We're Back from Hibernation.....Roanoke Times Comic Strips Dialogue (2 of 4)

This is our first entry since September of last year, and the only reason we have come back is that there is a loyal blog reader in Riga, Latvia, who kept pestering me about when I would blog again. Ok, so actually Instagram is to blame....all those amazing photos of Lake Van in Turkey are hard to ignore!!! It's hard to believe that in that amount of time we have watched Vladimir Putin became the 45th president of our beloved America (Sorry, but we can't stand Donald Trump, if there was definitely a God, then Hillary Clinton would have won the election...excuse the editorial)

Here are eight lines of dialogue we are stealing from the "Roanoke Times" Sunday comics section which ran on March 5, 2016. The reason we are using an image of starting Washington Capitals goalie Braden Holtby (pictured) is because a hockey goalie is referenced in "For Better or For Worse."

1) That stupid goalie! He just never looks! He misses everything! (For Better or For Worse)

2) "I think I need a hug anyway," (Zits)

3) What do you mean? (Hi and Lois)

4) I know red flowers make me sneeze. (Pickles)

5) At long last...............The Baby Aisle! (Jump Start)

6) I was just leaving for the day (Dilbert)

7) You're going to be late! (Baby Blues)

8) Chef Salad! Lasagna! Fried Chicken! (Blondie)

Now we can finally devote more time to those Mental Floss pop culture quizzes!

http://www.nhl.com

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.gocomics.com

http://www.mentalfloss.com

Super Tuesday 4 Tweets: Ted Cruz Has Awful Night

To keep it brief: Donald Trump won Republican primaries in Delaware, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Maryland over John Kasich and Ted Cruz, who finished last in those states tonight.

On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton appears poised to claim the party nomination as she was unable to do during the 2008 election cycle. She won four of the five primaries with challenger Bernie Sanders winning in Rhode Island.

The Philly Phanatic is being featured as one of our images in honor of the Pennsylvania primary; the Phillies won tonight over the Washington Nationals 3-1 (we think).

We tried to capture the night with tweets from the left, the right and the center. Alas, we were unable to get many tweets from women but the one we did get was from Jessica Valenti, who is a feminist American-based reporter for "The Guardian" (UK).

Here are the tweets; we will put Valenti first:

1) Jessica Valenti: 'It's very easy to be presidential' Hmmm....

 2) Anderson Cooper: Donald Trump says Bernie Sanders should run as an independent.

3) Dave Rubin: Cruz did win exit poll for Candidate Most Likely to Scare Children.

4) Matty Ice: Trump just won more states than Ted Cruz's mistresses.

5) David Axelrod: On big night, team Trump can't get mike to work??? Still a few wrinkles to work out, I guess.

6) Ricky Vaughn: Looks like Rhode Island delegates will be Trump 11 Kasich 5 Cruz 3.

7) Matthew Ygelsias: John King's enthusiasm for the state of Rhode Island is making the evening for me. (King is with CNN).

8) Rich Lowry: Trump's 57 percent in Pennsylvania is just astonishing.

9) Major Garrett (CBS): 'I'm not doing that,' Trump when asked about vetting running mates. 'I don't want to think about it.'

The Iowa GOP Debate Hangover in Tweets

The images of an elephant in a zoo (the animal is the unofficial mascot of the Republican Party), T.C. Panther the mascot for Northern Iowa U, and a still with Robert Redford in "The Candidate" (1973) one of the best films ever made about American politics start us off here this afternoon.

Here are some tweets from the Day After as well as some we overlooked last night during the Republican Debate Minus Donald Trump broadcast by Fox News in Des Moines, Iowa.:

1) Liz Mair (conservative): If Marco Rubio were gay, his hair would look better.

2) Rich Lowry (conservative): Another takeaway which may get lost, but this is the debate when Rubio lets his full disdain for Cruz show.

3) Lila Rose (conservative pro-life activist): Thank you, Rand Paul for sharing during GOPDebate that 'abortion is always wrong' and for spearheading legislation protecting the unborn.

4) Christopher Hayes (liberal): This campaign is starting to feel more and more like a long, national nervous breakdown.

5) Brian Stelter (CNN): The #s are in.....12.5 million people watched Fox's GOP debate last night.

6) John Fuselgang (liberal): I especially liked the 1 question about Flint 51 minutes into the GOPDebate that was quickly dodged by Kasich and then forgotten.

7) E.J. Dionne (liberal, Washington Post): Interesting. Jeb Bush seems more confident with Trump off the stage.

8) Tyler Morrison (stand-up comic): Jeb Bush reminds me of a supply teacher who is constantly losing control of his class.

9) Des Moines Register: Rand Paul and Marco Rubio took turns attacking Ted Cruz at the GOP Debate.

GOP Debate from Iowa Minus Trump (3 of 3)

Before we get to our final entry on this blog about tonight's GOP debate from Des Moines, Iowa, let's say Gunaydin/ Good Morning to our American Ambassador John Bass in Ankara, Turkey, where it is now 8:30 a.m. Yes, I know there is a less than one percent chance he reads this blog....

For your knowledge, the man at the top is Gov. Chris Christie and the man at the bottom is Sen. Ted Cruz, the state capitol building in Des Mones (not where the Fox News debate took place) is in the middle.

Here are the tweets:

1) Peter Beinart: Chris Christie__ the fact that your wife was near Ground Zero on 9/11 is not a foreign policy credential.

2) David French (conservative): Jeb Bush is right_he's been out front on ISIS strategy__and getting lawyers off the damn backs of the military__Yes!

3) Andrew C. McCarthy (conservative, no not the brat pack actor from the '80s): You think something about Muslims is suspicious.....and Chris Christie says you're a Sharia crazy.

4) Meghan McCain (conservative, daughter of Sen. John McCain): This is a completely different and more substantive debate with Trump off the stage.

5) Patton Oswalt: Mohammad Atta tried to fly a plane into my wife on 9/11........Chris Christie....

6) Spartan Basketball: With 513 wins at Michigan State, Coach Tom Izzo moves ahead of Gene Keady for second-most victories at a Big Ten school (yeah, we did this to play a mind game on you)

7) Zeynep Tufekci: They were trying to out-Trump each other yet they got hit with tough Qs while Trump didn't? Umm.....maybe, I'll read this Art of the Deal book.....

8) Cenk Uygur (liberal): Ben Carson just copied and pasted his closing statement. Too much effort to come up with his own conclusion.

9) Michael Medved (conservative): Maybe Trump's strategy worked....in his absence, chief rival Cruz had his worst debate, by far.....

Tonight's Republican Debate from Iowa Minus Donald Trump in Tweets (1 of 3)

Here are tweets from tonight's debate from folks who are right, left, center and non-partisan. As everyone outside of Tashkent, Uzbekistan, probably knows Republican front-runner Donald Trump (pict. top) ironically boycotted the Fox News debate because of a feud with moderator Megyn Kelly.
The other images are of the eastern Iowa town of Nemaha (the debate was actually held in Des Moines) and an image of Jeb Bush (actually from an event in New Hampshire):

1) Erick Erickson (conservative): This is a brilliant part of the debate. Megyn Kelly's accountability project.

2) Cenk Uygur (liberal): I have to give credit to Fox News for asking really targeted and fair questions showing these candidates' clear hypocricy.

 3) David Corn (liberal): Asked about immigration, Ben Carson points out that he declared war on ISIS.

4) Molly Ball (The Atlantic): Ivanka is due in two weeks, but Trump is hoping she has baby in Iowa: 'It'd be great. I'd definitely win.'"

5) Michael Ian Black: "Carson: 'I recognize not all Mexicans are terrorists.' Brave."

6) Michigan State Spartans Basketball: "With 15:18 remaining, MSU leads 41-29." (They wound up winning the game over Northwestern; yeah, this has nothing to do with the debate).

7) Ana Marie Cox (liberal): 'Chris Christie: I will flip flop in public so you can totally trust me." (Yeah, he didn't actually say that).

8) Michael Medved (conservative): If Ted Cruz wants to win anything, anywhere, he MUST learn not to talk like a bad, slimy televangelist. (Yeah, Medved did actually tweet this!)...

9) Chris Cillizza (Washington Post): Jeb Bush is getting better as a debater. But, he's not natural at all."

10 for 10 (10th entry): Three Hip Urban Slang Defintions............Defining Hottish with Tori Spelling

Greetings to our blog readers in the Netherlands, Argentina, and Burkina Faso....

We will be the first to admit that we should be at the gym in a yoga class or in a public library reading "Esquire," "Mental Floss," or "The Atlantic." But, we are here, and this will mark the 10th and final entry for a series commemorating the tenth anniversary of our blogging practice, which started on Sept. 21, 2005.

Today, we are going with three definition from The Urban Dictionary which have been slightly altered.

Tori Spelling, the former "Beverly Hills 90210" (original show) actress, is pictured here because she is the first woman who came to mind when we heard the term 'hottish.' The second woman who came to mind was Florence Henderson from "The Brady Bunch" (original version). And, the third choice was Sarah Palin (now, we are swimming over our heads).

To find out what that word and the other two urban slang words/terms of the day just keep reading, Angry Birds will be waiting for you when you are finished here:

1) Hottish: Somewhat hot. Although cannot be considered as 'hot,' a person who is hottish is not completely ugly either. (Our apologies to Ms. Spelling)....

2) Donald Trump: Living proof that money simply can not buy good hair.

3) More Issues Than Vogue:  When you imply that your amount of issues (personal problems) are greater than the amount of issues of Vogue (the magazine).

http://www.urbandictionary.com

Comic Strip Survey: For the First Time, We Check Out the Baltimore Sun

Greetings to our blog readers in Hong Kong, Turkey, and Germany........

This week for the first time in the eight-year history of this blog, we look at Sunday comic strips from "The Baltimore Sun." We were hoping to see "Zippy the Pinhead," and as it turns out, yesterday Bill Griffith's comic strip was truly a piece of art. Today, he made vintage fun of Donald Trump; even Bao Bao, the panda at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., isn't such an easy target.

Omigosh, we just made a major faux paux as it is considered rude to mention Washington, D.C., when one is talking about Baltimore. Fortunately, when I briefly met John Waters, a cult film director from Charm City, in 2002, I did not make this mistake. But, I only talked to him for about eight seconds, which is how long I spent talking to Willie Nelson backstage at a Farm Aid concert  around that same time.

"The Baltimore Sun" features several comic strips which we don't see in the other newspapers we survey, like "The Washington Post" (whoops again!), including "Mother Goose and Grimm," "The Middletons," and "One Big Happy." All three of those strips made our big list.

First place goes to "Foxtrot," which features the family going out for a Sunday picnic at a state park in a place like The Humpback Bridge State Park in Covington, Va., and they encounters all sorts of natural elements likes ticks (top image), poison ivy, and snakes. Of course, in Florida, they would also have to worry about alligators.

Third place goes to "Speed Bump," in which a judge (center image) tweets his verdict, somehow we can't imagine Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas doing such a thing (ahhh, that's the third D.C. reference).

And, in sixth place, we have "Mother Goose and Grimm," which ironically has a nursery rhyme themed strip (given its title) as Humpty Dumpty falls off his great wall. We actually didn't get the Obamacare gag (and, that makes four), but we liked the strip enough as it is.

Now, let's give this list which you can perhaps read on the Metro after you've come back from seeing that new Woody Allen movie at the Landmark E-Street Cinema...........now, we are up to five!:

1) Foxtrot

2) Pearls Before Swine

3) Speed Bump

4) Dilbert

5) Get Fuzzy

6) Mother Goose and Grimm

7) The Middletons

8) One Big Happy

9) Garfield

10) Zits

http://www.baltimoresun.com/

http://baltimore.org/

http://www.visitmaryland.org/

http://www.gocomics.com/foxtrot

The Republican Candidates for President: Worst to Best........

We gather that it's entirely possible that folks in Ankara, Turkey, and Tel Aviv, Israel may have been watching the Republican debate on Fox News from Cleveland, Ohio, on Thursday night, even though it was 2:00 a.m. when the debate aired in Turkey and Israel, two countries which are both seven hours ahead of Cleveland, Washington DC, and New York.

Here in America, 24 million people were watching including Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the most liberal Democratic candidate in the face, who was followed and retweeted by more people than anyone else during the GOP debate that he was watching live.

While everyone from David Letterman to Garry Trudeau was rightfully lampooning Donald Trump, whose candidacy seems like a joke, given that he has zero political experience and a reputation for insulting people for the sake of doing just that, there are actually three candidates who are worse than Mister Clown.

These include Rick Perry (pict. top) the notorious former governor of Texas who left years of scandal and probable wrongful executions behind him when he ran for president for the first time four years ago, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas,pict. center) a darling of the Tea Party movement who is probably less progressive than members of the Iranian Parliament, and Mike Huckabee (pict. bottom) an evagelical former governor of Arkansas who dropped a Nazi Germany reference against President Barack Obama.

Here are the candidates from worst to best, to be 'fair and balanced,' we have the candidates listed from best to worst on our sister blog http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com

1. Rick Perry, Texas

2. Ted Cruz, Texas

3. Mike Huckabee, Arkansas

4. Donald Trump, New York (currently first in the field)

5. Rick Santorum, Pennsylvania

6. Bobby Jindal, Louisiana

7. Scott Walker, Wisconsin

8. Ben Carson, Maryland

9. Jeb Bush, Florida

10. Rand Paul, Kentucky

11. Jim Gilmore, Virginia (currently the last field, the only candidate we have met in person)

12. Marco Rubio, Florida

13. John Kasich, Ohio

14. Carly Fiorina, California (the only woman in the GOP field)

15. Chris Christie, New Jersey

16. George Pataki, New York (at 72, the oldest Republican in the race)

17. Lindsey Graham, South Carolina

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics

http://www.politico.com

http://www.thehill.com

http://www.nationalreview.com (A conservative journal)

http://www.thenation.com (A liberal journal)

http://www.theonion.com/politics (A satirical site)

Top 10 Comics from Sunday's Washington Post: Space Aliens and Donald Trump

Carly Fironia, Carly Fiornia, Carly Fironia, Carly F-I-O-R-I-N-A.............ok, so I'm having a difficult time trying to spell the name of the lone Republican presidential candidate (pict. center). This week, Garry Trudeau made fun of her as well as her opponents Ben Carson and the extreme ego maniac Donald Trump whom the cartoonist referred to as "Mister Clown."

"Doonesbury" finished second in our survey of comic strips in the nation's most political newspaper. First place actually went to the Danish import "WuMo" which featured a little green man from outer space at what appears to be a futuristic gas station in a town like Altoona, Pennsylvania pumping gas for his UFO (pict. top). This was actually a different "WuMo" than the one shown nationally, which to our recollection made fun of Indonesian monkeys.

"Brewster Rockit: Space Guy" featured a clever strip in which creatures from outer space, including Darth Vader and the spaceworm from "Dune," displays their past offenses via public shaming.

Among the other comic strips which made the top 10, we also like Scott Stantis' strip "Prickly City," which had a yellow dog, one of the title characters along with a little girl who looks a character from "The Waltons" or "Eight is Enough" (hmmm....I sense we lost millenials there), making wings to fly and crashing to the earth ala Icarus (pictured bottom) or Wile E. Coyote.

Here is the list:

1. WuMo

2. Doonesbury

3. Brewster Rockit

4. Lio

5. Candorville

6. Sheman's Lagoon

7. Foxtrot

8. The Argyle Sweater

9. Prickly City

10. Dustin

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.thehill.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

http://www.gocomics.com/wumo

http://www.gocomics.com/pricklycity

Top Ten Comics from The Roanoke Times (Sunday Edition): Trudeau Jabs Trump, Read All About It

Greetings to our blog readers in Costa Rica, Hungary, Kenya, as well as those of you who may be checking in from Sacramento, Calif., where the Monday 9:00 a.m. work day is just getting started.

Today, we look at our favorite comic strips from yesterday's "Roanoke Times," the daily newspaper for Roanoke, Va. Our chart-topper this week is Garry Trudeau's "Doonesbury," where the cartoonist lampoons Donald Trump (pict. top) and his bad hair. This is followed by a clever edition of "Zits," which features a hand grenade gag (of all things), and "Jump Start" in which two kids ask each other what they think of aliens (pict. bottom, "Alf").

For those of you who might be herding sheep in Mongolia, Trump is one of 15 (or is it 16 or 17) Republicans running for president. We just learned that the conservative magazine "The National Review" has Carly Fiorina on its cover. Like Trump, she has zero political experience as well. (Her name is not spelled right on our tags, but we've learned from the Donald to not apologize).

Here is our top ten:

1. Doonesbury

2. Zits

3. Jump Start

4. Garfield

5. Pearls Before Swine

6. Speed Bump

7. Get Fuzzy

8. Dilbert

9. Family Circus

10. Pickles

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.denverpost.com/comics

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

http://www.doonesbury.com

Quote of the Day/Week- Stefania Fernandez

And, we fully expect that this image of Stefania Fernandez, Miss Universe 2009, will boost out hits total for the day and week. Fernandez, 21, is one of many women from Venezeula who have won the coveted Miss Universe pageant, which we believe is one of Donald Trump's media entities.

Sadly, on Dec. 17, another former Miss Universe/Venezuela 2001 Eva Ekvall, died of breast cancer at age 28 in Houston.

Fernandez became the first woman crowned Miss Universe by a title-holder from her country as she recieved the crown from Dayana Mendoza, Miss Universe/Venezuela 2008.

Though she is perhaps not as politically active as many American celebrities like pop-star "American Idol" winner Kelly Clarkson who endorsed the libertarian-leaning Republican candidate Ron Paul today, it is widely believed that Fernandez opposes the policies of eccentric, far-left president Hugo Chavez.

Fernandes is actually of Ukrainian heritage.

Here is her quote:

"We've already reached the same level as men."

Special Quote of the Week- Mark Twain

Wow, even Newt Gingrich is quoting Mark Twain (1835-1910) these days, well at least according to Google, but we don't think he'll be using the quip we will posting down below.

The author best known for novels like "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and "Tom Sawyer" will be featured on a commemorative American postage stamp in June; the first one will be post-marked in (where else?!) Hannibal, Missouri. There is also a Mark Twain House in Hartford, Conn., which I was fortunate enough to visit as we headed north to Maine a few years ago. One of the museum's many highlights is a sketch that animator Chuck Jones ("Bugs Bunny") made regarding Twain.

Late last year, "The Autobiography of Mark Twain" also came out, and it has been selling well. I have not read the book, but I did read his novel "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" fairly recently. And, luckily I did not have to write a book report on it!

When we get a proper chance, we will be sure to make fun of Gingrich and Donald Trump, but today well we are slightly overwhelmed! But, I would love to see a Republican candidate shaking hands in places like Sioux City, Iowa, or Rock Hill, SC, and making lofty promises that they themselves know could never ever happen. I guess that's what C-Span is for.

Here is the quote from Twain:

"A man is never more truthful than when he acknowledges himself a liar."

Quotes of the Week- from Billionaires....

Since April 15th, the day of paying taxes here in les etats unis is just 'round the corner, we thought we'd dedicate our weekly series to famous (or infamous) quotes to some very, very rich people.

I must admit I had this idea before last night's 'Simpsons' episode, which featured Mr. Burns going to a billionaire's retreat, but I did decide to use eccentric Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban as the quote for the entry on our sister blog 'Politics, Culture and Other Wastes of Time' (see our links section).

Today, on this blog, we are going with a quip from Donald Trump, aka The Donald, who is known to be a bit of an ego-maniac, and if there was any doubt, this line should illustrate that proverbial point:

"All of the women on The Apprentice flirted with me- consciously or unconsciously. That's to be expected," Donald Trump.

I wonder if that also includes lesbians.


SIDEBAR: My good friend Christopher Knight of Reidsville, NC, pulled off a brilliant April Fool's Day prank when he suggested that radical minister Johnny Robertson of Martinsville, Va., who is a bit of a small-town Jim Jones, tried to attack the Pope at the Vatican. He actually got an email from the State Department saying that his prank caused some concern! He used an actual layout from The New York Post, and an imaginary BBC headline with an actual footage of some other lunatic trying to go after the Pope.

Check out his blog 'The Knight Shift' on our links page to see this for yourself!