I really thought things were coming along, well, swimmingly, with regard to resolving this pesky boat/gators problem, when Rivera decided to move the water farther back, then give Mark apparent super strength. And also a third-rate punchline that makes no sense (to me).

But no way is somebody going to manually push a 15-foot grounded powerboat stuck in sand back into the water without assistance. And if Rusty is going to drive out the boat, doesn’t he first have to turn it on? Does he know how to do that, with somebody else’s boat? Well, details.

So, will Cherry & Company show up by Thursday’s strip? It would be kind of pointless to show up as they spot the boat churning away in the distance. That might happen in real life, but who wants that? This is an adventure strip. If you want real life, go read Peanuts.

Schulz died almost 23 years ago, but his strips continue to be recycled, like the nonstop reruns on Me TV. I reckon that is just fine for fans too cheap to go out and buy all of the reprint books available, so that the newspaper can give the slot to an up-and-coming cartoonist. But that is not what editors care about.