Monday, January 30, 2012

Masked Mom's Media Monday: Frank & Ernest

I've always loved the comic Frank & Ernest, even though I've never been entirely sure (until now) which one is Frank and which Ernest and have occasionally been troubled by the fact that both of those fine gentleman often appear to have skipped significant portions of the hygiene unit in 6th grade health class.

Frank & Ernest was created by Bob Thaves, who died in 2006 and is now written by his son, Tom. It is widely syndicated in newspapers across the United States and around the world. A daily dose of Frank & Ernest can be found here.

Today's daily cartoon may be of interest to those of us who have followed along with the elephant theme started by Suzanne over at Periphery and picked up by Mark over at Mark's Work. (To find various elephant-related posts on either blog, use the blog search window in the upper left corner of either blog's home page--it's worth the effort.)

Anyway, many years ago, I came across what has got to be not only my favorite Frank & Ernest comic, but easily in my Top Ten Favorite Comics Ever (to the extent that I even have a Top Ten Favorite Comics Ever List). In it, Frank (I think) is sitting in a hoarder-level cluttered office, saying to Ernest, "I'm giving up trying to get ahead so I can concentrate on slowing down the rate at which I'm falling behind."

I clipped that little bugger out of the paper then and there. I later laminated it and kept it in my wallet for a long time until it eventually was purged in one of those once-a-year wallet clean-outs I get around to every three or four years. I tucked it into a junk drawer (sadly, that's a bit of a redundancy in my household) two moves ago and it is probably even now sitting in a box in the attic or basement along with receipts intended as proof of purchase for rebate offers now long-expired and school photos of children I've never met that came in Christmas cards from people I haven't seen in person since middle school.

Obviously, I identified with Frank's near-hysteria at being almost physically engulfed by his resposibilities, but the thing I loved most about the comic was the brilliant simplicity of Frank's solution to the problem. Focus on the manageable. Let the rest go. Something I need to be reminded of on a practically daily basis.


Masked Mom's One-Word Review: Wise.

9 comments:

  1. Thank you for the shout-out. I don't read the comics any more, but I love Frank's solution. I love the irony of the fact that your beloved comic about dealing with the overwhelming junk is lost somewhere in the overwhelming junk. Story of my life. I also got extremely sidetracked and read your incredibly sane post about circumcision. I haven't thought very much about foreskin in several years, but such a compelling argument you make about the insecurities. I may be in danger of falling down some sort of black hole of time and needing to sit and comb over all of your archives.

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    1. The archives can be a dark and scary place. ;) That post is one I obviously agonized over so I'm glad you had a chance to read it and glad you appreciated it. Thanks!

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  2. I can surely identify with the once-a-year event taking place every third or fourth year. And yes, I have boxes of stuff everywhere, also. Operative word-everywhere. I am still looking for a box of paperwork, removed from a filing cabinet in my classroom, when I retired. In it was a great deal of personal writing, all from my time in the middle school. One of these days…

    Also, I did a unit on comics with my middle schoolers, that tied into the California State Standards. They had to read, read, and read more comics, before choosing a theme and pursuing it, culminating in a piece of writing and an oral presentation, complete with overhead transparencies, to show off their comics. Great success.

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    1. During the ten years I worked at the flower shop, we had a subscription to two daily papers and I read both the "funny pages" comics and the political ones with great pleasure. (A few of the political ones inspiring vaguely ranting letters to the editor...) I was often pleasantly surprised at the philosophy and wisdom available there. Now that I don't see a daily paper every day, my comic-reading is limited to finding a cast-aside newspaper on the dining room table at the halfway house. I'm sure your middle schoolers had a great time with your project. ;)

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  3. My boxes of unorganized stuff are my dirty little secret. Everything has its place in my house, but for my own sanity I require a couple well-chosen spots to be places of repository for randomness that I never actually intend to organize. Though it doesn't apply to me in the physical sense, I can definitely appreciate the wisdom of this comic, and could apply it to other areas of my life. Thanks for sharing.

    p.s. Off to try and hunt down your circumcision post now. Wanna help me out?

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    1. "A Post About A Comment--Now I Know I've Gone Too Far..." The link is under "Parenting" category in the right-hand sidebar. Or you can copy and paste this in your browser:

      http://maskedmom.blogspot.com/2007/01/post-about-comment-now-i-know-ive-gone.html

      :)

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  4. Oh! Well! I needed that! Thank you!
    So simple. Huh.

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    1. Like many things in life, it's easier to understand than to apply. ;)

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  5. Just realized the link to "today's" (which is now yesterday's) was going to the current comic rather than to the one with the "irrelephant" punchline. It's fixed now. Apologies for any confusion.

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