Snark It Up, FuzzBall!

But Rex carries on! (He’s a doctor, you know.)

Yep.  Rex really and truly mentioned leprosy…

Funky lives to see another day.  Maybe he’s learned something from his near-death experience.

Nah.

The only people that your scary fake sea monsters are going to get is “Ida Know” and “Not Me,” who richly deserve all the pain that fake jellyfish stings and tainted calamari salad can provide. Right, Big Daddy?

Usually I love the Sunday 9 Chickweed Lane (aside from the occasional Thorax sighting), probably because it tends to say less and show more (i.e., I can just sit back and admire Brooke’s work of slinking, silly cats, or beautiful young things dancing, or swimming, or stretching, minus the words).  Maybe it’s the sturm und drang from the last decade’s worth of weekday strips that’s wearing me down, but today’s strip (a Sunday strip, of all things!) just set my teeth on edge.

I feel much better now.

…Funky’s alive, and back in Westview.  You think he’d be happy seeing his loving wife Holly.

Evidently, Holly went to the hospital cafeteria and didn’t bother to put a “Do Not Disturb Patient” sign on his door.  Dean Booth has already ushered in a number of “well-wishers” (I’m saying this, only because the only other alternative is that random people in Funky’s room are looking to steal his wallet or any other items of value).  To see them:

http://comicbooth.com/blogengine.net/post/Welcome-Back-to-the-Future.aspx

A few others have slipped by hospital security, too.  One is a fellow who’d argue against all those people who think Funky is a terrible, terrible father:

The other is one of the hospital’s own angels of mercy, although”zombie” of mercy might be a little closer to the truth.  Hang onto your brains, Funky! (Mary, dear — please go have your meds adjusted.)

And I don’t think it could really be Funky lying there if there weren’t a few maudlin drop-ins.  (Plus, I think this has real potential as a television series.)

Rex Morgan is back in the office, and his first task is an unpleasant one of telling Funky Winkerbean Mayor Stu that he has prostate cancer.  Of course, Rex is the consummate professional…

The USPS has issued a series of five stamps honoring the comic strips.

Let’s just say of the five chosen, as far as I’m concerned the Post Office is batting .200 (with the Calvin and Hobbes selection).  Needless to say, I’m not buying these because I like way less than half of them.

BUT! Oh, my gosh.  If you’re a regular reader of Josh Fruhlinger’s The Comics Curmudeon blog, you’ll know that today’s entry (“Friday One-Liners,” 7/16/10) is so chockful of great “shouldabeen” stamp selections that you’ll laugh up a lung, or some unidentifiable bits of something.   (A premoistened “Marvin” stamp! A totally black “Funky Winkerbean” stamp!)

CC’s Boojum pretty much capped it:

The Calvin and Hobbes stamp may be neither bought nor sold, but must be received as a pure gift. Properly applied, it can deliver not only the letter but the sender – immediately and free of charge – anywhere he or she can imagine: the planet Glorg, a snowy hillside, or the place where cooties are born. Its best and truest use, however, is to return the sender to childhood, and thence into a future of infinite possibilities. It is, always and forever, a First Class stamp.

*sniff*

Check out the entire merry thread:

Friday one-liners

Anyway, there’s just not enough stamps in the world to honor that which should be honored.  So here’s a very limited-run series of Rex Morgan, M.D. characters.  They weren’t around for long, but nuts to that.  And because he’s a doctor and knows these things, Rex has contributed some health and community-building insights that he’s garnered over the years on the golf course in his medical practice.

And not that anyone would use these stamps once they’d purchased them:

“How are Jenna and Dr. Mike getting along after that oh-so-magical first date?”

And, believe it or not, although schadenfreude sounds like one of those long, fancy-schmancy German words that explains something to absolute perfection (those Germans have a word for everything!), it really comes from the Feline, meaning just about what you expect it to mean:

Shannon is a small pain-in-the-ass child who Luann babysits on occasion.  This make her (Shannon, not Luann) one of the more entertaining characters in the strip.

I suspect Luann’s creator likes to believe that Luann is smarter than Shannon.  Dream on…

Well, as the week wears down (and the nasty emails to the writer increase), Luann discovers she’s babysitting!  How about that?

And since there’s nothing on TV, and she finished reading her Tiger Beat, and none of her friends are home  who she can chat up on the phone or the computer, she might as well talk to Shannon.

“Where’s Funky Winkerbean?”

Well, he was in an auto accident, and for the last few weeks he’s been transported back to Westview, c. 1970.  Confused and still fat, he runs into his younger self and wonders why he’s there.  Is he dead?  Is he nearly dead? Is this the proverbial life flashing before his eyes?

Deep philosophical things to ponder, that’s for sure.

But, here comes the weekend, so…

The original for the above mashup was published on a Saturday, but it seems that Funky has stayed in Neverland for the next two days! I don’t get it — it seemed like he was on his way to a hospital.  Is he still in a coma?  On a morphine drip? Sadly realizing what faces him if he returns to consciousness?

I just think he needs a little visitor…

Ahh, the mysterious wandering around explained — still en route to the hospital (no, not that it really explains anything):