end up getting cheated out of a gift.
It’s not fair, but I guess it’s been happening for
thousands of years.
this gift counts
for christmas
and your
birthday, jesus!
gee,
thanks.
107
I realized something today, though. I might not
have any cash, but I DO have something valuable:
my first-edition signed copy of the “Tower of
Druids” graphic novel.
tower
of
druids
by kenny
centazzo
tower
of
druids
centazzo
I got “Tower of Druids” signed by the author,
Kenny Centazzo, at the comics convention in the
city last year.
Well, actually, I didn’t technically get it signed—
Mom did. I waited in line for two and a half
hours, and then I had to take a bathroom break.
By the time I got back, Mom had gotten my
book signed.
108
COMICS EXPO
I was bummed that I didn’t get to meet Kenny
Centazzo, but at least I got his autograph.
I looked on the computer today and found out
that a first-edition signed copy of “Tower of
Druids” is worth forty bucks. So that’ll cover me
for Christmas presents, and I’ll have enough left
over to get Gregory’s Little Friend that jacuzzi
he seems to want.
I told Mom about my plan to sell my book, and
she didn’t like the idea. She said I waited a long
time to get that thing signed and I would really
regret selling it.
109
Mom said that when I had kids, they’d be mad I
sold it because it’ll be worth a lot of money.
Well, that settled it for me. I’ve already decided
I’m not HAVING any kids. I want to be a
bachelor like my Uncle Charlie, who spends all his
money on vacations and heated toilet seats and
stuff like that, instead of forking it over to a
bunch of ungrateful kids.
hey there,
plummers!
110
I can thank my librarian, Mrs. Schneiderman, for
getting me into the “Tower of Druids” series to
begin with, because she’s the one who started the
graphic novel section in our school library.
I don’t know when they started calling comic
books graphic novels, but I’m glad they did. Some
of the teachers complain that they don’t count as
REAL reading, but the way I see it, if they’re
in the library, they’re fair game for book reports.
OUCH.
111
Unfortunately, when Mrs. Schneiderman put in
the graphic novels, she got rid of the Easy
Reader section. I always used the books in the
Easy Reader section to do my reports for Social
Studies, because you could whip through one of
them in about forty-five seconds.
As a boy,
Abraham
Lincoln liked
to read. He
liked to read
a lot!
When I was little I used to want to be an
author myself. But whenever I started telling
Mom my ideas, she’d say my story was just like
some book that was already published.
112
I realized all the good ideas were taken before I
was even born.
Mom said if I wanted to be an author, I should
try coming up with something original. But it was
really hard coming up with a fresh idea, so I just
took one of my favorite books and more or less
copied it word for word with a few small tweaks.
When Mom read what I wrote, she was really
impressed, and I guess she thought I was some
kind of genius or something.
But I think Mom got a little carried away. She
sent my book to a publisher in New York, who
told her I’d plagiarized “Geoffrey the Gorilla,”
which was already a bestselling kids’ book.
113
Mom was pretty mad at me for passing off the
book as my own, but I’m surprised she couldn’t
figure it out herself from reading it.
Geoffrey the Dinosaur
Swings from vine to vine.
He perches in a tree and
eats a banana.“Ooh ooh
ooh,” Geoffrey says as he
pounds his chest.
Thursday
Well, it turns out my first-edition copy of “Tower
of Druids” is totally worthless. I brought it to
the comic book shop yesterday afternoon hoping
to cash in, but the guy who works there told me
the autograph was a forgery.
114
I told him he didn’t know what he was talking
about, because Mom got my book signed by the
actual author. But the comic book guy showed me
a catalog with Kenny Centazzo’s signature in it,
and it looked COMPLETELY different.
I was really confused, but on the walk home I
realized what must’ve happened. Mom probably got
tired of waiting in line at the comics convention
and just signed the book HERSELF. In fact, I
should’ve figured that out from the inscription.
Readers are winners! Keep reading to
make your dreams come true!
Your pal,
Kenny
115
It wouldn’t be the FIRST time Mom pulled this
sort of thing, because she has ZERO patience for
waiting in line.
When I was little I used to like to get my
picture taken with the characters at theme parks.
But whenever there was more than a five-minute
wait, Mom would just walk to the front of the
line and snap a picture of the character and
whatever kid was posing with him. That’s why
our vacation photo albums are full of pictures of
random people.
Snap
When I got home I went straight to Mom’s room
with my book, and the look on her face said it all.
So now I know why she didn’t want me to sell it.
116
I just hope Mom knows that when she doesn’t
get a present from me on Christmas, she’s only
got herself to blame.
Friday
Even though I was still pretty mad at Mom for
forging that signature, she bailed me out today.
At school Rowley was carrying a present, and
I asked him what it was for. He said it was his
Secret Holiday Buddy gift.
I forgot all ABOUT the Secret Holiday
Buddy thing.
117
Everyone at school is supposed to buy a gift for
the person they get assigned and then give it
anonymously.
To: Leighton
From: Your Secret
Holyday Buddy
The person I was supposed to get a gift for was
Dean Delarosa, who I’ve known a long time. Back
in third grade, I got invited to Dean’s birthday
party, but Mom got the date wrong and I
showed up at his house a week EARLY.
Dean’s mom told
us the party was the following
week, so we went home.
118
But the gift Mom bought for Dean was really
cool, and I ended up playing with it myself.
By the time Dean’s actual birthday rolled around,
I’d already broken the robot’s hand and lost the
gun that came with it, so I skipped the party.
I’ve felt guilty about that ever since, and today
I didn’t want to cheat Dean out of a gift for
the second time. So when I got to school, I
asked the secretary in the front office to call
Mom and see if she could pick something up for me.
And she came through just in time.
Space
Robot
119
The teacher started handing out the Secret
Holiday Buddy gifts, and I got a jar of gummy
bears. Finally, there was only one present under
the tree, and it was the one for Dean.
Unfortunately, Mom didn’t understand that the
gift was supposed to be ANONYMOUS, so it
was totally embarrassing when the teacher read
the card on Dean’s present out loud.
this one says, “to
dean delarosa, from
your secret holiday
buddy, greg heffley.”
Dean looked like he wanted to crawl under his
desk and hide, and I felt the same exact way.
120
Saturday
I always thought the only place in the world
where you could get Drummies was at the Holiday
Bazaar. But today me and Mom were at the
grocery store, and you’ll never BELIEVE what I
found in the frozen food aisle.
drummies!
drummies!
20 count
microwavable
Now I know that I can have Drummies whenever
I want and that they’re TOTALLY ripping us
off at the Holiday Bazaar. You can buy a whole
BOX at the store for what they charge for three
or four individual Drummies at school.
In fact, now that I could get my own Drummies,
I realized I could run my OWN Holiday Bazaar.
121
But first I had to buy up the grocery store’s
supply before the school beat me to it.
Other kids in my neighborhood have done this sort
of thing before. Last summer Bryce Anderson and
a bunch of his cronies set up a restaurant for all
the neighborhood parents.
menu
I heard they pulled in almost three hundred
bucks, and I know for a fact that one of Bryce’s
goons bought a brand-new BB gun with his share.
122
yowch!
I knew I couldn’t run a Holiday Bazaar all by
myself, so I called Rowley and asked him to help
out. We found some Christmas ornaments and
some other stuff in my basement we could sell.
But I figured if we were gonna compete with
the school’s Holiday Bazaar, we’d have to come up
with better games than the beanbag toss and the
ping-pong-ball bounce.
Rowley suggested a dunk tank, but I told him
I didn’t think Mom would allow that in the
house. Plus, we had a dunk tank when we ran a
Fun Fair in Rowley’s yard over the summer, and it
was a DISASTER.
123
We didn’t know you were supposed to protect the
guy in the dunk tank by putting him in a cage.
gaaah!
thwap
dunk
tank
$1
Me and Rowley decided it would be really cool if
our Holiday Bazaar had a video game arcade. We
didn’t have the money to buy real arcade machines,
so we got a bunch of cardboard boxes out of the
basement to make homemade versions.
We started off with Pac-Man because we thought
it would be pretty easy to make. In Pac-Man
you’ve got a little character who goes around
eating pellets while getting chased by ghosts.
124
In our version we were gonna have Rowley on
the inside of the box operating ghosts glued to
pencils, while the person who was playing the
game maneuvered Pac-Man from the outside with a
popsicle stick.
125
We spent the next two hours making the box look
just like the real thing.
But while we were working, Rowley started asking
questions about how long he was gonna be in
the box and what would happen if he needed a
bathroom break. I gave him an empty two-liter
soda bottle to keep in the box for when he had to
go Number One.
Rowley asked what he would do if he needed to
go Number Two, but I told him we’d cross that
bridge when we came to it.
126
Once we were done coloring in our machine, we
started cutting out the groove where the popsicle
sticks were supposed to go.
But I guess we weren’t really thinking ahead,
because as soon as we cut the outer border, the
whole maze fell inside the machine.
fwoop
So I guess we’re not gonna make a lot of money
on Pac-Man unless people are willing to pay
twenty-five cents to see Rowley sitting in a box.
127
Sunday
Me and Rowley still have a lot of work to do to
set up our Holiday Bazaar, but I realized we’d
better not wait until the last minute to let people
know about it. So we went down to the town
newspaper’s office and told them we wanted to
order up a full-page color ad in tomorrow’s edition.
They said an ad like that would cost a thousand
dollars, and I told them we could pay for it the
day AFTER our event. But they wouldn’t take an
IOU, even when I told them how many Drummies
we were planning on selling.
I suggested maybe they could just write an
article about how two regular kids were putting
together their own Holiday Bazaar and not
128
But they told us they didn’t consider our Holiday
Bazaar “newsworthy.”
I think it stinks that the newspaper basically
gets to control the information people are
getting. At home, I complained to Mom, and
she suggested me and Rowley start our OWN
newspaper and write about our Bazaar.
I thought that was a GREAT idea, and we got
right to work. We came up with a name for our
paper and put together the front page.
The Neighbourhood
TATTLER
Drummies
Pricing Scam
Exposed!
Tattler reporters have uncovered a
price-gouging scheme at the
school Holiday Bazaar that has
been running unchecked for years.
The popular chicken drumstick
items, “Drummies,” have been
sold at the Bazaar for more than
six times their retail value.
“I’m outraged,” said a loyal
customer who did not want to be
See DRUMMIES, A2
New Bazaar Offers Alternative to School Event
With the community reeling
from the Drummies scandal,
two boys have decided to
make things right.
“We’ve decided to start our
own Holiday Bazaar,” said
Greg Heffley, an entrepreneur
See BAZAAR, A3
129
We realized we were gonna have to come up with
some more pages for people to take our newspaper
seriously, so we started brainstorming ideas for
other sections we could add. I figured we needed
a comics section, so we started there.
T.G.I.F.
by Rowley Jefferson
Hey you! Why are
you running around
in your underwear?
It’s Friday!
Stinky Sebastain
by Greg Heffley
Ned the Napkin
by Rowley Jefferson
ok, who forgot to
wear deodorant?
Can you
clean up
my spilled
soda, Ned?
How come
you always
ask ME?
We added an advice column, where people write in
questions about problems they’re having. But we
didn’t have time to wait for people to send in real
questions, so we just made a few up.
130
Dear Greg,
My wife is always
criticizing everything I
do. The other day it
was a little chilly out so
I wore socks with my
sandals. My wife
actually made me go
back inside and put on
shoes! I feel like she
treats me like a child,
but she has a very
strong personality and
I’m afraid to stand up
to her. What can I do?
Sincerely,
FRUSTRATED
Ask
Greg
Dear FRUSTRATED,
It’s NEVER okay to
wear socks with sandals!
You should apologize to
your wife immediately.
Greg
Dear Greg,
Are you single?
Sincerely,
THE LADIES
Dear THE LADIES,
Why, yes, I am!
Greg
Rowley was all excited about this newspaper, and