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Mary Worth, 4/2/14

Just as I had hoped, this Mary Worth Tommy storyline is so amazing that its amazingness is bleeding over into the non-Tommy parts, including Iris and Wilbur going on this fantastic sandwich date. (The date, as Monday’s strip revealed, is taking place at “Jerry’s Sandwich Shop,” which was presumably once a humble lunch counter that Wilbur single-handedly transformed into what’s clearly a full-service sandwich palace, because he bought so many sandwiches.) As you can see in panel one, Wilbur has purchased the Longer Than It Is Wide Special, whereas Iris went with the more standard Perfectly Square model. Both sandwiches are, in keeping with Jerry’s relentless focus on quality, entirely monochromatic, with bread, ingredients, and condiments all the same uniform orange color. In panel two, our two lovebirds show themselves to be true sandwich aficionados: just as a wine connoisseur will take a deep sniff out of their glass and swirl a swig around in their mouth to appreciate the subtle flavors rather than just gulp their wine down thoughtlessly, Wilbur and Iris will spend twenty minutes rubbing their sandwiches against their lips while staring ahead with dull, lifeless eyes, in order to really get the most of out their Jerry’s experience.

Mark Trail, 4/2/14

I know Mark Trail is basically the Kama Sutra of ludicrously stilted dialogue, but “No sir, I would just like to speak to Mr. Trail!” strikes me as even more like something a group of aliens wearing an ill-fitting human skin-suit would say than usual. This may explain why, sometime between panels one and two, our friendly policeman lost two inches and got a different haircut and head-shape.

Dennis the Menace, 4/2/14

“Dennis reveals his parents’ financial troubles to horrified partygoers” is definitely a step up in the menace game! Also, kudos for the municipal water district in the Mitchells’ leafy suburb for calling with shutoff warnings after business hours, I guess?

Apartment 3-G, 4/2/14

I guess Lily is just going to have wait back in the car for however long it’s going to take for newly near-widowed Tommie to strike up a flirtatious romance with Dr. Riley, the sassy large animal vet. “Wait a minute, Josh,” you’re asking. “How can you be sure they’re flirting? Also, where’s this horse they’re talking about?” The answer to both questions is that that “horse” and “colt” are both euphemisms for Dr. Riley’s penis.

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Mark Trail, 3/31/14

As was foretold in prophecy Friday, Mark has shrugged off a sucker-punch to the face and responded with fisticuffs of his own, somehow managing to wind up and knock Marlin down with a right hook despite literally being an inch and a half away from him. Still, this victory is bittersweet, as Mark looks poignantly at the avalanche of sea turtle eggs cascading comically out of Marlin’s green poachin’-sack. Yes, there’s an exclamation point at the end of his dialogue, but based on his stricken facial expression I would guess that this is as close as we’ve ever come to seeing Mark on the verge of tears, bereft over the senseless loss of endangered animal life.

By the way, is sea turtle egg-poaching an actual thing? Like, could those eggs ever hatch now that they’ve been removed from their nest and plopped in a big pile in a bag? Do people try to keep sea turtles as pets? Do people eat sea-turtle eggs? Have we been reading the wrong meaning of “poaching” in this storyline all along?

Apartment 3-G, 3/31/14

Thank goodness Tommie has rented a freakishly enormous car from the 1940s so that there’s plenty of room for her deer friend to … sit? stand? … in the back seat. I love the way Tommie just talks to Lily like she can understand English, while the deer stares ahead with its black soulless eyes, thinking about murder.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 3/31/14

Good lord, Snuffy’s disgust with Jughaid is palpable. “I don’t care if he is kin, I ain’t gonna have no aesthete living under my makeshift roof!”

Pluggers, 3/31/14

Pluggers are just straight-up car thieves and don’t care what you think about it.

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Mark Trail, 3/29/14

OK, fine, I haven’t been keeping you properly up to date on the doings in Mark Trail, but at least I’m letting you know when Mark finally gets around to punching someone! Let’s all … wait, what? That’s … that’s not Mark’s fist? That’s Mark’s face? Oh, man, I gotta … I gotta lay down. Gotta rest up. Rest up for next week. There’s gonna be all kinds of punching next week. Mark hasn’t been punched in a while. You can tell from the dust cloud that puffs out from where Marlin’s fist makes impact. He’s not going to like this. Not one bit.

Apartment 3-G, 3/29/14

Wait, did Lily the deer just say “bleat”? Jeez, the forest animals are never going to accept her city ways! “I say, fellow deer, this grass certainly is more lush than what I’m used to in Central Park! Anything around here to wash it down with? Surely there must be a Starbucks nearby! Bleat!”

B.C. and Wizard of Id, 3/29/14

B.C. did a joke about “haters” and Wizard of Id did a joke about “cougars,” in case you were still holding on to your will to live! The best I can say here is that at least B.C. didn’t try to draw a hater.