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Gasoline Alley, 9/19/17

Love-sick Rufus done got lost in the funnies! But his contract done restricted his wanderings to the premium content offerings from the Tribune Content Agency, LLC! Alas, it’s too late for him to woo Brenda Starr on the rebound, or hit the road with Annie. But maybe he’ll turn up as the twelfth Mudlark on field in Gil Thorp? As a lovable man-goat in Pluggers? Stark naked in Love Is?

Funky Winkerbean, 9/19/17

Hey it’s Funky Winkerbean, beloved product of Batom, Inc., with syndication in North America thoughtfully provided by North America Syndicate, Inc. It’s been a while, because last week was one long, tiresome block of exposition from Buck Bedlow, high-school rival of Bull Bushka here. Bull, of course, is suffering progressive mental deterioration from injuries sustained at the hands, shoulder pads, and helmet of this very guy, and now we learn how it happened: Bull was actually a pretty lousy football player. His memories of high-school glory are therefore false and terrible, and losing them will be no big deal.

“Wow, that takes a load off my mind, heh heh — thanks for stopping by, buddy!”

Andy Capp, 9/19/17

None of your fancy-schmancy chronic traumatic encephalopathy for treasured Creators Syndicate legacy character Andy Capp. He earns his memory loss.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/19/17

The Morgans — including newly-minted Morgan John Carter — at home. Rex consumes premium content from King Features Syndicate, a unit of media conglomerate Hearst Corporation, on some kind of antique flat foldy-paper thing; June does so in the normal, sensible way. The narration box reminds us that “time passes,” but I’m pretty sure Hearst has already got that figured out.

All that plugging, and still not a dime from the syndicates! Good thing the Comics Curmudgeon has such generous readers! Thank you!

— Uncle Lumpy

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Herb and Jamaal, 5/2/16

Aww, an old friend … like whatever beloved buddy Jamaal killed, cremated, put in that urn, and stone-cold pawned to save on columbarium fees? Watch your back, Herb. Nice to know he’ll visit, though — I guess that’s what old friends are for.

Andy Capp, 5/2/16

Considering all the sexual directions this conversation could have taken, I’m glad it turned out to be about soccer.

Momma, 5/2/16

Am I the only person put off when medical staff say ‘Doctor’ as if There Were Only One? It smacks of status signalling, the way even soi-disant “horizontal” organizations signal their actual hierarchies by calling staff by last names, managers by first, executives by initials or nicknames, and CEOs only as “he” or “she.” OK for employees, I guess, but I’m the doc’s customer, dammit.

Anyway, for years I thought Momma’s surname was Hobbes — with an “e” — because she’s “… solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” I guess “Doctor” will find that out soon enough.

B.C., 5/2/16

Six thousand years ago, just before evolution stopped, moose — even the well-endowed ones — sported delicate little bird-tails that provoked religious zealots into orgies of murderous rage.

– Uncle Lumpy

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Andy Capp, 4/22/16

On October 20, 2004, a mere three months after I launched this blog, I received an email that consisted entirely of “ANDY CAPP!” repeated 44 times, plus 10 times in the subject line. And now, eleven and half years later, I’ve finally decided: why not Andy Capp? So I’ve started reading Andy Capp, which is a strip that I’m not entirely unfamiliar with. The domestic violence laffs seem to have been excised, but all the other markers of stereotypical working-class British loutishness are still there: “Andy spends all his time at the pub,” “Andy is unnecessarily violent during pickup soccer games,” “Andy is drunk constantly,” “Andy can’t hold a job,” etc. As an American, of course, I yearn for the window into this culturally specific milieu, but then you have episodes like today’s, where the joke mainly seems to be “Andy is an asshole.” It was smart to to put “GB” on Guitar Bob’s guitar case, so there’s no doubt as to what’s going on. It took three people to make this strip!

Momma, 4/22/16

Wait, Momma, don’t be so quick to cut off whatever explanation is being offered here, as I definitely don’t understand what’s happening. Is that lady … trying to give her children to Momma? I don’t know what’s sadder: the look of desperation on this other woman’s face as her attempt to rid herself of parental responsibility fails, or her children’s expressions of utter indifference, as if this were just one more baffling episode in a chaotic and confusing life.

Dennis the Menace, 4/22/16

I was going to write a long, elegiac paragraph about Alice’s sly facial expression and how sometimes we have to tell lies to the people we love in order to get them to do the things they need to do to thrive, but then the phrase “the anus is the ear of the butt” popped into my head and I can’t stop giggling about it, sorry.

Pluggers, 4/22/16

Pluggers only get “participation trophies” when all their friends are dead.