Snark It Up, FuzzBall!

Okay, so Mark Trail’s been kidnapped by some despicable hillbilly and thrown on an old shrimp boat, bound for A Long Walk Off of a Short Pier.  Faithful Andy saves the day (and Mark), and they’re off in the swamps.

Now, swamps can be nasty, slimy, dangerous places, right?  Not with Mark around! He’s kind of like a North American Snow White, communing with the critters, and having the critters communing with him, too.

I wonder what Disney’s next animated feature is going to be.  One featuring Mark might be a good idea, only we all know that Mark is one of the least-animated character on the comics page…

Still, we’ve got a pretty blonde woman, a crusty old geezer/sidekick, and more animals than you can contract rabies from! Walt would’ve been so happy.

I’d like to think that this is a mere coincidence, kind of like three comics spotlighting swans (of all things!) on the same day.  But earlier this week, the official Hot Bloggers Calendar for 2009 was published, featuring the Comics Curmudgeon himself, Josh! (Yay!)

Although this isn’t the photo used in the calendar, please note the haute couture that Josh is modeling in an exceptional display of sartorial splendour. (Yes, this is so classy, I must use splendour rather than the far more mundance splendor.)

And dang, if Ziggy isn’t horning in on Josh’s lingerial turf!  Ziggy, you squat little sentient mushroom! You’ll never be in Josh’s league — you may as well stop right now. (It’s a little disturbing, that never having mashed Ziggy before, I do two in one week. I do not want this trend to continue.)

Well, when it comes to The Phantom leaving his guns ANYWHERE near a dangerous, intelligent criminal, and keeping his knife in his boot, then kneeling near said dangerous, intelligent criminal, I can only conclude that wearing all that Spandex is hindering the flow of blood to his brain.

The 11 December Ziggy had a funny ( [craigferguson] I know! [/craigferguson]) strip.  The spastic swan made me laugh and laugh! Strangely enough, at least two other comics referenced swans in some manner; they don’t have anything to do with our PBS moment.

Here’s the Ziggy strip.  Its creator is Tom Wilson:

Dennis from Comics Curmudgeon wrote: “I’m a classicist, and so “the battle of the swans” juxtaposed with the diminutive Ziggy naturally put me in mind of a motif from classical Greek and Latin poetry: the battle of the Cranes and Pygmies. “.  It’s true! The story is referenced in the Iliad.  It was evidently a popular tale, and it’s even reproduced in art of the period:

This is an Attic red-figure chous,  430–420 BC,  in the National Archaeological Museum of Spain.  A chous is a jug.  Classy, huh?  Not much is funnier than a Pygmy.  Unless, of course, he’s riding on a goat, which the story says Pygmies would ride upon when they went to war against the Cranes.  Kinda like those little rodeo monkeys that ride on border collies.

Of course, leave it to me to sully classy name of ancient Greek literature and art with a recent acquistion of the Getty — the Estelle Getty Tea-cup Museum and Motor Lodge:

We now return you to WWF Smackdown! Thank you, and good night.

Things are weird.  Rex can’t get a deck blanket for love or money (even if he says please!), while Sara and June come upon a ship’s librarian who’s a poster child for bipolar personality.  What else, you might ask, can go wrong?

That’s right…KARAOKE!

There was a comment at the Comics Curmudgeon that the ship librarian is probably one of the chorus line dancers who gets double-duty during the day. Hey, that makes sense to me.  I’m sure some of the other dancers work as fitness instructors, lifeguards, booty call responders, and the like.

It’s a small world, though — I swear I’ve seen the librarian somewhere before.  And that little Sarah…she certainly is a feisty one!

Oh, and another episode of “Fill In the Blank” parlor game:  erase all the original dialog, put in your own words.  No fair adding or deleting word balloons.  Drinking probably improves the game.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, which means folks that are walking the razor-thin edge between civility and losing it entirely are teetering even as we speak.

Instead of decorating for the holidays, I’m admiring some of the great illustration work by Eduardo Barreto for Judge Parker.  (Someone over at the Comics Curmudgeon praised him, and I agree, that his characters are consistently drawn and readily identifiable, something that’s a challenge for some cartoonists.) This is the 2 November 2008 Sunday panel.  Aside from messing with the logo a bit, the only modification is replacing old dialog for new — no word balloons were added or removed, I just worked with what was given to me.

I think this has the potential for a swell party game.

Okay, so I don’t get invited to many parties.

The possiblity of a youthful stowaway is overshadowed by an absolutely wretched excuse for a crew member.  I think he learned his lesson:

No, my mistake.  He’s a slow learner (compared to Rex, is that even fathomable?):

Aaaaaaaaand….it’s official.  Mr. Stickuphisass Purser is more clueless than Rex.  Nope, he’s out-and-out stupid!