Recent Comments

1. about 2 months ago on Mutt & Jeff

   Jeff isn’t factoring in his own costs. Ancient joke has a young man telling his girl, “I make $200 a month. Could you live on that?” She answers, “Sure, but what would you live on?”

2. 3 months ago on Doonesbury

   Rita Rudner had a line to the effect that the old wisdom was that men mature later, so marry an older one. Her update was that men don’t mature, so go ahead and marry a younger one.

3. 3 months ago on Doonesbury

   A bit of time warpage: Kim was introduced as a Vietnamese infant adopted by an American couple; her thing was free association of catchphrases and buzzwords from TV. She grew older, eventually having to deal with Asian overachiever stereotypes in high school. Michael and most of the core cast were frozen in college years until Trudeau took a sabbatical, during which time he wrote a Doonesbury stage musical in which they graduated and Michael married (to Joanie’s daughter JJ, who in the strip grew from child to adult while Michael was still an underclassman). When the strip resumed Michael & Co. began aging, but Kim’s head start made her an adult when she met Michael, both employees of Bernie.

   This sort of thing happens elsewhere. In the supposedly naturally aging “Gasoline Alley” Rufus and Joel look no older than they did in the 60s. In “Peanuts” the kids were originally scattered from toddlers (Linus and Schroder) to grade schoolers; now most of them seem to be in the same class (Linus is at least a year younger than Lucy but is usually doing stuff with Charlie Brown and the gang; at the same time he’s been shown in the same class as Sally, originally several years younger). Prince Valiant and Aleta are looking impossibly good even as their children have become middle-aged. Unwrinkled Rip Haywire’s adopted son has grown from a small boy into a shaved-head bruiser (making it a little weird that he views the still-hot Cobra as a mother figure). And while the Phantom is supposedly a dynasty, the current Phantom and his bride (Kit Walker and Diana Palmer) have held their jobs since the 1930s. And don’t get me started on house pets.

4. 3 months ago on Peanuts

   Maybe I lived a privileged life, but I don’t remember kites lasting more than a year. They were cheap paper and came from Rexall Drugs, rolled up around the two sticks. Fancy ones, like the picture of Superman on a clear plastic backing, cost more and those we’d put away and maybe find again.

5. 3 months ago on Mutt & Jeff

   For the record, this gag goes back to an early Chaplin short.

6. 3 months ago on Doonesbury

   New fan theory: Marcie of Peanuts moved to China with her political dissident parents, and grew up to be an interpreter. She was drawn by Duke’s demanding and irrational behavior, which mirrored her relationship with Peppermint Patty …

7. 3 months ago on Annie

   Note the first generation Macintosh — already a relic when this was first run in 2006.

8. 3 months ago on Peanuts

   There was actually a pull toy of the Snoopy-copter. You pulled it along the floor by a string and his ears would spin. Snoopy and Woodstock also did the copter thing in a TV special. The one where they bring the Little Red-Headed Girl on camera and Charlie Brown finally kisses her (Eventually Schulz reportedly regretted that one, even though he wrote it).

9. 3 months ago on Luann

   I was afraid we’d get something about planting seed and Gunther.

10. 3 months ago on Peanuts Begins

    Possibly the only W.C. Fields reference in Peanuts.