A Tale of Billboards and Burritos
Posted on December 2, 2020 Posted by John Scalzi 37 Comments
First, you should know that Amazon took out a big damn ad celebrating The Last Emperox and put it up in midtown New York, and that got the social media folks at Tor books pretty excited.
So naturally, I tried to press my advantage.
The folks at Tor offered an alternative.
I was, naturally, amenable to these terms.
Fast forward to later in the day… and this happened.
Turns out… they had.
To which I was appropriately appreciative.
But wait, there’s more!
The folks at Tor thought that was pretty great, actually.
But there was one more way I wanted to say thank you.
And there you have it, a holiday story with billboards, social media, Mexican food and charitable giving. Not a bad day on the Internet, I have to say.
— JS
Wonderful!
You do queso shots?
Ummmmm . . . I’m up for that. What do you chase them with?
More queso.
To quote something Kurt Vonnegut Jr. said in a letter to a friend of mine, back around 1975, this “augmented my boisterous cheerfulness.”
Thanks for posting this! I needed proof that there are still little acts of coolness happening in the world today.
And now you know you can get Mexican food delivered to your home. On call burritos. Whenever you want. That’s fabulous.
I was with you right up until you started to drink the queso….
Because your response to joyful surprise treats is to make charitable contributions, would it be ok with you and K if I have a little crush on you?
queso raw, so raw
Am I seeing things? Is that sign sitting on a Hooters restaurant?
I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with that…
This makes me smile. A lot. Thank you.
Glc: That was horrible. I love it.
@Old Bob looks like a Sbarro’s pizza to me.
Beautiful. After years of the same, I know it’s rough residing in a rural area with limited food delivery service, but after living in that kind of nowhere land for many years and having moving into the city, we now have at least three excellent Mexican restaurants from which to choose – delivery or pickup (all within a 5 minute drive). Of course we don’t get the view of the Milky Way night sky anymore, but as sweet as that is, I have rarely found that it interferes with my appetite. I like the urban setting with all the food choices! Enjoy!
I love it when the social media people are allowed to play , like the lady who does the snarky Wendy’s twitter responses. Congrats on the billboard AND Mexican food :)
This just made me smile, chuckle, and as the kids these days say, have “all the feels”. Thanks, it was really needed today.
And congratulations.
And thank you for your donations.
It says something about this year that this thread post made me a little verklempt. Thanks for sharing.
I love a story that ends with food banks getting contributions! Thank you for being the kind of person who thanks people by making contributions to help others.
What, no link or 800 number for the burrito joint? Were they good? If so, consider spreading the good news.
Lovin’ this, the drinkable cheese included! ¡Arriba, abajo, adentro! ^_^
Speaking of authors who may or may not have been recognized in unusual ways lately, check out XKCD https://xkcd.com/2393/ which is obviously about SFWA president Mary Robinette Kowal.
‘Sneaky Cuisine Shenanigans’ could be your next band name.
From 5 minutes on Google Maps the closest Mexican (or possibly “Mexican”) place to Bradford that does delivery is probably the Hot Head Burritos in Piqua.
No idea what the quality is like, but it’s almost certainly better than the Taco Bell 50 yards further up the street.
@Dragoness Eclectic
Looks like a Hooters above the pizza place.
Excellent, and well done, Tor Books people.
(I’d skip the queso too, but that’s just me.)
Living in Brooklyn, I guess we are spoiled for delivery choices, You forget how isolated the boonies are from some things.
This is the most wholesome thing I’ve seen on the internet in a while!
Very cool, all around!
That’s awesome! I particularly enjoyed the “MUAHAHAHA!!!!”
Alrighty, show of hands: how many people saw the headline and assumed “John’s gone and eaten a billboard”?
Let me put in a plug for Tacqueria Mixteca in Dayton. Which this is probably not—but if you’re in Dayton I highly recommend it.
Yelp suggests half a dozen places with actual Mexican names that deliver, one in Greenville, several in Piqua and Troy, and then more up near Sidney or down near Dayton. One specifically calls itself “New Mexican” as opposed to Mexican if you want variety. It has Churros, but they’re probably better if you pick your order up yourself and eat them first instead of letting them cool during delivery.
Classy all around! Congratulations and happy holidays to you all.
This just made my day, and on a day I needed it.
@Bill Stewart: accordin to the Wikipaedia, that is Joseph Robinette Biden’s real middle name.
this whole thing is awesome.
Every man has his price. John’s is one burrito.
This really is a tale of Christmas. I got moisture in my eyes, for real!
Plus The Last Emperox is great. And Wil is an excellent narrator.
Thank you for some happiness today. What a treat.
Scalzi, congrats on the burritos, the billboard and the Amazon “best books of 2020” awards. You deserve all of those!
By the way, does anyone know what the heck is going on with the Goodreads “best sci-fi book of the year” Awards? This year’s nominations weirdly included exactly zero books I’ve read, and (even stranger) were all from authors I haven’t even heard of before. Besides Scalzi’s “The Last Emperox”, I’ve also read other 2020 books from luminaries like Peter Hamilton (“Saints of Salvation”) and William Gibson (“Agency”) and none of them was even nominated?!