Working Daze: Sure, right after I finish my vacation.

I've always suspected that Scott Roberts enjoys drawing the female characters in Working Daze just a little too much.

Family Circus:...forgive those who trespass against us. And leave us ninety-two temptations...

This cartoon is hilarious because there's no way the God of the Family Circus universe will tolerate this sort of error. So Jeffy's going straight to Hell.

Mark Trail: Mr. Trail, please, I'll have my brother meet with us tomorrow!

So instead of calling the cops on his belligerent, belittling ass like a normal human being, CEO lady defers to Mr. Trail and invites him out to dinner. Why? Because this is Lost Forest, and in Lost Forest women still act like the meek little things Jack Elrod is convinced they ought to be.

I can only hope that the second panel is an attempt at metaphorical foreshadowing in which Mark is the worm and CEO lady is the mother bird, and this so-called dinner is in fact a nefarious plot to lure Mark out to some remote location, murder him, dismember him, and feed his various parts to coyotes.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith: Nighty-night an' goodnight, an' somethin', somethin', la-la-la...

This comic is hilarious because Snuffy is a bad father.

Mark Trail: If you don't mind, I'll wait!

In the next exciting installment of Mark Trail: Mark gets arrested! And slapped with a restraining order!

Pluggers and One Big Happy: What's an outhouse? What's a couch-potato? What's a mother-in-law?

I really don't understand how a professional cartoonist could possibly have the gall to use a mother-in-law joke. It's the single most hackish joke in existence. So, of course, seeing it in Pluggers is not even remotely surprising.

The One Big Happy strip below is actually a send-up of mother-in-law jokes. So it's okay.

Monty: Mr. Crumpet, I command you...Eviscerate! Eviscerate!

Things that are funny about this cartoon, in order from least funny to most funny:

1. That the dog is scared of the cat.
2. That the dog is a shih tzu named Mr. Crumpet.
3. That the dog's bow is identical to Master Sedgwick's bow tie.
4. Eviscerate! Eviscerate!
5. Disembowel! Disembowel!
6. That the dog drinks kiwi-lemonade.
7. That the dog drank too much kiwi-lemonade.
8. That the dog is actually peeing in the third panel.

In the Bleachers: Uh-oh. They're bringing in the closer to secure the win.

Is there a joke to this cartoon? Or is it just supposed to be funny that the closer is a robot? Which is to say, why would that be funny?

For absurdity to work, it has to flow from some sort of logical starting point. I don't think this does, but it makes me feel like I'm missing something.

Family Circus: I CAN'T act my age if I don't know how my age is s'posed to act.

Despite certain lapses, cartoons such as this, which seem to depict flashes of actual brain functionality, clearly indicate that Billy is by far the smartest of the Keane children. And probably of the Keane clan in general, given that the adults have shown no such flashes.

Pearls Before Swine: I've started studying rocks. This is my collection.

This is a less useful, more gratuitous silent panel. But it doesn't ruin the otherwise well-constructed joke. The punchline is still funny. Which is to say, of all the clichés cartoonists use, the silent panel may be the one that bothers me the least. Your mileage may vary, of course.