Regular commenter, Downpuppy made a great suggestion yesterday, that the floating “Go on” quote really had to do with Cherry making a comment to Cliff, as in ‘Tell us more!” Makes sense to me.

Mark and Cherry sure seem excited in panel 1! Just how many times is Cliff going to repeat the news about going to Las Vegas for a Woodsman Olympics? This is the third time in 4 strips.

And where is the money for this trip coming from? I seem to recall they didn’t even have enough money in the bank to put in a water heater a few months back. This trip is not a sanctioned, paying job from Bill Ellis, either. I bet there is even a signup fee. And to top it off, Cherry wants to blow a wad of money at the slots. No wonder they had no savings for home improvements!  Poor Rusty will be left behind, having to eat wild hickory nuts for his meals.

Well, you can make up your own mind about how Jules Rivera drew Cliff in that inset in panel 1, but it certainly looks to me like Cliff’s been taking hormone treatments.

What also struck me right away is how Cliff got Mark’s “invitation” to this Woodsman Olympics? Why wouldn’t Mark get the invitation? And how did Cliff even get an invitation in the first place, since he has no “woodsman” experience, other than fishing. Or is that the hard work Cliff alluded to in Monday’s strip? This sounds like some kind of scam to me, which Mark will undoubtedly discover and try to destroy. Anyway, why did Rivera feel the need to drag this phone call out as long as excruciatingly possible, repeating a lot of the same information along the way? I mean, she has control over her own stories and their duration (I think!), so why slow-walk the teaser? Let’s get this story moving!