For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for August 07, 2021

Well, John and Elly, the word would be true if you watch April better and put childproof locks on the seat and lid.

You are right, I had that same thing with one of my kids.

Hopefully Lynn Johnston will tell her Don Martin’s wife story with this one. Don Martin was Mad Magazine’s king of sound effects. Supposedly, when Lynn did comic strips like the one today, she got letters with complaints from Don Martin’s wife that she was stealing his sound effects.

On a different note, John is going to a floor drain to unclog his toilet. I do not have one of these in my bathroom. It’s just toilet and plain floor. Are floor drains common in Canadian plumbing?

bummer, John

No gloves, John?!!! Gross!!

This would have been a good time to pay a plumber.

Next, he is going to stick that disgusting hand into some patient’s mouth.

Or you have to have your daughter better supervised!

Keep a closer eye on your toddler John. You know toddlers think the world’s their playground!

Worst of these I ever saw: My niece flushed the head of a pinwheel down my Sister-In-Law’s toilet. About a week later, the toilet refused to flush at all. The pinwheel had made it about 10 feet before it got lodged in the drain. After that, liquid could pass but solid material could not. This created a 10 foot long section of sewer pipe filled with a “cake.” (I don’t mean birthday cake either.) The good news is, it was a downstairs toilet over an un-finished basement. The bad news is, my Sister-In-Law’s husband had to cut out that section of pipe in order to clear it. Tarps and garbage cans with liners contained most of the mess but there was still a lot of bleach used during post-job cleanup.

John working on the…never mind.

Please note that there are stars… and no violence.

So, in other words (assuming you have or had kids) you always were able to manage to keep your eyes on them 100% of the time.

I was easy as anything for her to flush the toys. Very convenient.

Damn kids.

I would put on long rubber gloves before sticking my hand/arm down a sewer line, especially if I was a dentist.

One day our landlord asked to come into our bathroom. The upstairs neighbors’ tub was massively clogged & they needed to access the pipes. They needed to tear apart the ceiling to get to the pipes for the upstairs tub. Some of the things he found: milk-jug rings, milk-jug caps, and a cap from a shaving cream can. They then gave us a nice, new suspended ceiling and light fixture. I would LOVE to know how the upstairs neighbors managed to fit the saving cream can cap in there!

You think he would be wearing shoes. It looks like he’s in his socks standing in the mess.

Lynn’s Comments:

When I did workshops, I’d ask the class to come up with the written sounds for things like lawn mowers, snoring or the flushing of a toilet. Sometimes the sound effects alone were the best part of a strip.

I guess there is a drain beside the toilet?

“Convenience” — yet another euphemism.

had to do that once myself, was not happy then but look back at it now and laugh and also get to remind my adult son of that fond memory and hope he gets to experience it

I think the sound effects in panel 3 are quite effective!

Brings so many memories

These comments just show that some people think that COMIC STRIPS are real

I’m impressed that John has the skills to make calling a plumber unnecessary.

Maybe if you paid more attention to what your toddler is up to, it would seem more convenient to you.

John seems to be wearing white socks….in a wet floor bathroom. Seems kind of dumb.

Here’s an idea. How about we teach the kid(s) what is right and what is wrong!and enforce it with something other than a Time Out.

Been there, done that. One thing – plungers are not all that useful in toilets, they don’t make much of an airtight seal. I always found a good thick string mop did the job better.

John’s a dentist; he’s used to extractions!

What is John doing in p.3? Is that a sewer cleanout in the bathroom floor? If so then is that a Canada thing or just an artistic convenience?

On a cruise some Moron flushed a “Baby Pamper”down their cabin’s commode;disabling several other cabins toilet facilities out of commission for an hour..Smh

Kids do the “darndest” things!

This actually happened to me back in the day – well, a friend, really. I went over to his house to help him de-clog his toilet he had to fix due to the toys his son flushed down. We had to take the toilet out to the front yard and flush it out with the garden hose.

Or ever accidentally flushed a sample size bottle of shampoo…

I remember a long time ago, in the before time, when relatives where visiting the vacation home before we remodelled/renovated and one little nephew tried to see if he could flush a whole roll of toilet paper in one go. The paper would not have been so much of a problem if not for the load of processed breakfast he had just deposited. I cleared the clog but made his parents clean up the mess on the floor, walls and rest of that bathroom. And he was so proud that he was able to wipe his own bottom by himself that I almost forgot to slip him some Ex-Lax in his hotcakes for his breakfast before riding in that rental car back to the airport on their trip home. You would think that a 6 year old would know better. I made one of his parents chaperone any trips he took to the loo on all subsequent visits.

Hope he had a long rubber glove on.

This is just too funny!!!

LOL at all the sound effects, and his facial expressions…

: – )))

But for novices: do not do what John is doing. It’s all for a comedic effect…

Unless, the toilet is in the basement, John is making a flood which will create a smelly drip either to the first floor or to the basement!!!

Before starting he should have turned off the main valve, and drain the toilet bowl to a bucket, then he would have had a dry area and he wouldn’t be ankle deep in water and in real life, rarely does the plumber remove the toilet from its drain pipe to get at the obstruction…

In the words of Roseanne, “this is why some animals eat their young”.

I love the sound words. So accurate! I can hear them in my head.

If there were a childproof lock on the toilet the artist would just draw April undoing it.

Does not always work that way. Kids will be kids and even older “kids” can plug up a toilet. This really made me laugh

I remember years ago, standing behind a woman at Radio Shack,who trying her darnedest, to find out if there was any hope for her cordless phone that had gotten wet, without admitting she had dropped it into the “commode”.

When will Michael start his toilet training?

removing the whole toilet! Good Job John. I hope you replaced the wax rings.

My parents didn’t need locks…we knew better than to put anything down the toilet and neither my brother nor I ever did it.

Baby Boomers didn’t live in fear, they paved the way. hint. Do you see any cell phones.