Friday, November 20, 2009

Never put anything smaller than your elbow in your ear!

Today’s new-run of For Better or For Worse is one of the most insidious kind, because after viewing it, people may actually get the idea to try what Michael does to Lizzie and stick Strawberry Jam in their toddler's ears to try and get their dog to lick them. My wife used to work as an audiologist and the phrase I heard from her over and over is “Never put anything smaller than your elbow in your ear!”

Years ago, when I was a young lad, I was playing a game with a friend where I hid a piece of paper on my person and he had to guess where it was. I rolled up the paper and stuck it in my ear. Success! My friend had no idea where it was; but then I discovered I couldn’t get it out. My father tried to remove with a pair of tweezers and I passed out from the pain. The next day, the doctor took it out with a pair of very long, very thing, tweezer-like implements. No problem, but I still remember passing out.

Don’t put stuff in your ears, and especially don’t put stuff in your one-year-old sister’s ears. I don’t care how cute Lynn Johnston makes it.

NOTE: I will be on a Boy Scout over night trip tonight, so if there are any entries tomorrow, they will be late.

7 Comments:

Blogger DreadedCandiru2 said...

The sad thing, of course, ia that Lynn doesn't care that people shouldn't stick foreign objects in their or other people's ears; this is the woman that had Iris, the Confused Oracle indulgently chuckle in a retcon about the misguided people who made a big fuss on TV because some child fractured her pelvis rollerblading. She either thinks people are too risk-averse or doesn't want to step up and admit that her strip can influence people to do stupid things.

10:13 PM  
Blogger Clio said...

"Don't put anything smaller than your elbow in your ear."

I remember public service announcements to that effect when I was a kid.

Why would Mike get Farley to lick Lizzie and think this is uproariously funny? No sense this strip makes.

My verification word is "dense". :D

12:59 AM  
Blogger howard said...

DreadedCandiru2,

She either thinks people are too risk-averse or doesn't want to step up and admit that her strip can influence people to do stupid things.

Today was one of those days where I was thinking, “Thank goodness Lynn doesn’t have any young fans.” I wonder where she got this idea in the first place. I have never heard of anyone putting food in their ears to attract a dog.

4:51 AM  
Blogger howard said...

Clio,

Why would Mike get Farley to lick Lizzie and think this is uproariously funny? No sense this strip makes.

I did send in a Coffee Talk comment after the umpteenth “abuse Farley” strip complaining to Lynn that her audience would rather see the kids playing with Farley than Elly abusing Farley, and pointed out that there had only been 2 strips showing such a thing in the last year. Maybe she took this to heart and tried to come up with something.

4:52 AM  
Blogger April Patterson said...

I had read the strip as Michael dabbing some jam behind each ear, like perfume. Still bizarre and unlike any behavior I'd expect from a real-life, human six-year-old, but not as bad as putting that in her ears. But looking at it again, I see that Lynn drew panel three so that it's not entirely clear exactly where the jam is going. It's not good that she drew it in a way that can be read as putting jam in a sibling's ears. ::shudder::

5:11 AM  
Blogger howard said...

aprilp_katje,

I had read the strip as Michael dabbing some jam behind each ear, like perfume.

Looking at Michael’s right hand, I could come to that conclusion. However, Michael’s left hand index finger is pointed as if it is going in Lizzie’s ear. The biggest clue about the jam’s final location is the use of the index fingers and the way Michael puts the jam covering almost the whole finger, which implies depth, as if Michael was doing a wet willy. Even with perfume, you don’t cover the finger, you do a fingertip. If I wanted to smear jam behind an ear, I would put the jam on my fingertips and the fingertips of more than one finger of each hand for maximum behind-the-ear coverage.

5:48 AM  
Blogger April Patterson said...

I sent in a message to Coffee Talk asking Lynn whether the jam is going in or behind. I still think it's ambiguous, which is a function of poor drawing.

6:12 AM  

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