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CHICAGO (WP) - McDonald's Corp. Chairman and Chief Executive Jim Cantalupo died of an acute attack of irony on Monday in Florida, shocking the company and investors.

Cantalupo has now joined the growing list of high profile Americans like Dr. Robert Atkins to die from this debilitating disease.

Flags at Hamburger University were at half mast as the students and faculty observed a moment of silence at 12:00 pm to remember the fallen Executive who hid his battle with the disease from the general public. Top scientists at Hamburger University have long sought to develop a healthy alternative to traditional fast food, finally unveiling the "air-burger" a conceptual burger that looks suspiciously like people pretending to eat hamburgers. "It more theoretical at this point." Said Smithee Allen Watts, Professor and Lead Research Scientist.

Close friends say that Cantalupo was hopeful after Dave Thomas, the founder of Wendy's seemed to be winning his battle with Irony which was caused by his long time diagnosis of heart disease, Cantalupo had hope that he could beat the disease, but Thomas' death in 2002 dampened his spirits.

After Thomas' death there was an increasing focus on fast food and the fact that every 33 seconds, an American dies of heart disease. There was concern that Americans would catch on to the subtle connection between shoveling handfuls of super-sized saturated fat into your mouth and heart disease. The company breathed a sigh of relief when America promptly went about its business and washed its last chicken wing down with a ice cold Bud.

- Clark Brandon