Like most people, I get most of my facts from the irrefutable, reliably accurate fount of knowledge known as Wikipedia. Today I looked up “Tilting at Windmills”, which is described in part as, “…an importune, unfounded and vain effort against confabulated adversaries for a vain goal.” It is based on the novel Don Quixote, in which the hero sees a bunch of windmills, interprets them to be giants, then fights them.
Don Quixote was not a smart man.
Neither am I, so this year I submitted more cartoons to the National Cartoonists Society to be considered for the Best Newspaper Panel Cartoon award. I hardly consider fellow panel cartoonists as adversaries, but I have to admit they make pretty tough competitors, mostly because their cartoons are funny. And well drawn. And the cartoonists themselves are pretty cool guys.
Now that I think about it, I don’t have a chance.
So I’m thinking of maybe going for the sympathy vote. There are very few military cartoonists in the National Cartoonists Society, so if there were a way to turn that into a tragic, tear-inducing saga (maybe with a hint of patriotic duty thrown in), I might have a shot.
Ah, who am I kidding? I’m just tilting at windmills.
Here are my submissions for 2013:
1 Comment
Good ol’ Don Quixote (my college English prof who had studied in Jolly Old you know where, pronounced it “Qwix – it” — took me awhile to figure out who she was talking about) — always a challenge. Now, my friendly (and biased) observation. The first one is universally understandable, especially by males (and I haven’t notice too many female “competitors” in your lists. All of the others strike all sorts of chords, whether one has served on in uniform or not. Again, perhaps because I am biased, I could viscerally AND mentally associate with all of them. Go for the gold, bro’!
Mike