We're all interested in the future, because that's where you and I will spend the rest of our lives. Yes I just quoted Criswell. And comic strip characters are no exception, filled with anxieties and worries about where their lives will take them. Well, they could just ask their King Features rep, but the characters of Ted Shearer's Quincy are going to try a different approach.


Quincy, Rico, Nickles, Big Knuckles, and Viola take it to the fortune teller here in this giveaway comic published by, and designed to interest kids in working for, General Electric himself. GE makes everything from light bulbs to jet engines to comic books. If you're unfamiliar with Quincy and his friends, let's say they're a more interestingly drawn version of Wee Pals. What was Wee Pals? Well, they were a less interestingly drawn version of Quincy. There you go.


You can always tell an educational comic book because sentences in the dialogue always end properly, with periods, instead of the garish, overly emotional exclamation points littered throughout those regular, bad-for-you comics.


Let's see... you will meet a tall, dark stranger, who will invite you into a tent and subsequently make your pockets considerably lighter.


"You're going to be important - you're going to drink gallons of coffee - you're going to spend lots of money on CAD software - you're going to be the person everybody calls when they can't get Windows to load - you're going to be an engineer! No, no other options. Sorry."


Ha ha, Quincy's merely going to have a good paying skilled trade in a vital industry. Har har har.


There are lots of different kinds of engineers. Sanitation engineers, for instance. Or the kind of person that uses social engineering to acquire access to personal information, like, say, Viola, what's your mom up to? Where does she work? What's her birthday? Do you know her social security number?


Wow, I could design a super train that goes 200 miles per hour! Then somebody ELSE has to re-design and upgrade our rail network to handle it! And somebody ELSE has to convince Congress to pay for it all! And this will not happen in your lifetime, Quincy!


Nickles, you live in New York City. It's flat. You don't need a 25 speed bike. What do you need where you live? A really well designed bike lock.


AGAIN Big Knuckles is dismissing the skilled trades! Who else are you gonna call when your TV set dies in the middle of (quickly looks up popular TV of 1973) Kojak?


Wow, look at these new kinds of stereos and computers, which will be... obsolete junk by the time you kids are old enough to be electrical engineers. Here's a tip from the future, you can safely ditch the class where they discuss 8-Track tape player circuitry.


Okay, THIS we have now, and they are AWESOME.


Well, a civil engineer is one whose speech and manner are polite and courteous, hence the phrase "keep a civil tounge in your head." Which is hard to do when any kind of engineer or responsible adult sees a terribly unsafe situation, like for instance what we see here where a ferris wheel is attached to the back of a pick-up truck.


Oh, so it's engineers we can blame when low-cost housing is demolished and replaced with billion dollar taxpayer-financed stadiums that sit idle when they aren't selling $500 tickets to baseball games. Engineers, you say.


You mean the guy that gets your swimming pool pH just right, or Tony on the corner selling custom-made pharmaceuticals? Sure, we know about those kinds of engineers.


Brand new plastic hearts to replace the ones damaged by ingesting disease-causing artificial food! New kinds of sneakers you'll never wear because they cost eight hundred dollars! It's all part of the wonderful future that awaits you.


Now you know how important engineers are. Engineers have given this fortune teller something to talk about for ten minutes instead of her cold-reading a bunch of children, who will probably just get jam or bubble gum all over her tarot deck.


You're asking a kid why they disassembled their alarm clock or their bicycle? Kids don't have rational explanations, lady. They come into this world looking to cause trouble, that's all there is to it.


It's all about diversifying your revenue streams; when the fortune telling gig is slow, you can always pick up some extra money selling plastic model kits to the kids.


You've got the brains, Quincy. And if you don't make engineer? You can always move to LA and become a medical examiner. There's a lot of shouting involved, though!

See, I bet you thought I'd NEVER get to that "Quincy M.E." reference!


Give me a minute and let me look up the respective incomes and lifestyles of professional math tutors vs traveling carnival fortune tellers. Maybe Quincy has some career advice for YOU, lady


Yes your school guidance counselors know about LOTS of terrific, satisfying, well-paying jobs, that somehow they didn't take, and instead became... school guidance counselors. So there's that.


Dynamiting cars and trains while planning new social living arrangements and engaging in self-sufficient food preparation and supply? Are these kids junior Weathermen?


Well, before you start giving up your love of cooking and jump into engineering-prep elementary school classes, why not send a letter to General Electric himself and see if he and his engineering army can't fully convince you that a career designing washing machines, diesel locomotives, industrial turbines, and/or water treatment systems is for you. Stick around until they buy NBC and you might meet David Letterman!

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