Useless Squirrel Fact #1256

Link to today’s strip

Maybe it’s the Super Tuesday hangover, but Dinkle in panel three looks just like Bernie Sanders.

Wow. Just. Just, wow. Guys, I don’t know what to do with this really. I feel like that poor janitor hanging around outside, trying to sweep something off the same patch of ground days in a row.

Last week it took and entire week for Funky not to watch the last three seconds of a basketball game. This week we have Dinkle blathering endlessly about the parallels between rodents and band teachers.

Two weeks, out of an entire year, where nothing is being gained. Neither humor, nor character development, nor plot. A good joke in a story arises from the characters as designed and forwards the characterization, plot, or emotional arc.

When has Dinkle ever been a zany trivia nerd about anything other than music? Now, overnight, he’s so obsessed with his squirrel book he can’t bear not to share it with Becky.

How COULD music teachers be like squirrels?

Well, according to the Ohio DNR: The gray squirrel was one of the most populous species of wildlife in Ohio at the time of settlement. Gray squirrels had extensive habitat in the state taking advantage of the widespread forest in Ohio. Early historical records speak of gray squirrel populations so dense that “…it took a month for an army of squirrels to pass.” In fact, gray squirrels disrupted early agricultural efforts in the state to such an extent that Ohio law required each taxpayer to turn in a quota of squirrel skins along with his tax payment.”

I guess what I’m saying is that I hope the Ohio taxpayers are out for band director hides, because there are way too many of them cluttering up the state.

In Medias Arrest.

Link to today’s strip

Did Funky ever get to see the game winning shot? We’ll never know.

Actually, of course he did. Because it’s 2020 and he was able to pull the clip up on his smart TV within hours. We just didn’t get to see that part, because Ayers got tired of drawing Funky trembling in fear and amazement at the very idea of a last second tie breaker in a non-playoff game for a team we never had identified to us.

Back to the old grind then. Becky and Dinkle. Blathering inanely and pointlessly.

Nice to see Dinkle stopped at the office to sign in and get the ID badge that allows this old coot to wander the halls clutching squirrel books. Why did he bring the book with him, unless he’s been converted to some kind of nutty new rodent religion and is on the hunt to proselytize. Ave Sciuridae, glandulae plena.

Gamester’s Paradise.

Link to today’s strip

Many apologies for the late post tonight. Was working a late shift and forgot to set this up before I left.

It did give me a chance to actually SEE today’s strip. And I’m telling you, I can’t wait for Monday where Funky is probably back at Les’s house in the middle of the night. Sunday…the day unmoored to the normal linear time.

And LOOKIE HERE Becky and DSH John actually appearing together in the same panel for the first time in LITERAL YEARS.

One interesting note on the art. There appears to be a K2-SO robot in the background of panel three. I, for one, cannot WAIT for Disney to sue Batiuk for copyright infringement. You don’t mess with the House of Mouse’s IP, they will go after schools, pre-schools, nursing homes, and they will come after YOOOOOOOUUUUU.

Leaping Lapses.

Link to today’s strip

Oh no.
No one saw this coming.

That was sarcasm.

And on such a unique day too. February 29th. Leap day. Nearly every four years our calendars use a little curiosity of nature -that a year doesn’t have an even number of days- to give us an extra day. One more day to go out there an achieve something great.

It didn’t used to be like that. The ancient Romans used to get whole extra months! In a normal year they had 12 month, 355 day, years. But every few years the pontifex maximus of Rome would throw in an extra month, and make the year 377 days, just to keep things evened out. Only problem was, the Pontifex would decide this just… whenevs yo, and sometimes folx out in the boonies couldn’t even be sure what date it was.

Mack Daddy Dictator Julius Caesar didn’t like this, so he instituted the Julian Calendar. One leap year, one extra day, every four years, BAM. Simple.

OR WAS IT?
No. Because the actual length of a year is 365.2425 days long. The Julian calendar actually judged years as LONGER at 365.25. That decimal place may seem insignificant, but this is SCIENCE AND HISTORY. And the Julian year was almost ELEVEN MINUTES too long.

Over the centuries those minutes added up into days. The calendar kept falling further and further back, and the equinoxes that herald the seasons were not matching with the days.

So what?

Jesus, that’s what. He was crucified at Passover. A Jewish holiday determined at the time by the equinox, specifically after the first full moon occurring on or after the vernal equinox. And early Christians decided to celebrate Easter on the first Sunday following that. From that point forward, the Easter date depended on the ecclesiastical approximation of March 21 for the vernal equinox.

But now March 21 and Vernal Equinox no worky together.

So in 1582 Pope Gregory XIII has some of his popealicious scientists come up with a simple plan. So simple I had to copy it from Wikipedia directly. “Every year that is exactly divisible by four is a leap year, except for years that are exactly divisible by 100, but these centurial years are leap years if they are exactly divisible by 400. For example, the years 1700, 1800, and 1900 are not leap years, but the years 1600 and 2000 are.”

Only one problem left. The calendar still wasn’t currently fixed. The day on the chart still didn’t match the actual season they were experiencing.

So, Greg decided to DELETE TEN DAYS. People went to sleep on Thursday, October 4th and woke up on Friday October 15. Poof, one man’s decision and all those poor Italians had lost more than a week of their lives they’d never get back.

Kinda like all of us reading this stupid arc.

HAPPY LEAP YEAR EVERY BODY!