“Being an old-timey doctor would rule, just drunk as hell like ‘yeah u got ghosts in your blood, you should do cocaine about it.'”
As sometimes happens, Google was utterly unhelpful.
Okay……
So if we assume that patient has gotten pissy with his usual doctor and called him an “old-timey doctor” and said he was of no use and he was going to get medical advice the modern way (I guess from … the internet? …. from amazon?… whatever; not an old timey doctor), and then if we suppose the patient tripped and fell on a pig so that a pig got stuck in his mouth, and we suppose whatever ever the new-fangled way of getting medical advice was, it doesn’t actually cure or fix anything (…. I guess because it’s new fangled advice; not actual *care*), we assume the patient does have to see his doctor. Then, once we accept the set-up, it could be funny if the doctor bears and grudge and rubs the patients words in while the patient is in no position to argue cause he desparately needs the pig removed.
Yeah…. that makes sense doesn’t it?
I think it’s more about how so many people these days are dismissive of the “medical establishment”. The anti-vaxxers, Paltrow and her vaginal eggs, anti-glutenites, Chinese medicine advocates, and all the other embracers of quackery are constantly promoting their crazy and rubbishing medicine. But when they catch some parasite that makes their tongue swell up and look like a pig, then they’re at the doctor’s office.
Foot and mouth disease affects cloven-footed animals. Does the patient suffer from swine foot and mouth disease? Sorry, that doesn’t seem to lead anywhere.
I think the implication is that an “old school” physician would be qualified for simple cures, like vaccinations or extracting a bean out of a kid’s ear, but not for anything complex. Instead of the proverbial bean, this guy has managed to shove an entire pig into his mouth, but now he’s too embarrassed to go to a high-price specialist.
I’m pretty sure the art is a reference to a classic Far Side of someone doing the same thing.
The joke, I have nothing.
Apparently, the “swine flu”… right into his mouth. Probably not the joke but I made myself laugh.
@Carlfink: a snake? And then, the phone rings; “uh-oh”. :)
But was it a pig in the snake’s mouth? Can’t remember.
Welcome to the world of alternative medicine.
@Kilby, I think that’s it. Thanks.
You realize Larsen now hates you forever for making a copy of one of his cartoons?
This does illustrate why we think of Far Side “classics” and Loose Parts is maybe just “nice try”. There is a standing idea of boas swallowing a large animal and slowly working it in for digestion. So the bad-timing phone call makes perfect nonsensical sense. But there is no story we have for handy retrieval or reconstruction for the pig in a human’s mouth.
@ Olivier – Thanks for the description. I couldn’t find the date, but that was enough to turn up an image link for the comic Carl Fink mentioned above.
P.S. My first attempt got sent to moderation (see above, @12).
He couldn’t use the ‘teledoc’ (insert farside reference as to why) and had to result to the ‘old-timey’ doc.
You can buy your medications and glasses online, but when a gerbil or a pig gets stuck somewhere, you need a “brick and mortar” kind of doctor.
@ Carl Fink – Strictly speaking, I didn’t copy anything, I merely pointed to a pair of existing links. I certainly do appreciate Larson’s concerns, but he’s trying to put the genie back into the bottle. If he had a central archive from the beginning (such as exists for XKCD and SMBC, but also for Calvin & Hobbes and every other feature at GoComics, including Peanuts), then there would never had been a need (or justification) for a zillion dishonest Internet pirates to post massive collections of Far Side comics on Pinterest and everywhere else.
Comics I Don't Understand 
Google brings up umpteen instances of a meme:
“Being an old-timey doctor would rule, just drunk as hell like ‘yeah u got ghosts in your blood, you should do cocaine about it.'”
As sometimes happens, Google was utterly unhelpful.
Okay……
So if we assume that patient has gotten pissy with his usual doctor and called him an “old-timey doctor” and said he was of no use and he was going to get medical advice the modern way (I guess from … the internet? …. from amazon?… whatever; not an old timey doctor), and then if we suppose the patient tripped and fell on a pig so that a pig got stuck in his mouth, and we suppose whatever ever the new-fangled way of getting medical advice was, it doesn’t actually cure or fix anything (…. I guess because it’s new fangled advice; not actual *care*), we assume the patient does have to see his doctor. Then, once we accept the set-up, it could be funny if the doctor bears and grudge and rubs the patients words in while the patient is in no position to argue cause he desparately needs the pig removed.
Yeah…. that makes sense doesn’t it?
I think it’s more about how so many people these days are dismissive of the “medical establishment”. The anti-vaxxers, Paltrow and her vaginal eggs, anti-glutenites, Chinese medicine advocates, and all the other embracers of quackery are constantly promoting their crazy and rubbishing medicine. But when they catch some parasite that makes their tongue swell up and look like a pig, then they’re at the doctor’s office.
Foot and mouth disease affects cloven-footed animals. Does the patient suffer from swine foot and mouth disease? Sorry, that doesn’t seem to lead anywhere.
I think the implication is that an “old school” physician would be qualified for simple cures, like vaccinations or extracting a bean out of a kid’s ear, but not for anything complex. Instead of the proverbial bean, this guy has managed to shove an entire pig into his mouth, but now he’s too embarrassed to go to a high-price specialist.
I’m pretty sure the art is a reference to a classic Far Side of someone doing the same thing.
The joke, I have nothing.
Apparently, the “swine flu”… right into his mouth. Probably not the joke but I made myself laugh.
@Carlfink: a snake? And then, the phone rings; “uh-oh”. :)
But was it a pig in the snake’s mouth? Can’t remember.
Welcome to the world of alternative medicine.
@Kilby, I think that’s it. Thanks.
You realize Larsen now hates you forever for making a copy of one of his cartoons?
This does illustrate why we think of Far Side “classics” and Loose Parts is maybe just “nice try”. There is a standing idea of boas swallowing a large animal and slowly working it in for digestion. So the bad-timing phone call makes perfect nonsensical sense. But there is no story we have for handy retrieval or reconstruction for the pig in a human’s mouth.
@ Olivier – Thanks for the description. I couldn’t find the date, but that was enough to turn up an image link for the comic Carl Fink mentioned above.
P.S. My first attempt got sent to moderation (see above, @12).
He couldn’t use the ‘teledoc’ (insert farside reference as to why) and had to result to the ‘old-timey’ doc.
You can buy your medications and glasses online, but when a gerbil or a pig gets stuck somewhere, you need a “brick and mortar” kind of doctor.
@ Carl Fink – Strictly speaking, I didn’t copy anything, I merely pointed to a pair of existing links. I certainly do appreciate Larson’s concerns, but he’s trying to put the genie back into the bottle. If he had a central archive from the beginning (such as exists for XKCD and SMBC, but also for Calvin & Hobbes and every other feature at GoComics, including Peanuts), then there would never had been a need (or justification) for a zillion dishonest Internet pirates to post massive collections of Far Side comics on Pinterest and everywhere else.