M.Lawrenson

No need to allege anything. He's dead and you can say what you like. Well, I wouldn't like to be sued by the Martell cognac company for saying someone like Clough drank their product...

More like a bunch of proud haemorrhoids. I suppose the blood was spoilt for choice. After all, Cloughie spent a lot of time sitting in his office, drinking Martell and counting bung money from paper bags. Allegedly.

Some people (cruel people, I'm sure) have said that Forest's badge was based on a stylised graphic of Clough's liver.

Otto sounds pretty coherent to me, especially for someone who's 94 in eleven days. http://www.planet-cutie.co.uk/otto_von_habsburg.mp3 (right-click to download, file is 261k, oh can anyone tell me how to get mp3s to open and play in Firefox 2.0)

If so, it explains what others have told me about driving on Italian roads.

And they thought Mike Thackwell and Stephen South dropped off the face of the earth when they packed it in.... Hmm...whatever did happen to Renzo Zorzi, though? All I've read is that he went off to test tyres for Pirelli, then nothing. There's been something approaching a flurry of interest in him recently. They discovered a new angle of the Pryce accident, available on YouTube if you dare and people wondered what he was up to (mainly having much trouble disconnecting his helmet's air tube, by the look of things). Got a mention in the Tremayne 'Lost Generation' book as well, beyond the obvious one. He won the F3 Monaco race after Tony Brise got into some 'car humping' difficulty with Alex Dias Ribero...

I've just watched a cheery Horizon documentary about the 'flu pandemic that may well hit the world in the near future. If what was depicted on the 'drama' bits of the documentary (by the looks of things bird 'flu will cause mass non-natural acting in the world's population) come true, then I think dying of it will be easiest way to deal with it. I remember having 'flu in 1991, and my main memory is the days of sheer boredom of staring at the clock tick away until I fell asleep again. Surely death can't be any worse than that... [Topics merged - ff]

Polly Umrigar , Indian cricket legend died today of cancer aged 80.

I'm sure that everyone knows, despite the tabloid hate-mongering and rabble-rousing about paedophiles, that the vast majority of sexual abuse of children is carried out (1) within the family (2) by an immediate adult male relative or someone close to the family (3) and, very sadly, is never actually reported.

Seems Otto & co got their longevity from various sources, as indicated in this nifty chart :

Otto von Habsburg has been found - yesterday, there was the first part of a documentary series on his family. I've yet to listen to it, though I will. The Habsburgs are great - they make my family look sane and genetically normal. Not much chance in him dying soon though. Look at his siblings : * Crown Prince Otto (1912–) * Archduchess Adelheid (1914–1971) * Archduke Robert (1915–1996) * Archduke Felix (1916–) * Archduke Karl Ludwig (1918–) * Archduke Rudolf (1919–) * Archduchess Charlotte (1921–1989) * Archduchess Elisabeth (1922–1993) How many other other 94 year olds have three brothers aged 90, 88 and 87? There's a good record of longevity in the Habsburgs over the last couple of centuries. Not from these children's father, though - he died of pneumonia at 34.

La mort est bleu. Or something (bad French pun).

Brian Matthew , 78 (presenter of 'Sounds Of The Sixties') has been 'absent, ill' for the past 9 shows. Doesn't look good.

Also - anyone who is reported as 'very ill' during the last week in December.

I'd suggest Arthur C.Clarke, 89 next month and in long-term poor health. C'mon, I predicted Nigel Kneale's death last year...

'Course it's on Wikipedia. I put it there

And now today's unconfirmed newsflash - it's been reported that PW Botha died today. Anyone else celebrating?

Not only Franklyn today. Apparently, Nigel Kneale (Quatermass writer etc.) died 2 days ago. http://www.hammerfilms.com/features/tribut...gel_kneale.html

I think HMM knows if she goes to court she won't have a leg to stand on.

I think Mrs Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg (nee Windsor) will be around for a while yet, she's the near the bottom of the list as far as Queen's ages of death. Quite a few of her royal blood female relatives lived well past 80. However, the males usually don't last nearly as long, so Charles the Mad may die before her.

I mentioned as such on this site a month or so back after I saw him at Goodwood. Son Derek has retired from racing to look after him. Terribly rapid decline, he was the very picture of health in summer 2005. At the moment, he's just outside my top 20 for DDP, but is in my picks for the CPDP. But it hurts, really genuinally hurts, to have to even pencil his name in. I avoided watching the the ITV Goodwood Revival show after hearing about Phil Hill. According to the Motor Sport article he needs help for virtually everything, which I'm not surprised about as the relatives of mine who've reached a similar age required much the same. But none of them could leave their house, never mind take transatlantic flights, so I give PH major credit. And as I'm sure he knows, he's had much more life that his old teammates Taffy Von Trips and Ricardo Rodriguez had. Even Richie Ginther had a similar rapid decline, but 20 years earlier than P.Hill. I read 'The Cruel Sport' last year, so I give major respect to P.Hill.

After reading an article (and looking at the pictures, oh the sad pictures) of the latest issue of Motor Sport, I'd hazard a guess that 1961 F1 Champion Phil Hill will not be with us for much longer...

Well, I am also a son of Preston, though I've not lived there since I was 11. But 20 years later, things which can only be called 'circumstances' require me to move back there to live with my parents again. Yes, Preston Bus Station is awful. I remember reading the obituary of the architect who designed it years ago. (apparently, there was an exact copy of it built in Iran. As if the citizens of that country haven't suffered enough). My grandma lived across the road from it. In the early 80s, Sainsbury's kindly built a superstore to block out most of, but they're long gone. I'm hoping the bus station is demolished soon, as it will increase property values when it's gone - my family are presently waiting for my step-grandfather to die so we can get the house. The more famous M.Lawrenson lives in Southport, as I far as I know. It was the closest thing approaching a 'good area' near Merseyside that 1980s Liverpool players could afford. And if anyone wants to see it, I could take a photo of the side street in Preston town centre where John Inman was born. My father used to point it out to us as kids.

John Inman is Preston's finest. Preston's finest what, I'm not exactly sure. Other famous Prestonians include 'Freddie' Flintoff, the bloke who played R2D2 in Star Wars, some footballer who's name I can't remember, and (apparently) the parents of Butch Cassidy. Give me a chance - I need some reassurance about somewhere I'm going to be living in a few months...

Pat is one of the best friends of Peter Falk, which explains all those episodes of Columbo he was in. Falk must be a fair bet for Deathlist, even if he is still working at the age of 79. Remember, he's a cancer survivor. Even if he was only 3 at the time...