a
b I previously had a common [comma] between “heartedness” and “again,” but Lori took it oot out.
c
d Lori found eleven 11 other typos (including seven erroneous commas) that she graciously did not show above.
Lots of people with serious jobs to do are funny, although most are unintentionallya so I’ll let the reader decide if I succeeded in my aim for this book to be both thoughtful and humorous, but if you think I did, please join me in thanking all those who aided and inspired me in this task. If not, it’s [entirely] my entire fault.
Immeasurable appreciation goes to Lori Azim, a world-class researcher, proofreader, fact-checker, and BS-detector. The forcefulness of her vendetta against extraneous commas is exceeded only by the passion of her quest to her get [her] beloved America to practice common sense and open-heartedness again.b Plus, she provided the excellent photo of the Skee-Ball game. She even edited this acknowledgments section, so, to show you all the work she did, I left her editing notes in here.
I can’t tell you how [much I appreciate] appreciative I am that [renowned author] Jonathan Eig[’s] renowned author, for his clear-eyed editing and sage advice throughout this project. Considering that he was also working on what will surely become the definitive biography of the late Mohamad [Muhammad] Ali and that he was co-parenting three children, the fact that he gave massive amounts of time to help me in such an expert manner—despite the fact that I beat him out for Spring Valley Senior High School Student-Faculty Council by three votes in 1981—is a gesture of mountainous kindness. (Exactly the kind of phrase Jonathan would note as over-the-top and would delete.) I urge everyone to run out to your nearest bookstore, or to make four clicks in your Amazon account, to buy Eig Jonathan’s masterpieces: Luckiest Man, Opening Day, Get Capone, The Birth of the Pill, and whatever the heck the Muhammad Ali book is going to be called.
Full disclosure: a few of the best lines in this book were actually suggested by Azim [Lori] or Eig [Jonathan] [—including Lori’s idea to show the original draft of this acknowledgment section, edited, although I think she was joking].
A boatload of superlatives goes to graphic designer Cynthia Herrli for designing the original charts and graphs in this book and making them clear and interesting enough that they don’t put readers to sleep. Equally huge thanks to Rob Ruiz for his compelling original illustrations for the cover and section dividers. Big thanks also goes to Erin Johnson and Britt Boyd for conceptualizing and designing earlier version[s] of some of the graphs. I thank Barry Wilson for proposing early design ideas for the book and for his photo of the DC restaurant Bullfeathers. I can’t thank Sarah Azim enough for her additional design help.
I also want to heap mounds of praise on Seven Stories Press and its publisher, Dan Simon, for unfailingly taking on the “lost causes,” both literary and financial. Infinite thanks go to the wise and patient V. Liu for editing this book. More thanks go to Michael Tencer for copy editing it. Still more thanks to Jon Gilbert for the book design and Stewart Cauley for the cover layout. I greatly appreciate all the hard-working staff at Seven Stories who devote countless hours to their jobs for the love of books and progressive causes, not the big bucks. And kudos also to Crystal Yakacki, my former Seven Stories editor, for originally championing this project.
Enormous appreciation goes to the staff, board members, AmeriCorps*VISTA national service members, donors, and volunteers of Hunger Free America, who have so strongly have undergirded the social justice work that makes this book possible.
I also want to thank numerous bloggers (most of whom are underpaid or entirely unpaid) for inspiring, informing, and infuriating me.
A debt of gratitude goes to Al Franken, whom I’ve only met [twice], very briefly, twice, for writing books that pioneered the intermingling of public policy facts with humor and for generally becoming an excellent US senator, although I am still pissed at him for voting [in favor of] for SNAP cuts, despite the fact that, throughoput [throughout] the rest of his career, he has been a champion of the anti-hunger movement. Unless Franken wants to become “a big fat idiot,”c he should never again vote to take food away from hungry families.
I also want to thank Jennifer Tescher, Will Marshall, Melissa Boteach, and Bert Brandenburg for providing invaluable input on select chapters of this book.
If you are enthralled by this book, it’s because of everyone else’s excellent help. If you hate it, it’s only because I’m a dumb ass [dumbass or dumb-ass].d
a
b I previously had a common [comma] between “heartedness” and “again,” but Lori took it oot out.
c
d Lori found eleven 11 other typos (including seven erroneous commas) that she graciously did not show above.