Luann by Greg Evans and Karen Evans for November 07, 2022

Someone’s got a knack. ✨

Luann got nothin’.

And once again Greg fails to finish a story he started. What happened at the awards ceremony? Did Luann recognize Vale’s plagiarism. Did she complain about? Did she even get her $10? At least that will get her two espressos.

“Write like crazy.”

That’s what the late Kurt Vonnegut once said.

So get to it, Lu.

You may one day churn out this generation’s “Slaughterhouse-Five.”

Of course, it might also help if you were a POW and survived the firebombing of Dresden……..,

This is looking like a pretty good start to an arc. Tara has shown a talent beyond getting into trouble. Also good to see Luann in an interaction beyond Bernice – although there is nothing wrong with that friendship. It also brings The Fuse back into the mix – will we see Nancy there?

Hang in there Luann. Quantity does not necessarily equal quality. Hemingway wrote a 128 page novella which won both the Pulitzer AND the Nobel prize for literature in the same year; granted Papa was a hard act to follow. Extra credit; what was the title of his novella?

The Old Man and the Sequins.

.

Oops. That’s the rewritten version.

Tara is like a big block V8 running on ten cylinders.

Well, we all know our Luann is an underachiever. Tara will soon find out and probably will look for another partner. Luann will barely write a book. The last submission was a short story based on a true story that is easy to write. What Tara is proposing is over her head and beyond her skills.

“A job begun is a job half done,” if half done means one pitiful sentence…

Luann has my computer! That’s what it always says just as I’m about to work on something important!

Depends on the update. Is it a software update? If so, perhaps. Is it an OS update? If so, no thanks; I’m still happily using Windows 7, and will continue to do so for as long as is humanly possible.

Writing in a nutshell

Oh, dear…will Luann be tempted to plagiarize like Vale? Tune in tomorrow…and tomorrow…and tomorrow…

I thought Luann & Tara were in school. Where does Tara get all this time? We didn’t see Tara’s entry in the writing contest – to see if we think she has any talent.

Great idea indeed. It was about time for “The Fuse” to become a place where Luann can exprime her creativity. Tara is like an avalanche of ideas while Luann starts from zero. Let’s see if Luann will find new ideas and be able to write some good comedy. Dunno if she will change from comedy to other genres, but I see ger writing love stories, as well as fantasy and sci-fi. She doesn’t lack imagination, she just has to try. This could be the beginning of her great literary career and Tara’s helps is precious♡.

Microsoft Windows: “I’ll lock up before you leave”

Lu and Tera odd couple.

Yeah, that little icon has been sitting on my task bar for a couple of weeks now. It’ll sit there for a couple more. Microsoft has been particularly lax with the quality control of their updates since Win10 rolled out and they stopped charging for version upgrades.

An interesting thought. Tara and Luann are writing at The Fuse. Ox works at the Fuse. Ox knows thatr Luann knows Tiffany. Do you think he will happen to mention her accident while he’s serving them their Mocha Latte with two shots of expresso? Would Luann go see Tiffany (with Tara in tow) and will Tiffany’s adventure because the plot of a mystery thriller? We can only hope so! It would be so nice to bring the two siloed arcs together

Triple espressos??

Tara, you should collaborate with Adam@Home. You’ll get more accomplished there than with the clueless Luann.

Tara has actual pages and Luann has a slow laptop. I don’t think Luann will get much done….or finished.

Tara’s mind races. Such high level of energy. Must be the red hair. Luann just may have been a one-story wonder, will get discouraged and quit after this week. Luann is better off being alone rather than trying to keep pace with Tara.

OK, so apparently Vale is not only going to get away with stealing Luann’s work but she didn’t even recognize her own ideas when she read them.

I was thinking maybe we’d FINALLY see Luann grow a bit as she had to stand up for herself and call out somebody who ripped her off. Guess she’s just going to continue to be a wimp that everybody walks over.

Does Tara actually have a talent for something besides stealing things?

I’ve been trying to update my computer for a while, but it won’t finish.

It’s okay, Luann. It’s clearly a quality vs. quantity issue. You’ll come up with something good.

It’s too bad we didn’t get to see how the awards ceremony played out.

I wonder who will serve them… Ox or TJ?

It’s not good when you peak at Horrible Haircut, a story about something that happened to you in high school.

Tara may have already had a bit too much coffee

Click “Later”. Always later. :-P

Once again somebody is more prepared for something than Luann. If it would spoil the strip, it’d be nice if Luann was the one who was prepared.

Tara is always portrayed as an energetic confident young woman, whose past gets in the way but does not stop her desire to get an education, which she uses to stimulate and encourage Luann. Her friendship is more challenging to Luann than Bern’s; I think that is really good for Lu.

Does this mean that we will have to see more of the NO-brained, doofus?

Sometimes when you are starting (from scratch) a pen and pad of lined paper works best; I begin composing (whatever I have to write) on a piece of paper; thoughts flow better that way; at some point I move to the computer. I see that Tara has folders with lots of sheets. Luann is just staring at a blank screen…not a good way to make ideas flow.

Tara may have faults but it appears that Greg wrote her as a writer. Most people don’t know the hard work of a good writer. The late, great science fiction writer, Isaac Asimov, had the ability to write 8 pages of manuscript per day, double spaced, on a manual typewriter. He was dependable and a sought after writer for Analog, Galaxy, and other science fiction magazines. About 2,800 words is pushing three pages.

Poor Luann. You gotta love Windows.

Don’t forget to let it startup three or four more times! You’ll want to make sure that all those updates to the updates load!

Then go check those driver error messages! See if your sound still works!

Luann doesn’t look stimulated. Bern got Luann to write 825 words by pointing out the value of her diaries and a contest with a $ prize. Tara is trying to foster self motivation by example; so far it’s not working.

Do these 2 remember what happed to them at the Fuse last time? Tara sleeping there, Tara getting hit by the car. Plus Frank never confronted them on why they were at the Fuse after hours, they just ended the arc with the 2 of them sitting at the Fuse eating ice cream and laughing.

I hope Tiffany is ok and her house was not burglarized.

Good writing by Greg. Funny first panel, great setup second panel, and very funny third panel.

Tara mentioned she was taking a writing class, so does that mean the semester has begun? Are they still in their second year of Community College? If Luann is taking a full load does she have time for this? If Luann has a job it likely pays $15+ so wasting a couple hours at a ceremony for $20 does not make sense.

Tara is quite the writer. When I was writing for magazines, I’d be working on two or three stories at a time, but not anything like the volume of Tara and her deep genres.

write what you know Luann. Go back to those diaries and pick something else.

Don’t be intimidated Luann! Run your own race. If the laptop won’t load then grab a legal pad and a pen and start writing.

Luann is not a writer. She is only doing it because other people are pushing her.

I could write much faster home alone. I could not concentrate with other people around, trying to have a conversation.

There was no plagiarism by Vale. Go back and read his story and then compare it to the things Luann said that he recorded. Totally different. Anyone who insists on accusing plagiarism is just stirring the pot for no good reason and it shows they don’t pay attention.

Wow, Luann is still using Windows XP?

Tomorrow we will see Luann telling Frank she needs a new laptop.

There’s more than one way to write.

My son would still be working on which font to use.

Luann, the underachieving Gen-Zer (or Gen-Xer, or even millennial, depending on when you begin counting)

Tara seems to really be interested, while Luann seems to have already gotten bored.

This is so dull.

I suppose this explains why Luann has no real passions or hobbies, and any suddenly-appearing skills (like stage design) and up abandoned twenty minutes later. She simply doesn’t have the drive to actually do anything. Heck, even singing and acting seemed to be more for Quill’s benefit than hers, as she lost all interest in both after she broke up with him.

Must be weird to go through life with no hobbies or passions, losing interest in anything that starts to look like it might need a bit of effort put into it. It’s easy to blame this on Gen-Z instant gratification mentality, but Luann’s been like this before she ended up in Gen-Z, and will likely be that way long after she’s left behind by that age group too (assuming Karen doesn’t abandon the strip after Greg passes.) Luann’s only lasting passion was boys, and that ended once she reached the age of consent and Karen realized that a sex-obsessed character would logically feel the need to pursue her obsession, but Luann losing her V-Card is apparently a bridge too far.

It just seems to me that Luann allows herself to get beat down. First Bernice is all snarky with her and runs to Luann’s mom with her problems, then we have Tara in her enthusiasm “bragging” about everything she’s written, and Luann likely feels like she has nothing to offer anyone. Everyone she went to high school with got into Mooney U and she didn’t. A case of poor self esteem. Just sayin.’

install it now so it will be done tonight.

The California State Universities admit just about everyone who graduates from a California high school.“Students who meet the first-time Freshman CSU admissions requirements and have a GPA of 2.0 (CA HS graduates/CA residents) OR 2.47 (non-CA HS graduates and Non-Residents) will be considered for admissions. "

Sadly, I see a lot of myself in Luann right now. BUT….she is learning that writing isn’t the glamour job she thought it was. It’s hard work!

Luann is definitely funnier than Tara.

Been there done that.

Perhaps Luann should read “The Lazlo Letters” by Lazlo Toth (Don Novello/Father G u i d o Sarducci).

Luann actually still has plenty of material on her cassette tapes for a book of short stories. It seems to me that coming up with a brand new, unused idea for a book would be kind of hard.

Ogden Nash became famous for 4 line poems

I thought they spelled Fuse F U Z E.

They both need to be in writing groups that have members their own speed, IMO. I’d be looking like Luann too if I were a rank beginner confronted with revved-up overachiever Tara.

Switch to Linux!!!!!!! ❤️

There are a few new authors out there in the Sci-Fi / Fantasy world who really are that prolific.

Either that, or they have been writing for about 20 or 30 years and I never ran across them before.

Luann looks shell shocked in the 2nd panel. Rarely has she seen such energy and enthusiasm for something academic like writing. Tara is her friend but Luann is going to get left in the dust pretty soon if she cannot rise to the challenge that Tara is proposing. overtherainbow says Luann would be better off in a group of persons at her level. But Luann needs to be pushed; if everyone in the group was like Luann they’d all just be sitting there doing nothing together. So being with Tara is a good thing.

Answer in 5000 words (or more):

Is Luann’s totally hopeless condition actually worsening?!

In Luann’s defense, this is a new idea for her, Tara has already been planning for this.

Yes, she is a writer bursting with ideas and stories. Same here.

She needs to get rid of that Windows computer.