Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for March 09, 2014

I feel cheated. I was sure this was going to be a pun strip.

In one of my favorite episodes of SVU, a power outage causes the cops’ cell phones to run out of power, so they have to use whistles to signal each other.:Sometimes the old ways are the best ways.

I’m with Pig in the final panel, but I would quote Bob Dylan: “the times they’re a-changing.”

I love my cellphone. The boy loves his cellphone. Everybody loves their cellphones!

The exact same thing happened to me when I went to the county fair with some friends!A couple of us were working out meet-up arrangements, and someone else said “Don’t we all have cell phones?”

Well, duh.

My embarrassment, though, wasn’t the end of the story. I discovered that I couldn’t hear my phone, and we had to waste a lot of time looking for each other.Yup… sometimes the old ways are better! Or at least, you need both options.

Cop: “are you lost, little boy?”Boy: “yes”Cop: “And some other boys took your phone?”Boy: “yes”Cop: “What’s your parents phone number?”Boy: “01.”

Retain both systems, Pig. The old one works pretty well, and phone could fail. Not all technical advances are necessarily helpful in every situation….

That’a work!

That’a work!

I have no idea that now I’m 80 years old, and survivied with out a cell phone?

Little Willy won’t go home. http://youtu.be/hmbEuRzlhIs

I had a bad feeling at the start of the strip that it was going to involve Pig looking for his little willy.

I like that, in the last panel, Pig’s balloon is laying sadly on the floor as if it no longer has purpose.

Eh… It’s a fair strip today…

Mom used to say that if I got lost, I shouldn’t go crying to her!

@gir63 — me too! :0

Pastis must have needed to simply collect a paycheck…lol

The colorist seems not to have read the strip. Pig’s shirt is nowhere near bright red.

Just heard the best reason ever for kids not having cellphones (other than the obvious). They’re targeted by gangs (or just older kids), and hurt so they can’t get help. Do you really want to make your kid a target?

When I was a kid going to the fair, we went through the blue gate, so we were told to meet at the blue gate if we got separated. Then we went past the information booth, and were told to meet at the information booth if we were separated. Then we went past the lost kids booth, and were told to meet at the lost kids booth if we were separated. I wasn’t even lost yet and I was already lost.

They sure have, Pig.

xxx

Poor Pig! Willy took all the fun out of it for him.

I’m still looking for the “bright red shirt!” O_o It sure looked orange to me…

Despite the proliferation of cell phones times have really changed all that much. A few weeks ago I went to a camper show. You ever been to a camper how, a home show or events like that you know they could be like going to the fair. Hundreds, even thousands, of folks making nice large crowds folks can get separated in. Even setting a place to meet isn’t always an insurance, but it helps a little more than trying to call and say where you’re at might. I passed this woman at the camper show who was on her cell phone trying to describe her location to someone so they could meet. Walked away ten to fifteen yards from her, here’s a couple of young girls in their late pre-teens to early teens also on a cell phone. I quickly caught on by what they were saying that thy were the ones the woman was trying to hook up with. And they couldn’t even see her when looking in her direction for all the people making it difficult to spot the “landmarks” she was trying to describe to them.

So I bought a set of walkie-talkies to use at Disneyland in the pre-cell phone days. Two units. By the time we got home, one was lost forever.

I bought a cell phone when I was chaparoning a high school trip to Santa Cruz, and all the other parents had them. They looked at me funny when we were exchanging numbers, so I gave up and got one.

I’m still guilty of saying, “If we get separated, meet at…” but it’s not really a bad idea, since cell phones die or lose reception. Or your kids don’t pick up.

He’s a pig I think that’ll stand out more than a red shirt