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Dennis the Menace, 4/12/12

Yes, ha ha, Dennis tried to annoy Mr. Wilson while Mr. Wilson was going to the bathroom and Mrs. Wilson actually prevented this from happening for once. But wouldn’t it be a million times more awesome if Mr. Wilson had actually snapped and decided he was one of history’s more obscure kings (Louis XI of France, say, known to his people as “the Universal Spider”), had purchased a throne on eBay, and was currently sitting on it in his living room, barking out deranged orders to his nonexistent subjects? It would be a million times more menacing than anything Dennis had ever done, unless you count Dennis’ undoubted contribution to his insanity as the root menacing cause of the situation.

Luann, 4/12/12

In case you’re wondering, Luann has taken a break from its queasy-making storylines about teen sexuality in order to treat us to a queasy-making storyline in which Crystal tries to pee while Knute and Gunther stand right next to her stall and Gunther admires her shoes. (You may consider this to in fact be yet another queasy-making storyline about teen sexuality, but for reasons of my own mental health I am trying very hard not to do so.)

Mark Trail, 4/12/12

“Wait, no, that emphasis is kind of stilted, right? Let me try … ‘We are already here — surprise!’ Yeah, that sounds much more naturalistic. OK, mister, can you say your sentence again? Try to still act surprised when I yell surprise, it makes it more fun.”

Shoe, 4/12/12

“Ha ha, get it, because old people are old, like fossils are old? Old people? Ha ha? Seriously, though, I’m having lots of trouble pooping, so hand over the prune juice pronto.”

Ziggy, 4/12/12

The Home Shopping Network is a for-profit business whose margins depend on its operators taking customers’ payment information as efficiently as possible. They can’t afford to talk to sad, hairless gnome-men calling just because they’re lonely and need to hear another human being’s voice.

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Ziggy, 2/28/12

That’s true, Ziggy! It’s also true that sometimes that door is an inky black portal radiating evil so powerful that it somehow, incomprehensibly, casts a shadow, and that it doesn’t lead to opportunity so much as to an awful hell-dimension full of soul-devouring demons. KNOCK. KNOCK.

Pluggers, 2/28/12

Pluggers know that if things really get bad, well, old Jed down at the pawn shop has a pair of pliers, and a few hours of pain should pay the rent for another month or two.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 2/28/12

Did you know that “druthers,” as in “If I had my druthers, the characters in Barney Google and Snuffy Smith would keep their tongues in their mouths instead of letting them flap about obscenely,” is actually a contraction of “I’d rather”? It’s true! Today’s Snuffy Smith sent me on an etymological voyage of discovery, which is a sentence that I’m pretty sure has never been written before and will never be written again.

Six Chix, 2/28/12

Aw, that bluebird looks awfully sad! Probably because the squirrel has just told it, in so many words, that it’s going to starve to death.

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Archie, 1/26/12

I don’t know why, but Jughead’s statement that “a lot of famous people take naps” really bothers me. I mean, I guess strictly speaking it’s almost certainly true, as a nontrivial portion of the human race takes naps, and celebrities are humans, but is there anyone who’s actually famous for their napping? (Rip Van Winkle doesn’t count.)

I’m also unsettled by just how vigorously Jughead is laughing in the final panel. It reeks of desperation. “HA HA HA HA TRIGONOMETRY HA HA HA NAPPING HA HA HA but seriously I need to take a God-damned nap right God-damned now.”

Ziggy, 1/26/12

If you weren’t repulsed by Ziggy before when you thought he was just bald, are you repulsed by him now that you know that his smooth, pasty flesh is completely hairless? Do you think he scoops up big piles of dog hair and makes wigs and merkins for himself, of varying styles? Will you ever be able to stop thinking of it again?