Frazz by Jef Mallett for February 04, 2019

I don’t think that Dickens used any animal names (or nicknames) in his writings except for those animals found in England.

I thought she knew to add “about this subject” because Caulfield.

There aren’t any groundhogs in Britain.

cartoonists hate Saturday holidays

What the Dickens is he talking about?

Exactly!

One of the few Caulfield challenge questions where he does not seem to ask from pre-knowledge.

I’m sure she calls him a little dickens.

Isn’t “whistlepig” two words, “whistle pig”? Not that that reduces its charm… (speaking as someone who was born on Feb. 2, so I should know, right?)

When I lived in Oklahoma “Whistle Pig” referred to prairie dogs.

Dickens would have used it if he had heard it, Dr Whistlepig could easily have been a character of some humour.

I could see a Dickens character named Jonas Whistlepig as the owner of a rather seedy butcher shop.

Google has absolutely nothing but a brand of rye whiskey when I look for “whistlepig,” for at least the first four pages of hits. And yet googling “whistle pig animal” does indeed come up with a groundhog. I wonder how much that distillery pays Google for that.

Groundhog=ground squirrel=woodchuck=marmot (Marmota monax)

There were a couple of women watching some marmots when I happened by, and one of them asked how to whistle them. They’d heard that these furry ground-dwellers were called “whistle pigs,” so …how does one “whistle” them. I gently explained..

Frazz15 hrs ·

I realize it’s not a binary choice. But if it were, I’d rather have all the questions than have all the answers. And I’d rather be named “Jef” than “Whistlepig.” Though I’d be just fine with “The Dude.” And don’t tell me “The Dude” is not the very essence of a modern Dickensian name (though I’ll need a degree or two in comparative literature to know just how Dickensian a story The Big Lebowski is).

Am I alone in thinking ‘The Big Lebowski’ was only mildly entertaining? (And that the real star, if there was one, was John Goodman?)