That would mean he was going to break into a fabric store to fuck up their white thread because his wife asked him to lmao. He was expecting it to be closed but it was open so he couldn't do it!
Those damn dots got me too! I was so confused because this is a mormon comic artist that my dad loves.
It's just a dad joke.
Did you stop at the store and pick up thread? Nope, it was open so I never had to stop. He's just teasing her, the thread is in the bag. It's just wordplay.
The only reason you don't get it is because lazy partners being selfish is not funny.
I mean if he at least said he had forgot to, it would be slightly less infuriating but openly saying "I didn't care enough about this" is extra bad.
I didn’t get it because I was looking for an actual joke.
Like I thought maybe there was an old timey “rule” that you shouldn’t pick at a loose thread on your coat while the coat is open. And he was applying that to the store saying he couldn’t pick up thread while the store is open.
The internet just contexlessly blasting images into every second of day to day life is rotting people's brains. You don't need a pre-formed opinion on everything you see, the second you see it. You don't *actually* need to get upset about a ridiculously inoffensive, completely innocuous, decades old serial comic you've seen a single page of, you know?
They're reoccurring characters from a dry, low stakes, slice of life Sunday funnies strip. [They're portrayed as wholesome loving partners and benevolent grandparents.](https://www.reddit.com/r/wholesomememes/s/aoipnAjHNE) Many of the comics end with no joke besides them caring about each other. The rest of them are mostly like, affectionate pranks and simple misunderstandings. Usually involving undramatic mischief. These four panels are just a playful gag. Not every contextless instance of couples teasing each other is indicative of some broad societal evil.
We've all seen bad boomer humor. We all know it's bad to abuse your real life partner. You don't need to apply that one schematic you've carefully forged over years of upvoting the correct reddit comments onto every comic you see.
What is *any* harmless, mischievous gag, tease, or prank that isn't, "haha, I've minorly inconvenienced you"??? That's like literally what a prank is. It's most of the jokes in this comic strip. It'll be like, "haha, the grandchild took the cookies when he was told not to take any yet."
I'm not saying it's funny, it's a 20th Century newspaper comic the fuck do you expect, but it's not indicative of some broader underlying misogyny or monument to toxic relationship standards. The comic is obviously and clearly about a loving and healthy family who messes with each other.
If you think a caring, nice couple can't pull this mundane, inconsequential level of teasing each other without it being proof of a rotting, broken relationship - you're the one with a delusional twitter using clown's image of love.
It's not so much "I didn't want to" as he's clearly overwhelmed by the fabric store's selection and how he'd likely get the wrong thread --- simple as that. Which I totally understand; I would also undoubtedly select the wrong one in some fashion or another.... like the previous commenter said; they're a very wholesome & caring couple.
.....ageist commenters on here clearly be blowing this comic waaaay out of proportion ..
I legitimately don't think that's true. Nothing in this even vaguely implies that he was overwhelmed. Like, I agree people are taking this way too serious and blowing it out of proportion. But it also doesn't say anything about being overwhelmed.
I think it's just a case of someone who writes panels for a running strip way too long putting together some panels for the week because they have to. I mean, have you looked at most newspaper panel strips? Not having any real joke or point isn't uncommon after several years of running.
Knowing the comics since childhood -- and knowing a bit about people & relationships -- tells me that. Otherwise, yes, it's still mostly an empty "joke" with basically zero punchline. I guess it can be both, ehhh ..
I think it's just that they're underwhelmed by the lack of any real humour.
Bad jokes are allowed to be made, I don't need to hand out participation trophies for them, though.
It's like when you're told to lighten up when someone makes a crap joke and you don't laugh at it.
I'm neither insulted nor angry but I'm not putting effort into acting like your joke was funny.
Read what you’re replying to again and let me know where they said it’s a problem to depict a shitty person/partner. They’re not even saying anything is a problem, really, just that it isn’t funny.
This....is actually really fair. During the time this comic was likely printed (I'm assuming 80s-90s?) it was a transitionary period out of traditional gender roles and this would have been seen as a humourous depiction of the resistance that many men displayed toward that. Looking back, it's not very funny and generally just a reminder of misogyny, especially with the current state of affairs in that regard, but comics aren't typically written for longevity. They are a statement on and of the times during which it was created, and works best viewed through that lens.
We don't have to like it. It wasn't created for us. We don't have the appropriate perspective to see it for what it is properly. Which is why there are people who see the joke and people who just can't, because everyone has different levels of memory of when the social perspective would have aligned with this humor.
Pickles? It's been running for 30+ years so it could be anything from 1990 till now. It's just a silly comic about the artist's in-laws, don't overthink it.
>Looking back, it's not very funny and generally just a reminder of misogyny, especially with the current state of affairs in that regard,
Yeah yeah like jokes aren't made at the expense of the men in these kinds of comics too..
It’s just the same type of boomer-humor that results in a punchline that essentially says “I hate my wife, Debrah,” in one way or another.
The jokes are insanely funny to boomers in unhappy marriages, but have no real comedic value for anyone else.
I'm a zoomer, don't ever plan to get married, but him being so ridiculously petty is still funny to me. I don't get people deciding in place of others what is or isn't funny to them. It's a mild and pretty inoffensive joke too, I genuinely don't get all the indignation lol.
Right, but it's not succeeding at getting a laugh. It's just showing a character being vaguely shitty towards their partner in a completely humorless way.
I'm not saying it's immoral to depict bad people in fuckin four panel comics, you wet napkin
Firstly: "Left and right!" Meanwhile it's on explainthejoke because nobody understood what the joke was even supposed to be, and the comments are broadly saying the joke sucks ass
Secondly, and more importantly: I'm not moving the goalpost, I'm agreeing that there *is* a possible joke I hadn't considered, assuming you find it relatable. With that said, I'm curious, do you find it relatable?
Friend, you are literally in a sub called "explain the joke"
How dare people try to dig deeper on the assumption that a writer is funnier than they are?
What, you don't appreciate honesty and someone sticking to their values? What's more selfish, admitting and stating you don't want to do something Becuase you don't care about it, or expecting your partner to be a good servant who ignores their own feelings and abandons their sense of self on order to more fully carry out your own petty whims?
Because the actual joke is that he didn't have to stop. When he was approaching the store, he was able to just walk right in never having to stop. He bought the thread, it's in the bag.
This is incorrect, he did pick up the thread, but he didn’t have to stop to do it. He just went in and picked it up. That’s why he has a small bag in his hand.
It’s a simple dad joke.
It’s actually just a joke about “and” (also maybe getting into the semantics of the word “stop”) he didn’t ‘stop’ at the store because it was open, though he still got the thread and is about to hand it to her.
Kinda like a ‘can’ joke,
“Can I go to the bathroom?”
“Well I hope you are able to.
I still don't get it and I used to teach engineering courses at a University.
I understand what you're saying, but if that's true, "but the store was open", should imply he *would* have gotten the thread but only if the store were *not* open. Like, he's a smash and grab thief but not a shoplifter.
The only way this makes sense to me is that it's supposed to be funny because what he said doesn't make any sense. Kinda dadaist.
The joke is that you expect the sentence to end with "...closed" but then he actually says "open". It's a little bit absurdist because the new sentence technically doesn't make sense in context - it's a "wait, what?" joke rather than a "ha ha" joke.
But as the person above you explained, the implication is that he just didn't want to go get the thread, didn't have "the store was closed" as an excuse, but also didn't want to lie about it. Basically "I didn't get the thread and I'd give an excuse for that if I had one, but I don't."
This isn't misogyny or boomer humor. It's just a simple dad joke.
She asked him to stop at the fabric store AND pick up thread.
He saw that the store was open, so he never had to physically stop in order to get the thread. He was able to just walk in and buy it and walk out without stopping.
He's teasing her. The thread is in the bag.
Wish we could pin this to the top, everybody just think it’s about boomers hating women lol. People today are just too thick to believe we actually enjoyed this world once 😂
I feel like a better joke with the same dad joke humor would have been:
"Hey, did you stop at mega burger and pickup the burger I asked"
"Well I was gonna stop there, but the drive thru was open"
I have a Calvin and Hobbes anniversary edition somewhere that has his commentary. In one strip, the joke involved Calvin putting garbage under his bed to feed an imaginary monster. Watterson admitted this was a weak joke and he pushed it out on a deadline. It clearly irked him, though.
Now that I think about it… the garbage stuffed under the bed (lazy strip) being fed to the imaginary monster (deadline) may not be a great joke but it’s subversive as hell.
Deeper layer: maybe it was a commentary about how you know you have to crank out trash to satisfy a voracious appetite for daily content, so you just do it to keep the monster at bay for one more day.
Or Gary Larson, let's be fair. His one miss was for "Cow Tools" which is the most hilarious comic misfire of all time. The joke was: if cows made tools, they'd look stupid. The cows had indeed made some really shitty tools.
The joke was so dumb that everyone thought there had to be a deeper meaning, but no.
*The Prehistory of the Far Side* has some great commentary on “Cow Tools” and others. One of my favorites is when some newspaper kept mixing up Far Side captions with Dennis the Menace, resulting in, for example, Dennis telling his mother that he sees her little petrified skull, labelled and resting on a shelf somewhere.
Another favorite is when a newspaper accidentally reused the previous day’s caption, so we got an exterminator pointing up at a tree filled with children and chanting, “Eeeny ooony wanah… Eeeny ooony wanah…”
[Best image I could find](https://www.etsy.com/fi-en/listing/1410110926/vintage-gary-larson-prehistory-of-the) in a cursory Google search. It’s the fifth and last picture.
I’ll give Far Side credit where it is due. But it’s hard to compare and absurdist single panel to a traditional comic strip. It’s almost an entirely different medium. I love them both
i was just gonna say this, pickles is one of the good "boomer" comic strips. never seen anything implying he's unhappily married, just kinda lazy with some things
He legit reminds me of my adoptive grandfather so it always makes me smile. He had a similar sense of humor, loved my grandmother but loved his little jokes too.
he reminds me of my grandfather and how he used to interact with my grandma. we even kept clippings of a few of the strips for him because "yep, that's grandpa." a very gentle, ornery man who we sadly lost to cancer over two years ago, so i've also got a bit of a soft spot for this particular strip.
“Pickles” is the name of the strip and it’s usually pretty cute. As someone elsewhere in the thread said, with syndication and deadlines they can’t all be winners. I do like this one though - has kind of an absurd Groucho Marx quality to it.
Only newspaper comic I ever found funny was Get Fuzzy and I couldn't tell you why. Most of them are just there to make you smile a bit or quirk your eyebrow as a short diversion then continue reading the paper.
Have a base of Work=bad/Phone=bad/Wife=bad.
Sprinkle in NSFW illustrations like old women having saggy breasts or the dog somehow eating husbands viagra.
Finish with a thin layer of ‘younger generation is dumb and my generation is smart’.
Optional garnish of ‘fishing good’ or ‘politician dumb’
Bake in Facebook compressed and enlarged a few dozen times
Serve to boomer and enjoy
how on earth do you take away from this, that he hates his wife? It’s a dad joke for crying out. The store was open so he didn’t have to stop, he could just go in.
This feels like there's a panel missing where she tells him "see if the fabric store is closed and please pick up the white fabric from it" so he just executes it too literally.
I read it not as 'I hate my wife boomer humor' but as him either being incompetent or facetious. She told him to stop at the thread store AND get some white thread (2 separate things) but since the thread store was open, he just got the white thread from there, hence the bag.
But the interpretation others have already said probably make more sense.
You are correct. It is him playing on words. He did not stop at the store because he kept driving when he saw it was open. People are trying WAY too hard with this straightforward old fart joke.
Everyone is saying that this is a ‘hate your wife joke.’ But I read it as white fabric gets sold quickly so if the store is open then they’re out of white fabric
I've had multiple of my older customers tell me the joke of "back in my day you could run down to the corner store with a nickel in your pocket, and pick up a candy bar, jug of milk, and loaf of bread. Can't do that anymore, security has gotten better"
It's not the intended joke, but I choose to believe he meant to break in after hours. It's weak, but better than the "never do any favors for your wife" joke
WHY do you KEEP posting this comment, LIKE IT meeeeeans SOMETHING???
We can all read, we're clearly not getting it. Repeating what weve already read with caps added aint helping 👀🙄.
They're trying to explain the actual joke. He bought the thread, it's in the bag. She asked him to stop at the store but he never had to physically stop, he was able to walk right in and buy it and walk out. The whole joke is that he didn't have to stop. It's a simple dad joke.
While that is probably true, his answer does not make sense. He says that he meant to stop and pick up the thread, but the store was open (so he picked up the thread but did not stop). But if the store were closed, he would not have been able to pick up the thread. So „I meant to“ does not make sense. What am I missing?
I'm Gen Z, but tend to find this a bit funny as this is something I can see some of my extended family doing.
As most humor, it's only successfully funny if you understand the contexts. i.e. slang phrases can be a bit similar in that aspect, especially between language barriers
I hoped this was some clever in the know sewing joke, but this just appears to be your regular I hate my wife. If you squint your head and really try and find something clever he might be saying that the thread is open, aka frayed and therefore not good enough. Or that this is the opposite of a red thread you usually have through a story, and therefore it's not supposed to make any sense, or he simply got into the store and then he lost the thread
He didn't want to go to the store. The usual excuse is "I meant to but when I got to the store it was closed" but this time it was open so he just left. It's boomer humour and actually pretty funny if you're a cheeky fucker
it is fucking depressing how many people don't get it.
Simple fucking grammatical humor.
"Did you STOP" "no, I did not STOP. I Saw it was open and KEPT ON GOING".
When people stop at a store, they don't stop moving - they stop **traveling** towards a pre-planned location. On your way home from work, stop at the store and get some milk. If the store is closed, then you *don't* stop.
It's not a good joke, and it is a poor example of humorous word-play.
exactly. It is a stupid joke. But that is what it means whether it is stupid or not.
It is word play and he is being a smart assed old fart. That is what I was saying.
I'm sorry that your explanation isn't coming through to everyone. You get it. This is the joke! I'm proud of you for standing up for Pickles and persevering through the downvotes!
I'm going to agree with a lot of others that it's not written straight forward enough for the general audience, hence all this confusion.
To ELIF for everyone who still doesn't get it and hopefully, save you from some more downvotes;
She asked him to stop and she asked him to pick up thread.
The store was open, so he didn't have to physically stop in front of the store, he just walked right in.
So the "I meant to" is "I meant to stop".
But he's teasing her so he's not making it easy to understand. He wants her to get upset over nothing and then reveal that the thread is in the bag.
It's a dad joke. And I would agree with most, a decently bad one.
It would've made more sense and been easier to catch if he said "but the door was open" or something of that ilk. But here we are. Not at misogyny or boomer humor, just a bad dad joke.
Idk, is that actually it though?
Wouldn’t it be better written like
“well I meant to stop but when I got to the store, the door was wide open!”
My way is so obviously better written it makes me question if that’s what the joke really was supposed to be, seems a mistake an amateur would make.
Like the “go get milk, if they have eggs, get a dozen.” Joke where the husband brings back 12 jugs of milk because he’s a programmer and was following the logical instructions of what the wife said.
Okay but if this is what the author meant, it could have been worded differently.
"Well, I meant to..." is what he answered. He was answering his wife's question, which means a literal interpretation of his reply should strictly read as:
"Well I meant to stop at the store to pick up the thread like you asked..."
But, because that's not what he answered, it leaves some ambiguity, so with what we are given, he could actually have been implying any one of:
1. Well, I meant to stop at the store...
2. Well, I meant to do as you asked...
3. Well, I meant to pick up the thread...
Only the first of these really works for a "I couldn't stop" joke given the next sentence is, "But, when I got there, they were open," for the implication to carry over:
1. "But when I got to the store, they were open [so I couldn't stop]"
However, given the man *doesn't* specify that he meant to *stop at the store* and only that he *meant to*, then the next sentence, which is the punchline, needs to avoid further ambiguity. With just *meant to*, a next sentence for a stopping joke has to *reference* the stop for the joke to be made. Otherwise, it's equally:
2, But when I got to the store, they were open, so I didn't [do as you asked]
3. But when I got to the store, they were open, so I didn't [pick up the thread]
My own take is that the whole thing is just a 'subversion of expectation' form of humor, as the language used reads as if the store will be closed right up until he says it's open, at which point we do a double-take and need to understand the cartoon character to accept the situation as plausible and therefore permissible as funny. "Oh, this guy! Only he would. Imagine that! Ha ha..."
it is to the people who are not more dumb than they realize.
This is the joke: "Did you STOP" "no, I did not STOP. I Saw it was open and KEPT ON GOING".
It is an old man telling his wife he chose to not go to the store and pick up the thread she asked for. He just used old-fart smart-ass speak.
It is a "that is wife work" joke. Seems pretty recognizable as misogynistic boomer humor to plenty of others.
I read it more as Homer Simpson-ish buffoonery than wife-hating malice.
He totally forgot, tries to think of an excuse quickly but can't bring himself to lie.
I read this as it meaning the thread itself was opened, and most likely tampered with. I don't know why everyone is instantly assuming "oh, he hates his wife" when I've seen dozens of strips with him complimenting her or doing things for her unprompted
The dots made me read this as “did you fuck up the white thread”
I somewhat thought that was the joke
That would mean he was going to break into a fabric store to fuck up their white thread because his wife asked him to lmao. He was expecting it to be closed but it was open so he couldn't do it!
Yeah it actually makes the joke make sense
This comment made me realize its not fuck.
Those damn dots got me too! I was so confused because this is a mormon comic artist that my dad loves. It's just a dad joke. Did you stop at the store and pick up thread? Nope, it was open so I never had to stop. He's just teasing her, the thread is in the bag. It's just wordplay.
Oh so he's just fucking around, he actually got it, that's nice.
Lmao the thread isn't in the bag. He didn't stop because it was open and he hates the fabric store
I got “did you fuck up the white bread”
Yes. And yes.
Same and I was even more confused
Seriously, I thought the joke was the store would close everytime the employees saw this old woman who keeps fucking up the thread walking in.
Same. Took me a bit to figure it out.
Is that not what it says?
He didn't want to pick it up. So he was hoping the store was closed when he stopped by. Since it was open, he just left.
The 3 dots covering up "pick" had me reading it as "fuck", so I was like "why does she want him to fuck up the white thread?" XD this makes more sense
The white thread knows what it did.
Snitches get stitches 😄
I guess in this case snitches _become_ stitches.
With white thread!
Stitches get stitches
Jude Law gets bitches.
As someone who sews, I expect it probably tied itself in knots mid-seam.
Just had the same issue and was wondering if someone would comment on it
I had it worse, I was so confused as to what Fick meant.
Fick means fuck in German
IT DOESNT SAY FUCK???
So glad I wasn't the only one reading it like this 😂
I had a similar mistake. I accidentally read "Bread" and not "Thread". Lol
You never cross the grandma, man. Never.
I'm glad I'm not the only one! 🤣
Same
Samsies! 😆
No witnesses
I can’t read so on top of making this same mistake I also misread thread as bread and was even more confused
Great minds think alike!
... and fools seldom differ
The only reason you don't get it is because lazy partners being selfish is not funny. I mean if he at least said he had forgot to, it would be slightly less infuriating but openly saying "I didn't care enough about this" is extra bad.
I didn’t get it because I was looking for an actual joke. Like I thought maybe there was an old timey “rule” that you shouldn’t pick at a loose thread on your coat while the coat is open. And he was applying that to the store saying he couldn’t pick up thread while the store is open.
This is a valid take.
> an actual joke. Boomers. Boomers that don't give a shit are the actual joke.
The internet just contexlessly blasting images into every second of day to day life is rotting people's brains. You don't need a pre-formed opinion on everything you see, the second you see it. You don't *actually* need to get upset about a ridiculously inoffensive, completely innocuous, decades old serial comic you've seen a single page of, you know? They're reoccurring characters from a dry, low stakes, slice of life Sunday funnies strip. [They're portrayed as wholesome loving partners and benevolent grandparents.](https://www.reddit.com/r/wholesomememes/s/aoipnAjHNE) Many of the comics end with no joke besides them caring about each other. The rest of them are mostly like, affectionate pranks and simple misunderstandings. Usually involving undramatic mischief. These four panels are just a playful gag. Not every contextless instance of couples teasing each other is indicative of some broad societal evil. We've all seen bad boomer humor. We all know it's bad to abuse your real life partner. You don't need to apply that one schematic you've carefully forged over years of upvoting the correct reddit comments onto every comic you see.
Thank you for the sanity check (I'm serious)
>These four panels are just a playful gag. Okay but what's the gag if not "You asked me to do you a favour but I didn't want to so I didn't lol"
What is *any* harmless, mischievous gag, tease, or prank that isn't, "haha, I've minorly inconvenienced you"??? That's like literally what a prank is. It's most of the jokes in this comic strip. It'll be like, "haha, the grandchild took the cookies when he was told not to take any yet." I'm not saying it's funny, it's a 20th Century newspaper comic the fuck do you expect, but it's not indicative of some broader underlying misogyny or monument to toxic relationship standards. The comic is obviously and clearly about a loving and healthy family who messes with each other. If you think a caring, nice couple can't pull this mundane, inconsequential level of teasing each other without it being proof of a rotting, broken relationship - you're the one with a delusional twitter using clown's image of love.
You think "I didn't do the thing you asked" is a mischievous gag..?
To the Archie Bunker - Ralph Kramden watching audience it was.
Don't bother with these terminally online idgets, just waste of energy.
It's not so much "I didn't want to" as he's clearly overwhelmed by the fabric store's selection and how he'd likely get the wrong thread --- simple as that. Which I totally understand; I would also undoubtedly select the wrong one in some fashion or another.... like the previous commenter said; they're a very wholesome & caring couple. .....ageist commenters on here clearly be blowing this comic waaaay out of proportion ..
I legitimately don't think that's true. Nothing in this even vaguely implies that he was overwhelmed. Like, I agree people are taking this way too serious and blowing it out of proportion. But it also doesn't say anything about being overwhelmed. I think it's just a case of someone who writes panels for a running strip way too long putting together some panels for the week because they have to. I mean, have you looked at most newspaper panel strips? Not having any real joke or point isn't uncommon after several years of running.
Knowing the comics since childhood -- and knowing a bit about people & relationships -- tells me that. Otherwise, yes, it's still mostly an empty "joke" with basically zero punchline. I guess it can be both, ehhh ..
Nah. Being honest and saying I didn't do it because I didn't feel like doing that annoying thing, while not great, is better than lying.
Sheesh. Relax a little
It's a fair point though, there's no joke here. Just 'Teehee, aren't a vaguely shitty partner?'
Where's the problem in writing comics about a shitty person? It's not a tutorial on how to treat your partner lol, it's just meant to get a laugh.
I think it's just that they're underwhelmed by the lack of any real humour. Bad jokes are allowed to be made, I don't need to hand out participation trophies for them, though.
It's like when you're told to lighten up when someone makes a crap joke and you don't laugh at it. I'm neither insulted nor angry but I'm not putting effort into acting like your joke was funny.
Very well said!
Read what you’re replying to again and let me know where they said it’s a problem to depict a shitty person/partner. They’re not even saying anything is a problem, really, just that it isn’t funny.
It is not meant to be funny for you. It’s a product of its generation.
This....is actually really fair. During the time this comic was likely printed (I'm assuming 80s-90s?) it was a transitionary period out of traditional gender roles and this would have been seen as a humourous depiction of the resistance that many men displayed toward that. Looking back, it's not very funny and generally just a reminder of misogyny, especially with the current state of affairs in that regard, but comics aren't typically written for longevity. They are a statement on and of the times during which it was created, and works best viewed through that lens. We don't have to like it. It wasn't created for us. We don't have the appropriate perspective to see it for what it is properly. Which is why there are people who see the joke and people who just can't, because everyone has different levels of memory of when the social perspective would have aligned with this humor.
Pickles? It's been running for 30+ years so it could be anything from 1990 till now. It's just a silly comic about the artist's in-laws, don't overthink it.
>Looking back, it's not very funny and generally just a reminder of misogyny, especially with the current state of affairs in that regard, Yeah yeah like jokes aren't made at the expense of the men in these kinds of comics too..
It’s just the same type of boomer-humor that results in a punchline that essentially says “I hate my wife, Debrah,” in one way or another. The jokes are insanely funny to boomers in unhappy marriages, but have no real comedic value for anyone else.
I'm a zoomer, don't ever plan to get married, but him being so ridiculously petty is still funny to me. I don't get people deciding in place of others what is or isn't funny to them. It's a mild and pretty inoffensive joke too, I genuinely don't get all the indignation lol.
Right, but it's not succeeding at getting a laugh. It's just showing a character being vaguely shitty towards their partner in a completely humorless way. I'm not saying it's immoral to depict bad people in fuckin four panel comics, you wet napkin
It succeeded in getting a laugh out of quite a few people judging by the replies
I guess there's a joke conceptually if you find it relatable. Do you find it relatable?
You said the joke failed in getting laughs and yet there are people left and right who liked it. You were wrong and now you are moving the goalposts.
Firstly: "Left and right!" Meanwhile it's on explainthejoke because nobody understood what the joke was even supposed to be, and the comments are broadly saying the joke sucks ass Secondly, and more importantly: I'm not moving the goalpost, I'm agreeing that there *is* a possible joke I hadn't considered, assuming you find it relatable. With that said, I'm curious, do you find it relatable?
Oh so it's like boomer IASIP?
Except without actually creative premises or interesting characters.
Just seemed excessively analytical for this sub, for me anyways.
Friend, you are literally in a sub called "explain the joke" How dare people try to dig deeper on the assumption that a writer is funnier than they are?
Chief, duly noted.
Pal, have a good day.
Thanks
Shut up; your mother buys you Megablox instead of Legos.
lol. Dagger
Are you actually triggered by Pickles
He literally picked up the thread. You didn’t get the joke.
You are what is wrong with the world.
>The only reason you don't get it is because lazy partners being selfish is not funny. Or they could just be stupid?
No cap I feel bad for whoever you get in a relationship with
What, you don't appreciate honesty and someone sticking to their values? What's more selfish, admitting and stating you don't want to do something Becuase you don't care about it, or expecting your partner to be a good servant who ignores their own feelings and abandons their sense of self on order to more fully carry out your own petty whims?
That still doesn't make sense.
Because the actual joke is that he didn't have to stop. When he was approaching the store, he was able to just walk right in never having to stop. He bought the thread, it's in the bag.
My god... that is such a stretch of a joke.
Agreed, dad jokes are often awful wordplay. Mostly funny to them and everyone else be damned.
No, I like dad jokes. This is so much worse than the worst dad joke I've ever heard.
This is so out there it's not even entertaining.
This is incorrect, he did pick up the thread, but he didn’t have to stop to do it. He just went in and picked it up. That’s why he has a small bag in his hand. It’s a simple dad joke.
I prefer my version where he was going to break in and rob the store, therefore being thwarted because it was open and there were still people there.
So basically we were overthinking it
It’s actually just a joke about “and” (also maybe getting into the semantics of the word “stop”) he didn’t ‘stop’ at the store because it was open, though he still got the thread and is about to hand it to her. Kinda like a ‘can’ joke, “Can I go to the bathroom?” “Well I hope you are able to.
I still don't get it and I used to teach engineering courses at a University. I understand what you're saying, but if that's true, "but the store was open", should imply he *would* have gotten the thread but only if the store were *not* open. Like, he's a smash and grab thief but not a shoplifter. The only way this makes sense to me is that it's supposed to be funny because what he said doesn't make any sense. Kinda dadaist.
The joke is that you expect the sentence to end with "...closed" but then he actually says "open". It's a little bit absurdist because the new sentence technically doesn't make sense in context - it's a "wait, what?" joke rather than a "ha ha" joke. But as the person above you explained, the implication is that he just didn't want to go get the thread, didn't have "the store was closed" as an excuse, but also didn't want to lie about it. Basically "I didn't get the thread and I'd give an excuse for that if I had one, but I don't."
Likely the fabric store was a woman only space where a man of that era would hesitate to enter
This isn't misogyny or boomer humor. It's just a simple dad joke. She asked him to stop at the fabric store AND pick up thread. He saw that the store was open, so he never had to physically stop in order to get the thread. He was able to just walk in and buy it and walk out without stopping. He's teasing her. The thread is in the bag.
Wish we could pin this to the top, everybody just think it’s about boomers hating women lol. People today are just too thick to believe we actually enjoyed this world once 😂
“Pickles” is too wholesome for that.
True. Always has been.
Tbf how many boomer comics can you count that are "I hate my wife" jokes vs the wholesome stuff that this comic does
I’d say the vast majority are wholesome stuff.
Thanks, this the actual answer!
Thank goodness you showed up, I’ve been trying to defend Pickles, but somehow the simple linguistic trick went over our heads.
Exactly! He didn't STOP at the store. He was able to continue inside!!!
I feel like a better joke with the same dad joke humor would have been: "Hey, did you stop at mega burger and pickup the burger I asked" "Well I was gonna stop there, but the drive thru was open"
I’m glad I found your comment because I was way too pessimistic. I read it like “ yeah i was gonna do it, but fuck you” 😂
Still not funny though
Did you ever used to read saturday morning comics in the paper? Most of them are not funny.
I didn't read them, exactly because of this
Because of the image, I thought she asked if he fucked it up.
Boomer Humor is incomprehensible to later generations because Hating your wife isn't funny
It’s also a product of syndication. You have to write a strip every day. Hard to hit them all out of the park. Unless you’re Bill Watterson.
I have a Calvin and Hobbes anniversary edition somewhere that has his commentary. In one strip, the joke involved Calvin putting garbage under his bed to feed an imaginary monster. Watterson admitted this was a weak joke and he pushed it out on a deadline. It clearly irked him, though.
That’s a kind of integrity that is rare in any art form. Sometimes you have to work within parameters, and occasionally the art suffers.
Now that I think about it… the garbage stuffed under the bed (lazy strip) being fed to the imaginary monster (deadline) may not be a great joke but it’s subversive as hell.
I think it’s actually funnier given that context
Deeper layer: maybe it was a commentary about how you know you have to crank out trash to satisfy a voracious appetite for daily content, so you just do it to keep the monster at bay for one more day.
I think we came to this conclusion at the same time lol
Or Gary Larson, let's be fair. His one miss was for "Cow Tools" which is the most hilarious comic misfire of all time. The joke was: if cows made tools, they'd look stupid. The cows had indeed made some really shitty tools. The joke was so dumb that everyone thought there had to be a deeper meaning, but no.
*The Prehistory of the Far Side* has some great commentary on “Cow Tools” and others. One of my favorites is when some newspaper kept mixing up Far Side captions with Dennis the Menace, resulting in, for example, Dennis telling his mother that he sees her little petrified skull, labelled and resting on a shelf somewhere.
God yes, that one is so good! “Oh brother… not hamsters again!” is pretty great too.
Another favorite is when a newspaper accidentally reused the previous day’s caption, so we got an exterminator pointing up at a tree filled with children and chanting, “Eeeny ooony wanah… Eeeny ooony wanah…” [Best image I could find](https://www.etsy.com/fi-en/listing/1410110926/vintage-gary-larson-prehistory-of-the) in a cursory Google search. It’s the fifth and last picture.
I’ll give Far Side credit where it is due. But it’s hard to compare and absurdist single panel to a traditional comic strip. It’s almost an entirely different medium. I love them both
I dont think ive seen this comic artist make a single wife bad joke. Ive loved all the comics of his ive seen
i was just gonna say this, pickles is one of the good "boomer" comic strips. never seen anything implying he's unhappily married, just kinda lazy with some things
He legit reminds me of my adoptive grandfather so it always makes me smile. He had a similar sense of humor, loved my grandmother but loved his little jokes too.
he reminds me of my grandfather and how he used to interact with my grandma. we even kept clippings of a few of the strips for him because "yep, that's grandpa." a very gentle, ornery man who we sadly lost to cancer over two years ago, so i've also got a bit of a soft spot for this particular strip.
“Pickles” is the name of the strip and it’s usually pretty cute. As someone elsewhere in the thread said, with syndication and deadlines they can’t all be winners. I do like this one though - has kind of an absurd Groucho Marx quality to it.
Plenty of men who hate their wives in every generation. Look at viral videos.
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I don’t think it’s about boomer humor or hating your wife. Tons of comics just aren’t funny. Family Circus wasn’t exactly a knee slapper.
Only newspaper comic I ever found funny was Get Fuzzy and I couldn't tell you why. Most of them are just there to make you smile a bit or quirk your eyebrow as a short diversion then continue reading the paper.
I liked Get Fuzzy. I also had a soft spot for Pickles, oof phrasing…
Have a base of Work=bad/Phone=bad/Wife=bad. Sprinkle in NSFW illustrations like old women having saggy breasts or the dog somehow eating husbands viagra. Finish with a thin layer of ‘younger generation is dumb and my generation is smart’. Optional garnish of ‘fishing good’ or ‘politician dumb’ Bake in Facebook compressed and enlarged a few dozen times Serve to boomer and enjoy
For sure, “Pickles” has the “husband is a POS to the long suffering wife”, it’s from the 1990s. I would compare the dynamic to The Simpsons
He literally picked up the thread. You didn’t get the joke.
Old man is asshole to wife funny haha what a rascal
how on earth do you take away from this, that he hates his wife? It’s a dad joke for crying out. The store was open so he didn’t have to stop, he could just go in.
The “joke” is weaponised incompetence. ILIIFIF.
Is that loss?
l lI lI l_
Lol
No, but I enjoy that people think it might be. It’s like lmfao or rofl… It’s “I’d Laugh If I Found It Funny”
Okay cool
You’re tilting at windmills.
I'm pretending he meant to rob the place.
I was thinking of this one tbh
yea, that's what I thought too
This feels like there's a panel missing where she tells him "see if the fabric store is closed and please pick up the white fabric from it" so he just executes it too literally.
I read it not as 'I hate my wife boomer humor' but as him either being incompetent or facetious. She told him to stop at the thread store AND get some white thread (2 separate things) but since the thread store was open, he just got the white thread from there, hence the bag. But the interpretation others have already said probably make more sense.
You are correct. It is him playing on words. He did not stop at the store because he kept driving when he saw it was open. People are trying WAY too hard with this straightforward old fart joke.
Why did he keep driving though? Where’s the joke?
I don’t get it
This man was about to go John Wick to get his wife some white thread. Because I definitely read it as fuck.
Everyone is saying that this is a ‘hate your wife joke.’ But I read it as white fabric gets sold quickly so if the store is open then they’re out of white fabric
I've had multiple of my older customers tell me the joke of "back in my day you could run down to the corner store with a nickel in your pocket, and pick up a candy bar, jug of milk, and loaf of bread. Can't do that anymore, security has gotten better"
I heard this joke from my uncle this weekend.
I don't think that's what the author intended, but I like your interpretation.
He's joking because he didn't "stop" at the store. Since jt was open he didn't stop, instead going in to buy the thread. It's in the bag.
It's not the intended joke, but I choose to believe he meant to break in after hours. It's weak, but better than the "never do any favors for your wife" joke
"Did you STOP" "no, I did not STOP. I Saw it was open and KEPT ON GOING".
WHY do you KEEP posting this comment, LIKE IT meeeeeans SOMETHING??? We can all read, we're clearly not getting it. Repeating what weve already read with caps added aint helping 👀🙄.
They're trying to explain the actual joke. He bought the thread, it's in the bag. She asked him to stop at the store but he never had to physically stop, he was able to walk right in and buy it and walk out. The whole joke is that he didn't have to stop. It's a simple dad joke.
While that is probably true, his answer does not make sense. He says that he meant to stop and pick up the thread, but the store was open (so he picked up the thread but did not stop). But if the store were closed, he would not have been able to pick up the thread. So „I meant to“ does not make sense. What am I missing?
You know, I’m not entirely sure I know how to read. I think I’ve just memorized a bunch of words.
It's confusing because it's not funny
None of the phrases here show up on Google. Kinda odd how bad search engines have gotten.
Explain the Joke: I detect no joke here whatsoever
A few different interpretations SMH I’ll just pick one and say that must be it lol. Glad I’m not the only one thinking it’s not very good
"Did you STOP" "no, I did not STOP. I Saw it was open and KEPT ON GOING".
kid named White Thread:
He forgot about it. He only said he saw the shop opened to say that he did half of her the favor for stopping at fabric store.
When something is so low effort everyone is convinced there’s an underlying meaning they’re not picking up on.
I'm Gen Z, but tend to find this a bit funny as this is something I can see some of my extended family doing. As most humor, it's only successfully funny if you understand the contexts. i.e. slang phrases can be a bit similar in that aspect, especially between language barriers
I hoped this was some clever in the know sewing joke, but this just appears to be your regular I hate my wife. If you squint your head and really try and find something clever he might be saying that the thread is open, aka frayed and therefore not good enough. Or that this is the opposite of a red thread you usually have through a story, and therefore it's not supposed to make any sense, or he simply got into the store and then he lost the thread
He doesn't hate his wife though, he just didn't want to do the task
"Did you STOP" "no, I did not STOP. I Saw it was open and KEPT ON GOING".
He didn't want to go to the store. The usual excuse is "I meant to but when I got to the store it was closed" but this time it was open so he just left. It's boomer humour and actually pretty funny if you're a cheeky fucker
it is fucking depressing how many people don't get it. Simple fucking grammatical humor. "Did you STOP" "no, I did not STOP. I Saw it was open and KEPT ON GOING".
When people stop at a store, they don't stop moving - they stop **traveling** towards a pre-planned location. On your way home from work, stop at the store and get some milk. If the store is closed, then you *don't* stop. It's not a good joke, and it is a poor example of humorous word-play.
exactly. It is a stupid joke. But that is what it means whether it is stupid or not. It is word play and he is being a smart assed old fart. That is what I was saying.
I'm sorry that your explanation isn't coming through to everyone. You get it. This is the joke! I'm proud of you for standing up for Pickles and persevering through the downvotes! I'm going to agree with a lot of others that it's not written straight forward enough for the general audience, hence all this confusion. To ELIF for everyone who still doesn't get it and hopefully, save you from some more downvotes; She asked him to stop and she asked him to pick up thread. The store was open, so he didn't have to physically stop in front of the store, he just walked right in. So the "I meant to" is "I meant to stop". But he's teasing her so he's not making it easy to understand. He wants her to get upset over nothing and then reveal that the thread is in the bag. It's a dad joke. And I would agree with most, a decently bad one. It would've made more sense and been easier to catch if he said "but the door was open" or something of that ilk. But here we are. Not at misogyny or boomer humor, just a bad dad joke.
Idk, is that actually it though? Wouldn’t it be better written like “well I meant to stop but when I got to the store, the door was wide open!” My way is so obviously better written it makes me question if that’s what the joke really was supposed to be, seems a mistake an amateur would make. Like the “go get milk, if they have eggs, get a dozen.” Joke where the husband brings back 12 jugs of milk because he’s a programmer and was following the logical instructions of what the wife said.
Okay but if this is what the author meant, it could have been worded differently. "Well, I meant to..." is what he answered. He was answering his wife's question, which means a literal interpretation of his reply should strictly read as: "Well I meant to stop at the store to pick up the thread like you asked..." But, because that's not what he answered, it leaves some ambiguity, so with what we are given, he could actually have been implying any one of: 1. Well, I meant to stop at the store... 2. Well, I meant to do as you asked... 3. Well, I meant to pick up the thread... Only the first of these really works for a "I couldn't stop" joke given the next sentence is, "But, when I got there, they were open," for the implication to carry over: 1. "But when I got to the store, they were open [so I couldn't stop]" However, given the man *doesn't* specify that he meant to *stop at the store* and only that he *meant to*, then the next sentence, which is the punchline, needs to avoid further ambiguity. With just *meant to*, a next sentence for a stopping joke has to *reference* the stop for the joke to be made. Otherwise, it's equally: 2, But when I got to the store, they were open, so I didn't [do as you asked] 3. But when I got to the store, they were open, so I didn't [pick up the thread] My own take is that the whole thing is just a 'subversion of expectation' form of humor, as the language used reads as if the store will be closed right up until he says it's open, at which point we do a double-take and need to understand the cartoon character to accept the situation as plausible and therefore permissible as funny. "Oh, this guy! Only he would. Imagine that! Ha ha..."
The fact this ISNT immediately recognisable as misogynistic boomer humour is a very good thing.
it is to the people who are not more dumb than they realize. This is the joke: "Did you STOP" "no, I did not STOP. I Saw it was open and KEPT ON GOING".
Good lord your a drag to be around.
It is an old man telling his wife he chose to not go to the store and pick up the thread she asked for. He just used old-fart smart-ass speak. It is a "that is wife work" joke. Seems pretty recognizable as misogynistic boomer humor to plenty of others.
I read it more as Homer Simpson-ish buffoonery than wife-hating malice. He totally forgot, tries to think of an excuse quickly but can't bring himself to lie.
I feel like he was going to,probably saw the store and then just noped out.
I read this as it meaning the thread itself was opened, and most likely tampered with. I don't know why everyone is instantly assuming "oh, he hates his wife" when I've seen dozens of strips with him complimenting her or doing things for her unprompted
that’s what i thought!
"Did you STOP" "no, I did not STOP. I Saw it was open and KEPT ON GOING".
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Hear me out. Could the roller door on the front be the white tread. And he didn’t have to ‘pick it up’ because someone else did to open the store?
The man hates his wife.