LAST DAY for the “Redshirts” Auction to Benefit the Bradford, Ohio Public Library
Posted on September 19, 2011 Posted by John Scalzi 24 Comments
Yes! It is the last day! You have only until 11:59:59pm Eastern time to get your bid in to win the pre-publication bound manuscript of my upcoming novel Redshirts, plus a raft of other goodies, the bounty of which only increases as the bids go up. As of this writing the current bid is $6,000, which means that at the very least the winner will get everything you see in this picture, plus a rare signed hardcover edition of Agent to the Stars, plus the song of their choice performed by me on the ukulele. If the bid gets to $7,000, someone is getting pie. And I’m still hoping we get to $10,000, because damn it, I want an excuse to unleash that black velvet painting unto the world.
How will we get to those numbers? Simple: if someone bids them. All the details and the thread for bidding are right at this link. And remember that all the proceeds will go to the Bradford, Ohio Public Library. Which, incidentally, is now aware the auction is going on; I didn’t tell them but clearly someone did, because I got a very nice e-mail about it from the president of the library’s board of trustees. They are, as you may imagine, delighted. So thanks to everyone who’s bid so far: You’ve made a librarian’s day. More than one librarian’s day, even!
Remember that if you want to bid on the auction, you need to go to this link. Please do not put a bid in this comment thread.
If I had $10,000 in loose change kicking around, that’d be sooooo worth it.
If I had a million dollars… well… you know.
Good luck bidders!
sitting in bed, eating shchoedenfraude pie, gazing at a velvet painting of my wife and I, while scalzi reads us a bedtime story, would be so worth the money, if I only had that kind of money to throw around.
ah well.
Yeah, I always suffer from emotional conflicts on deals like this. I’d kill to be able to drift off to sleep to your sonorous voice, belly full of schadenfreude. But its well outside the limits of my budget. Still its hard to complain when its for a good cause.
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Ah, about that killing thing, John – is there some editor/publisher/school bully in your past that would be worth 10k to you . . . you know . . .
:)
Hoping that this doesn’t come down to somebody doing a last-second snipe… have you considered extending the auction clock by (say) five minutes for each bid that comes in the final five minutes?
And congrats–this is one of the cooler fundraisers I’ve seen in a while.
Gavin:
I have some thoughts on how to deal with a spate of last minute bids, yes.
I hope you don’t abuse this power, by the way. “These books are three weeks late? Why don’t you take the fine off the top of that [diabolical laughter] six thousand dollars?”
I think that whomever wins should have Jon sing “I’m a Barbie Girl” by Aqua, and then post the recording to the internet.
Gavin@8: How do we know that’s not why John started this whole deal in the first place? The library may be holding Athena and/or Daisy hostage even now, until John pays his current fines.
If I had the money, I would so go for the velvet painting, because that would be EPIC!!!
I hope there will be pictures shared by the winning bidder(s) here on Whatever. Good luck to those bidding for the amazing goodies!
I bet my wife someone would get a pie.
DON’T LET ME DOWN, PEOPLE!
p.s. On a teacher’s salary, alas, all I can do is hope to enjoy the pie vicariously. Vicarious schadenfreude. Is that a thing?
Alas it’s already too high for my current budget…. Hmmm I could use the money we’re supposed to spend on the wedding next year, but somehow I think that would solve the “problem” of whether there will be a wedding to begin with :)
#12 Doc Rocketscience – You don’t need to have Vicarious Schadenfreude Pie. You could bake your own Schadenfreude Pie, as the recipe is available on this website. (I’ve made it myself – it is delicious)
I think this would be quite appropriate for those of us who are only able to enjoy the bidding process vicariously. :) It’s certainly what I plan to do. ;-)
Sure, I could bake my own, but how doe that benefit anyone but me? And those upon whom I inflict said pie, of course
“after receiving your last book, I had written a thank you and request for a possible workshop at BPL.”
They might be able to afford your fee now. LOL
#12 Doc Rocketscience: what’d the other guy bet?
A pie, I hope.
Doc #12: If naming a thing can bring it into existence, then (I think) “stellvertretender Schadenfreude” is the phrase to get such a thing started. Dunno if there’s a single-word expression for such, but given that there are words for insanely improbable concepts such as natsukashii[1], there probably is.
________
1. natsukashii (.jp) n.: 1. nostalgia for a life you never had.
Here’s hoping you get a late night bidding war to keep track of.
@parkrrrr: What you did there… I saw it.
Woot! Someone’s getting a pie! Thank you Ms./Mr. Credible $7k Bidder!
I think in order to be properly schadenfreudelicious, the winner should post a photo of themselves enjoying the pie so the rest of us suffer pangs of envy.
(Yes, yes, we could bake our own pies. But none of them would be as schadenfreudelicious as one baked by The Scalzi himself.)
congratulations to the winning bidder, to the library, and to Scalzi for making it happen.