msc

Well, blimey. RIP.

Cheap Flirt in the Room... That's one of the oldest lines there is! Only one of them, mind you.

Most days of the year I'd agree with you, but I've just had to shell out for the wean's new uniform and am feeling distinctly poorer... Being Glaswegian, so does a scowl!

2 years on, 5 more folk dead and Alex Trebek likely to make it 6 before too long. Guessing on General Adnan to be the next on the wrestling side to fail to kick out...

Oh shit.

Ah right, I was confused as I'd just picked old folk and law of averages kicks in now and again. If Joanne Woodward sees 2021 I can only assume Biblio has the gift of life!

Hamish Barbour directed several of those chin stroking BBC4 documentaries that boring people like me love. He's also had Stage IV prostate cancer for years, but towards the end of 2019, his wife suddenly stepped down from her public roles to look after her husband who had "deteriorated quickly". Said wife is broadcaster Muriel Gray and if she steps down from the GAlasgow Art School, as she has, you have to twig things are looking grim. As for your analysis, it wouldn't shock me if any of the top 10 won at this point in time. Did you see what I did there? Although, while DI and I guess Spade are lingering ominously (although tbh I think Spade has missed too many gift horses this year) in the pack, I think Banana has a good shout this late on, if some of his solid picks stop breathing. He has a number of picks none of the other contenders have - Alagiah as you point out , but former lead civil servant Andrew McDonald is another who could easily go in the second half of 2020 too. Long road to go yet.

Who did Biblio and Deathray pick? Lionel Messi and Rita Ora?

Twenty four??? FFS. Happy birthday. All the coolest cats have July birthdays as we know.

Would put Reptile top of the DDP. The one year he wasn't sweating over his exact 20 till the deadline...

So Toast posts this and then Gooseberry appears to have combined the two just for her!

I might join in then. So you might have heard of horror writer M.R. James given the number of TV adaptations of his work the BBC and others have done. Or complete steals ala Drag Me To Hell. Or the 50s Night of the Demon, which is a bloody good horror film. What you might not know is that the original collections of his work were meant to be illustrated. Anyhow, in 1904, plans were made for his best friend, James McBryde to fully illustrate a collection of 8 tales. And then, after drawing 4 of the pictures... McBryde took ill of appendicitis, and died aged 29. His wife Gwendolyn was 3 months pregnant and when Jane was born, M.R. James became her legal guardian and financially supported the family for the rest of his life. But he put a block on anyone illustrating his stories while he lived, as no one could do them the justice he felt James McBryde could.

His voice is a lot stronger than it was for the Thatcher stuff last year when he looked like a ghost. Mind you, he's either dyed his hair since then or that's a far more flattering camera shot. Ulitzer - whose "in" with politicos is far better than mine - actually met Lawson last year and said he was very frail but still sharp. His health does appear to fluctuate quite a lot in the last decade, and I know when he was ill in 2011-12 (when he got on the DL) there were folk writing him off entirely but he bounced back then. Mind you, we're not short of apparently ailing big figures. Douglas Hurd is meant to have been ill for years, Winnie Ewing is very unwell (although as she's out of the public eye entirely now, its hard to know how far gone she is), and there's been Labour radio silence around updates on John Prescott. Which hopefully means he's recuperating in private and not that he's fucked. Add Dennis Skinner and Norman Fowler and someone somewhere is well on their way to a DDP theme team!

Well if this is the way the thread has gone, I'll bring up my all time fave TV talking head bit as I don't think Gooseberry has heard it. Right, so Judi Dench has turned 70, and Channel 4 or 5 or someone I forget had this big 2 hour celebration of Judi Dench documentary on. And they had all these luvvies talking up her braveness as a performer, and her gravitas and all that stuff. Suddenly on screen appears Brian Blessed who booms: "Judi Dench is the SEXIEST WOMAN I'VE EVER MET! And she stills drives me WILD WITH LUST! What a woman!"

Absolutely certain. He was recorded at the time as being present for Prince Louis of Battenburg's funeral in London in 1921 as a baby.

I managed to get: Great grandparent level – 70.8 years (54.2 years men, 87.1 years women) grandparental level = 71.5 years (and rising) (65.6 years men, 75.9 years women) What this tells me is that while this can give you a ball park, you aren't going to know your life span till you wake up one day aged 95 and think "how the fuck did I get here?". Well that, and apparently there's a big increase in the average male life expectancy when you aren't spraying a generation with poison gases in the Somme. Who knew?

Kerching, Tory donor Stuart Wheeler's death provides points for me, DI, Joey and Sean.

Presumably it wouldn't? The people who'd pay for a super league would want Barcelona v Man U every year, they wouldn't give a toss about Wolves or Newcastle or whoever.

Well I suppose that ends the decades long dispute about if he'd die off the radar! (He basically become reclusive and showing up at a funeral in 2013 was the first folk knew for sure he was still alive in about a decade).

Knew there'd be some smart alec...

With a remarkable choice of joker, Lardy appears to have gone from 121st place to 32nd in the DDP with one death. Those records aren't kept but that must be the largest leap up the table from one hit this late in a year ever.

Doesn't count. I've had that vibe about him since 2011!

If you'll excuse the rather gratuitous shot of Jack crying at Ray Wilson's funeral: That guy with glasses right next to him diving out of shot is Bobby. I'd imagine they talked as said but didn't want photos taken of it? (This is where someone posts an HD quality photo in the next hour to prove us both wrong here!) From all accounts they'd buried the hatchet but we've all got someone similar in our families, no? They're family so you're close but your personalities just completely clash so there's always that awkwardness.

What was wrong with calling the thread "King Salman of Saudi Arabia"?

I expect an obit given her role but who knows this year. If wrong, best here than in the DDP!