Hi all! Asking for my dad, who was reading some of his old Calvin and Hobbes books this week and came across this. What's up with Calvin wearing two pairs of shoes at once? Are the outer pair supposed to be some kind of galoshes? Do/did children in the US really wear galoshes in the winter? Or is this just supposed to be a visual gag about wearing a weird number of shoes?

Dear Mr. Watterson, Hallowed Be Thy Brush,

Thank you for blessing us mere mortals with Calvin and Hobbes,A divine testament to sarcasm, snowmen, and stolen wagon rides.Your strip, O Wise One, has enlightened us on the true meaning of life:To procrastinate with purpose and question authority,Preferably while hurtling downhill with reckless abandon.

You, the unseen deity of Sunday mornings,Have taught us that imagination is both a blessing and a curse.For what is joy without six-legged mutant snowmen?What is love without a tiger ready to pounce, claws first?And what is childhood without the thinly veiled disdain of Miss Wormwood?

Though you abandoned us in your infinite wisdom,Leaving behind a void of cheap gags and cookie-cutter cartoons,We are forever grateful for your refusal to sell out.No lunchboxes, no spinoffs, no Hobbes plushies—Just pure, unadulterated genius wrapped in ink and wit.

So thank you, Bill, for the laughs,For the philosophy disguised as a water balloon ambush,And for the occasional existential dread served with a side of Spaceman Spiff.May your pen rest eternally in peace,Or wherever pens go when their work is done.

Amen. (Or should I say, "The end of another stupendous adventure!")