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today i learned Stiff is worth $90?

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sometimes when i get low i think what have i done so far and i think NOTHING

such a question is so subjective because what is value? what is the right answer? who cares what youve bought or “earned” or made.

but tonight i was looking for a Blogger hoodie because i am wearing one right now and i want to wear it a lot because i love it so it would be great to have a backup.

so i went to ebay and one thing lead to another and there i was searching my name to see what would pop up

and holy cow there’s Stiff and someone thinks it’s worth a ton of cash.

i mean, it is the best thing ive ever written, and it is good, and i am proud of it because it’s wild and creative and

ALL ME

and i love it.

but never did i think it would be worth that much.

the seller has a bunch of images from the book like where i signed it. for some reason i just signed it Long Live Vegas which i totally agree with but it gives me no hint as to who i had sold it to.

but the best was the thanks.

it made me laugh because i forgot what i wrote there.

because Stiff is an extension of some of the weirdest stuff from How to Blog i wanted to be honest about that

and i also wanted to acknowledge that the rest of it originally came from this, the world famous blah blog, i thanked myself

“for the use of my own shit”.

i have had a good life. i have nothing to be ashamed of. i have nothing to fear about whatever comes next. there is no pressure other than to peak ontop of peak

and to clean out the kitty litter tomorrow because it’s stinky.

and whatever book i write next i want it to one day get sold for $200.

thank you Blogger for all that youve given me,

because sometimes all we need is a bigass canvas in which to rock.

beyonce ruined everything last night at Coachella

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and i do mean everything.

how am i supposed to go to a concert now?

it’s not gonna be as great as she was last night.

how am i gonna even go to a club?

she took everything great about music and dance and spectacle and black pride

and shoved it in our faces

and flicked her long, wild wig at it

and smiled.

i was not a huge Beyonce fan, but last night not only did i, but we all saw the light.

we all saw the power of black girl magic.

she was graceful and fast and smooth and only got better as the clock ticked closer to two hours.

she didn’t rely on video screens or inflatable props

she was so magical that even the fireworks were all fuck this and felt like sparklers.

she had a whole damn marching band on stage with her, all of MC Hammers dancers, the twins from Cirque, an orchestra, and an all girl heavy metal band.

it reminded me of Kanye’s 808 n Heartbreaks redeux show at the Hollywood Bowl mixed with gasoline and twerking. it was the history of black college culture, hip hop, a cookout, and a family reunion when Destiny’s Child appeared and reminded us that you can come home again.

for years the rumors have been that Coachella would drop a boatload to get the Smiths to reunite.

all i can say after what i am still trying to process from last night ON TV

is fuck the Smiths.

beyonce showed us what giving 100% to the grandest idea you could think of looks and sounds like

ONE HUNDRED PERCENT

and it is flawless.

took these two dude from one side of town to the other

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if i was a bad person i would have recorded their conversation and transcribed it here for you because it was really fascinating.

but i am a good person. sorta.

they were talking about all these tv deals that they were making and wanted to make.

they were talking about all these women and how powerful they were.

and how powerful they are going to be when they finalize these deals.

all of that was typical Hollywood blah blah blah and i was thinking to myself boring

but then they got bored with that, it was a long ride.

then they started talking about their kids

“did you ever take yours to the Tower of Terror?”

“in Florida, yes?”

“it’s it fantastic.”

“oh man, someone at Disney gave us these passes and we went on that thing eight times. Mary loved it.”

then they talked about this carnival they went to. then Europe.

their tone was so different. so sweet.

i wanted to tell them, do business with that tone and you will rule the world.

they didn’t tip.

guy lombardo of course

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what if you just get tired of things after a while.

what if you just overthink things after a spell.

what if you dont wanna share with the whole wide world about your fabulous life and all the pretty girls who kiss you and all the sweet old people who ride in your back seat and

those who tell you about the time that they moved here from north dakota in 1946.

oh really, what did you do when you got here?

i worked at decca records.

holy shit, decca was the label who didnt sign the beatles so they signed the stones and the rest is history.

yep.

so tell, me, if you were here in the 40s did you ever go dancing at the Hollywood Palladium?

yep.

omg. i heard that one mr frank sinatra used to sing there with a big band and everyone would dance in pretty dresses

i’ll have you know that that very same frank sinatra kissed me on the cheek when i met him.

were his eyes as blue as legend has it?

legend cannot live up to reality — his eyes were bluer than you could ever hope for.

tell me more about decca. i love them so.

well, every two weeks, when you got your check, they would let you pick out 6 records.

which ones do you remember choosing when you first started?

guy lombardo of course!

and when i dropped her off her assistant said, she never talks to uber drivers, EVER

which was the best compliment of all

 

the best medicine

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for some reason i still have friends inside the xbi

one of them ESPed me last night as I was at the Foods Co off Hoover

What are you doing there?

shopping.

Are you poor now?

ahahah shut up. whats going on bro.

Dude have you been having brutal headaches lately?

yep. for about three weeks.

Well I ran across someone’s screen and they’ve been pummeling you with vicious amounts of pain. What have you done to them?

same old same old.

But, like what spawned all of this? Who did you piss off?

hell if i know. last year i slowed down on my blogging. i thought they’d like that. maybe it’s because i have a girlfriend now?

Why did you do that?!?!

man can’t live on bread alone.

True. True. So what have you done to counteract the onslaught? You should be a mess right now.

easy, ive been doing the one thing they know nothing about.

Meditation?

LOL!

What?

i just told you.

I didn’t get it.

laughter. does anyone remember laughter?

Are you serious?

it’s the best medicine. and it works. it shines light on the darkness. and best of all it’s contagious. you should try it someday.

Oh and put myself on their radar? No. Thank. You. I will quietly toil away trying to do as little as possible until I can find a way out of here. 

that’s cool. i’ll be over here with a pretty girl, drinking pop, laughing whenever possible.

And being barraged by headaches?

the more you laugh, agent, the less strength their negative vibes affect you. not sure why. don’t care why. but i gotta go, ive probably said too much.

and then i bought some avocados.

in the days of chimpanzees i was a drive in

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she didnt mean any harm. long legs. short hair. didnt care.

hopped in the back seat, verified where we were headed and just sat there.

sometimes if they are looking out the window i’ll say something like

so whats happening where we’re going.

and they’ll tell me just going home

or theyre going to a party or

and sometimes they will tell you the saddest thing in the world

like theyre going to a funeral or a bar

or theyre gonna just go to a park and sit and cry.

one girl told me, sometimes i just want to get out of my own neighborhood

walk around where no one knows me

and just think about all the things i did wrong all week.

id say baby you didnt do anything wrong.

and she’d cry super quiet back there.

and id turn up the jazz louder so she could have some space.

and id drive super fast so we could get their quicker.

and give her five stars when we got there.

fuck what people think

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50 years ago today Stanley Kubrick’s classic “2001: A Space Odyssey” debuted in Washington DC to mixed reviews, mostly negative ones.

A few days later at its New York premiere, people booed and walked out.

“It lacks dramatic appeal to a large degree and only conveys suspense after the halfway mark…. The plot, so-called, uses up almost two hours in exposition of scientific advances in space travel and communications, before anything happens, [including] the surprisingly dull prolog… Film ends on a confused note, never really tackling the ‘other life’ situation and evidently leaving interpretation up to the individual viewer. To many this will smack of indecision or hasty scripting.”  – Variety

“A small sphere of intellectuals will feel that Kubrick has said something, simply because one expected him to say something.” – NY Daily News

“It is phony on many points, even for specialists. For a true work of art, the fake must be eliminated.” – Andrei Tarkovsky

We are here for a heartbeat. We are iPhones with no battery charger. When we die the poor will ravish us for our copper.

So while we are here we can sit around like a dolt taking orders from this one or that one

Or we can rock.

You don’t need confidence, you don’t need talent, you don’t need courage. For even a dog when he sees a cat knows to run after it at high speeds.

Life is the cat.

Run after it.

At high speeds.

Kubrick had a vision. He worked with the author Arthur C. Clarke. He built props and stages. He never used many of them. He had a vision. Were people who weren’t Stanley Kubrick in his ear telling him that he was spending too much money or that the script was lacking or the music was wrong or there weren’t any stars in the film?

Were people saying, why is half of this space movie about prehistoric monkeys who don’t say any words?

Probably. But because Stanley Kubrick was a dog he ran after what he was supposed to run after and we are all luckier because of it.

And for damn sure we should celebrate that some jackhole didn’t tie him to some tree in the backyard.

Live your life. Make your art. Make it weird and beautiful and unlike anything that anyone has ever seen.

Those of you who make art, that is actually your job.

Don’t be a thief. Be you. Be the most you you can be and if people don’t like it, good. People didn’t like the Velvet Underground or Van Gogh or GG Allin or The Replacements or Tsar or even Pinkerton when it came out.

But people sure loved Milli Vanilli. A whole bunch of them voted to give Milli Vanilli a Grammy. Where is the list of those geniuses?

Make art, not friends.

Make the artiest art you can art. If people say peeee-youuuu, kiss them on the cheek because I bet you those people are not Lou Reed and you need to give those people the kiss of death.

50 years after you have made your art, no one is going to say “Yes but I wonder what Kathy Lee and Hoda thought about it.”

They’re gonna say, Tony Pierce made that and I loved it.

And I love it even more now.

Now go catch that fucking cat.

back to the back to the beat y’all

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i got rhymes so fat and sweet y’all

ubes had a promotion this morning to get all our lazy asses outta bed on Easter Saturday, a morning that is typically slow, and we know

so like most smart drivers, i don’t get excited for anything unless it’s 1.9 or over

so for an hour in large swath on the east side of town they had a 2x surge – but the passenger doesnt pay the surge, ubes does.

and then in the next hour they had a 2.4x surge from koreatown to the west.

first ride was this young japanese woman. short ride. we passed a new target near mccarthur park.

a little one. like a corner store.

target i asked the silent / shy lady.

yes! she perked up.

you are so lucky i said.

yes, she agreed and settled back into the seat, looking out at the buildings going by.

$7 for a 7 minute ride. whatever. figured i was near the Line Hotel. figured i should probably circle it a few times because 2.4 times the airport is what it’s all about.

circled around it once. nothing. circled around again: ping. a mom and her two teenage daughters. Mexican.

i start the deal and it says Universal Hollywood.

hey we’re going to Hogwarts i say.

the ladies laugh, yes!

i told them how great their hotel is. about roy choi. kogi.

then i ask, where in mexico are you senioritas from?

the mom says, mexico city!

they tell me a little about it and i ask,

is it true that in mexico city the ladies have to ride Women’s Only busses

because the men are too — and i made the Grabby Hands gesture with wiggling my fingers

and they said yes.

and i said, im so so sorry.

dont let the cheery disposition fool you

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i can be very mean sometimes.

i try to hold it in. i do. i am a Libra.

but i am also on the Scorpio cusp so that tail is always moving, always wagging, always looking to

sting.

and when it strikes i feel bad because in my heart all i want are the hippie things: peace and love

i never want to use my superpowers for anything other than to make magic

and to help people feel wonderful,

but sometimes someone will cross the line.

how are they supposed to know that the xbi taught a few of us to read minds.

how are they supposed to know that their lies trigger a sound only we can hear.

how are they supposed to know the real reason i shave my head and wear a cubs hat.

i warn them by driving a car that says xbi right on it

i write about it all the time.

and still they treat me like i dont have this curse.

a black kid in an all white school will never be normal which is why they recruited me and made me

the polar opposite of normal.

even less normal than i was gonna be.

i did and do everything to balance the scales, i dress like poop i eat like poop i let the belly grow

i mispronounce misspell watch tmz read twitter and dont read books

i try to fit in but theres no fitting in because even in a facebook message i can tell when youre full of shit

and that tail will come out

and i dont miss.

she says you should write a book and i say baby youre reading it.

weird day today, maybe it was the mercury retrograde lsd

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my beard is growing in so it’s itchy.

yelled at this guy at a red light. he rolled down his window. i rolled down mine.

i did most of the yelling.

the whole time he was smiling, like he thought he knew me, or worse

like he was an undercover angel sent from above to see how im doing

AND IM CLEARLY NOT PASSING THE TEST

angels always have the little smiles that kill me.

deep down i was pissed because my uber app wasn’t working right

and when i called them for help the woman had no clue what i was talking about or how to fix it.

you could tell she was somebody’s mom in Manila and she needed to make a few extra bucks and all she had to do was type things into a computer and the script would tell her what to do.

but this wasnt something that a script could fix. a real person at Uber has to reset something, then i gotta reset something

so i said, i am so not mad at you, lady, i am mad that uber would put you in this situation.

i said can you just transfer me to your supervisor and she said he’s busy. i said what about the smartest person in the room. and she said she’s busy too.

i said can you just let me wait. i will wait all night if i have to because im seeing The Darkness tomorrow and Friday is Good Friday and a brother can’t work on Good Friday it’s like the holiest day and then Saturday is

and the phone disconnected.

and i was outside the westwood W, parked under a street light.

it was so quiet you could hear the crickets saying fuck you to each other.

so i called my mom.

the best mom ever.