Ring in December in ATL

If you happen to be in and around ATL, check my boy, Kelsy Davis out for his Birthday. He is, as his name suggests, bringing "Radical" back to the group of people whom need it most!!

Peace & Soul Power!!

Value meal gone overboard!!

I checked the foreign exchange rate with The University of British Columbia, Saunders School of Business today. So it is confirmed through a reliable source. The Rupees to US$ exchange rate for October 12th, 2006 was 45.537

What does that mean? My lunch of Rice, Dal (beans), curry aloo(potatoes), naan, and cumber/tomato salad cost 35 Rupees today. In US$, that is 77 cents. How much was your lunch today?

"B" is for Bombay?

Now don't that just beat all!! Every since I can remember, "B" was always for Bob and "N" was always for Nancy. "C" was always for cat and "D" was for David. Not so here.

"B" is for Bombay. "N" is for New Delhi. "C" is for chutney. And "D" is for Diwali. It makes perfect sense. The point of using names to further elucidate letters is not just about pronounciation, but its also about association.

Greg is as much for "G" as "G" is for Greg. You might not even know a Greg, but you know that his name is symbolic of the letter "G." In India, our "Greg" is their "Goa," a city located in the southwest of India.

While previously believed that you can't teach an aged dog new tricks, this old canine is learning to bark in Hindi.

Poor Man's Confession

Lord. My dear Lord. Lord of my work
I work, can’t stop citing the notes of my life
I give, can’t stop working the night shift at day
Drowsiness lackluster effort permeates my be
Forming formality, I drop to one knee
To conclude this saga of rest and of peace
I simply can’t convey, my tongue moves without
The strength in my chest to heave a sound out
I lower my head to see beneath all
And just as I suspect there is nothing below
The base of existence, how I came, I don’t know
Without wings, without resolution, I can’t return after long
Blasted is he, who reflects me to myself
I have tons of money, I have no wealth
A pauper of spirit, I must re-inter
My life, I must lift, so I can resume there
Lord. My dear Lord. I say this poor man’s confession
There can be death during life; I have learned my good lesson

Brain fart A

I write in abstract because I feel abstracted.
Suffered a mild concussion the day my mind’s thoughts retracted.
Stepped up to the plate, cuz they said it’s my turn at bat.
Swung for the fences until my lungs collapsed.

Now tell me, how does it feel to see a black boy born?
Does it make you ache with pain? Or make your heart feel warm?
Or does it make you feel like you’ve handed over a shit load of burdens
Like Corporate glass ceilings and neglected higher learnin’s

Have you given the best shot to the hot shot off the hot block?
Or written a death sentence, long live hip hop, now pick out the burial plot?
I cain’t call it, still figuring out how to wipe away my heart’s rust
We MUST be blind, cuz we sure as hell got the dumb leading us

I just know that when I get like this I sit down and write
Cain’t help it if my words don’t come out sounding right
But what it does is allows me to release this negativity
Wrench it from my soul so what is left is positivity

My liberalities, they create deep, thick creases in the mind
I gotta think about how I wish to die today, just one last time
Before I plummet into this fate destined to be a soul divine
Pulling grapes from the tree, tasting life before it becomes wine

I got a map, but can’t find where I’m going with this poem
But just like that Lee nail commercial say, I gotta press on
Move swift through this lightening before next come the hail storm
Before I get hit with shrapnel from this war that’s goin’ on

I wish my life was complete like these words are. . .

That’s it. . .don’t have anymore.

I want out!!!

The Pacers' Stephen Jackson was

reportedly struck by a car and fired

his gun outside a strip club early Friday.

He averaged 16.4 points per game last

season. (Matthew Stockman / Getty Images)

I cannot tell a lie. Often times I can be found making incendiary comments about black men and the way we are portrayed. . .correction. . .the way we ALLOW ourselves to be portrayed in the media. The self-fulfilling perpetuation of the black male ego has got us in a sad state of affairs. Bravado has made us very unaware of what life is really about. If the classroom is a boxing ring, we have accepted being overmatched and have called off the fight before showing up. If Corporate America is the race track, we can’t find the keys. If law offices were soccer fields, many times our black lawyers find themselves kicking the ball to themselves. If we cannot find black men aggressively competing in the classrooms, Corporate America or law offices, then where are we? Ahhh, yes!! Let’s go to the football field and the basketball courts, that’s where you’ll find us.

I can understand that life’s riches and the opportunity to see these riches are not afforded everyone. And so if trapped in a culture, community, city, neighborhood, household, you find yourself the continuous victim of belittlement and verbal punishment, you make the decision that life is a pile of shit and you don’t care how you live it anymore. I’m not saying your self-deprecating tendencies are right, but given the state of human mental conditioning, I understand.

What I cannot understand nor condone, are men, being paid absorbent amounts of money to physically entertain every night, finding themselves in the line of direct trouble. . .or sometimes just in the line-up!! I can no longer even place blame on the shoulders of rap music. Sans a couple of people, the nature of hip-hop has completely gone the way of projecting how much someone has, not how little. This black angst would only be necessary if you’re fighting for a piece of the pie. Not only do these men have a piece of the pie, but they also have a piece a cake and the big piece of chicken too!! So the recalcitrant nature of these men has no surface on the back of black culture with which to stand any longer. There is no excuse for their transgressions against. . .against. . .the world, let alone their own people. And let’s make no mistake about it; creating negative perceptions is a transgression.

Because I have a fantasy football team this season, I have continuously scoured sporting websites looking for nuggets of important information that could give me an advantage over my opponents. Sadly, what I have found is that the sports reporters have become just as proficient at scanning police reports for rap sheets, as they have the stadiums or basketball courts. What’s more, what a player has done off the field of play has become essential to what a player’s capacity is for sport; an adjunct statistic, if you will.

I once quipped with my league mates that it’s a shame I have to check the front page and the page 5 criminal reports to see if I can still start my fantasy players. Crazy enough, as long as a player is convicted early enough in the week, they can be out on bail by Wednesday, apologize to their teammates, their fans, family and the organization on Thursday, practice on Friday and Saturday and on the battlefield earning $300,000 checks on Sunday.

I am sad to report, however, that we are not given fantasy points for any of our players being involved in shoot outs, robberies, drug possession, money laundering or domestic violence, yet the statistics for each team, mount up abound like free throws, home runs and rushing yards. Perhaps realizing the perceptible fact that a man firing rounds in the air to save his life after getting beat up and ran over by a car was not a suitable statistic for the sports pages, this reporter found a way to include the points per game average of a year ago.
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Forgive me; I am at a loss for words.

JayGee Quotable H

Man, I need some music if I'm suppose to concentrate on executing my life!!

Profiles in Courage - A

There was a gecko on the wall of my living room and he wasn’t trying to sell me any insurance or baby-sit my unborn kids. Rather than continue my journey to hang out in the living room or try and do something about removing this gecko, I promptly (meaning quickly) shut the living room door and went back into the bedroom area.

I hope he either let himself out or something bigger came along, ate him and then let himself out. If not, then hopefully tomorrow I can talk one of the locals into scouring the room until they find him and kick him out.

Throughout my stay here in New Delhi, you will see many of my “Profiles in Courage.” While I probably would have no problem wrestling a lion or a bear, I have no qualms about letting people know I run from rodents, lizards and insects. I simply cannot deal.