Dead Pool 24th January 2016

Points galore this week!!! With the passing of the world’s oldest living man, Yasutaro Koide at the age of 112, Kaz scores 138 as she had him down as her Cert, and Paul C. and Dave J. both score 38. But not only this, Stu had Sheila Sim, so a further 57 points are awarded! Well done to all of you! This has now moved things along somewhat on the leader board and it’s barely mid-way through January!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Dale Griffin, 67, British drummer (Mott the Hoople), Alzheimer’s disease.
• Glenn Frey, 67, American musician (Eagles), songwriter (“Take It Easy“, “Hotel California“, “Tequila Sunrise“) and actor (Wiseguy, Jerry Maguire), complications following intestinal surgery.
• Andrew Hatch, 117?, American supercentenarian, world’s unverified oldest person claimant.
• Yasutaro Koide, 112, Japanese supercentenarian, world’s oldest living man, heart failure and pneumonia.
• Sheila Sim, Lady Attenborough, 93, English actress (A Canterbury Tale, Pandora and the Flying Dutchman, West of Zanzibar), dementia.
• Jimmy Bain, 68, Scottish bassist (Rainbow, Dio).
• Jennifer Guinness, 78, Irish socialite and kidnapping victim, cancer.

In Other News

British-born astronaut Piers Sellers says he is now living life at “20 times normal speed” after being diagnosed with terminal cancer. Dr Sellers, originally from Crowborough in East Sussex, is the deputy director of Nasa’s science and exploration division. The 60-year-old was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer in late October. “It did motivate me to concentrate my thoughts,” he told the BBC. “I’d been feeling rough for about six or nine months, getting progressively more ill. The outlook in terms of expected longevity was a bit of a shocker.” Speaking of his diagnosis and treatment, Dr Sellers said: “The prognosis right now is 12 to 18 months.” Dr Sellers had to become a US citizen to fulfil his dream of becoming an astronaut and has campaigned for the British government to develop its own space programme.

Jamie Foxx has been praised for putting his own life at risk by saving a man who was trapped in a burning truck. Brett Kyle’s pick-up went off the road and rolled over into a ditch close to Foxx’s California home. Foxx said the truck became engulfed in flames “within five seconds” after he got the driver out. “I don’t look at it as heroic”, he told reporters, “I just look at it like, you know, you just had to do something. And it all just worked out.’’ The Oscar-winning actor said he heard the crash from his house and called 911 before running to the scene. An off-duty paramedic who was driving by also stopped to help. They used his emergency room scissors to break the window and cut the man’s seatbelt and pull him out. “I told him as we were talking, as I’m getting him out, I said ‘you’ve got to help me get you out because I don’t want to have to leave you'”, Foxx said. The driver’s father Brad Kyle met Foxx to thank him for his actions. He said he had been shown surveillance footage of the crash site and said several cars had passed by the scene without helping. The 32-year-old driver has broken bones and a punctured lung, but he is expected to recover.

American Pie singer Don McLean was arrested on a misdemeanour domestic violence charge on Monday in Maine, a jail supervisor said. In a statement on his official website, McLean blamed “hard emotional times for my wife, my children and me”. “What is occurring is the very painful breakdown of an almost 30-year relationship…. There are no winners or losers but I am not a villain. I hope I will not be judged in this frantic media environment,” he said. The 70-year-old was arrested on 18 January after police were called to a property in Camden, Maine, at 02:00 local time. He was later released on bail. It is understood his wife was granted a temporary restraining order against the singer after she cited a pattern of abuse going back three decades. She claimed she feared for her life when she called police earlier this week, writing: “Don terrorised me for four hours, until the 911 call that I think might have saved my life.” McLean, “vigorously denies” his wife’s allegations. One thing is for sure, this clusterfuck ain’t over yet!

The Ryder Cup star Jamie Donaldson has suffered a potentially severe finger injury following a mishap with a chainsaw. The  Welshman, who claimed the decisive point when Europe  defeated the United States in September 2014, posted a graphic photo on Twitter of what seems to be a laceration to the little finger on his left hand. The 40-year-old wrote: “So folks in my time off decided to have a fight with a chainsaw and lost! Oops!! C u in Dubai.” It is not yet known whether Donaldson hacked off the finger completely, although the image shows he required multiple stitches. Further details remain unclear, but his post seems to indicate he will play at the Omega Dubai Desert Classic, which gets under way on 4th February.

On This Day

• 41 – Roman Emperor Caligula, known for his eccentricity and sadistic despotism, is assassinated by his disgruntled Praetorian Guards. The Guard then proclaims Caligula’s uncle Claudius as Emperor.
• 1848 – California Gold Rush: James W. Marshall finds gold at Sutter’s Mill near Sacramento.
• 1908 – The first Boy Scout troop is organized in England by Robert Baden-Powell.
• 1961 – Goldsboro B-52 crash: A bomber carrying two H-bombs breaks up in mid-air over North Carolina. The uranium core of one weapon remains lost.
• 1984 – The first Apple Macintosh goes on sale.
• 1986 – Voyager 2 passes within 81,500 kilometres (50,600 mi) of Uranus. Hehe 

Deaths

• 1965 – Winston Churchill, English colonel and politician; Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1874)
• 1986 – L. Ron Hubbard, American religious leader and author, founded the Church of Scientology (b. 1911)
• 1989 – Ted Bundy, American serial killer (b. 1946)

Last Week’s Birthdays

Betty White (94), James Earl Jones (85), Jim Carey (54), Kid Rock (45), Zooey Deschanel (36), Michelle Obama (52), Kevin Costner (61), Dolly Parton (70), Katey Segal (62), Bill Maher (60), Buzz Aldrin (86), Rainn Wilson (50), Geena Davis (60), Billy Ocean (66), Emma Bunton (40), Jack Nicklaus (76), Placido Domingo (75), Dj Jazzy Jeff (51), Linda Blair (57), Piper Laurie (84), John Hurt (76) and Rutger Hauer (72).

Why is Leslie Nielsen STILL dead?  BBC Blog by Anisa Subedar 

Is this a familiar experience? You wake up. Check the internet and there’s news of the passing of a much-loved celebrity. Then some time later after scrolling through screens of social media tributes you discover that person had actually died before… several times.

This week there have been waves of online sympathy over the passing of actor Leslie Nielsen prompting many to quote their favourite and most memorable lines from films such as Airplane! and The Naked Gun.

The only trouble is Nielsen actually died in November 2010 aged 84.

That didn’t stop thousands of online users sharing this BBC story without checking the date and so it appeared that Nielsen had just died.

As a result the article popped up in the “Most Read” section which resulted in even more people sharing it. And the snowball rolled on gathering weight. Many people shared their own personal tributes on Twitter and then felt foolish when they discovered the truth.

Leslie Nielsen isn’t the only celebrity who has experienced Multiple Death Syndrome, as we’re calling it. Artist and children’s TV presenter Tony Hart and Columbo actor Peter Falk have also been mourned more than once.

So why does this happen and why will it keep happening?

BBC technology correspondent Rory Cellan Jones says the intricacies of how stories spread on social media are complex and mysterious. “It’s no surprise that the deaths of Leslie Nielsen or Tony Hart are stories that people want to share. But they’re at an interesting level – not people whose death makes the traffic stop like David Bowie or Princess Diana, but big enough in people’s childhoods to mean something.”

So if a person’s celebrity is below a certain level some of their fans may have missed news of their original death. And if they randomly search to find out whatever happened to a star, they may discover a report of their hero’s death, but not notice the date stamp. And so another snowball starts rolling downhill. It’s chaos theory making its presence known via social media. An entirely innocent variation of the Butterfly Effect – very different from the malicious “RIP” trolling of celebrities who are still alive.

So what fuels the need to share the death of someone famous online in such a hurry without checking the facts? Rory thinks it’s obvious that there’s a natural urge to be first with breaking celebrity news. “Everyone now sees themselves as a celebrity reporter! I’m sure there’s an element of mischief involved – which sometimes descends into malice. Social media is now where you see all kinds of human behaviour reflected – from kindness to one-upmanship to sheer nastiness.”

So there you go, we’re all a bunch of nasties!

Next week peeps!