When pros fail

Glad to see that even a professional can screw something up. Give Joe Giella points for trying. Where does Mary hide all that hair? I thought she had an Ann Richards style hairdo.

How to recognize the signs of an imminent Mary Worth attack

How to recognize the signs of an imminent Mary Worth attack

Mary Faust, Part Seventeen

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That lap top is making Dawn's eyebrows shorter and making her grow old!

POET

Depart! elsewhere another servant choose
What! shall the bard his godlike power abuse?
Man's loftiest right, kind nature's high bequest,
For your mean purpose basely sport away?
Whence comes his mastery o'er the human breast,
Whence o'er the elements his sway,
But from the harmony that, gushing from his soul,
Draws back into his heart the wondrous whole?

Mary Faust, Part Sixteen

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Giant Galapagos Island Tortoises are reading this and thinking, "Get on with it!"

Ents (the tree people from Lord of the Rings) consider themselves quite hasty compared to the pace of this storyline.

Which will come first: my 41st birthday (Feb. 21) or the conclusion of this plot?

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Poor fools the muses' fair regards.
Why court for such a paltry end?
I tell you, give them more, still more, 'tis all I ask,
Thus you will ne'er stray widely from the goal;
Your audience seek to mystify, cajole;--
To satisfy them--that's a harder task.
What ails thee? art enraptured or distressed?

Mary Faust, Part Fifteen

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Maybe time to reinstate the Mary Watch: Number of Mary Worthless days. The over-arching lesson from the 2009 stories and continuing into 2010: stay off the internet.

As to a masquerade, with absent minds, they press,
Sheer curiosity their footsteps winging;
Ladies display their persons and their dress,
Actors unpaid their service bringing.
What dreams beguile you on your poet's height?
What puts a full house in a merry mood?
More closely view your patrons of the night!
The half are cold, the half are rude.
One, the play over, craves a game of cards;
Another a wild night in wanton joy would spend.

Mary Faust Part Fourteen

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I've given up trying to fit the text into the balloons. Easier to redraw balloons. I inflict my learning process upon you! Hopefully, the divisions will make more sense.

Wilbur doesn't own a cooler? I bet his condo neighbors appreciate him transporting the fish like that. Next panel: Dawn introduces her guest, Jill the Game Warden.

How it revolts the genuine artist's mind!
The sorry trash in which these coxcombs deal,
Is here approved on principle, I find.

MANAGER

Such a reproof disturbs me not a whit!
Who on efficient work is bent,
Must choose the fittest instrument.
Consider! 'tis soft wood you have to split;
Think too for whom you write, I pray!
One comes to while an hour away;
One from the festive board, a sated guest;
Others, more dreaded than the rest,
From journal-reading hurry to the play.

Mary Faust: Part Thirteen

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Wilbur and Kurt continue fishing.

Karen Moy gives the reader a feel for a real fishing trip when the fish refuse to bite. Too bad she didn't provide beer. A single keg should provide plenty of beer for everyone who actually reads Mary Worth.

Spin for their eyes abundant occupation,
SO that the multitude may wondering gaze,
You by sheer bulk have won your reputation,

By mass alone can you subdue the masses,
Each then selects in time what suits his bent.
Bring much, you something bring for various classes,
And from the house goes every one content.
You give a piece, abroad in pieces send it!
'Tis a ragout--success most needs attend it;
'Tis easy to serve up, as easy to invent.
A finish'd whole what boots it to present!
Full soon the public will in pieces rend it.

POET

How mean such handicraft as this you cannot feel!

Mary Faust: Part Twelve

Click on comic for larger image. The Sunday strip was a recap of the action from the previous week, which is to say, nothing has happened.

A sprightly fellow's presence at your play,
Methinks should also count for something too;
Whose genial wit the audience still inspires,
Knows from their changeful mood no angry feeling;
A wider circle he desires,
To their heart's depths more surely thus appealing.
To work, then! Give a master-piece, my friend;
Bring Fancy with her choral trains before us,
Sense, reason, feeling, passion, but attend!
Let folly also swell the tragic chorus.

MANAGER

In chief, of incident enough prepare!
A show they want, they come to gape and stare.

Mary Faust: Part Eleven

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Wilbur kept the same glasses all these years.

A failure now, with words now fitly mated,
In the wild tumult of the hour is drown'd;
Full oft the poet's thought for years bath waited
Until at length with perfect form 'tis crowned;
What dazzles, for the moment born, must perish;
What genuine is posterity will cherish.

MERRYMAN

This cant about posterity I hate;
About posterity were I to prate,
Who then the living would amuse? For they
Will have diversion, ay, and 'tis their due.

Mary Faust: Part Ten

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Has the boredom of Kurt and Wilbur's conversation driven everyone, including those out of earshot, from the lake?

POET

Oh of the motley throng speak not before me,
At whose aspect the Spirit wings its flight!

Conceal the surging concourse, I implore thee,
Whose vortex draws us with resistless might.
No, to some peaceful heavenly nook restore me,
Where only for the bard blooms pure delight,
Where love and friendship yield their choicest blessing,
Our heart's true bliss, with god-like hand caressing.

What in the spirit's depths was there created,
What shyly there the lip shaped forth in sound;

Mary Faust: Part Nine

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Out of boredom, Kurt's legs have left the scene. A most extreme case of Restless Legs Syndrome.

Still in broad daylight, ere the clock strikes four,
With blows their way towards the box they take;
And, as for bread in famine, at the baker's door,
For tickets are content their necks to break.
Such various minds the bard alone can sway,

My friend, oh work this miracle to-day!

Mary Faust: Part Eight

Click on comic to enlarge.

Thanks and shout out to Seattle PI for making larger comics available. You can even rate each comic.

I enlarged a bit more when removing original dialogue but since I had a larger image to start quality has not degraded as much.

How make our entertainment striking, new,
And yet significant and pleasing too?
For to be plain, I love to see the throng,
As to our booth the living tide progresses;
As wave on wave successive rolls along,
And through heaven's narrow portal forceful presses;

Mary Faust: Part Seven

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The posts are now erected, and the planks,
And all look forward to a festal treat.
Their places taken, they, with eyebrows rais'd,
Sit patiently, and fain would be amaz'd.
I know the art to hit the public taste,
Yet ne'er of failure felt so keen a dread;
True, they are not accustomed to the best,
But then appalling the amount they've read.

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The tackle box does not have tackle in it.

Mary Faust Part Six

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A yearning long unfelt, each impulse swaying,
To yon calm spirit-realm uplifts my soul;
In faltering cadence, as when Zephyr playing,
Fans the Aeolian harp, my numbers roll;
Tear follows tear, my steadfast heart obeying
The tender impulse, loses its control;
What I possess as from afar I see;
Those I have lost become realities to me.

Prologue in the Theatre
MANAGER. DRAMATIC POET. MERRYMAN.

MANAGER

Ye twain, in trouble and distress
True friends whom I so oft have found,
Say, for our scheme on German ground,
What prospect have we of success?
Fain would I please the public, win their thanks;
They live and let live, hence it is but meet.
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I'm filling balloons. Seven Sunday panels gives me lots of balloons.
I ran my final 20 mile training run - 20.09 miles in 3:25:19.90. I will set a new personal record if I can repeat that performance for the marathon on Jan. 31.

Mary Faust: Part 5

Click on cartoon to enlarge.

Sorry about the Comic Sans. I need to download Digital Strip to my home computer. I enlarge the comic strip and then paste text into balloons. I try to fit as much as I can while maintaining readability. I do cheat occasionally by slightly enlarging a balloon to add a bit of white space around the text.

Part of the third verse of Dedication:

Dispersed the throng, their severed flight now winging;
Mute are the voices that responsive rang.
For stranger crowds the Orphean lyre now stringing,
E'en their applause is to my heart a pang;
Of old who listened to my song, glad hearted,
If yet they live, now wander widely parted.

Mary Worth is the work of writer Karen Moy and artist Joe Giella and is owned by King Features Syndicate. All images from the comic strip are owned by King Features. Faust is the work of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and is public domain.

Mary Faust: More Dedication

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Today's larger word balloons allowed me to place more text. If you wish to keep up with the storyline as written by Karen Moy visit Mary Worth & Me. Wanders & friends do an outstanding job of keeping up with the goings on in Santa Royale. You will understand the humor of Mary Worth if you spend any time over there. Be sure to enjoy the Charterstone Jukebox.

Looking forward to the Sunday comic. Lots of balloons to fill.

Sorrow revives, her wail of anguish sending
Back o'er life's devious labyrinthine way,
And names the dear ones, they whom Fate bereaving
Of life's fair hours, left me behind them grieving.

They hear me not my later cadence singing,
The souls to whom my earlier lays I sang;

Mary Faust: Dedication Verse Two, Part 1

Click on cartoon to enlarge. Picture quality degraded because of enlargement. I don't know why syndicates don't make larger versions available for online venues. Maybe to prevent miscreants from rewriting crappy comics? It takes a larger comic to truly appreciate the care Joe Giella put into rendering Wilbur's comb over.

Shades fondly loved appear, your train attending,
And visions fair of many a blissful day;
First-love and friendship their fond accents blending,
Like to some ancient, half-expiring lay;

Mary Faust: Dedication Verse One

Click on picture to enlarge. (Click here for the first part)

Dedication

Ye wavering shapes, again ye do enfold me,
As erst upon my troubled sight ye stole;
Shall I this time attempt to clasp, to hold ye?
Still for the fond illusion yearns my soul?
Ye press around! Come then, your captive hold me,
As upward from the vapoury mist ye roll;
Within my breast youth's throbbing pulse is bounding,
Fann'd by the magic breath your march surrounding.

Mary Worth: Faust

Click on cartoon to make bigger.

An insomnia induced project idea: Goethe's Faust replacing Mary Worth dialogue. A fun way for me to read all of Faust and make Mary Worth a bit more amusing.

Also something to justify the continued existence of this blog.

Radioactive

Neat trick. Adrian does her impression of the Virgin of Guadalupe. I wonder if that will leave a mark on the wall?

Adrian, take your fingers out of your mouth otherwise you will spread the flu virus. Should we call you "H1N1 Adrian"?