Here's where I start to sound old.
A twenty nothing, kid with a weak mustache just called me sir. I returned the favor by calling him Sparky and Junior. Sheeesh. Sir?
A lot of has changed in the last twelve years.
I used twelve years because its a good even number, just over a decade, but not forever. I moved to Oakland from the city of Oz, twelve years ago. If you know where the city of Oz is, then you might know of the great Herb Caen. The illogically logical musings of Herb Caen, along with Hunter S, Burroughs, and Henry Miller, are the reason I write. Having been force fed by English teacher parents, a steady diet of reading, and writing a book report, every week during summer vacation, will lead a kid on one of two paths.
I chose the spiritual one.
The columns of Herb Caen, and me having have had the great privilege of growing up reading Herb, has lead me on the romantically, doomed path of the writer. In short I fucking BLOG, dude. It is a catharsis for anger and joy. An outlet for frustration and celebration. Writing is good stuff. Try it. Write your parents. Tell them you love them, or tell them your really pissed off about that thing that happened in third grade. Whatever you do take the time and think your words out. Verse your words of prose with eloquence and charm. Blow their socks off. In their dying days they will remember your letter and at least “think” they raised a good kid.
Obama Tacos.
What the fuck is an Obama Taco?? On the shuttle to the train this morning we passed by a taco stand with a big banner advertising, Obama Tacos. What the Fuck is an Obama Taco? I know what a Bush taco is. I have ate many Bush tacos, and the Bush was always happy I ate the taco. But a fucking Obama Taco??? Does it have pineapple in it? Does it like basketball? This Got me pondering. Never has a political figure become such a marketable consumer product, as Barrack Obama. I wasn't alive for J.F.K. So maybe he was. I remember Billy Beer, but that was Jimmy's brother. Perhaps some lesser known President of yesteryear was also a huge marketing gimmick of their time. Get your Millard Fillmore toothbrush. I don't know. To me its just plan weird, that people want to go around wearing a shirt with the fucking smiling grin of the commander in Chief. I guess I still have that punk rock bad taste for government in my head. I just haven't figured it out, and until I do, I blame the ghetto.
Having pretty much lived in the ghetto for almost twenty years,
( twelve in West Oakland, seven in the Lower Haight, before it was hip.) I can tell you that the denizens of the ghetto, are far and above the BEST consumers EVER. The Ghetto people will buy anything. If you make a liquor and get a rapper to put it in his song, your booze will be a gold mine. If you want your fashion to sell, don't go to Paris or Milan, give that shit away in Compton and the Bronx. Trust me people are watching the ghetto these days. The ghetto is responsible for some pretty amazing things of late. Giant chrome rims that cost four times the piece of crap 1992 Pontiac or Lexus they are on. Ghetto fabulous. Plain white t shirts. Ghetto frivolous.
The sagging pants thing. DID NOT start in the ghetto. It started in San Quentin, and it meant you were another mans personal property.
Why the ghetto kids took that one from prison to street fashion, will remain one of the great mysteries of a generation. Perhaps all those tough looking thugs on the corner are all really gay for each other. Wow.
The ghetto is where all the welfare money is spent on things that are wanted, but not needed. It is where one month you are the coolest kid for having those fresh BAPE shoes, and the next laughed at for having those weak as 08' BAPE's Get with 09' kid and rock some Keds. One week its Nike the next Adidas. (I will always be a three stripes man.) whatever The currant ghetto trend is, it is being bought and not just by the ghetto hip, oh HELL no. Grandma ma has gots to get it too. And if it can be worn by a fourteen ear old. Better make that baby sized as well. Lots of babies in the ghetto. This year they are all wearing Obama onesies.
I will be screening some I HATE MAYONAISE t-shirts very soon. They will be available at every corner licka' sto' in the hood. This time next year, I be a ghetto millionaire. Or at the least a thousandaire. Until next week, Write your parents.
P.S. I think I really fuckin' hate white people.
1 comment:
The Baby Ruth candy bar was named after the infant daughter of one of our presidents--grover cleveland or one of those mid-list prexies. But Obama is definitely a brand. Bush wasn't--but he did get us to buy a few things we didn't need.
I mentioned to a friend who lives in the "hood" (that's white for the ghetto) that conspicuous consumption is a dead end and why do folks in the ghetto go all out for it. His response was "Well, white people got their chance to try it. Now it's OUR turn." It's a point, I suppose. But not much of one.
Great blog.
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