did a great interview today for my new blog

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the guy is a hugely successful television producer and long time reader of this very blog.

he had some advice for me about my forthcoming podcast which i wanted to disagree with, but did i mention he’s hugely successful?

meanwhile im working the pole at Gold Diggers at 2-6pm

what was weird is usually i begin the interviews by buttering the guest up, but he beat me to the punch, complimenting me and this and saying that i always had the most interesting cast of characters here

he even gave me props for nothing in here is true which sorta blew my mind.

i drove around hollywood as i talked to him because my phone connection is always great when im not doing anything, but any time im conducting a serious interview it cuts off on me.

once i was interviewing now-councilperson Nithya Raman from my living room and the phone dropped like 5 times. so embarrassing.

so now i just drive while i interview, pulling over every now and then to look at my notes.

howard stern had it right: if two people are having a great conversation one hour is about right. i think today we did about an hour ten.

we agreed on many things, disagreed on a few, but the whole time he was so upbeat and friendly and real. only a few questions did he not want to answer, which is good, you want to keep pushing as a reporter to see where the boundaries are. usually they’re where you think they would be, some people surprise you.

anyways it was very nice to be a journalist again. especially nice knowing that this is going to go into my own publication. and if it takes off, i alone will reap the rewards.

it is funny though, i still get nervous before it goes down. it doesnt matter who i interview. ever since Black Francis was a dead fish conversation way back in 1991, i am terrified that i will be unprepared for the worst, and fortunately that day has never revisited itself. but still i get scared.

Then i get freaked out that the recording didnt take. i forget who, but once at the Academy i interviewed someone and the recording didnt work but thank God I took notes and was able to make it work. oh it was the great John August. fortunately we also had a follow-up interview scheduled so i was able to get a few more questions in there. still it was embarrassing because i really loved working for my boss Josh Spector and i could see how disappointed he was.

but shit happens with tech and he knows that as well as anyone. in the long run i think i have been far luckier with it than not. one thing i do is i usually call my mom and record her first to see if everything works. she played along by reeling off a list of curse words. LOL JK.

tomorrow i transcribe it and work on another project im doing for someone else.

it’s nice to be busy. it’s nice to talk to nice people. it’s nice to be alive.

tomorrow theyre going after trump one last time

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it’s the trial of his second impeachment. the sequel.

but unlike the first one, this one is going to be in a senate where the dems are the majority.

they say trump isnt going to show up and thats too bad because under oath it would be fascinating to watch him do his best to tell the truth.

i dont know why they didnt ask me to help him get on the stand because i could do it easily.

macho men HATE being called out, especially by women.

if i was the dems i would have all the female members of congress who he has insulted and disrespected, and i would have them make a little video.

it would be called Dear MAGA.

it would go like this.

Dear MAGA,

for four years your president talked a good game. he promised you a wall, great jobs, better healthcare than obamacare… he even promised to release his taxes.

all lies.

he talks a lot for a guy who golfs a lot and doesnt work.

he called us names and tried to insult us, but look at us: we’re still here in Washington DC and not only is he gone but so is the Republican majority in the Senate.

behind closed doors we always said to ourselves, “trump is weak. he’s gutless. he’s a coward.”

and look at him now. hiding in his bunker. like a baby.

MAGA, your guy is too afraid of his own shadow to come back to the scene of the crime and tell us how innocent he is. he’s too chicken shhh to get on the stand, put his hand on the Bible he pretends to love, and tell us what really happened the day that his supporters busted down the doors and climbed into the windows and desecrated democracy.

he knows he’s guilty and he’s too afraid to look you in the eye and admit it, or look us in the eye and defend himself.

he is old, he’s fat, he’s balding, and he’s guilty.

and he knows this is something that your money can’t change.

donald trump is afraid of the truth.

and that’s why he is too cowardly to take the stand.

ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?

i have been receiving the best work advice lately

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someone said to me,

tony pierce, you are 54 years old. for such a smart person you can be so dumb.

you put on these clothes that aren’t you, you try so hard to fit in, but you never will.

and you set your sites soooo low. why?

it’s like you’re David Bowie and you want to be in a fucking barbershop quartet

so you wear the bow tie and the straw hat but you know that wont fool em

so you put on a fake handlebar mustache

but it looks so phony – something you despise btw

and you’re still David Fucking Bowie

no amount of faux facade can change that!

so be David Bowie.

be that spaceman from mars that we want!

people can see who you are from a mile away and if they are afraid and don’t want you in their space that’s ok, leave them alone.

but there are millions who do want you.

we want you because we are David Bowies too.

and we hate our fake mustaches

and stupid barber shop harmonies.

we want to rock.

lead the way.

 

today i learned the guy who covers the cubs likes the DH

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can you imagine working for a big newspaper in Chicago,

sorta big, it’s the sun-times

and you get to go to the most beautiful park 100 times a year

and you are fundamentally against what makes the National League the National League?

to me that would be like being a bartender but not appreciating booze.

it’d be like saying you love women but would rather they be completely odorless

it’d be like being a librarian but you prefer the film adaptations.

we battled a little on twitter and he took offense when i told him that i was unfollowing him and then all of his fans piled on

and one by one i picked them off.

it was astounding how few of them really understood the nuance and truths about not just baseball

but strategy, pace, and how to score a run.

scoring runs, of course being the prime objective of baseball.

one guy told me that he liked the AL style that included the designated hitter because it sped up the games and created more runs.

i told him to find me the proof that the games were shorter in the AL than the NL

he conceded he was wrong.

so to reward him i showed him that the amount of runs scored in each league were virtually identical.

i even showed him a chart

 

more people defended the sun times reporter.

one guy asked me a ridiculous scenario where it was the first inning and the pitcher was due up, would i pinch hit? he said he would i said, “why? your team had batted around in the first. you’re doing great, why take out your pitcher for the hope of another hit even though the odds of a pinch hitter being successful is low?”

he was all, “well he has a better chance of a hit than a dumb pitcher!”

which is true but still inane. so i asked him about another scenario.

i said what would happen if its the bottom of the 7th, scoreless game, two no hitters until the Cubs #8 hitter smacks a double into the ivy.

one out, man on second, do you let your pitcher bat or do you yank him because now you have the best chance youve had all game to score… but if you yank him you are also pulling out a pitcher who is mesmerizing the opposite team?

he said, oh id let him bunt. its an obvious sacrifice bunt scenario.

i said is it? and i pulled out this Runs Expectancy chart like the nerd that i am that shows you have a .66 chance of scoring if you have a man on second with 1 out. but you only have a .35 chance of scoring if you have a runner on third with 2 outs.

so by bunting you are actually halving your chances, so you may as well let Kyle swing away and/or try to draw a walk… and make the pitcher waste valuable pitches.

all he could say was that the stats i provided were 5 years old (as if that matters) and any time he sees pitchers they stand there for three pitches and then walk to the bench.

it was then that i realized who i was talking with. and who this writer attracts. and that i was wasting my time with both of them and i should get back to actual work.

which i did

which i am nearly finished with.

which makes me very happy.

and tomorrow i will sell my OJ helmet.

to a very nice man who once used it in an art show.

and i will throw in an OJ football card.

everything must go.

im selling everything i own,

new year new you.

what a weird wild month

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can i tell you everything?

do you want to know?

are things suddenly true in here?

one thing that’s obvious is ive blogged on here this month more than in previous januaries going back years and years

in part because i dont have a job.

i have some projects im working on and even though they’re challenging,

they dont stop me from coming over here.

weirdly, when i worked at certain offices i either didnt blog here at all or i blogged all the time.

but now that ive been at home for literally years now ive had a hard time blogging for a lot of reasons,

top of them all is because id been busy.

first writing the first draft for a long and detailed book and most recently trying everything i could to get Los Angeleno noticed.

tonight im sitting here listening to Dio, finishing up on project #1 and about to work on project #2. which i know i shouldnt be doing on Sunday but the clock is ticking

and i have to remind people im amazing.

today i watched church on youtube and they were great.

really good singing, naturally,

the organist

but the sermons were so good

in one of them the pastor gave props to the poet who spoke at bidens inauguration

even though there wasn’t anything religious about the poem

not everything needs to be to get love in this church, which is nice.

i should start posting them here

since they’re on youtube

the first half hour is the organist and then the service.

 

ive been researching corporate social media accounts for one of the projects

i spent all week on it.

my conclusion is most of them, even though their businesses are about communication

have giant holes in how they do social media.

either they arent following up on the questions that get asked

or they make way too many twitter handles (which was something we did wrong at the LAT)

or they have broken links or embarrassing photos that really should be removed.

as i studied them i wondered – am i really this insightful

or does nobody truly give one shit about their social media?

one company’s facebook page was impressively good so i googled that company’s name and “social media manager” and found their person’s LinkedIn.

turned out she had been doing it for two years and got a promotion this month.

but even though the FB was good the other channels were either meh or very bad.

were they holding her back? did she have ideas and they vetoed them?

some channels had zero interactions, no engagement at all.

for that you get a raise and a corner office?

the world is upside down i tell you.

and this is a giant sector of business meaning if someone decided: we’re going to beat all of our competitors at every social media platform, they could do it, with little effort.

really what they need to do is hire someone, give them a little freedom and a graphic artist.

if these two were actually good together, they could pay for themselves with the youtube revenue.

almost all of these companies had youtube channels that were terrible.

ironic because thats the only social network that pays you if you are good at it.

today was ernie banks’ birthday

mr cub

wanna hear a crazy story

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20 years ago i was looking for pictures for my website

back then i didnt have a blog, i had tonypierce.com and i liked to get big pictures that weren’t too busy and then write around the images.

it was sorta art sorta writing. if you hated what i had to say maybe youd like the picture.

one day i was looking through this very well maintained Drew Barrymore fan site. they had folders from each of the films, ads she had done, tv appearances, and so on

and in one of the folders was pics of all the fans.

the person who seemed to be the leader, or the biggest contributor named DaisyPrincess.

let the record state i was not looking for a girlfriend. i wasnt even looking for a friend. i had plenty.

the sad fact was i was breaking up with my gf at the time which was so sad because we loved each other. but we had to do it.

we were in the process of moving. and my little website was a creative distraction.

meantime my friends in Tsar were trying to make it big. they had signed a record deal or were close to getting one. but the way DaisyPrincess hyped Drew made me think, “if Tsar had someone like her on their side, it’d give them a great push.”

so i started emailing her just to find out what her story was, why was she in love with Drew. one thing led to another and we chatted on AOL instant messenger for hours every day. hours and hours. and it was all PG if not G rated.

for some reason we just clicked.

because life is bizarre, it turned out that she loved No Doubt, and that band’s stylist had just been hired by Tsar’s management. and that intrigued Ashley and she listened to Tsar but she was not really into it.

but for some reason she kept chatting with me.

after a while i thought i was being catfished. what’s this college girl in vegas want with me? i was not making any real money at that time. i was way older. i did not look like any of the guys she had either dated or swooned over on her blog. was i being set up for a tragic end? would i be found in a shallow grave in the desert if i dared drive out to meet her?

probably.

so once my breakup with my ex was completed and i moved into the apartment im in now, i suggested that we meet for a day.

i said i would rent a car (i didnt even have a car!), drive to vegas

and i told her that if indeed she was a 400 lb man who hated Cub fans and was going to kill me, all i ask is don’t touch my face,

that way my friends or my mother could identify me and give me a proper burial in isla vista or wrigley field

or somewhere strangers could gather and say omg what an idiot.

turned out she was not a man, not a murderer, and even prettier in real life than in her pictures.

we spent the night eating taco bell and watching charlie’s angels.

when i dropped her off i thought i’d never see her again because, come on. who gets a girlfriend from a message board?

either you get chopped up or you get ghosted.

but that didnt happen either.

it’s funny that i chalk up a lot of the nice things that have happened to me in the last 21 years to the busblog and blogging, but this happened before the blog.

it was like the silent film era. you did everything yourself. design, graphics, HTML… everything. even when i started the blog i would fall back to old school features like photo essays and special web pages where i would write around pictures.

why did ashley like me? who knows.

perhaps she did want to kill me in the desert but got cold feet when it turned out i really did love drew

and really did want to watch charlies angels on pay per view

and was not there to get her involved in a life of crime

like the others had.

i just wanted some killer wallpapers.

20 years ago seems like yesterday.

maybe because i live in the same place and when i look at parts of my apartment it’s easy to remember this or that.

or maybe because time really does fly

which is why you should go and meet that stranger whose probably gonna butcher you

maybe you should drive all night while playing springsteens drive all night

we are alive for a bat of a lash

so live.

the reason i ask if you know i love you is because

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secretly i volunteer at a pop-up confessional

and as people confess their sins to me in the darkness two underlying themes exist

– they feel unloved or undeserving of love

– they don’t recognize actual love when it’s right in front of them.

now part of this has to do with hollywood and books and a lack of a good education in public schools

something as important as love should be taught better, and in more than a few classes in elementary and high school.

but it isnt

we have to guess. we have to ask our friends. and our friends dont know. so we read about it but those people are selling books. so we watch sixteen candles and sex in the city and porn and true hollywood stories

but none of them get to the root. none of them teach you the actual dynamics.

if love was a house most of us would be homeless

is what we think.

but thats so untrue.

the sun comes up every morning out of love.

the birds pollinate and photosynthesis occurs due to crazy love.

scratch your skin and watch it heal

work out and feel your muscles grow

talk to someone and hear what they know

love love love love.

but we are taught that love is this or that and comes with this thing or that

thing

the things are not the thing.

we know this and yet valentines day is coming and its all about the things

that is not love.

love is staring in their eyes and not thinking about your phone

or the boiling kettle

or the upcoming bills

or any of the minutiae

love is that instant

it’s why we are alive.

and what will be gone

when we croak.

and now you know i love you,

because i do.

why am i procrastinating?

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i seriously need to turn off my social media

the problem is im doing something ABOUT social media so i need to refer to it

but i dont need to be calling politicians liars on it, thats for sure

even though theyre lying

and poorly, at that.

why do i think my tweets matter? why do i think i will bring them around to the truth?

change their ways?

inspire them to be their higher selves? their Christian selves?

my higher self is to finish this damn thing by 1am, get some sleep and wake up at the crack of 9am and get this meeting done and go back to bed and do something else magical.

but something tells me i wont

something tells me i will listen to the siren song and i will eat the lotus flower and get stuck on the isle of procrastination with the fair maidens and wicked beasts

save me