[ddwayspd]

OMG, I didn't know he had passed. And on Election Day too! Passed from cancer, he was 66. I will miss him a lot, i love all his books, movies, tv shows.. dammmmmmmmmmmm.. no wonder his obit was missed with all the other hoopla goin on. G'Bye Michael.. God Bless ya.



http://www.latimes.com/entertainment...,3712374.photo

[Nikkkola]

Well you don't really think of authors too much. Some good movies though.

[SantaClaus]

Michael Crichton's death hit me like a ton of bricks. He was my favorite author.
He started writing when he was in the third grade. The teacher assigned the class an essay and while the rest of the class turned in a one or two page essay, Michael turned in a full play in 3 acts on 35 pages.

When he was 12, his parents took him to a volcanic national park. He was shocked that there were no publications to read that described the park and expressed his disappointment to his parents. At their suggestion he studied the park, wrote about it and his essay was published in the New York Times.

He naturally wanted to be an author and make his living that way but investigated and found out that at the time only about two hundred writers made upper incomes writing books. So he looked around and found out that there were about 17,000 doctors graduated each year and the odds were much better for success in that field. So he went to medical school.

He wrote several books under assumed names while in medical school because he thought that they would "think less of him" if they found out he was spending some of his time not studying medicine. It was while he was in school and his books were selling like hotcakes and being made into movies that he eventually started using his real name.

He needed to attend the premier of "The Andromeda Strain" so he went to his professor to ask for a couple days off. When probed he admitted he was a writer. His professor then lectured him about how hard is to make a living as a writer but gave him the time off. At the premier they took his picture and published it in the paper. His secret was out... and he said "they did think less of him". He then had to quit medical school because of the bias from all his teachers plus his rapidly increasing busy schedule of rewrites and new novels demanded by the entertainment industry.

Every time I heard him speak he was very modest and said he was just lucky. Far from the truth... He was a great man. Michael was 6'9" tall. He was also as nice and smart as he was tall.

I will miss him.

[ddwayspd]

awesome tribute dusty.. he also went to law school.. that's how he came up with such great tv ideas like Hill Street Blues, Law & Order, E.R. (medical of course), and a bunch of others which will go down in history as being classic shows. i'm gonna miss him a lot.. he was a great writer and thinker.