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Ah, relaxing on a Monday night … done with work … maybe I’ll surf the Internet a bit … read the comics — wait, comics? Aw, crap, I knew there was something I was forgetting!

Yeah, uh, let’s do some quick Sunday strips to catch up!

Marvin, 3/16/08

Just when I think Marvin can’t get any more delightfully charming, we’re treated to the spectacle of Marvin’s parents engaging in witty banter as their child stews in a mess of his own creation. I just hope that when time has ravaged my lower GI and urinary systems, I’m capable of making droll witticisms while I wait for my caregivers to clean off the filth.

Doodles by Mac and Sack, 3/16/08

I’m sure little comics-reading children across America enjoyed this week’s Doodles, which featured an adorable little koala unable to sleep because he’s forced to sleep inside the mouth of a monstrous insect-beast, presumably to satisfy his creator’s sadistic sense of whimsy.

Plus, a couple of charming panels:

Panel from Apartment 3-G, 3/16/08

Margo dropping the star-bomb isn’t really news, but Margo cussing because she can’t find her other glove is definitely amusing, and Margo using her gloved hand to point to her non-gloved hand so as to demonstrate the missingness of the other glove makes me positively giddy.

Panel from Rex Morgan, M.D., 3/16/08

Oh, June, are you sure this is a conversation that you really want to have?

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Marvin, 3/14/08

Tough questions for today’s Marvin:

• Do people normally let their two-year-olds toddle around the house eating entire hamburgers, and presumably leaving a trail of ketchup and half-masticated bun in their wake?
• Isn’t Marvin’s interlocutor old enough that she should be talking for real, and thus be unable to conduct the thought-balloon-based telepathic conversations typical of Marvin’s infant society?
• For that matter, why does she need to open her mouth in panel one to thought-balloon at Marvin?
• Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?

Gil Thorp, 3/14/08

Woo-hoo, ladies! That’s how you celebrate a basketball win — with a full-on locker-room orgy, not whatever half-assed smirking is going on in Funky Winkerban. Lisa Wyche (or whoever the vaguely Tommie-faced gal at the far right of panel two is) looks particularly pleased to “celebrate” Milford’s “victory,” if you know what I mean.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 3/14/08

Ha ha, Rex just got back from his harrowing camping ordeal only to be repeatedly humiliated by his pre-kindergarten-aged daughter. Yesterday she forced him to admit that he was pretty much terrified throughout the whole thing; today she lets him know that his lies and bluster are and always have been painfully transparent. Proving that there’s no doubt about her maternity, at least, she fixes Rex with one of her mother’s patented Icy Stares Of Death™ in panel two, while June looks on approvingly.

Phantom, 3/14/08

So, we’ve got an arms dealer surrounded by heavily armed guards as he sells more weapons — presumably military grade — to some kind of green-clad paramilitary group, and our tough lady cop and waitress are going to break it up with — a handgun and a … stick … of some kind. Um. At least its a long stick. I guess “toughness” isn’t the only quality needed to join the Jungle Patrol; “suicidal insanity” also appears to be on the list.

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Hey, everybody! I’m back from sunny Tucson (where I met up with Bob Weber, Jr. and a DELIGHTFUL group of readers — pics coming in a bit). I must give props to Uncle Lumpy for his fine filling in, and a huge thanks to everyone who gave money during the pledge drive — you’ll all be receiving individual thank-yous over the next day or two. After catching up on the most crucial storylines (Mary Worth flashback? OH MY GOD I THINK I JUST WET MYSELF) I confronted today’s comics and found nothing but sleaze and personal degradation.

For Better For Worse, 3/10/08

There’s an entire Women’s Studies thesis waiting to be written about the Foobs today. Elizabeth’s abject terror and panic that Anthony will think she’s a two-timing ne’er-do-well would be hilarious if it weren’t so pathetic and queasy-making. The fact that Anthony isn’t being a total douche for once (“Gosh, sorry you’re terrified about being caught alone with a man after sundown … I didn’t realize that this phone could call the 19th century”) just makes it ickier. Presumably Liz will agree to Anthony’s inevitable proposal to “make it up for him,” setting a firm foundation for a future life of quiet desperation and self-loathing.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 3/10/08

Niki, of course, isn’t a literal whore; no, he’s an ethics whore! You have to admit that there’s something pretty skewed about the moral hoops the strip made him jump through to get his sweet payoff, which, if you haven’t been following, went something like this:

BANK ROBBER: Hey, kid, even though you’re cute and ludicrously clean-cut, I can tell you’re from the streets, like me. Here, take some stolen cash!
NIKI: No way, Mister! Rex Morgan is keeping me on the straight and narrow! [Surreptitiously takes cash anyway. Later…]
NIKI: Rex, I … took some of that stolen cash! I know it was wrong!
REX: It sure was, Niki! Lucky for us, we’re about the freeze to death and can burn it for heat!
SHERIFF: Son, you sure did a great thing by helping catch that bank robber! Here’s some reward money!
NIKI: Sorry, sheriff, I’m wracked with guilt over the stolen cash I stole and then burned! I can’t accept the reward!
ANONYMOUS DONOR: Son, you sure did a great thing by turning down that reward money! Here’s some reward money! Plus a college fund, which is more virtuous than cash, since you’ll just spend the cash on hoodies and hair care products!
NIKI: Wait, Rex, even though it was wrong for me to accept the reward money, is it right for me to accept this meta-reward money?
REX: Who the hell knows? I’ve been drunk for hours!

Panel from Mark Trail, 3/8/08

Yes, Cherry, we know how you like to keep Mark at home! And we’re sure he won’t be going anywhere for … you know, a while …

Mark Trail, 3/10/08

Ha ha, Cherry! Now that Mark has finished up his thrice-annual marital intimacy with you (on a rock, as is his wont), he’s going to head out to “present an award for the magazine,” if you know what I mean! No, wait, this is Mark Trail we’re talking about, I’m sure that just means he’s actually going to present an award for the magazine — presumably getting a plaque from a raven-haired, all-tan-clad outdoorsman is the equivalent to getting a Pulitzer in nature journalism. Anyway, Cherry, you look to be getting along fine with Andy in panel two; you don’t need Mark at all!

Marmaduke, 3/10/08

And speaking of getting along fine with our four-legged friends … wait, you know what? I don’t think I can handle this on my first day back. I think it might be the kind of thing you have to build up to.