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Family Circus, 8/25/15

I absolutely love how angry that poodle looks in this panel. “Oh, you think it’s funny how I look, you smug stump-leaning little shit? You think it’s a game? Is my grooming style incompatible with your narrow view of masculinity? You think I don’t still have razor sharp teeth?” Shit is about to get very real for our Billy.

Mark Trail, 8/25/15

Yes, that does sound like a logical explanation: a shipment of fake radioactive rods, glowing with their own eerie, mysterious light, which are an extremely popular gag gift worldwide! Nothing loosens up a birthday party or Christmas morning like the moment when someone unwraps their “radioactive” “extremely dangerous” present and shouts with delight, “Oh my God, what is this? You’ve killed us all!” These novelty items are in such high demand that they’re flown around the world via sea planes — the market can’t wait for slow container ships! Anyway, Mark, don’t worry your pretty little head about any high-tech “tests” for radiation, I’m sure everything is fine, just fine.

Wizard of Id, 8/25/15

Whoa, like, what if, like, we need both the dark and the light, working against each other, to create the huge, amazing universe we all live in, man? Anyway, long story short, this comic portrays the process by which glow-in-the-dark dorm posters and van decals were created in the 1970s and ’80s.

Marvin, 8/25/15

Oh, don’t worry, Bitsy: Marvin isn’t going to stop shitting himself just because he’s got sand in his diaper.

Marvin’s never going to stop shitting himself

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Family Circus, 8/16/15

I like to think I’m a fairly modest person, but I will say this: because I’m both a tech writer and a comics blogger, nobody in the world is better equipped than I am to meticulously document when legacy syndicated newspaper comic strips make jokes about bitcoin. So here’s the Family Circus’s offering, coming in the wake of Six Chix and Barney Google and Snuffy Smith. I think it’s pretty clear, based on our put-upon ice cream man’s outfit, that this is a reprinted comic from the ’70s or ’80s, which leaves the question open as to what sketchy financial instrument was originally used in that word bubble. Junk bonds? Pet rocks?

Judge Parker, 8/16/15

I freely admit to not understanding at all the financial details of the whatever business partnership Neddy has established with Rocky and Godiva, and one of the points I understand the very least is why all of the sudden Rocky started agreeing to pay for everything a while back. Something about that being the price for letting him publish his tell-all book about being married to Godiva? Anyway, I’d like to think that he and his checkbook’s abrupt departure corresponded exactly to the moment when retail sales of said book began. Next week may depict the most shocking event in the history of Judge Parker: a Spencer-Driver paying for something with her own money.

Momma, 8/16/15

I am not comfortable with that knowing, self-satisfied look MaryLou is giving us here. “What Momma doesn’t know is that I’m living with a man! Did you guess? A man? A man who wears a baseball hat and a tie, and leaves his sporting equipment scattered around the house? Get it? And we’re fucking? A man?”

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Mary Worth, 7/31/15

Uh oh, looks like Ian’s plan to have Toby cook his boss dinner has hit its first snag: Toby has no desire to cook Ian’s boss dinner! That’s because Toby is not some young trophy wife who lounges around the condo pool gossipping with Mary all day while living off her husband’s posh academic salary; she’s an artist who Ian snatched away from the Greenwich Village scene to sterile southern California exurbia, and her creative urges still need an outlet. It appears that she’s moved away from the tiny paintings of her New York days to a new medium: tiny sculptures lovingly crafted then put on a shelf in her studio to be admired by nobody. Actually, that white lab coat makes her look more like a scientist, and she appears to be sculpting a tiny replica of Blucifer, the giant horse statue with glowing red eyes outside Denver Airport that literally killed its creator, so maybe she’s doing research on how to harness its evil powers. Better take Hilton out to dinner Ian! Better take him out to dinner … forever.

Dennis the Menace, 7/31/15

“The meaning here is that he’s literally wrecking our home, to be specific. He’s not breaking up a marriage by seducing anyone’s spouse, which is the usual meaning of the phrase. Just wanted to be really clear on that. Why would I even bring that up? He’s a child! I, uh, I really should walk this back, shouldn’t I.”

Family Circus, 7/31/15

The best part of this installment in the current “Keanes go to Disney World” sequence isn’t that Billy is being a moron; it’s that he seems to be all by himself, far from the hubbub of the main areas of the park. It’s as if his parents lured him to this out-of-the-way section, said, “Look, Billy, it says ‘PUSH’ in big letters! It’s very important that someone push it!”, and then ran away as soon as he was distracted.