Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus 09/24/21

I actually have no idea about the planets. Suffice it to say that men and women are, well, different. Take the case of television watching, for example. When we watch something my wife likes, she will ask me to turn the volume up so she can hear it. When I watch a ball game, any kind of ball game at any time of the day or night, I am asked to turn the volume down. When I mentioned this to John, he immediately went for an English period drama (the most boring thing we could think of to watch (although I did love The Crown) vs. the most boring sports moment we could think of. The announcer saying what yard line the football is on. You see, if we had the announcer saying “Touchdown” or “It’s outta here” for a home run, that would be loud all by itself, so we went for dull, the ball is on the 35-yard line.

We shared a beach house this summer with my daughter, son-in-law and their child, our first grandchild. After the kids put the baby to bed, we’d all watch a drama (no, not an English period drama. It was Designated Survivor, if you must know) and I swear, the volume was up to 30. When said drama was over, I’d tune in the Mets game, which I had previously recorded. The volume was at 15, and I was repeatedly asked to “Turn that down, wayyyyy down.” I pointed out that nobody in the house could possibly hear it, because at this point, I couldn’t hear it. Men are from Mars…

Our other comic came from nowhere else but our imaginations. We’ve all heard of the cliche of the husband running off with the nanny, or babysitter or au pair, or whatever else you call them these days. And we flipped it on its head. If you remember a storyline from our recent past, Sam and Shellie hired a male nanny (who had just come out of prison—hey it’s a comic, we can do anything we want). And when Sam decides to do a guy thing and go to the car show, well, what’s a woman supposed to think? That men are from Mars, and women are from Venus. We rest our case.

That’s all she wrote (who the hell is SHE anyway)? Have a great weekend and we will see you next week with two new comics.

Andy and John

Twins, twins 9/16/21

Twins are nature’s way of saying, so nice, let’s do it twice. On the one hand, you get over the process of having a complete family more quickly, but on the other hand…

What if they’re not on the same sleep schedule, feeding schedule (well that would be technically challenging since there’s only one mom and two kids) or pooping schedule? So John and I decided to have a go at another three part series, called Twins Come Home, parts 1, 2 and 3. So why do they appear on the website in reverse order, you ask? That may be because someone has not figured out how to put them in, in the correct order. One of us, but that particular person, if it happened to be me, should be given a pass today because it’s Yom Kippur and because that person happens to be fasting, and because being hungry makes that person pissed off and because that same person is expected to write a sunny and funny blog while he’s hungry and pissed off, capiche? I’m not saying that person is me you understand but if it were, that is how I’d react.

Oh yeah, the comics. Part one was last Friday featuring the exhausted parents and the calm, cool and collected grandparents. We can afford to be cool because we get to sleep through the night and not be awakened every 3 hours or so. So we imagined what would happen if the grandparents offered their services as babysitters for a night. We imagined the bedraggled couple would accept their offer rather quickly.

This summer, my wife and I shared a beach house with our daughter, son-in-law and their new baby. They wanted nothing more than a night off to feel human, go to dinner and a movie, and we wanted nothing more than to hang with the baby and put her to sleep. A win-win if there ever was one. Which leads to the part 3 comic, in which no sooner do the parents leave, than the baby starts shrieking. This too comes from personal experience. I recounted to John how my daughter asked me to babysit for one half an hour while she got on a phone call about a potential freelance job. My wife was working, my daughter and son-in-law were working so it was just me and the baby for 30 minutes, from 2pm until 2:30. I couldn’t wait. As soon as my daughter got up from the living room the baby started crying. I picked her up to soothe her. She cried louder. I rocked her in my arms, she began to shriek. Doors opened from other rooms, what are you doing to her? Nothing! I swear! I took her outside so nobody could hear anymore then when she calmed down I walked back into the kitchen to see how much time had passed. It was 2:08 This went on for the rest of the time, outside, inside, me: oh look, this is a tree, these are branches, want to shake the branch, go ahead, shake it…2:12

Finally, mercifully, my daughter’s phone call was over a few minutes early and she came out to her daughter who suddenly was all smiles and sunshine. When my daughter asked how it went I said, “Fine,” even though everyone in the surrounding zip codes could hear it wasn’t fine. John turned this story into Twins, part 3, even though you see that comic first, is that clear? Yeah, I don’t understand it either.

Enjoy the weekend a lot more than I am enjoying this freakin’ fast. And we will see you next week with two new ones, not about the twins.

Andy and John

You Can't Be Too Careful 9/10/21

Actually, you can. In the case of our hand sanitizer comic, Craig was allergic to it. Seems the stuff is everywhere now, drugstore counters, supermarket check-out lines, restaurants - but then they swipe your card in a machine that has everybody else’s swipes and hand you a pen that 2,000 people have used before you and, more hand sanitizer. But this comic doesn’t come from that insight. It comes from John’s wife Linda who mistakenly confused the sanitizer with bug spray. Turns out hand sanitizer doesn’t do a damn thing for preventing mosquito bites. Nor does bug spray do a particularly good job of cleaning your hands. Who knew? One of the most memorable cases of mistaken bottles occurred when my children were 7 and 4. One day when my wife was out of town, I was driving to a rollerblading rink and both my kids were in their car seats. My 7-year-old daughter was playing with her stuffed animals when I heard her say to her brother, “Uh, I don’t think you should be playing with that.” Then I heard the sound of an aerosol being sprayed. I was driving, so I said, “Can you please hand me that, having no idea what it was. It turned out to be a bottle of pepper spray. I exclaimed, “Fuuuuuck!” before I realized what I was saying. The genesis of this story is my wife worked in an office building that was quiet and dark come nighttime, where she went back to work, once the kids were asleep. So I got her a bottle of pepper spray to carry, just in case somebody surprised her. She put it in the center console, just in case…) Two hours and a long shower after, the situation was resolved, the pepper spray washed from our son’s eyes. My wife had just come home from her trip as I was towel-drying our son’s hair. She said to our son, “Hello honey, how was your day?” And he replied, “Guess what, Daddy said fuck!” So much for mistaken bottles.

As for the twins, we had a gender reveal party for Al and Joanne’s daughter a couple months ago and we figured it was time to deliver the twins. Turns out the delivery process is a lot easier to draw than it is to live through.

My wife and I were fortunate enough to spend a good part of the summer in a beach house with our daughter, her husband and their new baby girl, Charlotte. Though my daughter and son-in-law were overwhelmed with love for their daughter, I observed Charlotte not sleeping through the night, my daughter giving multiple feedings, both she and her husband never getting a full night’s sleep, and the toll it took to carry strollers, car seats, diapers, etc. When I explained this to John, he said, “Now imagine if you had twins. They might not have the same nap schedules, feeding schedules, etc.” (He didn’t actually say “etc.” I just put that in because I forgot the rest of what he said.) The comic that followed was what we imagined having baby twins would feel like. Turns out I just got a taste of the real thing. We just came home from a wedding in Denver followed by a few days with our niece, her husband and her kids, an 11-year old daughter and a pair of 5-year-old twins. One twin said to me, “Pick me up!” Followed by the other saying the same. Then the first one asked again and the second one said, “Hey, not fair, you picked her up two times!” You get the idea. The good news is that if you wanted two kids, you get it over at once. The bad news is, as the old Doublemint gum jingle said, “Double your pleasure, double your fun…’

See you next week with two new ones hot off the New 60 press. (There isn’t really a New 60 press, but I just like saying it.)

Andy and John

FROZEN TUNDRA 9/02/21

This week marks the unofficial end of summer. We celebrated it with a bag of frozen shrimp, and even though it’s not going to get freezing cold until December, I couldn’t think of another metaphor to link frozen shrimp and the upcoming fall season.

About the shrimp. As we get older, we find new and unique (not to mention embarrassing) ways to get hurt. Many moons ago, we did a comic about a guy breaking his finger trying to fish something out of the pocket of his skinny jeans. Now I didn’t do anything close to that humiliating, but… I went for a walk on the beach with my family and I asked to carry our grandchild in a contraption called a snuggli, in which you carry the baby in front, much like a kangaroo carries her baby in a pouch. You know beaches. They’re tilted so one leg comes up shorter than the other, but I figured you make up for it on the way back. Wrong. That evening my left ankle swelled and stiffened and I had to apply ice packs. I told John about this and how I used that ice pack on my foot all year, and now what should I do because I had two separate aches and only once ice pack. He came up with frozen shrimp. I, however, was all about bags of frozen peas because I heard people use them for injuries, but, as we’ve chronicled many times in the past, John hates peas, and besides, they do not comprise a main course, so shrimp it was. And can you really blame Al for using the frozen shrimp on his ankle? It’s not like he was touching the shrimp. They’re in a damn bag! And as he helpfully pointed out, he had already started the thawing process for dinner. A win-win situation if there ever was one.

As for our Labor Day poster, well Al’s daughter was in labor about to deliver her twins and voila, we had a Labor Day poster. We hope you have a much less painful Labor Day than she did and we’ll see you right here— same Bat Time same Bat Channel next week with our first two comics of the fall.

Andy and John

Good Eatin' 8/27/21

This week we become food obsessed. Okay, okay, we’re always food obsessed. Because face it, once you’re firmly in your 60’s, what else are you going to become obsessed with? 

The point is not everything works the way it used to work. Which is why we came back to food. In the first comic, we return to Al’s franchise, Pizza-on-a-Stick. One of the employees came up with a brilliant idea for dessert, Spumoni-on-a-Stick. What’s the plural of that? “I’ll take 6 Spumoni-on-a-Sticks please?” Or “I’ll take 6 Spumonis-on-a-Stick please?” These are the kinds of meaningful debates John and I engage in. The second one sounds better but the first one is right. Plus, John draws the strip so he won, not that I’m a sore loser or anything. To put the final ribbon on the bow I asked my daughter, an excellent grammarian, which version she preferred. She said, “I know the second one sounds right but the first one is actually correct. You’d order a cheeseburger or 6 cheeseburgers. So…” When she’s right and she agrees with John, it just doesn’t seem fair. But I’ll tell you this, if you come into Pizza-on-a-Stick and order 6 Spumonis-on-a-Stick, I promise not to be literal like John and pile 6 scoops of spumoni on one stick. I know this is fiction, but who the hell would do that?

Okay, now that THAT’S off my chest, let’s go to comic #2, Al’s backyard vegetable garden. John and I have a mutual friend Chris who built a magnificent garden with raised beds and every natural method of maintenance and pest control. John tried to mimic it as best he could, and when I had a house, I maintained a vegetable garden as well but much more basic. Why? For one thing I’m not very good with my hands (a common affliction among us Jews) and secondly, my love of vegetables stops at salads. But the point is, these gardens are a TON of work and they yield very little until you get overrun by cherry tomatoes during the last of summer, and end up having to shovel half of them into the soil so they make for a rich mulch the following summer. Sure, it’s a great thrill to go into the garden and pick out your salad or dinner for the night, but if you stop off at the farmstand on your way home, that works too. Plus, the cost/benefit ratio is a bit out of whack, as Al’s son Sid gleefully points out.

So, as Porky Pig said, Th-th-that’s all folks (at least for this week). We will be back next week with two new ones that take us up to Labor Day! Where does the time go?

Have a great weekend,

Andy and John

Expanding Families

This week we devoted ourselves to expanding families. Al’s family expands as his daughter Emily is about to give birth to twins. And Marv’s family expanded, or actually, Marv expanded by eating donuts, not that there’s anything wrong with that.

But first to the upcoming birth. My own daughter gave birth to our first grandchild, Charlotte, back in April. We raced down to the hospital and when we got there, were told we couldn’t come in due to Covid-19 protocols. I suggested we go back home, because there was nothing we could do by being there. My wife refused and wanted to hang out there, “Just in case…” I could try every logical argument I could think of, but no, she wasn’t biting. It was clear I wasn’t winning this one. She was going to be there for our daughter and son-in-law come hell or high water. Finally, the baby arrived, and thank goodness everyone was okay and we eventually made our way back home. When I told John about this he instantly turned the idea around, saying we didn’t need the Covid part. The essential story was when it comes to the birth of a child or grandchild, mother (or grandma) knows best. So we just focused on the act of driving to the hospital. We all have our emotional connections and if they make sense to us, that’s all that counts. When I am watching a Mets game and it’s a tense situation, I give the pitcher or batter instructions. To the pitcher, “Throw him a curve ball, he’ll ground into a double play.” Or to the batter, “Don’t swing at the next pitch, let him walk you!” My wife will ask, “Who are you talking to?” I know my words have no effect, but what if they do? In a similar vein she knew she had to be there just until the baby was delivered. She knew there was nothing she could do about it, but just in case…

The second comic came from another observation. I shared with John, a story about our rental house this summer. A guest came up with two large cookies. Not just cookies in the traditional sense, but huuuuge cookies with all sorts of goodies baked inside. The guests were staying for a long weekend and for two days the cookies just sat there, still wrapped in plastic. Nobody wanted to be the fatso who committed to an entire cookie which must have contained at least a full day’s worth of calories. So I unwrapped the cookies and broke them up into 40 or 50 bite size pieces and put them out on the counter. Within one day they were gone. Everyone who passed through the kitchen, which was everyone, stopped and grabbed a bite size piece on their way to wherever it was they were going. “Oh, on my way to the pool, a little piece won’t hurt.” “Oh, on my way to the bathroom, what the hell, it’s just one bite.” “Going to run an errand, let me grab one while nobody’s looking.” John shared that he does this with the occasional donut and we had our second comic. Here’s a helpful hint, DO NOT try the broken cookie routine at home. 8 extra pounds later, you’ll be cursing us out.

One last point. The Mets finally won a game Wednesday night and you know why they won? Because I told the batter, Kevin Pillar, to hit a game-winning 3 run homer in the 11th inning and he listened. The fact that I recorded the game earlier and watched it hours after it had actually ended had nothing to do with it. The batter heard me! Everyone has their little emotional tics. And no two people have the same ones. But in the end, they are what make us, us.

Have a great weekend,

Andy and John

Out of Control 8/13/21

When John and I first started thinking about writing a comic, we went out to lunch. He ordered some Amazonian chicken and rice dish and when it came, I couldn’t help noticing he was pushing the peas aside so he wouldn’t have to eat them. I laughed because I too am a picky eater, especially when it comes to vegetables. I like to think of myself as a pick and choose eater. I choose not to eat most vegetables.

So we got to wondering, what would it be like if you were invited over to a friend’s house for dinner and you didn’t like what they were cooking. It’s hard to say how much you love something, how absolutely delicious it is, when you’ve left 3/4’s of it on your plate. One of my favorite tricks is that when I get up to clear my plate, I pick up the person’s plate next to me, and carefully place it on top of my plate. This way, someone may miss the fact that I left all the “cauliflower rice” on my plate. It’s not freakin’ rice. It’s cauliflower, and I hate cauliflower, okay????

Now onto the comic featuring the traditional Indian dress, known as a Sari. In this case John and his wife Linda were invited to an Indian wedding and Linda thought it would be fun to wear a Sari. Until she tried to put the Sari on. Apparently it’s pretty difficult. Not to worry, there’s a YouTube video on how to do just about anything. Apparently it was very difficult as well. Sorry about the Sari. But it made for a good comic. What would be equally funny would be to see John in a Kurta, the male Indian attire that resembles a long shirt (just looked that up on Google). But apparently he demurred on that idea as well. A suit and tie is challenging enough for me, especially after two years in COVID-19 lockdown and sweatpants. I mean, even blue jeans and a long-sleeved tee feel like dressing up. Everything’s relative, right?

That’s it for this week and we will see you again next week with two new comics.

Note: Saturday night the NY Giants play the NY Jets in a pre-season football game. John is a Jet fan, me a die-hard Giants supporter. If the Giants win Saturday I will be sure to roast John and his Jets in next week’s blog. If somehow, someway the Jets win, I won’t mention the game at all.

Have a great weekend

Andy and John

Caps for Sale 8/5/21

“Caps for Sale” is the name of one of my favorite books when I was a kid. And it also happens to relate to both of this week’s comics. First the debate about screw-top wine bottles vs. corks. I love a good bottle of wine, and after the ritual of the cork is done - foil cutter, followed by Rabbit brand corkscrew remover, it’s time to pour and enjoy. At this point it’s just, wow, this tastes good and pairs well with whatever the hell it is I’m eating. I can also admit to occasions when we are having something that goes with a white wine at home (a broiled lemon sole, for example) and when I go to reach for the wine bottle I am thrilled when I discover that the wine is actually of the screw-top variety. You mean all I have to do is screw the thing open? No more foil cutter, no more Rabbit? Sign me up. But then there’s the occasion when you bring wine to somebody’s house. If you go to a wine store with a knowledgeable staff, chances are they’ll point you in the right direction. But it’s all about perception, right? Does it make you feel twice as good showing up with a $40 bottle of wine vs. a $20 bottle of wine? And who cares if the $20 bottle is actually superior? It’s the presentation that counts. Does it have one of those ribbons around the neck that have been carefully curlicued by running a scissor over it? But what if (gasp!) the bottle has a screw-top? Is the host going to think you’re a cheapskate? Does the ribbon more than make up for the screw-top? And will the wine’s lingering notes of strawberry and tobacco compensate for the easy opening top? Maybe forget the whole thing and bring a bottle of tequilla next time. But with a cork or twist-off…forget it.

And onto the ubiquitous beach hat. John remembers going on an extended family vacation on a cruise ship while I recalled going to my mother-in-law’s 65th birthday in Lake George (34 years ago!!!!!). John made special embarrassing t-shirts for his family and, in my case, we all had embarrassing t-shirts annnouncing “I’m with Charlotte.” When John and I discussed this idea, he immediately sent me a picture of a guy wearing a wide-brimmed, goofy-looking beach hat, just like the one he drew for the comic. I laughingly agreed that, “Yeah, people would really be embarrassed having to walk around wearing a hat like that.” What I didn’t share with him is that I wear a hat that looks almost exactly like that. It might look goofy, but hey, it keeps the sun off the back of my neck. And if it’s windy, it has strings so you can keep the hat from blowing away by tying the string into a bow under your chin. Well, YOU can tie the string in a bow under YOUR chin, but that is a step too far for me. I prefer to look cool, which is why I lost my first beach hat to a large gust of wind while riding in a boat. The guys in our comic actually WANTED to lose their hats. That was John’s ending, because I am still trying to hold onto my backup beach hat. And one other thing. John’s drawn hat was blue, which is much, much more embarrassing than the hat I wear, which is tan. And tan hats look totally cool, right Stuart? (My older brother-in-law who goes nowhere without the same tan beach hat).

That’s it for this week. Keep your hats on and wear your sun block. We’ll see you next week with two new comics, but we are keeping the subjects under our collective hat.

Andy and John

The evolving bathroom 7/30/21

Frequently, John and I will relate stories from our immediate present or past and then decide it they are comic-worthy or not. Occasionally, an idea happens that is so telegraphic, it doesn’t need any words. Such an idea happened to John and a much shorter colleague he used to work with. If you’re not a guy, you may not be aware that men’s bathrooms have urinals of differing heights. One for kids, one for adults. But there is also an unwritten rule that if more than one guy enters at the same time, whoever enters the bathroom first, goes to the furthest urinal, leaving the closest one open to the last person who comes in. There are other unwritten rules as well. Don’t ever take the urinal directly next to someone peeing, if there are more than two urinals. You leave one in between the two of you for some (imagined) sense of privacy. And then the big rule, don’t ever, ever, look down in the direction of the person standing at the closest urinal to you. Well, this particular comic happened to John and the aforementioned shorter colleague. As it is drawn. John, the significantly taller of the two, was about to pee into the kid’s urinal while his friend had to practically stand on tiptoe to get over the rim of the taller urinal. They broke the rule, took a look at each other, and switched. Wordlessly. Very funny indeed, but with no words to accompany the action, I have nothing to do with the comic except to say, “Funny idea, let’s do it.” So, I will swallow my disappointment on the comic not having any dialogue because, you know, I wouldn’t want to piss all over a great idea.

Second up in your “stream” is about a summer beach house rental that is so “smart” the renters can’t figure out how to use anything. Hint: I am living in such a rental as we speak. First of all is the toaster. It has a name, “June.” No kidding. You put an English muffin in and close the door, and a picture comes up saying “English muffin, two slices.” If you decide to toast on medium, it goes on for 4 minutes. If you don’t think it’s done enough, you push “add 30 seconds,” and after that if you are satisfied, it asks “do you want me to save the longer cooking time?” This impressed me and freaked me out at the same time. Later that same week, I went to reheat a piece of pizza in the same oven, shut the door and it said, “Pizza, one slice, thin crust.” I kid you not. But let’s get to the toilet (jeez, we’ve been speaking a lot about bathrooms today). You walk into the bathroom, and the light goes on. You walk to the toilet and the seat raises automatically. The seat, by the way, is heated. After you go, It rinses and dries your butt for you. And when you stand up again, it flushes and closes the seat for you. I explained all this to John and he said, here’s the ending, “Marv gets so frustrated he wishes he could turn the whole thing off and then, of course, the house is plunged into total darkness.” And we had ourselves another comic. None of this smart tech is an exaggeration. Which leaves me with two thoughts. First, how can I ever come back to my apartment, where you have to estimate how long to toast things all by yourself? Secondly, do you really expect me to lift my own toilet seat after all this???

Only time will tell. We will see you again next week with two new ones and until then, have a wonderful weekend.

Andy and John

Disappointing Results 7/23/21

Did you watch The Queen’s Gambit, a remarkable series about a fictional chess prodigy? Well, if you’re anything like me, it renewed your interest in chess, a game with no luck involved. A game that mirrors life itself. Are you defensive-minded or aggressive? Do you hide in the bushes, waiting for the right moment to attack, or are you out there big and bold, saying to your opponent, “Come get me”? I for one am aggressive. But when I said, “Come get me,” people had no problem getting me. First up was my son-in-law Mark. He and I were both basically starting from scratch. We’ve now played 5 times and he’s beaten me 5 times. At one point, one of my attacking moves left me so vulnerable, he said with pity, “Oh Andy.” Okay, so maybe I can’t beat him. Next up we had a visitor to our beach house who proclaimed, “I haven’t played in at least 15 years and I don’t think I have ever won. You’ve got nothing to worry about playing me.” He won. Finally, we had another couple over and the wife loves games. She is an avid bridge player, but didn’t know the first thing about chess. I thought, “Haha, at last, someone I can beat.” I offered to teach her the basic moves, like “This piece, the pawn, can only move straight ahead but it has to capture on an angle.” So, I showed her and corrected her and at some point she moved a piece directly challenging my king. I said, “Now you are supposed to say check.” And she tentatively called out, “check.” After studying my options I realized it was actually checkmate.” So John changed my friend’s character to an 8-year-old grandson, because we figured it was more embarrassing to lose to a first-time chess-playing kid than a first-time chess-playing adult (either would be embarrassing and I’d lose to both of them). We tweaked the ending, and that was our first comic. Oh by the way, I take back everything I said about “The Queen’s Gambit.” Chess sucks.

Now onto one of our secondary characters Sam, who used to be an announcer who made money by reading commercials. Now he is the official voice of the “Boulder City Boulders” minor league baseball team. My first real job out of college was as a sportswriter for the Pawtucket Times in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and our big team was the Red Sox’ AAA affiliate, lovingly known as the PawSox. As an aside, Pawtucket lost their beloved franchise to a newer stadium in Worcester (pronounced Wooster), MA, with the unfortunate nickname, WooSox, but there you go. Anyway, we invented a character for Boulder City, their all-time leading home run hitter, Bob “Long Ball” Bixon. As it turns out, Long Ball was a bit disappointed at the turn out for Bob Long Ball Bixon Bobblehead night, and who could blame him? As a former Boulder star who hit 38 career homers, he thought he deserved a bigger turnout. We didn’t tell him that half the people who attended were there for the postgame fireworks, because you know, Long Ball is sensitive about stuff like that. Let’s keep it as our secret, huh.

So that’s it for this week. We will be back at it again with two new ones. Until then, have a great weekend.

Andy and John

No Clue 7/16/21

Events. Weddings, funerals, unveilings, bar/bat mitzvahs, confirmations, graduations, gender reveal parties, you name it, there’s an event made especially for it. And if the event is about someone in your immediate family, chances are there’s a receiving line where people shake your hand or kiss you and tell you how happy/sorry they are for your gain (marriage/baby/graduation) or loss (funeral) and then comes the kicker — the sentiment that it’s a shame we only see each other at these kinds of events and let’s get together soon. Let’s be honest. There are those few that we really would love to get together with except for the fact that you live too far away from them, and then there are those who, well, ‘ya know. This first comic is dedicated to them.

The second comic in your feed comes from a patented inability to find a tv show on a given network or “platform.” First of all, platforms are for diving or giving speeches, not for watching tv shows. Secondly, how the f#@! do you find them? One half of the New 60 team is currently at a beach house and tried to find something on Netflix the other night. I was struggling with three remotes lying out on the living room table. The cable remote has a button called tv input, and if you keep pressing it, you can go from “living room hd” to HDMI 1, 2, etc. As I was struggling with this, my 35-year-old son-in-law picked up another remote and pushed a large button entitled “Netflix.” Who knew? At any rate, it worked. My bar? As long as I can record the Mets and the NBA playoffs, I’m good.

That’s it for this week. I know it’s a little bit on the short side, but there’s this beach house and well, the sun is out and I’m outta here. See you next week with two new ones thanks to our virtual meetings on zoom, but wait, the signal here is weak, so what if I cancel my video feed, well, wait, what about FaceTime, hey, did you just hang up on me, oh there you are…

By hook or by crook, we’ll be there. Have a great weekend,

Andy and John

These are a few of my favorite things 7/09/21

It’s kinda hard to believe that we are already past two of the big three summer holidays. At least we don’t have to go back to school. But as we race along through the year, it’s good to take stock of where we’ve been and where we’re going. Like Marv, who moved his mom into an assisted living home, where she was happy to go (hey this is a comic and things work out the way we want them to work out, okay)? But now it was time to get her papers in order, whatever that means. To me it means shuffling them around and putting them into piles that make sense at the time, and then never doing anything with those piles. But it was in the nascent days of The New 60 when John and I were at work on a bunch of upcoming comics. We had yet to hit our working rhythm. So, we would either work at his apartment on the balcony or my apartment on the balcony (this is before he moved over 100 miles away-maybe it was my breath?). This was also before the invention of Zoom. On this particular day we were working on my deck and John showed me a bunch of magic marker-type drawings he had done for upcoming ideas. He was very well prepared. He even came with stones to use as paperweights. Trouble is, I live right by the Hudson River and it gets pretty windy (note, if Larry David hadn’t already made it his trademark, I would’ve said, pretty, pretty, pretty windy, but he already said it so I can’t). Moving on, John neglected to place said drawings under said stones when a huge gust of wind came along and blew all the papers off the deck. I live on the 3rd floor so we had to knock on the people’s door on the second floor whohave the deck right below me, and then we actually broke into the deck on the ground floor and recovered almost everything, and while I was breaking and entering, John was going through some prickly shrubbery to recover the rest, and eventually emerged, worse for wear. Somehow, this turned into Marv losing his mom’s papers, but you get the idea.

Next up is the guys at the diner talking about one of their favorite topics, food. Hint to our women fans, when guys get together (heterosexual guys anyway), they used to talk about girls but after a certain age, they talk about food. Not just any food, but the food we sneak so you don’t see us eating it. There, the secret’s out. Shoot me. On second thought, please don’t. We had a lot of (un)healthy debate about McDonald’s vs White Castle vs In ‘n Out, but thought In ‘n Out was too esoteric for our east coasters. Another hint, if you go to In ‘n Out, as I once did with my nephew David, order it “animal style.” It’s an insider’s secret he taught me and now, well, I’ve blown that too. In short, don’t tell me secrets. Shhh. That’ll be our little secret.

We will see you next week with two new ones hot off the press. Until then enjoy your summer weekend.

Andy and John

The Great Outdoors 7/2/21

Is it just us or does it seem like the older we get, the more time flies? I mean it seems like only yesterday when we were stuck indoors, wearing masks every time we stepped outside. The thought of going to a restaurant or an outdoor baseball game seemed out of the question. And now? 17,000 people are packed into indoor basketball arenas, maskless, screaming their heads off. And are we really on the cusp of Independence Day 2021 already? So John and I decided we would celebrate our recent relative freedom by doing a maskless 4th of July celebration. With a tan line. If you remember last year’s 4th of July version, we had our guys mistakenly squirting a giant size bottle of hand sanitizer on their hot dogs. This year, a few lines from masking up outdoors. That is a definite sign of progress.

The second strip on your scroll is one of our favorites. As John says to me, you just live your life and tell me the incidents and I will make them funny. To me they are funny enough already, but as my dominant sense is verbal, and comics are basically a visual medium, I see his point. As James Thurber, a noted author and cartoonist once said, “A drawing is always dragged down to the level of its caption.” In any case I was supposed to be writing about the comic. Here’s the inspiration; my wife and I sold our house and moved to an apartment when our kids were grown up and living on their own. One of my favorite activities is to go out on the deck, sit in a lounge chair to meditate and look out over the Hudson River. We planted beautiful pots of flowers on the deck to enhance the view. I like to go outside and commune with nature as I do a 20-minute meditation. The birds are attracted to the flowers and often come and sit on the deck railing by the flowers and call out to each other. At first I thought this was incredibly charming and wonderful. Then the birds got a little louder and started calling to each other from other decks. It got so I couldn’t concentrate on my meditation. Caw, caw, Tweet, Tweet, CHIRP, CHIRP! Suddenly my calm was broken and I started thinking, “Will you shut the f@#% up already!” And there you have it, with the add-on of a concerned neighbor thrown in for a laugh. I actually don’t have a concerned neighbor, or if I did, she was out of town, because I gave those birds a piece of my mind alright. I guess it didn’t matter because they were back the next day and every day thereafter. We sure showed them. We just rented a beach house and left them behind. Now all I have to interrupt my meditation are crickets, cicadas and whatever crazy, unsanitary thoughts are rolling through my mind at the moment. That’s all. But in fact, that’s a lot.

See you next week with two new ones, both maskless.

Andy and John

On implants and veggie dogs 6/25/21

I was in Pittsburgh this past weekend and was bemoaning the loss of a cultural institution there, The Original Hot Dog Shop, listed in Google as “permanently closed.” It was better known as “The Dirty O” or “Essie’s Original Hot Dog Shop,” and it closed after 60 years. It opened up a block away from Forbes Field, where the Pirates used to play, and it debuted in 1960, the year the Pirates beat the Yankees in the World Series. The “O” was so beloved, Mark Cuban tried to buy it to save it, but to no avail. So there I was in Pittsburgh lamenting the loss of the “O” (full disclosure, I had a hot dog and fries there at 3 am after my wedding, some 37 years ago). So I asked a friend, where do you go for a dog these days? And he said Dee’s, without a moment’s hesitation. He added that he went there with his family, including his wife who does NOT like hot dogs. So she ordered a veggie dog, and when she asked the counterman what she should put on it, he replied, “meat.” So there it is. The New 60’s first ever comic that came complete with a punchline. Over the years, we’ve gotten lots of suggestions for ideas that we have taken and tweaked. But until now, no idea had ever come complete with a funny ending. I promised never to use people’s names to avoid embarrassing them, but in this case you know who you are and thanks for the story. It went down easier than, dare we say it, a veggie dog. A lot easier.

The second strip also came from a personal experience. This happened when my dentist shaved my four lower middle teeth into nubs and my periodontist pulled them a couple weeks ago. He put it implants, and I have to wait three months for them to heal. Now, if you are a certain type of person (hint: a guy) and you hear the word “implants,” what do you think of? Not teeth. And that’s what propelled us to our second comic of the week. One reason we love this comic is because it leads us to conversations like the following. I was getting off the plane Monday and looked at my phone and John had sent me his pencil sketch of the implants’ comic. The ending had Sam a little confused as he wondered why anyone would want bigger teeth. I wondered if “bigger” was the right word. Might it be fuller teeth or perhaps rounder teeth? In other words, what word would make the reader think instantly of breast implants. After much back and forth, we decided on “bigger.” And to think we could get paid for doing this…

Enjoy your summer as it starts warming up for good. Half of the New 60 staff is heading out to the beach, but don’t worry, this comic works remotely as well. Have a great weekend and we will be back to you next Friday with two new ones.

Andy and John

Expectations 6/18/21

Sometimes things turn out much, much better than we expect. And sometimes they turn out a lot worse. I remember once coming home to find my young son with an enormous 6’5” mountain of a man, I had never met before. When I went to ask him who he was I noticed he was teaching my son the alphabet. Turns out he was the boyfriend (and later husband) of our nanny who was taking care of our older daughter at the time. He was partially the inspiration for Sonny, the tattooed, ex-con, mountain of a man who is quietly becoming the best nanny we’ve ever seen. Sam and Shellie hit the nanny-jackpot with Sonny. We combined this story with another one that takes place outside my window several times a week. What I have observed is a mommy-exercise class. All these new moms have their babies in jogging strollers, including the instructor, who shouts out exercises they do while hanging on to the backs of their strollers. My daughter, a recent mother herself, enrolled in such a class in Brooklyn. One of the funnier incidents she recalled occurred when the instructor was demonstrating leg lifts (expertly illustrated by John) while simultaneously changing the diaper of her own baby! Anyway, since this is about Sonny, we changed the class to a nanny-exercise class. There really isn’t a big difference between a mommy class and a nanny class except for the fact that the nannies aren’t clad head-to-toe in Lululemon gear.

Now you might be wondering why I first talk about the second comic you see. I have reasons but they are both complicated and boring, not the stuff for a blog. Suffice it to say that the latest comic you enter appears first in the newsletter. Now you probably have no idea what I just said do you? That’s okay because I don’t either.

Moving onto the second strip (which of course appears first - don’t ask, I’m beggin’ you), we revisit the constantly evolving world of bicycles. There are two basic types of riders. One, like John, have carbon-fiber bikes that weigh only a couple pounds, and they also have pedals that require a special bike shoe that clips into said pedals. They think nothing of taking a 50-mile ride (I think that’s a lot of distance even when i’m in a car). Apparently, you have to wear brightly-colored spandex (which is a total non-starter for yours truly). As for the clip-on shoes, you just have to remember to unlatch one of your feet before you come to a stop, otherwise, crash! The other type of bike rider is like me. I have an electric, pedal-assist bike that helps me get up steep hills (after which I turn the motor off, I promise!!). It weighs about 55 pounds and has upright handlebars and a comfy seat. Readers, no matter which type of rider you are, we all experience the occasional fall. But when you pass 60 years of age, a fall exposes a dichotomy. The dichotomy is between the way we perceive ourselves as bike riders and the way others perceive us. I know this because I fell about a year ago after just passing the entrance to my apartment building. I sheepishly got up and before I could hop on the bike again, 5 or 6 workers, gardeners, delivery guys, etc., all came sprinting to the scene of the accident and asked if I was okay. ‘I’m fine,’ I insisted as I ignored the pain in my left buttock. Marv stands in as a cross between my type of bike rider and John’s.

That’s it for this week. We will see you (at least virtually) next week with two new ones. Until then, have a great weekend and if you happen to go for a bike ride, please, unclip your foot BEFORE you stop.

Andy and John

On Gender Reveal Parties and Emotional Support Animals 6/11/21

If you are a regular reader of The New 60 Comic (and if you’re reading this blog there’s a good chance that you are indeed a regular reader) you probably wonder why everything is becoming more and more complicated. Case in point, the gender reveal party. Used to be, your kid called you and said something like, “Mom, dad, we’re pregnant!” To which you would respond, “Oh that’s great,” and you’d follow it up with, “Do you know what you’re having,” and they’d either tell you or say, we didn’t want to know, we want it to be a surprise.” SImple, right? And then once the baby was born, you could come to the hospital and figure it out the old fashioned way. But now? Noooo way. Introducing The Gender Reveal Party. Like a lot of things these days, people compete over who has the most dramatic reveal. One brilliant couple in California decided to shoot off pink fireworks to reveal they were having a baby girl. Congratulations guys. Only trouble was 1) it was in the middle of an historic drought, 2 )the temperatures were extremely hot and dry and 3) there were strong Santa Ana winds. Know what happened? They started a wildfire that burned thousands of acres of forest, forced people from their homes, and killed others who couldn’t escape fast enough. But at least they got to tell everyone they had a girl. Fortunately, we chose to make our young couple a little more responsible and just send up balloons. which are kind of dramatic, and also ensures there’ll be plenty of helium left over to inhale and enable people to speak in really high voices.

Which brings us to emotional support. With the world getting more and more complex (ever try to find a radio station on your car these days), some of us (okay,okay LOTS of us) have turned to our doctors to help us cope with anti-anxiety and anti-depression. We consume drugs as if they were giant-sized party bags of m&m’s. But what if you want a non-medical way to cope? How about an emotional support animal? These have proved very helpful to people of all ages coping with all sorts of issues. Just recently a friend of mine (who shall go nameless to protect the innocent) found out her emotional support cat was very sick. The emotional support animal now needed her emotional support. What happens if you weren’t trained as an emotional support human? What do you do then, huh? Maybe there is such a thing as an emotional support animal specifically trained to provide emotional support to emotional support animals who are suffering. Or maybe this blogger needs to find himself a real job.

Okay that’s it for this week, see you next week with two new ones. Stay safe everyone,

Andy and John

Sam Comes Back 6/4/21

When we first started this comic, we thought it would be fun to have a diverse set of friends, not only diverse in the racial sense, but also diverse in how their lives turned out. Gives us lots of fodder for different plots. That’s why in addition to two married couples (Al/Joanne and Marv/Rachel) we have a single guy dating (Craig) and a guy on his second marriage (Sam). At first Sam was the object of jealousy when he married a woman 20 years his junior (Shellie). And then she got pregnant and had a baby (Sammy) and suddenly the gang was not jealous of Sam anymore.

Because John and I are in our 60’s and our kids are all grown up, we tend to forget what a tremendous amount of time and effort it took to raise children from infancy. Now, because I’m a new grandpa, I see it up close and cannot believe we got through it in one piece. Suffice it to say, Sam is not getting through it in one piece. So they hired a babysitter with an advanced degree in child development. The fact that he’s covered in tattoos and just came out of prison is entirely beside the point. Who are we to judge? Well, it turns out we’re just like everyone else. So we introduce you to the new male babysitter, Sonny. He will give Sam some form of his old life back again and he gives us a fun new character to play with.

This week we reintroduce Sam back to the diner with his buddies and then take him to the park where Marv gets to meet Sonny for the first time. We hope, once you finish judging him, you will grow to love him. Afterall, there’s nothing to lose, because what the hell, it’s not like he’s looking after YOUR kid.

Have a good weekend (even if it’s cold and rainy) and we will see you next week with two new ones.

Andy and John

Sid Grows Up (Al, not so much) 5/28/21

It’s easy for a couple of older guys to poke fun at 30+ year-olds still living at home. But the world today isn’t like the one we grew up with. Steady jobs with benefits that have a career path have been replaced by freelance gigs with no benefits whatsoever. They usually end with some form of “Thanks for the work, we’ll call you again next time we need you.” Followed by the click of a phone hanging up. Sigh. I actually once worked at an agency where I asked one of the other creative directors, “How do you find people who are content making the same ads into different sizes to fit different digital platforms?” His response, “I look for people with no ambition. People who are just happy to have a job.” Yikes. Well, your intrepid cartoonists were not about to let Sid suffer the same fate. So he sold his app for beaucoup bucks. And now he’s a big shot, in the way kids finding their first jobs and apartments are big shots. No place to sit, not furniture, not enough plates or silverware but, damn, there has to be room for a 70” hi-def tv and a Peloton. The Peloton is important because who among us wouldn’t want to have a $5,000 machine featuring a televised sweaty person in much better shape than we will ever be, screaming at you to tighten up that resistance screw, stand up on those pedals and move! move! move! That they have. A couch with an ottoman? Not so much.

And we also wanted to visit that age old tradition when your kid picks up the check for dinner. Most people are touched with love and admiration and a feeling akin to, “Wow our little (fill in the name) has really grown up!” Well, Al feels that as well, but a little dessert and an after-dinner drink would make him feel even better. As long as it’s on Sid.

We’ve spent a lot of time on kids lately. Grown up kids like Sid and his sister. New kids like the one Sam just had. And new grandparents like our characters will soon become (just wait for our upcoming gender reveal party). Maybe it’s because one of us (me) just became a grandpa or maybe it’s just that Spring is in the air, and we see lots of baby carriages out there. In any event we’ve got a lot of fresh new storylines out there for the summer and the best part about our comic book children, is that their crying makes no noise, they can’t pee or throw up on you, and when you’re done reading, you’re done. Sounds like a good deal to us.

See you next week with two new ones,

Andy and John

Sonny Starts and Sam's a Free Man 5/21/21

Becoming a grandfather for the first time in your 60’s is a wonderful experience. Becoming a father for the first time in your 60’s? Not so much. At least not in our limited imaginations. So we show Sam in his attempt to be a househusband and he fails spectacularly. That’s one element of our story. The next one is the search for a babysitter or nanny, if you will. So we decided to go against type. Instead of the typical au pair from a Scandinavian country, we decided to go with a big guy with two sleeves of tattoos who has been recently released from prison. And, of course, he happens to be an impeccable choice. On a personal note I happen to have a son with two sleeves of tattoos who happens to be great with kids, though thankfully, he’s not a prisoner.

Our ex-con Sonny studied child psychology while he was in the pen and has a chance to show off his skills. As a babysitter/nanny, he beats the hell out of Sam, who has never been to prison either (at least not as far as we know). And now, a brief respite from the land of funny into the land of serious. These days there is a rash of violence between people just because somebody looks different or comes from a different country or speaks a different language or even has an accent. Sonny is our small attempt to say don’t judge a book by its cover. And yes, you CAN teach an old dog new tricks.

We will see you guys next week with two new ones featuring a return visit from one of our most popular characters, Al and Joanne’s son, Sid.

Have a great and (at least in some areas) maskless weekend.

Andy and John

Sam Embraces Fatherhood 5/14/21

Being a new father is exhilarating, life-altering and exhausting. But what about if you’re in your 60’s? Luckily, neither John nor I would know, but what follows is what we imagine it would be like. This series is informed by friends of ours who are first time grandparents in their 60’s. It’s pretty much the same experience, except you don’t get to give the kid back to the real mommy and daddy once the weekend is over. In Sam’s case He IS the real daddy. I have a friend who started taking off Fridays so he could help his pregnant daughter by babysitting her toddler. My buddy and his granddaughter had a great routine culminating in lunch at the diner, followed by nap time. Yeah right. Grandpa and his granddaughter would head back to his daughter’s house and lie on couches facing one another. He would put his granddaughter’s favorite blankie around her, and take another blanket for himself. It’s debatable who needed the nap more. Actually, it’s not very debatable at all because each time my friend would feel himself drifting off, his granddaughter would get up off the couch and pull his blanket off, giggling. This went on for a long time before she finally wore out. And by that time, he was toast. That was with one grandchild. Now there are two, and instead of playing man-to-man he was forced to switch to a zone defense.

Our second comic features the other 60-somethings commenting on Sam’s absence from their diner crew. A guy’s gotta do what a guy’s gotta do, but somehow, someway, he’ll get a babysitter and then life can go back to normal, or at least he can join his buddies at the diner once a week. Is that too much to ask? Not only does a newborn add a lot to life, it also adds many a plot twist to your favorite comic strip. You’ll see them in the coming weeks. Sam got more than what he bargained for but he and Shellie and his buddies at the diner will all figure it out. Or, as the Beatles once famously sang, Ob-la-di, ob-la-da/Life goes on, bra…

See you next week with two new chapters in the continuing saga of Stay at Home Sam.

Have a great weekend,

Andy and John