Frank Gehry’s Fast Food Masterpiece

If you’re not knocked off balance by panels one and two, in which the architect of The Bucket tells Euclid to piss off, then the shifting narrative and stilted dialogue (plus mystery girl in panel two) shouldn’t present too much more of a challenge to parse.

For myself, I can confess nothing but disappointment that we aren’t getting another chance to continue talking about the shitty cars we drove in high school (and/or are driving presently). As it stands, I suppose we’ll have to wait until tomorrow to understand why these characters are being introduced.

Bonus question: Why is the strip’s date inserted front and center of panel two?

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Competing To Alienate Everyone

Guys and Gals, can I ask a (kinda) serious question?

What does it say that, of the Bader Family Trio, Ma Bader is the least functional and possibly most psychologically damaged?

I bet those frames don’t even have prescription lenses in them.

Edited to add Frank Zappa’s tribute to the imaginary journalistic profession, Packard Goose:

And They Call This Carnival, Progress

I was trying to hold it in. I have tried to refrain from using one of my favorite lyrics, hoping things would get better and this plot would limp out of existence. Such is not the case. So from the song “Tristesse” by the Australian group, The Church, this particular lyric is here to save the plot from abject lunacy and give us all a bit of sanity,

First off the agenda, as I told Ned in his post, Daffy is a supernumerary in the Bader household. Until today, her contribution to the conversation was worth as much as the Chips Ahoy brownies on the coffee table. And it’s going downhill from there.

Reinvent himself? Into what? Bozo the Clown? “Okay, boys and girls, I was once a 3rd baseman in AAA for the Pawtucket Red Sox but when I couldn’t hit left-handers, I took up Clowning.”

And who made Daffy judge and jury over Bader’s future anyway? She writes an article about Barry’s dad that I wouldn’t be surprised is the slime of the earth where I can only envision that Pa Bader is Pretty Boy Floyd. Then Barry is left to be this byproduct of this bad seed and will never find his way out of that image at this point, especially if Barry attempts to go by Daffy’s definition of reinventing yourself. That could get interesting.

Daffy, wake up and smell the brownies. BARRY IS A BALLPLAYER!!!!!!!!!!!! Nobody within this galaxy is saying Barry’s a gentleman. The kid is stuck on himself. His image is walking flypaper and has drawn more flies than your sleazy comments. But the brat can play the damn game. That has never been an issue and really shouldn’t be here. Now is not the time to locate the nearest comic book in the room, go back to the inside flap of a Little Dot comic and point to the “You Too Can Be a Locksmith!!!!!!!”

“Barry, just send in $8.95 plus shipping and handling to ‘Locksmiths are God, P.O Box 189, New Thayer’. I think I have stamp in my purse.”

 

“…parting is such sweet sorrow.”

“No problemo, Juliet. I’ll call Barry tomorrow since he’s an apprentice at Milford Lock & Key Shoppe. You sure there’s a cot in the Journalism room?”

“Oh, Romeo, it is in the bathroom by the shower stall. Could you toss a wrench up here? The release switch is a bit rusty.”

 

In the middle ad section of a Richie Rich Deluxe Edition

 

“The Scummy Article That Made a Man Out Of Barry”

“JESUS, Bubba, that’s the worst piece of trash you ever wrote about me!!!!!!!!!!!!! I don’t scratch my crotch between innings!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

“Listen, punk, I’d punch your face in but you might dry up and blow away.”

Later

Barry is kicking over the bat rack in the dugout

“GODDAMIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’ll show Bubba he can’t write dogshit like that and get away with it. OK, I’ll gamble a stamp and send away for Luke Bunkin’s Strength and Conditioning Program.”

6 months later while flexing in front of the mirror in the locker room

“WOW!!!!!!!!! I’ve got muscles rippling like Coach Thorp’s hairdo. I can’t wait to meet Bubba down at The Bucket and settle the score. He’s flexing his gluteus maximus while downing a tomato and wheat germ oil shake. Talk about rubbing it in. I’ll show him.”

While cramming wheat germ oil shake and a random Banana Bucket Split up Bubba’s gluteus maximus in front of a group of approving women including Mrs. Bader

“WHAT?????? Are you still around? I’ll teach you to take liberties with the 1st Amendment. And I bought some Cruex too!!!!!!!!”

Some girlie girl warms up to Barry. “OH BARRY, where did you get those muscles!!!!!!!!”

“Thanks to the Luke Bunkin Training Program, I have strong muscles and tireless legs. It took a while to lift that Polled Heifer and I failed the first few times outrunning that bull in the field but after getting tired of surgery on my abdomen, I decided enough was enough. And unsubstantiated articles are a THING OF THE PAST. And if I can eat 10-day old corn cobs in the pig sty with the rest of the porkers, SO CAN YOU.”

 

Mrs. Bader, WILL YOU PLEASE PUT YOUR GLASSES ON YOUR NOSE AND USE THEM UNLESS THEY’RE STAPLED TO YOUR HEAD??????? You look like a believable character for “Star Trek: The Next Generation After The Next Generation”

 

In the bathroom stall at Milford Gym girls bathroom stall

TOMMY LASORDA POOPED HERE

 

Do you think it’s alright

To leave Barry with Cousin Steven

Something ’bout him ain’t right

He works at night alone

He carries no phone

 

I think it’s alright

Yes, I think it’s alright

 

We’re all alone, cousin

All alone, cousin

Let’s go to the ball field and play

Now that Gil has stored all equipment away

You were always too much work

Being blind, deaf, and a jerk

But Ms. Rizk is on assignment today

 

How would you feel if I racked you with no cup

Turned on the sprinkler and drowned you 10 feet up

Maybe some lining chalk that’s crammed up your ass

Would cause your innards to fart out snowy gas

 

I’m the school custodian

I’m the perverted cheat

It’s what happens when I’m single

And work nights in the heat

 

I love Laffy Taffy stuck up your nose

And using the stem of second base to beat at your toes

What would you think if you swallowed Red Man chew

A veritable feast washed down with Elmer’s Glue

 

We’re all alone, cousin

All alone, cousin

We’re leaving the ball field, okay

Now that Gil is about to get up this day

You weren’t much fun being blind, deaf, and a jerk

But now I’ve got to go back to work.

 

“See the colors changin’

See the colors changin’

See th-SCCCRRRRRAAATTTCCCHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

 

Peaches drastically ends Tori Amos’ “Beauty of Speed” on the table top

“Marty, what are you DOING?????”

“Let’s see, carry the one and that should make the last 2 digits end in ’00’, making that a factor of 4.”

“Marty, why don’t you come to bed with me? This is the second night and I’ve barely gotten a cold kiss out of you. We only have 3 days left.”

“Peaches, I’m on a roll!!!!!! I’m trying to solve Fermat’s Last Theorem. If I can win over the Milford Mathematical Society, I will no longer have to put up with those snarly kids at WDIG!!!!!”

“Marty, I know you. You will NEVER quit your job at the radio station even if you have $1 million at Milford State Bank and right now it’s this Furman guy or me.”

“Oh c’mon, Peaches!!!!!!!! I just need to work through a kink in the quadratic equation because I think I added 1 radical too many, plus I have still haven’t proven 2+2=4 through reductio ad absurdum. But I’m getting there. Hmmmmmmm, but this contradicts the fact that there are 3 mangoes instead of 5. That’s it!!!!!!!! Now it’s just a matter of time. Shit!!!!!!! If I can angle this TI-46 towards the lava lamp just right.”

“Marty, one theorem you haven’t proven is that I turn you on. Now let’s put aside that weetle itty-bitty cal-kee-late-or and come to bed.”

“AND JUST WHEN I’M ON THE VERGE OF QUOD ERAT DEMONSTRANDUM???????????”

 

Needless to say, the papers were never submitted to the MMS. And to add insult to injury, Marty never had sex. Peaches left. The proof on his theorem was as weak as his wim wim.

Fortunately, the Milford Men’s Clinic can cure Erectile Dysfunction so that Boolean Algebra takes a back seat to mathematical ecstasy. Sex will never be the same once the positive conjugate enters the negative conjugate. That’s one complex number Marty forgot to factor in that night. BUT, he will have his graphing calculator and his ED medicine this weekend or my name isn’t Georg Cantor. The Milford Men’s Clinic has satisfied Gauss and Newton and it can satisfy YOU. Check it out today. You have nothing to lose but unnecessary digits on a repeating decimal.

 

Gang, comment away. I’m going to use a tire jack to pry those glasses off Mrs. Bader.

 

“Daggone it!!!!!!! The solar batteries went dead!!!!!!!!! Peaches, do you have your calculator?????”

“The one I use to figure my piece count at Milford Foundry???? I left it in my other purse at home.”

I Apologize, Betty Crocker was all out of trapezoid brownies.

Wait, wait, wait. Before we go ANY further, weren’t Aunt Bea and Opie going to fellowship over brownies? At least, the last time Daffy Duck went to Yalta to report on Stalin’s and Churchill’s bitches and gripes for the Milford Enquirer, that’s what people munched on. And if Ma Bader is on her hands and knees trying to get Daffy to change Barry from Goofus to Gallant, well, BROWNIES WORKED THE LAST TIME. WHY SWITCH TO CHIPS AHOY?????????? I admit in Mayberry, the more conventional culinary wisdom when catching up on the latest gossip would have been milk and cookies but brownies was an adequate substitute. But those look like COOKIES to me on the coffee table, being washed down by a Bucket Triple Chocolate Shake. The Uber driver arrived well before The Summit (“WE have 1 more coming, does the Uber driver have another T-Choc Shake in the fridge in his trunk?”).

 

Steve Luhm, writing off Milford High School Janitorial Science Department stationery

“Ms. Rizk, I love everything about you. Your Granny dreadlocks get me erect and you have eyes like frying pans smeared in Pam.”

A week later

“Hey, I dig your letter but didn’t Fred tell Wilma that she had frying pan eyes? I think that was the episode where Fred and Barney took Dino to the Bedrock Veterinary Clinic to get medicine for Dino’s tapeworms. I was 79 years old then so my memory’s slipping. I watched that episode on the ‘M’ Computer during my planning period.”

 

Watching Barry in negotiations with Daffy is comical. ” I really DID see Elvis and now you’re making me a liar. He and OJ and me went down to The Bucket to see if I had any chance at pro ball since I’m the star of the team. As long as Moose is going to swing his weight around, I might as well do some swinging myself. And you write like I was still in T-Ball”.

Richard, you did a lot for the country, you normalized relations with China and Russia, the economy did well under your leadership, for a Republican, you were very environment-friendly, BUT YOU’RE STILL A CROOK.

 

And gang, I promised you That Daffy’s day in court was coming. The Day of Reckoning is today. Sung to the tune “Good-Lookin’ Woman” by Norman Greenbaum, awayyyyyyyyy we go

 

You’re a sleaze-talkin’ woman, oh yeah

You spew venom out of your womb, oh, oh, yeah

There’s no mercy when you write

All of Milford goes running

They don’t want to get slammed and slimed

Time after time

They’d rather be napalmed

 

It’s gonna take manners to keep you around, Baby

Nothing like manners to keep you on the ground, Baby

You wonder why they hate you

Babe, it’s no-brainer

You are a viper

We need a restrainer

On a sleaze-talkin’ woman

Sleaze-talkin’ woman

Sleaze-talkin woman

Sleaze-talkin’ woman like you

 

You did a hose job on Pa and Barry, oh yeah

Reese’s Bits ‘n’ Pieces, that’s what’s scary, oh, oh, yeah

You could be Society’s Child

If you live like a human

I’m not holding my breath on that

The chances are fat

And baboons act better

 

It’s gonna take manners to keep you around, Baby

You behave like a tick-ridden, smelly bloodhound, Baby

You worry ’bout the future

Babe, you could end it

Use manners like money

Be willing to spend it

On a sleaze-talkin’ woman

Sleaze-talkin’ woman

Sleaze-talkin woman

Sleaze-talkin’ woman like you

 

Thank you for your patience, gang. You guys did a great scouring on Daffy. Just finishing the job.

 

Don Drysdale comes to Milford

 

While Don is throwing grapefruits to Moose during batting practice

“Don, I understand you played a little ball.”

“That’s right, Gil. Played for the Dodgers for years.”

“And do you have any advice for Moose here?”

While Moose is whackin’ ’em to the top of OJ’s townhouse across the field

“Sure. It’s not an easy road, son. You gotta pay your dues. Long bus rides. Greasy spoon restaurants. And I roomed with Tommy Lasorda while we were playing for Albuquerque. God, the shit he left in the shower when we were getting ready to go. One day, I asked Tommy after he used the Motel 6 towel to wipe his ass, My Man, the maid does supply toilet paper in the stall. Then he used 2 rolls every time he took a shit. I got left with 1/2 a paper towel, that gritty stuff you clean your butt with in the Milford boys bathroom. On the mound, it’s HELL pitching against the Reds and the sandpaper itch creeps up your butthole. Son, take my word for it, it’s a long ride.”

Don leaves to go down to Milford Sporting Goods to sign autographs and endorse his latest book “Life’s Lesson’s I Learned in Milford”

“Well, Moose, did you learn anything?”

Trying to pry one batting doughnut off because it’s not heavy enough to help improve his bat speed

“Sure, next time, make sure you bring 2 Charmin Rose-Scented 2-Ply 12-Roll Paks and stash ’em under the bed.”

 

“Oh, but Daffy, my Barry really is a good boy. Just because he stares at the mirror doesn’t make him a bad boy. He may be deaf, dumb and a jerk but he’s not Bart Simpson.”

 

Today’s headline in the Milford Enquirer

“OJ Filing Suit After Baseball Lands In His Aquarium!!!!!!!!”

sub headline

“Proceedings Will Not Take Place Until October; Judge Ito Is On Sabbatical.”

 

“Mr. Chambers. Mr. Chambers. It is the meal time. Kindly state your preference.”

“Oh, all right. I want a Triple Bucket Burger, hold the mayo, extra pickles, extra cheese, and X-large order of Chili Bucket Fries, and a Dutch Chocolate Bucket o’ Shake.”

“Small, medium, or large?”

“Aaaaaa, I’ll take large.”

“My, my, Mr. Chambers”, the lighted tube speaking briskly and efficiently, “You are going to be a 3-course meal by the end of September.”

“I thought you Kanamits have no sense of time.”

“We always know when it’s a certain time of the year. The plot finally ceases and that’s when we make our move to earth to get more condiments, er, people. The population of Milford is high on our list. They are haute cuisine of the human race.”

“BTW, how’d you manage to bring another Bucket up here?”

“We had a little trouble at the 5th Galaxy but after that, the legal deeds, property taxes, easement issues, parcel outlots, legal fees, environmental concerns, economic impact studies were simply a matter of time.”

 

A one Michael Chambers is left to ponder in amazement the denouement of The Bucket in the world of the Kanamits while his existence is on life support. Many careers fade, sadly to say, into a pot of boiling stew and while you’re commenting away on today’s strip, this story exemplifies that Man is a star about to nova in a world we call…The Twilight Zone

Rough Expectations

Well that was anticlimactic.  Given that (1) Barry has been treated like dirt by his teammates, his schoolmates, and his coaches ever since his father’s crash into Addison “Boo, But Not the Boo from To Kill A Mockingbird” Radley (b) no one, not even Counselor Dern, has suggested Barry get help or talk to someone except as a means to generate a lede, and (iii) Rubin has taken a ham-fisted approach to so many of his “ripped from the headlines” arcs only to end them in a flurry of tell-don’t-show moments, I fully expected today’s strip to feature Barry shooting up the halls of Milford High.  Rubin could wipe out underdeveloped and name-dropped characters in one fell swoop and turn the summer arc into a month-long episode of A Very Special Gil Thorp. I even implied as much in my Thursday post.

Art snark aside: Dafne and Bestie Who Looks Like An Extra From Room 222 (not to say that Dafne herself doesn’t look the same from time to time) have each lost a chunky bracelet since yesterday. Dafne and Barry are a bit closer in height than they were previously.

Back on topic: Maybe l’affaire Bader et Dafonte will still erupt in violence.  Maybe the adults in the teachers’ lounge will read the article and see it as the cry for help Barry has so desperately tried to make for the past two years.  Maybe the Nats will stop free falling, turn their season around, claw their way into a playoff spot and finally win a postseason series for once.  None of these things seems likely at the moment, and none of them are going to happen soon enough.

metapost:  timbuys’ Thorp of July post had some of us drifting off in Costello/Lowe reverie and realizing that we may have been in the same room at the same time.  Doubtless, then, the latest news from Mr. MacManus may have hit some of us like a ton of bricks. The news does seem positive, however, and I’m hopeful The Living Elvis will remain living for some time to come, which leads me to…

metapost 2: For the past couple of years I’ve been the Thursday and Saturday poster, a fact that always makes me think of a certain EC song.  As such, I usually end up being the guy who gets to weigh in on an arc’s final strip. Not this time, however.  I’m going to be traveling over the next two weeks, so one or more of my esteemed colleagues will get to see this train wreck into the station.  Thanks for hanging in there with me today.  I leave you with that certain song that almost always comes to mind when I enter the Thorpiverse.

Too bad we’ll never see this story

Milford goes modern, as Gil and Mimi read the Bader story in the Trumpet on their smartphones. How theyre already dressed and ready to go at 6:04 am is implausible, but since this strip never shows people in pajamas, I guess its SOP.

P2 shows Dafnes hotness – tight black shirt with short sleeves showing off her guns.. I love how both she and her friend both have 3 bracelets on opposite wrists so they all show as theyre fist-bumping.  Hopefully now that the story is out they can go about letting these kids out of school before summers over..

P3 Dafne says it should be safe? Will the story explode off the newspaper if it isnt? I would think that after all this time and energy it would (again) be edited and approved by Miss RisqK. Whats Daf worried about? And why did she have to call the Baders and tell em what she’s writing? I guess we’re in for one last surprise before this story is a (fish)wrap.  Methinks Del will get out of jail early because of what he said in the story, Barry will turn into a happy person because of it, and everything will be all right as we waltz into the sunset.

First Responder Timeline (in part)

6:04 am… Three hours from prison, in his comfortable home in Milford, Barry Bader cues up “Pumped Up Kicks” on his smartphone as he loads his backpack with his weapons of choice.  Using a metallic-silver Sharpie, he writes “Dafne,” “Ms. Rizk,” “Coach Kaz,” “Coach Thorp,” “Mrs. Coach Thorp,” and “that greasy-haired kid obsessed with launch angles” on six of the loaded magazines he proceeds to place in the backpack.

Happy Thorp Of July, Everyone!

Please enjoy the adult beverage of your choice in moderate moderation and set off lots of fireworks!

P1: Wouldn’t it be better to have, rather than a more or less anonymous character ask, someone like Ryan Von Auken poking holes in K-Pel’s aspirations?

P2: Sigh.

P3: Double sigh.

Edited to add the following as it looks like our Fourth will be washed out. I was at this show (one of two that night). It was incredible.

Edited to further add the following: