Today is Maggie Mae’s first birthday!  Maggie is not a nanobug and not a cartoon – she is my real live Beagle puppy.  I discovered that 2010 also includes the celebration of the 60^th birthday of a more famous Beagle – Snoopy.  Snoopy is the most wonderful cartoon character created by Charles Schultz in his comic strip- Peanuts.  Wikipedia sites October 4, 1950 as Snoopy’s cartoon birth date (when he first appeared in the cartoon).  Evidently, Schultz wanted to call the dog “Sniffy” but that name was already assigned to another dog in another comic strip.  He settled on the infamous name of “Snoopy” – his late mother’s idea to name their next dog.  It is an affectionate term in Norwegian. It’s hard to imagine the dog we know as Snoopy with any other name – but as comedian, Dave Barry says, “a Beagle is just a nose with four legs”.  I would have to agree on that and suggest that all Beagles be assigned a middle name of Sniffy.

Personification with characterization – especially in a novel cartoon format - is such an effective tool for entertaining and educating if the characterization is accurate. This is the basis for the development of the nanobugs: cartoon microbes that entertain and educate people of all ages about practical microbiology.  Cartoonists gave a voice to their characters with “thought balloons” or “speech bubbles”.  We have gone a step further and animated the nanobugs giving them a characteristic statement (one-liner) to reinforce their activity/behavior – whether it is positive or negative in relation to human health.

Happy Birthday to Maggie Mae.….and many more! 

Take a minute (or 10) today and reminisce about Snoopy via Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snoopy.  I guarantee you will be smiling.