The Sheriff, that is… There are times this strip doesn’t move and then there are times that it jump-cuts to another dimension…  such as today’s installment where there would seem to be no concerns over Sheriff Stober and his long-barreled peacemaker…

This has to be the first time we ever saw Ol’ Baldy smile, too…  Fast forward to tomorrow’s (or next week’s) installment and we will see a rogue funnel cloud drop out of nowhere and take out the small plane… Whereupon Blondie races into Mark’s arms which gives him the opportunity to declare his happily married state… then onto the Ferret Fields?  One can only hope…

Oh, and on the topic of going nowhere fast, check out Judge Parker today…

Can’t hardly wait ’til tomorrow!!

…than being called, “Cop…”  “That’s Sheriff to you, Mr. Clean…  I don’t stand for re-election every 4 years to be called Cop, thank you very much…”

So with Mark held Hostage (Hey, that’s Rusty’s job!!) we are again left to ponder for a day or two how this will resolve… Hey, I know, Mark, why don’t you wheel around and take out Baldy at the knees?  Do you really think he’s going to shoot?  I don’t.  And what about you, Johnny?  You are chasing Blondie who has voluntarily taken herself out of the picture for now, posing no threat.  She can be mopped up later… You’d do better to get the drop on Baldy as his attention is now fully on Sheriff Stober.  But hey, what do I know??

Which might account for Johnny’s actions and dialogue in the third panel.  As Blondie considers her options, she is surrounded by a miasma of despair and regret that blocks out all the natural and man-made surroundings…

For students of the Trailverse, let’s also consider how the universe has been reshaped… If the third panel was placed on a placard, without dialogue, presented and the question was posed, “good guy or bad guy?”  the obvious answer would be “bad.”  Look at the markers- long hair, unshaven face, brandishing weapons in an aggressive way… Even Sheriff Stober’s sideburns would have no place on the shiny side of the old coin…  I guess we live in a much different world now, don’t we??

“Cover me!” Johnny says…  in directive fashion that may have the sheriff complying with his wish… or not… which means Johnny’s life as a “save-the-dayer” might be short lived… But boy he looks super cool brandishing  those six shooters that Sheriff Stober’s Grandfather used to use for evil purposes…  in a way faintly reminiscent of Butch and Sundance…  and don’t forget… Sheriff Stober carries a tomahawk!

…that Sheriff…

Calm and crouching, he puts a bullet right where he wants to- just above head level and into the building.  No sense in actually shooting anyone, right?   Just need to let them know who has the superior steel…

And now it’s Baldy telling people to stay clear of harm’s way?  Since when did he acquire an ounce of empathy?  Of course as Mark, invincible as ever, makes himself available for stray bullets, it’s Blondie that realizes that life is nothing but a series of choices… some good, some not so good, that land us where we happen to be at any given time.  And right now she’s wishing she’d finished Pre-Algebra in the 9th grade and didn’t leave school to wander west…

I think Blondie wasted a round when Mark was getting his punch on…

And Baldy has now fired off 3 more in what appears to be a six-shooter…  Assuming that Blondie’s gun is fully loaded, that leaves 6-4+6=8 rounds left before reloading…

So now that we are all aware of of everyone else, what prevents a Mexican Standoff?  Am I still allowed to say that?  What does it even mean??

Thank you, Google… and yes, completely on point.  I predict that the FBI will swoop in with Helicopter (maybe Cal from the Island “Adventure…”) and save the day.  Wouldn’t be the first time that the Feds have made an appearance in these “stories…”

OK!  We are finally coming to the climax!    Not that we’ll ever get to see a prairie dog or a black-footed ferret!

As if…

Looks like in panel one Sheriff Stober has mastered the art of ventriloquism…  The words come out, but the lips aren’t moving!  But in panel two the right-eye-dominant lawman has a bead on Ol’ Baldy and Blondie! I feel the end coming!  It can’t be more than a couple of weeks now, kids!!

What the – !?

And had we noticed before that Blondie is also a leftie?  A southpaw?  Depending on the source, and who knows whether a study has ever actually been done, estimates indicate a range from 10-15% of the general population that is left-handed.  Seems like my life is full of lefties, though… my wife, mom, grandpa, two cousins, two of the four people who report to me at work, not to mention my boss… and it seems that my rate of discovery is only increasing… I was in a meeting the other day with 8 people in the room and 5 were taking notes with their left hands!!  I am hopelessly right handed, for the record.

So with the tried and true “I’ve got a bad feeling about this!” Mark is now being marched at double-gunpoint to some airstrip that by pure circumstance happens to be near the ghost town…  with Sheriff and Johnny skulking about in the shadows…

I saw yesterday’s strip and had to move on…

I mean really?  I’m no Calvinist, but I really don’t need to see a full frame close-up of Sheriff Stober’s swimsuit area…  and vague references to his “pistols.”

So now that Johnny is all gunned up and ready for a shootout, Sheriff is hoping that they just roll up like a pill bug and surrender…  Not likely, though, as Baldie is itching for a fight, and it appears that he’s not going to let anyone get between him and his money…   or the money that he claims to be his…  I mean how much are we talking, really?  Assuming he has to split it among his accomplices, even if there is now one less,  there probably isn’t enough to last him past a good bender or two, at which point he’s back on the robber circuit doing this all over again…

To the comments that pop up periodically questioning the “logic,” or lack thereof, concerning the hopelessly meandering and non-sequitur quality of the plot line, I hear you.  I guess I’ve been beaten into submission and accepted that they won’t tie up, or off… unless they do in a subsequent story arc, the way that Dr. Joyce first appeared in the Mississippi Ken and Barbie adventure only to have her show up in the Badlands…  And remember, that this going-on-a-year long slog has only covered roughly two days in real time, so when you look at it that way, there is always going to be “plenty of time” to bring seemingly meaningless plot points together…

Mark’s power of suggestion is getting to at least one of them…

Almost like Jedi Mind Tricks…  He lures people in with the power of suggestion… suggesting that he knows more than they do…  Again, this is a ‘new’ Mark… I prefer the old one that led with his fists.

Goodness, Mark, you are such a bore…  an absolute Buzz Killington…

So where’s your NOAA Weather Radio?  Pretty sure you don’t leave home without it… or at least the App…  Why don’t you help Baldie download it onto his phone, that way he’d have up-to-the-minute information about weather conditions in the local area!  And his safety would be assured!  Because if there’s one thing we have to do, it’s make sure that no one gets hurt!!  Poor Baldie… he never figured on what would happen once he stepped into the Trailverse… Once you check in, it’s awfully difficult to check out…  I know from personal experience.

I wonder if North American/King Features Syndicate knows that Mark is still shilling for NOAA??

Be right all the time?  Know more than everyone else? Care about bank robbers and kidnappers? OK, that last one is new.  In the olden days Mark would have punched his way out of there, leaving a Trail (ha!) of teeth and spittle…

But what is he talking about?  The mere arrival of clear skies does not mean the coast is clear?  That there is smooth sailing? That the small craft warning has been lifted?  OK, too many nautical references in the middle of the prairie…  but I guess that’s what he’s getting at…

… yup, time to WRAP THIS UP…

By now I am sure that Johnny is sick and tired of being nothing but a setup man for Sheriff Strober’s (Stober’s?) one-liners…  “I’m a bit slow and can’t see things the way you do, Sheriff…”  “That’s OK, Johnny, that’s why you are here… to make me look good.”

Who else would it be, Johnny?  Hmmm?

So the sun does shine in South Dakota.  Well, you’d never know it by the last few months, which felt more like a monsoon season…

But… uh… yea.  Sure.  I bet your cell/data plan is all that… able raise a signal in the middle of the Black Hills…  But then maybe he has Verizon… They always claim to cover the boondocks…  It’s that 1 or 2 percent better than the other plans…  Looks like Baldy is snapping a selfie in panel three…

Not sure what we are looking at or listening to this morning, but it appears that Johnny had to burst through a secure hatch…

…only to emerge in a crouch reminiscent of Brandon Lee in The Crow.

Good think Mark and Company are in the Saloon, otherwise the story might have moved along a little too quickly…

Here we go, kids, hopefully to something more moderately interesting…

Needing a Tetanus Shot?  C’mon Johnny… you should have one every ten years…  Just like Mark was admonished by Doc before we ever got going on this “adventure…”  Yea… that was 7 months ago…  good lord…

Oh the ink and time that is wasted on idle and meaningless prattle…

…but when the medium is largely digital, there is no cost, other than time… which as I pointed out yesterday is exceedingly precious, especially in light of recent events…  We never know when our number is up, when fate or evil will strike…

I went to a Celebration Mass last week for a co-worker’s father…  65 years old.  Heart attack while hiking, for god’s sake… While it was largely a traditional Mass, the service closed with a quote from Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse 5, wherein Billy Pilgrim becomes “unstuck in time” and travels to the planet Tralfamadore and learns that time is meaningless.  He learns that everything that has happened , is happening or will happen is actually all there in real time…  that “death” as we know it, doesn’t carry the weight we think it does.  Tell that to the people who were just mowed down…  and those left behind to deal with it.

As Johnny and Sheriff Stober make their way through the cave system…

…and we are forced to learn more about it than really matters…  We find the Sheriff dropping weight faster that Matthew McConaughey in Dallas Buyers Club…

…whereupon, they weren’t charged with anything, not seen to have violated the robbers’ rights to a speedy trial and  due process… Justice back in the day was swift… upon inspecting the bodies, it was easy to see that they were bad guys.  I am sure they all wore black hats…

In other , very sad news, Tom Petty passed away…  age 66.  I am sure when he was 10 years younger, he figured he had more time…  I certainly do…

Finally, a reference to the ONE, the ONLY…  the MARK

And why are you so sure, Johnny?  Why would Mark go the CHURCH?  Because he is a particularly religious man?  Never mind that you are correct (despite the fact that he got waylaid into the SALOON…) it’s nice to see that we might even be closing the circle here?  Oh, such a tease you are James Allen…

Completely off topic (other than it involves Mark…) below is an animated piece done by a true fan…  and if I’m not mistaken, it uses a storyline from a pre-Allen period.  No sound, and wait for it to load…

… Cuz that’s the category you’d be in, Sheriff… you did afterall plan ahead with the candy bars…

Bad puns aside, Johnny, I don’t think you have to worry too much about hurting Ol’ Sheriff Stober’s feelings…  and by the way, leave the punning to the master, Stephan Pastis of Pearls Before Swine…

While the twister twists its way through the Ghost Town, sending debris flying every which-a-way, Johnny and the Sheriff are oblivious to its wrath…

…while once again we are reminded of our author’s deft use of clip art…

look familiar??

…to resolve the question of “What will we do when we encounter Samson, the Grizzly, who is completely out of range and never leaves the cave?” mystery.  Wheeewee!  Still my beating heart!!

Meanwhile, back somewhere else…  Why don’t we cut to Mexico, or the Caribbean, or the desert southwest, or Kuala Lumpur?  It would make as much sense as anything…