Frazz by Jef Mallett follows the adventures of an unexpected role model: an elementary-school janitor who's also a Renaissance man. While he's sweeping the hall, he's whistling Beethoven. Or Lyle Lovett. He paints the woodwork in the classrooms; he paints a Da Vinci on the cafeteria wall. He's a trusted authority figure who is every kid's buddy. He took the janitor's job while he was a struggling songwriter, and when he finally sold a hit song, he decided to stay on at school. Frazz appears in 200 newspapers worldwide, including the Los Angeles Times, Seattle Times, Chicago Tribune and Detroit News. "A few years back, I wrote and illustrated a children's book," says Mallett. "When I was traveling around reading it at school assemblies, I noticed that often, the most respected, best-liked grown-up in the building was the janitor. And I thought, 'Hmm, there's a comic strip in that.'" Often praised for its intelligent wit, gentle spirit and effortless diversity, Frazz won a Wilbur Award from the Religion Communicators Council in 2003 and 2005 for excellence in communicating values and ethics.
© Jef Mallett - All Rights Reserved.
Frank & Ernest by Thaves
Fred Basset by Alex Graham
Comments (32) (Please sign in to comment)
simpsonfan2 said, 3 months ago
In Los Angeles, we never had snow days. But did play games and such if it rained. The Seven Up game is the only one I remember.
AshburnStadium said, 3 months ago
We had a mid-winter break when I was a kid in the 1970s. It was called Christmas vacation. We also had a spring break called Easter vacation.
KenTheCoffinDweller said, 3 months ago
And way back in the 50’s and 60’s we not only had both of those, but there was no bad mouthing and protests about what those breaks were called. The only hassles were that all the local districts didn’t use the same schedules for the breaks. Just like summer vacation was shifted by a week or two amoung the districts.
Nabuquduriuzhur said, 3 months ago
Only time I can think of that Oregon Tech closed was the year before I went there. There was 2+ feet of snow, black ice on the highway to where 97 was closed. They still were going to have classes, though. The kids in the dorm rolled enormous snowballs in front of the doors of the admin building. Closed school…
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As far as I know, the year after I graduated, they didn’t close when 96 inches of snow was dumped in the first three weeks of January.
Ryan (probably the older Ryan) said, 3 months ago
I don’t think we ever had our schools closed because of snow here in Edmonton.
smoore47 said, 3 months ago
Growing up in Connecticut we had a Winter break, usually around the first or second week of March, and a Spring break, usually around the first or second week of May.
Notsoastute said, 3 months ago
Here we have hurricane days.
kingstonave said, 3 months ago
Give me a break…
insipient1 said, 3 months ago
When I was in elementery school over a half century ago in NC, we didn’t have many snow days. However we did have recess and a class in cursive, which appears now to be things of the past. Excuse me now, while I take my pills and meditate on the relevancy of this comment.
sonorhC said, 3 months ago
That was one of the benefits of going to a Benedictine Catholic school: We could pray to St. Scholastica. Yes, there really is a patron saint of snow days, and no, I’m not making that up.
rshive said, 3 months ago
Well, almost by definition you can’t travel anywhere on a snow day.
South2North said, 3 months ago
One cartoon I remember from “those days” was of a school boy peering out of the window of a Latin Grammar School and seeing a bus stuck in the snow: “Sick Transit, Glorious Monday”
South2North said, 3 months ago
@insipient1
My father was Superintendent of Schools in our small NC town and as soon as the first snowflake fell, he would get phone calls as to whether school would be cancelled. But to be honest, it was a real concern; most snow fell at around 32 degrees (F) and produced ICE. Northerners use to complain the we Southerners didn’t know how to drive in snow – but nobody can drive in ice! People prove that every winter.
neatslob said, 3 months ago
In Rochester NY if the plows could get through the roads, we had school.
lightenup
said, 3 months ago
Very true! When I was in high school, I totally lucked out with 2 snow days when we were supposed to have mid-terms. (Of course, I didn’t study much during those days, but it was still awesome!)