Silflay Hraka

Tolkien Quotes for 9/11

Lynn Sislo
“I wish it need not have happened in my lifetime,” said Frodo.
“So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide.
All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

Glenn Reynolds
“It takes but one to make a war, not two, and those who do not take up swords can still die upon them.”

And one from me, for those who take up arms in this age against the West.

“All were slain save those who fled to die, or to drown in the red foam of the River. Few ever came eastward to Morgul or to Mordor; and to the land of the Haradrim came only a tale from far off: a rumour of the wrath and terror of Gondor.”

9/11 Comic Strip Reviews

I’ll leave the surveys of the television and the blogosphere to those that are bigger and better at it to begin with and do the 9/11 themed comic strips. It’s more my niche anyway, as if that weren’t already glaringly obvious. I’ll add to the list as I come across more, email me if you find one I’ve missed. I’ve always thought that reading the comic strips is a highly subjective experience; I’ve no other way to explain the continued existence of Cathy. So if I’ve dumped on one of your favorites, my apologies.

BTW, the dumbasses at King Features run their strips with a two-week delay, so they don’t make the list. Out of those, I know that Dennis the Menace and The Family Circus ran 9/11 themed strips. They were about as bad as you would expect. It’s too bad I can’t link to Rhymes With Orange, though.

Kevin & Kell – Nicely done
User Friendly – Too sappy
Over The Hedge – Get back to the jokes
Jerk City – Do what you do best, or the terrorists win
The Boondocks – You tell ‘em Grandpa
Preteena – Never heard of this strip, but that was kind of humorous
Gasoline Alley – When you can’t think of anything, you can always try yanking on the heartstrings
Dick Tracy – When you can’t think of anything, there’s always the tiny little note of condolence. To be fair, the note is more or less what I expect to see in a serial comic
Annie – Note and heartstrings done unexpectedly well.
The Big Picture – I don’t know the strip, but this doesn’t feel well done
Pluggers – Filler
Grand Avenue – Filler
Real Life Adventures - Above average filler
Overboard – What to do when there’s nothing to say
The Born Loser – Barely more than filler. The Born Loser is one of those strips that once your eye catches it, you read it, but you always wish you hadn’t. It feels like a waste of time.
Rudy Park – That would be a nice tradition
Sheldon – Touching
Warped – Filler
Luann- Cleverly done, if you follow the strip.
Nancy – Possibly the worst filler yet.
Alley Oop – Typical serial comic note to the reader
The U.S. of Play – If it wasn’t 9/11, you wouldn’t know it was about 9/11. I think that makes it decent filler.
Raising Duncan – Meh.
Committed – I think he thinks I should be doing something else.
Trevor – Clever Trevor
Pearls before Swine – Decent tug on the heartstrings
Planet Earth and Other Tourist Traps – I know the feeling
Mudpie – Competing with B.C. for the lucrative Christian non-funny funnies market
Superosity – That’s a lot of words for four little panels
Ozzy and Millie – Another meme pastiche, anti-war lyrics meet skyline meet couple watching sunset. It’s a big canvas brain dump.
Everything Jake – I bet he had to go buy a new pencil
The Surburban Jungle – Filler
LookWhatIBroughtHome – Sticking with what they know best
Life’s so Rad – Blurry Filler
Boxjam’s Doodle – Good on you, Boxjam.
Fat Jesus Weird, but it made me laugh.
Mallard Fillmore – Aflac
Foxtrot – Blended in almost too well. I totally missed it the first time I saw it. Thanks, Oreta!.

Editorial Cartoons
Matt Davies – Extremely well done
Stuart Carlson – Arty
Paul Conrad – Reminds me of Herblock
Bill DeOre- Needs sound effects
Bruce Hammond – Animated. Nice and simple
Walt Handelsman – Lots of black ink in 9/11 editorial cartoons
David Horsey – Spot on
Dick Locher – Draws anger really well
Dick Marlette – Feels like an awkward pastiche to me
Glenn McCoy – Nice Vulture
Jack Ohman – WTF?
Joel Pett – The person I think hasn’t learned anything is not the same person Joel thinks it is.
Steve Sack – Pretty. I don’t know anything about art, but that looks like an excellent use of charcoal and pen to me.
Ben Sargent – His people always look like frogs to me.
Ann Telnaes- Preach it, sister.
Tom Toles – Kind of utopian for Tom
Randy Bish – Hope he didn’t spend a lot of time on that
Mike Luckovich – Hope they’re coming for me, next.
Henry Payne – Nicely executed skyline
Rob Rogers – “Ignore the coverage” seems to be a wide spread meme.
Jeff Stahler – But that doesn’t mean that its execution can’t be just as bad as some of the others.
Ed Stein – Oh, well done. Bravo!
Sean Delonas – Nice underground comix feel. Love the evil Bert.

Divers Alarums

The fire alarm just kicked off. Not a good day for that, imho. Evacuating.

Update: We’re back. No one knows what caused the alarm, though there is a burnt electrical smell wafting through the hallway. The Fire Department showed up and turned off the alarm, which was taken as the all-clear signal. We probably won’t know what caused it unless the control center sends out an email update.

The alarm did give me pretty concrete evidence that deep down, in the bedrock of my soul, I’m an ass. One of the first things I thought to do was to go and stand underneath the alarm, call the wife on the cell phone, say “Honey, I…I…I love you,” cough a couple of times, and hang up.

Yet another Update: Here we go again. I think I’ll go eat lunch and work the rest of the day from home.

I’ve been working on the railroad…

Capitalism comes to the Moon
Armstrong was wrong. The giant leap wasn’t then, it’s now. The profit motive will put us into space a lot quicker than relying on government agencies will. Now we can start the countdown to colonies. 30 years, max. I’ll probably be able to retire to the moon.

Once we find the solar system equivalent of the spice trade, it won’t be just the moon, though the moon might well become the space equivalent of a seaport boomtown. Think of San Francisco at the turn of the last century. I’ll open a general store, and sell Space Levis to the prospectors.

There’s gold in them thar asteroids.

Hell, there’s stuff in them thar asteroids that makes gold look like spare change.