But then how do they calculate the vig?
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Dick Tracy, 8/11/25
Sam, Lizz, and Lee are searching the apartment of loan shark Sphyrna, murdered by tech whiz Theresa Lakoyle with her glowing gun. Yesterday, Sam bet Lee a week of sandwiches that he would find key evidence in two minutes, and here he does. In the toilet. It makes him so damn happy; just look at that grin. Please don’t anybody tell him why he always gets toilet duty.
Alice, 8/11/25
Lady, you took your brain out of your head and handed it to Boyfriend there. Little analysis is required.
Mary Worth, 8/11/25
“Olive, you’re leaning hard into this ‘I am so unusual’ bit; maybe give it a rest for a while and see how that works out?” said Mary Worth, never.
Judge Parker, 8/11/25
“Everyone to the couch. Now. The psychiatrist‘s couch, because you people are nuts.”
—Uncle Lumpy
40 replies to “But then how do they calculate the vig?”
Slylock Fox-The bee was arrested for public nudity.
MW-“Sometimes I wish I wasn’t always running around fighting people who want to use their gifts to dominate others.”
MW-“But my parents don’t love me the way you love me, Mary.”
FC-The whole town was flaming.
Dick Tracy: Sam found the loan shark’s old iPad in the toilet, and now will spend the next two weeks trying to decode their business records from Spotify Wrapped lists and old Wordle scores.
Alice: I’m a fan of the late neurologist Oliver Sacks, but The Man in a Hat Who Mistook His Wife’s Brain for a Present just doesn’t have the same ring to it.
Mary Worth: “They accept me. They have no choice. Not only because they’re my parents, but because if anyone isn’t nice to me, I’ll ‘send them to the cornfield.’ Ha, just kidding! No, but really, Mary, you should cool it with the meddling if you know what’s good for you.”
Pluggers: I understand the wordplay here, but it’s pretty much impossible to sell live worms in cans. I mean, Chef Boyardee Spaghetti & Meatballs comes close, but only in terms of texture.
I literally just woke up, so please forgive me that I read “Olive” as “Clive” and was greatly confused for a second.
I’m pretty certain that loan sharks do keep records. For tax purposes.
Judge Parker:
“Wow, Reena! — who would’ve thought that the original Betty Crocker would turn out to be so malevolent?!?”
Mary Worth:
“Mary, why are all those people walking the beach or frolicking in the water purple?”
“Well, those are plum locations, Olive!”
Alice:
Wow. I would have wagered three hundred quatloos that Alice didn’t know any of the Gamesters of Triskelion.
Kililng the real owner is mean, but taking the real owner home is nice, so it kind of balances out, right?
DT OK reaching into a toilet is one thing, but why do you have to mount it like that? You know what, I don’t want to know…
Alice finally admits that this is all just nonsense and there’s no point trying to look for meaning or even a joke. You realize that’s not better though, right?
MW “Like maybe a kid who’s best friend wasn’t an old lady that likes on the other side of the country…”
JP “Everybody on the couch. We are all watching The Pricess Bride until we’re friends. I’ll get the popcorn, you start braiding each other’s hair…”
Crankshaft: Funny? No.
Mary Worth: Olive is a very gifted and talented girl. Just ask her!
Rex Morgan: Why is he interested in knowing these random people and their problems. I wouldn’t.
Flash Gordon: Meanwhile, Dr. Zarkov, the old horndog …
JP: Landlady asks the barista what was he thinking.
“Uh, Girls…boobs…Uh”
“I got it. You can go, Einstein.”
DT: While Sam is clearly pleased with his find, c’mon. The late slimy loan shark does business every day. Does he update his files on his potty each night? Most people can’t be bothered to floss and we’ve seen how tidy and neat, the shark was, so this seems unlikely. Liz should find a small usb tucked behind the faux Patrick Nagel image on the wall.
JP: While the dim girls falsely accuse the woman running the boarding house, Aksel in his stealthiest chameleon mode stands absolutely still and hope the ladies can only identify him if he moves.
RMMD: Please let the brother be an associate of Rene Belluso! That will finally tie up all of the strands.
Flash Gordon: Well, at least someone is having a good time! Everything is coming up Zarkoff.
MW: It is like watching a video where someone has crossed onto a train track after the gate is down. Waiting to see how this ends.
Dick Tracy: Oh come on! They’d hide documents in a place so obvious?
MW: There’s no way Olive and Mary brought swimsuits with them to a steakhouse, so that means they went back to Olive’s house to get them. How did that work, Mary shouted through Ed-n-Evy’s bedroom door that she was taking their 14-year old daughter to the beach and they stopped making the sign of the 2-humped whale long enough to yell back “Yeah, sure, OK, whatever?”
Also, it’s easy to see why Olive’s schoolmates and even her own parents detest her, what with the endless, ENDLESS “I’m so different, I’m so special, I’m so gifted, nobody understands me” routine. Put a pimento in it, Olive.
MW- could she possibly be unpopular because she can’t shut up about being so special?
MW: “Your parents love you, Olive, but only I truly understand you. Together, we can rule the world. Let us begin…”
GT: Seriously, what is with the art here? These faces are the stuff of nightmares.
I am impressed with Moy and Brigman: that stayed awake long enough to write and draw this “story”.
Mary Worth is making Wrecks Morgan look almost interesting in comparison. I never thought I would write that.
Flylock Socks:
The red jackal knows that the “mutant honey bee” cannot possibly be real, since it is far too large for the spiracle based entomological respiratory system to work, and because chitin is too weak to bear that much weight. The “giant mutant honeybee” would have collapsed under its own body mass and suffocated to death. Since the “giant mutant honeybee” is fake, so is the bear’s accusation.
FC: You can tell a strip’s been around too long when being anti-Papist/Irish is still part of its core theme.
MW – Tomorrow, Olive starts “helping” the beachgoers.
“Hey, lady! You’re using SPF-5 when today’s UV levels indicate that SPF-30 is more appropriate. My tummy-brain says you’re going to get skin cancer!”
“And you, kid, you just ate lunch and now you’re going back in the water without waiting 30 minutes? My tummy-brain says you’re gonna get a cramp!”
“LISTEN to me, I’m special and gifted and remarkable! Why doesn’t anyone understand MEEEEE?”
Thoroughly fed up, everyone on the beach then buries her up to her neck in the sand and takes turns chucking conch shells at her head.
GT: Buckle up. This year’s social issues are going to come up front. This isn’t Neil Rubin’s Gil, where “I was in the Service, you know” solves all qualms.
I predict a out-of-school situation with Coach Luke, with Dr. Pearl finding out a sternly-written letter won’t work.
Luann: So Tiffany goes back to work still wearing a lei she got on vacation and carrying her luggage?
Sure, that’s something that happens. At least we don’t have to watch Luann and Phil
mime a blowjobeat hot dogs.MW: Is that guy in the background carrying a briefcase or a boombox?
@astroboy: MW: “Put
a pimento in it Olive.”
Priceless!
@brendancalling: Luann: Yeah, it looks like she didn’t even go home to change first. She’s acting like the Tiffany of old.
@Little Guy: Gil Thorp: get ready for a “very special” gender identity story.
On a scale of neuroses running from vanilla to Judge Parker:
4. Alice — anyone sensible has long since disconnected their brains
3. Dick Tracy — detectives have no right to be fabulous dressers, said no one ever
2. Judge Parker — a valiant effort to be sure, complete with a two ditzes and clown-like landlord, but this is Norway we’re talking about
1. Mary Worth — The mercury just shot out of the thermometer on this one. We’re one frustrated nebbishe away from this summer’s Woody Allen production.
Also! My experience with loan sharks is limited, but I did meet a guy who used to be able to calculate compound interest in his head. So I guess they’d go borrow him from the memory care unit?
@brendancalling: @Lord Flatulence:
Considering Tiffany is wearing all that tacky tourist souvenir stuff ON TOP of her work uniform, and how she reacts to Les “Yeah, welcome back from vacation. Get back to work.” with a lengthy “I WAS TOTALLY ON VACATION AND IT WAS A SUPER-EXPENSIVE TRIP TO A REALLY EXOTIC LOCALE AND I TOTALLY HAVE A TAN I’M NOT DRAWN AS HAVING”, I’m reading this more as “Tiffany DIDN’T go on a cruise during her (probably) weeklong
*vacation, but is pretending she did for attention”*Like the DeGroots (and Bernice) allow their employees even THAT. They probably don’t even know they NEED to schedule vacations, or simply never pay any leaveLoan sharks certainly do keep records, but they keep them in code.
I learned things growing up in a Mob town. Lived 3 houses down from a capo.
(Things my father taught me: There is no such thing as the Mafia. We call it La Cosa Nostra, but we don’t even call it that to outsiders. Never borrow money from them. Never ask them for a favor. Never date their daughters. Always show respect.)
MW: I’m very supportive of being yourself and letting that freak flag fly but really, for all of us, maybe you should give it a rest, Olive?
Crap. The toilet tank is where I store all of my valuables and secrets. Now I need somewhere else to stash my Rembrandt.
***
Olive, you are a teenager or young adult (sorry, I haven’t been paying all that much attention) who is having a day at the beach with an elderly woman you are not related to. “Normal” is a boat that has long since sailed. Don’t worry though, once you meet her regular friends group you’ll either feel the most normal or you’ll run screaming to a nunnery.
DtM: Dennis rejects the lord’s guidance for his own counsel.
Menace possibilities: high
And today’s award for total bafflement goes to Alice, for being the most truly baffling thing I have seen in comics form, consistently and thoroughly.
FG: That Zarkov blunders into more unearned poontang than the Morgans, Parkers, and Spencer/Drivers blunder into unearned largesse.
FG: Hey Zarkov, what are you going to tell your seismologist babe back in Frigia?
Alice : It’s not every day a comic flat-out says “I’m utterly brainless. Any attempts at analysing or interpreting this work is overthinking.”
DT: Wait til Sam learns that’s just her Twilight fanfiction.