The caption does a good job of picking up on some terminology that is deep deep geezerdom, beyond even the floppies themselves.
And I recently noticed some folks referring to the 💾emoji as “save file” rather than anything about “disk”.
From the “Ain’t it the truth!” brand of complaint humor:
The dog is up to something, hmm?
Bonus Bliss, with a somewhat less communicative canine:
This is just a blah. But can we improve it?
Sure, there’s a fix just calling out to us! Change the thought balloon to “Can I come up with the atomic symbol for Sodium?” and the bottom caption to “Na, he can’t.”
Other improvements from y’all?
And on this train of thought, for those with trigonometric inclinations, “Can he remember the sixth of the basic circular functions?” and the answer “No, of ____ __ ___ “.
This Breaking Cat News comes from Andréa as a problem of the physics. “Won’t the eggs fall out if they’re in the holder like this? I’ve not dyed eggs for YEARS, but I distinctly remember putting the egg in the holder small end DOWN . . .”
Here’s a new sub-category. It’s not LOL material, there is no joke to be understood, and it’s not a comic flop either. It’s just something you gotta see!
A “quickie CIDU” because it is entirely opaque while misinterpreting the artwork; then becomes a clear and simple joke the instant you re-interpret the artwork.
I think we’ve argued this point before: If a question is posed which is not answered within the comic itself, and is not clearly discernible after thinking about it, can we say “Well there isn’t meant to be an answer, but that’s part of why it’s meant to be funny”? On this one I just don’t get it.
Oh but wait! This was the 4-19 panel so of course it was a 4-20 joke. Ermmm.
Well this one might be called a second-take CIDU. I thought I had gotten it, or enough for a chuckle, when originally reading it – the guy hanging on the wall is a (baseball) catcher, and is the ideal one for the husband/fan-guy, so is his “dream” catcher. But the offstage wife takes that phrasing to mean a “dreamcatcher” wall hanging, whose proper placement she issues a reminder about. I didn’t give any significance to the nickname “Pudge” which the husband bestows on the catcher.
But then now Mark M sends it in and notes some complicating factors: I’m thinking if you’re not a MLB fan AND a geezer, this comic will be confusing. I’m both and it’s still confusing. Pudge was a nickname for Carlton Fisk, who played as a catcher some 50 years ago. A very good player, so “dream catcher” is a great pun. Maybe this belongs as an Oy or LOL. But the CIDU part is the response in Spanish. Fisk was born in the U.S. and had no Latino connections that I’m aware of. And then there’s maybe even more to this if we start to worry about him saying “This is how it works” which may go on only some readings.
(P.S. A few days later, he got down from that wall, and the husband caught him rifling in their liquor cabinet, and strewn about him were several bottles of this family’s favorite kind of American distilled grain whiskey. Which made him the catcher in the rye.)
Maybe it’s a genuine CIDU? But I think that punch line is all there is.
I think we all can sympathize with Duane’s motivations for his … little prank. And that’s the main joke, which is not in need of explication; so this isn’t quite a CIDU. But if we wanted to get into it a little, we could ask whether he’s getting revenge more on the kid or on the mom. And at the practical level, what does it mean that he still has the barber’s customer-apron as he’s leaving?
I guess this Working Daze fits an offshoot of the “CIDU-Quickie” category, where the joke is utterly incomprehensible until you are shown (or realize you already know) an instance of something-that’s-going-around, and then that entirely exhausts the mystery.
Linked here is a compilation of what lies behind the joke. (I can’t watch this all the way thru.)
Is it just that the guy is so shook up he books three appointments a day? Is that all there is? Is it weird that the receptionist builds on the standard “Your three o’clock is here” instead of, maybe, using his name (which she must be familiar with by now)?
This was going to be a standalone CIDU, with the question-blurb of The slug has eaten some salted snack and is having a toxic reaction?? There was another fly, and the frog scooped him up with his tongue?? Do you have another?
But then I realized the item hanging out of the frog’s mouth is not his tongue (which would be thin and ready to flick) but a wing tip, matching the wings we see on the speaking fly at the left. Well, that answers which of the explanations it was.
But I didn’t know whether to feel cheated of a mystery, or ready to applaud the skilfully delayed punch. Anyway, that landed it here!
“Love” – “Confess” – “Surf”
Those are the titles I can make out among the items displayed at this newsstand.
Okay, the joke is that this soldier (is he “Killer”?) is really just interested in eyeing the pin-ups and girlie publications, while prolonging his visit by asking for various small-town papers the newsstand does not carry.
But why do I feel like that raises gaps in the story that ought to have been dealt with? Like: is he making the towns and papers up, or are they supposed to be real within the fictive world? Is the “Nope” answer the basis for him to keep going, with possible second or third choices? Or might he have gotten them all, if commissioned by several guys back at the platoon to bring them back their respective home-town papers? And does this newsstand in fact carry regular newspapers and general-interest magazines, and the pin-up material is just what gets most prominently displayed? Or is that all they sell?
Hmm, something missing? Oh yes – the generator that would be hooked up so that the exercise bike powers the fan! Or go old style, and show some belts and pulleys making a mechanical connection. Otherwise, what’s the joke?
Here we have just one of those unanswered little mysteries, not any critique. Just what did he mean to say instead, eh?
P.S. It doesn’t answer that question, but the next day’s strip is from the same therapy session, and picks up the theme of slips.
This Cornered probably strays a little closer than we usually like to topical econo-political partisan issues, but it is a clever twist on the “start at the bottom and work your way up” trope.
From Chemgal, who says “I thought the highest possible GPA was 4.0. Are they using a different scale in Zits?” She mentions she can think of a possible explanation, and I think I know what it is too, but even if it’s not a full CIDU there may be enough uncertainty for people to discuss as a Semi-CIDU.
This Beetle Bailey is from 1965-05-17, and appeared in ComicsKingdom retro series recently on Thursday 2021-12-02. I wasn’t aware that spray-painting would be part of helmet maintenance, but I guess why not? But what exactly is going on in the aftermath scene that is puzzling the General? Has the grass in general been painted an odd color, but not inside the helmet outlines where it was shielded? But those patches don’t look like they’re supposed to be natural grass. Or has the procedure somehow damaged / killed off the grass inside the helmets, and left it normal outside?
We all know one of the standard time-travel puzzlement plots involves killing Hitler young. But what are the stories about smuggling him away in your luggage?
Call me hidebound and oldfashioned, but I don’t always think open-ended and unresolved are better. MAYBE someone with a lot of insight into snoring does have a principled way of matching these up. But without that, or an official answer key, you have to resort to “Oh, just posing the question is funny, and gives us a chuckle about how much snoring goes on and how bad it is.” But is that really enough?
Yeah but really, is it just a rat-race joke? Or just an oddly-executed commentary on human family economics?
I have to say I was a little put off from the whole picture by taking the rack of environments to be a bakery display case. But then what is this place? A lab? A pet store? Neither one should be recruiting their subjects from a handy nearby mousehole!
Why is she giving it five stars if she doesn’t like it? I get that humor often (usually? always?) comes from the contrast between what you would expect to happen and what’s actually happening, but I don’t understand what’s happening here.
Double hit for Mannequin on the Moon:
And now a pair of suggestions from Mindy!
BTW, Tom Falco discusses on his blog how he made use of previously published versions of half of this panel.
Comics I Don't Understand 