Comic Strip Conversations: A Quote from Garfield

Here are nine lines from nine different Sunday comic strips; we hope you enjoy them:

1) "Do you like pie, Earl?" (Pickles, Aug. 2nd)

2) "So what are you guys going to do tonight?" (Zits, March 29th)

3) "I forgot my Kindle!" (Blondie, Aug. 9th)

4) "He fell into a black hole of narcissism" (Brewster Rockit: Space Guy, Aug. 9th)

5) "Are you still single?" (Garfield, Aug. 9th, pict. top)

6) "Yeah, but the worst part is being invisible." (Doonesbury, March 29th)

7) "I've gotta hit the little boys' room." (Crankshaft, May 3rd)

8) "How should I approach your dog?" (Mother Goose and Grimm, May 3rd, pict. center)

9) "There's lasagna in the oven," (Sherman's Lagoon, March 29th)

http://www.gocomics.com

http://www.comicskingdom.com

Top Ten Comic Strips from the Sunday Roanoke Times: Going to Syria

We are quite pressed for time today, so let's go ahead and jump in the pool, which probably doesn't translate well in Japanese, Polish, or Norwegian!

This week's first place comic strip went to "Pearls Before Swine" where pig gives a brilliant line in the last panel; we don't want to give out a Spoiler Alert, so we shall let you find the strip for yourself (see link below).

In "Doonesbury," political satire takes center stage as one patriotic American wanting to defeat ISIS terrorists realizes that coming to Syria is even more problematic than Afghanistan, a country he knows much better.

In our third place strip, Bucky the cat and Satchel the dog have a spot about Atlantic salmon (pict. bottom); here is our top ten:

1. Pearls Before Swine http://www.gocomics.com/pearlsbeforeswine/2015/08/09

2. Get Fuzzy http://www.gocomics.com/getfuzzy

3. Doonesbury http://www.doonesbury.com

4. Agnes http://www.gocomics.com/agnes

5. Non Sequitur

6. Jump Start http://www.gocomics.com/jumpstart

7. Dilbert http://www.dilbert.com

8. Mutts

9. Speed Bump

10. Zits

http://www.roanoke.com

Top Ten Comics from the Roanoke Times: Hair Force One

Once again, Garry Trudeau brilliantly lampooned the Donald Trump presidential candidate run for the Republican Party nomination which makes me think that one Paris Hilton will make a play for the Oval Office as well in his comic strip "Doonesbury." In his strip, which got first place this week, Trudeau also makes fun of two other Republican candidates with zero political experience in Carly Fiornia, a former Hewett Packard CEO, and Ben Carson, a retired brain surgeon from Baltimore, Md.

Second place goes to "Zits"in which Jeremy, a boy who has been a teenager since the days when Nirvana was in its heyday, is depicted as a large massive head which his parents try to push along.

"Speed Bump" also finished in our top ten, and this week Dave Coverly's strip had a Roman man in a toga with son who was also dressed like John Belushi in "Animal House" looking up at the sky and noticing birds flying over them in a V-formation which makes the boy ask his father: "Why do birds fly in a five-shape?"

Here is our top ten:

1. Doonesbury

2. Zits

3. Jump Start

4. Agnes

5. Garfield

6. Pearls Before Swine

7. Get Fuzzy

8. Funky Winkerbean

9. Speed Bump

10. Dilbert

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.gocmics.com/speedbump

http://www.gocomics.com/zits

http://www.gocomics.com/agnes

Our Top 10 Favorite Comic Strips from Go Comics: The Flying MCoy Wins the Gold

The images above are in reference to: 1) "The Godfather" is used for "The Flying McCoys," which this Sunday featured a waiter giving a patron at an Italian restaurant too much ground pepper, yeah, it made us think of the Olive Garden too; 2) "Chilly Willy the Penguin" is used for "WuMo" where someone discovers an eskimo, a penguin, and a polar bear have been in a freezer!; and 3) the roller coaster is used for "Foxtrot" where Paige tries to recover from an uncomfortable luna park experience.

Here is our top ten:

1. The Flying McCoys

2. Lio

3. Doonesbury

4. WuMo

5. Foxtrot

6. Reality Check

7. Off the Mark

8. Phoebe and Her Unicorn

9. F-Minus

10. Stone Soup

http://www.denverpost.com/comics

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/comics/

http://www.gocomics.com

Top 10 Comics from Sunday Roanoke Times: Doonesbury Slam Dunks Kansas Politics; Pearls Praises Guns N Roses

Greetings to our blog readers in Germany, Lebanon, and Kenya..........

Kudos to Garry Trudeau for a brilliant satire of how Gov. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas) messed up his state's entire education program with excessive tax breaks for the wealthy; we are pretty sure this might get his comic strip "Doonesbury" banned from "The Wichita Eagle" in Wichita, Kan., assuming the paper carries the strip.

While "Doonesbury" got first place, "Pearls Before Swine" got second place with a comic strip that referred to both Nirvana and Guns N' Roses, hence the reason why former Guns guitarist Slash is our top image.

"Get Fuzzy" came in third. "Jump Start" came in fourth with a look at what might happen if little green men like Marvin the Martian visited an unsuspecting neighborhood in a suburb like Cary, NC, (Raleigh 'burb) and lastly, "Speed Bump" came in fifth with a strip featuring two laid back cheetahs.

Here is our top ten:

1) Doonesbury

2) Pearls Before Swine

3) Get Fuzzy

4) Jump Start

5) Speed Bump

6) Non-Sequitir

7) Zits

8) Mutts

9) Hi and Lois (wow!)

10) The Family Circus (double wow!!)

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.gocomics.com

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.kansas.com

Top Ten Comic Strips from Sunday, Feb. 8th edition of "Herald-Journal" in Spartanburg, SC: We Love Bizarro

Greetings to our beloved blog readers in Latvia, Ireland and Mexico.

What do Marvin the Martian, Lily Tomlin and U.S. Olympic skier Bode Miller have in common? Well, they each relate to three of the comic strips than we rank in our top ten of strips that appear in the Sunday edition of "The Herald-Journal" in Spartanburg, SC, not to be confused with newspapers with same or similar names in Durham, NC, and Huntington, WVa.!

Marvin the Martian is our ode "Bizarro" in which aliens present a cat to their leader and promise he will make for some nifty Youtube videos. Aliensand UFOs  were also featured in "Ziggy," a strip not carried by the "HJ."

Second place goes to "Doonesbury" which takes in an office. We thought it was somewhere like a call center which made us think of Lily Tomlin though when she did these comedy skits for "Laugh-In" circa 1968, they probably didn't have call centers.

Third place went to "Dustin," where the title characters decide to go skiing over the title character's mother's strong objections. Perhaps, they headed to Telluride, Colorado, or Park City, Utah...........


Here is our top ten:

1) Bizarro

2) Doonesbury

3) Dustin

4) Get Fuzzy

5) Garfield

6) Dilbert

7) Close to Home

8) Snuffy Smith

9) Gasoline Alley

10) For Better or For Worse.....

Our Top Sunday Comic Strips from the Roanoke Times for the Week of December 7th

Greetings to our blog readers in Costa Rica, Argentina and Brazil!

This week, "Doonesbury," which had an exceptional gag with scenes from the comic strip's six main characters and their unique story lines in six different panels. Since the comic strip reminded us of a soap opera, we decided to use an image with the cast of "Young and the Restless" to go with this Sunday's "Doonesbury," but we somehow doubt that Garry Trudeau watches soap operas?!

"Pearls Before Swine" featured a satire of a job interview in which Rat, who has even fewer people skills than Dilbert (for those of you in Slovakia Dilbert is in the comic strip "Dilbert;" we're not making fun as you are our favorite former Yugoslav republic**) tries to be candid and honest to his futility.Oh btw, the snazzy Mexican men's dress shoes are used as our image for "Pearls."

Lastly, "Get Fuzzy," which usually revolves around squabbling between a cat and a third comes in third place as the house pets have it out over a broccoli casserole, or something like that!

Here is our top ten from the Sunday Dec. 7th "Roanoke Times," which does not carry "Rhymes Before Orange," WUMO," Brewster Rockit: Space Guy," "Sherman's Lagoon," "Dustin," "The Brilliant Mind of Edison Lee"........................but, hey still have "Hi and Lois"!

1) Doonesbury

2) Pearls Before Swine

3) Get Fuzzy

4) Dilbert

5) Jump Start (highest rating ever for this comic on our survey)

6) Garfield

7) Speed Bump

8) Zits

9) Agnes

10) Pickles

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.gocomics.com











**_ This is a joke! Unlike quite a few Americans, I know that Slovenia is the country that was once part of Yugoslavia.

Our Favorite Comic Strips from the Sunday Roanoke Times (Oct. 12th edition)

Greetings to our blog readers in New Zealand, Kenya and Argentina as well as our domestic friends in Alaska, Hawaii and Kansas.

We are taking a H.G. Wells time machine back to last Sunday as we did not get around to posting our favorite comic strips from a week ago Sunday, but we have them for your consumption right here; for the latest survey go to our sister blog "The Daily Vampire" at: http://www.nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com

There is a major surprise in this survey as we rank "Zits," a comic strip about a teenage boy who hasn't aged since Bruce Springsteen's 1984 album "Born in the USA" came out and that was well, first when I was a teenager! (Actually, we just researched and "Zits" actually debuted in 1997). In the Oct. 12th issue, Jeremy, the kid who never gets passed the wonder years is seen loading textbooks on a conveyor belt as he takes them out of a '70s VW van (top image). This is perhaps the funniest "Zits" strip we have seen in ages.

The silver medal goes to American swimmer Michael Phelps (we were just trying to see if you were paying attention). It actually goes to "Doonesbury," right-wing comic talk show host Dennis Miller's favorite comic strip (yeah, I somehow doubt that since "Doonesbury" is brilliant progressive satire). which makes fun of how our government makes back room deal with Middle Eastern dictators. Since the dictator in the strip is a fictional character who looks like Saddam Hussein of Iraq, we went with an image of sheep for the comic strip (center image; these are actually sheep in Turkey).

In this place, we have the always funny Stefan Pastis comic strip "Pearls Before Swine," which features Pig offending two blue birds which leaves his frenemy Rat to come to his comfort.

Here is our top ten:

1) Zits

2) Doonesbury

3) Pearls Before Swine

4) Dilbert

5) Get Fuzzy

6) Speed Bump

7) Garfield

8) Non-Sequitir

9) Agnes

10) Jump Start

http://zitscomics.com/

http://www.gocomics.com/pearlsbeforeswine

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.dilbert.com

http://www.dennismillerradio.com/

http://www.michaelmoore.com (web site for Michael Moore, we try to abide by the 'equal time' rule)

PS: Dennis Miller will be performing live in Colorado Springs, Colo., a right-wing evangelical enclave that's also home to the Air Force Academy; I imagine he will have a large crowd there.

Top Sunday Comic Strips from the Roanoke Times: The Satan Gag Works!

Greetings to our blog readers in Wales, Estonia and Thailand.

Today, we once again look at our favorite Sunday comic strips, and this week, we focus on the comic strips found in Sunday, Sept. 21st edition of "The Roanoke Times," the daily newspaper for Roanoke, Va. The Sunday strips include strips aimed mostly at children ("Garfield," "Family Circus"), adults ("Dilbert" and "For Better or For Worse") and people who are 112 years old and living in a nursing home in Christiansburg, Va. ("Hi and Lois" and "Pickles").

We imagine "Pearls of Swine" may have received the wrath from Rev. Johnny Robertson from Martinsville, Va., which is just barely in the Roanoke newspaper's circulation area in which a woman who is dressed like the devil convinces the devil character rat to engage in mischief. "Pearls" is our strip of the week. (Yes, it is the reason for our poster from "The Devil," an amusing Turkish remake of "The Exorcist," no Linda Blair in the remake though).

Other strips in our top five include "Speed Bump" which has a take on what it would be like to be Icarus (center image) and visit a tanning salon, "Doonesbury" which has an American 'helping out' against radicals in the island national nation of The Maldives, and "Funky Winkerbean" which takes on a high school stage production of "Macbeth," aka 'The Scottish play.' Since, Criterion Classics announced it was releasing the vintage Roman Polanski film version of the Shaekespeare play, we though we'd include a poster from the film here.

Here is the top ten:

1) Pearls Before Swine

2) Speed Bump

3) Doonesbury

4) Funky Winkerbean

5) Non-Sequitur

6) Zits

7) Agnes

8) Get Fuzzy

9) Dilbert

10) Mutts

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.criterion.com

http://www.funkywinkerbean.com

http://www.doonesbury.com

For our look at Sunday comics from "The Washington Post," be sure to visit our sister blog "The Daily Vampire" at: http://www.nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com

The Rat is Back: Pearls Before Swine is Our Favorite Sunday Comic Strip in the Roanoke Times

"Pearls Before Swine" focused on a dinosaur named Moneysaurus which featured a surprising cameo with a character from "Dilbert," we assume Stephan Pastis had Scott Adams' ok. "Speed Bump" featured a visit from the Grim Reaper which, of course, always reminds of us Ingmar Bergman's "The Seventh Seal" (pictured center). "Doonesbury" featured Garry Trudeau making fun of those who deny global warming which makes us assume that Eric Cantor has not read Al Gore's stirring commentary piece in "Rolling Stone" (current issue) about that very topic. But, then again, Cantor seems to have other worries as does Spanish Ambassador Ramon Gil-Casares, who is probably still stunned by how bad Spain played in the 2014 World Cup.

Here are our top ten favorite comic strips from "The Roanoke Times:"

1. Pearls Before Swine

2. Speed Bump

3. Doonesbury

4. Get Fuzzy

5. Funky Winkerbean

6. Garfield

7. Zits

8. Dilbert

9. Agnes

10. Non-Sequitur

http://www.rollingstone.com

http://www.dilbert.com

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.gocmics.com/getfuzzy

Comic Strip Grand Slam (1 of 4): Doonesbury Takes It All

Paintball. Leaving the kid you are supposed to be baby-sitting outside while you go into a bar. Monkeys in Space. Brings Your Kid to Work Days. An out-of-season April Fool's prank.

All of these were topics from the June 8th edition of "The Roanoke Times," for our favorites from "The Washington Post" (also from June 8th) go to our sister blog "The Daily Vampire:" http://www.noctrnalguy38.blogspot.com

Here are our top ten favorites:


1. Doonesbury (paintball image)

2. Pearls Before Swine (beer image)

3. Funky Winkerbean (monkeys in space image)

4. Dilbert

5. Get Fuzzy

6. Zits

7. Garfield

8. Speed Bump

9. Non-Sequitir

10. Baby Blues

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.funkywinkerbean.com

http://www.roanoke.com

Sunday Roanoke Times Survey: Doonesbury Brilliantly Satires Dubya

Garry Trudeau hit the high mark in political satire on Mother's Day with "Doonesbury" when he made fun of former president George W. Bush's new painting hobby, which was even the subject of a political story by "New York Times" political beat writer Peter Baker. The punch line of the strip is highly political, and perhaps it will lead to "The Spartanburg Herald Journal" in Spartanburg, South Carolina, dropping the strip (we actually have no idea which strips are in that newspaper). Hence, "Doonesbury" is our comic strip of the week from those published in the Sunday "Roanoke Times" in Roanoke, Va.

"Funky Winkerbean" was a close second with its Starbuck Jones comic book cover series which featured a live octopus. We were unable to find a good image of a live octopus, so we went with this photo of an octopus on a plate in Greece. Our apologies to our good friends at the National Aquarium in Baltimore, Maryland, and the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta (well, we actually don't know a single who works in an aquarium).

Third place goes to "Speed Bump"," which features two dogs sitting on a couch as they watch a cat movie with subtitles. We didn't wan tto violate artist Dave Coverly's copyright, so we decided to go with an image of Cuneyt Arkin, a Turkish '70s action movie icon, which is made funnier with subtitles.

Here is the survey results:

1) "Doonesbury"

2) "Funky Winkerbean"

3) "Speed Bump"

4) "Agnes"

5) "Pearls Before Swine"

6) "Get Fuzzy"

7) "Zits"

8) "Garfield"

9) "Dilbert"

10) "Jump Start"


http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.funkywinkerbean.com

http://www.speedbump.com

http://www.goupstate.com/

http://www.georgewbushlibrary.smu.edu/

http://www.visitgreece.gr/

http://www.goturkey.com/

http://www.aqua.org/

http://www.georgiaaquarium.org/

http://www.roanoke.com

The Top 10 Sunday Comic Strips from "The Washington Post:" We Love WUMO Again

Hermit crabs were mentioned in two comic strips: Two which made our top ten........"Sherman's Lagoon" and "Mark Trail." And, there were Daylight Savings Time gags in "Foxtrot" and "Rhymes with Orange" as well as appearances by aliens in "Lio" and "The Argyle Sweater." Plus, there was the return of Mister Butts in "Doonesbury."

The Danish import "WUMO" is our top Sunday comic strips from "The Washington Post" even though the joke about an airline going into outer space seems to be a jolting coincidence given the missing Malaysian Airlines plane tragedy, but we think our friends at Turkish Airlines will like the use of their image here (we only know one person who works for them, actually!).

"Speed Bump" scored again as the single panel comic strip depicts the horror of a couple having breakfast as they are approached by very large bed bugs, which reminds us of the epidemic hotels in Raleigh, NC, had with the insects several years back.

Finally, Lio and his buddies from outer space go a Red Box machine and pick out Steven Spielberg's "E.T.," which we had difficulty finding an image of.

Here is our top ten:

1. "WUMO"

2. "Speed Bump"

3. "Lio"

4. "Sherman's Lagoon"

5. "Agnes"

6. "Reply All"

7. "Big Nate"

8. "Rhymes with Orange"

9. "Doonesbury"

10. "Mark Trail"

http://www.gocomics.com/wumo

http://www.gocomics.com/speedbump

http://www.gocomics.com/lio

http://shermanslagoon.com/

http://comicskingdom.com/mark-trail

http://www.turkishairlines.com/

Our Ten Favorite Comic Strips from the Roanoke Times: Speed Bump Takes the Gold

Here are our ten favorite comic strips from the Sunday "Roanoke Times," the daily newspaper of Roanoke, Va. "Speed Bump" which takes first place in our survey revolves around graffiti! The image here is of graffiti in Denver, Colo.

Here is our list:

1. Speed Bump

2. Pearls Before Swine

3. Doonesbury

4. Get Fuzzy

5. Funky Winkerbean

6. Agnes

7. Family Circus (surprise!)

8. Dilbert

9. Garfield

10. Zits

http://www.gocomics.com/speedbump

http://www.stephanpastis.wordpress.com
 
http://www.gocomics.com/getfuzzy

Favorite Comic Strips from the Sunday Roanoke Times: Another Great Week for Pearls Before Swine

We aren't just posting a 1993 photo of Heather Locklear in the hopes that it will generates lots of hit from Cuba to Kazakhstan to New Zealand (though that would be nice), but because a blonde woman named Wanda who looks a bit like a young Heather, is the main guest character in this week's Sunday comic strip.

Wanda ends causing friction to Rat, one of the strip's central characters, and his Uncle Dan, without intention.

Here are our top 10 comic strips from this Sunday's "Roanoke Times" (Roanoke, Va.):

1. Pearls Before Swine

2. Agnes

3. Doonesbury

4. Get Fuzzy

5. Garfield

6. Speed Bump

7. Funky Winkerbean

8. Dilbert

9. Blondie

10. Jump Start

http://www.garfield.com

http://www.dilbert.com

http://www.doonesbury.com

Out Top 10 Favorite Comic Strips from the Roanoke Times (Oct. 27th edition)

This entry was supposed to be posted way back on Oct. 30th, but we got distracted, and yeah life happens. But, we are back now. And, we will resume where we left off, as we look at our ten favorite comic strips from the Oct.27th Sunday edition of "The Roanoke Times" in Roanoke, Va.


Here we go:

1. Doonesbury (Image One_ a Virginia Tech Hokies helmet. The strip dealt with college football and academics).

2. Pearls Before Swine (Image Two_ this is of a pygmy goat from Cameroon residing at the Mill Mountain Zoo in Roanoke_ a goat is one of the main characters in "Pearls Before Swine")

3. "Garfield" (Image Three)

4. Funky Winkerbean

5. Agnes

6. Dilbert

7. Zits

8. Blondie

9. Hi and Lois

10. Get Fuzzy

http://www.exemplum.com/mmzoo/SitePages/index.aspx

http://www.doonesbury.slate.com

http://www.garfield.com

http://www.funkywinkerbean.com

http://www.dilbert.com

DC Week Teaser (2 of 2) : So Much for a Political Fund-Raiser at the National Zoo

We are getting ready for DC Week, which will begin on Thursday. Our interview with Newt Gingrich has been postponed as has our interviews with Michele Bachmann and Clarence Thomas (yes, we are kidding, of course), but we hope to bring you an array of entries pertaining to Washington, DC, as the nation's capitals deals with lost tourism revenue due to the federal government shut down.

But, for right now, we leave you with this teaser, which features: 1) Chris Pontius, an American soccer player for DC United; 2) a giraffe to symbolize the National Zoo, which is closed due to shut down and 3) Cong. David Price (D-NC), one of the few Democrats in a 'safe district' in the increasingly right-wing Tarheel State (Price's district is in and around Chapel Hill and Durham, NC), which was the subject of a brilliant "Doonesbury" comic strip that was published yesterday. I'm sure at least one tea partier in North Carolina cancelled his subscription to the "Charlotte Observer."

http://price.house.gov/#dialog

http://www.dcunited.com/

http://www.gocomics.com/doonesbury

http://www.ncdp.org/ (NC Democratic Party)

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/

Our Ten Favorite Comic Strips of the Week: Cubicle Dwellers, Aliens and Rural Kentuckians

Though it has never been mentioned in the comic strip, we suspect that "Barney Google and Snuffy Smith," one of the oldest running American comic strips in existence, takes place in a remote, rural place like Harlan, Kentucky, where one will likely find revival preachers.

It makes this initial entry on our ten favorite comic strips from the Sunday pages, along with "Brewster Rockit: Space Guy" in which 'our hero' must be fight to save planet Earth from an alien insectoid invasion, and "Dilbert" in which a bald-headed executive gives workplace strategies to Dilbert.

By the way, there is a UFO Museum in Istanbul, Turkey, of all places, not far from where the Gezi Park protests, against Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the authoritarian prime minister of Turkey. 

Here are the Top Ten, in alphabetical order, as opposed to order of preference:

1) "Barney Google and Snuffy Smith"(John Rose is now the cartoonist of the strip)

2) "Brewster Rockit: Space Guy"

3) ""Dilbert"

4) "Doonesbury" (this one was really awesome!)

5) The Duplex

6) "F-Minus"

7) "Knight Life" (Keith Knight continues his 'Life's Little Victories' series)

8) "Mother Goose and Grimm"

9) "Non Sequitir"

10) "Speed Bump"

http://www.dilbert.com

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.knightlifecomic.com

http:///www.ufoevidence.org (not an endorsement)

http://www.harlancountytrails.com