Thanksgiving 1998

In Foxtrot, by Bill Amend, there's an annual tradition of making fun of the oldest son Peter's infamous gluttony:

Wimpy

My son has made a suggestion for the blog while reading one of my old collections of Foxtrot, by Bill Amend:

Timing

Winter in Foxtrot, by Bill Amend:

Trying to mess with Google Maps satellites (which, for most urban areas in the US, are actually independent companies flying aerial photography that they sell to Google) is a recurring theme in comics recently.  Some examples:

Pay the roofer

Ready for my close-up

Marilyn

Circadian Foxtrot

High schooler's dilemma in Foxtrot, by Bill Amend.  Note the globe in panel 2.

Crimes against punanity

This epic exercise in over-wrought wordplay brought to you by Foxtrot, by Bill Amend. And in case you were wondering about the reference to Pearls Before Swine, here's a typical example.

Eat your heart out Tracy

This is from a February 2009 Sunday Foxtrot, by Bill Amend. I love this kind of joke. And I love Foxtrot and wish it'd go back to dailies.  Can you hear me Mr. Amend? This does remind me of this Dick Tracy post from a while ago (not actually from the Dick Tracy strip).

South Polar Express

Foxtrot, by Bill Amend, did a story arc involving the dad having a Christmas/Polar Express-themed dream.  This installment in the arc involved Mapquest.  The question there about going forward or turning around is related to this post and especially this one. Then there's the penguins Amend decided not to try to draw.  It's too bad that Amend is only doing new Sunday strips.

FoxTrot Satellite 6

Google Headquarters actually now sports a massive solar installation. And there are blogs/websites devoted to showing images from Google Earth where people have made specticles specifically for aerial viewing, if not directed at Google Earth itself. All the world has become a stage.

FoxTrot Satellite 5

Eileen Jacobson is the arch nemesis of the geeky Jason character.

FoxTrot Satellite 4

Did Mr. Amend know at the time he did the satellite imagery week that Dick Cheney had ordered the Vice President's address to be blurred out on Google Earth and other satellite imagery sites? Or was that too easy a target?

If anybody out there still harbors any illusions about Dick Cheney not being a profoundly troubling individual, take this recent quote from him about Gitmo detainees: "...if you don't have a place where you can hold these people, your only other option is to kill them."

FoxTrot Satellite 3

Definitely echoes from the early 2000's. The second 3 Star Wars movies definitely got a bad rap. I personally liked them well enough. But I don't know that they ever could have lived up to the originals. Jar-Jar was jarring, sure. And the holes in the plots were large enough to walk an At-At through (Why in the world couldn't the Jedis have simply gone back and freed Anakin's mother from a life in slavery? Wouldn't that have dramitically mitigated Anakin's evil streak?). But then again the original 3 were campy and flawed in their own right. But tremendously ground-breaking and iconic. Star Wars will always be a landmark in cinematic and cultural history, for good or ill.

FoxTrot Satellite 2

Actually it is possible to see people on Google Earth, but that's rarely from the satellite imagery. Most cities in the US are covered by aerial photography that is higer resolution than the satellite imagery. And there are plenty of people who troll Google Earth looking for people on nude beaches. But there's never much to see. And Google itself tries to remove such images. Whtcha gonna do.

Foxtrot Satellite 1

The great comic Foxtrot by Bill Amend did a whole week on Google Earth back in 2005. Here it is in its entirety.