Mike Just Isn’t That Stupid

Today in For Better or For Worse was a little tricky. I know the common perception is that Mike is afraid to leave the home of his mother to try home ownership, but the monthly letters made it appear that Mike’s resistance was based purely off his ignorance of mathematics. For the purposes of the FOOBiverse’s Journal, I went the through the math of it, and Deanna is right that they can afford to get a loan for $400,000 based on her salary alone. The big issue is going to be the down payment. In the monthly letters, Deanna seems to be counting on her parents forking over $20K because they did that for her sister when she bought her house. This is a key element because typically 10% down is required for family residence home loans. For a $400K house, that works out to $40K. Strip Deanna may be thinking $20K in savings and $25K in advance will cover it, but letters Deanna seems to realize that Mike hasn’t paid taxes on that $25K, so it won’t be enough to cover it after the tax bill. Ergo, letters Deanna’s parents are making up the difference. From my perspective as Mike then, and because the strip only mentions savings and advance, I decided that Mike was going to be unaware of Deanna’s parents’ monetary giftings for home purchase, because Mike has been adamant in the past to not accept money from the Sobinskis. The idea that the senior editor of Portrait Magazine, who would have to be aware of the money numbers generated by the magazine, would be unable to figure out if they had enough for a home mortgage, is stupid. I decided to use Mike as a voice of reason, because it is my belief, that Mike’s voice will end up being a voice of reason in this sequence. Elly and John are moving into the Stibbs’ place. It’s John’s dream home because of the lot size, and with only 2 bedrooms, it would be a very poor choice for Deanna and Mike.

susannamoodie informed me that her Zenia was the same Zenia as is in the Margaret Atwood novel, “The Robber Bride”. I must confess I have never read that book, so I wasn’t sure what to do with the information. I opted to create a situation which would adapt a scene I read about in the book where the 3 wronged women confront Zenia, and then let susannamoodie and the_berserker do what they want with it. I also brought back the concept that Eva is actually a member of a superhero family, by having her research succubae with her dad. The only super heroine succubus I could find was Satana, and she really had her start as a villainess and her turn as a heroine has been very recent.

Tomorrow’s strip: The reason why you don’t see John Patterson ever mention in the monthly letters the amount he and Elly are contributing to Mike and Deanna’s mortgage, is because ultimately, they will not contribute. Either John will be so angry about Deanna’s suggestion to sever away his train space he will renege on his offer, or they will be too busy with the details of selling their own place to Mike and Deanna and buying the Stibbs’ place to think about such things. When you get right down to it, John is living in a dream world if he thinks Deanna will let him put up 3 lots worth of train equipment in her yard, where the kids would playing.