I don't always read the comics section of the newspaper although I do enjoy it.  It seems to be one of those things that goes in spurts as my time allows, and sometimes a particular theme that a cartoonist is following will grab my interest for a while.
 
Dilbert is one of those strips I tend to look at first because I enjoy the "office" and "leadership" humor I find there.  Today's strip looks like it is introducing a new employee named "Jesus."  Above the first panel is a reading and pronunciation aid:  "Pronounced Hay-Soos" - that's important.  Beneath this heading, a bald guy with glasses is holding a cup of coffee and extending his hand in greeting to Jesus (Hay Soos):  "With a name like Jesus, I can't promise I won't mock you."  A timely statement during Lent, don't you think?
 
I don't know where Dilbert's creator is going with this theme, whether or not it will be offensive, but he's got my attention for the time being.  In the second panel, Jesus proclaims, "Baldness be gone."  And by the final frame, the bald guy with glasses has a full head of hair and announces, "I'm not lazy...and I can see."
 
With Spanish becoming so prominent in our country, I decided several months ago to purchase some Spanish language software for my laptop and have been trying to learn yet another language.  I've always found this to be fun - learning and languages, and learning Spanish at this time seems like a good idea.  Actually, I began learning Spanish from my boss in the shop, Ray Munoz, back when I was a teenager...but Ray was a bit of a prankster, and I've always been cautious of repeating words that he taught me, not really knowing if he was setting me up or not.
 
Way back in the closet of my memory, all this emphasis on Spanish reminds me of Pesco (that's long e and long o), a 7th grader I had in class about 30 years ago.  One afternoon Pesco was reading our closing devotions from CPH's "My Devotions."  That day's devotion told the story of "Juan" and "Jose."  We had a little difficulty, however, in that we were in Michigan's Saginaw Valley, German Lutheran country, and these particular Germans, descendants of the the Franconians, even had their own sort of...lilt to go with the German language.  German names, accents and...lilt were common in that community but not Spanish.
 
About half way through closing devotion one afternoon, and after the umpteenth time of pronouncing Juan as "Joo On" and Jose with a hard J sound and only one syllable (sort of like 'hose' but with a J), the kids began to look confused and finally asked, "What in the world is he reading?"  Pesco showed the devotion to a classmate who broke out laughing and provided the correct pronunciation:  "Whan" and "Ho-Za" (long 'o' and long 'a').  We all had a good laugh, including Pesco.
 
Oh, yeah, Pesco (long 'e' and long 'o').  When I told his mother the Juan and Jose story, I also asked, "What about Pesco?  I've known Chris since he started school here in Kindergarten, but lately everyone in your family has been calling him Pesco instead of Chris.  What's that all about?"
 
"Didn't he tell you?  A few weeks ago he was going on and on about a story you assigned his class for Literature.  He just loved it - kept talking about 'Pesco Bill'...Pesco Bill this and Pesco Bill that until Wayne finally said, Chris, get me that Literature book and show me this story - "Pecos Bill Rides A Tornado."  We got such a kick out of it, we started calling him 'Pesco' and it stuck."