Khaki is the new trash

I have a dilemma. I'm starting a new job soon. It will be the first job where I will be required to wear business casual attire daily.

Don't get me wrong. I can dress. I used to gear it up for work with absolutely no justifiable reason, back when I could wear a ballcap and shorts on summer days because I worked in the sports department.

I have enough of business casual wear to last a month if not longer. But that's not the problem.

Problem: I still have Khaki pants in my closet. I never - and I mean never - wear Khaki. But I need to get rid of them, all five pair. Like, yesterday.

I have about 20 pair of slacks. But I already know that on some random Tuesday I will long to slip back into that comfortable, yet sturdy feel of the Khaki, one different from the any other pant. I'll want to wear them to work. But I can't.

To understand why I this would be an egregious error to my style I must take you back, back into time.

The school year was 1993-94. Rayon and Silk button-down shirts were the in styles for the black man. But we ran into a problem that abruptly ended this fad. You couldn't sweat in either fabric. If you did, you would ruin said shirt and no girl who saw you with that shirt on would talk to you. Oh they would talk, but it would be about you.

So, with Snoop Dogg's help at the Vibe or Source Awards and Boyz II Men's Alexander Vanderpool feel, we transitioned to what I called the "uniform" look. It consisted of the name brands Tommy Hilifiger, Nautica, Polo, Dockers and Eastlands.

Trust me, you were nothing without a pair of Eastlands. One of the few pants that fit properly on top of the Eastlands were the Khaki pant. I can't tell you why, I just know it was part of the uniform, thus I followed the trend.

I lined my closet with Dockers, no Dickies please, from about 1996 to 2003. Then somehow, some way, the Khaki pant disappeared from the black man's wearable wardrobe.

I received no memo, but it seemed that all at once, black men stopped rocking clean Khaki pants. The cargo look was there for a sec over the Tims, but no regular Dockers.

Thus, I followed suit.

Do you see my dilemma now? I prefer jeans, and wear them regularly. But they won't work for work. I haven't worn a pair of Khakis since about 2003 or '04. And I know I will want to put them on because it's work.

But they're a major no-no. What to do?

I'm really tempted to burn or trash them for fear that I might actually pull them out one morning. I'll end up in front of the mirror saying "you know, that doesn't look half-bad."

But it will look/be all bad by lunch. Really, what am I going to do? I don't know.

Suggestions are welcome.

Click Here to Read More..

The Emotional Gamut

This has been a tough week. I've ran the emotional gamut, a few times.

On Monday, I received an unbelievable, yet long desired call. An editor from a premier newswriting outfit in town called to offer me a position where I'll do an array of things (write news, sports and some copy editing).

I said yes on the spot. I didn't overwork myself because I'd recently been let down by a another prospective job opportunity, and it crushed me for a few days. So, I didn't want to get too high or low depending on the phone call. I remained reserved, even in telling my best friends. They seemed more excited than me, although I truly am reservedly ecstatic.

I guess I'm glad I didn't get too high because of the letdown that came next.

One of my fraternity brothers was killed in a carjacking in downtown Kansas City on Tuesday night. This brother, 25-year-old Brandon McDowel, and I weren't extremely close. But we crossed paths often enough to know each other and to have many of the same friends.

First, I saw statuses slowly change on Facebook. Then I turned on the news, and it hit me. There he was, a black male college graduate prepared to finish grad school and go to law school in the fall, dead at the hands of self-hate's perplexing plight.

In some people's eyes, he's now no more than a grim statistic like Sean Taylor, Darrent Williams and countless other 20-something black men reduced to earth far too early. But this was different. This hit home, literally. It could have been one of my line brothers who lived maybe two blocks away from where this happened a few years back. It could have been my brother. It could have been me.

So all you're left with are questions. Why him? Why now? Why do these people loathe life so much that they want to take it from others? And then there's only one conclusion to it all.

Make sure you tell everyone you love that you love them. Make sure they hear and feel your words even if, in a moment, they make you seem or feel like a sap. You put things in a unique perspective knowing full well that perspective won't necessarily stick.

On Wednesday, I rang one of my cousins, a fraternity brother as well, who was closer to the Brandon than I. We tried to make sense of it, and couldn't. So we reminded each other of the sentiments in the previous paragraph.

We tried to move past it, tried to talk about other things - my new job, the bar he works at, that he was leaving town in a few hours, the new downtown development and St. Patrick's Day. Anything to pull our thoughts momentarily away from the ignorance.

All of these thoughts, good and bad, and all I wanted to do was call Triple B, and run my gamut through her ear and her world. This was a hard week because of all of the things that happened, but also because I felt like I couldn't share it all with her, the person with whom I have the strongest connection.

I haven't had a bad week concerning Triple B since, well, it's been so long that I can't really remember. The last time I had this urge to make sure she knew I loved her - last year the day everything went down at Va. Tech - I dialed her and told her. But not this time. Doesn't quite seem right, but it's still weirded me out.

Didn't help much that Q-boog rambled on about a similar situation with a guy in her hometown of Milwaukee earlier this week, too. That conversation made me wonder if this situation with Triple B will ever fully end in my head. Yeah, Q-Boog's man problem is that (a decade-plus type) serious.

So just throw that situation on top.

Oh, a friend who is quickly becoming my best friend in KC is leaving for the Peace Corps in a month.

And I got featured in a picture on Stuff Educated Black People Like since I designed the header.

So, I've got a lot going on, a lot to think about (told ya). The funeral is in the morning. I'll be there, deep in thought, still trying to make since of it all. If you can, just say a prayer for me, my people here in Kansas City and those who revel in the ills of self-hate.

If there's one thing I knew immediately when I saw the story on Brandon, it's that self-hate is prevalent in our society and at the root at the majority of our problems. We need to find help for those who suffer from it because it tragically affects us all. Some times, it's a little closer to home unfortunately.

Click Here to Read More..

Thanks Dick

I found myself glued to the couch this weekend, my eyes consistently focused on my local CBS station.

There, NCAA teams throughout the nation were running up and down basketball courts beginning the arduous trek from the start of March Madness to April's Final Four. Upsets abound. Buzzer beaters fell. The unexpected was expected.

There are schools that you have no clue as to where they are, Davidson and Belmont to be specific, that come out of nowhere to challenge hated squads such as Duke and prominent teams such as Georgetown. Some win. Davidson knocked the Hoyas. And we all tune in, because we have a vested interest in a team or two or because we have $5 invested in a bracket pool.

I, for example, watched maybe 10 hours of hoops between Thursday and Sunday night. I avoided most human interaction. It might be the best time of year for any man. Just him, his television, his beer, his comfort food and his bracket. No (or few) women.

Only one problem exists: the commentators, and more particularly their overwhelmingly skewed viewpoints concerning black and white athletes.

I will not name names, but I will point out the obvious because it's necessary. Most of the commentators are white men, and it's apparent per their word choice this weekend that they believe the black athlete is physically superior to his white counterpart.

All weekend, I watched shot after shot, amazing play after amazing play. Every time a black player did something outstanding the commentator deemed him "a great athlete" or he'd say, "He's so athletic."

Conversely, if a white hoopster made a great play, the commentator called him a "hard worker" or "a hustler" or even "intelligent with a high basketball acumen." One commentator went so far as to call UCLA standout freshman Kevin Love, a white player with serious skill, "not the best athlete," while he blocked seven second-half shots and almost single-handedly led his team to victory. They gave him the "high basketball acumen" mark.

Are you freaking kidding me? Kevin "McLovin" Love is a top-five lock in this year's NBA draft. NBA team don't draft "non athletic" players with top-five picks.

Ludicrous. These commentators are the verbal equivalent to listening to Emmitt Smith or Michael Irvin ramble, and I mean stumble through incomprehensible sentences, on Sunday mornings. They might as well say what they're thinking. Blacks are better athletes, and whites are ...

That's why they don't. But why say anything? Why say so much that your true feelings are no longer veiled and you come across like an insensitive asshole who is stating, albeit in a roundabout manner, that black athelete don't work hard, can't be smart and don't have to exert much effort?

To no one's surprise, this has been going on for years (see: Magic and Bird). But I don't understand how and why major media has yet to stop this buffoonery. Hire some black men to commentate sports. Not just (insert name of any white commentator you know because I know you can't think of a black one). Maybe this shit wouldn't be so commonplace.

We all know what they're thinking, and it's not politically or actually correct. Yes, somehow black athletes are dominating professional sports, and it likely has something to do with the black gene pool being toyed with on several fronts by the white man from about 1600 to 1865.

But that doesn't give you the right to backhandedly say white athletes are smarter and work harder. That's not right, and really, really fucked up. Fucked up enough to where it screwed up my man weekend.

On Thursday night, I'm watching the games on mute, and putting my iTunes on shuffle. It's that bad.

ed's note: commentator Kevin Harlan, a fellow Kansas Citian, is not included in the list of commentators who make idiot remarks.

Click Here to Read More..

I Owe You One ....

I told a friend last week that if I was 17, Teyana Taylor would be my crush. Thus, I bring to you, Google Me, her first single. It's been surfing the net for a long time, but they're finally dropping this vid.

Click Here to Read More..

A More Perfect Union

Today, we take a break from the daily bantering about me and my world to analyze Barack Obama's speech. Some of the media are dissecting it word by word saying he didn't do enough in denouncing his former pastor others are heralding it as historic.

Here are my thoughts.

As you know, I am a supporter of Obama's movement. I love that he is an architect of words, a thinker before a speaker, a listener, and most important, a uniting force.

That said, Obama's speech today, which I'm watching now on YouTube and read earlier today on Internet, moved me. Surprise, surprise, right?

Get this, I didn't totally agree with everything he said today, or think he said everything as best he could. It was wordy in some places, and unclear in others.

But here's why it moved me: it was earnest.

There is a brutal honesty found within this speech, a candidness you will find in the words of few other politicians. Obama worked both sides. He played every card the way Jimmy Rabbit did on stage in 8 Mile (bad analogy, I know). Barack told the nation about itself from the perspective of a embittered black man chastising whites for slavery and Jim Crow to the white working class despising blacks for affirmative action.

But he weaved his words and analogies all in the name of unity, the idea of perfecting our union in mind. Not making this country perfect, but striving for perfection understanding full well that we will fall short. He said he understand the impossibility and impracticality of curing all of the ills of the racial divide in this country during his time in office.

Yet in still, there's is a profoundness to a man who dare hope in the face of iniquity, a man who stands up at every turn and agrees or disagrees staunchly with his supporters and naysayers in moments of triumph and failure. This is what we, as a black people, have hoped for in Tiger Woods and Michael Jordan in so many ways. Someone to say something, that makes sense, in moments that matter, and be able to move a people.

But now we understand that he isn't going to agree with every black plight, as he has suggested by denouncing his former pastor's words. But Obama will call a spade a spade, whether it's white, black, Latino or Asian; whether it's rich or poor; corporate or union.

The thing he wants us to take from this tough, at least I believe, is to do what you do, and say what you say in the name of unity, in that name of perfected union. I could a write thesis on what the words perfection, perfected and perfect truly mean. They are loaded words.

But Obama is conveying that we should be striving for a perfected union, one that wants to provide a harmonious life for every child, woman, man and elder it possibly can, understanding that it can't.

That is this speech's purpose. It an attempt by Obama to make clear his purpose for running, and his true ambitions for America, to do the best things possible for the greatest number of Americans. The question is, Who are we to stop him or our own people?

And by people I mean Americans (and all watching superdelegates).

Click Here to Read More..

The Essentials

I'm stealing this idea from a blogger friend, including the first half of the first essential.

The Essentials of Vic Damone, Jr.

• I am a sucker for a good R&B song.
• I am extremely outgoing, but keen of my surroundings when I'm the center of attention.
  
• I believe I am smart, but have dumb moments all day long.
• I love watching kids, but for three hours max.
• I never check my voicemail, unless I'm certain it's an important call.
• I dreamed of being an actor in high school.
  
• I loathe all precipitation, unless I am engaging in some movie-like love moment.
  
• I think every one should read the Bible, even if they don't believe in God, for the stories. They're that good.
• I was able to sing like Barry White in the seventh grade, and got the girls because of that skill alone.
• I really do want to date Halle Berry because I think I'm capable of loving a crazy woman.
• I will always desire a woman I believe is beautiful without makeup, weave or an altered nose.
  
• I believe God laughs at people who marry right as they're pronouncing their love for one another during their vows.
  
• I'm a sucker for a good necktie, and will always spend money on one.
• I have at least 50 neckties, and will keep buying them although a sensible person will only wear one at a time.
  
• I will play my mother's vinyl records until I die.
  
• I will change my life's goals daily until I find some that suite me to a tee.
  
• I read for fun, only.
• I write because my livelihood depends on it ...

What are your essentials?

Click Here to Read More..

At A Loss

“I’m sorry. I’m at a loss for words.”

I have some advice for you. If in someway you allow the aforementioned phrase to seep out of your mouth in a moment of mental confinement, will you do all six of us in the real world a huge favor, and shut the fuck up?

Walk away from whatever podium, camera, microphone or reporter you’re standing in front of, and find something else to do with your idle mind. Preserve for us the precious few seconds you’re wasting so we can do something better with them than listen to you think of something to say after you have just told us you have nothing else to say.

Fuck a figure of speech, it’s a bad cliché. Can you possibly think of how it makes us feel to know we are wasting away listening to you think? If I added up the time I’ve waited for someone to say something profound after excusing that phrase from their person, then subtracted that figure from my age of 27, I would be, I don't know, 8.

This is not a gross exaggeration.

The first time I heard someone utter this phrase, I was in the second grade, and too young to recognize figures of speech. I took all things literally. If my mother said, “I’m going to whoop your ass when we get home,” I didn't laugh it off because she would follow through.

So when someone dare say “I’m at a loss for words,” I expected them to not say anything else. But, to my surprise, no one stops talking. They take it as an opportunity to soak up as much undeserved attention as possible.

“I… just don’t know what to say …. I just want to let you know that accomplishing this was just really, really hard, and it took a lot of effort.”

Really? It took effort to form that simplistic ass sentence and purse your lips to release it? Would you please …

… I don’t know … I’m frustrated … I’m walking away now because I’m at a loss for words.

Click Here to Read More..

Tales from the EBP

I decide that I wanted to contribute something to StuffEducatedBlackPeopleLike. Being that the blog didn't have a header that remind you of/mock StuffWhitePeopleLike, I made one.

I sent it to the blog's author two nights ago, and within two minutes of sending it, she added it to the web site. Pretty funny. We've started a dialogue over e-mail and chat. She seems like a really cool, laid-back person. She has to be to write this blog.

I've even written her a sample entry or two she could use if she wants. If she does, I'll let you know.

But back to the important part: So my graphic-artist game is about to jumpoff. Not really, but I have received a couple of cool compliments from bloggers out there concerning the header.

Here's one taken from Mixin' It Up:

Bonus points for whoever designed the masthead image to StuffEducatedBlackPeopleLike, which I've included at the top of this post. Besides being identical in style and form to the original and their overt comparison in the "About" section, you'll notice a small tribute in the form of a picture of some Black folks in a fraternity step show. In the background is some kind of poster ad -- for sushi. Classic.

I was called "Classic." It gets no better.

The funniest part about it is that I didn't even realize that Sushi banner was in the background of the Alpha picture. The blog author actually pointed it out to me. Ironic. We both got a great laugh out of that one.

Anyway, stay tuned. Oh, and I may have some good news come next week. We'll see, though.

Click Here to Read More..

I Owe You One ...

This is apparently what I'm going to call this weekly video segment because I always want to post it late. Anyway, this week, I give you Puffy (yes Puffy) when I could still stand him. If you don't know, this was when BIG was still alive. Thus, it's BIG and Total, Can't You See. Not the other way around because BIG dominates this track.

Click Here to Read More..

Being cool with a celeb

My best friend, Q-Boog, is a producer for a network. She works crazy hours, and rarely gets time off. But she enjoys her job, ahem, career.

A few years back, through work, she made friends with a wildly popular celebrity whose name I will not mention. They exchanged numbers, and actually started talking. He calls her whenever he comes to town.

Once, he dialed her while she was prepping for bed. He asked her if she'd come out to where he was. Already in her PJs, she declined. He told her he would gladly come to her and "get in his jammies with her." Of course, she said no.

They haven't seen each other since they met. They always miss each other. But every month, she tells me that "(INSERT CELEB'S NAME) called again." I get a grand laugh at knowing that they're "friends."

It makes you wonder how much celebs appreciate meeting someone who has no interest in their celebrity, but who wants to know them for who they are. You know, someone the celebrity can confide simple truths in, and still not worry about that friend leeching on for the ride.

It's also an opportunity for the celeb to prove to be human. Q-Boog's father recently had a heart attack. She flew home to be by his side. This celeb happened to be coming to her current town as she was leaving. He texted Q-Boog in hopes of meeting up, finally. She told him about her Pops and that she was back home. They'd missed each other again.

As any friend would, he sent along his well wishes. But get this, he has talked to her more during this time period than I have. This celeb knew she was flying home to be by his side before I did.

He has called her every day to check on her and her Pops, sometimes more than once a day. Yesterday, he called while she was chilling with her Pops. Her dad, who is at home and doing better every day, got so excited about the phone call that he actually started singing this celeb's latest hit song in the background.

I will not give away the celeb's identity by typing a lyric of the song. But just know this, you totally wouldn't expect this type of friendship from him. Well, maybe you would. Then again, you wouldn't.

For me, though, it's good to know a celeb like this dude has a real side, that he actually isn't full of himself and cares about people.

Click Here to Read More..

An Admission ...

There will be a week of my life some time in the next year where I will plant myself on a couch and watch every episode of HBO's "The Wire" from start to finish. This is because I have only seen maybe one episode ever, and I feel as though I'm about to lose my black card to this fault.

I have friends who talk about "The Wire," as though their lives would somehow be different if the show never went on the air five seasons ago. Yet, somehow I never got into it.

Maybe I never got into it because the one time I watched it was with my weed-loving cousin, who swears by it. He was trying to explain the characters to me while rolling/smoking a joint. It didn't work out so well. Maybe weed-smokers should concentrate on one thing at a time.

Some of my favorite writers, Whitlock and Bill Simmons can barely get through a 500-word column without mentioning it. Yet somehow, they haven't gotten through to me.

But it's okay. I will atone for my shortcomings. I promise you. My black card is that important to me.

Click Here to Read More..

I Owe You One ...

I owe you a video. So without further adieu, Mos Def's Ms. Fat Booty.

Click Here to Read More..

Stuff People Like Explosion

Just in case you've been sleep on the blogosphere in the last two weeks. There's a new champion out there, and it's name is stuffwhitepeoplelike.wordpress.com.

StuffWhitePeopleLike will make you wish you had thought of this before. It is an awesome read, and has gained an amazing amount of traction in three months of life.

It makes me want to start a similar blog. Not one about black people, someone is currently trying (StuffEducatedBlackPeopleLike) and it's OK at best (but still a daily read), but one about the things men want. I could educate women on men, and also dispel some of the myths out there about us at the same time.

I'm going to come up with about 20 things men want from women and life in general I think could make a good start. I might throw the ideas at a few of my trusted male friends. If they like it, I might give life to it. I've got a good start as far as things men hate for women to do (On Women).

Anyway, I really just wanted to make you guys who come here hip to what I'm reading.

Click Here to Read More..

I Am A Realist

I am a realist,
I mean idealistically speaking,
I peak while reaching for the stars
From afar knowing my arms don’t extend that far.
So I just gaze, and crave that energy.
You know, try to synergize
That which I am with what lies in the sky
As I live my dream
To set aglow the ever-burning flame penned within me.
Realist I am, I promise you.
Not worried about whether behind my name there’s a comma or two,
Because dollars don’t define what I’ve found within.
Although sin slithers around, I’m still confound to the truth
That resounds in crevasses of a soul.
Behold, a reflection is a window leading to the scroll.
And if you can’t read: Him ... well,
I don’t know what to tell you.
Put your contacts in, get some Lasic,
Look harder than you are
Because a mirror image should never fail you.
I mean, I know the mistakes I make
Don’t you?
So why is that we reach for the sky at a time
When the lines aren’t blurred,
Absurd it seems,
There’s right and wrong
And little in between.
Realist I am, it’s what I scream
Metaphorically,
You might have to prescribe me a John 3:16 antihistamine
To keep me from loving the way my heart was written to.
See, the scroll has one word on it, and a bunch of synonyms
And you can’t pick one out from the others like a yellow M&M.
They all led back to the same root, despite their different hues
And though some throw stones and falsely accuse
The Realist still stand out with his idealistic fuse
Lit and ready to be excused from your presence
See, I was destined to be a star, born to reach the heavens
So as I aim for them, and hold Him in highest reverence
You can laugh or do as I do, whatever happens to be your preference
But I know severance from this shell leads to the well
Of life the replaces the pain and strife of this world,
And I want my cup to runneth over.
Pierce my blood with His because of it
I want mine to be anything but sober
If you want, you can depend on luck
Keep searching this earth for a four-leaved clover
But me, I’m a realist,
Idealistically speaking, until my days here are long over.

Click Here to Read More..