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Paul Riccelli - PAR


Frank Hagan

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I have been notified that Paul Riccelli (PAR) passed away unexpectedly on May 30th, 2018..  There is a GoFund me page for burial expenses.I'm posting the link for others to pay their respects in whatever way they see fit.

 

My condolences to his family and friends. 

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In light of this, let me take the time to say how much I appreciate all of you. Especially when you bust my chops, even if I do act like a baby about it. ;)

 

I care deeply about my cadre of “invisible” friends. I’m so glad of this interface which allows us to be friends, as I fear the world would have prevented many of us from ever beginning a friendship.

 

Percieved differences based on looks just don’t apply here, and that’s the best thing about it.

 

I’ve no doubt most of my internet friends would have eschewed me in the corporeal world. Shoot, I do! :)

 

Anyway. Aside from Paul, know I love all y’all.

 

Peace,

Robert

 

P.S. Incidentally, a life long friend took his own life last Monday. The Tiger is not having a good end to last month, y’all.

Hug your loved ones, today. Tell them all how you feel. Everyday. Tell everyone.

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What a great wealth of knowledge gone, spoke with him several times, he even offered to give me a few things. So sad, we will all be worse off with out him on these forums, I learned a lot from his posts. Fair winds and following seas Paul.

Hulsey 

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   I'm really sad to hear that.  Paul was always happy to offer his experience to help those of us who haven't slopped as much goo as he has.  My heart goes out to his family and friends.

   I never met Paul, but like Robert the Tiger I am reminded of the community we have here.  I've long considered these forums to be the friendliest place on the internet thanks to Frank and his one rule (be nice) and to the people who enjoy helping each other and just talking about boats and other related matters (dogs, brides, grandkids, motorcycles, blah blah blah).  I've also thought that we all have a funny kind of community, though, because there are a lot of unknown lives going on behind all these discussions.

   I've recognized forum contributors in passing just by their boats.  I passed Scott and his beautiful yellow Belhaven on Highway 40 once in North Carolina and I recognized him instantly just because he posted the first pictures of his yellow paint job immediately after I bought my yellow paint for Southbound (Aargh!)  But even though his boat allowed me to recognize him at a combined closing speed of 130mph (113 knots or 208kph), I could easily have walked past him in a store or something without ever knowing who he was.

   Actually, I had that happen too.  I was at lumber reseller once looking for a nice piece of hardwood to make something or other (maybe the banjo?) and there was a couple who seemed to be buying every piece of mahogany in the place.  It struck me as funny at the time but a few days later when I checked up on a build I was following (a powerboat way up on Highway 321) they mentioned having bought pretty near all the mahogany in the Piedmont for their project.  So although I had been following their build avidly I had no clue who they were when I walked right past them.

   Like Robert, I've lost someone in the last couple of weeks and in that context it's strange (to me anyway) how hard it is to hear that Paul, who I never met, is gone.

   If you look at the sheer word count of my post I think there will be an indicator of what we've lost.  Paul would have written this many words about one specific aspect of one part of boat building and at the end of it we'd all know the implications of (x) to the final whatever-it-was.  Meanwhile I've used the same number of words to ramble aimlessly and haven't helped anyone advance their project by the slightest skerrick of a suggestion of progress.

   Raising a glass to you, Paul.

 

Ken

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These unexpected shocks do take a bit out of us.  Paul and I were often on the same wavelength in forum discussions and had personal confabs on topics of mutual interest as well.  The boats we designed had enough similar goals but were also enough different to afford a wide array of discussion topics.  The forum will be a more bland place without his daily contributions that were always on point and helpful.  While his sword could be a bit sharp at times, those who could take the jabs most always benefited from the encounter.

 

We glide along, not thinking that any major disruption is about to happen, when the loss of another forum friend stirs our mental pot.  Its a singular occurrence that we could develop such a close relationship with an unseen friend in almost any far away place on our planet. We almost never had such experiences before the internet put others thoughts and ideas so easily into our individual lives.  RIP, PAR, we will miss your presence.  I will miss your presence.

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  • 4 weeks later...

I read (and re-read) many of his posts and, like thousands of other people, benefited greatly from his freely shared wealth of knowledge .  He is leaving behind a rich legacy having helped many people get started in boat building; he will be missed.

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Even half a world away PAR will be missed by many. He was a frequent, knowledgeable and generous contributor to the wooden boat section of the Aussie based Woodwork Forums.  His willingness to freely share his experience helped many of us make decisions and find a way through difficulties with boat building and repairs. He explained things in a way that was easy to understand and also engaged in the humorous banter that goes on. Of course we never met him in person but in the Forum environment he  was good company for many reasons.

 

RIP

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  • 5 months later...

Just a shout out to Paul. I read of his passing while on a trip but I didn't have time to fully acknowledge how much his experience and advice has meant to me. I was just posting something on the B & B forum and realized if PAR was around it would be his advice I'd pay very close attention to. All of the tributes here show I wasn't the only one who felt this way. Rest in Peace.

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  • 2 months later...

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