Hard to know what was happening. He was only aged 60, so frontal lobe dementia is unlikely but possible. Poor judgement, grumpy, insight-less. Poor financial management. Did not care about any of it.
He did not even do a proper preflight, much less an inspection. He flew a strange aircraft *at night* while not current.
The strange part was he seemed to be doing all that while he was broke. The brokeness would have contributed to the get home itis. He deserved to be punched in the face.