Edwin Newman died today.

Funny, that got me thinking about my relatively brief correspondence with Scotty Reston. He'd taken an Amtrak trip, and had written to customer service about it. Luck of the draw, I got the letter. I didn't know who he was, but the writing was outstanding, and I thanked him, and complimented him on his "picaresque" tale. He was evidently charmed that some no name in customer service knew the word and wrote back to tell me so. We wrote back and forth for several months; me on Amtrak stationery, he, on his own. It wasn't till nearly the end of it that I finally realized who he was. And foolish me, that I didn't steal the correspondence from my employer, who didn't care about it at all. I did. He was a lovely, funny, kind man.