Constant personal edification. Even at the ripe old age of 41 I still recognize how crucial it is never to stop learning, never to stop feeding one’s brain–one’s very soul–with more and more information and the understanding of others. To deny ourselves new knowledge, new counsel, is to deny our very lives their purpose. For it’s not the “meaning” of life we are truly after in the end but the very experience of being alive, to know that we truly have lived, and part of doing such is to be open to all possibilities and potential, whether through our own actions or those of others.

So in that very spirit of self-exploration and intellectual expedition I decided to do something new and read several books from a branch of thought I have thus far denied myself–business management. To be quite honest, I fully expected to glean little of personal value from such an endeavor but lo, how wrong I was. And thus, to help those like myself who are always on the lookout for new academic and analytical horizons, I have compiled summaries of the five business books I read during the holiday rerun period on TV. Read, revel and reawaken your senses to what may be.

Just Because You Wish Thorn Bushes Tasted like Double Chocolate Swirl Ice Cream Doesn’t Mean You Should Go Right Out and Lacerate Your Mouth in a Thicket: A Business Fable
From the best-selling author of If Wishes Were Candy We’d All Be Buried Under Six Tons of Zagnuts comes this instructive guide about going from a career dreamer to a professional doer. The book opens—as many a business tome does—with a parable, this time about a snowman that more than anything else wants to be a polar bear. With a Fender guitar. And a trophy wife. He wishes and wishes but no matter how hard he hopes his dreams always come to naught. Then one day a penguin drives up in a golf cart and says in a comical French accent, “Stupid snowman. You can never be a polar bear. Your body structure is all wrong. Plus bears have strict unions. Instead, you should concentrate on being the best snowman ever.” The snowman mulls this over for a second and then replies, “You’re right! I’m going to be the best snowman ever.” Six months later he has controlling interest in U.S. Steel.

While the book includes much in the way of useful information, the reader is eventually left with more questions then answers. Why does the imagery of the parable in no way correspond to that of the book’s title? How exactly does a snowman assume leadership of one of the world’s largest business concerns? Why does the penguin suddenly reappear in the final chapter only to rail against the Scots and the Trilateral Commission? In the end, though, these are minor quibbles compared to the wisdom you are certain to gain about flightless waterfowl and the rich inner lives of inanimate objects.

Hunter S. Thompson on Leadership
Keeping in spirit with the late, self-proclaimed “gonzo” journalist’s decisive moves and distinctive style, this short, direct work will teach executives wholly unexpected approaches for results-oriented management. Less an actual book than a compilation of quotes he woke up to find he had written on the walls and roof of his house, it’s sure to appeal to professionals who don’t want to think outside the box so much as shoot at it with an unlicensed howitzer while under the influence of home-cooked mescaline (as clearly demonstrated in the author’s photo). From the opening chapter “Look What Those Fucking Raccoons Did to My Youth I’m Going to Poison the Water Commissioner” to the closing summary “Oh Jesus I Can’t Feel My Thoughts I Want a Quesadilla Why Won’t the Key Start the Coat Rack,” readers are sure to glean crucial insights into setting goals, establishing clear priorities, resolving personnel conflicts and just how to start building a submarine in your basement only to get distracted and instead try to construct a language consisting only of vowels. The book also contains what might be a recipe for beef stew, directions to some friend’s party and 122 pages about how to use dynamite in lieu of a fishing rod or swimming pool contractor.

The 247,000 Attributes of an Effective Business Leader
“Charisma.” “Confidence.” “Passion.” “Selflessness.” “Responsibility.” “Vision.” “Goals.” “Initiative.” “Analysis.” “Instruction.” “Teamwork.” “Guidance.” “Directness.” “Loyalty.” “Motivation.” “Productivity.” “Praising.” “Discernment.” The list goes on and one for more than 700 pages with nary an introduction, illustration or summation. While the author’s insistence on breaking up each term by syllable, the dearth of any context save proper grammatical usage and the inexplicable presence of such words as “heliotrope,” “nursemaid” and “pulchritude” may lead one to assume the publisher simply slapped a new cover over an old copy of Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, the tome is nonetheless an invaluable addition to any business professional’s library. Be sure to check out the highly informative appendices, including “Geographical Names,” “A Chronology of Major Historical Events” and “A Guide to Pronunciation Symbols.”

You Can’t Spell “Cannot” without “Can”: Making the Impossible Unimpossiblish
If good management is the execution of a plan that meets or exceeds department goals then clearly great management is the execution of a plan that defies all reasonable or even logical expectations. To prove their point the authors randomly brought together a paleontologist, an unemployed bass player and the touring company of “Godspell” to lead a small South Pacific island to prosperity and international prominence. Six weeks later everyone was dead save a lone monkey with a note taped to his chest that read “Our new leader.” While most people would look at the swath of needless destruction, the innumerable corpses and a logbook that includes the passage “Every day the monkey doubles our productivity quotas” as sure signs of absolute management failure, the authors (whose previous publishing credits include the investment guide Just Keep Thinking Happy Thoughts and Maybe Your Stocks Will Bounce Back) focus only on the positive. The country never had time to go into debt. No one achieved success at the expense of another team member. Everyone worked together to construct a large kite in hopes of flying off the island (albeit only to float into an active volcano). By concentrating on what was accomplished and completely ignoring all that went horribly, horribly awry, the authors illustrate a defining principle of most business leaders—to maintain a strong “vision” for your department it’s perfectly acceptable to ignore all the blind spots along the way.

Oh, God, We’re Fucked: How Change Will Be the Death of Us All
Written as a harsh rebuttal to the hugely successful and encouraging leadership bible Who Moved My Cheese?, this hastily scrawled and stapled tome starts with the premise that change can have nothing but a detrimental effect on one’s professional and personal life. Things proceed to get only darker from there as the author recounts a lifetime of setbacks, personal failures and opportunities that proved to be anything but. Eventually he forgoes prose all together to doodle stick figures in a hangman’s noose, paste pictures of his ex-girlfriend taken with a telephoto lens and scribble an extensive “enemies list” that includes several thousand names, many of them Muppets. Poorly mimeographed, published through a vanity press that shares an address with an SRO hotel and available only at check-cashing locations, the book is a desperate, utterly despairing cry for help. But at less than 40 pages—many of those torn out by the author himself—it can easily be read on your commute to work and the staggeringly obscene book jacket art alone is well worth your two bucks.

Anyway, I’m telling you this breaking news now so you won’t be caught off guard just like the grasshopper in that fable. You know the one I’m talking about. While the ant toils away to get ready for the long winter months ahead the grasshopper frolics and fritters, completely unaware that the ant is in actuality the very serial killer that’s responsible for a string homicides in the vegetable garden. Then one day the grasshopper returns home only to find his roommate hacked to pieces and a message on his bathroom mirror scrawled in blood that reads, “You’re next.” The grasshopper tries to tell the police what happened but they’re of no help. In fact, for reasons the grasshopper doesn’t quite understand the police think HE may be the killer! So the grasshopper must take matters in his own hands, even if it means endangering the love of his life. Immediately his girlfriend is kidnapped. Remembering something the ant told him at the beginning of the story–when they were both up for partnership for that architectural firm that wanted to build a new high-rise in the vegetable garden only to be blocked by a string of public advocates and politicians who are now all dead–the grasshopper goes to the ant’s home, where he finds he is too late to save his beloved. Federal agents now surround the house, no doubt tipped off by the ant to frame our hero, but he escapes thanks to dumb luck and a particularly egregious plot contrivance. Ultimately ant and grasshopper face off on the ledge of the now partially constructed high-rise in the garden. Words are exchanged. The ant details his plot to have the grasshopper found guilty of the murders so that he alone could be made partner and rake in the riches from his stock once the high-rise is complete and fully rented. Then we see the flash of a knife. We hear the peel of a gunshot. We see a limp corpse drop 40 stories. We are horrified but learn a valuable lesson and are all the better for it.

So in conclusion, please do me the great favor of voting every day for Medium Large for Best New Comic Strip. And make sure to support The Comics Curmudgeon in his strong bid for Best Humor Blog.

And never, ever trust ants.

“When the first draft of A Brief History of Time arrived it was 1385 pages. I had to make some tough edits. Removed an entire subplot about a magical amulet and ‘Robbits.’ Stevie was mortified but I think the sales speak for themselves.”

“When I can’t sleep I rescue people. Usually from burning buildings. Sometimes from awkward conversations.”

“But my second-grade teacher just threw my history report right back at me, saying, ‘China will never be a geoeconomic powerhouse.’”

“The next morning I awoke in a bathtub of ice with two fresh surgical scars and a note on the floor that read, ‘We took your breasts.’”

“When I first pitched Blues Clues I envisioned it in black and white with heavy shadows, a hardboiled narration, double-crossing dames, lost souls rotting in every alleyway and cheap cigarettes dangling from every lip. Blue was suppose to die at the end. Steve was suppose to shoot him.”

“I’m an old-school kind of guy. I almost never cry. But when I do the tears make enough gold to pay all my bills.”

“Quang Tri, 1972. I was up to my ears in the shit and out of my mind with fear. The water, the trees, the air. None of it seemed real to me anymore. And as the bullets screamed across the swamp, the blood-curdling cries of my unit filled the sky and hope was choked out of all of us with our every short, hollow breath one thought kept coming back to me again and again and again–’For the love of God, I’m only five years old!’”

“It seemed with each day I was awakened by greater and greater acclaim for my writing in Sally Forth.”

But what’s this? As of this writing that woebegone street urchin of webcomics Medium Large is ahead of newspaper mainstay Dilbert by not only a handful of votes but almost a handful-and-a-half, putting it squarely in fourth place!

But there is still a week of voting to go and so much can happen in such a short time.

Now is a critical time in our history, people. Now is the time to overthrow the status quo, to topple long-held notions about what is fit for fourth place and what is suitable for fifth place in an online comic strip poll. Yes, this may be tough going for us all. We may regret the actions we take in the coming week. But such revolutions are almost always characterized by savagery and a drastic change to the power base, only to begat further violence and upheaval. Remember the Russian Revolution. Or the French Revolution. Ot that episode of the Smurfs when they overthrew Gargamel only to turn on each other and realize that 1) Smurfs turn into malt balls, not gold and 2) Harmony Smurf made Idi Amin look like Snuggles the Fabric Softener Bear by comparison. So much bloodshed. So many high-pitched screams. So many carcasses mistaken for crushed blueberries.

But still, there was victory to be had, no matter how fleeting. So please, go to the Best Comic Strip poll and vote for Medium Large once a day, every day, until January 13th! (Not only is such repetitive activity legal by Weblog Award rules but it’s the perfect activity for your most dire obsessive compulsive needs!) And make sure to vote again and again for The Comic Curmudgeon for Best Humor Blog!

Be brave, my compatriots. Join us and create a brand new society with your votes. After all, “fear” is but a four-letter word but “comic” is five. Think about it.

Yes, starting TODAY, January 5, through January 13th you finally have your chance to help a struggling webcomic land in at least third or fourth place in the 2008 Weblog Awards by voting here! Yes, right here! Or by clicking the above image, which will lead you right to here!

Now, I’m being realistic about my chances, especially in light of such stellar competition as webcomic behemoth xkcd, the internationally-syndicated Dilbert and the Internet comic strip story of 2008, Garfield Minus Garfield. But wouldn’t it be great if Best Comic Strip this year wasn’t some strip with millions of fans and well-earned critical praise but an old ex-heroin addict searching for a comeback at any price?

Oh, wait. I think I just channeled Billy Mack from Love Actually.

Anyway, in honor of the occasion and in hopes of engendering some positive press in time for voting, all this week Medium Large is handing out its own “Best in Comics 2008″ Awards, complete with exciting categories those uptight, buttoned-down judges at the Reubens or Adult Entertainment Awards wouldn’t dare feature. So come see if any of your favorites will be walking off with the highly-coveted “Meedy Largey” trophy this year by clicking here!

So in conclusion, don’t forget to help Medium Large–the strip The Webcomic Overlook ecstatically acclaimed, “I’m fond of…but not a HUGE fan” win “Best Comic Strip” by voting here!

And don’t forget to vote The Comics Curmudgeon for Best Humor Blog by clicking here!

UPDATE: After a few hours waiting, voting has finally begun! Also, you can vote once a day so ballot stuffing is actually allowed. Yay!

I don’t know what’s sexier–the fact that I can’t smile on camera, that the wonderful makeup artist had to cover the razor burns on my face or that I openly admit to using antidepressants.

Anyway, Happy New Year!

Needless to say I’m honored. Also needless to say, I will be reminding people of this nomination when voting starts on Monday, January 5th.

Thank you to any and all who nominated my strip! That really means the world to me!

And a very special shout-out to The Comics Curmudgeon for being nominated “Best Humor Blog”!

“I’m sorry you feel that way.”

“Well, I better let you go.”

“Who threw that?!”

“Ask your mother.”

“I don’t get it.”

“This is why we can’t have nice things!”

“No, the other left.”

“Where the hell did that come from?!”

“I didn’t order this.”