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Crankshaft, 9/14/15

I really appreciate the ways in which the dystopic grimness of the Funkyverse is shaping Crankshaft’s Ralph Runs For Mayor plot. Normally we’d have a plucky underdog whose down-home simplicity and, yes, naivety actually turn out to be assets in the race against an arrogant, entrenched incumbent. Instead, we’re seeing what a one-note campaign run by old men who have no political experience and who range from befuddled to angry would actually look like: incompetent, incomprehensible, and offensive by turns. I assume the kangaroo is supposed to represent a “foreign” “species” from “down south” [WINK WINK] and that Ralph is … literally promising to pave the roads of Centerville with the mangled bodies of immigrants? Or else this is just absurdist surrealism, which would be even less effective as a campaigning tactic.

Notice the lovingly depicted valve on that kangaroo’s tail. While this spoils the fun for fans of elder plushiefuckers, it gives me hope that Crankshaft managed to poke a hole in the thing as he crammed it into the pothole, and that it’s slowly deflating behind Ralph as they film this terrible, terrible commercial.

Momma, 9/14/15

Momma is right to be confused. “But … Francis knows I don’t have any friends!”

Dennis the Menace, 9/14/15

“Some magic set. Where are the turtledoves and hares I can sacrifice to the Dark Lord, to beg him to grant me powers beyond those of mortal men?”

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Mark Trail, 9/10/15

Let’s all take a minute to appreciate what a thoughtful nature journalist Mark Trail is. Sure, that box of glowing rods marked by a giant radiation symbol is probably full of radioactive material, but wouldn’t it be embarrassing if a team from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission came out and found a bunch of gag novelty items or something like that? I think once Mark does eventually call them in, and they hear that he dicked around for a few days waiting for special dive suits to be shipped to him and then went poking around himself without any training on how to handle radioactive material, they’ll be glad he didn’t waste their time!

Blondie, 9/10/15

About a year ago I tore into Blondie for obviously having no idea what Twitter was or how it worked, so I now I have to recognize progress: as of September of 2015, Blondie knows exactly what Twitter is and how it works. Be sure to follow me on Twitter and watch how my tweeting rate increases rapidly as my workload and deadlines mount!

Dennis the Menace, 9/10/15

The only employer you ever hear Mr. Wilson talking about is the U.S. Postal Service. So, one job for his whole life, union representation, and a pension on retirement? Story checks out.

Momma, 9/10/15

“Phew! She can’t taste the slow-acting poison after all! The nice man I ordered it from over the Internet was telling the truth!”

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Family Circus, 8/16/15

I like to think I’m a fairly modest person, but I will say this: because I’m both a tech writer and a comics blogger, nobody in the world is better equipped than I am to meticulously document when legacy syndicated newspaper comic strips make jokes about bitcoin. So here’s the Family Circus’s offering, coming in the wake of Six Chix and Barney Google and Snuffy Smith. I think it’s pretty clear, based on our put-upon ice cream man’s outfit, that this is a reprinted comic from the ’70s or ’80s, which leaves the question open as to what sketchy financial instrument was originally used in that word bubble. Junk bonds? Pet rocks?

Judge Parker, 8/16/15

I freely admit to not understanding at all the financial details of the whatever business partnership Neddy has established with Rocky and Godiva, and one of the points I understand the very least is why all of the sudden Rocky started agreeing to pay for everything a while back. Something about that being the price for letting him publish his tell-all book about being married to Godiva? Anyway, I’d like to think that he and his checkbook’s abrupt departure corresponded exactly to the moment when retail sales of said book began. Next week may depict the most shocking event in the history of Judge Parker: a Spencer-Driver paying for something with her own money.

Momma, 8/16/15

I am not comfortable with that knowing, self-satisfied look MaryLou is giving us here. “What Momma doesn’t know is that I’m living with a man! Did you guess? A man? A man who wears a baseball hat and a tie, and leaves his sporting equipment scattered around the house? Get it? And we’re fucking? A man?”