An bizarre piece of Ritter-related intrigue: Like pretty much every other newspaper in the country, the New York Daily News publishes daily syndicated horoscopes, theirs written by “celebrity” astrologer Joyce Jillson. In addition to the usual short blurbs relating to each zodiacal sign, Ms. Jillson usually includes photos of a couple of celebrities who are celebrating birthdays that week. Each is accompanied by a short paragraph explaining how the particular star’s sign relates to whatever piece of shit album, movie or TV show he’s working on at the moment. In September 11th’s edition of the Daily News, Ms. Jillson surmises that Moby’s business acumen in licensing so many of his songs to advertising campaigns is a direct manifestation of his Virgo-ness. Fair enough, I suppose. The other celebrity featured on this particular day? That’s right, Mr. John Ritter. No, I’m not joking.

It gets better. Get a load of this line: “Having a Virgo sun sign helps keep his career ticking”. I will remind you that John Ritter died of…yes, a massive heart attack. Well done, Ms. Jillson.

Look, I know astrology isn’t a perfect science. In fact, it’s a not a science at all. And even if I did buy into that horseshit (I don’t), I wouldn’t expect that even the most gifted astrologer would be able to predict the exact day someone was going to die. But is it too much to ask that someone who purports to see the fucking future might have the ability to pick out one of the 364 days this year when John Ritter was not going to kick off? I mean, all she had to do was pick a celebrity who wasn’t going to suffer a fatal heart attack a few hours before her column went to press. I’d like to think even I could avoid dropping the astrological ball like that, and I’m not exactly what you’d call the Delphic fucking Oracle.

All I can say is, if I were Moby I’d be shitting my pants right now.