That one. Won.

Fatherhood Face-off (ffoff)

This is it!! I've found an awesome site that puts your comics on-line for free, and that's where my future posts will go. So please make sure to check it regularly!

Dad-dom

It's true, I'm officially a dad. Little baby Shivani was born on Nov 14th 2007 at 00:02 local time. There are so many cliched ways of describing the awesomeness of the experience in words that I'm not even going to try. Disappointed? Well, don't lose hope just yet. Starting next week, I'll try and upload a weekly cartoon strip depicting some aspect of the crazy journey called parenthood. Let's see where that takes us!

Which Batman Villain Are You?

You scored as The Riddler. The Riddler 89% Poison Ivy 89% Two Face 67% Cat-Woman 67% Mad Hatter 67% The Scarecrow 67% Clay-Face 56% The Joker 44% The Penguin 33% Killer Croc 22% Mr. Freeze 22% Which Batman Villain Are You? created with QuizFarm.com

Signs

Pictures taken from the net (definitely not mine).

Here you are one moment, living the sub-urban life, increasingly becoming the center of your world, and making Godzillas out of the geckos of everyday existence. And the next moment, Nature grabs you by the balls and shows you something so majestic, so unabashedly glorious that you can't help but revel in the understanding that you are just a tiny smidgen of Nature itself, no less beautiful, no less scintillating.

Driving to work a couple of days ago, NPR fighting for oblivion in the rest of the habitual morning noise, we swung onto US 682 where it hugs the Hocking river, and shoots off a driveway to the allegedly haunted Ridges, where I earn my keep. Before we could take that turn, however, a huge bird alighted on the fence. It was definitely larger than the ubiquitous turkey vulture. We drove past, missed our turn, turned around and drove back. Oblivious to the rush of the morning traffic, not a mile from the town's busiest thoroughfare, feathers glinting in the morning sun, there it was: a glorious golden eagle. Its cursory glance at our passing vehicle held all the dignity of aeons of perfection. All noise seemed to go silent. It was timeless.

Then it happened again, this morning. Going about our everyday scramble to decide what to have for breakfast, what to take for lunch - our overarching issues of the day, we were accustomed to seeing our lanlady's five canine companions potter around the front yard and litter by our window. But as I looked out today, I froze, only to breathlessly whisper to my wife to come see. The yard had emptied, the frigid temperature and frosted ground dissuading the dogs from staying out too long.
And right in the middle of the yard, still as any of the garden ornaments, but oozing life from every sinew, stood a magnificent six-point buck. Proud head raised, broad shoulders poised to spring, it listened to maybe the dogs barking from indoors. I had a brief vision of our neighbors (who had a dead deer hanging on the back of their house for weeks last year) coming out and blowing its head off, but it faded soon. Then, as though realizing how pathetic the little chihuahuas really were, it turned around and walked lazily to the three-foot high fence that surrounds the yard. It stopped when its forelegs were almost touching it, as if it had just noticed the fence's existence. I was wondering if it had to pace back in order to jump, when it raised its forelegs and cleared the fence with such fluidity and effortlessness that I burst out laughing. It sauntered down our driveway and back into the woods whence it had come. Again, total silence.

These moments seem to be Nature's way of laughing at us. Our little fences, our little vehicles, all our ruses to get around our little two-legged nakedness, and if we can't dominate, we pull out a gun (or bomb) and kill whatever (or whoever) does something better (or differently). But in such moments, we are the proverbial "deer-in-headlights", where we stand, in all our nakedness, shocked at the self-sufficiency of a being that is a perfect part of its ecology, awed by the prospect that we still have the choice to follow that path, scared by the very fences that we have built in our way, deafened by the very silence we have disowned.

The Joker's Song

Sometimes, it almost seems to make sense....



Above: The Joker and Harley Quinn -- Art by Alex Ross.
Below: Lyrics by Alan Moore (taken from "the Killing Joke").

When the world is full of care
And every headline screams despair,
All is rape, starvation, war and life is vile

Then there's a certain thing I do
Which I shall pass along to you,
That's always guaranteed to make me smile:

I go loo-oo-oony as a light-bulb battered bug!
Simply loo-oo-oony, sometimes foam and chew the rug!

Mister, life is swell
In a padded cell,
It'll chase those blues away:
You can trade your gloom
For a rubber room
And injections twice a day!

Just go loo-oo-oony like an acid casualty,
Or a moo-oo-oonie, or a preacher on T.V.

When the human race
Wears an anxious face,
When the bomb hangs overhead,
When your kid turns blue,
It won't worry you,
You can smile and nod instead.

When you're loo-oo-oony, then you just don't give a fig,
Man's so pu-uu-uny, and the universe so big!

If you hurt inside,
Get certified,
And if life should treat you bad,

Don't get ee-ee-eeven, get mad!!

There is always a Higher Vision

Fridays seem to be the day when everyone is celebrating the end of the work week, the passing of another stint at the world of doing something that one does not love.

"My job is not my life." A person once mentioned that when he goes home at night, after working all day, he reminds himself of his purpose in life, which is not to work all the time. "A job is a means to an end." What end? I sked him. Wearily he said, "I'm still trying to figure it out.

There are three mindsets, it seems, in the working world.

I work because I have to so I can raise money to get things I need (ie food, home, car, clothes).

I work so I can have money to play with and so I can do what I want to do (ie go to the movies, go see a concert, buy an iPod) or save up to get better things.

I work beacause they love what I am doing.

My theory is...if you are going to spend 8 hours a day at your job, it better be something that you like to do.

I beleive that one's Higher Purpose is to transform energy to make change that benefits the Higher Vision. What is the Higher Vision?

You answer that. But I can tell you...it's not making gigantic amounts of money.