Peanuts by Charles Schulz for April 17, 2011

Hey, I seem to remember this one from a Peanuts comic book once!

Now what is that blockhead Charlie Brown going to do with all that gum? Also, I’m sure Lucy van Pelt isn’t going to trade that Joe Shlabotnik card.

That’s correct. Charlie Brown tries to trade basically all of the name players of the era, and Lucy refuses, thinking he’s kind of cute. She finally decides he’s not as cute as she thought he was, and throws it in the trash. That’s without looking it up.

Yes. I remember this pretty well. Even as a kid, I saw through Lucy’s ploy. I didn’t believe she thought he was cute. Anything to get one over her brother or CB. By this time, I wanted to ring her neck. But I forget why CB couldn’t (wouldn’t) fish the card out of the trash. I s’pose we gotta stay tuned ….

It seems as though I’m always wanting to ring Lucie’s neck, skeeterhawk. Yesterday was certainly no different.

That’s usualy the way it is for me in the lottery.

\\//_

best comic strip peanuts forever

Hehe, five bucks worth of gum these days would get you… five packs! …sigh…

Charlie Brown didn’t fish it out of the trash because he never knew that Lucy threw it away, skeeterhawk. After he unsuccessfully tried to trade for the card, he finally gave up and walked away. It wasn’t until after he left that Lucy decided that Joe Shlabotnik wasn’t all that cute and tossed the card into the trash.

Am I the only one who thinks that Charlie Brown is one of the most clinically-depressing characters ever? And in a comic strip, no less?

@SCAATY I recommend you never read Funky Winkerbean.

Well Charlie Brown’s character pretty much defined Charles Schulz. How ironic that he died the same day his last Peanuts strip was printed. I know he had a terminal disease, but did his broken heart hasten his demise? Sorry, didn’t mean to get maudlin here.

Anywho, you can tell this strip is old. Nowadays, bubblegum ball card packs cost a couple of bucks a pop, and you don’t get as many cards or gum!

“OH, GOOD GRIEF!!”

Charles Schulz died on Feb 12, 2000, the Saturday night before the last original Sunday “Peanuts” strip ran, of colon cancer, at the age of 77.

dante.deangelo: Oh, I do read Funky Winkerbean — an excellent strip; I enjoy it. Some of its characters have to cope with deep personal challenges, even tragedies, just as in real life. But also just as in real life, even the most beaten-down of them have moments of affirmation, comfort, and hope.

But Charlie Brown? His life is shown as an endless purgatory of belittlement, disappointment, futility, and general existential angst. The only flicker of light in the gloom is his undaunted, if irrational, persistence in hoping for something better to happen eventually. Of course, it doesn’t.

In real life, a kid like this would show up ten years later at his high school with a black trench coat and an AK-47. Or maybe he would just become a cartoonist.

Charlie Brown is like the person who plays the slot machines for hours at a time, runs out of coins and walks away, then someone else walks up to and starts playing that machine, and “jack pot” – they get lucky after the first try.

I’m not sure if Joe Shlabotnic is a real player, but from the clues we get over the course of the comic, he’s as hopeless as Charlie Brown.

Sent to the minors and getting fired after coaching one game are just a couple of things he did. He even gave Charlie Brown money with his autograph once.

One penny?… ;)

SCATTY_423, I like to look at the glass as being half fool. At their 10th cast reunion Charlie Brown will show up as CEO of WIGITS INTERNATIONAL. Thanks to Lucy and her harassment he develoveted a backbone and a sence of being first in everything. Hey, The Donald, watch out, The Charlie is on a roll.

You could buy a penny’s worth of bubble gum in 1964, but you didn’t get a baseball card with it.

I used to buy baseball cards in the mid to late 1950s. I think they were 5¢ for a pack of 5 cards with a dried out slab of bubble gum.

(No matter how hard I tried, I never got a Joe Shlabotnic card either!)

Has anyone noticed that if you click on the Sunday page to enlarge it that it gets smaller? Is that for people who want to make it harder to see?

It’s a coding error, they try to get it to fit onto the screen in totality instead of expanding

Certainly one of CS’s shining moments showing the futility of want. Lucy’s not the bad guy (gal) here. It’s our desire for the acceptance of our normal lives by the supposed “elite”. If you judge your worth by the reflection of another’s percieved value you will always be left yearning for any sense of peace or inner worth. Paix.

Charlie should have let Lucy go first. BUT… she STILL would have gottenTHAT card. Poor Charlie.

It’s all you, Chuck!

You’re right, Charlie Tuba. It’ an Oldie!

I am an old dude and remember when Peanuts first started. I have watched every Peanuts tv special, every year, for 45 years. It never grows old. Joe Shlabotnik rules!

Wringing Lucy’s neck wouldn’t work. You’d need to drive a stake through her heart.