This is another strip from my “Best of 2014” entry in the National Cartoonists Society annual awards. (See yesterday’s post.) The NCS requires 12 samples from the calendar year being judged. Whenever I thumb through the old stuff to pick out my favorites, I always am reminded the strips I like sometimes are not the strips you, the reader, favor. So maybe you wonder what I am looking for when I pick out 12 of my favorite strips in a given year. Of course, “funny” is the gold standard. The cartoonist who can be LOL funny every day is going to be a wealthy person, but that is nigh impossible. Even 12 times a year isn’t easy. Second, I look for “fresh.” I look for comic strips with a different and meaningful take on ordinary circumstances. This is, after all, what artists across multiple disciplines strive to do.
204 responses to “Polished Approach”
Anon.: We do sad things to ourselves but mostly, at one adolescent moment or another, were guilty of reinforcing that tendency in others, when we didn’t distinguish btw. pretty or stylish or chic vs. truly beautiful.
Peace, emb
I was born in April.
During my trucking days, as now, I wore either flannel or linen shirts (never torn or stained ones!), Dickies work pants, and either tennis shoes (dry weather, no unloading freight days) or my steel-toed, slip-resistant work boots.
Of course that was a level or two above most truckers, but I was always treated better by customers than the drivers I heard complaining about those same customers.
When you speak of the Southern Cross, this is the real song.
https://youtu.be/Bw9gLjEGJrw
Happy Valentine’s
I am glad some of you are having nice weather. It has been -15F today with a wind chill of about -40F. It might warm up tomorrow to -1F if we are lucky. I don’t care as long as the car starts so I can take my sweetie out for a Valentine’s dinner.
The Baltimore peregrine nest is on the Transamerica bldg., 100 Light St., 35 stories up. The URL below should have that marked. The webcam is pointed roughly S., so you are looking S. at southern downtown Baltimore + some arms of Chesapeake Bay, the main body of which is out of sight to the left. You can see where a major expressway heads SSW and tees over open water. You can drag the map around, and zoom in or out. The scoop about the peregrine pair is below the webcam at the URL about 10 posts above this. The pair reside here year round, since there is plenty of food. Peregrines used to be called ‘duck hawks’ but I’m guessing this pair mostly feeds on ‘Rock Doves / Rock Pigeons’ = the common pests introduced from Eur. in the late 18th or early 19th c., which cost US agriculture a few billion a year. + starlings, I expect, another alien we don’t need. Peace, emb
http://www.mapquest.com/search/results?page=0¢erOnResults=1&slug=%2Fus%2Fmd%2Fbaltimore%2F21202-1036%2F100-light-st-39.287778,-76.613606&query=100%20Light%20St,%20Baltimore,%20MD%2021202-1036
The Chesapeake Conservancy URL is now about 15 posts above; several of you snuck in while I was researching and writing, but that was fun. Love maps. Hey, I can put it here now:
http://www.chesapeakeconservancy.org/peregrine-falcon-webcam
Peace, emb
Yes. That is the real Southern Cross, the best sailing song I know that I love very much. It has particular meaning to me personally.
So yes, happy Valentine’s Day to all we love.
Happy V Day, Villagers. I was born in April. Wear colored or denim jeans and turtlenecks most of the time (cold most of the time, remember why I moved.?) Dress up for church (although under choir robe 3/4 of year) and various meetings.
Hello Villagers, my computer crashed a few days ago — wouldn’t start, had a failed hard drive. I was lost without A&J, the other comic strips, our Village, news sources, and Facebook. Son-in-law had gone to an event at Fenway Park and wasn’t available. Nancy was trying to keep herself, the goats, and the chickens warm with the wood stove. The computer was six years old and I guess in Computerland that’s a LONG time. I prevailed on an old friend to go to the Best Buy in Manchester, buy what I needed, bring it here and set it up. The dear man came through splendidly — his name is David. Such a nice name.
So I’m on the new computer now, and it seemed very strange at first; I’m not used to doing this, but I must say that after an hour or two of noodling around it seems fairly simple. I was able to get on this site, anyway, and have greatly enjoyed catching up with what I’ve missed.
More tomorrow but will say that my February birthday will be here in about a week.
Welcome back Miss Charlotte. How I wish for a real Village with all of us as neighbors so we could check on each other instead of just wondering and worrying.
Debbe 😉 Happy Valentine’s Day, hon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rqnw5IfbZOU
Good morning Villagers….
August, a Leo, hear me ROAR……….don’t really believe in all that ‘stuff’ though 🙂 I’m really a quiet, introverted type of lady.
Miss Charlotte, so glad you got back online. And you ‘conquered’ your new computer.
Radar shows snow, but it’s not snowing here…someone else is getting it…hahahhahha!!! It will probably start about the time I leave though.
My Miss Prissies laid and I packed 206 cases of eggs, and quite of few of them were double yokers….sure wish I could bring home a tray of double yolkers….mmmmm, bacon and eggs!
I gave myself a nickname at work. The other day as I was pushing and pulling the lifter, I noticed the little grunts coming out of me……my gosh, I thought, I sound like Scrat the squirrel that is always chasing that acorn..Ice Age movies. So it was ‘Skittles’ and Scrat yesterday! Skittles did the hauling of the eggs though.
Wishes of a Happy Valentine’s Day to all…..
GR 😉 to all the children in us and our mothers…..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDknDWp-elE
…love the looks of the two little boys sitting with their mother…..
today’s grin….been there, have you Jackie?
http://cheezburger.com/8750225152/funny-cat-image-cat-vs-planter
Don’t know what’s up with gocomics…..I get server not found, had to come in the backdoor….arloandjanis.com ….I hope it comes up, as I enjoy the Sunday strip.
Jackie, saw a headline on whether.com that said OK had a historic earthquake….did you? Just read the headline, I don’t log onto their videos……
Can’t read today’s strip on Go comics, says not available. If we had earthquake I slept through it or thought they were exploding down at ammo dump. We still make most of bombs 20 miles south of me. And we worry about terrorists? Back to sleep. Cats are rioting.
Now that my birthday is over, I can move on to better things………..happy birthday
Charlotte (in advance)…………and happy Valentines Day to all!
Steve Moore
P. S. Weather this A. M. is much better than the original prediction. We are actually in double digits. Very little wind. I hope Debbe is as lucky.
Happy Valentines day, all.
This time a year ago I was waiting to go into surgery for my kidney transplant. The kidney is still working well and my health is improving. It was a good day.
Debbe, my sister lives in Oklahoma City and she said there was a smallish earthquake yesterday. There seems to be a general increase in movement for smaller faults around Oklahoma. There appears to be some correlation with the increase in “fracking” for oil and gas.
Ah, David, but someone will intone, ‘Correlation is not causation,’ and then claim that the quakes are caused by what ‘house’ Mercury was in the day that you were born, or maybe by secret atomic research done by the gubmint.
BTW, the gubmint runs the Coast Guard, and I can think of situations where I’d be happy if they showed up to help. Locally, also the 911 response people, and I was happy when they showed up at 0100 or so for my 1st angina attack [turned out not to be cardiac, but esophageal, as did my second].
Peace, emb
GoComics now open.
And, per the A&J today, hugs ARE nice.!
Happy Valentines Day to everyone. God bless us every one.
Happy Valentines Day to all of you in the Village, whether speakers or lurkers.
John in Richmond, Texas hasn’t been heard from lately. Maybe his adventure date is keeping him busy in a good way? Good for John.
Mindy from Indy, hope your grandmother is recovering well. And that you are surviving being the lead trainer.
Debbe, my brother and his wife get my mother flowers for Valentines and Mother’s Day. And I end up putting the vase on top of the refrigerator because it’s the one spot the cats can’t get to. One can make it, but she’s learned to leave them alone.
OK earthquakes news: http://www.koco.com/news/earthquake-rattles-central-oklahoma/37979562
A mathemagical duo offering for the Valentine’s weekend. Thanks, Mr. Johmson.