Comic Strip of the Day

CSotD: You’re entering the Juxtaposition Zone

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Mike Peterson Published: October 14, 2013 1 minute 2 comments

It's hardly surprising when two or more political cartoonists come up with the same metaphor. Lord knows, Ted Cruz's last name brought forth plenty of the same puns and I used the term "brought forth" because "inspired" seems inappropriate.

But when a couple of strip writers happen onto the same general concept at random, it can make for a little deja vu — Wait, didn't I just see this? — as you go through the various pages and sites (reading on line, of course, greatly increasing the potential number of strips read and thus the potential odds of this happening).

Presented for your approval:

Joys of parenting

(Baby Blues)

(Thatababy)

I particularly like "Thatababy," because the "burying the cell phone in the backyard" is a pretty generic thing that can be used for car keys and perpetrated by a dog as well as a baby, and the "PBJ in the tape deck" gags from two decades ago assume a rigidity not often found in Wonder Bread, though I know kids have persevered.

But the new phones do look like Pop Tarts. Probably about as nutritious, too.

Autumn and foreboding

(Stone Soup)

(Monty)

(Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal)

I'm at an age where I find this topic funnier than I would have in my thirties. I also find it funny that Redd Foxx made such a running gag out of "I'm comin', Elizabeth! It's the big one" and then, well, one day it wasn't a joke.

Maybe "funny" isn't quite the word I'm looking for.

Getting one past the goalie

(Pearls Before Swine)

(Agnes)

 If an intellectual is someone who can hear the William Tell Overture without thinking of the Lone Ranger, another definition is someone who cannot hear the word "horticulture" without thinking of Dorothy Parker.

Getting two past the goalie

(Soup to Nutz)

(Penny Arcade)

Okay, granted there is no goalie on the web to get anything past, and gratuitous vulgarity is kind of a mainstay of Penny Arcade.

But I tried watching "Orange is the New Black" and, well, that was kind of what I came away with, too.

I'd heard the woman whose story it is interviewed on Fresh Air and I was intrigued, and this probably could have been a good 90 minute made-for-TV movie. Maybe not a good one.

"Orange is the New Black" is not only a clever title, but it's better than "Shit Happens," which is pretty much what I got from it.

Well, plus a look at Donna's tits. But I'm old enough to be entering the "parts is parts" stage of life, and, yeah, she's a pretty girl, but the show (unlike "Spartacus: Blood and Sand") isn't bad enough to be worth watching for camp value, nor am I so unfamiliar with body parts that I'm gonna sit through 43 minutes of faux tough-talk for 5 minutes of boobies.

Speaking of my job

Well, we weren't, but I could use the segue. Speaking of my job, and of body parts, and of that catch-phrase, I write small news fillers for the kid-written publication I edit, and last week, I ran a piece about the recent analysis of chicken nuggets, using the phrase "parts is parts." But while the parents may have had a nostalgic snicker, I knew I had to explain it to the kids.

So, for those of you over 30, here, from the people who gave you "Where's the Beef?", is your nostalgic snicker of the day:

Now, having successfully segued

I wish I loved anything as much as kids love Big Nate. Our 10-year-old critic's review of the latest book in the series begins "Lincoln Peirce's newest book, 'Big Nate Flips Out,' is so funny I was laughing out loud by page two. If you like comic humor, then I assure you, you will also laugh out loud on page two."

One of the things I enjoy most about Big Nate is the recurring character of School Picture Guy, because we have started hiring one of the newsroom's freelance photographers each year to get mug shots of our reporters simply to avoid having to run the horrible school photos we used to use.

And it wasn't just the bad portraits themselves, though I do think it odd that a person who normally shoots house fires, auto accidents and hot air balloon ascensions can so readily coax good expressions from small children while someone whose actual job it is apparently cannot.

It's also those ghastly irridescent backgrounds that are so fashionable in the genre. They look like the stick-on backing you can get for your fish tank. We have our photog use a backdrop in a color pretty much called "blank." It works rather well.

Here's how bad it is: If a kid can't make the training workshop in July, I ask them to have their folks take a pic against a blank wall and send it in, and I am not joking when I say that this yields much more lifelike, appealing photos than those ghastly school pictures.

The light dawns

Mr. Fitz, which deals with educational issues from the teacher's side of the desk, got me today with the word "defiantly," which I have been editing out of kids' stories so often that it's nearly become automatic.

I don't jump on kids over individual errors, though I'll often pop back an email over something that would actually help their writing improve.

So I haven't said to them, "You all keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." But I've really been wondering.

Spell check. Of course. "Definately" becomes "defiantly."

Thank you, Mr. Fitz.