>> it wouldn't have mattered if Steve asked for something that Phil had been hunting for a decade and only found last week. <<
I grok this, but from a slightly different angle. I'm a finder. Somebody tells me they wish they could find a particular Thing (a rare book, a Duncan Phyfe table), and it goes on my mental "keep an eye open for this" list... until either *I* find the item, or hear from the seeker that someone else found it for them. It's such a delight to be able to surprise someone with something they thought couldn't *be* found! I suspect that Phil had a very similar feeling in this case.
As for the link: I know how URLs are constructed, so I just tweaked what was there 'til it showed a page not a 404, then pasted in the result. I have some art glass of my own; always nice to find Moar Shineez to look at! :-)
glazed and infused
I grok this, but from a slightly different angle. I'm a finder. Somebody tells me they wish they could find a particular Thing (a rare book, a Duncan Phyfe table), and it goes on my mental "keep an eye open for this" list... until either *I* find the item, or hear from the seeker that someone else found it for them. It's such a delight to be able to surprise someone with something they thought couldn't *be* found! I suspect that Phil had a very similar feeling in this case.
As for the link: I know how URLs are constructed, so I just tweaked what was there 'til it showed a page not a 404, then pasted in the result. I have some art glass of my own; always nice to find Moar Shineez to look at! :-)