As the tension mounts between the 2 erstwhile signalcallers solely due to hoping a chick who doesnt give a hoot about football likes each of them more, Marty notices whats going on and says its a first for the Milford program to have 2 players not getting along. He’s sure developing Alzeimers if he thinks its never happened before in 50 years of this dreck.
Hey a guy who fought a time or 2 in his day is trying to break them up. Kaz surely remembers his referee appearance in 2013 with Gil vs Herk the Mauler:
…or his boxing academy in 2007…
So at any rate he’s got the experience if the 2 QB’s wanna settle it in the ring.
No, not that virus, though you gotta admit that social distancing would be a plausible rationale for the seating arrangements in the Milford gym. Today we get a view into the inner workings of the Thorpian Stasi in action.
First, Gil walks in on the aftermath of Kaz shooting up on his desk instead of in what looks to be an Aeron chair but is probably a knockoff. How else do you explain that overdeveloped right arm with veins a-poppin’?
Then we catch Gil repeating the story with his chief informant Mimi. That Gil’s players had begun to show up to support Mimi’s team wasn’t enough for her; in her mind, they should have to do it as a unit. No place for players to sit with their friends on the team and to not sit with guys they wouldn’t hang with outside of football. Gil of course buys into that and decides he needs to get to the heart of the matter. How? Not by actually talking to the two guys who are actually at the heart of the matter, but to put two guys on the hot seat who have been the exact opposite of rivals for the past two seasons.
Finally we find out how Gil “squeezed” the intel out of Macy and Roh: via ungloved prostate exams with zero lube. Why is Gil so angry at these two? Did they not drop trou fast enough for him? Chance and Charlie aren’t the droids you’re looking for, Gilberto, and they’re not the ones who are taking sides in this controversy. EDIT: Alert TWIMer Downpuppy has pointed out that the pair getting reamed out by Gil in P3 are in fact the dueling quarterbacks Rappson and Thayer. Once Gil is finished with his unlubed prostate exams, these two will be singing Kumbayah (h/t hitorque) and playing rock paper scissors for first crack at Corinna. Does Gil know that these two have been actively recruiting teammates to take sides against each other? If not, this is Gil’s problem to solve, not the QBs. By calling them out of class and raking them over the coals, Gil will have sown fear, uncertainty and doubt among every Mudlark football player. That won’t win the Valley but it’ll keep the proles in line and, after all, that’s what the Thorps are all about.
Back to football and a pending transition to Mouseketeer Roll Call. Kaz practices his Carol Burnett Tarzan yell tells the guys to wrap it up with some cals. Back in my day we started practice with cals to loosen up, then ended it with wind sprints or a couple laps around the field. Then again we also had salt tablets and Gatorade was just a new fad, so what do I know?
Will Thayer is “an experienced criminal defense and family law attorney at Momkus LLC.” Charlie Rapson is a New Zealand schoolboy athlete, or a one-shot British actor. Here in Milford they are both gym rats, or one-uppers, or one-upper gym rats. Their jersey numbers suggest they might be quarterbacks, so we might be in for a competition a la Jarrod Hale and True Standish, only closer. Enough speculation; hope you TWIMers enjoy the rest of your Labor Day weekend.
While I was flat on my back in hospital this past weekend I did manage to keep up with the shenanigans at Milford Town Park, where the Milford – Valley Modified baseball game turned first into a rout then into a pukefest picnic. First the game was interrupted by pizza and drinks, then with a giant sub in the porniest way possible then, finally, with a visit from an ice cream truck with a name straight out of a Cheech and Chong movie and looking like it’s staffed by two Kazakhs and a bear.
As disgustingly as that whole scene played out, it pales in comparison to the victory lap these three mooks are taking in the Milford teacher’s teachers’ lounge. Nice to know that Gil, Kaz and Rooney feel as though buying the Dead End Kids some grub can assuage their guilt over not standing up for The Mayor when he needed it most, effectively screwing up his life for the forseeable future… or have they? What’s this mysterious email Gil’s referring to? Will it help Mike Knappe overcome the stigma of violating a draconian zero-tolerance policy for which none of his teachers or coaches stood up in opposition?
Who knows? All they care about is trying to figure out who sent the ice cream truck to Town Park. Hunkered down with a Popsicle® and a knowing smile, Mimi breaks the fourth wall. She must’ve been the one who stopped Uncle Bud as he was passing by.
The big event has come to a halt. It looks like The Mayor and Gonzo (?) are reviewing the game. The big takeaway is that Hiawatha and Corina Karenna are bonding over ice cream bars. I’ll bet an ice cream bar goes down nice and easy when your standing in the heat with a chest protector strapped to you. The odds are that we’ll never hear from Hiawatha/Corina again. Their meet cute will be as much a footnote to Mudlark lore as the rest of Hiawatha’s appearances.
This postmortem tells us that the game never actually ended. Presumably, the umpire got sick of all the nonsense and walked away. Also, the infield was covered in regurgitated pizza, subs and ice cream so it was kind of a health hazard.
What wrap up would be complete without Kaz and Gil summarizing something that they didn’t participate in? It looks like Kaz is catching Gil just as he’s sliding down a freshly waxed hallway in his socks. (Good job, Steve!) Yep, everyone left happy and there were only a few minor cases of food poisoning.
Oh boy do I love a coffee pouring panel. Mostly, I’d see them in Mark Trail. Mark would be sitting in his log cabin with Andy or Doc in the foreground, and Cherry would lean over and pour Mark a fresh cup of coffee. Usually Mark would be sharing a story about expensive rental vehicles being blown to smithereens while he covered a story about bark beetle infestations for Woods & Wildlife magazine.
Anyway, it’s nice to see Kaz intently dispensing some Teachers’ Lounge Blend into his personalized mug. Also, note that it looks like Don Rooney is having his own cup of something there in the background while keeping a low profile to avoid the attention of faculty alpha males Gil & Bob.
Okay, so the real story here is that Gil and Kaz know about the extra curricular game that’s going down, but they don’t *wink* KNOW about it. So sly this pair is. Maybe they think Rooney is some kind of snitch? (Rooney probably doesn’t care. The pest in his classroom is gone and he just wants to enjoy his coffee in peace.)
Meanwhile, the Mayor wants to make history with his Little Rascals squad versus the Mudlarks. Fire up!…but please fellas, no guns!
Gil tracks down Kaz to see if Chris Schuring has tracked down Kaz. Life at Milford High is mainly people tracking down other people so they can say things to each other. If you have an office, you’re generally easier to track down, as Gil demonstrates by tracking down Kaz. But, if you are not in you’re office, perhaps because you’re tracking someone else down, you’re generally harder to track down. Now, if you don’t want to be tracked down, but you do have an office, then you’re in a bit of a conundrum.
So now Kaz, having been tracked down by Gil, is being briefed on how to proceed when and if Chris Schuring tracks him down. Gil said he has “a few thoughts” which seems to translate into “here’s what you need to do”.
There is no suspense generated by Chris Schuring’s efforts to track Kaz down. One panel after the Gil/Kaz busines, Chris Schuring has tracked Kaz down. It looks like Kaz was tracked to the cafeteria. Next to the office, the cafeteria is an ideal place to track someone down. Kaz probably has “cafeteria duty”, which made him really easy to track down.
Gil has apparently fully briefed Kaz on his plan vis a vis the arrangement of a baseball game between Milford High and the Valley Modified “squad”. Once Kaz is tracked down by Chris Schuring, he begins to spew out Gil’s thoughts. Remember how the very last strip we had was Gil talking to Chris Schuring about the topic of arranging this game? I guess the speed of Gil’s thoughts have slowed to the point where he couldn’t share them with Chris then, thus necessitating extra layers of tracking and talking.
The kicker to all of this byzantine tracking and sharing is that we got absolutely nowhere today (other than seeing two successful track downs in one strip…Woo-hoo!) So we wait in suspense to see what else Gil told Kaz to tell Chris Schuring. Maybe some extra time to think gave Gil some ideas about how to be supportive of the plan for the game (but he’d prefer to have the ideas come through Kaz so he can stay away from any responsibilities). Maybe Kaz is just going to offer more lecturing on the liabilities at play here and throw more cold water on the plan.
For the third straight day we’re told that The Mayor has been expelled. Now it’s time for that news to spread throughout Milford and into the Valley.
Gil’s little “I know” and $1.98 will buy The Mayor a cup of coffee at Swifti Mart on his way out of town. I suppose that’s some kind of foreshadowing of Gil testifying on his behalf when this goes to trial, or not. A quick search (which I’m not gonna link to, sorry) shows me that successful challenges of school zero-tolerance policies as arbitrary or capricious, violative of due process, or discriminatory are few and far between but not nonexistent. Imagine if the Knappes win on the merits: The Mayor gets reinstated at Milford High, the Knappes get their attorney’s fees plus damages, Milford school and property taxes go up to cover the costs, Marty Moon never lets Milford hear the end of it, somebody’s head rolls… will that be enough to keep Gildeaux’s mouth shut?
Onto the diamond where the Mudlarks are trying out their new practice jerseys with glow-in-the-dark numbers. Gil gets vague and Kaz gets pissy, probably because he forgot to put his earrings on today. Kaz-bot may be breaking the fourth wall to render an opinion on modern society here.
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