A12 East Oregonian PEANUTS COFFEE BREAK Friday, July 26, 2019 DEAR ABBY BY CHARLES M . SCHULZ Small wedding at courthouse makes big waves among family FOR BETTER OR WORSE BY LYNN JOHNSTON B.C. BY JOHNNY HART PICKLES BY BRIAN CRANE Dear Abby: I recently got mar- in Texas ried at the courthouse. We had Dear Not Pregnant: Not every couple wants a large, formal wed- been considering it for months. (A ding. Many people — like you and courthouse wedding doesn’t take your husband — prefer to put the a lot of planning.) We decided it money toward a down payment was best for us and went for it. We on a house, paying off credit card didn’t want to spend thousands of debt or travel. If your grandmother dollars on a wedding, and I’m not thought you might be pregnant, one for tradition. We invited imme- J eanne diate family and two of our friends. she should have asked you. If you P hilliPs My grandmother made excuses would like to tell her you were hurt ADVICE not to come, saying, “Not enough that she wasn’t with you when you space,” and, “I’m taking care of pledged your vows, feel free to do my grandchildren.” It hurt my feel- so. And while you’re at it, point out ings that she didn’t want to be there. Both that you have “heard through the grape- vine” that she has been telling people you my parents have passed away, and I wanted are pregnant, which you’re not. (She should what family I have left around me. How- ever, I now know that my grandmother be ashamed of herself.) And explain to any- one who feels hurt not to have been invited didn’t want to come because she’s “tradi- tional.” She assumed I’m pregnant. (I’m that you kept your wedding small for finan- cial reasons, not because you had to rush not.) Many other people are also assum- ing that I’m pregnant because we didn’t into anything. announce it and did it at the courthouse. Dear Abby: I have an etiquette question about differences in time zones. My son I’m a private person and don’t feel the is currently serving in the military over- need to tell everyone everything that’s seas, and there is a 14-hour time difference. going on in my life. My grandmother is My question is: When we talk to him on currently not speaking to me. Should I tell the phone before we go to bed, do we tell her I know she was talking to our family him good night, even though it is morning behind my back? How do I tell her how or early afternoon for him? — Different much she hurt my feelings by staying Time Zones away, assuming something and spreading Dear Different Time Zones: Because rumors? What should I say to my family you are in a zone in which it is night, it’s who are hurt because I didn’t invite them? only natural that you would say good night What should I tell people who think I’m before signing off. If it bothers your son, pregnant? Should I just leave it alone, and which I doubt, ask him what he would pre- in nine months they’ll realize how stupid fer that you say. they were for assuming? — Not Pregnant DAYS GONE BY BEETLE BAILEY GARFIELD BLONDIE BY MORT WALKER BY JIM DAVIS BY DEAN YOUNG AND STAN DRAKE 100 Years Ago From the East Oregonian July 26, 1919 Pilot Rock is serving electric lights to its customers and on the streets until midnight at present and finding the plant very satis- factory, according to Mayor J.L. Vaughan. Power is turned on about an hour before sundown and is on for about five hours now. Later it will be operated longer hours. The city has not decided how to charge for its juice but is working on a system of rates. Whether the officials will settle the charges or call in expert advice is not known. Mean- while patrons are taking the service on faith. 50 Years Ago From the East Oregonian July 26, 1969 Being in a movie isn’t all a bed of roses. Ask Tammy Thorne or Dianne Lovelin of Pendleton. They’ve got bruises. The two girls landed small parts in a movie being filmed by Columbia Pictures at Lane Com- munity College at Eugene. The film is enti- tled “Getting Straight” and concerns college campus life, accentuating the unrest and riots. Tammy and Dianne will be in a scene portraying college coeds caught up in a riot. They get doused by a fire hose, dragged by their hair, beaten with clubs, and have to fall from a 15-foot concrete wall to a sidewalk below. Practicing with a professional stunt man for the past week, the girls go before the camera on location beginning Monday. 25 Years Ago From the East Oregonian July 26, 1994 A gravel road running along the edge of Dan Clark’s newly purchased property has the city of Athena and Clark in a quan- dary about who really owns it. Clark con- tends he does. The Athena Elementary School principal purchased property located along Fourth, Fifth and Garfield streets from Union Pacific Railroad — which has included the gravel and paved roads as part of its property since 1887. But city officials say they were unaware that the roads were owned privately and now have their attor- ney, Chris Wallace, poring over property titles. “It kind of caught us by surprise,” said Athena Mayor Kim Clark. “We want to be amicable and fair about everything, but by the same token we have to look out for what’s best for the city.” TODAY IN HISTORY DILBERT THE WIZARD OF ID LUANN ZITS BY SCOTT ADAMS BY BRANT PARKER AND JOHNNY HART BY GREG EVANS BY JERRY SCOTT AND JIM BORGMAN On July 26, 2016, Hil- lary Clinton became the first woman to be nominated for president by a major politi- cal party at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. In 1775, the Continen- tal Congress established a Post Office and appointed Benjamin Franklin its Postmaster-General. In 1908, U.S. Attorney General Charles J. Bona- parte ordered creation of a force of special agents that was a forerunner of the Fed- eral Bureau of Investigation. In 1925, five days after the end of the Scopes Trial in Dayton, Tennessee, prosecutor William Jen- nings Bryan died at age 65. (Although Bryan had won a conviction against John T. Scopes for teaching Dar- win’s Theory of Evolu- tion, the verdict was later overturned.) In 2002, the Republi- can-led House voted, 295- 132, to create an enormous Homeland Security Depart- ment in the biggest gov- ernment reorganization in decades. In 2006, in a dramatic turnaround from her first murder trial, Andrea Yates was found not guilty by rea- son of insanity by a Houston jury in the bathtub drown- ings of her five children; she was committed to a state mental hospital. (Yates had initially been found guilty of murder, but had her con- viction overturned.) In 2013, Ariel Castro, the man who’d imprisoned three women in his Cleve- land home, subjecting them to a decade of rapes and beatings, pleaded guilty to 937 counts in a deal to avoid the death penalty. (Castro later committed suicide in prison.) In 2017, President Don- ald Trump announced on Twitter that he would not “accept or allow” transgen- der people to serve in the U.S. military. (After a legal battle, the Defense Depart- ment approved a new pol- icy requiring most individ- uals to serve in their birth gender.) Today’s Birthdays: Actress Helen Mirren is 74. Actress Nana Visitor is 62. Actor Kevin Spacey is 60. Actress Sandra Bullock is 55. Rock singer Jim Lindberg (Pennywise) is 54. Actor Jer- emy Piven is 54. Actress Kate Beckinsale is 46. Actress Eve Myles is 41. Actress Juliet Rylance is 40. Actress Mon- ica Raymund is 33. Actress Caitlin Gerard is 31. Actress Francia Raisa is 31. Thought for Today: “Most human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted.” — Aldous Huxley, English author (born this date in 1894, died in 1963). PHOEBE AND HER UNICORN BY DANA SIMPSON BIG NATE BY LINCOLN PEIRCE