Author Archives: tony

sometimes nice things happen

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which is why you should never give in to the dark side

which is why you should never suicide

and why you should never listen to those who are negative nellys

as one of the handful of people who have worked in both “newsrooms” (LAist was my couch 10 years ago), i can tell you that this has the makings of a beautiful romance.

the people who make up KPCC are exactly the type of people who can help LAist get to the next level – wherever that is.

and LAist website traffic and social footprint was larger than the Pasadena NPR station’s, so the lil blog that could is a beautiful acquisition for KPCC.

and one of the sweet bonuses is there are living, breathing people at KPCC who used to work at LAist and vice versa.

the question is, will KPCC allow LAist to truly work independently, will the radio station help the bloggers literally find their voice on the airwaves and podcasts, and if something breaks on one side will the other side get bent out of shape?

these are the same exact questions that, I’m sure Gothamist and DCist are asking with their new NPR partners in one of the more interesting mergers media has had in a very long time.

i dont know about those other cities, but LA has truly missed LAist over the last 4 months (it has seemed longer than that) in part because the LA Weekly has refused to deliver even the slightest bit of news. so this is a godsend for millions of people who have grown accustomed to LAist filling in the gaps that the LAT has either found uninteresting or unable to cover.

the biggest winners of all will be the residents of Pasadena who will find their city covered better than ever.

thank you, anonymous rich person, for generously doing the right thing for news, Los Angelenos and Optimism.

the kids are all right

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decades ago The Who produced a film called The Kids Are All Right about the British band’s run through the ’60s and ’70s

but right now there are a group of idealistic teenagers in Florida who have had enough with America’s love/hate affair with guns, particularly assault rifles.

these teens were victims of school shooter who killed 17 of their fellow students. instead of freaking out (which they are also probably doing), they have used that energy to pressure local, state and federal lawmakers to stop accepting bribes from the NRA and start changing the laws so that mentally disturbed people have a harder time getting their hands on weapons and so a kid in Algebra class doesn’t have to live in fear any more for their life.

naturally Republicans are fighting the kids, which is bizarre. they are claiming that some of these students are actors being fed lines and aren’t earnestly asking for gun control measures, but are being paid by people like George Soros and other liberals.

the kids have been amazing. they say this has nothing to do with politics. they say it has nothing to do with Trump. what their goal is simply: they want last week’s school massacre to be the Last One.

they have a tough road ahead of them because even though they filled three Greyhound busses with protesting students, once they arrived at the Florida State House in Tallahassee, the GOP-led state senate refused to even debate gun control.

“if Congress or no one else wants to do anything about this, so what, because we are going to do something about this,” one of the students said. and you best believe them.

today is kurt cobain’s birthday, he would have been 51

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when i was driving the Royal Blood bassist from WeHo to DTLA he told me he was gonna be playing at the Forum in a few days.

I said, oooooh the Forum. I have seen many great shows there.

he said, like who?

i said, well The Cars, Manson, Clapton, Weezer, Nirvana, Kiss

he said, Nirvana? How were they?

i said, it was for charity and the Butthole Surfers opened. i sat all the way in the back. and they did something that i only saw once with Bob Dylan at the Arlington Theater… Dylan started the show sorta drunk but as it progressed it was obvious that the booze had been replaced with water, and by halftime Dylan had sobered up and was sooooo perfect.

the same happened with Nirvana. Kurdt seemed spaced out and super chill, but as they settled in the got louder and gnarlier and i dont know if the heroin was wearing off or the weed, but it got better and better.

they played Teen Spirit like 5th on the playlist. sorta to get it out of the way.

very punk rock. very “if you were here for the hit you can go home now.”

i have many things that i am supremely grateful for: namely the women i have had the great good fortune to know in my life, but seeing Nirvana live is way up there. and i take none of it for granted.

today is presidents day

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did you send out all your cards?

the only person who sends me cards for this holiday is my uncle jim.

jim of course is one of the original xbi agents.

i know this because i tried to send him R. Crumb’s illustrated “Genesis” for Christmas and amazon told me that no one lived there

even though it is the same exact address that i get on his cards for fathers day, valentines day, and every other holiday including this very special one.

we don’t have this day off at work because we are only a few weeks away from the Oscars and this is pretty much the home stretch.

this year i will be doing the Instagram Story. Last year if you remember i did the Snapchat.

i will reach about 11x the people that i did last year. so there’s a bit more added pressure but not much because the difference is

a lot of people or an OMG TON OF PEOPLE

they’re both the same. and im a pro. and ive been around this race course before. what i am looking for are some insoles to cushion my step because that is the only thing i wish i had done last year: protected my feet. as my dogs were plum wore out, Jethro.

today its windy. it rained a little last night. all of that is fine. get this bad weather out of the way so we have clear skies and warm temps for the big show.

everyone got sick these last few weeks. we will all be strong and healthy and wise and prepared for whatever goes down bc Lord knows it probably won’t be weirder than it was last year. and that was weird.

anyways happy birthday president obama.

 

dear tony, what can i do if i can’t change her?

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dear jean,

you can’t.

there’s not even a lot we can do.

all we can do is our own thing and live as pure as we can.

keeping in mind others are trying to make it happen too.

and everyone has a different goal.

hidden goals.

my goal right now is to make a spiritual miracle from these words.

my goal is for the Good Lord to hear my 1, 2, 3 and say

fine, tony, fine.

my goal is for my 1, 2, 3 to be real and good and as selfless as can be

my goal is for peace.

the right kind of la la la. the good kind. you know it when you see it.

sometimes i will see it and i will say

oh, right. yes! YES!

because i had given up on it.

because i thought it had fluttered away to either nowhere, or into the hands of darkness.

but there it is sometimes

right on the tip of yr tongue.

so here it is for you.

they want what you have

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one of the more fascinating things about my life is at almost every turn

and i dont say this as a victim, even though it may come across that way,

but people want what i have.

and then they ruin it.

since day one people have told me how to run this blog: what to put on it, what to delete, what to change up

theyve had plenty of time to make their own blogs. do they do it? nope.

three times ive been paid money to run other peoples blogs

each time the blogs i was handed were ok, and i turned them into something way better than ok.

and then, after i leave, poof theyre gone, after others swore they wanted to improve them.

but theyre gone.

it’s almost like living in a house and no one plays the piano, but then i start playing it

and it sounds beautiful after a while. and all these people gather to listen and applaud.

then someone else takes the piano, rolls it down the street, and throws it into the grand canyon.

maybe thats my lot in life. maybe thats what satan and the lord are doing, like im Job

but instead of giving me warts all over my body and killing my family to see if i crack

they just give me notes all day and when im not looking try to murder the sand castles i build.

but the cubs won the world series, haters, i will never crack now.

i complimented someone today on their instagram

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and they said, oh i love yours too.

and i thought, how could you? it’s terrible. it’s 10% of whats in my heart. it’s nothing. it’s a sell out. it’s me not trying to lose my job(s).

it’s me trying not to make waves.

it is the worst thing a 51 year old man could do: pretend like there’s 75 years left.

on paper im past my prime. how do i know? how many creative people do you know peaked in their 50s?

sure i could be one of the first ones. sure.

suuuuuure jan.

so what do you do if you can’t do the things you could do when you were younger?

you fucking floor it. you let em have it. you live by example. you rock the casbah. you show em what youve been bottling up inside for so so so long.

the last thing you do is go the way of the talentless cowards youve been scoffing at your whole life. and yet thats exactly what i have been doing since, hell, sooooo long.

did i rock during LAist? yes. was it perfect? it was so unperfect that now looking back at it and reading the archives i wince at sooooo much of what i was writing because i was doing it too fast. i had no time to think. i had to run the whole thing, manage the people, set up the thing, market the thing, and yes, try to be the living example of the thing

so when do you have time to channel The Spirit?

hardly never.

and yet it still came.

you dont need a lot of time. you just need the desire, the trust, and the platform.

and by trust, i mean no fear.

it helped so much that my bosses had my back. it meant everything.

but heres the truth about it all, your most important boss: Love.

always has your back

will never laugh at you

has no idea what Judging is

and wants you to do all the nutty crazy and beautiful things that are growing inside of you

and wants you to spray it on the side of the wall like a firehose.

this dick trickle shit is for the sucker mcs.

quincy jones was interviewed the other day by vulture

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and it was probably the greatest interview of all time because Q has seen it all

and he’s like 85 now and he doesn’t care any more

maybe he never cared. but he sure as hell dont care now.

so he tells us that he thought the Beatles were terrible musicians

says that Marlon Brando would have sex with anything that moved

even Richard Pryor and Marvin Gaye.

he admits that u2 isnt making good music and producers these days

are only in it for the money.

but when all the gossip and nonsense was over he talked about how

Coletrane used to carry around these music theory books

and how when you aren’t making music for the right reasons

“God walks out the door”.

two south african immigrants made news today

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the first was Elon Musk who sent a rocket ship containing a Tesla car into space this morning

and then had his rocket boosters fly back to earth safely so he could use them again

and again and again.

moral of the story: surround yourself with people who believe that anything is possible

and you will create miracles.

the second was the richest man in LA, Billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong,

who might take $500 million of his $7 billion fortune to buy the best paper west of Manhattan

your Los Angeles times.

moral of that story: sometimes good things happen to good cities.

always do the right thing, Mookie.

who’s that bald head in the bottom right corner?

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sometimes i dont know who to be. sure you’ll say be yourself but

no, you cant be yourself. because yourself might be someone who honks at someone when they cut you off.

and then yourself might be someone who flips that person off after they slam their brakes on you.

and then yourself might be someone who, when invited to join the bad driver into a home depot parking lot

ACCEPTS THE INVITATION

in life we are sometimes lured into that very same trap and if you’re being yourself

you just might fall for it, but if you are being the person you have been trained to be

you politely pass and go on with your day.

my day started with that bad driver. it was 8am. i was driving amber to pop physique. and then i was off to the annual nominees luncheon where i was to create an Instagram Story to our 1.4 million followers.

i wasn’t able to get much sleep the night before, but there i was seriously considering being a tad late for work to remind one BMW driver that the person who they cut off, brake check, and flip off

might be a former xbi agent, who foolishly thought that if he got those plates would send enough of a message to the jerkoffs on the streets to reconsider. but no. twas i who was the fool.

did my thing at the beverly hills hilton. met some people. chatted with my old boss. didnt make a misstep.

until i returned back to the office where i had to do some extra. and it was there that your hero hit a wall.

ran outta gas. threw in the emotional towel. ran out of blood sugar.

and made some mistakes.

then on the text message machine, was short with amber, because i was trying to concentrate, and wires were crossed, so we met at the grocery store. and over paid.

 

then went to the taco house. and the lady only spoke spanish and thought i said 6 tacos when i meant 2.

so i was all, whatevs, lets give 4 to the homeless. so i drove to this gas station. amber popped out. i said give him my giant mexicoke too.

dude goes I DONT WANT YOUR DAMN TACOS, but she convinced him.

but then he got up and marched from the bus stop bench to a pay phone.

placed the bottle on top of the phone and i left him in the dust cuz i was all, that fools gonna launch that bottle at us.

and i didn’t want him to see my magnetic shields in action.

and god knows who else.

so we zoomed before it got close.

i said, just lets get home in one piece.

then amber said i got us tickets to a show in new york.

and i was all, new york city?

pace picante sauce?

and i am so tired.

sooooooooo