News In A Jugular Vein!

MAD is no more.

For some more few details check in here.

I cannot tell you how sad that makes me. MAD Magazine was a permanent fixture in my imaginative universe. Despite all practical evidence to the contrary I believed (or wanted to believe) that MAD would be for all time. And in many ways it will. MAD has always made a hefty use of its articles and items in reprint formats of all sorts and I guess this will continue.

In fact my first MAD was the 1970 Fall Special, a reprint magazine. (I still remember the thrills of slipping glances at it and discovering Sergio Aragones and his delightful margin gags during class in seventh grade.) And then like many young men (and some young women too) I became a fan, getting new issues when I could. And truth told as I grew older I was more than a little attracted to that older sexier cousin National Lampoon -- MAD was for kids. I was of course wrong -- I just wasn't quite adult enough to know it.

Later as man in charge of my own finances I usually made room for MAD, but then family responsibilities took me away from some of my old haunts and habits and MAD slipped away too. Once in a while I'd see one, every now and again I'd get one, or pick up a reprint volume which particularly struck my fancy, but a regular reader I was not. But in recent months with the reboot, I felt the need to dive back in and support my local satire magazine. It felt like it could use the support. Alas it was not enough and now MAD is gone.

I feel like a friend has moved away forever. I never visited him much, but once in a while we'd get in touch and knowing he was out there gave order and structure to the daily life. Now that structure has taken a blow. So much of what was, is gone, and as budding oldster myself (five years younger than MAD itself) I find I often wish for what was. But that's foolishness. The day is always new and what was cannot ever be again.

Now MAD is gone too.

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