Thomas Wictor

After Mike Albee, Lura Dold, and Becca Pilkington defrauded me of my life’s savings and ruined my three books, nobody cared. Some publicist claimed that he’d dedicate his life to destroying Albee, but it was just jive. Not a single law-enforcement agency even responded when I contacted them. Being a cop is all about salary, pension, and benefit negotiations now. Mike, Lura, and Becca got away with it, but I’m still experiencing fallout from their crimes.

By the way, as I told someone yesterday, being conned and then ignored could’ve made me really bitter. It didn’t because I now know that what I experienced was nothing. At some point in the future, I’ll regain my equilibrium. Though Mike Albee, Lura Dold, and Becca Pilkington deliberately took advantage of my mental and physical illnesses and the suicides of my parents, their assault was laughably petty in comparison to others I’ve discovered. Some forms of predation simply can’t be explained. You have to go through them yourself to understand.

A couple of days ago I got an e-mail from a publication in which I bought extremely expensive ads to hawk Ghosts and Ballyhoo. The magazine had approached me—I realize now that Mike had told them to contact me—and asked if I wanted to buy an ad and be interviewed. In that order.

I was in a haze of disassociation, since Mom had died only twelve days earlier. It was simply impossible to think. I e-mailed Mike, asking him his opinion, and here’s what he wrote back.

It didn’t seem like my core audience, but Mike was the expert, so I bought two full-page ads. Notice that Mike says he’s got a designer on staff. That means part of the dead-as-dogshit Sandpiper Publicity.

The designer had some TV name, like Logan or Brooklyn or Jyehhhhhhhhhhh. She wanted to use the background of my Website as the background of the ad.

The problem is that the Website designer—whose name I took off the home page because he produced an invisible Website—used clip art that was only 72 dpi. For use in a magazine, it would need to be 300 dpi. Brooklyn insisted I try to get it. She got all cute and flirtatious. Dizzy and insane, I gave up and contacted the Web designer.

He sent me the 72 dpi background, and I forwarded it to Jyehhhhhhhhhhh. Then nothing happened for three weeks. When the deadline for the ad was two days away, Albee contacted me and said that Logan couldn’t use the backdrop because it was 72 dpi. Did I have another photo, maybe?

So I took this photo and sent it to Mike Fucking Albee in ten minutes.

It’s a beautiful shot of the Carmen Bass in my maternal grandfather’s workshop, where he built guns, molded bullets, and packed cartridges. Jyehhhhhhhhhhh also asked for my name in the font that Tim used on the cover of Ghosts and Ballyhoo. I had to race to Tim’s house and beg him to stop everything and bail out my fat ass again. Which he did without complaint.

A couple of hours later, Mike sent me two mockups from which to choose. Here’s the first, using my photo.

As you can see, it’s a catastrophe. Your eyes would pass right over it. What’s in the background? No idea. The darkening of the image and the humongous blocks of text obscure everything.

The second design was—surprise!—based on the background of my Website after all. Brooklyn had a bee in her bonnet about it, so she went ahead.

I like how the second and third blurbs have illegible lines because the text merges into the background colors.

Both designs were completely unacceptable, but there was no more time. I chose the top one, and that was what was published in the magazine. It generated no sales whatsoever, as I knew it wouldn’t.

So a couple of days ago, I get an e-mail from the publisher of the magazine. In the header it said, “Overdue invoice.”

Hi, Thomas,

I was surprised to hear from XXXXXX (accounting@XXXXXX.com) that you haven’t paid the invoice for your ad that XXXXXX prepared for us. Can you contact her and take care of this asap?

Thanks!

Best wishes,
XXXXXX

There was the name of a graphic-design company. Don’t that just beat all? When Mike Albee said he had a designer on staff, he lied. I wrote back to the publisher.

Hi, XXXXXX:

Mike Albee told me that his defunct fake company Sandpiper Publicity had an in-house design department that created that awful, worthless ad.

I was never invoiced by anybody, and I’ve never heard of XXXXXX.

Tell XXXXXX to take it up with Mike. You can find him at his new fake company here.

http://www.schoolmarketingstrategies.com/

This is not my problem.

Best regards,
Thomas Wictor

Here’s a message to Mike Albee.

And to Lura Dold.

And to Becca Pilkington (on the right).

Back to the sewer you go.

This won’t mean anything to you.

You’re lucky it doesn’t. In the world of crime, you’re endearingly innocent and vulnerable.