The headline of this piece is Thomas Jefferson’s last words, in case you didn’t know.  He died on July 4, 1826, on the fiftieth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, which he had mostly written.  John Adams, who provided Jefferson with copious notes on the text and could probably fairly be regarded as a co-author, died the same day, a few hours after Jefferson; his last words were “Thomas Jefferson still survives.”

Jefferson had died five hours ago, but Jefferson was in Virginia and Adams was in Massachusetts.  It being 1826 and all, the word hadn’t made it up there yet.

I love that story.

It is five o’clock in the morning and I have been up for an hour.

Happy Independence Day, chirren.  Tomorrow is my birthday; I missed being born on America’s bicentennial by about fourteen hours, and my mother went into labor during the fireworks.  I am therefore more patriotic than you.  Read something, in between bouts of blowing stuff up.