What is a good death?  Is there such a thing?  After an eight year battle with Renal Cell Carcinoma my wife finally died nine years ago.  She passed while thoroughly drugged, in the wee hours, in a room full of family and friends.  I was holding her left hand and her brother was holding her right.  Though the years leading up to this were tragic and hard this seems like about as good a death as one could hope for. 
    My Mom was as tough a character as you could ever meet.  One of her many mantras throughout her life was "I don't want to die in some GD hospital with GD tubes and wires sticking out of me.  She was a heavy smoker and though she quit with me on November 19, 1988 she got lung cancer anyway.  She eventually passed in her own livingroom one night while alone.  Though I'm sure her actual dying was most unpleasant I sincerely believe she would call her own death a good one.  She was 87, completely independent and self supporting, and died at home on her own terms, without GD tubes and wires sticking out of her. 
     Personally I'd be happy with a quick, painless death of some sort, though it seldom works out that way.  I would consider that a success. 
     Sorry if this is gloomy but death is something we all have to deal with.  It's a part of life. 

Agreed.  A perfect death would be a quick, painless one right after completing some amazing feat like right after catching a thirteen pound bass or bowling a perfect game.  But I'll settle for a sudden painless one 

Old age, affairs in order, surrounded by a loving family, not in a hospital, and peacefully falling asleep one last time never to wake up. That’s the ideal.