For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for January 15, 2025

Don’t be Sensitive Sally. You DO look like you’re stuck in the 1970s and apparently you are comfortable with your style, so that’s who you are. So what? I wear my hair long with hairline parted in middle which is a 1970s style and I am perfectly ok with it and don’t care that it is not quite the style nowadays except for young girls.

90s is 60s upside down, as the aging hippies said in the 90s

Most men don’t worry about such things, apart from their increasing girth.

My mom had splotchy skin from some kind of reaction and she managed to cover it up and asked me how she looked. I said, in the nicest tone possible “Wow you can’t even see it! You could be a mortician!” The look on her face haunts me to this day. I was trying to compliment her and my brain thought that was the best thing to say.

The reruns (this one being from January 17, 1996) having little changes like 90’s instead of the original ’60’s does make the 2nd panel a little weird.

But by the ’90’s, the hippie fad was long over. I wonder if there was a dialogue change here.

Most older people stick with styles they wore when they were young, both hair and clothing. In the 70’s most girls wore their hair with a middle part and just hanging down but in the 80’s layered styles had come in and looked great. I’ve preferred that style most of my life since then but now my hair is thinning a bit so it doesn’t look as good as it used to in that style so I’ve grown it out and cut it one length. Seems to be working.

Well Ell, that went sideways.

My mom used to have liver spots on her hands now I can look at mine and think of her.

“Hey mom… when Lincoln ran for president, did you vote for him or the other guy?”

Unfortunately, kids have the gift of being tactless and tell “grown ups” only what they see about them. It’s because they (the kids) have no experience about how their victims feels (yet).

“Not because you wanted to buy me a boatload of stuff?!?”

I got my hair cut when I was 20. I wore it short for about 2 years. Decided that I hated it short & let it grow out. I’ve kept my hair long & unstyled ever since. I’m 60 now. Style be D*mned; I am who I am. (The only change to my hair is letting the greys come in.)

At least she wasn’t a 90’s grunge mom.

I feel bad for Elly, Liz just burned her

How would a teenager remember things from 30 years ago?

Elizabeth, you’re a real buzz kill, but that’s what teens do, isn’t it?

I don’t think those wiggly lines above Ellie’s head are the sign she having a hot flash.

Well, Liz, you certainly managed to depress Mom!

Hilary Forth looks the same as she did in the ’90s.

I never comment on a woman’s appearance

The 90s? I guess every once in a while there’s a sort-of update in these strips!

She looks exactly like she looked, specifically, on January 17, 1996 (albeit with a lot more color). But you know what, Elizabeth? So do you!

Elizabeth should have quit while she was ahead. LIke…after the first panel. Although, this actual strip probably ran in the 90’s and they changed it up to rerun it now. I loved this strip in its original run and April is the same age as my youngest daughter who was born the in May 1991. They named her April because that was the month she was born & my Katie was born in May…even the hair was the same.

Ahhh… when young, you do not know either age or its effects. That is only for the old people.

Elly’s gonna get a makeover!

Now Elizabeth and Elly are as low as Trudeau.

What is happening here is that Bil Keane over on The Family Circus had announced that the mom character, Thelma, was going to get a new haircut in 1996 to modernize her from the hairstyle she had worn since the 1960s. Not to be outdone, Lynn Johnston decided to do the same thing for Elly Patterson, whose hair had not changed since 1979.

I think “peace and flowers” is a lovely look on Elly or anyone. But if Liz means an “old hippie” look, then she’s wrong because Elly doesn’t dress old hippie style (which I also like a lot). Elly dresses in a simple style, neither trendy nor old fashioned.

“No good deed goes unpunished,” or something to that effect.

Peace And Flowers!? The way I’ve seen Elly abuse her kids(Especially Mike), if she were President in 1970, there’d be no one left alive at Kent State.

Nice going, Liz.

Truth hurts, don’t it ! ;-)