preceded by rigorous sets of pud pounding….
Pluggers – Pluggers haven’t had a decent live stream since Rush Limbaugh croaked….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
@Tonio:
Mrs Fogarty/Phelps’ diplomas in her office being “little easter egg gaqs” that are just “Mrs Fogarty/Phelps is an incompetent” jokes has essentially been the character’s gimmick from day one, when the comic was sillier (in art style and tone). I think it’s more like that the strip dropped that angle when Luann graduated, so Mrs Fogarty/Phelps stopped appearing in the strip.
There doesn’t seem to be a price for that produce, Charterstone, but it will come at a cost. Oh, there will be a cost.
***
Silly pluggers, libraries and data centers aren’t the same thing at all! If they were, why would your local government want to force one upon you but take the other away?
MW: Mary uses customer-driven pricing for her veggies. “Nice watch. The tomatoes are uh, $3.50 each.”
Mary Worth: They managed to find a completely unnatural way of delivering sound effects in comics! Good for them! Sure, I thought the “BUZZ BUZZ” over Mary’s purse was a surrealistic sign explaining how much veggies cost at Mary’s table. No worries, clarity and coherence are the price of extremely bad innovation.
In today’s Mary Worth, inanimate vegetables are exposed to so much meddling that they gain consciousness and religion. Sit back and enjoy VeggieTales: Origin.
Jamal is rightly curious about what sort of exercises Herb is doing considering his body shape and general (lack of) health; but the reality is his next question would probably be: “should I call an ambulance before or after I get there?”
H&J: Rightfully, Jamaal is going to assume Herb is busy on the toilet.
MW: Which Charterstone dwellers are going to use the yellow squashes as sex toys? Let the speculation begin.
Mary Worth:
In fact, no one is calling—Mary’s just getting out her phone to cover for the fact that due to dying batteries the vibrator she keeps in her purse went off.
MW: Standing in line behind his arm-challenged neighbor at Mary’s Community Room Produce Stand, the older gentleman gazes thoughtfully at the array of tomatoes, summer squash, and okra, and wonders if any of these vegetables might help with his goiter.
@Lauralot: That’s not an accident. Mary loads up those vegetables with all sorts of mood-altering substances. And not the fun kinds.
FC:
Once Dolly starts shit talking, no one is safe.
MW: The Window Eel extends its reach to the edge of the table and waits for its opportunity to lift Mary’s wallet from her purse.
DT: Tomorrow we learn how Wallhack got the nickname “Wallhack” when he hacks through a wall to get away from our current archvillain, Homicidal Porch Pirate.
As a librarian, you’re mostly right. Pluggers will oppose funding libraries but will still complain when library staff can’t refund 30 cents of their free $7 weekly printing credit because they managed to print three copies of an email’s subject instead of the chain letter the email contained
Pluggers are also the ones who, despite growing up in the time of shushing libraries, feel the most comfortable sitting down in the computer lab and yelling “I don’t know how to do this” at the library staff at the reference desk 15 feet away
Bad Machinery: Charlotte Grotte has been drawn extra-adorable this whole storyline, but after today’s final two panels I’m ready to buy the stuffed plushie.
The library tech who moved all copies of The Iliad and The Odyssey to the top library shelf with the release of the movie secretly snickers to himself as he watches out-of-shape and overweight Pluggers reach for it.
SlylickFox And Comics For Kinky Kids: Solution — Max is an idiot #696968, and I’m sure Scratchy appreciates the appearence of Forrestville Hotel’s famed Room 609.
MARY WORTH: Given the smug self-satisfied smiles of the Charterstone residents, the “buzz buzz” from Mary’s purse and the…er…interesting shape of all of the vegetables, I;m actually think Mary is distributing her own line of organic sex toys.
The Ghost Who Disables Automatic Updates — And with a Whrrrr, Grrr, and a Blam, the Phantom saves the world from technological overreach!
Pluggers need to go to the library to get their thrills by checking out Peyton Place because Lord knows there’s nothing racy on the internet. . .
MW — Give a Charterstone resident a vegetable and they’ll eat for a day. Teach them how to grow them and they’ll have the place overrun with vermin. . .
The Familliar Mucus: “Mommy says,’Dinner will be burned in 20 minutes!’ “
MARY WORTH: Hmmm. Maybe Mary is so smug because it looks like ol’ Harv is back and she knows she can make a good killing off of him.
Harv: “I’ll give you $200,000 dollars for those tomatoes!”
Mary: “Um…Harv. This is a community garden and so these vegetables are free for any condo resident who…”
Harv: “You drive a hard bargain. Ok $300,000!”
Mary then shrugs and trades the veggies for cash. Meanwhile Harv gently squeezes his round firm tomatoes in each hand while reminiscing about Trixie for some reason….
MW: Another possibility is that the U.S. has descended into chaos, like Josh suggest, but that it’s just happened this morning, and the Charterstone residents are still blissfully unaware that Armageddon’s now raging all around them. Mary’s phone is blowing up with news updates!
BIZARRO: My first impression was that the chef is about to beat the customer senseless with that big wooden paddle. Of course, I don’t read Bizarro often, so for all I know, that’s par for the course in this comic.
BLONDIE: Wait, are these guys still in school? Maybe getting physically assaulted by the boss every other day is worth it if you can have three months off every year.
CS: Please, please, please be the catalyst that sets off The Burnings. I want to see The Burnings. And I want to see it all start in the dining room of Montoni’s.
Goodness me there are already three comments regarding the use of Mary’s aggressively-shaped vegetables as sex toys in this comment section. We must have all spent the weekend doing yard work and reading novels written in the nineteenth century. Perhaps the Chartersonians are not as frustrated as we are and a squash is just a food item? Nah, who am I kidding, those veggies will soon be in a cool dark place.
Six Chix And A Cat Who Wants To Be Made One With Everything In Search Of A Punchline: Who had Six Chix and Mr Abernarhy reruns in this week’s “Which Comics Will Cross The Streams This Week™ contest?
MW: Does Mary sell the “community garden” vegetables back to the residents at a profit, or does she simply ration them out based on her own judgment of who is the most worthy to receive them? Either seems possible given her weirdly autocratic position at Charterstone.
Phantom: Weird that the current Phantom writers are trying desperately (and unsuccessfully) to retcon the white savior/colonialist underpinnings of his origin story, but are fine with continuing to let him rely on firearms in defiance of modern vigilante hero ethics. Maybe this is why Fake!Elon and his drones have been introduced: shooting robots doesn’t come with any implicit moral ambiguity, much in the same way the Foot Soldiers in the 80s-90s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were turned into robots so the title characters could smash them up with impunity.
Pluggers: The Plugger relationship with libraries is indeed a complex one. They visit regularly to check out their weekly supply of fifteen James Patterson books and come by every April to get help navigating the IRS.gov website, yet they’ll vote down any bond measure that would provide funding and rant at the children’s staff because they caught a glimpse of the gay penguin book they were ranting about on Fox.
MW-It’s Dawn. Time to talk another Weston off the ledge.
Mary Worth: So Mary is now growing and publicly distributing large amounts of garden vegetables — during the same summer when there’s been a huge uptick in produce-related foodborne illnesses, including salmonella, cyclospora, and E. coli. Coincidence? Sure, probably. But Mary takes credit for everything; it’s time she took the blame for some things, too! If that’s the FDA on the phone, warn them that Wilbur has been seen picking vegetables from the garden with his bare hands, so we can probably expect an outbreak of several more pathogens they haven’t even heard of before.
Beat Up Bailey: No wonder the troops aren’t eating, the requisitioned reject trays have no food compartments in them, the Pentagon’s OPERATION STARVE OUT CAMP SWAMPY is in full force!
C’shaft: Oh please, like Mopey Pete had the money to shell out for a robo waiter.
Dustin: Don’t be rolling your eyes, Dustin, you majored in English. If anything your vocabulary should sound like that all the time.
GT: Isn’t false imprisonment one of those things that should get you fired from a teaching position?
JP: How did Neddy go from temporary caregiver to Charlotte to official full-time guardian? Or does nobody in this heavily law-connected family realize that there’s a bit more to having responsibility for a child than “we just decided it works best this way”?
Luann: I would be a hypocrite if I said you needed to pick a career path before twenty and stick with it for the rest of your life. I would also be lying if I said I thought Luann’s new “ultimate purpose in life” will last more than a semester.
DT: Uh, remind again, why having the box is so crucial to their case? They have two computers already. This is just going to make the whole trash diving by the ladies earlier seem even more superfluous.
Flash Gordon: Mongo has a fractious and chaotic political scene, but their process engineering and manufacturing science remains top notch. Ships, war machines, and all sort of manufactured goods are wrecked regularly, yet, they are soon replaced. Good going industrial engineers! Still wonder about Ming’s economic backing. New fleets, new armies, new war machines, and such all cost a lot of money. Is he running a huge deficit? The interest payments must be enormous.
JP: Are Ronnie and Anne finalizing the deal in La La Land? Will they cut out Neddy from the sweet post-pilot deal?
MW: The phone call is from the harbor police. They just fished Wilbur out of the water. After talking with Mary, he was in such an uplifted eyes on the horizon mood, that he didn’t realize he was walking off the pier until he hit the water.
Phantom: Good shooting from the Phantom. This strip has all of the answers to the current scourge of the battlefield: the drone. The Wambisis nailed one with just two spears! The Phantom is taking one down using a pistol and shooting from the hip! Forget all of these jammers, counter missiles, and even shot guns.
RMMD: Rene failed to explain to Uncle Lyle that he realizes the twins are psycho/social pathic. They have already decided on their plan and Uncle Lyle is just a thing in their way, a nuisance. Later Rene watching prison TV sees the local news: “Local man reported missing. He is identified as Lyle Ollman. The police are asking for anyone who may have information on his whereabouts to contact them.”
MW: Missus DiFerraro shows up early and attempts to take ALL the fresh tomatoes to make fresh marinara for family Sunday dinner. Does Mary a) gently dissuade her; b) point out the virtue of sharing with neighbors; c) see Missus DiFerraro draws back a stump.
Luann’s lifetime ambition is to be a preteen summer camp counselor. Luckily, the profession pays well enough to support her the other nine months of the year.
PLUGGERS: That Plugger is removing all of the LGBT books, so that he can show Fox News and his Facebook followers all of the “woke smut” the library is distributing to our children. (Sure that book is high so whatever age group this is “inappropriate” for can’t get it anyway, but can’t take the risk little Timmy might learn that some people have two mommies or his head might explode or something.)
You think you can do that type of Bible-thumping self-aggrandizement with a data center?! I think not!
GT: Wait a sec, Gil. A restraining order to keep Gerads and Darby 100 yards away from this comic strip is something readers would enjoy.
Beetle Bailey doesn’t feature Plato today. He’d be the first to tell Cookie that there will be less, not fewer, leftovers tomorrow, to which Cookie would do something unsanitary to Plato’s food.
FC: BDK can already smell what’s on the menu, and would like nothing more that Dolly to help Thel, along with Jeffy, Billy, and Trixie. Rather than get this over with, Daddy wants to delay its onset for as long as possible.
Zits: “Calves”, like from an iceberg? Miracle of miracles, Jeremy has been paying attention in science class!
H&L: “Boys’ Night Out” has the right punctuation. It’s not singular, and more’s the pity. Hi spending the evening alone would beat his spending time with his (now even more) drunk best friend and the nameless nobodies we see next to him at work.
RMMD – “Gramps, ‘Rene’ is Uncle Jimmy’s pen name. You know, the name his cellmate gave him on his first day in the pen.”
Mary will give away all kind of fruits and vegetables to people. But not apples! The syndicate has decided that Apple Mary was not the same character as Mary Worth, so they want to avoid any suggestion that could undermine their case that the countdown to public domain character should start some years later
“I wonder who is calling?” I guess there was not enough space for a third panel with the caller ID, allowing this amazing cliffhanger!
REX MORGAN M.D.: “We’re concerned about you…which is why we haven’t talked to you for years. Because of ‘concern'” (Like, the story keeps forgetting that all of these people are estranged. from each other, and have publicly said that they don’t like or respect each other at all.)
Sarah is not concerned about Herb, indeed might look forward for the opportunity to remarry. But Jamaal needs Herb as a business partner, so he is invested in him taking up regular exercise! Do those push-ups, Herb!
California Pluggers are too progressive to engage in reactionary culture war propaganda, but they are still Pluggers, so they will channel their reactionary impulses into snobbery
“Damn, this gun is too small to hurt a drone of that size! Luckily I can make it bigger through my superpower of forced perspective!”
My Plugger library moment occurred decades ago when I was a relatively young man and I went to the library to check out a book on treating your own back and neck pain (the so called McKenzie method if you’re curious) only to find that the book was on the very bottom shelf requiring a painful bend down to pick it up.
MW: One person you won’t see in that line is Ed Kudlick. A fresh vegetable to him is like garlic to Dracula.
What A Frazzhole!: (Fourth panel) “Ok, Caulfield, turn your head and cough.” ” Mrs Olson, are you SURE you’re allowed to do this?”
Mary’s Worst: I wonder who is calling? Its ether Abbott or Costello. Do they live in Charterstone? Did Mary take Mr Fields’ job as landlord?
Luann: Not totally wrong. After hearing “Camp Skye” she said flight attendant and not pilot. Even the dopiest counselor in higher ed wouldn’t think of Luann in a position responsible for her own let alone other people’s lives.
As Mary puts out garden vegetables in the community room for residents, all of whom — Mary included — are stoned out of their minds on the strong, unlicensed cannabis she’s growing behind the string beans, proving that her objection to Tommy dealing drugs was solely that he charged for them…
MW- The veggies are the one thing that lines up time-wise in this story arc. Back around mid May, Tommy was helping Mary put in the garden. (Remember the bent hoe?) By now, Mary should be getting ripe tomatoes. Of course, that also means we’ve been slogging through this shit ALL SUMMER!
MW: This whole setup is off-putting to me. Mary’s just giving these vegetables away, right? There’s no money changing hands? Okay, so why does she need to be there in the vaguely-named Community Room? I think it’s because she wants the other residents of Charterstone to know exactly who’s supplying these “free” vegetables. Every time someone takes a tomato or squash from the table, Mary goes into her spiel: “Someday, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me.”
Phantom: “Semi-recent technology? In a syndicated newspaper comic strip? Not on my watch.”
H&J: Look, Sarah, give your husband a break. Do you think it’s easy tamping down every emotion you have, every single personality quirk, so that you can present the blandest, calmest, most easy-to-get-along-with version of yourself to the world? No, madam. That takes work.
Pluggers: I was shocked — SHOCKED — when I scrolled down and saw that this was a joke about data centers. I was sure the punchline was going to be something like: “If a book is on the top shelf, pluggers are like, ‘Welp, guess I’m never reading that.'”
Pluggers are like data centers in they also waste excessive amounts of water and are bad for the environment. (The cartoon should be of a Plugger sitting on the toilet)
MW: “Yeah, this one should fit just about right. What do you think, honey?”
RMMD- (Panel 3) So Saturday it was Burl Ives. Today it’s Orson Wells? WTF is going on around here? I guess maybe the twinkies were selling wine…before it’s time?
Speaking of Pluggers, they actually got that gem of a “diddly-squat” pun into print two days before Herb and Jamaal. Given the lead time for comics, that doesn’t mean plagiarism, as if that were considered a taboo in the comics world. It does suggest Great Minds Think Alike, minus the “great” and possibly “think” part.
Pluggers are also like data centers in that people will go to great lengths to complain about them and oppose having them located near where they live.
Mary Worth: Mary answers and Dr. Jeff screams in her ear demanding to know why she missed their usual post-story arc boat ride. “THIS IS THE ONLY THING I HAVE IN MY LIFE! HOW COULD YOU TAKE IT FROM ME!? YOU BITCH, YOU’RE CHEATING ON ME WITH WESTON AREN’T YOU?!”
Also Mary Worth: Fun fact, I almost had the bit above include Dr. Jeff saying the only times he feels joy without Mary is when he’s killing animals by the truckloads instead of treating them at his veterinarian practice, but then I realized I was getting Dr. Jeff mixed up with Dr. Ed. So fun how basically interchangeable most of the Mary Worth cast is, totally doesn’t make it a pain in the ass to remember who did what.
Herb And Jamaal: Not a fan of how Herb’s wife has cartoony black dot eyes while every other character has normal eyes. Is it suggested that she has empty black holes where her eyeballs should be?
Pluggers: Fuck off, comic, there is no way that Pluggers are the sort of people who go to the library regularly, stop bullshitting yourself.
MW-Mary, you might want to remove the barcode stickers from the vegetables if you want to pass them off as your own.
@Joe Blevins: 78 MW- And the tomatoes are all nice and red and round and perfect. The wormy, diseased, and rotten ones are all on another table, with a sign that says “Reserved for W.W.”
Pluggers remember the good ol’ days when council meetings were used to complain about negros moving into the neighborhood.
@TheDiva: On CS – Who said he bought it? “This guy in a cool alien mask gave it to me, and all he wanted in return was a favor to be given at a time and place of his choice!’
@2+2=7: But with data centers you can smash them up like the Luddites did with the weaving machines, *then* you can burn everything. Twice as satisfying!
@Artist formerly known as Ben: I’m imagining the writer of Herb and Jamaal opening his Saturday paper two days ago and seeing Pluggers did the same pun he did in a comic already sent in and he just screams in frustration and despair because that “diddly squat” joke was the hardest he worked on this comic in thirty years.
@Joe Blevins: I can already tell the Charterstone “supplemental food supply” is absolutely nothing like an actual community garden that you see in neighborhoods that have them or anarchist/hippie communities or such. It’s clear that it is NOT a public service that many people in the community will help maintain, Mary exclusively owns and controls it and the produce that comes from it; the only people shown tending it or handing out the food so far are her and her personal friends (i.e., sycophants) like the Westons. It’s her property that she gives away to people.
Realistically this is just Karen Moy not bothering to research anything about what community gardens are actually like, working only off whatever vague secondhand rumor or Facebook post she heard about the concept from. But given what Mary and this comic is like, the end result is making Charterstone look like even more of a Jonestown-like cult than it already did: Mary controls the food supply and decides who eats and who doesn’t.
@2+2=7: I’m reminded of observations we all made a few weeks ago of how the Pluggers strips we see are probably what’s left over after all the horribly, unprintably bigoted ones are filtered out. There’s probably self-proclaimed Pluggers out there fuming at the funny pages because their submission declaring “Pluggers think fondly of the time they stomped a *insert slur here* to the brink of death for breathing too loud near them” is never published despite being regularly and repeatedly sent in.
MW: “I wonder who’s calling?”
Pet peeve: “I wonder” is a statement, not a question.
@Anonymous: (Remember the bent hoe?)
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That’s a terrible thing to call Mary Worth! No wonder you posted it anonymously!
Mary Worth – Why is Mary even there? And why is her purse on the counter next to her? I think I recall an episode where Mary or one of her thralls had her purse hanging on the back of a chair at a restaurant, and someone took something from the purse. One would think that she’d learn from that experience.
We didn’t have a garden this year, but last year we had an overflow of yellow squash. I used them instead of zucchini for quick bread and muffins, which turned out well.
JP – My Who Gives a Crap meter just went off the charts. All of these characters (including the raspberry haired brat) are horrible, loathsome people. It’s impossible to care about any of them.
Rex Morgan – Manley must be slipping. He missed an opportunity for at least a week of showing Lyle complaining because Jimmy/Rene had to call him collect from prison, and his phone bill will exceed his budget.
@Anonymous: (Remember the bent hoe?)
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(Take 2) Thats a terrible thing to call Mary Worth, even if she WAS in the Texas Revolution!
@TheDiva: Yeah, this plot acting like Neddy is some kind of adoptive mom to Charlotte and not just a glorified babysitter is annoying me. Especially because they’re suddenly trying to act like everybody loves Charlotte and wants to take care of her when basically every prior appearance from the character has everyone very clearly finding her to be a creepy and irritating burden that they can’t wait to be rid of, with no indication that anyone was seriously bonding with her. Neddy herself especially spent every interaction with Charlotte looking frustrated or confused. Like, c’mon, Judge Parker. Let’s not try to pretend this is something heartwarming.
@Anonymous: The wormy, diseased, and rotten ones are all on another table, with a sign that says “Reserved for W.W.”
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Wonder Woman? Aww, come on, her movie wasn’t THAT bad,Mr Siskel!
The Phantom does actually have a super power of sorts. If you ever look him in the eyes and you have ever done anything you feel guilty about, no matter how minor, it will fuck you up. It’s why he wears sunglasses even around his wife and kids. It’s all in all a pretty shitty super power since he never seems to use it.
@ectojazzmage: Friendly reminder that at this point Pluggers are people your age, and the people who actively participated in the sort of thing you’re talking about have pretty much all died.
Crank: Okay, on balance, I guess I like that we’re doing the introduction of the pizza robot more than the possibility of More Larry Dinkle Somehow. So far.
FC: “I asked how long it’d take if you helped, and she burst out laughing and said she had no way of knowing!”
JP: “After that, she’ll probably slap a restraining order on you to ensure you don’t steal her.”
S4th: Okay, these are usually mildly amusing, please don’t turn into meta nonsense about them noticing the title captions again.
@Horace Broon: On S4th – Rest assured, this will end with the Full-Size Amusement Park Made of Cardboard in the backyard. Maybe the Unseen Monster Bird will go all Mothra on it with the Jolly Green Giant joining the battle.
PLUGGERS: Totally agree, if you can’t find info at your local library, info isn’t worth knowing. No wasted energy, no massive waste of water, no air pollution, no misuse of land. Anyway, who needs energy,? (Taking nap now)
6CX: Totally agree, my community was Code Orange all weekend.
@Tom: No offense, but considering I turned thirty this year, I doubt very much that the Pluggers complaining to newspapers about their senior citizen bodies are in the same age group as me.
Re: Mary Worth today, where is Everybody Posts, Nobody Reads when we need him (or her)?
@ComicallyChallenged:
#8: MW: saw a bag of broccoli and cauliflower florets on sale this morning so spontaneously bought it. Putting it in my freezer, I saw brand is Tayler Farms. Thought about tossing but instead opened, soaked in salt water, rinsed, and now boiling for 5 minutes so I don’t accidentally use them in an unhealthy raw veggie salad. Will drain, cool, freeze. Living dangerously?
The Phantom:
Josh says that one of the Phantom’s “powers” is being good at shooting guns, but based on the evidence of this particular strip I’m not convinced. For one thing, he’s not looking down the sight as he’s shooting, and while I’m not a gun person my understanding it that that’s a prerequisite if you want to actually hit anything. On the other hand, maybe he does have a legitimate superpower: the power of a first-person-shooter-style floating reticle appearing in his vision whenever he picks up a gun.
@Schroduck: I saw an old “Night Court” episode the other day where Dan Fielding and Mac were dragging a large heavy box of sex toys as evidence for a trial.
An attractive woman walks by and the entire box starts vibrating in her direction.
@MKay:
#12 RMMD: Yes. Uncle is appalled at how they mistake petty scams for criminal talent and Gramps is appalled at this “college education” he has been innocently paying for.
@Activist: if you set them on the table and they start moving…..
Today’s Mary Worth, gives me the same vibes when I sell my crops to shopkeeper Pierre in the farming game “Stardew Valley” who takes complete credit for my veggies saying that he grew them himself (organically)
There is a reason there is a subreddit called r/FuckPierre with over 26,000 members.
@Activist: Living dangerously?
________________________________
You’re taking advice from Caulfield! In one of the last “Frazzhole” strips before the great Where To Vacation™ arc, Caulfield and Frazzhole debated if safe is boring, is it better to take risks and be entertained? Caulfield was on the risk/entertained side, Frazzhole was on the side of safe/boring.
@UncleJeff: @Schroduck: I saw an old “Night Court” episode the other day where Dan Fielding and Mac were dragging a large heavy box of sex toys as evidence for a trial.
An attractive woman walks by and the entire box starts vibrating in her direction.
_________________________________
“Now, THAT’S comedy!”- Slappy Squirrel.
@UncleJeff:
@Activist: if you set them on the table and they start moving…..
__________________________________________________________
Before I clicked the reference link, I assumed this comment was in response to Mary Worth’s Zucchini Vibraters™.
Crankshaft-“It’s better than an illegal immigrant because when we beat it it won’t scream.”
MT: To confirm what many of us can figure out on our own because we have basic common sense, “Anchoring a rope or harness directly to a cave pillar (column) is widely considered irresponsible, highly dangerous, and unethical in the caving community. The practice violates the core principles of both safety and cave conservation.”
And Jules is presumably just getting started.
Phantom – VRRR, GRRR, BLAM! And the skeptics said it would be impossible to adapt Kurt Schwitters’ Ursonate to a single installment of a daily comic strip.
Don Abundio, translated:
[On door: DR. GHOST FOOT]
LUANN: Luann being what she is, no profession would work. There is no profession in which she wouldn’t be incompetent, money-wasting, time-wasting, grossly-irritating, hazardous, combinations of the above, etc. etc..
I think Luann should perhaps travel to Italy with her mother and hope very hard for a LIGHT IN THE PIAZZA marriage. Though she isn’t even remotely as appealing as the young woman in that film.
.@Peanut Gallery:
What’s the joke supposed to be? Like, I could get it if he was going to a PODIATRIST, and going “but a person who walks is a PEDestrian. And a person who shows love and care for something is a “-PHILE”. How was I supposed to know that was the wrong way to find a specialist for my feet”?
(Also, shouldn’t this strip PRECEDE the “Hey, my corns make me a millimeter taller! I’m keeping them!” one?)
@Poteet:
Luann should travel to Italy to attend that clown school Tara suggested to her, she’d do great, she’s already a clown. And frankly, being a rent-a-clown for children’s birthdays would be a job that Luann could kinda-almost be well-suited for, as opposed to whatever child education/care career she mistakenly believes she could handle.
@GarrisonSkunk: #95 MW- I wonder if she has any sweet corn? Wilbur could cut it off the cob, throw it in the toilet, ( Like Tommy did with the smack) and save himself a lot of trouble. But he’s not smart enough.
@Anonymous: I agree, the gag in the original is barely a gag. It seems to be just that the podiatrist has foot-shaped signs on the walls to help people find his office. How whimsical! I suspect they are also supposed to resemble more conventional signs in the shape of a hand with a pointing index finger, but in that case the initial panels should have shown a sign like that pointing to some other office, and THEN the foot signs pointing to the podiatrist’s office.
As for continuity with the other podiatrist joke: In the older incarnation of the strip, they did a whole week or two about Don Abundio’s sister and nephew coming to visit. But in the later incarnation they were too lazy to plan anything that much.
@TheDiva:
GT: Isn’t false imprisonment one of those things that should get you fired from a teaching position?
True but Gerard and his lackey are COACHES. And coaches in the USA are given quite a wide berth so long as they are successful – see Two A Days for high school football, Arkansas with Bobby Petrino. These were all real life and not fiction!
So, he and his minion kidnapped a few people. Did he have a winning team with an innovative passing game or defensive scheme? That is what has kept Gil Thorp in power all of these decades! A winning record! Principal Pearl (sp?) will ignore a lot as long as he keeps whooping Valley Tech and all of those other pretenders.
MW: What we need is for Mary to answer the phone and hear Charlton Heston screaming “Soylent Green is people!”
LUANN: Um…nice try comic, but she was not a counselor. She was professor teaching a BS nonsense class. Also Luann did in fact say that the class inexplicably helped her with new direction (to be fair, Mrs Fogarty seemed to have forgotten that she was the one who recommended that Luann en an application to the camp counselor position, so just a well that she’s playing along with this “sneaky” retcon.)
Lord, this strip really does expect it’s audience to have the minds and attention-spans of goldfish that Bernice keeps.
Mary Worth – The Oldbatsignal isn’t visible during daylight hours, so Mary has to rely on the 911Meddle hotline.
She just left Wilbur, so it probably isn’t him, thank goodness.
@79 Anonymous: You forgot that both data centers and pluggers emit vast quantites of smelly gases.
MW- ” BUZZ! BUZZ!” That must be Toby, wondering if there are any Zucchini left.
Phantom: I know next to nothing about this character, but I appreciate that he’s just some dude. The Ghost Who Has A Gun. Yeah. Heck yeah.
Pluggers: As a former circulation assistant DO NOT GET ME STARTED ON PLUGGERS AT THE LIBRARY
(And no, it’s not about politics. The closest thing I saw to that was a Mennonite mother not letting her 3 year old check out a picture book based on The Secret Life of Pets because the trailer for the movie had like 4 seconds of heavy metal in it.)
@ectojazzmage: Huh, I figured I was the youngest one here. Howdy, friend.
@ectojazzmage: Er…you mean “Dr Jeff screamed all of that in his head” right? Because there is no way he’d ever dare say that to Mary. After all, we all know that Mary has Jeff’s “cherry tomatoes” in her vice-like grip and has had no problem squeezing them until they are squished into pulp. (Also I’m in the mood for tomato sauce for some reason.)
Late Thread Cuisine: It’s moon-viewing season again in Japan.
@Peanut Gallery: [On door: DR. GHOST FOOT]
________________________________
……and The Bikini Machine
@Austria:
#126. PHANTOM: If you want to learn more about character and strip, Austria, check out the Sunday PHANTOMS of past few months. A shipowner in 1500s, I think, and his crew were murdered by pirates with only his grown son surviving. Son is washed up on shore, rescued by native Bandur, etc,. It’s a good strip M-Sat.
Herb and Jamaal: “You see, every afternoon he goes to exercise at Ned Flanders’ house, he does Diddly squats, Diddly push-ups, Diddly yoga, its like he’s weighing nothing at all… nothing at all… nothing at all…”
@Baja Gaijin: Well, what else are you gonna do after eating that?
@Austria: “because the trailer for the movie had like 4 seconds of heavy metal in it.”
Geez… some people need to open up.
There was this slice of life videogame I played, called Button City, the three friends of the protagonist each got a “hanging out arc”
One who likes to do “Death Metal Yoga” and discovers that her “annoying” toddler brother does it too, to emulate her, which draws them closer as siblings.
Another who has a robo-sona but is too shy to cosplay in her costume at a fan meeting. Until the protagonist helps her open up.
And another who is being raised by her grandparents, her grandfather is tragically senile, and the plot squeezes it for as much drama as it can.
I mean, this is just life.
To hide (and hiding one’s kids) from REAL LIFE is just… ignorant.
Mary Worth – Charterstone becoming a survivalist bunker after the US government collapses would make for a fun change of pace. Every character would have to break from their usual routines of melodrama, and commit to being better versions of themselves. Wilbur will scrawl out his latest dispatches of “I Shouldn’t Be Alive” to describe having to live without take-out and his home maid service.
Pluggers – The Los Angeles Times had a piece a few years ago about how conservative retired police and firefighters from California moved to states like Idaho and Montana, only to face culture shock of being seen as liberal interlopers with pensions higher than their red-state police and firefighting brethren make in working earnings.
Pluggers who still read the newspaper and go to the library must find themselves in a even stranger place. Their neighbors have forsaken the mainstream media and libraries for AI slop that reinforces and deepens their biases. The readers of Pluggers, despite mostly only having a high school education and a reading list of mostly James Patterson novels, are now seen as an elitist literati by their devolving communities.
@ectojazzmage: Ah, so you’re unclear on the actual timeline for “being of age to have beaten up marginalized groups with impunity” for a much more understandable reason.
@Baja Gaijin: Interesting. However, my personal moon is more than big enough already without adding that to it.
@Anonymous: Good point, clown school followed by party gigs might work. Especially if Luann joined up with someone who could do the hard things (advertising, booking gigs, billing, business paperwork, creating the routines, being the lead clown) while letting Luann be the other clown, which would work partly because the kiddies would believe her numerous mistakes were being made on purpose, haha!
@GarrisonSkunk: In Pathétic Color!
Vincent Price was game for anything, but how did The Supremes get dragged into that mess?
@2+2=7: @TheDiva: @ectojazzmage: Thank you for pointing out that Charterstone has, very appropriately now that I think about it, the very weirdest version of a community garden ever.
JP: Abbey looks totally stoned, which would help explain her enormous willingness to watch her daughter taking care of Charlotte full-time for a few years, unpaid, while April and Randy attempt the enormous task of imitating normal human behavior convincingly enough to get their kid back. Why not, thinks Abbey, veeery slooowly. This will help to postpone if not prevent the evil day when I become a grandmother myself, ewwwww.
MW- Y ou can’t see it, but the residents can’t have any veggies unless they compliment Mary and ask her to solve their problems.
@Baja Gaijin: egg salad (tarutaru = “tartar sauce”, right? but with eggs in it that’s just a tasty egg salad variant…) on top of an egg-topped burger? sausage patty? the triple-stack seems excessive, but I am intrigued.
@Poteet: I went to a taping of a Penn & Teller show in Las Vegas.
One of their guests got his first job assisting his cousin, who performed as a clown at birthday parties, schools and libraries.
He entertained the audience with balloons, card tricks and other simple magic.
Ice T.
The show was delayed by a lighting malfunction so Ice T went into the audience and he was charming.
@Peanut Gallery: Vincent Price was game for anything, but how did The Supremes get dragged into that mess?
________________________
Best guess, Contractual Obligation, or someone from the future went back in time and convinced them to do it so Mike Myers would get inspired to make “Austin Powers” as history intended.
H&L – C’mon, Hi, stay home with Lois and help her practice doing “The Robot.”
MW – I wanna ask Mary if those are summer squash or yellow zucchini. Just to see how she reacts.
@Peanut Gallery: Don Abundio, translated:
[On door: DR. GHOST FOOT]
_____________________________
That time Don Abundio won “Laugh-Out’s” Fickle Flying Foot of Fate award.
Low and Hi-Less: Hi quotes Homer Simpson, “Does TV GUIDE count as a book?”
@Lodde: That’s not good against a sociopath like Ian Mollusk.
Diddly-squats are at least better than “Diddy Squats”