RIP Dr. Gonzo

There will be numerous and better sources for a eulogy (like this one, for example), but for one of the best clear distilled views of the man, you could do worse than watching this:

Fear and Loathing on the Road to Hollywood

Watched this last night (it's on the supplementary disc of the Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas Criterion DVD Set, along with correspondence between the good Doctor and Johnny Depp as read by Depp), and there were several of those mind-numbing moments of clarity interspersed throughout the BBC produced documentary. Such as when Dr. Thompson voices his disdain of having to live up to the Duke image. The movie ends with him and Ralph Steadman going into some non-descript office to discuss the plans for a monument to be built upon the Dr.'s death.

Here's hoping they go through with the crazy man's plan.

[This post has been edited to include the following, which was cribbed from Salon's service. Seems his ideas for his funeral had diminished some since the BBC docu.--tbo]

Gonzo to the end: Hunter S. Thompson's last request? Thompson's friend Warren Hinckle has told the New York Post that, shortly before the writer walked into the kitchen of his Colorado home and fatally shot himself, he told his son, Juan, he wanted a "great funeral -- I want my ashes shot out of a cannon." Hinckle says Juan was visiting Thompson with his wife and young son at the time of his father's suicide, and that Thompson's wife was out at the gym. Hinckle says Juan told him that his father, moments before his death, was "talking about a funeral, great funeral. Typical Hunter ranting, nothing out of the ordinary about that. And then he walked into the next room ... and pow." (N.Y. Post)