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The real meat of this story — which consists of comic book legend Tom DeFalco, Cracked.com, MAD Magazine, and poor judgment — will be the feature of next week’s Sneaking Into Comics. As a prologue to that highly ironic tale, I would like to provide a set of emails I sent to humormag@yahoo.com (an email address that, unbeknownst to me, was actually being checked by Tom DeFalco) in March of 2005:

from: nickmarino@gmail.com
to: humormag@yahoo.com
date: Thu, Mar 3, 2005 at 10:39 PM
subject: Humor Mag - hire me you bitches

Hey -

I found your info on monster.com. I am all about this Humor Mag thing. I kid you not. This what I do. I’ll send along my resume, but to really get a feel for why I am the new Renaissance man of comedy you need to see my videos, my music, read my articles, and see my cartoons. I could help getting multimedia for the website going, and I do A LOT of comedy music work (and my production skills are mint). I really would like to learn more about this, and I’m positive you would like to learn more about me.

Thanks, Nick

from: nickmarino@gmail.com
to: humormag@yahoo.com
date: Fri, Mar 4, 2005 at 12:30 PM
subject: Humor Mag - you still haven’t hired me

Hey “Humor Mag” -

Listen, I’m emailing because you still haven’t hired me. You should give me a mail address so I can send you some writing, music, video, and cartoon samples. Trust me, you really want all these. Hook me up. Then hire me.

Nick

from: nickmarino@gmail.com
to: humormag@yahoo.com
date: Mon, Mar 7, 2005 at 10:26 AM
subject: Re: Humor Mag - wait… hire me

Hi Humor Mag -

Just saying whats up, seeing how you’re doing. Hope you had a good weekend. I know I did. Oh by the way, just wondering what you were doing Wednesday night. There’s this little restaurant I know. kind of a hole in the wall. It’s real romantic tho, I mean that is if you like that sort of thing. Anyway, hire me.

Love, Nick

from: nickmarino@gmail.com
to: humormag@yahoo.com
date: Thu, Mar 10, 2005 at 12:47 AM
subject: Re: Humor Mag - about hiring me

hi.

i missed you.

hire me. i need a job.

from: nickmarino@gmail.com
to: humormag@yahoo.com
date: Fri, Mar 11, 2005 at 3:45 PM
subject: Re: Humor Mag - i wasn’t cheating on you

i’m so sorry i missed your call, baby.

i swear it wasn’t another Humor Mag i was talking to… OK, maybe it was. but listen - she’s nothing compared to you. she doesn’t have your easy to remember email, or your same sense of mystery. i can forget about her, really i promise.

listen, i left you a message. all you have to do is call me back. you know the number.

i’ll be thinking about you.

passionately yours,
Nick

And that’s just another reason why I’m going to have to sneak into the comic book industry if I ever want to make it in.