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So ends the Comics Curmudgeon 2019 Summer Fundraiser — Thank you for your generous support!

Six Chix, 8/24/19

Never mind joy, that blouse is sparking some serious anger. I’d love to know the backstory here: was the blouse a gift from an ex before a bitter breakup? A reminder of some humiliating public wardrobe malfunction? A hand-me-down from a hated elder sister? Or is she just feeling resentful at being pushed around by some weepy co-dependent rag? Jeez, lady, it hasn’t fit you in fifteen years!

Judge Parker, 8/24/19

First-time offender Alan Parker confessed, before any charges were filed, that he helped Norton here fake his own death. What is that, worst case maybe honest services fraud? But the judge in the case — a former colleague of Parker’s — denied his request for bail and threw him in the penitentiary until his trial. And now Norton plans to unwind all that by lying to the court that he made him do it?

Neddy wrote this, right? It’s a plot twist and we’re just reading her screenplay. Please?

Mark Trail, 8/24/19

Pluggers

Sally Forth, 8/24/19

Jackie wants to buy “Small Wonders,” her friend/boss Tasha’s vanity business. She hasn’t done the research. She hasn’t talked to the necessary people. She is still Sally’s lost little sister.

Jackie is the Fredo Corleone of Sally Forth, making Sally its Michael and Ted its … no no no, that won’t work at all; let me start over …

— Uncle Lumpy

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Mark Trail, 8/6/19

“Also, what if your gun had one off on purpose? You know, if, while you were pointing your gun at us with your finger on the trigger and threatening to murder us if we didn’t follow your commands, you had deliberately shot us with the gun, like you said you would. That also would’ve been a terrible tragedy! Anyway, I guess we’re all going to walk through the desert together over the next few days and then get into your car, so I want you to reflect on all the ways doing things that would have been beneficial to you would have also been bad for us.”

Family Circus, 8/6/19

I’m not usually one to praise the Family Circus art, but seeing Big Daddy Keane’s whole body spasming in shock and surprise as a bucketful of ice-cold water cascades over his back, his glasses flying off his face, warmed my black, withered heart this morning. I’m a particular fan of PJ’s expression, which basically seems to be saying “Phase one of the experiment has yielded interesting results; let’s move on to phase two, shall we?”

Pluggers, 8/6/19

“Pluggers and their friends are all dying” is a perennial and beloved running gag in this strip, but you have to respect today’s take on it: if a plugger lives long enough, not only will all his friends die, but he’ll get to see all the cultural touchstones that tethered him to a wider society die off as well, only to be replaced by strange and alienating newcomers!

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Funky Winkerbean, 8/3/19

Actually, Mopey Pete, I gotta disagree with you. My guess is that “The Beanstalk” is a play of of the “beans” that people grind to make coffee, which appears to be the main thing they sell there. And if you just read the phrase “spend a lot of Jack” and thought, “Hmm, I as a native English speaker have never heard ‘jack’ used as a slang term for money — is this a usage I should be familiar with?”: results seem mixed! It appears to maybe be an archaic Britishism, and Urban Dictionary insists that “making jack” means making a profit, though I would definitely interpret it as meaning “making jack shit,” i.e., making nothing. Meanwhile, the phrase “a whole lot of jack” mainly points to a Facebook page featuring cute signs about drunkenness. My point is that I think this is yet another Funky usage that has no relationship to actual English, along the lines of “solo car date” and “vendos” and “Lewis and Clarking” and “Nordic, with the added twist of this fake phony-baloney wordplay being the sum total of the “punchline.”

Mark Trail, 8/3/19

Leola may be uncomfortable when people grapple with their feelings in an enclosed space, but Doc isn’t afraid to “dig deep” and help JJ really understand the emotional rollercoaster he’s been on. “I don’t hold it against you that you threatened us at gunpoint!” Doc says. “It could’ve happened to anyone! If things had been just a little different, I definitely would’ve killed each and every one of you, with my bare hands, just so I could possess the precious, precious gold I thought we would find here.”