CSotD: More Saturday Morning Comics
Skip to comments
Following a major holiday is excellent timing for Workaholics Day and I say that as a dedicated workaholic.
I’m not the neurotic type obsessed with the notion that, if I took a few days off, they’d notice they didn’t need me. However, I am the neurotic type who, when I had a Sunday column, would pound out one or two before going on vacation because I hate offering “best of” substitutions in lieu of fresh content.
I suppose the neurotic part was feeling that, if I ran reruns, people should get a discount on that day’s paper. But I think it’s okay to wish everyone felt that way: The middle of the summer could feature a whole lot of nothing if too many people went on vacation at once.
Juxtaposition of the Day
I never worked for a company that took weeks off, since newspapers don’t do that, but then-wife was public information director at a college and she got a relaxed schedule in summer and the period between Christmas and New Years off completely.
The Earth managed to keep turning, just as it keeps turning today despite Quebec largely shutting down for vacances de la construction, a two-week period in summer when the construction unions go on break and a whole lot of other people figure they might as well, too.
When I first moved to Northern New York, Montreal was also largely closed on Sunday, which meant the money Quebecers spent happened over six days, but they changed the law so it could be spread over seven days and businesses could pay more for staffing and utilities.
Meanwhile, Americans had long lived with seven-day weeks and “holidays” in which you have to show up for work anyway, but, as Arlo recalls, it wasn’t always that way.
Charles Dickens wrote a novella about a crabbed, greedy man who’d lost his soul and expected his clerk to work holidays, and it’s good he chose Christmas because we’d have trouble understanding the story if it involved any lesser holiday.
Today, we’d elect Ebenezer Scrooge president and praise him for not letting that slacker Crachit take off work and expect special consideration because his brat had some medical condition.
Betty can get pretty pointed, and if you missed the message yesterday, she’s perfectly willing to offer a little more clarity today.
I particularly like the way Rasmussen and Delainey leave Betty and Bub’s class vague, because while I certainly knew a good number of rednecks growing up, I also knew plenty of working-class people who were thoughtful and curious. I think Betty’s middle-management but she’s sure not an Ivy League alumna.
I’d also note that whatever fictionalization crept into All the President’s Men — and there wasn’t much — it was absent from Spotlight, which makes both movies stand out from other Hollywood versions of how journalism works. Excellent choices.
In 1992, BTW, I toured the Washington Post’s HQ with a group of newspaper educators, and we came to a conference room with famous Washpo quotes on the wall. I said to myself, “I know one that won’t be there,” but by-golly, there it was:
Katie Graham’s gonna get her tit caught in a big fat wringer if that’s published. — John Mitchell
They’ve since moved, in more ways than one. But, sure, let’s call it nostalgia and leave it at that.
Prickly City indulges in a little nostalgia, too, though less pointedly. Still, just as Sunday closures forced people to find things to do that didn’t involve shopping, so, too, a limited number of channels and a limited broadcast day led people to exercise their brains a bit.
There are many more alternatives to sitting and thinking these days, but as King noted in his classic cartoon, thinking has always been optional. Still, at least the old fellow had the option, and I’ll bet that even when he sat there without thinking, his brain was more active than if he’d had 150 channels in front of his eyes.
Speaking of the olden days, I got a laugh out of this Andertoons, but the “actually guy” in me has to point out that actually, by the time Prince Charming and Princess Whoever got to their late teens and marital age, they had a pretty good chance of living more than 10 more years.
The short life expectancies of ancient times were soundly skewed by the number of children who never made it past three or four years. The reason is simple: They didn’t have good prenatal care or quality health care for young children.
And if it had been available, the king and his noble vassals would not have made it available to the peasants anyway. Richard might have, but Prince John would not.
One of the things I did right was to read to my kids every night, like the father in Andertoons. The parents in Daddy’s Home may be more typical, alas, because he’s even faking reading to himself.
I don’t know how many human babies are named for literary characters, but back in 1990, I did a large Sunday feature on baby names, and here’s a little insight from my research:
I wouldn’t mind revisiting the topic, now that more women continue to work through their pregnancies, giving them less down time to get wrapped up in daytime television.
Meanwhile, the part about movie characters reminds me of my mother fuming after a priest said children should have saints’ names rather than being named things like “Debbie” and “Rock.” She felt there was nothing wrong with St. Deborah or St. Rocco.
Best parents ever. And best ending ever to a surrealistic adventure.
Everything’s for sale these days, and when Dear Leader — who never makes money from being president — began hawking gold telephones, the pitch was that they’d be made in this country.
But after the first rush of sales, he backed off that ridiculous boast and now they’re only “assembled” in this country, a claim vague enough to be bullet-proof. Adding a sticker? Putting it in a box? Whatever.
The challenge isn’t to make a quality product. The challenge is to create a need.
Mike Peterson has posted his "Comic Strip of the Day" column every day since 2010. His opinions are his own, but we welcome comments either agreeing or in opposition.
Comments 11
Comments are closed.