Luann by Greg Evans and Karen Evans for November 10, 2021

Ignores Wally’s advice and Places Bet =) LOL

Don’t press Toni. She’ll decide when she’s ready.

But what, TJ?

“Fun” has nothing to do with it. ✨

Everybody’s doing the avoidance dance. Except TJ who. by the way, has an investment in the outcome of this "discussion. With Shannon’s sleepovers and a new baby, TJ will have to find new digs.

I find it difficult to accept the phrase “start a family” as meaning “have children”. If you have parents and or siblings, you are already part of an ongoing family. You are just going to add to it.

TJ states the obvious: discussing starting a family isn’t as fun as practicing to have a family. Saying “we’re trying to make a family” is nicer sounding phrase than “we’re having lots of sex.” **wink wink

Infertility coming up, then adopting Shannon. You read it here first.

Good—that’s exactly what needs to happen. TJ is a gem! If there’s one thing I can impress on young couples getting married, it’s LEARN TO COMMUNICATE! And it’s great that Toni’s willing to talk about it openly instead of playing games.

Everyone’s been leaping to the conclusion that Toni doesn’t want a baby, but she never said that. I was afraid to get married, but I wanted it, and eventually I did it.

And we’ll “discuss it” to death over the next several days.

Jury’s out…

When Toni said, “We are,” I was expecting her to say in the next panel, "I’m pregnant. " When I glanced at the next panel, my eyes gell on “discuss it” and I processed it as "disgusting ". I was happy to find that I read it wrongly.

GNK sure is dragging this arc out. 2 panels a day? Ugh. Okay, so there’ll be a discussion. And we all know how that will go. Toni will continue to vaguely say the timing is not right yet in her lame attempt to keep Brad at bay. Then Brad will ask when will the timing ever be right? If they get a house, Toni will think up something else. Perhaps wait until she makes Capitan at the firehouse. TJ jumps in and tells them they are at a stalemate and have been for years already. Then he bluntly tells Brad Toni doesn’t want kids and has been trying to hint at it. Lastly, he will tell Brad he has a choice to make. Possibly Toni will be alarmed when he says that. Will there be finally a conclusion to the baby issue? Not as long as Brad keeps on hoping Toni will change her mind until she hits menopause. By then Brad realizes he has been a dad to Shannon and decides that to be enough. Just my 2 cents.

Brad you and Toni need to have a serious discussion on the matter if y’all ready to start a family Brad you need to hear Toni out.

They need to get pregnant so that Greg and company have more to work with. Their storyline has been stale for quite a while.

It’s going to be a blast to share a single bathroom with four people instead of three. By the way, TJ, the bell pepper and tomato are not baby vegetables. No wonder Toni isn’t totally convinced.

TJ! breaking the ground. Toni is not mother type unless …..

Is Brad going to give up his career to raise the baby? Mr. Firemom

Toni needs to tell Brad that she will get pregnant, carry the baby, and deliver the baby IF he will agree to then quit his job and be the primary caregiver while she goes back to work. Then he can decide how much he wants to be a dad.

TJ, BUTT OUT!

Should have been settled long before now

a personal chef would make me happy

I don’t know I find it hard to have compassion for tjmaybe if he just quit smiling i dont no

That last panel is just so convincing: Toni does not want a baby. Ever. Full stop.

But why keep teasing us with these pregnancy arcs unless G&K do plan to have Toni get pregnant? I fear, and in the worst sense of the word, that this is exactly where G&K are taking this.

But they are also making it abundantly clear that, if pregnant, Toni is going to be railroaded into it.

Isn’t this the sort of thing they should’ve discussed a while ago?

Uh.

Three’s a Crowd “J.”

TJ, keep out of grown folks business.

TJ is a true friend of both ♡. He wants Brad and Toni to be happy and able to solve their issues and has no problem telling them to do it. Toni seems to appreciates him a lot for this.

Brad is resorting to the old Brad from Luann again (1993), opening his mouth before he thinks. He keeps pressing this issue and he is going to be in a lot of conflict with Toni.

He reminds me a bit of Gunther when he was in Peru with Rosa and working in the office there, Rosa said it was time for a change and Gunther brightened up like Brad in panel one and said "You mean you are ready to go back home’? Rosa said no she was going to the Andes and Gunther’s smile disappeared like Brads. Eventually Gunnie got the hint after Rosa had a discussion with him and he went home without her. If Brad pushes the envelope too far here he might be in the same boat. But hey, Toni said she will talk, that is an improvement over the popcorn night: perhaps set a plan for the future and clear the air but Brad needs to talk to her before he decides how many kids they will have. I still think adoption of Shannon might be on the table. Brad should also realize that Toni may not want kids, then he has a decision to make…….

The “kids or no kids” thing should’ve been completely nailed down and set in stone before they even got married.

Don’t worry Toni, Uncle Joe and Aunt Nancy will take care of your baby cradle to grave.

I don’t understand why people other than the married couple feel that it’s their right to pester about this issue. It’s nobody’s business!

At least no more subtle hints, for a while. :D

Baby’s often happen even if you don’t discuss them.

This is the sort of thing they should have discussed before they got married. It seems that what happened was they sort of brushed it off and each of them thought “I know he / she doesn’t agree with me, but that’s OK, I’ll change his / her mind.”

i always hate people who think that procreation is the end all be all of a relationship. not everyone wants or needs kids. so when i hear someone doing that when or why about kids- i wanna tell them to shut the f up and mind their own business.

TJ!

What does TJ have to do with them starting a family?

And, of course, we are only going to get to watch the discussion.

I don’t see how this is any of his business. If Brad and Toni aren’t ready for kids yet, then they aren’t ready for kids. They’re basically raising Shannon because her dad is a flake.

This story arc is LAME

Why can’t Brad have the baby by himself? After all, gender is just a social construct.

Come on, Toni. You know you want to, just like Brad does.

I don’t think there’s a need to read too much into this. “Don’t force Toni, she’ll have a baby when/ if she’s ready”. They’re just gonna talk about it. Now if Brad starts pulling some guilt-trip crap while they’re talking, then we should trash him.

Whaddaya think TJ is making/cooking?

NO. They’re already a family. The question is whether they’re going to expand it.

It could be an actual start. “I mean, how would we DO this?” “Here, let me show you.” “I know that!” “OK, show me.”

Why are so many acting like Brad’s opinion is irrelevant and he has no say on this?

I think Toni is getting restless and less interested in the whole marriage thing and wants a break.

Brad, take one look at your pretty wife with her gorgeous hair and perfect body and just go from there. How do you think you came to be?

“When she is ready” ? he is not putting pressure on her he wants to talk to her about it and she does not want to talk about it

How does TJ know it’s fun. He doesn’t even have a girl friend that we know of.

BOTH have to decide when the time is right…if it ever is. It takes both of them to have a child, so both should have equal say in when and if.

Like they haven’t already discussed it? I seem to remember a lot of “discussions”….I think last time they decided to fix up an old car instead of having a baby. No worries, they can’t have a baby anyway, Greg doesn’t know how to draw babies.

If a guy who professed to love me treated me the way Brad is treating Toni I’d be out the door.

Credit where it’s due. Brad has desires, but he’s still going at Toni’s pace.

Um, TJ? … You have no imprimatur to tell those two what they NEED to do or talk about. Not your business. Butt out. (PS: If they do have a child, they may need your room for the baby, so I wouldn’t push it if I were you. You may find yourself on the street.)

Don’t.

Shannon is a reason not to have children.

Are the Evans family cartoonists from Texas?

So TJ also works at the fire station in addition to the Fuse

It’s too late now, their baby won’t reach adult age before the end of humankind.

An interesting series actually and I like how Toni is handling the “pressure”. The two likely outcomes are either Toni reminds Brad of their profession and not at this time unless he’s willing to take time off to raise a family (impacting the income level) or she wants to see about Shannon being with them full time. Either is cool, especially if it’s a open and honest discussion between them.

Okay here I go again commenting after getting the tenor of lots of earlier comments. In terms of adopting Shannon:. That is not legally on the table. She has a parent, whom she resides with, when not being babysat by Brad and Toni, with Luann’s help. That is hardly abandoning parental rights. Something major, probably tragic, would have to be written for it to make legal sense, even with this being a fantastical world, Luannverse. I do agree they need to discuss the issue of children, if no more than to find out Toni’s real fear, which is what it is I think. This will drag along for awhile, but I think in the end that she will become a mom. Another DeGroot. But with this strip, patience, enjoy the story, don’t try to force it the way you think it should go .

It may be more frightening for Toni because she’ll have so much more invested in having the baby.

In the meantime Brad needs to convince Toni that they should practice a lot!

Boring.

And frankly, after all is said and done, I‘d rather a story about Brad and Toni having to deal with Shannon.

Than all of this Brad pressuring Toni to have a child.

This is no longer funny.

This is cruelty.

Okay, I have never seen a guy who’s so anxious to start a family like this; ordinarily, it seems like it’s the woman who’s so anxious to start popping out babies, what with the whole biological clock ticking thing.

Maybe if you didn’t look at Toni like she’s some sort of baby-making machine this would go a little easier. Actually, maybe you should’ve discussed this BEFORE you got married.

Just get a DVD of Henry Fonda&Lucille Ball in “YOURS,MINE,AND OURS”.

If the premise of this installment is that Toni and Brad aren’t having sex, that’s wildly improbable. (Cute sign taped to the fridge door.)

It was my wife’s idea, and she held all the cards.

Yeah, Toni wears the pants in the family

TJ the nag.

Actually, an exceedingly large portion of women get relentlessly nagged about that. Often it is the grandfathers who do so.

It is not at all unusual for people who have no concept of the potential health risks, nor what the woman usually has to give up career-wise to nag about that topic: over and over and over and over again…

So, now we know something new about TJ. We already knew he could be manipulative when he wants his way, especially back when he was a teen, but now we know that nagging in not below him.

TJ should mind his own business and, by the way, find his own place to live. So what if he does the cooking? Is that all it takes to mooch off your friends?

Toni doesnt sound like she wants to have a kid anytime soon, if at all

Even if they are sometimes monsters, they are sweet little monsters. Shannon is probably good training for the worst…no, I have seen far worse. Shannon-like may be a goal to seek.

Even family members shouldn’t bug a couple about this. Good grief! No one knows what’s going on with the couple—infertility, for example—and no one needs to know. The couple can share info if they choose to.

Maybe this arc will lead to more background information on Toni and her childhood.

We don’t have children and we wouldn’t want it any other way. If you get a hankering for being around kids, go volunteer with some, there are plenty out there that need mentoring. Why do they have to be your blood?

TJ needs to move out. There is no reason why they can’t have a home o their own.

In the meantime,Shannon has constructed a homemadeski lift in the backyard….

No one has the right to try and pressure a young couple to have kids. That has to be their decision, and their decision alone.

it sure would be nice if Toni would just state her position on the matter (by the end of this week) and let the case be closed one way or another.

Maybe a better way to look at this is this:

At what point does Brad’s asking for a baby become badgering?

And for evidence, consider the following: The only non- Shannon arcs are, without fail, Brad asking Toni for a baby.

I think I can rest my case right there.

It is sad that, instead of saying what she means, which is „not ever“, instead, saying „not yet“, she keeps stringing the hapless, clueless Brad along. Of that, she is guilty. But nothing else.

But if all we know about Brad is that, when Shannon isn’t around, he badgers his wife for a baby, well, that’s on him.

As I’ve said before, I used to like Brad.

After this arc, not so much.

Shut up, TJ. If they have a kid, you’re homeless. . .

Toni does not want to give up that Dynamite Body for Baby Hips.

Just don’t blow this one, kids.

Buzz off, TJ! —Way off!

What a disgusting, nosy buttinski!

Why does TJ have to involve himself in this anyway? I thought they were friends.