Google Alerts told me I'm dead...

There's an old joke about a man who reads his morning paper in bed. If he's not listed in the obituaries, he gets up to start his day.

A few months ago I was checking my email in bed (always a bad idea) when the vanity alert I have for my name appeared. Google took great delight in telling me that "Terence Eden passed away peacefully..."

I had a minor heart attack and continued reading,

"...at the Belleville General Hospital at the age of 98."

Ah! Phew! Not me, thankfully.

It's rare that I get mistaken for a different Terence. Mostly because there's a wide variety of ways to spell my name. Back when I first got online there was only one other prominent Terence Eden - the 8th Baron Auckland. I don't think we were related, and I've since surpassed the Right Hon. gentleman in the Google rankings.

I'm not particularly interested in family trees. But this specific Terence Eden was also unrelated to me, as far as I can tell. There's very little information about him, and I didn't want to bother his family at their time of grief.

Thankfully, this isn't a Buttle/Tuttle mix-up. Just a reminder that no one is ever as unique as they think they are.

You can read Terence Eden's obituary online.