Donald Duck the Boy Scout

I'm not much for comic books and it's mostly because of the dialogue. Vacation Time, although, gave me a couple of giggles with some of its more dated sayings such as, "A land-going fish! I don't savvy!" (pg 8). And of course there is my favorite phrase of, "Simmer down..." which for viewers of Nickelodeon (while it was still decent) who loved Stick Stickly like I did, there was that amazing reference. Then again, depending on the comics date, it could be in reference to the Wailing Wailers which, Simmer Down, was their first single or even the Bob Marley song. Take your pick.

Another cute (what I believe to be cute) aspect of the dialogue or at least thought bubbles was when Donald would be angry and thinking to himself and instead of some snarky or vicious thought being expressed it just said CENSORED. Which leaves me to wonder if that was intentional by the artists or if the comic was published and then censored.

However, all that aside for now, what I found interesting was Donald's boy scout qualities. Or at least the stereotypical picture of what a boy scout would be. For almost every pane Donald is obliviously excited about being in nature and "communing" with it. Donald ignores all of the dangers and annoyances that exist in the "great out doors" which leave his nephews (Huey, Dewey and Louie) to have a bit of a reality check. While Donald is busy being excited about the forest, he makes his nephews do everything and I think that this is a great similarity to what some vacations are actually like. There is always that one person who is obnoxiously excited to be there, wanting to do everything in about an hour when it'll take a month and orders everyone else about and then, when the tiniest thing goes wrong they get excessively harried.

I also equate Donald to a boy scout because of the whole fire scenario. The lovely Smokey the Bear reference, which Resplacida mentioned in their blog, and how the boys, "...look like fellows who'll read the rules and follow them." That bit kills me because Donald is so obtuse about everything and then focused to the point of blindness (the persuit of a picture of the buck) and yet when the fire happens--which was hinted at with a sledge hammer throughout the entire comic--Donald knows exactly what to do to escape being seriously harmed.

If the comic wasn't so transparent about its fire safety enforecement I would have though that it was a rather happy, random circumstance that Donald was so diligent about protecting the forest and knowing how to prevent a fire from spreading and what to do in an emergency.