I hadn't felt the pain of losing someone to the absolute of death in a long time prior to 2013. I'm lucky enough that it had been several years since I felt tears over the passing of someone I knew.

Earlier this year, one passionate, immensely talented and inspiring journalist was taken from us. Roger Ebert died at age 70. Now, yet another incredibly talented and inspiring journalistic figure has departed at the much more tragic age of 34. I miss Roger Ebert's presence and guidance in my day-to-day life, and I miss Ryan Davis, as he was an even more constant companion, less full of editorials and existential musings, but a lot more full of laughter. He made my life better. Giant Bomb does that.

I owe Ryan a lot more than just the laughs - and those, by themselves, were eternally invaluable and incredible gifts. I owe him, as I do every other member of the Bomb crew, their constant company (always uplifting), and all that resulted from it. Ryan never knew me, but his company and voice were invaluable in the shaping of my knowledge and opinion of this interactive, magical world that is so important to me and that has been with me for just about as long as I can remember. I also owe him all the words, correct pronunciations, and nutty expressions ("hot garbage!") that he injected into my vocabulary. I owe him the nurturing of my knowledge of 80's pop-culture (obscure and otherwise), knowledge that fascinates me and that I absolutely love to have, and might not have been introduced to otherwise. And, by God, I owe him all the laughs that resulted from his unique sense of humor, and that legendary comedic chemistry between him and Jeff. Laughs that brought me up on dark days, and made the good ones even funnier. On a nearly daily basis that man shared with me the gift of laughter. So many fond memories. I can't thank him enough.

Time is the ultimate healer, and eventually we'll all watch these videos and listen to these Bombcasts with nothing but fond remembering, but at the moment it's not easy. In the last 24 hours I was for the first time introduced to the feeling of crying and laughing, uncontrollably, at the exact same time.

I wrote this because I felt moved by the outpour of love by this community, and felt inspired to take part in it. If the whole overwhelming current of affection helps those closer to him, then I'm glad to be part of it, even if my teardrop in that ocean goes unnoticed. As it turns out however, this helped me in some cathartic way as well.

My thoughts and deepest condolences go to his friends and family.

Thank you Ryan Davis, for everything.