I see Three Little Pigs and a Big Bad Wolf, and perhaps Mother Goose playing third, and Jack Sprat is up to bat (hey, a rhyme!)–but what does that have to do with baseball? Why are the cat, fiddle, dish, spoon, and cow in the dugout?? Who’s that at shortstop???
(This editor feels entitled to use that hed, having dealt with a slight lisp for six or so decades)
From Chipster:
He notes that the discussion at GoComics suggests it’s the thimble from Monopoly in jail, and that while that sorta works, it’s not clear what the joke is or if that’s necessarily what Anderson had in mind.
targuman sends (and provides the title above):
On the gocomics site, various folks suggest there’s a fart joke in there, but my inner five-year-old can’t make that work either.
Meanwhile, https://inflatableblast.com/inflatable-men-car-dealerships/ suggests that those waving inflatable things have a host of names:
Creepy by any name. Though I did see a desktop-sized one once that was kinda cute.
Dirk the Daring sent this:
Note the quotes around ‘Mom’.
All we’ve come up with is some sort of Uber/Lyft reference, but?? Of course it IS The New Yorker [Magazine] (there’s a whole thing about whether it gets that last word or not).
From Maggiethecartoonist:
Vampires don’t photograph, we get it. But then why would anyone create a yearbook full of…what?
Thanks to Maggiethecartoonist for this Argyle Sweater:
From Irv:
If there’s some pop culture reference here, it’s beyond any of the editors. Mitch suggests “Release the Kraken” but that doesn’t seem close enough.
(Further editorial rumination: Releasing the tension is a common theme in meditation or massage, but here they seem to be trying to harvest it. To what end? Could they solidify it somehow and then be able to cut that tension with a knife? Why would they be doomed?)
Darren sent:
which sparked a lively discussion about arthroscopic vs. laparoscopic vs. the generic “minimally invasive” surgery.
Meanwhile, it also proved to be a mystery for some!
There’s some pun lurking about herd/heard there, but what???
Chemgal submitted:
There’s actually an explanation for this, left as an exercise for the community (but to also be revealed in comments, eventually).
Comics I Don't Understand 