Anjali Mudra,

Sometimes when I run into a problem in my life I ask myself, “What would I do if I was an autonomous robot?”

For example, when my wife thinks I’m spending too much time playing sports, I get to thinking. “How would an autonomous robot respond to that?”  Well, it would think, “Cool, I’m married.  I’m totally fitting in.  All the other autonomous robots are so jealous right now.”  Based on this I am able to realize that I’m lucky to be married at all.  What to do about the sports then.  Hmmm.  Tone them back a little to make the wife happy I suppose.  Ok, problem solved.

Another example, sometimes I have to figure out how to answer questions like, “Which one of these jeans do I look better in?”  Autonomous robot me, what say you?  “I’m still married?  This is awesome.  I’ll never let my autonomous robot friends hear the end of this.”  From this I deduce nothing.  I get tired of listening to that kind of thing after a while.  As far as the jeans go, I do my best but sometimes both pairs of jeans are really really incredibly similar to each other so I say “That is an invalid question me dear” and quickly leave the room.

Regards are for girls,

Ben

Howdy readers,

My wife is sleeping on the couch right now.  She seems quite serene.  She has no idea what I’m about to do and neither do you.  It may involve a small spray bottle.

Well, I better get to it.  No point in dilly-dallying.

She looks so peaceful.  I’m starting to have second thoughts.  Maybe I’ll just kiss her on the cheek, take her upstairs, tuck her into bed, start the dishwasher and then join her for a good night’s sleep.

…a light misting could be pretty entertaining.  She might not take too kindly to that.  In fact she might wake up a bit cranky, a bit testy one might say.  I can handle it though.  I know I can win her back in five to ten minutes.  I’ll have to get her to laugh somehow about something else.  I’ll bide my time and then strike with just the right comment at just the right time with just the right tone and expression. She’ll do a snort laugh and thaw right up.  What comment will I use you ask.  I never know.  It will hopefully come to me on the fly.

Hmmm.  These things don’t always go as planned…aanh, whatever.

Ok.  Its showtime.  Putting the computer down    …quietly…     bye

I’m back. I chickened out.  That’s not like me though.  I mean, really, it’s not too late yet.  She is still sleeping.  I’m just typing on the floor now.  Why am I writing this.  I should just go ahead with the plan, right?  Ok then.  It’s back on.  Go time.  Sorry for bothering you…

Dear citizens of your various countries,

So, I’m watching day 12 of the olympics the other day (yesterday) when I start thinking to myself, it may have been a mistake to record every single Olympic broadcast on CTV (Canada) and NBC (US).  I’m a little behind.  Canada has 11 medals so far! Yay!  I wonder how many medals we’ll finish with.  I was watching hours a day during the olympics.  The moment the closing ceremonies ended (I haven’t watched them yet) my interest in the entire show was cut in sevenths.  Its been a slow go.  I shall persevere.

I’ve thought of a solution to the drug problem in olympic sports.  I’ll admit ahead of time that it isn’t a very good solution but I think it would  have some interesting results.  At the next olympics, right before the closing ceremonies, redefine winning a medal with an automatic positive drug test result.  Gold/Silver/Bronze goes to the worst three finishers in the finals of each event in reverse order.  Crazy right?  No.  Remember watching the sprint races?  Remember watching the clump of racers at the front floating airily across the finish line in the photo finish?  Remember thinking they’re probably on drugs? (It can’t have only been my wife yelling that at the tv every time.)  Remember seeing the stragglers, wondering where the pack of dogs was that must have been chasing them to make them run so crazy, and thinking, “Well, at least that guy (or girl) isn’t on drugs.  He (or she) should get the gold medal.”  They don’t tell anybody if you are going to do the same thing or not at the next olympics.  Those olympics are the ones I want to see.

Next Olympics: In the final of the 100m dash half the field finishes in just under 10s while the other half get disqualified for competing for the most realistic looking last place finish.  They don’t fool anybody due to the airy way in which they slowly float across the finish.

Comic News Update: I’m guessing that most of you have quit reading by this point.  Some of you may have worried lately that this comic is slowly dying out.  Its not.  I’m ramping up production here again.  I’ve had a number of other things on the go lately (like watching the olympics).  The comic backlog is in good shape though.  The lull is over. Until next time…

Something better than “Regards”,
B