Test Your Surprise Demise IQ!

By DeLane McDuffie

Don't you hate it when things don't go your way? Or when the weather forecast calls for sunshine, but it rains instead? That may have been on the minds of the people mentioned below, ranging from fitness/health icons to regular Joes. One minute, you could be shaking hands with Life, and then the next minute, it could be slapping you in the face. Wear a helmet. The following individuals got a taste of Life's ironic side. Match the man with the characteristic that best befits his unplanned exit strategy.

1. Jim Fixx – Cholesterol roadblock. James F. Fixx was a key figure in America's jogging movement of the late 1970s. He authored the best-selling book The Complete Book of Running in 1977 and championed healthy dieting for living a long life. One morning in 1984, he suffered a heart attack while on his daily morning jog. His autopsy revealed that he had severe blocking in three coronary arteries.
2. Jerome Moody – Premature celebration. Near the end of the summer of 1985, the New Orleans Recreation Department held a huge pool party to commemorate its first summer in memory without a single drowning. Two hundred people were in attendance, with more than half of them being certified lifeguards. There were also four lifeguards on duty. As the party began to wind down, the lifeguards checked the premises. To everyone's shock, there was a fully clothed man, Jerome Moody, lying at the bottom of the deep end. Moody, a party guest, drowned while surrounded by lifeguards.
3. Jerome Irving Rodale – Bored to death. The other Jerome on this list is credited with establishing the organic food movement. He also was the publisher/founder of the Rodale Press, home of many wellness magazines, like Men's Health, Women's Health, and Prevention. During a guest appearance on The Dick Cavett Show in 1971, Rodale boasted to Cavett during the interview, "I'm going to live to be 100, unless I'm run down by some sugar-crazed taxi driver." Within minutes, the 72-year-old slumped over in his chair, dead from a heart attack. In the original story, Cavett thought that Rodale was asleep and asked him, "Are we boring you, Mr. Rodale?" However, Cavett later rejected this account, and the show never aired.
4. Sir Francis Bacon – Frozen dinner. An English Renaissance Man, Bacon was a philosopher, politician, writer, lawyer, and a scientist. His style of scientific investigation later led to the scientific method, and he's even been rumored to have penned some of Shakespeare's plays. In 1626, the man with the delicious surname wondered if snow could preserve meat. Unable to keep his curiosity at bay, he killed a chicken, stepped outside into a snowstorm, and spent several hours trying to jam snow into the chicken. He almost froze to death and later died from pneumonia.
5. Tycho Brahe – Table manners. This 16th-century Danish astronomer and alchemist was instrumental in establishing the early theories of planetary motion, and also worked alongside German astronomer Johannes Kepler. It is said that during a banquet in Prague, after some serious drinking, the Dane continued to sit at the table and refused to go to the restroom to relieve himself. Back then, it was impolite to excuse oneself from a feast before the meal was concluded. Because of his steadfast dining etiquette, his bladder popped like a balloon, and he suffered unimaginable pain, meeting his maker about a week and a half later. Other theories have developed about his death, including mercury poisoning and murder.