Today’s strip begs the question, if Lefty has to print 47 pages of things not to do for her band students, why is she taking them all to Columbus for the Ohio Music Educators Conference? Or rather, why is she taking any students at all to the Ohio Music Educators Conference? I guess they make preferable company to her typical OMEA companion Dinkle, but so does a moldy dish towel. I would take bets on whether or not the kids’ presence at the conference ultimately gets explained, but I cannot find any casino willing to give me odds on “yes”.
And don’t forget to tune in tomorrow, same time… same station, as spacemanspiff leads us all through what is hopefully something other than a return to Funky at the eye doctor. Frankly, I hope tomorrow’s strip is something other than a lot of things, including but not limited to: Les, Lefty and Dinkle, the Lisa movie, Cindy complaining about her looks, and Batom comics remembrance.
Son of Stuck Funky 
So, apparently we got 3 weeks of absolute boring nonsense, because Batiuk was carefully scraping together enough scarce humor to create one funny strip this month.
Oh the look of joy on Lefty’s face !
I’m not sure what’s worse: another week of Funky at the eye doctor or another Ohio Music educators convention.
We’ll probably get both.
This strip exists so it can be clipped out and taped to the refrigerator door for those band leaders who think this relates to them. Batiuk is finally acknowledging his only audience,
Who wants to be that the week to come will be the same? Clip art so it can be clipped and taped.
FUN FACT: No human being has actually cut out and saved a Funky Winkerbean comic strip since 1986.
You forgot about last year’s toilet-paper shortage, didn’t you?
Yeah, he panders to them pretty heavily. I believe he sells a collection of his band director strips at the conference.
As for today’s strip, it just suggests that Lefty cannot control her students. After all, Dinkle only needed one page of rules.
I think it’s still all about that sweet Dinkles brand band shoes money.
True. But I believe Batty also gets his own table and peddles his books.
I think it’s more an ego trip than anything else. The OMEA made the mistake of indulging Tom Batiuk once, so he’s going to be drawing and visiting them every year for the rest of his life. It’s a place where he thinks he’s important.
A forty-six page long list of how students nisbehaved at these dumbshit OMEA meetings? That’s bullshit. No way do Westview students have the imagination or guts to misbehave in so many ways. Certainly Batiuk couldn’t think of so many interesting ways to have kids act up.
Batiuk himself doesn’t have the creativity to think of 46 pages of hijinks, but I assure you a group of sufficiently bored adolescents certainly could. So one point for accuracy.
I remember my halcyon days of attending FFA nationals…and adding to a similar list myself, “Do not sleep underneath catering tables. Do not claim it is your birthday at a restaurant in order to get free dessert. Do not wander away from the group unless you have your own walkie talkie. Do not use your own walkie talkie as a pillow when sleeping under the catering tables. Do not lie about your age/height in order to use the McDonald’s play place. Do not fall asleep the McDonald’s play place unless you do so in transparent sections.”
It separately lists each particular brand of wine Funky sneaked onto the bus in the 70s.
Considering what Tom Batiuk writes about in his blog, I think imagine this behavior guide is 50% analysis of comic book covers, 30% Tom Batiuk complaining that he can’t do the serious work he wants to do, and 20% John Darling strips,
LOL these kids today, with their flagrant rule-flouting and lack of respect for the old way of doing things and so forth. This is one of those weird random Sunday strips that has nothing to do with anything. It’s just “there”. There must be hundreds of these, he should put them all together in a collection or something. “You Forgot About These…The Sunday Strips”.
I like how Lefty always wears little stud earrings so that, when TB can’t show her pinned-up sleeve, you don’t confuse her with Summer or a disheveled young Sam Donaldson.
Why does he go out of his way to draw such ugly women? Is it just poor drawing skills?
If I ever had to get on a bus that said “OMEA Or Bust”, I would have cut the brake lines and prayed for a quick death.
Did we ever see the sides of Bull’s car during his fateful last drive? Maybe he had the same idea.
Since this is a school trip, wouldn’t most of the code of conduct being enforced be the one contained in the student handbook?
That’s all right, though. They’ve never had a student on the Ohio Music Educators Association field trip refuse to sell prom tickets to a gay student.
Lefty looks at the list and blushes: “Oh, wait, this is forty-seven pages about what the chaperones aren’t supposed to do! Including every position known to man, woman and goat!”
“
The behavior guidelines listThis list is forty-seven pages long!” Now, isn’t that snappier?You know, I think I actually would prefer a Cindy strip. I’m ashamed to admit it, but it is true.
Why is she taking a busload of kids to a conference designed for EDUCATORS?? I can’t imagine that there would be anything there tailored to students, so most of these kids will be bored to death. If she took a smaller group of kids that expressed an interest in music education careers, that would make sense. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but it actually makes more sense for retired Dinkle to be there.
I was wondering about that too. It appears that some high school and college ensembles are showcased at the conference. Of course the potentially interesting storyline of how a school is invited didn’t even cause a blip on TomBa’s radar.
Silly me. It didn’t occur to me that they might be performing there. Maybe we’ll get more explanation this week.
Much of the appeal of teacher conventions is that you can get away from your kids for awhile. Not bring them along! I know this, why doesn’t Tom Batiuk know this?
Maybe, but I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for an explanation.