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Friday, January 08, 2010


Number 663


I went to my own sex change!


What are the odds that I'd be presenting not one, but three pre-Code comic book stories about sex reassignment? Yup, we had two stories in October, and you can find them in Pappy's #606.

In the October posting there's a story by Dick Giordano and another by Wally Wood. Here's yet another Dick Giordano story using a sex change as a springboard for a plot. This time instead of the earlier science fiction take on the subject, it's a crime story. Either way it's goofy. It stretches credulity until...snap! Oops, credulity got stretched too far!

From Strange Suspense Stories #16, 1954:















20 comments:

Unca Jeffy said...

"It sounds funny I know
But, it really is so
I'm my own Grandpa."

Credulity snaps and leaves a red mark.

Charles said...

Has there been some sort of behind-the-scenes changes to the website? Clicking on a picture now seems to require me to open a photo viewer on my computer rather than displaying it just in my browser.

Frank Forte said...

pretty sweet stuff. Great Blog!!!

Kirk said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Tamfos said...

Why can't comics be more like this now?

Unknown said...

please fix the way to view the comics instead of having the viewer having to go back-and-forth to view the individual panels, increase their size on both the reader feed and the site itself.

thank you

Mykal Banta said...

Pappy: This story was amazing. If you are going to stretch/snap credulity, don't pussyfoot around. Go for it! This story does just that with such a lack of shame, I can't help but love it.

With regard to the photo-viewer thing vs. display in browser - the same thing was happening to me when I posted new pages using the Firefox browser instead of Internet Explorer. Went back to Explorer for that reason. -- Mykal

Mr. Cavin said...

Re: display. I read this in Firefox and it has the same functionality today that it always has. I do not have to download anything, and can open each page in separate tabs.

The people who are having problems need to mention which browser they are using. Currently, I am tempted to believe the problem is that, at the new scan size, Explorer won't open the jpegs within the browser as a default. This may be due to Explorer not autoscaling (or creating scrollbars) for files larger than the display area. They're not optimized, after all. One of the reasons I shun Explorer, actually.

Mykal Banta said...

Re Display: - I have both browsers, explorer and firefox. If the post is created in Firefox, jpgs can be opened and read directly in firefox. When read in Explorer, a Firefox-created post's jpgs will require a photo-viewer to open and read them. If a post is created in Internet Explorer - either browser will open and read jpgs in the browser directly.

I often create a post in Explorer (so that posts can be opened directly in any browser) then read my favorite blogs in Firefox (which will open Pappy's great posts without use of a photoviewer).

Sorry to steer this fine post into techno-geeksvile. -- Mykal

Daniel [oeconomist.com] said...

Good G_d! Another of those “Ho hum. I'm bored. I guess that I'll become a woman.” stories from the '50s!

Pappy said...

I apologize to those of you who are having to open the pages in a separate window.

I have already uploaded my scans and blogs through February 14. Does this mean I'm going to have to go back and redo all of these scans in IE? I'm going to have to think about that...

Mykal, thanks for the tech explanation. I use Firefox because when I was initially uploading scans in IE, they sometimes wouldn't open at all. I found I didn't have those problems in Firefox.

I have no idea what browser of system anyone else uses or about the compatibility issues, but I have no problems seeing my postings on my wife's computer, which only has IE.

The only thing I'm doing different from what I was doing a few weeks ago is increase the size of the scans from 650 pixels wide to 700. Go back to my postings in November or earlier and see if they have the same problem.

Sorry, sorry, sorry!!

Mykal Banta said...

Pappy: I sure wouldn't redo all those scans - I have a bunch of scans that I did in Firefox that have the exact same problem opening in IE. They can be opened using a photoviewer, so I'm gonna let mine slide.

Think that Mr. Calvin from earlier post is on the right track about size of scan - I do all mine 800 DPI - always have. It's probably a resize issue that Firefox handles better, or more intuitively, that IE. Unfortunately, IE is so dominant, I do my posts assuming that's the browser of choice since Firefox can handle them either way.

With regard to your wife being able open your scans in IE (though you did them in firefox), my guess is your wife has some setting in IE that is uncommon, allowing the browser to work with larger sized images. -- Mykal

Mykal Banta said...

Pappy: Make that 800 pixels wide (not dpi). I scan at 800 ppi as well, but that's not relevant here. -- Mykal

Tamfos said...

Pappy, I wouldn't redo it either. Seems to me it's a pretty minor inconvenience, after all.

For the record, I use Firefox (the most recent version) and I have to open the pages in separate windows, but again, it doesn't bother me.

Mark Armstrong said...

I use a Mac and surf with Safari.

No photo viewers needed. The image files open in the browser as always.

Pappy said...

This could be as simple as defining what a separate pane is.

Yes, when I open my scans in IE I get the little circled + sign and click on that so my scans open full size in another pane. I don't need to do that on Firefox.

After writing my response this morning I went to my wife's laptop and her netbook. The smaller netbook in IE just opens the scans at one size to fit the screen. Her laptop, which is Windows Vista, rather than XP which is my default Windows operating system, in IE does the same thing as my desktop does; it gives the circled + and opens full size in a separate pane.

I've checked three browsers on all three machines, Firefox, IE and Safari. My son checked in all his browsers including Chrome and got the same results as me. He suspects it's on the readers' end and nothing I'm doing.

Once again, I apologize to anyone who is inconvenienced. We bloggers do our blogs as labors of love. I have a lot of fun with this blog, but I don't need or want the hassle of going back to redo what I've already done.

Thanks for bearing with me.

Pappy said...

Frank Forte, are you by chance related to late comic book artist John Forte? I have a double posting by him coming up January 20, and have posted two or three other entries with his work.

Mr. Karswell said...

This same thing happened to me over at THOIA a year ago with the pop-up download request instead of just opening the image in the browser as usual... it lasted for about a week or so and then just fixed itself. What everyone is saying is valid of course, but it also might just be some temporary glitch. I definitely would not re-do all your posts that are already uploaded.

Awesome story too by the way!

Daniel [oeconomist.com] said...

Pappy—

I don't have a 'blog on blogspot/blogger, and I don't know how much of the HTML you enter and how much is effected by their software. But the problem is in the onblur attribute (invoking some Javascript) of the tags that anchor full-sized images to the smaller images. If you're telling it to put that attribute in the <a> tag, best to stop. If they're doing it, there may be nothing to do but hope for them to stop.

FWIW, with the current HTML Firefox on my computer wants to invoke a helpr application for each image, while Opera is able to handle the Javascript without observable difficulty.

Peter Bernard said...

Whether I look at it with Firefox or Internet Exploder, it still won't let me view the pages without downloading them to my hard drive and then opening Photoshop or something to view them in.

I just tried Google Chrome, and THAT opens them the normal and better way, so I guess I have to view this site in Google Chrome from now on.