Before I begin, I’d like to say congratulations to America for concluding its presidential election.
You may have thought this election was tough. In fact, it reminded me of the Flaknarkian election of 29292929 for the position of Illustrious Poobah.
The Flaknarkians are a walrus shaped people. The male candidate was an elderly walrus with outlandish hair and the female was also an elderly walrus but she had a penchant for falling down all the time.
Hmm…come to think of it, there wasn’t a lot of difference between that election and yours.
Anyway, if your candidate prevailed, congratulations. If your candidate lost, my condolences.
But whether you are happy are sad by the results of this election, fear not, for it is meaningless, as the Mighty Potentate will most certainly take control of your wretched planet at some point anyway.
You may recall that some time ago my supreme overlord, the Mighty Potentate, declared that Bookshelf Q. Battler is the chosen one, the only writer capable of putting out a book so finely crafted that it would inspire the masses to give up on reality television altogether.
It’s been over a year and alas, BQB has yet to publish a novel.
Ergo, to prevent the spread of reality television across the cosmos, His Potentosity is planning a hostile takeover of your planet should BQB fail in his writing efforts.
In other words, start getting used to the idea of being ruled by the Mighty Potentate because it doesn’t look like BQB will ever get his ass into gear.
But you can help BQB and in so doing, save your planet from the Mighty Potentate’s potent potential.
All you need to do is follow BQB on one of the following time wasting social media sites that aliens invented to cause all of you dumb humans to grow dumber, fatter, lazier and more obnoxious and angry about literally everything.
BQB is an especially Twitterer. In fact, he Tweets as much as your incoming president but he is not as orange.
BQB checks in on Facebok and Wattpad regularly but has been letting Google + slide, though he needs to get back to it soon.
So follow him and then once he writes his book you can help him promote it and in effect, save the world from the Mighty Potentate.
In the meantime, if you see BQB screwing around on this pitiful blog, tell him to get his back ass to work on his novel, for the fate of the world is at stake.
Alien Jones is the Bookshelf Battle Blog’s intergalactic correspondent, graciously lending the power of his brain to answer your questions.
Ask the Alien a question and he may very well plug your book or blog in his answer. Ask questions in the comments or tweet them to @bookshelfbattle
Together, we can promote self-published material and ween the masses off reality television, a form of entertainment that Alien Jones’ boss, the maniacal alien despot known as “The Mighty Potentate” despises so much that he’s plotting an invasion of Earth just to stop it.
From the far reaches of space, aliens travel to Earth…
…to remind me that I am now old as f%&kT and have accomplished very little in 20 years.
Although in my defense, neither has the world! So there’s that.
SPOILERS abound.
BQB here with a review of Independence Day: Resurgence.
The year was 1996.
Bill Clinton was in the White House, chasing interns around the Oval Office with his pants around his ankles and turning Monica Lewinsky into a human humidor (Google it, millennials. It’s too disgusting to go into further detail.)
The Beastie Boys were laying down some of their ill-est shit.
The sentence “Bill Cosby gave that lady his pudding pop” could only have been construed as “that nice comedic father figure was kind enough to give a woman the delicious frozen snack treat that he endorses.”
The Internet was in its infancy. It was a cute toy but other than that no one saw a glaring need to pay a fee to tie up your phone line while your computer screeched at you.
People who took pictures of their lunch and then demanded that you a) look at the pictures of their lunch and b) make comments about their lunch were considered assholes.
Technically, those people didn’t even exist, or if they did, not in high numbers. Again, the Internet was in its infancy. If you wanted your own website you needed coding knowledge and technical know-how. It was just too much work to post pictures of your lunch.
And at the box office was a movie called Independence Day.
Yes, in a pure marketing move, it was released on July 4th. Independence Day.
Those aliens know how to screw up a barbecue.
In the original, aliens invade Earth. In a far flung story line, various groups and people react to the alien attack.
To the best of my recollection, you had Bill Pullman as the president, who was also a fighter pilot, for no other reason really than he got to make inspiring speeches and then fly around in a fighter jet and shoot at alien spaceships.
Oh and there was Randy Quaid as a guy who appeared to be a drunk jackass who was crazy for believing he’d been abducted by aliens as a kid only to be vindicated. Humorous. Also, he was, coincidentally, a pilot as well so he too enjoyed the alien shooting fun.
Of course, the big star was Will Smith as Capt. Hiller, the pilot/hero who saves the day.
(SPOILER ALERT – he and Jeff Goldblum fly a stolen alien fighter craft into the mothership, fooling the aliens just long enough for them to upload a virus with the help of a 90’s era Mac and a floppy disk.)
Seemed ingenious at the time.
Twenty years have now passed.
Holy f%&king butt nuggets. Twenty years.
3.5 readers, here’s my first criticism of this highly unnecessary sequel.
It made me think too much about my life – how quickly the past two decades went by. Mistakes made. Things I could have done differently.
How is it possible that I went from a wide-eyed young lad thinking this new fangled CGI movie was pretty cool (CGI effects were fairly new to the movie scene in those days so as a movie goer, they were a treat. I feel bad for you millennials as you have nothing to look forward to now, unless virtual reality actually ends up being as big as they claim it will be).
Where was I? Ah yes. How did I go from that young kid wowed by CGI to a jaded adult who has now seen so much CGI that it just doesn’t have them same wow factor that it did when it was new?
Shit. Then there’s me in general. Twenty years ago I thought by now I’d be a really amazing, fabulous person.
Had you told me back then that in 20 years my greatest achievement would be starting a blog with 3.5 readers my response would be a) “What’s a blog?” and then b) “Oh, it’s a website that any asshole with $10 and rudimentary typing skills can start? Excuse me while I GO STICK MY HEAD IN THE MOVIE THEATER RESTROOM TOILET AND FLUSH IT UNTIL I DROWN TO SPARE MYSELF THIS INCREDIBLY DISAPPOINTING FUTURE!!!”
Nah. I wouldn’t have done that. I’d have just vowed that I’d work harder and make a difference. You millennials weren’t the first generation to view yourselves as special snowflakes.
At any rate, I spent most of this movie paying little attention to the action on screen. Instead, I went over the multitude of mistakes I made, opportunities missed, warning signs avoided, paths not taken and so on that led me to a point where the highlight of my day is writing a review of a highly unnecessary sequel to a movie that was dumb twenty years ago.
Even worse, so little has changed in the world since then when you think about it:
A Bush had recently been president before Clinton became president.
Since then, another Bush became president. Then a third Bush recently tried to become president. Also, another Clinton wants to be president. At least if the Clintons end up back in the White House, the interns will have a head start this time. Bill isn’t looking as spry as he used to be.
Trump’s hair defied gravity and laws of physics, back in the 1990s and today.
Cars don’t fly yet. We have yet to meet real space aliens. Oh, and the Simpsons are still on the air.
And yet, despite all of these similarities, there were some differences between then and now that made the original film more enjoyable…then.
Specifically:
I was young and more willing to suspend disbelief. (Bill Pullman as a President/Alien Fighter seemed perfectly plausible.)
Seeing landmarks getting blown up by aliens seemed like harmless fantasy drivel back in the day. As I recall, the aliens in the original film blow up the White House so as to illustrate to you, the viewer that they were evil ass aliens who meant business and were not to be f%&ked with. Since 9/11, such scenes just seems to hit too close to home.
And like I said before, CGI was in its early stages, so it was awesome to see. Then George Lucas came along and made those cartoonish Star Wars prequels.
OK. Shit. 1,000 words in, let’s talk about the sequel itself.
It’s twenty years later and the world has become a Utopia. A casino magnate with gravity defying hair and the lady who ran the country in the 90’s by shoving her hand up her husband’s ass and working his mouth like a puppet (oh come on, you know she did) aren’t vying for control of the Free World.
Rather, the entire world is free and humanity works together as humans have set aside their differences in order to keep a watchful eye out for future alien invasions.
Alien tech has been used to create all sorts of wonderful inventions that improve life and make people happy.
And then, you know, aliens invade again. Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit, some people do some shit over here, some other people do some shit over there, cut in some scenes of shit getting blown up around the world, and so on.
There are new cast members like Liam Hemsworth, but mostly the film consists of the actors from the original who never did anything better than this bullshit.
Thus, Jeff Goldblum is back, as is Judd Hirsch as his father. Bill Pullman is back though I wish he wasn’t because I feel like it was just yesterday that I saw him in Spaceballs as Lone Star and now he’s old as f%&k.
And in general, that’s my main complaint. Will Smith didn’t return, I assume, because the studio didn’t want to shell out the cash now that he’s a big box office draw (you might remember the original Independence Day plus Men in Black made Will a celebrity icon.)
So Will is nowhere to be found. But everyone without anything better to do is back, and they are all old as shit, which makes me feel old as shit.
I literally think this movie was made for the sole purpose of making me feel old as shit.
HOLLYWOOD SUIT 1 – Should we make a sequel to Independence Day?
HOLLYWOOD SUIT 2 – Yes! It will make BQB feel old as shit!
There are many references to the original, shit that you probably wouldn’t get unless you saw the first one (and also if you’re a nerd like me who has seen it a few more times over the years so you remember what happened.)
The aliens are still slapping Bill Pullman’s face up against the glass and speaking through him as if he’s their puppet (I assume they got the idea by watching Hillary work Bill).
Jeff and Judd are still the unlikely father/son hero duo, except Judd’s still alive which is surprising as I thought he was old as shit twenty years ago.
Eat your Wheaties kids and you too can aspire to Judd Hirsch’s longevity!
Robert Loggia has a quick cameo though I think it might have been a CGI Loggia. Someone tell me if you have the details on that one.
Oh and Brent Spiner (aka Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation) is back as the eccentric Dr. Brakish Okun.
The plot is basically the same bullshit about aliens invading and their invasion happens to be coincidentally timed on Independence Day so Americans can feel very patriotic while watching a movie about Americans defeating aliens on the same day that the British were told to go pound sand.
Although, I have to point out, some Hollywood suit must have decided this sequel didn’t have the gusto to put butts in seats on the Fourth of July, seeing as how it was released in June.
You’ll know this franchise has hit the wall when they release an Independence Day sequel that hits theaters in January.
Oh and FYI – there will be another sequel. It will also be unnecessary and serve as little more than a reminder that 20 years have passed, your life sucks more than you thought it would and the world doesn’t even have flying cars.
Shit. Stop remaking 90s shit, Hollywood.
Next you’ll tell me there’s a Mallrats TV show in the works.
Wait? What?
STATUS: Semi-shelf worthy. The effects are worth a trip to the theater. Otherwise, if you miss it, you didn’t miss much.
Standby for a Transmission from the Mighty Potentate…
…SCANNING….SCANNING…ACQUIRING CONTROL OF THE BOOKSHELF BATTLE BLOG…
Attention pitiful humans, for it is I, the Mightiest of Potentates.
I have taken control of this miserable excuse for a blog to address two points:
1) Bookshelf Q. Battler, the Chosen One, continues to dilly dally in his assignment to produce a novel so well-written that it convinces you all to abandon the most wretched of all human art forms, “reality television.” You must continue to pester him to no end to finish his novel or else Earth will be invaded and turned into an intergalactic drive-thru delicatessen.
2) It has come to my attention that this your country known as the United States of America is choosing its leader.
I have reviewed the candidates:
Both are very, very old. Older than the deepest, darkest black hole in the entire universe. Entire empires have risen and fallen during their existences. Note that to my species, they are mere babes. But to humans, they are older than dirt. They roamed the Earth during the time of the dinosaurs, the beings that did a much better job of running your planet, in my opinion.
One wears some type of wounded animal on his head. The other has enough pantsuits to fill a Lane Bryant warehouse. (What is a Lane Bryant warehouse? I do not know what this means. My advisor, Alien Jones, told me pitiful humans would find this amusing.)
Both are very ego driven, as all Earth politicians are. Frankly, as all intergalactic politicians are. The male has built many tacky towers in his name. The female has siphoned enough money through her power and influence to choke a horse.
As a pitiful human, you might argue that I, the Mighty Potentate, am ego driven. I am. I have built many monuments to myself. And if you had conquered and civilized as many systems as I have, you’d be able to build many monuments to yourself, Earth loser.
In short, neither candidate is suitable, and thus, as the ruler of all I survey, I command you to write in “The Mighty Potentate” on your pathetic ballots this November.
I understand you American Humans are a particularly inquisitive bunch, which is a concept I don’t fully grasp as I am not used to having to explain myself.
Just ask any alien under my command:
WHAT A POLITICAL DEBATE LOOKS LIKE IN THE WORLD OF THE MIGHTY POTENTATE:
The Mighty Potentate commands me to do X. Should I:
A) Do X and not be vaporized.
B) Do X and not be vaporized.
C) Refuse to do X and be vaporized (Report to the vaporization chamber immediately if you select this choice.)
But very well. I shall abide by your Earth customs and answer your questions about the issues:
QUESTION #1 Mighty Potentate, if elected president, how would you fix the economy?
Vaporization.
QUESTION #2 – What?
All must be useful and productive or be vaporized. Next question, pitiful human.
QUESTION #3 – Free trade has been brought up a great deal in this election. How would you secure the best trade deals to make America competitive in the global market?
Vaporization. Purchase our products at the prices of our choosing or become vapor.
QUESTION #4 – I’m beginning to see a pattern here. The possibility of a war is always a concern for the person who holds the oval office. As President, how would you avoid war?
Vaporization. Stop pitching so many softballs, pitiful human.
QUESTION #5 – Vaporization again?
Indeed. All will hail the Mighty Potentate or be vaporized.
QUESTION # 6 – When you say “vaporize” what exactly do you mean?
I have conquered most of the Universe by perfecting vaporization technology. Through my various vaporization devices, I can turn anyone or anything into a fine mist that quickly dissipates into nothingness.
QUESTION 7 – Right. Moving on. Health care has been in the news lately…
Vaporize the sick. They only slow our operations down.
QUESTION 8 – Do I dare ask about crime?
All will obey the laws of the Mighty Potentate or be vaporized.
QUESTION 9 – Taxes?
Everything belongs to the Mighty Potentate. Render it unto to me or…
QUESTION 10 – Be vaporized. We get it. What about free speech?
All are free to speak praises of the Mighty Potentate. It is mandatory to do so five times an hour or be vaporized.
QUESTION 11 – What if people don’t want to be vaporized?
Then they will be vaporized.
QUESTION 12 – But how can they protest being vaporized if they’ve been vaporized?
Person-who-wants-to-be-vaporized-says-what?
CONCLUSION:
There you have it, pitiful humans. I am the Mighty Potentate, the only candidate willing to harness the power of vaporization to solve all your problems.
Vote Potentate. Better yet, Votentate.
Paid for by the Committee to Elect the Mighty Potenate or Be Vaporized
Alien Jones’s boss is the Mighty Potentate. He is an intergalactic dictator.
EN ESPANOL:
Hola. Soy Biblioteca P. Battler .
Tengo un blog con 3,5 lectores .
Leo libros. Escribo novelas . Lucho yetis .
Mi mejor amigo es un alienígena llamado “Alien Jones .”
jefe de Alien Jones es el Poderoso Soberano . Él es un dictador intergaláctico .
NOTE: Anyone know why it changed the Q to a P?
Moving on…
IN ENGLISH:
The Mighty Potentate has demanded that I either write a book so fabulous that it convinces all of mankind to give up reality television or else he will send an army of aliens to conquer the world.
So in other words, the world will probably be conquered by aliens as I take too long to write.
EN ESPANOL:
El Mighty Potentado ha exigido que sea escribir un libro tan fabuloso que convence a toda la humanidad a abandonar televisión de la realidad o de lo contrario se enviará un ejército de alienígenas de conquistar el mundo .
Así, en otras palabras, el mundo probablemente será conquistado por extranjeros como tomo demasiado tiempo para escribir.
IN ENGLISH:
I live in BQB Headquarters with Bookshelf Q. Battle dog, Video Game Rack Fighter, and other assorted characters.
Frequent Blog Contributors include the Yeti, Dr. Hugo Von Science, Anti-Suck Expert Vinny Baggadouchio, Search Engine Optimized Poet, Nerdstradamus, and the exceptionally cranky Uncle Hardass.
Thank you. I hope you will be one of my 3.5 readers.
EN ESPANOL:
Yo vivo en la Sede de BQB con el estante P. Batalla perro, películas y videojuegos en rack de combate , y otros personajes variados.
Colaboradores de blog frecuentes incluyen el Yeti , el Dr. Hugo Von Ciencia , Anti – Suck Experto Vinny Baggadouchio , motor de búsqueda optimizado poeta , Nerdstradamus , y el mal humor excepcionalmente tío Hardass .
Gracias. Espero que sea uno de mis lectores de 3,5 .
NOTE: I cut and pasted this all from Google Translate, so I apologize if any of it was wrong or if any of it translates into something terrible. I hope I didn’t imply your mothers wear combat boots or anything.
Are we alone in the universe, or does alien life exist?
I think it does. It has to. Space is so ridiculously enormous.
The problem is that space travel is filled with so many problems that it isn’t as easy as just hopping in a space ship and traveling around the universe the way they do it in the movies.
Interstellar was probably the most realistic attempt at portraying deep space travel that we have seen in a movie.
It takes too long. Time occurs differently and so on.
But I think space is so vast and there are so many planets that there has to be intelligent life out there.
It is possible that those aliens are douches that would take us over.
In fact, the Mighty Potentate has declared he will take over Earth if I don’t get my novel written.
And Alien Jones is also real so I suppose he’d be offended by the suggestion that he isn’t.
But I think what’s more likely is that there are aliens like us – beings that do mundane, trivial things.
There are probably aliens that have television shows, movies, they go to work and live boring average lives. Some of them may even be nerd aliens who write blogs for 3.5 alien readers.
There would be cultural differences. We’d have things they’d never heard of. They’d have stuff we’ve never heard of. But on the whole, we’d probably have a lot in common.
Battlestar Galactica was an attempt to portray this. Humans lived on (was it twelve?) planets and they had lives similar to ours…but they also had inventions, ideas and customs that were different.
Are aliens (besides AJ and MP, who are a given) out there? If they are, do we want to meet them?
“Hmm yes. Hot steampunk chicks with big cannons. I dig it.”
Greetings Earth Losers.
The Esteemed Brainy One here. The intergalactic trade war over irregular pants continues, but alas, I have done all I can. I have since moved on to Dromodo, where the beings are fighting over the right to marry.
I have heard you humans have been squabbling over that right yourselves (i.e. who should and shouldn’t be allowed to marry) but the Dromodons have a different kind of fight going on.
None of them want to get married ever again. The government wants to hitch everyone up in forced marital bliss whereas the Dromodons just want to chill out and let their freak flags fly.
That’s what they call their genitals. “Freak flags.” Very disgusting. Just take my word for it. You don’t want me posting any pictures of that nonsense.
Anyway, I just received this transmission from Earth writer, Dakota Kemp:
Should storytellers cross genre boundary lines? Or should authors like Bookshelf Q. Battler and I be considered clinically insane for their penchant of smooshing together wildly disparate genres?
For example, I’m mashing together the steampunk and sword-and-sorcery genres in my novel, Ironheart: The Primal Deception just as BQB does with westerns and zombie dystopia in How the West Was Zombed.
Are BQB and I unrecognized geniuses or delusional losers?
Hmmm. Like Charlie Sheen on a Friday night, that question is loaded.
Well, you’ve got all the trappings of a good novel here. A serious looking man with a derby. Old warrior who looks like he’s up to something. Hot chick with a big ass weapon.
I like it. And really, the whole secret to good writing is that you, the author, like it. And it appears to me that you do.
People try so hard to put books into boxes and slap labels on them.
The big question is “Are you having a good time while you write it?”
If you’re having fun, then it will show in your writing.
Everyone is different. Some people are old ladies who love to write cozy mysteries in which their precocious kitty cats solve crimes.
Others are lonely housewives who unleash their pent up angst with steamy erotica.
Some people are like Bookshelf Q. Battler who beats himself up a lot over past mistakes and then inevitably writes stories about characters who goofed something up big time and are forever trying to make amends for it in some way.
The general advice I have heard from authors is that you try to “write for market” i.e. slap together a book that fits a cookie cutter cutout of every other book that is doing well, it probably will not do well if your heart and soul isn’t reflected in that book.
In other words, just write what you love to write about. If you love certain genres, and you enjoy mashing them up together, then by all means do so.
Think about it.
Do you want to eat a store bought cake that’s one in a hundred that was dumped off the back of a delivery truck yesterday?
Or do you want to eat a cake that was made with love by a little old lady baker who gets up at four a.m. every day?
The corporate clowns at your local chain grocery store don’t care about your taste buds or the art of cake making, but the little old lady who has studied baking her entire life certainly cares.
And perhaps that little old lady has a few tricks up her sleeve. Maybe she adds a pinch of cinnamon or a dash of nutmeg to her cakes to really make your taste buds sing. Corporate clowns will never do that. They’ll just bust out their calculators, crunch the numbers, and decide they can still sell cakes without the added expense of nutmeg.
You sir, are clearly a nerd (no offense as nerds are held up with more reverence these days) who loves the steampunk and sword-and-sorcery genres.
You took your time, put in the work, built your own world and then birthed it into this one.
Are you insane and/or delusional? No. If you enjoyed writing your book, it will show and once the word gets out, you’ll have way more readers than BQB’s paltry 3.5.
Dakota, there’s an old commercial for Reese’s peanut butter cups in which various humans complain in jest to one another, “You got chocolate in my peanut butter. No, you got peanut butter in my chocolate!”
Once upon a time companies just made chocolate. Then Mr. Reese shoved some peanut butter up a chocolate candy’s butt and people have enjoyed getting that much more obese ever since.
You’ll never know what people will like until you try. Mr. Reese loved chocolate and peanut butter. They’re better together, and I’m willing to bet that steampunk and sword-and-sorcery fantasy will mix just as well.
Sure, there will be plenty of squares who will tell you “don’t do this or that.”
They’ll tell you that genres are a lot like the lyrics to that fine 1994 song Come Out and Play by the Offspring. “You got to keep ’em separated.”
Except, no you don’t. Toss all the genres you want in a big bowl, mix them up, pop them in the oven, serve up your dish to the readers and let them decide.
By the way, don’t compare yourself to the lowly BQB. You two are in different leagues.
You sir, got a book to market, whereas BQB just screws around all day and maybe if I’m lucky he’ll write a chapter or two once a week. He’s not exactly doing his part to stave off the Mighty Potentate’s conquest of Earth.
But you are, and that’s why your name will be added to the protected rolls once the MP rolls into town.
Good luck Dakota and stop by to let us know how your book launch went.
Alien Jones out.
Alien Jones is the Bookshelf Battle Blog’s intergalactic correspondent, graciously lending the power of his brain to answer your questions.
Ask the Alien a question and he may very well plug your book or blog in his answer. Ask questions in the comments or tweet them to @bookshelfbattle
Together, we can promote self-published material and ween the masses off reality television, a form of entertainment that Alien Jones’ boss, the maniacal alien despot known as “The Mighty Potentate” despises so much that he’s plotting an invasion of Earth just to stop it.
I have nothing witty to say today, so I think I will chill out in BQB HQ with the whole crew instead. Video Game Rack Fighter. Alien Jones. Bookshelf Q. Battledog. The Magic Bookshelf Characters. Uncle Hardass. Nerdstradamus. Search Engine Optimized Poet. Vinny Baggadouchio, Motivational Speaker.
My, how my circle of nerd friends has grown in 2 plus years of blogging.
In the meantime, I’d love your comments and feedback on How the West Was Zombed – good, bad or indifferent. 65,000 words in and I think I will most likely finish a first draft of a book for the first time this year.
Also, are you looking forward to Game of Thrones this Sunday? I know I am. Tell me what you’re looking forward to.
Finally, for no good reason, here is surveillance footage of Alien Jones on the can. Why he was there, I don’t know, because he doesn’t even poop. Maybe he was just testing out a human custom.
Don’t share this photo around though because the media on his home planet will have a field day and then he will never be able to become the next Mighty Potentate.
The Esteemed Brainy One plays Candy Crush on his Space Phone
The Esteemed Brainy One here, blogging from Kemphos 91, where an uprising has occurred due to a lack of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
Yes, that’s right. You’d be surprised in the vastness of space, that such seemingly trivial things are capable of generating interplanetary conflicts but here we are.
Keep in mind that the Kemphans require a constant supply of peanuts or else they break out into spontaneous song and dance numbers, which sounds like fun, but then they do it for days until finally their heads explode.
I’ve seen it happen. It isn’t pretty. It’s like being front row at a Gallagher performance.
Kemphos 1-90 really needs to fork over some of their peanut reserves to 91 but until then, I have to do my best to keep the peace.
Apologies for not writing more this year, Earth losers, but I just haven’t had the time. Disorder has been breaking out all over the cosmos this year. It’s very unsavory.
In the meantime, please assist me with my mission to launch BQB’s writing career. The sooner BQB is an established writer, the sooner the Mighty Potentate will get off my back.
Did I say get off my back? I meant to say until the Mighty Potenate can be pleased by another one of his genius plans coming to fruition.
All hail the Mighty Potentate.
Here’s where you can find Bookshelf Q. Battler on the inter webs.
Humans, I don’t want to put any pressure on you, but your likes and follows will help keep the Mighty Potentate’s plans to conquer the Earth at bay.
Technically, I’m not allowed to criticize the Mighty Potentate, but let’s just say that he literally solves all political problems by vaporizing his opponents.
Not exactly a boon for democracy, but it does make for fun prime time debate viewing.
Thank you 3.5 Earth losers. I’ll be back sometime this summer to answer your questions, so keep them coming.
He seemed like such a sweet guy when you met him. Alas, it wasn’t until after you fell for him that he started checking your purse for radio transmitters.
Ladies, is your man living in constant fear of “The Man?”
From BQB HQ in fabulous East Randomtown, here are the Top Ten Warning Signs Your Boyfriend Might Be a Conspiracy Theorist:
10. He owns a vast selection of tin foil hats, which he maintains prevent the government and/or aliens from reading his mind. You’re not able to stop him from wearing his tin foil baseball cap out in public, but he’s not unreasonable. He has agreed to stop wearing it backwards once he turns thirty.
9. It isn’t easy to take him to a dinner party. Your friends want to talk about movies, music and gossip. He wants to talk about how Hitler and Bigfoot worked together on the JFK assassination and that this would be common knowledge were it not for the fact that the news media is controlled by a race of worm people disguised as human journalists.
8. You can’t park your car in the garage. He has it filled with a set made up to look like the Moon in an effort to prove that the Moon landing was a fake.
7. Never takes you anywhere nice anymore. Too busy writing a blog filled with nonsense for the benefit of 3.5 readers. (I know what you are thinking but BQB is not a conspiracy theorist. His tales about aliens, yetis and the zombie attack on East Randomtown are entirely true.)
6. Once in awhile he pokes you in the shoulder for no reason other than to make sure you aren’t a hologram. The Man, as he will explain, has been known to infiltrate the operations of those who are onto him by enlisting the aid of hologram girlfriends.
5. Never goes to the doctor. Convinced all doctors are trying to put a spy camera in his butt.
4. All dates need to start an hour early so he can sweep your car for bugs, listening devices, and crumbs. The first two are signs of lunacy. The last one? Well, that’s really your fault, you slob. Stop eating donuts in the car.
3. You’d ask him how his day was, but it is getting harder and harder not to dump him every time he swears that he is “so close” to proving that Elvis didn’t die but rather left to rule over a benevolent race of half-man/half-lizards who will one day land on Earth and show us the path toward inner peace. So, you know, he’s not all doom and gloom.
2. Bonus: It’s easy to get him to do chores around the house. Just point out to him that the government might think something is up if they see him just lying around doing nothing and that he’d better start taking out the trash and washing some windows to trick the Feds into thinking everything’s hunky dory.
Saves your toe nail clippings in the hopes of cloning you when the aliens take you away to toil in their intergalactic mines. Is this psychotic or sweet? You be the judge. They’re your toe nail clippings, after all.
Two years. Hard to believe it. Two years ago this month, Bookshelf Q. Battler was stuffing his pie hole full of disgusting Taco Bell burritos when the idea to create the Bookshelf Battle Blog was born.
He’s come a long way since then and I must be honest, it came as a great surprise to me when my exalted ruler, the Mighty Potentate, assigned me the burdensome challenge of helping this nerd get his writing career off the ground.
I still remember how the conversation went:
MIGHTY POTENTATE: JONES! You are to aid the Chosen One in his efforts to become a successful writer!
ALIEN JONES: But Potent One, I’ve read his lousy blog and honestly, isn’t there a more realistic task? Perhaps there’s a black hole I could close?
ALIEN JONES: Wha..oh! You almost got me there, Your Potentosity. You are truly the craftiest of all potentates.
For those new to the 3.5 reader club:
The Mighty Potentate oversees a mind-boggingly vast empire of planets.
He despises reality television and fears if it goes unchecked, humans will spread this dreadful art form across the cosmos, replacing the MP’s much loved scripted programming.
The Potent One has seen in a vision that BQB’s writing will one day cause all humans to reject reality television.
Ergo, I am stuck as BQB’s advisor until he writes a novel so expertly crafted that it motivates all humans to reject shows in which brainless celebrities are followed around by cameras for no apparent reason.
So in other words, I’m BQB’s advisor forever.
Oh, and if BQB does not write such a novel before he kicks the bucket, the Potentate does intend to invade earth, strip it for parts, and resell it on the intergalactic real estate market. The Moloklaxons have already shown an interest but you know, they’re not considered the a-holes of the universe for nothing.
BQB, on behalf of the Mightiest of Potentates, I’m glad to see you have made so much progress on your novel, How the West Was Zombed.
Cowboys. Zombies. Love. Romance. Daring do. Werewolves. Vampires. Could use some aliens but eh, nothing is perfect.
Will this be the novel that hooks humans on a higher form of entertainment?
Well, I’ve read it and…hey, let’s just say if you want to be the one who informs the Mighty Potentate…be my guest. I just hope you don’t mind being vaporized. The MP gets a little testy when he doesn’t get his way and he has a hair trigger when it comes to his vaporization cannon.
Honestly, I was a little bummed that BQB put Undersiredverse on the shelf for now. It’s not like I utilized astounding time travel technologies to beam adventures from 3000 AD (which as you know, isn’t here yet) into BQB’s brain so he could write about them.
And I won’t even take it personally, since I had a significant role. I’m sure BQB will write this book eventually.
Really, what does it matter? Even if BQB does finish Undersiredverse, and even if he swings a movie deal with Hollywood, the CGI alien that plays me will never be nominated for an Academy Award.
That’s ok though. I’ve grown used to speciesism. Even so, I can’t help but notice a lack of aliens when it comes to Academy recognition. #OscarsSoHuman
For the 3.5 of you who enjoyed my columns, I apologize for not being around as much this year. It’s not by choice. There’s been a nasty trade intergalactic dispute over the price of irregular pants. War has broken out. Several planets have been decimated. It’s very tragic. I’ve been spending my time dousing water on that hot fire, leaving BQB to work on his zombie novel.
So in the meantime, dear humans, please provide BQB all the advice you can on his Zombie Western. I don’t want to say that the better this book is the less likely you’ll become the Mighty Potentate’s hairless ape slaves but…well…yeah I guess that’s what I’m saying.
But forget that. You’re helping me when you help BQB. The sooner I can drop this assignment the better. I’ve got too many plates to spin as it is.
Oh, and you can still feel free to ask the alien a question. I won’t get to them as quickly this year, but assuming your questions meet BQB’s rigorous standards (usually, that it was written by a human using words) you’ll get a plug for your book or blog.
But keep in mind it’ll take awhile. Sad to say, I’m not sure I’ll be able to check back in again until this summer. That’s how complicated this irregular pants fiasco is.
What can I say? An Esteemed Brainy One’s work is never done.
Bookshelf Battle 