Tom the Dancing Bug by Ruben Bolling for March 06, 2015

Today, the role of Loius Maltby will be played by Bertrand Russell.

It’s been my experience that the worse a person’s luck is, the more they believe in luck. Extremely lucky people tend to credit all the advantages they have to their own hard work—even when it’s obviously caused by outside events.

Is it just me, or do the Louis Maltby strips give everybody PTSD flashbacks to middle school?

Technology changes, but the horrors of Middle School remain the same. Middle school is a good metaphor for our global predicament. Either you are crawling around on all fours trying to put scattered papers back into a 3-ring binder, you just poked a binder out from under someone’s arm in a sneaky rear attack, or you quietly watch the hallway horror, slinking away while tightening the buckle on your book strap. Surprising how few in my day realized the potential of a weaponized book strap. Although, I think Bolling has it right, Louis is the most common denizen of the middle school metaphor, his middle name is undoubtably, “Clueless,” he’s one of those “stuporstitious” types. Does Louis read God Man?

So Louis really did forget the Geronimo poster at home; I had assumed he just hadn’t done the homework.

That’s fairly advanced-level self-sabotage. Hats off to you, Louis.

“The outcome of successful planning always looks like luck to saps.” —The Continental Op

The extremely unlucky will blame their luck for failure even when it’s obvious that they didn’t plan well, or made bad choices. The extremely lucky will credit their hard work and planning for success even when it’s obvious that it was unearned..This does not mean that the extremely lucky don’t work hard and plan well for their success—they do, because their good luck means hard work and planning pay off! The unlucky often stop putting in effort because it doesn’t pay off, so why bother?

Luck is the residue of design—Branch Rickey

Residue can be removed with a small amount of cleanser—Mr. Clean