Riding with Aunt Edna

(An epitaphany in spirit shared with Phil)

Or
Long Duk Gone
(Props to Phil)

Or
Uncle Kick the Bucket
(Additional accolades for Phil)

Or
Planes, Trains, and Hearses
John Hughes, the writer-director who made the baseless assumption that teenagers were people worthy of respect, admiration and their own soundtrack, has died of a heart attack at the age of 59. Drawing on the minutiae of everyday life, like the hassles of modern travel, relatives dying in the middle of cross country trips, horny exchange students, and computer-generated supermodels, Hughes created a world where teen crises like playing hooky were treated with the same significance as starting a global thermonuclear war, where a date with the most popular girl in school warranted the same gravitas as a horribly disfiguring disease or getting turned into a giant human-fly hybrid. After writing for adults in The National Lampoon, Hughes turned his attention to the brains, athletes, basket cases, princesses and criminals as the writer-director of Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, Weird Science, Pretty in Pink, and Some Kind of Wonderful, making stars of Anthony Michael Hall, Ally Sheedy, John Cusack, Emilio Estevez, Robert Downey Jr. and Judd Nelson, known collectively as the Brat Pack, and as a result, he wisely avoided the Hague. Services will be held in Shermer, Ill., assuming anyone can find it.