Brian in StL suggested this Baby Blues strip two years ago as a partial CIDU, commenting: “The joke is obvious, but what I and everyone in comments noticed is that the front passenger seat is open, so why does he need to ride on the roof? I guess it might be a better question of how the cartoonist could have done the strip to make more sense. Possibly a pile of packages on the seat, bumped out of the back by the tree?“
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P.S. I agree with Brian, the artwork makes absolutely no sense at all. An alternative option (besides “packages”) would be to put one of the kids in the front seat, so that half of the back seat could be folded down to provide room for the tree (that is exactly what I do every year when my son and I go out to the local “cut your own tree” lot). However, Brian’s solution would probably have been easier to draw convincingly.
Comics I Don't Understand 
Putting a kid under 10 in the front seat wouldn’t be legal and thus wouldn’t pass muster with the censors.
Of course, strapping your dad to the top of the car probably isn’t legal either…. but children’s safety sometimes takes precedence.
It’s no more over the top than, say, Zits. And it fits with a frequent threat to my daughter in her turbulent years: Tie her up on the roof like a dear, facing into the breeze.
I agree but somehow I’m bothered more by the dad wearing his glasses and hat up there. Those glasses cost more than the tree!
I guess an Uber for the Dad was out of the question?
An Uber wouldn’t serve the “joke.”
True. I’ll call it a tribute to “Flight of the Phoenix” and call it a night.
If we bought a live tree we at least should be able to fit it into our van – but husband’s family ALWAYS (according to him and true since at least when I first went to his family’s Christmas dinner) had a fake tree, so we have a fake tree.
Oh, that is not exactly true – we have 4 fake trees. Big tree for the living room, of course.
One year I decided my teddy bear ornaments were taking over the tree. I had husband make a stand for the top of the prior year’s tree and moved some of the bear ornaments to same – setup in in “the Teddy’s room” (aka guest bedroom – though have only used as same 3 times). This is what developed into my teddy bear village.
We get a brass ornament annually from Colonial Williamsburg as donors – they were taking over the tree (been members a long time) – and another one arrives each year. Bought a small fake tree and set it up in the dining room (decorated as 18th century tavern dining room) and put most of these ornaments on it – a few go to the main tree.
Finally, I got another small tree and set it up in our craft studio – where it can easily be seen from our kitchen. I did the same as with the others – some of our handmade ornaments on the tree were moved to this tree.
Oh, forgot a fifth tree – I made a beaded tree one year which stays decorated with tiny ornaments and is under a dome.
(We tiny lights on the bushes in front of the house. He ran out of the white lights on the big Christmas shaped bush/tree. He decided to buy red lights to add on as the white ones would like funny if the color varied from the others. Whatever he wants – his holiday. He put the red lights on the unlit bottom part of the tree. He draped them across hanging in an arc and then back the other way to where he started in another arc. There is an opening between the two. As I stepped back and looked it looked like a mouth – to be specific – it looks like the mouth at the start of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show”. But after all these years, I know to keep my mouth closed and not say anything. When he finally stepped back and looked he said “You know what that looks like? The mouth from The Rocky Horror Picture Show!” I told him I had noticed same – we decided to leave it as it is – neighbors too young probably to know what the movie is.)
I think part of the joke here is that they were sick of Dad’s complaining and strapped him to the roof so they wouldn’t have to listen to him anymore.
Gnoman is probably right. Also, perhaps they have packages on the seat and in the passenger footwell.
This reminds me, too, of the fuss about Mitt Romney’s dog crate atop his car. (Ah, for the days when that was the worst thing.)