I'd like to add my voice to the chorus of people clamoring for this show. It's an absolute no-brainer. Get Gaffigan to play the Alton Brown role. Why not?

I keep seeing this rubbish about cute little "atheist nightmares" that supposedly prove the existence of God, so fine: here's my latest TV pitch:

Now that Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares has hit America, it's time to take that concept and mix it with the success of The God Delusion, Root of All Evil? and others.

Thus, I submit to you:

Richard Dawkins' Atheist Nightmares.

Each week, Richard goes 'round to see if he can help budding atheists make that final leap and shed their unneeded belief systems.

Think about it:

Gordon convinces folks to use local produce; Richard convinces folks to find local groups that non-believe like they non-believe.

Gordon gets cooks to clean up their kitchens, which half the time are filthy; Richard gets people to tidy up their belief systems, basically showing them that they don't actually believe half of what they think they believe.

Gordon snaps people out of their culinary doldrums with tough love; Richard snaps people out of their spiritual doldrums with tough logic.

He's not converting the unwilling, mind you. It's just really hard to shed a belief system–take it from somebody who knows.

I think it would be a smash hit. Somebody pay me.

Here's the full article. My favorite bit:

Now facing six weeks off work, he said warning labels on the products should be revamped to alert people that excessive consumption could lead to death. Labels currently warn against consuming more than two cans, or 1.5 bottles a day, without describing the consequences. 'They say [on energy drink labels] don't have more than this much,' Mr Penbross said. 'But they don't say if you have too much, what will happen.'

That's right, Mr. Penbross. You also aren't told expressly not to drive your car off a cliff. And, on the Batman costume, when it says "Cape does not enable user to fly," it does not expressly state what will happen if you try anyway.

Bad shit is what happens, you jackass. It's not like they're trying to hide the fact that after the fifth Red Bull you suddenly gain magical powers or something. You had 640mg of caffeine in five hours while involved in a sporting activity that was already taxing your system. You obviously don't have a serious tolerance because I have 400mg of caffeine at a single go. But that's because I have a huge tolerance and I know my limits. And I go find out how much caffeine I'm taking in and control the levels by watching what I'm ingesting.

Thank you for admitting you are a terminal imbecile. On behalf of everyone, please: don't breed.

And listen to me, everybody. I know we take a light-hearted approach to being caffeinated and buzzy and whatever, but do not fuck with caffeine. It is your friend as long as you don't piss it off.

Know. Your. Limits.

Sorry for the rant. I just get pissed off by idiots who make life difficult for the rest of us.

Found via Neatorama.

Posting this here primarily because I want to make damn sure I use it for something. Just no idea what yet.

First day of the Art Festival is over and it went quite well, I thought. Sold some books, got to do a reading…the gas money for the trip home is covered, that's all that matters.

For those folks who might be visiting looking for information on the books, you can find them at the following places:

Mystics on the Road to Vanishing Point is available online under a Creative Commons license here or from Amazon in print form here.

Magnificent Desolation is available online under a Creative Commons license here or from Amazon in print form here.

That's right, you can read the books for free. No, I'm not nuts. If you like them, however, feel free to bookmark shop.needcoffee.com for when you shop online (because we get kickbacks), or heck, if you are in college or something and have no money then you can do other stuff that spreads the Needcoffee/One Tusk love. Either tell your friends about the books (or your enemies if you hated them) or you can bookmark help.needcoffee.com to do stuff that probably won't cost you a dime.

I'm easy.

At the Riverside Art Festival, I'm appearing in the Writer's Tent. I'll be there from 10-4 today and tomorrow. It's happening at Riverside Park at the intersection of Riverside Avenue and Post Street. I have some of my books to sell and the sites here to promote and I'll be doing readings. They have them at thirty minute intervals but say they only last 15 minutes, so I'll try and run over if there are people listening. 1:30pm today and 2:30pm tomorrow.

Huge thanks to Rox of Spazhouse for setting this up for me to come and shill.

I'm also available for weddings and bar mitzvahs.

Okay, here's some fun. Check this out: somebody sent me this out of the pocket program:

Wow, this looks really cool: a panel on fight scenes (which I've written and can speak to how hard it is to do properly), a panel on the apocalypse (badass! I've written apocalypse stories, shit yeah!) and a panel on killing characters (I've done that too! Rock!).

Trouble is this: nobody ever told me I was supposed to attend these panels. That's right: when I went to pick up my badge, I had no schedule printed on the back, nor did I have a schedule in my welcome packet. My arrangement to appear at the Con didn't get worked out until so late that I just figured they couldn't get me on panels in time. So I just went to the Needcoffee panels I had planned on attending anyway.

To anyone who showed up thinking I would be at these panels: I do apologize. They sound fucking cool. I hope they went well. I'm sorry as hell I didn't know, because I would have done my best to show. I've also written an e-mail to the track director, explaining what happened.

Dammit. Figures.

Thanks to Lisabetta for letting me know.

Update: Well, I have good news and I have D'oh news. The good news is that's not me. There's a major in the USAF who shares my name (well, one of my names) and that was him. So I feel better. Anyway, if there was confusion and people mistook him for me, then…well, that's cool, actually. Because a major from the USAF probably looks a lot more impressive than I do sitting on a panel. As for the D'oh news, well…D'oh.