I remember when I was in high school I discovered the badass motherfucker you see in the image above. His name was Mike Royko, and he was an opinions columnist for the Chicago Tribune. I delighted in his columns, and I had even more fun when I found out that there were collections in book form that I could dive into. He'd worked in Chicago for decades, and I had all that work to look over.
No big surprise, but he inspired me to want to be an opinions columnist. As you can imagine, I was in seventh heaven upon discovering Transmetropolitan in my college years.
So I went to college, and I wound up writing for the paper. I wanted to be the opinions guy and the movie reviewer, but I knew they wouldn't let me do both. I went for the movie reviewer job and did not get it. I had a backup plan, though. I became the first comic book reviewer (and probably the only one) for the Leader. I don't imagine anyone read my work outside of the editors. The professor in charge certainly didn't because I cursed in those reviews, and he never busted me. He caught my partner and I when we cursed in our regular feature, Primitive Underbelly, and made it clear that language would be unacceptable. I thought about still cursing in the reviews but decided not to risk it.
Life moved on, and I never got to be an opinions columnist. Except . . . I did. Not for money. Just for your amusement. Because what else is Goodnight, Fuckers than an opinions column?
One of the things I never expected was running out of ideas for these things. I'm in good shape now with a few pages of topics, but there were times I had nothing. What did Royko do in his day? I also didn't expect to write half of a column and suddenly realize that I'd done this one before. That's happened maybe five times so far. And no, I wasn't drunk for all of those. Just, like, four. I wonder if Royko ever caught himself doing that.
Sometimes I think about doing a newsletter. I enjoy reading them, so why not do one myself? But no, it wouldn't feel the same. I wouldn't get a Royko boner like I do when writing Goodnight, Fuckers. So that's what you're getting. Ah well. Goodnight, fuckers.
PS: I also got to be a movie reviewer for a few years. RIP Forced Viewing. That was a fun time.
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