Dead Pool 2nd February 2014

Another quiet week for celebrity deaths which means no points awarded. However, plenty to share in the news section. Animal deaths were mentioned in the emails this week and the stance has always been that animals are not to be listed but only mentioned in the newsletter for jovial purposes. But if all of you agree, we could have a fourth ‘biggie’ to join the Cert, Woman and Maverick for next year. The community shall decide, either email or leave a comment on the website.

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Arthur Doyle, 69, American jazz musician.
• Karl Slym, 51, British business executive, Managing Director of Tata Motors (since 2012), self-defenestration.
• Pete Seeger, 94, American folk singer and songwriter (“Turn! Turn! Turn!“, “If I Had a Hammer“, “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?”).
• Tom Sherak, 68, American film producer and studio executive, President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (2009–2012), prostate cancer.
• Colonel Meow, 2, American online celebrity cat,[32] holder of the Guinness world record for the longest fur.
• Maximilian Schell, 83, Austrian-Swiss actor (Judgment at Nuremberg), winner of the Academy Award for Best Actor (1961).

In Other News

You have to feel for the two white doves released by children on behalf of the Pope this week. The gesture of peace was soon brought to an end when a crow and a seagull attacked both doves in front of the horrified crowds. Now, I’m not one to laugh at cruelty to animals, but you have to hand it to the satanic avians, if you are going to embarrass the pontiff, be Hitchcockian about it. Nobody is sure what happened to the birds, lets hope they managed to reconcile their religious differences.

In a move that certainly shows that he’s a prize cunt, Ian Watkins, the former Lost Prophets singer, is making moves to apply for an appeal against his conviction for fucking a baby. Obviously he feels his 35 year sentence is too long or perhaps he thinks that sexually abusing a helpless child isn’t such a terrible crime. Lets hope that he gets shanked sooner rather than later.

Formula 1 legend, Michael Schumacher is slowly being revived from his induced month-long coma. In a statement, his manager said “Michael’s sedation is being reduced in order to allow the start of the waking up process which may take long time.” Schumacher has been at a specialist clinic in Grenoble since hitting his head during a skiing accident at the Meribel resort in the French Alps more than a month ago. He was put into an artificial coma after two emergency operations to reduce the swelling caused by severe brain trauma.

Justin Bieber has been in the news quite a few times lately, he’s been arrested for drunk driving, resisting arrest and driving with an expired license. He’s also returned to Toronto to face the music after his attack on a limo driver. It seems that officials in the US have grown tired of his antics as they searched his private jet after it landed in New Jersey, they also towed away his custom-built car for further checks. An online petition to deport Bieber from the US has gained over 100k signatures, alas the White House is powerless to act upon individual cases so nothing will become of it. I wonder if we can get Theresa May to ban him from UK shores, on the basis that he’s a cunt…

You may have noticed that there has been a few plunges from high buildings recently. One such plunge occurred at the HQ of JP Morgan at Canary Wharf, sad as it may be, one can only hope he was a banker. Another jumper was the managing director of Tata Motors. So it looks like the big and powerful are finally feeling the pinch of their actions but taking the cowards way out. I suspect we will be seeing a lot more plunges, maybe you should look at prominent bankers and managing directors for next year.

The worlds oldest known flamingo has died. The bird – who went by the name  “Greater,” passed away Friday at Adelaide Zoo. The bird was eighty-three years old. Greater, who managed to live his/her entire life without anyone ever determining his/her sex, arrived at the zoo in 1933. In April of last year, it became clear the bird was struggling with arthritis. After nine months of anti-inflammatory treatment, Greater took a turn for the worst last week. “The difficult decision was made to humanely put the flamingo to sleep this morning,” officials said.

A couple of strange deaths to report this week. A woman on the Montreal Metro was killed when her scarf got caught in an escalator. The unidentified 48-year-old woman was found dead at the bottom of the moving staircase at Fabre station in the north of the Canadian city. Her hair was also apparently caught in the escalator in Thursday morning’s incident.

We also saw the death of Gemma Moss, who was found dead in bed after smoking cannabis to ‘help her get to sleep’. The regular churchgoers blood levels contained a high amount of toxicity from the weed which brought on a cardiac arrest. She was said to be using around £60 worth of cannabis a week! Let that be a warning to you!

On This Day

• 1653 – New Amsterdam (later renamed The City of New York) is incorporated.
• 1848 – California Gold Rush: The first ship with Chinese immigrants arrives in San Francisco.
• 1887 – In Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania the first Groundhog Day is observed.
• 1901 – Funeral of Queen Victoria.
• 1913 – Grand Central Terminal is opened in New York City.
• 1922 – Ulysses by James Joyce is published.
• 1971 – Idi Amin replaces President Milton Obote as leader of Uganda.
• 1990 – Apartheid: F. W. de Klerk announces the unbanning of the African National Congress and promises to release Nelson Mandela.
• 2004 – Swiss tennis player Roger Federer becomes the No. 1 ranked men’s singles player, a position he will hold for a record 237 weeks.

Deaths

• 1461 – Owen Tudor, Welsh soldier (b. 1400)
• 1969 – Boris Karloff, English actor (b. 1887)
• 1970 – Bertrand Russell, English mathematician and philosopher, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1872)
• 1979 – Sid Vicious, English singer and bass player (Sex Pistols, Vicious White Kids, Siouxsie and the Banshees, and The Flowers of Romance) (b. 1957)
• 1995 – Fred Perry, English tennis player (b. 1909)
• 1995 – Donald Pleasence, English actor (b. 1919)
• 1996 – Gene Kelly, American actor, singer, dancer, and director (b. 1912)
• 2011 – Margaret John, Welsh actress (b. 1926)

Fuck! He’s Not Dead Yet by KoA

Luis Alfredo Garavito Cubillos, aka “La Bestia” (The Beast) is a Colombian rapist and serial killer. In 1999, he admitted to the rape and murder of 147 young boys.The number of his victims, based on the locations of skeletons listed on maps that Garavito drew in prison, could eventually exceed 300. He has been described by local media as “the world’s worst serial killer” because of the high number of victims.

Garavito was born on 25 January 1957 in Génova, Quindío, Colombia. He is the oldest of seven brothers and apparently suffered physical and emotional abuse at the hands of his father, like most of these serial killers are.

Garavito’s victims were poor children, peasant children, or street children, between the ages of 8 and 16. Garavito approached them on the street or countryside and offered them gifts or small amounts of money. After gaining their trust, he took the children for a walk and when they got tired, he would take advantage of them. He then raped them, cut their throats, and usually dismembered their corpses. Most corpses showed signs of torture.

Once captured, Garavito was subject to the maximum penalty available in Colombia, which was 30 years. However, as he confessed the crimes and helped authorities locate bodies, Colombian law allowed him to apply for special benefits, including a reduction of his sentence to 22 years and possibly an even earlier release for further cooperation and good behaviour.

As Garavito served his reduced sentence, many Colombians began to gradually criticise the possibility of his early release, some arguing that he deserved either life in prison or the death penalty, neither of which are applicable in Colombia.

A judicial review of the cases against Garavito in different local jurisdictions found that his sentence could potentially be extended and his release delayed, because he would have to answer for unconfessed crimes separately, however, it does look like he will be free soon enough. Lock up your urchins!

Last Week’s Birthdays

Oprah Winfrey (60), Christian Bale (40), Ellen DeGeneres (56), Justin Timberlake (33), Michael C. Hall (43), Heather Graham (44), Lisa Marie Presley (46), Elijah Wood (33), Minnie Driver (44), John Lydon (58), Vanessa Redgrave (77), Kelly Lynch (55), Gene Hackman (84), Phil Collins (63), Alan Alda (78), Eddie Van Halen (59), James Cromwell (74), Scott Glenn (73), Alan Cumming (49), Ariel Winter (16), Tom Selleck (69), Dick Cheney (73) and Peter Sallis (93).

2013 League Table

[Confidential]

Next week peeps!

2nd February 2014 | Categories: 2014 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 26th January 2014

Welcome once again to the Dead Pool Newsletter, alas the list of notable deaths is a vastly shorter one than last weeks. As you can imagine, no points to be awarded so placements on the league table remain the same.

With these quiet weeks it’s even more important for our little community to pull together, so if any of you fancy  guest writing an

article, like a few of you already have, feel free to submit a little something.

This week we have a new feature written by Sophie, who will be submitting a suitably morbid rendition every now and then. I hope you enjoy it, I did! 😀

So without further ado…

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Dennis Frederiksen, 62, American rock singer (Angel, Le Roux, Toto), liver cancer.
• Sir Christopher Chataway, 82, British athlete, broadcaster, politician and businessman, MP for Lewisham North (1959–1966) and Chichester (1969–1974), cancer.
• James Jacks, 66, American film producer (The Mummy franchise), heart attack.

In Other News

Former basketball star Dennis Rodman has checked into an alcohol rehabilitation centre, days after returning from a controversial trip to North Korea. Rodman’s agent, Daniel Prince said Rodman was in “pretty rough shape emotionally”. He had suffered from pressure to be a “super-human political figure” during his visit. I would argue that he brought all of it upon himself by visiting North Korea in the first place. One thing is for sure, he’s fully in the crosshairs of the Dead Pool now!

Ossie Ardiles says he is “fine and doing well” after a car crash left the ex-Tottenham midfielder needing more than 20 stitches in his head. Ardiles, 61, was believed to have been driving on the Falkland Islands with fellow ex-Argentinean midfielder Ricky Villa as a passenger. Reports suggest he swerved to avoid hitting a sheep, which makes sense as it was the Falklands after all…

Moors Murderer Ian Brady has broken two bones in a fall at the Merseyside psychiatric hospital where he is being held. A spokesman for Mersey Care NHS Trust, which runs Ashworth Hospital, said Brady, 76, was admitted to a “general hospital” on Tuesday. Brady has been on hunger strike in recent years, being force-fed daily to keep him alive, which is a very good use of tax payers money in my opinion, let the cunt suffer some more. You may have also heard that his appeal to be moved from the hospital to general prison population has also been refused on the grounds that his a fucking loony! Looks like the justice system is working somewhat.

Argentina’s president, Cristina Fernández, has spoken publicly for the first time in 42 days, ending a long silence that has led to speculation about her health following head surgery. She is known for her constant tweets on various topics but Fernández made her last comments on Twitter on 13th December. The uncharacteristic silence fed speculation in Argentina that she’d died. Some opponents even questioned who was really running the country! Alas, she is still alive.

The press offices of the Queen and the Prince of Wales are expected to merge in what is being described in media reports as the latest step in Prince Charles’ preparations for the day he becomes king. Or what they are really telling us is, Betty is on her way out and Charlie needs to get his arse into gear.

And finally, researchers say that the poorest people in society cannot afford to pay the costs of funerals. Apparently the average cost of dying – including funeral, burial or cremation and state administration – stands at £7,622, having risen by 7.1% in the past year. They estimate that more than 100,000 people will struggle to pay for a funeral this year. Now, personally, if anyone spends seven grand on my funeral, you are going to need your head examined. Bung me in a bin liner and let the bin men take me to landfill, or if you have concerns over that, save some money and use my body as a Guy on November 5th. Shit the bed, you could even process me as Soylent Green, just don’t pay those cunts a penny!

On This Day

• 1788 – The British First Fleet, led by Arthur Phillip, sails into Port Jackson (Sydney Harbour) to establish Sydney, the first permanent European settlement on the continent. Commemorated as Australia Day.
• 1808 – Rum Rebellion, the only successful (albeit short-lived) armed takeover of the government in Australia.
• 1841 – The United Kingdom formally occupies Hong Kong.
• 1905 – The world’s largest diamond ever, the Cullinan weighing 3,106.75 carats (0.621350 kg), is found at the Premier Mine near Pretoria in South Africa.
• 1915 – The Rocky Mountain National Park is established by an act of the U.S. Congress.
• 1998 – Lewinsky scandal: On American television, U.S. President Bill Clinton denies having had “sexual relations” with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

Deaths

• 1823 – Edward Jenner, English physician (b. 1749)
• 1885 – Edward Davy, English physician and inventor (b. 1806)
• 1891 – Nikolaus Otto, German engineer, invented the Internal combustion engine (b. 1833)
• 1932 – William Wrigley, Jr., American businessman, founded the Wrigley Company (b. 1861)
• 1973 – Edward G. Robinson, American actor (b. 1893)
• 1992 – José Ferrer, Puerto Rican actor (b. 1912)

Horrible Ways To Die #1 – Scurvy – by Sophie

Scurvy, as any fule kno, is a disease caused by lack of Vitamin C. In ye olden times, it was particularly prevalent on ships, where the diet mostly consisted of rum, beer, ‘hard tack’ biscuits (dried out biscuits full of protein-giving weevils – as tasty as they sound) and salted meat. Fresh vegetables and fruit were hard to come by. A wise soul called James Lind worked out it was a dietary deficiency causing the illness, and started getting sailors to consume lemons and limes. Scurvy as a deadly disease was all but eradicated. But what does scurvy actually DO?

First of all, it turns you bloaty, pale and lethargic, but otherwise well. Not too bad… Then your legs stiffen, movement becomes painful and you turn yellow. Your gums swell and bleed, before becoming putrid. Your skin dries out and develops spots, of varying colours. Your legs swell, along with your genitals. Finally, your skin becomes dark and bruised in colour. And this is only the first stage, quickly reversible on administration of some lemon juice.

Second stage scurvy attacks the muscles and tendons of the legs, causing them to contract and, on the slightest movement, to cause you to faint with the pain, and sometimes die of it.

If you’re unlucky enough to progress to the final stage, ulcers and blisters break out and burst all over your body, and you haemorrhage from everywhere. You defecate and vomit blood, your veins spontaneously burst, your nervous system goes into rigor and breathing becomes increasingly difficult. And then, mercifully, you die.

It was not uncommon to lose half the crew to scurvy on a standard, long distance voyage, before the good Dr Lind discovered the cure in around 1750. Who knows how many thousands died, in bloody agony, before that?  Now, eat your five a day.

NEXT TIME: Ebola

(Description of scurvy adapted from A Treatise on Scurvy by James Lind, 1753)

Last Week’s Birthdays

Alecia Keys (33), Dolly Parton (68), Rainn Wilson (48), Neil Diamond (73), Mischa Barton (28), Geena Davis (58), Emma Bunton (38), Katey Segal (60), Bill Maher (58), Skeet Ulrich (44), Buzz Aldrin (84), Billy Ocean (64), Placido Domingo (73), Jack Nicklaus (84), John Hurt (74), Piper Laurie (82), DJ Jazzy Jeff (49), Linda Blair (55), Rutger Hauer (70) and Aaron Neville (73).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

26th January 2014 | Categories: 2014 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 19th January 2014

What’s all this Dave, you’ve got points to give out? Yes, Stu correctly guessed that Mae Young would depart for the spectral wrestling ring in the sky at the age of 90, thus garnering himself 60 points. Well done that bloke, only just missing out on the first death of the year.

We’ve also said goodbye to the longest list of notables for a while, there must have been something in the air last week but they’ve been dropping like flies! Poor old Trigger fell foul of the reaper and that litigious bastard, Lord McAlpine also departed us, which now makes Twitter a safer place to cast aspersions. We also lost the last female Munchkin, but I thought that happened last year, so maybe we will find another one soon enough.

Also I’d like to share this little story that Nickie found about John Button, Jenson’s father, one of the true characters left in F1.  Jenson was away for a few days and left his luxury home in the care of his father. He came back to find his dad asleep on the sofa. On waking him Jenson asks if he’s borrowed his watches as they weren’t in his bedroom. Or the car, as it wasn’t in the garage. And what happened to the TV that was on the wall? It seemed that John had been on such an epic drinking session that he didn’t notice the house being cleaned out as he slept on the sofa….

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Sam Berns, 17, American high school student, progeria sufferer and documentary subject, progeria.
• Alexandra Bastedo, 67, British actress (The Champions) and animal welfare advocate, cancer.
• John Button, 70, British racing driver, suspected heart attack.
• John Horsley, 93, British actor (The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin, The Box of Delights, ’).
• Frank Marth, 91, American actor (The Honeymooners, Hogan’s Heroes, Gunsmoke), heart failure and Alzheimer’s disease.
• Mae Young, 90, American professional wrestler, WWE Hall of Fame inductee (2008).
• John Dobson, 98, American astronomer.
• Roger Lloyd-Pack, 69, English actor (Only Fools and Horses, The Vicar of Dibley), pancreatic cancer.
• Cassandra Lynn, 34, American model, Playmate Miss February 2006, apparent drug overdose.
• Ruth Duccini, 95, American actress (The Wizard of Oz), natural causes.
• Russell Johnson, 89, American actor (Gilligan’s Island), kidney failure.
• Dave Madden, 82, Canadian-born American actor (The Partridge Family, Alice), heart and kidney failure.
• Hiroo Onoda, 91, Japanese Imperial Army WWII intelligence officer, did not surrender until 1974.
• Lord McAlpine of West Green, 71, British businessman, politician and author, Treasurer of the Conservative Party (1975–1990).
• Komla Dumor, 41, Ghanaian journalist and news presenter (BBC World News, Focus on Africa).

In Other News

France’s First Lady, Valerie Trierweiler, has left the Paris hospital where she was admitted a week ago after reports emerged of an affair between President Francois Hollande and an actress. Ms Trierweiler had been admitted to hospital on 10 January, in a reported state of shock at the allegations. Apparently she suffered an anxiety attack according to the French media and needed to be hospitalised for a week. Now I don’t know about you, but finding out a Frenchman is cheating on you is hardly a shock-worthy event. I’m going out on a limb here and I’m going to suggest a suicide attempt.

Do I need to mention the ongoing cases of celebrity kiddie-fiddling? At this present time we have William Roache, Rolf Harris and Dave Lee Travis in court trying to defend themselves from allegations of fucking little children. True or not, those of us who have been following the stories as they unfold have certainly seen some devastating testimonies. Time will tell if they survive the mauling that the British Justice System is putting them through. You might need to keep an eye on Freddie Starr too, he’s been re-arrested as well. Dirty bastards!

Michel Roux, the Michelin star rated chef has revealed that he’s been secretly battling bowel cancer since 2008. The 72-year-old Frenchman is revered, alongside his brother, Albert, as one of the godfathers of modern restaurant cuisine in the UK, luckily for him his six year battle has ended with him being given the all clear. However, these things have a habit of rearing their ugly heads again from time to time. Best keep an eye on him.

Everyones favourite ‘musician’, Justin Bieber, is in trouble once again. This time he’s been accused of egging a neighbours house. Bit immature, but nothing you wouldn’t put past the little cunt. He almost injured a 13 year old girl as he was doing it! Almost, as in he didn’t.  His big mistake though was to forget to hide the cocaine at his house, obviously he feels that he’s bigger than the Los Angeles Police Department, whom I’m sure enjoyed every second of trashing his shitty little mansion. Let’s hope he goes down for his insolent behaviour and is made into a cock-sucking jail bitch and thus increasing the enjoyment of music for mankind.

Do you remember Hiroo Onoda? I do, he was the idiot who didn’t believe that WWII was over and continued to fight the war for a further 30 years! He was sent with some other units to the underpopulated Philippine island of Lubang in 1944. One year later, the Japanese Army dropped flyers to tell the soldiers that the war was over. Onoda believed that those papers were dropped by Allied planes and lived in the jungle for the next 29 years, the twat! When a backpacker named Norio Suzuki found him in 1974, Onoda refused to believe that WWII had ended in 1945. Suzuki returned to the island with the soldier’s ex-commander to tell him the truth. I bet he felt like a right cunt then. Anyhow, he’s dead now, so who cares…

Lastly, I’d just like to mention former Tory, now a UKIP councillor, David Silvester. He seems to believe that Britain’s recent storms and floods are “divine retribution for the government’s decision to legalise gay marriage”. He even warned David Cameron of this very likely outcome should the bill come to pass.  Now, I’m not one to bullshit anyone’s beliefs, but this cunt takes the biscuit. He’s an elected official in our government, yet he still believes that passing a law that he disagrees with has such cosmic ramifications that the Winter weather will change for the worse! People, before you sign your cross in the next election, please make sure you vote for someone who understands there’s no connection between two people who are in love and the weather. Being a bigoted cunt who doesn’t understand the causality of the seasons on this planet should be enough for you not to vote for him anyway.

On This Day

• 1840 – Captain Charles Wilkes circumnavigates Antarctica, claiming what became known as Wilkes Land for the United States.
• 1883 – The first electric lighting system employing overhead wires, built by Thomas Edison, begins service at Roselle, New Jersey.
• 1915 – Georges Claude patents the neon discharge tube for use in advertising.
• 1915 – World War I: German zeppelins bomb the towns of Great Yarmouth and King’s Lynn in the United Kingdom killing more than 20, in the first major aerial bombardment of a civilian target.
• 1935 – Coopers Inc. sells the world’s first briefs.
• 1937 – Howard Hughes sets a new air record by flying from Los Angeles, California to New York City in 7 hours, 28 minutes, 25 seconds.
• 1953 – 71.7% of all television sets in the United States are tuned into I Love Lucy to watch Lucy give birth.
• 1977 – Snow falls in Miami, Florida. This is the only time in the history of the city that snow has fallen. It also fell in the Bahamas.
• 1978 – The last Volkswagen Beetle made in Germany leaves VW’s plant in Emden. Beetle production in Latin America continues until 2003.
• 1983 – Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie is arrested in Bolivia.
• 1983 – The Apple Lisa, the first commercial personal computer from Apple Inc. to have a graphical user interface and a computer mouse, is announced.
• 1986 – The first IBM PC computer virus is released into the wild. A boot sector virus dubbed (c)Brain, it was created by the Farooq Alvi Brothers in Lahore, Pakistan, reportedly to deter piracy of the software they had written.
• 2012 – The Hong Kong-based file-sharing website Megaupload is shut down by the FBI.

Deaths

• 2000 – Hedy Lamarr, Austrian-American actress and mathematician (b. 1913)
• 2006 – Wilson Pickett, American singer-songwriter (The Falcons) (b. 1941)
• 2008 – John Stewart, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (The Kingston Trio) (b. 1939)

Only in America by KoA

In a story I’d normally sympathise with, a retired Florida policeman has been charged with murder after allegedly shooting a man who texted during a film. Authorities said Curtis Reeves, 71, and Chad Oulson, 43, got into an argument before the screening of the film Lone Survivor when Reeves asked Oulson to stop texting.

“Somebody throws popcorn. I’m not sure who threw the popcorn,” said witness Charles Cummings. “And then bang, he was shot.” Oulson told Reeves he was texting his three-year-old daughter and then they started arguing. Popcorn mind, nobody throws the popcorn!

Cummings, who had blood on his clothes, said the trailers before the film were still showing when the men started raising their voices and popcorn was thrown. The fucking film hadn’t even started yet! 

Authorities said Reeves took out a gun, Oulson’s wife put her hand over her husband and Reeves fired his weapon, striking Nichole Oulson in the hand and her husband in the chest.

“I can’t believe people would bring a pistol, a gun, to a movie,” Cummings said. I can, it’s fucking America!  “I can’t believe they would argue and fight and shoot one another over popcorn. Over a cellphone.” Again, it doesn’t surprise me in the slightest! 

Cummings said Oulson fell on to him and his son. Another man grabbed the gun, and the suspect did not attempt to get away. I’d have liked to see a 71 year old doing a runner though…

Chad Oulson died in hospital. His wife’s injuries were not life-threatening.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Michelle Obama (50), Kevin Costner (59), Kate Moss (40), Betty White (92), Orlando Bloom (37), Zooey Deschanel (34), Faye Dunaway (73), Jason Bateman (45), LL Cool J (46), Howard Stern (60), Rush Limbaugh (63), Melanie Chisholm (40), Dave Grohl (45), Kirstie Alley (63), Muhammad Ali (72), James Earl Jones (83), Kid Rock (43), Susanna Hoffs (55), Jim Carrey (52), Jason Segal (34), Pixie Lott (23), Carl Weathers (66), Skrillex (26) and Sade Adu (55).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

19th January 2014 | Categories: 2014 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 12th January 2014

One week in and I’m already dispensing points! Yes, you may have heard that Ariel Sharon has finally been allowed to die by the Israeli government. Eight years in a coma, many years on peoples lists, I personally had him on my own list last year but gave up as I was convinced that the Israelis were going to keep him alive indefinitely. So, Rebecca and Paul C are up and running already, scoring 65 points each for correctly predicting his death and 50 points each for getting the first death of the season. Well done both of you!

I shouldn’t mention an excited Stu emailing me mid-week saying Mae Young has been reported dead, alas, after looking her up she was very much still alive, albeit no longer on life support. She looked like she was going to be the first death of the year and Stu was in line for a points bonanza, but as this game is a cruel beast, he’s still on a big fat zero and she’s having the last laugh!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Eusébio, 71, Portuguese footballer, top goalscorer at the 1966 World Cup, heart failure.
• Larry Speakes, 74, American journalist, de facto White House Press Secretary (1981–1987), Alzheimer’s disease.
• Ariel Sharon, 85, Israeli statesman and general, Minister of Defense (1981–1983), Prime Minister (2001–2006), heart failure.

In Other News

Seems that Germans can’t ski. Firstly we had Michael Schumacher falling off-piste and bouncing on his head, thus putting himself in a coma which is now into its second week. Now we have Angela Merkel keeling over and breaking her pelvis whilst attempting a cross-country ski in Switzerland. Sources report that she’s broken her pelvis on the left, rear part with severe bruising. In other words, she has broken her arse. Being a politician, she won’t be able to do any work now as all they do is sit on their fat arses making each other rich! Perhaps now is a good time to invade Germany… Or maybe not, as we don’t have an Army anymore since the Tories have been cutting away at our heroes. At least she’s still able to give us a Nazi salute, well done Angela.

You may have heard of the big freeze in the US, although it’s a tad on the cold side, it hasn’t really affected any of our celebrities, yet. But in an amazing example of Darwinism in action, several Americans have been admitted into A&E with severe burns after trying out a simple stunt. Yes, throwing boiling water into freezing air to instantly create snow. But the majority of these amazingly intelligent Yanks failed to throw the water away from themselves. Yes, boiling water, even in cold conditions is still hot. Only in America!

Are you still alive? If so, pat yourself on the back as you have survived the deadliest week in the British year! More British people die during the first full week of the year than at any other time. But perhaps surprisingly, it’s not as simple as blaming the cold weather.  Britain has a 15% rise in deaths during that week but nobody knows why. I postulate it’s because everyone is trying out their New Years resolutions, going on a diet or trying some ungodly exercise, or even worse, quitting alcohol! You see, exercise and healthy consumption is bad for you, stick to the 40 a day and the two bottles of wine diet, you’ll be fine!

Fidel Castro has made a rare public appearance, his first in nine months. The 87 year old made a surprise visit to the opening of an arts studio on Havana. The old codger managed to walk into the venue with a stick but remained seated throughout the engagement. Sadly he did look rather spry for his age, but be heartened by the fact he couldn’t do a handstand.

On This Day

• 1895 – The National Trust is founded in the United Kingdom.
• 1908 – A long-distance radio message is sent from the Eiffel Tower for the first time.
• 1915 – The Rocky Mountain National Park is formed by an act of U.S. Congress.
• 1915 – The United States House of Representatives rejects a proposal to give women the right to vote.
• 1967 – Dr. James Bedford becomes the first person to be cryonically preserved with intent of future resuscitation.
• 2010 – The 2010 Haiti earthquake occurs killing an estimated 316,000 and destroying the majority of the capital Port-au-Prince.

Deaths

• 1665 – Pierre de Fermat, French mathematician and lawyer (b. 1601)
• 1976 – Agatha Christie, English author (b. 1890)
• 2003 – Maurice Gibb, English singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (Bee Gees) (b. 1949)

Thank Fuck He’s Not Alive to Eat Me! by Vic

While randomly googling I’ve come across Lolong, the worlds largest captive crocodile.

Now I know it technically wouldn’t have eaten me in captivity but it was only caught a couple of years ago by some brave (stupid or suicidal) men who wanted it to stop eating fishermen and to help boost their tourism. (Which means it was free to eat who the hell he wanted beforehand!) Weighing in at a tonne and measuring 21ft I’m quite sure anyone strolling through the remote Philippine village wouldn’t have stood much of a chance at getting away if they met him!

Now unfortunately the townspeople of Bunawan didn’t really have a clue how to care for a crocodile and it died in February after eating a nylon cord and having the shits for 3 weeks. You would have thought they would have maybe called a vet at this point but they waited until it was floating upside down before calling one, by then it was too late and it was so long Lolong.

The mayor of the town reportedly hugged the dying creature in his arms as he was so attached to him. (dickhead)

They are now hoping to stuff the crocodile and put him on display to keep the tourism going!

Last Week’s Birthdays

Bradley Cooper (39), Kate Middleton (32), Vinnie Jones (49), Nigella Lawson (45), Robert Duvall (83), Jemaine Clement (40), Rod Stewart (69), R Kelly (47), Pat Benatar (61), Norman Reedus (45), Mary J Blige (43), Nicholas Cage (50), Jimmy Page (70), Marilyn Manson (45), Kenny Loggins (66), David Bowie (67), Joely Richardson (49), Rowan Atkinson (59), Shirley Bassey (77), George Foreman (65), Dianne Keaton (68) and Lewis Hamilton (29).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

12th January 2014 | Categories: 2014 | 2 Comments »

Dead Pool 5th January 2014

2014 already, a new year and a bunch of new lists to memorise. We have almost doubled in number this year, which does mean I’m now having to remember forty lists which is technically over 500 names, luckily some of them are the same. So due to the unprecedented participation this year, you will have to help me by pointing out if you have an obscure death on your list. I don’t expect you to shout from the rooftops if this years favourite, Prince Philip, finally kicks the bucket, I’m sure I’ll notice him on your lists, just those easily missable ones. Anyhow, without further ado, let’s kick off this year by having a quick look at the demises you should have foretold!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• James Avery, 68, American actor (The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), complications from surgery.
• John Fortune, 74, British comedian (Bremner, Bird and Fortune) and actor (Match Point), leukaemia.
• Juanita Moore, 99, American actress (Imitation of Life).
• Dorothy Baldwin, 111, British supercentenarian.
• Saul Zaentz, 92, American film producer (One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, The English Patient) and music executive, Alzheimer’s disease.
• Alicia Rhett, 98, American actress (Gone with the Wind) and portrait painter, natural causes.
• Phil Everly, 74, American singer and musician (The Everly Brothers), lung disease.

In Other News

If you haven’t heard that Michael Schumacher was in a small skiing mishap last week, then may I suggest you crawl back under your stone. Currently he’s in an induced medical coma to try and relieve the swelling on his brain which will hopefully stop him becoming a cabbage. Let’s be honest here, if there is one man who is capable of surviving this kind of trauma, Schumacher is that man. He has previously endured some epic F1 crashes with barely a scratch, the man is super fit and undoubtedly has millions to help that wonderful private healthcare he’s receiving. Lesser men like myself would have already been cremated after sub-standard treatment by the NHS.

Everyones favourite ‘alleged paedophile’, Rolf Harris, is being charged with a further three counts of fucking children. The 84 year old entertainer is due in court on the 14th of January and is said to be contesting all allegations. At 84, the stress of a public trial could easily push the man towards the reaper. I bet he regrets singing about those two little boys now.

Former First Lady Barbara Bush is currently in hospital with pneumonia. The 88 year old is said to be doing well and is receiving excellent care. The wife of the 41st President and mother of the 43rd has not had it easy health wise. In 2009 she underwent heart surgery for a narrowing of the main heart valve, she also underwent surgery on 2008 for a perforated ulcer. She has more recently been hospitalised after having a mild relapse of Graves disease as well. Just goes to prove that Obamacare does work!

Doctors say that the condition of former Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon has deteriorated. Sharon has been a stalwart of the Dead Pool since 2006 after he suffered a series of strokes and slipped into a coma, where he’s been ever since in a vegetative state. According to reports his kidneys have finally given up on him, I bet he’s over the moon, I know I would be.

Pakistan’s former military ruler Pervez Musharraf is in hospital after his lawyers said he suffered chest pains on his way to court for his treason trial. The 70-year-old was transferred to the Armed Forces Cardiology Hospital in Rawalpindi and is undergoing tests. It’s the third time the former president has failed to appear in court following two previous security scares. He is the first former military ruler to face trial for treason in Pakistan, which has a history of army rule. If found guilty, he could be sentenced to death or life in prison. There’s been no word on his condition.

On This Day

• 1066 – Edward the Confessor dies childless, sparking a succession crisis that will eventually lead to the Norman conquest of England.
• 1757 – Louis XV of France survives an assassination attempt by Robert-François Damiens, the last person to be executed in France by drawing and quartering, the traditional and gruesome form of capital punishment used for regicides.
• 1914 – The Ford Motor Company announces an eight-hour workday and a minimum wage of $5 for a day’s labor.
• 1919 – The German Workers’ Party, which would become the Nazi Party, is founded.
• 1933 – Construction of the Golden Gate Bridge begins in San Francisco Bay.
• 1940 – FM radio is demonstrated to the Federal Communications Commission for the first time.
• 1944 – The Daily Mail becomes the first transoceanic newspaper.
• 1972 – United States President Richard Nixon orders the development of a Space Shuttle program.

Deaths

• 1066 – Edward the Confessor, English king (b. 1004)
• 1922 – Ernest Shackleton, Irish explorer (b. 1874)
• 1933 – Calvin Coolidge, American politician, 30th President of the United States (b. 1872)
• 1941 – Amy Johnson, English aviator (b. 1903)
• 1998 – Sonny Bono, American singer-songwriter, producer, actor, and politician (Sonny & Cher) (b. 1935)

Thank Fuck He’s She’s Dead by KoA

Serial killers tend to be men by an overwhelming margin. In fact, there’s no definitive profile for female serial killers. But if history and evidential testimony are correct, a woman is the most prolific serial killer of all time.

Erzsébet (Elizabeth) Bathory, a Hungarian countess, is believed to have killed as many as 650 people during the 54 years she lived. And exactly how the world’s most prolific serial killer took the lives of her victims has proven grisly fodder for storytellers.

Bram Stoker is believed to have been inspired by the countess: His Count Dracula is supposedly a hybrid of Wallachian prince Vlad Tepes and Bathory.

The woman who came to be known as the “Blood Countess,” was born into Hungarian nobility in 1560. She is said to have suffered from fits and outbursts of rage, possibly even epilepsy.

From an early age, she witnessed her father’s officers torture the peasantry that lived near her family’s estate. Most historical analysis of the countess includes young Elizabeth as a witness to a captured thief being sewn into the stomach of a dying horse and left to perish.

Bathory had a penchant for torturing young girls in particular; historians posit that she was bisexual and gained sexual gratification from torture. The acts she committed ranged from driving needles through her servants’ lips and fingernails, to leaving her victims naked in the snow, dousing them with water and letting them freeze to death. One servant girl was beaten by Bathory and an accomplice for stealing a pear. The clubbing was so bloody that Bathory had to change her shirt. The girl was beaten for hours and finally stabbed to death with a pair of scissors.

Perhaps the most notorious legend about Bathory is that she bathed in her victims’ blood. Inevitably, this led to rumours that the countess was a vampire. The official testimony of the murders, which is still in existence in Hungarian archives, is both questionable and convicting in nature.

Late in 1610, Elizabeth’s cousin conducted a raid on her castle. Inside, there were already dead victims and some imprisoned, supposedly awaiting death. Bathory’s accomplices were arrested and put on trial, she never was. Instead, she was walled into her room, with just enough space for air and food to pass through. She spent the remaining four years of her life there, until she was found dead on the floor in 1614.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Ted Danson (66), Marianne Faithfull (67), Danny McBride (37), Julia Ormond (48), Jude Law (41), Patti  Smith (67), Michael Nesmith (71), Tracey Ullman (54), Jon Voight (75), Jay Kay (44), Ellie Goulding (27), Eliza Dushku (33), Tiger Woods (38), Ben Kingsley (70), Anthony Hopkins (75), Val Kilmer (54), Frank Langella (76), Verne Troyer (45), Psy (36), Dabney Coleman (82), Tia Carrere (47), Mel Gibson (58), Cuba Golding Jnr (46), Kate Bosworth (31), Michael Schumacher (45) and Michael Stipe (54).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

5th January 2014 | Categories: 2014 | Leave A Comment »

2013 Review

2013 was a bittersweet year for many of us, but at least we are still here to play the game. Here’s a review of the people we lost and scored points with over the last year.

January

We saw Death Wish director and food critic Michael Winner die at the age of 77 from liver problems that had plagued him for many years. Conrad Bain (pictured between Todd Bridges and Gary Coleman), best known as the affable dad in 1980s sitcom Diff’rent Strokes, passed away aged 89. And British actress Sophiya Haque, a West End star who had appeared in Coronation Street, died aged 41 having been diagnosed with cancer before Christmas.

February

Richard Briers (top left), star of TV’s The Good Life, Ever Decreasing Circles and Monarch of the Glen, died aged 79. Reg Presley (right), who as the lead singer with 1960s band The Troggs had hits with Wild Thing and Love is All Around, died at 71. And US classical pianist Van Cliburn passed away aged 78, two years after being honoured by President Obama with the National Medal of Arts.

March

Actor Richard Griffiths, who died in March aged 65, was beloved by one generation as Uncle Monty in Withnail and I and celebrated by another as Vernon Dursley in the Harry Potter films. Frank Thornton (top centre), who was 92 at the time of his death, played stern characters in Are You Being Served? and Last of the Summer Wine. In March we also said goodbye to British horror author James Herbert (right) and jazz trumpeter Kenny Ball (bottom), who died aged 69 and 82 respectively.

April

April saw Ruth Prawer Jhabvala (left), the Oscar-winning screenwriter of such acclaimed Merchant Ivory productions as Howards End and A Room with a View, died aged 85. George Jones (top right), the US country singer who had a string of number one songs between the 1950s and 1990s, died aged 81. And the veteran movie reviewer Roger Ebert, the first man to receive a Pulitzer Prize for film criticism, finally lost his long battle with cancer at the age of 70.

May

The world bid farewell to 92-year-old Ray Harryhausen (top left), the visual effects master whose stop-motion wizardry enhanced such movies as Jason and the Argonauts and Clash of the Titans, and 34-year-old Chris Kelly, better known as one half of 1990s rap duo Kris Kross. Two sitcom giants also went to the great green room in the sky: Dad’s Army star Bill Pertwee (bottom left), who died aged 86, and Hi-de-Hi! actor Paul Shane (bottom right), who died aged 72.

June

The death of Scottish author Iain Banks at the age of 59 came just two months after his announcement that he had terminal cancer. The same month also saw The Sopranos star James Gandolfini succumb to a heart attack in Italy aged 51. Blott on the Landscape author Tom Sharpe passed away in Spain at the age of 85, while swimming champion-turned-movie star Esther Williams died in her sleep in Los Angeles aged 91.

July

The entertainment world was rocked in July by the sudden demise of Glee star Cory Monteith (left), who died from a heroin and alcohol overdose in a Vancouver hotel aged 31. The same month saw (clockwise from top middle) Bernie Nolan die at the age of 52 following a long battle with breast cancer, comedian Mel Smith die of a heart attack aged 60, former policeman turned “tough guy” actor Dennis Farina die aged 69 and former EastEnders actress Anna Wing die at the age of 98.

August

Two literary giants signed off during the month of August: the Irish poet and Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney (top left), who died aged 74, and the crime and western author Elmore Leonard (top right), who passed away aged 87. Jon Brookes (bottom left), drummer with British indie band The Charlatans, died aged 44, while Sid Bernstein, the concert promoter who staged the Beatles and the Rolling Stones’ early US shows, died aged 95.

September

September saw us bid farewell to two broadcasting Davids. The month began with the news that Sir David Frost, the veteran interlocutor who interviewed countless presidents, prime ministers and celebrities, had died aboard the Queen Elizabeth cruise liner at the age of 74. His passing was followed by that of 87-year-old David Jacobs, the veteran radio presenter with the soothing voice whose career spanned seven decades.

October

October took with it the British sculptor Sir Anthony Caro, who died of a heart attack at the age of 89, the best-selling US author Tom Clancy, who died in Baltimore at the age of 66, and singer and former Velvet Underground frontman Lou Reed, who died at the age of 71. The month also saw the sad deaths of British film director Antonia Bird and the actor Nigel Davenport, aged 54 and 85 respectively.

November

Fans of US actor Paul Walker (left), star of the Fast and the Furious films, were stunned when he perished in a car crash on 30 November at the age of 40 along with his friend and business partner Roger Rodas. The month had earlier seen the deaths of the British Nobel Prize-winning author Doris Lessing (top right) at the age of 94 and the leading British composer Sir John Tavener at the age of 69.

December

The end of the year brought the sad departures of the legendary Lawrence of Arabia actor Peter O’Toole (left) at the age of 81, Hollywood actress Joan Fontaine, star of the Alfred Hitchcock thrillers Rebecca and Suspicion, at the age of 96, and the distinguished sports commentator David Coleman (right), who died aged 87. We also said goodbye to Paul Torday, the British author who gave us Salmon Fishing in the Yemen.

And of course, we can’t end without mentioning the passing of one of the greatest men to have walked upon this earth, Nelson Mandela. Nothing need to be said about the man, but history will remember him.

The above was blatantly ripped off the BBC News Website, they can go fuck themselves over copyright, I don’t give a fuck! 😛

1st January 2014 | Categories: 2013 | 2 Comments »

Dead Pool 29th December 2013

Welcome to the very last newsletter of 2013, and if you don’t get your lists in pronto, it will be the last one you’ll see. This is how it works, I only send out the email to the people who take part, so no list, no email and you will be forever forgotten, much like an X-factor winner from 2007.

Lets dispense some points shall we? Moomin has improved upon his ‘always score nothing’ in predicting his second death of the year! He correctly guessed Mikhail Kalashnikov would bite the bullet thus scoring himself a tidy 56 points, boosting him from the bottom of the table to the bottom quarter of the table, a giddy high for him 😛

Unless something drastic happens, with little over two days left to go, I am provisionally going to declare Dave the winner with 597 points, Rebecca second with 519 points and last years winner, Paul C, coming third with 453 points.

The rest of us are just rather shit at this game, better luck next time. I’ve included a .pdf of the lists with the email, so if you would like to double check your list, just in case I’ve missed someone, if I have, you can shout at me that I’m a shite Death Master who can’t count.

I know that Dave will not let you rest on your laurels, I’m sure his list will be as successful in 2014, so the rest of us need to get our thinking caps on, we can’t have him winning two years in a row, once is enough as he surely wont stop mentioning the fact down the pub as it is…

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Herb Geller, 85, American jazz saxophonist, pneumonia.
• Al Goldstein, 77, American publisher and pornographer, renal failure.
• David Richards, 57, British record producer.
• Addison Cresswell, 53, British comedy agent and manager.
• Mikhail Kalashnikov, 94, Russian weapons designer (AK-47, AK-74).
• Ricky Lawson, 59, American drummer (Michael Jackson, Phil Collins), brain aneurysm.
• Jeff Pollack, 54, American film director (Booty Call) and television producer (The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air), natural causes.
• Allan McKeown, 67, British film producer (Tracey Takes On…), pancreatic cancer.

In Other News

Katie Price aka Jordan has revealed that she’s feeling a bit poorly. The glamour model has had a “nightmare” in the run up to Christmas having visited the hospital over the weekend after she posted a message on her Twitter page in the early hours of Saturday morning saying she had been put on a drip by doctors. She wrote “Still soo poorly problem getting worse no meds are helping such s*** times 🙁 … Great in hospital on a drip.” She later added: “Out of hos go back again in 48 hours mri scan had morning of needles my worst nightmare, time to concentrate on getting ready for christmas.” Surely that’s the most pricks she’s seen in some time! Let’s hope she recovers, nobody would want to take her place as her son’s punchbag/sextoy.

In a quest to find another news story, I stumbled upon Paul McCartney taking a swim, who’d have thought the Daily Mail would publish such things! The sad thing is, the former Beatle, who is 71, looks far better than I do.  Must have something to do with having a younger wife, but even at 52, she also looks better than me. Maybe it’s the millionaires lifestyle, I’m sure I’d be running with joy through the surf if I had heaps of cash and a young wifelet who’s only after one thing, but who cares, she has to put up with the old man sex before she gets Linda’s share of the cash.

On This Day

• 1170 – Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, is assassinated inside Canterbury Cathedral by followers of King Henry II; he subsequently becomes a saint and martyr in the Anglican Church and the Catholic Church.
• 1851 – The first American YMCA opens in Boston, Massachusetts.
• 1860 – The first British seagoing ironclad warship, HMS Warrior is launched.
• 1890 – Wounded Knee Massacre on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, 300 Lakota killed by the US Army.
• 1937 – The Irish Free State is replaced by a new state called Ireland with the adoption of a new constitution.
• 1959 – Physicist Richard Feynman gives a speech entitled “There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom“, which is regarded as the birth of nanotechnology.
• 2003 – The last known speaker of Akkala Sami dies, rendering the language extinct.
• 2006 – UK settles its Anglo-American loan – post WWII loan debt.

Deaths

• 1170 – Thomas Becket, English archbishop (b. 1118)
• 1926 – Rainer Maria Rilke, Austrian author and poet (b. 1875)
• 1986 – Harold Macmillan, English captain and politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1894)
• 2003 – Bob Monkhouse, English comedian, actor, and game show host (b. 1928)
• 2007 – Kevin Greening, English radio host (b. 1962)
• 2012 – William Rees-Mogg, English journalist (b. 1928)

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by KoA

Nikolai Dzhumagaliev is a Kazakh serial killer and cannibal known as “Metal Fang” for his unusual white metal teeth. He was found to have killed seven women before he was caught in 1980 and it was suspected that he may have killed many more, some sources put the total number of victims at 50-100. He apparently made it his mission to rid the world of prostitutes, perhaps if he’d used their services from time to time he wouldn’t have ended up like he did.

He would stalk his victims in secluded areas in Uzun-Agach, break into their houses, then kill them. He would cannibalise his victims, drink their blood and practiced necrophilia,  sometimes fucking the stab wounds he inflicted. He would often kill his female victims with an axe, carve the meat and serve it to his friends at dinners. Nom nom…

Dzhumagaliev’s crimes were discovered when two drunk friends, whom he invited over to his house for “snacks”, found a human head and intestines in his fridge. He was found not responsible for his murders due to insanity, and he was committed to a mental institution in Tashkent.

He escaped in 1989 while being transported to another facility. It’s unknown if Dzhumagaliev committed murders during the time he was on the run, but it was suspected that he might have traveled as far as Moscow, so anything is possible.

He was re-captured in 1991 in Fergana but Dzhumagaliev’s fate in the 1990’s is unclear. Some sources said that he was released and returned to Uzun-Agach, where people remembered his crimes and humiliated him. There is no record how the Kazakh people humiliate their serial killers so we will have to use our imaginations.  However it must have been horrendous as he asked to be taken back to the asylum.

During the mid 2000’s, Dzumagaliev remained in a psychiatric clinic but doctors believed that he was cured and could be released. Dead or alive, nobody is sure where he is today…

Last Week’s Birthdays

Ralph Fiennes (51), Harry Shearer (70), Dave Murray (57), Lemmy (68), Ricky Martin (42), Stephenie Meyer (40), Ryan Seacrest (39), Louis Tomlinson (22), Jimmy Buffett (67), Sissy Spacek (64), Annie Lennox (59), Shane McGowan (56), Dido (42), Caroll Spinney (Big Bird on Sesame Street) (80), Phil Spector (74), Lars Ulrich (50), Jared Leto (42), Gerard Depardieu (65), David Knopfler (61), Stan Lee (91), Nichelle Nichols (81), Maggie Smith (79), Denzel Washington (59) and Sienna Miller (32).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next Week peeps!

29th December 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 22nd December 2013

Welcome all to the pre-Christmas edition of the Dead Pool. This edition is specially written for you, not from the deepest darkest depths of Hell, but Wales. One can argue the differences on another occasion, I for one can’t see any!

Anyhow, points! Lots of points! Two stalwarts of the Dead Pool have passed away this week, must be the cold weather. I told you there’s a lot to play for! Liz was the only one who had Joan Fontaine this year, plus she selected her as her Woman, thus garnering her 154 points! Also with Ronnie Biggs biting the bullet, Wendy, Martin, Paul C, Dave and Rebecca all scored a further 66 points. With this bout of scoring we now have two clear frontrunners with ten days to go.

Yes! 10 days to go! Do I need to remind you to get your lists sorted out and submitted? I hope not. Now if you did submit one last week to the deadpool@kingofankh.co.uk email address and didn’t get a reply from me, please resubmit it, I seemed to have had issues there so I may not have received it.

*edit* I forgot to mention Peter O’Toole, he died on the cusp of writing last weeks and publishing the blog. I thought I covered him last week, but alas I didn’t, so to make up for it, he gets his very own mention and also Ken who had him also scores 69 points!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Joan Fontaine, 96, British-American Oscar-winning actress (Rebecca, Suspicion), natural causes.
• Harold Camping, 92, American evangelist and doomsday predictor.
• Ronnie Biggs, 84, English criminal (Great Train Robbery) and fugitive.
• David Coleman, 87, British television sports commentator and presenter.
• Lord Infamous, 40, American rapper (Three 6 Mafia).
• Peter O’Toole, 81, British-Irish actor (Lawrence of Arabia, The Lion in Winter, Becket, Troy).

In Other News

London had a bad week of it, firstly theatre goers got squished by falling plaster at The Apollo, must have been a very good show to bring the house down! *ahem*. Shame it only came down on the audience, imagine the carnage if the lighting rig above the stage came down during a high profile show! So many dead actors! Andrew Lloyd Webber commented that most of London’s theatres are in such disrepair that he was surprised something like this hadn’t already happened! Maybe a list full of theatre actors is the way to go!  Jimmy Carr isn’t such a long shot anymore!

I could also mention the bus crash, but lets face it, how many celebs would be found dead on a bus? Yeah… Let us look more closely at cycling celebs, mainly politicians trying to be eco-friendly and shaming us into trying it out for ourselves but mostly looking like self-righteous cunts because we all know we’re much safer in our cars. I’d be tempted to make a list of cycling politicians and somehow finding myself hiring cars in the London area,  sadly this contravenes the rules of the Dead Pool. *sigh*

Unhappily, I can’t ignore the fact that a countryman of mine has been doing terrible things. Yes, Ian ‘H’ Watkins from the band Steps has been making music again… Seriously now, I actually mean Ian Watkins, the lead singer of The Lost Prophets. You may have heard that he’s been sentenced to 35 years for fucking a baby boy. A sentence that in this day and age is one I can almost agree upon, at least it wasn’t 10 years with parole in 5 like they usually get, although I’d much prefer guys like him to be slowly broken on the wheel over the course of a decade. Death is certainly too good for that cunt! Luckily the prison system will not favour a person of his tastes and fame, I’m giving him a couple of months before he gets shanked at the least. I’m sure that will be Mega Lolz for him. Cunt!

On This Day

• 1956 – Colo, the first gorilla to be bred in captivity, is born at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium in Ohio.
• 1965 – In the United Kingdom, a 70 mph speed limit is applied to all rural roads including motorways for the first time. Previously, there had been no speed limit.
• 1989 – Berlin‘s Brandenburg Gate re-opens after nearly 30 years, effectively ending the division of East and West Germany.
• 2001 – Richard Reid attempts to destroy a passenger airliner by igniting explosives hidden in his shoes aboard American Airlines Flight 63.
• 2010 – The repeal of the Don’t ask, don’t tell policy, the 17-year-old policy banning homosexuals serving openly in the United States military, is signed into law by President Barack Obama.

Deaths

• 1880 – George Eliot, English author and journalist (b. 1819)
• 1943 – Beatrix Potter, English author and illustrator (b. 1866)
• 1965 – Richard Dimbleby, English journalist and broadcaster (b. 1913)

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by Stu

Now this may come as quite a surprise to you. It came as somewhat of a surprise to me too, but it was something of a stab in the dark really, when I realise that I haven’t done my TFHD and it’s almost 10pm on Saturday evening… That’s right, it’s everybody’s favourite conspicuously-Caucasian Middle-Eastern Jew, Jesus Christ.

JC (as my dad calls him) was born right at the start of it all in the year 1. Some believe him not to have been born at all, and others think he was born four years before or after his own birth. Whatever the timing, it made a lot of people very angry, and has widely been regarded as a bad move.

Not a lot is known about Jesus’ early years, as the council of Nicaea  voted on which gospels to include in the bible, and basically vetoed anything that didn’t portray Jesus as being the literal son of God. The story kind of skips his adolescent years, until we catch up again with Jesus in his twilight years (his early thirties) hanging around with a bunch of dudes wearing dresses. He is believed to have performed miracles such as walking on water, trapping mobile  phones in glass bottles and walking down the side of a skyscraper.

It could be said that Jesus was the first hippy. Maybe everybody was just tripping on LSD when he showed up at Woodstock in AD29 trying to feed five thousand people with a couple of fish sandwiches. To cut a long story short, he preached a different kind of Judaism, that cut out all the blood-and-thunder anger and vengeance of the Old Testament.

The Jewish elders didn’t take to this too kindly, especially Jesus’ claims to be a direct line to God – they wanted the monopoly on salvation all to themselves. They tag-teamed with the Roman governor Pontius Pilate to have Jesus arrested and crucified as an example to others  who would dare try to usurp their power and authority.

Whether you believe Jesus was the literal son of God, or that he was just some crazy fucker who woke up one day with dreams of appearing on some Texan woman’s toast, if he hadn’t pissed off the Jews and gotten himself killed then there would be no Christmas. Fair enough, there wouldn’t be any Christians either, and the world would have probably been a much more peaceful place for the last 2000 years, but when it comes down to a toss up between world peace and free socks, I know what I would choose.

Don’t try to pretend you wouldn’t make the same choice as me. Thank fuck he’s dead, and merry Christmas to all you sick fuckers.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Tim Conway (80), Cindy Birdsong (74), Dave Clark (71), Don Johnson (64), Stuart Townsend (41), Liv Ullman (75), Benny Anderson (67), Billy Gibbons (64), Bernard Hill (69) Ernie Hudson (68), Eugene Levy (67), Paul Rodgers (64), Bill Pullman (60), Sarah Dallin of Bananarama (52), Laurie Holden (44), Milla Jovovich (38), Keith Richards (70), Steven Spielberg (67), Leonard Maltin (63), Ray Liotta (58), Brad Pitt (50), Katie Holmes (35),  Christina Aguilera (33), Jennifer Beals (50), Kristy Swanson (44), Alyssa Milano (41), Jake Gyllenhaal (33), John Hillerman (81), Jenny Agutter (61), Jonah Hill (30), Phil Donahue (78),  Jane Fonda (76), Samuel L. Jackson (65), Kiefer Sutherland (47) and Julie Delpy (44).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next Week peeps!

22nd December 2013 | Categories: 2013 | 2 Comments »

Dead Pool 15th December 2013

Here we are again, where does the time go? No points to award this week but with little over two weeks left to go, I’m hoping for a late surge of point scoring. I wont moan at you to get your lists in just yet, but please remember to work on them, the more of you that join in the greater the hilarity will be. Try to think outside the box, all of the lists looking the same also begets a boring year. Try to find those young cancer sufferers or potential drug overdoses for example, the younger they are at time of death the more points you will get!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Don Mitchell, 70, American actor (Ironside, I Dream of Jeannie, CHiPs).
• Eleanor Parker, 91, American actress (The Sound of Music, Detective Story), pneumonia.
• Audrey Totter, 95, American actress (Medical Center).
• Jang Sung-taek, 67, North Korean politician, Vice-Chairman of the National Defence Commission (2010–2013), executed.
• Wyn Roberts, Baron Roberts of Conwy, 83, Welsh politician, MP for Conwy (1970–1997).

In Other News

Things aren’t going well for N-Dubz, a couple of weeks ago Dappy got kicked in the face by a horse, now we have Tulisa Contostavlos being charged with supplying class A drugs! The singer and former X Factor judge must be finding times hard if she has to peddle some cocaine, perhaps she should have found more discerning customers other than a Sun journalist, maybe Nigella Lawson. Looks like she’ll be going down because she’s been caught with her hand in the cookie jar, so a stint in a class A prison might be enough to send the only musical member of N-Dubz to suicide?

If you are struggling with your Dead Pool list, worry not, you might not have to complete one. Apparently the super volcano underneath Yellowstone National Park has been found to be nearly three times larger than originally thought and well overdue for a little bang. They now estimate that the cavern is around 55 miles in diameter and should it decide to explode, it would decimate the entire North American Continent and bugger up the climate for the rest of us. The only saving grace is the fact that it is in America, it has blown before but the rest of us survived, so happy days!

I suppose we cannot continue without mentioning the Mandela Mourning Period. Of course, such a great man deserves all the honours a country can bestow upon him, he is after all the modern day Gandhi.

But the media, rather than celebrating the life of the man himself,  have taken it upon themselves to concentrate upon other things, like the well hired Thamsanqa Jantjie, the slightly bonkers sign language interpreter who can’t sign for toffee, turns out he’s also a violent schizophrenic with a criminal history. You have to admire the guys cajones, a lesser man wouldn’t have the balls to stand at one of the worlds most televised moments in modern history and wing it! Less said about him the better.

We also have Desmond Tutu, moaning that he wasn’t invited. Well, I’m sure that the millions of others that attended weren’t invited either mate, so stop spitting out your dummy  and man up! I doubt anybody would have checked the guest list, you’re fucking Desmond Tutu!

They also pounced upon the Obama, Cameron and Schmidt selfie. Both men swooped on the chance of taking a picture with one of politics most attractive female representatives, much to Michelle Obama’s disgust, I’m sure Barak didn’t get his Presidential blow job that evening!

Not content with putting his foot in it once, Obama then shook hands with our old Cuban friend, Raúl Castro, oops! He must be taking advice from Prince Philip, but let’s be honest here, I bet he didn’t even recognise him.

On This Day

• 1791 – The United States Bill of Rights becomes law when ratified by the Virginia General Assembly, thus granting all Americans to bear arms and kill each other with impunity.
• 1890 – Hunkpapa Lakota leader Sitting Bull killed on Standing Rock Indian Reservation, leading to the Wounded Knee Massacre.
• 1906 – The London Underground‘s Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway opens.
• 1933 – The Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution officially becomes effective, repealing the Eighteenth Amendment that prohibited the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol.
• 1939 – Gone with the Wind receives its premiere at Loew’s Grand Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia, United States.
• 1970 – Soviet spacecraft Venera 7 successfully land on Venus. It is the first successful soft landing on another planet.
• 1973 – The American Psychiatric Association votes 13–0 to remove homosexuality from its official list of psychiatric disorders, the DSM-II.
• 1981 – A suicide car bombing targeting the Iraqi embassy in Beirut, Lebanon levels the embassy and kills 61 people, including Iraq’s ambassador to Lebanon. The attack is considered the first modern suicide bombing.

Deaths

• 1675 – Johannes Vermeer, Dutch painter (b. 1632)
• 1878 – Alfred Bird, English chemist and manufacturer, invented baking powder (b. 1811)
• 1890 – Sitting Bull, Lakota-American tribal chief (b. 1831)
• 1944 – Glenn Miller, American bandleader and composer (b. 1904)
• 1962 – Charles Laughton, English actor (b. 1899)
• 1966 – Walt Disney, American animator, director, screenwriter, producer and actor, co-founded the Walt Disney Company (b. 1901)

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by Stu

My, oh my. And you thought Blackbeard was a cunt. Wait until you meet Francois L’Ollonais.

This is the guy who makes the Cyberdemon from the end of Doom look like a little pussy. From the age of fifteen he was an indentured servant in the Caribbean where he endured incredibly harsh conditions which no doubt fuelled his misanthropic leanings. At least it wasn’t his smothering mother this time.

Upon his release he moved to Tortuga (where they were just about to start filming Pirates of the Caribbean) and signed up with a ship load of bastards looking for a right old fucking time. I should point out that L’Ollonais wasn’t a pirate, he was a privateer- meaning he had free rein from the French king to do pretty much whatever the fuck he wanted to the Spanish, which he did with immense enjoyment.

Before long he had a crew of his own, an impressive won-lost record and a fearsome reputation for violence. When the governor of one of the Spanish Territories sent a team out to kill his crew and take him prisoner, our hero snuck up on them, killed all but one of their number and sent him back with a message vowing never again to show mercy on the Spanish.

His killing techniques were brutal as fuck, and probably could have made a terminator run crying to its mummy. He once tore out the heart of one of his captives, ate a piece of it and threw it in another prisoner’s face all before it had a chance to stop beating. He liked to dismember prisoners bit by bit, starting with the hands and working inwards in order to keep his victims alive as long as possible. He perfected the technique of “woolding” which, obviously, is the practice of tying rope around someone’s head, and tightening it gradually until their eyes burst out.

Unfortunately for him, his constant run-ins with his Spanish enemies eventually led to his undoing. Attempting a one-ship invasion of Nicaragua, he crashed onto a sandbar, and was captured by the Spanish. He did manage to escape – but ran straight into the open arms (and cooking pots) of the Darien tribe, who meted out some rough justice of their own, cooking him alive and eating him. Possibly with L’Ollondaise sauce.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Taylor Swift (24), Jamie Foxx (46), Judi Dench (79), John Malkovich (60), Nicki Minaj (31), Kim Basinger (60)!!, Dick Van Dyke (88), Teri Hatcher (49), Kirk Douglas (97), Ann Coulter (52), Steve Buscemi (56), Sinead O’Conner (47), Donny Osmond (56), Vanessa Hudgens (25), Ted Nugent (65), Jennifer Connelly (43), Beau Bridges (72), Dionne Warwick (73), Christopher Plummer (84), Kenneth Branagh (53) and Dominic Monaghan (37).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

15th December 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 1st December 2013

Another week, another newsletter. This week we have no points to award but we are now in the final month countdown with Dave in the lead with an impressive 531 points, correctly predicting six out of thirteen deaths, consisting of the first death of the year and both his Cert and Woman. Embarrassingly I’m in second place with 355 points with Emily hot on my heels with 349. All to play for with the cold weather in front of us with plenty of points still to be had, so Dave’s seemingly unassailable lead could easily crumble.

Now onto 2014. If you need a rules refresher, please visit http://thedeadpool.rip/the-rules/ You can also point anyone who wants to join in for 2014 in that direction.

For 2014, I’d like you to fill in a spreadsheet I’ve prepared to help on the admin side, because there’s quite a few of us nowadays it would save me a lot of time if you could download the form and fill it in. There are various formats there for you to choose from, if you have any problems just contact me. These forms can be downloaded from http://thedeadpool.rip/downloads/.

I can’t stress enough that you must get your entries in by the closing date, you may not realise how much actual work goes into producing all of this on a weekly basis so the less time I have to spend chasing you for 13 names the better 😛

I’m also looking for guest editors, Stu has been amazing with his weekly TFHD, which I’m sure you all enjoy reading, I know I do, if you have an idea you would like to try please let me know. It doesn’t have to be a weekly thing, maybe a monthly or quarterly edition, every little helps as Tesco’s are so fond of saying, although those cunts prefer to screw both their suppliers, workers and customers, with me I’ll just want to screw you… 😛

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Robin Leigh-Pemberton, Baron Kingsdown, 86, British peer and banker, Governor of the Bank of England (1983–1993).
• Stan Stennett, 88, Welsh comic entertainer, actor and jazz musician, complications following stroke.
• John Galbraith Graham, 92, British crossword compiler (“Araucaria” of The Guardian) and Church of England priest.
• Lewis Collins, 67, British actor (The Professionals), cancer.
• Jean Kent, 92, English actress (The Browning Version), complications from a fall.
• Paul Walker, 40, American actor (The Fast and the Furious, Pleasantville, Into the Blue), traffic collision.
• Elwood, 8, American Chinese crested/chihuahua dog, World’s Ugliest Dog (2007).

 In Other News

Hot on the heels of last weeks revelation by Hugh Jackman that he contracted skin cancer, Vinnie Jones decided he wanted in on some of that hot shit. The 48-year-old, who turned to acting after hanging up his football boots says cancer is his ‘toughest and scariest opponent yet’. Vinnie found a lump under his eye, and did’t know whether it was a wart or a spot until he went to get it checked out. Turns out this pimple was CANCER!!! Since his diagnosis he’s had three operations to remove two patches under his eye and one on the back of his head. Unsurprisingly he’s also advocating you should get things checked out, unlike a real man who just chews the cancer off his face between a snakes fang and a polar bear canine, whilst they are both still alive!

The N-Dubz rapper Dappy has been hospitalised after a horse he was riding kicked him in the face His doctors reported they found it hard to notice any difference between the before and after pictures. Apparently he was riding the horse at his Hertfordshire home when it threw him and stamped on his face, I can only empathise with the horse, as I’m sure you do. Lets hope that a tractor takes exception to him next time…

For fans of Family Guy, we are all shocked at the news that Brian the Dog is being killed off. He might have been just an eight-year-old animated labrador to some, but to devotees of the show, Brian Griffin was top dog in the world of cartoon canines and will be sorely missed. Brian will be killed by a car. On the plus side, this means the troubled mutt never get’s to use the gun he always carried in case he needed to commit suicide. On the downside, the Griffins have apparently already bought a new dog called Vinny as a replacement. Monsters!

We also have Ian Watkins of The Lost Prophets found guilty of fucking a baby. Yeah, I know, shame we can’t just send him off to hell as soon as possible, along with those two mothers who let this happen due to ‘celeb eyes’. He’s going to be sentenced shortly, so without doubt he will be jailed in a top security prison which will hopefully put him in harms way from the other inmates. My guess is he’ll last all of three minutes, nobody likes a manipulative cunt, let alone a paedophile.  I only feel sorry for H from Steps, who shares his name, sadly he received a barrage of abuse online and a case of mistaken identity when his photo was used by Entertainment Online instead of the real cunto! *sigh*

On This Day

• 1420 – Henry V of England enters Paris. The City, not Hilton…
• 1885 – First serving of the soft drink Dr Pepper at a drug store in Waco, Texas.
• 1913 – The Ford Motor Company introduces the first moving assembly line.
• 1919 – Lady Astor becomes the first female Member of Parliament to take her seat in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom.
• 1952 – The New York Daily News reports the news of Christine Jorgensen, the first notable case of sexual reassignment surgery.
• 1955 – American Civil Rights Movement: In Montgomery, Alabama, seamstress Rosa Parks refuses to give up her bus seat to a white man and is arrested for violating the city’s racial segregation laws, an incident which leads to the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
• 1990 – Channel Tunnel sections started from the United Kingdom and France meet 40 metres beneath the seabed.

Deaths

• 1866 – George Everest, Welsh geographer and surveyor, namesake of Mt. Everest (b. 1790)
• 1947 – Aleister Crowley, English occultist and author (b. 1875)
• 2007 – Anton Rodgers, English actor and director (b. 1933)

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by Stu

This weeks TFHD is homegrown “hero” Michael Ryan. The unemployed labourer and (apparently) antiques dealer was responsible for the Hungerford massacre on 19th August, 1987.

Like so many of these lunatics I’ve written about in the past few weeks, Ryan had what was described as an unhealthy relationship with his mother, the Guardian wrote that she spoiled him, and that he was a “mummy’s boy”

His first victim was Susan Godfrey, who was out having a picnic with her children, aged 2 & 4. He spared the children, who sought help from a pensioner they met, telling her “a man in black has shot our mummy”

After a failed attempt to kill a petrol station cashier, he returned home to load his car with guns, shoot the dogs and torch the place. The car wouldn’t start, so he shot that too. He made his way through the town, shooting young and old indiscriminately as he went. He shot at PC Roger Brereton 23 times, hitting him with four bullets. The officer died sat in his car radioing for help. A couple who drove into the step rest just after the police car were shot at, but managed to escape with their lives.

Ryan’s mother soon turned up, and was understandably shocked to find half the street on fire and dead bodies everywhere. She tried to reason with her son, so he shot and killed her too. An old lady in a house nearby narrowly escaped with her life after coming outside to tell Ryan to keep the bloody noise down.

In the town centre he continued his rampage, shooting at drivers who had ironically been diverted through the scene of the carnage as police attempts to contain the spree started to go tits-up. He killed Douglas Wainwright, the constable who had signed Ryan’s gun license extension only two weeks before. A brave soldier, Carl Harries, was in the town at the time and attempted to give first aid to those who were wounded and dying.

Michael Ryan’s end came in the school he went to as a child. After locking himself inside, police surrounded the building, and sensing no escape, he stuck his beretta in his mouth and pulled the trigger.

The Hungerford massacre was one of the worst firearms atrocities committed in the UK, alongside Dunblaine and the Cumbria Shootings, and led to the Firearms (Amendment) 1988.

There are many references to the Hungerford massacre in popular culture, including the Radiohead song Sulk, Marvel comics antihero Pete Wisdom’s backstory includes his mother being one of the victims, Morrissey continued his long standing tradition of cheerfulness with Michael’s Bones and the Goldie Lookin Chain song Guns Don’t Kill People, Rappers Do includes the line “Like Michael Ryan about to snap, guns don’t kill people, it’s just rap”

Last Week’s Birthdays

Ben Stiller (48), Don Cheadle (49), Christina Applegate (42), Ed Harris (63), Tina Turner (74), Jon Stewart (51), Elisha Cuthbert (31), Billy Idol (58), Anna Faris (37), Judd Nelson (54), Randy Newman (70), Tom Sizemore (52), Robin Givens (49), Stephen  Merchant (39), Katie Cassidy (27), Joel Cohen (59), Kathryn Bigelow (62), Mandy Patinkin (61), Riley Scott (76), Percy Sledge (72), Bruno Tonioli (58), Peter Facinelli (40), Natasha Bedingfield (32) and Bill Nye (58).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next Week peeps!

1st December 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 24th November 2013

Welcome once again to the weekly Dead Pool Newsletter. As per usual we have a dearth of famous deaths but hopefully we’ve managed to compile an interesting if not readable effort nevertheless. What I did notice this week was the amount of gorgeous MILF birthdays there are, maybe I’m getting a bit desperate in the trouser department, see what you think…

Without further ado…

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Sheila Matthews Allen, 84, American actress (The Towering Inferno, The Poseidon Adventure), pulmonary fibrosis.
• Diane Disney Miller, 79, American philanthropist, complications from a fall.
• Marc Breaux, 89, American choreographer (The Sound of Music, Mary Poppins).
• Joseph Paul Franklin, 63, American serial killer, executed by lethal injection.
• Frederick Sanger, 95, British biochemist, laureate of Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1958, 1980).

In Other News

Heart throb and Wolverine actor Hugh Jackman has disclosed that he’s had treatment for cancer. The Australian found a small mark on his nose and at the insistence of his wife he sought medical advice and found he had skin cancer on his schnoz. Luckily it seems to have been operable and they only had to take half his face away. He’s now advocating that everyone use sunscreen. Sounds to me his little fall was a bit more death defying than his cancer.

In a prime example of Darwinism in action, rapper George Watsky thought it would be a fine idea to do a stage dive, from a lighting gantry 35ft above the stage. Unsurprisingly he fell to the floor with a bump injuring himself and a couple of audience members who were a bit too slow to move out of the way like everyone else did. It’s not the first time he’s done this either, last month, he posted a series of pictures on his Facebook page showing himself jump off a first floor balcony into a crowd while wearing a green Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle costume. Good call for next year I think…

Argentine President, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner has returned to work after undergoing brain surgery. The 60 year old politician had surgery in October to remove a blood clot on her brain found during routine checks after a fall that was suspected to have been brought on by low blood pressure due her lack of a thyroid. Her illness forced her to abandon campaigning for mid-term congressional elections meaning that her allies suffered heavy losses in the 27 October vote, and Ms Fernandez had her majority in Congress reduced. This puts an end to any speculation that she may try to amend the constitution to allow her to run for a third term in office, thank god…

On This Day

• 1429 – Joan of Arc unsuccessfully besieges La Charité.
• 1642 – Abel Tasman becomes the first European to discover the island Van Diemen’s Land (later renamed Tasmania).
• 1859 – Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species.
• 1962 – The influential British satirical television programme That Was the Week That Was is first broadcast.
• 1963 – Lee Harvey Oswald, the convicted assassin of President John F. Kennedy, is murdered two days after the assassination, by Jack Ruby in the basement of Dallas police department headquarters. The shooting happens to be broadcast live on television.
• 1971 – During a severe thunderstorm over Washington state, a hijacker calling himself Dan Cooper (AKA D. B. Cooper) parachutes from a Northwest Orient Airlines plane with $200,000 in ransom money. He has never been found.

Deaths

• 1963 – Lee Harvey Oswald, American assassin of John F. Kennedy (b. 1939).
• 1982 – Barack Obama, Sr., Kenyan economist (b. 1936).
• 1991 – Freddie Mercury, Tanzanian-English singer-songwriter and producer (Queen) (b. 1946).

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by Stu

This week we have the terrible tale of Albert Fish.

Hamilton “Albert” Fish is known as one of America’s most notorious child murderers and cannibals. He was born in Washington, DC, in 1870 into a family with an already-established history of mental illness. After his father died his mother put him into an orphanage where he was treated sadistically, he eventually grew to enjoy the physical pain the beatings brought.

After he was removed from the orphanage, he began a relationship with a telegraph boy, who taught him to drink urine and eat faeces a la Bear Grylls (I’m not ever so certain that Mr Grylls really has much experience in the latter.) He also began hanging round public baths in order to see naked boys, and writing obscene letters to women whose names he found in classified ads.

By 1890 he had become a prostitute, and began raping young boys. A visit to a waxworks museum where he saw a model of a bisected penis turned him in to the concept of genital mutilation, and the next few years saw him spiral out of control, experimenting with self flagellation, making his own children paddle his backside with a nail-embedded board, and sticking long pins through his groin and perineum.

The murder for which he is probably best known, is that of 10-year-old Grace Budd. Having befriended her family, he abducted Grace on the pretence of taking her to a birthday party. Having stripped naked in order to avoid getting blood on his clothes, he strangled the girl, cut her up and ate her flesh. In a letter to her family in which he described the killing, and how he himself became hooked on eating children, he chillingly finished with the line “How sweet and tender her little ass was roasted in the oven. It took me 9 days to eat her entire body. I did not fuck her tho I could of (sic) had I wished. She died a virgin.” So at least that was some consolation for the Budd family.

He boasted that he “had children in every state” and hinted that his tally of victims could have been over a hundred. He was executed on January 16th, 1936 in the electric chair of Sing Sing prison, New York. After his death, his lawyer claimed to be in possession of Fish’s “Final Statement” which had been written by the murderer in the hours before his execution. When he was pressed to reveal the contents of the statement, he refused. “I will never show it to anyone” he said. “It was the most filthy string of obscenities I have ever read.”

Last Week’s Birthdays

Scarlett Johansson (29), Owen Wilson (45), Miley Cyrus (21), Rachel McAdams (35), Danny DeVito (69), Mark Ruffalo (46), Jamie Lee Curtis (55), Goldie Hawn (68), Joe Binden (71), Jodie Foster (51), Larry King (80), Meg Ryan (52), Carly Rae Jepsen (28), Bjork (48), Bo Derek (57), Martin Scorsese (71), RuPaul (53), Linda Evans (71), Delroy Lindo (61), Sean Young (54), Michael Kenneth Williams (47), Boris Becker (46), Mariel Hemingway (52) and Billy Jean King (70).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next Week peeps!

24th November 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 17th November 2013

We have a winner! Dave correctly guessed that Britain’s oldest person would die this year, and lo she did, sadly she was the last person to have been born in the 1800’s that was still alive. So Dave now extends his lead over everyone else by a further 37 points! With little over seven weeks left to go this year, Dave’s lead looks certain, but who knows what will happen.

We also have to welcome a new member to the Dead Pool, Vic & Stu managed to bring a new life into the world in the form of a bouncing 9lb 3oz baby boy. I’m sure we would all like to send our congratulations to all three of them.

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Dennis Livson, 66, Finnish producer of children’s programs, founder of the Moomin World theme park.
• Sir John Tavener, 69, British composer (Children of Men).
• Al Ruscio, 89, American actor (The Godfather Part III, Showgirls).
• Grace Jones, 113, British supercentenarian, oldest person in the United Kingdom and world’s sixth-oldest person.
• Doris Lessing, 94, British novelist, poet, playwright and librettist, Nobel laureate in Literature (2007).

In Other News

There seems to be some unrest in the world of politics of late. The Colombian government says it has uncovered a plot by the country’s largest rebel group, the Farc, to kill the former president, Alvaro Uribe. Sadly they have now reinforced the security surrounding the former president, but even so, he might be a good shout for next year.

We also heard that a heavily armed taxi driver was caught on his way to kill David Cameron. Irfaq Naz was stopped in London with a 950,000-volt stun gun, a Samurai sword and masking tape in his Vauxhall Astra. Naz, 34, also had hammers, kitchen knives and a machete when he was stopped in July after going the wrong way down a north London street. If only he observed the Highway Code, we might all be happier people right now. Nick Clegg refuted allegations he was behind the plot.

Former South African president Nelson Mandela is now unable to speak but uses facial expressions to communicate. Winnie Madikizela-Mandela said the 95-year-old remained “quite ill” but she dismissed speculation that he was on a life support machine. Things seem to be looking rather grim for the old chap, maybe we are in for a points windfall before the year is out!

On This Day

• 1855 – David Livingstone becomes the first European to see the Victoria Falls in what is now present-day Zambia–Zimbabwe.
• 1947 – American scientists John Bardeen and Walter Houser Brattain observe the basic principles of the transistor, a key element for the electronics revolution of the 20th century.
• 1973 – Watergate scandal: In Orlando, Florida, U.S. President Richard Nixon tells 400 Associated Press managing editors “I am not a crook.”

Deaths

• 1917 – Auguste Rodin, French sculptor (b. 1840).
• 1968 – Mervyn Peake, English poet, author, and illustrator (b. 1911)

Thank Fuck He’s Dead

Today we have Ed Gein.

Now, I imagine that quite a few of you may have heard of Mr. Gein. If you haven’t, then chances are you are a bit more familiar with some of the horror movie characters he has inspired; Psycho‘s Norman Bates, Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and Jamie Gumb (A.K.A Buffalo Bill from The Silence of the Lambs) being the most well-known.

So you can probably guess that Gein didn’t fuck about. As far as totally screwed-up individuals go, he ticked all the boxes. For much of his early life he was a devoted momma’s boy and didn’t see many people beyond her and his brother, Henry. Henry wasn’t nearly as complimentary of their mother as Ed was, and there were suspicions that Ed was the one who offed his brother in a marshfield one day, though nothing was ever brought against him for this.

Old momma Gein pegged it in December 1945, leaving Ed all alone with his thoughts. Instead of just getting on with it like a normal, rational person however, Gein decided he needed to become a woman. Unlike most transgender people though, he figured the best way to achieve this would be to remove dead peoples skins and make suits from them (Leatherface and Buffalo Bill there for you.)

Much of his unusual haul (bowls made from the tops of skulls, belts made from nipples, the usual John Lewis collection sort of stuff) came from graves he robbed, but it wasn’t against his convictions to kill women for their skin either. Oh, he also had a shoe box full of vulvas.

And a lampshade made from somebody’s face.

He was rumbled when police investigated the disappearance of Bernice Worden. They found her decapitated body “dressed out like a deer” hanging by the wrists in his shed. Did I mention he had a pair of lips on a drawstring for his window shade?

Having initially been declared not guilty due to insanity, he was placed in a high security mental institution until eleven years later, when he was declared sane enough to stand trial and found guilty- due to prohibitive costs he was only tried for one murder. Because he was still considered insane he was held for the rest of his life in hospital.

I wish I could tell you that he met his end at the hands of another inmate, who cut off his face and wore it as budgie smugglers (or another amusingly ironic scenario) but the sad truth is that Gein died of respiratory failure in 1984 at the ripe old age of 77. After his burial, morbid souvenir hunters chipped away fragments of his gravestone, before some greedy sod stole the whole thing in 2000. When they got it back a year later, they kept it under lock and key in the Waushara sheriffs department.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Anne Hathaway (31), Ryan Gosling (33), Whoopi Goldberg (64), Gerard Butler (44), Maggie Gyllenhall (36), Prince Charles (65), Demi Moore (51), Leonardo DiCaprio (39), Neil Young (68), Calista Flockhart (49), Beverly D’Angelo (62), Wallace Shawn (70), Anni-Frid Lyngstad (68) and Chad Kroeger (39).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next Week peeps!

17th November 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 10th November 2013

Well, this week is a bit thin on the ground, I could just  about recognise two names from the Wiki list of notable deaths and even then they’re only vaguely famous. I only remembered who John Cole was because he was a Spitting Image puppet and Steve Prescott came up as a potential name for my own list due to cancer. So I will apologise now for the lack of point scoring or deaths of importance this week, even though I sent out those flying monkeys!! However, I will now put you all into shock mode, the original Karate Kid, Ralph Macchio, is now 51 years old!!!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• John Cole, 85, British broadcaster and journalist, BBC political editor (1981–1992).
• Steve Prescott, 39, English rugby league player, stomach cancer.

In Other News

Justin Bieber has incensed fans in Brazil after storming off stage because someone threw a water bottle at him. The bottle knocked the microphone out of the hand of the 19 year old  ‘singer’, who looked into the crowd before turning and walking off without even saying goodbye! A Twitter account created for the offending water bottle already has two million followers. One post read: “Stop judging me, I just wanted to touch Justin like the rest of you.”  I for one wished the bottle was made of glass and smashed him in the skull, alas we’re not that lucky.

Ireland’s former prime minister Bertie Ahern was assaulted in a Dublin pub last Friday night. Ahern was attacked with a crutch by a man in his forties inside the Sean O’Casey bar just off O’Connell Street. His attacker, who was said to be extremely drunk, was later arrested by the Garda and detained overnight in a city centre police station. The former Taoiseach has declined to talk about the attack, which comes three years after he was verbally abused by a number of customers in another Dublin pub. Shame this wasn’t a story about Cameron and a gun. *sigh*

On This Day

• 1871 – Henry Morton Stanley locates missing explorer and missionary, Dr. David Livingstone in Ujiji, near Lake Tanganyika, famously greeting him with the words, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”.
• 1951 – Direct-dial coast-to-coast telephone service begins in the United States.
• 1969 – National Educational Television (the predecessor to the Public Broadcasting Service) in the United States debuts the children’s television program Sesame Street.
• 1989 – German citizens begin to bring the Berlin wall down.

Deaths

• 1982 – Leonid Brezhnev, Soviet general and politician.
• 2006 – Jack Palance, American actor.
• 2010 – Dino De Laurentiis, Italian film producer.

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by Stu

This week we have Jürgen Bartsch. Born Karl-Heinz Sadrozinski, this crazy Kraut was adopted at eleven months and his name changed to Jurgen (at least it wasn’t Count Grishnack) by his mother, an OCD clean-freak butcher’s wife from Langenberg. His mother forbade him to play with other children, lest he become dirty, and bathed him herself until he was nineteen – probably a good place to start if you wanted to look for an explanation for his crimes.

He killed his first victim in 1961, at the age of fifteen. He lured his victims, aged between 8 and 13, into an abandoned air raid shelter, where he would undress them and sexually abuse them. Once they were dead, he would dismember the bodies. This hit a snag when he left his fifth victim, Peter Frese, before killing him. Frese managed to burn through his bindings using a candle that had been left by Bartsch and escaped from the shelter.

When he was arrested, Bartsch confessed openly. Originally sentenced to life imprisonment, this was later reduced to ten years of juvenile imprisonment, after which he was placed in psychiatric care.

Psychiatric reports recommended three possible courses of action to rehabilitate Jurgen; psychotherapy, psychosurgery, or castration. After initially refusing any form of surgery, he quickly changed his mind and opted for castration in order to avoid having to spend the rest of his life in a mental hospital. On April 28, 1976, he went into the operating theatre where an inexperienced nurse unfortunately (or fortunately perhaps) gave him a massive accidental overdose of Halothane which killed him. Karma’s a bitch.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Emma Stone (25), Matthew McConaughey (44), Sam Rockwell (45), Sally Field (67), Lamar Odom (34), Dolph Lundgren (56), Brian Adams (54), Gordon Ramsay (47), Ethan Hawke (43), Laura Bush (67), Tara Reid (38), Lou Ferrigno (62), Thandie Newton (41), P Diddy (44), Roseanne Barr (61), Tatum O’Neil (49), Art Garfunkel (72), Famke Janssen (48), Robert Patrick (55), Maria Shriver (58), Loretta Swift (75), Gretchen Mol (41), Rebecca Romijn (41), Tilda Swinton (53), Ralph Macchio (51), Billy Graham (95) and Jack Osbourne (28).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next Week peeps!

10th November 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 3rd November 2013

What a week! Without Lou Reed I’d have struggled to recognise a single ‘celebrity’ death! Sure I know their faces once I looked them up, but seriously! With less than two months to go for this years pool, things are moving too slowly. I think we need to send out the flying monkeys so we can start scoring again, failing that we all better start praying to Satan for some divine intervention.

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Nigel Davenport, 85, English actor (Chariots of Fire, Howards’ Way).
• Lou Reed, 71, American rock musician (The Velvet Underground) and songwriter (“Walk on the Wild Side“), liver disease.
• Graham Stark, 91, English comedian and actor (The Pink Panther, Superman III, Alfie), stroke.
• Paul Dennis Reid, 55, American convicted murderer.

In Other News

David Beckham has been involved in a car accident which saw his $76k Range Rover hit by another vehicle near his Beverly Hills home. The former England captain was behind the wheel and accompanied by his 14-year-old son Brooklyn when the collision happened. According to reports, the 38-year-old pulled out of his driveway and was hit by an oncoming car driven by a woman. Beckham and his son were sadly unharmed, but this is the second time both have been involved in a crash. In 2011, the two had a “lucky escape” when their vehicle was involved in a pile-up on one of the busiest roads in Los Angeles. Maybe next time…

You may have missed the fact that DJ Paul Gambaccini has been arrested as part of Operation Yewtree. The latest DJ from the Savile camp is now under lock and key and the BBC have pulled his Saturday night show from the radio, which is a great shame because the replacement show was utter tripe! Time will tell if he’s guilty or not, maybe he’ll take the same route as Savile’s former driver and kill himself, so perhaps Gambo is a good shout for next year!

Tranmere midfielder Joe Thompson has been diagnosed with cancer. The 24-year-old has not played for Rovers since September due to feeling ill and medical tests have since found the former Rochdale winger has contracted nodular sclerosing Hodgkin’s disease. Thompson will now undergo a six-month course of chemotherapy. I’m sure we all wish him well during his treatment, but just in case, I expect to see his name on a few lists in a couple of months time.

On This Day

• 1783 – John Austin, a highwayman, is the last person to be publicly hanged at London‘s Tyburn gallows.
• 1918 – Poland declares its independence from Russia.
• 1954 – The first Godzilla film is released and marks the first appearance of the character of the same name.
• 1957 – Sputnik program: The Soviet Union launches Sputnik 2. On board is the first animal to enter orbit, a dog named Laika.
• 1976 – Sissy Spacek creeps out audiences in the horror movie Carrie.
• 1978 – The family sitcom Diff’rent Strokes premieres on NBC in 1978.

Deaths

• 1926 – Annie Oakley, American target shooter.
• 1954 – Henri Matisse, French painter and sculptor.
• 1957 – Laika, Soviet dog. I never said she made it back…
• 1998 – Bob Kane, American writer and illustrator.
• 2002 – Lonnie Donegan, Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by Stu

This week’s TFHD is Euronymous. Ok, so he wasn’t really called Euronymous; Øystein Aarseth was the founder of Norwegian black metal band Mayhem, and originally went by the pseudonym “Destructor” before he renamed himself after the little-known Greek flesh-eating demon of the underworld, Euronymos. Seriously, I’m not making this up.

What sets Aarseth apart from previous entries in this column is that he (probably) didn’t kill anybody. However, this guy was pretty fucked up. A self-confessed satanist, he participated in the 1992 burning of Holmenkollen chapel but his stand-out what the fuck moment came two years earlier, when the lead singer of Mayhem, Per “Dead” Ohlin committed suicide at the house the two shared.

Now if you came home to find your roommate had just blown his brains out all over the walls and floor, you probably wouldn’t react the same way Aarseth did – he phoned bassist Necrobutcher (yes, Necrobutcher) and told him “Dead has done something really cool! He’s killed himself!” In a whirlwind of commercial brilliance he reassured Necrobutcher; “Relax, I have photos of everything!”

Aarseth posed the body of his friend, careful to make sure he arranged the shotgun, bloody knife and brain tastefully, and took photos – one of which was used as an album cover for a bootleg release, Dawn of the Black Hearts (check it out, it’s all over the internet.) It was rumoured that he made a stew out of bits of Dead’s brain, and made necklaces for other “worthy” musicians from fragments of skull. The band later denied the first rumour – but confirmed the second.

He was stabbed to death in 1993 by fellow metaller Count Grishnack (not his real name) in an attack that some speculate was to out-do a previous murder Grishnack had committed, though he claimed that Euronymous had planned to tie him up, electrocute him, and torture him to death on video. The whole story will probably never be known, but the fact remains that Øystein Aarseth was absolutely bat-shit crazy, and to put it bluntly, a bit of a dick.

In March 2012 a Norwegian airline held a public vote to pick a famous Norwegian whose picture would adorn the aircraft. Aarseth was leading the poll but his name was removed from the campaign after his family’s request.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Winona Rider (42), Joaquin Phoenix (39), Toni Collette (41), Jenny McCarthy (41), Julia Roberts (46), Richard Dreyfuss (66), Kelly Osbourne (29), Henry Winkler (68), Matt Smith (31), Charlie Daniels (77), David Shwimmer (47), Bill Gates (58), Simon Le Bon (55), Matthew Morrison (35), Anthony Kiedis (51), John Cleese (74), Vanilla Ice (46), Lyle Lovett (56), Dennis Franz (69), Nelly (39), Peter Jackson (52), Diego Maradona (53) and K.D. Lang (52).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next Week peeps!

3rd November 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 27th October 2013

This week poses a question, with the sad death of Marcia Wallace, the voice of Mrs Krabappel in The Simpsons, would this mean the character she played would have to die? Would we need to award points for both, or even more as she did many so voices! Also, what is going to happen to all those potentially lobster pink travellers going Spain? The voice of their anthem has passed on, this is such a terrible quandary!!
Anyhow, I’m in the process of setting up a new website for the Dead Pool, it will look and feel very much like the old one for the moment but hopefully we will have password protected areas for our Poolers to share and have fun and also downloadable content to help you with next years lists. If you want to have a sneak peek, go to www.kingofankh.co.uk/DeadPool. So if you normally read this on the website, please update your rss feeds or weblinks. Feel a bit stupid saying that, you’re obviously not reading this!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Naomi Conner, 114, American supercentenarian, oldest living person in Texas.
• Noel Harrison, 79, British singer (“The Windmills of Your Mind“), actor and Olympic skier.
• William Harrison, 79, American author and screenwriter (Rollerball).
• Sir Anthony Caro, 89, British sculptor, heart attack.
• Manolo Escobar, 82, Spanish singer and actor.
• Antonia Bird, 54, English television drama and film director.
• Marcia Wallace, 70, American actress (The Simpsons, The Bob Newhart Show) and comedian, breast cancer.
• Augusto Odone, 80, Italian economist and medical pioneer (Lorenzo’s oil).
• Hal Needham, 82, American stuntman and film director (Smokey and the Bandit, The Cannonball Run), cancer.

In Other News

It is truly with a very heavy heart, literally, that I have to share the news that Kadir Nurman has died at the age of 80. ‘Who?’ I hear you lament. Kadir is the Turkish immigrant who is credited with inventing the doner kebab! I know, this is truly a horrific moment for many of us.
Kadir emigrated to Germany in 1960 and noticed that the fast paced lives of the Germans needed a succulent dish that could be carried around, and lo, the mana of the gods for pissed people was born. Alas he didn’t patent the recipe so he made little money from the dish. However, he was pleased that so many Turkish people have managed to do so well with his recipe, thus improving the quality of life for his fellow countrymen. I’m not so sure about the quality of my life though, a few too many kebabs has left me with horrific angina that even red wine can’t help!

Dick Cheney has revealed to the world that he’s had to have his pacemaker modified in case of terrorist attack. Yup, the former vice-president is so paranoid he made sure that his wi-fi enabled ticker was impervious to Bin Laden and his friends. Now, I’m not one to cast an opinion normally, but wouldn’t it be easier to just give Cheney a gun and let him get on with it, after all he managed to shoot his mate in the face, so why bother making a complex device that would interfere with his pacemaker? Methinks he’s been watching too many episodes of Homeland.

We are all going to die!!! Yes, it’s true! But if you are to believe most media reports at the moment, we will all die from False Widow Spider bites. Now, I’m not a huge fan of spiders myself, but for us in the UK we’re pretty lucky really, overall they don’t grow as large as a house and they can’t kill you. In fact, the worst a False Widow can do it give you a tiny sting, much like a bee sting, certainly not lethal. So I’m wondering why a school in Gloucestershire insisted on closing due to a sighting of said spider? Any fucking excuse for a day off if you ask me. You don’t hear of Australian schools closing ever, and everything there is lethal and very ready to bite you on the testicles when you sit on the toilet! Shame on Dean School Chepstow, grow some balls!

On This Day

Not a lot happened on the 27th October in years past, but Wallis Simpson is granted a divorce in order to marry the Duke of Windsor, thus changing the face of the monarchy in the UK.
On a stranger note, Gloria Estefan becomes the first pop artist to be called upon by a Pope to perform at the Vatican. Who knew John Paul II was such a groover!
So who died on this day? Remember Akbar the Great, the Muslim emperor of India, whom established a sprawling kingdom through military conquests, but is more widely known for his policy of religious tolerance, no you won’t, but how things have changed…
We also lost Æthelstan, the first king of England, other than that I didn’t recognise anyone.

Thank Fuck He’s Dead bu Stu

This week’s TFHS is Ronald Clark O’Bryan.
As we approach Halloween we will probably be subjected to a glut of phoney Facebook warnings, quoting apocryphal tales from “friends of friends” who all claim to know somebody whose snot-faced little bastards rosy-cheeked little cherubs fell victims to razor blades, rat poison or other hilariously deadly items secreted inside Halloween treats.
They’re all bollocks, of course. One tale that is true, unfortunately, is that of 8-year-old Timothy O’Bryan from Deer Park, Texas, who finished off his trick-or-treating in 1974 with a Pixie Stix that was more than just past it’s sell-by date. Suffering convulsions, he was taken to hospital where he later died of cyanide poisoning.
It didn’t take the police long to catch the murderer – Timothy’s own father Ronald. Deep in debt this class cunt decided to take out life insurance policies worth over $60,000 on his two children in order to claim the insurance money because, you know, that never looks suspicious, especially when they’re eight.
O’Bryan was executed in 1984 by lethal injection. During the execution, a crowd of college students wearing Halloween masks showed up to cheer as he took his final breath.
The song Candyman was written about this nomination for father of the year. That’s the one by Siouxie and the Banshees, by the way, not the song from Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Katy Perry (29), Ryan Reynolds (37), Kim Kardashian (33), Judge Judy (71), Snoop Dogg (42), Jeff Goldblum (61), Carrie Fisher (57), Keith Urban (46), Jaclyn Smith (68), Tom Petty (63), Cat Deeley (37), Hilary Clinton (66), Seth McFarlane (40), Viggo Mortansen (55), Kevin Kline (74), Nancy Cartwright (56), Carly Elwes (51), Weird Al Yankovic (54), Catherine Deneuve (70), Christopher Lloyd (75), Jon Heder (36), Jesse Tyler Ferguson (38), Ang Lee (59), Bill Wyman (77), Bob Hoskins (71), Spike Jonze (44), F. Murray Abraham (74), Pele (73) and Wayne Rooney (28).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next Week peeps!

27th October 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 20th October 2013

Just a handful of vaguely familiar notables for you this week, but as always we’re bursting at the seems with amazingly interesting stories and a bunch of giggles and facts. Pretty much like the very recent plane crash in Belgium where ten skydivers, fully kitted out, died when the plane went down. Did none of them think if bailing out? Anyhow, without further ado, lets get on with it!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Terry Rhoads, 61, American actor (Liar Liar, Hitchcock, The Day After Tomorrow), amyloidosis.
• Hans Riegel, 90, German entrepreneur (Haribo).
• Sean Edwards, 26, British racing driver, racetrack collision.
• Ed Lauter, 74, American actor (The Artist, The Rocketeer, Family Plot), mesothelioma.
• Lou Scheimer, 84, American television producer (He-Man and the Masters of the Universe), co-founder of Filmation.
• Felix Dexter, 52, British comedian (The Real McCoy), multiple myeloma.

In Other News

Five days after undergoing brain surgery to remove a brain clot, President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner proves she can still count to five and has been allowed home to recover. She’s under strict instructions to rest for a minimum of thirty days, hence why I’ve sent her a Pilates DVD and hired a personal trainer for her. Has anyone else noticed that Argentina has stopped being a pain in the arse since she became ill? Women in power eh? First Thatcher now this one… Back into the kitchen with all of you! *runs for the hills*

For those of you who pay attention, you may remember former Nazi Erich Priebke from last week. There’s been a slight problem in putting his body into the ground as more than 500 people clashed with his hearse and Nazi sympathisers during his funeral in Italy.

Argentina, where Priebke lived for 50 years before being extradited to Italy to face charges for war crimes, have also refused to take his body even though he has a plot next to his wife there. Now ‘the man who followed orders’ is chilling in a fridge at an Italian airbase.  The Vatican, that shrine dedicated to paedophilia, has also issued a ban on interring him on Roman Catholic land, I wonder what will happen to ex-Pope Nazi Benedict when he dies? His family have demanded his body back but due to so many protests and even Germany itself being a bit scared of his rotting corpse, things are looking like this will be a continuing saga for some time to come. Maybe he should have shown some remorse and apologised…

The Transformers director Michael Bay got himself into a spot of bother in Hong Kong last week. As the story goes he was twatted one in the chops by an irate shop owner for missing him out on the embuggerance fee for filming on their patch. The little Chinese man demanded over £8k for the privilege of filming in front of his shitty little shop, no doubt Bay told him where to go as he’s famously known to be a bit of a firebrand himself. Anyhow, it all came to blows, Bay was floored and three Police officers also needed hospital treatment. I’m wondering if this little Chinese man was Jackie Chan…

On This Day

Sixty six years ago today Senator Joe McCarthy begins investigating Communists in Hollywood; 58 years ago The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien is published; 45 years ago Jackie Kennedy marries Aristotle Onassis; 35 years ago the rock group The Police make their debut performance in the US and lastly, Libyan dictator General Gadaffi is killed by rebel forces, ending nearly 42 years of his rule.  So who died on this day? The aforementioned Muanmar al-Quaddafi a mere two years ago! The 31st President of The United States Herbert Hoover (1964) and Burt Lancaster (1994).

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by Stu

Today’s TFHD is Daniel Camargo Barbosa

Not the captain of the Black Pearl, this Barbosa was a Columbian who, in the seventies and eighties preyed on children, raping and murdering between 70-150.

Dismayed to find his lover, Esperanza, was not a virgin, he did what any other rational human being would and roped her into finding him young girls in order to drug and rape them. He told police after his arrest that he chose young virgins “because they cried”

Like an idiot, he failed to tie up loose ends and his fifth victim reported him to the police. After serving eight years for the rapes, he decided to add murder to his CV when he committed an impulse-rape whilst passing by a school.

His favourite trick was to pretend to be a lost old man, trying to find a church to deliver a large sum of money to. He would offer the girls money and the possibility of employment if they would help him find his destination. Upon entering the local woods “trying to find a short cut”  he would then rape his victim, before killing them and hacking, slashing and crushing the bodies with a machete, just to make sure they were really, really dead this time.

He was finally caught after going back to retrieve some television sets he was trying to sell, that he had accidentally left next to one of his victims (duh!) He was sentenced to 16 (sixteen!?) years in 1989, but thankfully somebody had the good sense to incarcerate him alongside the cousin of one of his victims, who did the world a favour and shanked him in 1994.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Marie Osmond (54), Zac Efron (26), Pam Dawber (62), Roger Moore (86), Sacha Baron Cohen (42), Suzannw Somers (67), Paul Simon (72), Angela Lansbury (88), George Wendt (65), Jon Favreau (47), John Lithgow (62), Flea (51), Wyclef Jean (44), Tim Robbins (55), Eminem (41), Nancy Kerrigan (44), Margot Kidder (65), Dominic West (44), Evander Holyfield (51), Jean-Claude van Damme (53), Martina Natratilova (57), Steve Coogan (48), Chuck Berry (87), Sarah Ferguson (54), Trey Parker (44), Ralph Lauren (74), Ernie Els (44), Jason Reitman (36), John le Carrê (82) and Sammy Hagar (66).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

20th October 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 13th October 2013

This week is full of deadly goodness for you my evil little poolers, we have points to be awarded and a new (hopefully) weekly section that is being written by one of our newest poolers, Vic. Please let her know your appreciation as writing for the Dead Pool isn’t an easy task. If anyone else has any submissions or ideas, please send them through.

So, onto the points!!! Yes, Erich Priebke, that very famous WWII SS Captain has died, thus giving Ashley his first points of the season and Dave even more points to widen the gap at the top of the table. Congratulations to both of you for scoring 50 points. That leaves only two of you yet to score with little less than two months to go but with both of you having Nelson Mandela on your lists, I’m sure we will have everyone scoring this year.

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Phil Chevron, 56, Irish musician (The Pogues), esophageal cancer.
• Chopper Read, 58, Australian crime figure and author, liver cancer.
• Scott Carpenter, 88, American test pilot, astronaut and aquanaut, complications from a stroke.
• Erich Priebke, 100, German Nazi SS captain and war criminal.
• María de Villota, 33, Spanish racing driver, cardiac arrest.

In Other News

Tom Hanks has revealed he has Type II Diabetes due to being a fatty. Hard to believe since he looked like a Biafran in Castaway. The 57 year old actor say’s he’s managing things with diet and exercise. I’m sure we all wish him well, imagine a world without Tom Hanks films… Hang on… He should die for inflicting The Da Vinci Code on us!

The Argentinian President, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner has undergone surgery to remove blood from her brain following complications from a fall in August. To everyones surprise they actually found a brain hiding in there. This illness comes hot on the heels of her recent operation for thyroid cancer in 2011 which turned out to be a misdiagnosis, but there must be something going on if you ask me. Perhaps she should stop looking for a fight with us and start paying off her country’s debt.

In a sure death sentence, Sir Christopher Lee will soon be awarded the fellowship award from the BFI. The 91 year old iconic actor is said to be bemused, seeing that his 68 year career spanning over 200 films is finally being recognised after such young actors as Saoirse Ronan have already been awarded the prize after appearing in a handful of shit films. Well done old man, I’m sure the statuette will look good collecting bird shit at the bottom of your garden.

On This Day

1959 years ago today Nero was crowned emperor of Rome, two months shy of his 17th birthday, we all know how that panned out. Even worse was 90 years ago today, the US enforced the Volstead Act, prohibiting the production, sale and transport of alcohol! What were they thinking?? Luckily The Beatles appeared on Sunday Night at the Palladium 50 years ago today, thus launching Beatlemania and the stellar rise of the Fab Four. But who died on this day? Nobody interesting, just Ed Sullivan, Le Duc Tho and Milton Hershey.

Thank Fuck He’s Dead by Vic

This evil looking gnome is Joachim Kroll a German serial killer born in 1933. He was nicknamed the Ruhr Cannibal due to the fact he butchered and ate parts of his 14 victims as he claimed it was the best way for him to save money on his groceries when money was a bit tight! He obviously didn’t have access to value ranges! His favourite parts seemed to be slices of women’s buttocks! Finally arrested in 1976 officers found him simmering parts of his last victim, a 4 year old child called Marion Kettner in a pan, the rest of her was in his fridge.  Thankfully he died of a heart attack in prison in 1991.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Emily Deschanel (37), Simon Cowell (54), Sharon Osbourne (61), Matt Damon (43), Britt Ekland (71), Sigourney Weaver (64), Joan Cusack (51), Hugh Jackman (45), Jane Krakowski (45), Bruno Mars (28), Elizabeth Shue (50), Chevy Chase (70), Luke Perry (50), David Lee Roth (59), Paul Hogan (74), Scott Bakula (59), Daryl Hall (67), Tony Shalhoub (60), Thom Yorke (45), Stephen Moyer (44), Sean Lennon (38) and PJ Harvey (44).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

13th October 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 6th October 2013

Welcome one and all to this week’s edition of The Dead Pool. Another slow week points-wise, but there is a few things to cover. Many have mentioned the death of Dawn Berry, who committed suicide at the age of 36 due to alcoholism and depression. Alas, the most popular contestant on Come Dine With Me doesn’t cut the mustard on the Wiki list, so she’s officially not famous enough so her death means even less. *gulps on his very sad glass of wine* All that I can think to say about that is “I outlived her! Ner!”

Look who you could have had:

• Jay Robinson, 83, American actor (Dracula, Star Trek, The Waltons, The Robe).
• Tom Clancy, 66, American author (The Hunt for Red October, Patriot Games).
• Vo Nguyen Giap, 102, Vietnamese general and politician, Minister of Defence (1976–1980).
• Anton Benning, 95, German World War II Luftwaffe ace.
• Ruth Maleczech, 74, American actress (Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, The Crucible), cancer.

In other news

Some of you may have noticed that Bruce Forsyth was missing from his regular slot on Strictly Come Dancing last night. The old doddering fool has the flu apparently. I for one welcomed the sight of Claudia Winkleman for the first time ever, which goes to show how much I hate old Brucie. Let’s hope the old cunt dies and gives us all a rest from his three hundred year old ‘entertainment’ career. I really feel sorry for his wife, a former Miss World!! Imagine the horror of having Brucie on top of you firing his dusty white love piss into you. I can only liken it to being fucked by an Egyptian Mummy!! The horror…

Not to be outdone by Angelina Jolie and Sharon Osbourne, Anastasia has followed suit toremove both her breasts. The 45 year old singer has previously survived a bout of cancer in 2003 and was thought to have had the all clear, alas her tits turned on her. As some of you know, I’m a boob man and this news is probably more devastating to me than to her. So please send your sympathies to me at the usual address…

Phillip, The Duke of Edinburgh, is said to be in ‘rude’ health as he began his first official engagement since having his exploratory operation to remove his soul. The 92 year old will be undertaking a further 13 official engagements this October, but most of them are at Buckingham Palace, just to make sure he doesn’t over-exert himself.  However the old fart had to use a walking stick, this is a very good sign for us.

On This Day

The 6th of October is renowned as the day that Charlotte Brontë published Jane Eyre, a mere 166 years ago, but this was overshadowed by Al Jolson starring in The Jazz Singer, the first ever talking movie in 1927, which wowed the audience of its day! So who died on this day? Alfred Tennyson (1892), W.K. Kellogg (1951), Anwar el-Sadat (1981) and Bette Davis (1989). It’s also been two years yesterday since Steve Jobs died. Doesn’t time iFly!

Last Week’s Birthdays

Gwen Stefani (44), Zach Gallflanakis (44), Kate Winslet (38), Jerry Lee Lewis (78), Susan Sarandon (67), Marion Cotillard (38), Tommy Lee (51), Julie Andrews (78), Eric Stoltz (52), Lorraine Bracco (59), Guy Pierce (46), Alicia Silverstone (37), Sting (62), Annie Leibovitz (64), Jesse Eisenberg (30), Neve Campbell (40), Chubby Checker (72), Lena Headey (40), Randy Quaid (63), Bob Geldoff (62), Karen Allen (62), Clive Owen (49), Liev Schreiber (46), Johnny Mathis (78), Monica Bellucci (49), Seann William Scott (37), Jackie Collins (76), Jimmy Carter (89) and Martina Hingis (33).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

6th October 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 29th September 2013

I’ll have to admit, today has been a bit of a struggle to find anything interesting at all. It seems that last week was bereft of notable deaths, unless you’re into unknown prelates or American sports, both of which I know nothing about. But I’m not one to baulk at the lack of material, if pushed I’ll make it up, after all, you lot never read this far, you just look at the pictures, but just to confuse you I haven’t added any this week 😛

Look who you could have had:

• Christopher Koch, 81, Australian novelist (The Year of Living Dangerously), cancer.
• Kofi Awoonor, 78, Ghanaian poet and diplomat, shot.

In other news

Maggie Thatcher has finally been officially put to rest, or as some would say, thrown into the burning depths of hell.  Am I the only one wondering why it took five months to burn her body? I suppose all of Satan’s Minions are rather flame-proof…  She’s now in a small box a few feet underground at the Royal Infirmary in Chelsea if anyone is interested, perhaps it’s a good place to keep an eye out for the beginnings of the apocalypse.

Our old friend Nelson Mandela is still hanging on, which makes my prediction that heonly had four days to go seem silly now. President Zuma seems to think he’s doing quite well, but no real news as he wants us all to respect his privacy and dignity. I can only imagine that he’s already dead with a machine keeping him alive, which posts an interesting question, do I award the points??

On This Day

After last week’s amazingness of interesting facts, this week is rather shit again. This day is renowned in history as the day that Pope John Paul II went to Ireland *yawn* and we also saw the deaths of W.H. Auden in 1973 and Roy Lichtenstein in 1997. Seems that this newsletter was destined for utter mediocreness since time began!

Last Week’s Birthdays

Gwyneth Paltrow (41), Will Smith (45), Naomi Watts (45), Michael Douglas (69), Catherine Zeta-Jones (44), Mickey Rooney (93), Avril Lavigne (29), Bruce Springsteen (64), Heather Locklear (52), Mark Hamill (62), Joan Jett (55), Olivia Newton-John (65), Serena Williams (32), Julio Iglesias (70), Ditta Von Teese (41), Michael Madsen (56), David Coverdale (62), Mira Sorvino (46), Bryan Ferry (68), Hilary Duff (26), Meat Loaf (66), Tom Felton (26), Jim Caviezel (45), Brigitte Bardot (79), Bam Margera (34) and Andrea Bocelli (55).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

29th September 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 22nd September 2013

No points yet again this week, with only 14 weeks left to go it’s all to play for. Perhaps it’s time to put on your thinking caps and decide who will be on next years lists. You all know how difficult it is to be at the top of the league table now, so you need to do some homework if you want to avoid being on nil points again next year. If anyone has any bright ideas to liven up the Dead Pool for 2014, see what I did there?, please let me know.

Look who you could have had:

• Jackie Lomax, 69, English guitarist and singer-songwriter.
• Patsy Swayze, 86, American dancer and choreographer, mother of Patrick Swayze, complications from a stroke.
• Ken Norton, 70, American heavyweight boxer and actor (Mandingo, Drum), heart failure.
• Hiroshi Yamauchi, 85, Japanese businessman, President of Nintendo (1949–2002, 2002–2005), owner of Seattle Mariners, complications from pneumonia.

In Other News 

Last week’s big news was the announcement by The Big Yin aka Billy Connolly that he’s had an operation for prostate cancer and has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s. The operation on the 70 year old comedian’s arse was a total success, however, the Parkinson’s is here to stay. Ironic that his career first took off after appearing on Parkinson’s chat show, now it looks like it’s going to end with Parkinson’s too.

Stephen Hawking has come out in support of assisted suicide, is he trying to tell us something here? Apparently not, he’s still an advocate of living life to the full regardless of whatever condition you may be suffering from, ‘there is still hope’, he opined. At 71 he’s been a stalwart of the Dead Pool for many years, initially only given ten years to live, fifty years ago! I would imagine his consultant got fired for that error. Perhaps he’s finally thinking of even deeper questions. Perhaps a good shout for next year?

Here’s a nice bloke for you to wish death upon, his name is Geoffrey Portway, a Brit living in the States. He’s just been jailed for 26 years for plotting to kidnap, rape, kill and eat a small child. Now, I’m not one to like paedophiles at the best of times, but this sad individual is even taking kiddie fiddling to a new level. Eating a kid? Really? Mind you, from the photo he looks like he could quite easily devour a small human.

On This Day

After last week’s disastrous new debut feature, I thought I’d give it another try, hopefully it will be more interesting today. September 22nd is mostly renowned for Abraham Lincoln issuing the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing all slaves in the US, but let’s be honest, that was 151 years ago, we’re more interested in the comedy show Friends being first aired and CBS being fined $550k over Janet Jackson’s boob on live TV.  But who died on this day I hear you ask, George C. Scott (1999), Marcel Marceau (2007), Eddie Fisher (2010) and Irvine Berlin (1989). See, it wasn’t so shit this time..

Last Week’s Birthdays 

Faith Hill (46), Tommy Lee Jones (67), Prince Harry (29), Jada Pinkett Smith (42), Elvira Mistress of the Dark (62), Victoria Silvstedt (39), Mickey Rourke (61), Sophia Loren (79), Lauren Bacall (89), Adam West (85), Bill Murray (63), Jennifer Tilly (55), Liam Gallagher (41), Ricki Lake (45), Stephen King (66), B.B. King (88), Alphonso Ribeiro (42), Jeremy Irons (65), Twiggy (64), Lance Armstrong (42), David Copperfield (57) and Oliver Stone (67).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

22nd September 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 15th September 2013

A week full of unknowns, but I bet you’ve all sampled a wafer thin After Eight mint and I’m sure you all know about Dolby, even if you didn’t realise it was named after the inventor.  Goes without saying that we have nil points to dispense, so if you’re stuck there at the bottom of the league table, don’t feel bad, at least you’re not the subject of this newsletter.

Look who you could have had:

• Louise Currie, 100, American film actress (Adventures of Captain Marvel, Citizen Kane).
• Ray Dolby, 80, American inventor (Dolby NR, surround sound), leukemia.
• Otto Sander, 72, German actor (Wings of Desire, Das Boot).
• Brian Sollitt, 74, Chocolatier, inventor of the After Eight chocolate mint.
• Salustiano Sanchez, 112, American supercentenarian, world’s oldest living man.

In other news

Remember Bob Geldof? The architect of Band Aid and everyone’s favourite living zombie has revealed to the nation that he’s going to be the first Irish astronaut in 2014. Wonderful what money can buy you isn’t it. One would have thought Bob would have donated his millions to Africa, now it looks like he wanted our cash to fund his trip into space. Elvis may have left the building, but Bob is going to leave the planet, let’s hope he burns up on re-entry and scores us some points, the rich bastard!

Left wing politician Tony Benn has been admitted to hospital after ‘feeling unwell’. The 88 year old former cabinet minister is said to be resting comfortably and in no immediate danger of dying, so surely this means he’s only got days to live.

I’m going to take this opportunity to declare the death of Microsoft. The once mighty giant of computing has practically admitted defeat in slowly firing its boss, pulling derogatory adverts about Apple because they were truly shit, and last but not least, offering consumers £200 vouchers if they will trade in their iPad’s for a Surface. Yes Microsoft, you have finally lost the plot.

And now for something a little different. I thought I’d try out a new feature, Died on this Day. Pretty much what the title says.  On the day that the picture of Marilyn Monroe trying her best to hold her famous white dress down was taken, we lost… well, nobody interesting.  If it was yesterday I could have mentioned Patrick Swayze (2009) and Grace Kelley (1982). But at least we discovered Penicillin 85 years ago on this day. Well, that was a bit of a failure wasn’t it….

Onto last weeks birthdays: Michelle Williams (33), Colin Firth (53), Pink (34), Hugh Grant (53), Harry Connick Jnr (46), Adam Sandler (47), Eric Stonestreet (42), Henry Thomas (42) Elliott from ET is 42!!! Linda Gray (73), Joe Perry (63), Rachel Hunter (44), David Arquette (42), Sam Neill (66), Stella McCartney (42), Moby (48), Virginia Madsen (52), Michael Buble (38) and Guy Richie (45).

2013 League Table

[Confidential]

Next Week peeps!

15th September 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 8th September 2013

Hello all, another Sunday is upon us and a massive hangover here too. So please bear with me as I struggle to compile this week’s newsletter whilst popping painkillers and drinking pints of water. Not much to report, nobody has scored anything in a while, so I’m contemplating sending out the flying monkeys.

Look who you could have had:

• Frederik Pohl, 93, American science fiction author (Man Plus, Gateway).
• David Jacobs, 87, British radio and television broadcaster (Juke Box Jury, Any Questions?).
• Ariel Castro, 53, American convicted kidnapper and rapist, suicide by hanging.
• Rochus Misch, 96, German SS non-commissioned officer, last survivor of the Führerbunker.

In other news

George Bush Snr had a senior moment, he prematurely sent a condolence email about the death of Nelson Mandela. Bit trigger happy there Mr Bush, he’s still very much alive, unless you know more about it that the rest of us! Keep that email on ice for a few days though, you can use it again.

The Oscar winning actor, Jack Nicholson, has announced his retirement from acting. In a statement released last week the 76 year old admitted he can no longer remember his lines. A great shame for such a screen presence, but as you know, people who retire usually die pretty soon after. Points anyone?

Here’s a section of people to keep an eye on, for more than the usual reasons. US porn stars are falling foul of HIV, there have been five reported cases in the last few weeks and we all know that *insert ominous tune* AIDS kills you dead! I might have to undertake some research, for the dead pool you understand…

And finally, last weeks birthday’s: Beyonce Knowles (32), Keanu Reeves (49), Pippa Middleton (30), Charlie Sheen (48), Raquel Welch (73), Salma Hayek (47)!!!!, Damon Wayans (53), Michael Keaton (62), Lily Tomlin (74), Chrissie Hynde (62), Barry Gibb (67), Evan Rachel Wood (26), Gloria Estefan (56), Rose McGowan (40) and Idris Elba (41).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

8th September 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »

Dead Pool 1st September 2013

Here we are again, Sundays seem to turn around as quickly as a Cameron u-turn.  So, what’s happening in the world? Not a lot, some people died in Syria and nobody really gives a fuck, Miley Cyrus sluts herself on stage with Beetlejuice ands the world goes bonkers. Sadly the UK government have voted against sending the armed forces into Cyrus, which I’m sure she’d enjoy. I just feel for her dad, I bet he has an achy breaky heart when he sees how his daughter has turned out, maybe she’ll do something nice for his 52nd birthday, like cutting his hair, can’t be made much worse now can it?

And lo I wake up to the news that Sir David Frost has died, surprisingly, nobody had him, but it did mean I had to spend my breakfast time rewriting, the inconsiderate bastard! He could have waited a few more hours or at least die on a Saturday evening!

Look who you could have had:

• Julie Harris, 87, American Tony Award-winning actress (The Belle of Amherst, East of Eden, Knots Landing), heart failure.
• Mike Winters, 82, British comedian.
• William Froug, 91, American Emmy Award-winning television writer, producer (Bewitched, The Twilight Zone, Gilligan’s Island).
• Gerard Murphy, 64, British actor (Batman Begins, Doctor Who, Waterworld), prostate cancer.
• Cliff Morgan, 83, Welsh rugby player and broadcaster.
• Soledad Mexia, 114, Mexican-born American supercentenarian, oldest verified Mexican-born person and world’s fifth-oldest person, natural causes.
• Seamus Heaney, 74, Irish poet, laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature (1995).
• John Mainstone, 78, Australian physics professor, custodian of the Pitch Drop Experiment, stroke.
• Sir David Frost, 74, British broadcaster (That Was the Week That Was, The Frost Report), heart attack.

In other news

Mike Tyson has finally admitted to himself that he has problems. Tyson told ESPN that he’s close to dying due to alcohol and drug abuse. The 47 year old ex-boxing champion and rapist wants to live a sober life and at the time of the interview he’d been six days dry. Not bad for the man who beat Frank Bruno into mental illness and obscurity. Know what I mean Harry.

Michael Douglas and Zeta Jones are taking ‘time apart’. Rumour has it they haven’t been seen together for over four months. After 13 years of marriage they seem to have finally realised they make a terrible couple. With the amount of illnesses they seem to have brought upon each other this may be bad news for us on the Dead  Pool, they might both recover. 🙁

In another crushing blow to everyones childhood memories, Rolf Harris has been officially charged with 13 counts of child abuse. I still cannot believe this to be true, but the strain of the whole thing could put the 83 year old ‘Animal Hospital’ presenter under undue pressure. He’s on suicide and heart attack watch. You would think The Queen would step in to save her longtime friend, but old Betty is keeping very quiet, especially since her friend Jimmy Savile got into the same pickle.

Nelson Mandela is still alive!!! Although my funny story about how he’s still in hospital had to be scrapped, the cunter decided he needs to go home. One can draw two conclusions from this. He’s feeling better and wants to go back to normality, or he’s going home to die. Now I’m not one to hedge my bets, but I’m going to give him four days!

Last weeks birthdays: Richard Gere (64), Macauley Culkin (33) still alive dammit!, Aaron Paul (34), Shania Twain (48), Sean Connery (83), Cameron Diaz (41), Billy Ray Cyrus (52), Jack Black (44), Claudia Schiffer (43), Van Morrison (68), Peter O’Toole (81), Leanne Rimes (31), Gene Simmons (64), Paul Reubens (61), Tim Burton (55), Elliott Gould (75), Warren Buffet (83), Chris Tucker (42), Elvis Costello (59), Rebecca DeMornay (54), Florence Welch (27), John McCain (77), Rachel Bilson (32) and Jason Priestly (44).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

1st September 2013 | Categories: 2013 | Leave A Comment »