Baby Boomer Celebrities asked about their "To Do Before You Die" Lists

Author Stephen King, politician Dan Quayle, humorist P. J. O'Rourke, rocker Joan Jett, coach Bill Cowher, former baseball player Cal Ripken, Jr., television host Bill O'Reilly, singer Patti Smith a few other assorted personalities were asked by Newsweek to name three things on their "to do before you die" lists. Besides being celebs, the common thread for the grouping is that they are all middle age baby boomers--not a bad time to be thinking about what things you want to do before it's too late to do them (whether by death or other incapacitation).

Given the diversity of the panel it is no surprise that the things selected were equally diverse.

Among the items:

To see "American Idol" canceled. (Stephen King)
Treat heart problems in gorillas at D.C.'s National Zoo. (Bill Frist)
To be able to play the piano and sing. (Paula Dean)
...fool around with old cars. (P.J. O'Rourke)
Earn a Masters Degree. (Jackie Joyner-Kersee)
To learn a language. (Joan Jett)
Learn to speak Armenian. (Eric Bogosian)
Watch my girls play basketball at Princeton this season. (Bill Cowher)
Join a square-dancing club.(Mark Morris)
Get past my fear of scuba diving. (Camile Paglia)
Improve my golf game. (Cal Ripkin, Jr.)
Scuba diving. (Bill O'Reilly)
To go on a horseback safari in Botswana. (Dan Quayle)
Read the Bible, Torah and Qur'an. (Patti Smith)

What is on your "To Do Before I Die" list? If you don't have one, start one today. It is fun and healthy. All you need is a pen & paper (Excel also works quite well) and start listing the things that you'd really like to do "someday." Someday will be upon you (and us) quicker than you can imagine so part two of the list is to start doing them one by one. Some people (like me) thought the list should start at 100 items however you might find out that creating the list is a little harder than you might expect. Looking at what others are putting on their lists can be helpful. Click on the "Before I Die" tag to see the lists that we've aggregated so far. We regularly add more.