That is Priceless by Steve Melcher for November 21, 2023

/// The gray squirrel he keeps on a chain,

is a wild beast which Daniel can’t train.

Though they don’t transmit rabies,

their bite might maim small babies.

To keep one as a pet is insane.

The squirrel liked little Johnny, because all squirrels can sense a nut from across the yard.

That creepy neighborhood kid who spent all his time training squirrels. He was always charging the little old ladies a finders fee to find ‘lost’ jewelry.

Future congressman having a meeting with one of his constituents.

“When Squirrels Were One of America’s Most Popular Pets” —

https://www.atlasobscura.Com/articles/pet-squirrel-craze

.

Oh, “Nutsy” — whom as a child I once knew —

As connoisseur of walnut and cashew,

Although not allowed into our flat

(You reminded Mother of a rat!)

Our opened back door was the counter

Whereby exotic foods you did encounter.

.

You had not known of candied fruit

Or pomegranate seeds, forsooth,

Or cookie dough with butter texture —

Such food was not a Squirrel School lecture.

No, our back door was your chance

To form a Rodent Renais-sance.

.

Your education advance came to an end

When fickle Fate did soon portend

That humankind were like cruel gods,

With Squirrels and Men often at odds.

We might have socialized a little more

If your tail had not caught in our screen door!

.

Your tail, that furry train as once your glory,

Was scraped all bare, its appearance sorry,

Denuded shamefully, a voyeuristic kick

For perverted squirrels, pornographic.

The shame of Nutsy was such he came no more

To patronize the deli of our back door.

Copley apparently hasn’t learned the rules of proportion yet. The head is way too large.

Thet kid ain’ raht sized in tha hayed!

I will pet him and hug him and call him George.

It’s a little known fact that before rats Willard honed his craft with squirrels.

Of course son, he’s the only reason other kids call you “squirrelly”

That kids head is too big for his body. He has a good chance to become a tv news person

I always thought that kid was nuts.

Yes I am a droid. and one day I’ll be a billionaire running a social media company where I’ll spy on everyone and manipulate elections, sell private information and memorize the Fifth Amendment.

Sadly, Daniel Verplank didn’t get any better looking when he was older.

That head doesn’t suit his body

The classical music “squirrel”/

Is a fella named “Ives” (Charles- not Burl)/

No Mozart was he/

( When I hear him I flee)/

Try giving his music a whirl.

Dad, you need to work on your shading and shadowing. My back has disappeared and my head looks twice as thick as my chest.

The Artists Son, Without His Banjo, For Once

A portrait of Petey from Cul de Sac.

It was when the boy started dressing the squirrel up in little dresses and flowery hats that his father realized he wouldn’t be getting any grandkids.

Few knew that before the cold war Rocky and Boris were childhood friends.

Did anyone else look at that picture and your first thought was " Mark Zuckerberg before he started Facebook ".

Encephalitic child before frontal lobomoty – artist unknown…

Daniel Crommelin Verplanck: 

Paste (including the quote marks) 

"Category:1770s portraits of children" Wikimedia 

(syntax supported by the Google, Bing, Yahoo, DuckDuckGo, Ecosia, and Yandex search engines) in the browser address bar (or search for it using one of those search engines) and choose the first Category: found and once there find the text string Verplanck, and click its link for info and links that point to more info about this painting. 

Again, a larger strip image is shown by (Ctrl- or right-) clicking the image in Mr. Melcher’s MASTERPIECE #3225 (November 21, 2023) blog entry, accessible by the Check out the blog! box after the last comment, and using the dropdown menu (even larger, if you trim what’s after .png from the URL). I have added a comment there pointing to the blog entry with my comment pointing to info about this artist I used to point to here. So far, 16 works by him have been used here (18 times total, including 2 repeats), the November May 11, 2023, strip being the prior (a repeat).

after getting many shots for rabies after getting bit by “friendly” squirrel, jake decided to get a dog.

Daniel hoped posing with a squirrel would distract viewers from the awful buzz cut his father had given him.