Remember that story about how DOS for the first IBM PC was between Bill Gates and Gary Kildall?
If you're not familiar - Gates was approached by IBM for an OS while they were securing Basic and other languages from Microsoft (their business model at the time). Gates referred them to Gary who had CP/M OS for Microsystems locked up at the time since it wasn't their domain.
There's a lot of stories about what happened next, but Digital Research (Gary's company), blanched at the IBM NDAs and terms (which admittedly, required a huge leap of faith considering IBM's past behavior on deals to that time). The deal fell apart and Microsoft acquired a CP/M clone and ended up licensing that to IBM later. Slightly understandable because the up-front risk was less for Microsoft where Digital Research had far more assets and IP to lose.
The rest (of course) is known history - except the part where he sold to DR to Novell for 80m and eventually aquired a mansion in Austin TX, a Learjet and a boat (amongst other toys), in addition to his mansion near Pebble Beach CA, so he did ok for a decade after.
What does this have to do with improbable deaths?
(from Wikipedia with no fewer than 6 associated footnotes - and it's pretty close to the reporting at the time)
On July 8, 1994, Kildall fell at a Monterey, California, biker bar and hit his head. The exact circumstances of the injury remain unclear. He had been an alcoholic in his later years. Various sources have claimed he fell from a chair, fell down steps, or was assaulted, because he had walked into the Franklin Street Bar & Grill wearing Harley-Davidson leathers. He checked in and out of the hospital twice, and died three days later at the Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula. An autopsy the next day did not conclusively determine a cause of death.
Suffice it to say, head blows can be very very dicey - and can cause all manner of knock-on havoc with pre-existing conditions, or just plain bad-luck. Joe's scenario is sketch as fuck to be sure.
Weird death is 'possible' however unlikely.
Remember that story about how DOS for the first IBM PC was between Bill Gates and Gary Kildall?
If you're not familiar - Gates was approached by IBM for an OS while they were securing Basic and other languages from Microsoft (their business model at the time). Gates referred them to Gary who had CP/M OS for Microsystems locked up at the time since it wasn't their domain.
There's a lot of stories about what happened next, but Digital Research (Gary's company), blanched at the IBM NDAs and terms (which admittedly, required a huge leap of faith considering IBM's past behavior on deals to that time). The deal fell apart and Microsoft acquired a CP/M clone and ended up licensing that to IBM later. Slightly understandable because the up-front risk was less for Microsoft where Digital Research had far more assets and IP to lose.
The rest (of course) is known history - except the part where he sold to DR to Novell for 80m and eventually aquired a mansion in Austin TX, a Learjet and a boat (amongst other toys), in addition to his mansion near Pebble Beach CA, so he did ok for a decade after.
What does this have to do with improbable deaths?
(from Wikipedia with no fewer than 6 associated footnotes - and it's pretty close to the reporting at the time)
Suffice it to say, head blows can be very very dicey - and can cause all manner of knock-on havoc with pre-existing conditions, or just plain bad-luck. Joe's scenario is sketch as fuck to be sure.
Yeah, and she was not an alcoholic old man at a bar. She was a fit young woman in an office.
52 isn't young - but I wouldn't call it terribly old either. Not if they're riding a half-ton bike.
Yeah, I didn't see an age in your post, just assumed by the use of the term "in his later years".