Help Big Boy Find His Way Out Of This Plot

Gang, remember when we were kids and we went to Jerry’s or Ponderosa or Frisch’s Big Boy and we’d order our favorite food because our parents weren’t going to make us eat our vegetables at Frisch’s, WE COULD ORDER WHATEVER THE HELL WE WANTED? So we’d order a Triple Cheese Big Boy Burger, a washtub full of French Fries, Caesar’s Salad they’d serve in dog food bowls and OF COURSE THE DESSERT which was a hot fudge sundae designed like the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Naturally, we didn’t finish because we were kids and our eyes got bigger than our tummies and so Mom and Dad got us doggie bags to finish instead of Cheerios for the next couple of days. While we were waiting, remember those placemats? The ones that had “Help Long John Silver find the buried treasure” or “Help Big Boy find his way to his house” or “Help Marty Moon find his way to Studio 3 after he got hung over from Blatz Beer the night before”.

That’s the scenario as I see it in front of me. Etiqutte training? Blackthorne? One minute we’re on the trail of 2 teenagers, evidently with some game, about to brave the elements to,well, play more golf. Next thing you know we’re trying to cram in more terminology within the span of  less than a month. The plot that never ends, fer sure.

What does etiquette training have to do with the game of golf AT THIS POINT ANYWAY? Sure, you yell “FORE!!!!!” when you hit a shot and you think it’s going to hit a spectator or fellow golfer on the head if they’re in the vicinity of your shot. And you wait patiently until your partner putts or uses a 9-iron before you attempt your shot. But we don’t need to go into Amy Vanderbilt here and why are we going into it anyway? Because Gil is trying to hide the fact that HE’S CLUELESS AND HAS NO IDEA WHAT TO DO WITH 2 TEENAGE BOYS WITH OBVIOUSLY MORE GOLF LORE IN THEIR BAGS THAN GIL HAS IN HIS TRUNK?

Gil, why don’t you just say it? You have NOTHING to teach these kids so the month of August is strictly going to be a BS session as we help Cap’n Crunch and his crew find Etiquette Training and get a coupon good for a free Big Boy Catch of the Day Fish Sandwich, good for the next go-round plus a box of Cap’n Crunch Blueberry Cereal (Hey, we’re kids, we always loved a throw-ins). I mean, I don’t know if we’re reading Gil Thorp or James Joyce. St. Fabians? Was that in “Finnegan’s Wake” or “Ulysses”?

I’twas a blustery dye in Milfoordian as we goot nae soon for tree dyes now. Blackthorne woos a syte with ool its liefs drooped froom the trees. Gil nyded moor sex froom his wife sence the ploot woos fallin apart with nae end in syte.

 

At the Milford Girls-a-Go-Go Club during August

“AWOPBOPALOOBOPAWOPBAMBOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Heard at a table 10 feet from stage

“Man, I didn’t know Coach Kaz had it in him!!”

“I hear ya!! And Mimi is really SHAKIN’ THAT THANG!!”

 

Little Richard, you’re still going strong at 86 and I don’ t see that stopping. My hat’s off to you, My Man.

And have we really established where the hell we’re playing? As long as Gil is going to be the caboose on the Little Train That Could(“CHOO CHOOOOO, This plot is bad, this plot is bad, this…”), we’re given possible sites, Pine Ridge, St. Fabians, Blackthorne, Augusta National, Pebble Beach, Zion National Monument, Badlands, and so on but Gil is not only NOT REALLY coaching(like he ever was but this time his hand is caught in the hole on #10) but he’s drawn a blank for a specific spot.

At Milford Putt Putt

“NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You can’t have somebody hold the windmill blade while you’re shooting for an eagle. That’s cheating!!!!!!!!!!!!”

 

What happens when you call the number 1-888-O-BUCKET or go online at http://www.Bucketismyfirstlove.com to answer the survey to receive a Buy One Bucket Liver Cheeseburger and Bucket Fries Combo, Get One Free coupon

 

What did you order?

Bucket Burger

Bucket Double Burger

Bucket Triple Burger

Bucket Cheese Burger

Bucket Fries

Bucket Curly Fries

Bucket Chili Fries

Bucket o’ Tots

Bucket Hot Tamale

Bucket Pasta and Rice

Bucket Breakfast w/ Hot Cakes

Bucket Breakfast w/ Hot Cakes w/o Hash Brown Packet

Bucket Breakfast w/ Hot Cakes w/ I Can’t Believe it’s Butter!!!

Bucket Breakfast w/ Hot Cakes w/o Hash Brown Packet w/ Napkins & Straw w/o Butter and Jelly and Maple Syrup w/Arm & Hammer Baking Soda

Bucket Bologna Burger

Bucket Garlic Bologna Burger

Bucket Thick-Sliced Garlic Bologna Burger

Bucket Thin-Sliced Garlic Bologna Burger in Laminated Sheets

Bucket Thin-Sliced Garlic Bologna Burger Hand-Tossed

Bucket Turkey Burger

Bucket Buffalo Burger

Bucket Buffalo Burger(w/o Hormone Shots)

Bucket Burger w/ Matzo Buns

Bucket Pizza Burger

Bucket Pizza Burger Delivered in 30 Minutes or Less or it’s Free, excluding Oakwood and New Thayer

Pepperoni Pizza

Sausage Pizza

Canadian Bacon Pizza

Pizza! Pizza!(Oops, this is not a Little Caesars Survey)

Any Combo of these that it would take printing another piece of paper that was obtained by felling a tree in Milford Natural Area to print

 

How satisfied were you with the quality of the food products?  1) Highly Satisfied  2) Somewhat Satisfied  3)  Neither Satisfied nor Dissatisfied  4) Somewhat Dissatisfied  5) Highly Dissatisfied

How satisfied were you with the temperature of your food?  1) Highly Satisfied  2) Somewhat Satisfied  3) Neither Satisfied nor Dissatisfied  4) Somewhat Dissatisfied  5) They use thermometers that aren’t Blue-Lite Specials at K-Mart, no?

How satisfied were you with the friendliness of the staff?  1) Highly Satisfied  2) Somewhat Satisfied  3) Neither Satisfied nor Dissatisfied  4) Somewhat Dissatisfied  5) I’ve seen friendlier from a slut who got terminated at Milford Girls-a-Go-Go Club because of too many absences even though the Union is taking it to arbitration

How long did take to receive your order?

0-5 Minutes

6-10 Minutes

11-18 Minutes

19-25 Minutes

26-32 Minutes

Longer than the last plot

Did you order dessert products(Bucket Blast Banana Split, Bucket Blizzard, Bucket Bundt Cake, Bucketmints, Bucketpuddin’, etc.)?  1) Yes  2) No  3) Didn’t have time-had to get back to the Golf Plot

How satisfied were you with the quality of the dessert products?  1) Highly Satisfied  2) Somewhat Satisfied  3) Neither Satisfied nor Dissatisfied  4) Somewhat Dissatisfied  5) Highly Dissatisfied

The Bucket car hops had Plumber’s Butt  1) Strongly Disagree  2) Somewhat Disagree  3) Neither Agree nor Disagree  4) Somewhat Agree  5) Strongly Agree

I think playing “Hot Rod Lincoln” 736 times on the jukebox during Milford Frog Follies was a bit excessive  1) Strongly Disagree  2) Somewhat Disagree  3) Neither Agree nor Disagree  4) Somewhat Agree  5) Strongly Agree

I would be satisfied if The Bucket were to transfer operations to Camp Swampy  1) Strongly Disagree  2) Somewhat Disagree  3) Neither Agree nor Disagree  4) Somewhat Agree  5) Strongly Agree

I think The Bucket and Milford Clay Oven(“The Taste of the Himalayas comes to Mudlarkland”) should exchange menus for 1 week  1) Strongly Disagree  2) Somewhat Disagree  Neither Agree nor Disagree  4) Somewhat Agree  5) Strongly Agree

I think if Milford Clay Oven were to shut down for 3 weeks by the Milford Health & Safety Board due to numerous safety hazards, The Bucket would be The Taste of the Himalayas  1) Strongly disagree  2) Somewhat Disagree  3) Neither Agree nor Disagree  4) Somewhat Agree  5) Strongly Agree

I’d rather eat at The Bucket than Frisch’s Big Boy because I have suspicions that Big Boy is transsexual  1) Strongly Disagree  2) Somewhat Disagree  3)  Neither Agree nor Disagree  4)  Somewhat Agree  5) Strongly Agree

I’d rather eat at The Bucket than the Milford McDonald’s because there were rumors that Ronald McDonald had Red Books by Chairman Mao on his coffee table in his living room  1) Strongly Disagree  2) Somewhat Disagree  3) Neither Agree nor Disagree  4) Somewhat Agree  5) Strongly Agree

Thank you for taking the time to complete the survey. Your promo code number to Buy One Bucket Liver Cheeseburger and Bucket Fries Combo Get One Free is 48576390768574636458693766012365774758569687784626486068462362364547575785839094589686858684002274659235765748347289. Call for any problems.

 

P3: “And Gil’s putt at Putt-Putt went THAT far off the hole. It’s a shame cuz he made the shot through the cannon without landing on the street.”

 

“BOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! GET OUTTA HERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS AIN’T A CONCERT HALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” as numerous tomatoes and ice cubes are hurled at Coach Shaw at Milford Girls-a-Go-Go Club. Mimi and the Pussycats are still cuttin’ a rug.

“Dear, you can’t sound like Django Reinhart the first time. The Jazz Guitar lessons take time.”

“And I heard the Milford UMC has a Chicken ‘n’ Grits Supper this Friday and I heard their organist has the flu. My summer ain’t entirely shot. I’ll get supplementary income somehow.”

“Sounds like a winner. C’mon, let’s have fun in bed.”

“Uhhhhhhh, where’s those Barney Kessel CD’s? I could use a little more practice.”

 

Gang, comment away. I’m going over to Milford Putt-Putt for the Pro-Am Tournament. There was a question when the ball didn’t clear the drawbridge in time how to execute the ball drop. Do you step on the petunias around the bridge? The debate still rages.

 

“Oh, SHIT!!!!!!!!!!!! I lost track of the time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have to be at work in 15 minutes!!!!!!!!!!!! Gil, don’t you have bodyguard duty?”

“I’m off tonight.”

Well, can you water my daffodils? There’s a new dance routine we gotta learn tonight. We gotta get the Texas 2-Step down before the 1st show at 8.”

 

At Jerry’s Restaurant in Milford

“Help Coach Shaw find his sex life. His wife is on a deserted island wearing a tropical grass bikini with nothing but coconuts and Friday.”

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The P.R.C.C. Can Suck on This

Here are the heels of August: The Pine Ridge Boys. They’re what the policemen on Sodor would call “Regular Law Breakers.” I’ll bet they’ll give those earnest young golfing boys from the Milford CC all they can handle at the Valley Juniors.

We all know cheaters never win and winners never cheat, but can we take a page from The Pine Ridge Boys’ playbook and cut over to September while we’re at it?  Probably not, so stick around for a few weeks of Goofus and Gallant on the Golf Course if you will.

Inspiration for today’s post title at this link.

 

We’re From Milford, We’re from Milford…

… No one likes us
We don’t care
We’re from Milford
F***in’ Milford
No one likes us
We don’t care

I am Bader
Barry Bader
No one likes me
I don’t care
I am Barry
F***in’ Bader
No one likes me
I don’t care

It’s my dad’s fault
It’s not my fault
It’s my dad’s fault
I don’t care
Didn’t know that
Until last week
It’s my dad’s fault
I don’t care

Where was my mom?
Where was my mom?
For the last year
Did she care?
Did she stand up
To my father?
It’s not my fault
I don’t care

I’m Pelwecki
Kev Pelwecki
I hit homers
No one cares
I’ll beat Shankey’s
F***in’ record
You mean Sharkey?
I don’t care

I am Dafne
On a mission
Get in J-school
I don’t care
I’ll expose my
F***in’ classmates
They don’t like me
I don’t care

I am Ms. Rizk
I will take risks
Name’s ironic?
I don’t care
I just care ’bout
F***in’ Trumpet
I will take risks
I don’t care

I’m Kazinski
Bob Kazinski
I don’t coach much
I don’t care
Hair like Venus
Grab that penis
Off the basepath
I don’t care

I am Gil Thorp
Head Coach Gil Thorp
We’re still playing?
I don’t care
Trust the Process?
There’s no process!
When’s my tee time?
I don’t care

 

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.”

How Do You Solve A Problem Like Pelwecki?

Another strip already? I’m still mulling the meaning of the question “What about Kevin Pelwecki?” and why people will be asking it for the rest of his life. Does this mean he’ll always be the guy that gets excluded initially until the last minute when it suddenly dawns on someone that he hadn’t been given consideration?

“Well, I guess that’s it. We’re out of options. I guess we’ll just have to take the loss on this one.”
“What about Kevin Pelwecki?”
“Oh yeah, him. What have we got to lose? Send Pelwecki.”

Now on today’s episode of What About Kevin Pelwecki, where we join Kevin Pelwecki and Gil Thorp as they discuss the exciting future of Kevin Pelwecki. Gil seems to be advising Kevin to keep his options open which is code for “there’s no way you’re going to be walking on at State”. Either that or something way more racy like “it’s college, you’re supposed to experiment”.

“We need one more person for a proper Cambodian Flume Ride*, anybody game?”
“What about Kevin Pelwecki?”

The last time we saw Kevin, he was pretty pumped about going to State with an informal invite to consider the possibility of attempting to walk on to the baseball team. When did this become a problem for him?

“Oh shoot, I can’t think of anything else to put a button on this baseball season. Dafne’s going over to eat Ma Bader’s brownies. Del and Barry are still assholes, and we’ve done the requisite twenty panels of actual action. We’ve even thrown in four panels of softball but we’re still a few days short of a full season.”
“We can always just have Gil give some boilerplate advice to some kid about the future.”
“Yeah, but who should Gil be giving advice too?”
“What about Kevin Pelwecki?”
“Sure. Why not?”

*not a real thing

Done With The Baders? HA!

I’m at a total loss on what to say about this. I’ve already opined that covering this for the school newspaper is unrealistic and dumb. We all know that things are different at Milford High and trying to apply real world thinking to what goes on there is…what? futile? generally 90% of what we do here? So, the story is out and Barry is predictably upset.

Speaking of the real world, Barry’s clenched fist is actually an alarming allusion to something all too real in schools. Barry is a student in emotional distress. We could have described him this way before Del’s conviction, but now his distress in heightened by his father’s situation and its impact on home life. Is Rubin suggesting that Barry is edging towards a violent outburst of a physical nature? If we want reality, that would be a reality. The big question is do we trust Rubin to do it well, or even decently?

Setting that aside, let’s look at mystery figure in an office downtown who would appreciate… Is somebody in the Thorpiverse writing their own blog?? It’s probably Ma Bader, composing an email, asking for the story to come down. The email might not get answered because Barry is already starting to punch all the computers in the Trumpet’s “newsroom”.

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.

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.