Today, I’ve chosen another really old A&J for you, from 1987. I talk a lot here about the evolution of my drawing and sometimes about the evolution of the writing, but I don’t think enough is made of how much the personality of the characters has evolved over time. Arlo and Janis both have become familiar, knowable individuals. In the early days, as in this cartoon, nothing defined the players beyond an air of whimsy that always has existed within the strip and married-couple banter, hopefully from a fresh perspective—mine—but still married-couple banter. The development of the characters is, of course, a reflection of growth in drawing and in writing, yet it’s more: while a sum of the whole, it almost is a separate metamorphosis, the satisfying outcome of the cartoonist’s craft.
Punch Line
By Jimmy Johnson
Recent Posts
Ghost of Christmas Past
This holiday Arlo & Janis comic strip from 2022 is similar in concept to the new strip that ran yesterday. I thought the latter ...
Spearhead
I have produced a number of comic strips related to Veteran’s Day. Especially in latter years, I have tried to emphasize the universal experience ...
Dark Passage
Remember: it’s that weekend. The return to standard time can be a bit of a shock in the late afternoon, but I rather enjoy ...
What’s old is old, again
You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to build a web site, but there are similarities. Everything needs to be just right, or ...
Back to the ol’ drawing board
I don’t have a lot of time this morning. I wasn’t going to post anything, but I’m tired of looking at that old photograph ...
Thursday’s Child
On Sunday, I teased you with the suggestion there are more changes coming here. There are. They will appear soon, and I think you’ll ...
252 responses to “Punch Line”
Yeah, he waxed them, alright.
Speaking of waxed, I just read a newspaper article from 2007 that references “MySpace, the premier online social network”.
Drove through what looked ominous on toll roads to Tulsa. All the 18 wheelers off the road on shoulder, most of cars too. Idiot here drove thru it and emerged on other end to make doctors appointment .
Determination, pass it on.
Toll roads to Tulsa. Sounds like the title to a C&W song. Glad to hear from you, Jackie and glad to hear you are enjoying Mark Knopfler. As the sergeant on Hill Street Blues said, “Let’s be careful out there”.
Mark I have to confess that Piper to the End makes me cry and who in the world put Far From the Clyde back to back with it? I tear on that one and then Piper gets me. I love pipes and I am sure I have mentioned men in kilts?
Yes, I love Mark Knoplers and all your other groups too. You all have reintroduced me to music I love from all genres.
Love Jackie
I just ran across and read a “Hollywood Reporter” article on a subject that interested me. It ended with the comment “An earlier version of this story featured the wrong year for Nixon’s presidential campaign.” Something tells me I won’t be reading a lot of their articles in the future.
Do media organizations no longer hire editors? Or do they just hire editors that are no better founded in their craft than so many “reporters ” are these days?
GR6, what do expect from a millennial who believes Wikipedia is a fact checker?
Debbe 😉 Who, me?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyMMEmwFQUE
And good to know I’m not the only one here who has ever enjoyed the “other” morning brew, hon. 🙂 If I had access to Mr. Peabody’s WABAC machine, I’d probably take it back to then, drift out to Padre, and look you up.
True, sand. And “I saw it on the InterWebNet, so it must be true.”
Along with “History is about old stuff that doesn’t matter anymore.”
WANTED: Somebody to go back in time with me. This is not a joke. P.O. Box 322, Oakview, CA 93022. You’ll get paid after we get back. Must bring your own weapons. Safety not guaranteed. I have only done this once before.
Jackie, you have hit on two of my favorites by Mark. And I have teared up listening to Piper to the End, and So Far From the Clyde reminds me of what happened to the ship I served on. She ended up as a target ship in a fleet exercise, sunk by torpedoes not even fired from an American ship. Sad end to a WWII and Vietnam vet. But listen to Why Aye, Man and you will cheer up again.
Ghost, judging by the stories in the online edition of the Birmingham News, the reporters are somewhat dependent on the readers to point out errors and typos for them so they can be corrected. I don’t know what the rush is, as they are the only newspaper in town. Their only competition is from the tv/radio stations, who only post a paragraph or two on any given story.
Anonymous: Have weapons, will travel. Never particularly cared about personal safety. (I have flown light and medium aircraft; ridden motorcycles; and dated numerous women.) How far back?
Here I sit in my own backyard listening to Stevie Ray Vaughn playing All Your Love and dang, now he is doing Pride and Joy! A tornado will hit me before I go inside.
Wait, the above ground storm shelter is out here with me in the Boat Palace. Just need to get the CDs in with me.
Love Jackie
Jackie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRyNImChyqk
Jackie, the boat in the basement joke goes further back than NCIS: check this out
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyToeE5Lh9s
You guys are so entertaining! I can’t add anything tonight, maybe tomorrow. Take care now, Mark, Jackie, and Ghost. Debbe, the henhouse will be cooler, I hope … maybe it was today?
Very glad that eMb is okay. I miss his posts; hope his computer starts talking to us soon.
C in NH
Amtrak is good but I don’t see them going to Europe any time soon.
Though I think I remember a hair brained scheme in Popular Science about
a tube to Europe and one across the Bearing Strait.
Not aware of a planned Bering Strait tube, Bear, but a few years back I saw one of the cable science channels do a program on a proposed bridge, which as I recall would cross the Diomede Islands. They used CGI imaging to show how it would be constructed, and I remember thinking it might just work. But I also remember thinking the real challenge might well be building, maintaining and keeping open the approach thoroughfares. I’ve never been to Siberia, but I have been to northern Alaska in the wintertime, and I have my doubts about that part of the plan.
In any case, I suspect that at the present time our social welfare spending and Putin’s Dream of Empire will effectively rule out any such cooperative project, anyway.
Mark
Many moons ago man in Putnam CT built boat in cellar.
Them dug his way out to street – about 20 -25 feet.
Laid up dry stone wall and put in double doors.
“We’re churning out a generation of poorly educated people with no
skill, no ambition, no guidance, and no realistic expectations of what
it means to go to work”. Mike Rowe
Test does this go through?
As I remember it was pick and shovel digging.
GR6 I recall something like that now also.
Just filled in a Census form – They do want a lot of stuff they “promise” is secure -ha
They wanted race and one box was White – white is a color not a race.(So is Red, Black,
& Yellow)
In the box for other I put Caucasian.
Talking to my brother – his daughter is classed (on her college application) as Latina because
she was born in Brazil (it even said ignore race) She is 1/2 Chinese & 1/2 Scandinavian
and all smart as a whip.
It would not allow me to post last 3 comments in 1 block
Mark, both tornado song and The Boat totally entertained me. I am going to pass The Boat onto my sailing/boating friends
Wish I had it when I wrote one of my articles about where people build boats, it would have been perfect!
Ghost, I know you won’t believe me about swimming in water coming off a glacier but I did, halfway to Alaska although maps and navigation are not my strong suit as we all know. That was so unbelievable being able to do that, look at snow and glaciers melt and pour down just yards away, yet swim in warm waters. Of course there were no roads but some planes, wondered if you’d flown with any of those?
Love Jackie