Every year we crank out 156 Professor Hobo comic strips. While even we would admit that not every strip is a homerun, even we’re surprised sometimes by which comics turn out to be the most popular among readers. Below are the top ten most popular strips based upon hits on the website. Maybe we’ll pick our personal favorites later. Enjoy.
10. Rock and Roll Literary Analysis
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Prof or hobo?
Over the last few days we’ve been getting a ton of hits through Google and other search engines from people searching “professor or hobo.” Now, normally we get all kinds of weird searches that lead people to us, but these have been concentrated and at times outnumbering our regular content for bringing hits. So, what’s going on?
Apparently there’s an online quiz that has become the little sensation. The “Prof or Hobo Quiz” asks participants to look at some pictures and evaluate are the men pictured college professors, or hobos. Sound familiar to a certain comic strip? Well, sort of.
Anyway, since people are already looking for the quiz here, we thought we’d go ahead and point the way. If you’re looking for the Prof or Hobo Quiz, you can find it via the links here. Apparently the quiz originates from the University of Toronto. What spurred its popularity? We’re not sure, but this link from Andrew Sullivan over at The Daily Beast probably helped a bit.
Victoria has been a favorite character of ours for a while. Straight-laced, British, and above general silliness, she works as an excellent foil to almost any other character. That’s probably why she pops up often to roll her eyes for the audience. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Cramming is not a good strategy, but you already knew that
It’s the time of year when students overdose on Ritalin in a mad dash to cram in everything they didn’t bother to learn in the prior four months. I remember this time well (minus the Ritalin, just say no kids). Now, as a professor, I see it from a different perspective. So here’s some helpful advice that might put your final exams into a better perspective.
Your professors don’t want to grade anymore than you want to take tests
Many students have a strange belief that professors spend all of their free time reveling in the grading process. On the contrary, we hate it. Sure, there’s that occasional fool, but there’s also that occasional student that asks for more homework. They’re the anomalies.
The norm is that most professors hate grading, and they especially hate grading under the gun at the end of the semester. Just like you we’re prepping for the holidays or summer break, or maybe reading classes for the next semester. We don’t have the time for a lot of grading, especially not in four or five classes. We might assign papers due, but it’s not because we’re looking forward to reading them. It has more to do with… ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Harper's Island - excellent bad television
About a year ago my wife and I cancelled our cable television. I won’t go into details, but the cable company had been no end of problems for us, so we left. It was a decision we made nervously.
We were part of the first generation raised on cable television. We could both remember a time when our parents only had over the air broadcast television, but it had been years. Through college and the early years of work we’d always had some form of basic cable. Suddenly, we were going to have nothing. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Episode 9 Promo Image - Click to see larger
One thing we like to do with Professor Hobo is involve the community as much as possible. With that in mind, we’re presenting this behind the scenes shot from the next episode of Professor Hobo.
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A look at the online store
We recently launched our online store where you can buy t-shirts, posters, and more featuring Professor Hobo. We did this for one main reason–to allow fans to purchase items. Honestly, we make so little off each item sold that the store will likely not even pay for itself. So no, unless someone starts ordering a thousand shirt s a month we’re not getting rich. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Mickey gets tricky with your kids
After a work-related meeting yesterday my wife and I drove to a neighboring town for dinner. The town itself is heavily Amish and the restaurant features home-style food. These details are not unrelated, but not related in the way you might assume.
You might assume that a home-style restaurant in an Amish town would be run by the Amish, but then the electricity powering the glow of everything around you would seem to tip the scales against that. But the proprietors of this business are cunning, and rather than give into the almighty power of observable logic, they choose to dress their waitresses in dresses and bonnets. Well, now they must be Amish. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
John Wayne in The Searchers
For the last few weeks I’ve been working on prepping the Introduction to Film course I’ll teach in the fall. The class has a lab during which we have enough time to screen full length films. That means I have to pick which films to show, and that can be harder than it sounds.
When dealing with a young audience, anything made before they were born often comes off as odd and unapproachable. The dialogue seems funny, the special effects dated, etc. For this fall’s class, that means anything prior to 1990. Obviously I can’t limit myself to just films made in the last 20 years, but going beyond those years means not only addressing the previously listed concerns, but also one of morality. You see, many people can’t quite wrap their heads around the idea that the world was a place of questionable morality before they were born. It’s as if we all think original sin began with us. ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Note the two bottom right stories
While piddling about online looking for something interesting to read, I made the mistake of visiting CNN’s website. What’s so bad about CNN’s site, you ask?
First, why does CNN act confused about where I am? Just about every other website in the world can recognize and greet me knowing I’m from the United States. For some reason, CNN always asks me if I’m sure I want the US edition of its website. CNN is like a teenage waiter his first night on the job. “Are you sure you wanted a baked potato?” Apparently even if it did turn out to be wrong, all I have to do is click a link at the top labeled “US edition.” ↓ Read the rest of this entry…
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