Snoopy and the stupid cat

We all know that Charles Schulz never drew the most beautiful red hair girl; her exquisite beauty may be beyond his pen.  I also notice that he never drew the “stupid” cat.  Here are my collection of the snoopy and the stupid cat.  I will dedicate this to Joy’s Joki—the “stupid” cat; nothing personal, according to snoopy, all cats are stupid.  I am a big fan of snoopy, and snoopy is always right.

The cautious Joki garing at the innocent Azuki who came for a visit

Why I no longer sketch or doodle?

You may or may not know that, growing up (during my middle and high school days), I used to draw or sketch often.  I never learnt oil painting or water coloring; the only tool I had was a pencil or pen.  I recall drawing many movie stars, the likes of Montgomery Clift, James Dean, and Elizabeth Taylor.  I even drew comic strip, the one telling a story.

The only drawing I made (in Chicago) after coming to the States in 1971 was the vivacious Vivien Leigh that I used a pen.  The drawing surfaced 15-20 years ago, it was then partially faded, then it disappeared again, so did my skill—whatever little I had.

Seeing Katy has some gift of painting, our daughters often asked me why I haven’t picked up the pencil or pen to draw or doodle again.  You’ll see the answer in this Pickels comic strip: I am afraid Ben or Gabby will like it (they may be keen to spot a talent), telling me it is cute, wanting to put it on the fridge.

Why is our home simple, plain and homely?

Why is our home simple, plain and homely? You’ll get a hint from this The New Yorker comic as we want to appear sophisticated.

A home is supposed to be ‘homely’ (having a simple, unattractive and unsophisticated appearance); our home lives up to its name.

‘homely’ does have other meanings, such as ‘intimate’, “Our friends had dinner at our house and were homely with us.”  It also means ‘commonplace, familiar’, such as “An English garden full of homely old plants.”

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Love is tender and beautiful, even the unrequited one.  Charlie Brown Peanuts comic strip is full of unrequited love: Sally loves Linus, who tries hard to disclaim it in vain; Lucy loves Schroeder (the classic pianist) who can barely stand her; Charlie Brown can only admire the red-hair girl (the most beautiful girl we never saw) from a distance.  Enjoy the ‘love stories’.  Happy Valentine’s Day!

May you have as many Valentine's card as Snoopy had (I doubt it), so you can decorate the way he did

Poor Schroeder didn't know love has no logic.

May your marriage have a better "curve" than that of the current stock market!

Don't we all hate what our lover loves?

Love is hard to understand, harder than the theory of general relativity, according to Einstein.

Marriage is two partners working as hard

subtle love in action

Look at your loved one the way you look at your loved car

Valentine's Day is so romantic

You may be the last one to know you are in love

Love is the last best HOPE on earth!

It is hard to find a good Valentine's Day comic in the Calvin and Hobbes

Love in the air!

                                      Love in the air!  Happy Valentine’s Day!

The day before Valentine'd Day in 1977 (in Peanuts)

This Peanuts comic strip showed up the day before Valentine's Day in 1977; it is still fitting to use it as “Tomorrow is Valentine's Day” as Lucy, who has a crush on our greatest classic pianist, Schroeder, said at the beginning of this comic strip.  Charles Schulz’s Peanuts is timeless.

Being Lucy’s love interest, Schroeder can barely tolerate her.  Like many great men in literature or science, the likes of T.S. Eliot and Einstein, the difficulty in love life drives Schroeder to become a great musician.

No one but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money

How can anyone say Peppermint’s answer is wrong when she is of opinion same as Samuel Johnson who said, “No one but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money.”

Peppermint’s answers might not be off the mark when she was not sleeping in the classroom.  “Au Contraire” (on the contrary) must be Charles Schulz’s favorite French; we came across it every so often.

“Stupid cat” is a talented artist

There are lots of unrequited loves in the Charlie Brown Peanuts comic strip: Sally loves Linus, who tries hard to disclaim it in vain; Lucy loves Schroeder (the classic pianist) who cannot stand her; Charlie Brown can only admire the red-haired girl from a distance.  We never got a chance to see the beauty of the red-haired girl, whose beauty must have been beyond Charles Schulz’s pen.

Another character in the Peanuts series is that “stupid cat”, according to Snoopy.  We are never fortunate enough to meet with the cat; Schulz also never drew it.  Stupid though the cat may be, it is very talented, creating many artistic works on Snoopy’s house.  Here are some examples.

 

 

 

 
 

Home is where you should be during a snowstorm

This 1978 Peanuts comic strip tells home is the place where you should be when the snowstorm comes.  I have enjoyed many of the field trips of Snoopy and his troops; of course, we know Woodstock is the smart one and is Snoopy’s favorite.  Snoopy is the only one in the whole world that understands bird’s language.

Cleopatra: Sally’s role model

Smell is associated with love is no less than sight is to love.  If you read how Shakespeare describes how Cleopatra presented herself to Antony, you know Antony has no choice but surrender. “so perfumèd, that The winds were lovesick with them;”  They (the barge and all) were perfumed so heavily that they made the air seem dizzy with love.  Love at first smell, indeed.

And you wonder how Elizabeth Taylor (who played Cleopatra in the movie Cleopatra) made a fortune in her perfumes series.  Who can resist her Passion?

The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne,
Burned on the water: the poop was beaten gold;
Purple the sails, and so perfumèd, that
The winds were lovesick with them; the oars were silver

             Antony and Cleopatra,  Act 2 Scene2

NOBARBUS

Upon her landing, Antony sent to her,

Invited her to supper. She replied

It should be better he became her guest,

Which she entreated. Our courteous Antony,

Whom ne’er the word of “No” woman heard speak,

Being barbered ten times o’er, goes to the feast,

And for his ordinary pays his heart

For what his eyes eat only.

(The modern translation)

Upon her landing at the port, Antony sent an invitation for her to come to supper.  She replied by saying that it would be better for him to be his guest instead.   Our courteous Antony, who has never said “no” to any woman, after spending plenty of time being groomed by the barber, went to the feast.  For that simple meal, he paid with his heart—even though it was only his eyes that were satisfied.  

(“For what his eyes eat only”, if the Bard knew Chinese, he would have used a Chinese idiom, 秀色可餐.)

AGRIPPA

Royal wench!

he made great Caesar lay his sword to bed.

He plowed her, and she cropped.

(modern translation)

Royal seductress!

She lured Julius Caesar lay down his sword, into her bed, and she bore him a child.

(“He plowed her, and she cropped” is matched by a Chinese idiom, 藍田種玉)

Are these “the couple of things” that Sally found out  about Cleopatra? I wonder.  There went a role model for an innocent girl.

Facebook friends: I found out why my sister was not calling me

While at Jo’s place in Michigan a few weeks ago we’re browsing my Facebook page, Jo noticed I have many requests to be a “friend” of so many people and I never responded; one of them is my 4^th sister.

I am hoping Opal Pickles didn’t send the request to me, otherwise she will never speak to me again.  Then again, may be that’s why my sister was not calling me then.  Thanks to Jo, my dear 4^th sister is now my Facebook friend.

“I love you!” in comic strip and in my life: comic strip is life

In recent weeks I would LINE my daughters the moment Pirates beat whatever team they’re playing and they would respond with a sticker.  Each win was unique, so was the sticker.  Pirates must have won more games than the number of stickers they have amassed; that is probably why Pirates lost the last 2 games, lest they would exhaust their vast collection of stickers.

We at times communicated with stickers in LINE; one time (The LINE in my iPhone says it was August 22) I sent a sticker of teddy bear with the words of “I Love You” embedded.  They were surprised and thrilled as they never heard I said “I love you” to them.  I responded “So reserved a man I am, I can never utter ‘I love you’ to anyone, even the loved ones; may be the sticker made it easier to say.”  Janice wrote, “this is interesting . . . I wonder if that’s the appeal of the stickers” in LINE.

A few days later this “I love you” thing was running in Pickles comic strip. (Sylvia is the daughter of Earl and Opal Pickles, Roscoe is their dog.)  Enjoy them.