Emoji are, by any measure, the greatest sociological, technological and spiritual achievement of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Invented in Japan in the '90s as a kind of advancement for text-based smileys, smartphones like the iPhone and Android devices popularized the Unicode characters to the point that now they're constantly advancing to suit the needs of... every single person on the planet. Seriously. Do you remember when your parents started texting you with emoji unironically? We live in the Emoji Era. The Emoji Age. This is the dawning of the Age of Emojiokus.

The only downside to emoji is that sometimes their meaning can be nebulous, causing confusion or even a misunderstanding between sender and receiver. Occasionally a literal icon for, say, a benign food item can be commandeered by meme-sters for fun or even nefarious purposes. Can't an eggplant just be an eggplant?! But emoji misuses can easily be avoided by tirelessly obsessing over trending topics on Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Snapchat and half dozen other social networks. Easy, right? Know your memes and emoji in peace.

Off the Mark By Mark Parisi Feb 1, 2015

FoxTrot By Bill Amend Nov 9, 2014

Garfield By Jim Davis Jan 22, 2017

Non Sequitur By Wiley Miller May 4, 2016

Drabble By Kevin Fagan Sept 19, 2016

Off the Mark By Mark Parisi Mar 20, 2017 

In the Bleachers By Steve Moore Dec 9, 2016

WuMo By Wulff & Morgenthaler Feb 6, 2017

Andertoons By Mark Anderson Nov 7, 2015 

Thatababy By Paul Trap Feb 13, 2017 

Frank and Ernest By Thaves June 20, 2016