Ballard Street by Jerry Van Amerongen for July 23, 2012

I have to confess I don’t get this one.

What a wonderful image to go to sleep to. Thank goodness my new mushroom house is electric!

Wow…. a long tiring couple of days…. just got off the bus on Ballard St., stumbling towards the salon with my stuff…and now I have to worry that my neighbor Harold has ceased to be?That he’s bereft of life??No, No! I’m sure he’s just pining for the fjords.

Anyway, the gas leak apparently isn’t in the toaster; it’s behind the toaster….

Just a tiny hole in the wall, where Harold perhaps had driven a tiny nail…. so he could hang his…um…whatever one might hang on a tiny nail 3 feet above the floor…In so doing, he punctured one of the old gas linesthat used to feed the gas lamps on the wall…long capped at their extremities, they were never disconnected at the source…Day after day, hour after hour, the teensy tiniest hiss of natural gas escapes…the vapor drifting past Harold’s scent-impaired nostrils(a long-ago war accident caused him to be unable to smell anything but bacon and coffee.)Today, finally, he was overcome.But Harriet can still save him.If she wants to.Her expression, and her long, inactive pause remind me of Jack Benny in that old sketch….you know….“I’m thinking.

Meanwhile…. my Mom gave me a Toni or two in my preschool days…horrible!

And HER teenage sister took her along when she got one of those electric perms, about 1925…Mom was about 10 …she remembered a tall, scary machine with clamps wired to a central pole…When the clamps were removed, her sister’s hair went with them, in burnt clumps.The “beauty operator” said she would turn down the power and give my mom one for free, so they wouldn’t tell their mother.Like she wouldn’t notice!!!Mom said she cried and argued but they made her do it…it felt hot, and she cried the whole time, but she loved her new waves when it was finished..till her mother spanked them both. And I, too, slept on pink foam rollers as a high school senior…

Then about 10 years ago, I had a young client who wanted a “retro” 1960’s updo for her senior prom.

I told her how lucky she was, that I could do the curls in a few minutes with an iron instead of putting her under the dryer in rollers….

And I became, in my mind, the oldest person on Earth, when she said…in total innocence…“What’s a roller?”

That’s what the aliens in the tiny yellow spaceship claimed.

Stel…. I meant to get back in time to tell you what great pictures you posted…. So this is late…. but I loved them.Monkey, Redkaycei….You guys still rockin?Is Bev still there? Or is the Tiki still open?I know it’s the wee hours but I’m still wound up….just lookin’ for a place to land for a while, if anybody’s up….

On the toaster’s side of the table, behind Harold, there’s a huge gas leak.

Harriet: So I guess you don’t want cream with your DTWFNC this morning. So when are you going to fix that leaky toaster?

pcolli, I was thinking that it may be Harold that has the gas leak….I mean, she is looking at his butt in disbelief….

Thank God they both gave up smoking, last year !

Good Morning, all !

who farted?

Her hair isn’t blue and white!With Harold passed out from the gas, he didn’t have a chance to get Maude-lin.

Hey Suzy…!!!!Misssed ya this weekend… we wuz jammin’ at the Tiki bar an all points in between….

an ahm over doo fer mah foots rub…. ahl check in with ya later okey.????

How Martha Stewart got her start…..scary thought huh…?

First, Harold started with this pitiful snivel, then a series of stuttering sounds, then hand convulsions over his head, followed a convenient collapse on the kitchen table where his head landed comfortably on his arm……Shirley has seen it all before. If only his problems were as big as his antics. There’s no gas leak, that’s Rusty Boy breaking wind….

Hello everyone. I am a Ballard Street fan for a long time now. I am also a “comments” fan as well. It has taken me a very long time to read every strip and the comments that make this place wonderful. Thank you all for making my days happy. It is wonderful to finally find a place where my sense of humor fits in. I understand B.S. and that scares me more than a little. I hope there is room for one more here and I may not comment every day (or I may- I never know with me) but I will for sure be reading along and laughing loudly. At least until they make me stop.

Well, Maude looks unaffected by this “tiny gas leak”, yet Harold is out cold…with a smile on his face, at least. Even Rupert is flat out…

Rhonda, on the other hand, is hangin’ in there.

Maude seem clueless. Are her rollers too tight??

Edna is SHURE it couldn’t have been a gas leak, since that nice young man Claudio from the gas company said everything was FINE…!!!!!

Hullo, Hullo all — and welcome, Storm…

We welcome all fresh mea …. er… newcomers on Ballard St…

Yes, there are lovely houses for sale around here … But as for me, I don’t make enough at my little hair salon to buy anything impressive, and right now, I have 37 tomato plants already planted in California…so I do take the bus every day…

(The number 67 runs the whole length of Ballard St, if you need a bus.

)

Just look for the signs:

(It’s a bit more complicated on Sundays.)

Bev — OMG…. who needs speakers….those are some good looking… margaritas all right….whew…a whole box of….what was that stuff?and a kitten…..I…um… agree with Stel that we need to check out a few more…. recipes before we decide on one…Whether or not the viewing would make a good welcome party for Storm depends on whether s/he is of the female persuasion…. cos I think it’s a girl thing.Storm…. would you care to say?

And as for the view from the bus…. I usually take it at very odd hours….but I will say it does run past … just about every inch of Ballard Street, so sooner or later…..you know.

And…um…say, Monkey….. what are you up to right now?I think this might be a good time for a foot massage, don’t you?

Stelbel —

in re: DTWFNC…..I think X is talking about Doctor Toons WF (something or other) Nuclear Coffee…. which they drink down at the circus, I believe.

I never hang out with those circus types, but x_Tech gets around…. I hear…..

And my maternal grandmother was born around 1870 — so her mother may have been born around the same time as your great grand — and I thought MY family had long generations!

Grandma had 9 children, 8 who lived into adulthood, and either 4 or 5 husbands depending on which story you believe(mostly not at the same time, AFAIK.)

My mother was 2nd youngest, and the youngest was born in 1919, when Grandma was 49!

Hard to believe this was used only one generation before me:

Monkey and Red — woulda come by had I found out soon enough…

Say…. Monkey…. do you have a fireman’s uniform?

if he died, he seems to have done so happy. i think he is smiling.i wonder what kind of gas it is.

X — see, I get around too

I still think all these comments should be turned into a graphic novel.

If you want to see the space station and don’t be afraid to get real close to it:

https://cleoandcompany.net/july-22-2022/

Good morning Balladeers, (((((Plods))))) and Miss Susan.

Poor Cleo…

https://cleoandcompany.net/july-23-2022/

Tigressy, I got my days mixed up! I left you a message on tomorrow’s strip. :-D. :-D :-D I’m just going to leave it there! Have a good day!

OH YEAH, and Good morning Balladeers, *(((((Plods))))) and Miss Susan!