Sorry for skipping a day, kids, but now for the twofer!

Quick cut away from the Rapid City, SD FBI field office and all the bad hairlines to the home of Jimmy and Sarita (Wow, how exotic is that??) And Johnny Lone Elk lives with them?  What’s up with that?  I guess that’s what happens when you major in film… a life of dependency.  Wow, too, I can’t wait for weeks of clumsy and stilted dialogue pertaining to Mark’s unexpected “friends” or film crew or whatever…

Jimmy Ryan!  Now there’s a hairline worth writing home about…  Graying around the temples, paired up with the beautiful Sarita!  And her well placed hair band… and hand on the pane of glass making for beautiful smudge marks!

Yes, Mark is normally not so rude as to bring others along on his own invitation…  but there he is!

Imagine you’re sitting at home in Lost Forest, scrapbooking or something, and the phone rings…  It’s the FBI…  Asking questions about what you know about your husband’s travel plans… You know they aren’t going to come right out with what they know, they want you to tell them what you know… and only after your story hangs together will they share the reason they are calling and to not worry about a thing, they are sure that everything’s all right…  But Cherry ought to be used to this by now… every time Mark leaves the house shit happens…

But in other news, it’s the hair!  The Hairline in panel one.  Yikes, that’s a sight.  It’s like a putting green surrounded by a sand trap!  He needs to pull some more money out of his retirement account and finish the job!

Yea, and I am growing weary of waiting to hear what “thing” Mark did at the Rental Car counter, other than invoke the name of Leslie Joyce, friend and apparent benefactor to Woods and Wildlife Magazine..

By the look on his face, Boss Man is getting a big kick out this whole thing …  Mark Trail!  Huh! Really?!

Oh, tell us!! Please!  What’s so weird about Mark renting a car?  Did he flash gang signs at the security camera on his way out of the terminal?  What exactly did he do?  He had an idea… a long shot, as you may recall…

Is anyone but me creeped-out by the surveillance state?  I mean, it took about two seconds for them to ID Mark, the fact that he had booked a flight and rented a car, probably in town on business… do they know the contents of his suitcase, for crying out loud?  Oh well, I guess we don’t have anything to fear unless we are up to no good, right??

Drawing people having a conversation I’m guessing isn’t as easy as drawing an Elk or a Water Buffalo, but let’s not strive to capture every mouth shape, OK?  The last panel is positively creepy, lips all pursed and puckered.  Sort of looks like the typical Trumpian shot- what I like to call the “bugle mouth…”

Well, hallelujah… they have a lead- a positive ID on the suspect that also involve/implicates Mark.  Mark will have some ‘splaining to do once all this unravels, but certainly a famous person like Mark Trail would be in the facial features database!  Surely they have to be able to recognize him as well!!  Which is really funny… Mark Trail… Breaking Bad…

Or more likely a “Be on the Look-out” alert, if I had to guess.  But look at the slack-jawed, mouth-breathing look that the boss is offering up… At least I think he’s the boss, otherwise he wouldn’t be asking all the questions.  And I have to say, his hairline is the most disturbing feature I have seen for a while, even including Rusty’s mug…

And with a dismissive, “let me turn my back to you while I explain how modern surveillance works” move, the field officer offers up that they DO have the facial recognition software, just like Mr, Ponytail said they would.  We still don’t know what’s odd or strange about the whole thing however…  maybe tomorrow.

I thought FBI had to wear coat and tie… Not open collar shirts that haven’t seen the laundry in weeks… Thinking right now about Agent Dale Cooper of Twin Peaks fame… of course he had hair, too… But what the heck?  They are resurrecting Twin Peaks in May of this year?  Huh.

Something strange, you say?  Body Language?  Like what?  Did he walk on all fours?  Does it take an Analyst to make observations?  Are duties at the Bureau now so specialized that Agents can’t do their own analysis?  I can’t keep from wondering about hairlines and facial expressions.  Today’s installment certainly doesn’t disappoint… I guess tomorrow (or next week) we will learn what an FBI analyst considers “Weird…”

But what the heck is going on with the the guy in the middle panel- his hair line?  I have seen widow’s peaks before, but this is off the hook!  Maybe he’s gone in on Hair replacement and decided to start in front and work his way back…

But it does seem to be a fair rendering of the office itself…

Well, there’s your Federal Tax (or borrowing) dollars at work.  Guessing it’s a sleepy post that one is either relieved or disappointed by… as in, “Rapid City?  Really? I wonder who I pissed off…” or “Rapid City? Awesome!  I’ll be home for dinner every night and be able to hunt and fish on my days off!”

It does seem, however that Baldy’s hubris may be his undoing- taking off his mask so the guy he beat up could see his face…

But can Mark lie?  Is that in his nature?  Can he fib without giving himself away?? And when Mark or Baldy and Blondie go to take pictures, all his camera gear will be where?  And in its place will be what?  Cash?

Meanwhile, the Prairie Dogs/ Groundhogs/ Woodchucks are watching the (I assume) sleeping deer with great interest… Not like a deer to sleep in broad daylight without any cover whatsoever…  Highly irregular…

I am speechless.  Wordless.  Without  ideas.  I rely on random word generators, like a virtual Mad-Libs to write my scripts and related dialogue.  I am James Allen.

And Heaven forbid Mark you should question any of what Baldy says, lest he threaten to “shoot the girl.”

Please Mr. Allen, for the love of Mark, collaborate.  Find  a writer.  Elrod had Dodd for all those years… there’s no shame in admitting you are out of your depth here…

I don’t know how much more of this inane story line I can take.  Seriously.

As a master of the get-away, Baldy continues to prove he doesn’t even have the slightest inkling of that concept.  Getting away has more to do than with mere movement.  Usually there is a rendezvous point that was predetermined so that those “getting away” can re-group, take stock, consider options.  This meandering and random BS is more akin to Brownian Motion that one might find in single cell organisms, hoping they’ll bump into each other in order to mate…

…and I’m sure Mark is wondering that himself.  You know, this isn’t Mark’s first rodeo, Dumbass…  he and his family have been kidnapped countless times int he past.  But this is certainly the first time that any of them has been taken hostage only to be told to go where they were going to go anyway…

I m sure that the world has its share of diabolical geniuses, but clearly Baldy ain’t one of them… what possible leverage does he have as he continues to be out-numbered by those who would otherwise want the thwart his plans, if he can even be said to have a plan…

Took a day off yesterday and figured that would help move the story along…

Turns out Mark can read minds, ladies and gents, boys and girls of all ages…

Fat lot of good it does him as he continues (for reasons none of us can fathom) to play along with this whole caper.  Like I have said, he and Blondie are nothing but liabilities at this point, and yet this happy trio continues to travel together, with Mark at the wheel… At least we are introduced to another “look,” one of pain a suffering from Blondie.

But why did they need to stop at a truck stop to open the hood and remove “the tracking device?  Might have been a good idea to do that sooner that later, before a vector had been established for any eventual search?  Again applying logic and reason to this only makes one’s head hurt…

The iconic long-nose of a Peterbilt truck I am sure has inspired many an argument amongst truck aficionados…  Mack, Kenworth, Volvo… Sort of like Cubs or White Sox, Mets or Yankees.  Designated hitter or not. Hell, anything would be more exciting that this story…

Again, what? Doesn’t Baldy know how to drive?  What use does he have for Mark now other than dead?  Smart of him, I guess, to demand the keys…

Mr. Cranky-pants!!

And it’s obvious by the two rutting elk, in the foreground of the second panel, that competition and conflict are not the exclusive domain of mankind… And I can also see a small structure in the upper right… civilization.  I wonder where they are on the map?!

She Speaks Again!  Now only to contradict the only other thing she said!

And where have you been, young lady?  We established Mark’s identity many installments ago… and Mark, always looking for a compliment aren’t you?  Only to be smacked down in person!  “You’re no entomologist!”  Ha! It doesn’t cut any deeper than that…

But seriously folks, as Mark used to say, “What th…?!”

I wish he would quickly, like how is Mr. Ponytail going to know what airstrip to go to… and why the hell didn’t they all just go the the plane in the first place and take off from Rapid city?  Why bring another witness into the mix?  Why do I care?

And it’s only now that Baldy has expressed even a slight interest in where they are going?  My head hurts like those two rutting rams in panel one!

The bleached mount on the roadside about says it all at this point…

And Mark’s constant prattling has managed to put Baldy to sleep and Blondie to affect her one and only “look.”  Sort of like Derek Zoolander…  who found he had but one look… but it was killer.

So that just goes to show you that rich guys don’t always have the best ideas…

So now it’s a ghost-strip to go along with the ghost-town… again, where is this going??  Nowhere fast, that’s for sure…

…it’s Mark.  If the whole point of this was to procure a get-away car/truck/SUV, that’s been accomplished.  Why Baldy hasn’t ice-ice-babied Mark or at least left him stranded at this point is a wonder to me…  Not to mention that Mark could ID the guy in his sleep by now.  Mark is a definite liability here.

Oh look, see the Big Horn Sheep!  For some reason come down from the elevations where one would normally find them…  Guessing they are very close to sea level at this point… but hey, what do I know??  Rapid City is at 3,200 ft!  But still I think these animals typically frolic at 6-8,000 ft based on my own expeditionary experience…

An airstrip huh? And Mr. Ponytail is in a plane?  Will he find his way out here?  Who knows… who cares??

Shoot!!

“The girl” means about as much to me as that hare getting raptored in panel one…

But what the heck, right?  Mr. Ponytail is still sitting in a plane at the airport?  While Baldy and “the girl” are driving to wherever Mark is going?  I am so confused.  No one ever said crooks are smart, but this guy is a real keeper…