What day of the week is that?
In the first WildCards story, “30 Minutes Over Broadway”, by Howard Waldrop, the world changed forever on September 15, 1946. In its introduction in Waldrop’s collection Night of the Cooters, he relates:
About a month later, the phone rings.
“Yo!”
“Roger Zelazny.” [Another WildCards writer.]
“En que puedo servile?”
“What day was September 15, 1946?”
“Tuesday.”
“Sure?”
“Certainement!”
“Okay.” Click bzzzzzz.
I was certain September 15, 1946 was Tuesday, because that was my birthdate. I like the idea that the world changed forever the day I was born.I was always told I’d been born on a Tuesday. Roger needed to know this because his story takes place just as mine is ending, and he wanted to make sure it was a weekday, because his kid-character Croyd is walking home from school, and Tuesday is perfect for that. (After the book came out, someone came up to Roger at a convention and told him for real and true September 15, 1946 was a Sunday and showed him a calendar. Roger said a naughty word, took his ever-present pipe from his mouth, and threw it down, breaking it. I owe Roger a pipe.)
All of this could have been avoided had one of them known the ominously named Doomsday Algorithm for calculating days of the week in your head.
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