Arlo and Janis by Jimmy Johnson for May 29, 2016

I hope there wasn’t a hidden camera in that tree!

“The end of the commons by those who want to own everything.”.When everybody owns it, someone soon depletes it..Stlll, Outlaw Arlo is to be commended for not destroying what so many vandals would and have over the centuries.

“Sign, sign, everywhere a signBlockin’ out the scenery, breakin’ my mindDo this, don’t do that, can’t you read the sign?” – Five Man Electrical Band

They hang the man and flog the womanWho steals the goose from off the common,But let the greater felon loose,Who steels the common from the goose.

Memories are mixed blessings that cut both ways….(And that is probably the worst metaphor ever…I apologize.) When I first moved to Kazoo, in the early seventies, once you hit the edge of town, it was nothing but dirt roads and the canopies of huge trees, riding up and down hills……Best cruisin’ ever…Huge road side oaks, pines by the thousands, farm fields, deep woods maples, lakes, rivers, and rivers and lakes….and hilly dirt roads…..Most of the roads are paved now……. and things really don’t look all that different than they did before, but…….Something has been lost….Memory is a mixed blessing…..I’m sure that if I rolled into town today, for the first time, I’d be amazed at how beautiful this area is, for all the same reasons that are listed above… ……But I remember what it was like before….

Varnes… yes, but it’s everywhere that’s scenic, not just there…we all want to move to someplace “unspoiled”…

As long as it has all the creature comforts, of course.I mean… we have to have indoor plumbing, right?And electricity?Paved roads, a store or two…

um… what about TV, internet, cell towers, phone lines…if children arrive, they need schools… we were OK without a hospital, but we become more protective of children…

Before you know it, our corner of paradise has become suburbia, or a city…the new shopping mall is ugly…but wow, the t-shirts and canned beans sure are cheaper at Target…

But we miss “unspoiled.”So we move a bit father out…and start spoiling it, just by our presence.Others will come because we are there..and 20 years later, there’s a WalMart.

I especially love travel reviews, where people complain about the number of tourists on the beach, or in that formerly picturesque little town by the once-empty bay….Hey, travel writers! I know how to reduce that number by one!If everybody did that…. there’d be NO ONE there!!

LOL

BTW… I answered a few people fairly late on yesterday’s forum…in case you want to check back…and there were a couple of interesting posts that came in even later.

So I just want to say to Amethyst, if you see this…I don’t know whether you feel reasonably content with your present situation….but if you don’t…Everything he is, or suffers, he brought it on….everything broken, he broke.I haven’t met you, and I’m not a therapist…but for whatever my opinion is worth…if you want to move on, and leave it behind, you don’t owe him anything… and certainly not nursing or mothering.

Night-Gaunt: I assume that they are on private property, and they should respect the rights of the property owner.

Don’t you have some property that you want to keep to yourself? A house? An apartment? A car? Clothes? Bank account?

Secure property rights is one of the most important tenets upon which the free and independent United States was founded.

Bruce Lee: Immigration cessation is not enough. We must have deportation of illegal aliens.

(O-kay. Let the name calling, ranting, pointing, and spluttering begin.)

Usually a “No trespassing” sign is put up because either someone has misused the area or someone has purchased the land and the situation has changed. Remember, someone is paying taxes on this land. And if people continue to pass thru,after enough time it becomes an easement and you can’t stop people then.

Re: yesterday’s strip – in Greek there are several words for love. Agape is the affection we have for our friends, there’s a word for love between parents and children, another one for love between spouses. There’s no confusion. Does anybody remember the “Mork and Mindy” episode where she says she “loves” a certain dress, and ice cream, and something else, and he gets the dress and starts hugging it?

I think what Janis meant was “Agape”.

Susan, I understood what you meant. As I said, I realized early on that dating somebody who wanted to know why you didn’t answer the phone, where you where, who you were with, etc. and then sulked, was a prelude to a hellish marriage. No thanks.

Well, if it’s someone’s private property, they should respect that! If their backyard was a nice view for a stranger, would they be willing to let that stranger lay a blanket down and sit in their backyard? Hmmmm….

I grew up on an island, SE GA coast, in the 40’s and 50’s. Moved back to GA to retire, one county N. from my island. The island is now crowded, small cottages and homes torn down, including my former home, huge monstrosities built in place. We built on a salt river 1 hour N. of the island. Our county has no movie, 1 major grocery store, 1 small variety store, not counting Dollar General, and not even one 3 way stop light, 11,000 people. We have to travel 25 miles to anything! We love it.

Lots of pithy comments about property rights, etc., but could somebody please explain the last panel. Magnificent at what? They appear to have been too disgruntled at the sign to have been in the mood to make love. He didn’t rip the sign down in an act of defiance. He didn’t do anything except sit there and glower. WTF?

Jski14. Janis just said Arlo was magnificent,he was her scenery.

And I suspect it was especially hot for Janis because of the No Trespassing sign. There’s a natural harridan under that tight-a** exterior, and it keeps Arlo coming back for more.

Might also be the result of a week of stimulating Vince fantasies.

When we moved where we live now, it was on the far edge of a small town outside, by a stretch, of a little city. Now it’s all one huge mess. :-b

That’s the way it goes.

That’s also what happens to lovers when they get older.

Sending this to my lady friend will most certainly conjure up possibly the romp of the summer! Thank you kindly

One picky little detail. At least up to the panel where they are reading the sign close up – either they are not trespassing, or the sign is placed incorrectly. Normally you put the sign on a fence, facing out. In lieu of a fence, you can put the signs on trees, rocks etc, but always facing out. So if you are staring at & reading the sign, even inches away, you are not trespassing. but if you go past the sign, you are trespassing. The next three panels are a bit more ambiguous, but based on the final panel, it would appear that they did not trespass.To ut it another way – in that final panel it would appear clear that they are not trespassing.

In NH there is a bizarre (to me) law that all land is common even when owned by a person and anyone can go anywhere on it and do anything legal unless the land is properly posted. We have 10 acres (about 1/2 acre usable for a “yard”) of protected wetlands. It’s impossible to post it all because it would cost us 5k to have someone tell us where the lines are. So we post along the main road and that’s all we can do. It’s ridiculous that I would have to take my disabled self through something like 2200 ft of property lines in the woods to post signs to keep people from hunting on the land I paid for and paid taxes on.

You’ve never heard of the Tragedy of the Commons?.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

NG49:

You didn’t answer my questions.

NG49: I should still mention, though, that private property is private property. Period.

As for who/what owns huge swaths of land, check out the federal government.

NG49: And I fail to see the logic in your comment of “…over the top examples.” Asking if you have private property is over the top?

Well she wouldn’t snuggle with him cause she was thinking about Vince And Arlo sensing somethings not right, so with out question ask her if she’s ready to go..

Keep on keepin’ on ….gosh, thank you.You are too kind.

jarvisloopSo that is why the Declaration of Independence changed Locke’s “life, liberty, and security of property” to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”. In the few years between documents, “property” had changed to mean real estate, and “happiness” in a political context meant a government that would guarantee the rights of the individual.

“…..And on the other side, it didn’t say nothin’….that side was made for you and me….” Woody Guthrie ;)

@DavidHuieGreen“Seems to me the single corporate owners do plenty of depleting.”.Corporations tend to not be single entities even though they are legal persons..They are composites with many owners (shareholders) and a charter or articles of corporation calling for them to maximize profitability..Further, they have many employees whose rewards depend on profits along with other employees who don’t pay attention..Again, you have ownership by a group not focused on preservation but production and rewards. .“If people work together they will preserve it as long as they can.”.IF people work together they will preserve it as long as they can. .And if they don’t, they won’t.Even then they would have to work together to preserve, most unlikely..Based on past practices, most unlikely “if”

“…If you truly want to “keep these areas unspoiled”, you MUST stop immigration.”.That’s why 30 years ago (more or less), there was an active “Californians go home” campaign in Washington state..But it’s not just immigration. Population, and thus population pressure, is increasing even without immigration. Draw your own conclusions.