Lagniappe

I’ve been lurking around the Rocky Mountain News’ “Dozen for Denver” page, watching for Connie Willis’ story to appear. Not yet.

But I enthusiastically recommend last Tuesday’s entry, Joanne Greenberg’s “It’s November 1880, and the Angel of Death is having a bad day“, a terribly sad, terribly funny short story.

The Angel of Death for the 4-year-old state of Colorado has overslept. An hour after his normal waking, he heaves himself from his lumpy mattress. In the old country, he remembers with a pang, they had feather beds, deep, warm and soft. You could lie by the chimney and … He sighs. He is in his frailer years and had dreamt yet another dream of happier times.