Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for August 30, 2015

You know what else genetics is responsible for?Baldness.Damn you, gene pool!

He should have been neighbor Jim. You can’t Fixx your genes.

The new credo: “No pain, you’re sane.”

Ack! Where can I get some Genetic Insurance quick?

The genetic deck is stacked against me. My parents, at least one grandparent, all of my siblings, and a significant fraction of aunts uncles and cousins related by blood all have been diagnosed with diabetes and the commonest cause of death so far has been heart disease. This includes those who have eaten properly and exercised regularly and neither smoked nor drank. In my immediate nuclear family, only I have escaped both diagnoses. I only started seriously trying to lose weight this past March. According to the body mass index I’ve slipped out of the “obese” category into the merely “overweight” designation… by losing 16% of my starting weight of 237 pounds. I’m still losing. And, you know, I still find today’s strip FUNNY!

If ‘living’ is the same as ‘endure’, I would prefer one song from The Beatles than a full album of Justin Bieber.

Not overweight, huh? From what I can see there you sure look like Stephan with a dinner counter hiding most of your gut for a guy who claims to not be overweight.

Probably a reference to what happened to the famous runner, Jim Fixx.

no…..death is funny that way….ha ha ha ha…

Sooner or later, we’re all dealt that royal flush.

My doctor hates me when he reaches the lifestyle questions. I don’t smoke, I don’t drink, I don’t do drugs. I’d love to be healthier, but I’ve got nothing to give up!

And so it goes. The only real surprise here it that it was Neighbor Bill rather than Neighbor Bob.Kismet.

We’ve all heard of folks who did all the wrong things yet lived to a ripe old age, but do you want to take that chance?My mom lived till 97 and I’ve made it to 82 so I guess the genes are good but I still do all the healthy stuff. I will admit to alcohol however. Red wine in the winter and gin&tonics all summer. Cheers!

Into Death’s doorway we all must pass.Enjoy today should it be your last.

♫♪………“Sonny, move out to the country.”Workin’ too hard can give youA heart attackackackackackackYou oughta know by now..Neighbor Bill was a cool Cat.Ack!

All you health nuts are going to feel rather silly dying of nothing.

Why is it that everyone that ever dies in a comic strip says, “AACK”. Bill the Cat didn’t have nine lives, he had thousands!

Why is it that everyone that ever dies in a comic strip says, “AACK”. Bill the Cat didn’t have nine lives, he had thousands!

I’ve seen this happen so many times during my 50 years of life, to so many people who lived a healthy lifestyle, that I’ve stopped worrying too much about it. The idea that you can delay when you die has some truth, maybe, but is mostly an illusion. I eat what I want and drink all I want. I may die a little sooner, but I’ll have a lot more contentment getting there.

The secret to a long life…..live and love every day like it is your last.A nice song from Open Season.“A good day is every day you are alive.”Enuf said.

Read The Great Cholesterol Myth and you will know why he got the heart attack.

“At my age, it’s a good day when I wake up alive.” — Me….

heart attack. death. hilarious.

If you lived all the infinity of moments you don’t pay attention to, you would seem to live forever.

Loved it! ‘Risk factors’ are just another name for statistical correlations, and statistics are historical data about populations, so in and of themselves they can’t say anything whatever about an individual now and in the future.

Many years ago I worked in a corporate office where the comptroller was one heck of a character. He had a sign on his desk that read,

“Eat well, Stay fit, Die anyway”.

“Perhaps today is a good day to die”- Lt. Worf

….and it’s worse if they’re standing in the background.

shoulda taken a page from Jeff the cyclist.

my motto has always been: no pain, no pain

Like I always say, we don’t come with a warranty when we’re born.

@jimmjonzz, kudoes on the weight loss

@Lassie1 the quote is not from a movie, it is from real life Lakota (Sioux) culture. “Today is a good day to die!” is a quotation widely but inaccurately attributed to leader Crazy Horse before the Battle of the Little Bighorn. The earliest published reference is Judson Elliott Walker, Campaigns of General Custer in the North-west, and the Final Surrender of Sitting Bull (1881), in which the phrase is attributed to Low Dog. It is sometimes claimed to be a translation from the Lakota language, “Hóka-héy!” but it is not. Both phrases are used in context by Black Elk in Black Elk Speaks (1932).’’ Thanks, Wikipedia

As for me, I wsuld rather live reasonably healthy than long. I’ve made it to 62.

Maybe he didn’t eat enough cholesterol.

no one gets out of here alive. it’s the one fact we can rely on

there’s a mark twain passage where he refers to having been ill and going to the doctor who told him to give up drinking alcohol and smoking and eating things that were bad for him. he followed this directive, got better, and joyfully took these habits back up again. then he had a chance to recommend this cure to an aged spinster friend. she’d been going steadily downhill, so he told her to give up these vices and she’d be better in no time. she replied that she’d never done any of those things. well that was it. she was done for. she was a sinking ship with no ballast.

moral:take up bad habits now, they’ll save your life later

Did you notice how fast rat sprang into action to administer CPR?

“Genetics suck”

Something Beavis & Butthead would say.

xxx

Reminds me of a Bloom County cartoon … the punch line was … Here’s to no guarantees (or something like that).

In the words of Shel Silverstein (as channeled by the Old Dogs): you’re Still Gonna Die.

“The best pace is suicide pace and today looks like a good day to die” -Steve Prefontaine

My grandpa was one of four brothers. He and two of his brothers each died at the age of 57. That left Uncle Oscar, the youngest. I remember seeing him. He had just about the biggest bay window (stomach stretching out to here) I ever saw. When he reached 57, he was sweating bullets, fearing his time was up. He lived to be 75.

I’ve always remembered that scene in “Little Big Man.” I loved the movie, Chief Dan George, Dustin… just about everybody and everything in it. But I’ve never been able to hear the song Garryowen the same again… horrors! (My husband and I are both part Cherokee.)

At last … someone I can blame all my problems on: Gene Poole.

The way to make your life seem to last forever is to only do boring stuff (not mine).

Jim Fixx, the guy who basically created the running craze, dropped dead while running. Go figure.

did he die from a heart attack? If so he’s grabbing the weong side of his chest.

I would do a joke about “Jim’ll fix it!” But too soon, too soon.