Unbreakable

I can't even imagine a single person on earth who wants to smell like Lamar Odom or Khloe Kardashian. I watch this commercial and I think to myself, "there are so many other people that seem like they would smell better." Jon Hamm, aka Don Draper, comes to mind. I would have said Scarlett Johansson, but I found out last night at an Academy Awards soiree that she's a bit of a "sweat monster." Natalie Portman maybe? Although, every time I think of her, I am reminded of that absolutely retarded thing she does in her bedroom in Garden State. That looks like it smells.

In Lamar's defense, he does look a little shy about being shirtless with Khloe riding him like a horse. He can't make eye contact with the camera, he keeps covering his chest- do you think during the shoot he was imagining Kobe shaking his head "no," then not passing the rock to him when he's wide open for a game winner? I would be. I do lots of things imagining Kobe looking at me. Like right now, I'm typing and I'm thinking "if Kobe were watching me right now, he would be so impressed by my finger speed that I might land a job as his personal emailer." If I couple my job as Kobe's personal emailer, with mine as a professional flu spreader (see below), then land some incredible real estate deals when the market is soaring (see Jerry Buss), I could possibly be in a position to own the Lakers in 20-25 years. All this incredible good fortune because Lamar and Khloe had the foresight to start my career with a horrible fragrance.

Which brings me to the fragrance...any ideas what it smells like? I feel like it might smell like bacon, or a steak burrito wrapped in tin foil. I love Lamar, and am actually kinda into the Kardashian sisters and their wild farting antics. But fuck, I just don't want either rubbing their stink into my neck.

Thursday Night Poetry Jam

For now, I am in a small Lakeshow paradise. I watched most of the game last night through heavy goggles created by Sierra Nevada, shots of Fernet, and a pile of nachos in Silver Lake in a pink Mexican restaurant. Between Kobe fadeaways, I raved about the use of enchilada sauce in the nacho recipe- I highly recommend this little addition for superior nacho flavor. Needless to say, this morning was a little slow going. My brain just recently began to work.

I was going to take some time to discuss Khloe Kardashian, since I recently began following her on twitter. What a fucking mistake. Did you know she saw Monica in concert last night? I know! I don't care either!

Being that I am a little "under the weather," I've decided to start a new weekly blog called "Thursday Night Poetry Jam." I will post a poem, say a few words, then stare at the words for three hours before I go off to my job as a late night bartender. Feel free to stop by, watch me pour a beer, and talk shit.




jesse colin young

if only the dirt outside my window

would sprout youngbloods songs

I have thrown millions of seeds in the rain

across the brittle hard dirt
waiting for blossoms to shine through my ears
and change the weather in my mind

from gray to orange

I want to hear jesse colin young’s voice

surging up through the stems

and blasting out with the petals
a song about sunlight or getting together

a rose

would be more beautiful

if it wore his mustache

it is a mustache that makes me think

of making love at woodstock in 1969
inside the stream

this melodic mustache

made me locate point reyes station
and watch it carefully
on a satellite map
dreaming of living there with the driftwood
out on the edge of california
with animals and coastline
smoking dope with a friend

drawing pictures in the smoke
while he performs songs from the
dirt outside my window

(like a tree in a meadow wind she will bend to take you in makes no difference where you been that's the way she feels about you that's the way she feels about you - J C Y)

Although this poem lacks any type of classical, intellectual formula, I always dug it. I wrote it about five years ago during a time when I was super into The Youngbloods and smoking a healthy amount of grass. I was also trying to create poetry that didn't necessarily tell a story, but painted a picture more or less, of an emotion- that feeling you get when everything aligns in the universe, and the sun sets, and you smile, or conversely, when the world is falling apart, it is cold, and you are frowning. In this case, it's just pure california folk rock love. I love you JCY...

Are You Fucking Kidding Me?

Ordinarily this blog is devoted to all things Lakers that generally don't happen on the court (see "KoPau" etc.). But tonight, after losing to the worst team in the NBA and one of the worst NBA teams of all time, and going for their third straight loss for the third time this season, I have no other option but to vent. I'll make this blog short and sweet...Please Mitch and Phil, do something. At first, I was completely against a trade involving Andrew Bynum. After tonight, why the hell are we hanging on to him?- Terrible performance tonight against players six inches shorter and 80 pounds lighter. Next, can someone hit a shot? I know who can. Carmelo Anthony. Can we throw Ron Artest into that trade for the hell of it? Tonight Bynum and Ron Ron combined for a whopping 9 points. Maybe Denver will hook up a draft pick that can stop dribble penetration and/or block a shot and/or average 9 points a game. I can't even write any more about this. I am physically ill. I need to drink vodka. I feel bad about wearing my Magic Johnson jersey right now. I can't believe Lebron is gonna be in LA this week talking shit to everyone about the demise of the Lakeshow...and he's gonna get away with it...because he's too big and shit. I've seen the Lakers go through a lot of ups and downs in my life, but right now, I am embarrassed to be a Laker fan. Defending champs don't go down like this. That was what the Jacksonless 2004 Lakers were for.

The $125,000 Flu

Yesterday, the Lakers once again were manhandled by a sub-par team in what was yet another embarrassing ass-whooping. But it's not the team's lack of focus against pretty much every team they have played against so far this year that I would like to discuss, nor am I going to bring up the fact that "The Show" has lost 9 of the last 11 against the juggernauts known as the "Charlotte Bobcats." What is really on my mind is Kobe Bryant's flu. If you are as obsessed with the Lakers as I am, you know by now that Kobe gets the flu every year around this time. He always plays through it, sometimes effectively, sometimes ineffectively, as was the case last night. I sat in bed next to my fiancee, who is dying of the flu herself, and watched Kobe sweat and run and jump for thirty minutes wondering how on earth a human could possibly do all of that while deathly ill. I had the same "flu" last week and was only a few hours away from slamming my head between the door and doorjamb of my bedroom, just to feel something else than the pain that was tormenting my entire body, including the soles of my feet. Teesha, my fiancee, cowering underneath the covers, inhaling gallons of Thera-flu watched in amazement as well, until finally she said, "Isn't that a little self-centered of him? Doesn't that put the whole team at risk?" I had never thought about Kobe's flu in relation to the rest of the NBA until that moment. But, after careful consideration, it seemed to me that not only does it put the entire Lakers players and staff at risk of becoming bed-ridden, but it also puts everyone on the court at risk of spending a week or so watching "I Love Lucy" reruns. Which brings me to my point. If it is legal for a player to play with the flu, then why don't we hire someone like, say me, to catch the flu before critical playoff matchups, play three minutes a game sneezing as much as possible on Manu, Dirk, CP3, Durant, and whoever else plans on dismantling our team, and watch as players check themselves out of the game, vomiting on the sidelines, tears in their eyes, fatigued, dehydrated, and crawling towards a bed and Ricky's sweet Cuban voice screaming "Luuuuccccyyyy!" I wouldn't even charge that much- $25,000 per virus, with a bonus for every series we win. It's kind of like when the St. Louis Browns hired that "little person" to play for them so he could get walked every time he was at the plate. I smell a "five-peat." ...and a new six figure salary.

Bedazzled Mama Allen

Last night, Ray Allen became the NBA's all-time leader in 3-pointers made, beating out Reggie "Spike Lee Joint" Miller for the crown. But I don't give a shit. Is it strange that both of these men are absolute dickheads? I think three point shooters have Napoleon complexes- it's like they can't dribble, crossover, and posterize centers, so they stand behind the line and crank out 3's all night. It's a personality trait more than anything else. Of course, it just could have something to do with how they are raised. Did it seem strange to anyone that Ray Allen's mom, Flo Allen, was allowed to walk onto the court at TD Banknorth immediately following the big "3-pointer" during the television timeout to hug Reggie Miller and kick it with her son on the bench? First off, I don't even let my mom come behind the bar when I bartend. Second, does Reggie Miller have any idea who this woman is? I felt bad for Ray's wife who had to stay in her seat during the whole fiasco, holding on to all their kids, clapping and smiling while Flo pranced around the Garden with her bedazzled "MOM ALLEN" jersey on. I understand she's a proud mother, but she practically got as much face-time as her son, who actually did something incredible. I don't know, it just doesn't seem fair that Flo gets court access, and poor Jack Nichølson has to sit peacefully in his seat, cursing at the officials from a safe distance. I say if anyone deserves to be on the court hugging dudes and giving props, it's Jack. The Lakers have Easy Rider, The Shining, and One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest. The Celtics have an annoying mother with a bad sense of fashion. I think we all know who won this one.

KoPau! and Where I Fit into the Lakers Market Share

Last night's heartbreaking loss to the NBA's best team, the San Antonio Spurs, on a last second tip-in by Antonio McDyess should be the topic of discussion for just about every Lakers blog on the planet today. That's exactly why I'm not going to discuss it. We've more important things to cover about the lakers- like this Total Recall rendering of what a half Kobe/half Pau cyborg would look like. I'm not sure who the absolute genius is over there in Lakerland who puts these incredible graphics together, not to mention the auteur who oversees the Christmas videos, but I'd just like to say, "Fuck yeah." This particular image, for some reason, brings to mind the the AFI top twenty film Weird Science, that scene where the motorcycle gang terrorizes Wyatt and Gary's super awesome party. If they ever remaster that classic film, I know I'd like to see this 6'9", half mohawk animal running wild across the screen slam-dunking Anthony Michael Hall in a toilet somewhere.

Time, History, Poetics

I wrote this poem about five years ago and recently came across it, dusted it off, polished it a bit, and tried to remember what I was doing back then. And I'm glad I'm not doing it any more. Nonetheless, our experiences today are the books five years from now, when they make sense.


LOVE, but with arthur lee


I saw shapes of worried phrases
heavy twisting question marks
and helpless bleeding punctuation
passing through your eyes this sunset
as you fingered the needle
on the record player
and clung to side one
of my LOVE album
1. ALONE AGAIN OR
2. A HOUSE IS NOT A MOTEL
3. ANDMOREAGAIN
4. THE DAILY PLANET
5. OLD MAN
6. THE RED TELEPHONE
it reads like a cryptic fortune cookie of our relationship

I stared out the window
in a daylong silence that dried my tongue
refusing to speak
hoping you would leave

you glanced for a moment
through the same window
expecting to see
the white naked breasts
of my beautiful neighbor
just visible above the blooming rosebushes
seducing me with her ribs
an apple in her hand
her eyes shooting into mine
blue lasers cutting you out like cataracts

but there was nothing
you couldn’t see into the window of my eyes
past the thorns between my ears

Snarky

Do you ever read over an email or a letter and change your voice or the inflections of your words so that the entire tone of the correspondence changes? For example does this sentence sound snarky to you- like something a rich kid from New England with a go-cart track in his backyard would say now that he is "roughing it" as an artist in the Lower East Side?

"I have an impeccable work ethic, a healthy tolerance for cocktails, and a rotating wardrobe of beat-up vintage Levi’s, all of which I’d like to someday display for you."

It's like I look at it and I see Rob Lowe in Saint Elmos Fire. But it's me. It's meant to be mildly entertaining. Or am I crazy for changing the voice in my head when I read? Strange that I just finished a novel about a guy who has "funny schizophrenia."

Ron Ron, Gone Gone? Trade Rumors Swirl Around The City of Angels

Every time Ron Artest gets the ball, I say out loud, "Please don't shoot that Ron." I even said it during Game 7 last year- He proved me wrong. Once. In all fairness, his shot has proven me wrong 40% of the time this season, which is not bad when you compare it to a certain Laker legend by the name of Smush Parker who dropped a little better than 40% of his buckets in his career in the purple and gold. It's cool. Smush is now playing with Iraklis Thessaloniki, the last-place team in Greece. I bet if Mitch Kupchak plays his cards right, he could probably land Smush, the Serbian powerhouse and former Washington State Cougar Nikola Koprikiva, and a Grecian league First rounder for Ron. This trade deadline could change basketball internationally forever.