[PLUG-TALK] Gary Grossoehme (was SCSI cables)

[Keith Lofstrom]

Ron Braithwaite <ron at braithwaites.net> writes:
> Any more details about Gary? Any news of the rest of them would be
> appreciated, too.

The main fellow dealing with all this was Bob Randall, BOBRANDALL at aol.com .

Gary died early on the morning of August 30th.  He lived with his mother
in a small house in Northeast Portland;  50th and Halsey area.  He was
53 years old IIRC.

Here are some excerpts from Bob's emails to me:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>     Gary had been sick for a couple of months.... unexplained cause... (so
> far!)
>     He had respiratory and "energy" problems, along with cognitive problems.
> ...
>    Gary's sodium was off... Chris [BobR's doctor wife, our interpreter] 
> said that might contribute to the cognitive issues.
> 
>    The Dr. told Chris that he suggested hospitalizing Gary on his last visit,
> but Gary didn't want to "check in".
> 
>     He died, unexpectedly yesterday - sometime between 5:30am and 9:00am.
> His Mom called me at 9:50AM, 8/30/04.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>     The pathology exam apparently turned up signs of an infection of a heart
> valve(s?).  It is not yet known what type of infection this was, as complete
> details will probably take at least a month... the additional tests are in
> progress...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Keith returns:

When my 81yo mother crumped after a 6 month slide into worstening dementia,
we admitted her to the CCU at St. Vincent.  After some heroic all night
efforts by one of the residents (Dr. Cho, now practicing in Salem); her
electrolytes were stabilized and she was pulled back, not only from death's
door but dementia.  It was like she woke up after a 6 month nightmare.
Her next 2 years were lucid and much happier - she died smiling.

Had Gary made it to hospital for just a day or two, some simple treatments
with antibiotics and some electrolyte adjustment could have very easily
saved his life.  Unfortunately, the problem was affecting his decision
making abilities, and Gary had nobody he trusted to make such decisions
for him.  Dammit, if the rest of his friends had known the situation, we
could have talked him into the hospital stay, minded the store, etc.  

Gary and his mother had been a team since his father left when he was
small;  early on, he became the one that made the decisions and earned
the income.  The building and lot of Oregon Electronics was their nest
egg; the store didn't make a lot of income, and was primarily to babysit
the site until it was bought someday (there are plans to develop that
area with high rises - $$$ ).  Being a high crime area, most of what Gary
was doing was guarding the building.  Which was cool, it gave all of us
time to visit for an hour or so and share Gary's unique perspective on
computers and technology and politics and life in general.  Or just
buy a good cable cheap.

I will miss Gary.  I hope the rest of you will work on finding a friend
you trust, who is aware of your mental state and competent to tell you
when you are getting a little more loopy than normal.  A lack of trust
can kill you just as surely as a lack of caution.  Gary was not a
paranoid, but with just a little more willingness to take caring advice,
he would still be here with us.  As many of us computer types have 
similar issues, we should take his example to heart.

Keith
 
-- 
Keith Lofstrom          keithl at keithl.com         Voice (503)-520-1993
KLIC --- Keith Lofstrom Integrated Circuits --- "Your Ideas in Silicon"
Design Contracting in Bipolar and CMOS - Analog, Digital, and Scan ICs