John Curley sets, survives his own ‘death date,’ reflects on Dori Monson’s life

Eleven years ago, on June 19, 2012, John Curley proclaimed on his radio show that he would be dead in 10 years, freshly after turning 60.

“I will be 60 years old, and I will be dead,” the host told his show staff on 97.3 KIRO FM’s “John Curley Show.” “I have put an expiration on myself, that I will be dead in ten years.”

Curley officially signed off on the date of June 30, 2022 as the day he will perish.

“I forgot all about this, but according to mynorthwest.com 10 years ago, I put an expiration date on myself that I would be dead in 10 years,” Curley said on “The John and Shari Show.” “I made the announcement during the evening show because we didn’t really have much of a producer. I’d just blab for three hours.”

From John Curley’s archive: John Curley set to expire in 10 years

Curley explained the original thought came after he read the average person running in a race will run the last 300 yards almost 20 times faster than they ran the previous mile if they can see or hear the finish line, a phenomenon he experienced himself when participating in an Ironman Competition in France. He then wondered how he could achieve the same result in his day-to-day life without a health scare acting as a wake-up call.

A 10-year expiration date was soon formed for the KIRO Newsradio host.

“Then, each step you take has more gravitas,” Curley said. “It has more effect because soon it will be over. And so I had made that announcement then.”

With the announcement came goals of improving his life, including cutting down on work, spending more time with family, and accomplishing a few feats along the way.

“So, there’s a couple of things that you planned to do over these next 10 years,” co-host Shari Elliker said on “The John and Shari Show.” “Let’s see if you’ve done them. John said he’s cutting his auctioneer dates down from 100 to 50.”

“OK, well I threw 30 out,” Curley replied.

According to Curley’s original plan, he was going to spend his recently acquired free time with his kids, including coaching his son’s football team.

“I did that. I say this about the thing with kids: Yes, you have your plans for your kids, but your kids have other plans, like spending less time with you,” Curley said in response. “And they do that. They go out and you try like, ‘Hey, let’s go do this.’ And they don’t want to spend time with you. They do if you push them a little bit, but normally they’ve got their own friends and their own activities.”

Before he died, former KIRO Newsradio host Dori Monson also pondered his death and how his body would be preserved after his passing — including humoring the idea of being composted or taxidermized.

“It actually sounds kind of cool to me,” Monson said in 2016. “If you had somebody that you loved and all of the sudden a beautiful tree is growing, in part, because of them … I can’t imagine working somebody I loved into the soil, but I think I’d love to look at the tree.”

From the Dori Monson archive: Dori wants his dead body either taxidermied or composted

“You can create a false expiration date for yourself, but the true reality of knowing that it really may or may not be, and then the death of people like the death of Dori. I know I’m 61 and got more miles on and, all of a sudden, stuff can go wrong,” Curley said. “But life consists of two things, what you have to do and what you want to do. If you were successful enough to have some power to do the things that you want to do, instead of what you have to do when you’re younger.”

You can listen to the rest of the conversation below:

Listen to John Curley and Shari Elliker weekday afternoons from 3-7 p.m. on KIRO Newsradio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.