Urgent: Friends of Lawrence Grey, aka the Grey Mouser

Lawrence Grey, known to many as the Grey Mouser, is dying of cancer. Graves let me know this sad news this afternoon on the phone. I talked to Mouser's brother, Doug Taylor, and have some additional information for everyone.

Mouser is in Encino and is dying of a particularly aggressive oral cancer. At this point, his remaining time is in days at most. His brother is there doing what he can to take care of him, help deal with requests for information, and do follow-up after Mouser dies. Doug is also Mouser's executor.

You can email Mouser at leatherhorseman@gmail.com. He is not able to talk anymore because of the growths in his throat and he is having some trouble breathing, but he is still reading email and Doug is reading things to him, so it should get through. The meds and the cancer are really draining Mouser's strength, though, so chances are very good that you won't get a response. But time is very short, so if there's anything you want to say to him, do it right now!

In the course of dealing with things, Doug has found that Mouser touched any number of people's lives in positive ways, and I think he'd like to be in contact with as many of us as he can. When you email, please include your contact information. You may want to email a favorite picture of Mouser as well. It's my impression that he'd be keen to know a little more about how Mouser affected your life.

Doug says that Mouser is doing okay under the circumstances. He's definitely pissed about this (yup, that's Mouser) but he's not afraid of dying and is ready for the upcoming journey. You can phone Doug at his cell phone 206-291-3033 at any time. Mouser can't talk but Doug can give you news and you can pass short messages to Mouser. (Anything longer than a sentence or two should go to email.) If Doug's not up/awake/available, he won't answer, so leave a message. Doug seems to be a real mensch and I'm sorry that I didn't get to know him before this. When he's got things wrapped up, he'll be heading back to Seattle.

Sad news indeed.

Addendum, October 12th:

This news came in from Linda Rutenberg (Caitlyn) today:

Doug Taylor, Mouser's brother, reports that Mouser passed away Sunday evening at 12:22pm. He was kept comfortable to the last and died in his home surrounded by friends and family. They were able to have time for one more game of Yahtzee and Mouser won.


Mouser wanted to be cremated and wanted an Irish wake rather than a funeral service. Doug is taking care of the rest of Mouser's affairs and will be coordinating a wake in California and in Seattle. I will be helping him in Seattle. Doug will be returning Saturday but will have to make at least one more trip to California. There's a lot of things he needs to do and, fortunately, one of Mouser's friends is helping him get through all the paperwork.  

It's too soon to have details but what I'm going to ask you to do is spread the word, gather any pictures you have and think of any stories you'd like to share at his wake.   Doug and I will be talking to Leon.   It's also not too late to donate money to Mouser's paypal account [use the email address posted above for this].  Doug has power of attorney and has access to Mouser's account.

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[Note: if you don't have a PayPal account, you can probably talk to Graves, me, or someone else and we'll figure out some way to get donations to Doug for all of this.]

Another name to remember at Samhain.  Damnit.  

Urgent: Friends of Lawrence Grey, aka the Grey Mouser