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Apartment 3-G, 8/20/07

WOO-HOO! NERD FIGHT! NERD FIGHT! NERD FIGHT FOR TOMMIE’S LOOOOOVVVVE!

Last we saw Gary Walker, he was some kind of ancillary member of Gina’s Required-By-Court Order-To Remain-A-Minimum-Of-500-Yards-Off-Broadway theater company … the bookkeeper or something? I forget, and Lord knows I’m not looking it up. He mooned mopily after Tommie as she made out with the pencil-mustached director of the play. His hair, it almost goes without saying at this point, was the same sandy hue as Dr. Whatshisbutt, but apparently he’s dipped into the Miss Clairol Sassy and Brassy in a desperate attempt to win Tommie’s heart.

I know that failing New York theater companies aren’t professional, and that their members almost always have real jobs, but I’m suspicious of Gary’s professional geek credentials. (His personal geek credentials are in the clear, obviously.) “Solution package” just doesn’t ring true to me, and believe me, I have to read more of this crap than the average mind can comfortably encompass. “Solution” should be the noun for whatever horrible mass of code he’s going to foist on the hospital’s hapless IT department, modified by one or more of the following: “enterprise-class,” “HIPAA-compliant,” “open standards-friendly,” “Web services-ready,” or “XML-based.” I can only assume that Gary isn’t a systems engineer at all, but is merely willing to type aimlessly on a laptop he’s brought into the hospital for a chance to hover passive-aggressively in the vicinity of the boring object of his desire. Tommie’s quizzical look in the second panel seems to say, “Wait a minute — I’m going to be fought over by these two? I’m sorry, even I don’t find that remotely believable.”

Luann, 8/20/07

Now, the question of “What aspect of TJ’s outfit is the most jaw-droppingly ludicrous?” is one that we can all have a good time debating. Is it his elevator heels? His extra-high-waisted pants? The stripy sweater vest? The fact that Brad non-ironically calls it “stylin'”? The best part is that there are no wrong answers. Still, I’m holding out hope that what appears to be a sort of weirdly dark set of buttons below the collar is actually a tie, of either the bolo or the skinny ’80s variety. Either way, this ensemble is surely an early Labor Day present to each and every one of us.

By the way, I was in the Gap on Saturday and there was an entire rack of black sweater vests in the menswear section. Could Al Scaduto have more control over fashion choices than any of us realize?

For Better Or For Worse, 8/20/07

OH SNAP LIZ CANDACE JUST CALLED YOUR NEW BOYFRIEND FRIENDSHIP PARTNER GARBAGE! By uttering the phrase “angelic little Francie,” Candace cements her place as one of the few remaining likable characters in the strip.

Liz’s word balloon is already taking up a lot of panel four, so there probably wasn’t room to improve its accuracy by putting “who hit on me while he was still married to her” after “wonderful man” and “whom she was passive-aggressively browbeat into having” after “beautiful daughter.” I’m very excited about Liz’s boast that she can “handle” Thérèse. I sure hope she gets a chance to prove herself in physical combat — not because I get off on seeing the ladies fight with each other, but because Thérèse would almost certainly win any such altercation in short order.

Blondie, 8/20/07

I have to admit that I actually laughed at Blondie today. Dagwood’s eating patterns — frenzied bursts of feeding activity in which massive caloric intake occurs in a short period of time, followed by hours and hours of napping — match up pretty well with those of typical large carnivores, so the nature-documentary vibe of this strip, with a feral, hungry Dagwood roaming the corridors of Dithers Enterprises, works pretty well. The question is, who is the weakest member of this herd, destined to be culled by Dagwood’s razor-sharp teeth?

Marvin, 8/20/07

I’ve never raised an infant, so maybe I just don’t know, but someone who has raised an infant, help me out here: Surely it’s not socially acceptable to come into work covered in vomit, just because that vomit came out of someone too young to feed himself? And you wouldn’t relay this information without shame with a sort of heavy-lidded numbness to whoever might ask? Is this what casual Friday has wrought?

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Happy Sunday, everybody! It’s time for this week’s … comment of the week!

“Uh-oh, some man with facial hair thinks he can build a shopping mall somewhere near the Lost Forest again. I just hope his jaw insurance is all paid up.” –Trilobite

And the runners up also brought the funny:

“I’d have to say that eatin’ shitloads of greasy stuff is the most endearing Patterson family trait I’ve ever been privy to.” –Keg of Curd

“Shoe brings up an interesting point — namely, is jumping off a tree an effective method of suicide for a bird? What if that bird was morbidly obese and drunk?” –Electro

“That third panel is hysterical. Sam’s moving in for a relatively chaste peck on the cheek, and Mark is all tensed up with that wooden smile frozen on his face as though he’s thinking to himself, ‘Oh, no! The human female is preparing to initiate physical contact, which will only confuse and repulse me!'” –Paperback Rifler

“If the Shocker would only change his name to what he really is — the Golden Sausage Golem — he would get a lot more attention and respect. And maybe even a lucrative PR job at Hickory Farms.” –Squawk

“Dr. Drew continues to wrangle for every man’s dream: a threesome with a reserved and withdrawn workaholic with brother issues and a horse-crazy college student with a developmental age of 11. Godspeed.” –Nothing But Neck Scarves

“Hey everybody! Did you know the Shocker is a sex act? Oh yeah! It’s when Rex and June do it!” –Trotzenbonnie

“Josh can use Margo’s likeness on merch because Margo is ‘public domain.’ *rimshot*” –Red Greenback

“Next week: The Shocker sits around and draws pictures of himself standing with fists raised, captioned ‘The SHOCKER!’, while insistently humming ‘Something’s Coming’ from West Side Story.” –Old Man Muffaroo

“My first impression was that Elegant House Fine Dining had suspended some kind of huge lead ball outside their door, presumably to drop on customers who order hamburgers. (‘I do beg your pardon. We seem to have crushed your son beneath our conveniently located wrecking ball. If the large-headed young gentleman still desires his “ham burger”, he would be advised to take his custom next door to Shit Barn Food Trough.’) But it might be some sort of circular swinging blade. The artwork leaves this open to interpretation.” –Old Bean

“My name is Lisa — feel my pain!/ I’ll shortly die and moulder/ The Baron’s chip is in his brain/ I wear mine on my shoulder.” –Uncle Lumpy

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(I was planning to comment on the FOOBs today, but the image from gocomics.com was so ludicrously large that I thought it might cause blindness and dementia to those who looked upon it, so I’ll just say in passing BLARRRGGGH.)

Slylock Fox, 8/19/07

Pity poor Count Weirdly! It’s like a guy can’t even have a press conference atop his most scenic turret to promote his faked moon landing (like the so-called “real” ones weren’t!) without some nosey fox sticking his snout where it doesn’t belong and criticizing his Photoshop skills. If telling bald-faced lies at press conferences is illegal, I know a lot of more important venues where Slylock should be putting his patented brand of pedantic deduction to work. As it is, the only organization apparently gullible enough to accept the invitation to the Weirdly Moonshot announcement appears to be Agence France-Presse, as indicated by the reporter’s micro-miniskirt and the cameradog’s beret (and good luck getting any usable footage out of this nighttime press conference with absolutely no artificial lighting, Fideaux). In fact, this pair is probably more likely to be filming for the series Les Hommes Les Plus Étranges Au Monde than they are to be taken in by the idea of air-tight Chuck Taylors.

Mary Worth, 8/19/07

Man, that Dr. Drew is one smooth operator, isn’t he? One date’s worth of his bland, slick-backed handsomeness and Mary-style aphorisms and Vera is literally throwing herself at him! And of course we can see why Drew would be so eager to draw Vera into his web of love. “Ha .. ha .. I’ve decided to go out in public in shoes that I have no idea how to walk in! I belong in a sideshow like the circus freak that I am! AARRGH, I just fell over! Did I mention all the sexual tension with my brother?”

Apartment 3-G, 8/19/07

So I have to admit that when I joked about Alan being an addict and Jones the beatnik being his dealer, I didn’t actually think it was true. I guess I have a lot to learn about the soap opera comics’ willingness to obliquely take on tough themes! Alan’s commitment to sobriety ought to be obvious from his deeply square sartorial choices, as his white dress shirt/black vest combo would get him laughed out of any drug den in the five boroughs. Still, the years of chemical abuse of his brain have taken their toll; he’s undoubtedly spending this entire strip trying to keep his shit together despite the fact that events keep repeating themselves, and his and Eric’s hair keep swapping colors.

Crock, 8/19/07

And speaking of drugs … the combination of misplaced geography (Inca pottery in North Africa?) and garden-variety stupidity is all too typical for this feature, but the final panel pushes today’s Crock into the realm of peyote-addled nightmare. A little boy named Otis in the middle of the sun-blighted wasteland, chatting with a vulture who’s sporting a baseball cap? And where are they going to get the toilets, huh? Where are they going to get the toilets? Ye gods.

Dennis the Menace, 8/19/07

There is no reason why Dennis shouldn’t have unloaded that ball directly into Henry’s nuts in the third-to-last panel. None. They even set it up with the whole “waist high” thing. Still, this’ll keep dad from attempting to spend any quality time with his kid for the rest of both of their lives, leaving Dennis with more time to get into extremely low-level unsupervised hijinks.