From:    Albertus Magnus                        Area: Metaphysical
To:      All                                    25 Feb 94 02:44:14
Subject: The Week in Death: Feb 14-17, a        UpdReq 

 QUOTE OF THE DAY
 On the Death of Mr. Richard West
 ``In vain to me the smiling mornings shine,
     And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire;
  The birds in vain their amorous descant join,
     Or cheerful fields resume their green attire;
  These ears, alas! for other notes repine,
     A different object do these eyes require;
  My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine,
     And in my breast the imperfect joys expire.
  Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer,
     And newborn pleasure brings to happier men;
  The fields to all their wonted tribute bear;
     To warm their little loves the birds complain:
  I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear,
     And weep the more, because I weep in vain. ''
           -- Thomas Gray
 THE WEEK IN DEATH (February 14-February 17)
 PIETRO BELLUSCHI (94), architect. Designed the Pan Am Building (now
 Met Life's other building) and the Juilliard School of Music in New
 York, and the Bank of America building in San Francisco.
 SORRELL BOOKE (64), actor. Boss Hogg on ``The Dukes of Hazzard. ''
 ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL FAIRCHILD (87), entomologist. The last
 surviving grandchild of ALEXANDER GRAHAM BELL.
 GRETCHEN FRASER (75), athlete. First American to win an Olympic
 gold medal in a skiing event, in the special (giant) slalom in
 the 1948 games in St. Moritz.
 TIGER HAYNES (79), actor. Originated the role of the Tin Man in
 ``The Wiz.'' Films include ``Awakenings,'' ``Jungle Fever,'' and
 ``Moscow on the Hudson. ''
 CHRISTOPHER LASCH (61), history professor/author. The best-known
 of his several books is ``The Culture of Narcissism'' (1979), in
 which he accurately described the majority of Americans as being
 dangerously self-absorbed, selfish, tentative, and easy prey for
 manipulative leaders. His views were the basis of JIMMY CARTER's
 ``national malaise'' speech, a disaster not because he was
 wrong, but because we didn't want to hear it. So we booted
 Carter, and brought in RONALD REAGAN, who made us feel so good
 about being self-absorbed and selfish that we barely paid
 attention to how he merrily gutted the Constitution.
 TRACY-KAI MAIER-FORSYTHE (32), ballerina. Former principle
 dancer with the San Francisco Ballet.
 RODNEY ORR (31), NEIL BONNET (47), race car drivers. In separate
 incidents, both men were killed in one-car crashes at Daytona
 Speedway.
... Je suis venu trop tard dans un monde trop vieux. * de Musset


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From:    Albertus Magnus                        Area: Metaphysical
To:      All                                    25 Feb 94 02:46:54
Subject: The Week in Death: Feb 14-17, b        UpdReq 

 RANDY SHILTS (42), journalist. Believed to be the first openly
 gay reporter to work for a major news organization -- the San
 Francisco ``Chronicle.'' If he wasn't the first to sound the
 alarm about AIDS, he was the most diligent, persistent,
 eloquent, and vocal journalist to do so. His 1987 book ``And The
 Band Played On'' is a furious and lucid indictment of the REAGAN
 Administration, the medical establishment, and portions of the
 gay population for ignoring the epidemic during its first five
 years. The day he handed in the manuscript of the book, he was
 informed that he had tested positive for the HIV virus. His
 other works are ``The Mayor of Castro Street: The Life and Times
 of Harvey Milk,'' and ``Conduct Unbecoming: Lesbians and Gays in
 the U.S. Military, Vietnam to the Persian Gulf.''
 GLORIA STEWART (75), JIMMY STEWART's wife of 45 years.
 From the It Ain't Over Til The Fat Lady Brews Department
 (IAOTTFLBD): Finally getting old enough to have a beer with
 grandpa is a rite of passage in some families. Our Grandfathers
 lived when men were men, bars didn't admit chicks, and guys knew
 how to handle their alcohol. Gramps and his cronies could drink
 forever, or at least it seemed that way.
     Imagine our surprise when we found out that some people's
 grandfathers can and do drink literally forever. In some areas
 of Africa, we discover, it's common practive to mosey on over to
 grampa's final resting place from time to time and pound back a
 few brewskies while pouring a few for the old man -- directly
 into the mound of his grave or a bottomless glass embedded
 therein. Kinda makes you appreciate hangovers, don't it?
     All this is according to an article in the most recent issue
 of ``Beer: The Magazine'' (which gets our vote for most
 entertaining masthead of the year), which also sez that
 Egyptians used to be buried with big pots o' beer. In fact, the
 last stage of mummification, ``Beer ''contends, was prying open
 the mummy's mouth and giving it one last, soothing, frosty gulp.
 New resonance to the term ``pickled,'' eh?
     Skipping north a bit, ``Beer'' characterizes the Norse
 heaven Valhalla as a vast beer hall, where good Vikings got to
 drink beer that ran limitlessly from the udder of giant goat
 named HEIDRUN. Ouch. We don't even want to think about what it
 took to attach *that* tap...
 (The Week in Death is by Brian Santo, [B.SANTO@genie.geis.com].)
... Thinking is a momentary dismissal of irrelevancies. * Fuller


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