Depressing...yet optimistic forecast for my demise

Life and death are subjects that fascinate me. Life is so valuable...each one of us gets one chance at it. And, yes, it sucks that one day it's going to end for all of us.

As a child, I used to think about death all the time even though none of my loved ones have yet to pass away—only members of my friends' families and co-workers, etc. For some reason, though, I experienced many sleepless nights thinking about death. My childish imagination conjured up hopes that in the future, technology would exist to eliminate natural death.

But then I would think about immortality...eternal life. And that's when I would think to myself, "Holy crap! That would be SOOOOOO boring." And, of course, you have the problem of the Earth getting caught up in the expanding Sun five billion years in the future (according to a 2005 episode of "Doctor Who"). At the age of five billion, there's no way I'm packing up and moving to another galaxy.

So, in the end, death is a much better alternative than immortality. Of course, this also means that I hope there isn't an afterlife of some sort because that will lead to the same problem. Eventually, even Heaven is going to get boring. I mean, if there is a Heaven, I doubt there are concerts...and movies. How can you call a place Heaven when there are no Peter Gabriel, Ben Folds or Mike Doughty concerts? I would rather be, as Ben Franklin once wrote, simply food for worms.

Anyway, I came across a site called DeathForecast.com, which asks you some questions about your lifestyle and family history, and tries to calculate a likely age for natural death based on the responses.

According to DeathForecast.com, I will die at the age of 74. And you know what? I'm totally down with that. That's a good age to go, I think. I definitely don't want to go deep into my 80s, when I'll probably become a helpless shell of a human being.

And I'm not saying that anyone in their 80s and beyond is helpless...I'm just saying I probably will be based on the fact that I feel a little helpless sometimes now...and I'm still a few weeks away from hitting 35.

But in those remaining 39 years or so, hopefully, the Phillies will win at least one more World Series and the Eagles will finally win a Super Bowl. That's all I ask.