My Book Is Now Available!

My book is finally out: Reserved For Emperors is available on lulu.com.

Aaron Dietz unleashes his first collection of blogs with over 90 pages of additional commentary! He explains why he is better than you! He tells you how to start an earthquake for free! He organizes your closet!* This book is a regular tour de force!**

* Note: Aaron Dietz does not actually organize your closet; nor does the book.

** If, by "tour," you mean "book," and if by "de force," you mean "for sale."

The book is $11.99 (plus some shipping costs), but it can be downloaded for less than $3.  If you do have it shipped - make sure to select a cheap shipping method - my first time on Lulu.com defaulted to something pretty expensive and I was glad I noticed.

I was pleased to get Erik Tosten to do the cover. Check out his work sometime. One other thing of note is that in addition to over 90 pages of supplemental material that can't be found online, this book contains two original pieces of writing that I've not published elsewhere (one of them is my first comic strip in over two decades).

Also, if you're interested in attending the small book release celebration, send me a message; it's this Saturday night.

Thank you, everyone, for encouraging me to release this book!

A Phone Conversation

Kali: James, what's up?

James: Not much. What's the dealio, K-bob?

Kali: What's the what? I don't get it.

James: I don't get it, either.

Kali: You don't "get it"? Or you don't get "it"?

James: Did you just use quotes on me? Over the phone?

Kali: What? What do you mean?

James: You just, you know, "used quotes."

Kali: Uh..."no I didn't."

James: You just "did it" again.

Kali: I did "what" exactly?

James: That.

Kali: "That."

James: ""That.""

Kali: """That"""?

James: """"That.""""

Kali: """""That"""""? Seriously?

James: """"""That."""""" "Seriously."

Kali: "Oh."

James: "Yeah."

Kali: "Sorry."

James: That's what I thought.

Kali: So, how's it, you know, "going"?

James: How's "it" going?

Kali: Yeah. "How's ""it"" "going"?"

James: Yeah....

Kali: "Yeah?"

James: ""Yeah.""

Kali: """Yeah?"""

James: No.

Why all the hot girls should want to ride the Aaaaaaron stick

Recent contest winner Adam got to choose a blog topic for me to write about. He chose, "Why all the hot girls should want to ride the Aaaaaaron Stick."

This challenged me because:

A. It implies that the "hot girls" DON'T want to ride the Aaaaaaron stick (which is of course entirely untrue).
B. Who says I WANT the "hot girls" to ride the Aaaaaaron stick (I mean, I'm fairly choosy and I like to take good care of my disease-free stick)?

(This is not to say all "hot girls" have diseases. I'm also choosy for other reasons.)

But if I must explain why the "hot girls" should want to ride my stick, then I must. And here is one reason:

I can turn ingredients lists on various food products into erotic poems. It works well with just about anything, but I particularly like those that end in "spices."

It's really much better in person, but check out Zatarain's Red Beans and Rice:

Ingredients:

enriched long grain parboiled rice

(iron phosphate,
niacin,
thiamine mononitrate and folic acid),

cooked and dehydrated red beans,

enriched wheat flour

(niacin,
reduced iron,
thiamine mononitrate,
riboflavin,
folic acid),

malted barley flour, salt,

dehydrated vegetables

(onion,
bell pepper),

soy sauce

(100 per cent soybean),

yeast extract, dextrose, soybean
oil,

thiamine hydrochloride,

natural and artificial flavors,

modified corn starch,

torula yeast,

natural
smoke
flavor,

garlic,
caramel color,

spices.

Chapter 11 of a Thankfully Unfinished Saga

Chapter 11: An Unseemly Transmission

Wherein Aaron and Ptolemy-Boy discover
Farmer Latham beaten to unconsciousness.
Also wherein later that day Aaron and
Ptolemy-Boy intercept an unruly transmission
that yields suprising information….

“Look, Ptolemy-boy!” Aaron shouted. “Over there, in the tall grass!”

Ptolemy-boy saw it, too. There was a patch of blue showing through the weeds that matched Farmer Latham’s patented shade of overall.

They rushed to the spot and knelt down. Farmer Latham wasn’t moving.

“Let’s wake him up, Ptolemy-Boy!”

Ptolemy-Boy poured water from his trusty canteen on to Farmer Latham’s face.

“Someone’s beaten him to unconsciousness!” said Aaron.

“You fools,” Farmer Latham said, stirring slightly and spitting up water. “The chapter description already said that.”

Later that day, Aaron and Ptolemy-boy found themselves en route to Carstone 7-9er, when a high-priority transmission broke through their thoughtful silence.

“This is fuck niner fuck. How the fuck fuck are you fucks?”

“Ah,” Aaron said, “it’s Rogers.”

He flipped a switch and answered Rogers’ call. “We’re fine, Rogers. What’s up?”

Ptolemy-Boy whispered, “Get ready to be surprised.”

“No no-” Aaron said, “-that would be the wrong thing to do. If we’re prepared to be surprised, then we won’t fulfill the chapter description, because you can’t be surprised if you’re prepared to be. No, we’ll just have to expect nothing.”

Then Aaron said, “Could you repeat that, Rogers? The reader didn’t get to hear what you said while I was talking to Ptolemy-Boy.”

“I for fuck fuck’s sake said, ‘Fuck, I’m going to fuck fuck the fuck fuck out of a fucking fuckmaster alien weirdo who fuck waits fuck tables at the fucking fuck fuck barn’.”

“Why am I not surprised?” Aaron said. “But why are you sharing this with us in a priority message, Rogers?”

“This alien weirdo fucking claims the fuck fuck to be your fuck fuck wife, you fuck fuck fuck!”

Ptolemy-Boy was surprised. “Aaron, you never told me you were married.”

Aaron was surprised also. “I didn’t know I was.”

Rogers said, “And your kids are butt-ugly, no fucks about it!”

Men, do you REALLY care about the environment?

If you do, stop using kleenex and paper towels to wank off into. You are killing trees everytime you dump your jollies!

Just grab the waste can when you're ready and drop it directly in, effectively cutting out the middle man (middle tree, in this case). Or, simply move over to the window.

Got Cavities? Blame the Civil Engineers!

I discovered their Cavity Generator! You heard it here first!

The Good Thing About Corporations

Corporations are sometimes evil. Sometimes they are not evil but they still do evil things. Today, I’m going to tell you why corporations are good, especially when compared to, say, politicians.

And here is why: corporations have to pay attention to their constituents.

And their constituents are you, the consumer!

If you are not buying their product, corporations have to change in order to give you what you want (otherwise, they will not make any money). If they are out there being evil, shoving processed food out on the market, hiring slave labor, etcetera, then you have only yourself to blame (collectively, as a population of consumers, that is - I’m sure YOU, personally, never support such corporations). Ultimately, if all consumers purchased responsibly, corporations would behave responsibly (with a few exceptions - see below).

Politicians, however, only need to pay attention to you during election time. And even then, they know that having money for TV commercials will be much more important than any stand they can take on any particular issue. So, essentially, their constituents are wealthy lobby groups and…corporations. Hmmm. But the corporations are supported by US! That means we could take over this damned country! We only need to purchase responsibly and our attitudes toward commerce will “trickle up.”

Exception to the rule: In cases where corporations only sell to politicians (I’m thinking of defense contracts, here), the “trickle up” theory breaks down. Too bad. We almost had them.

Failed Book Titles

I'm pretty confident I've figured out the title of my first book of blogs, so I'm going to list the best of the titles I discarded:

I Am Better Than You

I Wish I Was Humble

Jumbotronic

Woman has religious experience in shopping center

Seattle, WA - An unidentified woman was seen outside a clothing store having uncontrollable fits of hysteria.

Witnesses say she exited the popular store, at approximately 4:25pm saying, "Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God."

She then rushed to her friends and said, "You have to see this."

She held her bag open while her friends gazed at the recent purchase.

"Isn't it the most amazing thing you've ever seen?" the woman asked.

"Oh my God," said one of her friends, reaching in the bag to touch it.

A Personals Ad for Thor

Norse god seeks woman who doesn't get jealous

What Thor means when he says thou must not get jealous is that thou must not get jealous of Thor's mighty hair! But it matters not, for once thou hast ridden the mighty Thor, thou will return to Thor as if by magic, just like mine magic hammer, Mjolnir. Mine Mjolner is capable of many things, one of them thou will experience as "awesome superhero hammer juice." No, Thor will not explain! Thor seeks a woman who will accompany Thor on moonlight flying, long walks in Asgard, and movie watching (but no horror movies with scary children in them - they are too scary because Thor cannot bring himself to smash kids' faces in with Mjolnir, so what can Thor do against such a menace?).

Adventures of Dogboy: Dogboy Visits Shrink!

Hello, everyone. After much deliberation*, I have decided to begin putting regular exclusive content on my pointlessbanter.net blog. The exclusive content will be posted every Monday and will be all about Dogboy and his amazing adventures! Just to give you a taste of the action, here is today's blog. Further Dogboy adventures will be posted only on pointlessbanter.net (on Mondays).

And now: the Adventures of Dogboy: Dogboy Visits Shrink!

Dogboy stares at wall.

Shrink say -Dogboy, how does it make you feel?

-I feel like taffy. You like taffy?

-It pulls at my fillings, so...no.

-How much this cost?

Dogboy gets bill and thinks of time when Hulk go crazy but didnt even go to Shrink and never had to pay Shrink bill. Dogboy thinks, Hulk is awesome, because he cures himself.

In Dogboys head, world revolves around pencil while pencil writes answer to life on back of Dogboy ear.

Dogboy pays Shrink bill.




* Four large men put me in the trunk of their car until I decided this.

You Win, C.I.A. Agent Jones

Do you remember when C.I.A. Agent Jones made my life miserable by forcing me to go to extreme measures just to get my favorite breath-freshening, potentially cancer-causing chewing gum?

Do you remember when I finally found a source in Seattle where I could buy Everest, only to find that C.I.A. Agent Jones had tricked me into buying the wrong flavor?

Well, I found yet another source and I went there the other day to buy more, only to find that C.I.A. Agent Jones had finally won the game.



Do you see that empty spot where nothing is stocked? That's where the Everest was supposed to be. I asked a sales person if they were getting any more in and he practically laughed in my face.

"I dont think so," he said.

You see, I'm afraid that C.I.A. Agent Jones has gone and shut down the whole company, just to keep me from buying my favorite gum. I can't even get it from candydirect.com anymore, and Everest's official Web site (everestgum.com), is now unavailable.

I give up, C.I.A. Agent Jones. You win.

About the Author

Quite a while ago, when I was asking people for ideas on what to write about, Kat suggested I write an "About the Author" as an exercise. I loved the idea, but it took me a while to get to it. So now, finally, here we go....

Take 1

Aaaaaaron suggests that everyone write at least one book, even if it is never published. No matter how bad it is, it will still be treasured by your offspring and if you have no offspring, you can donate it to your nearest library archive project. Sooner or later, someone will happen upon your work and believe it to be the most spectacularly wonderful thing in the world. It's true. I've seen it happen. So do it. Oh crap, this was supposed to be about me, wasn't it?

Take 2

Aaaaaaron currently resides in Seattle. Wait a minute. How come authors are always currently residing everywhere?* What's wrong with just plain ol' living? And what's with this "currently" stuff? People can pretty much assume that it's current unless they're reading something that was published five years ago, in which case, it might not be accurate information anymore. A more appropriate beginning might be this: "Aaaaaaron lives. Unless of course, by the time you read this, he does not, which would be sad if you knew him, because he was a great guy." Crap. I'm messing this up again.

Okay, Take 3

Aaaaaaron lives in a haze of random infatuation and misguided, self-invented jurisprudence. On a cloudy day, you might imagine his face in the sky, especially if you don't know what he looks like, because then just about any cloud will do. He has a friend that always wants him to play House of the Rising Sun on guitar every time he visits, but Aaaaaaron, thus far, has never learned the song.

* not actually my joke - I stole that one and added to it.

A Promotional Break

First of all, let me promote a few excellent writers who have books out. If you have a little money and want to support innovative literature, please check them out. Downloading their books is really rather cheap (just a few bucks) and you can also order the physical artifact if you like (make sure you pay attention to which shipping method you use – the UPS shipping can be costly)

Gary R Smith II’s Dog Person



Alex Vermitsky’s Some Semblance of Spring



Vincent Truman’s Ugly Bungalow



See, if I promote some friends books now, it will seem less sleazy when I promote my own first book of blogs, coming out within one month. But don't worry - I also have some free stuff to promote: writings by me!

First of all, for those of you who don’t know, I am posting my blogs on pointlessbanter.net. Many of your favorite bloggers are there and they even have cool stuff like an Internet TV show on Sunday nights! Yes, I’ll still be posting blogs here and usually they will be the same ones that are on Pointless Banter, but just like all my blogging sites, I like to throw in something unique to a site once in a while, just to keep the hardcore stalkers busy.

I am continuing to write for Needles for Teeth, an excellent literary and arts journal with distribution in Denver and, most recently, Japan. Here are a few of my pieces from their web version:

I was a blade of grass

Pedestrian Luck

A Smoke

And even though I haven’t had time to write for Punch Panda recently, I wanted to share these pieces with you, available on PunchPanda.com:

Evolution: Can It Be True?

My ASS Will Save America

There. I hope I’ve given you too much to read. Go now, and conquer the world instead.

Scotch: An Incomplete Primer

This is an incomplete Scotch primer for those wishing to know more about such a thing. Saunter down to your local Irish pub and try a few. Order it "neat" (without ice) and sip. Grow hair.

Lagavulin: Simply the best. It is harsh, manly and vibrant. It is also like sucking down a camp fire (very smoky). The bottle is distinctively attractive, just like the box it comes in. For a poetic description of what Lagavulin does to a person, see this poem I wrote about it.

Dalwhinnie: The closest thing you can get to the quality of Lagavulin for $30 a bottle less than Lagavulin. Plenty of peat, a little smoky.

Talisker: This is a manly Scotch, and quite excellent, but it's no Lagavulin.

Glenlivet: A lot of people drink this because they can actually swallow it without feeling puke run up their throat. This is an easy starter Scotch, but you will never understand how far it is from true excellence (Lagavulin) unless you move up. For some, Glenlivet is the end-all be-all. For me, it is the beginning of "adequate."

Macallan 12 and 18: So very smooth and palatable - a quite tasty Scotch. However, I've noticed that, in America, it's primarily assholes that order this drink. Seriously. Even in movies, characters that are assholes will order Macallan. I'm an asshole, too - I just don't like to readily advertise that fact. Still don't believe me? Ask your nearest lawyer what Scotch he drinks. Now, if you're ordering this anywhere in Europe, things change. Nice people order Macallan there, so if you're in Europe, have at it! Within the United States, in order to be cool, you must stay away from the smooth, easy Scotches and try to get closer to Lagavulin.

Have I mentioned Lagavulin, yet?

Ladies, I Am Issuing My Demands

Attention, females:

If these prophylactics cannot be used properly by this deadline:



...then I will be forced to destroy them.

You have eight and a half months to comply.

Roadnotes: Eugene to Seattle

I'm getting old. This whole trip was a struggle because I'm so overconscious of two things:

1. When will I get the next protein-filled vegetarian meal?
2. When will I next be able to get on the Internet?

The trip was great, but these things weighed on the back of my mind the whole time. I was away from the Internet for pretty much the whole weekend and it felt awful (I posted these latest roadnotes from home, after the trip, straight out of my journal). I just can't bear to be away from you all.

But anyway, Trapper gave me a ride to Portland and from there I caught the bus to Seattle. I'm home now. Another good trip. Sorry, to both of the people who invited me to Vancouver recently...I am not able to make it....

Die Hard and Die Hard 2: Movies for Sensitive Men

Die Hard raised the bar for what an action film could be by giving audiences a new level of realism other films were quick to pick up on. Here was our hero getting hurt - not just getting bloody, but getting hurt in a more human way than audiences were used to. He's a regular cop and a regular dad and husband with regular problems-not a "Rambo" type that measures on the scale of a superhuman entity.

But Die Hard didn't stop there. It showed audiences a manly, regular guy that could also be sensitive. In one scene, John McClain (played by Bruce Willis) picks glass out of his feet (a manly moment), while telling his new friend over the radio about how much he loves his wife and how badly he screwed things up in their relationship. Aw, how sensitive! In that scene, Die Hard demonstrates that masculinity does not have to exclude emotion and sensitivity.

Die Hard 2 also pushed the envelope in deconstructing the traditional male stereotype. In one of the first scenes of the film, John McClain enters the airport and takes one quick glance around before asking for information.

"Where are the telephones?" he says.

If the hero of the Die Hard series can ask for directions, then it should be okay for other men to do so without their masculine nature feeling threatened.

Hacking the Marvel Universe

The Redhead recently requested the following: "I would like a blog about how to hack into alternate universes. (You can write it in 4@xx0r if you like.)" So, in the style of Touching the Paperboy's Melnet posts, I have answered the call of the hero.

run C:..4@xx0r.exe
loading
4@xx0r: whackjob//
4@xx0r-->whackjob//^dud@34s: ******
4@xx0r-->d!d: 200605280318d^@s)dkd
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: !6dfd@er4(4@xx0r,engusa)
4@xx0r-->Rput: USA English loaded
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: load(comicHacks,'C:..support4xx0r..')
4@xx0r-->Rput: loading...
4@xx0r-->Rput: comicHacks loaded
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: hackUverse(Marvel)
4@xx0r-->Rput: Err(13)|Missing parameter(1,universeNo)|
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: selUverse(Marvel,0)
4@xx0r-->Rput: Universe=Marvel.0
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: selCharacter(Magneto)
4@xx0r-->Rput: Character=Marvel.0.Magneto
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: displayGenitalia
4@xx0r-->Rput: Magneto
version=0
testicles=2
penis=1
vagina=0
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: hackGenitalia('Marvel.0.Magneto',testicles )
4@xx0r-->Rput: Marvel.0.Magneto updated
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: displayGenitalia
4@xx0r-->Rput: Magneto
version=0
testicles=3
penis=1
vagina=0
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: Ha ha ha! Ive changed the Marvel universe!
4@xx0r-->Rput: Err(2)|Misspelled command()|
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: Yer stupid!!!
4@xx0r-->Rput: Err(2)|Misspelled command()|
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: deSelCharacter(Magneto)
4@xx0r-->Rput: Magneto deselected
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: deSelUverse(Marvel,0)
4@xx0r-->Rput: Marvel.0 deselected
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: saveUverse(Marvel,0)
4@xx0r-->Rput: Marvel.0 updated
4@xx0r-->whackjob//: logout
4@xx0r-->d!d: 200605280327d^@s(dkd
End

Roadnotes: Eugene 2

Trapper shows me around some more, to places that are sacred because of the company he held. I also get a chance to catch up with two friends from way back, though only for a brief time.

However, I do make visiting the Eugene Public Library a priority because of their famous "sorter" machine. It's a machine with treadmills and levers and arms (sort of) that returns library items and sorts them onto carts. A staffmember willingly takes me through the area without too much coercion on my part.

I'm standing there, looking at this thing in awe, when the staffmember says, "Very Goldberg, isn't it?"

"Yes," I answer.

She seems somewhat suspicious of me as I have openly admitted that I am no longer working for libraries.

"So," I say, "what does it use to sort the items? Is it a media code?"

She answers affirmatively and explains further, no longer suspicious.