# Wes Humboldt from Corner Gas dies of Cancer

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wes-humboldt-from-corner-gas-dies-of-cancer/720847>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [May 26, 2015, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wes-humboldt-from-corner-gas-dies-of-cancer/720847 "2015-05-26T05:17:23Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
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**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\
**Post date:** [May 26, 2015, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/wes-humboldt-from-corner-gas-dies-of-cancer/720847/1 "2015-05-26T05:17:23Z")

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Well, not really Wes, the guy who ran the combined insurance agency and liquor store in Dog River, but his real-life alter-ego, Mike O’Brien. He’s died of an aggressive cancer.

I knew him slightly back when he was a reporter on the local paper, the Leader-Post. He interviewed me a few times on court cases I ran. Always fair and reasonable in his reporting. One of his best articles was “Docket Court on Christmas Eve”, a story about the people who found themselves in docket court on criminal charges on December 24. Always treated the topics of his articles humanely.

He moved on from Regina to Winnipeg to get his dream job, writing comedy for CBC Radio. He also got married, and they had a little boy. Then cancer came.

Mike responded with a mix of humour and realism, starting a blog called [The Big Diseasy](https://thebigdiseasey.wordpress.com/).

A week ago, the National Post ran an article on him by Jana Pruden, one of his fomer colleagues at the Leader-Post: [‘Tumour humour and chemo emo’: Why a Canadian actor with terminal cancer plans to die laughing](http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadian-actor-with-terminal-cancer-plans-to-die-laughing-mike-obrien), which opened with this little story:

> [@](#):
>
> Mike O’Brien walked up to the admitting desk in the hospital’s emergency room. He was tall and thin, bald from chemo, weak from illness. He told the nurse, “I’m a diabetic who has stage four cancer. I just had my first chemo in months, and I’ve been vomiting and really fatigued. I’m having trouble breathing, and I have other side effects. This morning I started peeing blood.”
> 
> The nurse looked at him and said, “But apart from that, you’re fine?”
> 
> O’Brien and his wife, Robin Summerfield, burst out laughing at the inadvertent punch line. It still cracks them up, telling the story weeks later.
> 
> “We just thought she was so sweet to try to find something in this dying husk of a human that might not make it away from her desk before it collapses,” O’Brien chuckles. “She’s looking for a silver lining.”

Sadly, Mike didn’t get the silver lining; died this past weekend, with at least one dream unfulfilled:

> [@](#):
>
> O’Brien hopes to be able to walk his son to the first day of kindergarten in September, the way his own mother walked with him along the edge of the forest in Inuvik when he was a boy. He knows he may not make it that long.

[Mike O’Brien, comedian and Corner Gas regular, dies of cancer](http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/mike-obrien-comedian-and-corner-gas-regular-dies-of-cancer)

[Former CBC comedy writer Mike O’Brien, 51, dies of cancer](http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/former-cbc-comedy-writer-mike-o-brien-51-dies-of-cancer-1.3086979)

RIP, Mike. You were one of the good ones.