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Archive: Shoe

119

Hanging on by a thread

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Daddy Daze, 1/30/26

To me, the jury is still out on whether the Daddy Daze baby is actually expressing meaningful language in the form of a series of “ba”s that only the Daddy Daze daddy can understand, or if the Daddy Daze daddy simply maps his current obsessions onto his son’s meaningless babbling. Today’s strip is about one of them morbidly fixating on the idea of staring down an elephant and being trampled to death by it, and frankly I don’t think it really matters which one. These guys are really going through it! Or maybe just one of them is! But either way!

Shoe, 1/30/26

Speaking of guys who are really going through it, I know that Shoe and the Perfesser have worked together so long that they bicker like an old married couple, but “You underestimate me, but my time is coming!” is the sort of thing said between spouses in an old couple whose long marriage is abruptly ended by murder-suicide.

Heathcliff, 1/30/26

Let’s, ahhh, let’s get a little more upbeat, shall we? Look at these fellas, just sitting at the kitchen table with feedbags strapped to their faces, quietly snarfing whatever kibble’s in there. This right here is the cure to the male loneliness epidemic. Not a cell phone in sight, just people living in the Feedbag Friday moment.

Judge Parker, 1/30/26

Thank you Ann, this is what everyone who reads this strip has been trying to say for months

152

Mostly old people problems

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Beetle Bailey, 1/14/26

I feel like if you have an elderly authority figure looking startled and somewhat confused and shouting “Take some notes!” and then immediately afterwards passing out, and his subordinates are gleeful about it because it means they don’t have to do work, that’s a little less “Ha, this is a zany situation” and a little more elder abuse. It’s sadly not that unheard of for a powerful but ailing person’s staff to basically puppet them for an extended period of time, and it’s all fun and games until, in this case, the area of the United States protected by Camp Swampy is invaded by enemy forces and no competent general officer is present to coordinate defensive operations.

Mary Worth, 1/14/26

I’m not sure how old Ian is supposed to be so I guess I won’t call this “elder abuse” per se but it’s clear that his mind has been broken by Toby and Sunny. Look at his sleepy, dopey smile as Sunny cackles evilly literally inches in front of his face! This is some real “He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother” shit right here, only with a parrot.

Shoe, 1/14/26

To me, one of the most depressing things about the Perfesser and Skyler’s home is that there’s exactly one place to sit in their living room, which tells us volumes about the relationship between the uncle and his barely tolerated nephew/ward. Today we see that even when they eat out together, the Perfesser insists on sitting as far away from his nephew as possible.

Luann, 1/14/26

When I started commenting on Luann again, did I know things were going to end up less than a year later with Luann getting propositioned to go fuck over by the dumpsters? No, of course not. Obviously not. Different choices would’ve been made had I known, I’ll tell you that much.

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Sunday is for bird crimes

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Shoe, 1/11/26

Did, uh, did you know that “naked running” means running without music? I myself did not, and I can’t find much evidence that this is a phrase particularly widely known by others; it’s the name of a company that makes belts for running, and sometimes it’s used more broadly to mean running without any kind of gadgets. But a little poking around to research this turned up this post in a UK running group on Facebook, and, uh, do you think the syndicated newspaper comic strip Shoe stole a joke from a UK running group on Facebook? Who’s to say. We should mostly focus our energy on praying that the brain trust over there never gets wind of “rawdogging.”

Mary Worth, 1/11/26

God damn it, Sunny! Ian was so close to the sweet relief of death! So close! You’ve thwarted him once again!

Pluggers, 1/11/26

Look, man, people often yell at me for being a coastal elitist because I make fun of the pluggers in Pluggers, but today’s strip is about how pluggers would rather eat fast food than exercise and they won’t even get out of their car to do it, and I didn’t write this joke. A faithful reader of the strip did, and he sent it into the syndicate, and then they drew it and put it in the newspaper! I’m not the mean one here!

Mother Goose and Grimm, 1/11/26

Good lord, they murdered that turkey. He was so happy to survive the carnage but then they murdered him and ate him! With big stupid grins on their faces!