I'll have to say that today's strip made me happy, even though it took him forever to post it ("over the weekend"??  "Strips and flows aplenty???"  Geez, now he's torturing us.) because, as far as I know, it's the first Achewood that ever mentioned Oingo Boingo.  This makes me happy because I was a member of Boingo during the peak of their career in the 80's.  However, I thought if anyone in Acheworld had some Boingo records, it would be Pat -- right between his Cure and Robert Fripp albums.  And of course Ray would tell him "It is silly to like Oingo Boingo, Pat."  And he would be right.  Nevertheless, it's still fun for me to see that band name come up in pop culture (especially in my favorite talking cat free entertainment), even if only as the punchline to a joke, as it invariably always were.  I wonder if that LP has my autograph on it?  I did sign an awful lot of album covers for nervous, awkward teenagers back then.  I don't remember any of them being cartoon bear teenagers, though.

And yes, Teodor is a little unclear on the concept.  He thinks garage sales operate under lazy stoner dude hours.  In his mind, 9AM seemed plenty early enough. Too early, actually.

A perfect illustration of Ray's personality.  He makes a big symbolic show of how sorry he is for making Beef endure Disneyland by flying (first class, no doubt) to some remote village in England and staying in a quaint moss-covered shack.  Oh, the anguish he must feel!  Sending handwritten letters back to the states chronicling his journey into The Dark Night Of The Soul.  Just like Edgar frickin' Allan frickin' Poe, dude!  But his letters betray his true, self-centered, scatter-brained, narcissistic nature.  Ray is, as usual, all hat, no cattle.

This brings up an interesting topic -- who in Achewood has the most tragically flawed personality?  Who is the least flawed?  In terms of "most tragically flawed", in what order would you rank the top (bottom?) five?

P.S. -- A friend of mine (and fellow Achewood aficionado),  just IM'd me, "maybe Ray is all cat, no hattle."

"It's very similar to an Fm."

Sounds the same to our ear, yes, and most people who play by ear or don't have theory training would hear that chord (or play it on their guitar) and call it an F minor.  Hell, that's what I'd call it if I was showing someone else what chord to play.  But in the key of C# (for instance), it would be improper to call it Fm -- you would call it E# minor, and you'd spell the chord as:  E#, G#, B#, not F, Ab, C, as you would spell an Fm.  Why?  Well, I'm glad that you asked, and to be honest, a bit surprised that you even care, but here it is:  It's because the diatonic major scale in the key of C# would be:  C#, D#, E#, F#, G#, A#, and B#.  Yep, 7 sharps, and you'd put all seven of them on the staff in your key signature when you're writing something out in C#.  Otherwise, you'd run the risk of confusing someone who was attempting to sight-read the piece (by calling notes and chords by their enharmonic names, i.e.  E# = "F", or  B# = "C"). 

It'll still be kinda confusing to them, though -- that's a lot of sharps to keep track of on the page and on your axe.  They'd probably be happier if you had written your piece out in Db, which would sound exactly the same, but have fewer accidentals to keep track of (Db has 5 flats, as opposed to C#'s 7 sharps).  In Db, it would be legal and proper to call that chord Fm.  BTW, the key of F# (six sharps) also contains the controversial and contentious E#.

Having said that, I'm guessing that Onstad referred to it as E#m just because he thought its oddness made for a mildly funny musical joke.  Or maybe he just likes the damn key of C#.

Great strip, BTW.  So very, very much to recommend about it. 

I once accidentally discovered a web comic called Achewood, then accidentally spent the next two days doing nothing but reading all the Achewood archives.

I hope we see more of Rocky the owl.  I like Rocky the owl.  I'm thinking that Blister probably won't like Rocky the owl quite so much.

The garlic.  Without it, life would cease to have any purpose.

Speaking of Achewood blogs, I would say that Mr. Beef has come quite a ways since his last blog entry (Got the lamp!), like Ulysses or Siddhartha or Marlow or Ishmael or other some such dudes of old.  You know, all catharticized.

I don't know... somehow I don't think he'll much be needing The Lamp anymore.  Maybe he'll even get around to wearing one of those wiseass, ironic t-shirts he's been hiding all this time.  In public, even.

All I'm saying is when one's every move is the new tradition; when one becomes the ruling body, one hopes one wouldn't also be needing The Lamp.

"our every move is the new tradition"

I love these cats.

<<  It ain't over. It so ain't over.  >>

No, not by any stretch.  At least not until they stop off at Vlad's Subway for a couple of Cold Cut Trios.