Mar 26th 2012 07:12 am Weight of responsibility

Buy the new book, "Beaucoup Arlo & Janis!"Today's "Arlo & Janis!"
It’s about time for an update, don’t you think? I warned you last week was going to be busy, although I hadn’t intended to go this long without posting. I’m reaching all the way back to 1989 for today’s retro cartoon. I don’t know if it’s ever been posted on the Web site before, but I know you won’t see it in the syndicate’s online archive, which doesn’t go back nearly that far. I’m going to be showing some older material the next few days, so if you’re a fan of the moldy oldies, stick around. You might see something you haven’t seen for a long time. Or maybe ever.

The book signings were great. I had a huge turnout at my hometown library in Valley, Alabama, on Thursday and a good turnout in Nashville Sunday. The Nashville crowd was small, because we did not manage much publicity beforehand. However, it was a good crowd, and several of the regulars from arloandjanis.com were on hand. You know who you are.

Posted by jimmyjohnson / Vintage A&J

47 Responses to “Weight of responsibility”

  1. Will Overby on 26 Mar 2012 at 8:06 am #

    Didn’t make it to Nashville, but I’m glad all the good people were there!

  2. Neal in Bahstawn on 26 Mar 2012 at 8:12 am #

    One of the more popular fund-raisers for garden clubs in Massachusetts is the collection of the pull tabs on aluminum cans, and some clubs amass Hefty bags full of them. Massachusetts already had a five cent deposit on such cans, and the mystery was always why there was a market for these pull tabs. The working theory was that the tabs were made of a more valuable metal and thus commanded a premium when taken to recyclers.

    The truth, though, is considerably more prosaic. When you put your cans into a recycling machine to get back your deposit, the machine has no way of ‘seeing’ whether or not the tab is intact; it just reads the bar code and spits out a receipt. Removing the pull tab is just a way of ‘double dipping’ by selling back the can in two parts.

    So, how goes plans for a New England sojourn?

  3. Mindy on 26 Mar 2012 at 8:20 am #

    Neal, I remember ungodly long strands of tab-tops looped together, the tab of one through the pull-hole part of another. I thought it looked tacky but that was the time of black lights, LeRoy Neimann, Timothy Leary and…a lot of other stuff. Now I look at the redemption price of 1-liter plastic bottles in some states and wonder why, why, why we don’t have that in Virginia? I could make a fortune!

    And, if I may go back to an old topic, colorization, I don’t mind it at all, have finally gotten used to it, but the colorizer or whatever that person is called should be whipped, at least locally, for laziness. For nearly eight months Janis wore nothing but purple tops. Now she wears nothing but yellow and Arlo red. That gets old…or is it just a female thing where the Eleventh Commandment is “Change Clothes Frequently”? I know some males, no names will be mentioned, who would be content to wear jeans and a black T-shirt every day during the warm months and jeans and a black sweatshirt every day during the cold months. [Hint! Hint! Hint!]

  4. Mindy on 26 Mar 2012 at 8:20 am #

    Come to think of it, maybe that has something to do with the black undies fetish?

  5. Dave in MA on 26 Mar 2012 at 8:27 am #

    Mindy,

    If the look works, you stick with it.

    Remember, from a woman’s perspective, if you show up at an event and someone else has the same outfit on it’s a tragedy. From a man’s perspective, if you show up at an event and someone else has the same outfit on, it’s “oh good, I must look ok, someone else dressed this way too.”

  6. Tom (Somewhere in Georgia) on 26 Mar 2012 at 8:32 am #

    Mindy- I remember the long strands of pull tabs. Jimmy Buffet called them “poptops” and I believe he may have stepped on a stray one. At least he claims he did… no wait- he claimed there was a woman to blame…

  7. minnesotadon on 26 Mar 2012 at 8:51 am #

    I find it truly amazing how the smallest of suggestions can all of a sudden take life and the discussion goes ballastic. Jimmy’s introduction had nothing to do with “pull tabs”…yet it seems to be the discussion. I just wanted to mention how glad I am to get back to the golden moldies…I really enjoyed the younger Gene era.

  8. Ceolaf on 26 Mar 2012 at 9:02 am #

    what happened to yesterday’s new cartoon?

  9. Mindy on 26 Mar 2012 at 9:11 am #

    That’s it, Tom {Somewhere in Georgia} blame in a woman! :)
    That’s the charm of this site, minnesotadon [is that like a mastadon?], the topics are fluid. Sometimes other adjectives fit but the Arlo and Janis crowd that Jimmy hosts here is…well…strange?

  10. John in Virginia on 26 Mar 2012 at 9:15 am #

    “Strange” is a good thing, right?

  11. Jeff in Ann Arbor on 26 Mar 2012 at 9:26 am #

    On a completely different subject, Venus and the crescent moon should be visible in the daytime sky this afternoon, assuming it’s clear where you are. Instructions for finding it are here:

    http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/03/26/venus-visible-in-daytime-sky-today-heres-how-to-see-it/

    I figure that this gang seems to like this kind of subject, so I’ve given myself permission to post it.

  12. Tom (Somewhere in Georgia) on 26 Mar 2012 at 9:31 am #

    “Unique” not strange or wierd, Mindy. At least that is how my wife explained it to the kids… “You dad is unique children, not wierd.”

  13. Mindy on 26 Mar 2012 at 9:36 am #

    Excellent choice of words, Tom!

  14. Steve from Royal Oak, MI on 26 Mar 2012 at 10:07 am #

    I remember this comic, so I think Jimmy has shared it before. Michigan has long had a deposit on (is it soda, pop or soda pop) cans. The roads at least do not have the cans littered with them, but unfortunately we end up with a big bag(s) of them in our basement. When it finally gets so bad that I have to take them in, I always forget to bring latex gloves as it is rather disgusting to get all of that sticky stuff on your hands. What really gets me is that you put the glass bottles in the machine and then it tosses it out the back and they often break. I assume that it costs too much to clean and reuse them.

  15. Alan in Nashville on 26 Mar 2012 at 10:12 am #

    Jimmy,

    I enjoyed meeting you yesterday. Would liked to have visited longer but the ribs on the smoker needed tending. Wish your turn out had been better, but those of us who came are really glad you made the trip.

  16. Symply Fargone on 26 Mar 2012 at 10:14 am #

    Mindy,

    Are you watching me? And why do you care what I wear? LOL, been borrowing a page from JJ and peeking at my house?

    Though I do agree the cloth color could use with a more frequent change.

    Dave in(my neck of the woods)MA, Truth though I never heard it put like that. I do feel my sartorial choices vindicated when someone else has similar attire.

    Flowers are popping in MA and I am Symply Fargone.

  17. Blinky the Wonder Wombat on 26 Mar 2012 at 10:15 am #

    @Jeff in Ann Arbor-

    Even better, after sunset, Jupiter joins the show. Apparently t his configuration only happens once every three decades or so. Venus is especially noticeable as it is just about as high as it can get in the sky and is visible well into the evening, belying its status as the “evening star”.

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/venus-jupiter-crescent-moon-meeting-up-this-weekend/2012/03/21/gIQAbmI9XS_story.html

  18. sandcastler on 26 Mar 2012 at 10:16 am #

    Strange I am not; the Army did say I was certifiable. I will plead a Mindy on that, maybe a story for some future day.

  19. Pam in Nashville on 26 Mar 2012 at 10:30 am #

    NashVegas was a happier place yesterday :) Glad to finally meet you in person.

  20. Bob, near Mark on 26 Mar 2012 at 10:44 am #

    On the North Shore of Boston, pull tabs are on “tonic” cans! :)

  21. TruckerRon on 26 Mar 2012 at 11:14 am #

    Today’s Zits (http://bit.ly/GRBkjp) is a case where coloring a strip can be offensive. Why did the colorist assume the cafeteria worker has that color of skin? I’ve seen plenty of white women of that size and occupation.

  22. Mindy on 26 Mar 2012 at 11:31 am #

    “Plead a Mindy?” Oh, Lord, don’t let that end up on Urban Dictionary!

  23. Cattye on 26 Mar 2012 at 11:52 am #

    I remember as a little kid my family would gather cans to turn in for the money. We’d gather them from the side of the road. My mom always hated when one of us kids would pick up a beer can and it had stuff in it still and we would always manage to spill some on us… then we smelled like drinkers. Weird the things that come back to memory.

  24. John in Virginia on 26 Mar 2012 at 11:58 am #

    Cattye, I remember, a long time ago in the Dark Ages, when we got together to gather cans to make money for some police athletic activities supported by the Department but not paid for by same. We had those huge clear plastic bags that looked like a dismembered Zepplin, held about 4 millions cans each. A citizen saw us doing it, asked why…and came back at the end of the day with seven bags full. Said we were a good cause. And, yes, we all went home smelling like the back lot of the Dixie Brewery.

    Plead a Mindy? I like that!

  25. Dave in MA on 26 Mar 2012 at 1:06 pm #

    Symply Fargone, flowers may be popping, but tonight’s 18-20 degree weather is expected to kill a lot of them!

  26. Dave in MA on 26 Mar 2012 at 1:08 pm #

    TruckerRon, I think you’re reading too much into the choice of skin color. If they had been black and she had been white I don’t think you’d have been so bothered by it…..

  27. Dave in MA on 26 Mar 2012 at 1:10 pm #

    Mindy,

    Kari Byron of the mythbusters has an entry on urban dictionary, and I personally think it is very UNdeserved.

    http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=kari+byron+effect

  28. phil in Missoula, MT on 26 Mar 2012 at 1:53 pm #

    TruckerRon;
    I passed through your neighborhood several weeks ago, headed for Grand Junction. If I’d thought ahead, I would have arranged to meet you for lunch.

    In thinking about your comment, it seems to me that there is a missed point there and that is the inference that a cafeteria worker is somehow a menial job. In times like these, people of all flavors do what they can and are glad of the work (except when they have to put up with jerks). People do the best they can and deserve respect for doing it

    All us hope that our kids can go to college and make the big bucks (so they can support us in our old age). One of mine did and they other two didn’t. In truth not all people should go to college and there are careers out there for people who don’t get a Bachelor’s. There needs to be a class along about the second or third year of high school that presents the alternatives (and the consequences) of going to college or vo-tech school or of dropping out and getting your GED.

    I know my former company actively recruits at vo-tech schools and junior colleges and Boeing takes all the aviation tech graduates it can get from the two year program in Helena and is trying to promote more.

  29. Bill in Paducah on 26 Mar 2012 at 2:14 pm #

    My trip to Nashville!

    http://tinyurl.com/ckrpbcv

  30. Mary in Ohio on 26 Mar 2012 at 2:46 pm #

    Steve in RO – many of us in Ohio have tried for years to get a deposit law like you have up there, but I guess since Michigan did it, we here in Ahia cannot. Shame on us!

  31. Burns Fisher on 26 Mar 2012 at 3:22 pm #

    Bill: So THAT’s what JJ looks like. And you for that matter :-)

  32. Mark in Boston on 26 Mar 2012 at 3:30 pm #

    Bob near Mark: Did you see yesterday’s Sunday Globe? The use of “Tonic” is dying out in the Boston area, unfortunately.

  33. Mark in TTown on 26 Mar 2012 at 3:34 pm #

    Bill in Paducah, Thanks for the photo. What’s scary is that I look like JJ in this photo! Maybe its something about Alabama.

  34. Bill in Paducah on 26 Mar 2012 at 3:59 pm #

    Well, they didn’t get my good side – when the lighting is just right, I’m more like this:

    http://www.imdb.com/media/rm3569135872/tt0055278

  35. Tom (Somewhere in Georgia) on 26 Mar 2012 at 4:08 pm #

    Bill- I sent you a “friend” request. I’m interested in the story about your trombone!

  36. Bob, near Mark on 26 Mar 2012 at 5:09 pm #

    Mark in Boston,
    Yes, I saw the article, and posted a link to it on the Facebook page that you will find if you click on my name… that is, if you dare. That might take a bit of Moxie. :)

  37. Jerry in Fl on 26 Mar 2012 at 5:36 pm #

    No one from Colorado commented on the Colorado mammouth. Maybe I’m not the only one who is clueless about lacrosse and why there is a professional league. Since I am planning a trip to beautiful Canada I won’t comment on curling except to ask whether that has a professional league. Weird and unique? And generally respectfull which does indeed make this group unique.

  38. Galliglo in Ohio on 26 Mar 2012 at 5:43 pm #

    Gee… have you noticed how happy and communicative our members are when JJ is back amongst us? What a catalyst!

  39. Hoag in MA on 26 Mar 2012 at 6:25 pm #

    Hmmm, Pull-Tabs and Pop-tops

    I’m old enough to have had to remember to bring a church key – but just barely.

  40. emeritus Minnesota biologist on 26 Mar 2012 at 7:08 pm #

    The standard spellings are mammoth and mastodon. According to my Shorter OED [Oxford English Dictionary], mammoth comes from a Russian term for these fossil true elephants [which are more closely related to Indian than African elephants]. Elephant cheek tooth structure is highly derived and elephant tooth succession is strange. Mastodons are the older group, and elephants are derived from early mastodons. Both groups, several species in each, hung on well into the Pleistocene, the period up until 12,000 or so years ago, which included several ice ages. The term mastodon means bre ast-tooth, from the conical nipple- or bre ast-shaped tubercles on the cheek teeth. The mast- part is Greek, as is the -don, like den, for tooth. Men name these things. The Grand Tetons are so named because of their shapes. According to the OED, the term teat, for nip ple or bre ast, is Old English. Tooth succession in mastodons was pretty ordinary. We’ll see if this escapes moderation.

  41. James Pollock on 26 Mar 2012 at 7:11 pm #

    If you’re bothered by the definition of “Kari Byron Effect”, move up one definition to “Kari Byron”, where you find this:
    “Interestingly enough, in addition to being so talented, Kari Byron has been confirmed as being the cutest redhead known to man. Do not dispute it.
    Kari Byron, helping to bust myths while ofsetting the show’s geekiness with her sunny personality, beautiful smile and expertise in reckless demolition in the name of science.”

    Perhaps it balances out.

  42. TruckerRon on 26 Mar 2012 at 8:48 pm #

    FWIW, I’m neither thin- nor dark-skinned. I was just bothered by the assumption that a cafeteria worker needed to be colored differently than the two boys.

  43. curmudgeonly ex-professor on 26 Mar 2012 at 9:27 pm #

    …And exactly what would be the meaning of “pulling a Mindy”? It’s a nice expression, but I couldn’t quite make out the definition.

  44. Just Jay on 26 Mar 2012 at 11:24 pm #

    Greetings All,

    I’m in Anchorage Alaska tonight. Between Daylight Savings and Anchorage being geographically one time west of its actual time zone it was still light out at 9:00 PM. Course tomorrow sunrise probably won’t be until 8:00 or so. Strange month for me, one trip to Miami, and the other to Anchorage.

    Cheers,
    Jay

  45. Rick in Shermantown, Ohio on 27 Mar 2012 at 4:04 am #

    Jimmy:

    Today’s strip about tomatoes: I have repeatedly heard that Ohio River tomatoes are among the best in the country.

    Of course, I keep hearing that from Ohioans, but that doesn’t mean they’re wrong.

  46. Mark in Boston on 27 Mar 2012 at 3:56 pm #

    Bob near Mark,

    Thanks for the link! I always love seeing that “Alfalfa Farms” sign, mainly because it means I’m driving up for vacation. Does Farmer Alfalfa http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKCcABs_-v0 live there?

  47. Lost in A**2 on 27 Mar 2012 at 8:09 pm #

    Marquette, Michigan, is similarly situated: about as far west as Chicago, but in the same time zone as Boston.