Never Trust Me With Your Eulogy

 The following is why I should never be allowed to give a speech, whether it's for a funeral, a wedding, or anything else.

Dear friends, thank you for coming out on what is a somber day, when we remember our good friends Alex and Kate. We're all still trying to process the news. It seems so unfair, to die so young, with their whole lives ahead of them and so much to be done. Better that it would have been peacefully in their sleep, decades from now as elderly people. Just like my grandfather. Not screaming in terror like the passengers in his car, but let's not get off track.

Kate and Alex lived life to the fullest, even at their young age. They had known each other since childhood, were the best of friends. Went off to university together. Caused all sorts of mischief, some of which I was part of. The infamous prank we pulled on Professor Watson and sending his car into the River Tay is still talked about all over St. Andrew's. Oh, Professor. I wasn't aware that you would be attending today. Sorry, forget I said anything.

Where was I? Oh, right. Alex and Kate. Inseparable in life, and inseparable in death, it seems. Both of them in these coffins before us, to be buried side by side. Most of us who knew them would have expected them to get settled down after university, get married, start a family, that sort of thing. But that's not going to happen now, is it?

Because they're dead.

It's tragic. Because they loved doing what they did.

What they did killed them.

Let's just deal with the facts at hand. I know we're all unsettled by what happened. I mean, those caskets are closed for a reason. 

In some ways, I blame myself for it all. If I had been there, it wouldn't have happened. They'd be safe and we'd probably be having lunch down at the pub right now instead of attending a funeral.

But things happen. We were all supposed to go on a jump last Saturday, but of all the days to come down with a cold... well, that was mine.

So instead they asked that bloody sod Daniel Wallingford to come along.

Now, yes. Admittedly Daniel is a rated, qualified skydiver... just like me, just like Alex and Kate were. But Daniel is, sorry to say, a full blown alcoholic these days. 

So let's go through it. We've been told that the three of them went up with the pilot for a jump. Alex and Kate have done this dozens of times. They're up there, getting ready to jump. But from what we're hearing, what they didn't see was Daniel, opening up a can of Guinness and taking a few swallows. Which breaks a few rules of skydiving. Don't drink and jump. I'm just saying. But again, Daniel is a full blown alcoholic.

So Alex and Kate jump. No issue. They start on their way back to earth. 

And then there's Daniel. Pilot said he stumbled to the door and just stepped out.

What happened next defies physics.

Alex and Kate had pulled their chutes and were slowing down their descent already. 

Daniel had another can of Guinness with him. It slipped out of his harness as he pulled his chute, and started falling. At high speed.

Straight towards Alex and Kate. 

Somehow- and again, all we've got at this point is Daniel's statement to the police on this one- the can tore right through Alex's chute. It must have hit Alex in the head before it kept going, because he didn't pull his reserve chute. His main chute started tearing apart because of the damage, and he started falling faster. 

And if that wasn't bad enough, that same can did the same thing to Kate's chute. Tore a hole right through it, causing enough damage that it started coming apart too. We can only guess that she was hit by the can in the head as it went by, because she didn't pull her reserve chute either. 

That can was later found, having reached its final velocity, smashed through the front windshield of a Porsche driver. The driver, we're told, still owes 75 000 pounds for it and is said to be devastated.

Alex and Kate? They hit the ground. Faster than they would have expected.

It was that old crone Mrs. Gogarty who heard two loud thumps outside her farmhouse. Oh, Mrs. Gogarty, I wasn't aware you were gracing us with your presence. Where was I? Oh, right. Well. What can I say? 

It's a hell of a thing, skydiving. You experience the thrill of falling through the air, the rush of pulling that chute, and the joy of existence. 

And then one day, a whole lot of little things go wrong all at once, and you're.... well, you're pancaked. 

I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said it that way. It just would have been better if it had been Daniel pancaking into the ground, instead of sitting in a jail cell right now facing criminal charges. I've always hated that wanker.

Well, to wrap things up. Let's all remember Alex and Kate as they were in life, happy and joyful.

And try not to dwell on the last twenty seconds of their lives.

Taking The Express Bronco To Hell

The following is my response to the recent death of someone who really, really, really had it long overdue.

Deceased And Disgraced Former Football Player and Actor Reported To Be Complaining About His Place In Hell

Los Angeles (AP). It is a truth universally acknowledged that some people only do the world any good by no longer being in it. Perhaps that's the way Jane Austen might put it these days. Earlier this month, O.J. Simpson, the former football player turned ad pitchman turned occasional actor turned murder suspect turned general dirtbag, died of cancer at the age of 76. The world is now left with him gone- which is not a bad thing.

Simpson earned notoriety in the wake of the murder of his ex-wife Nicole and her friend Ron Goldman, ending up arrested (after a slow Bronco police chase that captivated millions) for murder and put on trial in what was billed as the Trial of the Century, which would a surprise to anyone who participated in the Nuremberg Trials, which would actually qualify for that title. 

What became a months-long ordeal of constant coverage, grandstanding by everyone involved, and general nonsense ended with Simpson acquitted, but later found responsible in a civil case. Simpson's life afterwards was chaotic, including prison time for a botched robbery and kidnapping, years of being shunned by society, and regular outbursts at multiple people, including this reporter.

Simpson was cremated, with no apparent plans for a public memorial or burial, despite rumours. In the wake of his death, there wasn't a lot of sympathy for the man, considering the general state of disregard he was held in. In fact, comedians and editorial cartoonists skewered him, while members of the public made a point of ridiculing him through memes on social media. This is the sort of thing that happens to you when you've done the sort of things he's done.

This reporter has previous history with Simpson, having had been dispatched to multiple Super Bowls down through the years, and even back in the day when Simpson was in prison. Simpson made repeated violent death threats towards this reporter, losing his temper just at the sight of this reporter. This reporter is not required to be objective, as this reporter is, at this point, more of a columnist, and besides which, the readers like this reporter.

And so this reporter freely says the following: rot in hell, O.J., rot in Hell.

Speaking of which- this reporter heard from the fellow in charge in that particular place. Satan, aka the Prince of Darkness, has occasionally spoken remotely to reporters about subjects like the state of Bill Belichicks' soul. This week, Satan advised reporters that Simpson was not having a pleasant time in Hell. "Yes, we've got him stretched out on a table every morning and chopped up into pieces by a cranky demon with a rusty knife. I thought that fitting. The pieces gradually reassemble in the afternoon. It's very painful. Anyway, that's going to continue each day for the next six million years. Then we'll make it more painful."

The Devil paused before continuing. "He broke in the first five minutes. Full confession to everything.  Complaining constantly about how he's being treated down here. For a guy who tried to play the tough guy, he's really a gutless wonder. Very gutless by ten AM, in more than one way."

In the opinion of this reporter, it couldn't have happened to a more deserving person.

Try Hard Not To Speak Ill Of The Dead

The following is why I should never be trusted to give a speech at a wedding or a funeral. Because I'd make it an occasion to remember.... for all the wrong reasons.

"Thank you, Reverend Murchison, for that kind introduction. And thank all of you for coming out on this sad day to pay tribute to a man who left us far too soon. It falls to me to give a eulogy for my old friend Peter. For one thing, we knew each other since childhood. For another, I'm not on the suspect list.

When we think of the manner in which Peter died, we must shake our heads at the unfairness of it. A man's life snuffed out at the prime of life. A man who had succeeded in life, built a reputation for himself of good standing in the community. A man with a loving wife and three children. And his faithful Spaniel Muffy.

It's tempting to ask God... why? Why him? Why not someone who really deserves it? Like Chester Holloway, for example. That bastard deserves to meet a bad end if you ask me, and you are asking me. Oh, don't look at me like that, Chester, everyone in town hates you. You're not going to make friends in this life if you listen to ABBA, let alone headbang to ABBA. Honestly, man, were you born with bad taste or did it develop gradually?

But I digress. We're not here to talk about Chester and his horrible taste in music and how much he deserves to get thrown into a pit of hungry fire ants. We're here to talk about Peter. Pillar of society. Upstanding citizen. Family man. President of the Lions Club. Gave to charities of his time and his money. Member of the town council. Successful businessman with his own hardware store. Beloved by all. Or so we thought, until three days ago when his life came to an end. Because someone went out of their way to kill him.

It's shocking, really. One minute you're driving along, the next you're facing the Almighty and being told that your brakes were cut, your car was wired to explode, and for good measure, someone double tapped your corpse with a 22.

I probably shouldn't have said that. I have this bad habit of speaking without considering what I'm saying. Sister Mary Margaret of the Sisters Of Little Or No Mercy said that would get me in trouble someday. The point is, we don't really need the visual, do we? Not when we're trying to remember the good, not the bad.

And yet the bad is there. We can't dispute it. We can't dismiss the reality of the awful way that Peter died. We can wonder who did it. We can try to come to terms with what's come out since his death. What the police have learned. About how he'd been skimming funds out of the town council budget and depositing it in a Panama bank. About how that money he raised for Schauffhausen Syndrome went into another account in the Caymans, and how Schauffhausen Syndrome doesn't actually exist. About how he was cheating behind his wife's back with his secretary. What's that, Bridget? You didn't want the kids to know? Oh, my bad.

But it's shocking, I tell you. Shocking. How a man presents himself in one way and hides secrets. And he was the last person you'd expect in this town to be hiding secrets. Oh, we all expect secrets being hidden by old Elsa von  Berger over there, who to this day refuses to divulge what she was doing in Berlin in 1944. And we expect it out of Helen and Tommy over there, trying to hide their affair from their spouses. But Peter? Good, upstanding Peter?

Who wasn't so good and upstanding?

Yes, shocking. But someone knew. Someone had enough reason to want to kill him. And to do so in a way that would make sure he really was dead. Who was it? Could it have been the ABBA loving nitwit we all hate? Don't even start, Chester, or you and I can go outside right now and I'll beat your ass into a coma. Could it have been the reclusive possible former Nazi dominatrix Elsa von Berger? Could it have been a random stranger passing through town who just decided they'd kill someone in a spectacular way? Could it have been Miss Scarlett in the drawing room with a candlestick?

Could it have been the mayor? After all, the police have arrested him on corruption charges. It does appear they were both in on the siphoning budget dollars to Panama gambit. A falling out between two cohorts in an illegal scheme could lead to something even more illegal. Like murder. I'm just saying, I don't know. You don't know. Nobody knows but the killer. 

I'm getting ahead of myself. I'm sure Chief Seddings has her list of suspects well in hand. For all we know she's got her sights set on the grieving widow as Suspect #1. Because Bridget had a whole lot of reason to want to off her philandering, money laundering husband. Not the least of which was that ten million dollar life insurance policy.

Where was I? Oh, yes. Peter. Peter the upstanding member of society. Peter the secret crook. Peter the cheater. It is patently unfair when someone we love leaves us too soon. It is even more unfair when we find out they were a dirty rotten lying skunk. And it is dismaying to me. I consider myself a reasonably smart person. Even if I say things without thinking ahead from time to time. But I'd known Peter for years, and even so, I never saw what he was hiding. And that just baffles me.

Well, Peter, at least you went out quickly. Horribly, but quickly. Hopefully justice is done for you. It'll even be better if justice being done means Chester is the killer and winds up getting thrown in prison for the rest of his days. Which won't be long once the gang in lock up finds out he loves ABBA."

The Curse Of The Lucky Hangman

The following is another example why I should never be asked to be a best man, or to give a eulogy at a funeral. It just won't end well.

“Thank you, Reverend Benton, for that kind introduction on this most somber day. We come together to mourn our friend Brian, whose life came to a tragically short end four days ago. I see his family, his friends gathered here together to mourn. And I see the lawyers hoping to cash in. Thank you all for coming. Well, not the lawyers.

Amanda asked me to eulogize Brian, and I only hope that I can be up to the task. When we think of him, we’re left to mourn the man that he was. People are supposed to die in their old age, not when they’re in the prime of life. Brian was certainly in the prime of life. Happily married, three wonderful kids growing up in the countryside, a good career in real estate. Not a complaint to be heard from him. Brian was the sort of fellow who could just lift the mood, and if he was here now- well, beyond the way that he actually is here now- he might tell a joke, kid around and lighten this gloomy atmosphere.

But he’s not. He’s in that coffin, and we’re out here, trying to make sense of the injustice of it all.

And so we have to take into consideration what happened four days ago.

On that day that changed everything for Amanda and the kids.

And so many other people, for that matter.

Because let’s face it, there are a lot of funerals going on in these parts right now.

It was supposed to be just another day. Brian left the house early, driving in that convertible of his. That was his gift to himself for closing the Midwick estate sale. He was proud of that one- that place had been for sale for five years, and no one could close the deal. Nobody wanted to buy the place. It didn’t help that the house had a reputation for being haunted after Old Man Midwick threw his butler off a balcony. But that’s beside the point.

Brian was driving along, enjoying the day, heading for town, heading for his office. It should have been just another day. But it wasn’t.

We know that the last people to see him alive- well, to talk to him, anyway, because there were witnesses who saw him rush by- were the staff at that pub out at the intersection of Highway Thirteen and Gallows Road. On a related note, what kind of place names itself the Lucky Hangman?

We know he left there- with a fresh cup of coffee in hand. We know he got behind the wheel of his convertible and drove off. Then what happened?

From what the police have been able to put together, Brian was driving with one hand, holding the cup with the other. And it seems the coffee was a bit too hot. For whatever reason, he spilled the coffee, all over his shirt.

That’s how he started to lose control of the car.

Joe MacArdle saw what happened next. He was out on his walk along Highway Thirteen, just like he does every day since he retired. He told the police he heard a car coming up behind, turned, saw it weaving back and forth on the road, coming right at him. That last moment, he saw Brian and Brian saw him. Brian somehow managed to swerve to avoid hitting Joe, and kept going. Joe counted his blessings and wondered why on earth Brian didn’t stop the car.

We’ll never know why. Maybe there was something wrong with the car- that’s something the police haven’t told us yet. Maybe Brian wasn’t thinking straight. You try spilling scalding coffee all over your chest and see how you like it. But that’s beside the point. By this point Brian was racing downhill around hairpin curves. Swerving all over the road. Oncoming cars tried to get out of his way.

Edith Newton was the first fatality of the day.

Yes, that crazy old battleaxe we all knew and hated.

She was driving up Highway Thirteen in that station wagon of hers. Her kids had been trying to get her to stop driving for years on end. Apparently her eye sight and reaction time wasn’t what it once was. But she wouldn’t listen to the concerns of her kids, just like she never paid any attention to anyone else and would routinely scream at people for no reason. And it was still six months until she had to get her license renewed, so she was still driving.

Until that day.

We know that Brian was honking his horn, swerving back and forth. We know that he came into the path of Edith’s station wagon on that stretch of the highway alongside Dead Man’s Canyon. We know he swerved out of the way- but so did she. While he sped past, we know that her car went through the guard rail and out into empty space, a couple hundred metres to the bottom of Dead Man’s Canyon.

Brian kept going. Honking his horn, downhill, unable to stop. He still had ten kilometres to get into town. Out of control, maybe thinking of his wife and his kids and what would happen to them if he didn’t make it home that night.

What happened next nobody could have expected.

Aside from that geologist from the university who published a paper about the slope three years ago.

So there Brian was, speeding downhill past Dead Man’s Mountain. And he inadvertently triggered something that none of us saw coming.

Except for Professor Sedgwick. Are you happy now, James? You got proven right.

Brian’s car sideswiped a rock by the side of the road. That rock turned out to be the lynchpin in holding up what James said was a slope of unstable soils and rocks. The only thing standing between it and disaster.

And he sideswiped it.

Just enough so for it to shift in place.

Not that he would have realized it. He somehow got back on the road and kept on that terrible last ride. I wonder if he might have had a chance to look in the mirror and see thousands of cubic tonnes of soil and rock barrel down the slope, pouring west over the road and down towards the village of Alton.

Well, they’re still busy over in Alton as I speak. Ninety homes buried in rock and soil and landslide. A hundred and thirty seven people dead or missing. And all because Brian sideswiped one boulder.

But that wasn’t the end of it.

No, Brian was finally coming down from the high ground and into town. He must have been panicked by this point. Spill your coffee, lose control of your car, find yourself on an endless careening downhill towards what had to feel like certain death.

And it was.

Brian’s car finally came to a stop.

By colliding with a tanker truck at the Petro Canada at the corner of Highway Thirteen and Aspen Street.

Incidentally, the corner of Highway Thirteen and Aspen doesn’t exist anymore.

Long story short, twenty eight more people were added to the death toll. Brian was one of them. All because of a spilled cup of coffee. Which is why all the lawyers are here- the big question is, will the Lucky Hangman pay a steep price for their too hot coffee?

I hope not. Weird name or not, it’s still my favourite watering hole.

That’s beside the point. One hundred and sixty six people are dead in what’s already being called Black Thursday. Our friend Brian is one of them. He leaves a wife and children who love him, friends who will miss him, and lawyers seeking to cash in on this whole thing one way or another.

We might find ourselves dwelling on the unfairness of it all.

Instead, I might suggest we look for the silver lining in it.

After all, one good thing came out of this.

That crazy old battleaxe Edith Newton is roasting in Hell right now.”

Requiem For A Drunken Sailor

Notorious Drunken Sailor And Strongman Dies; Acquaintances Relieved

Boston (Reuters) In life, he was larger than life, a one eyed barely comprehensible man of the sea with overly developed muscles, a corn cob pipe, and a bizarre taste for one of agriculture’s more noxious vegetables. For nearly ninety years, his presence made itself known in popular culture, while he himself, and those around him, never aged beyond a set point in time. He presented himself as ill-mannered and not terribly well educated, and he shared a tempestuous on and off relationship with a peculiar sort of woman. All while regularly brawling with anyone crossing his path.

Popeye The Sailor Man is dead.

Whatever his real name is, it was long since lost to history. The sailor steamrolled into the popular culture in 1929, finding himself portrayed in comic strips, animated shorts, and even a dubious film. A brawling, spinach eating, garble-speaking tough guy known to break the arms of others in arm wrestling contests, he was over the top, cranky, possessive of superhuman strength and given to losing his temper with acquaintances and perceived rivals. For all his ferocity, Popeye (no last name given) was prone to going out of his way to please his significant other, one Olive Oyl.

“They had what in current parlance would be called a meet-cute sort of moment,” early twentieth century pop culture historian Geoffrey Willington noted. “Popeye and Olive hated each other at first. And you know how that goes. First they can’t stand each other, then they’re having at each other in the fun way. Happens all the time. I mean, half of Hollywood’s romantic comedies work that way. But there were times Olive was known to have a fickle eye, sometimes drawn to a rival suitor, sometimes irritated by his poor manners. After all, Popeye was what he was. A sailor, and sailors aren’t known to be the most suited to high society.”

“I yam what I yam!” Popeye once bellowed as the keynote speaker for a gathering of the Daughters Of The Revolution. In a 1973 speech that is still remembered by the social group for its incoherence and paranoid rantings, the sailor spent an hour raving about freemasons, the price of spinach, the planet Nibiru, and the inability of hamburger eating moochers to pay him back. He was never invited back, and the group cautioned other historical societies against taking him on as a celebrity guest speaker.

“They say not to speak ill of the dead,” longtime acquaintance and professional moocher J. Wellington Wimpy told reporters. “But honestly, Popeye was a drunk. A full blown alcoholic with a mean streak. He was even worse than that cobbler who always wished death on me. No, Popeye was the sort of person who would go beyond wishes and hopes. He would beat me up for not paying him back for that burger he bought me last week. And he’d do it while laughing at me. Which reminds me, I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday for a burger today.”

“Oh, he wasn’t all that bad,” Popeye’s paramour Olive Oyl told reporters at her home, dressed in black as befits a widow, softly weeping. “Of course he had a temper. But whenever he got angry, he never took it out on me, never took it out on Swee’Pea. No, he had Bluto or someone else to throttle. Oh, sure, sometimes he’d throttle the wrong person, like that time he gave President Roosevelt a black eye. But Popeye said that he thought that FDR was going to run him over with the wheelchair, so that made everything okay. Turns out the Secret Service didn’t agree. That’s beside the point. With us, he was gentle and sweet and kind. Even if he could be kind of hard to understand at times. I’m going to miss the big lug. Even if he never got around to putting a wedding ring on my finger.”

Swee’Pea refers to the perpetual infant who was often in the care of Popeye and Olive. It has never been made clear who the child is, let alone his real name. Whether he was biologically related to or adopted by either Popeye or Olive has always gone unaddressed. Until now. “There’s a big problem with being a cartoon character,” Swee’Pea told reporters from his nursery at the Oyl home. “I’m over eighty years old, and here I am, still a baby, still supposed to go around talking as if I’m a baby, still wearing diapers, still going by a stupid nickname. Well that’s not my name! My name is Richard Winslow Hollingsworth the Third! I’ve been on the lam hiding out from my family for eighty years. I didn’t want anything to do with the Hollingsworth tobacco fortune. Which, in retrospect, I now regret. I mean, I could be a millionaire right now making big bucks off people dying of lung cancer, and instead here I am toddling around in diapers.”

“He was a lout,” longtime rival and fishing captain Bluto told reporters. “A jerk. A thug. A bully. A deranged jackass. Good riddance to him.” The oversized, bearded mountain of a man was known to occasionally kidnap Olive Oyl to win her affections, only to be promptly beaten up by Popeye. “No, that was just the plotlines of the strips and the film shorts we did,” Bluto clarified. “I never kidnapped Olive. You think I’d be the sort of guy who’d commit a crime? That doesn’t change the fact that Popeye was what he was. A brute who’d beat you up just because he woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Now I’m a big guy, a strong guy, but he was stronger.”

Popeye’s vaunted strength was credited to his consumption of spinach- so much so that he was noted as the biggest single consumer of spinach on the planet. But there was a darker truth to his strength that has only now been revealed in the wake of his death. “Steroids,” Cape Cod police captain Wayne Davis confirmed to reporters. “His real strength came from steroids. We found stockpiles of them in his home in the wake of what happened. Well, it explains a lot.”

Popeye was at a local bar Saturday night in the midst of an arm wrestling contest with five men at once. Breaking all their arms by winning the contest, he stood upright, yelled in triumph and flexed his arms… and then it happened. His massive arm muscles, vastly over developed, seemed to burst, as witnesses reported. “We’re talking veins and arteries busting open,” a bartender confirmed. “It’s like those body builders who go way too far in developing their muscles, to the point where you wonder what’s holding those muscles together. Well, in this case, veins popped, the skin popped, his pipe went flying, and he collapsed in a heap, going back and forth between howling in pain and that weird laugh thing he did.”

Medics were called, Popeye was taken to hospital, where doctors and nurses tried to save his life to no avail. “It seems that decades of steroid abuse had taken their toll on his heart,” Davis noted. “And his heart just couldn’t take it anymore.”

And so it is that an icon of pop culture has left the world’s stage. Popeye is no more. Funeral arrangements have been made. Bars around Cape Cod are determining if his tab had been paid in full. Spinach producers are wondering how to make up the gap that will surely show itself in their market. J. Wellington Wimpy is relieved that he won’t have to pay Popeye back for unpaid burgers. Bluto has been seen buying up flowers to court Olive Oyle. Richard Winslow Hollingsworth, formerly known as Swee’Pea, is making inquiries with doctors to see if he can start aging at a normal rate. And the sort of a widow Olive Oyl has been heard weeping from her parlour windows about her beloved drunken sailor, claiming, “I’ll never be able to look at another can of spinach again without bawling my eyes out!”

Death And The Grouchy Sedgwick

Today I have one in my occasional series of totally inappropriate eulogies. The ending came to me first.  This is why I can never be trusted with doing a public speech.

“Thank you, Reverend, for that kind introduction. And thank you all for coming out on this sad, somber day as we try to come to terms with the unfortunate passing of Andrew. A husband, father, son, brother, and dear friend to us. Alicia asked that I should do the eulogy. I can only hope I do justice for Andrew and see him off with what he would expect of us all. A few tears, perhaps some laughter, and good memories.

When we think of the manner of Andrew’s passing, we think of how unfair it all seems. Taken from us in the prime of life, and in such a way. But perhaps we should talk of the man himself as opposed to the way he died. That can wait, after all.

Andrew, Alicia, and I all met in college. We all were geared towards medical school, becoming doctors, establishing private practices sometime down the line. Andrew was already known by a nickname that many of us will always call him before we think of him as Andrew. A name that fits, given his chosen profession.

Doc.

There’s this old expression that comes to mind. Never play cards with a guy called Doc. I learned that one pretty fast with him. I always wondered afterwards if Andrew cheated during poker, so after four or five evenings of him cleaning me out hand after hand, I decided to refrain from playing cards with him again.

So, Andrew and I became friends. Despite his cheating at cards. He and Alicia met and fell in love and made plans for their future. We all went through medical school, somehow managed to survive residency and the endless long shifts and particularly that old bastard Doctor Sedgwick… let me assure you, if anyone deserved to go the way Andrew did, it was Clive Sedgwick… oh, hi! Sedgwick! You’re here! Good god, old man, how are you possibly alive? You must be ninety six by now.

I’m letting myself get off track. Sorry. That happens.

Well, we got through medical school. We got through residency. We did our time in the proverbial trenches of hospital life and the tensions of an emergency ward. And we all moved on with our lives. Private practice beckoned, because honestly, who wanted their life to turn out like an episode of Grey’s Anatomy?  Which, for the record, is an awful show.

Andrew and Alicia got married and settled into a private practice and a quiet life in the countryside. Had three wonderful kids. Katie, Michael, and Ella, your father loved you very much, and you made him very happy. He’d be proud of you.

In time I got married too. Josie and I have stayed friends with Andrew and Alicia, even though my private practice took me to another part of the province. We’d get together every once in awhile, keep in touch the rest of the time. Life was good. A good living, practices that were thriving, patients that kept us busy, but time to be had for the important things in life. Family and leisure and the occasional evening dining out.

Which I’m sure is better than can be said for Sedgwick and however he spends his days. Honestly, old man, tell me you finally retired, or are you still making life hell for every resident doctor you’ve ever met? Oh, don’t look at me like that.

I’m getting off track again. Sorry.

Where was I?

Oh, yes. Life was good.

Until last week, that is.

It’s for the best that we have a closed casket.

It’s not as if open casket was an option, under the circumstances.

Andrew was off at a medical conference in Chicago. Everything went fine. He was on his way home. He just happened to pick the wrong flight.

If he’d flown Air Canada, maybe nothing would have gone wrong.

Instead, he flew United.

Well, from what we’ve been told by the other passengers, United continues to have problems with customer service. This, after more than a few incidents in the last couple of years.

They had a couple of their employees flying with the passengers, off duty, just heading for Toronto for some time off.

One of them wanted a seat to put their shopping bags on.

Now apparently shopping bags for an off duty pilot is more of a priority than a passenger.

Okay. So the plane was fully booked. Enough so that they had to turn people back at the gate who’d bought tickets in advance. Let it not be said that United has learned anything from their previous mistakes.

So they went looking for a volunteer.

Someone to give up his seat.

And they settled on Andrew.

They’re still not saying how it happened. I mean, I would have thought it was physically impossible to open a plane’s doors in flight. Sufficed to say there were unpleasantries said, according to the other passengers… and Andrew was removed from his seat.

And then kicked off the plane.

At cruising altitude.

Without a parachute.

They say the terminal velocity for someone falling through air is about 195 kilometres an hour. Before he hits the ground. Andrew hit the ground on a farm outside of Kitchener. Or the ground hit him. I guess it depends on how you see things.

Well, they say if you have to go, you might as well go fast. Better to go fast than to die slow and in agony. A little pain, but fast? Okay. A lot of pain, and horribly slow? No thanks. We’ll never know if Andrew passed out of this world before he hit the ground. But in those last moments, surely he must have been thinking of his beloved Alicia and their kids.

Strangling the chairman of United Airlines after suing the company into bankruptcy.”