What's Up With (Evil) Mary Worth?

With my AOL blog, I had started up a mock comic strip of Mary Worth that I was jokingly calling "What's Up With (Evil) Mary Worth?" For those who don't follow the newspaper funnies, Mary Worth is a small town yenta who is always counseling people. In the past, Mary and her friends have usually been very staid...and boring. Recently, the creators of the strip added a character named "Rita" who is an alcoholic, which put a spin on the story line that has never really existed before. Rita gets drunk, blowsy, smashes things, mouths off, and then gets repentant and begs Mary's understanding and forgiveness. The fact that the cartoon artist would add this dimension got me to thinking about ways he could really push the cartoon "out" and spice things up: Mary Worth as Madame, pimping out her drunk friend.