Doesn't look good. He posted his resume on another thread over a month ago. Gives bits and pieces of his info. You could go the extra mile and call the FD in his area - Richmond, VA. Maybe they could figure out where he lives based on the info in his resume:

Here is a link that might be useful: resume thread

Here's the note. I was in a hurry and never thought to post it.

Here is a link that might be useful: note

Parma, thanks so much for posting this! I responded to his post & also e-mailed GW, to blow another whistle.

Allison, yes, I saw the thead a while back about his unemployment struggles & responded to that too. He mentioned his wife then & said that she worked at the local Ukrops grocery store.

He must be terribly lonely & depressed. It's a good sign though, that at least he reached out here. Let's hope he gets some help!

He listed a few personal references on his first resume. Allison Wright is at that address on Anywho.com Gives the last 4 digits of her phone number.....if you want to call her.

fwiw, I searched the Richmond newspaper obits - did not list woman with first name he had given for his "lady" passing away this week. Doesn't mean she didn't, but.....

He's only posted three times on GW. The resume thread sounded like he had posted on GW a lot more, with the "family" talk. You know there is a slight chance someone is making all this up - having what they consider fun......but also a slight chance it could be true.

Here is a link that might be useful: Phone number listing for the Wright's - 3rd from top

Allison, I called the Richmond FD. Believe it or not, a message machine came on! I left my name & number. If someone calls me back I'll forward this additional info you gave onto them! Thanks!

I wrote to GW too. Also emailed Sephia (Linda) someone it appeared he was corresponding with via email. I checked the Ukrop's site and found a lot of stores in the Richmond area. I called the one with the same zip code he gave for his home residence, but the store is closed today and the person I spoke with was a stocker and couldn't offer any help. Without more to go by I don't know what else we could do. Hopefully he had a change of heart or reached out to a friend. And as much as I hate to say it, I hope Allison is right and this is just someone's sick idea of a joke.

Squirrel posted & left a link for a crisis center...great idea!

According to an IP lookup, he is using Verizon in VA.

I wonder if this could be her obituary instead of flowers, they are asking for donations to help with funeral expenses.

If anyone else wants to search, go to the bottom of my link, where it says Today's Bristol Herald Courier obituaries - then browse full text, it will say Obituaries and Guest Books for 8/9/2009 - change the search to last 7 days.

Ugh. I hope it is a joke. I just posted.

Someone who can help with your technical skills call 911. You don't have to be in his state.

Allison, roselvr, please! 911, not the fire department.

Here's the ip address in the source file, for anyone contacting 911. Coming from a pool of ips out of Verizon, I'm not sure how specific they can target the identifying info.

WhatsMyIp is a good search tool for additional info.

I just received a telephone call from a Garden Webber staff who wanted to let us know this situation is under control and Paul is OK as of now and help is on the way via family.

Thanks for the phone call GW. I'm so glad I freely give my name and number out.

Golddust, that's great news! Did you email GW with your phone number? I'm surprised someone was even around to listen today.

Wow! That's amazing and such good news, Golddust. Very quick response, and fast in tracking him down. Maybe he included full info in his registration. Someone may have even reported it last night but just didn't post to his thread. He posted that note about 12 hours ago, quite a long time for such an emergency! Glad he's alright and help is on its way.

No, I actually thought the incoming call, whose number I didn't recognize, was a work call. I get phone calls from all over at all times, day and night. I answer all my calls unless they are an 800 type number.

I have posted my name and phone number in other threads and the alert staffer likely searched it out. Thanks again, GW. I was deeply concerned. That said, the obituary didn't appear to match up according to the caller. Everything else did, though.

Now I'm confused. Abundantblessings wrote in his topic that Paul and Brenda are alive and well. What am I missing? I was going to reply until I read that.

Ditto what oakleyok said.

Parma42 and everyone else who took action, I am so glad that you did!

Golddust, when I posted before, we were on our way out which is why I couldn't finish. I didn't think I had enough info to call anyone. I was still trying to track his IP on gardenweb when I ran into a snag. I found 3 other posts with it but they didn't match up to a user name.

Squirrel - that is not the IP I saw in the posts I viewed. I had 71.246.146.58. I did ping it from my computer before we left, computer was on. I'm pretty sure I viewed the source on every post they made and it had the same IP.

I also don't understand the post saying both are alive. I don't know who Abundantblessings is, but they share the same ISP as the OP.

Glad they are ok.

Well, Paul didn't lose his wife. That part of Paul's story was not true. Brenda is OK too.

He *was* feeling suicidal, apparently, and he is getting help.

Rose, that was the ip on the 'Time to Say Goodbye' thread. I noticed the other thread had a different one (only checked one of his posts). That's not uncommon, and his posts on the other thread were somewhat older. They both came out of a pool of Verizon ip addresses and Richmond, VA.

Glad to hear Brenda is ok. I had to wonder about that part. Hopefully he'll get some assistance now in getting back on his feet.

Looks like that's not the end of the story ...

Here is a link that might be useful: who's who?

There's some kind of psychodrama being played out here ...

The "rebuttal" post (see natal's link) is by someone named mrclose. He registered in 2004. I just searched and found that he posted a handful of times on the gardening forums; in one of those posts from 2007 he said he was 89 years old and had a wife named Brenda who was 67.

"stinkbug1" registered in June 2009. He has the same birthdate as "mrclose" but said he was 57 years old and his wife was 68.

A child, perhaps? Angry with parents? Or someone else with a grudge?

Very strange, indeed...

But, good call, Parma. You have a big heart and quick reflexes.

As Yogi Berra used to say..."This is deja vu, all over again"

The name Brenda made me recall another suicide post on Household Finances. Some of the threads are now missing, but at the time, my searches for a spouse led to mrclose.

I have no idea if he has some family or friends? that are a few cards shy of a full deck. The poster in my link has va in his/her name.

Sorry if I got people worked up about nothing, but these posts shake me up.

Here is a link that might be useful: very weird

And now the next question is why would GardenWeb call Golddust and say what they did?

That one is out of Verizon, Richmond, VA also. 71.246.146.118 I think GW is probably already aware of this person.

Good call, Parma. Those things should never be ignored or dismissed as a prank.

Wow, Tamara responded on that thread in March.

I don't think GW would release any information. They'd just go along with the story and say it's under control -- Paul is OK.

Squirrel, apparently I'd looked that one up too as it's still in my IP finder. I had so many tabs open, I was starting to get confused. lol

Mrclose and the OP share the same IP.. so, either someone used their computer to post it or someone spoofed the IP. Mrclose had posted on the computer forum, so who knows?

There's something called Münchausen by Internet; it's getting to be a huge problem. I wonder how many of these posts are actually real and how many are trying to get money, etc from good hearted people on forums. I go to 2 forums where one person has pretty much cleaned up due to saying they & their spouse are sick. It's why I will never donate money to someone I don't know.

It makes me wonder if anyone contacted the OP in the 1st resume post offering money..

It makes me wonder if anyone contacted the OP in the 1st resume post offering money.

One poster contacted him by email and even gave him her phone number. I wouldn't be surprised if she didn't give him more than that.

They called me because I have openly and regularly given out my personal information here and have made comments that my real name, address and phone number is available on the internet already. I am President of an Internationally based non profit organization who has a strong presence on the web. I get calls from all over the world as part of my job.

I have given open permission for anyone to call. The fact that I have said that I wasn't worried about being open about who I am on the internet was the first thing out of the callers mouth. The caller is right. I take all calls and do not mind who calls me. Sheesh, I'm listed in the phone book too. I'm not paranoid about the internet at all.

Simple as that, I guess. I'm grateful because the caller made our day much brighter. It was nice information to receive, huh?

Golddust, if you read those threads again, you'll see that all of this is now questionable.

I am saying as much as I am willing to say here. It was real but I'm not going to give away anyone's privacy to prove a point as it isn't helpful and doesn't matter. Getting that OP help is what mattered and lots of people stepped up to the plate.

I did my own checking (reverse phone number look up) and believe I was given enough correct information to relieve our concerns. Let's now give them a little privacy and dignity and quit trying to question and investigate. Please.

Parma did the right thing as did everyone else here. Paul and family, I am wishing you the best and sending hugs. Please get that young man some help. There will be better days. I just know it.

Well holy cow I missed a lot today!

Good eye Parma.

No good deed goes unpunished, I guess. I wasn't aware of this thread or godldust's 911 suggestion when I saw the supposed suicide note this a.m. I was hoping to see if the Sears interview from the resume post had any feedback when I was alarmed to read the post from this morning. Being concerned, I tracked the #s from the resume post and informed the daughter of Brenda who assured me both Paul and Brenda were fine. When I went back to the suicide post I read godldust's 911 plea and hoped to stop a panic. golddust was lovely. as one would expect, although I did not identify meyself as working for GW, just a poster. For my concern, I have received several call backs from the family, the last threatening me with the cops for aiding and abetting if I didn't provide them with more info. Since this is all on line, I told them how to read both of "Paul's" posts, but I resent being harassed for trying to stop what might have been a murder/suicide.

Since the threat seemed real, I hope I did the right thing. But, and this is a big problem, since thiere are so many crazies out there in cyberspace, I'll hesitate to try to help again. Sorry I contributed to the confusion by falling for a hoax. You may remember I'm the one who researched the Mr.Willie painting and suggested that may have been a different type of hoax, so I'm not usually gullible.

The one problem I still have with unravelling this is if Paul is in his 80s it's unlikely he'd have a resume on line. Nevertheless, I hope everyone remains healthy and that the original resume guy finds work soon.

Whoa, this keeps getting more bizarre. I didn't think GW had staff on hand during weekend hours.

In retrospect, the caller may have just said from Garden Web and I assumed in my initial post (while sipping my first Latte) that the caller was a staffer. I no longer believe that part, thanks to my research and a phone call I made back to the same number who called.

I'm sorry if I have added to the confusion here but there is only so much I'm going to say. I believe I received enough information to solidly believe this was real and help was coming. Talking to people on the telephone is better than posts, KWIM?

golddust, this has been very trying for lot of people, you and me included. No good deed goes unpunished, as I said before. Though my involvement in this nonsense was in good faith it certainly put me in closer touch with BS than is wise. This has taught me to weigh more carefully any future response, and I really hate succumbing to cynicism, but live and learn.

Brenda's daughter assured me in the initial phone call that she knew her mom was okay but she would go check. I wanted you to know so that you wouldn't worry, and I appreciate that you seemed as worried as I. I don't know who the culprit(s) is in this hoax, nor does it really matter. Nothing in the subsequent info makes me feel assured that the poster was/is not either off-kilter or depressed, though I doubt he's 89. I don't know the motives, but I'm glad it wasn't a genuine suicide and hope that family will be well. Thanks for your concern this a.m. and hope neither of us has to go through this type of unwarranted stress again. Life is hard enough for so many, it seemed plausible. Thank goodness it wasn't real, but it could have been and you just try to do the best you can when faced with a possible crisis like that.

Thanks again.