alt Hacker NewsRegarding your edit. The first paragraph kind of lines up with you reading about it. But the second one is kind of confusing, and I think it's because "then" can mean two different things here. You meant "at the time of his arrest". If you casually read it without cross referencing the first paragraphs context, you might think it means "as I was sitting there".
And there's nothing in the following sentences that corrects this garden path assumption.
>Then Ulbricht walked into the public library and sat down at the table directly in front of me
Would not confuse as many if you wrote
>At the time of his arrest Ulbricht walked into the public library and sat down at the table directly in front of me
Or even clearer
>At the time of his arrest Ulbricht had walked into the public library and sat down at the table which was now directly in front of me
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Wow, you've totally cracked the mystery. This explains why all the commenters are at each other's throats - half of them are reading it one way and half are reading the other way, and only one of the two ways makes any sense.
Yes, it took three reads before I worked out what the story was trying to say.
Even just adding one word "Then Ulbricht had walked into the public library and sat down at the table directly in front of me" would be enough of a clue.
But now It doesn't feel the same as the original comment
His writing employs a little bit of poetry in order to capture his feeling. Not all writing benefits from being as clear and bland as possible. HN should probably read some non-fiction books from time to time