something I am grateful for today

There seems to be a recent resurgence of interest in the newspaper comic strip, as evidenced by new comprehensive hardcover collections. Back when I was a kid, strips collected in book form were badly printed paperbacks on horrible paper, with the panels chopped up and re-arranged to fit on a page that was totally the wrong shape for a strip, and there was no rhyme or reason or chronology to the selection or presentation of the strips. It's nice to see the medium get some respect!

There have been “good” collections of Peanuts and Dennis the Menace coming out for a couple years now, but today I see I can look forward to Hagar the Horrible and Rip Kirby and Secret Agent Corrigan and Buz Sawyer, all strips I have a special admiration for and would love to have in hardcover... who knows what else I'll find out there now or in the near future? This seems to be a good time to be a fan of old strips!

birthday shout-out

to ginsu, one of my all-time favourite rogues and gadflies. Life was a weak tepid cup of tea before you arrived in it, good sir.