Global Apes

Bizarro is brought to you today by Insatiable Mutant Apes. "What can we f*ck up next?"

This is an odd cartoon that came seemingly from nowhere. In writing this blog, I began to analyze it, and myself, and have come to some conclusions about why I thought of it and why it appeals to me so much.

On the surface, I particularly like the disdainful you're-such-an-idiot look of the woman's face and body language. Okay, I admit it, I've seen that look before, and here begins my self analysis.

Some women have a way of looking at something a man does in a superior sort of "you are so immature" way that those of us with a noticeably immature side are all too familiar with. In response, we men often react with indifference or, some might say, childish impudence.

So if you're a an amateur shrink like me (or even a professional one), you'd say this cartoon is about the boyish nature of some men, and the objections some women have with it. I have occasionally had relationships with women like this, but have since learned to choose women with an equally strong inner child, so as not to be called out on it.

A side joke in this cartoon is the newspaper headline, "Global Village To Lose Idiot." This was submitted by a friend of mine from Saskatoon (which is up north somewhere), Brian Graham, whom I met during an extended stay in Costa Rica a couple years back. He and his lovely wife were in the cabin next to ours, a couple hundred feet through the jungle, and we happened to meet on the trail one day.We got to talking, he asked me what I did, I said cartoonist, he said I like cartoons what kind do you do, I said Bizarro, he said oh my holy god that's my favorite cartoon in the whole world even while I'm on vacation here I pull it up on the Internet each day because I can't live without it will you have sex with me?

So began our friendship, still sex-free after two and a half years, I'm happy to say.

But we correspond regularly and Brian throws ideas at me now and again. This headline was terrific, I thought, and it seems even more fitting to have it on a paper held by a chimp.

Ball-slinging Oafs

Bizarro is brought to you today by Firehouse Beast Adult Novelties and Gifts.

When I was a kid I loved sports, games, and just about everything about recess. Except dodgeball. I felt compelled to play because not doing so would have singled me out, but the game made me as nervous as an Arab in Alabama.

My virtues as an athlete were dexterity, agility and speed, so in activities like footraces, baseball, soccer, football, jungle gym, etc., I excelled. But even though I had a full beard at the age of 9, strength was not my forte as a grade-schooler so I was no good at slinging that giant rubber ball at high speed, the way some of my bigger, more oafish classmates were. The speed thing helped me get out of the way, but when Todd Wesley (6 ft. tall, 185 lbs in the sixth grade) would take that ball into his frying-pan hand and hurl it at the line of terrified children squirming against the wall, if my name was on it, there was little I could do to get out of the way.

Apart from the tattoo-inducing sting of Todd's missile (I think I read that line in a porn novel), once hit, you stayed "it" until you hit someone else. And there was my problem. To Todd, the ball was the size of a cantaloupe. To my much more age-appropriately-sized body, it was the size and weight of a beachball made of solid clay, so getting any velocity on it or aiming it accurately was virtually impossible. I stayed "it" longer than the bigger kids and nearly dislocated my shoulder trying to sling a winner.

As an adult, I'm still on the smaller side of average here in the U.S. Which is one of the many reasons I love visiting Central America. The average height of adults in Guatemala, for instance, is about 5 feet, so I tower over them like a Swahili in Japan. I love it. I've even managed to talk a few of them into playing dodgeball with me and it's awesome. I've tattooed many a Guatemalan with my stunning strength and accuracy. In some neighborhoods of Antigua, I am known as "El Gringo Grande."

Yeah, baby.

Naughty Potato

Bizarro is brought to you today by Transvestite Comics.

I'll be honest, I'm not crazy about this cartoon. I like the idea of playing around with cartoon logic within a cartoon, but I don't think this one is particularly successful. I hope some readers liked it, though. I'm not always a good judge of what people will like.

So instead, I'll offer you another one of my adult cartoons. The cartoon linked below has never been published anywhere, so this is the first time anyone other than the cartoon editor at Playboy, my wife, or I have seen it.

I used to publish cartoons in Playboy a few years ago, I think there were six or eight over the course of a year and a half, maybe. I stopped submitting because, oddly enough, they were too restrictive. Hefner still vets all the cartoons that go into the magazine and he's really picky. He wants the women to be hot in the Playboy sense, so you can't do a joke that features fat women, old women, creepy women, ugly women. My "Medusa on a nude beach" cartoon was rejected, for instance. He wants the cartoons to glorify sexual liberation and be the stuff of fantasy, not reality, so there goes any joke about a nagging wife or STDs or transvestites or homosexuality, etc... They can't feature anything about bondage or it can't be exported to Canada, which is why the one below was rejected. The list of "no-nos" goes on and on. After a while, all you're left with is the same dozen subjects you've seen in Playboy for five decades now.

I don't mean to criticize the cartoonists who work and have worked for Playboy. There are many legends among them and thousands of classic cartoons have come from that magazine. My objection is purely about the limitations of subject matter.

This one was submitted before I knew of the "no bondage" themes rule. I like to keep this blog suitable for all ages, so if you're under 18, ask your guardian if you click on Naughty Mr. Potato Head. Or any of the above links, come to think of it.

Disappearing Act

This Bizarro cartoon is brought to you by Painful Truth Imaging Company. "We see right through your crap."

X-rays are pretty creepy, from a non-scientist's point of view. Imagine what people must have thought shortly after they were invented. "This thing can see through me. Awesome. Maybe now they can find out the cause of those headaches."

These days, nothing seems impossible. Technology changes so fast that nothing one hears is completely unbelievable. For instance, take this simple test: Which of the following statements is false?

1. Engineers can create transparent material as strong as steel.
2. There is a battery so tiny it can fit into a single human red blood cell.
3. The average home computer can process information tens of thousands of times more quickly than the human brain.
4. The average 5th grader can process information tens of thousands of times more quickly than George W. Bush.

Actually, all are true. What an amazing world we live in.

And speaking of the world, The Economist magazine recently asked what would happen if all the countries in the world could vote in our upcoming Prez election. Based on our own electoral college system, which countries would vote red, which blue? The answer is here. Most notable to me is the way Iraq and Israel voted.

Electronic Orifices

Today's Bizarro cartoon is brought to you by Foolish Cool. "We'll make you look like all the other idiots, and you'll like it."

I've been looking forward to blogging about this one because a lot of people didn't understand it. I got a small wave of emails from readers wondering what it meant, some of them trying to attach a political meaning.

The truth is that I was simply poking fun at the way bluetooth ear devices have become a fashion accessory. In big cities I've been in recently – NYC, LA, SF – you see an increasing number of hipsters wearing their ear devices all the time. I suspect some don't even have phones. If you haven't seen this yet, it will only be a matter of time before the white suburban kids in your area are following in the footsteps of the urban Hip Hopsters elsewhere.

For those of you seeking a deeper political meaning, try this: Just as the U.S. is listening illegally to our phone conversations, Brazil is monitoring its citizens' TV viewing habits, China is stifling free speech, and Russia is imprisoning inveterate nose-pickers.

Oral Bullets

Bizarro is brought to you today by Links to Links.

This cartoon was in part inspired by a joke I heard a stand-up comic tell when I was a kid, way back in the late 1900s. It might have been the legendary Robert Klein, but I can't swear to it.

The comedian describes seeing a man catch a bullet in his teeth in a stage act and wonders how you learn to do such a thing. "All right, I'm going to toss you the bullet a couple of times, and you catch it in your teeth." He pantomimes an underhand lob. "Very good, now this one is for real," as he pantomimes loading the bullet into a pistol.

I've always loved that gag and it crossed my mind again when I was doing this beginner's golf lesson. I enjoyed caddying for my dad when I was a kid, but have never played golf myself. I'm sure it's fun, I like games and sports, but I'm so busy that I've always thought that the last thing I need in my life is a five-hour hobby. Maybe when I'm retired.

Speaking of "games and sports," I'd like to say that not all games are sports and vice versa. Football is a game and a sport. Marathon running is a sport but not a game. Checkers is a game but not a sport.

I mention this as a way of telling ESPN to STOP PUTTING POKER ON TV. Poker is not a sport and does not belong on a sports channel. If I want to watch people play cards, I'll go to a nursing home.

Flowing Fool

(Click the chart to make it bigger and see it gooder)

This fairly brilliant flow chart was created by Aden Nak. My only regret is that her appalling habit of winking into the camera is not represented.