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Ray writes to Reader's Digest Wednesday, December 14, 2005 • read strip Viewing 79 comments:

This is a classic.

It's a particularly characteristic Ray thing to do - declare that his own self-destructive behavior is the result of mysterious scientists, rather than his own impulses.

It's not because of scientists?!
Damn, I've been lost but now I'm found.

Actually Tough Customer Ham Pockets were created by science specifically to be irresistible. True, it is our own impulses, but the deck has been stacked against us.

I'd say that they're both guilty, but Ray is the more guilty.

Wait a damn minute! Did he pack his own lunch for school? No. I bet it was his mom. Blame her.


Also, the scientists.

...and every other time i look out the window, i take a casual puff of my cigar...holding it loosely in my fingers, like "yeah, i smoke a cigar, but it means nothing to me..."

The idea of "Lunch Juice" intrigues me.

More than "intrigues." "Fascinates the fuck out of" is how I would put it.

Made with 100% real lunch!

There was/is a brand of cookie that the Tobacco shop next to my old job used to sell... "Van-O-Lunch" or "Choc-O-Lunch" cookies, 35 cents a pack. The name always intrigued me, as though there was some sector of the populace that could be convinced that mediocre sandwich cookies could comprise an entire meal, because the cookies told them so.

actually it's true....why do you think they put MSG in doritos?

Or that there's more sugar in blue cheese salad dressing than there is blue cheese?

Dudes and dudettes, you must make YOUR OWN bleu cheese salad dressing yourself, from scratch : bleu cheese, olive oil, cream, finely diced garlic cloves and bell peppers.

That is HARDCORE, dog.
That is BADASS! THE BADDEST!

I have never seen anyone so excited about salad dressing before.

You should try it!

you haven't lived.

Because it activates umami receptors, which most people find pleasing.

informative

Quite.

MSG makes everything better. I sprinkle MSG on everything. Meat, Bananas, Toilet paper, etc.

You wipe your arse with MSG?

you have a strange way of showing affection for something you like

A comment left by soticoto was marked lame too many times and excluded. (marked lame by zcross00, riotdejaneiro, glorify, 60teeth, psyko777, lakesofcanada, LordPretzel, ASaltySalute4, Doc_Rostov, yingkaixing)

if no for the MSG, doritos would taste like scraps of painted canvas.

The "men in white lab coats" line made me give this a 5.

Chubbied for having something that looks like a fucked-up platypus for an avatar.

alt: Ray permanently likes Tough Customer Ham Pockets.

Tough Customer ham pockets made me laugh.

That's EXACTLY what monosodium glutamate is supposed to do.

I like the mix of imaginary products and Fritos. Fritos are absurd.

Do you perchance hail from the state of New Mexico?

New Mexico is absurd.

Know what's truly absurd about Fritos? The complete list of ingredients in Fritos: Corn, oil, salt.

About once every six months, I forget that I cannot eat Fritos any more, and get myself one of those snack packets from the vending machines in the cafeteria at work. I regret that for about the next day and a half. The ingredient list on Fritos should read: "Oil, Salt, Corn."

You know, call me crazy, but I think Ray's writing about himself in the last panel...

no didn't you see it says "gray rackles" which is obviously not his name.

It's the "and only occasionally glancing out the window" that makes the strip. Instead of living in the mortal fear of diabetes kicking down the door and forcing its way into him, he's only casually glancing out from time to time to see if it's coming down the driveway.

And the diabetes, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Fritos just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my insulin level from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!

way good! mad props!

Don't say that.

dont tell me what to do, asshole.

OH HYEA WATCHA GON' DO

refuse to comply.

Fuck. Well you win this one.

Wicked sack, greenkoolayd, wicked sack.

NO COM-PLY!

(Willy Santos)

I love the "tap" sound turns to a "delete" sound when he deletes :>

Ray should just write to Wilford Brimley himself.

[IMGS OFF]

I was looking for this in the previous strip's comments. You are too late, sir.

Why oh why is this everywhere...it was funny the first time, and now you killed it!

Diabeetu?

Ray thinks Reader's Digest is powerful.

The last paragraph is actually true

It may acutally be true. You only cite one magazine article, hardly scientific proof of anything besides the fact that someone wrote a magazine article, and perhaps a book.

A comment left by mangtastic was marked lame too many times and excluded. (marked lame by treatyofparis, salvagebar, mystkmanat)

Today's Blogs

Roast Beef: Gettin' my depress on
Molly: I think I actually am starting a gossip column!

i like what you're doing with this blog stuff

it is good.

It is nice, and good. No one has ruined it yet.

Every now and then, Teodor strikes me as a complete douchebag. Molly's blog here is one such instance.

...because he had an espresso and rode a skateboard?

I'm not sure I understand your reasoning.

"Yesterday he downed it in one quick gulp before jumping on his skateboard and youthfully kicking away." (Emphasis mine)

It just...it annoys me, so much. Because you know the whole time Teodor was doing that he was thinking "damn I must look cool" and he just...agh. I really can't logically define why he irritates me in certain instances, but he does.

Teodor's indulgences, in this case, seem relatively harmless: "'youthfully' kicking away" seems to intone Molly's subtextual interest in T more than whatever T might have meant in his actions, so I have a hard time blaming it on him. My guess is that most movement on a skateboard is going to be perceived as youthful by most women.

jesus christ what am I writing.

I don't drink espresso is it a sin and citation to drink it one gulp?

I don't drink espresso either but it just seems like Teodor would drink all in one gulp to convince others and himself that he's cool.

As a girl, may I say that there is nothing that makes a guy finer than being able to drink a shot of espresso in one gulp. Over walks some loser guy all trying to hit on girls, the espresso dribbling out the corner of his mouth. Not cool.

The snack food industry implanted love in Ray's brain via plastic-wrapped ubersweets and damn tasty carbohydrates. Them all in white lab coats strutting 5-inch black stiletto heels, what all keen on um Bauhaus in lo-fi or such as early Christian Death, sneaking in the chemicals like Alien pupae into Ray's abdominal cavity to burst into constant cravings. Christ it's bad trying to write this lacking sobriety yeah.

It takes a special type of mind to link goth rock with MSG.

Of course, by "special" I mean "weird and creepy".

Meanwhile Beef's lunch consists of half a Fruit Roll Up and a packet of ketchep.

Hunt's ketchup, to boot.

Ketchup, even.

Tough Customer Ham Pockets. Now with extra Brown Eye Gravy.

Smacks of Gravity's Rainbow.

Ray Smuckles: Tyrone Slothrop
men in white lab coats: Laszlo Jamf
Tough Customer Ham Pockets: Imipolex G

This explains... well, nothing.

Chubbied for getting through Gravity's Rainbow.

i will permanently like this one.

"Gray Rackles" almost made me piss myself

i almost didnt reply to your comment.

I almost lamed you.

Ray's room drapes are living . He'd have to be crazy to hide behind them. Who knows what they might decide to feed on him. Feed on his diabetes. Only his feet left poking out at the end of the day. Because the drapes have consumed his badness.