Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for January 23, 2021

Don’t you have to get nominated for something before you prepare a thank you speech?

No reason to wait until the last minute or decade in JJ’s case.

She’ll be home soon, her credit cards are almost maxed out!!!

Even in the pre-Google™ days of 1995 it wouldn’t have been that hard to find a person who wasn’t trying to remain out-of-sight. (But her concern for her mother makes it a completely reasonable worry.)

Does she take him to the cleaners in the divorce? A week ago, he would have gotten away scott free; no money, no job, no child support and the fact that she abandoned them. With him now having a good job, I could see a lawyer making the case for a long drawn out divorce

I learned long ago, “Living well is the best revenge.” The trick is to know what “living well” means to me and recognizing it when I’m there.

As has been noted before, Zeke’s hair and hat prevent us from seeing if he’s wide-eyed like a few adults and most children in “Doonesbury,” or more cynically narrow-eyed like most adults and a handful of children. That puts him in the same company as Duke, Honey, Earl, Jeff-as-an-adult, Howie (whom AFAIK we never saw as an adult), Mike’s brother Sal, Clyde, Elmo, the cop-hating son of the woman Ray dated that one time, and others, all of whose eyes are hidden (either by hair, hat, hair & hat, or [sun]glasses). In “Doonesbury,” you can recognize “morally dubious” (or in Elmo’s case being too insane to have clearly defined reality-based moral standards) characters by looking them in the eyes only to discover that you CAN’T. ;-)

So I presume that neither Mike nor Alex remember precisely HOW they got to Seattle, literally across the country from their previous location? That could be awkward when Mike gets the bill from the movers. They could claim that he owes them for damages incurred to their trucks while working for him and he wouldn’t be able to contradict him. See, that’s where weeks of fourth-wall crap can get you. ;-)

She’ll never quite come back to the real world.

If that’s supposed to be Mt. Rainier and this is Seattle, then “Liberty Cap” should be on its left. Unless this scene is in Tacoma.

The Gone Girl.

Michael Frayn’s debut novel, The Tin Men, has a character who is an aspiring novelist. In his writing, he usually starts with the dust-jacket blurb: “This brilliant novel, by the polymath new author, is about….” and then he runs out of steam and ideas.

If a problem voluntarily leaves and you then let voluntarily allow it to return, who’s really at fault.

Mike’s being so protective and diplomatic.