Comic for Friday, January 6th, 2006

Posted: 7:37 am, Friday, January 6th

In case you're wondering why you've never seen Ron in a sweater before, it's because I hate sweaters. However, I got this weird British military-looking sweater from my parents for Christmas, and I kind of like it. I'm even hesitant to call it a sweater, because it doesn't give me sweater gut. What is it with sweaters and the spare tire they give you? I was soft enough as a little kid, I didn't need the ridiculous thing my mom threw on me for class portraits helping out any with that effect.

So, we've made it through the entire first work week back from the holidays. I guess it wasn't a full work week, but whatever. I feel drained enough from four days, I don't need a fifth tomorrow. Oh, speaking of things that happened over the holidays, poor Watch Me Turn 30 (the original and this year's edition) were lost the day after Christmas. Everything - the whole archive and whatever. God, I'd be crushed if that happened here. Thankfully, the odds of my host losing everything *and* my laptop going down on the same day are pretty slim. Of course, now that I've jinxed myself rotten, I'm going to burn a back-up copy of the site over the weekend.

MNP called for the collitch football moritorium yesterday, but I've got a few things. We'll call it an end to the season after today. Until signing day next month, when I'll ramble about the high school kids the Irish signed, and you will all cease paying attention immediately, because who really cares? OK, now that that's settled, a Fark-up of the Onion's man on the fucking moon from the always-excellent Every Day Should Be Saturday about the Rose Bowl (which, by the way, I was wrong on when CK asked me about it the other day - this is why I did not do well in the office pool this year). The other thing is a vague rumor-mongering thing from Deadspin - the NCAA is snooping around tOSU (maybe). This does little to alleviate the ass-whooping the Bucks laid on us the other day, but schadenfraude is always fun.

I mention the Comics Curmudgeon from time to time, but yesterday's entry on Luann was just awesome. Anyone wondering, my initial reaction was more along the lines of "she's poking her eye out!" than "kinky victim roleplaying." But I have noticed that they brush their teeth a lot in that strip. (Those of you scoring at home, I'm pretty sure we've only seen the boys in the bathroom twice in Five Bucks history, and the girls not at all.)(Not that the girls aren't clean, just, I'd feel weird drawing that.)

Yesterday's Daily Dinosaur, also fantastic. The misuse of "begs the question" drives me nuts.

Now, since I don't have anything in particular to talk about, I'm going to just make fun of Matchbox 20, which is just about the worst band ever, and one that my buddy Bitter tried arguing to me was good once. He should've given up when my then-girlfriend agreed with him, but whatever. OK, so, stereogum the other day linked to Rob Thomas covering the Pumpkins' 1979. Two things wrong with this: 1) First, that this no-talent hack has achieved enough notoriety to where I know his stupid name, and 2) He's touching a Pumpkins song. Anyway, down in the comments, some dude steps to the Pumpkins and a few people defend them, and that's all fun or whatever, but you may notice the link on Rob Thomas's Q&A on drugs. I actually bought that issue of Blender (trust me, something else was on the cover, and, actually, I find Blender to be excellent airplane reading), and you can pretty much skip the Q&A, he comes off as the massive douchebag you always thought he was anyway (although, frankly, I find it hard to believe that anyone who did so much coke he can hardly remember the first two years of the band could make music so fucking *boring*). But! On that page (yeah, I was pretty bored at one point yesterday, why?), there's a link to *another* story on Rob Thomas - being caught in bed with Tom Cruise. Evidently, this all came up back in late June, but hell if I remember it. Astoundingly, the whole thing goes full circle with a random mention of Billy Corgan's penchant for taking out ads in newspapers. But since I, through virtue of having an on-going comic strip, detest neat conclusions, let's kick it back out to the Onion to wrap things up today, with a classic on Matchbox 20 and their penchant to not rock in the slightest.

OK, well, I feel like we got more done here today than yesterday. Sorry about that, it really wasn't one of my better efforts. Damn Sims.

bullfrog

Simple answer to the question posed in this headline: No.

http://southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/arti cle?AID=/20060106/ProSports09/601060441/CAT=ProSports09

OK....that would be crazy!

Seriously, I thought Bloomy's plan for the Olympics in New York was bad enough. "We'll just build a three-billion dollar building over on the West Side to have some of it, and have the rest of it over in Queens." Had he thought things through a bit more, he would've realized that holding some of the events NINETY MILES AWAY is really the key.

By the way, welcome everyone finding the site by googling "Brady Quinn's sister." I have no idea what it is you're looking for (well, you're looking for Laura Quinn, I guess, but why you're doing that is beyond me), but welcome, all the same. Good game if you're Bucks fans, come and drown your sorries with us if you're Irish.

This is from Fark - a Des Moines Register article on the "critical assets" of Iowa that the state submitted to the DHS.

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll /article?AID=/20060106/NEWS10/601060345/1001&lead=1

There are 1,360 things on the list. I was shocked to learn that there are 1,360 *things* in Iowa. Somehow, I don't think the terrorists are going to hit the Field of Dreams or the Krispy Kreme in Clive, Iowa. These things are on the list, no kidding.

And the FBI bristles at the NYPD creating its own counter-terrorist unit.