The Forebode Warrior

I seem to remember that in the days immediately following the "assassinations" (see Chris Rock's definition) of worthless airbrush t-shirt icons Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls, one or two media outlets actually made the ill-advised decision to jump on the bandwagon of those asking the laughable question, "Did Tupac and Biggie predict their own deaths?"

As if it were somehow spooky that two thug-life dipshits whose nearly every song involved violence of one kind or another might've wound up being killed themselves at some point.

In the spirit of that kind of ratings-driven thinking, I give you last night's episode of Larry King Live (the show with the most unintentionally ironic name in television).

For an hour last night, Terri Irwin, the widow of Steve Irwin -- Aussie stereotype and notorious irritant to 93% of the animal kingdom -- had her own up-close encounter with the elusive Vampire Bat of Brooklyn, talking to Larry King about her life in khaki, as one half of the married team behind television's erstwhile most popular nature show. It was all to promote a book she's written about the intrepid adventures of her late husband, who was killed by a stray stingray barb while shooting a scene for their show along Australia's Great Barrier Reef.

It was pretty much your average interview -- until Larry began baiting Mrs. Irwin with the staff booker "pre-interview"-approved insinuation that Steve Irwin may have, like Tupac and Biggie before him, predicted his own death.

To this, Terri Irwin responded that yes, Steve had in fact foretold that he would "die young."

Larry, likely having just experienced mild incontinence, reacted with shock.

Terri nodded in quiet reverence.

So, just for the cheap seats, let's recap: a guy who, from his 12th birthday on, spent as much time as he could poking, prodding, and generally harassing every deadly creature on the planet once intoned that he probably wouldn't live to see old age.

Thanks Nostradamus.

Although I still believe that Irwin was, in fact, assassinated by that stingray.

Hey, if anybody had a good reason to...