Post Content

Hey, all, I have some comments of the admittedly truncated week for you, but first, a few items that I maybe should’ve gotten out of the way when I did my recap but oh well let’s do them now! First, I am on a new social media thingie, if you care about that: Instagram! You can follow me at joshreads there. Mostly it’ll be pics of random things I find funny/pretty, occasional horrifying comics panels, and very rare self-promotion. And then there are the other ones I’ve been on that you may or may not know about: Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and Google+.

In non-self-promotion news, I have received an anecdote and some charming images from a faithful reader who wishes to remain anonymous:

I’m a reporter for a small newspaper. Every so often, cartoonists will send newspapers customized artwork to thank them for running their strips, which is a nice gesture, because the rights to newspaper comics are astonishingly expensive. If I’m not mistaken, our usual comics package costs nearly four grand per quarter.

My editor has collected a few of these pieces of art over the years, including a personalized autograph from Cathy (not Cathy Guisewite, but the titular noseless wonder herself). Friday at work, I was pleasantly surprised to find this Christmas card from Tom Batiuk in our office. I was particularly surprised since our paper doesn’t run either Funky Winkerbean or Crankshaft.

On the lovingly rendered card, the viewer gets to witness Ed Crankshaft and Funky Winkerbean fighting over a Christmas tree like the miserable bastards that they are. Inside, we see that they have somehow managed to tear the tree in half with their bare hands. They have each taken half, and this perversion of the wisdom of King Solomon has left them briefly contented.

And, finally, faithful reader Wanders, proprietor of the beloved and amazing Mary Worth and Me blog, has put up the nominations for the 2013 Worthy Awards, and you can vote! Vote for Outstanding Floating Head, Most Beautiful Use of Nature, etc.!

And now, with that out of the way: Your comment of the week.

“Not now, Dennis. I’m watching the Delicate Ankle Bowl.” –Doctor Handsome

And your runners up! Very funny!

“Hey, when you enlarge panels of Mary Worth, you can see the terrifying madness lurking behind the cracks in our reality! Fun!” –Majicou

“No, Margo, something much better: I learned how to turn Lu Ann into a handsome silver fox! Happy New Year!” –Chip

“I’d like to propose that As Friends Relax be the new title for this strip. It would take a lot of pressure off the writer to keep coming up with, you know, plots and stuff.” –Joe Blevins

“Obvs the Professor has been aged down to jump on this ‘hipster’ wagon that the creators have heard so much about. Hipsters have chin beards, right? And dark, soulless black eyes?” –Amber

“Not digging Tommie’s new hairdo” [next comment] “Either of them” –cooby

“They’re playing a sport where there’s a move called the finger-roll layup, and the best basketball-themed innuendo-about-your-sister they can come up with is, ‘nice moves?’ I don’t know if Gil can reach these kids. I don’t know if he should even try.” –Dan

“I’ve been very much off the grid for the holidays, so I’m only now getting back into checking in with Spider-Man. Not entirely sure what the setup was here though I’m going to assume that J. Jonah Jameson found an old discarded Iron Man suit which Tony Stark threw away due to all the radiation leaks it emitted. The bubbling tumors on the side of Jameson’s head in panel 2 verify my suspicions.” –Chareth Cutestory

“Mr. Jameson … you do know we don’t always have to Skype these things, right? It’s just … you do know you can wash a moustache, Mr. J, right? Just a little water, some shampoo? I’m sure it would look a thousand times better! Also, I’m questioning your decision to put this camera directly in Manbots anus, but there’s no real delicate way to put that.” –Tophat

“Dennis asks Henry to play with him only because all the batteries are dead. When Alice gets home, she will ask him the same thing just for the same reason.” –seismic-2

Thanks to everyone who put some scratch in my tip jar! To find out more about how you could be thanked in this spot, and more about sponsoring this site’s RSS feed, click here.

Post Content

Santa surely would regard this week’s top comment as … nice!

“If I am holding a pistol, ready to fire, and a large adult male approaches me to take my pistol, my first option will not be ‘somehow kick his head, even though it’s more than four feet above me, landing the kick so hard that my hat flies off.’ TL;DR: I have a lot of facial hair and am prepared to shoot Mark Trail center mass.” –Ed Dravecky

And there’s nothing naughty about these runners up!

“Doc Holliday? ‘List’ as an architectural term? Hoes? Billy is clearly a 70-year-old man trapped in a 7-year-old body, so if drawing atrocious puns can numb his anguish for just one Sunday, I say let him.” –Izzy

“Go ahead and mock FC’s terrible puns while you still can: Billy didn’t acquire a nuclear weapon to use as a lawn ornament.” –Nekrotzar

“That panel looks like the prelude to Heathcliff finally snapping and murdering the family. ‘Soon, cupcake. Soon it will be only us!'” –WCjobber

“The way that Ken is holding the slice of pizza in panel two suggests to me that he’s sliding it across his bearded face. Being a professional mugger interrupter, Ken knows that red smears around his mouth will strike fear into the hearts of New York City’s criminals. And and and, Mary really likes this pizza so it also ups the chances that she’ll rub her mouth near his mouth.” –Chareth Cutestory

“Having baited the fireplace with a cupcake and lit a fire, Heathcliff waits. Soon, it won’t matter who is or isn’t on the Naughty List.” –Robot Quasar

“Is there any way a New Yorker asks ‘how’s the pizza in X?’ that isn’t pompous and condescending? Is the next question going to be ‘How high is the architecturally necessary peak of the tallest building in Santa Royale?'” –Nekrotzar

“‘Food an’ drink’ seems about what you’d expect Loweezy to ask for (personally, I’d just be relieved it wasn’t ‘room an’ board’), but Elviney seems crestfallen, as though she expected the answer to be, ‘meaningful female companionship, an’ perhaps forbidden physical intimacy.'” –Doctor Handsome

“My going theory is that Santa is working up a Jughead-themed ventriloquist act and has had his elves build a tiny wooden vent figure called ‘Souphead’ to avoid copyright infringement lawsuits. (Jughaid v. Jughead is languishing in the courts after many decades of litigation.) You have to admit, this strip is written just like a ventriloquist act, with Santa dutifully feeding straight lines to a hideous little wise-cracking homunculus on his lap.” –Joe Blevins

“When I read this strip, I just assumed Santa had decided to start slinging insults at the kiddies. ‘Have you been a good boy all year, Souphead?’ ‘What would you like me to bring you, Numbnuts?’ ‘Hey, Snotbreath, did you see my reindeer parked outside?'” –Dr. Mabuse

Judge Parker: “I don’t know what to make of this strip. Half the time is seems to be nothing but rich people drinking wine and having differences of opinion over legal matters and literature, and then BAM! Suddenly we’re driving around in military-grade amour-plated cars. I had to look up what a 50 BMG was, and I’m dismayed to report that it’s a large cartridge for a heavy machine gun or a high-powered sniper rifle. Not that the Parkers have to know what that is, they just know that money means safety and security and they can leave the acronyms to the people throwing themselves in front of the machine-gun fire.” –pugfuggly

Luann: “I like to think the other girls talk to Luann only to confirm what college she’s going to, and then to make sure they don’t go to that college.” –S. Stout

“His newest elf will be named Jeffy, if by ‘Santa’ you mean the Malaysian textile manufacturer I’m selling you to.” –Voshkod

Thanks to everyone who put some scratch in my tip jar! To find out more about how you could be thanked in this spot, and more about sponsoring this site’s RSS feed, click here.

Post Content

That kind of rhymes, right? “13th” and “week”? A “soft rhyme,” like Emily Dickinson used? Anyway, here’s this week’s top comment.

“Coming Soon: Jared and Cherry in Fifty Shades of Flannel.” –Little Blue Bicycle

And the runners up! Very funny!

“One has to admire the Family Circus’ home-made shrine to the Lidless Eye of Sauron, though he’s not really the sort of deity who is into answering prayer requests.” –dmsilev

“Whatever look Thel is going for with the white jacket, purple shirt, and large gold crucifix — doctor? Tony Manero? newly-religious Sonny Crockett? — it’s ruined by the mom jeans.” –Joe Blevins

“Today’s Slylock Fox missed out on a great opportunity to teach kids how to identify hot steaming bear crap.” –The Mangler

“Ken Kensington may have more gray in his hair (actually, 100%) and less song in his voice (actually, none at all) than he used to, but he’s still aged better than Shelly, who can no longer use a spoon.” –seismic-2

“My favorite bit of the Bertha Bear tableau is the television, spatula murder weapon still in its side, with the look of shock and surprise still hauntingly in its dead eyes. You want to look for a motive for the prison break, there’s your answer.” –Damian

“Yes, Dead-Marmot-On-Head guy looks depressed in the last panel, but what about that smirk in panel one? ‘I knew when I invested my life’s saving in this place twenty years ago, that eventually everyone in town must come crawling to me! This one has finally realized that comic books are as essential as electricity or running water! Maybe I’ll be able to unload that Casper and Wendy overstock finally. For sex! Maybe I’ll tell her to have sex with me if she wants the comic books on this list! It’s a seller’s market now. Bwa-ha-ha-ha!'” –Dr. Mabuse

“Wow, I’d let Doris pierce my skull with her nail gun any time, if you know what I mean. (What I mean is that I don’t understand the mechanics of sexual intercourse.)” –Chyron HR

“There’s something about black and white photos that fosters a certain mood. Not that I’m talking about the photo you’re looking at, of course, it’s clearly got shades of blue all over. I just thought I’d make conversation. There’s something about white hair that’s been dyed blonde in the very front that gives a man an air of youth, don’t you think? Again, just making conversation.” –BrutusJ

“Barney spends a whole week trying to locate Snuffy? HELL FUCK YEAH, IT WAS WORTH THE WAIT!!!!! BARNEY GOOGLE IN THIS BEEOTCH!!!!!!!!” –Stantheman

“In other news, never has the phrase ‘The Hots? Really?’ summed up the feelings of so many, so wonderfully succinctly.” –A New Day

“Mark Trail is going to be so disappointed when he catches up with Cherry. ‘You struck him in the face and he still has stubble?'” –Dragon of Life

“Heathcliff is my new favorite short-tempered space-age feline greaser.” –Robot Quasar

“We ran out of milk. That’s why I put NyQuil on your Fruity Pebbles, giving you bizarre hallucinations. Our cat is driving a cat car, you say? That’s wild. Let me put on some Steely Dan and get you some B12.” –Christopher

“I am disgusted that the ‘protagonists’ in Judge Parker once again learn that the true path to success is just to be an arrogant dick to everyone and all your dreams will come true. I am even more disgusted that the gonzo journalist himself Hunter S. Thompson has returned from beyond the grave to throw his support behind Judge Senior’s awful novel.” –Sloth

A3G: “Ah, another happy ending: Cole gets a new lease on life, Lu Ann starts a new relationship with him, Marty’s apparently getting asked out on a date by the best doctor in the state, and Tommie continues her Italian vacation uninterrupted. Margo remains at large and should be considered dangerous.” –pugfuggly

“As a Star Trek fan, you can imagine my horror when I saw that almost the entire cast of Gil Thorp is decked out in red shirts. Who will die in the first five panels to demonstrate this plot’s monster? Farewell, Wynn Wiley.” –Ed Dravecky

“Given that Robbie is pretty much the nicest guy in Peter’s world, I can only conclude that either a mild collision would cause Peter to burst into flames like a Ford Pinto, or Spidey-Sense is kind of racist. Both are believable.” –Doctor Handsome

Thanks to everyone who put some scratch in my tip jar! To find out more about how you could be thanked in this spot, and more about sponsoring this site’s RSS feed, click here.