Top Ten Comics from The Washington Post (Sunday Edition): We Endorse Dustin for President

Greetings to our blog readers in Croatia, Israel, and India.....

During our lunch hour, we took the Mental Floss Presidential Quiz, and we forgot about Chester Arthur, who was president 20 years after the Civil War. Our sincerest apologies to his descendants. Otherwise, we named all the presidents correctly, even Rutherford Hayes and Martin Van Buren.

Here are our top ten favorite comic strips from "The Washington Post." First place, goes to "Dustin," where a water balloons gag (pict. top) ends with a brilliant zinger. Second place goes to "Lio," a comic strip with dark, gothic humor, which this week features a Grim Reaper gag (pict. center), and lastly in fifth place, the lazy American male is lampooned in "Rhymes with Orange."

"Hagar the Horrible" is not actually out tenth favorite comic strip, but we thought we would start our own running gag, by having it in tenth place every week. Here's the list:

1. Dustin

2. Lio

3. Doonesbury

4. WuMo

5. Rhymes with Orange

6. Foxtrot

7. Zits

8. Brewster Rockit

9. Prickly City

10. Hagar the Horrible (Pearls Before Swine would've actually gotten tenth place)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

http://www.denverpost.com/comics

http://www.dustincomics.com

http://www.gocmics.com/lio

http://www.gocomics.com/lio

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

Quote of the Day/Week- Ingmar Bergman

Today, we continue to quote people associated with the 16 countries in the Euro 2012 Cup being played in Poland and Ukraine. And, we are going to quote the late, great film director Ingmar Bergman (1918-2007) who was from Uppsala. Bergman was known for many outstanding cinematic ventures, including "The Seventh Seal," "Persona" and "Fanny and Alexander."

The Swedish soccer team has the daunting task of facing a star-studded English soccer team in Kiev, Ukraine, tomorrow. The Swedes are in a virtual must-win situation.

Here is Bergman's quote:

"The theatre is like a faithful wife. Film is the great adventure_ the costly, exciting mistress."

SIDEBAR: Since we are popular in Slovenia, we thought we should congratulate the Los Angeles Kings for winning their first ever NHL Stanley Cup titles by defeating the New Jersey Devils four games to two.

Though soccer and basketball are more popular than hockey in Slovenia, Anze Kopitar, 24, who was one of the key reasons for the Kings winning the cup has made the sport more popular in the former Yugoslav republic. Kopitar is also the first Slovenian national to hoist the Stanley Cup.http://www.losangeleskingsinsider.com

Highlights from My 24 Things to Improve My Life List

It seems to be a slow Saturday night, and I can tell that from Twitter where I saw that people as diverse as right-wing evangelical acivist Nathan Tabor, from Winston-Salem, NC, moderate conservative pundit David Frum and liberal journalist Suzy Khimm were all watching the Republican debate from Michigan tonight.

So, perhaps this will mean more blog traffic than normal.

A funny thing happened the other day as my mom and I were browsing through an independent bookstore in Roanoke, Va. I stumbled across a copy of a self-help book entitled "Clean Like a Man" by Tom McNulty. I saw on the back jacket that comic/actor Richard Lewis ("Curb Your Enthuiasm") had strongly endorsed it as he confessed to being an Oscar Madison-type.

My mom looked when I showed her the book, which I should probably read_twice, and said (paraphrase): "Oh come on. You know you'll never read the thing; sorry son, but you are a hopeless cause."

So, with that, here are highlights from a list I made today on ways I could improve my life:

1. Lose weight

2. Get a good-paying job

3. Write a short story or even a short, short story

4. Clean house (hence, the reason for the vacuum cleaner image)

5. Try to get more hits on the two blogs; surely there is someone in a hut in the jungles of Burundi who cares about what I have to say.

6. Develop more confidence around attractive women; some guy found a way to ask Anne Hathaway out on a date.

7. Go on more long walks

8. Read Leo Tolstoy's "War and Peace" or at least the first chapter.

9. Watch more Jean-Luc Godard films (we would've gone with Ingmar Bergman, but his films make me feel very depressed, especially "Fanny and Alexander," it's more gut-wrenching than "Schindler's List").

10. Listen to more Turkish psychedlic music from the 1970s.

11. Save up money to buy a $500 antique Swiss cuckoo clock.

12. Drink more Counter Culture* coffee instead of Starbucks.

*-Company based in Durham, NC. Reportedly, they use beans from farms in Rwanda and/or Uganda.

Has It Really Been Six Years?

The short answer is 'yes.' It has been six years since I've started blogging, and apparently, there is a real Channel 6 in Omaha, Neb., but we have no idea if we are popular in that marketplace or not!

SIDEBAR: According to a short article I read in the current issue of "Film Comment," the sappy film "The Champ" (1979. Dir- Franco Zeffirelli), which starred Jon Voight, Faye Dunaway and a young Rick Schroder (he is the same age as I am) is the most depressing film ever made. Researchers at Cal-Berkeley verified this in a scientific study conducted over many years. But, my vote would go to Ingmar Bergman's downer "Fanny and Alexander" or the Louis Malle tear-jerker "Au Revoir Les Enfants."

Coming Attractions-Where in the Soviet Union Will We Go Next

Here are some possible or likely features we will have posted hopefully within the next week assuming we don't get a pie-in-the-face (ala the late tv great Soupy Sales).

1) This week, we finally had a chance to watch the relatively new "Conan" show on TBS with Conan O'Brien who got the shaft at NBC. On the episode I watched, Conan's guest was just-retired NBA great Shaquille O'Neal, who revealed that he likes to go go-kart racing?!

2) Though Lithuania has been in the news, as the mayor of Vilnius unceremoniously crushed a lavish car parked in a bike lane with a tank, we are probably going to go with Turkmenistan as our next destination in our "What We Learned from Google Today" series, which is currently focusing on the former republics of the Soviet Union.

3) We will be continuing our quotes from subversive artists next week. John Waters, R.Crumb and Iggy Pop are among our candidates for the quotes.

_ If you want to take your kids to the movies and you live near Lexington, Va., (one hour north of Roanoke, three hours south of Washington, DC) then the Hull's Drive-in has a lineup geared just for the little ones with a double-feature consisting of "Winnie the Pooh" and "Zookeeper." Of course, for those of us with no kids, we can always stay at home and watch the Criterion version of Ingmar Bergman's "The Seventh Seal" while munching on Milk Duds.

Today We Celebrate Five Years of Blogging

As of today, this blog (which originally ran on AOL; they have since ended their blogging features) is five years old!

And, as usual, it has put me slightly behind my schedule as I have pertinent things to do today like read email, go to a comic book store and watch a Criterion version of some obscure early Ingmar Bergman film.

They are actually kicking people off computers here at the Pyongyang Public Library in Pyongyang, North Korea (that is a joke, so don't call Jimmy Carter!).

So, let me go ahead and congratulate the Ragsdale High School football team who won their home game in Jamestown, NC (a suburb of Greensboro and High Point) by a whopping 52-7 margin over Person County High School which had to make what must have been an awful hour and a half trip back to Roxboro last night. Though we feel for the folks from Person County HS, I gather Ragsdale fans follow my blog more closely so we are ultimately happier for the home team!

Finally, anyone looking a new home for a cat or dog (of course, cats are the better pet), in the Triad might want to go to the Forsyth County Animal Shelter in Winston-Salem where a tuxedo kitten named Rebel is looking for a new home.

Well, the North Korean soldiers are pointing towards me, so we better run while we have the chance....!