My HST obit

Just came out today in the altweekly I write for:


Gonzo journalist's gone

And finally, a big tip of the 40 to Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, who finally succumbed this past weekend to the bad case of terminal weirdness that had plagued him, apparently since birth. While Internet rumors fly about George W. Bush having the good doctor whacked, I'll stick with the suicide explanation; though it failed to make any of the obits, I have it on good account that Thompson's son, Juan, was in the next room when he heard the gun go off.

Thompson once said, "I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me." Well said. And they worked for him right up to his dying day. Those of us who write in the first-person, subjective style known as new journalism owe him a staggering debt of gratitude, which we will pay back to his estate, just as soon as the expense checks clear.



http://www.southflorida.com/citylink/sfe-cl-022305musicdan.story

There are two written passages that never fail to make me laugh out loud no matter how many times I read them. One is from "Innocents Abroad" where Mark Twain's companion describes Twain donning a kid glove like he was "hauling a cat out of an ash hole" and the other is Dr. Thompson's sports lead which begins: "The Miami Dolphins stomped the balls off the Washington Redskins today..." which comes from, I believe, "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72". I can never get to the final "hammer jack stomps around both ends" without cracking up.

I liked the guy....liked him a lot. Here's looking at you, Duke of Gonzo.

Thanks for posting. Your obit is a good antidote to that POS whack job from the Weekly Standard that I posted yesterday.