For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for August 22, 2009

Play gently with daddy. baby.

Michael seems just a tad too happy, doesn’t he?

yeah. it’s always the adults who get hurt playing with the kids. whoever said that “age and experience will destroy youth and skill, always” didn’t have enough experience or age.

Love the look on Michael’s face.

Eh. Although maybe your comment was cryptic enough to be subject to misinterpretation, I doubt that anyone of good will and common sense jumped to the conclusion that you were advocating vehicular homicide of toddlers. Fret not.

Always remember John, you asked for it.

for heaven’s sake, flightsuit, you don’t like the strip, don’t read it! And no, I’m not saying the moderators should have deleted your comment (didn’t see it, so don’t know how bad it was). I just can’t for my life understand why people bother to read and comment on something they dislike.

I’m with hildigunnur here- there are tons of comics out there. FBoFW is one of very very few that ever really make me laugh and usually makes me smile. Tons of people hate it, which is fine. We don’t have to like the same comics, or we’d all just read peanuts and not need comics.com. But I really don’t get forcing yourself to read comics you don’t like. And while I wouldn’t delete a comment stating to a certain comic’s fans that you hate what they like, I don’t see the point of it, either.

Wonder if Ellie taught here that?

Don’t feel bad flightsuit mine was deleted too and I have no idea why. Did I say something that offended someone?

Lizzie’s stronger than she thinks. Look at Michael’s face in the last panel.

John is thinking “Crap! I can’t fix my own teeth! And I don’t want to bleed in front of the children!”

Lizzy is thinking “I did good! Daddy got ball!”

Mike is thinking “HA! HA! Sucks to be you daddy.”

And I’m thinking, that ball looks like you’d use it for duckpin bowling. How heavy are we talking? ;)

Macushlalondra I think your comment was deleted because it didn’t say you were happy WildMustang wasn’t hurt, just the opposite. I’m glad you weren’t wishing anything bad to happen to anyone.

unless “bad words” are used…leave the comments alone…poor taste shows up quick and I refuse to read comments in poor taste or just plain mean. After awhile, the poor taste/mean peoples remarks will never be read. We do catch on quick.

John, never underestemate the power of a woman, even if she means no harm.

Sooner or later, ya play catch with your kids; you find out they’ve got a better arm than you!

so, goaler. do you wear the mask when you play catch with the kids? flightsuit, tell us what you really think. it’s just a comic!

flightsuit: We got it. You don’t like the strip. Now go away and leave it to those of us who do.

Machushla, I know why your post was deleted yesterday.

Your last sentence (I think it was the last one) had a typo (or maybe a double negative in it) that, when you read it, it changed the meaning of your post from wishing Mustang well to wishing Mustang, ummmm….not well.

No biggie. Well all knew what you meant. Except the person who flagged it.

What an arm! Is Lizzie going to grow up to be a pitcher?

This reminds me of a wonderful segment on Tiny Toon Adventures:

One of the Baby Plucky segments with Pkucky Duck in diapers and his dad.

Dad takes Baby Plucky to play miniature golf. Sets down the ball, hands Plucky the putter, steps back.

Says “Hit the ball, son.”

Plucky winds up, hits a screaming line drive that hits a wall, bounces straight back, passes right over his head.

Thud.

Heartfelt moan of pain.

Strained voice: “Congratulations, son. You’re going to be an only child.”

Burgundy2, sometimes the big ones don’t know the little one’s strength either.

Uh… good thing it’s not a jai-alai or cricket ball; those things are about as hard as rocks! That’d REALLY hit John in the face and/or break his glasses.

at least john got hit in the face, my son threw a baseball and hit me a couple feet lower ( cringe )

JanCinVV, we aren’t going to go away.

You want to know why? Because Lynn Johnston is being paid to do this comic. Not only that, she is being paid TWICE. She was paid 30 years ago for the original prints, and she’s being paid again today to reprint them, along with inserting some new material that really doesn’t add much to the old. I have no idea why any newspaper would be willing to pay twice for the same material, especially in this economy and besides, newspapers haven’t been doing well in a long time, not since people can read what they want online for free.

Another reason is that the comics space in newspapers have been shrinking for years, and really, the comic strips that have outlived their creators (in some cases, decades!) and are reprinted over and over again needs to be chucked and some new cartoonists can be given the space. It’s not as if the old comics will fall into a black hole, never to be seen again. They have all been collected into collection books. Go buy those! It’ll be cheaper to, actually.

Ah well, that last reason will pretty much be moot in about 20 or so years when there are no paper newspapers anymore.

I thought Lynn had passed on and that is why the “classic” strips. I’m new here, and I have to wonder if flightsuit has read any of the more recent offerings. They did get much better. But I’ll read these… for better or for worse.

Good thing John’s a dentist. Except, I guess he can’t work on his own mouth.LOL

I agree, LOVE the look on Michael’s face. He knew that one was going to happen. Hope John knows a great dentist, besides himself that is. :D

Thanks for those who explained why my comment from yesterday was deleted. It must’ve been a typo. I do the comics one of the first things in the morning and maybe I hadn’t had my coffee yet. I’d never wish bad for wildmustang, he’s a buddy of mine and one of the few people I followed when we could follow people. Thanks to those who gave me the benefit of the doubt. I wish all of you well even Not Norman who I’ve had words with now and then.

@Fairportfan; I rarely see anything that makes me even smile, and almost NEVER anything that makes me laugh. But the ending of your story about the golf player was completely unexpected (I was expecting the ball to hit his daddy’s head), and I burst out laughing! Thank you so much! You made my day!

From his/her comments I see now that @flightsuit is NOT one of them, but there are people who love to read things they hate so they can enjoy the pleasure of condemning them. The self-righteous type.

Where IS notnorman?