It's Summertime!

Robot can't wait to show off his chest hair but Unicorn's feeling a little apprehensive. Are YOU body conscious like Unicorn? Well, get a MYTHFITS tee to wear to the beach. Hide that webcomic reading body under distractingly charming fabric! A couple more designs have been added to the t-shirt shop. Nothing says Summer more than fun new T-shirts! Click on the tee icons below...

King Kong Tennis

Bizarro is brought to you today by Larry King.

I like this Larry King Kong joke. The bottom title caption thingy is funny by itself and the humor is further advance by the reference to Skull Island, which is where Kong was captured. Not to be missed is the coffee cup which reads, "Marry Me," since Larry marries a lot of people. So there you have it – three jokes in one. Because I care about you.

Random thoughts of the week:
The USA won a World Cup game in the last minute of the match the other day and unlike my previous experiences with soccer, I found it exciting. In spite of my disparaging comments about soccer (football everywhere except the U.S.) a few days ago, I'm starting to get into the tournament. I still say the melodramatic diving is absurd (every time someone falls in apparent agony because he was tapped on the back I want to introduce him to the hockey player who, during the recent Stanley Cup Playoffs, had seven teeth knocked out by a puck, finished the game, had surgery the next day and played the next night), the officiating is laughable, and it's a bit slow for my taste, but I'm having fun with it. I like to listen to sports while I draw cartoons and look up when the commentator gets excited.

You may have heard that a truly historic tennis match happened at Wimbledon this week. Without going into how tennis is scored, the average match takes around 3 hours and around 50 games are played, often less. This one, between John Isner and Nicolas Mahut, lasted 11 hours and five minutes, took three days to complete because it was called for darkness twice, incorporated 183 games and 980 points. That's more games in a single match than some players have to play to get all the way through a tournament and several different opponents to win the trophy for the entire thing. To put it into perspective, it would be like a baseball game that lasted fifty or sixty innings, like a football game that lasted 12 hours, like a soccer match that lasted 9 hours, like an election that lasted 6 weeks (oh, we had one of those), like a dumped lover eating three gallons of Haagen Dazs at one sitting.

Here is what the average score of a tennis set looks like:
Player A: 6 4 4 6 6
Player B: 3 6 6 3 4
Each number represents the number of games it took to win each of five sets. Player A wins the best of five.

Here's what this match looked like:
Isner: 6 3 6 7 70
Mahut: 4 6 7 6 68

How these guys remained standing and playing well is beyond anyone's guess. After the match, Mahut went home and cried a lot, Isner went on to lose his next match (a day later) quickly and mercifully, going home and downing three gallons of Haagen dazs.

Last random thought: We had a dandy time watching our buddy, Rhett Miller, play at the Bowery Hotel bar last night. Here's a pic of me, Rhett, CHNW, and Rich, Rhett's dentist, whom we've become friends with because he shows up at all of Rhett's gigs in NYC. And no, it was not Loud Shirt Night at Bowery Hotel last night, it was just a coincidence.












P.S. Rhett isn't naturally shiny, he had just finished playing and was sweaty. (Mmmmm...rock star sweat...)

Amazon Top 50

Here are the Top 50 Graphic Novels on Amazon this afternoon. All the previous caveats apply.


1 (-). Troublemaker Book 1: Alex Barnaby Series 3 *
2 (+1). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 2: Scott Pilgrim Versus The World
3 (+2). Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days
4 (-2). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 1: Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life
5 (-1). Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 3: Scott Pilgrim & the Infinite Sadness
6 (-2). Scott Pilgrim Volume 6: Scott Pilgrim's Finest Hour *
7 (+1). Diary of a Wimpy Kid 5 *
8 (+5). Maus I: A Survivor's Tale: My Father Bleeds History
9 (-). Twilight: The Graphic Novel, Volume 1
10 (R). Cover Run: The DC Comics Art of Adam Hughes *
11 (-4). Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood
12 (-6). Kick-Ass
13 (-1). Watchmen
14 (+1). Hellboy Volume 10: The Crooked Man and Others
15 (+6). Blackest Night *
16 (-6). The Walking Dead Compendium Volume 1
17 (+24). Blacksad
18 (R). Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season Eight Volume 6: Retreat
19 (-5). Wednesday Comics
20 (N). Criminal, Vol. 5: The Sinners *
21 (+18). Tales from a Not-So-Popular Party Girl (Dork Diaries)
22 (+3). Walking Dead Volume 12 *
23 (+11). V for Vendetta
24 (+6). Green Lantern: Blackest Night *
25 (-6). Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
26 (N). Star Wars: Knights of The Old Republic Volume 9 - Demon *
27 (+18). The Complete Calvin and Hobbes
28 (-5). Instructions
29 (-18). The Book of Genesis Illustrated by R. Crumb
30 (R). Batman R.I.P.
31 (N). Johnny The Homicidal Maniac: Director's Cut
32 (-6). Naruto, Vol. 48
33 (+11). The Flash: Rebirth
34 (-10). The Walking Dead Book 5
35 (+5). Justice League of America: Cry for Justice
36 (-16). Chew Volume 2: International Flavor
37 (+11). Blackest Night: Green Lantern Corps *
38 (R). Irredeemable Vol 2
39 (-12). The Long Way Home (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8, Vol. 1)
40 (-24). The Walking Dead Volume 11: Fear The Hunters
41 (R). Fables Vol. 1: Legends in Exile
42 (N). Deadpool Volume 4: Monkey Business Premiere HC *
43 (-7). Batman: The Killing Joke
44 (-7). Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art
45 (R). Incorruptible
46 (N). Squee's Wonderful Big Giant Book of Unspeakable Horrors
47 (-1). Maus II: A Survivor's Tale: And Here My Troubles Began
48 (-16). The Sandman Vol. 1: Preludes and Nocturnes
49 (-7). Dark Tower: The Fall of Gilead
50 (R). Ex Machina, Vol. 9: Ring out the Old


Items with asterisks (*) are pre-order items.

N = New listing appearing on list for first time
R = Item returning to the list after having been off for 1 or more weeks


Commentary:

* The top of the chart remains pretty much the same with just some rearranging of the places.

* The highest debut this week isn't until #20, with the pre-order for the latest Criminal collection. New Star Wars & Deadpool colletions pre-orders debut as well.

* Also, two Jhonen Vasquez collections, JtHM & Squee, show up on the chart, the first time since I started keeping track of these things.

* Blacksad goes from pre-order to released, and takes a large jump up the chart.

* Naruto is the lone manga to chart this week.