In California (and several other states), gay people do not have to right to marry. Due to certain propositions, mainly #8 in California passing, numerous gay civil unions are in jeopardy.

If you happened to have supported any of these initiatives, please go and fuck your self. I really do mean that sincerely.

If you could you would probably vote way rights for minorities or repeal voting rights for women. In voting for these horrible initiatives you basically approved discrimination at the governmental level.

I am especially disappointed at any fellow black person who may have voted Yes on any one of those propositions. Speaking from experience, I know that homosexuality is not supported in the black community. It upsets me that such views are reinforced by some black churches.

I don’t like to get all preachy, but we all need to condemn this. We cannot let religious extremists to continue to make things worse for gays. If they can succeed at banning gay marriage, then it could possibly lead to further discrimination to others.

As mentioned earlier, while I was very hopeful for Obama’s chances leading up to the election I still was very pessmistic about his chances of winning. In my mind I thought that McCain, Palin and the right wing media would find some way to steal the election.

I did not volunteer for his campaign because I believed that my negativity would be more of a hinderance than help. I was very recultant to even put an Obama bumper sticker on my Jeep fearing that some moron would slash my tires (despite the fact that I live in a SOLID blue state.)

Despite all of my worries, America responded loudly on Tuesday night. They didn’t fuck it up this time around. Maybe having 8 years of Bush rule, a useless war and our crap economy made people “Harden the fuck up”.

After the victory, Obama still has to prove himself to the country. He seems very “Fired up” in anticipation of inauguration day and is moving quickly to set up his cabinet. While it has started to sunk in, most who think that he’ll wave a wand to fix our issues are going to be in for a rude awakening.

Even prior to Election Day I knew that Obama or any candidate wouldn’t solve all of our problems….at least immediately. Obama is not going to make my Student Loans disappear or make me lose weight. He will not bring me a girlfriend or improve my Jeep’s gas mileage. Obama can change some of our country’s policies, however he will not change everything in our life. WE are responsible for that.

Obama will be publc ememy #1 to the morons who still think Bush was great, but hopefully his actions will speak louder than words.

FUCK YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1111

America, I have regained faith in you. After a long bitterly contested campaign, Senator Barack Obama of the great state of Illinois has won the Presidency!

Despite absolute fucktards calling him “socialist”, “radical”, “muslim” and “hussien” he has proved that America is simply sick and tired of the Fox News doctrine. Now Barack is not off the hook yet. He still has to guide us out of this mess and repair the damage done after 8 years of incompetence.

The worst is unfortunately yet to come. I truly expect the republicans to continue to unite with right wing media (Fox News & Right Wingnut talk radio…BFF) and smear him. The attacks will be meaner than what Bill Clinton, the nations FIRST black president, faced.

Perhaps the greatest fear is the fear of him getting shot, injured or killed by some KKK loon. I really hope the Secret Service really takes great care in protecting him.

Of course Obama himself will not wave a magic wand and make the economy better. He might be even hampered by congress, depending if there is a majority or not. I actually hope that he stays as a centrist rather than being too liberal.

Still I trust my judgment and I hope that he will be the right president for the right time.

One regret…I should have volunteered. I didn’t want to because I believed that my cynicism would have hurt more then helped.

Anyway America has spoken and I hope the damage of this great nation will start to be fixed.

By Lakeandlocal on flickr via a creative commons license.

Election day in the United State of America is Tuesday, November 4th 2008.

That happens to be TOMORROW.

As you already know this is going to be a historic election. Either a black man or woman will take one of the two highest offices for the first time in our country’s history. No matter who you vote, be it Obama/Biden, McCain/Palin or even Ralph Nader or Bob Barr, your vote counts.

If you DO NOT exercise your right to vote, you are an idiot, plain and simple. Don’t complain or bitch if things are going wrong. Don’t say “I should have voted” when you had the opportunity.

By NOT voting you basically are not caring. While the president cannot make things better instantly, whomever will be selected will have tremendous influence over the next decade.

DO NOT make any excuses. In most states your employer will give you paid time to vote. If you are in school, your professor or teacher will understand. If you are a slacker, put down the bong or Xbox controller and get off your ass and VOTE! They’ll be around anyway once you get back. If you are worried about missing your favourite show, DVR it. Its probally a rerun anyway.

• For Starters I curse a lot and use a lot of internet slang. For example I abuse the meme “Over 9000” a LOT. I will also refer to the internet as “internets”. If you hate that, please GTFO. I can’t help having a dirty mouth and I will not censor myself for anyone.

• I frequently talk about the following: The Rangers, Mets, sometimes Jets. If you are a fan of their rivals, it is almost guaranteed that I will shit on them at any opportunity. ESPECIALLY the Phillies and Islanders. Its in good clean fun…with a lot of profanity of course.
• I tend to be left leaning in politics, but I really don’t mind people who are conservative. What I DO mind is when people debate politics by referring to words like “Socialist”, “Communist” or using “Liberal” in a negative tone. If you cannot debate civilly then I will promptly unfollow you. I already ignore Fox News in my real life. I prefer not have it on my twitter stream. Please don’t be surprised if I unfollow you because of that.
• Please don’t be 100% promotional. While its ok to post a link to your blog entries, I also prefer if you interact with your followers as well. Unless you have a powerful brand like Wine Library TV, don’t bother making a twitter account just full of blog updates. Like Gary Vaynerchuk said, don’t be like Britney Spears.

For anyone who decides to follow ME, I will usually follow you back…IF your stream interests me. I am easy to please, but I find things like “SEO make money online” boring and trite. Obviously don’t be a spammer either. (They probably wouldn’t read this anyway, but it goes without saying.)

Flickr: cigarette (by SuperFantastic). Used via a Creative Commons License.

In high school I was drug free, alcohol free and smoke free. These days people call it SxE or straight edge and make it a part of some movement. The only movement that I caused was laughter when I revealed that I didn’t partake in such things.

Back then I was pretty sheltered and I was not joining the “in crowd”. I felt that I had an honour and image to uphold. Sometime between the 12th grade and my freshman year in college that image began to erode.

After getting teased rather mercifully, I began to finally rebel. Normally kids would begin to drink, smoke and do other bad things starting the 9th to 10th grades or even eariler. It took me until the end of freshman year in college to drink regularly. It took me until sophomore year to lose my v-card at the age of 21! What began as an exercise to fit in, soon was normal.

I first started with liquor and then moved on to “malternatives” (aka Zima and Mike’s). After the so called “Alcopops” tore up my stomach due to the acid, I settled on beer. I first drank nothing but Sam Adams but then for some reason I had taken a liking for Heineken. I don’t care what people say, its fucking good beer. Oh and NO its not “skunky”.

After that, in late 2002 to early 2003 I began to smoke on and off. My family at the time was going through some very rough times, so I began to smoke. I remember the first thing I smoked, was a shitty 7-11 cigar. I had lit the wrong end.

I would smoke some cigars once in a while and then I would switch to cigarettes only when I was drinking. My fatal flaw was when I realized that smoking would be a great icebreaker to talk to people, mostly women outside. (So thank you anti smoking laws for making me smoke MORE!)

Soon I would smoke due to work stress or with coffee. (GOD I miss coffee and cigarettes). I would start to smoke so much that Parliament would send me tons of buy one, get one free offers to me in the mail. Still I figured that I only smoked “socially” and it wasn’t a big deal.

Unfortunately I would have breathing issues, my teeth would be yellow, my breath would stink and other things that I am not at liberty to discuss.

After I finished school in Buffalo and moved back to New York I decided to quit. My mother had smoked a few years back and quit, while my grandfather had died from it. When New York State raised the taxes on cigarettes I finally decided it was probably the best time for me to quit. (Of course this was not my first attempt at doing so)

Regardless of what happens to the economy, $7-8 a pack is not feasible for me. That alone made me quit cold turkey. Besides, the costs are too great both physically and figuratively for me to continue to smoke.

Unfortunately I will have to find another excuse to talk to girls at bars. As I mentioned earlier, PUAs won’t be of much help.

You will get these if you have watched the AMC series “Mad Men”. If you haven’t watched it already, I strongly suggest you get it on DVD (or pirate it) because it is an amazing fucking show.

Courtesy of ssandars via flickr under a creative commons license.

Due to the success of the VH1 show “The Pick Up artist” and the book (soon to be a movie) “The Game” by Neil Strauss, the “game” of seduction is becoming mainstream.
Because of this, numerous men (AFCs aka Average Frustrated Chumps) who suck at talking at women are now invading bars, clubs and other places annoying women with “routines” and “negs”.

I remember a time when I was an “AFC” and I stumbled on Pick Up Artistry (aka PUA). It almost felt like I found my “Matrix”. From high school on to college I did not act like a man. I worshiped women and put them on a pedestal. I did not know how to approach or even call girls on the phone.

From 2002 to about 2003 I read a lot of seduction pdfs such as “Double Your Dating“* and “Unstoppable Confidence”*. I learned about things like the “neg” hit, how not to supplicate(aka give things like free drinks) to women, routines, kinds of eye contact, non verbal language, and body language (aka kino in PUAspeak).

I did learn a lot of things, but routines made me very uncomfortable and I did not use them often. If I did it was only for “training in the field” (yet another instance of PUAspeak). I think one time a girl threatened to punch me in the face and another girl cursed me out!

I used a “routine” (again PUA speak for pickup lines) like “Who lies more”:

“Hey guys, quick question…Who lies more…men or women?”
—(Girls talk for a bit, then you cut them off.)
“Ok, I can only stay a sec, my friends are waiting, but who cheats more, guys or girls?”
—(Girls talk for a bit, then you cut them off.)
“I was waiting to get a haircut a few weeks ago, reading one of those women’s magazines, and it says that girls lie more and cheat more…is that true??”
—(Girls talk about topic. Go into your next routine.)

Its a good thing I didn’t get used to saying this, (it really did not sound right coming from an “intimidating” black man). A female friend of mine once heard this a year ago and instantly recognized it. Now because of PUA’s popularity it is no longer effective.

As I continued to read and occasionally tried these things out, I was able to get a wingman to go out with me on Long Island. I remember this guy who had spikey hair and often wore more jewelry than girls. He called it “peacocking” (PUA speak for wearing things to attract attention). The most “peacocking” I did wearing a silver chain around my neck that I eventually pawned off.

For I guy who saw himself as socially advanced, he wasn’t. All he would talk about were plans on how to scheme girls out of their panties. I met more wings in Manhattan for a “field mission” and they were even more screwed up than this guy. I recall one guy suggesting I wear leather pants! No way!

So after that and getting no where with PUA studying, I gave up. While I did learn a lot about social dynamics, it did not result in anything except for maybe one or two make out session with drunk girls. (in PUA they called this “fools mate” aka getting lucky)

The funny thing that happened? I got laid MORE without PUA tactics. Most of it was…you guessed it “Fools Mate”. Other times it was me acting more aggressive and trial & error. I did still retain a lot of the tenets such how to recognize signs of attraction such as eye contact or overt body language. Thanks to PUA, as a cardinal rule I never buy girls a drink in order to talk to them UNLESS they are good platonic friends of mine.

Still I would probably be ten times more successful if I lost weight and was less cynical. (I can’t help being that, I tell it like it is.) For the current “AFCs” who are now in awe of “The Pick up artist” on VH1 should really take care of OTHER issues before going out making fools out of themselves.

If you want further reading, I would read “A long list of ways that the seduction community can make you weird”
Its good I came to my senses before it made me VERY weird.

*Disclaimer: I did NOT pay a dime for any PUA books or DVDs. I downloaded them them all via bittorrent. The only thing I paid for was the “session” in Manhattan for $60 to be instructed by a “Master PUA”. I got off easy. There are guys who paid THOUSANDS of dollars for “advanced” bootcamps and they STILL didn’t get any.

Because I’m a part of Starbucks “Rewards” I can get free things like syrups or wifi at good ol’ SBUX.

What was once an attempt to retain their customers who like to buy overpriced and fattening drinks, is now something of desperation.

For $25 you can upgrade to Starbucks GOLD.

In early November, you’ll have the opportunity to join Starbucks Gold and take advantage of significant everyday value and exclusive member benefits. The annual membership fee is $25 and it entitles you to -

10% off most purchases in participating U.S. Starbucks stores*
A free drink when you purchase your Starbucks Gold Card in a Starbucks store
The option to pay for purchases any way you like
A special Gold Card that identifies you as a member of this group

And if you register your Gold Card, you’ll unlock additional benefits. That’s when the top-shelf treatment really begins. This is a program for people who really love their Starbucks.

If you’re enjoying Starbucks Card Rewards benefits, such as free syrups, milk options and refills on drip coffee, then we hope you continue to do so. But if you’re looking for daily savings on everything from espresso beverages to espresso machines, you should check out Starbucks Gold. (Please note that Starbucks Card Rewards discounts cannot be combined with Starbucks Gold discounts.)

We’re letting you know about Starbucks Gold early, so don’t be surprised if your barista doesn’t know about it yet. You’ll be able to find out more when you visit your neighborhood store next month.

Oops. I’m going to let my barista friends AND the rest of the internets know. Pretty soon I’ll get info about Starbucks TITIANUM. In that program I can get a barista serve me drinks with free soy milk and directly to my house in a bikini. The cost will be only $9000 a year in unmarked bills!

I’ll stick to making my own coffee at home. I’ll only have starbucks once in a while, thank you very much!

Why I blog and why blogging is still important:

As noted in previous entries, only in February I started to seriously blog after being hampered by the closed off environment of live journal and the massive idiocy of YouTube.

I really enjoy blogging and I still feel that it can be a great way to communicate. It is even more important for niches and communities that are not represented in the mainstream media.

For example, my favorite sport Hockey hasn’t been represented well in the US mainstream sports media. Hockey bloggers are the key voice instead of uninterested newspaper departments who are laying off hockey writers.

I also love reading bloggers from a black perspective from time to time. Their voices and writing is not representative in the mainstream media. Blogging or the “Afrospear” give black people of all strides a voice.

The reality of blogging.

I definitely agree that blogging is saturated in the popular niches such as Technology and Social media. I don’t think the marketplace needs another gadget blog or another person telling us how “SOCIAHL MEDIAAAH” is awesome. Blogging is also not a quick way to get rich.

Very few blogs, if any are self sustainable to generate income to make a living. Numerous blogger wannabes think if they read ProBlogger everyday, learn SEO, slap on a few google ads, they’ll retire rich.

As with any field, only the ones who work hard and who are fortunate enough to be successful. When I started to blog for fun it was to enhance my writing skills and of course, get my opinion out.

I will soon launch a blog on black issues and maybe put some ads there. I don’t expect to earn much from it. At most I’ll make enough for the $50 a year I pay in hosting and maybe some beer money.

Dealing with morons on blogs.

Mr Boutin and others were upset at the quality of commenters. On my blog I don’t tolerate idiots. If you can’t spell or if you veer off topic simply GTFO. All bloggers can and should lay down the law. Its your blog, kick the riff raff out.

Personally I still think Jason Calacanis shouldn’t have “retired” from blogging. Who cares if people disagree with you. If he can create a sucessful blog network, then he can take criticism (of course he has every right to eject anyone who is disrespectful.)

The importance of Twitter, Facebook and etc.

Twitter and Facebook are great tools in their own right. Twitter has pretty much replaced livejournal for times if I wanted to say something quickly. Facebook is great for connecting with my existing friends. However both are not substitutes for blogging. Blogs are perfect for me say something in long form. You cannot express complex points in a 140 character twitter message.

Facbook itself is not a good medium to blog or even network with strangers. Personally I am probably going to cut down on the “friends” I have. (That’s another entry for another time). There are too many distractions to even have a quality conversation.

Conclusion

Blogging is still a young medium. It still has time to grow and mature. To write it off is just moronic. I hope wannabe bloggers see the harsh cold realities of running a blog. You should not have dollar signs in your eyes and just do it for fun.

While your voice is important, realize that you are in a sea of similar people. Many of them are not passionate at all and they will wither out. Only the strong will survive.

The link in question.

Twitter, Flickr, Facebook Make Blogs Look So 2004

I broke my iphone’s screen yesterday. This means when I start working again I’m probably going to get me a iphone 3g. Good thing they are only $200.

It also makes me calmer knowing that I can get $150 for a broken iphone on Ebay. I’m guessing people in china want one still at any cost.

BAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW

I wonder how many of his “fans” will unfollow me from twitter?

Update LOL WUT

Why of all things, TBS decided to air an episode of the “Steve Harvey” show is beyond me. Aside from “The Original Kings of Comedy”, that show fucking sucked.

Luckily TBS recovered from an outage in Atlanta in time for the 2nd inning. I think white racist America is already pissed at the possibility of an Obama Presidency and they are taking their anger out on poor steve.

LEAVE STEVE HARVEY ALOOOONE!

But now friendfeed added a live feed of the site.

Because of it I use the site a little more than I used. Only time will tell if I am a active participant.

Add me if you are so inclined.

If you don’t want to to read the tl,dr just watch a video (*sigh* I HATE linking to youtube, they deserve NO traffic)

* crowd boos *

Oh Fuck all you people you ya know what you fucking losers, I hope you all fucking die, and I hope those fucking Eagles never win the Superbowl. Go fuck yourselves.
*boos*
Fuck all you motherfuckers and fuck the Flyers. Fuck all of you. Bunch of goddamn fucking losers. Booing Dom Irerra. Suck a dick. All of you. Suck a fuckin dick

How’s that?

Yo - I’m seguewaying into my next joke. You can all lick my fucking red nuts. All of yas…can line up with your Harold Carmichael fuckin jerseys, and one at a time you can all suck my dick.

City of Brotherly Love. You bunch of fuckin cocks. Fucking goddamn losers. 52 fuckin hours into a show. What the fuck am I gonna do at this point. You people are on goddamn acid. Fuckin be up here talking about Hitler. That aint’ gonna work.

What do you want me to talk about. Say it. Throw out some topics Let’s talk about heart disease, something you’re all gonna fuckin die of. And I’m gonna laugh at your fucking funerals which is gonna be great. You’re all gonna get fuckin cancer which is fantastic because all your fucking heads are shaved anyway no one’s even gonna notice. You’re gonna get fired for coming to work too late cause they’re not gonna notice that you have fucking bone marrow cancer. The only thing that’s gonna give it away is me laughing at you in the fucking background.

You fucking bunch of losers with your fucking cellphone pictures Fucking suck a dick. Fucking assholes.

11 more minutes of this

I hope you all get in your Ford Focuses and fucking drive off the side of that faggot ass Ben Franklin bridge. You fucking one bridge having piece of shit city that no one gives a fuck about. The terrorists will never bomb you people ‘cause you’re fucking worthless and no one cares about you. You are this high above New Orleans. No one gives a shit. FEMA would never show up for you fuckin’ assholes. I hope your mother has herpes in the center of her asshole and you go home tonight and lick it and get it on your tongue and some other horrific shit happens that involves cancer – all of you.

11 minutes left.

I hope somebody takes a fuckin beer stein and just slaps you in the back of your zit infested fucking shoulders and your awful man tits hang. I hope that happens to you. I hope the glass gets fuckin into your fuckin shoulder blades and then I see you afterwards “Hey how’s it going” (*simulates slapping a good friend in the back) Enjoy the fuckin show? That’s great. I’d grab you buy the fuckin hair but you don’t have any.

Does it really have to come to this people? Does it really have to come to this? I really hope all of you run into all those black people that you love so much here in Camden. I really hope that happens. I hope there’s a line of all of you guys getting fuckin car jacked and they take out their big black dicks and they just shove them right in your fucking mouths. Each and every one of you and somehow they just keep repeatedly cumming right in your fucking eyeballs, so that it builds up so much that your eyes fucking crust over. You can’t see shit. Somehow there’s another dick in there for you to suck.

10 minutes left.

*CHEERS*

What do you want? Is this what you want? Bunch of fucking losers. Fucking Rocky is your hero. The whole pride of your city is built around a fuckin guy who doesn’t even exist. You got fuckin Joe Frazier is from there but he’s black so you can’t fuckin deal with him, so you make a fucking statue for some 3 ft fuckin Italian you stupid philly cheese-eatin fucking jackasses. I hope the cheese melts your faces off. All of you collectively SUCK a FUCKIN DICK. Fuckin boo me 9 hrs. into a fuckin show. You and your fuckin Donovan McNabb shirt. I hope he snaps both his fuckin ankles the first goddamn game. I hope you go 0-15. I SAID SUCK A DICK

8 MINUTES left. 8 fuckin minutes left.

The Flyers. Do they even fuckin exist anymore? Bunch of goddamn pansies. Never won shit, since fuckin Gerald Ford was in office. Why don’t ya just get the fuckin Ice Capades down there you assholes. You probably won’t even notice the fuckin difference. That fuckin pussy team. Remember that had that whole season when they wore the slacks. You bunch of faggots. What else what else. I got your mothers. 8 Minutes I’m doin it all.

I’m fuckin standing here. I broke the mic stand. I have a little fuckin cane now. I’m gonna be the little observational comedian here. What’s that sir? What do you have to say sir? Never passed the fuckin 8th grade. What brilliant shit are you gonna fuckin tell me? Go back to the dock and unload some shit. Fucking warehouse working, weed smoking, fucking disappointment to your mother.

7 MINUTES left. 7 Mother fucking minutes left. And I’m doin ALL FUCKING SEVEN.

You fucking assholes. Fucking standing backstage for 3 hours to get booed by this GED fuckin stupid-ass piece of shit fuckin crowd. Bunch of fucking losers. I hope your fucking radios fall on yourheads tomorrow. Fucking antennas go right in your fucking ears. Fall out of one of those piece of shit buildings. Fuck all of you and fuck the liberty bell, and shove it up Ben Franklin’s ass. What do you think about that? All of you mother fuckers. I hope that bridge collapses onto your pathetic lives. Go fuck yourselves.

6 Minutes left and I will be selling my CD after this shit you mother fuckers **CHEERS** and the only way one you’re getting one is if I throw one at your fuckin stupid heads. Bunch of racist fucking morons.

Look at this. What are you taking a picture of E-Rock? Huh? This is right here is the theme of my set – a broken mic stand.

What’s left, the Phillies that faggot ass team named named after a female horse. Bunch of pussies. You won one fucking world series since 1880. Suck a dick. Bring Tug McGraw back from the dead you fucking jackasses. Maybe you’ll win another one. It aint’ ever happening. It ain’t ever fuckin happen. With your red candy-striped faggot fuckin uniforms. Your team should be selling cotton candy in the fucking instructional league.

You have a soccer team? That’s all I got left. Huh. You got a fuckin ping pong team? Some other shit-assed team that’s never gonna win a championship. You haven’t won a SuperBowl since they had facemasks. You fuckin jackasses. Roland Gabriel running around without a fuckin helmet. Oh suck a dick. Who’s he your dad or something? You don’t know who the fuck he is.

I had to buy a fuckin shirt for this shit. Went to the Banana Republic, picked a 20 dollar shirt off the rack.

This gotta be fucking ridiculous. Getting booed by people sittin in the fucking grass. Goddamn lawn seats. Fun isn’t it. It’s great. I should get fucking paid right now people. I’m getting paid to shit all over you guys and your stupid fucking rock t-shirts of bands that no one gives a fuck about.

4 MINUTES LEFT.

Your fucking Rush T-Shirts that say I beat the shit out of my girlfriends. That felt great. That I really feel great. I wanna thank you guys for having me. You guys were phenomenal *Crowd Cheers* Oh no.. I got 4 minutes left. 4 minutes left To fuckin talk about you CUNTS. That’s not bad 12 minute rant. That’s the first time I said ****. That’s a fucking record. I’m gonna finish my set by takin this mic stand base like a fuckin disc. I hope I hit a baby in the fuckin head. The one fuckin kid that would actually go to college in this fucking crowd.

What’s that sir? Dave Chappelle. Yes. He’s not here. I wish I was on his fuckin tour right now. Maybe I wouldn’t have a bunch of cunts not fuckin paying attention 4 hours into a goddamn show.

3 FUCKIN MINUTES LEFT.

3 minutes left of this motherfuckin tirade. What’s that? Sir why are you screaming? You’re in the front row, you dumb fuck. God I hope mass aids, full blown, like fuckin you get weak as you walk to your fuckin car and you just pass out and they just find you next to your ’83 Fucking Monte Carlo with gravel imbedded into the fuckin side of your bald ass fuckin head.

**someone offstage interjects..Dru Boogie? “

What about not fucking interrupting me you jackass. Play the fucking records. I’m fucking trying to deal with this bullshit. Jesus Christ the goddamn people on this show are givin me shit. So anyways back to the joke.

So I got a computer recently people.. .

*CROWD GOES NUTS*

Fuckin Motherfuckers.

2 MINUTES LEFT. The last two minutes is gonna be my rider for the rest of this fucking tour. I got one first. I do 3 minutes. That’s’ it I come out here with a fuckin gun right. That’s what I do. I come out here with a fuckin gun, hollow tip bullets, and I just start fuckin shooting people. OK. Everyone’s chained to their fuckin chairs and just start blowing your fucking brains out. Just one after another. 2 to the back of the head. I just blow all your fuckin brains out. I would really enjoy blowing everbody’s fucking brains out. The next day somebody’s mopping up the 3 pounds of fucking brains that are actually left in this goddamn crowd.

1 MINUTE LEFT IN THE PERIOD. *cheers*

Listen. This doesn’t change anything. I still fuckin hate you people. I hate this fuckin city. I hate the way you eat with your little shitty ass subway. Why don’t you fucking build something for Joe Frazier. You all gonna go see Rocky 19. Dude I think he can win! Alright listen I’m out of time. You guys were here man. Thank you very much. All of you go fuck yourselves in your own assholes. Have a good night.

These are actual posts from the okcupid forums.

A few months ago, I joined OKcupid. For those who don’t know its a free dating site that uses tests to weed out most of the spammers, scammers and other undesirables that plauge dating sites. There is no bullshit like paying $30 a month to contact people or policies to keep out gay and transgendered people like one site allegedly does.

Even my cynical self managed to get at least two dates within a month’s span on that site. Of course nothing happened with anyone of them (aside from one shameful hookup), but I still think that getting a date is a success to me. I wasn’t expecting a HB10 model anyway. The way I things, as long as you get dating experience I consider it a success. Getting a date PERIOD is cause for celebration knowing my lack of experience.

However many men of all ages seem to get frustrated at this. Often they will get whine about at not getting any responses to their form letters or they will get upset after they send a girl pictures of their penis.

Right now I am sitting on the sidelines because I have better things to worry about. In the meantime I amuse and educate myself by looking at many profiles….of other guys. Now I’m not gay, but looking at another guy’s profile teaches what to do and what not to do on OKcupid.

Let me say this before I go any further: I AM NOT A DATING EXPERT. In fact I am the worst person when it comes to dating help. So take my advice with a large grain of salt.

Now let me rattle of a list of the wrong things I CONTINUE to see on profiles.

• Bad pictures: Pictures of guys not smiling, without friends or just creepy looking.
• LONG ass paragraphs that ramble on about shit that people don’t’ care about.
• Negativity. Profiles of guys who ACTUALLY say that they are depressed, a failure or list 10 different types of anxiety disorders.

If you are potentially meeting a new dating partner you need to sell your self. Stating that you hate yourself, sleep with stuffed animals or the fact that you proudly man the grill at McDonalds is very bad. You need to make yourself look GOOD.

I do see some make an attempt to improve their profiles by getting their profiles reviewed by others on the okcupid forums. It is entertainment in itself because they will reject advice like “get a haircut” or “’stop putting your suicidal thoughts” on your profile and continue to whine about people not caring.

I also see guy bitch about not getting messages from girls. After a while guys have to realize that any marginally attractive woman on the internet WILL get bombarded with messages and or harassment from horny men daily. Men rarely get any attention on dating sites (unless they say they are a millionaire). It sucks, but that is how things are. Type a normal and sincere message instead of a boring form letter (like “hi, how r u”) and maybe you will get a message back.

Also stop being super specific. Don’t restrict yourself to liberal,white, atheist, non smokers. Just be open to as many girls as possible. You never know if you’ll find a conservative, Asian, taoist who smokes who might be compatible.

Of course your mileage may vary, so whatever I say may be different for you. I am NO dating expert.

Rick Sanchez is the alpha and the omega.

Rick loves each and everyone as if they were his children.

Rick is the reason why you wake up at 3pm when you don’t have a job.

Ok enough…my tweet made it to CNN Newsroom. I commented about the latest Palin scandal (a part of numerous ones) and lo and behold it made the air!

For the unitiatied, the 3pm edition of CNN Newsroom is hosted by Rick Sanchez. He not only uses twitter, but facebook, myspace *shudder*, and text messaging as part of the newscast. If all news programs were like his I would become a news junkie. Rick Sanchez makes me give a damn about cable news again after Faux News infected their brand of stupid on America.

Of course CNN has a liberal bias, Stevie Wonder could even see that! At least they don’t lie and say they are “Fair and Balanced”.

This video is full of epic lulz. My next plan is to create a Rick Sanchez drinking game! Chug every time he says AIG!

I really should be excited about my team being at 5-0, but this is a horrible tragedy. 19 year old New York Ranger prospect Alexei Cherepanov died of a heart attack yesterday. He collasped on the bench after a shift during a game in Russia.

What really pisses me off is that not only the team, Avangard Omsk, did not have a stretcher availible, the AED wasn’t working!

Very careless for a professional sports team to even operate like that.

Its a damn shame that he will never skate the ice at the Garden. When I first heard him being drafted, I had thought the Rangers had a steal. Now we may never get to see his potential almost like Len Bias died after being drafted.

RIP Alexei. May you score more goals in heaven.

YouTube - Sarah Palin BOOED at hockey game.

I hate even linking back to youtube, but I’ll make an exception.

Among the 11, were myspace and Twitter.

Personally, I won’t shed a tear if myspace goes. It is a cancer of the Internet. Unfortunately FOX is making too much cash by exploiting their idiot masses.

Twitter, whether you love it or hate, is the darling of our internets. Once used by social media mavens with unwarranted self importance, it is now exploited by Jet Blue and CNN!

Could this happen to twitter??

I initially written off the site. I joined a year ago and tweeted this:

Just reserving my name here, this site is useless.

I pretty much dismissed the site and just registered it as placeholder. Then my brother continued to bug the hell out of me to use it and of course I’m really hooked. The site makes it easy to connect to friends and the API makes it adaptable for use on numerous platforms. In my case, I use twitteriffic on my Mac and iphone. With that ease of use I was able to connect to existing friends and made new ones.

The first thing many notice is that twitter does not have any ads running (except for the Japanese version) I often say to myself how can a company continue to run with out a visible business plan or any advertising. I think I may not be alone with these thoughts.

As the economy continues to worsen, venture capital funding is going to be difficult to acquire. The staff at twitter MUST find a way to monetize while keeping their user base happy. There should be subtle advertising before or after some tweets. Maybe they can sell ad space directly to twitterers wanted to promote blogs or their business. To satisfy the twitter addicts maybe there should be a Twitter “Pro” option with guaranteed uptime and special features.

The company should not wait for a sugar daddy in the valley to buy them out. They should focus on making money NOW before its too late.

Please , for the love of a benevolent god, KEEP YOUR SHITTY POLITICS OUT OF THE NHL. The nation’s 4th most popular sport is not THAT desperate to get publicity.

A presidential candidate regardless of party should not inject their campaign into a NHL regular season game. When I watch hockey I want to keep my mind of such things. That is why sports is a good distraction from the presidential race.

If you do your planned ceremonial drop of the puck tonight at Wachovia Center in Philly you deserve every boo from the crowd.

I pray that Flyer and Ranger fans unite for one moment to denounce this. Of course afterward they can resume to beating the shit out of each other in the stands like they always do.

Enjoy your brotherly “love”!

Sincerely,

Justin Leon

Aside from the fact that this guy has been completely oblivious to racism, this person uses language that is only used in middle english literature. Just because you abuse your thesaurus doesn’t mean that you are automatically smart.

Friends, my heart catches and chokes like a heavy stone in my throat as I write this. I awoke today, I thought, in the year 2008.

America has finally nominated a black man for president and a woman for vice president. Regardless of one’s political position(s), voters’ choices this year seem to indicate that America continues to progress socially, culturally and politically. But as I sat breakfasting late this morning at a local dining haunt, I saw something that gave me sickening pause and caused me to rethink my notions of American progress.

A robust, barrel-chested man seemingly suffering from some kind of ambulatory disability shuffled incongruously on pencil legs up to the counter of the Texas Avenue Whataburger. He sported a weathered collection of various cheaply-drawn tattoos emblazoned up and down his arms. On his left forearm sneered a hideous, multicolored skull. On his right (I had to look thrice to verify) and situated prominently for maximum effect, stood a hooded Klansman brandishing a flaming torch in one hand, the severed head of a black person clutched by the hair in the other and white-robed arms outstretched before a burning cross in the foreground. This was an elaborate and disquietingly frightful scene on anyone’s flesh, but somehow eerily at home on this dark-eyed, hobbling, unkempt fat man.

Ok, you could just say I saw a guy with a KKK tattoo go to a black cashier. Do you really have to overdo the prose? It continues with a wall of text.

I didn’t want to ponder such thoughts any further than this bizarre moment, but his ugly, angry, arm art compelled me to.

I hadn’t felt this saddened about any so random a human happening for some while. Did this poster-child of human hatred really feel somehow justified or righteous or good in despising someone he’s never even met? Did she sense creeping up her spine a chilling kinship with her ancestors, connecting with them in a painful way she hoped she’d never have to feel publicly? Will the fact that people still walk around broadcasting such misanthropy haunt her thoughts all day? All of her days? Did I just witness someone publicly losing her ethnic innocence?

YES YOU DID! Of course probally don’t know that she probably deals with racism on a daily basis. Stop acting shocked.

Rest in peace.

Some have asked me why did I change my name? Well I felt it was more natural that people call me Justin and not Leon (even though its my middle name). After diving deep into reading the blogosphere, I noticed a lot of people don’t use fake internet screen names. They either use their real name or an alias that sounds real.

Leon Westbrook sounded to me more like a “porn name” more than anything. I don’t think people can take a person who used a combo of his middle name and the name of a deceased pet. Another reason why I decided to leave this moniker behind is because its strong association with You Tube, a site I wish not to be a part of anymore.

Because of that the site’s name is now JustinLeon.com. At the same time I’m going to straighten this’s blog’s focus. I want to live up to my tag line “Because web 2.0 is a crock” (Yeah I know it sucks). Aside from some personal stuff every now and then. I want to become the Keith Olberman/Bill O of the internets.

Everyone (including myself) have what we call unwarranted self importance. Some have small and realistic amounts of it. Others have amounts that lead to delusion. A new goal of this blog is put those with large egos back down to earth…one good argument at a time.

So welcome everyone. You can just call me Justin.

I’m fine.

No really, I’m fine after the specatcularly epic fail witnessed at what would be the last game ever in Shea Stadium. I’m somewhat content at the Mets being the laughing stock of baseball for two years straight. Initially, I nearly cried at the “Shea Goodbye” ceremony, but I realized that much worse has happened.

I have watched countless Mets teams simply shit the bed and tank in May. Still I enjoyed going to met games. I witnessed the rise, fall and rise of Met teams that were far superior to the current squad. I fondly remember Bobby Bonilla, Bret Saberhagen, Vince Coleman and others simply embarass this team with their off field antics.

When you compare the past fail to the current fail, its no contest.

If anything I’m sad that Shea Stadium didn’t go out with any dignity. I wanted shea to go out with a win, playoffs or not. It even disturbs me that some of the so called met fans SKIPPED OUT THE FINAL CEREMONY. I’m guessing some of these fucks decided to get season tickets for the sole purpose of reselling them or just jumped on the bandwagon when they were once winning.

My hope is that when the new Shea opens (aka Citi Field, I refuse to call it that) on April 13th, 2009, many of these fans will not buy up all the tickets. Hopefully I will be able to attend 2 or 3 games at the very least if I can afford them.

Unfortunately, new Shea will cater to the corporate scum who are only interested in making another corrupt business deal. No more $5 seats on select nights. Its either season tickets or GTFO. Sadly stubhub will be become one of my favourite web sites. :(

The only problem? I have over 9000 social networks that I’m a part of. Its not going to be easy and its going to take a long freaking time.

My “rebranding” probably will be fully complete sometime in late 2009.

Ever since I graduated and moved back home, I am jobless. To make matters worse, I’m broke as fuck. I do not have any money really to go out and do things. (or save money).

At home the only things I do these days are playing NHL 09, watching TV show DVDs, every sport imaginable and of course applying for jobs. I should be really blogging more, but honestly I feel at times there is nothing interesting to talk about.

I used to really read about everything social media, but I feel that its a total waste of time. (going to save that virtol for another post).

I am not going to blame anyone for my predicament now. This is not the first time that this has happened to me. You do have to wonder though if this economy is going to get better anytime soon. In the meantime I hope to get something soon. I need money so I can go out and make friends again.

In before cries of “wahaaa, quit whining”. This is my blog and I can say whatever I want.

The thing the offends me about this shirt? Its not in my size because I am a fat ass. Fuck American Apparel for making their clothes only for skinny ass hipsters.

I’ll just leave this here…

If I could fit in the shirt I would have bought it here.

I particularly didn’t like blogging about my real life. I didn’t think anyone in their right mind would want to read the details of my boring life. That is what livejournal is for.

But then I read this today by my fellow blogger Alana Taylor on personal blogging.

Online Reputation: A Love/Hate Relationship

I have noticed that a lot of my friends don’t necessarily enjoy being photographed or caught on video as much as I do. They fear tarnishing their reputation or having too much personal content online. Most probably the reason is because they want to look spiffy clean for when their future employers come knocking at their door.

I, for one, don’t really mind being open online. I think that having a blog is one of the best ways of managing your personal brand and controlling your reputation. A blog allows you to write your side of the story — always. If there was a picture that was posted or comment that was made about you that you didn’t approve of or that you want to explain… your blog is the place to do it.

And from now on that will be the case. Of course i’m not going to reveal EVERYTHING about me, but I’m going to start to get a bit more vocal. Hopefully my mouth won’t get me in trouble again.

Thank you again for inspiring me Alana. The internet is not defined by just facebook, livejournal or even the sea of stupid.

Shea Stadium -New & Old, originally uploaded by Dr.DeNo.

On the left Shea Stadium. A good friend for 45 years.
On the right Citi Field. A nice but corporate drone waiting in the wings to replace Shea.

I will really miss the good old friend. I’m not sure about the new guy. I hear he can be a dick.

The site wecanbelievein.com allows anyone to “Change”, Barack’s slogan to anything.

As a proud supporter, I find this site hilarious. Others may not, but who cares.

I wanted to give a review on Google Chrome but unfortunately IT IS NOT FOR MAC OSX YET!

Nice going google! Really great! One of the most progressive companies in the nation DOESNT CARE ABOUT MAC USERS! Even evil Microsoft manged to make a decent version of Office while you guys continue to pussyfoot around.

My feelings are hurt. Let me cry in the corner. *sobs*

Just kidding. I’ll stick with Firefox 3 for now. Windows users enjoy your crashing.

Now text, next text, later text, originally uploaded by ronaldhennessy.

Someone at CNN is going to get fired. Taken by my brother right before Obama’s Speech Thursday night.

When it comes to online communities, divide and conquer isn’t going to work. I find it surprising that people are just now finding out that YouTube doesn’t give a shit about content creators. They are handsomely profiting from mostly copyrighted clips that populate the site. Do you really think they give a shit about boring vlogs and people who are too sensitive to be on the internet?

Anyone who believes in Paul Robinette’s vision of a “troll free” vlogging site is an absolute idiot.

This is the same person:

• Who appeared in Blackface ripping off a poem from NPR in a video
• Orchestrated a fake harassment scandal with his wife
• Attempted a similar “exodus” with Livevideo only to call people who joined “traitors” a few weeks later.
• Who has stepped on many toes, big and small for the sake of worthless views.
• Who is egotistical and possibly unstable like most youtubers.

I have a two theories. Either this is a stunt to upset vloggers or he is trying to set up a half assed business.

After reading the mostly bad reviews on the site and knowing about the proposed “identity verification*”. I have no interest at all in joining such a site. If a website requires a “third party” for my private information to confirm my identity by a person like Renetto who can might use it for abusive reasons, I don’t want any part in it.

Vloggers who believed Paul Robinette’s bullshit failed to realize this fact: no matter how many safeguards provided, people will find a new way to talk shit about you online. If you can’t deal with that, you don’t belong on the internet. On other websites I had racial slurs & other types of harassment directed toward me. Did I raise a fit and alert the NAACP? Absolutely not? I simply never let it reach to a point where I am at “war” with someone.

Like a school yard bully, the more you agitate him or her, the more he or she will try to push your buttons. Vloggers need to either ignore trolls or use this thing called the “block” button. It is pretty effective on this blog and other places.

As for finding a new place to vlog, there are literally 100s of video hosting sites to go on. Tired of youtube? Why not try veoh, or metacafe, dailymotion or viddler (where I went)? While those sites may not get the audience of youtube, a respectable amount of people are watching videos. Someone will try find a way to harrass you (if you let them), but you won’t get a wave of stupid comments that popular youtube videos often get.

*Oh right before I put this up I learned that the provider that would have taken care of the verification process was given the banhammer by ning.com, the provider behind vloggerheads. Paul if you really wanted to make a site independent of youtube, YOU SHOULD HAVE USED YOUR OWN SERVER AND NOT SOMEONE ELSES!

THE AREA IS UNDER SURVEILLANCE, originally uploaded by leonwestbrook.

Because people are so desperate to steal an award winning movie like “Semipro” they have to have a sign above telling them not to steal it.

Taken at a supermarket in the Ghetto.

So whatever I find I will share them with you.

For example here are some pictures taken over the past few months:

Graffiti at Mohawk Place, my favourite music venue in Buffalo.

LOL on blackboard

Buffalo 66 on iphone!

Oh and enjoy Aids in a bag!

Also I gotta work on the epic blog roll. So if you want to be linked (if you blog is relevant to my interests that is), shoot me a email.

Back to IRL responsibilities…

Last month I did a comparison of two video streaming sites, BlogTV & Stickam. I noted that both sites had irritating characteristics. In particular BlogTV featured the ilk of youtube that I can not tolerate.

After I wrote the entry I got a message from BlogTV’s community manager, Kara. It was sent in early July, but I’ve been sitting on it for a while because I have been busy with school, banging women, drinking Blue Moons in Philadelphia and twitter. (all in that order)

Hello Leon,

I was reading the article you wrote about stickam vs blogTV and I wanted to speak to you about it.

I am the community manager here and while I know we are still in beta phase and have our problems, we really care about our broadcasters and about the future of this site.

Our dream is for this platform to inspire people to create ‘better than TV’ quality, live shows where people can come to be interactively entertained. I feel that stickam is, as you said, ‘a watering hole.’ It seems to be more designed for a person who wants to hang out with online buddies.

BlogTV on the other hand allows you to hang out while still providing more of a creative environment. We constantly create events and contest, games and performances for people to take part in. We have a music venue called BTVM (blogTV mainstange) where live music performances take place every week or so. We truly want blogTV to feel like a place where you can get lost for a few hours and be entertained on every page that you turn.

As for you thinking we don’t pay attention to the ‘little’ guy…this is not true. You have really caught our interest with the way you think and we would like to promote your show if you want. All you need to do is send me some high quality pics of yourself or something that represents you, plus a show name and times to community@blogtv.com and we will get a home page banner up for you. Then we can also mention you for new comer of the week on our weekly news show (Fri. 9pm EST username: weekly) and even in our monthly newsletter.

So, keep being honest and speaking your mind…you have something special.

Contact me any time,
Kara-Hannah
Community Manager
email: community@blogtv.com

I responded to blogtv with this:

While it would be very neat to be promoted, i’ll be honest and say this. (You want honesty :) ) I am a boring person when it comes to online streaming. I have absolutely nothing to offer to anyone in the arena of video entertainment. If YouTube, the MTV of online video sites, rejected me for partnership 4 times in a 3 month span, its probably for a damn good reason.

I do really appreciate that you took the time to hear me out in a message that isn’t a form letter. You don’t see that with YouTube or even other sites. Sorry it took me a very long time to respond. I’ll consider the featuring spot when I have the time to do so.

Still Stickam is my online streaming home (though UStream is starting to steal the spotlight and that’s another blog entry!)

Kara responded:

Hey Justin,

I definitely appreciate the honesty. I only want to you to do a show with us if you are interested in it yourself. This is not about partnership or stats necessarily, but just that we felt you had an intelligent and forthright point of view.

Keep enjoying yourself at stickam or ustream, but know that you are always welcome to come do a show with us whenever you want.

You can always reach me via message or at my email address community@blogtv.com

Keep it real,
Kara ;)

So there you have it. We should all give BlogTV a round of applause for hearing me out. You don’t get that with youtube (the only time they would have heard me out when I told them something was broken and not for my content). Look out for LeonWestbrook’s hour of unwarranted self importance coming to blogtv.com soon! (I remember, PrincessDiana161 thinking that was a awesome room name at PhillyTube. :) )

"Weev", From ED

I found it aboulutley hilarious that the Old Gray Lady talked about 4chan, /B/, “An Hero” and Enyclopedia Dramatica all in the same article. Here is an excerpt. 

Today the Internet is much more than esoteric discussion forums. It is a mass medium for defining who we are to ourselves and to others. Teenagers groom their MySpace profiles as intensely as their hair; escapists clock 50-hour weeks in virtual worlds, accumulating gold for their online avatars. Anyone seeking work or love can expect to be Googled. As our emotional investment in the Internet has grown, the stakes for trolling — for provoking strangers online — have risen. Trolling has evolved from ironic solo skit to vicious group hunt.

“Lulz” is how trolls keep score. A corruption of “LOL” or “laugh out loud,” “lulz” means the joy of disrupting another’s emotional equilibrium. “Lulz is watching someone lose their mind at their computer 2,000 miles away while you chat with friends and laugh,” said one ex-troll who, like many people I contacted, refused to disclose his legal identity

I honestly think that this whole article is total satire. (Its in the Magazine for Sunday, NOT the actual paper!) Its ironic they are talking trolling New York Times readers when “A corruption of LOL” is mentioned in a serious context.

One particular quote by Jason Fortuny aka RFJason aka the guy who did that epic Craiglist prank stuck out. It is really sage advice.

“…..trolling will stop only when its audience stops taking trolls seriously. “

Here is the LONG article. It is a MUST READ.

New York Times “The Trolls Among us”