Well, that certainly explains it all…  Mark Trail is sort of like James Bond, isn’t he?  He can just walk up to any counter of a certain Rental Car company (I’d presume it wouldn’t work with just any company) say the name Lesley Joyce and keys would be handed to him!  What I don’t understand right now is whether Water World is in South Dakota or if Mark and Lone Elk traveled to another location to shoot the documentary.  Maybe a coastal location?  That would explain how the Walrus “Got away…” in the sea, and not on the Midwestern plains…  Man, it’s really difficult to figure out what’s going on here!

Well, enough with the words… I have to believe that James Allen is reading the blogs and figured he needed to knit some things together fast otherwise we would be in Gil’s office for another month…

Her face and her body proportions just keep getting goofed up!

She looks almost normal (if not completely different) in panel two, but by panel three her neck has grown as thick as a redwood tree!  Not to mention that Gil, taken from 3/4 reverse angle has taken on a rather different look…  good thing that they are wearing the same clothes… otherwise this could get confusing.  Although that didn’t really help with transition from Honey to Abbey Powell… as they were both wearing green bikinis…

Where exactly are we?  I see palm trees and a shore bird in Panel two.  And a slightly familiar face in Panel one…

Yea, his name was something like Lone Elk… I never took the time to get to know the help, because you know, I am a University Professor and kind of a big deal…  and if this “Lone Elk” guy was there to help the guy I hired, well, that’s not something I am going to spend a whole lot of time on.  So, then, where was I?  The Walrus.  The Pregnant.  Female.  Walrus.  I mean seriously.  She got loose!  Had to be clocking at least a quarter mile an hour!  We were at a loss!  I blame the entire incident on Trail and Lone Elk… It’s like they were trying to pull off a “Free Willie” thing, right here in… that’s right, where the hell are we??

Snail’s Pace is a phrase maybe lost to the ages, but it certainly applies to the Trailverse… <sigh…>  in today’s installment it’s almost like ‘Gil’ is trying to get Leslie (morphing and growing more beautiful by the frame) to engage in some ritualistic act that would get most bosses fired…

So with Cherry resting comfortably at home despite getting a call from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (hey, all in a day’s work, right??) we are about to be regaled by a lusty tale of a water-based theme park gone awry… sit tight, kids, this should (could?) be a hoot!

There she is!  Bedroom eyes and all!!  And what is that on “Gil’s” chin?  is that a shadow or a soul patch??

Apparently Boss Man Gil has caught wind of Mark’s attempt at identity theft…  but wait… how?  I mean well… OK, I get it now… even though he rented the car under the account of Leslie Joyce (hey, why not??) and given that WaterWorld had not removed Mark’s name from the list of approved renters (tsk, tsk) and they probably still had to take his personal information- Driver’s License, etc.- and this transaction then hit the account of WaterWorld, well, voila, Leslie is being called into the office for a grilling…  Pretty sneaky, Mark.  Still highly improbable, but let’s suspend disbelief long enough to just go with it.

Dread the thought?  How about Perish the Thought??

Check out the Master… Josh at the comics curmudgeon as he riffs on the latest Mark Trail plot “twists.”

Some vestiges of the old Mark Trail still sneak in, despite laptops and cell phones telling us that we are in a more modern age…

Like the scene above, “Miss Joyce?” calls the white male boss.  “Yes, Mr. _____,” as we apparently don’t use first names…  Terribly old school.

And what’s with Leslie Joyce?  Good Lord she ain’t lookin’ so good… certainly not compared to the siren we were introduced to a while back…

Is that a look of shock, complete with hand to mouth, or is she going to call out to someone??

…because Cherry has to get back to her Pinterest boards…

Like I said, Mark is a safe a a kitten no matter where he finds himself…

But what about all the wildlife wee have been treated to during this exchange?  Bear, Owl, all manner of furry rodent.  Beats looking a people, I guess…

So, it’s back to the Badlands and questions about what Baldy’s next move might be since he has lost all control of the situation!

…my husband?

Yes, Agent “JP,” trouble follows this guy like white follows wonder bread, and rice, and well, you name it.  But he has the greatest defense of all- he is the namesake for a serial comic strip which provides a relatively steady stream of income that provides a lifestyle for a person lucky enough to inherit this franchise…  Sort of like the a manual transmission being the greatest theft deterrent in a car (Damn!  I don’t know how to drive one of these!! I’ll have to go onto my next option…)  And Mark always wins!  It might take months to get through a single day in Trail-time, but he always wins!  So fear not, Agent JP, you might as well just sit back and watch this play out…  meddling will do you no good!

As Cherry lets us in on her little joke, suddenly it’s like she has known this FBI agent (JP?) for years…

Not to mention her impressive use of department slang… BOLO?  Well, YOLO back at you… might as well get in all the slang you can while you can, right?

But really?  Did Mark have Leslie Joyce’s Credit card?  ID?  How exactly did he rent the car in a stranger’s name?  Doesn’t that border on/constitute Identity Theft?  How does Leslie become aware that Mark Rented a car in her name?

So.  It’s coming together… slowly.  I think.

Leslie Joyce (provider of the radiation-proof diving suit that Mark used to foil an international terrorist plot along with Mississippi Ken) is somehow connected to Waterworld, the scene of unknown but probably destructive hijinks with Johnny LOne Elk…  And Mark rented a car under her name in order to send a message to the outside world that he is in trouble?  What? is this a code word/name that he and Cherry agreed to for use in such occasions as the current one?  Kidnapping/ False Imprisonment or some such thing where Mark wants to put the world on notice that he’s in trouble and needs help?

Thank goodness I went into the woods this weekend and only have to wait until tomorrow morning!  The suspense would have otherwise killed me!

Couldn’t have been the FBI’s… As Agent Paul continues to run his mouth and share info that Cherry doesn’t have a need to know, he is soiling this crime scene almost as if he intended to!

And what does this 1960 281 series tanker truck have to do with anything except that the GPS was planted on it to take people off the trail- quite frankly the first smart thing that Baldy did in this entire story line…  Remember the all-white ghost truck?  I guess it’s toast now…

As Nature, oh Cruel Nature, plays out at Lost Forest, and the sun has yet to set on day one of this saga, Cherry offers more information and in return gets more of the story…

The Station Chief looks mighty pissed at Ol’ John Paul… I’m guessing that he doesn’t appreciate the way that he is offering information that Cherry doesn’t need to know and using language that is euphemistic and metaphoric… Literally a dead end?  I don’t think so…

When on earth would he have time to do that?  Or maybe it’s a compendium of all the “articles” he as written over the years… re-use, recycle… that’s one way of getting through life… I’ll bet it sold at least 100 copies…

Nice sensible attire, Cherry.  Looks like you just returned from a parent-teacher conference or something… assuming Rusty actually goes to school.  We’ve never heard ‘boo’ about any academic pursuits pertaining to their adopted ward…

But really, Cherry…  do you really know what Mark does when he is away?  Why he could be a regular Charles Kuralt, complete with second family…

…that we know too well.  As in, what trouble has my husband gotten into now?  As in, this is getting really old.  As in, what have I gotten myself into?

How the heck would Cherry know that the phone lines are down? And that Jimmy only has a land line?  And doesn’t Mark have a cell phone?  And why didn’t Baldy take that away from him?  Why hasn’t mark sent a text?  Or something?  What was his big idea anyway?

Holy Comic Time!  We were introduced to Baldy and Co. on March 31st!  We are going on the third complete month since then and the earth hasn’t even completed a single rotation in the Trailverse…… wow…

By now I am sure that Cherry is asking herself why she lets Mark go anywhere… All he does is attract trouble and calamity.  But there was of course plenty of foreshadowing regarding hooking up with Johnny Lone Elk (who Mark refers to simply as “Lone Elk…“)  So let’s all try to keep up, Kids, the sun should be setting in a week or two…

Seriously… Let it roll to voice mail and and let who (whom?) ever leave a message.  I probably get five spam calls a day on mine.  If I don’t recognize the number, I let it roll…

Anyway, thank goodness this part of the story is starting to unfurl.  The tension here is unbearable (OK not really…) but it will be good to string a few dots together… Speaking of unconnected dots, what the hell is happening with Dirty Dyer?  We had but a glimpse of him having returned from the dead a while back (February!) but with no current hint of his whereabouts…

JP!  What the hell have you been doing??  I asked you to call Trail’s wife about two weeks ago!!  Jiminy Crickets, man!!  Do I have to do these things myself?

OK, we KNOW that we lost track of Trail once he left the airport!  Isn’t it your JOB to pick up the scent and find him??  Head over to the airport and check the rental records at least?  FBI… sheesh.  They could use some good press these days what with all the BS going on at the top of the org in Washington… at the rate we are going here the boss-man just might complete his hair replacement program!

Oh gosh, Mr. Trail, whatever do you mean?  Do you mean we are in danger?!  Being forced out onto the prairie was a bad idea??

Enough of the idle prattle about storms and such…  Below is a great example of use and re-use…  Baldy has only so many “looks,” one of which we’ll call “Resting Bitch Face.”

Take the “look” from a week ago, flip it, add some shading, and voila, there you have today’s head shot…

Yea, I’d say… One really has to wonder what sets a man on a path of no good?  For Walter White it was the realization that he was dying and that he hadn’t done anything to leave his family well situated upon his demise…  So he did what he could, hedgehog style, and used his knowledge and skill to manufacture the best crystal meth the plant has ever known.  He “Broke Bad…”

But for Baldy, now clearly out of his element and locus of control, he has to question everything because he simply doesn’t know whether he is being fed a line of BS or not…  So now he has no other choice than to fall into Mark’s trap… along the ridge at Vulture Creek… ominous enough for you??

All that chatting about the weather?  Well, looks like Baldy was wrong about Mark and Johnny getting “chummy…”  Looks like they were all business up ahead on the Trail…

So as Mark gallops the 30 feet separating he and Johnny from the Bad Guy and the girl (whose allegiance we can’t quite determine) we continue on the slow burn that will probably take us into the July 4th Holiday weekend…