Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson for February 24, 2013

I can feel that in the pit of my stomach as he looks over that steep drop!

It looks like Calvin’s cap caught up to him from panel 4.

Even for our hero thats one h of a ride.

The ride is fun, it’s the sudden stop at the end that’s the killer.

Why is a little kid all alone like this?

Where’s Hobbes. He usually is on board or smart enough to bail out.

Something tells me that panel 3 shows Ohio (especially Chagrin Falls, Bill Watterson’s hometown).

Thank’s God! It’s done!

A man’s reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for?

This reminds me of visiting the Nagano winter Olympics site in Japan before the games and being taken to the top of the ski jump. Man, those things are HIGH. I backed up very slowly and gratefully took the elevator back down.

imagine if he did a skeleton run

Wonder just how Felix Baumgartner felt at 38,969.3 m, ahead of reaching 1357.64 km/h.

l had the same feelings…The hill is always taller from the top.

The colorist sure did a poor job. What’s with the sled shadow being bright blue?

Reminds me of those giant Sequoias trees I use to climb all the way to the top in my back yard when I was his age.

Imagination and Reality are not the best of friends.

xxx

It’s so true though, you can imagine a giant hill, but you can’t get one big enough…

I was just thinking the same thing.

Reminds me as a kid we would tie a 100 foot nylon rope to the top of a flexy tree and the other end to our togoggan. We would wait for a car to come, then launch ourselves from the top of a hill toward the road, stopping just feet before the car would have hit us. Drivers weren’t too happy with us.

Interesting how in panel 4 the sled track goes all the way to the bottom, when he’s just starting down.

This sums up my families sledding experience years ago.

Shadows on a bright day with blue sky actually are a bit blue. Artitistic license covers the exaggeration. (Did you also think he got the heights wrong?)

It’s all fellings!!!!!

where’s Hobbes?

Good metaphor for life in general, isn’t it?

isn’t that the way it always is for kids?

We’ve found our next James Bond-007!

This is how I feel about life, sometimes.

R u sure it wasn’t a suicide attempt ? Look at that tree!

Farm kids in Iowa I knew used to toboggan down a steep hill that had a barb wire fence across the bottom. They all just laid back and swooped under each time. 1940s.

Just beautiful scenery!

Yes, where is Hobbes? Many inquiring minds want to know.

Ah, Imagination.

“Sledding”

Those thousand-foot high hills of my farm-youth sure looked puny when I came back after a 57 year absence. Perspective… both in age and time. What a loss.

We must have been on the same hill. :-)

Me too!

My earliest memory is flying down a steep drive way on a tricycle. In reality, it is about two feet tall and has a gradual slope, but at 2 or 3 years old, it was as steep as Calvin’s hill.

Calvin imagination is awesome

Safe at first.

Always at least one like orinoco womble who feels he has to inform folks that they are viewing and commenting on a cartoon, as if they hadn’t been aware of that.

He wants toboggan with the universe for a better hill.

that is how big our problems feel at night but in the morning they are much smaller.

Imagination >> Reality

to a kid, even the slightest slope can seem like a downhill race course. it’s all a matter of perspective. it’s all relative. but with Calvin, a lot of it has to do with imagination, as evidenced by the final panel. he WISHES it was exciting and death defying, while in reality… sigh… it was just a slow glide down the gently sloping hill. Hobbes is not there because no dialog is necessary to convey the message.

Taboggans always seem to bog down! Is that in the name?

I think the ‘sigh’ is reality kicking in over imagination.

And yes, hills are much higher, and buildings much grander, when seen before age six!