I was filled with great sadness yesterday upon receiving the news of Patrick Tisseghem's tragic and sudden death in Gothenburg. My deepest sympathy and condolences foremost go to his wife, two young daughters and the rest of his family - what a tragic loss for them! I also have the deepest sympathy for his business partner at U2U, Wim Uyttersprot and all the employees there. It feels like a bad dream to me and I am still having a hard time believing this sad event to be true. It is very cruel and unfair of the big man up there to let him depart so early in his productive and successful life. We are many who had been looking forward to celebrating his 40's birthday in Belgium next month. 

Patrick became a dear friend and inspirational peer to me. I feel privileged to have earned his friendship for five years since we met at his very first SharePoint 2003 course in Brussels. We have since done great things together like taking a trip to Grand Canyon in connection with a Las Vegas SharePoint conference where we also did the fun city together. Lately we also wrote a book on SharePoint Search - our favorite topic in SharePoint land. Back in June this year we did our first joint Workshop on SharePoint Search and I truly wish we could have had the chance to do this a lot more.

Patrick traveled the world like no other person I know and his work occasionally brought him by Aarhus where I live. Here we have spent many memorable evenings talking, laughing, barbecuing, working and drinking good single malt. I also promised to take him out sailing some time in Denmark and he invited me to come visit him and his family at their houses in Brussels and Cypress. I am so sad this will never be....

Farewell Patrick, I will always remember you and appreciate the few years we happened to know each other. You were a very joyful, witty and interesting person to spend time with and I will greatly miss you as a dear friend in life and great mentor in business. Your departure is a huge loss for all of us close to you as well as it is a huge loss to the whole SharePoint community.