Howard on Pheromones

My mother used to breed Irish setters when I was young. I remember vividly, when we had the in-heat Irish setter mom in our garage, every single dog in our neighbourhood was outside our house, scratching and whining. By neighbourhood, I mean a good square mile. I knew all the dogs owned by the other kids in the neighbourhood, and they were all there. Humans are attracted to each other off of visual cues, the same way as birds. I have often wondered how our society would be if we operated like the dogs do. What would it be like, if when any woman’s body said it was time to mate, the scent would go out, and you would have no choice but to quit whatever you were doing and pursue that woman until someone had impregnated her? With this in mind, I tried to show this perspective from Howard remembering his dog days.

Fiona Brass. Someone suggested Howard have a relationship with Fiona Brass, when I solicited suggestions from 3 weeks ago on this Blog. I cannot think of any person in the Foobiverse less attractive than Fiona. I originally started with the idea of them dating, but then thought an engagement would be funnier. When I think about them kissing, I was reminded of the old movie Harold and Maude, except those actors are more glamourous than Howard and Fiona. Anyway, the ARB posters tried to talk Howard out of it. I had great fun countering each of the arguments with dog-related answers.

Today, Jeremy Jones was mainly a catalyst for the “April tries out as a cheerleader idea.” I enjoyed making up cheers that riffed off the school name of R.P. Boire, where “boire” is French for “to drink.” The masterstroke of this story was adrianne_p’s mention that April is wearing thong underwear. Things took off from there. A lot of good posts by the posters at April’s Real Blog.

Tomorrow’s strip: Why April likes suck-ups.