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do you know i love you? i do.

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the world is going through some interesting phases right now.

it reminds me of how i am when i am sick. i get angry and bitter and then sad. then i think imma die. then i get real quiet.

then i promise to God Above that i am gonna change if i survive it all.

then i get even MORE sick and eventually puke all over everything. then i sleep for a while, clean the whole house, eat right for once, and return stronger.

i think this country is in the puking stage followed by the burning of police stations and Wendys’

i must say this is the first time i have ever seen a nation as a whole go through this together, and it is fascinating to watch some resist it. but if i can return to analogies about bodily fluids: when you have to puke, putting your hand in front of your mouth only makes it spray.

this is change we are going through. real change. change for the better. and hopefully what will soon follow is change for women and immigrants and on and on. i hope it’s like dominoes. i hope it happens one after another. because the thing is, all people who have felt like their growth has been stymied dont want to take the sunlight from others, we just want to share it.

and theres enough for everyone.

white men can relax. there will always be room for them at the table. Larry Bird taught us that. as did Eminem. as the great Lizzo said, If I’m shinin’, everybody gonna shine.

also: if everyone on the team is hitting their marks, and performing at their best, things are easier for everyone and life is better. dont we all want life to be better for everyone? are there people who truly want to be the only successes? i want to meet them. i wanna see whats up with them.

ok its 1026pm. dinner time.

dear people of the future, hello

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if you look back at your history books you’ll see that this period of time starting in may of 2020 a lot of weird wild shit went down after an otherwise unknown man, George Floyd, was murdered by a group of police in Minneapolis.

it’s really fascinating how some movements start and how others dwindle quickly.

but the perfect storm of so many of us being holed up due to the coronavirus lockdown and the fact that Floyd’s death was documented on handheld video while several yelled at the cops to stop, became the last straw for people… around the world, to say that racism is fucked up, the power of police is fucked up, and the fact that rarely do cops get punished is fucked up.

meanwhile theres a perfectly good quarterback being shunned from his job because he dared to peacefully protest about these very same issues.

here’s some good news though, today the LA Times said they will start capitalizing B in Black.

ive had two really good days in a row

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Sunday was fantastic. i wrote an important email, had a very good phone call, got some laundry done, talked to my mom and had a fantastic heart to heart with Amber.

she has done a lot during this shut down. A LOT.

at first she resisted this thing. massively. she hated it. she’s such a workaholic so to be locked into our little apartment drove her nuts. she worried they wouldnt hire her back. she fretted over everything. she wrote so many emails and called so many people.

plus unemployment was a nightmare. they still havent paid her everything on time.

but then something happened a few weeks ago and she just clicked into the next gear. now shes accepted that shes at the mercy of so many things outside of her control and she’s ok with it, cuz fuck it, they’re gonna do whatever theyre gonna do no matter how many hours she waits on hold for this or that.

in the meantime she visits a half dozen homeless people every day and posts memes on her instagram. Also, she’s learning how to edit video. which i love her for.

today we went to walmart for a $9 can opener. left spending $101.

on the way i interviewed a community organizer from lansing michigan. a black girl who was so honest with me. we bonded beautifully and her idealism was genuinely inspiring.

we could have talked forever but im trying to keep these interviews down to 35 minutes or so because the long ones make me hate life when i have to transcribe them. and with so much happening every day i want to turn these around in a day if i can.

that’s my goal. which is tough. but tough goals are the best.

it wouldnt be so bad if my electronics could keep up

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i write and record and upload and download.

i have a new laptop, a good phone, speedy internet, two tvs.

but everything is against me. the internet especially. on saturday i was trying to do so many things and everything was all NO TONY NO

outside theres the Rona and Rubber Bullets and weirdos

inside the pretty girl wants to talk to me but baby i have like two stories a day i should be doing, the world is ending. we are the documentarians otherwise OAN gets to have the last word.

fortunately my old eyes and bones and body and fingers and gut are all LETS FUCKING DO THIS G MONEY.

shes pretty and she tries to cook but just now the fried chicken i ordered was ignored in the air fryer and they may as well be rubber bullets. but its ok because its the thought that counts.

today my article about the house call doctor got published. if it comes across as an infomercial, im sorry. i had two others that i wanted to talk with but either they were too busy or scrammed outta town so i only had that one guy and thats ok. you get the gist.

yesterday i did this story about the LA Police Commission getting reamed in an 8 hour Zoom session. people seemed to like that one.

i am getting the nicest text messages and DMs and Debbie Urlic even sent me a little care package. is my exhaustion showing? on one hand i was built for this but on the other hand i would really like to take tomorrow off but i gotta finish this super huge thing i started today and would like to sleep now because its 1am and the helicopter outside could be the Guard, the LAPD or the Childrens Hospital

but it cant drown out the Marvin Gay the pretty girl is blasting in the kitchen as she tries to whip something up so i can watch the news with her even though ive been seeing every tweet and FB item anyone could have made.

but still it’s fun to see how you do on the Final.

on this crazy weekend

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life is fucked up, unfair, focused too much on money and worldly possessions, invested too much in cops and not love

and rooted in fear.

i watched a lot of TV this weekend, tweeted a bunch of it, and even went through a bit of Beverly Hills, Hollywood, and Inglewood to soak in what i could.

to me the best take on it was Trevor Noah’s about the Contract.

when people are sold a lie that things will be a certain way, and it’ll be fair,

and if time after time after time it’s not fair, and the rules change, but never in your favor, after a while you’ll say fuck this game.

and fuck this contract.

and part of the contract is you and your whole neighborhood won’t bum rush a store — or all the stores — and take everything.

even the ice cube tray.

but trevor doesnt address why the cops are acting so out of control.

i think its the same reason trump supporters do

they know it’s about over for them.

the same way 9/11 transformed air safety, this is the last straw between cops and The People

and so every chance they could they beat a kid, or ran over pedestrians, or shot pepper spray or rubber bullets at a journalist.

the free for all is ending among the bad apples and this is the last dance.

love it or hate it but generally shit changes after riots and looting.

people start treating each other better.

especially businesses to their community.

i remember clearly a year or two after the rodney king riots i was in a liquor store and the customer whispered to the shop

see you at the riot.

just that threat is good enough to improve customer service by A LOT.

is it right? no. did i hang in there for a good 20 years or so? yes.

 

 

woah i havent blogged all week?

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well it was a crazy week

and as life goes, what you may think is weird in your personal or professional relationships can suddenly turn into small potatoes when shit goes afoul in the USA and then your own city.

this was the week that a young man was killed in Minnesota and it was filmed.

his murderer: a cop.

it took forever for the cop to get fired which pissed off a bunch of people, and then it took a while for his three partners to get canned. but only the one cop ended up getting arrested, and that took a bunch.

so add to the mix the fact that most of the USA is locked down, watching things over and over on the internet and TV, and added to that people don’t have to go to work in the morning. Also people are nervous and mad and scared about their jobs. 40 million americans are unemployed.

then sprinkle onto that the fact that white women are still calling the cops on black men for being black, and the POTUS has zero leadership abilities, and the rich are somehow getting richer from funds that are supposed to go to small businesses

and you have a slow burning fuse

and then a powder keg.

riots.

fires.

looting.

mahem.

people stealing stuff not just in the hood any more, that’s so 20th century, now they have gone to beverly hills, and melrose, and today was santa monica.

nordstom at the grove was hit.

gucci on rodeo drive.

big five in santa monica.

everything must go.

now theres fires across the street from the white house.

on friday trump was rushed down to an underground bunker.

shit’s so crazy and so wild that i have zero story ideas.

and whats worse is i have three stories in the can that if i had worked faster and pushed harder would already be out there but now if they go out this week they’ll probably seem stale.

cuz theyre based on COVID, which is still a thing, but the Riots are the new thing

racism, police brutality, the national guard

the deadly disease is def not the main thing any more.

which is a lesson i knew a long long time ago: publish your stuff ASAP because you never know what world changing event will happen tomorrow.