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Spider-Man, 8/27/14

“B-but if I’m busy taking pictures for Jameson, how will I be able to keep an eye on Dr. Octopus? Think, Peter — think!”

Mary Worth, 8/27/14

As word of the Kapuht scandal spreads, Santa Royale Hospital quickly dragoons Dr. Drew Corey — son of Mary’s long-suffering paramour Jeff and no stranger to talking out of both sides of his mouth — to handle damage control. “Dr. Kapuht? Oh, are we still talking about that? Well, certainly, he did lose a patient on the operating table, and, yes, he was found using heroin. But there is absolutely no reason to believe these two are related in any way. For example, suppose he hadn’t been found out — do you seriously think the outcome would have been any different? And isn’t this all proof that the system works? Now let’s all put this unfortunate incident behind us, stop interfering with poor Dr. Kapuht’s recovery, and let the family grieve!”

Phantom, 8/27/14

Wow, team Phantom seems to be going through a dark period lately. Two days out of their multi-month tale of torture, extralegal rendition, and more torture, they had Barker here shoot an innocent homeless man in the head to impress “Shotgun”, his partner in a planned hijacking. Now the pair run from the crime scene with Barker waving the murder weapon and Shotgun indulging in the kind of twisted Phantom-logic that makes people run toward murderous armed lunatics.

Or maybe these utterances are linked more tightly than it appears? Shotgun: “That was murder — for what?” Barker: “Ha, ha — because you get a free drink, buddy, that’s what!” Shotgun: “Wow, I like free drinks – guess I’ll stick around!”

Call me old-fashioned, but I think Savarna did cold-blooded murder with a little more grace.

The second leg of The Road West runs from Asheville (shown) to Memphis — maybe even as far as Little Rock. New information and pictures posted if/when they arrive. Don’t forget those generous donations!

And stick around for the free drinks!

— Uncle Lumpy

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Click the banner to contribute by credit card or PayPal, or here for complete details and a banner index. — Thanks!

As is now widely known, Josh Fruhlinger — the Comics Curmudgeon, who has singlehandedly kept newspaper comics fresh and funny for more than a decade — is at this moment moving his family and earthly possessions to Los Angeles, there to build a new life in the entertainment industry.

I’m sure you remember alternating moments of elation and terror from big risks you’ve taken in your own life, and how much it meant when people reached out to you with expressions of encouragement and support. Well, here’s your chance: whenever PayPal registers a generous contribution from a Comics Curmudgeon reader, it sends a notification to Josh’s phone. My goal for the Westward Bound! fundraiser is to keep that iPhone pinging through the long hours as the Curmudgeon Caravan draws ever closer to its goal in America’s Golden West. It’s easy to contribute, and the fact of your thoughtfulness matters far more than the amount. Take a minute right now!

To contribute by PayPal or credit card: Click the banner and follow the instructions at the secure PayPal site. You don’t need a PayPal account — major credit cards are fine.

To send a check by mail: click here to send me an email — I’ll reply with an address for your check, cash, or money order. Remember, it’s a new address – please don’t use the old one. Check this page for complete details.

Thank you, generous reader!

Follow along on Josh’s magical adventure with the Westward Bound! series of old-timey postcards, a progress map, and occasional updates from the road:

The movers have come and gone, and Josh and Amber are on the road — in Mark Trail country. Today’s destination is Asheville, North Carolina – gateway to the Great Smoky Mountains, and 11th largest city in North Carolina. It’s a beautiful but strenuous drive – wish ’em luck! Send ’em money!

— Uncle Lumpy

PS. This page has a helpful index to the 70+ banners for this fundraiser, and more than 500 running all the way back to 2008. Enjoy!

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In the last full week of August, attention spans and expectations are low. Time for a week-long ‘theme’ series to fill up the queue without too much annoying work.

Apartment 3-G, 8/26/14

Oh hey it’s Tommie’s cavalcade of boyfriends, going back to 2007! Sure, Lu Ann and Margo get all the attention, but it’s boring old Tommie who gets all the action. Here’s the Swain o’ the Day:

Apartment 3-G (panel), 2/4/07

This is Neil Flynn, a small-time community-theatre lothario who played a one-shot role in 2007, mostly to humiliate IT Security Studmuffin Gary, shown in silent lamentation there on the right.

Neil kissed Tommie once, and was never her “boyfriend” in any reasonable sense of the word. So “arrogant, cruel, and a cheater” is apparently Tommiespeak for “I totally let him kiss me — and no proposal, not one! Can you believe it? I would be a grandmother today if not for that bastard — the nerve of the man!”

Crankshaft, 8/26/14

All week long, bitter old Ed Crankshaft daydreams about delivering his incoherent petty spite globally, at industrial scale. But in a run of bad luck, his bus is beset by gremlins, hijacked by convicts, overrun with snakes, and crashlands on a mysterious tropical island somewhere in the South Pacific Ocean.

Judge Parker, 8/26/14

Dude, if you’re gonna do the waxed moustaches, use the little grey cells, too: “Hi, Sam” just won’t cut it. Repeat après moi: “Ah, M’sieur Drivair! I ‘ear zat M’selle Nedday, she ‘as retourned, wiz zee radiant skeen, and zee fairm, rounded … ‘ow you say … accoutrements. M’sieur Drivair iz M’selle Nedday’s step-fazzair of course, but none of zees is creepaiy, n’est-ce pas? Non! We are Franch, zat iz why!”

Mary Worth, 8/26/14

Mary Worth wraps up the “Bad Doctor” loose end. Say, have you noticed that all Mary ever does at the hospital is peer at blank sheets of paper and eavesdrop on gossip? It’s almost as though patient care somehow isn’t her top priority. Go figure.

And wouldn’t you just love to see Nurse Bluehair on your medical team? Sure, it’s all grins watching her try to work out the relationship between “the ones you don’t suspect” and “the ones you don’t bother to keep an eye on” until you see her standing at the foot of your bed with a catheter, an I.V., an oxygen cannula, and a baffled look on her face.

Baby Blues, 8/26/14

Any parent ever born just switches the plates. Any parent ever.

–Uncle Lumpy