There's no doubt about it: fate has a sick sense of humor. By now you've all heard about the untimely demise of Jef "Two F's Would Be Redundant" Raskin, who was widely credited as the "Father of the Macintosh" for having launched and named Apple's late-'70s project to create a simple and affordable word-processing appliance for the masses. Of course, what eventually shipped as the Macintosh was a marked departure from Raskin's vision, what with the whole "affordable" priority having been back-burnered until... well, until a couple of months ago and the advent of the Mac mini, really. And the first Mac may have been far simpler and more appliance-like than other personal computers of the time, but it was a lot more complex (and versatile) than Raskin's original mouseless word-processor concept. In fact, Raskin left in a huff about two years before the first Mac ever shipped-- but there's no doubt that he planted the seed that eventually grew into the platform we know and love, and he certainly deserves credit for being the Mac's "biological father," even if (and maybe because) he did spend a lot of time criticizing what the Mac has become.

Indeed, in recent years we've always looked on Raskin's incessant grumpy criticism of Mac OS X's human interface as a comforting constant in the Mac universe, and while a lot of his rants were of the "it's all wrong!" variety, we like to think that at least some of his points were valid and led to human interface refinements and greater ease of use. So it came as a shock when faithful viewer Marc Kirmoyan broke the sad news: the Father of the Macintosh died over the weekend, and according to WIRED's Cult of Mac, at the not-so-ripe, not-so-old age of just 61.

So where does the cruel-- and sick-- hand of fate come in? Well, in part there's the whole deal with Raskin having finally just secured $2 million in funding for his "Archy" alternative interface project (previously known as "The Humane Environment" and intended to be as much of a revolution over the GUI as the GUI was over the command line interface), which he'll never get to spend. We assume that Raskin's collaborators will make good use of the cash and maybe Archy will still emerge one day, but Jef will never get to see his dream realized, which is one of those classic cosmic bummers.

Mostly, though, you can tell that fate has its greasy fingerprints all over Raskin's untimely demise because of the cause of death: pancreatic cancer. Unless you're exceptionally skilled in the suppression of unpleasant memories, you remember all too well that Steve Jobs had his own brush with pancreatic cancer last year. You probably also recall that he was sure to inform the troops ASAP that his particular brand of the disease was a very rare and treatable form, because he didn't want anyone getting the wrong idea; most pancreatic cancer, after all, is notoriously quick and fatal.

So, uh, take a wild guess which kind Jef Raskin got, considering that he was diagnosed "in late December 2004 or early January" and didn't make it to March. We can only hope that fate hasn't decided that this is to be the general ailment of choice among early Apple pioneers, and we strongly caution Steve Wozniak to keep at least one eye on his pancreas at all times. (Not literally, of course, as that would be anatomically difficult. And a little gross.)

What can we say? Being inappropriate is our coping mechanism. In all seriousness, our thoughts are with Jef's friends and family following their sudden loss, and we hope that others can continue the Archy project and bring his plans to fruition. Even if he'd never had anything to do with Apple or the Mac, anyone who quits a job by sailing away in a hot air balloon deserves a solemn moment of silence... followed by a boisterous moment of wild abandon. We're sure that Jef, looking down from his balloon, will approve.