We used to play the same thing...
...but we only had three picks. Laziness, I suppose.

Anyway, you were only allowed two 'bankers' - half-decrepit octegenarians who'd been circling the drain since rationing. The other had to be a 'wildcard' - someone unlikely to shuffle off from natural causes, but who'd had a bit of a rough year for whatever reason, or whose wildy excessive lifestyle made throwing a seven a tangible possibility.

So here are a few people (from both categories) I bet on and lost:

Prince Phillip - Hanging on until the word 'wog' becomes acceptable again.
Maggie Thatcher - May have discovered the secret to eternal life, possibly involving the crushed up stem cells of Yorkshire miners.
Michael Barrymore - Was a shoe-in 3 years running. Did he cash in his chips? Did he arse.
Michael Jackson - Right fruitcake. Wrong year.
Robbie Williams - Had OD written all over him.
Pete Doherty - See above, times 20.
Richard Littlejohn - Suicide, due to the shame of being caught backstage at a Scissor Sisters gig, ripped to the tits on crystal meth and fellating a disabled, gay, Romanian LGBT outreach worker*.

*Admittedly this was a bit of a long shot. But in so far as it's possible for an atheist to pray until his knees bled, that's what I did.
(Monkey Tennis isn't Spartacus, Fri 17 Dec 2010, 11:46, 1 reply)

Fruitcake
I simply have to applaud the Michael Jackson description of "Right fruitcake, wrong year". Bravo!
(golddust QOTW now revolves around being a cunt, Fri 17 Dec 2010, 16:19, closed)