GoogObits

Earl Hindman, 61, the Neighbor Unseen on `Home Improvement,’ Is DeadBy WOLFGANG SAXON Earl Hindman, the actor known to millions as the odd neighbor barely seen as he peeks over the backyard fence in the long-running television situation comedy “Home Improvement,” died yesterday at Stamford Hospital in Connecticut. A Stamford resident, he was 61. The cause was lung cancer, said his…

One thing I love about reading obituaries is because of patterns. Here’s a pattern: real estate ownership issues can be really thorny. Think Western Wall / Temple Mount. Or any civic zoning dispute. That stuff I’m familiar with. But by reading the Times of India, I am able to read about what appears to be a pretty intense land dispute that has a…

Reading the obituaries has given me countless of unplanned, uncontrollable, unpredictable lessons born from the lives of those who died yesterday. Today, we get an old lesson: If it smells like a fish, and looks like a fish, and feels like a fish, it really could be a fish. George Elliott, 85, Dies; Warned of…

Sometimes an obituary will startle me slightly, shake me out of silly conceptions and lazy thinking. Before I read Daniel Nehme’s obituary, the nature of the Syrian political and educational systems– the number of political parties, the existence of law degrees, the apparent ability to be known as a Communist, never occurred to me. Now,…