
And then … you evolved?

And then … you evolved?
In the lane of “I guess I get the intended joke point, but the execution is unsuccessful” we have this “powdery math” example from zbicyclist. “I’m lost here. He’s eating one donut, and has another on his plate. That’s two donuts. So how is it 50% less sugar than two donuts?” I guess the *one* donut Leroy is waving around does have 50% less sugar than the two he has altogether, since it’s 50% less donut.

I thought at first it was going to be the funnish kind of percentage mistake coming from inconsistent base. We’re going to increase your supply of widgets by 10%. But now you have too many, so we’ll reduce your supply by 10%. That should put you back where you started …. eh?




The main-punch of this charming joke is clear enough — curiosity may be fatal to cats (as in the common saying) but not to these patients. But what is it that the vet has diagnosed as a case of curiosity? And is it supposed to be clear why he speaks in the singular, and which one of the dogs is the patient?


I dunno, maybe the problem is that the top section looks like a “throwaway panel” but actually it’s essential that it appear right above the scene with the cars. Because it’s the upper-storey window and sign for the gym? But we still have to pin down the connection between weight-lifting and how that extra car got where it is.

If your thing is to visually or linguistically play off some familiar phrase or saying that almost everybody surely knows …. there’s going to be trouble when you use some that nobody knows. (All right, I know about “disruptor”. But that’s about it.)



Okay, let the anatomists explain from the configuration of fingers (and additional hand in panel 2) that the hand doing the artwork in panels 2 and 3 has to be Nancy’s. Even so, what does it get her? And if it could possibly be Fritzi’s own, does that mean her panel 1 nag about “the expression on my face” was just a fancy prank setup?

After inserting this one here, I later found it discussed on Arnold Zwicky’s Blog, in his usual exemplary detail and scholarship.




Oh, he got us! It turned out not to be an oy about “Youth In Asia”!

Here’s an Ewww-Oy for sure:

A synchronicity from Andréa!


A link-only reference to this Medusa Far Side:






That’s quite a surprise!



“Thought I was being ghosted.”

A slightly Ewww-flavored LOL:


This might take a moment as a Quickie-CIDU before resolving as a LOL:


Bliss has been running an excellent series with the dog and/or cat in anthropomorphized domestic settings. Here is a good example:



From Le Vieux Lapin:

And still from Le Vieux Lapin, and for that matter still about bees:

Le Vieux Lapin still on a roll!








An Ewww-LOL from Reality Check:


And another Bliss. This maybe should have counted as a CIDU, if there’s much doubt what his special message would be …


Yet Another Ewww-LOL from Kliban:




Nice twist, maybe LOL-worthy? It takes the over-familiar observational-humor point “fitted sheets are hard to handle” but adds a factor which is gonna interfere with anything at all he tries to do.


I guess the premise is mostly “analogy”.





Eats, shoots, and leaves.




These are comics that somebody thought were pretty good, or even full LOL, and not baffling but a little hard to pin down. Like, you can think of a rather plausible explanation of the chuckle — or maybe two! — but there’s nothing that clinches the case that *this* or *that* just has to be the key to what’s going on.

For example, with something like this Andertoons, we might think of the minor mystery as expressed in terms of providing the missing caption. Is it about the odd feeling you’re being watched? Or more like “Oh, where did I set down my glasses?”. It could be either, do you agree?

A Minor Mystery from Darren, who says “I can’t tell if Watson’s jarns need to be interpreted as a specific term. I’m flummoxed. Apparently the squirrel is as well?”


Okay, the joke here is that the threatened punishment will involve a cannister vacuum cleaner (in what seems to be a photo clip?) rather than a conventional physical beating or the like. But it’s an unanswerable mystery just what the threat is. Torture by exposure to noisy motor, like a household pet? Being inhaled altogether? Having some portion of his body inhaled?


Arrgh, they just missed the chance to pun it off against serialism, the academic successor to atonal or twelve-tone music as a body of theory and compositional practice. To boot, cerealism and serialism are pronounced identically, while surrealism is distinguishable! Well OY to that, or indeed ARRRGH!

This time the squirrel does have something to say — and he’s clearly wrong.





Here’s an Oy-Ewww. Wait, do I know the actual etymology? And how’s about “steak tartare”?
