gcreptile

Peter Naur, the N of the BNF notation has also died, at 87: http://www.computerworld.dk/art/235905/den-verdensberoemte-it-dansker-peter-naur-er-doed(danish link) So who is going to be the third one?

The terminal illness celebrities I didn't pick, some of them might be 2017 targets, depending on obitability: Larry Rees (pancreatic cancer activist, friend of Nick Hewer) (died in Feb 2017, no obit) Terrence Reeves (dodged a bullet, he died on NYE) Todd McCaffery (cancer guy who got a visit from Arnold Schwarzenegger) - who knows???? Heidi Loughlin (for 2017) - still alive!!! Channan Petrides (pulmonary fibrosis) died in Oct 2016 - no obit Hazel Birnie (had weeks to live after booze destroyed her liver, but no news for a long time) (died in 2016, but hard to find, no obit) Alisha Barnett (cancer bride who never smoked, yet has lung cancer, universal press coverage - and I probably should have picked her, though she still wants to run a marathon) (died Feb 2016, no obit) Julia Watson (turned author, "Breakfast, School Run, Chemo") (died Dec 2016, Daily Mail QO) Milly Simmie (2017) - healed with the power of horses! Valeri Spiridonov (the head transplant guy) - still alive and with head! Dorothy Crosby (classic cancer bride) - died Dec 2015 already, but my research wasn't as good back then Trevor Barlow (campaigner against asbestos that gave him mesothelioma) died in June 2017 - no obit Amber Guzman (one of those human barbies) - still alive! Andrew Culliford (not obitable anymore without regional BBC obits) - still alive, incredibly! Paul Chippington (also pulmonary fibrosis) - last sign of live is an Amazon review from March 2016 Andrea Finlay (Taylor Swift's mom) - alive, of course. Ben King (a chef with cancer, probably already forgotten) - died Feb 2016 - no obit Jade Pateman (2017) now dead with qualifying obit Lizzie Velasquez (who knows... definitely obitable though, as "the ugliest woman of the world") - alive, and doing well Rebecca Griffiths (ran a half-marathon to defy cancer, won "Pride of Britain" of ITV Anglia West) died in Juli 2016 Penny Edwards (got cancer from too much tanning) I think she died a while ago. Aimee Willett/Bond (total silence, but was picked last year) - alive as of July 2017, but since then Twitter silence! Garth Callaghan (a.k.a. Napkin Dad) - cancer under control Greg Hudgens (Vanessa Hudgens' Dad) now dead with qualifying obit Orla Tinsley (prominent pulmonary fibrosis campaigner, had a health improvement) - still alive! Ashley Harris Moore (she got the lung transplant she needed) - alive and healed Georgia Davis - the overweight one - alive and doing better, I think Jennifer Walker (some medical malpractice background story) - no idea Sonny Lang (has cystic fibrosis) now dead with Mirror Obit Sophie Sabbage (turned author, "The Cancer Whisperer") - still alive! David Smith (the paralympian who has to decide: cancer treatment or Olympic games) - alive! Tom Cooper (I just realized, he died on Christmas with mirror/ITV obit, possibly because of his support from ManUtd)

Rob Kardashian's health supposedly deteriorating, but then, you never know with those... http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/rob-kardashians-doctors-warn-deteriorating-health-entrepreneur-ex-reality-tv-star-1535808

Classic arcade game musical composer Brad Fuller has died of cancer: http://twinfinite.net/2016/01/atari-legend-brad-fuller-passes-away-from-pancreatic-cancer/

The only must-meet for me is Stephen Hawking. Maybe Carter. Just out of curiosity Kissinger.

Alright, I expected drama, and now it begins: First hit for my terminal illness theme team, and as expected, it's Sarah Jones, the Joker, on New Year's Day: http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/brave-mum-three-dies-cancer-7112276

Congratulations, Sir Creep! Stellar performance for your first entry on this board.

Ah, now when I had read about a fifth of book 4 I discovered that someone had created a way of rearranging books 4 and 5 so that they could be read as a single book. And it could be downloaded to an e-reader. So that's what I did. I have got the books anyway, so felt entitled to do that. Ah yes, I've heard of that. At least, I got to read the books so late I didn't have to wait for 6 years between book 4 and 5 like the fans, but instead read them one after the other last fall. But it's essentially true, book 4 and 5 are one book, plot-wise.

Now he has already been mentioned here elsewhere, but... Andrea Camilleri, italian crime author. He turned 90 last year and the interviews in german media never failed to mention his chain-smoking (he had a heart attack before). After Helmut Schmidt's death, he almost entered my teams, but he looked just well enough not to. 2017 sounds good.

Ah, too bad, this sports.yahoo.uk obit in french doesn't count anymore, hehe... https://uk.sports.yahoo.com/video/hommages-%C3%A0-michel-delpech-115600534.html

When his wife said "He survived December" on Dec, 30th, one could know that it was the end. A little french/google translate was necessary though. There was a lot of drama around his case, with people blabbering about his health without permission and so on... The obit ...shouldn't... be a problem, in these quiet early days of the year. He already got prominent ones in Germany. But then we might, culturally, be more francophile than the UK.

Maybe... I mean, Tyrion's trip to Meereen with that other dwarf didn't really make sense... The show simply cut it out, just like the whole Jon Connington arc, of which I can't imagine what Martin intended with it. Plot-wise, I like book 4 probably more than book 5. Though, I can see why people complain about it.

Hmm, apart from the bad health history of jockey in general, I can't see why they picked him. Because O'Sullevan's death opened a slot for horse racing?

Interesting choice, though maybe there are too many names of the "authors famous for one" book variety. I mean, why wasn't there Gabriel Garcia Marquez, for example? That said, Wikipedia says he was already frail in 2012. So really not bad.

That's a monster of a master list...

If I had to guess, I'd say my omission of Mark Farren has the risk to disappoint me the most. But I wanted to keep my main team free from gambles. Could have put him in my other team though... As far as I know. Farren's cancer wasn't stage IV, but grade IV, meaning highly aggressive. It tends to return again and again. But as far as I know, it has not spread. Diski, ah well... like Clive James, she's dying for years now. And for example, Martin Crowe said that the 2015 World Cup final might have been the last game he ever watches. That didn't turn out to be true, so we know that his illness is progressing slower than he himself thinks. And now we know that it's moving slower than statistics say. I believe Diski is similarly dying slower than statistics and she herself think. And Christmas being only one week away from 2017 doesn't make her a lock, in my very personal opinion.

Ah sorry, my condolences... I received a phone call from my father today that my step-grandmother died before christmas. There wasn't a lot of connection left after my grandfather died, and my step-relatives shielded him and then her off from the rest of the family. They also gave my grandfather the pitiest little funeral available and sucked every Euro out of him. We knew of her death more or less by accident. Hard to feel sorry after the past years.

Hehe, true. She talked about remission though, and that she's now more likely to die from lung damage than from cancer. Physically, I guess she can live under these circumstances for quite a while. And she's too young for her lungs to give up or something like that. But maybe the pain will drive her crazy, and make her do something fatal.

The last one to leave my main team was Mark Farren. The very final picture of the year showed to me that there is actually some improvement going on. That said, the cancer will most likely return, and they cannot take out his whole brain to keep him alive. But I think it's going to happen 2017. Karel Gott, huge star in Germany as well, is in recovery, for now. Not as promising as it initially seemed. One mysterious case was that of Sydney Swans official Frank Burton, who supposedly had weeks to live after being diagnosed with a rare strain of Creutzfeld-Jacob syndrome. It made the Guardian for some reason. But then, there were no updates on it for half a year. And since I got burned with Bob Ellis in Shaun's Deadpool I decided that this guy was too "untrustworthy". Also, during the year, I had the "idée fixe" to pick French New Wave photographer Raymond Cauchetier, simply because of age and uniqueness. But then better picks came up. Jenny Diski will hang on I think.

With heartfelt thanks to YoungWillz, A B Bardhan died today: http://english.manoramaonline.com/news/just-in/cpi-leader-bardhan-dies-hospital-new-delhi.html Edit: This does feel a little like Shaun's trial run to me, though, where I, after entering myself, had a quick hit with similarly hospitalised Indian Suvra Mukherjee.

Lol, now I imagine her yelling at the screen "Just say no! Just say no!"

First!!!!

I believe Havelange is a lock because the frequency of his lung problems is increasing. But I still couldn't pick him according to my "20 dead nonagenarians is a winning strategy" theorem because he turns 100 this year. Graham is a near-lock, if I had to guess the truth behind his son's statements. Wouk is certainly a lazy pick. Zsa Zsa not a lock either. Douglas, I'd say is a 2/3rds possibility, based on the fact that they are selling their assets. Reminds me of Maureen O'hara. But Douglas looks better than O'Hara at the Oscars. Reagan, I think, is also a lock. I am disappointed she wasn't a hit for me in 2015. She used to be so active on TV and in the conservative movement, but that has all gone now, except for that one photo OP at Ronald's grave, where they didn't even show her face. I had expected Vera Lynn to die as well, after a photo showed her very frail. But then, they announced some fundraiser for the Vera Lynn foundation or something like that, with her involvement in March or April this year. So she recovered and is now on another up-and-down cycle. I didn't pick Castro for any team at all. At the moment, he's literally just an old guy. I mean, he looks like Christopher Lee in his late 80s, so may well have 2-3 more years. And the cuban health sector is very good. LaMotta shouldn't be alive according to his bio, yet he's still seen in public, at movie promotions, photos with fans. Could die tomorrow, but more likely won't. I have no idea about DeHavilland, I only have a feeling that she's in decline and won't see 2017. I think Perez De Cuellar will die. Kissinger won't, Bush Sr. probably won't. Prince Philip won't. Peter Sallis will.... I don't know... I'm seeing 12-13 hits.

What exactly is wrong with Sinead O'Connor? Everyone seems to be mentioning her name around here at the moment Crazy and suicidal. I see her as too much of an attention-seeker to actually kill herself. People who are serious about suicide tend to do it without any fanfare. (I've probably seen her off by saying that now.) Yes 100%. She posted it on facebook, she wanted to be found.

Me neither. I think last year the whole thing with not being able to get past 14 hits despite waiting nearly 2 months for a death was partly karma for not including Sir Nicholas Winton on the list. I would have had him at #1 on the 2015 list with Zsa Zsa second. Lee Yuan Kew should also definitely have been on last year's list. This year? There are some good picks on this year's list, but also some major omissions and some iffy picks as well. Some of these "iffy picks" are new blood, further down the list, and some of them I don't actually know that much about. So I agree with you. I don't see this year's list as being as good as last year's, but who knows, time will tell! Yes, they missed huge chances last year. Though I mostly have King Abdullah on my mind. Lee Kuan Yew right at second place of missed chances. They were both already going down in December 2014. And the list got a fluke with John Nash, so the necessary luck was there. I think this year's list still has good potential. Still too many very old people waiting for death. Joao Havelange is a lock this year, in my opinion. Zsa Zsa however might have another year, simply because I think it's now obvious that she inherited her mother's longevity genes. And her mother lived to 101 (or 102?).