Category / Synchronicity

by EditorM

(Recovered suggestion box item) The famous team of Siri and Alexa

In January of 2018 CIDU Bill implemented a Contact form page*, and during February 2018 a few readers used that form to send in their suggestions for cartoons to run and analyze on CIDU. We recently stumbled on that cache, and will be running three.

Thanks to Bill Kiraly for this near-synchronicity, which he calls “Great synchronicity for Feb 1 Non Sequitur and Jan 30 Speed Bump”.

*Original Contact form now at https://cidu.info/contact/ . Updated Suggest-A-CIDU form page now at https://cidu.info/suggest-a-cidu/

by EditorM

Cheap, yummy, and already here

Thanks to Boise Ed for this tightly-matching-motto synchronous pair!

I am still in the market for a quick-and-easy lesson on how to turn auto-rotate off on my iPad momentarily, so I can turn it to more easily read sideways or ʇxǝʇ uʍop ǝpısdn, especially in images. For those not ready to risk neck strain trying to read the motto in the last panel of the Ginger Meggs, Editor Phsiiicidu has kindly provided a clipped and de-rotated image; and Ed provides a transcription as he discusses the synchronicity.

Boise Ed says ‘Ginger Meggs always has a little saying added on. Today, it is “If we are what we eat, then I’m cheap, fast, and easy.”  So then Herb and Jamal used almost the exact same line.’

by EditorM

Saturday Morning OYs – August 13th, 2022

Thanks to Le Vieux Lapin for this one, which is some sort of word-play on language-related terms, so what is there not to oy?

For Argyle Sweater, one bad pun deserves another. The actual Pony Express is famous, but only existed for a short time, from from April 3, 1860, to October 26, 1861. Pricing didn’t help (The initial price was set at $5 per 1⁄2 ounce, then $2.50, and by July 1861 to $1. Normal mail service was $0.02 then.). The service continually lost money, and closed two days after the transcontinental telegraph connected Omaha with Sacramento.

Now we’ll segue into some that miss a bit. Kilby reminds us that Segway ceased production in June, 2020. One might ponder the various reasons why the Segway, introduced in 2001 to great fanfare, was a failure (and by the end, so out of mind it might have merited a geezer alert), while now e-bikes are flying off the shelves and electric scooters are commonly seen.

Well, there are some judgement calls here; let”s see if you agree. The “just ok” is enough to qualify it as a pun or Oy; but isn’t especially good, or enough to make it a funny Oy. However, the second shot, using the idea of “settling for [smthg]”, does make it work, and earns at least a chuckle. (No comment on the squirrel’s addition.)

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is screenshot-2022-08-02-175249.jpg

For those of us who’ve served as executor of someone’s estate that wasn’t tied up very well, this will bring back painful memories. Painful OYs here.

And just when we were making plans to officially retire the Synchronicity category, this pair comes along within a week of each other with the same double pun. One factor is that this one was already published here, in last week’s OY list:

But this one is fresh:

by phsiii

Crossover Synchronicity

Thanks to Powers, who wrote:

Extra synchronic because they appear kitty-corner from each other in my Sunday paper.

And then there was Rubes from the very next day (Monday 20 June), which seemed to combine the two and made me wonder what was going on.

And just for a kicker, Monday’s Ziggy continued the theme: 

Editorial comment on “kitty-corner”: this Anglicism, also spelled “catercorner” and various other variations, apparently comes from the dots on a four in dice or cards being, well, kitty-corner from each other, plus the French word “quatre” for four, at one point also spelled “catre”. Given that the Brits have “centre” and the like, the mystery to me is why it’s not “catre-corner”.

by EditorM

Saturday Morning Oys – June 4th, 2022

This Mother Goose and Grimm is analyzed at Arnold Zwicky’s blog.

I also posted this F-Minus, with remarks, in a comment on that same Zwicky blog entry.

Several selections contributed by Andréa coming up:

“I KNEW IMMEDIATELY WHO THIS WAS, EVEN BEFORE READING THE CAPTION . . . DOES THAT MAKE ME A GEEZER??”

Synchronicity–

This Bizarro from Andréa is also taken up under the Arnold Zwicky analytical microscope. I like his term “a Desert Crawl cartoon” for the main trope here.

“SYNCHRONICITY – ABOUT *NOT* LEARNING A LESSON . . .”

And one final OY contribution:

by Mitch4

I always speak like this?

Thanks to Kilby, who saw the rerun Cul de Sac, was reminded of the recent Jesus and Mo, and was led to ask Jesus reads “Cul de Sac”?

If you enjoy Jesus and Mo?, then for some science?, and a lot of opinion?, you might enjoy the Why Evolution is True blog from retired University of Chicago Professor Jerry Coyne?, who often prints in the blog fresh Jesus and Mo strips he receives from them?

P.S. This ginger guy is Mo? He’s a big help with email?

by EditorM

A sync crossover

Andréa noted these two rerun strips appearing on the same day last week. Not exactly the usual synchronicity, where two comics make the same joke or take up the same (unexpected) topic. Rather, one is making a direct reference to the other.

This Boondocks comes at the end of a week series in which Grandpa expects Huey to help out with household chores, specifically mowing the lawn, and Huey likens this to illegal child labor practices and even to slavery. Here he returns to the child labor idea, and brings in the example of American companies using exploitative practices, including child labor, in their overseas facilities or those of their suppliers. And what is his news source? Another comic strip!

Here is the week of Doonesbury on this theme, concluding with the one appearing in rerun on the same day as the Boondocks above.