New Weekly Voting Incentive: SARTORIAL NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS!
2014 is behind us, and the Puck gang is vowing to not make the same fashion-related mistakes they made last year! Vote for Puck on TWC to see Phoebe’s resolution right now! A new one featuring Puck will pop up later this week, so keep voting to catch it!
CLICK HERE TO VOTE FOR PUCK! IT’S RICH IN VITAMIN P!
As for this comic…
Desperate times call for desperate measures, as they say. But if you have to send someone to distract a nosy in-law, why not send the only person who can’t clearly verbalize her objection?
Puck 267
Chapter: The Tale of Two BlondesCharacters: Colin's Mom Miranda Phoebe PuckTags: art of war baby shower
New Weekly Voting Incentive: SARTORIAL NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS!
2014 is behind us, and the Puck gang is vowing to not make the same fashion-related mistakes they made last year! Vote for Puck on TWC to see Phoebe’s resolution right now! A new one featuring Puck will pop up later this week, so keep voting to catch it!
CLICK HERE TO VOTE FOR PUCK! IT’S RICH IN VITAMIN P!
As for this comic…
Desperate times call for desperate measures, as they say. But if you have to send someone to distract a nosy in-law, why not send the only person who can’t clearly verbalize her objection?
I’m wondering how accurate the little one’s lines are.
Relatively inaccurate. Babies under three months generally only cry high-pitched squeals of displeasure. The ‘goo goo ga ga’ and babbling stuff doesn’t start until later. But I get bored of ‘wah’ so there we are.
actually, according to scientists (who seem to have time to check into ANYTHING), babies in any nation ALL (and I do mean ALL) have the same six-cry vocabulary.
the documentary I watched on it played recordings of each cry and what the cry meant. I could not have told the difference to save my life, but it appears the babies’ mothers heard the differences VERY distinctly.
I guess I wouldn’t be a very good mother. quite convenient I’m male, in that case.
Yeah, there are some distinct ‘newborn baby’ sounds, and they’re really quite limited. I wouldn’t be able to tell you the meanings of them, though. I leave that to the kooky scientists.
They’re all horrible sounds. Completely unacceptable as attempts at communication. The only appropriate response to is to ignore them. Out-stubborning a baby is quite easy, in fact. They CAN be taught that silence serves their needs better than noise.
Wow, hot temper decent fighting skills and knows tactics. If I had any doubt that she could be seriously dangerous, its gone now.
As for the voting incentive. The first thing I thought was She’s not going to wear cloths?!? How will that stop accidents?
Well, that would be one surefire way to increase accidents.
A tactic so low, so underhanded, so despicable that even the daughter of Satan disapproves!
Seriously, I like Pheobe more and more and more…. Her evil plan seems to be working on me!
Well, Satan’s daughter is pretty lightweight here, in all honesty. But in any conflict, no matter what the stakes, my bets are always on Puck. She has the malice, coupled with the intelligence, and topped with a general hatred for her fellow human beings which frees her up to do many, many things in the quest for victory.
given pucks everyday life, i´d say thats reasonable survival literature 😉 also, kudos for not letting mom join the fight – while she´s a bitch i n her own right and would certainly deserve a lesson or two, adding her into the mix would make the whole thing instable and, when mom and her spawn unite, possibly backfire against puck and co.
also, phoebe should SO take lessons from puck. i bet satan would aprove!
Mom would be an irritating factor in the affair – like Canada or Australia joining the war. They’re not necessarily going to be a deciding factor, but it’s a pain to have them involved.
Baby is saying: “WHAT?!” and “NO, Mommy! I want to be with you when the bad things happen! Don’t give me away to the woman who smells like mothballs and has no milk!”
You know babies so well.
I knew what my sister’s baby was saying whenever I got to hold her.
…
“MOMMY! DO NOT WANT! VOICE TOO DEEP AND NO MILK!”
I see Puck has taken chapter three to heart… (It’s been a long time since I read that book, I don’t even recall if it has chapters)
You’d think that baby had just seen the devil herself.
“The Art of War” is not nearly as exciting as its title would suggest. It’s mostly intelligent and sensible advice, and has no parts about the joy of seeing your enemy flee before you and listening to the lamentations of the women. Contrast that Ovid’s “The Art of Love”, which is EXACTLY as exciting as its title suggests. And hilarious.
On a random note, whatever happened to that dude who hated Daphne just for the sake of hating her? He get banned?
I don’t ban people for dumb criticism! I haven’t banned anyone yet, actually. That guy was a one-off reader. He came; he ranted; he left.
Job Opening ?
Gosh… giving your child to the mother-in-law/boyfriends mother… for the moment you are safe 😛 but she’s going to use this incident against you in the future…
And all those barfed-on blankies and pooped-on sheets? Yeah, they were deserved 😛
Well, the barfed-on blankies and pooped-on sheets will happen no matter what, whatever their motive. Why not put your child to work? Life affords us so few opportunities to profit from our children anymore.
Pretty sure Sun Tzu wrote that in the book. …Pretty sure. Now I need to find the damn book hidden somewhere…
To be honest, I quite agree with Puck’s reasoning; it’s bad enough to have two people arguing and involving a third one (step-mother/grandmother) would just make things… Awkward.
I recall a friend telling me he had a baby shower right before new years 2013 (why? I don’t know; the kid was eight months at the time) and he told me “he’s gonna have another one each year”.
Me: …I thought baby showers was once/baby?
Him: …What’s your point?
Me: If you’re gonna make one each year… You’ll need a LOT of babies.
Him: …Wait, I do?
Me: …Pretty sure you do.
Him: …Think you can take care of the kids while I produce some new offspring?
…He’s still wondering why my girlfriend and I refuse to speak to him again.
This is a guy who needs not to be spoken to. Not sure why someone would actively want to create the shower experience every year. I mean, the profit element is always eclipsed by the misery.
isn’t the yearly baby shower in question really called birthday parties? I think they guy go the information mixed up.
Yeah, that sounds like a question of terminology. Call it a birthday and life is good.
Almost looks like little Miranda is making a sign-language gesture. Unfortunately I can’t read it; I only know a little of the alphabet…
I think she’s signing “Awagha!”
Ah, the famous art of war “diaper gambit”
“Clever is the one who knows her baby, for to know your baby is to know when she is about to let a really messy one loose, allowing you to trade her off to someone else in the nick of time.”
Sun Tzu’s art of Parenting… “The best child ever raised is the one not born.”
I thought it was
“the best child ever to raise skips the teens”
Hello from Ireland
stumbled across this comic last nite and somehow got through all of them in less than 6 hours between 2 days
i think ive found a new favorite webcomic
Yay for Ireland! And yes, it’s the sad truth that all the strips, which I’ve spent thousands of hours working on, can be easily read in one sitting. But no matter. Glad you enjoyed!
well it makes a change for me to find a webcomic i like, i was quite disappointed to reach the end and realize ive to wait till next week to view more
Well, it’ll be WAY slower reading from this point forward. Just a strip a week.
Whaaaat ?
Someone is skipping the COMMENTS !
Only the most dedicated and hearty of readers reads the comments. Though I do pride myself on the fact that the comments section is a bit more enlightened and entertaining than your average Youtube comments section.
I think it’s really ironic that Puck’s making use of Sun Tzu’s Art of War considering how I even suggested devoting a vote comic to him being given a test of his military skills by the king of Wu.
I really hope that Phoebe is about as good at sticking with her New Year’s resolution as I am (which is not very good at all). She definitely deserves more screen time.
Also, I really admire how ruthless Puck can be when she needs to. Or wants to. It’s not something I usually consider an attractive trait in people, but she makes it… kind of… hot.
Well, dogged ruthlessness is attractive when you feel like you share common goals or values with the dogged, ruthless person. And I do here. I think most people do.
As for Phoebe’s New Year’s resolution, I can assure you that she’ll be terrible at sticking with it. Terrible. Guaranteed.
Daphne has been my favorite so far with her gamer nature and sarcastic attitude, but there’s something very alluring about a woman who keeps The Art of War next to her bed. That’s probably a very bad sign for any future progeny I may be “blessed” with.
You, sir, have terrible taste in women. Which means you’ll live an interesting life, most likely.
Socrates’ advice to men= “All men should marry. If you get a good wife you will be happy, and if you get a bad one you will become a philosopher.”
Or a playwright! Happy people seldom generate good fiction.
I think Puck will make use of Sun Tzu in future strips.
I love how the baby looks more upset that she is giving her to her grandma then anything
I tried to have the baby speak with her eyes.
In the the G.I. Joe cartoon Cobra stole Sun Tzu’s DNA in order to make Serpentor.
Actually, didn’t Sergeant Slaughter stop the attempt to use Sun Tzu’s DNA?
Will we ever meet any of Puck’s or Phoebe’s siblings?
Not until I run out of other good ideas. And my ‘good’ ideas currently will last me for the next decade, so I don’t think they’ll show any time soon. I’m pretty sure that neither of them have siblings that they know about.
“Distract bitch mother in law with baby”
– Sun Tsu, Art of War
That’s in ‘Art of War’ somewhere, I’m sure.
When times are tough, use subterfuge.
If you’re really in the groove you can use a baby like Perseus used Aegis, deflecting the attention/comment/wrath/gaze of multiple grand parents like a Porche deflects the rain… AND if you can tickle on the fly, the giggling baby is like a high powered “Happy Ray” fired upon the unsuspecting bystanders forcing them to forget their pettiness and immediately go, “Aaawwwwwww…”!
Are you sure you haven’t been trained in the dark baby arts? Because it sounds like you have.
Wow. “real mothering skills.” Puck, you just got burned, didn’t you notice?
I like to insert the odd ‘sick burn’ into the comic here and there.
Hey, not sure if you remember me. I wrote a blog post about your comic way back when. I just popped by to tell you that your art and writing have both gotten a lot better over the last two years! They weren’t too shabby to begin with, either!
I’ve had fun following Ramen Empire for a while now, so yeah! I totally remember you. And thanks for the vote of support. It’s good to know that I’m improving, even without a concerted effort to improve.
Don’t know why there isn’t a link to your comic in my sidebar. So I’ll put one there, ’cause that’s an oversight.
Wow, the poor child was nothing more than a tool used in the grander scheme of things. Nice move for the immediate future. 😀
Life is cruel. Even for teeny babies.
Sgt.Slaughter’s DNA was stolen by Cobra to replace Sun Tzu’s in the G.I.Joe cartoon.
I’ve read “The Art of War”. I quite agree here. It does have some great ideas for just such a situation as is depicted on this page. LOL.
It’s a book full of wisdom. Chock full.
Yes, it is. I need to read it again, though. It’s been several months since I read it.