The Layout King

Now with fixed links! YAY!


Ol' Fat Horse has stated he's a freelance layout artist. Now, according to his works he thinks, like a lot of amateurs, that all layout consists of is creating a text box, and using cut and paste to throw the word document into it with the option to keep adding pages as long as there is text. Of all of his shit-tastic works, I chose "An Ass In Shadows" because of his very loud and vocal braying about how wonderful it is.

Keep in mind, that I've been working in PDF products for the last 10 years, in an arena that expects all the bells and whistles, and will tear the shit out of your if the layout doesn't meet expectations.

You see, PDF has a multitude of functions for the user. Everything from embedded hyperlinks to ease of use bookmarks, to page backgrounds, and on and on. People who purchase PDF's nowdays expect to get their money's worth, not only with the text, but with the appearance.

On that note, let us examine the first 5 pages of "An Ass In Shadows", for educational purposes, as is permitted by the DMCA and American Copyright Law. (HAH! Suck it Nicky! This page is protected by law!)

• First of all, note the over abundance of whitespace. On a cover, this is inexcusable. The graphic is a public domain graphic, now, I could say Fat Horse chose this picture as a commentary on the world of e-publishing, but since it has demons in it, I'm going to say his grade school mentality automatically thinks anything with demons and cool, so he chose the graphic because of that.
• Second, notice the fact his picture is in the lower left hand corner. Now, not any picture, but from the looks of it, his high school yearbook picture. Once again, I could state that he chose that picture because this book reflects his high school years, but I doubt it. He was probably embarrased to put his current appearance on the book, afraid that the picture of an unwashed, brown snaggly toothed, greasy haired rotting bigfoot fetus on the cover would cause people to automatically bypass it.
• Third: Putting his email on the cover. Not his professional email of FAT-HORSE@LAKEFAILUREPRESS.CUM, but his fucking Gmail address. Way to look like an amateur, Fat Horse.
• Then the title of the book, in the upper right, smaller than his name or his email address. Why "DuPage County" is viewable in the little bubble is beyond me, but it looks sloppy.

• The cover page is bad, really bad, and anyone who pays Fat Horse for his services are going to take one look at a cover like that and demand their money back.

But, let us move on.


The disclaimer. There are a lot of problems right here, not only from a layout standpoint, but from a product standpoint.

• The copyright notice is buried in babbling, and may be rendered moot since he also has babbling instructions. Copyright notices follow a certian format.
• The disclaimer is long, and acts as both a preface and a disclaimer. Disclaimers are normally short and sweet, such as "PRODUCT RATED MATURE AUDIENCES ONLY", not an entire page of some bloated manchild ranting on and on.
• The headers and footers are missing, and there should be prefacing page numbers right here. It looks like the middle of some high school creative writing project, not a professional product.

The Table of Contents. Another fuckup from layout standard

• No bookmarks. In a PDF, this is inexcusable.
• No subchapters. Those year sections should be, well, sections or books, rather than full chapters. There should be subchapters in order to allow the reader a sneak peek at what each section contains, as well as making finding one's place again easy.
• The third chapter is underlined and in blue font.
• The third and fourth chapter lines are in blue font
• The boxed section is difficult to read, using a low point font with thin letters on a black background without ensuring that the letters are crisp makes the section appear blurry. Additionally, everything after where he got the quotes from should have been in the preface section, instead of clogging this area.
• The header graphic is a low dpi clipart, blurry and poorly done. While fine for a slideshow or power point presentation, it looks like unwashed ass.
• The dashes on either side of the page numbers, while an artistic choice, do not go well with the font choice.
• No border, no header, no footer.

The first actual page of the book. This shows many, many problems.

• The box encroaches on the text area. A solid line, roughly 3 points thick, should have been pushed out about a 1/8th of an inch. Because of the option Fat Horse used, the border crowds the text, since he didn't put any standoff distance in it.
• The white space at the borders, while fine for traditional print, looks like ass in a PDF product.
• The page number is at the bottom of the text box, surrounded by dark grey, rather than at the footer of the page, where it belongs. Now, this could be listed as an artistic choice, but it still looks bad, and makes me question whether or not Fat Horse knows how to properly program in headers and footers. Additionally, we see the return of the dashes.
• The headers, which switch off between Fat Horse's name and the title of the book, still crowd the text of the manuscript. It should have been lifted about a 1/4 to 1/2", away from the text, done in a slightly larger or bolded font.

The document looks like ass. According to him, he spent days on this product. If I'd paid him, and he handed me shit like this, I'd hand it back and do a reverse transfer of funds to get my money back.

Well, looks like it is time for me to put my money where my mouth is.

I whipped this up in about 30 minutes awhile back. It's a free preview of Marauders II. I chose this because it is the most recent thing I've done layout for.

OK, cover page:

• Like it should, the cover is entirely, well, covered. The background is standard for the product line, and is crisp and clear.
• The background graphic is from Marauders I, reused in order to give product line continuity. It's clear, uncluttering, and gives an idea of the contents.
• The fonts are standard for the product line. Nowhere is there an email address, and the name of the publisher is on the cover. The "Preview Sample" pops out enough that it won't be confused easily with the full product.
• On the larger (click me) version, you can see the bookmarks, broken down into section, section contents, and details. PDF's are wonderful for this, and a product missing the booksmark section in the RPG field will get blasted. It's worth a full rating point.
  

I'm not totally happy with it, but it is a rushed job. Still, it looks like a PDF cover needs to. It is not overly busy, the graphics are related to the contents, and the fonts are clear.

First Page. Now, I skipped copyright and table of contents, since this is just a 5 page sample. Moving straight to the product itself. However, there are some choices and problems that I left, merely to illustrate a few things.

• The shade boxes have a dropshadow. Now, this doesn't look good, but it is left in ALL previews, in order to track the differences.
• Sidebars are products name, and the spiral notebook edge. The spiral notebook edge is standard through the series, as is having the product name on the outside edge. The "Year of the Zombie" at the top is also standard. However, rather than put my name and UKG Publishing on opposite pages was bypassed for this sample, and a placeholder graphic was used instead. Now, normally I would have used the automation to track page numbers, but honestly, it's 5 fucking pages long. No need.
• Sections are seperated by a small amount of whitespace and a large point bolded font.

I'm not totally happy with this layout, and if it was going out on a pay product, I'd probably spend a few hours tweaking it to give it the best look. I could have used a background artwork, but decided not to due to the amount of information in the boxed areas.

Same thing, but since this was a rough draft layout, I decided to see how "squishing" the text a little would look, reducing the whitespace. Well, it looks like ass. Plus, I centered one header, and like that a lot better, so I would probably use it centered for the final draft. The dropshadow would definitely have to go, since it bleeds onto the sidebar and bottom graphic.
But, as I said, this is a 30 minute rough draft.

Finally, we have the last page. Here I broke up a large amount of white space with a charcoal sketch graphic of a Crashhawk. This fits the theme of the product and the product line, as well as gets rid of the white space that would be jarring and a waste of space.

As you can see, Nick "Fat Horse" Pacione thinks that layout is just cut and paste, but it isn't. When designing a PDF product, a lot needs to go into them. Since he doesn't understand proper layout, anything he makes will be seriously fucked up. I wonder if he's aware that people that hire him to do layout WILL take him to small claims court to recoup their losses if he screws the pooch on the layout.

Plus, a decent layout can take hours. For a 200 page book, complete with graphics, bookmarks, backgrounds, sidebars, headers, footers, it can take 12-18 hours to complete. For $65, he'd be better off flipping burgers. In the same amount of time it would take to make a properly laid out product, he could have made about $96-$154 flipping burgers at minimum wage.

And in closing, let me reiterate my challenge to ol' Fat Horse.

Come up with an RPG product and upload it to RPGNow within 30 days.
The product must be priced at $5, no more, no less.
30 days after the project is uploaded, whoever has the highest ratings and sold the most products wins.

Can you meet this challenge, Fat Horse? Or would you rather dance on a tabletop and lisp some more...

OH NOES!

Well, good ol' Fat Horse finally has decided he is better than me. That no matter what I say, he is a "published" writer, and I am not.

Why?

Because, he finally learned how to use Google and looked up what I've been doing for the last decade, what I've been writing.

I write Role Playing Games. Ala Dungeons & Dragons. Only I write a modern survivalist horror one, two sci-fi ones, and a steampunk one. I've written a small handful of fantasy product for a couple of companies, and a handful of other stuff, but for the most part I've been concentrating on RPG's for the last 10 years.

So in Ol' Fat Horse's mind, he automatically wins. He doesn't consider RPG's an actual publishing field. He considers putting together his own shitty company and printing his stuff on lulu.com without editing or decent artwork or proper layout actual publishing.

Never mind that the PDF competition and standards in RPG fields is intense. Or that the critics can make or break not just a single book, but the entire company. Fat Horse's little childish PDF's wouldn't last a hot second on the RPG market, not only because he has no fucking writing talent, but he has shitty layout, shitty art, and doesn't even know how to add a fucking bookmark to a PDF.

He writes HORROR that he PUBLISHES for himself and that makes him a HORROR AUTHOR. Anyone who writes RPG's is a geek, and of course Nickolaus "Iron Horse" Pacione, six foot tall and 210 pounds, black belt in judo, high school letterman in wrestling, former amateur boxer is no geek. No shit, that's everything he claims to be. Something I find hilariously funny, but that's for another post.

Where I just write kid's games. And of course, he calls me a skinny four-eyed geek, because I am: 6 foot tall, 210 pounds, former US Army, former bartender/bouncer.

Pud-polishing Pacione, upon seeing that I sign my emails to him Tim "Iron Ant" Willard, insisted in an article he wrote that was deleted that his nickname was "Iron Horse", showing he could write fiction, just not believable fiction.

He writes horror stories he sells for $10, and is getting acclaim (according to him) for his writing, which of course makes him better than me, who just writes RPG's.

It doesn't matter how much I make from my writing, he considers himself better, because in his mind, writing for an RPG doesn't count. He figures anyone can do it, anyone can write RPG materials, even children.

Well, if he believes that, I've got a challenge for him.

I want to see him write an RPG product, and put it up for sale on RPGNow, and have it be on the Top Ten List for at least a week for the first month it is put out.

Since he's such a bad assed horror, sci-fi, and cyberpunk author, surely he can put together a PDF and it will sell like mad on RPGNow.

This means, little Nicky, if you are such hot shit, do the following:

Write an RPG product, complete with game mechanics.
Put together the PDF. Put it for sale on RPGNow.
Make it on the Top 10 List.

Well, Fat Horse, you have 30 days to do it. You keep bragging you can outwrite all of your foes. There's the challenge, fat boy.

And before he says I'm stacking the deck, I'm not telling him he has to find a pre-existing publisher to print his stuff (no RPG PDF publisher would touch shit like his with a 10' pole), he can use his little vanity press called "Lake Fossil Press" and print it out.

Of course he won't do it. He'll just snivel his way out of it, or back out saying "I don't have time", or say it isn't a fair contest. How do I know he'll chicken out?

Easy. Ol' Nickolaus "Fat Horse" Pacione is a coward, plain and simple. A yellow bellied shit sucking coward.

A personal mention

So Fat Horse listed me in his newest AC article:

When Timothy Willard "reviewed" An Eye In Shadows, he actually lied about where he got the book from when I already knew he got a pirated copy of the book when he described the watermark on the PDF copy, that was a rushed copy because a person who goes on as Ramir via Gmail bought the book for $16.00 and that was an e-book. I didn't even have the time to design the covers to my liking. He lied where he got the PDFs of two of my books too, and I am going to say that the person he got them from actually shop-lifted the copies from Lulu.com.

Well now, let us examine that....

I stated I got the book anonymously in my email. According to him, I received a pirated copy. Notice how it was pirated... Poor Ramir spend $16 on that piece of pig shit, yet now he's a pirate.

OK, he bought a "rushed copy" that he didn't have time to design the covers to his liking for, but yet he put it up on lulu for sale? OK, so he's an idiot.

And I got the other two anonymously in my email, but yet they are actually "shoplifted" copies from Lulu.com?

How the FUCK do you shoplift from Lulu?

I predict that the article won't last a fucking week before it gets pulled down due to the personal attacks in it.

Tears in the Night

Lately Fat Horse AKA Nick Pacione AKA Buttery Ram has been making snide comments about something he found out from my MySpace blog and someone from my past.

I sometimes cry in my sleep. He also thinks that my mumbled "please stop looking at me" or the fact I mention "her eyes..." in my blog mean I am talking about a woman I was romantically involved with haunts my dreams. He's made a big deal over the fact that only children cry in their sleep, that I'm a coward, and that I'm not a man for crying in my sleep.

Well, it is true. Some nights I cry in my sleep. I wake up covered in sweat, shaking with horror, crying, and my wife holds me until I calm down, until I move from the past to the present, and until the horror fades from my mind.

Nicky makes a big deal over this, because unlike him, I finished Basic Training and served in the US Army for almost a decade, including multiple theaters. Knowing this makes him feel like the worm he is, and he moves on any opportunity to try and hit at me, thinking that he can make me feel like a coward or less of a man if he comments on me crying in my sleep.

However, what I cry over isn't a breakup, or a woman leaving me, but something worse than that.

I dream of "her eyes" looking at me in the last few seconds of life she had, as far as I know.

What happened? I'm not going to tell the whole story. It's painful, really painful, but I'll give you the gist of it...

I was at Ramstein Germany on August 28 1988 standing in the crowd. I was less than 50 feet from the ice cream truck. I sustained burns on my back, the backs of my legs and arms, and the back of my neck. My hands, my forearms, and my face had minor burns on it, no worse than a bad sunburn, but burns all the same.

I also became an instant alcoholic. At first it was to drink the pain of my burns away at night. I was popping Vicoden from when I broke my forearm during the day and just gritting my teeth. My wife left me when I admitted I was drinking and taking Vicoden. I was on the phone, trying to tell her what I had gone through, almost begging her to come to Germany and be with me, telling her that I needed her. When I told her I was popping Vicoden and drinking, she told me, on the phone, that she wouldn't be with a man who mixed drugs and alcohol, and told me that she was divorcing me. She left me alone on August 30th, 1988.

I relived the whole thing every night. From the sudden realization of what was about to happen, the realization that the speed and angle were wrong and that the planes were going to collide, to waking up because someone was lifting me, fighting my way free of people grabbing me, and managing to shove them away so I could return to my car and drive 2 hours back home, stopping every now and then by the side of the autobahn so I could puke. And my hands, oh God, my hands. Covered with blood and burnt flesh from where I grabbed that woman's arm and the skin just slid down her arm, but I yanked her free of the flames anyway and she screamed and tried to pull away, but I ignored her screams and yanked her free of the flames. My hands, they were covered with what came off of her. Under my fingernails was her flesh.

Over and over and over and over and over. Every. Fucking. Night.

For 20 years, I dreamed that dream. The horrifying realization that that jet was going to hit the crowd, hit where I was standing. The sudden pain as I was enveloped in flames. The fact that I looked at that wall of fire and charged back into it to pull a woman free. The fact that I was held down and pounded out with jackets with people yelling at me to stay down. Regaining consciousness laying in the grass, of people grabbing at me and I couldn't understand what they were saying, of fighting them off, pushing my way free, going back to my car, and driving back to my barracks, where went in the back door, went to my room, locked myself in the bathroom, peeled off my burnt and blackened clothing, crawled into the shower with a bottle of Jack Daniels, and drank until I passed out in water.

I never went to mental health. I never admitted where I went. And I never let anyone know that I had burns across the back of me.

I remember my brown T-shirt was stuck to me for a week so I wore another one over it, until I managed to peel it off in the shower with the help of a bottle of 151 and my leather belt to bite down on. The next one I put on healed into the burn, and it took me a few more days until I could peel that one off. And the next one. I went through several shirts. Unless you've ever seen what cloth looks like peeled off a burn after the burn liquid had hardened around it, you have no idea what those shirts looked like.

The best part? I was healed enough that my shirts no longer stuck to me, and I was deployed to field. No medical care because I was embarrassed about what happened, embarrassed about the fact I wasn't able to get to my feet and rush back into the flames.

And I was embarrassed about The Burning Man.

I saw him before I went under, before I lapsed into unconsciousness. He was a man made of flame, a god wreathed in fire, and he carried two children from the flames like some kind of victorious creature of legend. Still ablaze, he plunged back into the flames, and my dimming vision saw him exit that piece of Hell with two more children, only to plunge back into the fire that birthed him.

His glory shamed me. His fearsomeness belittled me. I was a mere mortal, unable to rush back into the flames, unable to pull away from my rescuers, while he, a living fiery God come down from on high to save those who needed saving most, plunged into the flames again and again to rescue those I was unable to.

And her eyes. The eyes of the woman that was right next to me, the woman that I couldn't save. I can remember her eyes. Bright blue, with long lashes, her eyes wide in horror and fear. She wore no eye shadow, and her eyes were clear and pure.

So yeah, I cry sometimes at night. I see her eyes, The Burning Man mocks me, and I am consumed by guilt that so many died, and I lived.

There it is. Why I cry sometimes at night. Why I wake up covered in sweat and shaking, and why my wife holds me in her arms and sometimes cries for me.

So, Nicky, still think my tears make me a coward or a baby?

Because all they mean to me is that 20 years later, the events of that August day still hurt.

The tears mean that 20 years later, I still relive that day.

Memory Lane

Well well well, Ol' Fat Horse is trying a new tactic against me. Rather than fight in the here and now against me he would rather go back into my history and try using that against me. While Ol' Fat Horse doesn't have the brain to use Google to find anything on anyone, I recently found out that he had an old ghost from my past whispering in his ear.

See, what pisses me off is right now he is scurrying around my Memory Lane like a little greasy bloated rat, chewing on things that were precious, shitting in places that were once precious.

But, Nicky is only a rat, a cowardly one at that, so even though he is scurrying around my Memory Lane, he isn't going to be able to damage it.

The amusing thing is what he's using against me.

Do I cry in my sleep sometimes? Yeah, I do. There's damn good reasons for it too, reasons I'm not ashamed of, because something Nicky doesn't understand is that a man isn't ashamed of honest emotions. So yeah, he's right with his accusations that I cry in my sleep, and it isn't surprising that a sheltered little manchild like him can't envision something happening in a person's life that would make them do that.

Why does he pick on it, though? Because he knows I'm tougher than he is, and I've succeeded at everything he has failed at. It galls him to know that I made it in the military why he dropped out for crying so much that they just dropped him on a pre-existing condition to get rid of him. He thinks that crying in my sleep means I'm not as tough as he thinks I claim to be.

Too bad, Nicky. Even people who knew back then, in my head stomping days, knew why I cried in my sleep, and never bashed me for it, usually just offered me comfort.

His comments about Linda piss me off the most. He doesn't know what he is talking about, and his greasy sausage fingers typing her name annoys me. He's going to just keep talking and talking about her, and pissing me off more and more.

All in all, Nicky is strolling down my Memory Lane, a squalid greasy hunchbacked troglodyte whose lank and filthy clotted hair hangs over his face, led through the Lane by a little stool pigeon.

But Nicky, your source is using you.

And you're making a bad mistake trying to use my past against me.

Ol' Fat Horse Off the Record

LEGAL STUFF: Ol' Fat Horse will undoubtably claim this is copyright infringement. However, US Copyright Code allows reprinting of pertinent sections of a copyrighted work, providing that the author is given credit, and the work is not reprinted in it's entirety. This blog is in response to the Associated Content article Off the Record which was written by Nickolaus "Fat Horse" Pacione. As far as I know Assocaited Content owns the article (depending on the distribution plan Pacione agreed to), but even if Mr. Pacione holds the copyright, I do not contest it. I merely reprinting pertinent sections of the article in order to critique and review it.

Ol' Fat Horse has another AC article up, this one called "Off the Record", which I guess is his way of trying to tell people that they can't use the content of the article against him. Well, sorry Piggy Peaches, it don't work like that. By posting it on AC, he pretty much goes on the record babbling his typical stupid shit all over the internet.

What prompted his latest round of slack jawed drivel? Well, it seems like someone lit a copy of his shitty little magazine on fire and then pissed it out. So what does he do? Does he face the creator of the video? Of course not. Ol' Fat Horse can handle real confrontation, so he went to YouTube and complained that the video violated copyright. According to Stretched-Anus Nicky, because his photograph was on the cover, and the book's cover was in the video, it was a violation of his copyright. Yeah, wrap your head around that shit. Worse thing was, YouTube just took the video down. And of course Ol' Fat Horse is bragging about it, but I'll let his latest rambling discourse of stupidity speak for itself.

Burning books and putting them out with urine is never an acceptable way of reviewing a book.

Having reviewed a lot of Ol' Fat Horse's writing, yes, yes it is.

I wonder if some of you authors out there seen this of your works would you try to keep a cool head about it.

Why would I care? I got paid. See, Fat Horse, you need to define yourself as something beside's your writing. You're a human being, not a book. Get a life outside of writing, since you suck at it so badly.

It's going against policy on YouTube.com of using fire or explosives to make videos.

No, it isn't, you gibbering troglodyte. Doubt me? Check the Community Guidelines and the Terms of Service. But of course Ol' Fat Horse wouldn't know that, because he's too stupid to read the ToS. This is obvious from his frequent and constant violation of everyone's ToS's, from Amazon to Xanga.

That's when they not only violate copyright law but they commit acts of Arson.

Just stay away from legal definitions, Fat Horse, since you don't understand them. Arson is not burning a magazine. It is not a violation of copyright law to burn a book either, you mouth breathing moron.

When trolls do something that repulsive, I can't even find words for what they do.

As someone who has reviewed your stories, I can believe that. You can't even find the words to describe water, you foul mouthed hunchback.

When they've blatantly report because I've spoken the truth about what they've done.

Really? All I've seen is lies, wild guesses, and half truths. You get reported for being a bigoted, racist, homophobic foul mouthed troglodyte who lies constantly.

I just won't do videos from home.

I guess he's going to be doing gay bestiality porn to raise money, since his writing career doesn't make enough money to pay his authors.

Isn't destroying someone's book who put the book together having a disability a hate crime?

No. No matter how much you wish it was.

Correct me if I am wrong there;

OK.
Definition courtesy of the FBI.

A hate crime, also known as a bias crime, is a criminal offense committed against a person, property, or society that is motivated, in whole or in part, by the offender’s bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, or ethnicity/national origin.

See, that's what kind of coward ol' Fat Horse is. He hides behind a disability, trying to make it out that everyone hates him because he is disabled, not because he's a talentless asshole and a coward.

Correct me if I am wrong here, but isn't that against MSN policies to impersonate another user on there?

Nope. Of course, that would require Fat Horse to read the MSN Terms of Service but since it's lacking pictures of naked men and has words with more than three letters in it, Fat Horse can't understand it. The only time it is against policies is when the impersonation is illegal, and sorry, Fat Horse, using your name for parody and comedy purposes is NOT illegal, since nobody in the fucking world, even people being hunted for sport in Darfur, are not going to try to steal your shitty identity.

When they go around reviewing and offering pirated copies of my manuscripts that I am trying to actively sell, there's a lack of professionalism on their part and they ask me why I swear like a sailor when I see people doing reviews of pirated books.

He swears like a sailor, because like any ignorant and immature doofus, he thinks long strings of obsenties make him sound tough. But in his high pitched "my nuts haven't dropped" voice, he sounds more like Micky Mouse's gay cousin in the throes of reciever passion.

The person in question had bragged about obtaining "donated" copies of the stories when I already know where he got them from.

And of course he claims this. And of course he can't help but mention me. I'm willing to bet he masturbates to the thought of my bending over him, strapping him down firmly into his sleepsack, and then lovingly pushing my cock past his chapped lips, his yellow teeth, then onto his fur covered tongue, where he can suck on me and call me "Master."

Sorry, Fat Horse, it ain't happening. Not in this world, not in the next, and not with a stolen dick.

The very same person who got in trouble with his host for breaking a copyright law.

And wrong in one. Of course, Ol' Fat Horse is used to being wrong.

There is so much one can take with grace, but when they've done everything in their power and trying to go after one's livelihood, all professionalism is out the window.

Ol' Fat Horse has never shown the slightest bit of professionalism, maturity, or intelligent thought for as long as I've been able to tell. Nowhere in his internet presence does he show the slightest bit of any of that. Want to know what his most common response is to people who leave him bad reviews is? "FUCK YOU!", and I imagine he often cries while typing it.

I've done a blog entry

With the exception of those of us making fun of you, nobody cares about your shitty blog, Fat Horse.

I am off record here,

No, you aren't.

When they born books that are anthologies, they are really insulting everyone who are involved with a project.

I think you meant "burn" there, Fat Horse. Editing, have you fucking heard of it?

I have a message for those who go around playing with matches and torches on the Internet,

Great, advice from the scarecrow made of fat, cowardice, and failure.

don't because that will be seen as a felony in your state.

No it won't. I dare Fat Horse to show me a SINGLE state law like that.

Off record and un-pc as this sounds.

It didn't sound un-PC, it sounded uninformed and stupid. That 98 IQ is really pulling overtime making shit up, isn't it? Why can't you put that much imagination into your stories as you do these shitty "facts" that you spout?

If they came across me at 16-22 years old, I'd be pounding on them.

More fantasy from Fat Horse. Having read his shitty autobiography, I know for a fact that he never won a single goddamn fight. But of course, we can all tell it is just another fucking excuse on why he won't fight anyone, or back up the shit he talks.

Fat Horse talks a good game, but never shows up. He just stands across the street from the game and yells nonsense.

Laws of the web are fairly new and sometimes they operate within the fine lines to get away with murder.

Spoken like someone who hates freedom.

Then they go around leaving malicious reviews on Amazon.com of a book no longer available,

In Fat Horse's world, that means telling the truth about how shitty the book was.

I am candid and will say exactly what I am going to say, no matter how offensive it comes out to be

Which is why people burn your books, you bigoted asshole.

-- I will disagree with a lot of Liberal policies in effect and the way the publishing industry is these days seems to have more left leaning policies.

What liberal policies does he disagree with? You know, hippy shit, like Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Expression. Anti-American shit like that.

When the one person had forcefully wanted me to apologize -- you want an apology?

You should have apologized, Fat Horse.

My apology is pointing one finger up and if it was on television camera they would have it blacked out. Why because I am giving you the middle finger.

Ooooh, pointing your fat little manchild finger up in the air makes you so tough. I'm shaking in my combat boots.

Notice, he's never sent me such a picture.

If I was to use polite words, hell no.

But of course he doesn't use polite words. Like a spoiled rotten kid whose parents never taught him to to speak civilized, he'd rather scream profanity.

I take ownership of my name and my intellectual properties

Yeah, his intellectual properties. Like "Twilight Zone" and "The Crow".

Fat Horse, nobody is trying to "steal" your intellectual properties. By law, none of your stories, none of your characters, none of your locations qualify as intellectual properties.

Going online and claiming I had committed acts of murder.

Nobody would ever believe you actually killed anyone. There's 5 month old infants who's pictures look more menacing, who look more capable of murder and violence that you're bloated manchild ass.

It's gone on long enough, you constantly calling me your joke.

You're my bitch, get it right. You're the world's joke because you collect SSI disability, and still have to live in your grandmother's basement, you have to tell a grownup if you are going to be gone for the night and you are over 30, and you have the literary skills of an illegal immigrant in his first 2 weeks of English as a Second Language. He'll at least spell his own name right, won't he "Albret"?

You like to accuse me of plagiarism but you're the one throwing the stones into a glass house.

My God you are stupid. It's "People in glass hosues should not throw stones." not "throw stones at glass houses" you goddamn idiot.

Some would say this kind of article would be such, when I use disturbing images to get my point across.

With the exception of Ol' Fat Horse's obsession with feces, NOTHING in his fucking article is disturbing. Of course, this is the same guy that wrote a "ghost" story that is basically "Fat Fuck Falls Off A Fence"

yeah I've been on the receiving end of racism so I am by no means a racist as some would claim after the last article.

Yeah, tell us how much racism you've recieved as a white male between 18 and 40 in Chicago, Illinios. That statement alone marks you as one of the biggest fucking losers I've ever met.

Now watch the "bigot" card being thrown around. I've seen it all, and yes it does make me sick when they throw it at me as such

How about "misogynistic homophobe", that work for you, Ol' Fat Horse?

-- the human version of primates throwing shit.

More Fat Horse fecal obsession.

I've gone on record on a lot of this, and I have yet to get started with the bs in my guestbooks. (Unlike many in the blogging world these days, I still employ a guestbook.)

And like a typical coward, you have disabled comments on many of the sites you use, moderate all comments, delete comments, and in general block all opinions that don't tell you how great you are. You use a guestbook because you hate for other people to voice their opinions, don't you, you cowardly little tyrant wanna-be?

They're the ones who say I protest too much, let people buy the books and be the judge for themselves of how an anthology or book is.

Let people leave comments giving their opinion on the drivel they just wasted money on, coward.

It's just going to end up with them getting into brawls in places they don't want them happening.

Nice vieled threat. Too bad you are about as scary as a parapalegic raccoon. Trapped in a garbage can. Full of water. Did I mention that the raccoon is dead?

We're all adults here, right?

You'd think so, but judging by your prepubescent voice and immature attitude, I'd say no.

Stay tuned, boys and girls, because soon on AC, a review of one of Fat Horse's print anthologies!

A Glimpse Into the Heart of a Tyrant

Piggy Pacione recently put up another blog entry. Now, despite his direct command from his throne built of the bones of his enemies, I have decided to post sections of the blog in order to reply to them. I realize this will make his Highness angry with me, and undoubtedly he will send his flying ass-monkeys out to murder me and carry my dead carcass back to him, but I must risk it in the name of the resistance.

I am not broken by a long shot.

Of course not, you just lost your Lulu storefront, have had your AC articles removed, and in general discovered that you can't do anything you want without repercussions.

I guess they’re mad because they lost the video that burns my sixth issue of the magazine.

In a way, yes. You see, by stating he owned that the video was in violation of his copyright, Mr. Pacione inferred to YouTube that he owned the video, where instead he claims that because that his book is the one being burned, the video violates his copyright. That would be like claiming a picture of a hot chick on a Ford Mustang violates Ford's patents.

I showed that to one of the authors and the author who commented wanted to beat down the bastard for burning the book and pissing on it in the video.

I doubt this.

The story that the author wrote in the magazine, was an early Christmas present.

Wait, the author was an early Christmas present to Nicky, or the story was an early Christmas present to the author? Does Nicky even know what the fuck he is talking about, or is he just rambling on like usual?

The person is trying to force me to say otherwise but I am the rightful owner of the photograph on that magazine and he had no right to do what he did.

And there is Mr. Pacione's logic in having the video removed. He owns the cover photograph, so burning it is violating his copyright. Mr. Pacione seems as if he would be right at home with the RIAA, since apparently if you buy one his magazines, only he can decide what you can do with the magazine.

It reminds me of the fact that he informed me that even if I purchased his anthologies, I can't write reviews about them, or it is considered piracy.

Well the asshole did violate my copyrights there.

Actually, Little Sticky-Anus Nicky, he didn't, but you don't understand that, do you?

I guess they’re saying I use my disability to buy cheap beer but the case, asshole I hardly drink when I do drink.

Because you have the alcohol tolerance of a small child?

So, Nicky's latest blog entry is pretty much all flash and no bang. Showing everyone that if you do anything he doesn't like with his magazine, it is a violation of his copyright.

I wonder how he is going to react to what I am going to do to the print versions of his products I have on the way? One of the first things I'm going to do is improve the whole anthology by ripping his stories out it. That will improve it to something I wouldn't be embarrassed to be caught with, as well as help the other authors ease their sense of shame for being in the same publication as him.

And then I shall continue my quest to see if Nick's supposed copyright keeps me from doing any of the other indignities I have planned.

By the way, Nicky, you having copyright on the cover does not mean that nobody can post pictures or videos of your book being mangled. YouTube misunderstood you, and thought that you were claiming that the video itself was your property.

And last but not least, I leave you with the horrible nightmare that Mr. Pacione wakes up sweating from, the nightmare that he is convinced is so horrible it would drive Edgar Allen Poe and Lovecraft insane.

A woman has eight children, each eight years old, with her own 39 year old face on each of them.

Oooooh, scary.

More Allegations

From the Scarecrow Made Of
Fat, Cowardice & Failure

So, Ol' Fat Horse Pacione couldn't resist targeting me in his latest shitty blog entry. Let us dissect it, shall we?

Baxter, you and the 40 Foot Cockroach started this thing.

And I gave you a way to finish it, Piggy, all you had to do was take down the lies about me on your site. Did you do that? No. So this war between us is entirely your fault.

The very fact what you did wasn’t right every step of the way.

But what did was right? Threatening my children? Stalking my oldest daughter on MySpace, emailing my wife, threatening me?

It’s horse shit on your part, where the fuck is your professionalism?

The only horse shit is from your mouth, Ol' Fat Horse. As if anyone really believes that you had the nickname Iron Horse. You only started claiming that after I signed my emails Tim "Iron Ant" Willard for the hell of it. As for professionalism, where's yours? Let us look at the difference between us:

• I have a publisher, you self publish
• My artists are paid, you use crap artwork
• Content producers for my work are paid, yours are not
• My works win award, yours do not

I'd say I have professionalism, and you're just wishing.

You’re making other authors suffer because they did one thing, write for a project.

Point out one instance of where I made anyone else but you suffer, Piggy.

What is the biggest crime they did to you? Do you expect every person to put me on a blackball list because of your article?

No. But I do expect quality sources to blackball you as a fraud and scam running troglodyte.

I am not even going to link that article because you’re not worth the money.

Doesn't matter, I still have more views than you, am making more money than you, and haven't had any of my articles pulled for AC ToS violations. Where you have had them pulled from AC, Piggy. Speaking of pulled, how's your Lulu storefront doing? And, I'll do what you didnt: Ms. Baxter's Article and My Article linkage for the curious. Oh, and my Review of Fat Horse.

You were too much trouble than you were worth, and ten years from now I picture you pushing a cart around downtown Atlanta, or Athens, Georgia,” Wait isn’t she the one who got the mentally ill person’s storefront shut down on lulu.com? Don’t buy anything from her if that’s the case.”

Actually, when they find out it was you, they'll probably applaud. You don't get to hide behind your disability, you little freak of nature. Plus, notice how he always has to bring up his disability. Rather than attempt to overcome the challenges of being mentally disabled, he'd rather wallow in self-pity and use it as a shield to protect himself from retaliation for his disgusting acts than ever try to better himself. It's almost like he'd rather be known for being mentally ill than a good writer. He probably does, since being mentally ill doesn't require effort on his part, all he has to do is not go to medical appointments and not take his medications.

Her co-author on a project is just as seedy too when it comes to that shit.

And that would be me.

I will not be buying anything from snuff books anytime soon enough.

That would be my stuff. Notice how he refers to my stuff as "snuff books" because it features people getting killed, and some pretty graphic CGI images and artwork. Year of the Zombie. Check it out if you want at: Year of the Zombie Stuff

I am guessing any anthology he edits for his imprint would have a rushed look.

Of course he guesses. He hasn't looked at anything I've written, he just sees "zombie" and figures it's all gore and killing. I wonder if he can read well enough to understand what it is all about. Want a free look at the Year of the Zombie product "Survivor's Guide to Risen America" for your education? Here, live it up:

Free Stuff! YAY!

You decide if it looks rushed. Be warned, it is for the d20 Modern RPG by Wizards of the Coast.

Dancing on my imprints grave, don’t speak too soon.

How about if I dance in front of your closed down Lulu storefront? Writing all those nasty things, and admitting you were using your "anthologies" to get back at people isn't smart, since Lulu doesn't want to be hosting hateful stuff.

I guess he had too many orgies with barn animals.

No, Nicky, that wasn't a horse cock, that was my cock. I have a normal human penis, not a 3" micropenis like you.

See, Nicky likes to talk all this shit, but he can't back it up. He can talk a good game, but when people fight back, he runs away and hides in his grandmother's basement. See, he's a 30+ year old man, who lives with his grandmother despite the fact that the government gives him a disability check to live off of. He's a 30+ year old man who harassed a 16 year old girl on MySpace because her father refused to knuckle under to his juvenile threats.

You can comment as you wish on your own blogs but stealing my facebook.com notes and myspace.com bulletins, that is off limits.

Notice how he so graciously allows us to comment on our own blogs. Of course, he also forbids comments on his, and won't post ANYWHERE we he can't control the comments. Why? Because he is a coward, and like all cowards, he's a tyrant at heart, seeking to control everyone else.

I'll take his MySpace bulletins if he sends them to me. I'll take his facebook notes if he wants. When he makes the publically available, he makes them usable by the public. He doesn't get to dictate the terms of this fight so he can stack the deck. He picked this fight with me, so I'll chose the weapons and the battlefield.
Control the battlefield, first rule of victory.

You're finished, Piggy Pacione. I told you I'd end you. That wasn't a physical threat, I'm not going to kill you or anything like that. I'm going to end your harassment of my family and me.

What do you have to say now, bitch?

On the Attack

Mr. Pacione has had his chance. I told him that I'd stop reviewing his works, that I'd quit punching him so hard, all he had to do was remove a few lies he told about me, remove references to me in all of his shitty articles, and put up a retraction on his blogs and his MySpace.

He responded by bringing up someone from my past, a woman named Linda, as well as our child.

So now I'm hitting back. I'm going to keep reviewing his stories, keep critiquing his works, and punch him in the only place he feels a single bit of self-worth. He tried punching at where he thinks I have all my self-worth wrapped up, in my military career. He seems unaware that time has moved on since I was a soldier, that I do not define who I am, or what I am, based on what I used to be. Like most people, as I age, I grow and change, and it is who I currently am that defines who I am.

If I was told today that I would never be able to write again, I would still be me. I would not cease to be the man I am any more than I ceased to be the person I was when the medical board refused my request to stay in service.

Pacione doesn't understand that. He doesn't understand that I have done nothing in my life that I would run away from, that I would lie to conceal. He believes that his claims can hurt me, but it's become obvious since he's run away and hidden like a little girl, that while he thinks he can dish it out, he certianly can't take it.

His little love-notes to me have changed in tone. From crowing at me that he knows deep dark secrets about me and vieled threats to my family, to half hysterical childish whining to leave him alone, all he has done is shown me that he is a little coward whose mouth writes check he can't cash.

He's a coward, plain and simple. When I didn't immediately cave to his threats, when I didn't run away and scream over him guessing some details or finding out scattered details about my past, he immediately back pedalled and started crying at me to leave him alone.

But he still refuses to remove the falsehoods he has published about me. Showing me that he is a complete coward, the kind that not only runs away when he finds out that his target can and will fight back, but is terrified that if he removes that stuff, he will have to admit to himself that he isn't as tough as he thinks he is.

He's threatened me physically, and he has bragged that he is 6' tall and 200 lbs. I'm 6' tall and 205 lbs my last weigh in, and two things strike me. He's not 6' high, there's no way. And if he is 200 lbs, it's mostly flab. I guess he thought I was going to be intimidated by a flabby manchild threatening me.

But now that I've refused to knuckle under to him, he's ran away and hidden, shouting at me from a distance to leave him alone, claiming he hasn't done anything to deserve the wrath I've begun showing him.

Which shows me that at heart, Pacione is a selfish coward. He doesn't understand why I've regained my resolve to crush him. He doesn't care enough about anyone else to understand why threatening my family would fill me with such rage.

He claimed I have no honor, because I am attacking him. Which shows he knows nothing of honor. He attacked my family, besmirched my name, and then tries to claim I'm dishonorable when I defend the honor of my family and my own honor.

Of course he doesn't understand honor, he's a self-centered coward. A spoiled child who has always been able to hide from everyone by running to his family. He is still a child, he has no idea how to care for himself, lives off of the charity of the government and his family, and instead of trying to better himself, he uses everything as a crutch.

Nicky, you are a cowardly selfish little manchild who leeches off of his family and has proven over and over again that he cannot succeed in real life. You have all the honor of a mongrel dog digging through the trash and humping the corpse of a raccoon. You have the bodily hygiene of a mangy sheep suffering from syphillis.

Keep crying Nick, your tears do nothing but show the world you are a simple coward.

A Sign of Weakness?

Perhaps ol' Stretched Rectum Nicky mistook my last post for weakness, that I was unable to defend myself, and would not answer any of his accusations or attacks because he had managed to overwhelm me and destroy me.

Not so. You see, unlike Knob Nibbling Nicky, I care for other people, I have people that are important to me, and there are people that are important in my life. I am capable of something called human empathy, as well as human affection, something Nicky cannot understand because he is too selfish to look beyond himself.

Yesterday morning there was a death in family. Someone I cared very deeply about, and his death left a void in my life, and a lot of pain inside of me. It was sudden, but not unexpected, and the worst part of it I will not explain here on a public blog. I spent the day with my immediate family, all of whom were vastly upset, as they had as much affection for the deceased as I did.

But now the arrangements are done, and Nicky has made a vast mistake. You see, I'm angry over my relative's death. Angry at the whole world, angry at him, and angry at myself and others. Rage is an old friend, and is sooo useful. All Nicky da Gawth has done is earned my ire, and moved from vague dislike and contempt to a burning fucking hatred.

Which is good, I need a focus for my anger. I need to make someone suffer and feel pain. Sharing my pain with others always makes me feel better.

Nicky probably thinks he has me on the ropes, that I'm on the edge of caving in to all of his retarded demands, that he has what he needs to blackmail me, or "expose" me and every wrong doing I have ever done.

Let him, if he actually knows of any evil deeds I have done.

Unlike him, I'm not going to whimper and cry and run away. I'll stay in the ring, I'll fight.

See, he made a mistake. He informed me that if I don't leave him alone and give in to other demands of his, he will make an anonymous call the state I live in and have them take my children away.

One little anonymous phone call you're fagged a woman and child abuser. Want to back off now, I call this leverage. I supposed you were never a wrestler, it's a game of leverage and right now I have some leverage on you.

Well, that's enough for a police call right there. Threatening my children, huh Nicky?

So, Nicky wants to up the stakes? Not a problem, I'm plenty willing to up the stakes.

A Warning...

Nicky, I know you read this blog. I'll give you a warning right here...

Do NOT fuck with me for the next week or so. No emails, no threats to my family, nothing.

You do NOT want to attract my attention right now. I'm full of rage and hatred at the entire goddamn world right now, and you do NOT want that rage directed at you.

Step the fuck off, Nicky. Know when someone is wearing one of nature's "Do not touch me" signs, and know when to step. This is not out of weakness, I'll warn you right now.

Fuck with me right now, and I'll tear your fucking head off and parade it around the block on a fucking stick.