Thanks to MN, former reference librarian, who nonetheless still holds that MLS degree and the compulsion to give people information they will find useful; he sends me articles and links and other tidbits by email that he knows are of interest to me.

Anyway, as I was saying, MN alerted me that yesterday was an anniversary of sorts: the anniversary of the last day that Major Alexandar Gordon Laing was seen alive.

On the 10th of January 1826, he left Tuat and made for Timbuktu across the desert of Tanezroft. Letters from him written in May and July following told of sufferings from fever and the plundering of his caravan by Tuareg, Laing being wounded in twenty-four places in the fighting. Another letter dated from Timbuktu on the 21st of September announced his arrival in that city on the preceding 18th of August, and the insecurity of his position owing to the hostility of the Fula chieftain Bello, then ruling the city. He added that he intended leaving Timbuktu in three days time. No further news was received from the traveller. From native information it was ascertained that he left Timbuktu on the day he had planned and was murdered on the night of the 26th of September 1826. His papers were never recovered. - Wikipedia: Alexander Gordon Laing

A friend was recently in Timbuktu (actually in Bourem Inaly, outside Timbuktu). From what he tells me, if you leave Timbuktu today and are never heard from again, it's not because a belligerent chieftan has sent his henchmen to capture you. It's because, perhaps, your rental 4x4 had a leaky radiator, overheated, and broke down in the desert; or, perhaps, because you only made it halfway, and you are still sitting on the un-air-conditioned bus in Mopti that was supposed to leave hours ago, but will not budge until the seats are full of people and the hold full of baggage, goats, and motorcycles ...

A little embarrassed to admit: when E first started traveling to Mali for work, I had to look it up on a map. I wasn't sure I'd ever heard of it. "Oh!" I said. "That's where Timbuktu is."

Still kicking myself: when I went to Timbuktu last year, I didn't get my passport stamped. I didn't know you could until after I got back.