So It Goes
We lost Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. last week. A real milestone. We saw various clips of interviews on the tube. There was an old one, I think it was just after Slaughterhouse Five came out. I thought I was looking at Tom Hanks for a second. In one interview with Charlie Rose he graded some of his books. He gave Cat's Cradle, Slaughterhouse Five, and Mother Night a grade of A+. When asked which ones failed he said that Slapstick must have, because the critics hated it so much. I loved it.

There was something special about his writing, no question. Way back in high school a friend recommended Happy Birthday, Wanda June and I was hooked. I've read all of the novels, and some of the collections. After arriving in Albuquerque I started checking out books from the library that I thought I hadn't read. I had already been through most of them though.

It was quite a week in the news -- the Lacrosse kids, the Imus flap, explosion in the Green Zone, and the death of a literary giant. This week starts with the deadliest campus shooting ever. So it goes.