Giz Wiz Biz - Mad Stuff

It’s 1980 and disco isn’t dead yet. But MAD Magazine put the first nail in its coffin with this one-of-a-kind

MAD DISCO Special Edition.

It’s unique in many respects. It’s the only issue of MAD without a number or cover date. It’s the only issue of MAD devoted to a single subject to contain it’s own 33 1/3 floppy record. It’s the only 32 page MAD. And it’s the only issue of MAD to ever have: “MAD DISCO is an idea conceived by Dick DeBartolo” on the contents page. Here’s the back-story: I loved disco. Heck, I loved it so much I built a disco right inside my 50 foot houseboat complete with “infinity floor’, fog and bubble machines. And talk about a tough “door policy”. The only way to get into Disco Dick’s was to know it existed!

Meanwhile at MAD I wrote a lot of disco satires, which just kept piling up on the editor’s desk. Finally I told MAD Publisher Bill Gaines that if we didn’t do something with them soon, disco would be on its way out. So we could use all the material at one time, Gaines asked if I could get some of the other Usual Gang of Idiots to contribute enough to make MAD’s first (and only) Special Edition. I said I could, and I did! So MAD Disco was born. Features include: MAD'S Disco Owner of the Year / A MAD History of Dancing /MAD'S DISCO Mother Goose Rhymes /SLIPPED DISCO – The complete Disco Magazine /Don Martin's Guide to Disco Sounds / "SIX MINUTES" Looks at Disco

A 30 minute 33 1/3 RPM Record "MAD DISCO” is bound inside. A sample of one of the song is above. (It’s a floppy vinyl record – emphasis on FLOP.) Songs include:   "DISCO SUICIDE"   /   "SORRY, NO WORDS" / "THIS TIME, THIS NIGHT" / "BARELY ALIVE" / “THE DISCO CLAP" / And a Disco Version of the World Famous MAD Song: "IT'S A GAS" - Lyrics by Dick DeBartolo, Music By Norm Blagman PLUS: Music & Lyrics for all the songs (except It’s A Gas) are also in this issue! Now how much you would pay for this? (Don’t answer, I can’t hear you.) Someone on Ebay feels it’s worth $39.95: http://tinyurl.com/ycw52r5

I’m selling my copies for half that: $19.99. And mine are autographed! Plus, the copies I have, have never been circulated. They have been sitting in Dick’s Gadget Warehouse for almost 30 years, so they do have “warehouse” yellow on each page to prove their heritage. Although there may have a mark here or there on the covers from storage, all have the floppy vinyl record in place just the way it came from the bindery. Most copies you'll find on sale have the record removed and played, or even missing. The record in each one of these issues is pristine. Each copy is sent first class in a protective plastic sleeve. First class postage adds $3.99, but it's the only First Class thing about this great offer!

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More MAD Garbage From Dick's Gadget Warehouse!

Alfred is 7 1/2" high & 8" wide -- ear to ear.It's 1996 - yes 13 years ago - and MAD came up with the Alfred E. Neuman Mouse Pad.

These Alfred-head shaped mouse pads were designed as a give-away for people who signed up for a MAD subscription. I think it came free witha 3 year sub, but I can't remember back that far.

Along with the Official MAD Mouse Pad there was a postcardsized "Instruction & Care" card whichwas written by one of the Usual Gang of Idiots, often called MAD's Maddest Writer. Oh okay, I wrote it.

It includes important tips like: DRY CLEAN ONLY!

Warnings such as: Never repeatedly run any object, such as a computer mouse, over your pad.

And warrantee information: Lifetime Warranty will remain in effect if you do not remove your MAD Mouse Pad from its Official Shipping Envelope!

There's more, but you'll read that when you order your own Official Alfred E. Mouse Pad! (You will order one, right?) These are not the thickest mouse pads you've ever seen, but my guess is most people won't actuallyuse them as mouse pads. They'll be more like a conversation piece. Just show it off to your friends, and the conversation will immediately start! The first question most likely will be: "You paid HOW MUCH for that piece of garbage??" Of course to be honest, these are part of MAD's history & once they're gone, they'll be no more.

Price is $11.99 for the Official Alfred E. Mouse Padand "Instruction & Care" card.I'll autograph the back of the 'card card'. First Class postage is $3.99.

Rather than accept contributions as some have suggested, your purchase will help me to continue topay off the rent on Dick's Gadget Warehouse. $355 a month for the past20 years! And a bit lower for the previous 5 years when I had a smaller room.But I have stupidly spend more than $85,000 or so saving this kind of garbage!

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Another MAD Paperback Book uncovered in Dick's Gadget Warehouse!

It's MAD TALES FROM THE SCHOOL OF HARD YOCKS!

Written by Dick DeBartolo, Illustrated by Harry North.

They've been sitting in a sealed carton since 1991! And if you don't believe me, just see the 'warehouse yellow' that has gracefully settled on most of the page edges!

These are first edition, uncirculated copies. They're also unsold copies, which is why they're in the warehouse!

The title of this book has very little to do with the contents. As William M. Gaines, MAD founder & publishertold me when I started writing original MAD paperback books: "You have to come up with a good presentation to get your advance. "So give them a catchy title. Then write a page of contents that sounds excting! Then once the publishersigns off on it, go and write the book you want to write! The contents can change from what you presented, but you have to keep the same title!"

So Tales from The School of Hard Yocks is nothing about School. Itcontains a mystery story solved by Lance Boil - more than a Notary Public, less than a Notary Private. There's a Show Biz Saga - "Give These Retards to Broadway" And a several part western: How the West Was One, How the West Was Two, How the West was Three & How the West was Four! There's even an opera: "If She Wants To Wriggle, Let 'er".

I wasn't sure how to price this paperback book, so once again I turned to EBay. There's a book seller offering a copy of MAD Tales from The School of Hard Yocks in "good condition" for $6.27. I figured mine are brand new, so that's worth $2 more. And their copy isn't personally autographed, so that must be worth at least a $1.50 more! So I priced the book at $9.77. We both are charging $3.99 for First Class postage.

If you want the "good condition" book for $6.27, here's the link: http://tinyurl.com/kosn8d

If you want the brand new, first edition, uncirculated, personally autographed copy for just $3.50 more, click the BUY link below!If I sell 38 copies it's enough to pay one month's rent on Dick's GadgetWarehouse. (Yes, true.)

Your book comes with it's own OFFICIAL Diploma from THE SCHOOL OF HARD YOCKS! It's suitable from framing assuming you have a real cheap frame and don't care what kind of garbage you hang on your walls! Also cutting out the diploma ruins the book, so hopefully you'll buy a another copy!

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Here's another very rare MAD paperback book!

Another gadget warehouse book find! Uncirculatedcopies of MAD Murders the Movies! Written by Dick DeBartolo, Illustrated by Don "Duck" Edwing. Edited by Nick Meglin.

First published in July, 1985! Reissued in November, 1990 after Dick DeBartolo discovered the 1985 issues were accidently shredded ! (And that's why they're never were any royalites!Yep, that happened!)

Satires of some of the best films of all time! * Groan With The Wind * The XXorcist * The Maltease Foul-Up * The Phantom Of The Uproar * Mutiny On The Bouncy * Franken Shtick * Robbin' Hood * The Wizard is Odd

You can buy a "very good condition" collector's copy for $12.00 + $3.99 S&Hhere:
http://tinyurl.com/bbjnlt

Or you can buy an uncirculatedcopy from me, autographed to you (or a friend) for $9.99 + $3.99 S & H. (Bonus!!! There is some Dick's Gadget Warehouse Yellow on the interior pages at no extra cost!) This is a 7" X 4 1/2" 196 page paperback book.

There are no more hard copies of my book GOOD DAYS AND MAD.

But in Dick's Gadget Warehouse I do have some copies of the first printing of the soft cover edition from 1995. It has all the heartbreak, all the humor and all the typos of the original! It's exactly the same except for the cover! And it's cheaper too. Just $16.95, plus $5.99 Priority Shipping.GOOD DAYS AND MAD

If you like the stories of the mad way William M. Gaines ran a very successful MAD Magazine that I tell on The Daily GizWiz, then you should enjoy GOOD DAYS AND MAD. It's a biographical look at the 30 some odd years I spent working for Gaines and for MAD. All the strange stories are in there - like the time Gaines took the entire staff to a subscriber's house in Haiti to beg him to renew!

Gaines and I also became fast friends and I get to relate of some incredible things we did together. Like the time Gaines, knowing I love trains, rented a 1890's observation car and took 12 of us on a trip from NYC to Boston in total luxury. Gaines loved food and also had three chefs aboard! He arranged to have this private car hooked up to the Amtrak Metroliner! We went to Boston, spent 5 hours there sightseeing, and then the car was hooked up to another Metroliner for the trip back to NY's Penn Station. Then there was the time I arranged to get Gaines onto the torch of the Statue of Liberty. It was an incredible adventure until Bill almost got stuck trying to push through the elbow of Miss Liberty!

The book is no longer in print, but I did squirrel away some copies in the warehouse. Each copy of GOOD DAYS AND MAD sold helps pay off the rent on Dick's Gadget Warehouse. I spent $380 a month to store old books and old gadgets! Yes, there is a real gadget warehouse (Sofia Bros.) at Amsterdam Avenue & 83rd Street, I'm trying to downsize and move into something smaller and less expensive. I'm slowly realizing being the "The Giz Wiz" is expensive. It's more than $4500 a year just to house gizmos in Dick's Gadget Warehouse. I had the warehouse for more than 25 years. Yes that's almost $100,000. (I thought it was 20 years, but Sofia told it was more like 25 years that I've been renting space there!) I should have never figured it out, because it's making me a bit ill!

Photos from Good Days & MAD

Dick De resting in his private 'think tank' in his office. Gaines spared no expense to make me comfortable at MAD. Truth is, he let have a operating model railroad in my office!

John Ficarra, Editor of MAD, Dick De, and Morley Safer record a spot that appeared on 60 Minutes. I think it was in the late 1980's. Under the video section of this website you can follow a link to see it.

Dennis Wunderlin, Annie Gaines, Bill (William M.) Gaines , Dick De, and Carol Stuart on the observation platform of the private railroad car Gaines rented so he could take a few friends from New York to Boston and back! He had three chefs aboard! We had a champagne brunch on the way to Boston, and a full sit-down dinner on the return!

Bill's office wall. Look carefully. Among all the photos of Bill is an oil painting The Usual Gang of Idiots gave Gaines for Christmas one year. Yes, it's an oil painting of the back of his head! Come on, if we took a picture of him from the front, he might have suspected something!

And you get a free MAD gift with your order that'seven older than the book!

Here's what I'm including as the mini MAD bonus with the GOOD DAYS & MAD paperback books.

These colorful peel off stickers were bound into copies of MAD Specials about 15 years ago. They sat on a shelf in Dick's Gadget Warehouse until I tripped over a box of them several weeks ago. You can peel them off & stick them on photos, letters, office doors, etc. They're real hard to stick on emails however, unless you print them out first! And they look better in person. I don't know why the scanner felt compelled to add the brown overtones!

You'll get a sheet of them as a bonus with the purchase of the soft cover copy (first edition printing) of GOOD DAYS & MAD! The ones you'll get are exactly the same as the ones in the photo, right.

And thanks for supporting Giz Wiz Biz and helping to pay the rent ($380 a month) on (ECHO) Dickkkkk's Gadgetttt Warehouseeee!

If you do order, please let me know who you want the book autographed to, or if you just want my name on the book. (That way you can read it, and still give it away as a gift!)

If you live in Canada, I'll use "media mail" so it goes for the same price, but takes longer to be delivered. But with media mail, I don't need to do a custom's slip.

and thanks for supporting (ECHO) Dickkkk'ss Gadgetttt Warehouseeeee!