Since I post so many Calvin and Hobbes strips here, I though I should show you this photo of a real-life Halloween version of Calvin's "Snowmen of Horror" displays.
Showing posts with label Calvin and Hobbes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Calvin and Hobbes. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Calvin and Hobbes Halloween
Friday, June 08, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Out to Get Me Edition
Released on: Tuesday, May 6th 1986. Images copyright Bill Watterson and Universal Press Syndicate.I'm told that when she was younger, my sister Diane had two lists: "People I Hate" and "People Who Hate Me". God and my brother Johnny were at the top of both lists. I'm pretty sure she's gotten over it at this point, but I always think of her when I read this strip.
My most enduring personal memory of my sister is of her dragging me out of bed at two in the morning when she was bored and wanted to play cards. The fact that I was sleeping and didn't want to play cards was irrelevant -- her usual
Groggy, bleary, barely understanding the rules to "Battle" she taught me, I staggered through an hour of "play". Finally she laughed and told me she had played the same ace, the exact same card, seventeen times in a row. "I've been cheating the whole time and you didn't even notice!" she howled, hooting and pointing. She assumed I was an idiot, never even guessing that my true motivation was utter indifference to cards and an all-consuming desire to return to sleep.
Humiliated, abused, and cardless, I was finally permitted to go back to my bed, but the memory stuck.
I've got news for Calvin -- the person out to get him isn't God, it's my sister Diane. If he's lucky Hobbes will hide the cards before she gets to them ...
Saturday, May 12, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Saturday Edition
©copyright Bill Watterson and Universal Press Syndicate, 1988.
I achieved a lower state of consciousness today by drinking margaritas last night and eating a whole plate of nachos virtually by myself (Annie's meager handful of chips doesn't count). Which explains why Hobbesian Friday didn't take place yesterday and why I have a lower state of consciousness today, better known as a "hangover". Ugh. I should've stuck with cartoons and cereal like Calvin.
Friday, April 27, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Bad Polling Edition
Last month I predicted that Bush's approval numbers in polls would go up to 41% by September due to Democrats having taken control of the Congress. We've still got a long ways to go till then, but so far one month later I'm looking every bit as wrong as I predicted I'd be:
President George W. Bush's job performance rating has sunk to a new low, with only 28 percent of U.S. adults viewing his job performance positively. In a new Harris Interactive Poll, seven out of ten adults view Bush's job performance negatively, including 48 percent who say his job performance is poor. This is down significantly since February, where 32 percent viewed his job positively, and 67 percent viewed it negatively.
I'm not very good at math, but I'm pretty sure going from 32% to 28% is getting further away from my predicted 41%, not closer. And like Calvin's dad, I suspect the decline has a lot to do with something Bush has actually done. Iraq and continued corruption charges for members of his administration aren't in the same league as flooding the basement, but then again, I don't see Laura making him skip desert either.
On one hand, it's nice that I continue to be wrong; if I were suddenly right about something it would upset the natural balance of the universe and the Earth might spin off its axis into the sun, which would be a real bummer. On the other hand, it's gotta suck to be either the President or Calvin's dad right about now.
Friday, April 20, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Huge Risk Edition
After my last post announcing that I am currently jobless (pending a much-hoped-for Big Announcement Part II next week), I think this cartoon just about says it all.
Unlike Hobbes, of course, Annie would never abandon me in the face of this kind of gut-wrenching terrifying risk, right Annie?
Annie ... ?
Well, I'll take it by her silence that she agrees. Gulp.
Friday, April 13, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Hoover Dam Edition
©Universal Syndicate
My mom, my sisters, and I had taken a trip to Vegas, and we took a day to go see Hoover Dam. So we trundled into a rented van, and drove out along the Hoover Dam Expressway, to the sign that said "Hoover Dam This Way", along Hoover Dam Road, into a big parking garage that said "Hoover Dam Parking Garage", out through the elevator past "The Hoover Dam Gift Shop", to the top of the road passing on top of the dam itself, right by a big green sign saying "Welcome to Hoover Dam!", and my mother, standing on top of one of the largest man-made structures in history, with a gigantic reservoir of water on one hand and untold spans of concrete falling away to the river below on the other, says:
"So where's the dam?"
Friday, March 30, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Kids Edition
(Copyright © Universal Syndicate)
Annie and I don't have kids of our own, and this causes some consternation among other people. Most people are too polite to just blurt out "Well why on earth not?", but a few hardy souls over the years have gone there. I'm tempted to give either a smart-alec response, like "Well we had a few, but then decided we didn't like them and got Angelina Jolie to take 'em off our hands." Or with something brutally tragic designed to make them back off, like "I lost my testicles in a bad tractor accident."
But mostly I try to be honest. The pat answer I've come up with at this point is as follows:
Being a parent is one of the most important jobs there is. It's so important that we feel if you're not 100% committed to it, if you don't want it more than you've ever wanted anything in your life, then you've no business taking the job in the first place. So far, we don't feel like we want it enough.
The full answer's more complicated than that, of course, but usually that satisfies most people. I imagine in the back of their minds they're thinking "I get it -- you're a selfish bastard." And that's true a little bit, probably. It's also true that the idea of being a parent is scary, and that we're both afraid of some of the trouble lurking in our respective gene pools (alcoholism, schizophrenia, depression, etc.). I think we were both also had some pretty rough spots growing up, and we don't want to visit that on any of our own kids.
But at the end of the day, it really does come down to what I said initially -- being a parent is the most important job in the world, and unless you're willing to treat it like that you don't have any business having kids. And we aren't willing to do that. I respect the hell out of people who do, but we're honest enough to admit that we're not in that group.
We like kids a lot, and love having our nephews and nieces and goddaughters over to visit. We just don't want kids, and we're pretty OK with that decision. Society wants to make it more complicated than that, I think largely due to an understandable fear that if that choice gets too socially acceptable, we'll somehow run out of people to keep civilization going.
To those people, all I can say is "I offered to get a dog instead, and Annie agreed."
Friday, March 23, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Maturity Edition
On the possible eve of a compromise bill on Iraq passing the House, and in light of recent debates here over religion and atheism, I think this sums it all up pretty well:
© Universal SyndicateClick for a larger version.
Friday, March 16, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Snow Atheist Edition
© Universal Press Syndicate
Click for a larger version
Click for a larger version
I think this is best summed up by a quote from another Calvin & Hobbes strip, wherein Calvin's dad says "I'm not sure whether your grasp of meteorology or theology is the more appalling."
Friday, March 02, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Animal Rescue
I think this set of Calvin & Hobbes strips sums up the life of an animal rescuer just about perfectly. I know I've felt like this on more than one occasion when a little life that somehow stumbles into my own is ended too quickly. To me, this is one part of Watterson's genius, that he was able to use comics so effectively in achieving the ultimate goal of true art -- to prompt genuine feeling in the viewer. (hat-tip to Progressive Boink)
© Universal Press Syndicate
Friday, February 23, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Soldiers
Now that I am getting older, I realize Calvin is absolutely right -- I think all of us so-called adults are in fact making it up most of the time. We're out here just wingin' it, hoping we're not screwing things up too badly. Life's a lot easier as a kid, when all you've got is black and white.
As far as the substance of this installment, I'm no pacifist. Sometimes violence DOES solve problems, like when someone is coming at you or your loved ones with an intent to kill. Flowers and sunshine wouldn't have beaten Hitler -- there are times when you have no other recourse but the force of arms, and the right thing to do is to fight.
Violence certainly can't solve everything, but it's just as false to claim that it solves nothing.
I should point out, however, that I'm just ACTING like I know what I'm talking about -- that darn Calvin has nailed again!
Friday, February 16, 2007
Friday, February 09, 2007
Hobbesian Friday: Changing Beliefs Edition
Ed Brayton from "Dispatches From the Culture Wars", made the following comment on one of his posts regarding "The Blasphemy Challenge" (a very silly and pointless exercise by people on YouTube who proclaim they deny Christ and thus are eligible for eternal damnation):
Exactly my point, thank you (though I couldn't care less who's right about the interpretation of the "don't blaspheme the holy spirit" verse). As I said, I would find a bunch of videos, or better yet essays, on why people left Christianity or what they find unconvincing about it very interesting. That would be an argument. That would be communicating ideas. That would actually be something worth thinking about.
I was looking at the above "Calvin & Hobbes" strip and Ed's comment resonated with me. I think reading such stories would be very interesting for everyone, and so I issue you this challege -- write an essay, comment, video blog post, or e-mail message on the topic:
"Why I stopped believing what I believed before, and now believe this instead."
This isn't really intended to be a "Why I became an atheist" exercise, what I'm most interested in is the process people go through in the course of changing their fundamental beliefs. Maybe you were raised Baptist and turned away from that in favor of Catholicism. Maybe you were raised an atheist and eventually converted to be an Episcopalian. Maybe you were raised Christian and became a Muslim, or gave up on God altogether and settled on atheism.
What I'm interested in hearing is stories of how and why you came to the conclusion that the faith (or non faith) you were raised in no longer was satisfying, fulfilling, or convincing to you. There's already plenty out there about the end of the story, about why you decided that the new belief system was better, but there's not a lot about the first part of it, about how people decide that what they fervently believed before is no longer correct.
Again, this isn't so much a request for conversion stories as it is a request for "de-conversion" stories -- I want to know why you don't believe what you used to any more, not why you currently believe what you do, if that makes sense.
I look forward to hearing what people have to say about it. If I get any submissions (either in comments or via e-mail) I'll compile them and put them into a new category. You can contact me
Friday, February 02, 2007
Hobbesian Friday, Wanton Indulgence of Animals Edition
I'm going to try and start a new tradition here at Nerd Country, with the introduction of "Hobbesian Friday". Every week I'll post a favorite "Calvin and Hobbes" cartoon that is in some way relevant to current affairs, and maybe post a little commentary on it. 
(Click for a larger version)
I'd say this one pretty much sums up me and Annie. Calvin and I stand on a hill, pontificating about various philosophies and our relationship to the rest of the universe, and then start flinging snowballs at passersby as we revert to "Seven Year Old" mode. Meanwhile the much wiser Annie/Hobbes points out that the only true happiness comes from the wanton indulgence of animals (specifically, one presumes, Annie and Hobbes themselves).
It's been so long since "Calvin and Hobbes" stopped its run (more than a decade ago now) that I think we forget just how great it was, on a consistent basis. There's nothing else on the comics page today that even comes close to the level of artistry Watterson displayed day in and day out. These strips are just as relevant, just as funny, just as unique today as when they were published.
I also find the strip relevant to the subjects I cover on this blog. Religion from the historical John Calvin, founder of Calvinism, juxtaposed with purely mechanical political and social engineering from Thomas Hobbes, mixed in with super-heroes, science fiction, dinosaurs, and the absolute absence of any kind of filter between brain and mouth -- me and this blog in a nutshell.
People characterize Hobbes as Calvin's conscience, and there's a lot of truth to that. But he's more -- as in this strip, Hobbes to me represents our animal nature. Not in the negative sense that the modern era has ascribed to that description, but in its best sense -- Hobbes represents all that animals have to teach us, in their wisdom and maturity and single-minded focus on the next meal. They're the perfect couple for showing us what's best (and worst) in our natures, that wide-eyed childlike ability to see the possibilities that lie beyond this thin veil of "reality" and the grounded animal with both feet firmly rooted in the practical now.
Plus, they're wicked funny, and without humor life's just not all that worth it.
I hope you enjoy "Hobbesian Friday" here at Nerd Country. Have a good weekend!
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