It’s late August, and I am cracking up as I read a brand-new Garfield comic. Panel one: Garfield, lying belly-down in his cat bed and wrapped up in a blanket, wears a bored expression as he thinks, Time to get up and start another day. Panel two: Garfield, in the same position but now smiling to himself, thinks, Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Panel three: Garfield has fallen back asleep, a tell-tale Z suspended above his head. My appreciation for the comic partly stems from the elegance of the cartooning, the way Garfield creator Jim Davis and his team manage to convey three distinct cat moods (apathy, private joy, sleepiness) in just a few ink strokes. It also has to do with the way I can immediately connect Garfield’s face to that of my wife’s tabby, Helen, whom I have observed for thousands of hours during our cohabitation.
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