Luann by Greg Evans and Karen Evans for February 11, 2020

Dating is hard. ✨

I think my own fuse is still waiting to be lit.

So, the only guy to ever valentine her is the one she calls names?

Yo, Pru! Do you have a copy of “Linda Ronstadt’s Greatest Hits” somewhere? Cue up “Poor, Poor Pitiful Me”. Play it for Luann.

A fabulous firework with a foxy fuse? Don’t stop with the metaphors. I think they are Dyn-o-mite!!

The fickle finger of fate will reveal her one true love to the fabulous firework with a foxy fuse…

Hey, the metaphor worked for Katy Perry.

@Dreamdeer

Everyone seems to forget this one.

https://www.gocomics.com/luann/2013/02/15

Okay.

So, what guy do you think will drop in Luann’s lap, on cue as in answer to prayer by the end of the arc?

1) Jack?

2) Doug?

3) Ryder?

4) Quill?

5) Aaron (SNORT) Hill?

6) Les (As suggested by Pru)?

7) Someone Brand New?

8) NOBODY.

I think 7 with 8 as runner up.

Luann looks pretty sad in the second panel. I can understand wanting love in your life; that’s what I want, too. The problem is that Luann has a pretty narrow idea of what love is. Furthermore, she has a narrow idea of what her life is supposed to be. I understand that she has poor self-esteem, but she could stop to think for a moment about what her life is—and could be—instead of what it isn’t. What would it take for Luann to see her own self-worth?

Quill never did anything for Valentine’s Day when they were dating? Or has this been retconned?

Luann, now sit back and look at your Valentine history. You gave cards to guys you were crushing on (bad-boy types) and received one from a nerdy guy. What do you see what all this says about you? You need to sit back, think, reflect, analyze and understand yourself before anything good could happen. You need to understand who you are first before you can find happiness. Otherwise, you’ll just go on cycles. I suspect Pru is here to help you.

I wonder how many years it will be before they actually get together.

I saved my fuse for “the one”. A really special one happened to come into my life, and we are going on 30 years of marriage (plus a few before). If things were that we got to come back to this earth for another life after this one, I would spend that one looking for her.

Luann! “Get thee to a nunnery!” (Courtesy Will Shakespeare) :P

Married at 18 and widowed at 74 to my one and only. It’s been over 9 years and I miss him still.Married at 18 and widowed at 73 to my one and only. It’s been over 9 years and I miss him still.

Metaphorically, Luann’s room is the star of the strip. Bernice and Luann are the stars of the room where they fantasize about the purpose of their their lifes. This strip gives purpose to the readers and thus Bernice and Luann will be perpetual single and Gunther’s children will get more action than the two ladies.

Time to try the other side of the street, Luann.

“Gosh, Luann, maybe if you didn’t still look and act like a fifteen year old you’d have better luck.”

Seriously? R-rated metaphors in a FAMILY COMIC?

Who remembers cherry bombs? Firecrackers on steroids!

She treats guys like dirt. Why’s she surprised that no one is into her?

Quill Valentined the heck out of her

Seems Pru is looking a bit cut and pasted. Either that or her expression is just stuck.

The last time Pru got Luann off her non-romance duff we all got suckered, IMHO! Remember it ended with LU going to meet Gunther and we all went gaga over a Gunther-Luann hookup. GnK’s real outcome was to get both onto net-dating and a Gunther and Bets hookup. Turns out, in reality, that was the arc GnK wanted played out.

So now we have Gun (ugh) not to happy with the way the Bets relationship is going. We have Luann with a more than innocent interest in Gunther’s relationship. And we have a return to the familiar “Pru priming Luann for another adventure” startup. This big-sister-like talk suspiciously starting again with reminiscences of our boy Gunther. Plus talk of Gunther’s Valentine’s Day cards leading up to, you guessed it, Valentine’s Day on Friday.

Either we are being duped again into believing Luann will fizzle in a temporary relationship like last time and someone else will be “hooked up” (like, say Tiffany). OR Luann will pursue Gunther; consequences be darned! OR another surprise we don’t expect, like Gunther and Bets hooking up so quickly.

But IMHO GnK will surprise up. (I just hope, like Mordy, it doesn’t involve Les.) ;o)

I’m sorry but a good looking & intelligent woman who’s not infected by “woke” is going to be asked out by a nice guy. That’s just the way it is. Demographics back the statement up. American women have choices, men have chances. In 2020 America the America women have as many choices as possible.

Luann is a hopeless romantic and always has been one, from Aaron Hill to Quill (strip historians what was his last name). She is a babe, and has a good heart, and is a good person, if a bit doofus. She has to be doofus though to satisfy the humor element in the strip. Now her nature is bumping up against the calendar, and the normal angst that being a young adult entails. I have a clear candidate, Jack, but I think both of them would have to come to realize that the fiery pyre goes to class with them, and meets at dog parks, plus going on shopping trips to the mall with Shannon. (Shannon is a very important plot element is this strip by the way). But time will tell, hilarity will ensue, people will get bored, and I can assure you surprised. If she does actually find the one, and gasp marries him, I bet Greg will be shortly thereafter retiring.

OK, after grade school Valentine’s parties, what is the big deal?

Lila has captured Luann’s thinking today.

https://www.gocomics.com/meaningoflila/2020/02/11

Your fuse has fallen out, the gunpowder is wet and so are the matches.

Luann is so sad and confused. Her conversation about her own needs of a special one is full of Freudian slips, that she notices only after saying them. It’s so nice that she has a friend like Pru to talk, that gives her real advices (because Bernice’s advices aren’t exactly helpful) and encourages her. I hope Pru organizes something for her “little sis”. Maybe go around will all her friends, having fun. Maybe involving Jack in this.

Luann might elicit more sympathy if she was actually trying to find love, instead of expecting romance to fall in her lap while she’s too lazy to do anything herself. Remember how one bad date was enough for her to quit online dating altogether? (and we never did find out why that guy bailed) Remember how she needed rescuing from a party that was “too intense” because god forbid some people were drinking and kissing?

Luann’s problem is that she never makes an effort at anything and success just falls in her lap from time to time (like that time she was somehow a stage-decorating prodigy without even trying), so when her laziness has the actual logical result, she pisses and moans about how bad her life is but doesn’t actually make any real change. She’s mad because life doesn’t always reward her aimlessness.

With a little luck, maybe THIS guy will show up, for REAL this time:

https://www.gocomics.com/luann/2019/07/21

Prudence is a master of alliteration.

A ‘foxy fuse’?!? There goes my breakfast!

When you’re ordinary on the outside,sometimes it takes a while.

Hmm. . . . I wonder if we are about to see how open minded Luann and the readers are. . . . .

Alright, I know the characters all have faulty memories when it suits G&K, but Luann is wrong. She got a valentine from Quill when they were going together. I don’t remember the date of the comic, but Lu and Bern are in Bern’s dorm room at Mooney, and Tiff shows up with a bag claiming it’s full of valentines from guys, and she asks how many valentines did Lu and Bern get. Luann replies: “just one from my true love Quill.”

Really this selective amnesia the characters suffer from is getting a little old.

Two words: push-up bra.

I was just thinking that it might be time in this comics story arc for LuAnn to fall in love and get married. I was thinking some swashbuckling type that just appears on the scene out of nowhere. New adventures to spread around. But Gunther? Hmmmm. Well, he’s well known to the readers. Not a bad guy. But would he cause LuAnn to see fireworks?

Quill gave her Valentines. How quickly she forgets.

Nothing beats a good metaphor. Bad metaphors beat everything silly.

We have seen Gun mature and improve in relationships. Unfortunately we haven’t seen that happen with LuAnn. You gotta date to learn things about yourself and what you really want in a relationship.I don’t think Gun and LuAnn belong together, but at this rate she wont be ready when he is.

Luann stop taking advice from Pru.

For those who were saying Stef’s eyes were “off,” check out Luann’s rectangular eyes in panel 2.

You mean Quill never gave her one? Or did she forget about him completely?

I’m guessing Luann might get an unexpected valentine before the week is up, maybe from Nil. That would be interesting.

Fuse? Fuse? Wait, I used to know what that was…

Come on baby light my fire – The Doors

3

For me today…. and I apologize if I missed one of the comments that explained all of this…..

But, for the life of me, I am either too damn obtuse, too coffee deprived, too pipe tobacco deprived, or something similar…. but….. I have absolutely NO CLUE as to why there is a problem with the “metaphors” of a “fallen out fuse” and “wet matches”. The metaphors seem to suggest Luann is unable to currently “light someone’s fire”. That seems an appropriate set of metaphos for Luann’s own statements given her frame of mind…. even though I suspect it is false on many levels.

Wet matches are indeed an abomination…. I remember the consternation I felt more than a few times that I felt when I would walk around in the rain…. with a traditional yellow slicker…. and I would unfortunately not watch carefully and have the pocket flap over the jacket pocket…. and the heads of the wood matches I had in my pocket to light my pipe would be soggy and useless.

Unfortunately, it did not stop there… I was (am) the forgetful sort at times and have have had the same sogginess (probably water-logged would be a better term) occur if I carried a lighter in my pocket instead of matches… that too had occurred a variety of times leading me to grumble considerably under my breath.

“One day your match will strike, and BOOM!”

With any luck, Evans and this strip will both be dead before that happens.

I went to high school with a girl who was Totally Uninterested in Anyone. She just could not understand what all the fuss was about and found it very confusing.

Until she was 18 and met a “Mr Right”. She was still Confused, but at last she was Confused by the Same things everyone else was so confused about.

I think this is a set-up for a serious relationship/growth for LuAnn. I would bet that with Pru’s help and encouragement (and hopefully accompaniment) LuAnn will get out of her comfort zone, try and go someplace new and meet someone. Though personally, I still like the Jack and LuAnn angle.

I feel your pain, Luann. I’ve walked in those shoes.

I suppose that metaphor is subject to strained misinterpretation. But, mostly, woeful Luann’s self-assessment is correct. Pru is too peppy and positive for the ill-starred eponym here….

Someone earlier mentioned that they didn’t know if Jack’s dog had a name. He does; it’s “Max.” The link to the comic showing this is at the end of this. I"m sorry that I wasn’t able to find the person who inquired and reply, but I’ll post this anyway in case anyone sees it so late at night, or maybe tomorrow. :-) https://www.gocomics.com/luann/2016/10/27

F isn’t for failing, it’s for faltering in Luann’s case. She can’t make up her mind what she wants. So she expected and still expects guys to wait around for her to make up her mind. She expects these guys to know what she wants before she knows it herself. She refuses to let guys know how she truly feels. She acts all offended when they don’t spontaneously sweep her off her feet.

You know what, now that i think of it: she wants a man who’s a highlight reel; gunther’s sweet thoughtfulness, aarons boyish looks, quills handsome charm, and jacks muscles. and like every other woman, she’s disappointed that the male she wants——doesn’t exist.

Sounds legit

You mean like this one: https://www.gocomics.com/luann-againn/2020/02/14

that’s not true her ex gave her a valentines