Happy Birthday, Zombie Will Rogers.

I know you and Wiley Post (tragically born Texan but raised Okie) died together way back in 1935, but damn it, you left us way too soon. Hard to imagine that the state of Oklahoma once produced adventurers like Post and thinkers like you. In fact, you and Woody Guthrie were the best thinkers the state of Oklahoma ever grew. Honest. Since you two left, it's been mostly front-end-of-the-Bell-Curve territory for us, public-figure-wise. Which is why I'd be damn curious to know what you and Woody would think of your state and your country these days.

Now I know you once famously said you never met a man you didn't like, but I must point out that, well, you did die rather young, and perhaps you just never got the opportunity, so I have an idea: Please, for the love of all that's holy, and decent, and good, come back. Just come back. Yes, as a zombie. The undead are not only socially acceptable these days, they're actually celebrated (there's a societal metaphor in there somewhere). Truly, it's a damn interesting epoch we're in, and I'm confident that without much effort you'll finally find someone you not only dislike, but loathe. Trust me, there are legion from which to choose.

Come on, Will, re-animate. We miss you, we need you, and there's a helluva lot of us stuck here in the temporal world who would gladly take even a zombie Will Rogers over the entire current crop of bloviating fuckwits polluting the airwaves and the ether these days. I guess you could say that we're just all zombies looking for some brains down here, Will, and not finding them anywhere. Could you come back and give us yours, again?