Dan's Papers - December 21, 2007 - Twentysomething...By David Lion Rattiner

Throughout life you get to know people who do memorable things for you. Yesterday, Pentagon John did one of those things.

For about three years now, I have been discussing with Pentagon John his desire to write and publish a book. His idea was to write about what life is like being a waiter in the Hamptons. He spent seven years as a waiter in the heart of the underground world of the Hamptons restaurant business before working at the Pentagon, and he felt he had a story to tell.

Because I write this column and because I self-published a book about my experience in college, I became the most qualified guy for Pentagon John to talk to about publishing and selling his book. I remember receiving an e-mail of his manuscript, kicking back and reading the first draft of his now published book What I Do and literally laughing myself silly.

Pentagon John may be a government man, but he is a very funny guy and hasn't forgotten where he came from. "You got to get this out there. It's really good," I'd tell him. "You definitely have to get this book published."

About two years went by and during those two years, Pentagon John chipped away at his story. But along the way, he became worried that his idea was already hitting the market. The movie Waiting hit the big screen, a comedy about working as a waiter at a chain restaurant, as well as several television shows that revolved around restaurants.

"Sooner or later, somebody is going to write a book about this, I got to move faster."

John would work late into the night, doing edits and organizing pictures for the cover, and went into overtime on the book. He was not going to go through life without getting this thing on the shelves before Christmas of 2007. I was excited for him.

I think that nearly everyone, at some point or another, says to themselves that they are going to write a book, but only a small percentage of those people actually roll up their sleeves and put in the effort. Pentagon John is in that small percentage.

Yesterday, I received my first copy of What I Do in the mail and read it cover to cover in its final form, and was laughing until I ached. If you have ever had any experience in the restaurant business, I'd recommend that you pick up this book. You will relate. Although you can get it in bookstores, the absolute best place to get the book is at the website www.whatidobook.com and buy it there directly. Everything from worrying about whether a customer actually thinks the chips in the fish and chips platter are potato chips to underlined restaurant words such as "bussing" and "island," which are then defined at the end of each chapter, are in this book. It really makes an excellent gift.

But for me, the best part of this book was one of the first pages and had only two words on it. The dedication in big font reads, "For Dave." I can't tell you how honored I was by this, and I sat and stared at the dedication for about an hour, thinking about how big of a deal this is. I thought about all that John and I had been through over the years. I thought about water skiing camp, touring Europe, high school track and musicals, Jazz band, girl stress, movies we've seen, walking the entire length of Manhattan, his phone call when he got the job at the Pentagon, a wall to wall sand party we threw in college, sailing to Connecticut, his family's Italian cooking, www.beerpongtv.com, www.datehampton.com, and now this dedication. I mean, this was his first book and he was really dedicating it to me. How cool is that?

I have to be completely honest, I would rather receive this dedication than a Medal of Honor. I would rather have Pentagon John's first book be dedicated to me than to win an Oscar award. There is no other award that I would rather get than to have the dedication of the soon to be bestseller, What I Do by John Schirrippa.