Dear Apress....
As a loyal customer, I need to ask you for one favor. This is a very petty and immature request on my part, but I have to ask it anyway. Please don't give Tobin any more HardCovers for his books:
Working with Tobin is hard enough as it is because he outdoes me at everything, we have essentially a Homer Simpson, Ned Flanders relationship. Everything I want, he's already got. Every time I learn something new, he already learned it. Every time we have a discussion on politics or religion, he beats me. It's brutal to deal with. He's beaten me to being an author by a few years and now that I'm finally having an opportunity to publish, I thought I had finally caught up. UNTIL THIS!!!!!!!!!! A Hard Back Book? Ok, I can see why Ingo gets a Hard Back. I can see why Mark & Jason got one. But Tobin too? Ok, I'll admit it, his threading book was Threading book was great and this book is too - but it doesn't deserve a Hard Cover. Why? Because I'm jealous that's why. So this of course means war! I need to write a better book then him first, and then I need one that's hard cover. (A little know secret about www.tibasolutions.com is that I was hired in large part because of my stunning good looks (Tobin was hired solely for technical prowess (and while it's true that his wife is probably one of the hottest ladies in NC or SC, I can only think she married him b/c she's really impressed by men who know their way around Code Access Security), we were trying to help develop a studly programmer image which I've done wonders to make happen. Here's a huge possible benefit for my next publisher, they could put my Mug on the Front of the book and that should at least cause a few thousand extra sales.)
Also, the .NET For Strippers - A Practical Guide to Design Patterns, .NET and other interesting topics - project is open again. That's right, if FYM, Wired, GQ or any other magazine wants to write an article on it, or any book publisher wants to break new ground in book coolness, KC and I are your men.
Anyways T, congratulations on the new book man and thanks for the complimentary copy. Hopefully some of your brainyness will start rubbing off on me ;-)