Bob Lassiter - Retirement/Death

Retirement/Death

Shortly after his retirement, Lassiter experienced a serious downward slide in his health. A lifelong and unrepentant smoker, he had long ignored the advice of his physicians, and after he was diagnosed with diabetes in about 1990 he had ignored the problem until the disease had advanced considerably. Between 2000 and his death, he would lose 40 percent of his foot, receive treatment for bladder cancer, experience slow decline in kidney function, and slowly lose his eyesight.

During his retirement, Lassiter devoted himself to his longtime interest in futures trading, and in 2002 he started a public journal of his trades on Elite Trader, a popular web site for financial traders. He posted on ET under the username "Tampa" and his journal titled "Tampa's Short Skirt Trades" would go on to become one of the most popular journals on the site. The journal retained Lassiter's wit, wordplay, and love of playing with his audience. Between 2004 and early 2005, Lassiter also maintained a trading blog (now deleted) under the alias of "The Big Cheese."

By 2005, Lassiter was largely confined to his home in the Tampa Bay area. However, his spirits remained good, and in the summer of 2005 he began a new blog—under his own name—whose readership steadily increased. In his writings, Lassiter revisited many memories, but mostly depicted a life in which he was isolated and reclusive, his computer being his only real window on the outside world.

On February 14, 2006 — his 19th wedding anniversary—Lassiter revealed on his blog that he had been told that his kidneys were failing. His doctors, whom he had seen that day, had given him a prognosis of six months to two years. He lived eight months afterward, dying October 13, 2006. It was 13 days after his 61st birthday. His death was revealed in a final post in his blog by his wife, Mary Lassiter: