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Family Circus, 8/13/16

“Am I practicing flat-out nihilism, or some godless esoteric discipline — ha ha I’m agnostic on the question! Oh, I learned so much at Heresy Camp, Dolly, you have no idea ….”

Judge Parker, 8/13/16

Oh man, that’s some sub-Mary Worth-level advice Abbey is pitching right there, but in fairness, why would she engage seriously the efforts to “find and hold onto a man” of somebody whose 10-year romantic history reads like this:

  • Hometown squeeze Bob — he of the front-porch “tongue thing”. Neddy dumped him.
  • Julian “Beautiful Shoes Jules” Edgemont, Neddy’s “live-in boyfriend” from Paris. Neddy dumped him.
  • Retcon Mark,” Neddy’s newly-divorced former boyfriend, home from Harvard. Neddy dumped him.
  • Mark again, back from Hong Kong and proposing marriage. Neddy dumped him again, and somehow everybody was supposed to feel sorry for her about it.

So maybe the reason you can’t hold onto men, Neddy, is that you keep dumping them? Just spitballin’ here.

Phantom, 8/13/16

Mr. Walker (for Ghost Who Walks don’tcha know) drops his son off at school. I hope this branches the story into three: Heloise and sometimes Diana in New York, mother/daughter bonding and daughter/roomie hijinking under the sinister eye of Eric Sahara (the Nomad!); Kit Jr. learning Phantomry from the monks; and Kit Sr. and sometimes Diana going through the trials of empty-cave syndrome.

But I wouldn’t get too sure about that “You’re a Phantom” thing quite yet – the strip has been dropping hints for a long time:

Phantom, 4/5/06

Since Heloise routinely bests young Kit in athletic contests, maybe some kind of sibling duel-to-the-death scenario is in the offing? I’ll pop some corn.

–Uncle Lumpy

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Pluggers, 8/12/16

“Our media choices are better than your media choices.”

You know, I had assumed that the Bear-Roos and the Houndstooth-Beaks, pluggers all, would just naturally know one another and sit in the same row at the movies — to chat, take too many bathroom breaks, let their phones ring over to voicemail, chew their food with their mouths open, and generally annoy the hell out of me. But in an archive dive of the last three years, I can’t find a single panel that shows Andy and/or Henrietta with Earl and/or Shiela. That’s some pretty admirable consistency, Mr. Chief Plugger! But now my discredited assumption makes me feel like one of those people who says “But you must know him – you’re in the same Army.” You know the people I mean: pluggers.

Spider-Man, 8/12/16

There’s no way she’s not trolling him right now: “Does he show up uninvited at picnics? Can he sit quietly without fidgeting? Does he work in venture capital? Have Mommy Issues?”

Beetle Bailey, 8/12/16

Killer’s appetite for sexual risk only grew until the day they found him in the woods, naked and blue, with a taut chain from his neck to the axle of a stalled Jeep.

Gil Thorp, 8/12/16

“Hmm, there’s a rift between Barry Bader and the rest of the team. Can I get True to take care of it for me? Nope. Can I fob it off on Kaz? Nope. Oh, well — guess I just gotta make the kid figure it out himself. Hope Mimi put that wine in the fridge — this is shaping up to be one tough day!”

There’s a reason his cup says “GIL” and his nameplate says “THORP.” The word “COACH” belongs nowhere near this guy.


Just a reminder that there’s no Comments of the Week this week — BigTed’s contribution gets an extended ride!

–Uncle Lumpy

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Blondie, 8/11/16

Uh-oh, look at that graph. Dithers Construction Company’s profitability is tanking despite robust top-line growth. That indicates significant diseconomies of scale, probably because tightwad Dithers underinvested in staff and equipment for so long. Now every new project increases the company’s reliance on outside contractors, who take advantage of tight supply and exact their revenge for Julius’ endless chiseling by driving their prices relentlessly upward. The staff is right to be alarmed — Dithers’ panicky plan to “grow his way out of trouble” only advances the day when savage job cuts will fall without warning. But yeah, how about those Olympics?

Dick Tracy, 8/11/16

Whew! Team Tracy finally slowed its march through the character archives long enough to give us a week-long standoff between Dick and aspirational nemesis Abner Kadaver at Switzerland’s Reichenbach Falls, scene of Sherlock Holmes’ (temporary) death at the hands of Professor Moriarty.

Kadaver is a high-end hit man whose body is actually decomposing from some ill-advised makeup experiments during his former career as a horror-show host. His mouth is strangely unaffected, maybe because he runs it nonstop.

Gasoline Alley, 8/11/16

There are two humanoid species in Gasoline Alley. The Round-Eyes include patriarch Walt Wallet, daughter-in-law Nina, granddaughter Clovia, the annoying Frank Nelson character, and various animals, children, and cops. The Coal-Eyes include sons Skeezix and Corky, Clovia’s husband Slim, and the Bump family here, Rover, Hoogy, and Boog.

Now of course a Coal-Eye mother may deliver a Round-Eye baby, that’s only natural and God’s plan and why would you ever ask such a thing. But I always thought they developed in the usual, uterine, fashion. Now we see that a Round-Eyeling actually inhabits its Coal-Eye mother as an insatiable parasite, consuming the body of its host from within until its eyes glare out from her hollowed-out sockets, silently shrieking “How long ’til I am born, to shed this skin-prison and feed free?”

Wow, the comics teach you something new every day, don’t they?

Sally Forth, 8/11/16

Hilary Forth has the exact same schtick as her father Ted. In any confrontation that makes her confront her future — here, confronting her literal future self — she panics and spews any nonsense she can think of to change the subject. And it works! Present Hilary can take comfort from the fact that Future Hilary apparently didn’t think it was a problem worth solving.

Spider-Man, 8/11/16

Maybe its just the thought-bubble and the scowl, but I think Egghead and Ant-Man are the same guy! I mean, ants lay eggs, right? — it totally makes sense. Egghead probably hatches twice the number of evil schemes he really needs and blames Ant-Man for the 50% that fail because of stupidity or bad luck. Then he writes a tiny, tiny note saying “I quit! Signed, Ant-Man” and leaves it where Spider-Man will find it and blab his “scoop” to the Bugle. Investors will then flock to Egghead’s schemes, figuring that with Ant-Man out of the picture they’ll be 100% successful!

I’m beginning to respect the evil genius of this Elihas Starr, even though he talks down to people with those big impressive $100 words like “equivalent” and “commence.”

–Uncle Lumpy