All Good Things...
No decisions have been made, and there's no reason to panic, but it definitely looks as if the days of The Newsletter are numbered. Originally, the renaissance had six staff columnists: The Plate, Neutral Man, The Guy, the Mountain of Love, M. Phegley, and your humble narrator. Now, we are reduced to four. Sure, technically we still have all six, but in practice we are only four. In the last eleven issues, The Plate has only contributed three "The Hot Plate" columns. He's submitted a fair number of "Less Artsy, More Fartsy" reviews, but they are a pale substitute. I cherish the variety the reviews bring to each issue, but the core of The Newsletter has always been and must always be the columns. In that same span my brother has only contributed four "Is It Too Much To Ask?" columns. He sincerely desires to write more often and promises that he will when his schedule is less hectic (and believe me, his schedule sucks), but his schedule will never be less hectic. He hates, for reasons I will never understand, free time. Whenever his schedule affords him free time, he picks up new jobs and projects to occupy that time. He wants to write, but he'll never be able to do so reliably. Counting on him to have the time to write is like counting on Charles Rogers's collar bone to stay unbroken for more than ten minutes; it's a losing proposition.

And today we hit a new low. The next issue is a "Summer Reading" issue, and I have received material from exactly one staff writer: The Guy. Nothing from Associate Editor Neutral Man, nothing from M. Plegley. Nothing from my brother (though internet access is spotty in the wilds of upstate New York), nothing from the previous guest contrubtors I invited, and of course nothing from The Plate. (Again, think Charles Rogers.) With The Guy's supershort story and my supershort story and one of The Guy's two "Transcripts from the Last Night on Earth," we might have a two page issue. We haven't published a two page issue since Vol. 1, No. 1 (September 2001), when Uncle Jerry, The Plate, and I put together The Newsletter as a lark, and never gave any thought to it as an ongoing venture.

Maybe this issue, Vol. IX, No. 4, should be the last issue. No warning, no begging the staff to actually live up to that title, just POOF! gone. There is a certain poetry in the first and last issues both being two pages. Things seemed so good just a few weeks ago when we published the twelve-page behemoth "The Star Wars Issue," but as I've often said to the staff, The Newsletter is a ravenous beast. It needs to be constantly fed, and I cannot and will not be the only one putting forth any Bogdamned effort (all apologies to The Guy, my hero). But of course, I'll wuss out and won't be able to pull the plug, and The Newsletter will keep limping on, as if anyone actually gives a rat's ass. But start bagging and boarding your issues today, because it is only a matter of time, and probably sooner rather than later, before The Newsletter disappears again.

And after having my heart broken twice, I'll be damned before I resurrect this beautiful monstrosity ever again.