A pithy comic strip about life, love, lust and puthy cats.

Est. 1985

Extra, Extra!

Natural-Born Chiller

By Jimmy Johnson


It’s three-fer Thursday! Here is part of a little series that ran 10 years ago this month. I recall it was easy to produce; the jokes about meditation wrote themselves. I do not recall exactly what was going on around me at the time, but I can tell by looking at this old artwork that I was drawing very fast. My favorite gag is the first one. It is this type of strip that earns my humor descriptions such as “subtle,” and “intelligent” and “not very funny.”

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195 responses to “Natural-Born Chiller”

  1. Ghost Rider 6 Avatar
    Ghost Rider 6

    Debbe πŸ˜‰ A soaring Sunday morning song for you…

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKHzaRpL7s8

  2.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Good morning Debbe. I am going to bed in a minute. I am still thinking of adding chickens. They got in adorable bantam chick’s and some other assorted colors varieties.

    I just want them out in garden and dog yard to run around as pets. The birds were all chirping and singing just now when I went out to bring in more groceries I had forgotten.

  3. Debbe Avatar
    Debbe

    Good morning Villagers….

    ….and a special good morning to you, Jackie. And yes, I’ve seen pets as chickens. Think I’ll have Ian get Golden Boy out and bring into the packing room today. Wish I could post a pic of him, but I have no means…he is one beautiful rooster…mean looking too. I wonder where the old saying “madder than a wet hen” came from.

    Got side tracked this morning. Husband was telling me of these pics, and this one in particular, so I went ‘cruising’ thru all 44 of them. GR πŸ˜‰ you will “stop in your tracks” at number 40/

    http://historythings.com/historys-greatest-images-30-photos-that-will-stop-you-in-your-tracks/12/

    Well, today is our 17th wedding anniversary. My first and only marriage….and I thought it was going to be a blessed union. But then again, at age 45 when I got married, I was definitely set in my ways. So, it’s hard work on both ends. I once asked my paternal Grandfather how they reached to celebrate 50 years of marriage….he said “it wasn’t easy, but then it wasn’t easy for your Grandmother either.”

    Jerry, my paternal Grandfather had a pacemaker back in the days. I remember a suitcase that we would hook up the phone to and wires to his chest…..I’m glad you are in good spirits.

    ya’ll have a blessed Lord’s Day

  4. Debbe Avatar
    Debbe

    GR πŸ˜‰ great cd to own…..some songs were played at our wedding, this is one of them

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNpmOMNznGI

  5. Debbe Avatar
    Debbe

    I’m still laughing at this one πŸ™‚

    http://cheezburger.com/8800746496

  6.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Debbe, it isn’t easy staying married. Getting married is easy. No one probably has happy marriages but half the Village is going to tell you and me they do and how simple it is. Ha! And if you were set in your ways, wasn’t he?

    Don’t beat yourself up. You have a complicated relationship. It is like you acquired half of Indiana as relatives and all their problems. There has got to be a reality chicken show in there somewhere.

  7. Jerry in Fl Avatar
    Jerry in Fl

    Like Truman said, “The buck stops here.” I have a neurostimulator in both sides of my chest. Each has wires which run from my chest up my neck and the back of my skull (all under the skin) to the top of my head where I have a hole on each side of the top of my head. The wires run through a plug so I have a slight ring on each side where the bone has build up a little. The units provide an electrical stimulation to certain areas of the brain which control the tremors that I have as a result of Parkinsons. We have a remote which we can place over the unit and turn it up or down. If it is turned up too high it can result in very unpleasant side effects which has happened. The goal is that my tremors are controlled without medication, but that has never happened. The tremor is the only symptom that it affects and there are others such as my balance, short term memory, etc. As time passes it gets worse and finally the body losses the ability to control necessary functions to survive. In that regard it is like Alzheimers although they tell you at the beginning that it isn’t. I don’t mean to frighten anyone as I was diagnosed 10 years ago and I think that I am doing pretty well. It requires a lot of patience on my and my wife’s part. For instance it has taken me about 20 minutes to type this and correct the many, many typos, but I consider myself lucky. I have a cousin who was diagnosed at about the same time. He is now in a wheelchair and can’t really carry on a meaningful conversation. I still drive and do most normal activities, just a little slower.

  8. Jerry in Fl Avatar
    Jerry in Fl

    Sorry. The word should have been “built” and yes the wires do bind a little if I turn my head as far as I can.

  9. domaucan1 Avatar
    domaucan1

    Not much time today.
    Marriage: If the Good Lord is willing, Wifey and I will celebrate 52 years in a little over a week. Not easy but good, with three grown kids, married and living within 15 minutes of my house and 6 BEAUTIFUL & BRILLIANT grand kids. What more could one ask for? I have been blessed.

    JJ: How about those Auburn Lady Tigers? On to the semifinals of the WCWS!
    WAR EAGLE !!!

    God bless us every one.

  10.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Jerry keep on keeping on. Which is what you are doing. Go on and yes, you are lucky.

  11. emb Avatar
    emb

    This is a test: will the URL transmit if I insert a space [which you can later close] in the word explore?

    http://explo re.org/live-cams/player/decorah-eagles-north-nest

  12. emb Avatar
    emb

    Another win for the Enlightenment perspective. Peace, emb

  13. Ruth Anne in Winter Park Avatar
    Ruth Anne in Winter Park

    emb: Congratulations on beating the block! I had tried putting spaces between the elements of the URL but that didn’t fool whatever it is that doesn’t like that site. So now I’m off to watch the puffins and the underwater cam πŸ™‚

  14. Mark in TTown Avatar
    Mark in TTown

    Good one for the morning cat pic Debbe. Happy Anniversary. I married at 42, to someone who had been married once previously. Unfortunately it didn’t work out. I allowed it to beat me down very badly. But I am beginning to try to turn things around. Thanks for the friendship and care all of you have shown since I began posting here. I’m not going anywhere, just wanted to say thanks.

  15.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Mark what you are doing is courageous, to change the status quo and just go forward. Say, I ain’t ever going back and go forward. One day at a time, one foot forward is forward and progress.

    The Village was my support and continues to be daily. It is a good place. When orphans leave I hope they are somewhere safe and thriving, not wandering lost.

    Yes, thank you Village. I am not leaving. I love this place.

  16.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    Just about my favorite Grateful Dead song as long as we are on a Southern trip. And yes, I like a lot of Grateful Dead, Scarlet Begonias is another favorite.

    https://youtu.be/rTG6pvXp4l0

  17. Mark in TTown Avatar
    Mark in TTown

    Jackie, I think we scared everyone off. No posts since 1119 am?

  18. Old Bear Avatar
    Old Bear

    Just opened “The Pocket Book of Quotations”
    The first thing I see is:

    It matters not how straight the gate,
    How charged with punishments the scroll,
    I am the master of my fate:
    I am the captain of my soul.

    W.E.Henley, Invictus

    How apropos how true – keep on keeping on.

  19. Old Bear Avatar
    Old Bear

    Be nice to be able to do italics and underline

  20. Old Bear Avatar
    Old Bear

    GM Debbe
    B’hugs

  21. TruckerRon Avatar

    Old Bear, you need to learn some simple tokens that involve lesser than and greater than symbols. To keep this from converting, I’ll do it with parentheses:

    Italics: (i)
    Cancel Italics: (/i)

    Underlines: (u)
    Cancel Underlines: (/u)

    Use the same approach for bold…

  22. TruckerRon Avatar

    BTW, once you master those tokens, you can nest them, just be careful to match them up like you would quotes and double quotes in a sentence.

  23. TruckerRon Avatar

    Ok, forget about underlining.

  24. Rick in Shermantown, Ohio Avatar
    Rick in Shermantown, Ohio

    Jimmy:

    I never use “not funny” whenever I write a joke that bombs.

    Instead, I use “intelligent.”

    I simply shrug, say that my joke was too intelligent for them to grasp, and all is well in my world.

  25. emb Avatar
    emb

    There’s also Tom Lehrer’s line, when audience laughter was weak: ‘The rest of you can look it up when you get home.’ Works only with some kinds of gags. Peace,