Snark It Up, FuzzBall!

What a difference a space makes! Then again, maybe next time Mark and Cherry adopt, it’ll be a puppy or a kitten rather than a space alien little boy like Rusty.

I figured that some of those very spiffy tigers drawings from “Big Top Tracy” needed to show up in a place where spiffy wildlife drawing are appreciated…

Adrian finally escapes Mary’s clutches (on the pretense of “talking to Scott”), only to find her father already in what seems to be deep, deep conversation with her fragile fiance:

And until Rex Morgan returns to his rightful place (in his own $*#$&*# comic!), I’ll be forced to snark Mary Worth unmercifully thanks for the gift basket, though!):

And this is just a throwaway.  The touch on the arm, the meaningful, if haggard and worn, look, the utter schmaltz of it all, just reminded me of this:

Even if you’re a Total Fan of Mary Worth and Her Platitudes, the last week has been quite a slog.  I thought a bit of a respite from the Monday through Saturday strips was in order:

Sure, that made me feel better, only to realize that the Sunday strip was a complete repeat of the weekly ones!  Oh, Mary, you really, really need a break. And perhaps I know just the person who could provide one for you:

…like happiness, different things to different people.

In the original panel, Big Daddy  is holding Billy up by his ankles, who seems to find this a high point in his educational career:  “Now I know what people in Australia  feel like!”.  Too bad Big Daddy didn’t give Billy a swirlie so he could compare the the Coriolus Effect in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.

Then again, it seems like Big Daddy had other things in mind:

But wait! There’s more!

Even if there were, I’m feeling much better now:

Well, heck, maybe even Adrian is feeling a little better now, too:

Yeah, Dick Tracy and FBI Agent Ennen are still going to be eaten by a tiger.  It’s a shame about that already-occupied trapeze…

Then again, it always could be worse:

Okay,  Shrek’s not in here anywhere, but the shrike (a real bird!) was the guest wildlife in Sunday’s Mark Trail.  It’s a pretty cool little creature, the size of a medium songbird with the ‘tude of a pterodactyl.  Yeah! Kill that vermin! Impale it, like some avian kind of Vlad Tepes! Yeah!

Wow.  Just like Tennyson said, “Nature, red in sharp little beak and weak little toes.”  (That might be a paraphrase, come to think of it.)  Even in black-and-white, the little shrike’s reputation is pretty colossal:

There seems to have been a lot of the latter recently…