Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for March 30, 2013

Uh, yeah, they are for roadkill dinner.

Ironically, the last thing a lot of armadillos see is the word DODGE.

They seem to have an attraction to 18-wheelers.They must be semi-conductors.

Have you ever driven over an empty water bottle with the cap on it? POW!!!!

Around here I see a lot of racoons sleeping very close to the road….looks kinda dangerous….Possum too…They are very good at playing dead….The tire tracks are the kicker….

When your defense mechanism is to curl into a ball, you are not very well adapted to dealing with large moving metal masses. Well least not the big ones, my dad use to tell stories about the things getting hit by cars and walking away like it was nothing.

Hedgehogs have this same problem in Europe, though their greatest enemy appears to be the weed-whacker.

Every time I see Armando in PBS I hear in my head the scene from Steel Magnolias where they discuss “bleedin’ armadilla groom’s cake” made of Red Velvet Cake and grey icing. “I don’ even wanna think about how you make grey icin’.”

Olde proverb: When in doubt jump higher.

@orinoco wombleSeeing Shirley McLaine serve Tom Skerritt the hind end of that cake was among the best scenes in the flick. I still chuckle over that whenever someone mentions red velvet cake.

@Blias. Kudos. you deserve some credit (Says former Semiconductor Engineer)

Goat is sounding awfully elitist in panel 3; why doesn’t he explain Survival Tactics to poor Armando, who is simply following his genetically-wired instinct?

I know a lot of people like this. The trouble is that there are not enough 18 wheelers in the world to get rid of them all.

Armando should cross at the green.

swerve just a bit …Huh!

Goat sounds like Rat.

“30-something years driving an 18-wheeler, and I don’t remember ever hitting an Armadillo.” Understandable. I don’t know about the rest of the South but it has been about thirty years since we had many armadillos here in central Texas. Back in the 60’s and 70’s you couldn’t hardly drive anywhere without hitting one or two. Guess they all got run over.

Jump three quarters of a foot lower.

Maybe this strip wasn’t meant to be funny…

possum on the half shell…

Goat recognizes the situation for what it is. Rat tries to mangle the situation to fit his mindset. Same phrase; different paths..Waaay too much thinking for this early on my part!

Fifty-two years ago I was driving the English Ford through Georgia and approached a couple of vultures enjoying roadkill in the middle of my lane. They flew away as the car approached, but one thought he’d cop just one more little bite and dropped back down. The WHAM! put a nice little dent in our grill. (There’s a moral here, somewhere.)

Armadillos are possum on the half-shell. (For a while I lived in southern Georgia and in Florida, and had numerous encounters with armadillos… including one where I was struck by a hit-and-run armadillo.)

Oh that’s nice, Goat.

LOL xxx

In Texas it’s feral hogs. Sometimes the car and passengers are severely injured.

Did SP run over some armadillos or something?

I LOVE it but don’t know how to get it transfered to my E-mail so I can chuckle everyday HOW ??? Thank you, Carol

Har! Har! Haar!

You know, most animals would be scared into moving faster rather than letting themselves be easy targets.

Hey Pastis, I see you did not get the email. Nix the armadee. Where are u going with this? Enough with the roadkill, we get it and you can only go so far with the plot. He’s boring.

Jump 4 meters in the air! But then the fall… Better just borrow the RPG launcher from Guard Duck and blow up the offending incoming trucks.