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Folks: There comes a time in every book’s time in this world when it hits the discount phase of its life cycle. For The Enthusiast, the novel I Kickstarted and published a few years ago, that time is now.

If you somehow haven’t already purchased this delightful tome, you can now get both hardcover and paperback versions at half price ($12.50 and $7.50, respectively)! This deal is exclusive to my storefront on Topatoco — in fact, this storefront is the ONLY place you can get the hardcover version.

The novel is about soap opera comic strips, subways, online communities, stealth marketing, capitalism, and joy. I really enjoyed writing this book and am proud of how it came out and would love to get it into more hands. Check it out! And if you’ve already read and enjoyed the book, feel free to chime in in the comments about how much you liked it!

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Hello everyone! This is the time of month where I’d normally be like “come see my live comedy show next week!!!!” but I’m taking July off, to celebrate America. We will be back reading the internet aloud in August!

But you can still get some solid laffs on the internet itself, right here with this comment of the week:

“So you told your wife that we’re all being poisoned, and she insisted you see a doctor? I think she was using hyperbole. Has she ever said something like, ‘If you love Game of Thrones so much, why don’t you marry it?’ And then when you tried to marry Game of Thrones, your church refused to perform the ceremony? This is like that.” –A Concerned Reader

Plus these very funny runners up are here for your amusement!

“When you live next to a child who has been six-year old for more than sixty years, you would also be surprised that people born in the late 1980s are now adults.” –Ettore

“I’m not sure I agree 100% with your policework there, Slylock. I think it’s much more likely that Weirdly lied about how long that shark had been caged without food rather than built an incredibly convincing fake mechanical shark.” –Joe Blevins

“You can see under the doors that there are no toilets. My best guess is that this takes place in a department store fitting room. Anyway, Superman shouldn’t discourage Batman, the resulting guano could be very lucrative.” –nescio

“People in long-term relationships can find their time together becomes stagnant. Speaking of which, let’s gossip about a totally different couple’s lives for another eight hours.” –BigTed

“The real question is how Batman takes a dump without soiling his cape. My guess is a triple axel with a backward crossover in the opposite direction of the original rotation. Of course, when he takes a dump in Australia, this all has to be reversed.” –LXIX

“I love how the door handle is set at Snuffy’s level. Sure, this forces Loweezy to bend over, but a permanent stoop makes it that much easier for her to scrub the floors, feed the chickens, weed the garden, etc., while Snuffy naps.” –Pozzo

“Dying is easy; comedy is hard — as Funky Winkerbean proves day after day after day.” –TheDiva

“Those are some sad chickens. Maybe they understand that the sack was supposed to have food but didn’t, or being in comics, maybe they are supposed to smart enough to anticipate what happens to chickens they can’t afford to keep. But really, chickens don’t understand much of anything, so most likely they just have traumatic memories of the sack — that dark and torturous maw Snuffy throws them into whenever they manage to get out, which probably happens a lot since it’s the only way they can find sustenance. It really adds a lot of color to this light joke about how ‘chicken feed’ can be literal or figurative.” –pachoo

“‘Here’s a scene we should be watching!‘ says the dialogue box, convincing no-one, not even itself.” –pugfuggly

“Any experienced golf coach would know that you don’t bend down to place a ball on the driving range tee while a 7 year-old is standing next to it with a club in her/his hand ready to strike, and especially that you don’t turn around in said position and look away from the child even if Mr. Clean appears out of nowhere. But this is Gil, of course. He has let his guard down after realizing that the young girl is a natural and he will not be placed in the unfamiliar and terrifying position of needing to teach his charge athletic skills.” –But What Do I Know?

“Wasn’t Hadley v. Baxendale the Supreme Court case that upheld a lower court ruling that Gil Thorp was protected by the Constitution’s Unbelievable Stupidity and Archaic References Clause? Or was that Clambake v. Board of Athletics?” –Mikey

“Doctor Fedora ‘Banana Bread’ Flyface Junior is running his operation from a secret undersea empire, which is why Sally needs her scuba goggles to deliver the package. She’s also wearing swim fins. Luckily, comic strips are a silent medium so we can’t hear the telltale slapping as she walks in.” –Ukulele Ike

“Sure, that shaven-headed prisoner seems scary. But when you look more closely and see he’s frantically squeezing a stress ball, you realize he’s just another person overwhelmed by the situation and needs a hug.” –Where’s Rocky

“The only way to have this ‘millennial dating’ scenario make sense is to assume that it actually takes place in some kinky sex club, and ‘fix my computer‘ is a code expression for some S/M act that is so unspeakable that it has no actual name. Then the screwdriver makes perfect sense, as well as why this couple has apparently invited Dustin to watch it.” –seismic-2

“‘Ain’t no kind of armed person empowered to commit state-sanctioned acts of violence in HERE, Judge!’ –man about to get shot.” –Chyron HR

“I’m an expert on Fitch. Ezra Fitch, the co-founder of Ambercrombie and Fitch. Did you know he was a lawyer and some say he brought the game of Mahjong into the United States? He died, and this is interesting, on a brand-new yacht named Content. He met David Ambercrombie when he shopped at Ambercrombie’s store! So, do you want to go back to my place and hear more about Ezra Fitch?” –Voshkod

Thanks to everyone who became a Comics Curmudgeon Supporter to get an banner-ad-free site, put some scratch in my tip jar, or backed me on Patreon!. If you’d like to advertise on the Comics Curmudgeon, and get your very own shoutout in this space, head on over to my BuySellAds page!

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Good morning, folks! Let’s greet the day with this comment of the week:

“You’re a plugger if you don’t know the name of a technology that is so ubiquitous that there are jokes about it in Pluggers.” –matt w

These runners up are also very funny!

“I defended myself by planking, as the Officer’s Manual instructs.” –Thomas Keith, on Facebook

“So I Googled ‘do frogs care for their young’ to determine if today’s Six Chix had any basis in reality (as one does), and found out that not only is the answer ‘in some cases, yes’ but the highlighted response focused on the strawberry poison frog, where not only does the father care for the eggs, he ‘pees on them to make sure they don’t lose their moisture.’ Fortunately Six Chix was unaware of that particular tidbit, which is really more the provenance of Mark Trail, or Marvin.” –TheDiva

“Sarge is being sincere, and his eyes are closed as he envisions the pitch. ‘Okay, so, you know in The Little Mermaid< ?i> when the fish broad saves the guy? Okay now what if instead of a mermaid, it’s a bear! It’s The Little Mermaid meets The Revenant. You smell that? That’s money you’re smelling!’” –Jenna

“To be fair, JJ and Leola are only making guest appearances, so it’s not in their contracts that they have to do homage to Barney Google. They get the day off.” –Myrtle

“Why are they thanking us? Did we somehow cause their continuation, or rather, fail to cause their cancellation? Are we all culpable?!” –JJ48

“The Six Chix cartoon just emphasizes how lost and alone Barney Google is. Were Barney a modern, his ‘Spark Plug’ might well be a self-driving electric car. But he’s not. Snuffy has been left behind by time but he still has all the rest of Hootin’ Holler that’s been left behind with him. But Barney is a city boy, a city boy from a city that no longer exists. He doesn’t belong in Hootin’ Holler and he doesn’t belong in the modern world. Even the Steampunk fad that might have allowed him to pass for an obsessive cosplayer is fading. As long as the strip exists he is doomed to lonely wandering. End his misery, please.” –Curtis Adams

“Ah yes, I too have friends, like my wife Cherry! And I like to greet her as well, I say things, ‘Hello, my wife Cherry!’ or ‘Happy birthday, my wife Cherry!’ [nods very comfortably] I understand friendship.” –Dan

“Jeff: ‘It will be good to catch up!’ Mary: ‘I have some news about Wilbur…’ Jeff: ‘I stand corrected.’” –nescio

“Remember when I had a cat, you found it too irritating, I had to get rid of it and Estelle took care of my unwanted liability? I have some news about Wilbur.” –Ettorre

“News about Wilbur? Hold the phone! …No really. Hold it. Like a normal person.” –grsblvnyk

“Don’t flatter yourself, Beetle. I’ve been annoyed with this strip for as long as I can remember.” –Peanut Gallery

“Silverdaters seems an odd choice of site for Wilbur, who’s never seemed quite that old. Perhaps he thought ‘silver’ referred not to the age bracket of its members, but rather was a general indicator of their quality. ‘I don’t deserve Golddaters,’ he thought, ‘but Silverdaters seems suitably low self-esteem.’” –Truckosaurus

“Actually, maybe leering-head guy was ogling Beetle. That’s always been his fantasy — a soldier-boy, who wears his Army hat to the beach! He left in disgust, though, once he saw those swim trunks.” –seismic-2

“From the art, it looks less like Beetle and Buxley switched places, and more like they were absorbed into each other, a sickening sound as flesh ate flesh and spat it out the other side. The thankfully missing middle panel would have shown the melded BeetleBuxley (BeeBux?) as parts writhed and passed to the other side. The third panel shows the transmogrification (as as side note, good job Chrome for recognizing the word ‘transmogrification’) nearly, but not quite, complete. An almost-Beetle addresses the audience, while a proto-Buxley continues to bud from his side. Well done bit of modern body horror for such an old strip.” –Voshkod

“Sure, Wilbur’s into sports… water sports, probably. Of course, Mary and Jeff also seem to be into water sports, but a totally different kind. Speedboating, that is. Possibly followed by motorboating? This story has gotten so long and boring that the characters would need a wide variety of kinks just to keep things lively.” –BigTed

“Horny and desperate are common interests, right?” –ZeroWolf

“‘Sports Nut‘ Wilbur, who hasn’t expressed interest in or knowledge of athletic competitions one single time since he gave up his sports writing job to pretend to be a woman for higher pay. ‘Crazy Catlady’ Estelle, who has zero interest in anything to do with cats other than taking care of the one that was recently forced into her hands as a favor for a neighbor. ‘Balanced Hobbyist’ Mary, who has compulsively baked 15 dozen muffins every single day for the last year and a half.” –jroggs

“Wilbur sure seems to get a lot of interest from the janes, if by ‘a lot,’ you mean ‘two,’ and by ‘interest’ you mean a sexless sham of a relationship.” –Sandy McGuire, on Facebook

“Sorry. With our crippling student loan debt, combined with skyrocketing rents, our only possessions are this chair and this broom. Banging on the ceiling is our only form of entertainment.” –GeoGreg

Thanks to everyone who became a Comics Curmudgeon Supporter to get an banner-ad-free site, put some scratch in my tip jar, or backed me on Patreon!. If you’d like to advertise on the Comics Curmudgeon, and get your very own shoutout in this space, head on over to my BuySellAds page!