I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post. And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Welcome, Jazz Pickles, pickles with other musical preferences, and non-pickled cukes of all kinds.

Promoting myself always feels vain and narcissistic, and I hate it, but these days, if you don’t, you slowly disappear like an ice cube in your pocket. So I’ll say a tiny little something about my graphic novel in progress, Peyote Cowboy, and mention a way you can help me get it published that will only cost 30 seconds of your time.

My latest episode is getting rave reviews, so I want to share a few of them. I’m over the moon that so many people liked it so much. 

Wow, Dan! This one is an on-the-edge-of-your-seat thrill ride! Thank you! —Bob

Awesome! I'm so excited to see where we'll be going in the next few episodes! —Tyler

Stunningly vivid illustrations. —Jeff

Fantastic art! —Beth

Yow! —Cass

DAYUM, I hate it when each episode ends, but this one more than most! —Ernest

Holy shit! —Kay

Amazing.  Wonderful.  Excellent.  Fan-Tas-Tic! —Stephen

This is a really great one! You have really outdone yourself with the graphics and your concept of the world beyond. You have a bestseller with this one. —Tracey

I have no opinion about your story. I am an illiterate fictional monkey. —King Kong

Some smartass wrote the one for King Kong, but the rest are real.

When I finish the art, I’ll be approaching publishers, and I hear that these days, if you don’t have a large following online and a big mailing list, they won’t even look at what you’ve got.

Here’s how you can help that won’t cost you anything:

Have a look at my story and, if you don’t hate it, join my Peyote Cowboy free email list. You’ll get an email each time I post a new episode, which lately has been about once a month. I won’t sell your info and won’t bug you constantly, but I will appreciate your help. You can count on it.

You Jazz Pickles are the best!

Let’s find out now what Bizarro cartoons the best partner I could ask for, Wayno, imposed on the public this week…

“How would you qualify yourself in five years?”

Wait until he meets a dung beetle.

Spoiler alert: In the end, he checks into a roach motel and dies.

Move along now, before you expire on my couch.

For an accountant, he sure gets a lot of tail.

Mmmm. Snow pie.

Thus concludes our cheesy chucklefest, Jazz Pickles. Please consider helping us keep the giggles coming, free of ads and paywalls via the links below. We’ll imagine your face and kiss you like a basket of puppies in gratitude.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including women’s V-neck styles! (And some weird shit from other comics that doesn’t even belong in our shop. Sorry about that.)

Audio by Sound Legacy

Michelangelo takes a chunk of rock from a mountainside and turns it into a heart-wrenching depiction of a mother grieving over the lifeless body of her son; Jackson Pollock tapes a canvas to the floor and splatters paint all over it. Are they both “art”?

The Pietà, left; the floor of Jackson Pollock’s studio, right.

As a teenager, I had a button on my jacket that said, “If your mom likes it, it isn’t art.” I still admire the rebellious nature of that expression, but how true is it?

Michelangelo’s mother loved his Sistine Chapel ceiling (or so she told me during an acid trip I took in high school), as have many millions of people for over 500 years.

On the other hand, Google says Pollock’s mother was an artist and his biggest champion until he began doing his drip paintings, which she called “craziness.”

Maybe Pollock also had that button and just kept experimenting until his mother disapproved. It certainly paid off for him financially, but will people be drawn to Pollock’s drop cloths in 500 years?

For my money, Renaissance Mike’s mom had better taste. What do you think?

Is Some Art Bullshit?

Distinguishing “good art” from “bad art” is a bottomless pit of subjectivity.

Unlike most articles on this topic, I’m neither going to defend modern art nor rip it a new one, as much as I’d sometimes like to. Instead, I’ll just poke fun at it with comics and let you decide. In the end, that’s what art is anyway: a personal preference.

We are all different, and nothing demonstrates that better than art.

I don’t mean to say that all modern art is not to my liking, far from it. But after a successful 40-plus-year career in comics and fine art, I’m no longer afraid to say that some of the emperors of the art world have been buck naked. That’s just my opinion, which is worth far less than a Jackson Pollock painting.

What Is Art?

That’s a trick question, because the topic is too broad to be defined in any useful way.

Are you familiar with “conceptual art”? That’s when the idea of the work takes precedence over the visual thing that represents it. A very famous example is a banana taped to a wall.

The original banana taped to a wall was sold at a Sotheby’s auction in New York for $6.2 million. (True.) That makes it “art.” The photo above is a replica taken by someone who taped a banana to their fridge as a reminder to eat less meat. That makes it satire.

Conceptual art comes in innumerable forms and often exists primarily as a challenge to what people think art is. And for me, that’s where it gets interesting.

Though I couldn’t care less about the taped banana as “art,” the fact that it was taken seriously enough to be auctioned at Sotheby’s goes a long way toward proving that art can’t be defined. It could be anything created by any human. Or not. Who knows?

So, a more practical question is, “What do you look for in art?”

Now we’re getting somewhere.

Many people want art to be pretty. That’s how Thomas Kinkade made enough money to spend $6.2 million on a piece of fruit taped to a wall (though he was not the person who did that).

Others are more interested in what art means than what it looks like.

And some, like the yahoo who bought the world’s most expensive banana, use art to show how rich they are.

“There’s a sucker born every minute.” — falsely attributed to P. T. Barnum, but said about the popularity of his exhibits

Here’s where I think you can begin to tell if the emperor has no clothes.

It would go a long way toward convincing me that Pollock’s drippy dribbles were a legitimate art form if many other artists had been able to forge careers in that style, as Impressionism, Cubism, Surrealism, and abstract art have made many artists famous. But that isn’t so with Pollock’s “craziness.” He’s the only one who got away with it. (However, check out the paintings of Janet Sobel, whom Pollock was doubtless imitating but who never achieved his fame. Being female in a patriarchy was probably her biggest mistake.)

What Do You Look for in Art?

I like art to be interesting visually and to make me think. It doesn’t have to include an obvious message; in fact, it’s better if it leads my mind to places unknown and unintended by the artist. That’s what I love about surrealism. Like a convoluted dream about flying shoes or a visitation from a fish in a tuxedo, surrealism can feel like it means something, but you have to search your own psyche to figure out what.

Does it Matter?

No. In the big picture, it doesn’t matter what’s “art” and what isn’t, who created it, or how much money you spent on it. What matters is surrounding yourself with things you enjoy.

I used to be afraid to express my opinions about certain kinds of modern art for fear I’d be seen as unsophisticated. I no longer care enough about my reputation to fake it, so I’ll freely admit that I do not see the value of many kinds of modern art—other than for investment purposes—which I think degrades the cultural importance of art.

The craziness started after Picasso and Braque shook things up by inventing Cubism, and it was not long before the fine art world tossed out all concepts of convention and became a race to see who could do something no one else had done before. It morphed into an “anything goes” industry, and if you were in the right place at the right time, you could get famous for anything, as long as you did it first and the right collector liked it. That’s how Pollock got rich.

I certainly would not want to limit what can be considered art, but imagine if other forms of creativity indulged in the same ethos.

Who’s the Banana Now?

I once visited the Museum of Modern Art in NYC and witnessed a crowd of people gathered around an artist named Marina Abramovic as she sat motionless in a chair for many hours. Members of the viewing public were encouraged to sit across from her and look her in the eyes. The piece was called “The Artist is Present.” This sort of thing falls under the category of “performance art.”

I suppose it made a statement about the power of celebrity, or the weirdness of staring into the eyes of a stranger, but so what? You can experience that even more intensely on the Subway if you’re rude enough.

I might have liked it better if the artist had been taped to the wall, but probably not.

Where Does Art Come From?

Creativity is our species’ superpower. Our abilities in this area are endless, and have resulted in everything from great beauty to environmental destruction, from antibiotics and organ transplants to nuclear war.

I’ve created thousands of pieces of art and have spent as many hours pondering where creative inspiration comes from.

Some art is a market calculation: “This will sell.” But at other times it’s a spark of something that comes from an elusive elsewhere, a tiny voice from another dimension. Learning to listen to that voice can be the difference between mediocrity and a masterpiece.

Yes, that sounds mystical, but sometimes being an artist is just a paint-splattered smock away from being a shaman. It can be an exhilarating act of magic that results in something you never saw coming.

Whatever the case, human creativity is the greatest creator and destroyer the world has ever known. Using it to create art, music, literature, or hilarious TikTok videos is one of the most gratifying activities life has to offer. I highly recommend it, wherever it leads you.

My mom’s creativity was in crafts, including sequin-bedecked holiday sweatshirts, and she sold them at craft fairs. They weren’t the sort of thing that Sotheby’s would be interested in, but it made her happy.

Cutting to the Chase

Enough of my know-it-all bullshit; let’s review some more of my comics about art.

Trigger warning: Some may be as dull as Abramovic’s chair performance, and none are worthy of the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Especially the one that parodies it.

I’m as modest as most average folks, but it amazes me that some people are so terrified of nudity that they will object even to a stone or bronze version of it. This is much more common in the puritanical U.S. than in Europe.

Even before I became a stoner, I fell madly in love with the art of M. C. Escher, and the romance has never subsided. I’ve published around a dozen cartoons parodying his work, and this one is my favorite. (That’s a cameo appearance by my wife and me in the lower left corner, and a caricature of Escher as the bartender.)

Here, Picasso and Escher trade friendly jibes over a meal. (This one is best read left-right, left-right.)

Oldenburg was most famous for creating enormous versions of everyday objects. I like that his sculptures make me contemplate the importance of relativity and how minuscule I am in relation to the cosmos. But mostly, it’s just fun to see a familiar object in gigantic form.

This is a good rule of thumb when visiting museums and galleries.

As a teenage freshman in art school, I was both shocked that there were people who could sit naked in front of a roomful of strangers without blushing and disappointed that none of them was attractive. I quit school after one semester, but at least I got this cartoon from the experience.

Cartoons are more likely to be found on refrigerators than in museums. I’ve often thought that kitchens are cartoonists’ Louvre.

This has long been one of my favorite comics of my career. The idea was suggested by Phil Witte, a fine cartoonist in his own right. (Cartoons, Articles) I enjoyed drawing this cartoon version of Renaissance Mike’s masterpiece, though I’ve no idea if his mother would like it. I gave up acid a few years ago.

Where Does That Leave AI Art?

Machines have taken away menial chores such as laundry, math, research, and so much more. Now, AI can handle our creative efforts in the fields of writing, drawing, painting, music, design, you name it.

Which returns us to the concept of “calculated” versus “inspired” art. AI can calculate, research, and imitate in a matter of seconds, but it cannot be inspired the way a human can.

Allowing creativity to flow through me and give birth to something new is among the most gratifying experiences in life. I’d no sooner allow a machine to take that away from me than I would employ one to have sex for me, take a mushroom trip in my stead, or eat my dessert.

I’ll surrender calculating a tip to a machine, but I’ll never turn my back on the joy of creating, even if only taping a banana to a wall.

Take a peek at my graphic novel in progress: PeyoteCowboy.net.

And here’s my video inviting you to become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy.

If you’re enjoying my articles in The Naked Cartoonist, please recommend it to your friends. If you’re not, recommend it to your enemies. Either way, you can send them this link: bizarro.com/signup. Thanks!

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Season’s greetings, Jazz Pickles. No, it isn’t Christmastime yet—thank Santa—but it is still a season, and I greet you.

Gulliver’s Travels was a favorite story of mine as a kid. I loved how it inspired me to think of the highly relative nature of size. Quite naturally, it is easy to unconsciously assume that the starting point for size is us, and that anything smaller is “small,” and anything larger is “large.” 

A couple of seconds is all you need to realize how misleading that can be. Compared to us, an ant is small, but compared to the Grand Canyon, we are smaller than an ant’s turd.

To envision your size relative to the Earth, imagine a ball with a diameter that reaches from Seattle to Baltimore—30% larger than our moon. If it were sitting atop Kansas (it would crush everything beneath it, but that’s not the point), its equator would stretch from California to the East Coast.

Now imagine the period at the end of this sentence on a ball that size, and you’ll be approximating the size of a single human relative to the Earth. 

That’s why, for millions of years, humans thought the Earth was flat. Where you’re standing, it doesn’t look like a globe, but even on a flat, featureless plane, you’re only seeing 0.0000157% of the surface. To the period in my example above, it would be as if it were in the middle of a dinner plate sitting on Mercury.

At this scale, it is impossible to get a sense of the sphere on which we spin. To do that, you’d have to observe the movement of other celestial bodies and understand what that implies, and watch tall ships slipping below the horizon as they sail away, and be smart enough to figure out what all that meant. That was well beyond the capabilities of common Homo sapiens for a very long time, and still is. 

However, why so many modern humans in possession of cell phones that work because of satellites orbiting this globe still think the Earth is flat is beyond even those brilliant early astronomers. More evidence that not every member of a species evolves at the same rate, I guess.

I’ll add that I’m not nearly as smart as those who figured out the world is round before space travel was possible. I would never be able to figure that out on my own had I not benefitted from the knowledge of so many much smarter people before me. I’m just not smart enough.

But I am smart enough to know that others are smarter than I am, and therein lies the key to why trusting experts is essential: most of us are dumbasses, but there are geniuses among us willing to help keep us from shooting ourselves in the face. One big trick to success in life is being smart enough not to refuse their help.

And that’s the reason that those who wish to dominate a society with authoritarianism routinely denounce experts and encourage people to disparage them. Once the masses distrust experts, they are living in a bubble of ignorance in which they will believe any nonsense you repeat often enough. 

Anthony Fauci knows this very well, as do all of the scientists, medical professionals, academics, historians, and other invaluable experts who’ve lost their jobs or research funding since January of 2025.

Surely you didn’t think I’d make it through an entire post without going there.

Now let’s turn those frowns upside down by seeing where Wayno’s week of Bizarro cartoons goes…

In today’s world, unless you’re already a billionaire, that seminar isn’t going to do anything but remove a few more bucks from your pocket.

I submitted a similar comic years ago with the caption: The Princess and the Pee. My editor at King Features felt it was too coarse to publish. Shows you how much times have changed since the spoiled potty-mouth has been in office.

“Trump.”

“Where do you see yourself in five years?” “Grappling with hormonal forces.”

You just know they’re going to pee in that fountain before they leave.

They’d sleep better if they didn’t read that stuff.

That concludes another week of running poolside with scissors, Jazz Pickles. If you’re enjoying our free content each week, please recommend it to your friends and consider helping us keep it that way via the links below. We promise not to pee in your fountain out of gratitude.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including women’s V-neck styles! (And some weird shit from other comics that doesn’t even belong in our shop. Sorry about that.)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Howdy, Jazz Pickles. It’s nice to imagine your face again.

Let’s start with a quick mention of my Naked Cartoonist creative writing project. I posted a story yesterday titled “Life With a Hand Up Your Butt” that is all about puppets, Muppets, and humanity. Here’s an excerpt:

“We may think puppets are nothing more than children’s toys, but I’m fascinated by the power they wield over us psychologically. Though we know they are not alive, we can easily be mesmerized by them, buying into their feigned words and movements until we are fully captivated by a construction of fabric scraps or wood. In a clever ventriloquism act, it is the puppet that has us in stitches, not the human.”

One of the many cartoons featured in the article

You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll take a nap afterward to recover your strength. For $5 a month (less than a Starbucks coffee), you can read all my weird musings and help to support my work as a creative kook trying to make the world a smarter and funnier place. 

Thanks to all of you who subscribe. You are deeply appreciated.

Item #2 this week: I’m happy to see that a certain government admitted there was never any vandalism of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, and that the problems it experienced were due to the crappy contractor hastily hired.

This comes as a surprise to a vanishingly small percentage of Americans. Most of us have already realized that anything the bullies who’ve taken over our junior high school say cannot be trusted.

Sadly, the Antifa Algae & Boxknife Terrorism Ninjas will now have to look for another target—maybe Lake Michigan or the Great Salt Lake. Of course, they’re going to need a bigger boxknife.

Finally, I have a correction for last week’s post. That cool house shown in the photo below, which I reported was in San Luis Obispo, is actually in Santa Barbara, California. Thanks to the several Jazz Pickles who pointed that out.

Olive Oyl does all the driving on these road trips, while I gaze out the windows in a haze of reverie, barely knowing what day it is or where I am. It’s a necessary reboot of my otherwise busy mind.

Time now to reboot our chuckle buttons with Wayno’s Bizarro comics from the week…

Unfortunately, I have the real kind, although I think it may have helped me write cartoons.

I tried this compliment on Olive Oyl, but she didn’t like it. It may only work on people with those circular stickers on their head and chest.

That’s the only kind I’d attend, not out of modesty, but because I have a sensitive gag reflex.

I’m pretty sure I’ve been to that show.

Frankenstein’s monster, made of multiple people's parts, is a metaphor for us all, genetically speaking.

I hate to have to tell those little men that book will not tell them where to find little women.

That concludes this week’s chuckle chapter, Jazz Pickles. We hope you enjoyed our silly scribbles and comments. If you did, please consider helping us keep this page free of charge and ads via the links below. We’ll dance in gratitude like giddy leprechauns.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including women’s V-neck styles! (And some weird shit from other comics that doesn’t even belong in our shop. Sorry about that.)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY‍ to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Hello again, Jazz Pickles, or for the first time, stranger.

My partner Olive Oyl and I returned this week from our two-week sojourn up the coast of Southern California. We visited various family members and friends along the way, and, before heading back to Mexico, we spent a couple of days in San Luis Obispo, a charming little town in Central California that we wish we could afford to live in. 

It’s not that San Luis Obispo is a gated community for millionaires, but these days, you have to be a millionaire to live in any city in the US that O2 and I would want to wake up in daily. Prices on everything from gas to groceries, and housing to antifa algae-propagating supplies have gone crazy since the Führer Wannabe “lowered prices on day one.” Lucky us. 

Here are some photos that do not capture the highlights of our trip.

This atypical house is in a typical residential neighborhood of San Luis Obispo, and I think it’s really cool.

Left: Two human constructions and some tiny humans. Right: Two seagulls with three legs.

Left: A few minutes from San Luis Obispo is Morro Rock Beach. Not sure how it got its name. Right: Olive Oyl points at the Pacific Ocean in Malibu.

O2 and me too.

Thanks for caring about what Wayno and I do here each week. If you’d like to help us scrape by in these tough times, we hope you’ll consider some of the links at the end of this post. We appreciate your readership and your support.

This seems like a great time to review one of Wayno’s rare thematic weeks of Bizarro cartoons…

He would probably enjoy the proverbial train at the end of the tunnel, too.

Okay, son, but don’t be careful.

This drawing is as close to an Oscar as Wayno or I are likely to get despite our convincing portrayals of slackers doing our best to avoid Walmart jobs.

Have you spotted the theme of this week’s cartoons yet?

Even a dummy can see it coming.

One point in favor of self-driving cars is that they don’t text or check email while driving.

That concludes this week’s crash course for dummies, Jazz Pickles. If you enjoy that we do this for free each week, please consider helping us keep it that way via the links below. We’ll put in a good word for you with the head of Antifa.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including women’s V-neck styles! (And some weird shit from other comics that doesn’t even belong in our shop. Sorry about that.)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Olive Oyl and I are still on the road, but we’ll be returning to our Mexican hideout in a few days. Our trip has been fun and relaxing, despite the health app on my phone reminding me daily that I’ve only been walking a fraction as many steps each day as I normally do, and asking me if I’ve broken an ankle or been taken hostage. I’m refusing to answer, which I think is making it angry, but I don’t care. I’m not letting that damn thing run my life. 

Have you been following the World Cup? I enjoy some sports, but prefer ones in which things happen more quickly and more often than they do in soccer (futbol). I can’t shake the feeling that if it were not for baseball, soccer would be the world’s most boring sport. Sure, every now and then, there is a brief string of exciting seconds, but it cannot be denied that 95% of the time, it’s just people jogging in a big field with a ball nearby. That’s the one thing that makes it less boring than baseball, which is mostly men standing around scratching their crotches and spitting.

I know nothing about the game of cricket, but I’ve heard those games can last for days. I’m sure it’s great if you’re into it, but to me, that sounds only marginally more interesting than watching the grounds crew mow the lawn in the days before the game.

While on the road this week, I managed to dodge traffic well enough to post my latest article to The Naked Cartoonist. This one is titled “Do You Think a Lot of Modern Art is Bullshit?”

One of my subscribers, Susie Somebody, said this about it:

“Wow! Your amazing display of creativity in this week’s Naked Cartoonist is one of my all-time favorites. Thank you so much!”

I have no idea what she is referring to, but I’m glad she enjoyed it. Thanks, Susie!

If you’d like to be encouraged to think and chuckle while supporting my writing habit (which is no less life-consuming than a drug habit, but somewhat less damaging), you can start here for a mere $5 a month. I always keep my prices low because I don’t like how expensive everything is getting.

One thing that isn’t getting more expensive is our latest batch of Bizarro cartoons. Let’s see what Wayno coughed up for us this week…

You’ll never grow up to be a cowman if you don’t practice.

This image used to represent the human conscience, but since we’ve stopped thinking for ourselves, we can now see it as the “facts” and “alternate facts” of the internet competing for our attention.

But everyone knows that if time travel for potatoes were possible, the fact that those fries exist in the future means Mr. P Head did not heed their advice, and…oh, never mind.

This is a cautionary tale. Children need to learn to recognize a brutalist before they’re old enough to get romantically involved with one.

That fact that the creature thinks the platform is a train speaks volumes.

I lived in NYC for ten years and must have said that a thousand times each year. No wonder the apartment was full of bees.

That wall we just hit is the outer limit of our comedy enclosure this week. Thanks for stumbling through the dark with us. If you enjoy what we provide here for free each week, please consider helping us keep it that way via the links below. We’ll cast a beneficial spell over your life, and everything will instantly improve.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Hey there, Jazz Pickles. I hope you’re all hanging in there and riding out the Tangerine Torment comfortably. Olive Oyl and I are taking a little time off this week and next to visit family.

We spent yesterday morning in shuttle vans and airports, and the afternoon in what felt like a cramped utility closet where they store metal folding chairs. O2 tried to persuade me that it was a commercial airliner, and the gigantic man in the folding chair next to me, who kept his right elbow and knee pressed firmly against me for three hours while snoring loudly enough to nearly drown out the wind storm outside, almost convinced me.

As I looked behind me, there were dozens of rows of tiny, uncomfortable chairs smooshed together, full of sleeping people in various embarrassing poses, with gaping mouths and slack jaws.

That sounds like a plane, but it still didn’t make sense. People have to pay big money to ride on commercial airliners, and there’s no way my wife and I were stupid enough to have paid for that experience. All I can think is that somehow, we accidentally locked ourselves into a vibrating storage facility with hundreds of others who’d snuck in there to sleep off their Friday night drunk.

Whatever the case, we’re out of the closet now and sitting in properly cushioned chairs, so it’s all good.

Before I go, I’d be as stupid as a person who pays hard-earned money for a flight on a cheap-ass airline if I didn’t mention our splendid new products in the Comics Kingdom Bizarro shop. Run over there right now as fast as a Mario Brother escaping some sort of animated danger and nab some for yourself and your loved ones. You’ll permanently be one of our loved ones if you do. 

Lastly, but not leastly, next Friday’s article in my subscription creative writing thing, The Naked Cartoonist, is titled “Do You Think a Lot of Modern Art is Bullshit?” 

Here’s one of the several comics within my clever and amusing essay.

This story is snarky and funny, but also open-minded, so you can decide for yourself if modern art is for you. I think you’re going to love it. (My article, that is; I’ve no idea if you’ll love modern art.)

That makes it time to peek under the comedy curtain and see what mischief Wayno’s Bizarro comics for the week include…

Sheet happens.

I love a park bench with a pie shelf. It keeps the pie where the pigeons and squirrels can enjoy it without having to bend over.

When you’re tired of watching lame sit-coms try an intentionally lame sit-chuck.

Good idea. Since none of the commandments mention a prohibition against molesting women, how about Bill Cosby, Harvey Weinstein, and His Obfuscating Orangeness?

A reader demanded we apologize to the descendants of those who died in the famous 1975 sinking referenced above. This seems an unusual request since we aren’t making fun of the wreck or its victims, only mentioning it as something that happened and was written about in a popular song.

Still, we’re sorry that anyone was offended by this comic. That’s never our intent. There’s an adage that is famous among humorists: Comedy = tragedy + time, but nobody tells you how much time has to pass. We thought 51 years would be enough.

If I had a cargo suit, I wouldn’t need to carry a purse.

And that brings down this week’s comedy curtain to a standing ovation. (I’m standing as I type. You may remain seated.) If you’re into what we do here for free each week, please help us keep it going via the links below. Thank you for your attention to this blather.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Thanks for stopping by, Jazz Pickles. It’s always nice to see you sense your presence.

The title and topic of today’s post will doubtless turn off some readers. Most of you regular visitors know who I am and read my stuff because you like how I think and what I say about it.

But that’s not true for everyone. Judging by the comments I still occasionally get, some readers just come here for a light-hearted laugh and wish I’d leave topics like politics out of it. 

That’s what Garfield is for.  Here at Bizarro, Wayno and I often give you lighthearted fun with no difficult thoughts attached, but occasionally we express an opinion or truth that makes some readers uncomfortable. 

We think that’s a good thing, as the image and quote by James Baldwin below express rather poignantly.

Image by Carlos Barberena

I understand the sentiment; the world is overwhelming, and comics are an escape. Accordingly, polite suggestions are understood and appreciated, but when someone objects in a less-than-polite manner, I tell them, “If someone is forcing you to read our work, tell your parents or a trusted teacher.” 

Regarding the seaside comic above. Scientists report that up to 75% of large fish are gone from the ocean as a result of overfishing and other causes, and many fish populations are on the brink of collapse. Meanwhile, certain politicians are more concerned with bringing back “all-you-can-eat shrimp night” at Red Lobster.

Additionally, in the late 1950s, the average American adult looked like the fisherman on the left in my cartoon above, while the average American today is overweight or obese.

As our behavior threatens our food supply on numerous fronts (over-fishing, climate change, right-wing political policies for short-term profit, etc.), obesity among Americans is becoming epidemic, while farms are failing right and left. What’s wrong with this picture? 

Yesterday was our nation’s 250th birthday. What should have been a grand celebration of the American Experiment from sea to shining sea was extinguished like a campfire in a tsunami by unrelenting, textbook fascism and grifting over the past 18 months. 

A certain malignant narcissist who would be king has frantically attempted to cement his place in history in embarrassing ways, including attempting to build gawdy monuments to himself that no one but his own ego has asked for. 

He had a huge chance yesterday, on the 4th of July, to ensure that his name would forever appear alongside Thomas Jefferson and John Adams.

They both died within hours of each other on July 4th, 1826, exactly 50 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. If Trump had done yesterday what they did exactly 200 years ago, he’d have secured his place in history, at least on a Wikipedia page about political coincidences. And what could’ve been a better anniversary gift to America than that?

But once again, he missed his chance of being remembered for something other than being the person who made the most tragically convincing proof of reincarnation who ever lived. Or, maybe it is just a coincidence that he was born a mere 13 months after Hitler committed suicide and has used Adolf’s biography like a cookbook recipe for (temporarily) destroying a republic.

Oh well. His place in our nation’s history will definitely be cemented, but not for the reasons he hopes.

In better news, as promised in last week’s post, we’ve got the new V-neck ladies’ style shirts posted on Comics Kingdom’s Bizarro swag shop! Treat your neck to some V-freedom now! (All of the latest products are available on those two pages, not just V-necks.)

Let’s cleanse our hearts and minds now with some chuckles from Wayno’s Bizarro comics from the week!

That hand would also be quite handy while driving, although with a different finger extended.

Wayno already made a joke about applying for a job at Monster(dot)com, so I’ve got nothin.’

I don’t even wanna know where a zombie baby came from or what you’d feed it.

For those of you who love oddball indie films, I highly recommend “Listers,” available for free on YouTube. It’s a charmingly hilarious documentary about a couple of brothers who are real-life characters like “the Dude” in The Big Lebowski deciding to take up bird watching. So fun.

This is one of my very favorite bits of punnery from Wayno and a perfect example of the aphorism, “Comedy equals tragedy plus time.”

It could also be “couples massage” if they hired that guy to let them massage him together.

That’s douses this week’s comedy campfire, Jazz Pickles. Thanks for stopping by for some s’mores. If you enjoy that we do this for free every week, please consider helping to feed the Bizarro Bunny via the links below. Our income from newspapers has gone the way of civil political discourse in recent years. Either way, we appreciate you pointing your seeballs at us.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Welcome to the jar, Pickles of Jazz. Thanks for dropping in.

A couple of weeks ago, I asked you to help us pick some new T-shirt designs. You voted, and we listened. 

We’ve just launched a bunch of new shirt designs, as well as a travel mug (they’re calling a “tumbler”), a water bottle, and a few coffee mug designs. 

There are seven new shirt designs in various colors, and three new Secret Symbol shirts that you’ll love. LOOK AT’EM HERE.

NOTE: THE V-NECK LADIES’ STYLES HAVE NOT YET BEEN POSTED, BUT WILL BE ADDED NEXT WEEK. THEY PROMISED ME! 

Sorry to say that at this time, we couldn’t add all of the suggestions our cherished Jazz Pickles requested, but we appreciate your contributions and will continue to expand our offerings.

In the meantime, please purchase a dozen of each product in all colors and styles available, and donate the ones you don’t want to a local charity. That should spiff up your tarnished karma quite nicely!

Time now to view Wayno’s attempts to polish his karma by donating chuckles in the form of the week’s Bizarro cartoons…

You’ll feel better soon after he runs out of bananas.

No method of societal change is more effective than bumper opinions.

I particularly like Wayno’s version of our Bizarro Alien in this one.

Being a centaur is challenging enough, but this poor schmuck got stuck with Shetland Pony genes.

When Lucy pulls up, she waits till he’s about to grab the door handle and steps on the gas.

It has been my personal experience that chickens never fall for a chicken costume. Of course, it may also have been because I am five times larger than they are.

That’s the bell for recess, Jazz Pickles. Before you go out to play, please consider helping us keep this nonsense going and free of charge. We enjoy enchucklating you and appreciate the loan of your eyes for a few minutes each week.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post. 

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Thanks for stopping by, Jazz Pickles. 

In last week’s post, I featured 20 of my title panels (the small, square graphic at the top of these posts) and asked if you’d like to see any of them on a T-shirt, and if so, to vote for your faves. 

The response was surprisingly robust, and we got over 500 votes! So we’re in the process of turning the top five vote getters into shirts, and a few other products, too.

Thanks so much for your enthusiasm! More on this soon.

A few days ago, I published a new Naked Cartoonist article titled “How to Avoid a Horror Show Marriage.” (I should know, I’ve had two.) It’s been quite popular (and not at all political!), so here’s an excerpt to whet your appetite. 

“Couples therapists wisely recommend being in a relationship for two or three years before deciding to marry. That’s because while nothing feels more euphoric and transcendent than falling in love, it also renders you the stupidest that you’ll ever be. Those two years give that toasted marshmallow explosion in your skull time to morph back into a working brain.

That advice comes from people who’ve made a career of listening to spouses complain about each other, often with tears, shouting, and gnashing of teeth. Trust them when they tell you not to rush into it.

I rushed into my first two marriages like I was saving children from a flaming orphanage, which would have been less dangerous than those marriages turned out to be.”

The article also contains some of my favorite comics about relationships and matrimony. It’s sort of a humorous “how to” and “how not to” manual on marriage. 

I only charge $5 a month for my entire archive of articles, and I post one every two weeks. I’m not trying to get rich, just looking to compensate myself for the time I spend looking for ways to keep you entertained. 

If you enjoy enjoyment, I think you’ll enjoy The Naked Cartoonist. You can cancel anytime, and I would never share or sell your contact info.

Now let’s enjoy Wayno’s highly enchucklicating Bizarro comics from the week…

I found a Bitcoin in my washing machine the other day. I must’ve left it in my pocket.

It’s the bloodiest awards show on TV, which may account for its high ratings.

There will never be a better song by an actor than William Shatner’s “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.”

Unfortunately, I’m a much better spell victim than spell caster.

Tell that to my friends Theodore and Cliodore. They’ve been married for over 30 years, a few of them happily.

He wrote the book “Testing Crashes for Dummies.”

Thus concludes this week’s typing experiment. If you’ve enjoyed the order of the letters, spaces, and punctuation above, we hope you’ll consider helping us keep this site free and weekly via the links below. We thank you in advance for your generosity.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the comments to follow. 

Since 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Hola, Jazz Pickle. Thanks for pointing your pickle at us.

We like to add new products to our King Features’ Comics Kingdom shop from time to time, but we’re not sure what you, the Pickle Public, would like to see. Will you help?

If you have an idea for a bit of Bizarro swag of some kind, please tell us about it in the comments section.

I was thinking maybe a few shirts with my Bizarro Sunday title panels on them might be fun. Would anyone be interested in that? If so, have a look at the handful I picked out below, and vote for the ones you like best by the number on the lower corners. (Or suggest something else you’d like to see.)

Vote for as many as you like. If you don’t think you’d want a shirt like that, please refrain from voting. Whatever your thoughts on this, we’d love to hear your feedback in the comments section. We’re always looking for ways to replace our income from the erstwhile newspaper industry.

(I read all comments before posting them, so if you don’t want me to publish your comment, just say so and I’ll keep it off the site.)

Thanks a llama, Jazz Pickles. We’re eternally grateful for your support. You’re the smartest and coolest readers in the entire comics kingdom!

Thank you for your attention to this blather. Now, on to Wayno’s Bizarro comics for the week!

I’m a longtime meditator and this happens to be my exact technique.

I’m having trouble believing she’s hearing anything.

If I were God, I’d give myself much more hair.

I suspect he’s stoned. (I couldn’t help it. I’m a dad.)

For you non-musicians, these are not the kind of “bass” you’d see on a seafood menu.

As they say inside the hill, being an ant is no picnic. Except when it is.

That’s the bell for the final lap, Jazz Pickles. Don’t forget to vote for one or more of the images above for a shirt if you’re into that kind of thing. If you enjoy that we offer our work here for free, please consider saying thanks via the options below. We’ll make sure the Guru Bot adds karma points to your permanent record.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out the latest edition of Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Hola, Jazz Pickle. Thanks for popping into our Tiki bar.

Last week I talked about the latest production at the New York Metropolitan Opera, El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego. It was (IMHO) spectacular.

Since then, I discovered the following quote by Diego Rivera in reference to a product he would not allow in their home:

“The black water of Imperialism.”

He was talking about Coca-Cola. I love that expression because his instincts were dead right, and he was foretelling the future. 

That delicious poison was injected into Mexico in the first quarter of the 20th century and is now a daily, lifelong staple of the diets of far too many people. Obesity and diabetes are rampant in Mexico for a variety of reasons, with Coke leading the way. 

On a more amusing note, my Sunday cartoon above, written by my comics partner, Wayno, and illustrated by me, metaphorically describes a funny story that happened to me in Mexico many years ago.

I lived in Texas in my twenties, and my best friend was a Mexican-American. He invited me to go to Mexico City with him for a few days, and I accepted. It was my first visit to this country.

We wandered the city and visited many of the fascinating historical and cultural spots, including Chapultepec Park, the world-famous Museum of Anthropology, the enormous central plaza (El Zócalo), under which they had only just discovered and begun excavating the Templo Mayor, now an amazing underground museum of the main Aztec temple that the Spanish destroyed and replaced with a Catholic cathedral. (Imperialism at its worst.)

A major highlight of the trip was a visit outside the city to the great pyramids of Teotihuacan. 

Another major highlight occurred later that night…

Because we were in our twenties and still had energy after dark, we decided to look for a club to go to after dinner. 

Wandering the crowded streets, we spotted a nightclub with large posters outside advertising elaborately dressed chorus girls. It looked like something from the early days of nightclub floor shows, so we decided to give it a try.

Seated at a small table near the front of the stage, we sipped our cocktails, chatted, and waited for the show to begin. As curtain time approached, I looked around at the other audience members—well-dressed couples mostly—and began to sense something odd. As I looked more closely, I realized that everyone in the audience was male. Including the “women.” 

I leaned over and whispered this to my friend just as the show began, and yes, it was a drag queen club. We got a terrific laugh out of our naivete, settled in, and enjoyed the show. 

I can’t help but wonder if anyone else in the audience was watching us as we figured it out. It must have been hilarious.

Olive Oyl and I love Mexico City and have visited at least once a year since we moved here. I think of it as a tropical New York City. We still haven’t experienced all there is to see and do there, but we’ll keep at it.

When Wayno suggested this comic to me decades later, he knew nothing about my drag show story, but the memory of it, combined with my love of Tiki culture, made this a terrifically fun comic to draw.

Time to experience the tiki tickles that await us with Wayno’s Bizarro comics from the week…

You never know what to expect when you shop at Bunny Mart.

To be clear, a group of monks is not called “monkeys.”

The pie is essential, grasshopper.

Don’t feel sorry for him. His career will last decades longer than human soccer players. (“Football players,” for our readers not in the US, Canada, or Australia.)

Unsurprisingly, Sir Robin is afraid of cell phone technology and still uses a landline.

Once inconceivable, it is now every con-artist’s dream to one day be president.

That’s last call at the Bizarro Tiki Bar, Jazz Pickles. If you enjoy this nonsense and appreciate that we offer it a the low, low price of FREE, please consider helping us keep it that way via the links below. I’ll light a candle for you in thanks, the next time I visit the Templo Mayor in Mexico City.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post. 

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Hola, Jazz Pickles. Thanks for stopping by our chuckle emporium.

To alleviate our fear of the ruthless Cookie Monster pictured above, let’s talk about an opera that even the opera-averse may enjoy.

Olive Oyl and I are not regular opera-goers, but yesterday, at a theater in León, Mexico, we attended a streaming of the New York Metropolitan Opera’s production of El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego, a critically acclaimed opera by a Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and a PzrPrz-winning librettist.

It was amazing, and we highly recommend it! (Hence the bold italics.)

It’s about Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, of course, but rather than being based on their biography, it is a dramatic reimagination of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. The story transpires after Frida’s death, both in the Underworld and in the world of the living, and incorporates familiar elements of Frida and Diego’s relationship and art.

My History with Frida

I first discovered Frida Kahlo’s biography and art in the early ’90s when I read Frida Kahlo: The Brush of Anguish by Martha Zamorra. (Chronicle Books, 1993)

I found her life story and self-portraits fascinating, and have been a fan ever since. 

Shortly after reading that book, I created a costume for my family’s yearly Halloween party, pictured below. I recall having to explain to most of our guests who I was supposed to be, but Frida’s fame is now such that she is much more widely recognized.

Left: My costume, 1993. Right: A more carefully styled photo I’ve used as a publicity shot ever since. The frame was from a garage sale, and I attached it to the hand-painted background in a kind of box that fit over my head and rested on my shoulders with straps. The hand-painted banner “floated” atop wires attached to the frame.

O2 and I have seen much of Kahlo and Rivera’s art in museums (and murals) here in Mexico, and have visited both of her former residences in Coyoacán (a neighborhood in Mexico City), both of which are now museums. So when we learned of the opera and that it was showing at a theater a couple of hours from our town, we donned our evening gown, pearls, and tuxedo and hopped into the car.

It was a bit over four hours of driving round trip, but well worth it!

The production design, sets, costumes, choreography, and singing are spellbinding and ravishing, even if you’re not into opera. If you’re at all a fan of Kahlo’s, you’ll doubtless love it.

The Met is doing at least one more live streaming event in the US in various cities on June 3, and a few more dates in Canada in late June, so check online for a theater near you. (Info about these locations and dates was hard to find, but try here.)

Special thanks to Jazz Pickle Richard K. for sending me a link about the streaming events, allowing us to get tickets in time.

No tickets or tuxedos needed for Wayno’s Bizarro comics from the week. Join me now in the Chuckle Emporium’s screening room…

Don’t miss the Gibbon guitar amp.

Now that the US Department of Health and Human Services is being run by a conspiracy clown, good luck finding a cooties vaccine.

If you’ve never heard of Patreon, treat yourself to my own short video about my graphic novel, Peyote Cowboy. (Excuse the horrible beard, I’ve since trimmed it considerably.)

Who couldn’t use a robot that handles anxiety for them these days?

I once came very close to having a Bizarro animated show on TV. The grueling process of getting a show produced in Hollywood was enough to convince me I wanted nothing to do with it.

Even with a head full of nothing but air, this clown’s IQ is double-digits higher than the clown mentioned above.

Thus concludes our medal ceremony for the week, JPs. If you enjoy that we do this for free, please consider helping us keep it that way via the links below. We’ll sing an aria for you in gratitude.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the below-cartoon comments to follow. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Hey, there Jazz Pickle. Welcome to my weekly word vomit.

Today’s cartoon above is a classic bait-and-switch formula. Your first glance tells you a hunter has killed a deer and strapped it to his car—something hunters do, though probably not in front of their sight line. Upon reading the dialogue, you find out he’s actually a friendly Samaritan who has acted as the designated driver for a ruminant who’s had a few too many.

That seems unlikely until you realize it’s happening in a world where an eight-point buck is a regular customer at Marty’s Roadhouse, and the local yokal knows the buck’s wife’s name.

That’s comedy for you.

In last week’s blog post, I mentioned some TV shows and movies Olive Oyl and I have enjoyed, and some readers appreciated it, so here’s another, along with a cherished personal story.

I first saw Zach Galifianakis at a theater in NYC around ‘03 or ’04, when he was an up-and-coming stand-up comic opening for a well-known comedian. I loved his set and thought he stole the show. I’ve been a big fan ever since. His faux-interview segments from a few years back, Between Two Ferns, are hilarious.

His latest thing is a wonderful series of short episodes on Netflix called This is a Gardening Show. It comedically mixes facts about growing food with interviews with kids and experts. It’s wonderful!

My cherished story about Zach: Around 2007, I attended the Just for Laughs comedy festival in Montreal. Galifianakis was one of the many performers in the two-day festival, and I went to see one of his shows. 

It took place in a small theater with a proscenium stage, cafe tables on the floor, and a small balcony with theater seats. During his show, he left the stage and wandered through the floor tables, improvising with random audience members.

After a couple of stops, he happened by my table, stuck the mic in my face, and asked, “What’s your name?” I said, “Dan.” 

He said, “And what do you do?” 

“I’m a cartoonist,” I replied.

“Oh really? What do you do? Have I seen your work?”

I said, “I do a newspaper comic called Bizarro.”

To my self-shitting surprise, the audience erupted in cheers and applause. That alone would’ve been enough, but it got better.

Zach said, “Oh my god. I love your work! I’ve read Bizarro for years.”

Holy crap, are you kidding me?! I melted like a schoolgirl meeting Paul McCartney in the ‘60s. I went backstage after the show and gushed over him, and he probably thought I was a dork. That’s the last time we spoke, and he doubtless has no memory of it ever happening.

That kind of public recognition almost never happens to a cartoonist, certainly not mid-level ink jockeys like me. It’s still my favorite moment of my whole career. I don’t know what my second-favorite moment would be, but it’s probably too boring to even write about.

Anyway, his This is a Gardening Show is charming and funny, and you’ll love it. If you don’t, don’t tell me.

You’ll also likely love Wayno’s Bizarro cartoons from this week. I’m sure Zach would, too, if he weren’t too busy gardening.

My friends in the make-believe cartoon mob loved this one.

On the off chance that you don’t already know, there are spas where you can do this with your feet.

The thing I like most about pretzels is their logic.

Some readers had trouble with this one. They say you’re not supposed to explain jokes, but I’ve made a point of not doing what they say. This is a pizza lying upside down on the ground, with the picture flipped so that the entire world is on the pizza. It’s a similar trick to the one I used in this comic.

Here in Mexico, they call those an “IRM” and “Señor T”.

This guy may have gone to the same school of childish political retribution as a certain orange man-baby.

That concludes this thing I do here each week. I hope you enjoyed it, and if you did, please consider helping us keep it free of ads and a paywall. Now that newspapers no longer pay us a living wage, we rely on donations from readers like you. (And some who are not like you at all.)

Whatever you’re like, we cherish your readership and appreciate your generosity.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the non-cartoon comments below. 

Since 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Hey, there Jazz Pickles. Welcome to this thing now.

Since the world at large can be a daunting horror show these days, I’ve got some amusing entertainment suggestions for you this week.

After a hard day of thinking, writing, drawing, and suppressing the urge to remember where we hid those cyanide pills, Olive Oyl and I watch a little TV at night to unwind. 

Never the news, of course. That would be as relaxing as drinking monkey vomit and setting our hair on fire. No, we look for programs that express original, human creativity and remind us why our species is more magical and special than computerized word-guessing machines will ever be able to emulate. 

Here are a few things we’ve loved lately:

Widow’s Bay—series on Apple TV. Matthew Rys, whom you’ve doubtless seen on numerous other great shows, plays the mayor of a quaint New England island town that hopes to become the next Martha’s Vineyard, but is beset by ludicrous legends of an encyclopedia of horror cliches. Rys brilliantly plays the straight man, trying to control every other absurdly eccentric character, all of which are perfectly played without going over the line. Viewers quickly realize the legends are true, and it becomes a horror story that is laugh-out-loud hilarious. Comedy-horror has been done before, but this is a cut above any that I’ve seen. 

Big Mistakes—Netflix series. This is a dysfunctional family comedy starring and created by Dan Levy (Eugene Levy’s son and creator of Schitt’s Creek). It’s somewhat less original than Widow’s Bay, but still funnier by my reckoning than most modern sitcom fare. If the first episode makes you laugh, you’ll love it. If not, move on.

She Came to Me—(2023) movie, Netflix. This one hasn’t been as well-reviewed as the shows mentioned above, but I suspect that’s because it is odd and offbeat. I love unusual and surprising stories, and Olive Oyl and I found this one charming and fun. It’s a “romantic comedy,” but without the cliche recipes we’re used to, and it’s not remotely sticky-sweet. The casting is perfect, and the characters and storyline have depth. If you don’t like operatic love stories about tugboat captains, this one may not be for you. 

Marty, Life is Short—documentary, Netflix. This overview of the life of comedian Martin Short is terrific, unless you hate him. I haven’t loved everything he’s done, but I have been in awe of many of the weird characters he’s created. Ed Grimley and Jiminy Glick are two that I still find laugh-out-loud funny. His energy and creativity fairly leap off the screen, and this documentary of his personal life and career is full of inspiring and heartbreaking surprises. He is a uniquely creative human being with admirable depth, and O2 and I just loved this film.

Finally, not coming to your TV but soon to your computer screen, is next Friday’s installment (22 May, 2026) of my subscription creative writing project, The Naked Cartoonist. It’s a non-political, humorous article about a handful of vintage Bizarro cartoons illustrating how a certain famous toy is a metaphor for all of our lives.

You’ll either love it or feel neutral about it, but I guarantee it won’t make your eyes sting or your face morph into a nightmarish mask resembling a humanoid weasel. Here’s how it starts:

The Most Terrifying Role Most of Us Never Play

Do You Have the Courage to Play it?

Can you guess what the first toy advertised on TV was? It sold over a million units in the first year, has appeared in numerous films, and is still in production after three-quarters of a century. No, it’s not the Barbie doll — though, like her, it is also devoid of genitals.

The toy I’m referring to is a covert metaphor for each of us, a mirror of humanity, which may explain its enduring allure. When we played with it, we were unwittingly practicing life.

Subscribe before next Friday to receive the gift of this article and my entire archive of other stories.

Join me now to find out what gifts of chucklementation Wayno’s Bizarro comics from the week shall bestow…

Don’t be surprised if this absurd suggestion becomes a reality in the near future, as the insatiable greed of Jeff Bezos continues to consume what’s left of his soul. (Oh, how I wish I were kidding.)

If she’s going to exercise “wristry” as well as palmistry, I think she should add it to her sign.

File this under “near puppet experiences.”

At least he fulfilled his calling to feed the hungry.

Haunting without moving your lips is harder than you’d think.

And, we hope, wearer of underpants.

That crack of comedy thunder marks the end of our rain of humor, Jazz Pickles. If you like this kind of crap and hope we keep doing it for free, please consider helping us keep it this way via the links below. We’ll love you for it.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the non-cartoon comments below. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post this week.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Cock-a-doodle-doo, Jazz Pickles.

That greeting seems appropriate this week as we discuss lesser-known characters of Greek Mythology.

You’re probably familiar with centaurs (half-human, half-horse) and satyrs (half-horny-human, half-goat), but few are acquainted with the half-human, half-chicken, poultraurs.

Poultraurs subsisted on a diet of insects, worms, greens, and berries, just like regular chickens. This made them unpopular dinner guests, as they were almost as difficult to cook for as vegans. 

On the plus side, watching them prance around the yard on human legs, pecking the ground, could be amusing. I won’t even get into their reproductive process, as it was fairly disturbing.

I confess the above comic contains an inaccuracy: the poultraur I’ve drawn has the head of a hen, which are female, but is referred to as a “brother.” My bad. I chose the head of a hen because it is inherently funnier than that of a rooster. I’m not sure why, exactly, but that’s my comedy instinct after nearly half a century as a humorist. 

Sadly, poultraurs are extinct. During the severe famine Greece endured during WWII, the top half of poultraurs were widely consumed. It led to the expression, “finger-licking semi-cannibalism,” a phrase that was partially appropriated by a certain American fast-food chain a few years later.

If you enjoy these little cloud-burst blog posts, you’ll doubtless thrill to my creative writing project, The Naked Cartoonist. It’s $5 a month for the entire archive and a new article every two weeks. It’s one of the ways I’m supporting Olive Oyl and myself, as well as paying Wayno to do his award-winning thing. 

My most recent article is titled “Ten Things I Have in Common with Trump.” It’s a political satire that includes such points as: “We have each been married three times,” (though none of my wives left me because I cheated on them with a porn star); “I have put my name on things” (such as my underwear when I went to summer camp, but never buildings that were already named or a catalog of cheap crap), etc. Here’s a preview:

I Have Fantasized About Being a Superhero

When I was four years old, my mother ordered a Superman suit for me from a catalog and snapped a photo as I posed before running outside to pretend to fly. I was not an 80-year-old leader of the (previously) free world, nor did I share those images on social media, but my mother kept the photo in my childhood scrapbook.

That’s an actual photo of me on the left, while the image at right is some of the stellar work of a mindless robot. This article will doubtless cost me a few subscriptions if I have any MAGA fans left, which I doubt. Oh well.

Time now for the week’s Bizarro comics by Wayno, or Captain Chuckles, as they call him in the Marvel Universe.

The third and fourth Secret Symbols in this one were hard to find even for me.

O2 and I recently endured a cafe musician who was worse than a tone-deaf, drunken, karaoke singer.

Full disclosure: I’m completely against live music in restaurants. It is invariably too loud. If I wanted to eliminate any chance of meaningful conversation with unbearable noise, I’d dine in a teenager’s bedroom.

Once they start to embed computer chips in our brains, this will be inevitable. Rented movies & series on Amazon Prime now include commercial breaks, I guess because Bezos doesn’t have enough money to keep up with his new wife’s plastic surgery addiction.

Speaking of big brass, years ago, in NYC, I happened upon a performance by Edward Babb and the McCullough Sons of Thunder. I can honestly say it was a spiritual experience. Here’s a short clip on YouTube. To skip the long intro, the music starts at 3:25.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkQnnoJ0xJw

In contrast, I’ve never encountered a sermon that could do what that thundering band I mentioned in the comment above did. IMHO, music has an unexplainable, mystical power.

If there were one of these in the White House, a certain grievance-baby-in-chief would never come above ground.

That brings us to the end of this week’s thingamajig. If you enjoy the things we do and that we offer this majig for free, please consider helping us keep it that way via the links below. We will think of you fondly, with gratitude.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some ORIGINALS!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is now!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the comments below. Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my award-winning comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Foldeundertøj, Jazz Pickles. That’s how they say “welcome” in Sundfornuftmark, a country I made up.

It’s a “Scandinavianish” country midway between Scandinavia and the tropics. I’ll be writing in detail about that country in a hilarious and meaningful future article for The Naked Cartoonist, and those of you who subscribe for the absurdly low price of $5 a month will experience hilarity and deep philosophical meaning for less than (what will soon be) the price of a gallon of gas.

But for now, let’s discuss piñatas.

Piñatas are those papier-mâché objects that blindfolded children are encouraged to beat with a stick until they give them candy.

“Papier-mâché is the hoity-toity way the French spell the name of the common children’s art class stuff piñatas are made of. Though the word looks high-falootin’, it means “chewed paper,” another thing that happens in children’s art classes.

Piñatas were traditionally in the form of a donkey or a satellite, but more recently, they are available in the shape of everything from superheroes to risque anatomical objects. (There is metaphorical logic in whacking a piñata shaped like the afore-linked anatomical object until it gives up its contents, but we’ll leave that topic for another writer.)

According to Wikipedia, the basic piñata tradition originated in China (as did the invention of both paper and papier-mâché—I’m not sure if they invented chewing). It then migrated to the Middle East, then Europe, and eventually was brought to the “New World” (same age as the “Old World,” so, not really new) by that heavily armed gaggle of pale-skinned ambassadors who kindly offered to decimate numerous, enormous, complex cultures and rebuild the country to their liking and call it Mexico.

But get this: An extremely similar tradition already existed among the Aztecs to celebrate Huitzilopochtli's birthday, the main god of the inhabitants of Tenochtitlan, the capital of the Aztec Empire, now called Mexico City. (Unlike Foldeundertøj, I didn’t make up that Aztec god’s name.)

To this day, children the world over, even those who cannot pronounce the name of that god, will doubtless have ample opportunities to beat something with a stick until it coughs up its contents.

In the cartoon above, I’ve used a piñata as a stand-in for the famed Trojan Horse, which was not only my high-school buddy Rick’s nickname (earned for his uncanny ability to secure numerous opportunities to use a condom), but also a thing from Greek mythology. Obviously, my comic is based on a combo of the Greek and Mexican versions.

I only mentioned all of that because I wonder if it has been wise to train children for thousands of years to beat things until they get candy. Some children inevitably grow up to be politicians, and some of those seem to still think this is a good way to get what they want.

I’m skeptical of the long-term wisdom of that approach.

On a slightly different topic, Olive Oyl and I are currently spending a few days in Tenochtitlan, and I thought you might enjoy this photo of the My Sweet Jesus restaurant sign. We haven’t eaten there, so we don’t know if it’s as good as the name implies, but I admire the effort.

Had the conquistadors not conquisted the Aztecs, it might have been named My Sweet Huitzilopochtli. A person could work up an appetite just trying to pronounce the restaurant’s name.

Let’s shift focus now to my comics partner Wayno’s enchucklicating Bizarro comics from the week.

I am proud to announce that he has once again been nominated by the National Cartoonists Society for their Best Newspaper Panels Silver Reuben Award. Congrats and good luck, amigo!

Maybe he could help around the house by putting away the pipes and eyeballs.

This cartoon brings back memories of how much I hated the third grade. I often fantasized that our ill-tempered teacher was a piñata, and I was first in line for a turn at the stick. Unlike certain eternally-adolescent public officials I could name, however, I grew out of that childish way of addressing my preferences.

I used to work out at a gym frequented by the local NBA team’s players. I felt like Minnie next to them, and did not enjoy the view when they passed me in the locker room on their way to and from the showers.

I wouldn’t care how many of us would fit into his car, I’d rather chase a weasel around a mulberry bush than listen to that damn clown’s song again.

Many are called, fugue are chosen.

If reincarnation is a thing, and I’ve got any choice in the matter, I’m going to ask that I be allowed to wait until humans have evolved beyond their insatiable greed and penchant for violence, as well as their use of fossil fuels.

Thus concludes this week’s journey of joviality, Jazz Pickles. Thanks for dropping by our weekly backyard carnival. If you enjoy our content and that we offer it for free, please consider helping us keep it that way via the helpful links below.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some originals!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my PITCH VIDEO and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is!)

I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the non-cartoon comments below. 

Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post.

And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.

Fùnyìhng, Jazz Pickles!

That’s Cantonese for “welcome,” according to Google Translate. Given the accuracy of AI, however, it might actually mean something else, like “your butt is showing.”

I chose it because it kind of looks like “funnying” or “funny thing,” which are concepts Wayno and I hope our comics will deliver.

I’ve always been impressed by language, but it’s among the easiest things in the world to take for granted—until you try to learn a new one late in life.

Being raised and schooled in the self-centered US in the late 1900s, I was never encouraged to learn a second language. Most of that time was spent in Oklahoma, one of the most backward and “unwoke” states in (what used to be) the Union, so that didn’t help. 

Spanish and French were offered in my high school, but they were “elective” classes, and we only got one elective. Another elective class was ART, so I chose the one with pencils, ink, paint, and papier-maché, not the one with homework and difficult jibberish puzzles.

Back then, I didn’t know a single Asian or Latino kid. Everyone in Oklahoma was a white or Black American. Before I hurried out of the state at age 18, I doubt I’d ever met anyone who spoke a second language. 

Time traveling forward to now, I’ve been living in Mexico for almost ten years and working daily on my Spanish. I am accustomed to being a quick study in most things, so I figured it would be like learning to cook; I didn’t think I’d ever have my own cooking show on TV, but figured I’d fairly quickly be functional enough to pull off a dinner party.

Not true. If Spanish were food, I’d confuse, disgust, and poison my dinner guests with unrecognizable glop not fit to be consumed by humans.

After ten years of practice, when I speak Spanish to Mexicans, they just stare at me, wondering if I’m drunk or insane. When they respond, I can pick out a word or two and usually figure out what they may be saying based on context, but it’s a game of chance at best.

When Olive Oyl and I watch foreign films (with subtitles), from an Asian or Arabic country—languages that do not resemble anything we’ve studied or heard often—I suddenly realize how ridiculously complex and miraculous language is.

Fundamentally, verbal communication is nothing but random noises fired from our facial orifices at the speed of hurricane winds. How anyone can make sense of anything communicated in this way is a miracle.

And yet, if you shoot those vocal ejaculations in the direction of a human baby for a few years, it effortlessly begins to understand and replicate them. WTF?! Are babies that much smarter than a man in his sixties?

English is said to be among the more difficult languages to learn because it has so many “exceptions” to phonetic “rules” (which should more accurately be called tendencies). Still, it was so easy to pick up, I don’t even remember learning it. 

Spanish is reputed to be easier, but understanding it is as difficult for me as glancing at a pile of Legos on the floor and instantly telling you how many there are, like Rain Man.

Now think about reading. Look at written Arabic or Mandarin, and try to imagine how anyone makes sense of those seemingly random scribbles, much less can comprehend complex, nuanced concepts from them in a split second. Consider how quickly you’re converting the chicken scratches on this screen right now into hurricane-fast mouth noises, and comprehending my thoughts! It’s astounding.

Why am I going on about this? Because when you experience a miracle, it’s hard to keep it to yourself.

Another miracle will be how I continue to support myself now that my cartoon income is almost gone. 

One way I’m trying is with my subscription creative writing project, The Naked Cartoonist. If you like my blog posts, you’ll love the articles I write for NC. They’re deeper, funnier, and I include a lot of comics for emphasis. And, unlike these posts, I even prufread them for tpyos before posting!

It’s only $5 for two articles a month, which goes a little further in Mexico than in the US, so Olive Oyl and I will use it responsibly and stretch it as far as it can go.

Yes! I want to buy you and O2 a plate of rice and beans!

Thank you so much. Your generosity humbles me.

Time now to explore the mysterious scribblings of my talented comics partner, Wayno, and chuckle at the miracle of humor…

I remember a time when confession booths didn’t have running water.

Or, maybe the “president” will dress up like a “doctor” and heal you with his glowing hands.

At least she’s working in the right department.

If there were giant bird-people dressed in human clothing, I’d spend more time at the beach.

But that amnesia drug they give you always makes me forget this lesson; or maybe I just want to forget it.

My favorite poet is Dr. Seuss. Everyone since then has been too lazy to bother rhyming.

Here’s where we’re drawing the line this week, Jazz Pickles. Thanks for using your miraculous scribble-deciphering skills on us. If you’d like to help us keep doing this, here are some more ways. We’ll love you like a hurricane.

The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.

Limited edition, signed & numbered prints of BIZARRO CARTOONS, and some originals!

Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!

My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY.

Watch my pitch video and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.

Super fun BIZARRO SWAG from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar. (ALL the comics are still funny, no matter what month it is!)