Marmaduke is dead.

Marmaduke's owner-man offers up a fatalistic zen-like aphorism on the futility of 21st century life that doubles as an explanation of his huge stupid dog's behavior.

Marmaduke is bi-curious. And not the least bit shy about it.

Marmaduke is an asshole.

So I just moved a few weeks ago. I'm still unpacking and settling in, and this evening I asked my roommate what I should work on. She said "why don't you do Marmaduke again?" and I realized I hadn't updated this blog since just after we moved. I look at today's strip, hoping I'd be inspired to unleash some deliciously clever wit on Brad Anderson's latest brainfart. Instead I find the above cartoon, and am forced to once again revert to the closest thing to a catchphrase I have authored in my silly little life.

My roommate, to her credit, discouraged me from taking the easy way out, but when asked what the hell else I could possibly say about this comic strip (without just mentioning my last entry and writing about vomit), she was at a similar loss and could only offer up "I don't know... Something about TV trays?"

So yeah. Marmaduke is an asshole.

Marmaduke is doing a blind taste test. Marmaduke's owner-family refuses to buy him dog food that isn't made from vomit, which finally explains to me exactly why he's such an asshole.

In light of this discovery, I may not need to ever update this blog again.

Marmaduke is forcibly dry-humping his owner-man. Marmaduke's attention-starved owner-lady blathers something about eating some weird kind of pie, but Marmaduke's perturbed/sassy glance towards the reader indicates that he cares infinitely less about her eating habits than about dry-humping.

Marmaduke, according to his owner-man, chug-a-lugged (sic) his food so fast he got hiccups (also colloquially referred to as "whif-ups," or sometimes "whuf-ups"). For some reason Marmaduke's food dish has been placed upon a teeny little table. His owner-lady peers out from behind a wall that disappears into her dog's hindquarters. None of this counts as a proper joke.

I know I sound like a broken record, but I really do hate this comic strip.

Marmaduke is afraid of cats.

Wait, what the fuck?

Marmaduke is an asshole.

I am talking about the internet tomorrow (in real life)

If you want to watch it on your computer, here is some information (copypasted from an email I just got):

"LIVE-STREAMING: ROFLCon panels/talks will be live-streamed on USTREAM! We think this will be comforting for everyone on the interwebs who can't come to this crazy event. If you would like to comfort your fans, please blog this/twitter it/shout it from the rooftops! URL: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/roflcon-live"

I will be speaking at 1 pm Eastern time on a panel with the Chuck Norris Facts guy, the Bert is Evil guy, the One Red Paperclip guy, and the JibJab guy. If any of this sounds like something that would interest you, you might find this interesting.

Someday I will make another post about Marmaduke, I swear.

Joe Mathlete Publicly Responds To Some Of Your Correspondance From Like A Month Or Two Ago

The following messages were sent to my band's MySpace account, as I guess it's kind of hard to find my email address (sk8erboi420@hellokittyfans.shit). In case anyone else reading has or had any similar thoughts or concerns, or maybe just because I'm a dick and I'm procrastinating today, I figured I'd respond to them here.


---------------------------------------
From: ameera

Subject: Marmaduke Concerns

Body: Dear Joe Mathlete,

My friend Sarah and I have long been fans of you and your explanations of the antics of everyone's favorite dull-witted cartoon dog. However as of late, it seems like your explanations of Marmaduke are a little uninspired. In fact, Sarah and I have developed a theory that perhaps you are not actually writing the Marmaduke explanations yourself. So what's the deal? Have you hired out a ghost explainer? Or have you just lost the taste for brief summaries of Marmaduke?

cordially,
ameera

------------------------------

Dear ameera,

Thank you for you and your capitalized friend Sarah's concerns (such as they are). I will allow that I got off to a bit of a rocky start at the top of the year; there are essentially four jokes in any given Marmaduke strip (Marmaduke is big, Marmaduke is an asshole, Marmaduke thinks he's people, and the occasional inexplicable bit of "phantom humor"), which means that if I'm just explaining what's happening in each day's Marmaduke (what I originally intended to do with this blog) I'm going to be repeating myself quite a bit. Also, karma's known for being a bitch so I'm trying not to jinx myself with too many more Alzheimer's jokes. I think the blog tends to be funnier if I'm working the kind of job where I'm sitting in front of a computer all day bored out of my skull, which hasn't been the case since late last year. But I'll try to keep up with the funny.

Having said that, considering I decided to stop selling merch awhile ago and don't advertise on the site outside of Google Ads (which if I'm lucky makes me almost enough to buy a sandwich every two or three weeks), the idea that I've hired someone to ghostwrite this stuff strikes me as kind of hilarious. Also, the most recent strip as of the writing of your email was this one, which was in my humble/egotistical opinion one of the best posts I've ever done (read it carefully this time).

Anyway, thank you for the cordiality and such. I hope things have begun to get a little bit less phoned in, and I'll try to keep some level of quality control for as long as I'm going to keep doing this (going on nearly two years now... Jesus, how have I not been sued yet?).

Beats,

Joe Mathlete

------------------------------------------



From: DOOLEY

Subject: To Joe

Body:

i couldnt find a way to email you so i decided to use myspace, anyway i can tell you really dont want to do marmaduke explained anymore, so please stop, you used to explain it in a funny and witty manner and i was laughing my ass off, but now, now your REALLY explaining it it's not funny at all your just saying whats happening in a totally un-funny manner, so im begging you, please stop, just let it die and let me forget about this blog completely.

Thank you,
Mike

-------------------------------------

Dear teenage stoner from Boise,

Thank you for taking the time to give blunt (no pun intended) and unsolicited advice to a stranger on the internet. As glad as I am to have made a Kottonmouth Kings fan laugh his ass off (literally? That part was a bit unclear. If so, I hope it got better), I would have no problem if someone who didn't enjoy my silly trifle of a blog stopped looking at it. I imagine after two or three days you would have absolutely no trouble forgetting it.

And for the record: I know your MySpace music playlist is essentially the result of you trying to compile pretty much every song you could find about drugs into one convenient place, but Guided by Voices' "Weedking" is not about weed, nor is Mazzy Star's "Fade Into You" about getting faded. I will grant you that "Fade Into You" sounds really good when you're high, though. And "Weedking" sounds really good regardless. But you're not the first stoner to accidentally get into music way out of your league, so don't get too excited.

Anyway, you should be commended for your ability to write an entire paragraph using only one period. Thank god you're not into meth or it could've been nine times as long.

Beats,

Joe Mathlete

----------------------------------------------

For the record, I've got nothing against teenagers, stoners or Boise. Case in point: I'm a huge Built to Spill fan, something that can be said to encompass all three.

Marmaduke is paralyzed by the pressure of choosing which of two objects he should spend his day chewing on. Marmaduke's owner-lady mocks his plight while cradling an armload of either towels or enormous lasagna noodles.

Marmaduke, bereft of any vestiges of morality as ever, tried to cheat at a game of poker. What's worse than that, it was at a game made up entirely of elementary school girls. What's worse than that, he failed instantly.

Marmaduke's impotent neighborhood dogcatchers have delusions of grandeur.

Hey, Joe, what's new with you?

I appreciate your interest.

So on April 25 and 26, I am going to Boston to appear at "ROFLcon," which is as far as I can tell a gathering of a bunch of people who have gained some sort of notoriety based on cool and/or dumb shit they did on the internet. I'll be speaking on a panel at 1 PM Friday afternoon, then most likely drinking whiskey for the remainder of the weekend. The people setting up the convention/conference/symposium/nerd party have been incredibly friendly and cool, and it should be a lot of fun, or at least bizarre. Registration appears to be closed, but if this is the sort of thing you would be into, I can't imagine you don't already know about it.

Also, I have my hand in another blog, "Robot McGee Explains Fine Art." If you would like some context, you can find it right over here. Don't expect this one to get updated all that often. Actually: don't expect any of them to get updated all that often. That way, when they do, it's a nice surprise.

I made a short film about the Beatles that I'll hopefully put on the internet soon. I think a lot of you may like that. I'm recording a whole bunch of songs right now, too. Those I'm not so sure how you would react to, but I'm liking them quite a bit at the moment. I have a sunburn and my sister's cat had kittens. I guess that's about all for now. Thank you for asking.

OMG WTF CONTINUITY

Marmaduke creator Brad Anderson crafted a zany gag so epic and layered it required two consecutive days to tell it. The breakdown: Marmaduke is trying to read his owner-man's newspaper before Owner Man is finished with it, in multiple distracting and insubordinate fashions, even though he is a dog (dogs can't read newspapers, or anything else).

Marmaduke is tentative about venturing into Spooky Haunted Rape Forest.

Marmaduke is aggressively Tiananmen Square-ing a couple of pushover garbagemen.

Marmaduke sexually harassed a police officer just to get his owner-man in trouble, and by the looks of the (uncomfortably breast-level) raspberry he is blowing at his owner-lady, he would do it again in a heartbeat.

Marmaduke hasn't terrorized his fat elderly neighbor in a fortnight. This warrants a friendly visit from the curious egg-shaped gentleman, smartly dressed in a dapper pork pie hat/vest/slacks/old man sneakers combo.

Marmaduke is subordinate to the moon.

Marmaduke smelled pizza on a pedestrian's breath and began violently licking the man's face off.

Marmaduke dragged his owner-man through Disney World.

Marmaduke is about to go on a date. His owner-lady makes an unfathomably distasteful double entendre about Marmaduke's girlfriend, Snyder.

Marmaduke is mildly rebuked by his owner-lady (who says she would prefer a subtler and less aggressive courtship) as he prepares to fuck the living daylights out of her.

Marmaduke is upset that it is too cold to use the hot tub, so he began yelling.

Marmaduke is bartering with his owner-boy. Owner Boy is offering a bunch of stuff dogs like to chew on or eat for a baseball, which Marmaduke probably stole.

Marmaduke slept on his owner-lady's lap all day, preventing her from being in the kitchen.

Marmaduke does not want to eat a bowl of Daug Food-brand dog food, which he considers to be distasteful. Marmaduke's owner-man tells Marmaduke it would be in his best interests to develop a taste for the food, as Owner-Man bought a very large quantity of the product and has thus committed Marmaduke to several weeks worth of Daug Food meals.

Marmaduke is a Freegan.

Marmaduke shits bones.

Marmaduke likes being a dog, due in part to his flexible schedule.

Marmaduke has committed unspecified mischiefs against his owner-lady and is hiding from her in an ineffectual manner.

Marmaduke is being held in his backyard against his will. Rather than destroying something or threatening physical violence to get his way, he writes a distress signal in the snow in an attempt to communicate with passing aircraft, birds, or Google Earth.

Marmaduke is stoic.