I’ve often wondered how many gigabytes of Internet space I have wasted over the years with my many dumb posts about many topics. I was once on AOL and rec.sport.football.college, where I was posting dumb shit going back to at least 1993. You buy Internet space in terms of how many gigabytes of space you need. I wonder how many gigabytes of space there are over the entire Internet, and what percentage one lifetime’s worth of shitposting would be.
AI answer: an estimated 5 zettabytes of data, equivalent to about 5 trillion gigabytes or roughly 5 billion terabytes.
It’s annoying how easily everything comes to Batty’s favorite characters. Writing best sellers, attending the Rose Bowl Parades, setting sales records for band candy, getting movies made in Hollywood, and even receiving an Academy Award, just to name several.
TAKE COVER! IT’S RAINING AWARDS!!!
It would be nice if Batty’s Super Best Friends put their minds together to do something, aside from personal gratification, like curing cancer or Alzheimer’s.
Ha Ha. Yes. Of course that was intentional. Had to make sure you knew it wasn’t made via AI. Riiiiight. >.>;
Thanks everyone for the compliments, critique and feedback. So gratifying to see that you beady eyed nitters could spot differences I was going for without a bit of coaxing! Stay tuned for part 4.
Right about now, Batiuk would be kicking himself for not thinking of that “second fiddle” joke, if he actually read this site. (That, uh… that’s a compliment, by the way.)
Ed’s “I choose ‘not'” in the last one is also great. (If Dinkle had that dialogue in an actual strip, we’d all be saying the exact same thing.)
The “second fiddle” joke is funny, though I think I laughed harder at Harriet’s “It’s not so bad” response. What a deadpan doormat response. It can’t be easy being married to a man who is married to his career and calls himself “The World’s Greatest Band Director”. There’s barely any room in Dinkle’s brain for that poor woman.
Love the “decomposer” joke. It is both a solid joke and, in true Batiuk-ian fashion, the kind of solid joke he would actually use… years after Gary Larson already did and did better, of course.
Once again, CBH, you have topped Batty, who once bragged, “I’m a storyteller”. In your effort, there is a coherent story, there’s emotion that’s not maudlin or forced, and most importantly, there’s laugh-out-loud humor.
I’m curious to see how you’ll handle the wordless seventh week, which I referred to as ‘French Mime Week.’ Empty word balloons? I’m thinking that will still be an improvement over Batty’s effort.
I do like how the auction items in today’s very awkwardly framed strip look like they were “stamps” placed in the strip using Brøderbund’s KidPix Studio Deluxe. Not just traced, but traced and xeroxed…
I’m still betting on a “Fair Thee Well” joke on Saturday. I think the last time was saw it was wirh Min-Dumb and Mopey Pete during the “engagement tiger” idiocy. That’s been about 7 years, which feels like the half-life for reusing a joke.
Well, no wonder today’s quest for their vehicle apparently took so long. Judging from the art, It looks as though they parked a good eight or nine spaces from the entrance. How’s about a little artistic perspective next time to sell the “joke,” please?
Apropo of less than nothing, may I just point out that this past August 5th marked the two-year anniversary of the start of the presumably ongoing Skip Rawlings/Batton Thomas interview?
Fortunately, Batty would give us a warning text box if that were to be the case:
“Prepare thyself for a tale well told, as all worthwhile tales are, with both a delicate touch … and an unflinching presentation of Reality As It Is Really Lived In Today’s Reality Today. Is is a tale referred to as “The Mother Of Invention.””
Today’s Batty Bog post discusses the content of a comic book, not just a cover. And Tom doesn’t simply summarize it, but rather, he tells us WHY he likes it.
I’m not claiming it’s a post full of brilliantly-worded insight. In fact, it would be at best, a just-barely-reaching-average post for almost anyone else. But, y’know … baby steps.
It’s certainly an interesting blog post, though I find it a little bemusing that it’s been posted out of the blue just because the One World Under Doom comic crossover resonated so strongly with him due to its political “metaphor”. Not only that, but that it’s one of the few modern comic events he felt justified itself beyond marketing purposes, so he’s doing his occasional thing of criticizing modern comics beyond putting out a good cover (supposedly why he had Pete quit writing to make pizzas) thanks to that topical nature.
I won’t bite into said “metaphor” beyond saying “yeah that’s pretty agreeable”, but with his trend of using the blog for an occasional “this is all very concerning, isn’t it?” reflection to show his thoughts on the state of affairs, you’d think that actually would motivate him to do more stories in Crankshaft about that rather than just leaving us in gag/Batton limbo. Though who knows, maybe the photo Ed recognized yesterday is the start of an important message saga.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Spotting the differences would involve going back and rereading the original arc, and that ain’t gonna happen.
But even without rereading, this is better!
I can spot some differences!
6. Fewer examples of blatantly swiped artwork.
7. It wasn’t a daily waste of bandwidth for seven weeks.
I’ve often wondered how many gigabytes of Internet space I have wasted over the years with my many dumb posts about many topics. I was once on AOL and rec.sport.football.college, where I was posting dumb shit going back to at least 1993. You buy Internet space in terms of how many gigabytes of space you need. I wonder how many gigabytes of space there are over the entire Internet, and what percentage one lifetime’s worth of shitposting would be.
AI answer: an estimated 5 zettabytes of data, equivalent to about 5 trillion gigabytes or roughly 5 billion terabytes.
That’s a lot of data. No wonder there are so many data centers.
I wonder how many terabytes have been spent snarking on Batty.
I had a similar thought the other day while typing up a report. How many keystrokes have I made during my lifetime?
The difference is that he’s established as a character.
You are one smart cookie!
Batiuk created a baffling cipher. You created an easily distracted loon.
8/12: This looks funny until you realize how passive it is for people to just not compete with this woman.
Cue up another award for Lillian!
Given Batiuk’s clear yearning to be the one inflicting suffering, it’s going to hurt to look at her.
It’s annoying how easily everything comes to Batty’s favorite characters. Writing best sellers, attending the Rose Bowl Parades, setting sales records for band candy, getting movies made in Hollywood, and even receiving an Academy Award, just to name several.
TAKE COVER! IT’S RAINING AWARDS!!!
It would be nice if Batty’s Super Best Friends put their minds together to do something, aside from personal gratification, like curing cancer or Alzheimer’s.
I thought Mort Winkerbean already cured Alzheimer’s?
No, it was Batty who cured Mort. He needed a trombonist for the Bedside Mannerisms.
Another example of Batty not letting previously established storylines get in the way of new ones.
Someone wants a trophy for breathing so he can turn around and complain that kids want a trophy for breathing.
I like how you intentionally put a grammar error in the 4th dialog balloon on purpose to see if the readers would catch it. Just like Batty does!
Ha Ha. Yes. Of course that was intentional. Had to make sure you knew it wasn’t made via AI. Riiiiight. >.>;
Thanks everyone for the compliments, critique and feedback. So gratifying to see that you beady eyed nitters could spot differences I was going for without a bit of coaxing! Stay tuned for part 4.
I don’t understand what’s happening in the last strip (“High … fast … swing”).
That series of words inspired DinkleDad to abandon his son in the middle of playing baseball, to go write a song with those qualities.
Right about now, Batiuk would be kicking himself for not thinking of that “second fiddle” joke, if he actually read this site. (That, uh… that’s a compliment, by the way.)
Ed’s “I choose ‘not'” in the last one is also great. (If Dinkle had that dialogue in an actual strip, we’d all be saying the exact same thing.)
The “second fiddle” joke is funny, though I think I laughed harder at Harriet’s “It’s not so bad” response. What a deadpan doormat response. It can’t be easy being married to a man who is married to his career and calls himself “The World’s Greatest Band Director”. There’s barely any room in Dinkle’s brain for that poor woman.
Love the “decomposer” joke. It is both a solid joke and, in true Batiuk-ian fashion, the kind of solid joke he would actually use… years after Gary Larson already did and did better, of course.
Also, cueva smirk so full of hate, it hurts.
Once again, CBH, you have topped Batty, who once bragged, “I’m a storyteller”. In your effort, there is a coherent story, there’s emotion that’s not maudlin or forced, and most importantly, there’s laugh-out-loud humor.
I’m curious to see how you’ll handle the wordless seventh week, which I referred to as ‘French Mime Week.’ Empty word balloons? I’m thinking that will still be an improvement over Batty’s effort.
Well when you lie you’re “telling stories” so I suppose in that sense Batty calling himself a storyteller means he’s a storyteller.
He didn’t say he was a good storyteller. Or a coherent storyteller. Or an interesting storyteller….
Can you imagine the kind of bedtime stories Batty told his son? Yikes!
I’ll bet he was fantastic, assuming the goal was to get him to go to sleep.
I wonder how many times Brian pretended to sleep just so Batty would stop talking and go away?
Be Ware of Eve Hill,
You are right, Eve. In the capable hands of CBH, her “empty word balloons” will speak volumes over Batty.
💝🫂💖
8/23: Two more mildly amusing vignettes and a Sunday before Batton.
I do like how the auction items in today’s very awkwardly framed strip look like they were “stamps” placed in the strip using Brøderbund’s KidPix Studio Deluxe. Not just traced, but traced and xeroxed…
Which makes a nonsense of his claims of slavishly following his role model’s example.
I’m still betting on a “Fair Thee Well” joke on Saturday. I think the last time was saw it was wirh Min-Dumb and Mopey Pete during the “engagement tiger” idiocy. That’s been about 7 years, which feels like the half-life for reusing a joke.
It’ll be bad wordplay of some sort.
It’s dumb enough.
Yesterday’s Crankfuckery
Day 3 of Random Joke Week
Ed: Myrtle Hill is still gonna win this year.
Today’s Crankfuckery
Day 4 of Random Joke Week
(ZZZZZZZ)
8/15: Sure, Jeff. Hand a high tech toy to a man who just watched his phone catch fire. There are no drawbacks there.
Day 6: We get bad wordplay based on these two refusing to remember where they park. At least it ain’t Batton.
Well, no wonder today’s quest for their vehicle apparently took so long. Judging from the art, It looks as though they parked a good eight or nine spaces from the entrance. How’s about a little artistic perspective next time to sell the “joke,” please?
Both Yesterday and Today’s Crankfuckery
Ed: I got rid of it before we entered the fair.
(Jeff lunges towards Ed)
6/16: We’re never going to know what happened to Eugene but we get a call back to the battery fire. It’s called priorities.
Apropo of less than nothing, may I just point out that this past August 5th marked the two-year anniversary of the start of the presumably ongoing Skip Rawlings/Batton Thomas interview?
Today’s Crankfuckery
I genuinely have nothing to saw about this Crankshaft strip
I can: someone has just heard of battery fires.
8/17: This could end up being anything.
Anything but amusing.
That’s for sure. We could be dealing with Pizza Monster, Ordained Minister.
Yeah, the strips starring Ed Crankshaft seem so low-effort. This looks like another week of random jokes with no real theme.
Or it could be another idiotic saga to write better.
Also, about the battery fire… don’t want to be that guy but I think that Batiuk just learned that they were a problem.
6/18: Oh, great. Another pointless long runner.
Ed’s found something on the wall of nothing he wants to talk about for the rest of the week.
This setup seems like an excuse to rehash something that’s already been rehashed enough times. My guesses are:
Please, please, please let it be Zanzibar.
Y’know I think there is a picture of a chimp dining at the place on Luigi’s walls IRL.
It’s something even stupider.
Tension builds…
The plot thins.
Yeah….. because we don’t know HOW stupid it will be.
Oh, no! Now we’re going to have a two-month-long story where Ed discovers a photo of Harry Dinkle’s mother and takes it to show him.
Fortunately, Batty would give us a warning text box if that were to be the case:
“Prepare thyself for a tale well told, as all worthwhile tales are, with both a delicate touch … and an unflinching presentation of Reality As It Is Really Lived In Today’s Reality Today. Is is a tale referred to as “The Mother Of Invention.””
If you do ever see an intro like that … RUN.
Some credit where credit is due…
Today’s Batty Bog post discusses the content of a comic book, not just a cover. And Tom doesn’t simply summarize it, but rather, he tells us WHY he likes it.
I’m not claiming it’s a post full of brilliantly-worded insight. In fact, it would be at best, a just-barely-reaching-average post for almost anyone else. But, y’know … baby steps.
It’s certainly an interesting blog post, though I find it a little bemusing that it’s been posted out of the blue just because the One World Under Doom comic crossover resonated so strongly with him due to its political “metaphor”. Not only that, but that it’s one of the few modern comic events he felt justified itself beyond marketing purposes, so he’s doing his occasional thing of criticizing modern comics beyond putting out a good cover (supposedly why he had Pete quit writing to make pizzas) thanks to that topical nature.
I won’t bite into said “metaphor” beyond saying “yeah that’s pretty agreeable”, but with his trend of using the blog for an occasional “this is all very concerning, isn’t it?” reflection to show his thoughts on the state of affairs, you’d think that actually would motivate him to do more stories in Crankshaft about that rather than just leaving us in gag/Batton limbo. Though who knows, maybe the photo Ed recognized yesterday is the start of an important message saga.
Both Yesterday and Today’s Crankfuckery
Mindy: Hey, Gramps, what are you looking at?
The plot sickens.