I’m guessing that “4840” wasn’t an actual choice for this one’s name. I’m also guessing that in the near future this comment will make no sense at all.
Back when I subscribed to Writer’s Digest and optimistically bought Writer’s Market every year, a running theme was editors besieged by unsolicited manuscripts from authors who didn’t read the guidelines. They’d send their sweaty coming-of-age stories to such inappropriate markets as trade publications for tax accountants. Editors had stories of such writers who’d actually re-submit, angrily asserting that such publications had a higher duty to Truth and Art.
I can easily imagine this cartoon appearing in Writer’s Digest. Although the nerdy-looking aspiring author randomly begging random people to read his work is clueless enough to play to a broader audience.
Speaking of aspiring authors randomly … (sounds of a scuffle and a door slamming)
Maybe the publishing joke could become a series, eg aspiring author in the Antarctic unsuccessfully approaching one Penguin* after another. Many in the series would require some knowledge of publishers: how many people reading a cartoon with manuscript-toter approaching Wile E. Coyote out in roadrunnerland would know of Wiley?
Other options: Vikings, Black Swans, Ladybirds, Corgis, Octopeaux. Admittedly the “house” element of Random House makes that the best choice, given these are publishing Houses.
*Though the overall corporation is Penguin Random House.
@ Arthur – I never saw the “4840”, so it would appear that Bill decided that no title at all would be better than a cryptic numeric one.
What are the odds I’d forget the subject line two Saturdays in a row?
Pretty good, obviously.
For the record, both times I was out Friday night, and put up the Saturday morning post in a rush…
I bow to narmitaj. I missed the “Random House” joke entirely.
Arthur’s link just goes to this same page.
4850 just refers to the fact that it’s the 4850th post, so that URL should always lead here.
That number seems kind of high, though…
Of course it’s high. This is only post 4840. ;)
But seriously, it’s extremely high. I ran the numbers and if you averaged 2 posts per day, it would take over 6.5 years to rack up that many. And we’ve only been here, what, a little over a year?
I also like that his name is ‘Ernest’, as in earnest . . .
There have been days with a lot of posts, and of course the 24-Hour Project in July, but 4840 in 15 months definitely seems wrong.
The first one took a while for me: I was trying to figure out if “Ernest” was a character I was supposed to recognize. Then I read the speech bubble carefully…
I hadn’t though about the 24 hour project, but at 15 months you’re still talking about an average of over 10 posts per day. I might believe it’s the number of comics posted, but even that seems a little high.
Regarding Rhymes With Orange – Read Mindbridge by Joe Haldeman for the baseline of this cartoon.
Re: the Rubes panel. This may be the first time that I‘ve thought a caption was unnecessary (or worse). I scrolled down slowly so I didn’t even know there was a caption as I paused to let the speech balloon lines sink in. It took me a moment to get that “Random House” was his problem. And I laughed. Then I discovered the caption, read it, and the laughing feeling abruptly stopped.
I may now be a step closer to understanding people’s reaction to Dave Whamond’s squirrel.,
Comics I Don't Understand 
I’m guessing that “4840” wasn’t an actual choice for this one’s name. I’m also guessing that in the near future this comment will make no sense at all.
Back when I subscribed to Writer’s Digest and optimistically bought Writer’s Market every year, a running theme was editors besieged by unsolicited manuscripts from authors who didn’t read the guidelines. They’d send their sweaty coming-of-age stories to such inappropriate markets as trade publications for tax accountants. Editors had stories of such writers who’d actually re-submit, angrily asserting that such publications had a higher duty to Truth and Art.
I can easily imagine this cartoon appearing in Writer’s Digest. Although the nerdy-looking aspiring author randomly begging random people to read his work is clueless enough to play to a broader audience.
Speaking of aspiring authors randomly … (sounds of a scuffle and a door slamming)
Maybe the publishing joke could become a series, eg aspiring author in the Antarctic unsuccessfully approaching one Penguin* after another. Many in the series would require some knowledge of publishers: how many people reading a cartoon with manuscript-toter approaching Wile E. Coyote out in roadrunnerland would know of Wiley?
Other options: Vikings, Black Swans, Ladybirds, Corgis, Octopeaux. Admittedly the “house” element of Random House makes that the best choice, given these are publishing Houses.
*Though the overall corporation is Penguin Random House.
@ Arthur – I never saw the “4840”, so it would appear that Bill decided that no title at all would be better than a cryptic numeric one.
For the 4840, check the url:
https://godaddyandthesquirrelmustbothdie.wordpress.com/2019/04/06/4840/
An oi and an “Ow!” Nice pairing.
What are the odds I’d forget the subject line two Saturdays in a row?
Pretty good, obviously.
For the record, both times I was out Friday night, and put up the Saturday morning post in a rush…
I bow to narmitaj. I missed the “Random House” joke entirely.
Arthur’s link just goes to this same page.
4850 just refers to the fact that it’s the 4850th post, so that URL should always lead here.
That number seems kind of high, though…
Of course it’s high. This is only post 4840. ;)
But seriously, it’s extremely high. I ran the numbers and if you averaged 2 posts per day, it would take over 6.5 years to rack up that many. And we’ve only been here, what, a little over a year?
I also like that his name is ‘Ernest’, as in earnest . . .
There have been days with a lot of posts, and of course the 24-Hour Project in July, but 4840 in 15 months definitely seems wrong.
The first one took a while for me: I was trying to figure out if “Ernest” was a character I was supposed to recognize. Then I read the speech bubble carefully…
I hadn’t though about the 24 hour project, but at 15 months you’re still talking about an average of over 10 posts per day. I might believe it’s the number of comics posted, but even that seems a little high.
Regarding Rhymes With Orange – Read Mindbridge by Joe Haldeman for the baseline of this cartoon.
Re: the Rubes panel. This may be the first time that I‘ve thought a caption was unnecessary (or worse). I scrolled down slowly so I didn’t even know there was a caption as I paused to let the speech balloon lines sink in. It took me a moment to get that “Random House” was his problem. And I laughed. Then I discovered the caption, read it, and the laughing feeling abruptly stopped.
I may now be a step closer to understanding people’s reaction to Dave Whamond’s squirrel.,
oops, I‘ve