Mourning Becomes Electra

I hate Eugene O'Neill, but the title is an apt one today because so many people seem to be in mourning.

First things first. My colleague in the blogosphere, Jake at NoFo, is mourning a member of his extended family today in a lovingly written memorial piece that you should definitely check out. Jake's writing tone and style are so beautiful that I could swear he went to parochial school and probably even knows what a gerund is and, more importantly, where to place it when diagramming a sentence. So go read it and fall in love with his writing like as I did.

Next, my 12-Step "home group" is mourning the passing of a sweet old gentleman named Griff, who past away in his sleep last Monday evening. Griff was a stalwart member of our big book meeting on Tuesday morning and will be missed by all the regular irregulars, myself included.

Finally, apparently we should all be mourning the loss of someone near and dear to hearts of many an Englishman and the subject of one of Wm. Shakespeare's greatest plays, Richard Plantagenet (Richard III, King of England) who died this day in 1485 (age 32) at the Battle of Bosworth Field (the last English King to die in battle), thus ending the War of the Roses and marking the ascent of Henry Tudor, 2nd Earl of Richmond and scion of the Red Rose House of Tudor to the English (for it wasn't yet British) throne as Henry VII. (There's your entire sixth grade history class in one paragraph.)

You can't make this stuff up. There's a whole society devoted to the memory of the original Tricky Dick which you can check out here. Ignore those dead princes in the Tower. Richard was framed! And every year for as long as I can remember, on August 22nd, that society places an "In Memorium" piece on the obituary page of the New York Times. I have to admit, I get a real kick out of reading it every year.

But unlike those folks, when I realized I needed a hobby I took up blogging instead of worshipping a long-dead king.

I wonder who is crazier?