Tuesday, July 05, 2005

The Eventual Gander: Doonesb-ehry

So, this post wsas going to be all about Doonesbury, a wonderful strip that for 40 years has striking down the powerful with vicious satire of advertising and performance art (oh the 80's!). It lampooned start-ups and conglomerates, Senators and Shorties. But one thing it's found in its old age (or perhaps that I've been able to appreciate in my newfound 23-ness) is an ability to make us really feel for characters as we also find humor in them. Cf. B.D, a character we've watched grow from a self-centered football star to a Vietnam soldier to a California Highway Patrolman to a College Football Coach to a Gulf War II amputee. Along the way he married a starlet, had a kid, hired a man named Zonker as a nanny, and gave up his fixation with wearing his helmet. Yeah. In the funnies. Perhaps the epitome of this is this strip. Touching, topical, recent, everything. Incorporates the history of the saga of families and friends while also being funny on the surface.

I was going to review it like that, until I saw this article on Martha Stewart and became totally apathetic to real art, craft, story, or people. Instead, I got focused on Ms. Stewart and her felonious ass. Apparently, she is known in the joint as M. Diddy. Also, she's a nice person, really. While she's filming her new soul-killing reality show The Apprentice spin-off, she's going to be nicer than trump. Quoth the matron:"
She says her version of "The Apprentice" will be different than Donald Trump's and that she doesn't want to be portrayed as mean and harsh. She says she would never use Trump's catchphrase, "You're fired."
"We're trying to come up with other ways to say it," she says. "For instance, if someone is from Idaho, I could say, 'You're back in Boise for apple-picking time.' ""

-D"Goin' Back to Cali^wBoise"an