Tuesday, April 15, 2008

dead funny

A disclaimer up-front, before we start: the death of anyone is of course a tragedy to those who knew and loved them, and is in no way a suitable subject from which to obtain comic mileage. Right, now that's out of the way, let's crack on.

I was having a conversation today in which the subject of recent celebrity deaths came up, probably after Charlton Heston's demise a week or so ago (at which point I must link to his finest cinematic moment, and one of the, ooh, I dunno, four or five best film endings anywhere, ever). That prompted a look back at who had died so far this year - Jeremy Beadle, Paul Scofield and Edmund Hillary, to name but a few, but more amusingly some of the people I'd never heard of but who have names worthy of mention, and, in some cases, envy (or ridicule, as appropriate). Here are a few that caught my eye, in reverse order of demise, i.e. most recent first:
  • Buzz Nutter, American footballer.
  • Frosty Freeze, member of the Rock Steady Crew. Come on, you remember them.
  • Chalmers "Spanky" Alford, jazz musician. No detail on his Wikipedia page as to the origin of his nickname, sadly.
  • Metropolitan Laurus, head of the ROCOR. The best known of the Laurus family, he is survived by his younger brothers Bakerloo Laurus, District Laurus and Docklands Light Railway Laurus.
  • Vicki Van Meter, pilot. Which reminds me of the old joke about the Irishman who thought Hertz Van Rental was a Dutch footballer.
  • Bill Bolick, country singer. Strangely, he decided to call the band he co-founded with his brother Earl Bolick The Blue Sky Boys, not, say, Total Bolicks or Utter Bolicks.
  • Al-Bandari bint Abdulaziz, minor Saudi royal. In some cultures it would be a source of mild embarrassment for a woman to have the middle name "bint".
  • Static Major, singer & rapper. Not his real name, I regret to say (nor was Frosty Freeze, mind you).
  • Mindrolling Trichen, Tibetan spiritual leader. This is some serious shit; you thought Ezekiel 25:17 was some cold-blooded shit to say to a muthafucka before you popped a cap in his ass, but imagine rolling a brutha's mind. That's some serious spooky-ass Buddhist voodoo shit, right there.
  • Max Bănuş, journalist. Huhuhuhuhuhuhuhuh. Banus.
  • Schoolboy Cleve, blues musician.
  • Rose Hacker, activist. Not a gardener, sadly, as that would have been more amusing.
  • Floyd Boring, ex-Secret Service agent. That is the best undercover name ever. Except perhaps for Undercover Elephant.
  • Pratap Chandra Chunder, Indian cabinet minister, and big fan of the old 14 pints of Stella and a crabmeat vindaloo combo of a Friday night.
May they all rest in peace.

2 comments:

The Black Rabbit said...

Howd the golf go then cocker?

electrichalibut said...

Not great. Par 3 course, went round in 80! Bit rusty to say the least. Plus, I hate par 3 courses, or at least ones with a lot of holes in the 75-100 yard range. Those little half-to three-quarter wedge shots require a certain amount of finesse which I don't have after not playing for six months. I do have a 64-degree lob wedge but there's a fine line between skulling it into the middle of next week and hitting the ball up your own left nostril.