bobafred

My friend Erlene passed away this past weekend as a result of a tragic accident.

I met Erlene on March 25, 2005 at a PGA.com happy hour event. From the first time I met her I could tell she was a very special person. I remember talking about different books and Atlanta and just thinking that she was an extremely friendly person. It was impossible to not instantly like this girl.

I started working with Erlene at Super Deluxe in February of 2006. We shared a corner office with a printer named George, where we sat across from each other at a conference table. As time went on and Super Deluxe grew, we moved to different offices and then to different sides of a large cube farm, but she would always stop by to talk both work and non-work things. She was an extremely hard worker, often times putting in extra hours over weekends and even holidays. She was passionate about her work and doing the best for Super Deluxe.

When Lori and I first started dating I remember how happy Erlene was for me, and us. I think she might have been as happy for me as I was for me. I always felt that she honestly cared for me and my happiness. She was a true friend.

A bunch of people metup the other night to remember our friend and the great times we all shared together. There was laughter and there were tears. Afterwards, we headed over to The Sword show, because that’s where she would have been and that’s where she would have wanted us to be. I can’t speak for others, but it was a way for me to feel close to my friend again.

Erlene was smart, funny, talented, and extremely genuine. She was taken from us far too early. There was so much more that she was meant to do in life. I will never forget our Korean barbecue discussions, how excited she was about the monster truck jam, her laugh, or the thousands of other memories that have slowly trickled back to my brain over the past few days.

My heart goes out to Erlene’s family, Aaron, and all her friends. As I read tributes to her around the web, I am reminded how extremely lucky I was to have known her, if only for just a brief time.

She will be dearly missed.

My friend and former co-worker Bill Sims passed away this afternoon after suffering a heart attack over the weekend.

Bill was a very talented and hardworking programmer. He was a devoted family man and had the spirit of a man half his age. Whether he was dismantling the dryer to find the one part that squeaked or wiring a house for electricity, he always managed to keep busy.

I have to admit, Bill was a pretty unique character. He didn’t take crap from anyone, and that included managers and directors. As you can probably imagine, he was a perfect ally to have by your side in the workplace. At one point he and I were pretty much the programming department for the Atlanta office and he always had my back. Whether it was some stuffy corporate type with an unreasonable request or a horribly written specification document, Bill was there to help in anyway he could. He coached me in the ways of navigating office politics and was always available to offer up life advice.

One of the greatest compliments I have ever received was when Bill told me that I reminded him a lot of himself when he was my age. He would always counter my anger or frustrations with a ‘been there, done that’ answer that made me believe this to be true. I can safely say that if I someday attain the level of personal and professional happiness that Bill did, I will in fact consider my life successful.

I’m going to miss my friend Bill. I’m a better person for having known him.

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Update 08/31: Adam shares some memories.

Having finished The Hafling’s Gem, I have now read 6 books in the The Legend of Drizzt series, of which there are currently 16. I need a break.

Therefore, I have begun to re-read The Talisman by Stephen King and Peter Straub. I was probably 13 or 14 the first time I read this and my memories of it are great. Weighing in at a hefty 750+ pages, it’s a good mix of fantasy and horror. I’m about 70 pages in so far, and my goal is around 100 a day.

I’ve been hard at work on another site layout update. I’m pretty happy with how it’s going, but still think I need to do some more work on it. The goal of the redesign is to have a simple, easy to read layout and to streamline my css file some.

As previously reported, I still have some behind the scenes stuff to get done. This will all happen before I put out the new layout. I feel that I should have plenty of time in the coming weeks to accomplish all this.