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Today is Mother’s Day across most of the world (British “Mum’s Day” is celebrated during Lent, in retribution for their cooking). Because of its ability to trigger a laugh riot of misunderstandings, dysfunction, and resentment, Mother’s Day is a huge deal in the comics, on a scale with Thanksgiving. Let’s see how some of our favorite families celebrate:

Edge City, 5/12/13

Obsessive neurotic Abby Ardin demands smooth sheets and an unsullied mattress, even if it means forgoing all the messy pleasures that sustain bonds of love. Husband Len submissively abets her every whim. It’s a mystery how those children got here.

Zits, 5/12/13

Jeremy Zits-Duncan promises to give his mother the tolerance and respect she most desires, but fails utterly in the execution. SPANG!

Mary Worth, 5/12/13 (panel)

Beth Kinley celebrates her mother’s special day by ditching Elinor to enjoy some incompetent afterdinner macking on new beau Tom Harpman. Hey, Tom: Beth is a real girlfriend — quit trying to inflate her.

Lockhorns, 5/12/13 (panel)

Leroy cranks up the hypocrisy to give Loretta’s mom a proper greeting. Brrrrr…

Dennis the Menace, 5/12/13 (panel)

Henry and Dennis get it right … and so, as always, does Alice. But c’mon — Dondi was more menacing than this!

Funky Winkerbean, 5/12/13 (panel)

Darin and Jessica bring flowers to the grave of somebody named Lisa Moore whose ashes weren’t scattered in New York’s Central Park the way Darin’s mom’s were.

Crankshaft, 5/12/13

Jeff Murdoch congratulates himself for overspending at the Hallmark: “Surely now my mother will love me?” Ha ha, nope!

Happy Mother’s Day — give Mom a call!

— Uncle Lumpy

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Curtis and Momma, 11/26/12

Comics artists! It is true that you are old and cranky, and that everything about the young people who don’t subscribe to the paper is annoying. Nevertheless, it is perhaps advisable for you to do a cursory bit of investigation to determine exactly how newfangled the habits and turns of phrase and cultural production of today’s youth are before you lambaste them in the comics pages as irritating novelties. For instance: auto-tune made its musical debut with Cher’s single “Believe,” which hit the airwaves in 1998! This means that it’s a musical production technique that is literally older than Curtis is, and would probably be familiar to his father already. Also, the word “awesome” in its weakened, colloquial sense of “very good” is first recorded in 1961, and was in vogue from around 1980. So have you been complaining about this usage for 30 or maybe even 50 years? Perhaps now is the time to give up on this particular fight!

Zits, 11/26/12

No, your attacks on the young should be universal and timeless. For instance, did you know that teenagers are monstrous, unthinking appetites, whose compliments cannot be taken seriously because they will vibrate ceaselessly in joy at anyone or anything that can sate their endless need?

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Zits, 9/14/12

My wife and I got married seven years ago this week, and we were together for three years before that, so yes, there is a certain amount of gas-passing that goes on in each other’s presence at this point in our relationship, and by “a certain amount” I mean “good lord it is a constant chemical warfare battle of the sort banned by the Geneva Conventions.” And yet I still have a certain amount of sympathy for what’s going on at the bottom left of the third panel. Walt’s just shoveling spoon after spoon of fart-fuel into his gaping maw, blithely assuring his son that someday he and his true love will be so confident in each other’s affections that they’ll go through life hand-in-hand, surrounded by an invisible self-generated cloud of noxious gas, their farts mingling and becoming one; but Connie’s face is a frozen mask, as she tries to hide the fact that her soul dies a little every time Walt toots audibly at the dinner table. I mean, there’s a bathroom right up the hall, you know? It even has a fan.

Mary Worth, 9/14/12

Well, it looks like Dawn is going to be living a more meaningful life, since she’s sure to imbue the fact that her new boyfriend (DO NOT DOUBT THAT HE WILL BE HER NEW BOYFRIEND) has but one arm with much more meaning than the situation deserves. (As about a million people pointed out in the comments, Jim’s disability was completely obvious in yesterday’s strip and yet I managed to not notice it at all, whoops.) Will Jim turn out to be a war hero, or even a semi-hero like Gil’s ex-student? Or is he just some guy who shouldn’t have reached so far into the garbage disposal? Whatever the case, we all know who the real hero is here: Wilbur, for inventing the Meat-Tart that Jim is enjoying with one-handed ease.

Dennis the Menace, 9/14/12

It appears that a shifty-eyed Dennis the Menace has decided on a new tactic in his war against society’s strictures: hard-line Calvinist theology. Isn’t the omnipotent God, who created the universe and predetermined our very ends before time began, the real menace here?

Momma, 9/14/12

“Francis, you have 17 of your friends on ‘speed dial,’ despite the fact that your phone appears to be a rotary-dial bakelite model of the sort not produced in more than 25 years. Why? And, more importantly, How?”