ELISA ENGLISH's Blog 英語園地

My son’s school closed last Friday, so I have been busy juggling between him and my work for the past few days before the summer program starts.  His summer program started this Wednesday, so I finally get some breathing room.  Now, I have a little time blogging again.  Don’t call me a slacker.  I am not hiding, though I do sometimes feel like hiding from the crowds.  It is a gorgeous day after the storm last night.  There wasn’t any damage to our house.  Our neighbor’s huge tree was knocked down by the wind.  Luckily, there wasn’t any damage to their house.  We do have quite a few big trees.  Some are really close to our house.  I have read some news lately about the tornado and how some victims were killed during their sleep.  It would be hard to escape when tornado comes during your sleep.  Oh, I am mumbling again.  This isn’t the topic of my article today.  I like reading comic strips and have bought several comic books throughout the years, such as Snoopy (http://comics.com/peanuts/), Garfield (http://www.garfield.com/comics/todayscomic.html ), Dilbert, Calvin and Hobbes (http://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes), and Cathy (a comic strip drawn by Cathy Guisewite http://www.gocomics.com/cathy/).  Last night, on a whim, while watching weather channel on tornado hits in Minnesota, I decided to look for the comic books that I bought over the years, but I couldn’t find any of them.  I might have thrown them away during the move.  What a waste!  Now I can only regret.  Some of them might even be a classic.  It has been ten years since the death of Charles M. Schulz and his final Peanuts Sunday strip.  I might get a fortune from selling them.  Oh, well.  I am not a person who wins the lottery.     

Okay, so what is my point?  Nothing significant.  I just want to talk about comic strips.  I used to read Dilbert.  If you haven’t, you should.  They are truly funny.  It is one of my favorite next to Cathy.  I always feel that Cathy is a reflection of me.  Anyway, this is the link to the official Dilbert website http://www.dilbert.com/.  You can find the comic strips published from April 16, 1989 until now.  This is the link to the first published Dilbert comic strip http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1989-04-16/.  Dilbert is an American comic strip, written and drawn by Scott Adams, known for its satirical office humor about a group of dysfunctional cynical white-collars in a micromanaged office in the United States, working pointlessly and without motivation for a clueless and incompetent management. I started reading Dilbert in 1992 when I worked at Wells Fargo Bank (then Norwest Bank).  Then, I was too green to see through all the irony in the workplace.    

I like to read the ones that talked about consultants and project management.  These are a few that I like.  http://www.dilbert.com/strips/comic/1996-02-18/ (Project Management),

http://www.dilbert.com/strips/comic/2009-02-26/ (Government Bailouts of Failing Corporations), http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/2010-06-10/ (Employee Satisfaction).  It is hilarious and true to the work life in Corporate America.  Over the years, I have seen many people posting Dilbert comic strips on their cubicles, including some of my bosses.   However, you may want to think twice before you post one in your workplace.  Depending on how liberal your workplace is, you might get fired from that.  An Iowa man was fired for posting a "Dilbert" comic strip at work that made fun of bosses.  Apparently, not everyone has a sense of humor.  See ABCNews:  Man Fired for Posting 'Dilbert' Comic at Work.

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/WaterCooler/story?id=4323900

http://www.dilbert.com/strips/comic/2008-02-20/ (Managers as Drunken Lemurs)

George Carlin once said “Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist”.  Isn’t it true? Conversely, isn’t there a cynical person inside every idealist?  What is a cynic?  I wonder.  Are they who view this dysfunctional world through the lens of sarcasm?  A lot of time, we find irony in life.  Laughing through cynicism and sarcasm, and joking around the idiocy, the nonsense and the ridicule sometimes help you to cope with the reality through humor.  I don’t see Dilbert to be offensive.  Sarcasm, to an extent, if not overdone, can be witty. 

 By the way, I recently learned a term “anchor babies”.  Whoever comes up with the term is brilliant. 

Written by Elisa English

On 6/18/2010 in Minneapolis 

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