Born on October 22, 1966 to Mary Catherine (McPoland) and James Howard Dietz, at ten pounds, James Michael Dietz held the record as the largest baby born at Cleveland State Hospital that year. The self-described “blue blood of white trash”, Jim Dietz was much more than his family’s pedigree.

At age 12, Jim lost his beloved mother to breast cancer. He spent his young life hopscotching around the country with his sisters and his father, who did his best to preserve his family while he fought his own demons.

Emancipated by default at 16, Jim went on to graduate from Brazoswood High School with honors. He found an outlet to his angst in the form of long dusty walks to the mall in his trenchcoat, which concealed the cassette tapes he shoplifted to feed his Walkman.

After graduation, Jim left Texas for Florida, where he stayed with his maternal grandmother, Junita McPoland, who had helped to raise him. In Florida, he enjoyed DM’ing the neighborhood D&D games and staying out of the sunlight.

Marooned when his grandpap’s gifted El Dorado died just outside of Ravenna, OH, where Jim had traveled for his father’s second wedding, Jim called his cousin his aunt and enrolled at Kent State with a faculty discount. At Kent, Jim became a stand out in the slam poetry scene, drank far too much espresso while slinging coffee at Brady’s, worked the night shift at Jerry’s Diner and bounced at the punk club JB’s down, where his nose was broken by a combat boot to the face at least once.

Jim worked two summers in Ketchikan, Alaska, cooking at the canneries when they were unable to provide him boots in his size to work the canning line. He lived in a tarp and pallet tent in the parking lot by the dock with his cannery comrades, and ate mussels scraped from the pier and simmered in beer over the campfire when they could no longer stand eating the free salmon. He made enough money to pay for his remaining schooling.

Following a brief stint in grad school at Cleveland State, Jim traveled to San Francisco and apprenticed in classic Italian cuisine at the historic Martinelli’s Ristorante. Eventually, he followed his little sister Megan to Pittsburgh, where she was enrolled at CMU. Jim continued his Mediterranean training in Pittsburgh, preparing authentic Greek dishes under Nick Plutis.

Jim was a lunch chef at Pittsburgh Steak Company when he met his future wife and partner, Melanie Evankovich, at a Halloween party at Dee’s Cafe, thanks to the insistent plotting of a mutual friend. Together they dreamed Mediterranean-and-beyond Gyspy Cafe into life, and for eight years welcomed, hosted, celebrated, fed, and employed an assortment of creative folk, neighbors, and “regulars” who became great friends and were as eclectic as the cuisine.

Jim and Melanie welcomed their daughter Violetta in 2011 and soon “retired” to the family farm in Murrysville, where their son Jack was born in 2013. There, Jim took up podcasting, expounding on the pop culture media that had always captivated him. He was a founding member of Legion of Dudes and Action Lab Entertainment, and an active contributor to the Half Hour Wasted/Legion of Dudes site as well as the Taylor Network of Podcasts. With a voice as deep as his knowledge of comics, television, and film, Jim was also a frequent guest on several other pop culture podcasts.

Jim and his family lived their happily-ever-after until his sudden and untimely loss on March 7, 2022.

Jim is survived by his sisters Catie and Megan Dietz (Richard Henderson); his wife and elfmate, Melanie Evankovich-Dietz, and his equally Geeky children, Violetta Beatrix and Johnathan (Jack) Artemis Dietz, as well as his bonus mom Bernice Evankovich, countless friends, the Gypsy Krewe, two cats, and many, many chickens.

The family will host a Celebration of Life for Jim on Sunday, May 22, 2022 at Townsend Park, Murrysville, PA 15668 from 2PM to 7PM.

Please consider a donation to the family in his memory to benefit his children via GoFundMe. Search for Jim Dietz.

Send to someone

Share this obituary with others

https://everloved.com/life-of/james-michael-dietz/obituary/

Copy