What newspaper has a headline like "Big Game Today"?

I just spent the past few minutes staring at today's strip. I'm not sure I get it. I'm not sure there's anything to get. A kid hasn't done his chores, wants to go out with his friends, and is pleading with his mother. Darn tootin' they'll do that every time. Is this supposed to be funny?

Kid, if you wanted to go to the game so bad, you should've cleaned your room. And maybe if you clean your room fast enough, you can make it to the giant rally. It's your own fault, kid, so shut it.

I just hope the mom doesn't give in on this. Particularly disturbing is that the submitter is from a town quite close to where I live. None of the local papers carry this strip! Why was she (or he, I guess) submitting?

Set it and forget it!

I'm not sure why the couple in today's strip are so upset about receiving a well-packaged item. Sure, the manufacturers may have gone a little overboard with the "Fragile" markings, but hey, if I pay decent money for something, I'd prefer it to be in one piece. And obviously the precautions taken (apparently to the extent that there's no address on the box--how did the mailman know where to take it???) meant that the customer received the box, and item, in decent shape.

And I don't know about all of you, but when I get a package in the mail, I get excited. Inevitably, even if I know that I'm merely getting the boxes of checks I ordered, it makes me happy. If someone actually hand delivers it to me, I say, "Ooh, presents!" That joy seems to have gone out of poor ol' Lugley's life. And that makes me sad.

Fun to note: Lug's wife in the top panel. She doesn't seem too pleased with her husband ordering something (that, from the picture, I can think of no real uses for) from an infomercial. Seriously, people, if you're going to order something off tv, make sure it has at least a cool name (e.g., the Magic Bullet).

On a side note, big thanks to Josh for the link--I'm flattered!

Of course she's a snob, her name is Cronk

My favorite part about today's strip is that it's from "No Name Please" in "Somewhere, U.S.A." Clearly someone submitted this suggestion in a fit of guilt.

And it's right that this person felt guilty. In this day and age, I don't particularly expect people to be carting over casseroles when I move to a new place. I recently moved and when I saw my new neighbors, I introduced myself and said hello. But I don't regard those who didn't rush over, roast in tow, to be snobs. It'd be nice, but I'm not taking it personally.

I'm particularly curious about how long this woman has lived in this new place. I'd guess that it hasn't been terribly long; otherwise, the "snobby" neighbor probably would've apologized for her tardiness.

My second favorite part of the strip is the expression of the two women the complainer is whining to. They seem surprised. In my world, it's because they're amazed at the complainer's rant.

And has anyone heard the phrase "on the pan" before?

Mix or no, cake rules

Today's strip involves a topic near and dear to my heart: cake. I'm wondering our heroine's name, Catastra, is a play on "catastrophe." I want to say yes--perhaps this woman assuming the cake is from a mix caused Cat's dinner party to become a catastrophe?

To which I say, "Pshaw." This guest just gave Cat the perfect opening to point out that the cake is home-made. If this other woman hadn't spoken up, Cat couldn't have boasted without being rude. Now she can! Instead of "package mix[ing the guest] to the moon" (whatever that means), Cat can demurely say, "Oh, I actually made that from scratch this afternoon. A bit of a pain, but I just love the recipe!"

It's sure to impress.

He'll do crap every time

According to Al Scaduto's "About the Cartoonist," They'll Do It Every Time originated in 1929, and was syndicated starting in 1936. It's now carried in more than 100 papers, and "usually is a humorous look at human hypocrisy, inconsistencies or one of the quirky twists of fate that beleaguer us all."

I remember reading TDIET when I was younger; it appeared in the Sunday paper. Fortunately, my current local paper (The Washington Post) does not carry this "comic" strip, but thanks to The Comics Curmudgeon, I rediscovered it.

I went to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer's website and started going through the archives. And I managed to find something objectionable in every single strip. I don't know who the people are sending things in, but they need to be stopped.

So I thought, as one does, that I would start a blog to point out the problems with each day's strip. Nothing personal against Mr. Scaduto...but the strip frightens me.