Hey Truck, is that Lisa’s bench you’re monopolizing?
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Dagwood demands that the dietary preferences of the majority be enforced on all through the power of the State. Today I learned Dagwood is literally Hitler. And here I always thought it was that guy over in Marmaduke.
Between Friends, 9/10/24
Torn between the listless advances of her French boss Jean here and the ambiguous affections of her ex Steve back home, Slut Friend Maeve resolves to make something happen. This being Between Friends, it’s far more likely to involve shoes than sex.
Six Chix, 9/10/24
The next time you’re on deadline for a blog post, trust me you do not want to go Googling “What does Godzilla eat?” or “Do pigs have souls?” But if you’re ever in Decatur Indiana, make it a point to check out Soul Pig: it’s got four and a half stars on TripAdvisor! I’ve read all the Yelp reviews, and apparently their smoked ham is delicious! Now what was it I was supposed to be doing…?
Bizarro, 9/10/24
Airport Security: “Arbitrary, opaque bureaucratic intrusions or world-historical cruelty and oppression? Make up your mind, buddy, you’re holding up the line!”
Me: “I’m thinking, I’m thinking!”
Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/10/24
♭♪ “Sit on, Truck Tyler, sit on!” ♮♬
—Uncle Lumpy
164 replies to “Hey Truck, is that Lisa’s bench you’re monopolizing?”
Controversial opinion: People can have pineapple on pizza or not and it has absolutely no bearing on your life.
RMMD:
“Oh — you’re a friend of Corey’s, huh? Nice kid. Can’t tell a good joke on open mike night to save his life, though, from what I hear tell!”
“Oh — you’re a friend of Corey’s, huh? Nice kid.”
“Actually, that’s an incorrect grammatical expression. In the sentence you just uttered, the preposition ‘of’ makes the prepositional phrase that it introduces possessive to begin with. Therefore, the correct formulation should be ‘you’re a friend of Corey‘ — not ‘Corey’s.’ That’s an improper double possessive!”
“Listen, you little wisenheimer. Why don’t you ride that bike of yours into the deep woods and not come back this way?”
Crankshaft-“Hello, Ed. I know where the burning debris of your grills have landed.”
RMMD-“You’re a friend of Corey’s huh? You have my condolences.”
FC-Jeffy, your kite is an offering to the Kite Eating Tree. After the disappearance of that roundheaded child Daddy is hoping the tree will take more than just kites.
Bizarro:
“Okay, young lady. You may be the one who gets to process all the check-ins, but at least Elton John sang a song about me adjectivally that he didn’t sing about you?”
“Really, Nicholas? — what song was that?”
” ‘Tsarry‘ Seems to Be the Hardest Word’ !”
Much more interesting alternative:
“Yeah, I’m Truck Tyler. You know me?”
“Nah, some cops were asking about you earlier. You’re sick, mister.”
RMMD:
“Son, you’ve expanded to Brobdingnagian proportions — you may want to put some air in those bike tires!”
Family Circus: Jeffy, your kite is shaped like a tombstone. [Daddy thinks: He just won’t take a hint. Maybe I should get him some lawn darts.]
Between Friends : “I’ve decided I’m going to stay in France during the two weeks between the end of this contract and the beginning of the next one!” So, Maeve thinks jet lag doesn’t exist? That “it takes time to travel between two locations, and Paris-Toronto is multiple hours BY PLANE” isn’t a thing?
************
Heart of the City : her “song medley” was just two songs? Though I gotta admit that her ability to instantly change outfit by just spinning around like Wonder Woman is impressive, Lee does deserve applause for that.
************
Marvin : I know a competition where they’d be evenly matched : being potty trained
(both Marvin and Bitsy would completely fail, and reform their bond over that failure)************
Ripley’s Don’t Believe It :
a) The way it’s written, it could be that Wallace just sliced each tomato once like in Fruti Ninja or something, this would be more impressive if it said “diced”, or “cut into small slices”. Phrasing ALWAYS helps!
b) Oh, so that’s where Bianca Xunise’s (most recent) ex came from!
c) Other little-known fact : the natural prey of the Star-Nosed Mole is the 9.8 feet sandwich.
************
Six Chix : Claiming that the building Godzilla destroys are always empty, and that no one gets killed in the process, is just as wrong as claiming that Godzilla directly eats people. Fight me.
…Too far?…D the M — Dennis embarrassing Dad’s business associates — that’s menace. Dad shaming this guy’s addiction problem behind his back — that’s pure assholiness. Great role modeling, Dad.
@Baja Gaijin:
Great one, Baja!
RMMD: So apparently Parker has recovered fully from the beating that left him – oops, them – hospitalized. If only the miracles of modern medicine could treat arthritis that well, then there would be hope for Truck, too. But no, he will never be able to play guitar again, and he can’t afford to hire someone to play guitar for him, so his next album Glenwood Park Bench will have to be an a cappella production.
Six Chix: Two words: obligate carnivores.
Usually Tuesday Chick inserts herself into the comic, is she supposed to be the cat?
But which cat is she supposed to be…?
But then again, if the cat was her, it would be wearing a nose-ring.
Regardless, despite today’s six chix is still nonsense, AT LEAST it’s moving on from food sex.
MW: Ahhhhhh the first seeds of doubt creep in like the start of fall, dewey and moist, with death lurking and waiting for us all…
Clearly in this analogy the place where fall creeps is Stelle and soggy death is Mary.
@Amelie Wikström: Yeah, Anchovies were so despised on pizza, that nearly EVERY pizza chain I can find no longer has them.
The haters ruined that for me, they shouldn’t ruin pineapple as well.
Blondie:
“You’re a wimp!”
“So are you”
The line should be “No, you are!” otherwise the second politician(?) is admitting that they’re a wimp.
@Liam: Holy cow, I think you just predicted the end of this Crankshaft arc. That whole confusing ‘maybe the protestors DIDN’T burn down the bookstore (but they could have!)’ implication yesterday might be setting us up for a wacky ‘Oh that Crankshaft!’ denouement after Batiuk has finished making his Very Important Point about literary freedom or whatever.
CS: Hoo boy. There are going to be a lot of longtime Crankshaft readers with fist-sized holes in their computer monitors after reading the last panel of today’s strip.
I have no idea who Lillian would be calling right now to, ahem, “do the right thing” here based on the information that she has, that being an extremely incomplete thirdhand account from a very unreliable source. Nonetheless, she’s already on the phone to do… something. I guess we’ll just have to wait to see what this is, but somehow I doubt her self-righteous path is about learning and confirming the facts of the situation before taking or calling for action, nor do I think she’ll offering to help the nameless and faceless owner of the destroyed store.
Then there’s the heroism of Les, which is an even bigger farce. His side of the story has the A Time to Kill problem, where the writer is using a specific emotionally manipulative subject to advocate for a really, really, really terrible broader idea, except here Batiuk badly fumbled the “emotionally manipulative subject” part because very few people in the US have strong feelings about Fahrenheit 451 and whether 10th graders read it, which hasn’t been aided by Batiuk playing make-believe about what the book even is. Regardless, Les’s decision to disregard the school’s ban and distribute the book to his students is indefensible. While many people would disagree on what material exactly is inappropriate for schools to be teaching or disseminating, almost everyone agrees that there is inappropriate material, and that vetting and establishing what is and isn’t acceptable is something that should be determined collectively by parents, education authorities, governing bodies, and so forth, not by individual teachers. And if those individual teachers don’t agree with a particular policy, then they should have to make their case to the decision makers to change the policy, not simply thumb their nose at it and do whatever they want.
And while I personally blame Les the most, it seems like the owner of the destroyed bookstore knowingly took part in his scheme with the understanding that they were going against the local school board and thus their own community by agreeing to distribute a proscribed book to minors. Not that that justifies arson, but this Booksmellers owner is far from innocent and did bring this angry response on themself. In fact, I cannot fathom why this store owner would have thought this would result in anything less than an infuriated community backlash. They openly conspired with a smirking malefactor to distribute prohibited materials to children behind the backs of their school and parents; that was never going to be good for business.
Yeah, the straw protestors are terrible people, too, because that’s what Batiuk decided they would be. But Batiuk managed to make all of his heroes into inexcusable villains as well, especially his pet character Les. What Batiuk is ultimately advocating for is the position that teachers and similar figures should be commended for flouting the system and sneakily getting children to read whatever they think is important, regardless of what anyone else thinks – political/ ideological extremist propaganda, religious texts, erotica/ pornography, woo-woo “health” books, hate group indoctrination; fuck it, fight the power, anything goes as long as you want kids to see it.
This is why you never win any of those writer awards, Batiuk.
Gutted that RMMD shied away from turning into “Truck Tyler thinks about how he’s sitting on a bench, forever.” It would have been very soothing! And isn’t that what the target audience wants?
Shut up and eat a wiener submarine sandwich (or a “hot dog” if you must), Dagwood.
Blondie: Who knows? Tonight’s debate might devolve into food preferences.
6C: It might be a sign that there’s a deficiency in your cat’s diet if it’s eating the walls. Maybe you should take your cat to the vet instead of fantasizing about deli meats.
@The Rambling Otter:
Don’t be too sure. That second cat didn’t specify WHY it wants ham.
Don Abundio, translated:
“That’s a tough shot, Abundio”
“If only I could pull on the ball instead of push it… That gives me an idea!”
“I’m pretty sure this is against the rules!”
Frazz: Oh, good. We’re going to get a WHOLE WEEK of dissecting an innocuous saying, and why a member of the outsider group is so stupid for using it.
Luann: Les only likes the “wacko in the sacko” part.
CS: I bet Lillian’s calling Bill Clinton to get this fixed.
Bizarro: “Choose one… it will forever change the past, present and future… Altering reality in ways you couldn’t imagine. A reality where the Soviet Union has an iron grip on the entire world, or one where America took hold on the planet and all of its customs and cultures”
Me: Just let me on the damn plane already.
Rex Morgan – The kids today love Roots Country! I’m sure the fact that I live in Nashville has everything to do with this, but one of the local college stations is a public radio station completely dedicated to Roots Country/Americana. I’d rather listen to that than “bro country”, which makes up about 60% of the airwaves here. That said, they stream online at wmot.org, should you be interested.
Blondie – Dagwood doesn’t get politicians on either side don’t truly want the vote from people who make their personality about low-effort engagement baiting posts about nonsense topics. These people cannot even name their members of Congress.
Six Chix – I’d much rather Tuesday Chick go back to literal food porn than give us an obligate carnivore acting in a way to ensure it suffers.
Bizzarro – The DMV being a slow bureaucratic institution is such a played out trope, and with the TSA you could have much more visual fun when if they cause you to strip down, or make strange new rules about what can be brought on board. But by the time the TSA was implemented, all the legacy strips that dominate the newspaper were stuck in their ways.
Anyhow, Happy 9/11 Eve everyone
Rex Morgan, MD – Instead of being a medical storyline, this is going to be about Truck teaching Buck’s loser kid to be a root country star instead of trying to bring back vaudeville.
BIZARRO:. We easily spot two of the three secret symbols. Given the two types of restless proletariat, the third should be a hidden stick of dynamite. Lit.
6CHX:. Nerml? Is that you? You’ve been away from any strip far too long.
@The Rambling Otter: Best option: pineapple AND anchovies. The salty compliments the sweet. Only problem is, the pizza tends to be a little soggy.
@The Quiet Man: This is one of my major points of irritation with this Very Important Story.
This is a comic strip where the title character routinely sets fire to stuff (accidentally, allegedly), and it’s meant to be wacky fun, where the perpetrator faces no consequences for his actions. Meanwhile, Batiuk has decided to set his very serious, Pulitzer-baiting story in a similar realm, with absolutely no thought about the tonal whiplash.
RMMD – I’m eagerly awaiting “Park Bench,” the follow-up to “Glenwood Motel.”
Sadder, still, Truck can’t afford to hire someone to give him a hand job.
@jroggs: My 4th grade “science” teacher pushed me to read books on “scientific creationism”, as it was called back in the day. He also pressured me to come to his church. That’s Les’ next step.
MW: Estelle is so stressed, she nearly hit a pedestrian. Luckily, there was a pudgy man around to accidentally knock the pedestrian out of her path.
Zits: I don’t know. If I got lab results like that, I’d be worried about what was going on with my body.
FC: “A manta ray. Use your imagin- Fuck it, that’s a lost cause.”
Six Chix: These cats would have eaten the giant submarine sandwich (with boobs!) differently than the Chix did a few weeks ago, if you get my drift.
GT: People are complaining about the new NFL kickoff rules, but they’re not as strange as wherever Milford is, where you kickoff to you own team.
Apparently you’re a Plugger if you are in an advanced state of dementia.
BF: “The croissants and cafe au lait here in Paris are okay, but I really miss Tim Horton’s.”
Baldo: Who’s this supposed to be? The Frito Bandito?
Blondie… I simply cannot fathom the regular arrangement of Blondie sitting with Dagwood to watch television but to have her chair pointing at a 90 degree angle from the screen. Not a snark, just WTF?
Crankerbean: Remember, all that matters is that Lisa’s Story survives.
Heathcliff yells over from his panel “Hey, Chix Cat,you want ham, buy a helmet!”
Bizarro-And off in the wings Stalin is waiting for the Tsar to mess up.
Six Chix-Like everyone else I want to read a comic with a joke in it.
Six Chix-If you want to eat something without a soul then may I direct you to the editors of your comic and the editor of ‘9 Chickweed Lane’.
@Everything Is Better With Monkeys:
I think it’s canon that Dagwood watches TV while Blondie reads. Funny thing, though, it’s just about impossible to read with a TV in your peripheral vision.
Nancy: Four nearly identical panels, but with four really great facial expressions. Good to have you back, Olivia.
Nancy Classics: Possible violent anarchist mob, or a cabal of Soviet spies plotting nuclear espionage? Fine work, vigilant officer! (1953 must have been a fun year.)
RMMD: so the nine-year-old actually is Parker?
Ripley: Bianca Xinuise fan service, order up! Extra disgustingness on the side!
GT: I’m no sports expert, but maybe if he’d tried RUNNING instead of prancing up the middle like some great fairy, he’d have gained better yardage.
6C: I….guess this is meant to demonstrate the duality of cats, being both unpredictable destructive little hellions and little sad-eyed babies that want you to feed them? Maybe? I’m just saying, Two Lumps is kind of sporadic these days but still does it better.
RMMD: Oh, so that’s Parker? Didn’t recognize them with the bike helmet covering their whitefro. They’re doing pretty well after being severely concussed.
@The Rambling Otter: One pineapple anchovy pizza coming up!
Dustin: The doctor doesn’t appear to be in any better shape than DustDad, but he just can’t resist using his authority to stick it to Ed. Good for him.
H&L: The garbagemen appear to be the only happy people in this strip. I wonder what Caufield would think about this. (Actually, no I don’t.)
Pluggers: Just stop it. Pluggers don’t use calculators. They use a No. 2 pencil and a piece of lined paper. Come on.
GT: The player in white seems to be taking taunting to a disturbing new level.
@Buck Ripsnort: I had a middle school biology teacher who definitely wished he was teaching history or social studies. We once had a class where he rambled about Civil War artillery pieces (with prepared visual aids) for the entire period. He was also deeply insecure about the Soviets and would go on long rants denouncing them and their faked scientific accomplishments, despite the fact we were in the late 1990s at the time.
@Cleveland Mocks: On Dustin Yeah, far be it from me to tell professional cartoonists how to do their job, but the recurring gag of the doctor fat shaming Ed would possibly land better if they weren’t depicted as having exactly the same body.
@16 The Rambling Otter: The reason the pizzarias ditched anchovies is that they smell like Mary Worth after a vigorous…you know, I don’t think I like where this sentence is going.
@49 richardf8: Isn’t that the kind of pizza that people fling onto that house in Albuquerque?
@50 Cleveland Mocks: on Pluggers: Of course pluggers use pencil and paper. They’re too stupid to know that the TV’s remote is not a calculator no matter how hard they press the buttons.
MW: Meanwhile, back at Generic Animal Hospital, Ed seethes because Estelle blew off work to check out Generic Party Center.
CS: “There’s only one thing to do when things start getting scary. Get the hell out of town. . . . Hello, Greyhound?”
Bizarro: “Stupid me, that’s the line I was looking for. I was at the other end of the airport looking for the CZAR line.”
Sick Chics — Forgive me, but (perhaps due to the script) I read the line as “I want Haiti” and for a minute I thought someone had finally blown the lid off the conspiracy to hide a malevolent, country-devouring feline which will soon encompass the destruction of all mankind, if not all beings on Earth.
I feel better now, but perhaps I’ve said too much. . .
Bizzaro — In Russia, banned substances find you!
C’shaft: The “right thing” to do in the face of school board book bans/challenges:
1.) Speak out against current policy, and advocate for its change;
2.) Support school board candidates who will enact policy changes, or consider running for a position yourself;
3.) Open discussion directly with parents, explaining why you believe the book is both appropriate for the grade level(s) you teach and important educational material. Thank them for taking an active interest in their child’s education and offer alternatives that will serve everyone’s needs;
4.) Encourage parents and students to read the material outside of the school setting, and make their own judgments.
Not the “right thing” to do in the face of school board book bans/challenges:
1.) Openly defy policy in what you claim is a noble stand for truth and justice but is really a self-aggrandizing attempt to make yourself the hero of this story while trying to loophole your way around the rules to claim you’re not really breaking them and therefore cannot face professional discipline for doing so, drag a local business into the situation (possibly without their prior knowledge or consent) in a way that makes them a target for violent attack;
2.) Smugly proclaim your own virtue to anyone within earshot, or out loud to yourself if nobody else is available.
Seriously, this is making the “gay prom” debacle look like Moonlight.
Dustin: “But seriously, most ways of measuring body fat are an inaccurate picture of total body health at best and are rooted in inaccurate and outdated ideas of health that presume the white male body as both the default and the ideal at worst. And while I know you’d appreciate a system that allows you to frame your mediocrity as exceptional, I think you’d be better off not hogging all the donuts in your office break room, you selfish bastard.”
Luann: “I just spent several hundred dollars on textbooks that will be deemed obsolete by the end of the semester and which I will either sell for a tiny fraction of what I paid or will gather dust in storage for years! Oh the rapture!”
MW: “Could it be I’m making an overly big deal of this, and we would both be happier with a modest ceremony among close friends?….Nah, it’s his fault for not having good work-life balance.”
@TheDiva: Gaaah, markup fail. But seriously, who wouldn’t want to yell at Dustdad?
@TheDiva: That’s the way I envision everyone talking to Ed Kudlick.
@taig: This is one of my major points of irritation with this Very Important Story. This is a comic strip where the title character routinely sets fire to stuff (accidentally, allegedly), and it’s meant to be wacky fun, where the perpetrator faces no consequences for his actions. Meanwhile, Batiuk has decided to set his very serious, Pulitzer-baiting story in a similar realm, with absolutely no thought about the tonal whiplash.
Batuik got “Funky Winkerbean” cancelled by turning it into the comic strip equivalent of a poorly written “Afterschool Special,” and then almost immediately decided to turn the marginally more popular “Crankshaft” into the exact same failed comic strip because his ego is just that big. Say what you will about Stan Lee but he obviously knew who NOT to hire as a writer.
@jroggs: Yeah, the straw protestors are terrible people, too, because that’s what Batiuk decided they would be.
Well, firebombing a bookstore for selling Ray Bradbury *is* a little excessive.
@Old School Allie Cat: WMOT is great, but my favorite in Nashville (outside of WSM) is WXNA.
Blondie: The team behind Blondie offers their opinions on the first presidential debate of 2024, so long after it happened and ceased being news that we’re now coming up on the second debate with a completely different candidate. By the standards of newspaper comics, that’s practically being on the bleeding edge of the zeitgeist!
Between Friends: Melodramatically guilt-tripping a woman who barely knows you into staying near you when they have somewhere else to be is totally how to score, right?
Six Chix: Godzilla Nerd here to inform the curious; Godzilla’s diet isn’t super consistent across the various continuities but he generally is depicted as either eating fish or not eating at all in favor of simply absorbing radiation. This just pushes the debate into whether or not fish have souls.
Rex Morgan: GET ON WITH IT
RMMD: Corey, he’s a good kid. But if he’d wash his hair now and then he might get a girlfriend.
Luann: Explain to me again, Gunther has a girlfriend but Les doesn’t.
Pluggers:
Pluggers are stupid and/or demented # 3,728.
CS: Time to do the right thing, like when you ruined your sister’s life?
@Everything Is Better With Monkeys: There’s a damn good reason why Blondie’s chair is at that angle, but it’s diminished a bit by the chair obscuring so much of her side boob.
Why does the woman in Between Friends have an upturned square nose in full profile, and a downturned triangle nose in quarter-profile? If we see her straight on, is it a circle?
@But What Do I Know?: I read Haiti too. Until otherwise corrected, I was very impressed with Xunise’s up-to-the-minute knowlege of the latest right-wing nutjob conspiracy stories.
@Old School Allie Cat: Thank you so very much! I’ve been searching for something like this for my background music in my WFH space. Those Spotifandora AI algorithms just aren’t cutting it! Yet another benefit from following this blog!
Six Chex And A Pissed Off Cat Named Heathcliff In Search Of A Punchline: I see Chix Cat found out why you don’t rip off Heathcliff’s schtick. If you think two black eyes is bad, you should see what Heath did to Uncle Milty when Berle raised a ham flag on “Texaco Star Theatre”!
@Patrick+Duke: Why does the woman in Between Friends have an upturned square nose in full profile, and a downturned triangle nose in quarter-profile?
___________________________
Her husband just brought William Holden home to meet her.
@Ukulele Ike: BF – Timbits!
@GarrisonSkunk: Got the reference! That’s one of my all time favorite TV episodes. I have a Christmas ornament of Lucy from that episode.
@Rootin Tootin Rootster:
AI trains on mass appeal, so it feeds niche audiences only crossover content. Ask for classical music, and you’ll get Yo-Yo Ma, Andrea Bocelli, and Susan Boyle.
@The Rambling Otter: The line should be “No, you are!” otherwise the second politician(?) is admitting that they’re a wimp.
______________________________
“I know you are, but what am I?”*
*in the Pee-Wee tongue. (Careful, we know where that tongue has been)
@Guillermo el chiclero:
Les is gay and living with the man who gives him everything he wants and needs every night.
Slylick Fox And Comix For Kinx: Thanks again for getting me the action shot,Sid. Sorry for the puff of smoke emanating from my head, Cassandra Cat was on set and sold me some primo ‘nip. Don’t do drugs,kids!
6Chix – Yes, cats are well known for their moral objection to meat.
I first read this on my phone, and like @But What Do I Know?: and @ValdVin: I thought the second cat said Haiti.
Rex Morgan – Oh, good grief. Now Beatty thinks that Parker is a beloved character who will be showing up regularly. They’re slightly more appealing than Buck, Truck, and Wanda, but that’s a low bar.
Crankshaft – Yes, Loathsome Lillian is well known for doing the right thing.
Ripley’s – Bianca Xunise had an orgasm when she saw this.
That is Priceless – I would think that instead of insulting him on his mustache, the tough guy would comment on whatever that is that he’s wearing.
9CL – Even without meticulously drawn legs, boinking, or children watching their parents boink, this still makes me feel queasy. Apparently Brooke came across the word dandle and thought it was hilarious, so he’s going to beat us over the head with it for the next week or two.
Is that Juliette and Elliot? They’re drawn in a very slapdash way, and it looks like they shop for clothes at the same Goodwill as Amos and the women in the death spiral of Apartment 3-G.
Six Chix: I think it’s the “my wall” label that’s confused me most, as in whose wall? I once had a cat a cat that would scratch the walls sometimes, so I guess they were “our walls”, only guess who didn’t get their damage deposit when we changed apartments? Not that my cat needed the money. I fed him. He never ate walls. I guess you could say we lived like we were in ” Garfield” instead of this weird hell.
@Banana Jr. 6000: But they were asking five grand for a first edition Dark Carnival when it was only “near fine” condition, with a “good, usual yellowing and chipping” dust jacket!
@Patrick+Duke: Slut Friend’s nose is completely porcine, which is why she can’t hold on to a man.
(ducking onslaught of ripe tomatoes and cabbages)
Sex Organ V.D.: Will Josh be back in time for the gripping “Rex lances Truck’s hemorrhoid” sequence?
Gassed Up Alleycats: Ida Claire’s on first.
@I speak Jive: 9CL – And having Eliot shrink down to mini-me size so he can sit on Thorax’ knee gives it the Squick factor that a female-free 9CL installment would otherwise have avoided.
@I speak Jive: and like @But What Do I Know?: and @ValdVin: I thought the second cat said Haiti.
____________________________
I guess Cassandra was there….slurring of speech is one of the first signs of ‘Nip addiction.
LUANN – Once again skirting the question of whether Gunther is intentionally written as a childish dweeb or if the authors think he is endearing.
Pepsi And Her Corny Unicorn: Lord Shameful Display! This comic is selling LSD to kids! Won’t someone think of the children?
@made of wince: Six Chix: I think it’s the “my wall” label that’s confused me most, as in whose wall
____________________
My wall is a very very very fine wall, with two cats in the spam,one of them wanting ham, and everything is easy because of you….
Luann: “What a weenie!” Priceless.
Mary Worth Spanish to English.
Pluggers: Use count on their fingers (and toes for large numbers.)
@GarrisonSkunk:
Visually, that wall is either a side wall with a bite or a back wall with a protrusion.
@ectojazzmage: Rex Morgan: GET ON WITH IT
_______________
Gene Shallet’s review of Truck Tyler in the revival of “Waiting For Hemorrhoid”
@Sequitur: Mary Worth Spanish to English.
“Hey! Why’d you let those doves go? They weren’t ready!”
______________________
“This is what it sounds like when doves meddle”- The Artist Formally Known as Dawn Weston.
6C: Huh. I mean, it’s weird, but it’s not really Tuesday Chik weird. Not that I’m complaining; if she’s dropped the sandwich thing I couldn’t be happier!
DT: So, to sum up:
1) Diet Smith welcomes a complete stranger into his home because he’s got antennae and says he’s the brother of the Moon Governor.
2) Mysta tells him that, during her recent adventure in Moon Valley, this guy wanted to conquer the world.
3) Diet Smith, instantly concluding that Mysta is making this up for no apparent reason, demands proof, and continues to treat Ro-Zan like an honoured guest until he gets it.
4) “Proof” turns out to be Dick Tracy telling him the exact same thing, because he’s a man in a serious hat, and therefore his claims can’t be the result of nervous hysteria.
5) Diet Smith then decides that maybe he should have someone keep an eye on Ro-Zan, who, of course, isn’t there any more.
It’s a high bar to be the dumbest guy in Neo-Chicago, but I think the NCPD’s favourite genius might well have achieved it.
GT: Could someone please send the colourists notes on who these people are, because I’m pretty sure Oscar Capp should be in Milford red-and-black, and I’m absolutely certain that someone should be!
JP: We interrupt this interruption to … go back to the original plot, maybe?
RMMD: “Yeah, I’m Truck Tyler.”
“Great, my Aunt Judy has a truck that needs tiled!”
SH: So, even though Feryl is genetically identical to a human when in human form, she still has the highly sophisticated sense of smell of … um … a dove. Sure, why not?
I got a chuckle out of Nancy today.
@Uncle Lumpy: Visually, that wall is either a side wall with a bite or a back wall with a protrusion.
__________________________
It’s the “Laugh-In” Joke Wall after Kramer dug it out of the disposal bin. It just hasn’t been the same since Goldie Hawn went serious.
6Chx: So far, cats eating walls and cats scratching walls have been mentioned. Cats sometimes express themselves by doing something else to walls. If you don’t know what it is, consider yourself fortunate.
@I speak Jive: I have a queasy remembrance of Brooke using “dandle” before in this strip. Maybe it’s the word, itself, but I really suspect it’s the situations Brooke presents that makes me feel ill.
CS: I hate this storyline too much to snark about it.
@Lord Flatulence: What do they do if they have to count to 21?
@101 Scratchy Scrotum LXIX:
The male pluggers use their dick.
Female pluggers use their boyfriend’s dick.
Hey, Baja! Don’t let Earl Pickles make your funeral arrangements.
To be fair to Dagwood, it doesn’t say what his position is regarding the legality of pineapple on pizza. He could be endorsing constitutional protection for pizza topping choice.
CS: on review it might be appropriate that the bookstore was burned because of Fahrenheit 451. That’s the last thought I will give to this.
@Old School Allie Cat: Which type of “country” is it where the lyrics consist of “My woman up and left me, and took the dog. I’m sure gonna miss that dog.”
No! NO! DON’T!!
RMMD: Thrill as RMMD boldly continues the enthralling “old man sits on a bench” storyline, no doubt to be followed by the equally amazing “old man decides to get off bench” storyline to follow.
@GarrisonSkunk: Keep away from the Blue Unicorn blotter acid. The Green Dragon is cleaner, less “speedy.”
6Chx: I gave Xunise’s comic the same percentage of my attention as I usually afford it, saw Cat #2 thinking “I want him,” and wrote it off as another one of her creepy sex strips.
Crank: Loathsome Lillian is phoning “Underdog.”
Rex: Yes, as an oldster, any kid that says they know me is a “nice kid”, be they a niece or complete stranger. You know middle aged women are normally invisible to kids, so when something like that happens it goes in the diary. ” Dear diary, my niece called me by my name before looking at her phone at stuff. Huzzah!”
Josh used to feature Marmaduke quite a bit. I guess he got tired of him.
Blondie: It should be “I know you are but what am I?”
@Old School Allie Cat: #27: One standup comedian whose name I don’t recall made fun of the current “bro country” by saying that you could make a hit song by just including these tropes in your lyrics; dirt road, pickup truck, cold beer, pretty girl, cut-off shorts. He even sang it out in an improvised song.
One local Houston conservative talk radio host lamented how C-W music is now dominated by these handsome, young metrosexuals who all enjoyed comfortable middle class upbringings and not the hardscrabble lives of the old country stars. The problem is not these new guys faults, it’s just the improvement in the US standard of living in the last few generations. The reason they can’t sing about growing up in a tarpaper shack rock poor sharecropping cotton is because no one has to do that anymore and thank God for that.
@111 Lord Flatulence:
You’re right. According to the archives there are 184 posts that contain Marmaduke. However, the last one occurred on December 2, 2013. I have no idea why they stopped. Perhaps Uncle Lumpy knows the answer.
@Sequitur: I got a chuckle out of Nancy today.
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It was the licorice one wasn’t it? Nancy hoards the fruit flavored ones for herself.
@Sequitur: I got a chuckle out of Nancy today.
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Was it 96 worthy?
@Calvin’s Cardboard Box: Yeah, shrunken Elliot creeped me out. I can’t decide if Brooke deliberately drew him like that to show how large Thorax is, or if he got bored and sketched him without planning. I’m sure that boredom sets in quickly when there are no female legs to draw.
I do hope it isn’t an age or health issue.
@taig: I must have blocked that out of my memory. The copyright of today’s strip is 2024, so this isn’t a rerun.
I’m sure that he thinks the word is just enough out of use to be not well known, plus it sounds like it’s naughty even if it isn’t. Giggling over a word like dandle and then running it into the ground is something a third grader would do. Or a beefwit.
@Fathom Haunt: Hey! Spoiler alert!
@Sequitur: Thin-skinned author maybe?
@The Rambling Otter: #16
@Baja Gaijin: #53:
My sister has hated all seafoods since childhood. She wouldn’t even eat fish sticks, the blandest and least fishiest of the aquatic food forms. However, she likes anchovies, which most seafood lovers will turn away in disgust. Go figure.
SNL did a skit back in the 70s where an ad agency hired by the Anchovy Council was working up an ad campaign to get black people to eat more anchovies.
@Sequitur: Perhaps Uncle Lumpy knows the answer
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Who knows what evil lies in the hearts of comic strip characters? The Lumpy knows!(evil laughter)
@Sequitur:
Fatigue.
@Guillermo el chiclero: Anchovies are salty, are packaged in long brown strips. I mean, it’s the bacon of seafood.
@Lord Flatulence: Josh used to feature Marmaduke quite a bit. I guess he got tired of him
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Josh found out that Marmaduke was just some chick in a dog costume.
@Horace Broon: RMMD: “Yeah, I’m Truck Tyler.”
“Great, my Aunt Judy has a truck that needs tiled!”
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-Peter Graves, Goldie Hawn, Cocktail party sketch, “Laugh-In” episode 269b
@Lord Flatulence: You can only make that one joke* so many times** before it gets stale.
* “So Marmaduke ate him.”
** seven times.
@The Rambling Otter: I mean, it’s the bacon of seafood.
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Try new Anch-os™brand soy based anchovy substitute!
@Ukulele Ike: * “So Marmaduke ate him.”
** seven times.
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***”Hey, his owner looks like Hitler!”
@I speak Jive: Yeah, shrunken Elliot creeped me out.
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I remember those “The Shrunken Guy” sketches when Chris would run around on Dave’s desk, and swim around in his coffee mug, but it didn’t really creep me out until Charles Grodin crushed him with the heel of his shoe.Then when he walked around you hear Chris’ voice saying “Ow!” and ” Hey,I’m not dead yet!” every time Grodin took a step.That was really creepy to this 11 year old viewer.
@GarrisonSkunk:
I suspect Gearhead Gertie is headed for a similar fate. Ironically, Pluggers avoided it through inconsistent messaging.
@Sequitur: According to the archives there are 184 posts that contain Marmaduke. However, the last one occurred on December 2, 2013. I have no idea why they stopped.
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After the movie, Josh couldn’t take the Owen Wilson flashbacks they caused.
@GarrisonSkunk: Fucking Hitler. Ruined the toothbrush mustache for EVERYBODY. Made Charlie Chaplin and Oliver Hardy cry. It was the worst thing he ever did.
1. It’s bold of Mr. “Lumpy” to assume that anyone knows what happens in Between Friends, a strip so obscure Josh has only mentioned it 8 times in the last 2 years.
2. Six Chix, as usual, is terrible. The art is bad, the joke is bad. It’s bad.
3. Bizarro, usually good, is today very lazy. At least it has fully-drawn art, unlike Six Chix.
@Jeffmcm:
“… Josh has only mentioned it 8 times in the last 2 years.”
That comment made me curious. Is there ever a year-end summary that shows how many times a certain strip was mentioned during the previous year? Does Beetle beat out Blondies or did Mary Worth take the honors?
@Unca $crooge:
An archive search on the comic within a range of dates returns the number of hits.
@Ukulele Ike: #131: Ron Mael of Sparks didn’t let Hitler stop him from rockin’ his toothbrush mustache.
@GarrisonSkunk: Also kind of creeped me out as a kid, was in a Tool Time segment in “Home Improvement” where Tim and Al are shrunken down (presumably an act within canon, as I doubt Tool Time would ever have that in the budget) to demonstrate how a car motor works.
When they are turned back to normal size, Al doesn’t grow back and Tim accidentally steps on him, and it shows a cartoony image of Al being all flat.
That didn’t so much disturb me as much as confused me, because kid me didn’t understand why they would kill off Al like that, only to have him back to normal in a later scene. I didn’t understand much back then xDBut years later rewatching that episode on cable the scene of Tim stepping on him was removed.
(Had to remove and edit a few times as the Edit button doesn’t work that well)
@The Rambling Otter: Whenever I try to edit the comment, most of the time it just goes into loading limbo forever, until I refresh or close the page, which removes the comment outright.
@Guillermo el chiclero: Or Spiderman’s J. Jonah Jameson (for decades) until Captain America (who personally battled Hitler) called him out on it.
Jameson who is a big fan of Captain America immediately shaved the mustache and never wore it again.
@The Rambling Otter:
Yikes, it’s not supposed to work like that. Unfortunately, I don’t have access to the internal workings of the site, but I’ll forward your comment to Josh, who will probably email you for details after he gets back.
Not really OT Luann: I had to drive through the university campus today and it must be the first full day of classes. How do people get to the point of being university freshmen and not know how to cross the damn street? Did they all grow up in little towns without traffic lights? I swear, every September…..
Blondie: Wait, the Blondie people were aware there’d be a debate tonight and scheduled a comic about it ahead of time? Spooky!
RMMD: Hey Beatty, did you hear anyone say, “Man, I can’t wait to see that Parker kid again! Like, I need to see them again right away! Preferably with those Brillo curls flattened by a bike helmet!”? Did you? Well there’s a reason you didn’t.
6C: From having a mad love affair with a giant sandwich to trying to raise vegan cats, with about the same level of success in both endeavors.
@Al of the Christian Singles Jungle Patrol: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sK2HaGzscs “I don’t miss her any more but I sure do miss her dad”.
@Lord Flatulence: But golly jillickers, there are an infinite number of jokes you can make about “Dog is big”!
Oh, please, don’t tell me they’re bringing back Emperor Ming. We were doing fine exploring how alliances can shatter once the oppressor is removed. It’ll just be more recycled stories if he does rise from the dead. Again.
9CL: On the bright side, Brooke has taken a break from the mind-numbing sex jokes. I mean, I hope he has, at least.
C-Shaft: I assume “the right thing” is posting a yardlong tweetstorm (or whatever they call it on X) that no one will read.
Crock: A talking scale in the middle of the desert sands when for when you have a fat joke emergency.
DtM: The way Henry smirks at Dennis pointing out that the impeccably dressed guest of the evening is a recovering alcoholic means he doesn’t have a lot of plausible deniability on this one.
GT: Hey, Oscar Capp plays American football and he has the same last name as a comics character who sometimes plays what they call football in most of the world so obviously no one’s going to forget him. JK.
MT: “Extinction Park”? I didn’t realize Les Moore was the Michael Crichton of Mark and Rusty’s world.
Phantom: It’s obviously not going to learn anything from you, chief.
@The Rambling Otter: You have an edit button? Is this a gift to subscribers?
@Ukulele Ike: The Talentless Mr. Ripley’s – What goes into a Giant Gatsby sub sandwich? “Little pig sausages and mashed potatoes”? Doesn’t matter, everyone ignores the food while they get bombed on Gin Rickeys.
@146 Buck Ripsnort: Yes, an edit button and a golden key to Josh’s pleasure dome.
@jroggs</Yeah, the straw protestors are terrible people, too, because that’s what Batiuk decided they would be
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So TB is speaking out on the plastic straw controversy? Will that finally earn him the pullet surprise?
@Baja Gaijin: I’m not at the “pleasure dome” tier.
“Tsar wars, those crazy tsar wars,all the hazy Tsar wars,wars with the tsars.”- Bill Murray, SNL.
@taig: Boop the Clown’s nose three times to enter the pleasure dome.
@Buck Ripsnort: Yeah :3
@Uncle Lumpy: Thanks! :)
@Uncle Lumpy: I suspect Gearhead Gertie is headed for a similar fate. Ironically, Pluggers avoided it through inconsistent messaging.
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Plugger messaging= bombarding Josh with Western Onion™ telegrams?
@GarrisonSkunk: No clowns. Disintegrations are OK, though.
@Buck Ripsnort: You have an edit button? Is this a gift to subscribers?
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Does Josh still offer the naked Multiboobage drawings of Cassandra Cat in 3-D to his top supporters? Asking for a friend.
@taig:@GarrisonSkunk: No clowns. Disintegrations are OK, though.
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Can we disintegrate the clowns? Asking for a Baja.
Sid, if you get a blowup made of today’s Slylick Fox, I’d be happy to pawtagraph it for your client wall.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DY1EnxzsJ3A&t=101s&pp=ygUQdml4ZW4gcGFyayBwaWxvdA%3D%3D
Mark Trail Mix: Why go to “Extinction Park” when you can go to “Vixen Park”?
@Baja Gaijin: @taig: Just Click here for the great Pleasure Dome of American avant-garde cinema. Rest in Peace, Kenneth Anger.
(Scuse me, I took a shot of bourbon every time Trump said MINNEAPOLIS BURNED TO THE GROUND and now I’m spending the night on the kitchen floor.)
@Guillermo el chiclero:
The San Diego of Luann is a good place to be voluntarily celibate.
GT: OH, oh. That tight end is going to be turned into a wide receiver.
@Uncle Lumpy:
Will give it a try. Thanks!