Sunshine and Light

RIP

I got an email today from a co-worker in Houston, letting me know that a former co-worker had passed away this morning. Steve was probably one of the kindest, most open-hearted people I ever met. He was Texan to the core, and I remember one of the proudest days of his life when he was commissioned an Admiral in the Texas Navy (Come to think of it, GW Bush was probably responsible for that, it was during his tenure as Texas Guv). One of Steve’s favorite lunchtime pastimes was to find the diviest barbecue joints on the planet. Two became favorites – the wife swapping barbecue place, and the police station barbecue place. Thusly called because of their proximity to the wife-swappin’ bar and the police station respectively. (He swore he knew that they swapped wives at the bar only from the stories) He and another co-worker were incredibly intimidated by the computer, and Steve named his machine Fred –as in Fucking Ridiculous Electronic Device. His counterpart in computer fear was called Elmer (as in the glue) after he learned to cut and paste in Word. The work that Steve and I did in Houston was a strange combination of monotony and stress. We did a lot of configuring items for which there could only be 42 components. It became a favorite game to walk by and shout out “25!” to which the response was “17!” And as dumb as it was, you couldn’t help but laugh.

Alas for Steve, he did not take good care of himself. He was overweight. Smoked like a chimney. Never exercised. And we strongly suspect (although it was never officially verified) that he was alcoholic. He was in bad shape already from cirrhosis of the liver, and this morning he had a massive heart attack. It was a shock, but not really a surprise. I’ve asked one of my co-workers to let me know funeral arrangements. I’m sending flowers, but I probably should send some Shiner beer and barbecue.

posted by MyHusbandRules @ 1:36 PM