While on recent vacation I did see a sign for a beef jerky outlet.  My experience has been that beef jerky isn’t exactly expensive to begin with, so I wonder what the allure of an outlet is?  I hope it does have attractions like Swine Lake.

Yes, the boys will eventually make it to their spring break destination.  Eventually.

I like the concept of these “style” Bibles so much, there’s a good chance they might turn up again in another strip.  There’s one designed like a fashion magazine for teenage girls.  I assume it includes makeup tips from Jezebel.

Jimmy looks so sad in every strip, even when he’s on dates with Amanda.  Maybe more sad.

I suspect that secretly upwards of 85% of pop music makes absolutely no sense.  Sure, “Adia” is a notable offender, but listen to many country music “story” songs and you’ll quickly lose track of who is doing what, and why.

This also happens to be the type of strip that will encourage people to stop us at work or email us and say, “Hey, I know what that song’s about!”  Then they’ll proceed to try to explain it for the next thirty minutes.  Lucky us.

The campus comes to a standstill when the latest celebrity scandal grabs everyone’s attention.  Originally started as a comic, the idea soon became too unwieldy for the printed page.  Right before dropping it entirely we wondered if it might work best as an animation, and so here it is.

Of course, for something spoofing current events timing is key.  By the time the idea had come to us we were already running a bit behind, so we spent essentially a day and a half putting this animation together.  Considering, we think it turned out pretty well.  Like most recent animations, voices were recorded across three states.

Trivia

• Tiger’s dialogue is from the actual Tiger, and not a dubbing.
• This episode features non-speaking cameos from several characters.
• Was completed in less than a day and a half.  The original strip did not contain the bookend sections with the professors.

Cast and Crew

David Rothwell
Director / Animator / Executive Producer

Derek Seltzer

Justin Young
Director / Writer / Executive Producer

Mr. Mittens is at his most fun when he’s most evil.  This is pretty evil, even for him.  I do like to contemplate exactly who’s stuffed into that bag.  Any guesses?

Strips like this raise the issue of why Professor Hobo keeps Mr. Mittens around?  I prefer to view their relationship more as Mr. Mittens allowing Professor Hobo to stick around.

I mention this, because I’m starting to think my wife views me as nothing more than a big blonde kitten.  Part of my suspicion stems from the saucer of milk I find bedside every morning, but a bigger part comes from the questions she poses casually to me.  Here’s a hint—they’re traps.  We all know the standard line that a wife asks her husband if a certain dress makes her look fat, but all but the dumbest of us see right through that one.  Look, even if the dress has a pattern of a school bus on it, we’re not saying anything.

My wife is sneakier, however.  She asks question such as, “Do you ever wish you were still single?”  I immediately shout back no, hoping a lack of hesitation will equate with a validation of commitment.  But it doesn’t end there, because she comes back with, “Really?”  Now, I know really she doesn’t want to know really, but I also know she’s incredibly adept at spotting me fake it.  She could be the Simon Cowell of an acting competition, tearing apart contestants because they didn’t sell disillusionment, and then pointing out that, no, she hasn’t just introduced irony into the situation.  It’s one of the wonders of being married to acting evaluating, grammar nerd.

But back to “really.”  I always fail at really, so instead I try being honest.  “No, why would I want to be single again?  I like not having to think.”  At this point Admiral Ackbar is slapping his fishy forehead because I’ve missed his pleads of, “It’s a trap!”  But women, let me explain.  Marriage is a great nullifier of one of man’s primary concerns—finding a woman.  Once married we no longer concern our brains with this pursuit, which at any given time prior to marriage occupied 30-40% of our brain cycles.  With that burden lifted, we feel a great relief and relaxation.  Sure, we still might look at other women, but no longer do we concern ourselves with pseudo-clever things to say to her.  She’s more like wallpaper to us—very attractive to look at, but nothing we want to stand around in a Lowe’s fretting over.

Women, of course, get the same benefit from marriage.  No longer do they worry if we will call after the date, and their brains are thankful for the reprieve.  However, men introduce other stresses by the nature of who we are.  No wife sees her husband at work in the garage without worrying that the next morning she might find a wrench in the washing machine because, “It needed cleaning.”  Husbands, on the other hand, don’t worry if you to decide to paint a room of the house a light pink, because there’s always another room we can go into, instead.

And this is why marriage adds years to a man’s life and takes them away from a woman’s.

I once worked for a company where everyone thought this way.  We’d have a meeting and the discussion would instantly turn to what our competitors were doing.  When someone suggested trying something different they recoiled like vampires to a crucifix.  Innovation is scary, which seems to be the reason many companies die held up in their corporate offices with the doors barricaded.

Is this the first color view of Barry Broccoli?