This! This is why! This is why Karen Moy deserves a Pulitzer Prize or something. Instead of being boxed in by established literary conventions and showing us the towel folding demonstration, she uses beautiful descriptive language ("very nice!") to paint a picture, allowing us to visualize the towel folding demonstration ourselves! After eight days of build up, I never expected to be so not disappointed! Maybe next week someone can describe the formal dress up dinner (very nice!).
14 comments:
(You're seeing Toby and MW in Formal Dress today. Like the Towel-Folding, I feel As If I Am There.)
Today's Boldface Haiku is titled "Wistful/Envy".
Towel Folding?
Very nice! Favorite Katie, Derek!
Nice in love!
Young love. Past. Real love!
Aha, the subplot congeals! All was sweetness and light, towel-folding and entertainment until Mary sadistically throws Derek and Katie's young love right in Toby's face. Wounded to her core, Toby's eyes betray a deep marital discontent, and she realizes how much she is dreading her return to the soul-crushing mundaneness (mundanity?) of life with that musty sack of mulch she is married to.
Ten bucks says Toby gets hammered at the formal dinner and hits on some swarthy stud-muffin, waking up the next morning with a blinding headache and hating her life even more.
-- S. McW.
I bet that the Caribbean island that the Bargain Cruise Lines ship is sailing past would be "very nice" to visit. Too bad nobody will get to see it.
The biggest suspense we have is: When does Mary catch Derek lighting up a cigarette? I'm guessing Friday.
I'm glad Mary packed an evening coat to wear over her dress. This is essential cruise wear, especially in the Caribbean.
Meanwhile, in the Hoosier's cabin:
"No Derek, you cannot wear a Joe Camel tank top to dinner! And where did you even get that?! Have you been smoking??"
I guess that should be in the Hoosiers' cabin. D'oh!
Also, it's a bit presumptuous of Mary to name the Hoosiers as "Our Favorite Cruisers". Toby must have met some other cruisers in the gym or line dancing by the pool and surely some of them should be in the running by any objective measure.
Isn't the formal dress-up dinner a dinner where the attendees dress up in costumes? Judging by Mary's jewelry she's going as Margaret Dumont in A Night at the Opera, but who is Toby supposed to be? If she continues to talk as she applies lipstick, maybe a clown?
Thanks for making me do a spit-take with my oat bran, Anonymous. (Ian = musty sack of mulch)
It was real love despite everything, such as my habit of getting carried away and applying so much makeup my nose would seem to disappear.
Toby's look of sad longing notwithstanding, this strip is too chaste for an affair. So that's out. She's not dumping Ian, either. So her look is just a teasing plot-hyper, and I fear we will be overfed the Hoosiers for months to come.
I'm pretty sure Mary is dressing as a pirate for the formal dinner. Maybe it will be more fun thanwe think?
Don't you just love Mary's look? A bold statement necklace and a military coat she borrowed from the Santa Royale Community Playhouse's costume department. It was last used in their production of Les Miserables, with Mary triumphant as Javert. She was much more convincing than Toby is in panel two. Yeah, Toby, convince us of the stable, healthy state of your marriage.
Panel two is *promising* today! This is, after all, a "soap-opera" strip, so I am holding out hope for an affair or at least a flirtation! Maybe with that cute Derek Hoser! Today's Toby seems more like the Toby we know (and love!)--reflective and interested in dissecting human relationships with her dear friend Mary.
Mary's Helpful Hint #19: If your traveling companion starts to open up about her marital woes, quick!, change the subject! And walk on down to the formal, dress-up dinner!
Dawn Weston: Life is brutal!
Mary Worth: Not if you go on a cruise!
Dawn Weston: I've been on a cruise. It didn't make me happy.
Mary Worth: But there's food and entertainment, and you can meet a lot of interesting people!
Dawn Weston: My Dad and I almost drowned in the Mediterranean. Several people ended up dead, many were seriously injured.
Mary Worth: Oh. ... Toby? Toby? Where are you, dear? ... Excuse me, Dawn, I have to get going ...
Dawn Weston's evil twin: I think you're on to something. Didn't Mary and Toby once "observe" some couple "interacting in their natural habitat"?
Post a Comment