Pastry Puns
I’m Dan Piraro, the creator of the Bizarro newspaper comic, and this is my weekly blog post. The large Sunday comic above is mine, as are all of the non-cartoon comments below.
Since January 2018, the Monday-Saturday Bizarro comics have been written and drawn by my comics partner, Wayno. For more fun, check out Wayno’s weekly blog post. He’s got some particularly disturbing news about Pittsburgh this week!
And here’s this week’s ANSWER KEY to my Sunday comic’s Secret Symbols.
Welcome, Jazz Pickles and pastry pirates.
Pirates are among the most enduring figures in pop culture history. Untold billions have been made from movies about pirates, and there is no shortage of pirate costumes and accessories for those who want to cosplay as one.
But have you ever thought about how this affectionate fascination contrasts with the fact that these were among the most ruthless, godawful thieves, enslavers, murderers, and all-around barbarians our species has ever concocted? The fact that they rarely bathed was just rancid icing on the cake.
I wrote about our odd fascination with pirates, Vikings, and other despots in one of my bi-weekly Naked Cartoonist articles not long ago. It’s titled, “What’s so Funny about Ruthless Murderers?” and it includes my theory on why so many cartoonists have done so many cartoons about such horrible people. I’m no exception. A few years ago, I filled a book with such cartoons of my own from Bizarro.
Wayno and I actually met at a pirate-themed art event in Pittsburgh back in the late 1900s. The photo below is from that fateful evening. It bears mentioning that neither of us committed a crime or an atrocity that night, other than to agree to consider working together one day.
Piraro, left, Wayno right
While we’re on the topic of ruthless despots, my most recent Naked Cartoonist article centers on a well-known orange tyrant and was well-received by my subscribers on NC, as well as readers on medium.com and Substack. So I’ve decided to offer it to our non-subscribing blog readers here as well.
You can read “Being a Lobster of Hope: Swimming to freedom as the ship sinks” (or listen to a recording of me reading it) without a subscription. (And it falls right in with some disturbing news from Pittsburgh that Wayno relates in his blog post this week.)
(Note: If you’ve already read that article, I’ve changed the comic at the end, and you may find it worth checking out.)
Time to move on to the chucklements awaiting us in Wayno’s Bizarro cartoons from the week!…
I thank the universe daily that I was able to escape the corporate world early on. If you haven’t, you have my deepest sympathy. Unless you really enjoy it. That’s cool, too.
I have to be careful where I sit in airplanes because I am allergic to people with peanut allergies.
They don’t call him the Cootie Kid for nothing.
I wish I’d thought of this before I filled out my dating profile after my second divorce.
From which floor can I access the “flabberghasted” mezzanine?
Well, it’s better than the single, flashing, twinkle light and miniature beanie propeller I’ll probably get.
That completes this week’s comedy catastrophe, Jazz Pickles. We hope we twitched your chuckle meter at least a couple of times. If you’re digging the groovy vibe we’re laying down and that we do it for free, please consider helping us keep it that way via the links below. Your generosity may win you a bigger halo and larger propeller in cartoon heaven.
The Naked Cartoonist…My every-other-week creative-writing subscription service.
Bizarro TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!
WAYNO’S TIP JAR …One-time or repeating. Your choice!
My (free) graphic novel in progress, PEYOTE COWBOY
Watch my pitch video and become a supporter of Peyote Cowboy here.
Super fun Bizarro swag from ComicsKingdom, including our 2026 Bizarro wall calendar.