One of your intrepid cartoonists is back from a long vacation. Actually it’s not as long as it was supposed to be. In the past, we ran a couple comics about traveling to Bhutan, and Al seemed to be going under duress. Well Al kinda, sorta...let’s just say I relate to Al. But I decided to go. And when the time came to drive to the airport, I was coughing and sneezing a little. When we got to the airport my wife took a Covid test kit out of her suitcase, right before we went to check in. I swabbed and bingo, I had Covid. For the third time. Back home I went. Well that’s one way to get out of doing something you were ambivalent about doing. Which happens to be the subject of one of our comics this week. Compromise. More on that in a moment.

But first, if you’ve gotten this far, you saw the pumpkin John carved with the New 60 logo on it. He even managed to carve in the comic book typeface (which of course, he created in the first place)! If you want to see more of his very creative and extremely funny pumpkin carvings, just type, “John Colquhoun pumpkin carver” into your search bar and see for yourself.

And back to the comic. Marriage, like any partnership, is a series of compromises. Like agreeing to go to Bhutan for me, or watching a sports event for my wife. It’s not something one of us would have necessarily chosen. But you go along to get along. Sometimes you even end up enjoying yourself, as I am sure I would have in Bhutan, if not for the 8,500 foot altitude, the occasional 4 am wake up call and having to drink a cup of yak butter tea. I kid you not. But the company and the beautiful vistas while hiking would have been spectacular. In similar fashion, I heard news of a Steely Dan/Eagles concert. I love Steely Dan and called a good buddy who loves them as well. He passed on the offer and my wife (semi-reluctantly) accepted. And it turns out she had a great time. In the case of Al and Joanne, her attitude was helped by the gummy Al offered her. This would never have occurred with my wife and I. Not in a million years. Or at least 70.

Finally, I did join my wife and friends in Japan, which is where they were headed from Bhutan. I’ll take a giant carved Buddha and a Michelin starred sushi restaurant any day over yak butter tea any day. How about you?

That’s it for this week, we’ll be back to you next week with two new ones.

Andy and John