It's a balance for the *patient* to decide. Cancer treatment can be so debilitating/painful that you don't feel as though you ARE living -- or that YOU are living! I cringed a bit to hear Trebek say that one reason he is pressing on is because his wife wants him to live. Of course, but IME that is undue pressure. I am not in anything like Trebek's situation with his pancreatic cancer. People live many years with the multiple myeloma I have -- live *well* with the ongoing chemo to keep it at bay. However, when I go for my chemo, I see patients in the Cancer Center who are suffering terribly. Their families are there, suffering too! When I see someone with so little chance of "survival "(with whatever degree of living that may entail), I think of my BFF. She developed a glioma (brain cancer) in her early sixties. Chances were 2% survival past two years. She had surgeries. She had radiation. She was terribly damaged and diminished. She finally called a halt, refusing the next 'one more thing' that doctors always have waiting. She deeply regretted the time she had lost 'fighting it'. She was devastated to know that her grandchildren's final memories of her would be the barely human person who survived the treatment, but not the disease.

I wish I'd seen the ABC special. Here's something from a CNN email this morning: When the producers of "Jeopardy" announced Trebek's death, they also revealed that he produced new episodes of the game show up until the end of October, just a week and a half ago. Cabrera asked Richards: "Did you know it was going to be the last?" Richards said no, but "he was in pain and we knew it. He'd had surgery. I couldn't believe he was already back from the surgery that he'd had just two weeks before that. I had chills the entire tape day. That first show of that final week, which is, unbelievably, [scheduled to air] the week of Christmas, he gives a speech talking about togetherness, how important family is, and it will resonate even more now. It was so beautiful." Richards added, "He was at the top of his game, even though clearly he was very ill."

He was a class act. Just last week THIS happened after an episode aired: “On Thursday's episode, Navy veteran Burt Thakur won a tight game, taking home $20,400. After the episode finished taping, Thakur tearfully told Trebek how he watched “Jeopardy!” with his grandfather when he was a child, and in doing so learned how to speak English.”

I would be happy with Ken as the host. We’ve watched Jeopardy for years and years It was something I used to do with my father too, and the different times he was in the hospital and then in rehab. When we knew we were going to lose him, and my sister and I were caring for him, Jeopardy was the only thing he’d make the effort to get out of bed to watch. That was during James H’s run. Recently Alex talked about children recognizing the theme song. We watch my one year old granddaughter 3 nights a week and when Alex said that I hoped to myself that it happens with her. Then the following week we got the sad news. Watching Jeopardy is a family tradition, if you will. My heart and mind will be okay if the baton is passed to Ken. I hope he can do it well because that of course will be the deciding factor.