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Family Circus, 2/24/07

Siddhartha Gautama was born a prince, and his parents vowed that he would never experience any suffering. When, as a young man, he slipped out of the palace and saw an old man, a sick man, and a corpse, the shock set him on a spiritual journey, at the end of which he became known as the Buddha, or “the Awakened One.”

Since Dolly has apparently been kept in some kind of hermetically-sealed plastic bubble, protected even from insects, for her entire life, I’m curious as to what sort of religion she’s going to found as a result of her stunning first encounter with these tiny filth-eating creatures. I’m guessing it will really, really like ants, or really, really hate them.

Mark Trail, 2/24/07

Who knew that Dan would make this the sexiest Mark Trail storyline ever, what with his strolling around naked day after day? Admittedly, random objects intervene so we can’t see his perky man-nips, but this is Mark Trail, where a lady’s sexiest outfit is a pink polo shirt, so you have to take sexiness where you can find it. The first panel in particular, taken in isolation, would work if Dan were about to go on stage one more time tonight as part of some tawdry Chippendale-style revue; even though he’ll be subject to the drunken stares and hooting of dozens of women, he assures his lady love that hers is the only gaze he really cares about.

I’m assuming Dan’s “thing” is actually some kind of ill-conceived insurance scam involving faking his own death. The plan will fail because it relies on Sally’s anguished reaction in the wake of Dan’s feigned demise; since she never seems to have any dialogue, I’m guessing that her inability to speak will derail the scheme.

Funky Winkerbean, 2/24/07

So, yeah, this happened. Do you think maybe all the other FW suffering is in video game form too? Harry Dingle could get his hearing back if he just got more power-ups? Cancer Girl is really playing Halo’s “Remission” mod?

They’ll Do It Every Time, 2/24/07

I’ve mostly posted this so that you could unironically enjoy the Loyal Order of Caribou roll call (including “Anson Pantz” and “Harv Buttly”). But I do wonder whether Schnookly is less a “member” of the club and more its “hired servant.” It would explain a lot.

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Family Circus, 2/18/07

You know, there are literally millions of people working in the IT industry, from the theoreticians who come up with the big-picture advances that make faster processors and clearer monitors possible, to the engineers who build the chips and the programmers who write the code, to the human factors experts who make it all accessible to the ordinary user and the factory workers in Taiwan who put the physical parts together. And I think all of them would look at this cartoon and say, “This? I spent the last fifteen years of my life for this? ‘A whole line of sleep?’ I should have gone into insurance like Mom said.”

Doodles by Mac & Sack, 2/18/07

Why is it so hard for this poor, dumb koala to keep out of the gullets of various koala-devouring beasts? Why aren’t the little frogs at right more concerned about the presence of the freakishly oversized mutant frog in their midst? How did said freakishly oversized mutant frog find a freakishly huge mutant lily pad to sit on? Why doesn’t the Doodle Zoo feature two snogs, snogging? These are serious questions and I demand answers.

Apartment 3-G, 2/18/07

I’ve been treating the totally insane Wacky Adventures of Lu Ann and Albert Pinkham Ryder storyline in Apartment 3-G with the comics-reading equivalent of covering my ears with my hands and shouting “LALALALA I CAN’T HEAR YOU,” but I have to admit being charmed by the look of disgust on the grim specter’s face in the second panel of the bottom row. “Oh, great, I command you not to tell them about me, and then you just go and say my name so everyone can hear it. Why don’t you just take a picture of me with your cell phone camera while you’re at it? God, I keep forgetting what a bad idea it is to haunt stupid people.”

Funky Winkerbean, 2/18/07

“This is a good start — they’re rooting for a team that’s being soundly defeated and declaring that their Friday night is wasted. But have you considered giving one of them a fatal disease? Maybe shearing off a limb? Think about it.”

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Gil Thorp, 2/5/07

It’s good to see that the revolutionary struggle that Steve Luhm and Hadley V. Baxendale waged for gender equality two years ago has transformed Milford High athletics into a gender-blind paradise. Hadley and Steve may have left Milford behind for higher learning at Vassar (where they are pursuing degrees in Women’s Studies and Anthropology, respectively), but their legacy is felt as the boys prepare to go cheer on the Lady Mudlarks in a nurturing, mutually supportive environment. More troubling is the … precipitation … in the first panel. Is that confetti coming down in the middle of the game against New Thayer? Or … snow? Is it snowing indoors? My God, has the girls’ athletic program, in budgeting decisions forced by the ultra-liberal 9th Circuit Court of Appeals’ interpretation of Title IX, eaten up the resources that should by rights be used to patch the roof on the gym where manly competition takes place? DAMN YOU, FEMINAZIS! DAMN YOU TO HELL!

Slylock Fox, 2/5/07

This edition of Slylock Fox presents an intriguing meeting of the realistic and the cartoonish, as the bowler-cap-and-shorts-wearing bright yellow Max Mouse peers nervously through the gloom at his much more lifelike feral counterpoint, who presumably spends less time aiding detective work and enjoying co-ed sleepovers with lady mice named “Melody” and more time eating garbage and being poisoned. Similarly pleasing and realistically drawn is the sinister, multitentacled furnace. As for the mystery itself, the solution is rather clever, though I imagine that whoever comes down to turn the furnace on will be less likely to provide clues to Slylock and Max to help them catch the thief and more likely to shriek and try to hit them with a broom.

B.C., 2/5/07

Ha! It’s funny because … there’s … a pit with a huge pile of … dismembered human legs. Or, um, parts of human legs, anyway. Um. Funny. Ha. Um.

Curtis, 2/5/07

Dear Curtis:

• Compton.
• Philly.
• The distance between the two.

Here to help.

The Family Circus, 2/5/07

Years later, renowned developer William Keane, a close friend to the Secretary of the Interior, stood on the ridgeline and watched the bulldozers do their work, transforming this part of the former Yellowstone National Park into the Estates at Yellowstone™. As the formerly rugged ground was graded into the smooth surfaces necessary to build the broad arterials, looping drives, and nestled cul de sacs that would define the geography of this exclusive suburban community, a small smile played across his lips, as if some ancient anger had finally been soothed.