Friday Funnies

Running late -- first airport had no wifi but ran me late so the next one had wifi but no time. This one has a very little bit of both.

A story even less interesting than it sounds. Here you go:

I don't know that "Friday Funnies" have to be -- or even should be -- newsworthy, but the new Nancy is drawing some attention on social media for not being the old Nancy, and for doing it subversively.

It does seem to be dealing in dada, which is good if that's your thing and probably not so good if it's not, but the real question is whether fans of Original Nancy will notice. There have long been people who dug unintentional dadaesque meaning from the strip, and now their job will be easier, but, unlike with the Jerry Scott rebirth experiment where the strip was actually funny, I think the original fans may not notice the change.

Dada isn't my cup of tea. Not that I don't like it at all, but a little goes a long way and it seems more like a spice than something to be consumed on its own.

But I'm keeping Nancy on my daily list because, for the moment, I'm fascinated, and I want to see how the pseudonymous artist whom we are told is a woman settles in and hits stride.

On which topic, I've seen people celebrating that, "after 85 years, Nancy is finally being drawn by a woman." Given how few times the strip changed hands over those 85 years, they may be bringing their own brand of dada to the table.

Unless they've been hoping for Sluggo St. John to don an eye patch.

 

Should I be offended by xkcd? 

I don't proselytize or evangelize much, mostly because I live alone and questions of socks and bananas don't come up very often at the dog park. 

Fahrenheit does, mostly in the form of people noting the official temperature and contrasting it with how it feels when the wind whips down the river valley. I'm hoping this topic is gone shortly.

Meanwhile, Fahrenheit is more precise, but, then again, I'm not sure how much precision you really need. Zero is cold, 10 is not, 20 is warm and 30 is hot.

And it's easier to start at the bud end than the stem end. Defending the stem end is simply defending tradition and status quo. 

I'll proselytize on the topic of being an Old Fart, sure. 

Or we can get into an argument over whether it's kill-AHM-itters or KILLO-meeters, but that assumes we make the conversion. 

 

Though if you really want to argue, let's dig out Plato's Republic and relive those college years of trying to respect the Great Man and reconcile it with his rejection of poetry from the ideal kingdom. Existential Comics doesn't bother with the respect and has a much better reading on that part of the book than we did.

Of course, you have to realize that, when I was in college and reading the Republic, there were a lot of people out there trying to create ideal communities, so that, however theoretical Plato was being, we were taking large chunks of his book as a literal blueprint.

And, yes, I have watched some of "Wild Wild West," but, whatever the purity of their early attempts in India, by the time they got over here the crazy was great amongst them, and much of the fascination was the fact that Sheela's accent was just thick enough that she could keep telling Geraldo Rivera that the accusations were "all boolsheet" and the network censors wouldn't bleep her.

And by the time they got here, I'd had enough friends join cults that there was a sort of transparency to all the promises, whether they honored poets or advocated emptying your mind. The days of non-parasitic, non-exploitive communes were over about the time Woodstock happened.

Until the Rajneeshees went completely criminal, they were more like a bizarre satire of those cults, and I even had a politically way-incorrect character named "The Baba" who used to appear on my radio show from time to time, with a theme song that included this verse:

He taught me how to meditate; it felt so fine
Da-doo-ron-ron-ron Da-doo-ron-ron
I gave him all the earthly goods that once were mine
Da-doo-ron-ron-ron Da-doo-ron-ron
Yes, it felt so fine, and his good were mine,
Yes, and when he chanted "Om"
Da-doo-ron-ron-ron Da-doo-ron-ron

Just in case you thought we weren't in favor of poetry.

 

On a lighter note, Dick Tracy's new story arc includes a guest shot by the Green Hornet. 

 

While Mandrake has just wrapped up his Vintage arc with what we all agree is, in fact, the dictionary definition of a happy ending: Married by 21!

 

Over in Betty, Bub has discovered that his beard came in salt-and-pepper and is trying to remedy the problem, sparking a question I hadn't thought of, either, but that will now trouble me every time I walk down that aisle in the store.

This beard thing has been going on awhile and I have a feeling readers are dividing over whether he should keep it or shave it off. My vote is that he should stop obsessing over it, but as long as he doesn't start waxing his mustache, I guess we're okay.

One of the oddities of my brief chemo experiment surfaced when I tried to grow a beard. I've had beards before, but apparently while the chemo made my hair grow back somewhat thinner it had the opposite impact on my beard, which came in like Brillo, hard and curly and thick and weird.

There's probably a nostrum to fix that, but I fixed it with a razor.

Labelled, "Just For Real Men."

 

 

 

Comments

[Tom Falco]

I love the "new" Nancy. It's actually funny. I usually don't like when comics change hands. I feel that when the creator passes on that that the comic should pass on, but in this case I am glad Olivia took over. I'm enjoying Nancy and Sluggo being in the 21st century. The comic you show above is excellent and if you are of an older generation you may not get it, but this really hits the spot for the millennium/generation Z generations. It makes so much sense and is right on.

[Mary McNeil]

My problem with the "new" Nancy is the green skin colors. I hope that's not racist, but - what's up with GREEN ?

[Kip W]

I was in a play once when I was 46 (I remember the number because it was the only time I ever played someone exactly my age) and grew my beard in for the occasion. It came in with a white streak. For a while, we were darkening my beard and then adding a streak—then I wised up and only darkened the parts that didn't already have that streak. Duh.

[Kip W]

I commented at GoComics that when I used to read the daily Nancy, her skin was the color of newsprint. This drew an explanation, sober and overlong, from someone who must really be a blast at parties.