Frazz by Jef Mallett for March 02, 2025

Sometimes you can hear “2+2” without adding things up.

The Lord sometimes speaks in a third grader’s voice.

You won’t live forever, no matter what you do. At some point, you need to enjoy life, not just prolong it.

We’re forced to give up fondness for the pleasant things,/and we stop living so that we might live. Maximianus. An aging Roman emperor

I think Caulfield would like Mrs. Olsen around for a very long time. This way when he’s an adult, he can come back and see Mrs. Olsen, show her how successful he is, and take her out to dinner to reminisce and thank her for all she did for him.

This sounds like our emperor, “Did I say that?”

Well, here we are, some of us in our 70s, asking the same question (politically). I hope we each hear the third grader, and find more to do. There is much to do and the next “quiz” has started.

Caulfield interrupted and caught half a conversation, then made a judgement. Typical for his age.

You can always do better. I have my limits.

I see Mrs Olsen’s point: any hard-core smoker who has quit knows that’s the biggest and most important hurdle. A couple of summers ago, she and Caulfield had their reading/walking contest. If she gives up carrot cake, too, her tiresome doctor will just add another unreasonable demand- like eating kale. They’re never happy!

Perfect is always the enemy of good at doctors’ offices. That’s why so many people ignore them.

My mom was a smoker from about 15 until she was 30 when she quit. She died of Lung Cancer in her early 80’s. Before some fools says something like “Well she had a long life so that’s not so bad.” She died by drowning in her own fluids because tobacco had finally killed her lungs and they couldn’t work anymore. I was there, she refused all treatments because the cancer had spread.

Brand this on you forehead, “Tobacco in any form, Kills.”

At some point you have to decide what your priorities are. It’s easiest if you can find a way to be happy doing the things that give you long life, but it looks like she enjoys eating high calorie foods and reading. Giving up those things for long healthy hikes and lots of whole foods wouldn’t necessarily be worth it to her.

And life comes with no guarantees. I had a dear friend who lost more than a hundred pounds, discovered he loved distance running and was good at it, good enough to qualify and run several Boston marathons. There’s a last photo of him smiling at mile 13 of a marathon. At mile 14 he collapsed from a blood clot in his calf which had traveled to his lungs, and despite the EMTs being right there was dead before he reached the hospital. He had been having a crampy calf for a week, and did all the right things, went to the doctor to be sure it wasn’t anything more serious than a strain. Doctor missed it for some reason.

In the case of my friend, I think he would say he died doing what he loved. But not everyone does love running. If you don’t, try to find something else active that you do love. Because doing things you hate just to stay alive longer so you can keep hating your life is a bad bargain.

Caulfield may be a cynic, but he has a point.

Related: I’ve heard that 60 minutes of exercise a day when you’re 35 can extend your overall lifespan by as much as a full hour. Which means you’re trading in an hour when you’re young, healthy, vigorous, and ambitious for one when you’re old, feeble, achy, forgetful, and useless.

I remember a “Cheers” episode where one of the characters was asked if she ever listens to herself and her reply was “Sometimes”.

Touché, Caulie!

I’m reminded of two jokes:

The person who drove… slowly… into the auto repair shop and said “Please fix my horn: My brakes are getting soft”The person who, visiting the doctor said they had a lot of gas, but fortunately, it was imperceptible to everyone around. So the doc gave them some medicine… and when they came back they complained that the problem had not gotten better AND the medicine had made the gas stink horribly, but at least it was still silent. The doc replied: “Okay, we’ve gotten your nose working, now let’s work on your hearing!”

I think that if a student is consistently getting good test grades, he should not have any homework.

I wonder just how many strips over the years have shown a student or adult complaining about something, and then promptly saying or doing the exact thing that they were complaining about?