Crankshaft by Tom Batiuk and Dan Davis for April 12, 2024

But it’s not.

Umm, I hate to tell you, Ed, but Mitch there is your great-grandson. His father Max, the movie theatre guy, Pmmm’s offspring, is your grandson. Understand how it works now?

Also, sure, Ed. You never see a cash register at the supermarket, the Dale Evans, Montoni’s, the Sprawl-Mart, or any of those other places you frequent. Sheesh.

No reader for credit or debit cards? So this store can only take cash or checks? Talk about customer convenience! No wonder it’s going out of business.

“By crackey, back in MY day at the local general store and pig slaughterhouse, you could only pay in pieces of tree bark! And by crackey, it sure not be too infested with wood lice, or we kids would have to LICK them off! For some reason, we had high child mortality in them days!” (leans down) “Hey, Rictus Homunculus! Want another tasty slab of lead paint?”

Where do I tap Gramps?

So first panel not punchline today? How we suppose to knows which one is punchline if you is keeps changing panel orders randomly?

“This is Mitch. You shouldn’t be able to see him”.

There’s a cash register in every store in the world. Maybe he means a MANUAL cash register. Which would explain why this old, outmoded place is going out of business.

“And if you just slide that register off the top of the counter where this kid is standing underneath it, I can make it worth your while. Keep the store open, you might say. Don’t worry about the parents, they’re too preoccupied with their own failing business to even notice…”

There’s clearly a credit card station in the background, indicated by the Visa sign.

Old hardware store, I expected an older register, with the money tags that stick up on top.

When Ed goes to pay for that one little screw the guy will say that will be $12.87, please.

But the Smithsonian has older looking ones than that great grandpa.

MR B please bring back the “x seconds earlier” format. I actually think I prefer a mangled joke to no joke at all, thank you.

This story arc makes me sad because I’ve seen the closure of two small, family-run hardware stores in my town since the Big Box stores came here.

Home Depot and Lowes put many mom and pop hardware stores out of business. ACE seems to be one of the few chains that can stay in business in proximity to the big boxes.

I remember learning how to use a cash register in high school.

Owner: “…. Yeah… you didn’t buy ***t back then either…”

Ed slips further from reality and he thinks Mitch is his adult grandson.

i bet ed and the idiot kid cant stir brownie mix either

Anybody know where there’s an “automatic change dispenser” attached to the cash register?

Stacks of coins in a side compartment and the change goes down a little slide.

Grand Central Station Oyster Bar in NYC had one for decades.

NCR gear drive with backup hand crank power.

That is nonsense!

Was just doing the math. Isn’t Mitch his great grandson? Or does Ed just not want to show his age?

The biggest tool in the store is cranky himself the way he stands there with his glib attitude after spending a whopping 3 cents to the guy who just told him that the place is closing for good. What a freakin’ goofball…..

Cash registers have been replaced by Point Of Sale terminals. But, people still refer to the POS terminals as cash registers. They do, after all, still have drawers for cash, and they do record (register) sales and refunds.

NCR?

I liked the sound those machines made.

I think I see the real reason the store’s going out of business: he is charging the exact same amount ($1.57) that he did at least fifty years ago. Yeah, that’ll do ya in pretty quick.

He also has the exact same merchandise on the walls, so it would appear the $1.57 is not for the sale of hardware and tools, but for admission to his “hardware store museum.”

Think of all the gardening supplies he bought from Bean’s End, which might have kept this guy in business!

I miss the way Batiuk used to use photo corner thingys to indicate scenes and memories from the past. Sepia panels make sense if the scene was from the 1920s or something. Whenever I see a sepia panel, my mind’s ear starts hearing some kind of old-timey ragtime piano music.

We need more photo corner thingys. And bricks!!!

This week of Crankshaft could have been a whole heck of a lot worse. It could have featured Loathsome Lillian at the Ohioana Book Festival.

Loathsome Lillian, the black hole of charisma, standing around with her usual idiot eye-popping, air-sucking expression. I can feel my soul slipping away just thinking about her. Oh, how I hate her.

I know somebody who has one of those… except that he never bothered to register it.