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NYC-based readers and pals, I am sending up: THE JOSH-NEEDS-HELP SIGNAL! I really, really, want to do a reading event for my The Enthusiast in New York City. I’ve written to a crapton of book stores (OK, like six or seven) and have either got all nos or no responses. And my timeframe is narrowing — it’s gotta be between the 21st and 25th of April or the 28th of April and 4th of May. I would be 100% up for doing this in any kind of venue you could name that would hold like 30-40 people. Doesn’t have to be a bookstore! Though I’d love to do this in one, because I love bookstores! Anyway, chime in on this thread and/or write me at jfruh@jfruh.com if you have IDEAS.

And with that out of the way, let’s cut to the chase, the “chase” being the comment of the week!

“I hope Beetle Bailey from now on devotes itself entirely to uncanny valley versions of Annie Hall jokes. ‘At first I didn’t want to join the club, but then they said I could be a member!’ ‘My brother’s crazy, he thinks he’s a chicken. But I’ve got too many eggs as it is!'” –OwenKije

And the runners up are as always also funny!

“For all the crap we give Momma for being terrible, we must give her credit for her moonwalking skills.” –Alan

“I couldn’t remember who ‘Max’ was, and for a few wild happy moments I thought maybe these two had an open marriage. Oh well.” –Poteet

“Max Mouse is really eating his feelings.” –Philip Rodney Moon, on Facebook

“The extradition rules there apply only to human beings. Minotaurs are a grey area.” –Shrug

“If you were a man made of snow and knew all you had to look forward to was the coming spring and the inevitable, slow, excruciating melt that comes with it, you might decide to take the quick way out as well.” –WLP

“Sing a Song of Sixpence (1744) – Goofs

Revealing mistakes
24 blackbirds could not fit in a pie, and if they could, oxygen starvation would soon kill them.

Anachronisms
The sixpence hasn’t been a valid coin since 1980.

Mistakes by characters (possibly intentional)
A pie filled with 24 oxygen-starved birds would not be a dainty dish, whether or not it was set before a king.

Suggested by BillyK. 0 out of 142 people found this interesting.” –Schroduck

“Ok, aside from the horrible ‘joke’, where the hell is this supposed to be taking place? In a darkened cave? Oh god, is this a crossover with Mark Trail? Is that … a cave cricket? You never told us they had thoughts and feelings, you monster!” –pugfuggly

“Notice how the ‘irises’ of Boog’s eyes appear to be attached to the upper arc of his orbit (or eye socket). Those aren’t irises, they’re uvula, and those aren’t eyes, they’re mouths. Screaming black mouths gibbering nonsense about fire.” –Voshkod

“Time out, Kenzie! Flag on the play! Illegal use of hands! Ha ha, sports everybody! Sorry, what were we– right, your boyfriend. So… holding? Look, somebody else jump in here.” –Dan

“Look. I spent $25.99 on this dildo. Are we going to use it, or not?” –RavenHawk

“I’m curious as to what a plugger thinks is involved in ‘calculating’ something. I’ll bet they don’t think it involves math.” –AndyL

“Dolly, did you know if you pray hard enough to the Patron Saint of The Pledge of Allegiance, ‘Red’ Skelton, Raleigh Cigarettes will appear under your pillow?” –Baka Gaijin

“Still working hard on that LIZ BELLMAN spin-off strip, I see. Unfortunately, superhero fans never got over the disappointment of finding out that LIZ BELLMAN is not, in fact, a space lizard with sonic powers.” –Aphthakid

“Good thing Thel didn’t go in until after Dolly was done. Time must have slowed to a crawl when she was struggling with ‘indivisible.'” –Artist formerly known as Ben

“Sarge may be in it for the gluttony, but Beetle is just happy that the Bill’s Diner buffet (‘Home of Green Mush!’) lacks both food heaters and a sneeze guard. Whether it’s food poisoning or the flu, something is going to get him out of doing any work tomorrow.” –BigTed

“Girls don’t date guys with big humps on their backs, but since I’m a camel, I’m literally swimming in *ahem* camel toes. Sorry; I thought we were doing a whole stretch-a-joke-to-its-absolute-absurdist-limit thing.” –The Might Untrained FOOZLE

“[cue a dozen male camels not wearing stupid hats walking by with dates]” –Doctor Handsome

Thanks to everyone who put some scratch in my tip jar! And let’s give thanks to our advertisers:

• Strange World Cthulhu: Shadow Over Texas: Veteran Comics Curmudgeon fan Donald Saxman has a new Kickstarter campaign ad for an HP Lovecraft monster fighting role playing game set in Texas in the roaring twenties. Even if you aren’t an RP gamer the “Strange World Cthulhu: Shadow Over Texas” adventure modules are interactive fiction and the Texas sourcebook should confirm all your most horrible suspicions about the Lone Star state. If that doesn’t sell you, haven’t you every wondered what would happen if the steam-powered Battleship Texas fought the ancient giant Deep One Dagon?
• Bluebeards Original is proud to join The Comics Curmudgeon as an advertiser! Company owner Paul Kaniewski is a longtime follower of this site, to the point that it inspired him to created the famed Aldo Kelrast MySpace profile. Bluebeards has been making top-rated beard care products for ten years now, so any bearded folks or those that love them, please check out the site and try their stuff.
• Oh, yes, and my novel is something you should buy, in hardback, paperback, or ebook form! It’s called The Enthusiast, and it’s about trains, comics, stealth marketing, capitalism, and joy

If you’d like to buy advertising on the site, you can do so on a CPM basis through BuySellAds. To find out more, you can go to my BuySellAds page or just click here.

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Want a good laugh? Read this week’s top comment. It’s very funny:

“Don’t feel sad, Boog, some day you and the bear will meet again in Heaven [pause, looks at Boog’s soulless eyes] …never mind.” –Droopy Says

Oh, man, you know what else is funny, though? The runners up:

“It’s kind of sad that Ol’ Snort’s story is about to end with him and his children getting shot and eaten, but history belongs to the winners.” –BigTed

“To us, the Perfesser is just making a slightly sexist judgement on a woman’s body. To the sentient birds in this strip, however, I think he just used a highly offensive racial slur. For once, the google eyes of horror seem completely justified.” –pugfuggly

“I’ve studdied that Blondie for a good few minutes, and the best explanation I can come up with is that Elmo is actually an undercover agent desperately repeating his codewords in the hopes of finding his handler. ‘Ol’ Stork Baby! Detention is in the gym! Please, someone acknowledge me, I need to get rid of all this classified microfiche!'” –Schroduck

“Poor Elmo, detention is really going to cut into his afterschool play dates with with an adult man to whom he’s not related.” –Chyron HR

Spider-Man: “Sure, Namor, you fucking hypocrite. All ‘Don’t pollute my oceans but don’t mind me while I fuck up your atmosphere with my bourgeois flying jet-submarine. Ta ta! I’ll be back to bone your young women soon.’ Good riddance, asshole.” –Mikey

“Look at that poor, beat-down plugger chicken-lady. You know she’s only got one thing on her to-do list — get a new husband — and yet again the year will go by with that item not crossed off. Watch your back, Funky Winkerbean, because Pluggers is kicking the despair game up the notch.” –Voshkod

“Pretty sure the editor added that cup to Olive’s hand so she wouldn’t be making a jerk-off motion.” –Dan

“In both panels, she’s been hypnotized by the animals to do their bidding. There is no version of this in which the man doesn’t die from scissor wounds.” –rbmalpha

“Who’s that standing with [name every character one by one for anyone who hasn’t been paying attention for the past sixty years]?” –Chris Rywalt, on Twitter

“To heck with these fancy schmantsy coal-fired or wood-fired oven pizza joints, with their high-falutin’ airs and high prices! Pizza Hovel’s ovens are garbage fired, and they pass the savings on to you!” –Nehemiah Scudder

“Wait, Alex, Blondie, Cookie, Dagwood? Finally, I have a mnemonic to help me remember how the alphabet starts.” –Irrischano

“…from the docks, struggling to keep my eyes open, this is Astound-o the Magician. Back to you, Ron and Deena.” –handsome Harry Backstayge, idol of a million other women

“Less self-control? Like … people who hurl cups of steaming hot chocolate at boring old women when they start to spout meaningless platitudes? Would we be better off if more people has less self-control, like that? Let’s see!” –seismic-2

“Mary’s been in New York too long. She’s already blasé about a dude getting mugged by a ghost.” –Doctor Handsome

Thanks to everyone who put some scratch in my tip jar! And let’s give thanks to our advertisers:

• Bluebeards Original is proud to join The Comics Curmudgeon as an advertiser! Company owner Paul Kaniewski is a longtime follower of this site, to the point that it inspired him to created the famed Aldo Kelrast MySpace profile. Bluebeards has been making top-rated beard care products for ten years now, so any bearded folks or those that love them, please check out the site and try their stuff.
• Oh, yes, and my novel is something you should buy, in hardback, paperback, or ebook form! It’s called The Enthusiast, and it’s about trains, comics, stealth marketing, capitalism, and joy

If you’d like to buy advertising on the site, you can do so on a CPM basis through BuySellAds. To find out more, you can go to my BuySellAds page or just click here.

Post Content

Very sad news in the comics world yesterday: Jack Elrod, the longtime writer and artist of Mark Trail, died at the age of 91. While he didn’t create the strip, he was in charge of it for nearly 30 years, and my fascination with his earnest and entertaining style was a huge factor in getting me to start this blog. Everyone who knew him seemed to think he was great, and this obituary has some great stories about him. I’m glad the strip is in the hands of James Allen, who’s carrying on his legacy, and I’m sorry James has lost a friend. Let’s all salute the Elrod Ball one more time in his honor!

But we the living must carry on, and let’s enjoy this comment of the week:

“This outpouring of Anti-Dutch sentiment in Dennis’s classroom is justified. The world watched in horror as the newly-proclaimed Greater Dutch Rijk flouted all treaties and agreements, brutally annexing Belgium, Luxembourg and parts of Normandy. A true menace always goes through Belgium.” –Gen. von Buxhoevden

And the runners up are very enjoyable as well!

“Funeral arrangements are pending. If only we could all be so lucky, dear reader.” –rbmalpha

“Oh. I thought it was funny because the schoolchildren are being poisoned by their own society. I guess I just haven’t got the hang of Shoe’s humor yet.” –Eric

“I dunno, I think the Six Chix drawings are ALL HAIL OUR NEW MASTER, DEMON PIG!” –Steve S

“I can’t wait for John Locher Springstein to tell his origin story. ‘You know how I got into this job? It’s because of a man who used to wear this vest. A man I made a solemn promise to, long ago. I swore I would bring down Chuck Berry for ripping off Johnnie B. Goode from him, all those years ago.'” –Doctor Handsome

“The Paleo exhibit depicts one of the ancient Mole Rat’s most important daily activities. There are many theories as to why the entire species later developed blindness.” –Mikey

“I return to my previous assertion that this is the laziest Catcher in the Rye reboot in history. Mary Holden and Olive Phoebe go to the museum, where ‘you could go there a hundred thousand times and … nobody’d be different. The only thing that would be different would be you.’ They go to the show, that’s ‘not as bad as some I’ve seen. It was on the crappy side, though.’ Now they’re going skating, where Mary and Olive will no doubt ‘be the worst skaters on the whole goddamn rink. And there were some lulus.’ Will we get a flashback to Dr. Jeff’s disgusting razor, all gunked up with soap and hair? Will Olive wake up when Mary is patting her hair while she sleeps? Will it all end on the merry-go-round? Will Mary force a comic Salinger out of hermitage with her relentless advice? At least the Mary Worth audience is unlikely to contain teens who might try to use the storyline to avoid reading the book, and spectacularly fail all of their assignments.” –rocketbride

“More horrifying is the inky blackness of Death is now retreating from the dead fish, now that he has reaped his terrible harvest.” –Ethan Shuster

“Mostly due to arson. We get up to a whole lotta arson in the country, dad.” –Torquil Colbo, on Facebook

“Once CNBC reported this literally-sweating-the-price-of-a-jacket thing, the great LodgeCo selloff began. If the government hadn’t designated Mr. Lodge ‘too big to fail,’ Veronica would be wearing burlap by Christmas.” –handsome Harry Backstayge, idol of a million other women

“Archie, I’m going to attempt to relate to you now. Now let’s see, it’s been a while, but I think teens address each other by … staring intently at the nape of the neck, then immediately turning away without eye contact? Yeah, that sounds about right.” –Dan

“In panel one, the dog looks on in helpless horror, knowing that his master is about to be devoured by a clowder of feral cats but is helpless to stop it. In panel two, he’s just miffed because he knows the greedy buggers won’t even leave him a thigh bone to chew on.” –TheDiva

“Gasoline Alley’s scrapbook obsession is now officially a cry for help, probably euthanasia.” –C. Sandy Cyst

“I’m at that in-between age. I don’t know if I live in the 1950s or the 1980s! And what the fuck is a Spongebob?” –Chyron HR

“If ‘best shot’ refers to photography, then I hope Peter caught Namor’s Blue Steel pose in panel 2.” –A Concerned Reader

Thanks to everyone who put some scratch in my tip jar! And let’s give thanks to our advertisers:

• Bluebeards Original is proud to join The Comics Curmudgeon as an advertiser! Company owner Paul Kaniewski is a longtime follower of this site, to the point that it inspired him to created the famed Aldo Kelrast MySpace profile. Bluebeards has been making top-rated beard care products for ten years now, so any bearded folks or those that love them, please check out the site and try their stuff.
• Oh, yes, and my novel is something you should buy, in hardback, paperback, or ebook form! It’s called The Enthusiast, and it’s about trains, comics, stealth marketing, capitalism, and joy

If you’d like to buy advertising on the site, you can do so on a CPM basis through BuySellAds. To find out more, you can go to my BuySellAds page or just click here.