Thank your grandpa for my cotton shirt...

Yanno, I am not big on revenge, but a large part of me wants to let the community mete out justice for this one.

I will be VERY curious to see how this one turns out.

It takes two...(Rob Base)

David spent the rest of his life in a futile attempt to carry his father's name around and pretending that was all he really gave him. He could not have been more wrong, but he wouldn't find that out until he was older.

David's mother went about the business of raising a son alone officially rather than being a music widow. His mother's family, starting with his grandmother, who had raised 6 children alone since his grandfather's death in 1954, closed ranks and aided David's mother as best they could.

David's journey as a music orphan led him to spending his earliest years in St. Clair Village, which sounded like a quaint hamlet, but in actuality was one of Pittsburgh's most notorious housing projects. To truly understand this, you must know this about the city's planning (pay attention, Jammy). From picturesque downtown you are surrounded by tremendous hills on each river bank as well as in the city's center. On the BACK end of each of those hills, completely hidden from sight and out of the way of anyone trying to get anywhere of consequence is where they hide the projects. If you ever wanna FIND a housing project in Pittsburgh, find a PAT (Port Authority Transit) bus and follow it up a hill and around a dark corner. It will find itself in a housing project in short order.

Being the sole provider led David's mother to carting him down the hill and across the river to the University of Pittsburgh, where he sat dutifully and silently during her evening classes, which followed 8 hours working in the project community center. By the time the Pittsburgh winter arrived, the prospect of getting out of St. Clair to go...anywhere became more and more unlikely since she didn't have a car. Since she wasn't driving, college was no longer an option and more hours would need to be worked to get that situation resolved.

It was during these days that the relationship between David and his mother was forged. David watched his mother pour herself into his life, investigating his interests, feeding his insatiable desire to learn and praising him for his ambition. David, Sr. passed through periodically strugglign with his decision and struggling with the shackles that Pittsurgh tends to put on talented black men, so much so that its most talented sons of color find their ultimate fame elsewhere. (see - Antoine Fuqua, August Wilson, John Wideman, Erroll Garner, Billy Strayhorn) David, Sr. finally moves to Grand Rapids, Michigan for reasons I do not recall. In light of that situation, David's mother started talking to her articulate son, explaining to him the ways of the world. filtering what he watched on television and using the immense amount the two of them spent alone talking to him, not like a 4-5 year old, talking to him on the level he understood.

As time passed, David began to find more comfort in the sports conversations of his uncles than the toy conversations of his cousins. His uncles marveled at David's quick study and started teaching him the game of football and basketball, with Baseball soon to follow. David's introduction to football coincided with the rise to dominance of the hometown Pittsburgh Steelers and David became a huge fan of the Black and Gold, an admiration that was only strengthened by a visit by some Steelers to his hospital room when he was hospitalized at Children's Hospital in December of 1975.

Kindergarten was an interesting experience as he arrived already knowing what was expected of the children of Phillip Murray Elementary School. First grade found him in a open classroom setting at Carmalt Elementary school thanks to school desegregation and a first grade teacher who thought to give me one of her HUSBANDS books to challenge me in my reading. Asthma and Allergies kept me close to home and kept me from playing with the other kids on many occasions. My mother got more and more protective as St. Clair Village started to bear the fangs that started to show in the projects as 1980 became closer than 1970.

As 1977 entered I started to ask my mother for a brother and to question what was so different about me and why it seemed that making friends my own age was starting to become more and more of a challenge. Talking to adults, especially about sports was easy, playing with my cousins was becoming more and more difficult. My father hadn't been heard from in a while and it was starting to wear as my questions became more and more insistent. It was at that point when one door seemed to close with a tirade from my mother and another door opened with the emergence of a man who may as well have been riding a white horse.

The Year was 1970....(Lords of the Underground)

On Wednesday, June 10, 1970 at 11:35PM Eastern Standard time(which means I was ACTUALLY born on June 11 at 12:35 am Eastern Daylight time) David Wayne Parrish, Junior was born to a fledgling Jazz/R&B drummer prodigy and his new wife in Magee Women's hospital in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Aside from having basically NO discernible pigment, and taking the better part of two entire days and part of a third of labor on the part of his mother, not to mention being born almost 3 weeks after his May 22 due date, David, Junior hit the scene. His father was on tour so he wasn't there if the accounts that I have ingrained in my head are accurate. Oddly enough, I cannot remember precisely what was told or by whom, but that is the story by which I operate, so color it gospel.

I was rememebered as an exceptionally quiet child. Even though I suffered from severe allergies and asthma, I was the babysitting task of choice for my many aunts and older cousins because of my mother's iron fist and its handiwork.

Something was clearly going on when it was discovered that the vagaries and complexities of phonics and reading proved to be an easier obstacle to hurdle than the nuances of potty training. In fact, Young David spent the latter stages of his potty training reading incessantly. This reading persisted through his toddler years and into his primary school years. Soon, the tried and true grownfolks trick of spelling out words to go over the head of the child in the room was futile, no matter how quickly the word was spelled.

Interestingly enough the reading and vocabulary led to a severe stuttering problem, which led to an assessment that there wasn't anything wrong, except that David's mind raced ahead of his mouth to the point where the mouth got frustrated that it couldn't form the words fast enough to keep the two in sync. Through careful skills and the like, he learned to get a handle of that situation, although it plagues him to this day.

David's rapid growth escaped the eyes of his father, who spent the majority of his early childhood on the road chasing his dreams of being a world famous musician. HE and His wife divorced in 1973 when he ultimately, after coming home from an aborted tour of England with up and coming musicians George Benson and Earl Klugh that led them to major label recording contracts. That summer found Mr. Parrish a job at Sears doing portraits. The ensuing resentment led David, Sr. to inform his wife that he no longer wanted to be a father or husband and that he wasn't cut out for marriage at the moment. All this information escaped the young Mr. Parrish, all he knew was one minute Daddy was finally there, then almost as quickly, he was gone, never to return as he was informed by his mother.

Winning starts with beginning

Robert Schuller said that. And I agree wholeheartedly, even if I don't know why he said it.

Through the wonders of technology, I know that I am speaking to people that I do not know. Whether you are here for 2 minutes or two hours, You showed up and read at least one word. That makes this worth doing. It is even better when you comment, but I am not going to get greedy. I spent a lifetime talking to myself (and even occasionally answering back) so it is not something I am unfamiliar with.

My betrothed asked me about two months ago what my dream was, and I told her that my dream was to earn a living as a thinker, to revolutionize how Americans in general, and African-Americans in particular thought about the world they lived in and what part they played in it. I told her I wanted people to point to me the way I point to those who profoundly impacted the ideology I have constructed and say. David Parrish, Jr. changed the way I think about ______.

IN the way a woman who is hitching her life to yours in every possible way would, she asks, quite innocently, Does that come with a pension or health insurance?

I ignored the specifics of the question and addressed what I thought the issue really was, namely that she didn't know what the hell I was talking about, a common occurence around here, not because I am so much smarter than she is, but because our level of intellectual intensity is so different.

I explained to her (and now I guess I am explaining to you) that I have always been different, I rarely accept things at face value. I believe there is an explanation for everything, and when there isn't, there is a perfectly logical reason why there isn't.

Yes, it took me far more words than necessary to say I am a bit of a know-it-all.


But dammit, God gave me this noodle and I am gonna work it till he takes it.

I don't know exactly why he made things so clear to me, good bad or indifferent, but he has made it quite clear that I am supposed to share with you what I think.

It took me the vast majority of the life I have currently lived to find a comfortable place to start in earnest on the dream that I have carried since I was 6 years old.

That dream is to be remembered as one of the great thinkers of the 21st century, and for little boys (especially little BLACK boys) who were blessed with gifted minds to know that even it is ok to be different, to see the world a tiny bit clearer, even as a child.

This century is five years over, and I am just now starting.


But I cannot win if I do not start.


Thank you for witnessing my beginning.

Homicide Season 1- Night of the Dead Living


An entire show spent in an unair conditioned squad room. Heavy on character development and fleshing out upcoming story lines.

Nervous...

I have to get my car towed in.


Again.


I have had that car on a flatbed at least ONCE in every month this year. I cannot get it traded in for all the fixing on it I have to do.

My financial status cannot afford a bill of but so much. Money is quite Funny and change is even stranger. This comes on top of all the pressures involving the wedding and just the daily grind of making the ends more friendly.

Perhaps I will be able to focus on my intended topic today tonight.

What She thinks...

Marriage Is for White People'

By Joy Jones
Sunday, March 26, 2006; B01

I grew up in a time when two-parent families were still the norm, in both black and white America. Then, as an adult, I saw divorce become more commonplace, then almost a rite of passage. Today it would appear that many -- particularly in the black community -- have dispensed with marriage altogether.

But as a black woman, I have witnessed the outrage of girlfriends when the ex failed to show up for his weekend with the kids, and I've seen the disappointment of children who missed having a dad around. Having enjoyed a close relationship with my own father, I made a conscious decision that I wanted a husband, not a live-in boyfriend and not a "baby's daddy," when it came my time to mate and marry.

My time never came.

For years, I wondered why not. And then some 12-year-olds enlightened me.

"Marriage is for white people."

That's what one of my students told me some years back when I taught a career exploration class for sixth-graders at an elementary school in Southeast Washington. I was pleasantly surprised when the boys in the class stated that being a good father was a very important goal to them, more meaningful than making money or having a fancy title.

"That's wonderful!" I told my class. "I think I'll invite some couples in to talk about being married and rearing children."

"Oh, no," objected one student. "We're not interested in the part about marriage. Only about how to be good fathers."

And that's when the other boy chimed in, speaking as if the words left a nasty taste in his mouth: "Marriage is for white people."

He's right. At least statistically. The marriage rate for African Americans has been dropping since the 1960s, and today, we have the lowest marriage rate of any racial group in the United States. In 2001, according to the U.S. Census, 43.3 percent of black men and 41.9 percent of black women in America had never been married, in contrast to 27.4 percent and 20.7 percent respectively for whites. African American women are the least likely in our society to marry. In the period between 1970 and 2001, the overall marriage rate in the United States declined by 17 percent; but for blacks, it fell by 34 percent. Such statistics have caused Howard University relationship therapist Audrey Chapman to point out that African Americans are the most uncoupled people in the country.

How have we gotten here? What has shifted in African American customs, in our community, in our consciousness, that has made marriage seem unnecessary or unattainable?

Although slavery was an atrocious social system, men and women back then nonetheless often succeeded in establishing working families. In his account of slave life and culture, "Roll, Jordan, Roll," historian Eugene D. Genovese wrote: "A slave in Georgia prevailed on his master to sell him to Jamaica so that he could find his wife, despite warnings that his chances of finding her on so large an island were remote. . . . Another slave in Virginia chopped his left hand off with a hatchet to prevent being sold away from his son." I was stunned to learn that a black child was more likely to grow up living with both parents during slavery days than he or she is today, according to sociologist Andrew J. Cherlin.

Traditional notions of family, especially the extended family network, endure. But working mothers, unmarried couples living together, out-of-wedlock births, birth control, divorce and remarriage have transformed the social landscape. And no one seems to feel this more than African American women. One told me that with today's changing mores, it's hard to know "what normal looks like" when it comes to courtship, marriage and parenthood. Sex, love and childbearing have become a la carte choices rather than a package deal that comes with marriage. Moreover, in an era of brothers on the "down low," the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and the decline of the stable blue-collar jobs that black men used to hold, linking one's fate to a man makes marriage a risky business for a black woman.

"A woman who takes that step is bold and brave," one young single mother told me. "Women don't want to marry because they don't want to lose their freedom."

Among African Americans, the desire for marriage seems to have a different trajectory for women and men. My observation is that black women in their twenties and early thirties want to marry and commit at a time when black men their age are more likely to enjoy playing the field. As the woman realizes that a good marriage may not be as possible or sustainable as she would like, her focus turns to having a baby, or possibly improving her job status, perhaps by returning to school or investing more energy in her career.

As men mature, and begin to recognize the benefits of having a roost and roots (and to feel the consequences of their risky bachelor behavior), they are more willing to marry and settle down. By this time, however, many of their female peers are satisfied with the lives they have constructed and are less likely to settle for marriage to a man who doesn't bring much to the table. Indeed, he may bring too much to the table: children and their mothers from previous relationships, limited earning power, and the fallout from years of drug use, poor health care, sexual promiscuity. In other words, for the circumspect black woman, marriage may not be a business deal that offers sufficient return on investment.

In the past, marriage was primarily just such a business deal. Among wealthy families, it solidified political alliances or expanded land holdings. For poorer people, it was a means of managing the farm or operating a household. Today, people have become economically self-sufficient as individuals, no longer requiring a spouse for survival. African American women have always had a high rate of labor-force participation. "Why should well-salaried women marry?" asked black feminist and author Alice Dunbar-Nelson as early as 1895. But now instead of access only to low-paying jobs, we can earn a breadwinner's wage, which has changed what we want in a husband. "Women's expectations have changed dramatically while men's have not changed much at all," said one well-paid working wife and mother. "Women now say, 'Providing is not enough. I need more partnership.' "

The turning point in my own thinking about marriage came when a longtime friend proposed about five years ago. He and I had attended college together, dated briefly, then kept in touch through the years. We built a solid friendship, which I believe is a good foundation for a successful marriage.

But -- if we had married, I would have had to relocate to the Midwest. Been there, done that, didn't like it. I would have had to become a stepmother and, although I felt an easy camaraderie with his son, stepmotherhood is usually a bumpy ride. I wanted a house and couldn't afford one alone. But I knew that if I was willing to make some changes, I eventually could.

As I reviewed the situation, I realized that all the things I expected marriage to confer -- male companionship, close family ties, a house -- I already had, or were within reach, and with exponentially less drama. I can do bad by myself, I used to say as I exited a relationship. But the truth is, I can do pretty good by myself, too.

Most single black women over the age of 30 whom I know would not mind getting married, but acknowledge that the kind of man and the quality of marriage they would like to have may not be likely, and they are not desperate enough to simply accept any situation just to have a man. A number of my married friends complain that taking care of their husbands feels like having an additional child to raise. Then there's the fact that marriage apparently can be hazardous to the health of black women. A recent study by the Institute for American Values, a nonpartisan think tank in New York City, indicates that married African American women are less healthy than their single sisters.

By design or by default, black women cultivate those skills that allow them to maintain themselves (or sometimes even to prosper) without a mate.

"If Jesus Christ bought me an engagement ring, I wouldn't take it," a separated thirty-something friend told me. "I'd tell Jesus we could date, but we couldn't marry."

And here's the new twist. African American women aren't the only ones deciding that they can make do alone. Often what happens in black America is a sign of what the rest of America can eventually expect. In his 2003 book, "Mismatch: The Growing Gulf between Women and Men," Andrew Hacker noted that the structure of white families is evolving in the direction of that of black families of the 1960s. In 1960, 67 percent of black families were headed by a husband and wife, compared to 90.9 percent for whites. By 2000, the figure for white families had dropped to 79.8 percent. Births to unwed white mothers were 22.5 percent in 2001, compared to 2.3 percent in 1960. So my student who thought marriage is for white people may have to rethink that in the future.

Still, does this mean that marriage is going the way of the phonograph and the typewriter ribbon?

"I hope it isn't," said one friend who's been married for seven years. "The divorce rate is 50 percent, but people remarry. People want to be married. I don't think it's going out of style."

A black male acquaintance had a different prediction. "I don't believe marriage is going to be extinct, but I think you'll see fewer people married," he said. "It's a bad thing. I believe it takes the traditional family -- a man and a woman -- to raise kids." He has worked with troubled adolescents, and has observed that "the girls who are in the most trouble and who are abused the most -- the father is absent. And the same is true for the boys, too." He believes that his presence and example in the home is why both his sons decided to marry when their girlfriends became pregnant.

But human nature being what it is, if marriage is to flourish -- in black or white America -- it will have to offer an individual woman something more than a business alliance, a panacea for what ails the community, or an incubator for rearing children. As one woman said, "If it weren't for the intangibles, the allure of the lovey-dovey stuff, I wouldn't have gotten married. The benefits of marriage are his character and his caring. If not for that, why bother?"

What he says...An essay from an "expert"

A Poverty of the Mind

By ORLANDO PATTERSON

Cambridge, Mass.

SEVERAL recent studies have garnered wide attention for reconfirming the tragic disconnection of millions of black youths from the American mainstream. But they also highlighted another crisis: the failure of social scientists to adequately explain the problem, and their inability to come up with any effective strategy to deal with it.

The main cause for this shortcoming is a deep-seated dogma that has prevailed in social science and policy circles since the mid-1960's: the rejection of any explanation that invokes a group's cultural attributes — its distinctive attitudes, values and predispositions, and the resulting behavior of its members — and the relentless preference for relying on structural factors like low incomes, joblessness, poor schools and bad housing.

Harry Holzer, an economist at Georgetown University and a co-author of one of the recent studies, typifies this attitude. Joblessness, he feels, is due to largely weak schooling, a lack of reading and math skills at a time when such skills are increasingly required even for blue-collar jobs, and the poverty of black neighborhoods. Unable to find jobs, he claims, black males turn to illegal activities, especially the drug trade and chronic drug use, and often end up in prison. He also criticizes the practice of withholding child-support payments from the wages of absentee fathers who do find jobs, telling The Times that to these men, such levies "amount to a tax on earnings."

His conclusions are shared by scholars like Ronald B. Mincy of Columbia, the author of a study called "Black Males Left Behind," and Gary Orfield of Harvard, who asserts that America is "pumping out boys with no honest alternative."

This is all standard explanatory fare. And, as usual, it fails to answer the important questions. Why are young black men doing so poorly in school that they lack basic literacy and math skills? These scholars must know that countless studies by educational experts, going all the way back to the landmark report by James Coleman of Johns Hopkins University in 1966, have found that poor schools, per se, do not explain why after 10 years of education a young man remains illiterate.

Nor have studies explained why, if someone cannot get a job, he turns to crime and drug abuse. One does not imply the other. Joblessness is rampant in Latin America and India, but the mass of the populations does not turn to crime.

And why do so many young unemployed black men have children — several of them — which they have no resources or intention to support? And why, finally, do they murder each other at nine times the rate of white youths?

What's most interesting about the recent spate of studies is that analysts seem at last to be recognizing what has long been obvious to anyone who takes culture seriously: socioeconomic factors are of limited explanatory power. Thus it's doubly depressing that the conclusions they draw and the prescriptions they recommend remain mired in traditional socioeconomic thinking.

What has happened, I think, is that the economic boom years of the 90's and one of the most successful policy initiatives in memory — welfare reform — have made it impossible to ignore the effects of culture. The Clinton administration achieved exactly what policy analysts had long said would pull black men out of their torpor: the economy grew at a rapid pace, providing millions of new jobs at all levels. Yet the jobless black youths simply did not turn up to take them. Instead, the opportunity was seized in large part by immigrants — including many blacks — mainly from Latin America and the Caribbean.

One oft-repeated excuse for the failure of black Americans to take these jobs — that they did not offer a living wage — turned out to be irrelevant. The sociologist Roger Waldinger of the University of California at Los Angeles, for example, has shown that in New York such jobs offered an opportunity to the chronically unemployed to join the market and to acquire basic work skills that they later transferred to better jobs, but that the takers were predominantly immigrants.

Why have academics been so allergic to cultural explanations? Until the recent rise of behavioral economics, most economists have simply not taken non-market forces seriously. But what about the sociologists and other social scientists who ought to have known better? Three gross misconceptions about culture explain the neglect.

First is the pervasive idea that cultural explanations inherently blame the victim; that they focus on internal behavioral factors and, as such, hold people responsible for their poverty, rather than putting the onus on their deprived environment. (It hasn't helped that many conservatives do actually put forth this view.)

But this argument is utterly bogus. To hold someone responsible for his behavior is not to exclude any recognition of the environmental factors that may have induced the problematic behavior in the first place. Many victims of child abuse end up behaving in self-destructive ways; to point out the link between their behavior and the destructive acts is in no way to deny the causal role of their earlier victimization and the need to address it.

Likewise, a cultural explanation of black male self-destructiveness addresses not simply the immediate connection between their attitudes and behavior and the undesired outcomes, but explores the origins and changing nature of these attitudes, perhaps over generations, in their brutalized past. It is impossible to understand the predatory sexuality and irresponsible fathering behavior of young black men without going back deep into their collective past.

Second, it is often assumed that cultural explanations are wholly deterministic, leaving no room for human agency. This, too, is nonsense. Modern students of culture have long shown that while it partly determines behavior, it also enables people to change behavior. People use their culture as a frame for understanding their world, and as a resource to do much of what they want. The same cultural patterns can frame different kinds of behavior, and by failing to explore culture at any depth, analysts miss a great opportunity to re-frame attitudes in a way that encourages desirable behavior and outcomes.

Third, it is often assumed that cultural patterns cannot change — the old "cake of custom" saw. This too is nonsense. Indeed, cultural patterns are often easier to change than the economic factors favored by policy analysts, and American history offers numerous examples.

My favorite is Jim Crow, that deeply entrenched set of cultural and institutional practices built up over four centuries of racist domination and exclusion of blacks by whites in the South. Nothing could have been more cultural than that. And yet America was able to dismantle the entire system within a single generation, so much so that today blacks are now making a historic migratory shift back to the South, which they find more congenial than the North. (At the same time, economic inequality, which the policy analysts love to discuss, has hardened in the South, like the rest of America.)

So what are some of the cultural factors that explain the sorry state of young black men? They aren't always obvious. Sociological investigation has found, in fact, that one popular explanation — that black children who do well are derided by fellow blacks for "acting white" — turns out to be largely false, except for those attending a minority of mixed-race schools.

An anecdote helps explain why: Several years ago, one of my students went back to her high school to find out why it was that almost all the black girls graduated and went to college whereas nearly all the black boys either failed to graduate or did not go on to college. Distressingly, she found that all the black boys knew the consequences of not graduating and going on to college ("We're not stupid!" they told her indignantly).

SO why were they flunking out? Their candid answer was that what sociologists call the "cool-pose culture" of young black men was simply too gratifying to give up. For these young men, it was almost like a drug, hanging out on the street after school, shopping and dressing sharply, sexual conquests, party drugs, hip-hop music and culture, the fact that almost all the superstar athletes and a great many of the nation's best entertainers were black.

Not only was living this subculture immensely fulfilling, the boys said, it also brought them a great deal of respect from white youths. This also explains the otherwise puzzling finding by social psychologists that young black men and women tend to have the highest levels of self-esteem of all ethnic groups, and that their self-image is independent of how badly they were doing in school.

I call this the Dionysian trap for young black men. The important thing to note about the subculture that ensnares them is that it is not disconnected from the mainstream culture. To the contrary, it has powerful support from some of America's largest corporations. Hip-hop, professional basketball and homeboy fashions are as American as cherry pie. Young white Americans are very much into these things, but selectively; they know when it is time to turn off Fifty Cent and get out the SAT prep book.

For young black men, however, that culture is all there is — or so they think. Sadly, their complete engagement in this part of the American cultural mainstream, which they created and which feeds their pride and self-respect, is a major factor in their disconnection from the socioeconomic mainstream.

Of course, such attitudes explain only a part of the problem. In academia, we need a new, multidisciplinary approach toward understanding what makes young black men behave so self-destructively. Collecting transcripts of their views and rationalizations is a useful first step, but won't help nearly as much as the recent rash of scholars with tape-recorders seem to think. Getting the facts straight is important, but for decades we have been overwhelmed with statistics on black youths, and running more statistical regressions is beginning to approach the point of diminishing returns to knowledge.

The tragedy unfolding in our inner cities is a time-slice of a deep historical process that runs far back through the cataracts and deluge of our racist past. Most black Americans have by now, miraculously, escaped its consequences. The disconnected fifth languishing in the ghettos is the remains. Too much is at stake for us to fail to understand the plight of these young men. For them, and for the rest of us.

Orlando Patterson, a professor of sociology at Harvard, is the author of "Rituals of Blood: Consequences of Slavery in Two American Centuries."

Things Black Folk Say #3

"Let me tell you about Mike Tyson. He is one of the most engaging and smartest guys I have ever had a chance to go toe to toe with in a debate. The first conversation I ever had with him, you know what we talked about? The philosophy of Mao Tse Tung."

"welcome in a heartbeat. He may be divorced from my sister, but I can't cast him aside. You embrace. You love. He is the father of my nieces and nephew. I've never sat in judgment of him, and I never would."

"everyone — cousins, friends and neighbors — was always asking her why she didn't take public assistance. 'Why don't you stand in line and get a check?"' His mother, a Democrat with pictures of Martin Luther King Jr. and J.F.K. on the wall at home, would answer the same way every time: "Because I don't want the government raising my kids."

"The birth of democracy is an ugly process," he said. "It's a lot like making sausage. Now, when it's done, it's good. Fried up, it's delicious. But to make it can be pretty nasty. So I don't sit back and judge the Iraqi democratic development as somehow out of kilter or somehow unexpected. I just go back to 1860, which was how many years past 1789? In that 70-year period, we went from a band of brothers to fighting each other."

"I'm conservative, but I'm also moderate," he said. "As I like to tell people, I'm a little bit hip-hop and a little bit Frank Sinatra."

"You know what it's like to be called an Uncle Tom because you're a black Republican? Folks started throwing Oreo cookies at me"

"You know how it goes; Six months and it's gone. What happened to the chicken joint? The Chinese are now serving us chicken. Nothing against the Chinese."

"So let me get this straight, I'm going to invite him to Maryland, the bluest of the blue states, where the president on a good day has 32 percent approval, which he probably had nationally at that time, 2 percent African-American approval, and you are going to focus on the fact that I did not say, 'Thank you, Mr. President?' I think it was enough that I had the president here when everyone told me not to. The thank-you was: 'Come on in. I'll take the risk. I'll take the heat.' That's how I look at it. 'Mr. President, you're not very popular right now. So what time are you showing up? What time are you getting here?"'

"I have to deal with the fact that my opponents will try to hang George Bush around my neck and make me some kind of right-wing ideologue who's in the back pocket of Karl Rove. So what I'll do is show up and look them in the eye and say: 'I know what you're thinking, now let's talk. Who do you think I am and what do you think I represent to the black community, and to the future?"'

Michael Steele, Republican candidate for US Senator and brother of Monica Turner, Ex-wife of Mike Tyson

From the NYTimes Magazine

Davey Wayne goes to the movies...

The missus and I saw Spikes latest Joint.


Everyone doesn't love Spike. Not all white folk, not all black folk, not all anyone. Either you do Spike or you don't.

I have ALWAYS done Spike. He has an annoying penchant for running off at the mouth and not thinking through exactly what it is he is trying to say, but as a movie director, he is not to be trifled with. Demme, Scorcese, Spielberg, Stone; Spike can get with any of them.

I am not going to go into the particulars of the plot so as to avoid giving it away. What I will say is Denzel and Clive Owen and Jodie Foster are as good as you are going to see them. The movie is a carefully pieced together puzzle that will require you to work at keeping up with who is getting over on whom and even at the end, there will be more questions than answers. Just know that despite the script being written by Russell Gewirtz, this is a Spike Lee movie. For those of you that have seen it. feel free to email me with your thoughts. This is easily the best movie I have seen this year.

Birthdays were the worst days....

Friday was HER birthday andMonday is HER birthday. Happy Happy to Both of yall. BUT first allow me to dwell for a bit on the loveliness of them

I started Reading DJ back in late October. I've always had a thing for sistas who are stunningly intelligent and maintain a healthy amount of streetcred. In some ways its like having TWO friends. She did a post on Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez that had me hooked. I will be reading her from now on. Hard to not have love for a woman wif her own turntables. She changed her name and her steelo, but once a diva always a diva. I admire her convictions and wish her and her twins all the best.

Sista I have only been reading about a month. Quick witted doesn't do her justice. Merciless is probably a bit too harsh. Enjoyable is an understatement. Her tone is probably what I enjoy the most. Articulately profane, she is just a plain old fun to read. And like Fat Albert, if you aren't careful you will learn something before you're done.

All this talk of birthdays had me thinking about mine. I have never thought about my birthday this early in the year before. Then again, I have never gotten married ON my birthday before.
I had a run...i dunno, lessee...twenty years or so....of deepressingly nondescript birthdays. out of 35...Six, eleven, thirty and thirty-five really stand out.

six - Had one of those outdoor project birthday parties... got bootajillion gifts and there were a bunch of people there, family and friends( or what passes for friends when you're six). For someone who is rarely the center of anyone's party it was a damn good time and one of the singular highlights of my childhood. And the birth of my addiction to chocolate cake.

eleven - Stands out because it was the last birthday I remember my step-father whole. My Father's gift actually arrived...on time no less(or was that his Christmas present, I'm not sure) I had cake and ice cream and a little party. I remember my step-father before Lung Cancer and and the cumulative effects of years and years of Phillip Morris Commanders extracted their revenge. But on June 10, 1981 all was still well. I had a gift or two, a good chicken and dumpling dinner with my Mother, Step-father, and little brother, followed by the chocolate cake. Times were hard and change was strange but life was still good. Earlier that day I finished 5th grade with a highest honor designation and thought I had the world at my fingertips, even if the world didn't know it.

thirty - Married, with the spitting image of a son who bears my name, I walked into my ONLY surprise birthday party. Three fellow couples from our church who were good friends of ours were there and we had good steak and again..the everpresent chocolate cake. I was genuinely surprised and remember it as probably the highlight of my life, excluding childbirth and wedding days.

thirty-five - Divorced, miles from my babies, but happier than I can ever remember due to a rapidly blooming love affair with a woman I never would have thought would have me (don't ask why...just accept that for now) I decided it was time. We had begun planning a wedding and I couldn't bear the idea of having my baby walking around talking about marrying and not having the requisite hardware. I snatched it out of layaway and on the sneak tip took her away to the American Airlines Center in downtown Dallas, site of our first date a mere 6 months before and proposed to her, at 12:35 am central time on June 10, 2005. Later that day I got my Texas Drivers license, forsaking my Yankee status forever and cementing my permanent SunBelt residency. That evening the soon to be Mrs. Davey Wayne took me out to the FINEST steak restaurant this restaurant connoiseur has ever been blessed to eat in and we dined as we never have before. Followed by after Dinner drinks here and unspeakable acts of depravity that can only be topped by THIS year's celebration. I woke up on June 11, 2006 and felt that, finally, I was in a place where I was happy and comfortable and secure about my future mental state.





In that spirit I have embraced the idea of Birthdays, not so much as a holiday but as a personal celebration of that person's existence. That explains why I was so eager to agree to marrying on my birthday. In my opinion, what better way to celebrate MY birthday by celebrating my oneness with my soon to be other half.


Happy B-Day, Sista and DeeJ, anyone I have missed this year, please hit me HERE and remind me of your birthday so I can make amends.

This includes my BEST MAN, who I distinctly remember getting HAMMERED during our freshman and sophomore year @ FAMU about this time of year(he was legal..we were not), although I don't remember exactly what day. His time in the spotlight is scheduled.

Countdown to Imagettin...

author's note...That is one of the BEST puns I have EVER written.



If you all direct your attention to the purple square on the right, you will see a countdown(shamelessly Jacked from DJ's blog) to the biggest day of my life.

On Saturday, June 10, 2006, at 7pm in Dallas, TX, yours truly will be getting married for the second time and celebrating a birthday for the thirty-sixth time.

If I were a football player I would be getting cut for salary cap reasons.

Instead I will be starting a new life with a new wife.

I haven't said a whole lot about this, because I am not sure exactly how much to say. But the reality is that getting married is first and foremost on my mind almost all the time. I sometimes find myself ignoring the marriage and the wedding just long enough to think about something else to write about.

Perhaps that is because I don't think ya'll care about all that stuff.

It is probably because I don't think it is any of your business.

I think I am reaching a point where I can start to talk about it.

I guess part of me is a bit wary of putting folk that I care about in the street. I know I am capable of this because they are often worthy of BEING put in the street. But I still love them.

I am going to chew on this some more, but suffice it to say, I am biting my tongue over here and it is getting a bit uncomfortable. We shall see what happens.

The TV-Netflix Adventures of Davey Wayne

Homicide:Life on the Streets Season 1 - Ghost of a chance

The murder of Adena Howard went on to become a intermittent focal point for the entirety of the show's run. It serves as a testament to the realness of the show. Now I have to figure out what sex "iguana style" is.

Things Black folk Say Vols 1 and 2

She was just

incredible," Blige noted. "The things
we have in common is that we both

move people, we're about truth, we

stand up for what we believe in and

we have morals at the end of the day.

Her husband was managing her, and my

husband manages me, and we're people

that are not afraid to walk through the
fire. Nina Simone was vocally incredible;
he just gave you those goose bumps."

Mary J. Blige, who is starring in a biopic based on the life of Nina Simone


"I've got mad love for Tyler, he's someone who's become

a force. When he was trying to get that

film made, people were telling him,
'Black people who go to church don't

go to movies,' and that type of stuff.
He didn't take that or let it stop him,

and he's been a box office king. So
hopefully people will use him as an

example, if you have a vision and you're
driven, no matter who you are, black,

white, Latino, Asian, you get your
stuff done."

Spike Lee on Tyler Perry

from EUR

Nuclear Fusion ain't easy, y'all

Yanno, There isn't a day that goes by when I don't thank God my mother raised me the way she did. Not that I have any claims on perfection, it is just that I feel like she raised me to be responsible, even if I do not always show it.

The unfortunate thing is that she raised me to please my woman, which means a whole lot of

"that sounds good."
"whatever you wanna do is fine"
"what you wanna eat?"
"I got it, don't worry about it"

Now that in and of itself isn't a problem. The problem is when what SHE wants, isn't what is best for US. The fact that there isn't quite an us, yet. soooooooo her being the strong independent sista she is, the very idea of some nigga telling her "no." is a problem. She, of course, denies this, saying it isnt no...it is HOW I said no that is the issue. Frankly, I find that laughable.

I do not back down from this challenge. I embrace it. I say:

Bring it on.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. (I Cor 13 4:10)

Ok...I am going to stop before I say something I regret.

The Ongoing TV-Netflix Adventures of Davey Wayne

Davey Wayne is my newest nickname, compliments of my soon-to-be-better-half(Her or She)
I have taken a liking to it, therefore whenever I refer to myself in the third person, that is the name I will use.

In celebrating ONE FULL YEAR without Cable, I am persisting through the remaining 3 months or so by indulging in the magic of TV on DVD through the wonder that is Netflix. Whenever I get a free 45 minutes or so I will settle down and watch an episode of one of the great television series of my generation....first up....

Homicide Life on the Streets(Season 1): Gone for Goode(featuring a really young Steve Harris)

Continuing to raise the bar...on CPTime

From EUR

*BET News wait...they still have a NEWS department? What the **** for? will explore the “down low” phenomenon within the black community on a special program airing March 28. The documentary “Down Low Exposed” will look into the secret world of heterosexual black men, some with wives and girlfriends, who also have sex with men. The program explores a variety of angles linked to the topic, including the impact that men having sex with men while in prison is having on the spread of HIV/AIDS; and the cultural taboo policy of “don’t ask, don’t tell” in the black church. The program begins at 10 p.m. ET/PT.


When you get scooped by Oprah by SEVERAL years on a topic of interest to African-Americans what does that say?

Straight from the HorsesAss' Mouth

snatched from Salon.com's War Room

The things he said today

Tens of thousands of words have been written about George W. Bush's press conference Tuesday. We think it's time to let the man speak for himself. Without further ado, then, here are excerpts from the president's talk in Wheeling, W.Va., today:

"My purpose is to share with you what's on my mind and then I look forward to hearing what's on yours ... I'm the commander in chief. I'm also the educator in chief. And I have a duty to explain how and why I make decisions, and that's part of the reason I'm here."

"I knew that the farther we got away from Sept. 11, 2001, the more likely it would be that some would forget the lessons of that day. And that's OK. That's OK ... And it's fine that people forget the lessons, but one of my jobs is to constantly remind people of the lessons."

"When I was coming up in the '50s in Midland, Texas, you know, it seemed like we were pretty safe. In the '60s it seemed like we were safe. In other words, conflicts were happening overseas but we were in pretty good shape at home."

"The most important responsibility of the commander in chief ... is to defend the citizens of this country. That is our most vital and important responsibility. I have never forgotten that from September the 11th on."

"By the way, if the president says something, he better mean it, for the sake of peace. In other words, you want your president out there making sure that his words are credible."

"There's an interesting debate in the world, is whether or not freedom is universal, see, whether or not -- you know, there's old Bush imposing his values. See, I believe freedom is universal ... The way I put it was, there is an almighty God. One of the greatest gifts of that almighty God is the desire for people to be free, is freedom."

"I'm finding out what went wrong. In other words, one of the things you better make sure of when you're the president, you're getting good intelligence. "

"Iraq is a part of the global war on terror. In other words, it's a global war."

"And I can understand people saying, 'Man, it's all going to -- you know, it's not working out.'"

"Oops -- not through yet. A little early on the clap."

"Thank goodness Laura isn't here; she would be giving me the hook."

"De Tocqueville, who's a French guy, came in 1832 and recognized and wrote back -- wrote a treatise about what it means to go to a country where people have -- associate voluntarily to serve their communities."

"My buddies come from up from Texas ... And they come up from Texas and they're, kind of, looking at you, like, 'Man, are you OK?' Yes, you know. And I tell them, I say, you know, 'I can't tell you what an honor it is to do this job.' They often ask, 'What's the job description?' I say, 'Making decisions.' And I make a lot."

"Just got to keep talking. Word of mouth, there's blogs, there's Internet, there's all kinds of ways to communicate, which is literally changing the way people are getting their information."

"First, I hope that your generation will lead -- no doubt, your generation will lead. Generations, when called, somehow find the courage to lead. That's step one. Two, I think you'll be dealing in a world in which you will be confronted with making values choices; for example, family -- understanding that the family is an important aspect of society. Secondly, the choice of life. You know, for example, you'll be confronted with a very difficult debate between science, on the one hand, and the hopes of science, and life. That debate is just beginning. In other words, 'Do you destroy life to save life?' for example, is one of the very difficult debates that your generation will be confronted with ..."

"Anyway, you'll be confronted with some stuff. Hopefully, our job is to make sure you're confronted with less issues, like being hooked on oil. One of the issues that we're confronting with now that I hope you'll not have to confront with is jobs going elsewhere because we don't have the math and science skills and engineering skills and physics skills that are taught to our children here."

"I wish I could stay longer to answer your questions. I can't. I've got to go back to D.C. You know, I'm not necessarily saying I would rather be in D.C. than here. I'd rather be here than there, but nevertheless, that's what my life dictates. God bless you all."

Never let your mouth get ahead of your brain

STLtoday - News - St. Louis City / County: "


“She’s just got a patent resume, of somebody that’s got such serious skill,” “She loves football, she’s African-American, which would kind of be a big coon, a big coon – oh my God, I am totally, totally, totally, totally, totally sorry for that, OK? I didn’t mean that. That was just a slip of the tongue.” Lenihan later said he meant to use the word 'coup.'"


There really isn't much more to add to this. Other than:


Dude, your mouth doesn't make mistakes like that unless it is used to doing it.

And...


Shame on me for actually thinking that white folk had stopped calling us "coon". I assumed they had all settled on "those people" and nigger.

This fool bet not EVER be allowed in front of a live microphone again.

You'll be sorry...No, he won't, Helen.

W*USA 9 News - Helen Thomas Versus The President (make sure to watch the video)


So, After about 4 years, President Bush calls on Helen Thomas, who has been covering presidents since JFrigginK was in office. She used to ALWAYS ask the first question, (hell, I remember that when I watched the Reagan PCs, but I was an odd child so don't read too much into that), but after quitting UPI when Rev. Moon bought it, she pretty much got the shaft.

Anyhow, for whatever reason, W decides to call on her...and the rest really should be heard or seen for yourself.

Whatever your opinion of their exchange...You can be sure W wasn't the least bit sorry about it, aside from the fact that for 45 seconds, he had to be the most uncomfortable man on the planet.

A few words from the Secretary of Offense

My father(RIP) was a "big picture cat".

Channels his late father in a 1978 Conversation completely out of nowhere

Big picture cats, dave,
they take small pieces and analyze them
break them down and see how they can fit.
Then they piece them together

Me: Like a puzzle?

Naw, Dave. Think three dimensions...Like your legos

Me: I don't have any Legos, Dad. Legos frustrate me, Dad.

*shakes his head*
you know what I mean, you're too smart not to.
You aint layin carpet, man, you building a building
gotta have your foundation, then you go up from there.

Me: Like three dimensions?

Yeah, I knew you would get it. You a big picture cat, too,
better than me though
Your mind is too sharp
You should be able to piece together stuff a lot faster than me
I got all that music shit in my head.
I didn't read up like I should have when I was a little cat, like you.

When I got older, and found myself grasping it. This is ONE world...all the pieces fit. Like a great big If-then statement.

(I wrote that about 2 months ago....It has been sitting there waiting for daddy to come home to it. Here I am)

Something happened yesterday that rarely happens to me. With a background in politics, offending people accidentally is something I just don't do. As I tell the little crumbsnatchers I work with:

If you get offended, trust me, It was purely intentional, and I am NOT sorry in the least. You are young, use this verbal ass-whooping to grow.

My betrothed and one of her better friends were at the shrimp plantation and I was still chewing on THIS article. Seeing as they were both single accomplished childless sisters (although in a manner of days one will be much less single than the other) I launch into the following soliloquy linking the ongoing plight of the Black Male to the inherent evil that is the war in Iraq.

" I don't think we really understand what is happening. At some point, aggressive actions have to be taken and we have to do whatever is necessary to save these boys before it is too late. It is bad enough our generation is already deep in peril. And the tragedy is that we act like it's ok. I mean I struggle with the two or three jobs I have not because I lack ability or intelligence or even a good resume. I just can't get market value because I didn't finish college. Imagine a culture in which more than HALF it's men don't even finish HIGH SCHOOL. Then you factor in the soon to come return of YET ANOTHER generation of soldiers scarred on the outside and the inside with the wounds of a war easily avoided. That is probably the undoing of our generation. How many young brothers watched their fathers come home mere shells of themselves from Vietnam? Or did some crazy stuff to get out of going to Vietnam...or whatever.

So what are the options? Our PARENTS generation profited from being in the military. Who wants to be a part of this now? And it isnt the military...it is those who direct them. The only folk OVER there are folk trying to gather up money to make a better life for themselves. And the war they lose their lives and bodies and minds over is...."


Somewhere in the midst of this monologue(and I was JUST getting warmed up good), A lil crumbsnatcher says to me


in a little sheepish voice: "I am sorry but my table is offended by the conversation at your table"

Now here is the kicker...

I didn't even GET to the anti-war part, which while patently true and (should be) inoffensive, can be a bit divisive to the small-minded and myopically patriotic. I only got as far as

"I just can't get market value because I didn't finish college."

Being a good employee (and wanting to avoid the urge to verbally slay someone in the presence of my baby, who would have supported me, but would have hated to see me go righteous black man to the point of losing his well-paying but demeaningly simpleminded side gig) I stopped the conversation in its tracks and moved on to the special.

Then the whole thing gnawed at me...like one of those mosquitoes you swat but keeps sucking your blood long after you have smacked the life out of it.


WHAT THE HELL WAS HE SO OFFENDED ABOUT??????


Then it all made sense to me. Ole boy (typical white blue collar texan btw) lives a life free from such analysis. It is easy to presume that the state of the black man is solely his own fate.

That we do what we do because we are just that way...

That there is nothing that can be done...that SHOULD be done

That things are BETTER for everyone.


To hear otherwise is offensive.


Well, guess what, Jim Bob?

I am sorry you are too insulated and self-absorbed to understand that all our boats rise or fall together. That you lack the enlightened self-interest (to coin a conservative phrase) to see how addressing this problem will prevent many of the ills of American society.

What grieves me MOST, however, is that you will never, EVER see the truth for what it is because you refuse to give that voice an audience. You like most Americans, white, black and otherwise hued, live a lie.

I refuse to, and furthermore, I refuse to apologize for my unwillingness to do so.

Will Senator Barack Obama Be Loved Tomorrow? - New York Times

Will Senator Barack Obama Be Loved Tomorrow? - New York Times

We need to pray for this man. When a brotha starts drawing comparisons to JFK, it is time to start calling on the Lord.

How Harvard could share the wealth - Los Angeles Times

How Harvard could share the wealth - Los Angeles Times

Now HERE is an idea I could get behind. I told my mother I wasn't going to apply to Harvard because if I got in, I would rob and steal to make sure I got to go and not put too much of a burden on her. Even though they would probably pay for everything, I would still have been the poorest negro for miles and I didn't wanna put my mother through that hassle. I applied to Princeton instead, got in and told them a polite "No".

Funny thing is, almost 20 years later..the sticker price for a year at Harvard looks a LOT like what I told Uncle Sam I made last year.

I'll file this in the "and the establishment says: GTFOHWTBS" category.

Pick for Interior Said to Show More Charm Than Substance - Los Angeles Times

Pick for Interior Said to Show More Charm Than Substance - Los Angeles Times

Stop me if you have heard THIS before...a Bush appointee who lacks the wherewithall to do the job but is an overall nice guy who endears himself to everyone...

On my way to church...

The book I would spend my money on if I had the time or money to spend reading it.

it would be worth it just to read a reputable political scientist write this:

The American press in the first days of the Iraq war reported extensively on the Pentagon's failure to post American troops in front of the National Museum in Baghdad, which, as a result, was looted of many of its great archaeological treasures. Less widely reported, but to Phillips far more meaningful, was the immediate posting of troops around the Iraqi Oil Ministry, which held the maps and charts that were the key to effective oil production. Phillips fully supports an explanation of the Iraq war that the Bush administration dismisses as conspiracy theory — that its principal purpose was to secure vast oil reserves that would enable the United States to control production and to lower prices. ("Think of Iraq as a military base with a very large oil reserve underneath," an oil analyst said a couple of years ago. "You can't ask for better than that.") Terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, tyranny, democracy and other public rationales were, Phillips says, simply ruses to disguise the real motivation for the invasion.


I Guess the unpatriotic pinko commie bastards weren't so crazy and wrong after all.

Things you just cannot make up

The president was pitching the Medicare prescription drug plan at an event in Maryland Wednesday when someone in the audience asked him a question about the different rates hospitals charge for patients with or without insurance.

Bush started strong. "This guy has got a great question," he said, "because, really, what he's talking about is transparency in pricing." But then the president tried to move into the world of metaphor, and the wheels started coming off pretty quickly. "When you go buy a car, you know exactly what they're going to charge you," Bush said. The comment drew laughs from seniors in the audience who've apparently spent more time at car dealerships than their commander in chief. "Well, sometimes you don't know," Bush said. The seniors laughed some more. "Well, you negotiate with them," Bush said. More laughs. "Well, " Bush said, "they put something on the window that says price."

ESPN.com - WC - Lester out from behind desk to get behind wheel

ESPN.com - WC - Lester out from behind desk to get behind wheel

I am adding Mr. Lester to my list of heroes. Who says dreams are for children?

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain and read this

If you don't think this is the least bit funny...You need to check in and have your sense of humor examined for paralysis. I am off somewhere kicking around dust in my fortress of solitude and will return as soon as the things start making sense.

Reading-Too-Much-Into-Things Comprehension.

BY GEOFF HAGGERTY

stolen from HERE

All questions will have more than one correct answer. Please choose the BEST response for each question.

Paragraph A:

Her leg brushed up against yours.

Questions 1-24 will be based on Paragraph A.

1. Did she do that on purpose?
a) Yes.
b) No.
c) Maybe.
d) Don't know.

2. Why would she do that?
a) She still loves you.
b) She still likes you.
c) She still wants to have sex with you.
d) She still wants you to think one of the above.

3. Wait. Did she even notice it?
a) Maybe.
b) It doesn't look like it.
c) She's just pretending not to notice.
d) Don't know.

4. Maybe she did it subconsciously?
a) She wants you back.
b) She feels what you feel and doesn't know how to express it either. You can learn together.
c) Maybe.
d) No, she did it on purpose.

5. She's probably just teasing you.
a) Probably.
b) No, she wouldn't do that.
c) Maybe she did it to tease you but forgot how much it would hurt you and regretted it immediately.
d) Maybe.

6. Why would she do that?
a) To give herself an ego boost.
b) Always liked to see you suffer.
c) Because she can and she knows you can't do anything about it. Not can't. Won't.
d) Don't know.

7. Her leg is still touching yours.
a) Ooh!
b) She's evil.
c) She probably thinks it's just the table leg.
d) Don't know.

8. Now she's waggling it up and down.
a) Oh my God.
b) She's evil.
c) She definitely thinks it's just the table leg.
d) It's more of a nervous tremble than a waggle.

9. Should you move your leg away?
a) Yes.
b) Yes, but it feels so good.
c) Maybe.
d) Just don't know.

10. She probably doesn't even notice.
a) She has to notice.
b) Move it anyway, to show that you're being considerate, even if she doesn't notice.
c) But wouldn't moving it make her notice your legs were touching and then she might think that you put your leg there on purpose?
d) Grah! Don't know!

11. Isn't that a little weird that you want to keep your leg touching hers?
a) Yes.
b) YES.
c) She smells amazing.
d) Yes.

12. But is it really weird? You're a human being after all.
a) Yeah, but aren't we supposed to be more civilized?
b) Tactile comfort is essential according to Harry Harlow.
c) Yes and barely.
d) Don't frickin' know.

13. Why isn't she making eye contact?
a) She notices your dumb leg.
b) Because you've been thinking about your dumb leg instead of talking to her.
c) You're ugly.
d) Honestly, at this point you need to get your life in order before worrying about small things like that.

14. She's probably thinking about someone else.
a) Definitely.

15. Someone better than you.
a) Yup.

Vocabulary

16. In this paragraph, what does "brushed up against" mean?
a) gently grazed
b) banged clumsily into
c) kicked
d) might not have brushed up against

True/False. Indicate whether the following statements are true or false.

17. You're too good for her.
18. Even if she asked you back you would say no.
19. You're probably not ready for a relationship right now anyway.
20. She's gotten fat.
21. You shouldn't have to pay, right? She invited you.

Essay questions:

22. What's wrong with you?
23. When will things start going your way?
24. Get a job.

Paragraph B:

She just asked what your friend Jake was up to lately.

Just here long enough to post my picks

Just swinging by to post my brackets. More on all this and my whereabouts tonight.


Atlanta Bracket
Duke
George Washington Duke
Texas A&M
LSU Texas A&M Texas A&M
West Virginia
Iowa WVU Texas
California
Texas Texas Texas

Oakland Bracket
Memphis Memphis
Arkansas
Pittsburgh Pittsburgh Pitttsburgh
Kansas
San Diego State Gonzaga Pittsburgh
Gonzaga
Marquette UCLA UCLA
UCLA

Minneapolis Bracket
Villanova Villanova Boston College
Arizona
Nevada
Boston College Boston College Boston College
Oklahoma
Florida Florida
Georgetown Georgetown Georgetown
Ohio State

Washington DC Bracket
UConn UCONN UCONN
UAB
Washington Illinois UConn
Illinois
Michigan State
North Carolina North Carolina North Carolina
Wichita State Wichita State
Tennessee








Texas Over Pittsburgh
Boston College over Connecticut

TEXAS OVER BOSTON COLLEGE
completing the rare double of Football and Basketball National Championships in the same year. You will NEVER shut their fans up again.


As I said...more on all this later.

Some Jokes write themselves.

So much for my dream of writing for VIBE...My spelling isn't good enough.

'What Jesus Meant,' by Garry Wills - The New York Times Book Review - New York Times

'What Jesus Meant,' by Garry Wills - The New York Times Book Review - New York Times

Here is a book I will be bargain hunting for. I have always been on a mission in regards to just what my ideology is regarding my faith. I have never seen it as cut and dry as the ministers I sat under. I am curious to see what this man has to say.

Since I am too tired to write....ill just jack something from somewhere else...part one of a continuing series.

Real live quotes from Insurance reports

Car Accidents:

• "A pedestrian hit me and went under my car."

• "The other car collided with mine without giving warning of its intention."

• "I had been learning to drive with power steering. I turned the wheel to what I thought was enough and found myself in a different direction going the opposite way."

• "Coming home, I drove into the wrong house and collided with a tree I don't have."

• "I thought my window was down; but found it was up when I put my hand through it."

• "No one was to blame for the accident, but it never would have happened if the other driver had been alert."

• "The pedestrian had no idea which direction to go, so I ran over him."

• "I saw the slow-moving, sad-faced old gentleman as he bounced off the hood of my car."

• "I had been driving for 40 years when I fell asleep at the wheel and had an accident."

• "I was taking my canary to the hospital. It got loose in the car and flew out the window. The next thing I saw was his rear end, and there was a crash."

• "I was backing my car out of the driveway in the usual manner when it was struck by the other car in the same place where it had been struck several times before."

• "The indirect cause of this accident was a little guy in a small car with a big mouth."

• "The accident happened when the right door of a car came around the corner without giving a signal."

• "I was thrown from my car as it left the road. I was later found in a ditch by some stray cows."

• "I had been shopping for plants all day and was on my way home. As I reached an intersection, a hedge sprung up, obscuring my vision."

• "I was on the way to the doctor with rear end trouble when my universal joint gave way causing me to have an accident."

• "I was sure the old fellow would never make it to the other side of the road when I struck him."

• "I told the police that I was not injured, but on removing my hat, I found that I had a fractured skull."

• "My wench slipped, losing my balance, and I hurt my back."

• "I was unable to stop in time, and my car crashed into the other vehicle. The driver and passengers then left immediately for a vacation with injuries."

• "To avoid hitting the bumper of the car in front, I struck the pedestrian."

• "The accident occurred when I was attempting to bring my car out of a skid by steering it into the other vehicle."

• "When I could not avoid a collision, I stepped on the gas and crashed into the other car."

• "I collided with a stationary truck coming the other way."

• "In my attempt to kill a fly, I drove into a telephone pole."

• "My car was legally parked as it backed into the other vehicle."

• "As I approached the intersection, a stop sign suddenly appeared in a place where no stop sign had ever appeared before. I was unable to stop in time to avoid the accident."

• "The telephone pole was approaching fast. I was attempting to swerve out of its path when it struck my front end."

• "A truck backed though my windshield and into my wife's face."

• "I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my mother-in-law, and headed over the embankment."

• "The guy was all over the road. I had to swerve a number of times before I hit him."

• "An invisible car came out of nowhere, struck my vehicle, and vanished."

A Friday Quickie

I have so much to say and so little time to say it. I will just file it away with all the other ideas. Austin was...quick. But I learned a lot. And now I am back, Full of ideas and staring down one of those 85 hour work weeks. I will try to bob and weave in and drop a gem or two. 8 Hours total on the road leads to a lot of thoughts and I can't wait to pour them out on the page. In the meantime, enjoy the prelude to March Madness and the faint rumblings of spring.

Many Couples Must Negotiate Terms of 'Brokeback' Marriages - New York Times

Many Couples Must Negotiate Terms of 'Brokeback' Marriages - New York Times

As I embark upon matrimony of my own, these arent the issues that I am facing. I find it interesting that people act like these issues never existed until a movie comes out about it. Let this be a lesson to those of you who doubt the power of media.

Destination: AUSTIN TX

Today I am leaving as we speak for Austin, TX for some government training. I will be back in the metroplex tomorrow night. As such for those of you who came for some needlessly verbose musings disguised as cultural commentary, come back tomorrow. In the meantime for all of you newcomers...i bring you a blast from the past.


Posted 11/18/05

I have been struggling for an analogy that accurately represents my relationship to HipHop. At the tender age of 35, I am fortunate(?) enough to witness practically all of hip-hop history in real time; that is, I wasn't able to string together the entire Run-DMC catalog at my uncle's house and listen to it all in one day. I had to actually LIVE through the 15 yrs from Run-DMC to Crown Royal(yes, as a matter of fact they DID record an album in 1999, although for the life of me I cannot remember ANYTHING on it). Thusly, just as I do not attempt to enlighten those who came of age during the Motown years as to the context and subtext of the music that became the soundtrack of their life, I get a bit annoyed at those who came before or after us claiming to have insight to what the songs of my youth.

The unfaithful lover analogy fails based on the fact that well, while hip-hop does a great many things for me, get my dick hard is not one of them. Hip-Hop is truly a male organism, so the lover analogy just won't do.

HipHop is a lot like my sibling, my actual real life sibling in fact.

Immensely talented, endlessly creative, yet lazy as hell.

Charismatic(far moreso than yours truly), yet always using it as a crutch to escape situations of his own making. Situations easily avoided with just a hint of maturity.

Reminds me of all that I hold dear and intimate about being who I am, and also reminds me that sometimes, I can be a real ass.

But, like HipHop, he is family, and family is all you have.

And like my brother...I will NEVER forsake him, nor will I stand idly by and let him make a fuckin mess of his life because he is on some old stupid shit.

Something about hip-hop and family always makes me cuss. Go Figure.

Pouring a little out for....

Gordon Parks (1912-2006)


Live and learn, brothers and sisters. One of the enduring failures of our culture is that we do not appreciate the true giants of our people until they die. This man is a giant of the media whose value to the continuing struggle of African-Americans to present their own story cannot be over-emphasized.

Quotes by Gordon Parks

Many times I wondered whether my achievement was worth the loneliness I experienced, but now I realize the price was small.

I had known poverty firsthand, but there I learned how to fight its evil - along with the evil of racism - with a camera.

You know, the camera is not meant just to show misery.

Didn't I tell yall to leave it alone and move on?

It has been almost 24 hours since my last Oscar post. I was hoping to pour a little out for Kirby Puckett, but clearly he is going to have to wait. There is pressing business.

Let me state, for the record, That I, categorically, without question, that I am no fan of 3-6 Mafia.

I am a hip-hop head who acknowledges them for the place they hold in the lexicon of the music. The next 3-6 mafia album I buy will be the first, and that would only be if I was ON it. Seeing that for the unlikeliness that it is, I will move on to my point:


What the hell are ya'll so mad about? This is a FICTIONAL MOVIE ABOUT A PIMP. Boys and Girls, Pimps still walk the earth. As long as men exchange currency for cum-n-see, there will be pimps there to facilitate the exchange. I will spare you the seldom elaborated premise that the very idea of criminalizing prostitution, in THIS oversexed Society is the very height of hypocrisy and futility.

I don't have time for all that.

Nor do I have time for all the weeping and gnashing of teeth over the imagery celebrated in the movies.

Yes, I understand that we as a people have serious issues with the images that represent us. And I have been at the forefront of holding young people's feet to the fire when they abdicate their responsibility to keep their guard up at all times, because the second they let their guard down, those who lay in wait for ammunition for their Weapons of Mass character assassination and destruction program.

My issue is that we focus on the very things that matter the least.

It matters not to me that a movie about a pimp was highlighted as basically the pre-eminent Black themed movie of the year by those who make such things matter.

It DOES matter to me that we sit idly by when REAL LIVE HO-SLAPPIN PIMPS are actual celebrities, complete with pimp cups and the like.

It DOES matter to me when black radio personalities complain about the images held in esteem by the Academy, but do NOTHING about the images they put out there every 9.3 minutes by playing music that appeals to our most base and primal urges.

*********************************DISCLAIMER**************************************
Let the record show that the author enjoys the random song about shaking ones ass. The author wishes it wasn't on where impressionable children could hear it.

Over


And Over



And Over again.

*********************************END DISCLAIMER**********************************


The unfortunate reality is that DJay was the one of the most PROVACTIVE movie characters I saw this year, For the record I saw some 38 movies this year in theaters. I am not sure I would have given him the nod over Russell Crowe's character in Cinderella Man, but I am sure it was a worthy nomination. He lost to a worthy winner in Phillip Seymour Hoffman's Capote. His career is finally on it's way. What people fail to realize is that the Academy has a thing for bad guys, be it Anthony Hopkins' Hannibal Lecter or Marlon Brando's Don Corleone or Denzel Washington's ____________(insert rogue cop's name here)

To encounter Terence Howard in person (which I have) you would never suspect that DJay lied within him. That, ladies and gentlemen, is acting, and that is what the Academy Awards celebrate.

If you think the Academy Awards gives a warm piss in a cold pot about the relevance and authenticity of Black images in film, you are likely mistaken. They choose from the pool of movies given them.

Are the Academy Awards perfect?

Hardly.

They are what they are, a collection of human preferences, given weight by their standing in the industry.

Expecting the Academy to preside over the authenticity of Black Images in Film is like expecting the dean of Harvard Law School to exhibit concern over whether or not the teachers in your child's elementary school are up to snuff.

When we stop pushing off the responsibility for Black Images on other folk all the while using our wallets to reward the very images we decry at the expense of the images we wish to see, you will see a marked change in those images.

Progress? or a sign of the apocalypse?

Stop.


Step away from the ledge. It isn't worth it.

So they won...life goes on.

Say it with me:

Academy award winning hip-hop group 3-6 Mafia.

There...now let it go. In a month you won't even remember it happened. Now let me move on.

It's funny how folk wanna whine and complain about the images we see on the big screen, when they choices they make reinforce those images.

I saw a fabulous movie about love and race and the trials of a Black Professional woman. This movie was the first movie EVER marketed commercially for wide release with a Black Female STAR, WRITER, DIRECTOR and PRODUCER. This movie is dying a horrible death, not because of bad reviews, not because of poor performances, but because of the volatility of the central premise of the movie.

Is the idea of a successful black woman falling for a white guy so morally repugnant that you wont go see a movie about it, even if it looks good?

We line up for movies about crooked cops and pimps, cross dressing pistol packing grandmothers who tell fart jokes and smoke weed, and make these movies #1. but let a sista fall for some white dude and the boycott kicks in. Did it look that uninteresting? Did the character not seem realistic? Do you think there are too many romantic comedies built around positive Black female characters? What was it?

in one month, Something New has grossed 11.4 million dollars. I have yet to find anyone who saw the movie who didn't like it. I thought it was as well written a movie in that genre as I have encountered.

By Comparison, Pink Panther has grossed 69 Million Dollars, Big Mommas House 2- 67M, and Madea has done 48 million.

Something New will surely drop out of theaters after this coming Thursday to make way for the new slate of movies.

Will that writer or that director get another chance? I paged through multiple emails encouraging me to watch Jamie Foxx on NBC because the good people at General Electric wanted to lose money because he chose to have a lot of Black Folk on his show.

Where was the outrage about the lack of support for Something New.

I want to discuss things from the movie...but I doubt anyone here saw it.

I am a bit frustrated now. I love movies. I hate the state of Black Movies at this point and I am starting to think we get the kinds of black movies we deserve.

That is the crulest fate of all.

How hard IS it for a pimp?

DailyBulletin.com - News

At some point, We who still claim hip-hop amongst our kinfolk have to address the questions raised and haphazardly answered by the author of this article.

How much misogyny and violence can a chid hear before she/he starts to inhabit the roles played out on the Radio/TV

Flashback: A peek inside myself

At times, I look back on stuff I wrote about me and wonder if it is still true. I wrote this about 4 years ago. It is more true now than it was when I wrote it.

I am a man who has accumulated many talents

in this life. Through hard work and

natural God given ability, I have been able

to explore the mysteries of life from many

perspectives. It is from that that I derive

my passion to be a writer. Since I was very

young, I latched onto the power of the

written word and never let go. Although

lured away in adolescence by a society

infatuated with technology and science, I

returned to my first passion with a

vengeance in August of 2001. Since then I

have written as a way to bring a voice to

the roiling intellect that I have always

known to dwell within me. This intellect is

my trademark, it is what distinguishes me,

but not what defines me.



What defines me is my capacity to love.

The love that I brandish is rare in any man,

but unheard of from an intellectual. Love

is not something to be thought about. True

love lacks rational explanation or

indisputable logic and usually doesn’t make

good sense. Since I was barely able to

grasp the subtle nuance of a loving glance

from one man to a woman, God has navigated

me through life gathering object lessons to

create a delicate balance to allow for my

ability to love fearlessly and without

boundaries to peacefully coexist with an

intellect that craves order and logic.



It is often said that people fear that which

they do not understand. People fear the

power of love, and that is why so many are

without it. When they do encounter it, they

are so awed by its power that they dispute

its very existence, denial in its purest

form.

Yup...that's me.

In case you STILL haven't Seen it.

This is the updated link to find the State of the Black Union 2006 in its 3 part entirety on C-Span


It is my hope that you have made an honest attempt to watch this. for Good or bad. Even though I am a dedicated cynic, I have an honest hope that this forum will serve as a tipping point to move us from complacency to action.

I guess this IS the next movement...I'm in

Those of you who don't know me know that I have not spared the rod with Tavis Smiley. As I watch and listen to the State of the Black Union 2006 (which is STILL able to be seen on demand on the C-Span Website) I am led to let up on the brother, to the point where I won't even recite all the things about him that previously annoyed me. Bygones.

Tavis may have succeeded in finally taking the next step.

I hope.

But hope springs eternal, so we go forward.

I just bought a book with Tavis Smiley's name on it. My mother, my ex-wife, or my future wife will tell you that I must be serious about something if I put some money on it and ride with the likes of Mr. Smiley, and Rev. Sharpton and Rev. Jackson. I am taking this in the most serious and most responsive stance possible.

• I have turned off my music until I finish watching the State of the Black Union.
  
• I will read no other book once this book arrives until I finish it.
  
• I will put aside ALL previous notions about the people's whose names are associated and take this in an objective fashion.
• Operating on the assumption that this Covenant passes muster, I will devote my God-Given Gift to doing my part in spreading this message and articulating its vision as best I can.
  

I feel liberated from my hateration. The hateration that I have carried for Mr. Smiley heretofore almost precluded me from giving this a fair chance. I am grateful God saw fit to clear my mind.

I am in the midst of part two. I will weigh in in full soon.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT!!!!

You can watch the State of the Black Union at ANYTIME by going to the C-SPAN website and clicking on the link for the three parts. it will stream on RealPlayer

Incidentally You can email me @ dparrish2@gmail.com and i will be able to reach out to you directly.

The Next Movement

I have read really nice things about me on the blogs of other folk. I have also begun reading new blogs from powerful minds and hearts. All this while working my ass off. There is finally a crack of daylight in the dark midnight of my personal schedule that is allowing me to press on things that are important to me.

As I type this, I am watching The State of the Black Union on C-Span, (Tavis' little party) It is truly mind boggling the kind of power and the kind of thoughts that spring from that thing every year. apparently it falls on deaf ears.

PLEASE set aside a DAY...(cause that is what it is going to take at EIGHT HOURS) to watch this if you haven't seen it already. Apparently at the end...some book is going to emerge from it and a paradigm for us to follow. I will Be spending considerable time posting and researching on this. I look forward to your input and feedback.

Stay tuned.

Happy Mardi Bah Humbug

I hope Mardi Gras was all it was supposed to be for you.

Mardi Gras has officially rocketed up to the top of the "least favorite Holiday" List. (Father's Day was the previous number one...but I shall not elaborate on why that is right now)

Until I moved to Texas, it was always the day before Ash Wednesday, itself an innocuous enough holiday that features people with ashes on their forehead, acknowledging the fact that they were recently in church, perhaps repenting for how drunk they were and how many times they either earned beads by flashing their boobage or encouraging boobage to be flashed in exchanged for beads, all of which would depend on the amounts of estrogen and testosterone in their bodies. The especially bold sojourned to New Orleans for the largest such celebration in North America.

Of course 2006 has found New Orleans a bit differently than it has been in the past and as a resident of one of the metropolises which absorbed a tremendous number of New Orleanians, Mardi Gras just became a bit more intense. Add to that my continued servitude at the Cajun Shrimp Plantation, and you have the makings of a lucrative, but tiring six day weekend. A six day weekend is no fun when you have to work all the way through it. The money was nice...very nice...but for once I wasn't THAT broke.

All that said; after witnessing Mardi Bah up close, the fact is you would have a tough time explaining to me how productive it is to celebrate 40 days of fasting and consecration by getting hammered and exposing yourself for beads that arent worth the Chinese imported and manufactured beads people throw at you. Or vice versa, in case you thought I was letting the men off the hook.

So much came about to write on but I had barely enough time to stumble across it, much less do the subjects due diligence.

With any luck, the impending quagmire that is Operation Enduring Freedom, Rakim, Vince Young and his test taking adventures, Tyler Perry, the United Arab Emirates and Buck O'Neil will make their appearances very soon.

I am taking my ash to bed now that it is Wednesday.

See you tomorrow.