Tag: Bedside Manor

Wednesday, May 20

Today’s strip was not available for preview. Instead of my usual trite attempts at strip-related snark, please enjoy this trite attempt at a tribute to a popular television personality who is leaving the air this very evening.

The Top Ten things you don’t want to hear at Montoni’s

10. We’re bring back the gazpacho pizza.
9. I’m sorry, no credit cards. We accept cash, check, and fair condition or above issues of Starbuck Jones.
8. Holly, can you go down to the storeroom and get some more napkins? Yeah, they’re between the Space Invaders machine and Maddie Klinghorn.
7. *Ring* Hello? What? The Band Box checked themselves out of rehab?
6. Darrin, did I see you changing Skyler on table 3?
5. Hey Tony, where is our list area? The health department said we need to get rid of it.
4. Huh, that plate of Pup-Peroni I laid out for Buddy was here a minute ago.
3. Crazy’s beard just DOES NOT wash out of these coffee mugs.
2. Let me tell you about Hollywood…

and the number one thing you don’t want to hear at Montoni’s

1. Eh, he’s no John Darling. Now that guy knew how to do a talk show finale.

Mind over Manor

Wait a sec, does this mean that yesterday’s exchange wasn’t just a pointless nostalgia trip for Wally and Dinkle? Oh no, it totally was, but in today’s strip we learn there is a purpose to their likely use of a week’s worth TB’s valuable printed panels, Dinkle has formed a little band at Bedside Manor.

For those that do not remember, Bedside Manor is Westview’s local assisted-living facility, the residence of Funky’s father, and possibly the deathbed of Act III-era Crankshaft. Whether this band deal came about because Dinkle started hanging around Bedside Manor spouting band directing advice after Lefty finally changed the locks or because some of the nursing home staff saw him talking to his wife one day and reasonably assumed Dinkle was an AWOL resident will likely be left to our imaginations. We may, however, find out how little Dinkle’s band is.  Small enough to fit in the band box, perhaps?

C’est la Mort!

Well, after a week spent rehashing Funky’s failed fitness program, today’s strip is a change of pace indeed!

Six months after we learned of it, Funky finally gets around to telling Holly that his father has started smoking. As he’s telling her this, a nurse passes by pushing a wheelchair in which sits the crumpled, soulless husk of Ed Crankshaft! But that, that’s not the big news! Today we learn that Funky’s dad has a name!

No doubt his friends knew him as “Mort.” His daughter-in-law, however, in the first time we’ve seen her come to visit, stiffly addresses him: “Hello, Morton” (I imagine her intoning this the same way Seinfeld would say  “Hello, Newman“). Without imparting a hug or a kiss, she proceeds to lace into him about his recently acquired habit. Mort gives no fucks: he proceeds to smoothly light two cigs with his Zippo, proffering the second one to his lady friend.

Six months ago a doctor took Funky aside and raised the prospect of moving his father into “full-time nursing care.” But Mort seems happier and more engaged then we’ve ever seen him.

Reflections in a Jaundiced Eye

Link to today’s strip.

Not much to say about this one, although I thought Pa Winkerbean was already in a nursing home.  Live and learn, I guess.

The visuals in panel three are pretty good, though it’s kind of an odd choice–Funky’s supposed to be thinking about what to do with his dad, and yet there are his own faces looking back at him.  I suppose it represents his self-centered nature.  To be more effective, in a character sense, I’d think lots of Pa’s faces looking back at him would be more thoughtful–of course, I’ve never been nominated for a Pulitzer, so what do I know?