Category: Memoriams

Writing posts like these never get easier. I went for a long walk to get my thoughts in order but they are still a mess so forgive me if my sentences seem the same.

This morning I found out that a friend, Natalie Nguyen (@tipsytentacle) had passed away due to suicide.

Natalie and I did not know each other very well but the one thing I did know about her is that she loved to play a game called OpenTTD.

Therefore, in her name I have made a small donation to the OpenTTD project. I hope the game brings others joy like it did Natalie.

Gone but not forgotten.

Rest in peace Natalie.

Occasionally folks come into large IRC channels and ask some variant of “anybody alive?”. Sometimes I would reply, “No, we are all ghosts in the shell”.

Today, I logged onto IRC and found out that we did indeed have a ghost in our midst.

Jon “avenj” Portnoy is the type of dude on IRC who always says “hey” back no matter the time. Sometimes I thought the dude never slept. An avid Perl programmer he made me see beauty in a language where I only saw gibberish. #otw will never be the same again but I hope the rest of us can keep the spirit of it alive.

In his memory, I have made a donation to The Perl Foundation. If you wish to do so as well, you can do so from here.

Rest in peace, friend.