Thursday, 13 January 2011

Confusion

Bizarro is brought to you today by Nothing.

I got a couple of comments from readers who didn't quite get this headache gag. While I fully understand how a person might not understand it, I'm not sure how to explain it. I think it is one of those oddball gags that you either find amusing or you don't. There is no secret to it that you're not seeing, it's just that this guy has a headache and his wife and dog are part of the equation. If you're still out to sea, get married, sit around with your spouse for 10 or 20 years then look at the cartoon again.*

I'd like to say this about the "Backwards Caps" cartoon: I hate backwards caps. Yes, perhaps "hate" is a strong word for how one could feel about a particular fashion, you're right. Okay, I think it is dumb. A baseball cap is designed with a bill to protect your eyes from the sun, not the back of your neck. It's the entire point of its existence. It is like wearing shoes on your hands. However, if you were the only person to wear it backwards, then you're probably just quirky and individual and I admire that. But if you started doing it just because everyone else is, you're just being a sheep. If, on the other hand, you feel confident that you like the way it looks independently and you'd wear it that way even if you had never seen anyone else in the world do it and tourists were asking to take a picture with you because you looked so silly, then it would be wrong for you NOT to wear it backwards just because it was a fad. And if you find that you're just more comfortable looking the same as everyone else, own it, girl, and don't change a thing. There is also no reason in the world why you should care about what I think of your hat stylings.

In the interest of full disclosure, I was wearing what I call "old man hats" a few years before they caught on with youngsters and now they have become a symbol of shallow hipsterism. But I refuse to give it up because I liked them before they became a fad and I still like them. Again, no reason at all you should care.

I hope this has been sufficiently confusing so that you now don't know what the hell to do with your baseball cap. Life is like that and we've all learned a valuable lesson.

And here, to round out our confusion, is a cartoon from 1997 that even I don't understand. I have no idea why it occurred to me or why I thought it was funny but it did and I did and I still do. Figure this one out for yourself, you're on your own.


*I'd like to mention that this cartoon in no way reflects my own marriage to CHNW. We have a ball virtually every day and she gets more adorable and interesting year by year.**

** Yes, she is a regular reader of this blog.

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Tuesday, 11 January 2011

Prepared


Bizarro is brought to you today by Preparedness.

If your head and eyes are not frozen solid in a single position, move them just an inch or so to the left and see the cartoon there. This will increase your understanding of my next sentence. People liked it.

Sometimes simple ideas work best and this one is a perfect example. I got lots of emails from readers who really liked the "interest-free checking" cartoon. It was the result of a collaboration with my buddy, Andy Cowan, who is a former writer for "Seinfeld". (He was responsible for their most famous episode, in which Kramer is elected Supreme Dictator for Life of all of North and South America, then has the rest of the cast executed. Rent it if you haven't seen it.)

Our next offering today is in the field of locomotive laziness. I think we can agree that the Segway scooter is an odd invention. On a scientific level, it represents an amazing breakthrough in gyroscopic technology as regards ambulation without moving your legs. God forbid we should burn one calorie more than is necessary, that would be unAmerican. But, like trans-gender immigrants, it has had trouble fitting into American society. Segways are not powerful or safe enough to be in traffic and most communities consider them too dangerous to allow on sidewalks, so they're pretty much confined to open fields and empty parking lots.

People with absolutely no sense of vanity occasionally use them for security purposes at malls or airports, but what was once predicted to be the biggest thing since indoor plumbing has mostly become an expensive novelty. I have no compunction about looking ridiculous, so I ride these things any time I can hijack one. I don't own one, of course, but they're fun to buzz around on when you can get hold of one. I kind of feel sorry for them, like trans-gender immigrants.

For some reason, the Interest-Free Checking gag reminded me of an old favorite of mine from 1997, so here it is. Again, I like the simplicity of it. I hope you do, too.

We're expecting another big snow storm tomorrow, so I've got to get to the gun store today and stock up on weapons and ammo in case there is a run on supplies at the corner food shop. Good Americans can never be too prepared.


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