Don’t forget to vote in the 2023 Crankshaft Awards! Voting remains open for about another 5 days.
In Part 1 of this series, I predicted the seven Funky Winkerbean characters that will appear most often in Crankshaft in 2024. Here’s a recap of characters we’ve discussed so far, ranked by predicted most appearances:
- Mopey Pete Roberts/Reynolds (probability of appearing at least once in 2024: 99.9999%)
- Mindy Murdoch (99.9999%)
- Les Moore (99%)
- Dead Lisa (probability of being mentioned 99%; probability of actually appearing 20%)
- Dinkle (100%; has already appeared)
- Atomik Komix staff: Flash Freeman, Phil Holt, Darin Fairgood (55%)
- Pizza Box Monster (98%)
Dinkle’s off to a fast start, while Les and Lisa aren’t out of the gate yet.
Here are my remaining predictions. Keep in mind, I’m excluding native Crankshaft characters from my list. But it’s going to be a Top 25 of Funky Winkerbean characters!
8. St. Spires Choir: Lois, Mary Jane, Nancy, Bonnie, Pat, Ricca (100%; has already appeared). I said previously that Dinkle would have a larger role this year, and that choir arcs were in play. So I expect this group of characters to appear most often of the remaining Funky Winkerbean exiles.
Note: I’m not distinguishing between different choir members. They have had varying numbers of appearances in the past, and already have in 2024. The lesser ones, like Ricca, haven’t appeared yet and may not appear at all. This is where they’ll generally be in the rankings.
9. Cayla Williams Moore (35%). I don’t think Cayla’s ever been in Crankshaft. (CORRECTION: ComicBookHarriet points out in the first comment that she has, in 2010.) But I give her a fighting chance this year. If Les and his precious Dead Lisa book are going to be the center of the Burnings, he’s going to need someone to confide in. That’s long been Cayla’s only role in the Funkyverse. If she appears at all, she’ll be in at least 10 strips.
10. Funky Winkerbean (90%). Funky is the character we most thought would never appear in Crankshaft. He did in 2023, so he could sell Montoni’s to Pete, despite all the massive problems with that story. Now that that’s over, there’s one reason he’ll be back: Halloween. We’ll get to see the Pizza Box Monster terrorize him for a week. I think it’s very likely he’ll appear, but unlikely he’ll have an appearances count over 6 or 7.
11. Summer Moore (50%). If the Burnings really are going to be about book-burning, you’d better believe she’s going to weigh in. Knowing that Summer will write the book that survives the Burnings and redefines the human race, and the timeline in the Funkyverse being what it is… well, who knows how it’ll fit into the current story? But that won’t stop Batiuk from giving Summer some smug, faux-pithy remark Les could have made. But he’ll think it’s more ironic if Summer does it.
12. Mason Jarre (40%). Like Montoni’s, Batiuk went to great lengths to bring back the Valentine Theater, but hasn’t used it in a story yet. If Lisa’s Story The Movie, or visual media in general, figure into the Burnings, then I could be underestimating this horse.
13. John Howard (85%). John’s already had the “anime smutpeddler” arc, so I don’t think he’ll have much of a role in the Burnings. It’ll be about writers, not sellers. John’s wife, Becky, serves no purpose in Crankshaft. Batiuk doesn’t even need her to start Dinkle stories anymore. There’s zero reason for John to appear, except for visits to Komix Korner. Which means he’s almost guaranteed to appear. And, we’ll also see:
14. Crazy Harry Klinghorn (25%). Crazy’s only purpose in Crankshaft is to exist in the background of Komix Korner stories, and help John Howard be a dick to customers. Maybe Batiuk gets nostalgic and gives him a week. Especially now that Montoni’s is back for him to waste time in. Maybe we’ll get another week of “hip” jokes. Uggggh.
15. Rachel/Adeela/Cory/Rocky. Maybe Batiuk will remember that Montoni’s once had some employees, or notice that it needs some now.
16. The Real Housewives of Westview: Holly Budd Winkerbean, Cindy Summers Jarre, Jessica Daughterofjohndarlingwhowasmurdered Fairgood, Donna “The Eliminator” Klinghorn, any other pudgy dishwater blondes I’ve forgotten or not already mentioned, one-armed Becky Blackburn Howard, Harriet Dinkle (10%).
Crankshaft already has Pam and Mindy. It doesn’t need any more women to say “what are you doing, (man’s name)?” and “yes, (man’s name), you can go to the comic book store.” This has noticeably affected the Crankschluss; the women have been left at the border gate. Mason Jarre, Funky, Crazy Harry, and John Howard (none of whom have any reason to be in Crankshaft at all) each out-appeared their wives about 12 to 1 in 2023. I expect this ratio to continue among Funky Winkerbean refugees.
17. Bingo The Cat. Tom Batiuk loves his Continuity Porn, even though the Funkyverse has no continuity whatsoever. So I can see Bingo sticking his cat butt into the background of one of the choir arcs, or a one-off Sunday gag.
The rest of this list is pure madness. These are characters I don’t really expect to appear at all, but it would be fun and/or insane to see them:
18. Susan Smith. If Lisa doesn’t figure much into 2024, expect Batiuk to bring his #2 chew toy off the bench instead. Maybe the Burnings will drive Susan to not kill herself again.
19. Roberta Blackburn. Someone has to be the antagonist of the Burnings, right? Yes, but I have a much better idea:
20. Frankie. Imagine if the Burnings happened for no reason beyond pure spite towards Les, Lisa, and Westview. This would instantly make Frankie the most beloved Funkyverse character.
21. Any Random Act II or Act III High Schooler. Again, Tom Batiuk loves his Continuity Porn. The state of play in 2024 Centerville lends itself to some long-forgotten name popping up as an adult employee somewhere. Which one? Take your pick! Jinx, Rana, Keisha, Owen, Cody, Owen, Wedgeman, Mooch Myers, Maddie Klinghorn, Chien Parks, Maris Rogers, the gay prom students, Malcolm “Thatnot Hewmore”, Logan. Guesses are invited in the comments.
22. Dick Tracy. He canonically exists in the Funkyverse, and Batiuk has no qualms using characters from other comic strips without permission. Imagine Dick Tracy being the lead detective investigating the Burnings. Or even better: instigating the Burnings.
23. Andy Clark. Not Ed Crankshaft’s bus driving coworker Andy Clark, but Dinkle’s band director friend Andy Clark.
Having two Andy Clarks in the same place at the same time could bring about great comedy, both intentional and unintentional. Imagine this doddering old fool trying to drive a school bus, and is forced to play Ed Crankshaft’s “Thunderdome” game. Then he wins! Because, as it turns out, all you have to do to abandon children and cause traffic jams is be really bad at bus driving. (Tom Batiuk will completely fail to notice the inadvertent meta-commentary this makes.)
Meanwhile, Dinkle tells band director stories to a very confused black man. (Tom Batiuk will completely fail to notice the inadvertent meta-commentary this makes.)
24. Sadie Summers. Tom Batiuk thinks Sadie Summers is his worst mistake as a writer. I’m planning to write a post about all the things he’s done that are worse, but first I need to save money for a ten-terabyte hard drive.
Anyhoo, we also know Batiuk is vindictive. An attempt to settle the score against the character he hates the most could be very entertaining.
And finally, the best Funky Winkerbean cameo that could possibly happen in Crankshaft this year:
25. Zanzibar.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Awesome post, BJ6K, the only person I might rank the odds a little higher is Masone Jarre, as I feel like he might stick ol Jarhead into nearly every Valentine arc from now on.
Cayla actually did show up in Crankshaft back in 2011, when the time skip was still in play. Cayla’s dad, Smokey Williams, was a World Series winning pitcher for the Indians that Cranky helped advise sometime around the turn of the Millennium.
REMEMBER, do not confuse Smokey Williams with Jefferson Jacks, the integration era pitcher that Cranky actually played WITH on the Mudhens.
Like CBH, I’ll take those odds on Masone Jarre. How could Batiuk resist doing something about that theatre? Masone’s coming back … I can feel it.
Not on your list, but a character I think has at least a 25% chance of coming back? Ol’ Timemop himself, Harley. I think he may play a part in The Burnings…or at least in ‘elegantly’ undoing the damage they cause.
And if Zanzibar DOES make it into Crankshaft, traveling all the way forward from the silent movie era of … uh, okay, fine, 80 years ago? Don’t you think Timemop might have something to do with it?
Timemop
Yeah, he really should have been on my list. But that’s a topic I’ll dive into soon.
Hmm … he should have been on your list, but wasn’t. I wonder …. do you feel like somehow, someone nudged you into “accidentally” leaving him off?
I’m looking forward to your thoughts on Timemop — IF the controlling forces allow you to publish them!
I can see Mason flying back to Westview to “check on” or indulge himself in his theater, setting up Batiuk to do a week of Cindy stories.
Because, as we all know, Cindy can’t possibly fly back to her hometown on her own. And she certainly can’t make the decision to do so on her own!
I have no idea who these “Andies Clarks” are. Nor the slightest desire to find out, TBH.
But is this what Dinkle is this week? Just people praising him beyond all measure outside of a cult. It’s just Tom imagining what it must be like to be an author at a table swarmed with fans, while his basement-stinking hardcovers written by his own self lie on the rented table, untouched and mildewed. Dude, you already gave yourself an imaginary Oscar. When will you just stop this?
This is so Mary Sue that the Picard Facepalm is being done by *Marissa* Picard.
Nice list, BJ6K. I vote Zanzibar, who starts “The Burnings” by carelessly discarding a cigar butt. Zanzibar, the hero of millions. 💞😍
You omitted Kevin Brown. I know that sneaky little bastard is up to no good. Kevin can devise a cunning plan to pose as the Rictus Homunculus in order to steal Jeff’s prized omnibus editions. I wouldn’t rule him out as the Pizza Box Monster, or possibly even Zanzibar, in costume. The cheeky bastard.
Carelessly?! No, Zanzibar knew what he was doing… he was doing the world a favor.
True that.
Scenes We’d Like to See: Zanzibar drives into town in Cliff Anger’s convertible. He shoots up the town and sets it on fire with his cigar.
Chef’s kiss.
(stares out the window and lets out a contented sigh)
“Maybe the Burnings will drive Susan to not kill herself again.”
I think Susan would let the flames consume her
also I think Chien has a 0.0001% chance of appearing in this year’s Crankshaft strips
Wait…Did the guy who’s spent years whining about naming his strip Funky Winkerbean…Name his MOST popular character…”HARRY DINKLE”?
Is this why this is so popular with kids in middle school band class? “Yeah, teacher’s got to have a really–HARRY DINKLE!” “Hey, me too! Check out the boots I got to cover my…HARRY DINKLE!”
The problem with Sadie is that Batiuk doesn’t see why the character falls flat: she’s a stale copy of someone who’s basically a revenge fantasy concocted by a drone who doesn’t know what he’s doing to alienate people. The unreflective, suggestible child who thinks that it makes sense that Barry Allen have no real motivation other than being able to run at Idiotic Speed in the first place to punch armed robbers in goofy costumes grew into the AV geek who had no idea why his lack of social skills made his dating life a bust.
And, of course, TB took the stale copy that was Sadie and Xeroxed her into Jessica Darling, who was Xeroxed into Rana Howard, who was Xeroxed into Mallory Brooks, who was Xeroxed into Maris Rogers. TB is only made at Sadie because he probably thinks giving all of the others different haircuts makes them different characters.
TB actually ALMOST did something interesting with Sadie in later Act II when she got the pixie cut and took a job at Montoni’s (a job at Montoni’s IMPROVING a character?! Yeah, it was that bad…), becoming probably the most likable member of the little snark mob of Montoni’s waitresses (Becky, Lefty, and Lisa) that didn’t give Les nearly enough grief.
That’s the thing though…..he’s blind to his own deficiencies as a storyteller. He honestly does think that the appearance matters more than the personality.
Reminds me of Tiffany in Luann. Tiffany was originally an antagonist/frenemy, getting all the things Luann wanted because Tiffany was more attractive/more socially skilled/no less deserving/no less inteligent than Luann was. Luann supposedly had “inner beauty” but this was never in evidence.
After high school, Tiffany got a little pudgy, lost her queen bee status, and had to get a job. But this made her a much better character than Luann, and the other stunted dweebs who haven’t changed since middle school.
Batiuk’s hatred of Sadie Summers is even worse than Greg Evans’ continued use of Tiffany while still acting like Luann and the others are the people we should be rooting for.
We were never supposed to root for Luann. We’re supposed to root for the carping annoyance Bernice with her non-stop undermining of the title character. This is for a reason even stupider than Batiuk’s: Greg Evans’s on-going need to defend his utter lack of sympathy for teenage girls. It’s not the daughter who he got to keep’s fault that he had to give his son up for adoption but here we stand, watching the dad be a great guy because of his bored lack of investment in his daughter’s life.
The writers are going to have to get Bernice into therapy then, because they have made her so unlikeable that no one is rooting for her.
For what it’s worth, here my take on Bernice: Her know-it-all attitude reflects deep rooted insecurity from her mother giving up the older son (Bernice’s brother) for adoption. She heard about this brother her entire life, and somehow got the idea that her mother regretted that decision and therefore felt that she could never live up to this ghost of sibling. So she has tried her entire life to be “worthy”; hence the perfectionism, repression of her feelings and need to be smart because her personal skills are definitely lacking. She’s trying to be ‘”good enough” to her mom and trying to make up for the absence of her brother.
In the strip, the brother shows back up and reconnects with the family. There was a storyline a couple of Christmases ago where he and his own wife/kids are staying with Bernice’s family because he had lost his job or something, which led to Bernice living with Luann’s family. I don’t recall if the strip made this clear, but I think Bernice volunteered to give up her room in her own house on her own. She didn’t even want to go to Christmas dinner at her own house. That to me says “now that my brother is back, Mom won’t care if I’m around” and that she was avoiding how she feels about all of this. She spent a week of strips wrestling remembering how after reconnecting with her brother, they were writing letters to each other and for some reason he stopped writing. Bernice automatically assumed that she had done something wrong, without considering that maybe life had just gotten busy for him and it had nothing to do with her. She automatically blamed herself. I don’t think the strip showed what conclusion she came to in her head, but that particular Christmas story ended with her celebrating with her family.
To relate this to FW: both Bernice and Les have had a major family trauma that has turned them into insufferable characters. We and everyone in Westview know what Les’s trauma is. My only defense of Bernice is that she hasn’t yet realized how much the absence/reappearance of her brother has affected her entire life. Exploring it in the strip might be a really great story and would allow Bernice some much needed positive character growth as opposed to the controlling, difficult person she has become. She’s book smart, but emotionally, she’s a hot mess and I think it runs deep. Greg and company have really overdone it with her attitude and that’s a shame because she wasn’t always that way. If she’s wanting to be a therapist, I’m hoping that during one of her psych classes the light might go on for her. Or maybe at the very least, one of her friends might actually call her out on her behavior which might result in some serious self-examination. So maybe I am rooting for her a bit, but only in the context of character growth. And because I don’t want to see her become another Les.
As for Tiffany and Luann: I think Tiffany has actually had the most character growth of anyone. Every once in a while she’s the most sensible one in the strip! Luann has changed the least-sometimes I’m not sure the authors know what to do with her anymore.
Sorry for the over analysis on a non-FW strip character, but it bugs me when characters I generally like are turned into unappealing obnoxious ones-especially when there could be storylines to explore it. And that, of course, also applies to FW.
I do notice that by not invoking a name, you hope to delay that person’s appearance. Too bad the Devil appears even if you don’t speak his punchable face…..I mean, name.
Today’s Funky Crankerbean:
Harry L. Dinkle: Yep, we were all ass!
(Chien walks up to Harry L. Dinkle)
Dinkle: (grinning) are you here to purchase a book?
Chien: Why would I want to purchase a book made by someone like YOU?
(Dinkle becomes angry and tries to charge towards Chien, but a group of angry high schoolers tackle Dinkle to the ground)
Look at CS today (2/2). Look at how detailed P1 is. Then look at the woman in P2’s mouth. Why, it’s the One Big Happy look of parental slack-jawed shock and disbelief! Hey, lady, need a drool cup?
The oddly, wildly inconsistent art this week (remember Forehead Guy?) makes me wonder if Davis is using AI to scrape his own art, and maybe even Ayers’.
The dialog is believably human made, as Tom has spent decades writing badly. Read P1’s dialog out loud. No self-respecting robot would allow that through.
Maybe Davis’ intern being paid in “exposure” told his friends who he was working free for, and they said “Dude…that is so not fleek and riz that…TikTok something. Keep working for that guy, and it’s all solo-car dates at the vendo for you!”
I don’t think Les or any of his family will show up in the strip. I think Batiuk will play all coy and talk around Les and obliquely refer to him, Lisa, Cayla and/or Summer, but Les will never show. He’ll do this in an attempt to give Les this sort of mythic status, which he accomplishes by doing this and believing that everyone reading the strip KNOWS who he’s talking about.
It’ll be like all those times in FW when he’d have people talk about “That Cranky Guy” despite the fact that everyone in the conversation knew Crankshaft by name.
“That smug bearded asshole guy, you know who I mean. The obnoxious smirking WHS teacher, the one everyone despises.”
This is good speculation. It would be very like Batiuk to promote Les and Lisa to untouchable mythic legend status. Especially if he’s been advised against using the characters anymore. And, because the nature of the story requires the “burners” to win, at least for the short term. “Oh, Les would have stopped all this with a pithy passive-aggressive comment, and Lisa would have defended them. Sigh…”
We end the week defining who Dinkle is. He’s a self-important little man who refuses to understand that he and his band are secondary to the football team, he’s wasted his life devoted to said mirage and he probably can’t connect his antics to the hatred they engender. It’s as if he would say that the jury is still out on the cause if, having stuck his hand in a fire, he wound up with third degree burns.
I’m on board with most of your predictions, sadly, BJr6K. I do wonder whether we’ll ever see Frankie again. My guess is no, because he was specifically Lisa’s nemesis, so if there’s no Lisa-centric plot, there won’t be any Frankie. But then again, never underestimate TimeMop and his Rather Elegant Solutions.™️
Today’s Crankshaft continues the trend toward incoherence.
OMEA Guy: “Our football team really didn’t like our band using the football field, either!”
Dinkle: “I know… we had haters long before the internet came along.”
The internet has been a daily feature in most people’s lives for about 20 years. The guy talking to Dinkle looks about 40. I can’t imagine him ever having been a coach “before the internet.”
And he speaks in the past tense. Is he retired already? The OMEA seems chock full of retired people. Odd.
TB’s obsessively revives “Football fields are for band practice!”, Dinkle’s old catchphrase and his most successful moment. It’s starting to feel creepy, like a former child star who still puts on a baby voice and sings their big hit long after puberty has come and gone.
Anyway, do football players today use “the internet” to hate on band leaders? Or… is Tom talking about us?
Dinkle is very much speaking for Batiuk, even if Batiuk doesn’t realize it. He blames his negative reception on “internet haters”, after he boasts about very valid reasons for people to hate him: brainwashing and abusing children, forcing his band into concerts whose attendees paid money to hear something else, and selling public property for his own benefit.
Frankie did shift into becoming Boy Lisa’s nemesis in Act III, though (because, as usual, Les couldn’t be arsed to bother), and if Batiuk is going to make Mopey a semi-regular, there’s probably a decent chance Boy Lisa will make more appearances. Probably not enough for him to bother bringing Frankie back, but I wasn’t expecting Pizza Monster to show up again, either, so…
(On the other hand, based on how utterly uninteresting Pizza Monster’s appearance was, maybe you’re better off not getting more Frankie.)
i actually voted for Pizza Box Monster as best character, because…. well, at least he was weird. There was something kind of “Crazy Harry spinning pizzas on the record player and getting actual music” about PBM being a co-owner of Montoni’s. I wish Batiuk had leaned more into that, but he’s far more interested in wish fulfillment for characters who do the “correct” things.
Today’s I Hate Dinkle And I Want Him To Die (aka Funky Crankerbean)
Of course there’s no doubt that Dinkle was hated by the football team, he is nothing but an ass to everyone that isn’t him
Dinkle’s not just a rude ass; he’s someone whose behavior would grounds for immediate termination, if not criminal charges, and lawsuits against the school/church he works for.
Csroberto, you said you were currently in high school, is that right? I’d be curious to know how Act I of FW strikes you, compared to your own experience. It rang pretty true for me, but I graduated high school in 1990. Does Dinkle’s behavior seem out-of-date to you? Or boorish in ways that would no longer be tolerated?
To me, Batiuk seems to be writing like it’s still 1987, and has ignored all societal change since then. People are a lot more aware of bullying, and a lot less tolerant of it.
I think Dinkle’s behavior definitely wouldn’t be tolerated nowadays and would have got him a few decades in prison at best, and the electric chair (with a dry sponge) at worst
My experience in high school is rather dull compared to what happened in FW Act I
Also I think that Dinkle would be the kind of asshole who treats neurodivergent people far worse than neurotypical people (I’m on the spectrum)
If he was my teacher, then I would contact the principal so they can fire him
the electric chair (with a dry sponge) at worst
The “guest star” in today’s Crankshaft looks resembles Buck from Funky Winkerbean. I forget his last name, but a lot of us referred to him as “Cinder-Block-Head.” You know, Bull Bushka’s football friend/nemesis from Big Walnut Tech. The jerk who made a move on Linda while the dirt was still fresh on Bull’s grave.
Did anybody have Buck on their scorecards for predicted Funky Winkerbean character appearances In Crankshaft? I certainly didn’t.
Perhaps I’m wrong. Most football players in Batiuk’s strips resemble people who have sat in Jack Pierce’s makeup chair for a Frankenstein makeover, anyway. They must hit the blocking sleds with the crown of their heads, sans helmets. One flat top coming right up!
It’s possible Dan (I feel so uninspired) Davis simply copied and pasted, or traced, Buck from one of his appearances in Funky Winkerbean.
Buck Bedlow. I considered him, the late Bull Bushka, and Linda Lopez Bushka for my Top 25. They didn’t make the cut. It doesn’t seem like Batiuk would bring them back anyway, and there wasn’t anything fun to say about them. Linda in particular is the most dour, unlikeable character in a dour, unlikeable world.
If I remember correctly, wasn’t Buck showing early signs of dementia? In the real world, he would be receiving care for his condition. However, in the Batiukverse, I wouldn’t be surprised if he started smoking and made a full recovery. Currently, he is on a book tour promoting his life story in football.
Perhaps I jumped to conclusions. The guest star in today’s Crankshaft may simply be a cinder-block-headed band director who just happened to bring up the topic of football field scheduling conflicts. His head resembles the hats that some marching band members wear. You know, the tall, fuzzy, cylindrical ones resembling giant marshmallows.
I can’t say I miss Linda either. She was a real Debbie Downer. An over-entitled Debbie Downer who whined in a woe-is-me manner when things didn’t go her way. Her ever-present onion ring earrings and the Death Star trench part in her hair annoyed me.
Buck was last seen skulking away in rejection after being shot down by Linda. That was not an easy sentence to type, or think about. Man, that was a really sick, disturbing little plot twist. No one misses Linda. Linda was quite possibly the most relentlessly downbeat, dour, cynical, and joyless character in the strip. I can’t recall a single instance of Linda being happy, or enjoying something.
Oddly, despite the rejection, Batiuk/Ayers decided to seat Buck beside Linda in the 12/25/2022 comic.
I think Batiuk intended that Sunday strip to be the final curtain call for many of his Funky Winkerbean characters.
As a final Batiukverse curtain call for Chuck Ayers, I respect the hell out of it. It’s a nice job.
Did Chuck knew he’d have to take a back seat to John Byrne in the final week? Part of me hopes he read the storyboards and told Batiuk, “I’m not illustrating that garbage.”
Don’t forget that the ‘Mickey’ seated next to Buck was actually an Ayers to Ayers art swipe of Keisha from Bull’s funeral. So for all the admitted effort, at least some of it was a paste job.
CBH
Aw girl, harshing on my Chucky wuv?! 💔
You have a valid point though. After locating Buck and Linda, I confess to having wondered who was sitting on Buck’s right. I eventually assumed Mickey because she’s sitting close to her mom. But his Mickey doesn’t resemble the Mickey Lopez of my minds eye. Mickey was the type of gal who’d throw on a football helmet and score touchdowns in her homecoming dress.
Another reason to accept this person as Mickey is because Linda is not wearing her signature onion ring/Blackbeard the Pirate earrings. Linda appears to have passed them on down to Mickey.
This Mickey is an art swipe of Kiesha? I confess, I don’t have any Bull Bushka gravesite strips in my download collection. She doesn’t resemble the Keisha in the front row of the Christmas 2022 strip. I’ll have to find the SoSF blog for that strip.
Neither Mickey nor Keisha appeared very often in FW Act III. Perhaps Chuck forgot what they looked like.
Wasn’t Mickey shown with a husband and kids at one point? I could swear she had family with her at Bull’s retirement ceremony. Did they break up? Was Mickey dating the Pizza Box Monster at the time of the Jazz Messiah concert? Pizza Box Monster, homewrecker. Who knew?
Perhaps I’m confusing Mickey with Halle Dinkle at the Dinkle Thanksgiving Parade of FW Characters.
Extra observation: One of the twins in the back row is wearing black. Amelia, right?
I have a nickanme for Linda Lopez-Bushka and it’s “Linda McSadsack”
Here’s a prediction that’s easy for me to make. Guess who’s the most likely to get a comment stuck in the spam filter.
A little help, please?
As my FIL would say in an exaggerated Scots accent, “T’enk ya velly mooch” (Thank you very much)!
It was really acting up today, and flagging comments seemingly at random. Seems better now.
The spam filter was affecting others too? And nobody else complained? My OP makes me feel like a real Linda now. “Oh, woe is me, won’t anybody help me?”
It just seems my posts ran clear of the spam filter for months until the last couple of weeks. The post above about Buck was my third in a couple of days. The spam filter issue popped up for me and other readers on another WordPress blog, The Daily Trail.
Since New Years, I’ve had some difficulty loading Son of Stuck Funky and other WordPress websites. There seems to be some kind of lag. Even logging into my WordPress account took a few reloads. As I’m logging into WordPress from SoSF, there’s a pop-up with a light gray WordPress logo on a white background. It then does nothing. A right click and reload gets me logged in.
I wonder if recent upgrades has anything to do with the lag issues. WordPress emailed me the other day about improvements they’ve been making recently. https://wordpress.com/blog/2024/01/31/http3/
It’s all Greek to me. They may as well be blogging about astrophysics. Perhaps an IT type person, such as @Banana Jr. 6000 can understand it. Supposedly it’s about faster page loads, but I don’t recall that being an issue with SoSF until recently. As with many upgrades, there’s usually a period of adjustment and debugging. If it’s for privacy, I’m all for it. This might also explain why I’m having difficulty with Chrome and other Chromium based browsers. Who’s worse at user privacy than Google?
Hopefully the spam filter issue is just a side-effect and will lessen over time.
Thanks for hosting/managing my favorite blog.
The short version is “it’s faster to load now” but I don’t know if SoSF’s particular installation of WordPress has implemented it yet. It’s a high-level fix that seems like something the host would do as a universal upgrade, not an option you’d pick for your own blog.
That makes sense. I can’t see why a blog host should have to serve as a web administrator.
I seem to be encountering similar slow page loads over at the ‘Mark Trail’ WordPress blog too.
Ditto the ‘Daily Cartoonist’ website. I wonder if they’re WordPress as well?
Not all upgrades are seemless. I remember when my phone initially upgraded to the 5G network from 4G LTE. There were quite a few issues, but it’s a lot better now.
Some “upgrades” never get better over time, i.e., the Comics Kingdom.
UPGRADES! UPGRADES! UPGRADES! = FAILURE! FAILURE FAILURE! #NeverForgive
This whole Arc of the Covenant (cuz it’ll melt your face off if you stare at it too long!) is Dinkhead giving teasers about old strips in front of a giant poster of a book. “Condoms Under the Bleachers,” I think it’s called. There is no way you can convince me that Tom didn’t plan this 11 months ago, to push a book that no one wanted to publish. Is he trying to get his fanbase (Herbert in Lorain and his dog who eats books) all het-up and demanding it?
The pro-Cranks at GC sure are lovin’ them some Dinkle! So, good luck with your viral marketing campaign buddy.
“This is all well and good, but what’s going on at the real OMEA?” I hear you asking. Well, I’ve stalked their Facebook page so you don’t have to, and I can confidently say: Bands, professional development, awards, and more bands.
Oh, and this one post, which incidentally shows TB’s booth. Clearly posed, so there aren’t any customers at either booth, but it does reveal a few interesting facts:
What the actual fork? I tried to make a numbered list but the bullying commenting interface took over and forced me to allow it to automate the numbering. Then when I posted, the numbers were gone. [shakes fish] WOOOORRRRRRRDPRESS!
If Hitorque comes back, and I dearly hope he does, how will he post without numbered lists? Curse the WordPress coders.
Aaaaand I was so discombobulated by the numbered list that I forgot to attach the link to the Facebook page.
https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=825936256210764&set=a.433447082126352
Bands, professional development, awards, and more bands
Which is exactly what should be at a state-level convention for band directors. Not some hack cartoonist schlepping books of vaguely on-topic crap he wrote decades ago.
“He’s not wearing a mask. Last year he was apparently the only person at OMEA wearing one; this year nobody there appears to have one on.”
Apparently Batiuk does his public health preparations a year in advance, too.
FIRST OF ALL! I agree on the WordPress nonsense shenanigans. I don’t know what is happening any more, but I assure you the only tinkering I’ve done recently was with the spam filter.
SECOND OF ALL!: Thanks for posting the pic of Batiuk at the OMEA. Seeing him healthy and smiling is nice. Seriously. Carl Weathers death had me waxing on how people’s 70’s and 80’s are such a crapshoot. You might have decades, but you can’t take them for granted.
I want Tom happy and healthy. I love to hate his work. But I’ve got nothing but affection for the man himself.
I meant to respond to this the other day. This was the first that I heard that Carl Weathers had passed. I had just seen him the other day in a FanDuel commercial with Gronk. Carl appeared to look buff and healthy as ever. Articles about Carl’s death have the typical “cause of death unknown at this time.” It does make one wonder. Heart attack?
You never know what can happen at that age. A neighbor in his 70s died from a fall in his home. He lived alone and no one knew he died until his daughter came to check up on him. I hope he didn’t suffer.
Well, I was just over on GoComics and saw the Sunday, 2/4/24 ‘Shaft strip, which features Ed dropping a prescription pill onto the floor which then rolls behind the fridge, prompting a comment about the large number of pills now residing back there. Something about this “joke” triggered one of my dormant brain cells (the ones that should have been used for remembering a foreign language or studying Sicilian geography), and upon checking out GC’s calendar feature I found almost the exact same routine in the strip from Sunday, 2/4/18. Does this mean that Batiuk will try it again the next time 2/4 falls on Sunday, in 2029? Only time will tell.
Okay. Six years is NOT long enough between jokes this specific.
And the fact they’re on the same day? Insane.
Interesting. They’re basically the same joke, but each is slightly different in how they don’t quite get it right.
The 2018 version recognizes that this central idea is not a seven-panel joke, so it at least tries to get in a mild grin during panel three with the Elvis reference. But then Batiuk blows it by making the punchline too wordy, meandering and poorly-structured. (“If I could get out all the pills that have rolled under there … I could probably flood the market and bring down the cost of drugs dramatically.” Ugh. Get me rewrite, stat!)
Flash forward to 2024, and the punchline is actually much better crafted. (“If we had every pill that’s rolled under the fridge … we could open a pharmacy!”) Sure, it’s not a particularly brilliant or original joke, but it’s quick, pointed, and it actually works. Too bad that for this one, Batiuk does his usual Sunday routine of taking seven leisurely panels to actually tell his one-panel joke.
Beware The Blog…
Batty’s ongoing John Darling postings continue to make it crystal clear why the comic eventually keeled over and died, unmourned. But while Batiuk usually just posts a Sunday Darling strip with no comment, he does occasionally favour us with a very short musing on the nature of the specific work he just posted. The one for John Darling – Take 405 is particularly astonishing in how Batiuk manages to show us how completely and thoroughly deluded he is about his creation, and in just two brief sentences.
This is why the Burnings are guaranteed to be anticlimactic and stupid.
That blog post is an absolute humdinger. He calls that particular strip “ahead of its time on a couple of levels.” The only thing I can find is that it offhandedly acknowledges the concept of diversity programs. And the joke undermines that concept! The joke seems to be “diversity programs only exist so the privileged class can remain so.” That’s a nonsensical take, then or now.
I wish I could ask Tom Batiuk “please explain to me how this is ahead of its time in any way, much less multiple ways.” It’s not something Batiuk actually thinks. But he knows it’s something people say about good writing, so he’s mimicking it to describe his own. He’s “masking.” Most of his commentary on his own writing is nonsensical self-compliments like this one.
Today’s Funky Winkershaft
Pam: Isn’t it strange that this happened six years ago, on this very day?
(crank runs outside)
Crank: DAMN YOU TIMEMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP!