Death is all around

At the moment it feels that we're surounded by death...but fortunately not quite touched by it.

Natasha Richardson was very sad, leaving two teen kids and a grieving husband. Having bought a ski helmet for the first time this year, after some twenty years on the slopes,I have become something of an evangelist on the subject. And it could have been so different for her if only she'd worn a helmet. In most resorts now they're fashionable as well as safe. So I hope that anyone who read about her untimely passing, and heads off to the slopes either buys or rents some brain protection. For the boy, it's been required ski wear since the moment he first strapped some wooden planks to his feet, and now it's second nature to him.

I didn't initially pay too much attention to to the disappearance of Jude Richmond her and disabled daughter Millie. It seemed a sad piece of news and there was a sense that the search would end in only one way (as indeed it has). However, the radio was on in the office, and the news team were interviewing the ex-husband. The voice was immediately recognisable to me, and so I checked the story out on the web. Sure enough, it was someone I used to work with and I well remember the trauma of Millie's birth. A sad start to life and a tragic end, but from what I know the bit in the middle was joyous.

Lastly, the death of the year is Jade Goody. Whilst I thought her celebrity status was the ultimate comment on the vacuousness of our celeb-culture, I can't help but feel for anyone who doesn't live beyond 27 years...and her two small children. Her funeral will take place at a church just 150 yards from our house, and curiously she was brought up in Bermondsey where my office is.

So Mr Grim Reaper, no more death for a little while please