Today’s blog post is basically these two pictures. One is Alfred E. Newman, the MAD Magazine mascot. The other is Maikol, a student at the school I’ve been volunteering at.

Is it just me? No, it’s not. He’s dead on. Here, all this time, I thought Alfred E. was just a figment of some crazed artist’s imagination. Nope. He’s a living, breathing (and incredibly short) 14-year-old in rural Costa Rica.

That’s really all I have to say.

Except this: Once, I was having dinner with one of Maikol’s elementary school teachers. We whipped out the computer and showed her Alfred the cartoon’s picture, explaining that he was a famous character in the United States.

She laughed. And then she cried. Not just a little tear up, mind you, she wept with laughter, and had to borrow several napkins to dry her face.