(Sigh) So many Great Ones checking out, starting with David Carradine, then Ed McMahon, followed by Farrah Fawcett and now Michael Jackson. To add insult to injury, I "Save Unpublished" my title selection and immediately get warned about those no-content substandard Hubs. Hey, if this keeps up, the country is going to end up with a no-content substandard group of living celebrities!

One thing is certain: My take on the translations (deaths) of all these high profile, high talent individuals is much different from what most writers experience. Run a search on "David Carradine", for instance, and you get page after page of results focused entirely on the manner of his death, who leaked the death photo, all the media feeding frenzy of (trite example, I know) a school of great white sharks with blood in the water. I'm reminded of a Dr. Phil episode which Pam and I watched as a rerun this afternoon. He's advising a couple who lost a young son and states:

"How long you grieve has nothing to do with how much you loved."

A bit later in the show, he follows up on that statement with:

"You're focusing on the moment he died, not the years he lived."

I prefer to focus on the years David Carradine lived. Being old enough to have been a fan of his Kung Fu series when it first aired, I eventually wound up appreciating his performance in Kill Bill as the finest of his enormously talented career. Additionally, based on what I've seen and read about his personality and beliefs as a human being (as opposed to the characters he played), I always felt that had we been personally acquainted, we'd have genuinely understood and liked one another. It is never enjoyable to see someone like that leave your life in any way...but I wish him well with all my heart, whatever plane of existence he may be experiencing at the moment.

Being the only one of the four who passed on at a significantly advanced age, Ed McMahon provided no surprise to the public when his time came. Considering the state of the economy, perhaps it should not even be a surprise that he lost his life and the battle to save his multimillion dollar home in the same month...but it was. I watched his long running gig as Johnny Carson's sidekick from the time my ex-wife and I got our first TV until Johnny retired. If anyone seemed indestructible, financially or otherwise, it was Ed.

Part of that aura of invincibility emanated from his willingness to make it clear, even to Carson himself in front of millions of viewers, that he was no doormat. I recall one Tonight Show episode where Johnny told Ed that he (Ed) had a "lot of nose hairs". Ed's snarling response made his former Marine experience abundantly clear, warning even his boss not to taunt the big dog when you were too close to his chain. Johnny never made a comment like that again, either, at least so far as I ever saw. As everyone knows, when Johnny finally retired, Ed continued working for many years as a celebrity pitchman and talent show host, among other things.

Pam and I had to give up our home in Colorado to foreclosure in April. We rolled with that punch, and we'll be fine...but I'm 65, not 86. To have been at the top of the heap and then face eviction when your health is not its best...hey, that's enough to make anyone wonder what might be waiting on the other side of the mountain.

Happy Trails, Ed.

Even when Charlie's Angels was in production, I could seldom name the other two angels. Not that they were any slouches in the Hot Babe department, but Farrah had my heart. Still has it to this day, in fact. Over the years, the more I saw and heard about her as both an actress and a person, the more I wished our mutual destinies would have allowed us to hook up. Not that she didn't find the right man in Ryan O'Neal. She obviously did, just as I found the right woman in Pam (though in my case it required seven marriages to get the job done).

The reason Farrah attracted me so strongly was simple. I have a lifelong defect: Whenever I see a beautiful woman in pain, I feel this overpowering urge to protect her. Don't get me wrong. It's entirely shallow. If an unattractive woman is in pain, hey, sorry, but you're on your own. In the cases of both Farrah and my wife, Pam, they struck me as the two most attractive women I'd ever seen in the most pain I'd ever seen, tackling their personal demons with the most courage I'd ever seen. Not that Farrah would have necessarily been drawn to me even if we had met; can't see anyone mistaking me for either Ryan O'Neal or Lee Majors.

But I will keep her in memory in the same admiration-and-respect section where resides my recall of Princess Diana.

Farrah, I salute you. Godspeed.

Michael Jackson was not my first choice when it came to singers, since I was ranch raised and rodeo bred, a Montana cowboy saturated with the music of Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, and that ilk. Even I could hardly miss the fact of his immense popularity with people worldwide, however. Out of curiousity, I just now checked that popularity by running "Michael Jackson" through a Google AdWords keyword search and discovered that on Google alone, nearly twenty-five million searched his name globally in just the past month.

Other writers will understably make note of his many hit albums--Thriller, Bad, Beat It, all the rest--or some of his many innovations in the entertainment field, such as but hardly limited to the moonwalk. I'll also mention something related to entertainment, just one: Somewhere around 1988, my wife (now ex-wife number five) and I took my youngest Montana-dwelling sister and her children to Disney World one day. One experience there involved Michael. In a 3D movie theater complete with 3D goggles, a ten minute Excite-o-rama provided an in-your-face experience that was beyond outstanding. It was Michael Jackson's music behind the whole thing, couldn't say now just what, but it definitely worked.

As of this writing, details of Michael's death are yet to be released. That's OK. Like I said, I prefer to focus on the years lived, not the moment of passing. And Michael, you lived.

But with four of our best gone in rapid fire succession, I still want to know: Who hit the Recycle button?

Thanks for reading,

Ghost32