Monthly Archives: September 2020

truly unplugging

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the skies of LA look like the water in the bowl after youve had a rough night

and you coulda sworn you flushed but when you toss the TP in there

you see this golden brown reminder that booze just aint your thing

and bacon wrapped hotdogs have a time and a place

hi, my name is tony.

i am on vacation for 10 days. and i am at the beginning of a lil experiment.

last night at 6:30pm i turned off my phone and put it in ambers purse.

the goal was not to turn it back on until my mommas birthday a week from sunday.

but it only lasted an hour because i needed to call her to tell her i wasnt dead.

and also to fill her in on my plan.

somewhere along the line i also have chosen to cut my social media use down by a good 96%

im still the founder and co-moderator of the greatest Howard Stern Facebook group around

and i dont want to burden the other two moderators with my vacation, so i will be dipping back into that page a few times a day.

its been less than 24 hours and naturally at first i wanted to see what my FB page thought of my plan

a few people said something super dumb that normally i would have retorted

but thats all part of the problem.

for being such a laid back person, at my heart i am a bit of a controler, a secret alpha

and definitely an astrological cardinal sign

i feel more comfortable leading than following unless i have someone incredible to support

but if you say something stupid on my facebook wall, for example, i will school you

because obviously nobody else has.

ive noticed that i am spending more time reading the newspaper and reading reddit.

in fact ive already been guilded this week on reddit for something i found and thats nice.

whats not nice is i like wishing people happy birthday on facebook and i have no idea who im slighting

but i hope they understand.

cutting off the phone and social is not something im doing because

OMG ITS TAKING SO MUCH TIME AWAY FROM MY WIFE AND KIDS

or because its evil or spying on me or sucking away my creativity.

the web and social have put bread on my table, beautiful women in my life and given me most of my real life post-college friendships.

ive been able to work several Oscars, buy a Benz, and live a reasonable life.

if anyone loves it and knows it and enjoys the daily give n take of it all, it’s me.

but only until now have i been able to take a break, driver 8.

every other job had me tethered.

i once had a job where i was  forced to work seven days a week.

i even asked the HR director one day if it was legal. years and years with no real days off?

the response: you’re staff, and thats the nature of your gig.

which was baloney. but what can you do.

theres something about emotionally and mentally not having to worry about being responsible for shit for a few days.

where you can truly unplug.

it’s been about 22 hours. and already i have some good ideas bubbling that probably wouldnta been there.

im watching more tv, and by that i mean youtube.

and im focused when i watch because i dont have that “second screen” to distract me.

my attention span is returning.

but the only real issue is the air quality. i cant really go outside.

no one can.

the smoke and soot and smog and crud are everywhere.

i wanted to go to Palm Springs for a few days and not do shit by a pool

but even that oasis is closed.

fine.

maybe i’ll blog more often.

as the who said, it’s hard

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every day is a struggle.

every day mortality looks you in the face and laughs.

the clock begins ticking as soon as you enter this crazy maze, but Life in The Era of Rona is weird and gets weirder every day.

people get mad, people fuck up, people do dumb things, people fight and lash out at Death and now the skies are blood red or brown or black.

like my heart.

i asked for a vacation and i got a vacation. i told my boss i wanted a few days off and she said take the whole week. i cashed out my 401k not long ago and now i want to go on a western road trip and sleep by the pool.

at first i wanted to go to Palm Springs but the smoke is so bad here and its floating over there. soon it will kill all the birds and the bees and the grass and the trees.

so Santa Barbara? Mexico? Arizona? Vegas? who knows, who cares. we are all gonna die and if we survive everyones gonna vote for the wrong man and russia is gonna take over and imma have to do the Kremlin’s twitter so we may as well party now while we can.

Alexa: where is it safe to drive to?

Nowhere, Tony, nowhere.

then thats where we’re going.

rarely do i fight with my mother

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typically we have pleasant phone calls and everythings cool

but today she told me something incredibly disturbing.

she told me that she is going to go to my sisters house to tutor her grandchild.

i said have they discovered the cure to the contagious disease that kills senior citizens, especially minorities are the most at risk?

i had literally just posted on LosAngeleno a tweet that said

250k Angelenos this year have contracted a disease that has no cure. 

the person who implored me to be safe my whole life was telling me that she was planning on going to a home filled with people, including children,

one of whom just happens to be ill and has no idea what the malady is.

when i objected my mother accused me of being on drugs.

I AM THE MOST HONEST MAN OF ALL TIME. YOU RAISED ME TO BE THAT. IN COLLEGE I WOULD CALL YOU WHILE I WAS ON DRUGS AND TOLD YOU I WAS ON DRUGS I AM NOT ON DRUGS RIGHT NOW. IF ANYONE IS, IT’S THE PERSON SAYING SHE IS GOING TO A HOME WHERE GOD KNOWS WHERE ANYONE HAS BEEN.

it was a disaster of a phone call.

and who knows maybe my mom wants to wrap it up. who am i to stand in her way. my whole family is filled with strong black women. nearly all of them college educated going back to my great great grandmother. a rarity for our race.

she knows what she is doing.

i would be devastated without my mother.

the one reason i am as incredible and thoughtful and open minded and sensitive to the needs of women in the workplace is because of what she taught me and what i saw her go through as a single black woman in a corporate hq.

the last person i would ever want to grow up to be is someone who had done my mother wrong.

also i had a pair of grandmothers who would literally beat my ass if i was anything less than gentlemanly.

i am sure its hard to sit in the house and watch trump every day and read the Daily Kos and stare out at the window watching the leaves turn brown. but thats the struggle we all have right now.

WELL YOU GO OUT ALL THE TIME she said.

and i do. and i wear gloves. and i sanitize everything. constantly. and im in and out. and i use apple pay from my iphone. i dont touch shit and if i do i set it on fire and set my hands on fire too

and i rise from the ashes.

i dont know what these people are doing at my sisters house. i dont know who their friends are, what sort of situation is going over there. for pete sake my niece had 3 jobs last month, tell me how that is not a risky maneuver right there.

dont you think i want to go out into the world and interview people?

dont you think i want to go to every neighborhood in LA and pull back the curtain?

dont you think i want to take a road trip around the country and talk with every single person and take their picture and hug them and kiss their babies and pet their dogs and eat on their porch swings and pee in their snowbanks?

but this is not the time.

this is the time to sit in the house.

just like in the omega man.

just like in the bible.

just like in the end times.

i was so mad i drove and drove through the night in the valley and people were outside bars dining on the sidewalk, way too many of them

everyone taunting fate.

every one just exhausted of the fear and the invisibleness of it all

every one just borderline suicidal because blooming onions and a margarita are just too irresistible on the last night of summer

and i will not go to any funerals of people who die when i tell them not to die.

 

do you know i love you? i do.

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i also love every single person alive.

i once had a girlfriend who in a fight said, IT DOESNT EVEN MATTER THAT YOURE MAD AT ME BECAUSE IN 100 YEARS YOU WILL FORGIVE ME JUST LIKE YOU FORGIVE EVERYONE BECAUSE EVEN THOUGH YOU ARE TWICE AS OLD AS ME YOU ARE 88 TIMES LESS MATURE AND YOU DONT EVEN KNOW WHAT LOVE IS BECAUSE EVERYTHING TO YOU IS LOVE

and later she did something that made me stop loving her for a little while

but she was right, i have returned to loving her.

i am the sunshine that rises in the morning.

do i hold some grudges though? oh yes.

are they all justified?

weirdly, no.

because im a caveman i like to go outside with just my pajama bottoms on, sometimes barefoot,

it’s 111 degrees right now at 9pm in LA. but the sky is tremendous. ill take a pic.

so i walk outside, down my little alley and someone is on the stairs in the back

i was startled but i noticed she was a bigger woman

and in the shadows.

so i said hi like nbd its hollywood this happens every night

she said hi

afterwards i came inside and told amber.

then i said if you wanna give her some water and some of my flaming hot cheetos, be my guest.

so she did.

when she got back she was all your cheetos were a hit!

about a half hour later amber goes, the cops and the fire dept are in our alley.

we listened through the window. the woman had a fever of 106.

they were worried she had COVID so they put her on a stretcher and into an ambulance

amber and i were both a little shocked at the quick developments.

did my flaming hot cheetos do something to her?

who called the fuzz?

half of our building isnt around.

was it the quiet ones????

later we went to the grocery store.

i wanted some fritos and noticed there was a great discount if you bought 5.

i was a little nervous to have that many because i didnt wanna pig out on them

and ruin this sports illustrated cover look i got going

but i loaded up the cart with 5 of them.

got some water but then amber got a couple of jugs.

we drive back and we spot one of our favorite homeless guys.

once upon a time he told us he always could use water.

so i gave him a jug and a bag of cheetos.

then at the next stoplight were two of ambers favorites.

i put water and chips in a waldorf astoria bag

one for one guy, another for the guy next to him.

as i handed it to him he says

youre an angel from heaven.

when i get into the car, ambers crying.

i said, all of this cost us like $2 a guy, this is nothing.

she said

but you ARE an angel from heaven.

but you know how i feel?

i feel like i have maybe a 50/50 chance to get in there.

i pick fights on twitter. i procrastinate like crazy. i dont treat my body as a temple. i judge. i dont honor my mother and father

if i honored my mother properly half of the stuff in this blog wouldnt even be in here.

you have no idea how close i have been lately to erase this blog from the world and just start over

great flood

but God said afterwards that he wished he hadnt have done the great flood.

so there you have it.

if theres one thing my mom likes to talk about it’s the weather

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she also likes to talk about her timeshare, probably because she knows that its complexities drive me nuts because it makes me feel dumb.

many moons ago she got a timeshare in Palm Springs.

and like a bratty kid i whined PALM SPRINGS SOOOO BORING!

fast forward to three weeks ago and nearly every day i have been scouring the web for a desert getaway.

my favorite resort out just re-opened and it’s charging $800 for a weekend stay.

and even though i am in no way that financially stable to blow $800 on two days of snoozing under a palm tree next to a pool i have no intention of dipping into,

i keep looking at that price to see if i could will it to shrink.

i paid $400 a month to live in a closet in Isla Vista in a huge house next to the beach.

people would say you pay $400 for THIS?

and i would walk them up to our second floor deck and say, no, i pay $400 for that.

and gesture at the pacific whose waves would crash one after another to the sound of

toe

knee

 

toe

 

knee

 

the purpose of life is to live it.

to wring it out at the end of the day,

put it on a hook

 

sleep the sleep of the just

 

and strap it on the next day.

 

but you do need that rest.

 

you do need to recharge.

 

some things are priceless.

 

and other things cost $800

 

plus food.

what do you do if you saw a perfectly good guitar, alone?

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is it a test?

is dumbass ashton kutcher gonna jump outta a taco truck?

is Dateline going to fall from the sky?

are the strings coated with COVID?

are the angels in the Heavens debating the morals between Christians and non-believers and one of them says, oh here comes a Christian, Gabriel, set a perfectly sweet guitar in his path and see what he does

but thats tony pierce, Gabriel says

other angel cuts him off, just do it Gabe. jeeeze!

Gabriel says but but

other angel glares at him and points at his watch DO IT

and i walked by it, investigated it. took exactly three photos of it and moved on.

angels laughed

other angel huffed

Gabriel sighed and says, tony only plays electric guitars

things i wrote for los angeleno last month

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birthday

i had terrible writers block last month.

i just coudnt get it together.

i struggled harder than i have — ever. just too much was going on. like all the time. finally i snapped out of it.

how?

i just let that gunk flow through me and waited. and finally it was gone. and i was able to get back to writing.

but if that makes you think i wasnt concerned AF, youd be wrong. fortunately i was able to eek these out:

Why My Girlfriend Doesn’t Want to Eat in a Parking Garage in Glendale

Why Not Just Party if the Cops — and Everyone Else — Are Doing it?

Picking a Psychiatrist’s Brain About Kanye, Racism, and the Rise of Karens

Twitter Sounds Off on Kamala Harris’ VP Nomination

Uber and Lyft Poised to Hit Cancel on California Like the Losers They Are

Who Is That Masked Man Offering Me Pizza?

The Buck Stops Here: NBA, WNBA, MLS and some MLB Games Postponed