One day, I was in my sociology class. It was one of those touchy-feely California classes where we sat in a circle and talked about stuff. The boys were lamenting what a lame dance this was going to be, because no one knew how to ballroom dance. Lesley Y. started to object. "Come on," she said, "you must know how to at least waltz." Everyone sat dumbly looking at her. I didn't say a thing, but she turned to me. "Wes, you must know how to waltz."
Well, my mother had taught me a waltz step, so we got up and waltzed around inside the circle for a little bit. I was embarrassed. After we sat down, a girl sitting on the other side of the circle was scrawling a note that she then passed around until it got to me. "To Wes. Will you go to the winter formal with me? Katrina."
This only added to my embarrassment because everyone could pretty much guess what had been written inside the note. But to my friends, this was all a big deal. Katrina was a foreign exchange student and a model from Austria. Later she would drop acid and freak out, but for the time being, she was considered an international woman of mystery. And she was desperate to find a dance partner who had half a shot at keeping up with someone raised in Viennese ballrooms.
Some friends of mine, sensing my discomfort at going to the dance with Katrina, invited us to double with them. We went to a French restaurant, which was a new experience and I hated it. I ordered duck, which is about as miserable a meat selection as one can make, but what did I know? I was 17.
The most embarrassing moment of the whole ordeal came as I tried to cut tiny pieces of meat from between the duck's tiny bones, and Katrina who was sitting next to me, made the pointed comment, "In Austria, when we are young, they make us eat with telephone books under our arms until we learn to eat with our elbows at our sides."
I don't know why, but something about today's Mary Worth brought back that memory.
Today's Full Strip
Mary shares a hearty meal with Nola's torso.
ReplyDeleteGee, it's been a week, and Nola is yet to ask Mary for good advice. Interesting view in the first panel - are we seeing things from the perspective of God, or from Mary's upstairs neighbor, who has drilled a peephole through the floor to monitor the riveting goings-on in Mary's apartment?
ReplyDeleteI hope that on Sunday Nola tells Mary she has a bun in the oven and needs good advice as to determining its parentage. (Wanders, I did my best to keep that family friendly.)
This has got to be the most unappealing meal that i have seen in a long time. The main course is Green Glop with a side of Orange Mush.
ReplyDeleteWhat will Mary serve for dessert? Red Runny-stuff?
wv-gosimati
As in Nola saying "Why did I agree to the vegetable terrine when I could have had gosimati?"
Where is this going? I know, hopes and expectations in Santa Royale...
ReplyDeleteBut Nola is gleefully demented, oblivious to anything, a raving narcissist, and Mary's going to calmly talk her down to Earth?
Why am I taking this seriously?
wv: morints As in, a couple of morints at dinner. More butter!
If only young Wes Wanders had washed down that oily duck with a steaming plate of green Oobleck casserole (Mary and Nola are putting quite a dent into it) and tried a pat of butter, his night with Katrina and whole life could have been different.
ReplyDeleteThen again, we might not have MWAM then. Thanks for taking one for the team.
If Nola had arrived on the scene in 2011, she easily would have gotten my vote for the Character of the Year Worthy Award.
I had no idea where you were going with that, Wanders. I seriously laughed out loud at the end of your story (because true comedy comes from pain, I guess).
ReplyDeleteDid Katrina ever recover from her freakout?
Word verification: foody (yes, for real!)
I thought we'd only get the one establishing strip showing the "meal" Mary prepare and that we'd moved on to the post meal conversation. Behold, we are blessed with another lingering look at that "stuff".
Great story, Wanders!
ReplyDeleteKitKat @ 8:42 - Panel 1's view is from atop one of the many bookcases in Mary's apartment.
I'm impressed that Mary has one of those nifty plastic things that holds the sugar, Equal, and Sweet'N Low, on her table (probably swiped from Good Eats Diner).
Comparing today with 2/7: (1) Nola definitely slid her chair away from Mary to the other end of the table, perhaps to make more room for her elbows. (2) The green glop is growing and moving around the serving dish. (3) Nola's plate has returned.
WV: "squirsid" - what Mary is serving for dessert.
Loved the Katrina story! Imagine if such a thing were to happen in the Worthiverse. It would stretch out into at least six months of strips.
ReplyDeleteSomething odd is going on at Mary's house. Mary, Nola and the dining room table all look as if they're in different dimensions. All that's needed is a last panel featuring Rod Serling, smoking a cigarette and saying;
''Picture if you will, a typical dining room table, in a typical suburban condominium. The two attractive ladies seen here are enjoying a pleasant evening, having dinner and some friendly conversation. What the attractive young lady with the dark hair doesn't know, is that her decision to accept the friendly widow's dinner invitation was just the first step into the abyss of meddling known as... The Twilight Zone!''
What's the little bedpan next to the serving dish for?
ReplyDeleteOh, never mind.
Nola Wolvenson strong and able,
ReplyDeleteGet your elbows off the table!
This is not a horse's table (although the main course does kind of look like a flake of hay),
But a decent dining table!
Round the mess hall you must go,
You must go, you must go,
Round the mess hall you must go,
You were naughty!
--Beagle Vet
P.S. My BEAGLE wouldn't even eat that main course!
WV: "satiot" = a combinations of satiated and idiot, referring to anyone who enjoys MW's "cooking".
Also, is that picture of Jeff on the shelf foreshadowing for when Nola turns her beady little homewrecker eyes in his direction?
ReplyDeleteMaybe SHE'D say yes to one of his many proposals.
--Beagle Vet
Nola must love the green glop, she is flapping her wings with delight.
ReplyDeleteLooks like Nola needs to sit on a couple of Katrina's telephone books, Wanders.
ReplyDeletewv: Vident, the toothpaste that gets terrine off your molars.
There is no serving spoon so apparently Mary has used her hand to scoop out the green mush. Between that and Nola's elbows I am simply aghasted at the boorish table manners.
ReplyDeleteNot only that, but Toby has proved to be deadly accurate where Nola is concerned. No man is safe. Santa Royale is going to run out of wraps.
I believe Mary's reputation has preceded this get together. Nola isn't there to take advise but to give it. "MYOB you old crone."
ReplyDeleteI almost sense a power struggle going on between Nola and Mary. Mary needs to be knocked down a few notches, so it's great to see her out of her element.
ReplyDeleteOh, what gifts from above today's strip, Wander's story and everybody's comments are! I just now found time to check in with our old, OLD friend and got to read all of the comments in one go. I have to admit, it was almost too much for my delicate constitution!
ReplyDeleteNOLA: "Hate the game, not the playa! Talk to the hand, Mary-Woe!"
ReplyDeleteMARY: "?????"
(My word verification was "acking," which is what Bill the Cat is doing right now.)
Fortunately, there is plenty of leftover Green Glop, for another meal with Nola or possibly with Nola's divorced friend.
ReplyDeleteWV = "louse" Leaves nothing to be said.
Robert at 2:44 p.m., I would have thought that "Acking" is what Cathy was doing as she looked over from that obscure corner of the comics page and saw the exchange between Mary and Nola.
ReplyDeleteIn the second pane, the primitive African artwork hanging next to the curtains chimed in for Mary. Was Mary really too dumbstruck to speak herself?
ReplyDeleteYou're all going to think I'm obsessed with Highlights (given my Goofus and Gallant comment from a few weeks ago), but I think the panel that Wanders chose today could easily be repurposed in that magazine for educational use. Just remove the talk bubbles and add the text: "Nola shows her grandmother how she can form a triangle with her arms."
ReplyDeletewv: fallyen. As in: what kind of woman Nola is.
It's actually amusing to see how flummoxed Mary is by the homewrecker, while they eat their oobleck.
James in N.D.: I forgot Cathy does "Ack!" too! (And my word verification this time wasn't nearly as fun, sesclask.)
ReplyDeleteNola:
ReplyDelete"I had an affair just to see if I could. They divorced--It's not my fault if their marriage was weak.
"I torched my neighbor's home just to see if I could. They died--It's not my fault if they couldn't run fast.
"And oh yeah, I shot a man in Memphis, just to watch him die."
Elbows on the table, is there NO societal rule Nola won't break!? She is a force of nature, that one!
ReplyDeleteI fear poor Amy in-a-sling will soon be the next hapless recipient of this green glob goo. Mary will put the leftovers in another dish, swish it around a bit, maybe plop a pat of butter into it and....Voila! "Hello, Amy, I made you another casserole!"
Nola's elbows in the first panel reminds me of the way Rachel Nichols of ESP-Ann (as she pronounces it) holds her microphone.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of redheads, are there any in the Worthiverse? I only recall seeing blond/sandy, black with blue highlights, and Mary's halo of white.
--Beagle Vet