The Comics Curmudgeon

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200

I declare victory in my long war against Crock

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Herb and Jamaal, 10/29/25

One of my personal crosses to bear is that I cannot just go along with it when comics deliberately, and for “humorous” effect, conflate fire hydrants with toilets in ways that imply that they don’t actually understand why and how dogs pee on fire hydrants. But at least the strips I’ve complained about to this point involve whimsically anthropomorphized animals. Herb and Jamaal, by contrast, is about humans, who should know better, which is why I find this strip particularly puzzling. Is this supposed to be some kind of dog pee joke? Does Herb not realize that the water that comes out of a fire hose is the exact same water that comes out of a fire hydrant — that indeed fire hydrants exist entirely to supply water to hoses? Does Herb think that the water coming out of a hydrant is infected with dog pee, somehow? Is he visualizing someone putting their mouths right on a fire hydrant, the way you’re not supposed to put your mouth on a drinking fountain, but a lot of people do anyway? There’s a lot to think about here, and none of it pleasant.

Crock, 10/29/25

Oh, does the syndicated newspaper comic strip Crock want us to think it’s silly that this Legionnaire has some jokes about buzzards to tell? Well, if that’s so, why does the syndicated newspaper comic strip Crock tell jokes about buzzards all the time? Heh heh, I’ve now caught this strip in an act of hypocrisy from which there is surely no coming back.

Dustin, 10/29/25

Ha ha, fellas! You know how sometimes you can’t tell whether or not you can get horny anymore, because you hate your wife so much? This sure is relatable content, for guys!

177

“The Bum Boat never disappoints” is a phrase that will haunt my nightmares

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Mary Worth, 10/28/25

Wow, did you know that Dr. Jeff doesn’t even like seafood? Did you know he’s just been choking it down every other week for years, just for a chance to spend an hour or two in Mary’s presence? She knows it, too. “My sole filet is delicious. How are your scallops tonight, Jeff?” she asks, knowing that they make him want to puke, but it doesn’t matter. She’s already filleted his soul. Maybe that’s why he bought his boat: he thought that if she loved fish so much, surely she’d love being on the open water with him even more. And maybe he’ll eventually find the courage to simply head out to sea and never come back.

Dennis the Menace, 10/28/25

You know, everyone seems to be enjoying whatever it is Dennis whipped up in the blender, and sure, Joey’s an idiot, but he’s also a feeble little boy who probably couldn’t handle something really disgusting, and Gina’s always been the most sensible character in the cast. There isn’t even any mess on the counter! None of this is menacing at all! The colorists had to make the smoothie or whatever it is a weird set of hues just to imply some menacing, but it’s not working on me. I don’t buy it!

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 10/28/25

An economic landscape where it’s somehow economically advantageous for a dentist to drum up more business by ruining kids’ teeth, but also advantageous for a doctor to invest in preventative care, seems unspeakably perverse, so I’m going to avoid doing the kind of research that I fear will tell me that it’s exactly the system we operate within today.

185

Quotable Monday

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Crankshaft, 10/27/25

“I mean, I get it! We’re all thinking it. We’re all thinking about the guy who dresses up in pizza boxes and how he’s mortal, and how he’s going to die someday, maybe right here in our restaurant. We’re all thinking about how we might have to pull these pizza boxes off his corpse and look at his face, for the first and last time. We all think about it all the time! But we don’t talk about it. You’ve got to learn not to talk about it.”

Hi and Lois, 10/27/25

“We also text each other about our husbands! Uh, all good stuff.”

Dustin, 10/27/25

“Anyway, long story short, I ruined my laptop.”