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It's a tradition. Every year on my birthday Gene gives me a rest from my crippling workload by drawing a strip that I write. You can see his past triumphs using our nifty new search engine. Coward that he is, he started down an avant-garde path which didn't require him to do any actual drawing. I summarily rejected it, but he asked me to show it to you. Here it is:

With no way out and nowhere to turn he buckled down and produced something wonderful, and he even admitted after it was done that he had a good time. I did too. Thanks, Gene, for the great birthday present!

This essay has transformed my thinking about eBooks. (via Gruber)