Happy Anniversary, Charlie Brown!

To celebrate the 75th anniversary of Peanuts, Michael, Harold, and Jimmy each pick their top ten Peanuts strips of all time! Who picks what? Will one character dominate? One Decade? Listen to find out what is the toppermost of the poppermost in Peanuts five decade run of brilliance.

You Tube interview Jimmy mentions: https://youtu.be/s_vmm4JW61U?si=lNs3Cqh-aQTz9D6F Our original discussion of Be Of Good Cheer was in our 1955 Part 2 episode from May 24, 2022 at 0:54:42.

Transcript available at UnpackingPeanuts.com

Unpacking Peanuts is copyright Jimmy Gownley, Michael Cohen, Harold Buchholz, and Liz Sumner. Produced and edited by Liz Sumner. Music by Michael Cohen. Additional voiceover by Aziza Shukralla Clark. 

For more from the show follow @unpackpeanuts on Instagram and Threads, and @unpackingpeanuts on Facebook, Blue Sky, and YouTube. For more about Jimmy, Michael, and Harold, visit unpackingpeanuts.com.  

Thanks for listening.

Episode Transcript

VO (00:02):
Welcome to Unpacking Peanuts.
The podcast for three cartoonists, take an in-depth look at the greatest comic strip of all time, Peanuts by Charles M.
Schulz.

Jimmy (00:19):
Hey everybody, welcome back to the show.
It is an exciting day here.
We are celebrating the 75th anniversary of Peanuts, and we're doing it by picking our top 10 Peanuts comic strips.
Can you feel the excitement?
It's crackling through the internet at you.

(00:39):
I'll be your host for the proceedings.
My name is Jimmy Gownley.
I'm also a cartoonist who did things like Amelia Ruehl's, 7 Good Reasons Not to Grow Up and The Dumbest Idea Ever.
And you can read all of my new comics now for free over at GVILL Comics on Substack.
There's like 100 plus pages there available for you right now.
Joining me as always are my pals, co-hosts and fellow cartoonists.

(01:00):
He's a playwright and a composer for the band Complicated People as well as for this very podcast.
He's the co-creator of the original comic book prize guide, the original editor for Amelia Ruehl's and the creator of such great strips, The Strange Attractors, A Gathering of Spells and Tangled River, it's Michael Cohen.

Michael (01:15):
Say hey.

Jimmy (01:16):
And he's executive producer and writer of Mystery Science Theater 3000, a former vice president of Archie Comics and the creator of the Instagram sensation, Sweetest Beasts, it's Harold Buchholz.

Harold (01:27):
Hello.

Jimmy (01:28):
And making sure everything runs smoothly and keeping us out of trouble, it's our producer and editor, Liz Sumner.

Liz (01:34):
Howdy.

Jimmy (01:35):
Okay, today is a very special day.
We are celebrating, as we are this whole season, the 75th anniversary of our beloved comic strip Peanuts.
And we are going to do something that we have not done before that I think is going to be a lot of fun, inspire some fun conversation, and maybe give you a little insight into what each of us is like.

(01:58):
We have picked our top 10 peanuts comic strips.
Liz has declined in an effort to keep the editing task under control.
But Michael, Harold and I have each picked our top 10.
None of us know what the others have picked.
But we are going to go through, we are going to start at each of our number 10 picks.

(02:22):
We're going to go around and then we'll see if there's any overlap and we'll see if we can come up with a final top 10 list for peanuts.
Does that sound good to you listeners out there?
Of course, we would love to hear what your top 10 list is.
If you want to send it our way after you've listened to this episode, just shoot us an email over there at unpackingpeanuts.gmail.com.

(02:43):
We would love to hear from you.
Harold, what was this experience like for you?

Harold (02:49):
Well, it's daunting, 17,897.
Is that right?

Jimmy (02:55):
That's right.

Harold (02:55):
Strips ever done.
The very first thing I made sure to do was a podcast with three friends, where we read all 17,897 strips and discussed them over a few hundred hours.
This was essential.
Then I went with my gut and I quickly thought of some memorable strips that just came to mind.

(03:16):
I think seven of them came to my mind, wrote them down really quickly.
Then I went through my top picks from the podcast for each year and picked 16 more standouts.
Then I did a process of selection and elimination.
What I didn't do, and this might be different for you guys, I didn't place requirements on myself for even distribution over the decades or for even character representation.

(03:41):
Although, if there were some similar strips in theme or story, I would pick between the two.
That was my process.
I really tried to enjoy it because it's weird how imposter syndrome comes in when you have an impossible task.
It's like, who am I to do this?
And then, oh, I'm probably, at least on paper, one of the top 100 people in the world to do this because we did the podcast.

(04:04):
And I felt a little better.
It's like, okay, people aren't going to agree with me.
It's very individual.
But I tried to keep it individual because the strip is very personal to me.
It's why I'm a cartoonist today, I think, and it shaped my life.
And so it's so meaningful to me that I can't universalize it.
Why bother?
Everyone's different.

Jimmy (04:26):
All right, Michael, how about you?
What was your process like?

Michael (04:28):
Well, it was a little, I think it would be more difficult for you guys because I was very biased from the beginning.
And as I compiled my initial list, I, like Harold, I went to all our picks of the year and wrote them down.

(04:52):
And I realized pretty soon that my love of the 50s and 60s, it just totally biased me.
So there's no way I was going to be unbiased.
It could have been a daunting task, but I realized when I realized how many favorites, unbelievably great strips there were, I didn't even think of going past the 60s.

(05:16):
I knew there's no chance I would find anything to compete with these, at least in my mind.

Harold (05:22):
So you didn't even say, what did I pick for 70s, 80s, 90s?

Michael (05:26):
No, I didn't because I knew there was no chance.
Here's my analogy because we have to go back to the Beatles for everything.
Okay.
Your assignment is to pick your top 10 Beatle or post-Beatle songs and put them in order.
I would not look past the 60s, past the Beatles.

(05:47):
I wouldn't even think for one second what McCartney's song would go in this list because the top 10 is just so high.
You can't get higher than the top 10 Beatles songs from the 60s.
You can't.
I felt that with Peanuts.

Harold (06:02):
Yeah, fair enough.

Michael (06:03):
These are classic in my mind because I was fairly young when I read them, but I also read them hundreds of times.
There's no chance, even Woodstock, who was a character I grew to love.
There's a Woodstock strip that couldn't top any of these, so I didn't bother.
Also, I did not look at balance at all, and you'll see when you get through my list, it's heavily biased towards one character.

Harold (06:31):
Well, yeah.
We were very similar in how we approached this.
Jimmy, I'm really curious to how you chose to approach this.

Jimmy (06:40):
Well, I picked the objective of 10 best strips.
I thought it was easy.

Michael (06:47):
Really?

Harold (06:48):
That's so Jimmy.
I love it.

Jimmy (06:49):
I did it in 10 minutes.
It was simple.

Harold (06:52):
I love it.
Yeah, that's what having the INTJ Myers-Briggs.

Liz (06:59):
Oh, and the Loosky and the Marsy's.

SPEAKER_2 (07:01):
This is it.

Harold (07:02):
No questions.

Michael (07:04):
I'll tell you, cutting some was painful.
Because I boiled it down to like 14, and then that last cut was hard.
Because how can I cut this strip?
But I did it.
And also, come on, we're just picking stuff out of the air.

Harold (07:21):
Well, Michael, you and I are.
Jimmy, no.
His encyclopedic memory.
Well, Jimmy knows I can't remember what I did with him two years ago.
He knows it about me.
So you have to approach it individually based on who you are.
It's absolutely true.
And I thought, the other thing about it, like you said, it was more fun to pick the strips for me and then go back and take a look.

(07:47):
Like you said, Michael said, well, okay, which characters are dominant after the fact, instead of trying to jigger it one way or another.
And I think that to me was the fun of it.
And then being kind of surprised.

Michael (07:59):
Yeah, you can easily go crazy trying to balance it and make it.
It's not.
It's not.
It's just like, for some reason, these particular strips are like in my mind, this is like the Louvre of comic strip.

Jimmy (08:15):
Yeah, the only other thing I would add to my thing is that I only picked one that I would say I picked for its importance within the strip.
Like, for instance, you could pick the first strip easily, because whether it was good, bad or indifferent, just because it's the first strip and it's important.

(08:35):
The only one I picked because I think of its importance was one.

Harold (08:40):
OK.

Jimmy (08:41):
But it's a great strip too, so it's fine.

Harold (08:43):
Michael, did you find any things thematically that you just kept picking over and over again?
Or you mentioned there was a character who was dominant.

Michael (08:51):
Yeah.

Harold (08:52):
Were there certain types of strips that you just finally kept going, oh, this is what makes Peanuts great, and I just keep seeing this type of strip?

Michael (08:59):
It's almost like I didn't even have to think.
It's like, there's no way I'm not going to put this strip in my list.
I did when the weeding came down, I noticed there were two strips that were similar in a lot of ways.
And so I cut one of them, whereas I might have kept both of them.

Harold (09:16):
Yeah, yeah, we're so very similar.

Michael (09:22):
Yeah, I also have to apologize for my ignorance, because I was a little late for that.
Well, I was around on the day that Peanuts debuted, but I didn't glance at the paper.

Harold (09:37):
Oh, well, you know.

Michael (09:38):
That's where we told him.
I neglected to look in the paper for Carmichael.

Harold (09:43):
Well, maybe you did.
Maybe you did.

Michael (09:46):
It's possible, I thought.
Or maybe they cleaned up something that I'd spilled.

SPEAKER_6 (09:51):
Over there.

Harold (09:54):
You were just fascinated by the birdcage.

Michael (09:58):
Well.

Liz (09:58):
Shall we do this?

Jimmy (10:00):
All right, so who wants to go first?

SPEAKER_2 (10:02):
Starting off tonight's list at number 10.

Harold (10:07):
Michael, why don't you go first?

Michael (10:08):
Okay.
What I did was, when I was sorting through them, I titled each strip so I'd know.
I wouldn't have to keep going back and looking at it, so I know which one was which.
My first pick from August 19th, 1967.

(10:29):
This is my number 10, a daily, and I only have two dailies in my list.
This one, I titled The Vulture.
As you know, I'm a big fan of Snoopy's impersonation of vultures.
This is a later one.

(10:49):
He'd been doing this for 10 years already, but for some reason, this one really resonated with me.
I don't have Jimmy's talent for reading.

Harold (10:59):
Go for it.
Just get us back up to speed.
What are you seeing there?

Michael (11:03):
Okay, well, I can easily do this.
First three panels.
There's three panels of Snoopy, clearly in his vulture mode, and he still had a little bit of an elongated snout, so he can kind of curve it.
And he's sitting on some box or something.
And first panel, he thinks, here's the fierce vulture waiting patiently for a victim.

(11:27):
Second panel, waiting, waiting, waiting.
Third panel, waiting.
And then the fourth panel, you see what's going on.
He's sitting on the TV.
Charlie Brown is sitting like two feet from the TV, trying to watch the TV with Snoopy's head in the way.
And Charlie Brown says, you can't possibly realize how annoying that is.

(11:50):
And I'm a big fan of annoyance.
And so this is like masterful.
I mean, Snoopy's really getting to him.

Jimmy (11:59):
All right.
Number 10, Harold, how about you?
What's your number 10?

SPEAKER_6 (12:03):
And we got one vulture.

Harold (12:05):
Got one vulture.

SPEAKER_6 (12:06):
Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Jimmy (12:07):
Hold on.

Harold (12:08):
Yeah, yeah.

Jimmy (12:09):
Okay.
Now let's say, I want to ask this.

Harold (12:11):
Yes.

Jimmy (12:12):
Did anyone else pick that one?

Harold (12:14):
No.

Michael (12:15):
I didn't expect that.

Jimmy (12:16):
No, neither did I.

SPEAKER_2 (12:17):
Okay.

Harold (12:19):
All right.
I'm not too far off of you.
I'm August 29th, 1965, from my number 10.
It's a Sunday.
And Linus is in a little wizard hat holding a crystal ball in his lap.
And Lucy walks up looking at a newspaper and she says, fantastic.
Have you ever known anyone who has the gift of prophecy?

(12:41):
And Linus was sucking his thumb and holding his blanket with his eyes closed, and he says, just myself.
Lucy says, you?
Absolutely.
I can predict what any adult will answer when he or she is asked a certain question.
If you go up to an adult and say, how come we have a mother's day and a father's day, but we don't have a children's day?
That adult will always answer, every day is children's day.

(13:05):
It doesn't matter what adult you ask, you will always get the same answer.
It is an absolute certainty.
Lucy walks off, says, I'll try it out on grandma.
Off screen, grandma, how come we have a mother's day and a father's day, but we don't have a children's day?
And grandma replies, every day is children's day.
Lucy now stands next to Linus, so with the eyes closed, sucking the thumb, holding the blanket, looking very dazed.

(13:32):
And Linus says, the gift of prophecy.

Michael (13:36):
That is a classic.

Harold (13:38):
Oh my gosh.
And this is one of those things where there's certain lines that just wind up in your life.
Gift of prophecy is one of them in my family.
This one came to mind instantly when I was thinking of certain strips.

Michael (13:56):
That easily, it could have got on my list.

Harold (13:58):
Actually, no, it isn't.
I didn't think of that one right away, but as soon as I saw it, I was like, oh gosh, of course.
So yeah, that wasn't one that just instantly came to my mind, but it's probably the one I quote the most, Peanuts of anything.

Jimmy (14:10):
All right.
Well, I have to say, two good strips to start off with.
All right.
My number 10 is from August 9th, 1976.
I hear you're writing a book on theology.
I hope you have a good title.
Snoopy, I have the perfect title.
Has it ever occurred to you that you might be wrong?

(14:33):
I think that was a perfect way to start off picking these 10 strips.

Harold (14:37):
Right.
Yeah.
If Snoopy were writing the book for me and Michael.

Jimmy (14:43):
Yeah.

Harold (14:43):
Right.

Liz (14:44):
Of course.

Jimmy (14:47):
I don't have too much of Snoopy's alter egos because a lot of the ones I like the best tended to be in long sequences or where the grocery clerk, which I just couldn't read, I couldn't actually put in my top 10.

SPEAKER_6 (15:03):
But anyone pick that one?

Michael (15:07):
Nope.

Jimmy (15:07):
All right.
So those are three.

Harold (15:09):
That is a classic.

Michael (15:10):
It is a classic.

Liz (15:11):
Interesting that all three are from August.

Harold (15:14):
Right.

Michael (15:15):
That's weird.

Harold (15:16):
So he did his 10th best work in August.
Keep that in mind.

Jimmy (15:24):
All right.
So we have a hot start.
Where are we at now with you, Michael, for number nine?

Michael (15:30):
Number nine.

SPEAKER_6 (15:32):
Number nine?

Michael (15:34):
Going way back, 1954.
August 15th.

Harold (15:40):
August.

Michael (15:41):
This is entitled The Dance Lesson.
And this is one of those just hilarious multi-panel, many panels.
It's just the drawing is so great.
But anyway, Patty and Violet are sitting on the pavement, and Lucy comes walking down the street with a big smile on her face.

(16:08):
They mention that Lucy's just been going to dancing school, and they want her to do a few steps for them and show them what she's learned.
And she's very young.
Lucy at this point is definitely younger than the rest, because she started as a baby.
So Lucy is a little worried because she's not sure if she can remember all the steps.
But in the next six panels, we see a sequence of her.

(16:32):
She shakes one foot, she shakes the other foot, she shakes one hand, she shakes the other hand, and then she jumps up, and then she makes a little pose.

Harold (16:42):
One Grecian urn.

Michael (16:44):
Yeah.
And then she says, that cost my dad $12.

Harold (16:53):
With a big grin on her face.

Michael (16:55):
Yeah.

Harold (16:56):
I'm just so proud.

Jimmy (16:59):
That's a great one.
That's a classic for sure.

Harold (17:01):
Love it.

Michael (17:01):
It's so funny because it's clearly not dancing.
And she's really little.
I mean, she looks like she might be three or something.

Harold (17:10):
Yeah.
That's more relevant even today with parents taking their, shelling their kids from one parent to another, paying for one event after another that they are sponsored in, that they have to learn.
That's just so classic.

Jimmy (17:23):
That's a good one.
Harold, how about you?

Harold (17:27):
Oh, number nine.
I'm sorry, I broke our August streak.
I am on December 23rd, 1979, my first Christmas strip of the top 10, not the last.
It's a Sunday and it shows Snoopy looking at a package that says, mustn't touch.
Charlie Brown finds a package in the mail and brings it over to Snoopy's doghouse and he says, package just came for you but it says, do not open until Christmas and Snoopy gleefully tears it open.

(17:56):
Dogs can't read.
He pulls the hat out of the box, sticks it on top of his head as this big fluffy striped toque.
He's like, how nice, a new stocking cap.
Then the next panel instantly, he's like, he was right, I should have waited.
Now everyone else will be opening presents, but I'll just have to stand around and watch.

(18:17):
Rats.
Then he pulls the hat down over his head and stomach, so you just see his feet and tail on top of the doghouse.
I'm so stupid.
Then he lies down in the same pose with the hat and says, I do this every year.
Then Charlie Brown shows up, surprise, another package just came, but it says, do not open until, Snoopy's like, who cares?
I can't wait.

(18:38):
Tears open the package, and the last panel is him still wearing the hat and the polka dotted tie around his neck.
He says, I'm so stupid.
I love this one so much.
It's one of those super memorable ones.
It dates back, I'd say about half of these at least date back to childhood memories of the strip.

(19:03):
Ones that just didn't go away, which is a pretty good bellwether for why it should be on our top 10 list if we remember them from way back when.
So it biases us, but it also, I think it's a good test of time.
This one is, I think, very funny.
It's so Snoopy.
Thinking about, again, what makes Snoopy so special, it's those ones, he just swings wildly in what he does.

(19:29):
He's, like we said, contradictory in certain ways, like we all are.
You definitely see it here from absolute joy to absolute regret, back to impulsiveness and then just ending it with, I'm so stupid.
I love that one.

(19:50):
It just encapsulates Snoopy in a lot of ways in one little strip.

Jimmy (19:55):
Good pick.
For my number nine, this is the one I picked for its resonance within the strip, but I think it's pretty great, all on its own.
This is January 2nd, 2000, and it's Nobody Shook Hands and Said Good Bye, which really is the finale of the strip, I think, to me.

(20:20):
And nobody draws rain like good old Charles Schulz.

Harold (20:24):
Yeah.

Jimmy (20:24):
And it just kills me.
It's just a wonderful comic strip.

Liz (20:29):
Is that the one that with We Had Fun, Didn't We, Marcy?
Yeah.

Jimmy (20:35):
It's Peppermint Patty and she is in the mud and she's calling out to all the other characters.
They're calling out actually to Charlie Brown and saying, it's your ball, fourth down.
And then Marcy comes and says, everybody's gone home, sir.
You should go home too.
It's getting dark.
And then Peppermint Patty says, we had fun, didn't we, Marcy?
And then Marcy says, yes, sir, we had fun.
And Peppermint Patty ends with, Nobody Shook Hands and Said Good Game.

Harold (20:58):
Yeah.
Do you think, like you said, it's because of where it fell, that gives it that extra massive punch?

Jimmy (21:05):
Oh, yes.
Absolutely.

Harold (21:06):
No question about it.
Yeah.

Jimmy (21:07):
Absolutely.

Harold (21:08):
Yeah.
That is a great one.
And yeah, well, it was very emotional.
Yes.
At the end.

Jimmy (21:16):
So are we having any themes develop so far with two?
Not really.

Harold (21:20):
A lot of Sundays.
A lot of Sundays.

Jimmy (21:22):
Yes, a lot of Sundays.
Well, here's a question.
How many Sundays did you pick, Michael, did you say?

Michael (21:27):
Eight.
Wow.

Jimmy (21:29):
Harold, how many Sundays did you pick?

Harold (21:31):
I would have to go through them.
Let me see.
So I see one that is a daily.

Michael (21:37):
Oh my God.
You must have nine then doing the math.

Harold (21:43):
If all is correct, yes, that is true.

Jimmy (21:46):
I got five Sundays, five dailies.
That was not intentional though.
It just happened that way.

Harold (21:52):
Nice balance.

Jimmy (21:53):
Yeah.
All right.
Coming in hot at number eight.

Michael (21:57):
All right.
Yeah.
I mean, the Sundays, especially in the period I was picking, I think he spent a lot of time on.
Generally, a lot of panels, a lot of characters.
It looks like he wasn't doing blank backgrounds at that point.
So he was really working hard to get his Sundays down.
So the next one is another Sunday, December 19th, 1954, entitled The Rubber Band.

(22:26):
You guys probably know which one this is.

Jimmy (22:29):
It means for you to have that much fun.

Michael (22:31):
Yeah.
That's the way.
You'll see that Lucy features heavily in my picks.
Even though I wouldn't put her as my favorite character, not even near.
But at this point, this was such an original character.
I don't think we ever had a character like this in comics.
It was a little bit shocking considering a kid's characters in comics tended to be lovable.

(22:59):
So this is baby Linus.
Lucy now has grown up to her normal stature.
She happened pretty quick.
Linus is so happy.
Sitting on the floor, he's playing with his toy boat, and he's got little toy car and blocks.
Lucy comes up, yells at him.

(23:19):
She says, give me those toys.
Everything is mine, mine, mine, mine.
Little baby Linus doesn't know what's going on.
Lucy, in the kindness of her heart, says, here, I guess you can have this rubber band.
Have fun with that.
So baby Linus sees a little rubber band, he starts stretching it, and he's pulling it with both hands, and he's laughing, having a great time, stretching the rubber band, and Lucy comes over, what's going on?

SPEAKER_6 (23:47):
Give me that.

Michael (23:48):
I didn't mean for you to have that much fun.

Harold (23:52):
That's a classic.
Man, that defines that relationship so well, and those characters.

SPEAKER_2 (23:59):
Yeah.

Harold (24:01):
I love that.

Jimmy (24:02):
Yeah.
I think particularly in those first two decades, Lucy makes the strip really work in so many ways.
She's an engine that drives so much of it.
It's really fun.

Michael (24:14):
Yeah, because it's kind of funny.
I wouldn't have thought that 54 would be considered him reaching his peak already.
If someone asks me, I don't want to start Peanuts at the beginning.
Where do I start?
I might have said 55, 56, but a lot of my picks are 54.

Liz (24:36):
That's a good year.

SPEAKER_2 (24:38):
Yeah.

Liz (24:39):
Harold?

Harold (24:41):
All right.
I'm taking us forward to August 6th, 1972.
We have Peppermint Patty and Charlie Brown sitting at the tree that they so often sit at, looking opposite directions, getting philosophical.
Peppermint Patty says, lately, everything seems to bother me.

(25:02):
Charlie Brown says, how do you mean?
What do you think security is, Chuck?
Security is sleeping in the back seat of the car.
When you're a little kid and you've been somewhere with your mom and dad and it's night and you're riding home in the car, you can sleep in the back seat.
You don't have to worry about anything.
Your mom and dad are in the front seat and they do all the worrying.
They take care of everything.

(25:24):
Peppermint Patty pulls her hands to her chest and has a big smile on her eyes closed.
She says, that's real neat.
Charlie Brown says, but it doesn't last.
Suddenly, you're grown up and it can never be that way again.
Suddenly, it's over and you'll never get to sleep in the back seat again.
Never.
Peppermint Patty is concerned.

(25:44):
Never?
Absolutely never.
Peppermint Patty, looking incredibly disturbed, grabs Charlie Brown by the arm and says, hold my hand, Chuck.

SPEAKER_6 (25:54):
No.

Michael (25:56):
Well, I have that fond memory, especially coming home from a movie, in lying in the back seat and falling asleep.
But yeah, that's a good one.
I probably totally forgot that one though.

Harold (26:10):
That's my one Peppermint Patty in the 10.

Jimmy (26:14):
Beautiful.
Yeah, I have one Peppermint Patty.

Harold (26:16):
But I love this one.

Jimmy (26:17):
Yeah, that's a great one.

Harold (26:20):
I noticed the ones that were philosophical slash profound, that was definitely a piece of peanuts that was going to show up in my top 10.
And this is one of those classic ones like that.

Jimmy (26:33):
Yeah, he often would be able to pull something off like that in the Sundays where he had a little more room to paint a picture with words, which is nice.

Harold (26:43):
Definitely.

Jimmy (26:44):
All right, my pick is August 20th, 1962.
Charlie Brown is sitting by himself having a little lunch.
And he says, I think I'll go over and introduce myself to that little red haired girl.
I think I'll introduce myself and then ask her to come over and sit next to me.
I think I'll ask her to sit next to me here and then I think I'll tell her how much I've always admired her.

(27:05):
And then it ends with, I think I'll flap my arms and fly to the moon.
Flap my arms and fly to the moon.
I think I'll flap my arms and fly to the moon is like Harold said, some of these things just infect your daily speech.
That is one for me.
I have said that for years.

Harold (27:25):
Wow.

Liz (27:27):
Even I got that one infected.
I mean, that one infected me.
Anybody else pick that one?

Harold (27:33):
Nope.
No, no, we have no overlap.

Liz (27:36):
I would have.

Harold (27:37):
You would have picked that one.

Jimmy (27:38):
Yeah, all right.
Yeah, I just, it's a great punchline.
I mean, basically, that just comes down to something very simple.
It is a very, very funny punchline.
Yeah.
All right.
So we are flying through these.
Michael, what's your number seven?

Michael (27:55):
Okay.
We're going once again back to 1955.
This is January, February, March, April, May 22nd and it's entitled The Catch.
Jimmy, do you want to do the punchline?

Jimmy (28:14):
Oh, yeah.
Sure.
This is Linus runs into the house and up to the steps and out the window, right?

Liz (28:21):
No, no.
It's the three of them sitting on the curb.

SPEAKER_6 (28:25):
Oh, Willie Mays.

Jimmy (28:27):
Oh, I'm sorry.

Michael (28:28):
No, you're all wrong.

Liz (28:29):
Oh, really?

Michael (28:30):
You're all wrong.
Oh, wait.

SPEAKER_6 (28:32):
Why didn't he?
No, okay.

Jimmy (28:36):
Yeah, that's what I was thinking.

Michael (28:37):
So essentially a silent strip.
Again, how much work he did in these panels.
Yeah, I'm looking at the Sundays.
Six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen panels.
Total background perspective.
Okay, Charlie Brown is obviously, for some reason he's in the outfield, and the outfield is just a dump.

(29:05):
It's muddy, there's these puddles, there's broken bike wheels, there's an old fence.
So this is not their normal playing field.
So he's shouting, come on, let him hit it.
What do you think I'm out here for?
And then he sees the ball coming.
And there's a sequence.

(29:25):
I mean, this is, might be Schulz's greatest work here.

Jimmy (29:30):
Oh, is this the one where he takes his shoes off and goes into the pool?

Michael (29:34):
Nope.
No, no, no.

Jimmy (29:35):
There's a lot of catches.

Michael (29:36):
Okay, he sees the ball coming.
He starts running and he's running over a pile of bricks.
He jumps over a barbed wire fence.
He runs down this narrow alley.
He's running and running, kicking up dust, looking over shoulder.
He's running through a pile of old tin cans.
He runs through a hole in a fence.

(29:56):
He runs through a forest and he's sighting the ball.
He's waiting, he's smiling, he's got his glove ready and the ball lands in the mitt and pops out.

Jimmy (30:07):
Yeah, that's a brilliant one.
That's a great one.
Totally, totally Charlie Brownie and beautiful, beautiful cartooning.

Harold (30:17):
Yeah.

Jimmy (30:18):
I would have loved to see a couple of like a good 32 page Charles Schulz comic book, maybe of a baseball game, you know, in that era where he was really putting all the work in little details and stuff.
That that would be fun.

Harold (30:33):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it's so it's interesting.
I don't I have no no baseball, no baseball strips.

Michael (30:40):
That's why I have almost no Charlie Brown, which is strange.

Jimmy (30:43):
But my next pick is baseball and Charlie Brown.

Michael (30:46):
All right.

Harold (30:47):
We'll balance this out here.

Jimmy (30:49):
That's right.
Go for it.
Harold, what do you got?

Harold (30:51):
All right.
All the way forward.
You guys probably know this is going to be in my top 10s.
I haven't shut up about it.
Last episode, January 30th, 1998.
Rerun is sitting between his brother and sister on the couch as they watch TV.
There's this lovely Stalilocle.

Liz (31:11):
Yeah.

Harold (31:11):
Oh my gosh.

Liz (31:12):
I'm an only child.

Harold (31:13):
This Stalilocle is great.
Yes.
Rerun is watching TV with them and he has this thoughtful innocent look on his face as he says, Someone at school today asked me if I had an older brother who dragged a blanket around.
No, I replied, I'm an only child.
Then someone said, but don't you have a weird older sister?

(31:34):
No, I insisted, I'm an only child.
And so I go day after day dodging questions from curious outsiders.
The next panel is being tossed out the door into the snow.

Jimmy (31:51):
A great one.

Harold (31:53):
So late peanuts, and this is by far the newest peanut strip that I selected.
I love, love, love this strip, made me laugh out loud.
I have to give props for this, and I'm glad that I have a strip from this late in the series because I was concerned about where would I be reading the last 20 years of the strip, given that I've been out of the mix.

(32:15):
This one proved to me that Schulz, though he changed, there was always something special in the strip and vibrant, and he was a fighter.
He was gonna make this as good as he could through his entire run.
He was never coasting.
You just never got the sense, maybe for a strip or two on a rough week, you might get the sense he was rushing through something.

(32:39):
But my gosh, this guy gave his all to this strip for 50 years, and here we are 48 years in, and it's great.
I love it.

Jimmy (32:49):
Absolutely.
That's a great pick.
Well, I also have a 90s strip for my next pick.
Mine is June 26th, 1995.
Snoopy and Woodstock sitting under the tree, Woodstock on a little stump.
They both look forlorn and Snoopy says, they're emotionally bankrupt.

(33:10):
Scott Fitzgerald was emotionally bankrupt.
We're all emotionally bankrupt.

Harold (33:15):
There's your profound strip, right?

Jimmy (33:18):
Absolutely.
You cannot imagine any other funny animal character in the 90s comic strip scene doing that.
It's just impossible to imagine.

Harold (33:33):
Well, except for ones that have been incredibly influenced by Schulz.
The reason it's there is because of him.

Jimmy (33:41):
You're right.

Harold (33:41):
Exactly.

Jimmy (33:42):
But yeah, and it's got the profundity.
It's got Woodstock and Snoopy.
It's one of his single panels, which really I only noticed this time reading it with you guys, how much I enjoyed the fact that he did really nice single panels at the end.

Harold (33:58):
Yeah.
And mine felt like a single panel in that soliloquy.
It's such a huge long panel.
Yeah.
Yeah.
He mastered that.
And I'm grateful that he wasn't stuck in the four panel grid through the end.
I think it did give him the chance to do what he did incredibly well and show us how you can make an amazing one panel, two panel, three panel strip that we wouldn't have that timing represented in his work.

Jimmy (34:26):
Yeah.

Harold (34:26):
And he's a master class.

Jimmy (34:28):
Yep.
Yeah.
No question.

Harold (34:30):
No question.

Jimmy (34:33):
So now we're on number six.
We're wrapping up the top half or the bottom half, I should say.
Michael, what is your number six?

Michael (34:41):
Okay.
Well, I'm kind of a one trick pony here.
Yeah.
I mean, I was probably six or seven.
When I got the first books, I saw these all in the books and pretty much learned to read from those peanuts books.
So almost all my pics are from that period when I wasn't even looking at the newspaper.

(35:06):
So we got, again, 1954, January 24th.
This is called Lucy Kicking.

Jimmy (35:15):
Is she kicking a snowman?

Michael (35:17):
No.
Okay.
This is very much the same period because Linus is a baby.
And this, every panel is a different scene, which Sunday will allow you to do this.
But that's what I think of your box of cookies, as Lucy as she kicks his box of cookies.
Linus is in his baby clothes.

(35:40):
That's what I think of your old piano.
She kicks his piano as Schroder looks puzzled.
That's what I think of your old stamp collection, violets like Horrified, as her stamps go flying.
That's what I think of your old picture puzzles.
Charlie Brown sees his puzzle he's been working on all week go flying.
That's what I think of your stupid old marbles.

(36:02):
So old Shermie's getting his marbles kicked all over the landscape.
That's what I think of your silly old color crayons as Patty watches her art project go flying.
Last panel.
Long panel.

Jimmy (36:15):
Can I guess, see if I remember this punch line?

Michael (36:18):
Yes.

Jimmy (36:19):
I'm frustrated and inhibited and no one understands me.

Michael (36:22):
Exactly.
Yeah.

Jimmy (36:23):
Boom.

Michael (36:24):
Yeah.
Last panel.
All the kids are, it's an angry mob chasing Lucy.
They don't understand that she's frustrated and inhibited.

Harold (36:39):
Who's the only kid not chasing after Lucy?

Michael (36:42):
Well, Linus can't walk.

Harold (36:45):
He can't do it, so they're going to have to be his proxies.

Michael (36:51):
He's got these anger lines around the kids.
It's just like these spiky things just to generate total rage.

Harold (37:02):
Yeah.
There's heat coming off of them.

Jimmy (37:06):
Yeah.
I can totally remember.
I'm not looking at the strips so that I can completely remember that line, the wavy glow around them.

Harold (37:15):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Again, 1954 comic strip.
I'm frustrated and inhibited.
Yeah.
That is so 50s in a lot of ways.
That was in a lot of adult types of things.
People are always talking about themselves in terms of psychiatry and psychology.
But seeing little kids do it is, it was definitely in the culture.

Jimmy (37:39):
Yeah.
Then she goes on to be her field.

Harold (37:45):
Yeah.
Yeah.

Jimmy (37:46):
All right, Harold, what's your pick?

Harold (37:49):
Okay.
This is my second of two Christmas strips.
This is from December 21st, 1958.
I remember this one as a kid.
This is the theme that I have noticed for the 10 strips that met the most to me.
The number one and two characters who were most in these strips are Linus and Lucy.

(38:14):
I was the younger of two kids.
I was two years younger than my sister.
I can say that I learned and navigated what it was to be, I don't know, how to fit into the world through more than anything in this strip, the relationships between Linus and Lucy.

(38:39):
It rang very true to me and I learned from them.
That's the thing.
I can remember, I learned from these.
I would study them, I'd ponder them.
It would be over your head when you first read it, but it doesn't leave you and then you go back and it's like stuff sinks in.
It's just a comic strip, right?
Just a comic strip, but no, it had a huge impact.

(39:02):
This one maybe isn't so subtle, but I did learn from this strip and it's basically you see the kids standing on the stage and you're hearing a recitation from each of the kids having their own line one at a time.
Violet and Schroeder say together, we are here to tell you of a wondrous light.

(39:25):
Linus is on the bottom row standing next to a smiling Lucy, but he's saying, I'm sunk to himself.
Then I'm glad Shermie gets in my top 10.
He says, a wondrous light that was a star.
Linus looks off stage like, I wonder if there's any way I could get out of here.
Lucy, the wise men saw the star and followed it from afar.

(39:49):
Linus is like, Lucy.
Then Charlie Brown, they found the stable in the night, beneath the star so big and bright.
Lucy out of the side of her mouth, what's the matter?
Linus, I can't remember my piece.
Then we have Patty, the wise men left the presents there, gifts so precious and so rare.

(40:10):
Lucy's like, what do you mean you can't remember it?

SPEAKER_6 (40:12):
I can't remember it.

Harold (40:14):
And then we get Pigpen, look up, looking very clean.
Look up, the star still stands, seen by millions in many lands.
Lucy's like, you better remember it right now, you blockhead.
Or when we get home, I'll slug you a good one.
Linus, in the biggest voice you can-

Jimmy (40:33):
Can I see if I remember?

Harold (40:34):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, go for it.

Jimmy (40:35):
The star that shines in Bethlehem still shines for us today.
Is that it?

Harold (40:41):
Pretty much, yes.
In the last panel, it's Lucy out of the side of her mouth again going, Merry Christmas.
Liza Linus passed out on the ground.
Thank you, thank you.
I was super shy kid and life was overwhelming, I think.

(41:01):
You'd see it through Linus, he griped and complained about the things he wasn't capable of doing, and he had an older sister who pushed him to do the things he said he couldn't do.
Yeah, as much as it's out of the thread of violence, I learned, I know that I learned from these strips that you're going to get through.

(41:25):
It's going to be okay.
It may make you pass out in front of public.
You're going to make it.

SPEAKER_6 (41:32):
It's all right.

Jimmy (41:33):
You know what?
That's something art can do for us.
Just tell us it's going to be all right.

Harold (41:40):
Yeah.
So we've gone, you know, we're halfway through and no duplicates.

Michael (41:46):
There will be at the top.

SPEAKER_6 (41:48):
I think so.

Jimmy (41:49):
I do have Shermie in my next pick too.

Harold (41:53):
Oh, nice.

Jimmy (41:55):
Wait, no, I don't.
Oh, yes, I do.
One panel, one panel.
What are you doing?
It's a Sunday.
All right.
So this was I actually made an audible at the last second when I was picking these because I was going to pick a different one of these strips.
But then this one just has a better punchline.
What I really wanted was one of the strips where you get as many characters as possible, like in panels, you get the whole kind of group of them around.

(42:22):
So I found this baseball one, which I absolutely love.
It's Schroeder, Charlie Brown and Linus on the pitchers mound.
Schroeder says, how shall we pitch this next guy, Charlie Brown?
Charlie Brown says, well, I don't know.
Linus says, throw him your curve ball, Charlie Brown.
Then Linus continues, I say, have you noticed how built up it's getting around here?

(42:43):
Pretty soon there won't be any place for us to play.
Look at all the houses.
Schroeder says, my grandpa says that all of this used to be a big pasture.
Anyway, this goes on for another four panels where five shows up, Patty shows up, and Shermie shows up, and they're all talking about property values and the suburban sprawl that they're living through.

(43:06):
In the last two panels, Linus says to Charlie Brown, what do you think Charlie Brown?
Then Charlie Brown ends with, frankly, I think he'd hit a curve ball.

Michael (43:17):
I don't think he gave the date.

Jimmy (43:19):
Yeah, I'm going to give it right now.
Yeah, it is June 30th, 1968.

Harold (43:23):
Okay.

Jimmy (43:24):
I love seeing all the characters together.
They don't...
Something happens with the way they fill out late in later years.
And you can't quite...
I think their heads just get bigger.
You can't quite get them in the same panel the same way.
But this is a real sweet spot.
I think this might be my favorite.
Like if I think if I was going to pick one fan of a graphics book, I think I would pick the 1968 one.

Harold (43:52):
Really?
Interesting.

Jimmy (43:52):
Yeah, I think so.
Yeah.

Harold (43:54):
Do you have others in that book, in this list?

Jimmy (43:58):
No, it's more that it's just generally the part of it that I like the best.
The look of it's the best.
I think it's funny all the way through.
He was just doing good.

Harold (44:10):
Yeah.
Well, I went back and I looked, okay, so what is my representation for the decades?
I found out I had one from the 50s, which is the one we just read.
I have six from the 60s, two from the 70s, none from the 80s, one from the 90s.
I was definitely 60s heavy.

Jimmy (44:28):
I got three from the 50s, three from the 60s, two from the 70s, none from the 80s, one from the 90s, and one from the aughts.

Harold (44:36):
The 80s are the one that struck out for us.

Jimmy (44:40):
I could have guessed that going in.
But that's okay.

Harold (44:47):
Yeah, it's all right.
There's still some great stuff in there in the 80s.
Absolutely.
I'm trying to think if I got any second tier 80s stuff, and I do.
I will give my honorable mention here, because I just can't have Sparky strike out for a decade.
It's not worth it.
It was one with Linus and Lucy, and he had sent a letter to Lydia.

Jimmy (45:12):
Oh, yeah, yeah.

Harold (45:17):
She gave him an address, and it came back, no such address.
Lucy says, why do you bother with her?
Linus is just draped over the side of the chair.
She fascinates me.
I love that one, but it didn't quite make the cut, but definitely Lydia was a highlight of the 80s.

Jimmy (45:34):
Yeah, Lydia is good.

Harold (45:35):
Honorable mention.

Michael (45:36):
Yeah, I feel bad about not picking Woodstocks, Lydia's or Sally, which are basically my favorite characters in the 70s, 80s, and 90s, but they weren't around.

Jimmy (45:54):
Well, who else isn't going to be around for the next few minutes?
Us, because we're going to take a break, and then we will come back and we will get into the heat of the action.

Michael (46:02):
Woo, top five.

Jimmy (46:03):
Top five.
Can you handle it?
My gosh.

Liz (46:09):
Hi, everyone.
Thank you for listening and engaging with us.
Your appreciation makes this effort a real pleasure.
And now we're asking that you support our work.
If you enjoy the show, we hope you'll join us on Patreon as a contributor.
Those of you who can't, for whatever reason, that's okay.
We've been there.
Thank you for being an essential part of Unpacking Peanuts.

Jimmy (46:35):
All right, we are back.
Ready for the top five.
I say let's just get to it.
Michael.

Michael (46:43):
Okay.
I didn't really have to think very hard on these.
They kind of picked themselves.
Picking the order was tough, but these were all definitely going to be on.

Jimmy (46:52):
I actually did not sweat the order too much because I realized that could have driven me mad.
You know, is this number two or number three?
In the year up on night.

SPEAKER_6 (47:02):
Yeah, right.

Michael (47:03):
Anyway, I'm not going to give you a title, because that will make it too easy for Jimmy to pick the final panel.
So anyway, we're back in 1950.
No, it's first time, 1958, the September 7th.
Kind of wordy, but here is the classic Schroeder and Lucy at the piano.

(47:28):
We've seen this.
This is probably the thing that's been the most in peanuts of all the little schticks.
He never stopped this, and this went on through the entire length.
Every year, there must have been five or six of these.
Anyway, so she's mooning over Schroeder as he's playing, and he's ignoring her, and she's thinking, there's nobody's fascinating as a musician.

(47:56):
Well, it's now or never.
Jimmy should be reading this.
So she's really nervous, and then she says to him, You know, Schroeder, hee hee hee hee, if you ever wanted to, hee hee hee, lean over and kiss me, hee hee hee, I wouldn't mind.
And Schroeder, just like disgusted, thinks good grief and walks away, but she doesn't see this.

(48:21):
I mean, hee hee hee, if you really wanted to, hee hee hee.
And so she still thinks that Schroeder is at the piano, and she's going, I mean, after all, there's nothing wrong with a little kiss between friends.
Meanwhile, Snoopy is walking.
And sits by the piano, kisses her on the ear.
She's, her eyes are closed.

(48:42):
She's on the ear.
How quaint.
How like a musician.

Harold (48:46):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Michael (48:47):
And she looks and she sees it's Snoopy and she has the most horrified look in her face with a little giant sweat beads pouring off her.
And the classic line, she runs away screaming, germs, disease, infection.

Harold (49:06):
Jimmy, what is the line of line, Jimmy?

Michael (49:09):
The final line?

SPEAKER_6 (49:09):
You know it?

Jimmy (49:10):
No, I can't remember.
Is it black?

Michael (49:15):
No, she runs away, germs, disease, infection, Snoopy sitting alone goes, I've never been so insulted in my life.

Jimmy (49:21):
Yeah, of course.
Yeah, that's a good one.
I got the next to last paragraph or panel.

Michael (49:27):
Yeah, you got one panel.
Yeah, but I've used that a million times.

Harold (49:34):
Which one?

Michael (49:35):
Germs, disease, infection.

SPEAKER_6 (49:36):
Okay.

Harold (49:39):
That's great.
I'm glad that there's a Schroeder and Lucy one in the next.
I did not pick a Schroeder and Lucy one.

Jimmy (49:49):
All right, Harold, what do you got?

Harold (49:51):
I'm going to take us to 1962.

Michael (49:54):
Good year.

Harold (49:54):
I'm assuming the others of us have not overlapped in that top five with Michael, but it's a great one.
So many to pick from.
This is February, 1962.
It is the 18th of a Sunday, and Snoopy is lying down on his stomach on the doghouse looking over it at a snowman, right next to the doghouse.

Michael (50:18):
I almost picked that.
I had to cut this near the end.

Harold (50:21):
Yeah.
Snoopy says, please try to understand.
Then he sighs.
He says, you're a fine fellow, but I can't risk your friendship.
Every time I become close friends with one of these snowmen, the sun melts him away and I'm left broken hearted.
I can't stand the agony, the terrible sense of loss.
I've been hurt too often.
Although I will admit you have been a good neighbor.

(50:42):
You look quite handsome with your cold eyes and carrot nose.
Well, we can't deliberately avoid friendships, I guess, as he cuddles up next to the snowman.
You can't keep to yourself just because you're afraid of being hurt, or and then the sun comes out and Snoopy's ears shoot straight up.
He looks directly at us in horror.

(51:02):
Then as the snowman melts, Snoopy is just hugging this dying snowman, going, oh, sob.
Then he's cut to the last panel.
It's Linus and Charlie Brown looking out of the window.
Linus says, poor Snoopy.
I see he's lost another friend.
It's too bad.
He's so sensitive.

Jimmy (51:21):
Charlie Brown says something like, I noticed he wasn't too sensitive to not eat the carrot.
Something like that.

Harold (51:29):
But I noticed he wasn't too sensitive to eat the carrot.
Again, classic Snoopy going to the extremes.

Michael (51:37):
It's so great.
He's trying to stop the sun.

Harold (51:40):
Yeah.

Michael (51:41):
He's teaching the sun not to shine too hard.
That one was probably number 11 on my list.
It was a brutal cut.

Harold (51:51):
It may be a different one because there is one, the very memorable one where he's got his back to the snowman with his arms trying to hold back the sun.
That's another amazing strip.

Michael (52:02):
It's very similar.

Harold (52:03):
Another amazing strip.
Super similar.
But that classic drawing is not in this one.
In this one, he's crying and hugging the snowman as it melts.
So yeah, he revisited this.
There are a couple of classic snowman strips like this.
But I love this one because again, it shows the contradictions in Snoopy so beautifully.

(52:24):
He doesn't want to get hurt, but he can't help himself.
He wants a friend, and then he goes into just terrible heartbreak as this thing is melting before our eyes, and then he eats the carrot.
I mean, there's so much of Snoopy in one strip.
I love it, just going from one thing to another.

Jimmy (52:44):
It's a great one.
All right.
Well, I have one that is absolutely going to be on Michael's list and probably Harold's list.
It is July 11th, 1954.

Michael (53:03):
Yes.

Jimmy (53:03):
Fug.
It's a piece of fuzz.

Harold (53:08):
That's it.

Jimmy (53:08):
That was my pick.
That's it.
You guys picked that one?

Harold (53:11):
Nope.

Jimmy (53:12):
No?
There is one crossover with Michael.
Don't tell us where though, Michael.
This is the classic one with Snoopy, with Lucy and Charlie Brown.
They're very little.
They're trying to walk around the block.
Of course, Lucy sees fuzz.
There's a piece of fuzz on the sidewalk.
Brush it away, Charlie Brown.
Charlie Brown thinks it's dumb.
Why would anyone be upset by a tiny little piece of fuzz?

(53:36):
Then Charlie Brown yells, Ah, it moved.
It's a bug.
It's a bug.
Lucy screams, It's a piece of fuzz.
Then they walk around the other way.
It's just so funny.
There, I mean, it's a bug.
It's a bug.
It's a piece of fuzz.
I don't know why that will always.

Michael (53:54):
That's the name of my autobiography.

Jimmy (54:03):
Just funny.

Michael (54:04):
But they do go around the block the other way.

Jimmy (54:05):
They go the other way, yes.

Harold (54:07):
Yeah, just to be safe.

Jimmy (54:09):
Yeah.
All right.
Well, I'm curious to see where you got that or you have that place, Michael.

Michael (54:15):
Well, I'm glad great minds think alike.

Jimmy (54:18):
Absolutely.
All right.
That brings us to four.
What's your number four pick?

Michael (54:23):
Oh, it's back to me.
It is January, February, March, April 16th, 1961.
Really good character who unfortunately passed away.
But I remember talking about this when we did it, because this is choreographing a wordless strip, and it's brilliant.

(54:49):
It's got like three acts, and this is Schroeder's playing the piano, and a lovely young girl is lying there listening, smiling.
But it's Frieda.

Jimmy (55:03):
Oh.

Liz (55:04):
I love this one.

Jimmy (55:05):
Oh, yes.

Michael (55:06):
And Lucy, next panel, Lucy is happily walking towards Schroeder's house because she's going to see her love.
And she closes the door, and she walks in the room, and there's that horrified look, like the same look as when Snoopy kissed her.
She sees Frieda, who's kind of like snarkily smiling at her, and Lucy goes away.

(55:29):
She says, this is a big black blob in her thought balloons.
And she's sitting on the sidewalk thinking like a big black blob.
And Snoopy, who generally isn't that close to Lucy, but he's also thinking big black blob.
This is really bad.
So he has an idea, and he pantomimes what she should do, which is basically pounce.

(55:56):
And so Lucy thinks about it, walks back, pounces on Frieda.
And second to last panel, there's just whirlwind of colors and stars of their fighting.
And then we see Lucy and Snoopy shaking hands in the last panel.

Harold (56:14):
Brilliant.
With a really beat up Lucy.

Michael (56:18):
Yeah.
I mean, this could have been a whole comic book.

Harold (56:24):
That's great.
That's great.

Jimmy (56:26):
Everything about that strip is great.
It is so hard to do silent comics.
You get someone like Andy Renton who has only done a word.
I say silent, but it's technically wordless because they're all silent.
But someone like Andy who's done them for years and years, it's just such a pure version of cartooning.

(56:47):
You have to do it with the pictures.
And no one does it better than good old Charles Schulz here.
Harold, how about you?

Harold (56:56):
All right.
My number four is the one I was most confident and I would have some overlap with you guys.
We'll see.
It's August 14th, 1960.
Charlie Brown, Linus and Lucy are looking up at the clouds.
Lucy says, aren't the clouds beautiful?

(57:17):
They look like big balls of cotton.
And then they all lie down on this mound, each looking up at the sky.
Lucy says, I could just lie here all day and watch them drift by.
If you use your imagination, you can see lots of things in the cloud formations.
What do you think you see, Linus?
Linus points up and says, well, those clouds up there look to me like the map of the British Honduras and the Caribbean.

(57:39):
That cloud up there looks like the fate profile of Thomas Eakins, the famous painter and sculptor.
And Charlie Brown's listening.
Linus says, and that group of clouds over there gives me the impression of the stoning of Stephen.
I can see the apostle Paul standing there to one side.
And Charlie Brown at this point has lifted his head off of the mound, just looking at us, this amazed look in his face.

(58:02):
Only to hear Lucy say, uh-huh, that's very good.
What do you see in the clouds, Charlie Brown?
And Charlie Brown looks back up in the skies as well.
I was going to say I saw a ducky and a horsey, but I changed my mind.

Jimmy (58:17):
Yeah, I have that one.

Michael (58:18):
I've got that one.

Jimmy (58:21):
All right.
That's a three.
Wow.
That's a unanimous decision.

Harold (58:26):
Three top four.
That's not bad.

Jimmy (58:29):
No, that's a good comic strip.

Michael (58:30):
Yeah, it's just like he totally defines the characters.
Yeah.

Harold (58:34):
Yeah.

Michael (58:34):
I mean, Linus, if you had never seen Linus before, you'd get an idea who he is.

Harold (58:38):
Yes.

Jimmy (58:39):
Charlie Brown lifting his head up to look at us.
All of it is beautiful.

Harold (58:49):
It's so classic.
I mean, it's beyond genius.
What do you say?
This is just so perfect.
That's true.

Jimmy (58:56):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, I think there's going to be a lot of that in the top five here because they're just a genius.

Liz (59:07):
And you're number four, Jimmy?

Jimmy (59:09):
My number four is-

Harold (59:11):
You think this is going to overlap?
What do you guess?

Jimmy (59:14):
Oh, yes, I think there's a very good chance this could overlap, but it would only overlap with you, Harold.
So here we go.
It is March 26th, 1972, the Coat Hanger Sculpture.

Harold (59:28):
Oh, that's a classic.
If I had remembered that one, for whatever reason it did not get on my top list, it would have been on there, I think.

SPEAKER_6 (59:37):
But I did not remember.

Jimmy (59:38):
The Wheel Gets the Grease.
Yes, we have a good old Sally getting a C in Coat Hanger Sculpture, and she basically whines and complains her way to hopefully getting a better grade.

Liz (59:53):
She debates.

Jimmy (59:55):
She debates.
Yes, she debates.

Harold (59:57):
Yes.
Yeah, as a student who doesn't like being a student, she's, boy, is she a good debater.

Jimmy (01:00:03):
Am I to be judged by the quality of coat hangers that are used by the dry cleaning establishment that returns our garments?
Is that not the responsibility of my parents?
Should they not share in my sea?

Harold (01:00:19):
If that one had crossed my path while I was doing this, I think it would be in the top 10 for sure.
But for whatever reason, I guess maybe you nominated it or somebody nominated it and I didn't see it as I was going back through.
But that is absolutely, absolutely a classic.
I think it's Sally's best moment.

Jimmy (01:00:38):
Yeah, it's a great moment.
Great Sunday Strip.

Harold (01:00:41):
Again, a learning thing.
I remember as a child reading this and just taking it all in.

Jimmy (01:00:47):
Yeah.
There's something to be said.
The way this imprinted on us at such a young age.
I've read lots of things when I was a kid.
None of them stay with me and my thoughts and my vocabulary in quite the same way.
Again, I'm talking about being a very little kid, not like 12, 13 when you're, but yeah, it's impressive and very cool.

Harold (01:01:13):
Yeah, that should have been on my list, Jimmy.

SPEAKER_6 (01:01:16):
I know it should have been.

Jimmy (01:01:18):
It should have been on everyone.
I'm just kidding.

Harold (01:01:21):
Slipped by.

Jimmy (01:01:23):
Oh man, top three.
This is pretty, this is the nitty gritty.
This is where the rubber meets the road.

Michael (01:01:32):
Well, we've already seen the rubber in this case.

Harold (01:01:37):
Okay.

Michael (01:01:38):
It's coming back to me, my number three, August 14th, 1960, Ducky and Horsey.

SPEAKER_2 (01:01:46):
Okay.

Michael (01:01:47):
So do I have more to say about this?

Jimmy (01:01:54):
I think we can probably move on.

Michael (01:01:55):
I think we've covered this.
I thought this might be your guys' number one.

Liz (01:02:02):
There's still other brilliant ones too.

Harold (01:02:06):
Yeah.
Top four.
You can't complain about getting the top four.
Absolutely.

Jimmy (01:02:11):
Yeah.
It's all arbitrary.
Any one of these could be my favorite.
Any one of these 30 could be my favorite, really.
They're all great.

Harold (01:02:23):
All right, Harold.
All right.
Number three.
I'm guessing I'm alone here.
This is my guess.
This is June 5th, 1960.
No?
Okay.
This is another Sunday.
Start out with Lucy, and she's looking at this kit she has.

(01:02:45):
Tell me when you guys know.

Michael (01:02:47):
I don't know yet.

Harold (01:02:48):
I have to say two words, and I think you're going to get it.
Tyrannosaurus rex.
Yeah?

Michael (01:02:54):
No?
Yeah.
That's a good one.

Harold (01:02:56):
His life size 50 foot long and 20 feet high.
Wow.
Model size, 16 inches long and 10 inches high.
He sure had a lot of bones, and there she is with her tongue sticking up the top of her mouth, while she's concentrating on gluing stuff together.
Then Linus and Snoopy show up.
Linus says, a dinosaur set.
Oh boy, may I help you put it together, Lucy?

(01:03:19):
Lucy's like, oh, I suppose so.
We got a more mellow Lucy here, 1960.
Linus starts to look at the parts.
He says, this looks real interesting.
There's something about dinosaurs that's fascinating.
Let's see now, this toe bone here should connect to this foot bone and Snoopy's watching.
This foot bone here should connect to this ankle bone.

(01:03:41):
Then Linus turns to smiling Snoopy and says, and the ankle bone connects to the leg bone, right?
Then boy, the dancing starts.
Oh, the ankle bone connects to the leg bone and the leg bone connects to the thigh bone.
The thigh bone connects to the hip bone and the hip bone connects to the knee bone.
Oh, and now Snoopy's getting full nose up to the sky in that classic 1960s little peanut head.

(01:04:06):
Oh, the knee bone connects to the wrist bone and the wrist bone connects to it and then all of a sudden we see Lucy for the first time in many panels with the most angry face you're ever going to see in the history of peanuts.

Jimmy (01:04:17):
And then Harold's favorite punchline in peanuts, which is someone getting thrown out of the house.

Harold (01:04:23):
Being thrown out of the house and with the extra touch of Charlie Brown looking from afar as they go out the door.

Jimmy (01:04:31):
That's even better.

Harold (01:04:33):
Yes, I get to double up my punchlines because, my gosh, that's funny.

Jimmy (01:04:37):
Oh, my gosh.

Harold (01:04:37):
I love it.

Jimmy (01:04:39):
Really good.
Really good.

Harold (01:04:42):
Had to have those joyous moments.
Yeah.
The thing I noticed when I was doing these, the types of strips that I thought were getting into my top 20, top 10 payoff strips, meaning something's going on in the strip forever.
And then there's this tension that never gets resolved.
And every once in a while, Schulz will give you a pressure release.

(01:05:03):
But it's so earned because you've waited so long for the payoff.
I definitely saw that in the strips.
I saw there were some empathy strips, where there's just some deep connection.
Like Snoopy and the Snowman being one of them.
And joyful strips, this is definitely one of the joyful strips.
Sibling strips for sure, specifically Linus and Lucy.

(01:05:26):
Characterization strips that just define the character better than I think anything.
And then the last one I would call philosophical or profound strips.
Those were the kinds of things that seemed to be, I was gravitating toward when I was picking these.
Those were what they had in common.

Jimmy (01:05:42):
That's a good approach to take.
My third strip here, I actually have a memory of the first time I consciously read it.
I mean, I'm sure I had seen it previously before.
But good old Michael came to visit me in my apartment back in the mid 90s.
And he brought me an apartment warming gift, the Peanuts Treasury, I think it was called.

(01:06:09):
The Snoopy Treasury, some big hardcover Peanuts book.
And he's like, read the first two pages.
I know which one you're going to laugh at.
And he predicted exactly correctly.
And that strip was February 5th, 1968.
Snoopy's lying atop the dog house, and Frieda comes up and says, you spend all your time lying on top of that dog house.

(01:06:33):
That's all you seem to do.
You just lie there and lie there.
And then Frieda walks away with her hands in the air, yelling, I just don't see how you do it.
To which Snoopy replies, let's not overlook the possibility of genius.

Harold (01:06:51):
That is classic.

Jimmy (01:06:56):
Just great punchline.
I like this.
I love Frieda.
I think Frieda is a great character design.
She had a really good run, so it was fun to get her in the top 10 and up high.
Not only as a great man, but still.

Harold (01:07:11):
Yeah.
I'm assuming that that's something that's been quoted often.

Jimmy (01:07:15):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_6 (01:07:15):
Oh, absolutely.

Jimmy (01:07:16):
In my house?

Liz (01:07:20):
On this podcast.

Jimmy (01:07:28):
All right.

Michael (01:07:31):
Now, before we hear number 1, at number 2.

Jimmy (01:07:34):
Well, top 2 peanut strips.
Before we get to the top 2, let me just talk to you guys out there.
You know, we would love to hear what your favorite strips are.
And if you want to tell us, there's a couple of different ways you can do it.
First thing you could do is go over to our website, unpackingpeanuts.com.
You could sign up for our newsletter.
And you can also just email us, unpackingpeanuts.gmail.com.

(01:07:56):
Tell us what your top 10 is.
You can also shoot us a text message or leave a voicemail on our Unpacking Peanuts hotline.
The number is 717-219-4162.
And I would love to hear what your thoughts are on this topic.
And remember, when I don't hear from you, I worry.
So with all that said, Michael, give us your number two.

Michael (01:08:19):
Well, I probably was assuming this would be everybody's number one.
But after giving it a good think, it ended up being my number two.
Obviously important for this show.
I don't have the date.

Jimmy (01:08:35):
It is 12-16-55.

Michael (01:08:38):
I figured, do you guys have the date?
Okay.
Well, this one, the two dailies I picked.
We've got our catchphrase from this.

Liz (01:08:51):
We have a song.

Michael (01:08:53):
We have a song from this.

Jimmy (01:08:54):
That's right.

Michael (01:08:55):
Wow.
This is one of the most philosophically deep explorations into life that Schulz did.
Yeah.
I'm sure you guys know what it is already, but I'll describe it.
Snoopy, who's still looking a little puppyish here.

(01:09:17):
It's so pitiful.
He's freezing.
It's snowing out.
He's shivering.
He's all by himself.
Here comes Charlie Brown and we guess that's Shermie?

Harold (01:09:28):
It's Schroeder.

Jimmy (01:09:29):
According to the Peanuts Wiki, it's Schroeder.

Michael (01:09:31):
Okay.
They got big fuzzy hats on.
It's really cold out.
Charlie Brown says, Snoopy looks kind of cold, doesn't he?
It's Schroeder.
I'll say he does.
Maybe we'd better go over and comfort him.
What?
Give him your hat, give him your coat.

(01:09:52):
No.
Schroeder says, be of good cheer, Snoopy.
Charlie Brown, just to double what they're doing, says, yes, be of good cheer.
Then they walk away.
Snoopy is shivering and just big question mark over his head.

(01:10:13):
Like, what was that?

Jimmy (01:10:19):
Oh, yeah.
Well, I do have that in my top two.

Harold (01:10:25):
I do not.

Liz (01:10:26):
I think I'll find the original conversation where you described what that strip meant to you.

Michael (01:10:32):
We talked about it for 15 minutes.

Jimmy (01:10:34):
Yeah, I think it's like an episode.
Yeah.

Harold (01:10:37):
For this podcast, this is definitely a top 10 strip to me for this podcast, but it's not in my top 10.

Michael (01:10:43):
No, you're kidding.

Harold (01:10:44):
No.

Michael (01:10:45):
I'm stunned.

Jimmy (01:10:47):
Well, what is your number two, Mr.
Harold?

Harold (01:10:49):
My number two?
Well, it's, I think, my only sports strip.
Any guesses before I reveal?

Michael (01:10:55):
No, there's so many.

Jimmy (01:10:57):
Is it a Sunday or a daily?

Harold (01:10:59):
It's a Sunday.

Michael (01:11:01):
Sports strip.
I'm sure.

Harold (01:11:04):
I'll give you the date.

Michael (01:11:07):
Give us the date.

Liz (01:11:08):
Tell us the date.

Harold (01:11:10):
It's October 26, 1969.

Jimmy (01:11:14):
Can tell us all the dialogue.

Michael (01:11:18):
It's got to be a World Series strip.

Liz (01:11:20):
No, it's a football.

Harold (01:11:21):
It's a football strip.
I don't have any baseball strips.

Jimmy (01:11:24):
Okay.

Harold (01:11:25):
But here's the other thing.
None of the characters are playing football.
Can you tell now what it is?

Jimmy (01:11:31):
Of course, I know.

Harold (01:11:32):
How did the other two feel?
Yes.

Jimmy (01:11:35):
Yes.
That was my number 11.
That one hurt to get rid of.
Yes.
That's great to see that one here.

Harold (01:11:43):
Linus sitting at the TV, totally enraptured.

SPEAKER_2 (01:11:45):
Go, go, go.

Harold (01:11:47):
He's jumping up and down on his chair.
He goes, fantastic.
He runs out of the house and he sees Charlie Brown holding a football.
Says, Charlie Brown, I saw the most unbelievable football game ever played.
What a comeback.
The home team was behind six to nothing with only three seconds to play.
They had the ball in their own one yard line.
The quarterback took the ball, faded back behind his own goalposts and threw a perfect pass to the left end, who whirled away from four guys and ran all the way for a touchdown.

(01:12:14):
The fans went wild.
You should have seen them.
People were jumping up and down and when they kicked the extra point, thousands of people ran out onto the field laughing and screaming.
The fans and the players were so happy.
They were rolling on the ground and hugging each other and dancing and everything.
It was fantastic.
Charlie Brown just looks at him and says, how did the other team feel?

(01:12:38):
Oh my gosh.

Jimmy (01:12:40):
You know what just dawned on me?
I think he'll hit a curveball strip that I read earlier.
That's the same mechanism, right?
You set something up, then you talk about a bunch of stuff to almost forget what that initial thing is.
Then you undercut it, right?
It's so great.

Harold (01:12:59):
What I love about this one, because at least the setup is there in the one you picked.
In this one, it's entirely dependent on who we know Charlie Brown to be outside of this.

Jimmy (01:13:08):
That's true, yes.

Harold (01:13:10):
That is so Charlie Brown and the fact that Schulz could do this.
You could have gotten away with this in a strip that you didn't know Charlie Brown was, but the impact would be 1% or 10% of it.

Jimmy (01:13:23):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Harold (01:13:24):
But it's like a sock in the gut, right?

Jimmy (01:13:30):
Yeah, it is, yeah.

Harold (01:13:32):
This is how Charlie Brown sees life and he has trouble processing joy.
He could be empathetic to Linus, but instead his thoughts go to the loser, which is also a beautiful thing.
He's an empathetic guy, not just because he's experienced so much failure himself, but I think he really does have that sense of, and this seems very much like who Schulz was as well.

(01:14:00):
That was that piece of him that you're always aware of the flip side of a joyful moment.
That was always a piece of the strip.
There's so much of those moments where, I mean, the reverse of this would have been, say for me, one of my choices, where Snoopy has anguish about losing his snowman friend, but then he enjoys a nice carrot at the end.

Jimmy (01:14:22):
Yeah, that's the difference between the two of them.

Harold (01:14:24):
Schulz can go to both places and live with them.
Yeah, they live side by side in Schulz's world.
I think that creates this marvelous tension.
I think some of my favorite strips are the ones that have those juxtaposed so beautifully.

Jimmy (01:14:40):
Well, all of the strips that we picked, it makes me think of what Michael was saying way early in the show, early episodes, that how many of the strips we were pulling, were the punch lines were at least amplified, if not dependent on the characters' personalities.
Yeah.

(01:15:01):
It's not just that you can write a bunch of gags and have these characters say them.
They come out of their personalities that seems so real to us.
Yeah.

Michael (01:15:11):
Absolutely true.

Liz (01:15:14):
You're number two, Jimmy?

Jimmy (01:15:15):
Duckie and Horsey.
Okay.
I think we said it all.
That's unquestionably one of the best.

Liz (01:15:29):
Yeah.

Jimmy (01:15:30):
All right.

Liz (01:15:31):
Wait a second.
Before you get to all your number ones, I want to give an honorable mention to my favorite strip.

Jimmy (01:15:40):
Oh, of course.

Liz (01:15:41):
This is April 8th, 1957, and it's Patty and Violet are looking at Linus who's holding something, and he says, here, Violet, these are for you because I like you.
Violet says, why, how nice.
Thank you, Linus.
Thank you very much.

(01:16:02):
Linus walks away and he's blushing, and the heat is just coming off his face.
And Patty says to Violet, what did he give you?
As she's smiling after Linus, and Violet says, some French fries with a rubber band around them.
I remember where I was when I first read that.

Harold (01:16:24):
Where were you?

Liz (01:16:25):
I was sitting in a chair next to the bookcase where the Peanuts books were, and I was probably eight or nine.
These are for you because I like you.
It's just so off the wall.

Jimmy (01:16:46):
I would love to get some French fries wrapped in a rubber band.
That would be amazing.

Michael (01:16:51):
But they'd be cold French fries.

Liz (01:16:53):
But you could play with the rubber band.

Jimmy (01:16:55):
That's true, yeah.

Harold (01:16:58):
That's a classic.
That's great.
That sincerity off the wall line is special.

Michael (01:17:07):
Debuting all the way up at number one.

Jimmy (01:17:13):
All right.
Here we go.
This is it, the big one.

Michael (01:17:17):
Yeah, we already know what this is.
So there's no suspense at the end.
Well, just from what we've talked about, you can scientifically, mathematically work out what might make this.

Harold (01:17:31):
I confess, I have no clue what your choices are.
Really?

Jimmy (01:17:34):
Yeah, it's ducking and horsing.

Michael (01:17:36):
Well, anyway, yeah, I had to go with this just because it's lived with me.
Every time I see something on the sidewalk, me and Liz say, it's a bug.
Yeah, it's the bug.

Jimmy (01:17:49):
Oh, wait.
Oh, I guess they're wrong.
Yours is bug and piece of fuzz.
I thought yours was ducking and horsing.
Okay, I'm sorry.

Michael (01:17:54):
No, ducking and horsing was my number three.

Jimmy (01:17:56):
That's right.
I'm so sorry.

Michael (01:17:57):
Then Be Of Good Cheer and bug and fuzz.
It could have been anyway, those three.

Jimmy (01:18:03):
Yeah.

Michael (01:18:04):
But there was something so hilarious about him understanding kids and he had young kids.
So, you know, I suspect this might have come from something real.
All kids are afraid of bugs.
Nobody's afraid of fuzz.

(01:18:25):
And that's what made it so brilliant.
To actually go around the block rather than walk around a piece of fuzz.
It's just how insane little kids are and they're afraid of the world.

Harold (01:18:41):
That's great.

Jimmy (01:18:42):
Great strip, great exploration of the characters, funny, everything about it's good, beautifully drawn.

Harold (01:18:49):
So I mentioned the categories of strips I found I was picking.
To me, this is the ultimate payoff strip of the 17,897 strips from the relationship that is the most meaningful to me in the whole Peanuts catalog.

(01:19:11):
It is Lucy and Linus from June 30th, 1963.
Lucy is saying to herself, fully, Linus walks up to her saying, What's the matter?
Lucy looks very angry, looks out the window.
My life is a drag.
I'm completely fed up.
I've never felt so low in my life.

(01:19:34):
Linus says, when you're in a mood like this, you should try to think of things you have to be thankful for.
In other words, count your blessings.
Lucy's like, ha, that's a good one.
I could count my blessings on one finger.
I've never had anything and I never will have anything.
Then she's perched up on the side of the chair with her elbows in her face and she says, I don't get half the breaks that other people do.

(01:19:56):
Nothing ever goes right for me.
You talk about counting blessings.
You talk about being thankful.
What do I have to be thankful for?

Jimmy (01:20:05):
You have a little brother who loves you.

Harold (01:20:06):
Linus says, well, for one thing, you have a little brother who loves you.
She looks at him and starts to cry.
She says, Linus does every now and then, I say the right thing.

Jimmy (01:20:16):
That's a great one.
Yeah.
A great one.

Harold (01:20:20):
Again, I learned something.
I know I learned something from this strip and it was a good thing to learn.

Jimmy (01:20:27):
Absolutely.

Harold (01:20:29):
A kind word in a relationship that can be rocky.
If you're brave enough to say it, sometimes it's one of the best things you can do.

SPEAKER_2 (01:20:39):
Absolutely.

Jimmy (01:20:42):
Well, that is a fantastic pick.
My number one pick is, of course, no surprise, Be Of Good Cheer, because I've been talking about it since I was five years old.
You can actually, on YouTube, we should put a link.
There's a video, an old documentary, some guys in Harrisburg made that has Harold and I in it.

(01:21:02):
I am looking a lot younger and I'm still yapping about Be Of Good Cheer.
Wow, so we did it, guys.
We picked the 10.
Well, there's no real way we could get to a 10.
I thought there would be more overlap so we could get to an actual definitive 10, but you got something better than that, people.

(01:21:28):
You got like 25.
So you can't beat that.

Harold (01:21:32):
Yeah, and we do have one that we all have in common.
So that's not right.

Michael (01:21:36):
I really would have predicted at least for sure three in common in our top 10, but we are individuals.
We have different lives.

Harold (01:21:48):
Yeah.
We're not redundant.

Michael (01:21:49):
Yeah.
It would be to expand this to 20 would be a whole other thing.
Because it would have, or 50, I would have considered more later strips.
I still stand by my, what I said originally that I don't think anything after 70.
I mean, the 10 I picked are my 10.

(01:22:11):
There might be some others from the same period, but I don't see anything looming that large to get in, to knock any of those off.

Harold (01:22:22):
If I had to guess, just looking at, I had narrowed things down to, was it like 23 strips or something like that?
And I'm just looking at these, trying to see where I might have overlapped with you, Michael.
I see a couple maybe, but I don't think so.
I think even these would be unique.
Could be wrong.

(01:22:43):
I definitely missed the boat on this Wiki Wheel Gets the Grease.
If I were to rearrange, I would slip that.

Michael (01:22:50):
Oh, there's plenty.
And there are just so many classic peanuts things that none of us picked.
It's just overwhelming.
I mean, Snoopy, all the Snoopies.
I mean, we've been doing a lot of Snoopy lately, but all the impersonation.

Harold (01:23:04):
Yeah.

Jimmy (01:23:05):
No psychiatry booth, no football pulling away.

Harold (01:23:09):
Yeah.

Liz (01:23:10):
I mean, hardly any Woodstock.

Michael (01:23:12):
Yeah, very little Linus.
Yeah, no Woodstock.

Harold (01:23:18):
Yeah, I had like eight Linus out of my 10.

Michael (01:23:20):
Yeah, I had like six or seven Lucy's and-

Harold (01:23:24):
Zero Lydia, zero Marcy's, zero Spike, zero Sally.
Although that would have changed if I had thought of the Squeaky Wheel and zero Schroder's other than him being a side character in the pageant.

Michael (01:23:34):
Yeah.
So anyway, we'll love to hear from you guys if you can do it.

Jimmy (01:23:40):
Yeah, we'd love to hear from you.
Let us know what your top 10 peanut strip is.
Come back.
What's going on next?
I'm not sure when this is happening, Liz.
What's going on next week or next episode?

Liz (01:23:51):
So this month, we're doing all kinds of special things for the 75th anniversary.
So keep an eye on your podcast feed for what's coming next.

Jimmy (01:24:04):
Awesome.
Well, as always, it's been fun hanging out with my pals, talking about the greatest comic in the world, and it's so much more fun when you guys hang out here.
So come back next time, until then for Michael, Harold and Liz.
This is Jimmy saying, Be Of Good Cheer.

Liz (01:24:22):
Yes.

Michael (01:24:23):
Be Of Good Cheer.

Liz (01:24:25):
Unpacking Peanuts is copyrighted by Jimmy Gownley, Michael Cohen, Harold Buchholz and Liz Sumner.
Produced and edited by Liz Sumner.
Music by Michael Cohen.
Additional voiceover by Aziza Shukralla Clark.
For more from the show, follow Unpack Peanuts on Instagram and threads.
Unpacking Peanuts on Facebook, Blue Sky and YouTube.

(01:24:47):
For more about Jimmy, Michael and Harold, visit unpackingpeanuts.com.
Have a wonderful day and thanks for listening.