Maybe I Should Just Rename It the Chickweed Award
Cidu Bill on Jan 18th 2010
Is there even a pretense that she’s saying anything other than “I can tell because my kiss gave you an erection”?
Filed in 9 Chickweed Lane, Arlo Award, Arlo Page, Bill Bickel, Brooke McEldowney, comic strips, comics, humor | 24 responses so far
David N Jan 18th 2010 at 01:49 am 1
Subtlety is a lost art here. I rather enjoy Arlo more because it’s not stood up right in front of you most times. If you’ll pardon the expression.
nonegiven Jan 18th 2010 at 08:57 am 2
i just wish I could read the whole thing. When I increase the size so I can read the words, the right side of the cartoon disappears off the screen and there is no scroll bar to move sideways.
padraig Jan 18th 2010 at 09:41 am 3
Really enjoy this strip, but I only see it online, and I have to wonder: Does it actually run in ANY daily paper?
Plus, isn’t Grandma supposed to be pretty virginal at this stage? The other USO girls must have been tutoring her.
Here’s a direct link for you ng, usually works better than the blog page:
http://comics.com/9_chickweed_lane/2010-01-18/
Carl Jan 18th 2010 at 09:42 am 4
nonegiven, right-click on the comic and choose “View Image”. This puts it on its own page so you can zoom to your heart’s content (in Firefox).
arvy Jan 18th 2010 at 09:48 am 5
Nonegiven,
The problem you’re having is a function of your browser; I have the same problem on my droid. I need to click on the image and select view image to see the whole strip. It’s a little inconvienient, but well worth it for saving me the arduos task of actually having to get out of my bed and walk 6 feet to my PC to read cidu.
You can probably do the same with whichver browser you have.
Bill, who is Chickweed Guthrie?
arvy Jan 18th 2010 at 09:50 am 6
Of course the timing of my post and Carl’s post shows just how pathetically slow I still am at typing on my droid.
Tom Jan 18th 2010 at 10:57 am 7
Virginal, yes … but since she’s a grandma, we’ve got to assume at some point she STOPPED being virginal. Besides, sometimes you just have to comment on the elephant in the room — or, I would assume, the erection pressed into your abdomen.
Frosted Donut Jan 18th 2010 at 11:32 am 8
@padraig: “9 Chickweed Lane” appears in The Seattle Times (both daily and Sunday). And, as far as I can tell, isn’t ever edited or substituted.
Cidu Bill Jan 18th 2010 at 12:25 pm 9
Just clicking the comic gives you a page with only the comic on it. That’s the way the blog is set up.
Silviya Jan 18th 2010 at 12:57 pm 10
i don’t get the ‘verginal objectin’. seriously, since when a virgin is unable to recognize an erection?
AaronB Jan 18th 2010 at 01:13 pm 11
The image scrolling issue can also be solved with a simple tweak to the CSS on the page. Just add a rule to the style.css file (or in the head section of the HTML file itself, using a style tag) to set the overflow property of “.element” to “auto”. I tested it on this page with Firebug and it works beautifully. However, I don’t know how much control Bill has over the coding on this site.
Charlene Jan 18th 2010 at 01:24 pm 12
According to my mother (RIP) everyone back then was at it like rabbits, but even those who were virgins knew more about sex than we assume they did. She always laughed at the Leave It To Beaver view of the 40s and 50s, because in her experience it was nothing like that. She believed that the idea that the Old Days were some magical time when everyone remained virgins until marriage was an invention of the 60s.
padraig Jan 18th 2010 at 02:20 pm 13
Not so much that she wouldn’t know what an erection is, heck, maybe she has younger brothers, but more surprised that she is comfortable joking with her guy about his “gallant reflex.” Not having, y’know, gone up close & personal….
David A. Rooney Jan 18th 2010 at 02:23 pm 14
Charlene - Just as we create god(s) in our own image, so we (re)write history to make ourselves look better.
So if you try to tell me my good Catholic parents did anything other than standard missionary with their eyes closed while thinking of baseball, my 2 brothers and 2 sisters and I will figuratively stick our fingers in our ears saying “lalalalalalalalalalala!!!!” very loudly.
Ted in Fort Lauderdale Jan 18th 2010 at 05:47 pm 15
Padraig - well, it is a (by intent humorous) comic - maybe Brooke was unable to let that joke go by even if it didn’t quite fit the personality of Edna as we’d expect. Then again, he’s showing parts of her personality that Juliette doesn’t expect either. So maybe as Charlene suggests above, Brooke is pointing out that while she was sheltered, she wasn’t _that_ sheltered…
bookworm Jan 18th 2010 at 06:18 pm 16
arvy, thanks for the laugh! Looks like Bill outed himself.
Max Zook Jan 18th 2010 at 07:27 pm 17
FYI, “9 Chickweed Lane” runs in the Los Angeles Times. It’s McEldowney’s other strip, “Pibgorn”, that’s only seen on the Web.
Kit Jan 18th 2010 at 08:31 pm 18
I’ve always wondered if “Pibgorn” was meant to be a riff on “glib porn” . . .
Chuck Jan 18th 2010 at 08:48 pm 19
“more surprised that she is comfortable joking with her guy about his “gallant reflex.” Not having, y’know, gone up close & personal….”
I don’t follow this comic, so I don’t know the character specifically, but you can be a virgin without being uncomfortable about sex. Some people just wait.
mkilby Jan 19th 2010 at 03:48 am 20
@ Kit (18) - A “pibgorn” is a type of Welsh hornpipe. The problem I have with the name is that I kept reading it as “Pigborn” the first few times I saw it, and have trouble shaking the mental “swine” connection.
chuckers Jan 19th 2010 at 04:36 am 21
You aren’t the only one that reads it as Pigborn, mkilby.
Christine Jan 19th 2010 at 07:44 pm 22
While I agree that one can be a virgin without being uncomfortable about sex, the term “virginal” has other connotations to it as well, generally that someone is uncomfortable/ignorant about sex.
I think this series is supposed to be showing her changing and becoming more knowledgeable/comfortable with the topic - look at how she chipped his tooth when she kissed back (her second kiss).
Chuck Jan 21st 2010 at 08:48 pm 23
Re: Pibgorn vs. Pigborn, it doesn’t help that searching Pigborn on Go Comics takes you directly to the page without offering a correction. Sure it’s correct in the comic header, but if you typed it in a certain way and it got you to the right place, what would make you double check how the header says it?
Penny Nickles Jan 24th 2010 at 03:35 pm 24
Funny, every time I see the title, I think it’s “BigPorn”