Billy Graham Hasn't Cracked Yet, Here For S'more

There are just certain people that popular newspapers seem to think are dead. And those that people seem to think are dead. The latest example comes from the Washington Post:

A March 9 Magazine article about hospitals in North Korea incorrectly referred to "the late evangelist Billy Graham." Graham, 89, lives near Asheville, N.C.

Maybe the writer confused Billy for his deceased wife Ruth. Because we know for a fact that Billy is alive and preaching. Wichita Eagle 1 Washington Post 0.

[Washington Post]
[Wichita Eagle]

Hospitals Now 20 Percent Less Preachy

Two popular DP picks both got out hospitals yesterday. Let's go in age order.

Evangelist Billy Graham returned to his mountainside home Tuesday to continue his recovery from surgery to update a shunt that controls excess fluid on his brain, officials said. Graham, who underwent the elective surgery last Wednesday, is recovering well, and his physicians are pleased with his progress, said Mission Hospitals spokeswoman Merrell Gregory.

Dr. Ralph Loomis, Graham's neurosurgeon, said doctors will continue to calibrate the updated valve at Graham's home. The shunt was first installed in 2000 and drains fluid from Graham's brain through a small tube, relieving excess pressure that can cause symptoms similar to Parkinson's disease.

And now to someone who "just said no" to breaking a hip:

Former first lady Nancy Reagan was released Tuesday from a suburban Los Angeles, California, hospital after a fall over the weekend, according to Joanne Drake, chief of staff for the Reagan Foundation...

The 86-year-old Reagan was taken from her Bel-Air home to St. John's Health Center in Santa Monica, California, on Sunday, where doctors determined she did not break a hip as feared, according to The Associated Press.

So two celebrities, close in age, both single, leave the hospital to "go home" the same day and no gossip blog wants to investigate this? If something ever comes to light, you heard it here first.

[AP]
[CNN]

Graham's Brain Surgery Leaves Him Medical Bill-y

Evangelist Billy Graham underwent successful surgery Wednesday to update a shunt that controls excess fluid in his brain, and was expected to remain in the hospital for several days.

Graham was listed in fair condition at Asheville's Mission Hospitals after the 28-minute procedure. "He's on a soft diet tonight, will be on a regular diet tomorrow and should be up and walking around," said Larry Ross, Graham's spokesman.

Even into his old age and through his health problems, Graham continues to produce a daily advice column in many newspapers. We're confident that if Graham wanted to take some time off from the column, the papers could surely rerun older advice columns with past questions. It's what we feel JWD if he was the editor and forced to make a decision at this difficult time.

[Fox News]

Cupcakes for All!

Some birthday wishes to start your day as you ponder whether American Gangster should be euthanized....

Today is somebody's birthday! Whose Birthday? Professional Wrestler King Kong Bundy's Birthday. How Old Is He? 1,2,3,4... 50! And Never been Kissed By... Death
Bundy appears on 1 2007 Death Pool roster and because we're throwing you this party, we leave you with a little goody bag-

• The birthday fact of the day: Recently, King Kong Bundy has turned towards a career in stand-up comedy, seemingly with success.

Today is somebody's birthday! Whose Birthday? Evangelist Billy Graham's Birthday. How Old Is He? 1,2,3,4... 89! And Never been Kissed By... Death
Graham appears on 5 2007 Death Pool rosters and because we're throwing you this party, we leave you with a little goody bag-

• The birthday fact of the day: Between 1950 and 1990, Billy Graham appeared on Gallup's list of most admired people more than anyone else.

... And Many More!

[IMDB]

TWID - United Nation's Day Edition

This Week in Death brings you: Notes and news covering a week's worth of health and death. How Old is Ruby Mohammad, you ask? What's the latest on Ted Kennedy blocked artery? Is it true that Big Moe really died? Did someone actually fall off a roof? These questions and more answered below, in this week's edition of This Week in Death!

We'll miss two people who we lost with points this week: Deborah Kerr took her Golden Globes to Dirt-Colored Earth and Joey Bishop went from hanging with the Rat Pack to hanging with a pack of rats. We will miss you both. As always - we start with health news...

These People are at least healthier than those in the next section...

"We Meant: As Fit as a Really Sick, Weak, and Old Young Person," His Doctors Later Explained
"Iran," President Shimon Peres said, "is an imperialist state and it is no secret that they want to take over the Muslim world, the Middle East and anywhere else they can reach." The president also rejected rumors about his health. Peres said he was feeling well and added that his doctors said he was as fit as a young person.
[Jerusalem Post]

Ruby May Not be as Tarnished as Believed, This Could Effect Appraisal
Ruby Muhammad (born March 20, 1897 or March 20, 1907) is the Mother of the Nation of Islam. In 2007, research by supercentenarian tracker Filipe Prista Lucas indicated that Ruby Muhammad was most likely 'only' 100 years old (born in 1907), based on an April 1910 census listing of 3 years old.
[Wikipedia]

Next Question. Dear Billy Graham: You've Long Been Diagnosed with an Incurable Disease. Can You Give me Any Reason Not to Take Your Life Right Now? -- God
DEAR BILLY GRAHAM: I've just been diagnosed with an incurable disease that will leave me weaker and in more and more pain as the months go by. Can you give me any reason not to take my own life right now? — D.G. DEAR D.G.: The greatest burden you could ever place on your family would be for you to take your own life. Their confusion, hurt and guilt would be almost endless (no matter what you told them), for they would constantly wonder what they could have done to prevent such a terrible act and why you chose to reject their love and concern so decisively.
[Kansas City Star]

Kennedy Out of General Hospital, Back to Bold and Beautiful Self. These are the Days of His Life
Sen. Ted Kennedy is resting in his family's Hyannisport compound after he was released from Massachusetts General Hospital following surgery to clear blockage in a major neck artery. His office said he'll rest there for a few days before returning to the Senate. The blockage in his left carotid artery was discovered during a routine physical and MRI on Kennedy's back, which was injured in a 1964 plane crash.
[Boston Now]

These people are not healthy. They are dead.

McGee Takes It To The House; Lands Dead in the Coffin Corner.
Max McGee, the free-spirited Green Bay packers receiver who became part of Super Bowl lore after a night on the town, died when he fell while clearing leaves from the roof of his home. He was 75. "I just lost my best friend," former teammate Paul Hornung [said], "He shouldn't have been up there. He knew better than that." McGee caught the first touchdown pass in Super Bowl history in 1967. He didn't plan to play in the title game against the Chiefs because he violated the team curfew and spent the night before partying. "When it's third-and-10," McGee once said, "you can take the milk drinkers and I'll take the whiskey drinkers every time."
[ESPN]

For Big Moe, Cough Syrup Was the Nighttime, Snuffing, Snorting, Guzzling So You Can Sleep Forever Medicine
Big Moe, a Houston rapper whose 2002 album reached No. 3 on Billboard's hip hop charts, has died. Big Moe, whose real name was Kenneth Moore, was 33. Bryan McLeod, a spokesman for the county public hospital system did not release a cause of death, but numerous hip hop Web sites said the obese rapper suffered a heart attack. Big Moe was a member of the late DJ Screw's rap collective the Screwed Up Click. DJ Screw died of a heart attack in 2000 after a reported overdose of codeine-laced cough syrup. The titles of Big Moe's first two albums made reference to it. His first album was called "City of Syrup" and his most successful offering was 2002's "Purple World," for the color most often associated with the drug.
[Click2Houston.com]

Kar·ma /ˈkɑrmə/ [kahr-muh]–noun: (def.) fate; destiny. (example) When the Indians Lose to the Red Sox, One Week After Bellecourt Dies
Vernon Bellecourt, an Ojibwa Indian who waged a long campaign for native rights, most visible in battling the use of Indian nicknames by sports teams, died Oct. 13 in Minneapolis. He was 75. It was as president of the National Coalition on Racism in Sports and Media that Mr. Bellecourt achieved his greatest visibility. When teams with names like the Indians, the Redskins or the Chiefs appeared in high-profile contests, he was often there to protest. He was arrested twice for burning an effigy of the Cleveland Indians' mascot, Chief Wahoo, and protested the Washington Redskins at the Super Bowl.
[New York Times]

Life to Death, It's an 82 Year Trip, as the Crowe Flies
Adm. William J. Crowe Jr., who as chairman of the Joint Chief of Staffs in the Reagan administration signed an agreement with Soviet military leaders that helped reduce tensions between the superpowers, died yesterday in Bethesda, Md. He was 82. Admiral Crowe [said] the pact showed how far "the courage of our political leaders has brought us toward developing a more sustainable larger relationship."In his four years as chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Crowe brought a deft diplomatic touch to a number of difficult situations.
[New York Times]

He Photographed Dr. King, But Still Took Pictures in Black and White
Ernest C. Withers, a photographer whose voluminous catalog of arresting black-and-white images illustrates a history of life in the segregated South in the 1950s and '60s, from the civil rights movement to the Beale Street music scene, died on Monday in Memphis. He was 85. Mr. Withers worked as a freelance photographer at a time when events of the day were not just newsworthy but historic occasions. He photographed the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. resting at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis after the March Against Fear in 1966, and riding one of the first desegregated buses in Montgomery, Ala., in 1956, along with the Rev. Ralph David Abernathy.
[New York Times]

This Week Was Somebody's Birthday! Whose Birthday? Some Death Pool Entrants' Birthdays. How Old Are They? 1,2,3... And Never been Kissed By... Death
Happy Birthday to:
October 16: Suzanne Somers (61)
October 17: Robert Jordan (59)
October 17: Evel Knievel (69)
October 18: Chuck Berry (81)
October 18: Jesse Helms (86)
October 21: Whitey Ford (79)
October 22: Annette Funicello (65)
... And Many More!!!!!!!!

Joey Bishop accomplished many things in his life, and in death he can add one more: putting Life's a Bitch in the Top 5, booting Struck Down by Yahweh. Deborah Kerr on the other hand, helped last week's #4 move up to #2 and cut the leader's margin to the smallest its been in months . The Top 5...
1. El Esta Adead - 76 points (6 deaths)
2. Yiz-score - 74.3 points (5 deaths)
3. The Ex-Parrots - 62.3 points (6 deaths)
4. Kraut's Picks - 60.9 points (8 deaths)
5. Life's a Bitch - 53.9 points (8 deaths)

We are alive and kicking,
The Commissioner's Council

TWID - Autumn Edition

This Week in Death brings you: This Week in Death! Below are all the notes and news to cover a week's worth of health and death. There are more health notices than a hospital, and more death than... well, a hospital. How is Billy Graham this week? What's the latest on Courtney Love? Which Music or TV persona - whom I have never heard of - died? (Hint: It's Alice Ghostley) Even as the Shakespearian colors of fall beset us, there's still only one way to find out...

What, my dear... are you yet living?

Ahmadinejad Hoping Nobody Needs to Impress Jodie Foster Over the Next Day
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, facing protests and tabloid headlines calling him "evil" and a "madman," stirred debate Monday about free speech ahead of his appearance at Columbia University. The New York Daily News' front page on Monday read: "THE EVIL HAS LANDED." The New York Post called Ahmadinejad the "Madman Iran Prez" and a "guest of dishonor." Ahmadinejad's scheduled address to the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday will be his third time attending the New York meeting in three years. His request to lay a wreath at ground zero was denied by city officials and condemned by politicians who said a visit to the site of the 2001 terror attacks would violate sacred ground.
[Houston Chronicle]

This Herman Is No Pee-Wee, but Health Rubs Him Out of Concert
Broadway composer Jerry Herman has been forced to pull out of a BBC Radio 2 gala concert celebrating his career due to bad health. The 76-year-old writer of hit shows such as Hello, Dolly! and Mack and Mabel was to fly to London from his home in LA to take part in the concert, which is taking place this Sunday. But on his doctor's advice, Herman will no longer be able to attend.
[The Stage]

Zsa Zsa Recovering; Getting Some Superfluofus Z's in the Hospital
Zsa Zsa Gabor is recovering in a US hospital after undergoing surgery for infections in her legs, her husband said. "The operation was successful, she is in recovery and in a couple of days she'll be okay," hubby Frederic Von Anhalt said in a telephone interview from Zsa Zsa's room at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles.
[This Is Nottingham]

"This is Just a Typical Love Story... This is How it Ends"
Don't call them her drug years. Courtney Love was "out sick." It's a concept she says she got recently from friend Gwyneth Paltrow, who, along with Trudie Styler, was among a handful of friends Love says were "kind to me through thick and thin. You really know who your true friends are when you're down and out." The former Hole singer and widow of Nirvana's Kurt Cobain says she's patiently treading on a long-term trek back from her own personal hell of drug addiction, bankruptcy, identity theft and legal troubles. She has been clean and sober for three years, the singer says, "but it will be another two years before my memory is back to normal" because of her heavy drug abuse.
[USA Today]

Jesus Could Walk on Water, Billy Can Walk on Land
Evangelist Billy Graham took several walks in the hospital where he continues to recover from intestinal bleeding, his staff said. The 88-year-old also visited with family, and his walks included the longest one he has taken since he was hospitalized, a hospital spokeswoman said. Graham will continue to undergo physical therapy to build strength and condition him in preparation for going home, officials said, though there has been no date set for his discharge.
[International Herald-Tribune]

Done to Death... By Slanderous Tongue?

Ghostley Lives Up to Name; Alice off to Wonderland
Alice Ghostley, the Tony Award-winning actress best known on television for playing Esmeralda on "Bewitched" and Bernice on "Designing Women," has died. She was 81. Ghostley died Friday at her home in Studio City after a long battle with colon cancer and a series of strokes, longtime friend Jim Pinkston said. From 1969 to 1972, she played the good witch and ditzy housekeeper Esmeralda on TV's "Bewitched." She played Bernice Clifton on "Designing Women" from 1987 to 1993, for which she earned an Emmy nomination in 1992. Ghostley's film credits include "To Kill a Mockingbird," "The Graduate," "Gator" and "Grease."
[AP]

"Non!"
Marcel Marceau, who revived the art of mime and brought poetry to silence, has died, his former assistant said Sunday. He was 84. A French Jew, Marceau survived the Holocaust -- and also worked with the French Resistance to protect Jewish children. His biggest inspiration was Charlie Chaplin. Marceau, in turn, inspired countless young performers -- Michael Jackson borrowed his famous "moonwalk" from a Marceau sketch, "Walking Against the Wind." Offstage, he was famously chatty. "Never get a mime talking. He won't stop," he once said.
[CNN]

I was just Checking the Specs on the Inline of the Rotary Girder... I'm Re-dead-ed"
Jazz drummer Gordon "Specs" Powell, who recorded with Billie Holiday and played for "The Ed Sullivan Show" as part of the CBS network orchestra, has died of complications from kidney disease. He was 85. "He made sure he worked harder than anyone else, he was always prepared, he went to all of his sessions—he called them dates—in suits, impeccably dressed," said his son, Ted Smith. "It was never a bad day for him, and if it was, he wasn't going to let it show."
[Mercury News]

With All that Humbard Accomplished, Rex Still was Booed in Chicago
Rex Humbard, a guitar-strumming revival preacher who became a pioneer of television evangelism in the 1950s and remained a familiar Sunday morning presence in millions of American homes for almost half a century, died Friday. He was 88. Mr. Humbard's sermons were televised on Sundays from 1953 to 1999, reaching up to 20 million viewers, his ministry estimated. At its peak, in 1977-8, the program leased time on 378 television stations in the United States and Canada and broadcast on about 1,200 more in other countries.
[New York Times]

This Week Was Somebody's Birthday! Whose Birthday? Some Death Pool Entrants' Birthdays. How Old Are They? 1,2,3... And Never been Kissed By... Death
Happy Birthday to:
September 21: Larry Hagman (76)
September 21: Nicole Richie (26)
September 23: Mickey Rooney (87)
... And Many More!!!!!!!!

No points deaths this week means no change in the Top 5, who remain...

1. El Esta Adead - 76 points (6 deaths)
2. The Ex-Parrots - 62.3 points (6 deaths)
3. Kraut's Picks - 60.9 points (8 deaths)
4. Yiz-score - 54.3 points (4 deaths)
5. Struck Down by Yahweh - 53.6 points (6 deaths)

Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow...
The Commissioner's Council

TWID - Labor Day Edition

This Week in Death brings you: This Week in Death! Below are all the notes and news to cover a week's worth of health and death. There are more health notices than a hospital, and more death than... well, a hospital. How is Billy Graham this week? What's the latest in baseless Fidel Castro rumors? Which Music or TV persona - whom I have never heard of - died? One way to find out...

Life was points-less this week. As always, health comes first. Eddie Vedder said it best, "Is something wrong, she said. Well of course there is. You're still alive, she said..."

Tim-ber! Johnson Falls Back Into Senate Seat
Sen. Tim Johnson, a Democrat who has been recovering from brain surgery since December, plans to return to his Senate office on September 5, his office said on Wednesday. Johnson will be in his home state of South Dakota for the next few days before returning to Washington and he "plans to be in his Senate office and on the Senate floor on Wednesday, September 5th," according to his office.
[Reuters]

Back to Home, Back to Home. Billy's Got his Lunch Packed Up and His Boots Tied Tight, I Hope He Doesn't Get in a Fight. Seriously, It Would Kill Him
Evangelist Billy Graham may be able to return home this week from the hospital where he has been treated for more than a week for intestinal bleeding, doctors said Wednesday. Graham, 88, is continuing his program of exercise, physical therapy and full meals to rebuild his strength, said Merrill Gregory, a spokeswoman for Mission Health & Hospitals in Asheville.
[Washington Post]

Much Like Lindsay Lohan, Bouteflika Tired of Rumors Starting, Tired of Being Followed. Why Can't We Just Let Him Live?
President Abdelaziz Bouteflika said Tuesday he was upset vis-à-vis the rumours on "his health deterioration". While visiting Sheikh Yossef Al Qaradaoui in Ain Naadja military hospital, the President seemed as if complaining as he was telling him: "I wish I could visit you the day you've been sent to hospital, but I decided to postpone the visit to avoid speculations about my alleged illness."
[El Khabar]

Fidel Fit? Finding Facts Feels Futile
There is no reason to believe that Cuban President Fidel Castro's life is in danger as he convalesces, Culture Minister Abel Prieto said late on Friday. The statement came amid a wave of rumours, especially among the Cuban-American community in Florida, that Cuba's long-time communist leader, who has not been seen in public since undergoing surgery over a year ago, is either dead or on his deathbed. "I have no element that leads me to believe that the life of Fidel is in danger," Prieto told reporters.
[iafrica.com]

Death? Eddie Vedder said it best, "I'm gone, Long gone, This time I'm letting go of it all, So long, This time I'm gone"

Gardner's Heart Shaken; Won't Stir
John Gardner, a prolific British thriller writer who wrote more novels about Bond — James Bond — than Ian Fleming did, died on Aug. 3 after collapsing near his home in Basingstoke, England. He was 80. The cause was heart failure, said his daughter Alexis Walmsley. Mr. Gardner wrote four dozen books in a career of more than 40 years. He was best known for the 14 Bond novels he wrote in the 1980s and '90s, which officially continued the work of Bond's creator, Fleming.
[New York Times]

No Use Crying Over Shattered Kristal; Hilly is Cold, Buried, Gone, Bye
Hilly Kristal, who founded CBGB, the Bowery bar that became the cradle of punk and art-rock in New York in the 1970s and served as the inspiration for musician-friendly rock dives throughout the world, died in Manhattan on Tuesday. He was 75. From its opening in late 1973, when Mr. Kristal, a lover of acoustic music, gave the club its name, an abbreviation of the kinds of music he originally intended to feature there — country, bluegrass and blues, CBGB presented thousands of bands within its eternally crumbling, flyer-encrusted walls.
[New York Times]

Richard - A Jewell of a Man. A Gem of a Person. A Diamond in the Rough. A Sapph--- OK, We're Good Now. Sorry About That
Richard A. Jewell, whose transformation from heroic security guard to Olympic bombing suspect and back again came to symbolize the excesses of law enforcement and the news media, died Wednesday at his home in Woodbury, Ga. He was 44. Mr. Jewell died of natural causes and that he had battled serious medical problems since learning he had diabetes in February.
[New York Times]

♫ No.... one... dies like Gaston ♫
Gaston Thorn, former prime minister of Luxembourg and president of the European Commission, died Sunday. He was 78. A longtime politician and businessman, Mr. Thorn led the government in the tiny Grand Duchy of Luxembourg from 1974 to 1979. He was known as a strong advocate of European integration.
[New York Times]

Nautilus's Mr. Jones Tells Fairy Tales and Stares at (and Marries) Beautiful Women
Arthur Jones, a wild-animal enthusiast, filmmaker and entrepreneur whose Nautilus fitness machines helped to transform the fitness industry and the way ordinary people exercise, died on Tuesday at his home in Ocala, Fla. He was 80. Mr. Jones died of natural causes, his son William Edgar Jones said. Mr. Jones was a rough-and-tumble character who had six wives, a nearly lifelong smoking habit and an affection for exotic animals like rattlesnakes and crocodiles, which he kept at his farm, the younger Mr. Jones said.
[New York Times]

This Week Was Somebody's Birthday! Whose Birthday? Some Death Pool Entrants' Birthdays. How Old Are They? 1,2,3... And Never been Kissed By... Death
Happy Birthday to:
August 30: Rich Cronin (32)
September 2: Meinhardt Raabe (92)
... And Many More!!!!!!!!

No points deaths this week means no change in the Top 5, who remain...

1. El Esta Adead - 76 points (6 deaths)
2. The Ex-Parrots - 58.5 points (5 deaths)
3. Kraut's Picks - 57.1 points (7 deaths)
4. Yiz-score - 54.3 points (4 deaths)
5. Die Hard - 46 points (4 deaths)

Eddie Vedder said it best again, "Can't find a better TWID"...
The Commissioner's Council

TWID - Dog Days of August Edition

Seldom a day late but never a dollar short, This Week in Death brings you: An ocean of news rivaled only by the Midwest floods in volume. Don't worry, we promise not to flood your basement, only your inbox. Take one more trip with us down to the beach. For the last week of summer, get those floaties and beach balls inflated and your swim trunks on. Don't forget to bring a towel! Last one in is a rotting corpse!

" Life is for Living," says Coldplay. "Health is for Updates" says TWID...

Graham's Golden Ages Crumbling, Can Soon Ask God "How Do You Cram All That Me?"
Evangelist Billy Graham experienced a third intestinal bleed Wednesday, but doctors say he remains in fair condition. Physicians plan more definitive tests to determine the cause and source of the bleeds. Graham, 88, has been hospitalized since an initial bleed Saturday.Graham, who suffers from a variety of ailments including Parkinson's disease and age-related macular degeneration, has been largely confined to his home in recent years.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,294136,00.html

Pavaroti Departs Modena, Too Sick to Journey to Mecca?
Ailing Italian opera star Luciano Pavarotti has been discharged from hospital in northern Modena where he was admitted more than two weeks ago with a fever, the hospital said on Saturday. Pavarotti will "be able to continue to convalesce in the serenity of his family surroundings, where he can count on the close collaboration of the doctors of the Department of Oncology and Haematology," it said.
http://www.news24.com/News24/Entertainment/Celebrities/0,,2-1225-2108_2171113,00.html

Castro joins Tupac, Biggie, and Cobain as (Possibly) Posthumous Publisher
Fidel Castro signed a lengthy essay published Sunday saluting a Cuban political figure but the 81-year-old gave no hint of how he is feeling, even amid rampant rumors of his death. Castro has not been seen in public in over a year and has not even appeared in official photographs or video footage since taping an interview with Cuban state television June 5.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/americas/08/26/cuba.castro.ap/index.html

Is it Because We Suck at Soccer?
Former Argentine soccer star Diego Maradona on Sunday said he hates the United States "with all my strength" during an appearance on Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's weekly television show. The leftist soccer legend, like the fiercely anti-U.S. Chavez, is a close ally of Cuba's Fidel Castro.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/19/AR2007081900996.html

Comatose Sharon: "Consider me an Object;" No Word on if He'll be Hanging Upside Down or Where he Will Swing
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon remains comatose and attached to a respirator nearly two years after a devastating stroke, a spokesman for Sheba Medical Center near Tel Aviv said Sunday. "There is no change in his condition," hospital spokesman David Weinberg said. Sharon, 79, was transferred to Sheba's long-term respiratory rehabilitation unit in July 2006 from Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem, which treated him after his stroke in January of that year.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/26/AR2007082600527.html

"Death is Point(s)less"...

Griffin's Crash Scene More Gruesome to Watch than Deuce Bigalow - Norbit Double Feature
Former Minnesota Timberwolves forward Eddie Griffin died last week when his sport utility vehicle collided with a freight train in a fiery crash, the Harris County medical examiner's office said Tuesday. Investigators used dental records to identify Griffin, 25, who was waived by the Timberwolves in March."The cause of death and manner of death, which also includes toxicology results, is pending," said Beverly Begay, chief investigator for the Harris County Medical Examiner's office.
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=2985307

Too Many Brewskies for Brewster, Too Much Live for His Liver
Daniel Baugh Brewster, 83, a decorated Marine Corps veteran and former Democratic U.S. senator from Maryland whose career was shadowed by alcoholism and a charge of accepting an illegal gratuity, died Aug. 19 of liver cancer at his home in Owings Mills, Md. "He served his country in war and in peace. Although brought low by alcoholism, he overcame that illness to lead a successful and productive life," Steny Hoyer said in a statement.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/20/AR2007082001813.html

A TWID Haiku: Beloved Poet, And World Famous Novelist. Say Goodnight Gracie.
Poet and short story writer Grace Paley, a literary eminence and old-fashioned rebel who described herself as a "combative pacifist," has died. She was 84. A published writer since the 1950s, Paley released only a handful of books over the next half century, mostly short stories and poems. Her fiction, although highly praised, competed for time with work, activism, family and friends. "None of it happened, and yet every word of it is true," she once said of her fiction.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/books/08/23/obit.paley.ap/

This is the Sound of Settling: Death Cab for Betty
Betty Matas, the Queens woman who made national headlines in April when she and her husband took a cross-country taxi ride to their new retirement home in Sedona, Ariz., died on Monday in Cottonwood, Ariz. She was 75. Betty and Bob Matas hired a New York cabdriver, Douglas Guldeniz, to drive them the 2,500 miles to Sedona to spare their two cats a trip in an airplane cargo hold. Both of the Matases had spent their lives in the New York area, and neither had ever learned to drive.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/23/nyregion/23matas.html

"Go Sox Go, Go Sox Go! Hey Chicago What Do You Say? Sox are Gonna Die Today!"
Charles Albert "Chuck" Comiskey II, grandson and namesake of the Chicago White Sox founder and a former front-office executive and co-owner during the "Go Go Sox" years in the 1950s, has died. He was 81. While his family name is one of the best-known in Chicago sports history, Comiskey left his own mark in helping to successfully remake the team en route to its first American League pennant in 40 years in 1959.
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2993932


This Week Was Somebody's Birthday! Whose Birthday? Some Death Pool Entrants' Birthdays. How Old Are They? 1,2,3... And Never been Kissed By... Death

Happy Birthday to:
August 22: Ray Bradbury (87)
August 25: Sean Connery (77)
August 25: Van Johnson (91)
... And Many More!!!!!!!!

Back by popular demand, the Commissioner's Council proudly brings you "Skinny Dipping," a weekly glance at some of the goings-on in the Pool. Columns will feature a more in-depth look at some of the squads and picks. To comment on this feature, or suggest an idea for "Skinny Dipping," feel free to send an email our way.

Every week, TWID publishes the Top 5 leaders in the standings. Two numbers are listed alongside the team names: the points total, and the number of deaths recorded to date. While the winner of the pool is obviously the one who scores the most points, picking a high number of deaths should certainly be acknowledged. To date, Kraut's Picks, currently 3rd in points, has the highest number of points deaths, with 7. Following him with 6 deaths each are points leader El Esta Adead , Go to Hell (7th in points), Life's a Bitch (8th), and Mine are the Deadest (12th). That's right - the 1st-place team and 12th-place team have recorded the same amount of deaths. The difference is El Esta Adead's deaths include one solo shot for 20 and a pair of 15-pointers. Mine are the Deadest's largest score was 15, and the next-highest score was 7.5. Meanwhile a pair of teams with 4 deaths recorded are 4th and 5th in the standings. Points per death, as determined by popularity of the pick, obviously plays a huge role in the standings, something worth thinking about as DP 2007 heads into the fall stretch and DP 2008 preparations begin.

No points deaths this week means no change in the Top 5, who remain...

1. El Esta Adead - 76 points (6 deaths)
2. The Ex-Parrots - 58.5 points (5 deaths)
3. Kraut's Picks - 57.1 points (7 deaths)
4. Yiz-score - 54.3 points (4 deaths)
5. Die Hard - 46 points (4 deaths)


Will people continue to die? Will TWID continue to come up with funny headlines for them??? Tune in next week — same Death-time, same Death-channel!
The Commissioner's Council

TWID - Lemonade Day Edition

This Week in Death brings you: A welcome relief from the summer heat! Hop a fence with us and join in on the fun. Get your beach balls inflated and your swim trunks on. Jump in so we can catch you up on the veritable ocean of news you need to know to be an educated death pool competitor. Don't forget to bring a towel! There's still plenty of room for everyone, especially for the next few days. Last one in is a rotting corpse!

We bid farewell to three New York icons this week: Phil Rirruto (those are z's), who sanctified many cows in his career, though probably not among them was Leona Helmsley, a notoriously bitter miser, especially when compared to Brooke Astor, who by all accounts was a gregarious, generous GILF.

A toast: Here's to your Health Updates...

Manager and Wife Clash: Should He Stay or Should He Go?
Luciano Pavarotti has been given the go-ahead by doctors to leave the hospital where he was admitted last week with a fever, but he plans to remain for a few more days just to be sure, his wife said Tuesday. Manager Terri Robson had said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that Pavarotti, 71, would be leaving the hospital in Modena "imminently" after doctors had "happily given him the go-ahead to leave hospital and resume his summer holiday." Later in the day, however, the opera superstar's wife, Nicoletta Mantovani, told reporters outside the clinic that he had chosen to remain for a few more days because he feels more tranquil there than at home, the ANSA news agency reported.
http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2007/08/14/ap4019801.html

Graham Growing Closer to God Every Day
Hospital officials say evangelist Billy Graham had an "excellent night" and is in fair condition today as he recovers from an intestinal bleed. The 88-year-old evangelist is being treated at Mission Health & Hospitals in Asheville, North Carolina. No date has been set for Graham's release, but family members say they hope his hospital stay will be brief. On his web site, Graham writes, "God doesn't want our relationship with Him to be like this, and He has provided us with everything we need to grow closer to Him every day."

http://www.abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=3500491&page=1

Johnson's Brain Back at Full Throttle, Anxious to Filbuster
South Dakota Sen. Tim Johnson will face his constituents for the first time since suffering a brain hemorrhage last December, making a long-awaited public appearance in his home state later this month. Johnson, a Democrat, will appear in Sioux Falls on Aug. 28, his office announced Thursday. He is expected to return to the Senate in September.
http://www.siouxcityjournal.com/articles/2007/08/17/news/south_dakota/88e7512da63424468625733a000cfb5e.txt

Why Is This Man Happy? Because He's 368 in Dog Years
For a minute I'm trying to remember whether I've come to see Jack LaLanne or Robin Williams. But I learn a lot from LaLanne - quick. First, he's 92, not 180. And this guy could bench-press me. With one hand. Turns out I'm the proverbial 98-pound weakling, facing down the 92-year-old he-man. "The Jack LaLanne Show" aired for 34 years. What kept them tuning in? LaLanne says he tried to get fans to think positively by peppering his fitness instruction with cheery aphorisms ("Train for life like an athletic event!"). He also made fitness fun—even bringing pets on the show. Clad in his trademark jumpsuit, LaLanne did crunches, then his dog, Happy, did tricks. "It kept the ratings up," he recalls.
http://www.mercurynews.com/opinion/ci_6646737?nclick_check=1

Sometimes, though, you're just toast. Death...

Grand Papa Roach Squished by the Foot of God
Max Roach, the master percussionist whose rhythmic innovations and improvisations defined bebop jazz during a wide-ranging career where he collaborated with artists from Duke Ellington to rapper Fab Five Freddy, has died after a long illness. He was 83. The self-taught musical prodigy died Wednesday night at an undisclosed hospital in Manhattan, said Cem Kurosman, spokesman for Blue Note Records, one of Roach's labels. What distinguished Roach from other drummers were his fast hands and ability to simultaneously maintain several rhythms. By layering different beats and varying the meter, Roach pushed jazz beyond the boundaries of standard 4/4 time. His dislocated beats helped define bebop.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/Music/08/16/obit.roach.ap/index.html

Leave it to Deaver. Um...Deaver Left
Michael K. Deaver, who arranged some of Ronald Reagan's most memorable photographic backdrops for public consumption and privately gave the president blunt, sometimes contrarian advice, died yesterday at his home in Bethesda, Md. He was 69. The cause was pancreatic cancer, his family said. Mr. Deaver was widely known for creating photo ops that showed Reagan atop the Great Wall of China, at the cliffs of Normandy and filling sandbags to show concern after a Louisiana flood. And he played a central role in planning Reagan's funeral in 2004; the last visual was burial as the sun set over the Pacific Ocean.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/19/washington/19deaver.html

Behind Every Good Woman's Death Is a Goodman
Carolyn Goodman, 91, the mother of one of three civil rights workers killed by the Ku Klux Klan in the renowned "Mississippi Burning" case, died Aug. 17, it was reported from New York. No cause of death was reported. Mrs. Goodman's son Andrew was killed June 21, 1964, in central Mississippi's Neshoba County, along with fellow civil rights workers Michael Schwerner and James Chaney. Carolyn Goodman was a psychologist who founded a program to help mothers leaving mental hospitals learn parenting skills. She set up the Andrew Goodman Foundation in 1966 to carry on her son's legacy.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/17/AR2007081702213.html

Phake Peter Pan who Phone Pranked a Peck of Peculiar Phreaks has Passed
A blind genius known as the "Peter Pan of phone hackers" because he insisted on being five years old forever has died in Minneapolis at the age of 58. Joe Engressia, who legally changed his name to Joybubbles in 1991, played a pivotal role in the 1970s subculture of "phone phreaks" after discovering at a young age that he could make free phone calls by whistling tones, The New York Times reported Monday. The precursors of today's computer hackers, the reign of phone phreaks ended when digitalization replaced the tone-based system.
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/Top_News/2007/08/20/genius_phone_hacker_dead_at_58/4813/

This Week Was Somebody's Birthday! Whose Birthday? Some Death Pool Entrants' Birthdays. How Old Are They? 1,2,3... And Never been Kissed By... Death

Happy Birthday to:
August 14: Earl Weaver (77)
August 17: W. Mark Felt (94)
August 19: Bill Clinton (61)
... And Many More!!!!!!!!

Back by popular demand, the Commissioner's Council proudly brings you "Skinny Dipping," a weekly glance at some of the goings-on in the Pool. Columns will feature a more in-depth look at some of the squads and picks. To comment on this feature, or suggest an idea for "Skinny Dipping," feel free to send an email our way.

The last two weeks, Skinny Dipping has looked at age extremes and age breakdown by 10-year intervals. In this thrilling final installation of looking closer at dates of birth, we present a quick glance at a breakdown by the month of birth. Legend has it (or, possibly reported in many news outlets) that there are more births during summer than any other season. Well what about DP's 272 picks with known birth dates? (9 have known birth years but not dates, 2 have neither) Here's the breakdown --- January: 27; February: 24; March: 30; April: 19, May: 18; June: 18; July: 30; August: 21; September: 22; October: 29; November: 15; December: 19. That's 70 in the winter months, 67 in the spring, 69 in the summer, and 66 in the fall. So while the commonfolk may breed more in the heat of summer, it is clear that celebrities are more evenly proportioned. Oh, and since you were wondering: the most popular date of birth among the pool picks is July 4th, celebrated by an astonishing six people. Al Davis, the recently departed Leona Helmsley, Pauline Phillips, Alfredo Di Stéfano , George Steinbrenner, and Gloria Stuart all share a birthday with our nation. The rest of the pool is obviously less patriotic.

Three points-deaths this week, who's up for a change in the Top 5? We are! Kraut's Picks, a recent addition to the Top 5, has jumped two spots since we last checked in. The 5...

1. El Esta Adead - 76 points (6 deaths)
2. The Ex-Parrots - 58.5 points (5 deaths)
3. Kraut's Picks - 57.1 points (7 deaths)
4. Yiz-score - 54.3 points (4 deaths)
5. Die Hard - 46 points (3 deaths)


Come sail away, as next week our full boat returns...
The Commissioner's Council