Nobody Knows Anything

Welcome to Diane Patterson's eclectic blog about what strikes her fancy

Death

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Darin just got a phone call. A guy Darin used to work closely with at General Magic died. Just…died. (In case you used to work at Magic, his initials are PG.) His wife woke up and he was dead.

He was Darin’s age. My age. He was in fantastic shape physically. He was fabulously wealthy, had a wife and young child, a house the rest of us will pretty much only dream about.

And he’s dead.

We hadn’t been in touch with him for a little while—moving to LA (on our part) and a radically different career path (on his)—separated us. But there are all those similarities between him and Darin, and I cannot fathom losing Darin when the kids are tiny like this.

I’m still pretty flabbergasted by this news.

Update: Scott Knaster has more, complete with more details.

Vigilanteism, Silicon-Valley style

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I came across this article in the Chronicle today:

The sight of a solo driver illegally zipping along in the carpool lane is enough to stir a desire for revenge in many a law-abiding motorist and conscientious carpooler.

Long-distance commuter Sean McIntyre said the last straw was an October day when he and his partner, David, were zipping along in the diamond lane. “We’re already doing 70 mph … and this guy comes whizzing up behind us, parks on my bumper and flashes his brights,” McIntyre said…

Suddenly, McIntyre thought of the perfect payback for carpool-lane scofflaws — more enduring and publicly humiliating than an angry hand gesture or a horn honk. He and David created www.CarPoolCheats.org — a Web site featuring photos of cheaters they have caught in the act on their digital camera.

Of course, I haven’t been able to get to their site today; it’s probably overloaded by visitors from the San Francisco Chronicle. But haven’t you always wanted to do something like this? Photograph the cars who barrel around corners, regardless of whether there are pedestrians there or not? The ones whose only handicap making them eligible for the handicapped space is a total lack of ethics?

The ones that always got me in LA were the ones who took the carpool-only lane (24/7, carpools only) and moved in and out over the double-yellow lines at will.

Pop culture marches on

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You know that your vision of pop culture has moved on when you’re reading alt.gossip.celebrities (sigh—yes, I still read some posts in it, I’m ashamed), you read the headline, “Jackson Charges Will Be Difficult to Prove,” and your first thought (I kid you not) is: “What’s Peter Jackson supposed to have done?”

Took me a few seconds to think of another guy named Jackson.