Dear Valentine's Day

I couldn't resist putting this flick up!

So, before you sit there and say to yourself, 'Sheesh, here's another heartbroken, bitter tirade against me by some hopeless romantic without someone to spend my day with,' you should know this, Valentine's Day: Yes, I am a hopeless romantic. Yes, my heart's been broken more times than I can count. Yes, I am bitter. However, V-Day, there is no hate coming from my side this year.

Eros, or erotic love as we know it, has made you into a day for lovers, and that concept has been eaten alive by the media, card companies and by the saps good people who believe yours is the day of love. Yet, I've come up with a rebuttal for your tantalizing hold on our hearts, Valentine's Day: When your not in love with someone else, it's time to love yourself. That said, I've prepared a list of things that make life worth loving. Rather than pine over lost loves and recount the 'what-ifs' constantly circling my mind, your day will be spent doing and experiencing self love (get all the masturbation jokes out now.. *waits*) and the beauty of remembering that oneself is enough. On your day I will:

- Be listening to the most ignorant, asinine, non-erotic music known to man. Whether Waka Flaka Flame, Gucci, Wayne, 50, Old Jay-Z, Big L, Linkin Park (#shoutout to Hybrid Theory for being my high school soundtrack), The LOX (not D-Block), Cam'Ron and Dip Set. Not only will that be some good old fashioned n*ggadry floating in the air, any thoughts of romance will be vanquished by that of guns, money and utter testosterone. V-Day, I don't need your R&B playlist to have a good day.

- Be wearing a neutral color. There are two types of people during your day: The saps great people who are decked out in red and whatever regalia of your day, and the Debbie Downers rocking black as a 'protest' to your rosy air. Neutral colors will give off the atmosphere of a regular day, not one marked by foolish affections. Rather than fall victim to either love or hatred of you, it's better to stay in the middle.

- Do inordinate amounts of homework, job searching, and (hopefully) blogging. Maybe I'll even work out. Anything.. Something that'll benefit me. One of the things that we abandon while searching for 'that one' and running around like decapitated lovebirds is an appreciation for getting things done. People use you as an excuse to take the day off 'in the name of love'. Valentine's Day, you're a Monday! As far as I'm concerned, it should be business as usual and will stay that way.

- Hang with the people that will always love me: my friends. People get so caught up in you, and being 'boo'ed up' that they forget they have friends... Friends that share stories and ideas, and have smart conversations about stupid things, and insult you mercilessly, and make those 'single life' moments all the more memorable. Who needs a Valentine for your day, when you've got friends?

- Get a good night's sleep. One thing I always notice on February 15th is how tired everyone is. Whether from an evening full of 'activities', to an all-night argument, to sitting up pining, people come in to work or school looking more famished than the Israelites traveling the desert. Rather than bother myself staying up (and I'm a night-owl to the core), I'll be asleep at a reasonable hour and wake up at such an hour. That's better than living nocturnal for one night, then taking the entire week to catch up on sleep. When the lovebirds are falling asleep at the wheel or making depression-caliber financial mistakes while dozing off on the trading floor, I'll be completely coherent and ready to rock on the 15th.

Valentine's Day, it's not that I hate you or that I'm trying to distract myself from thinking about you. It's that I'd rather live and love the other 364 days of the year, than try and have a 'memorable' day with you. It's not that I wouldn't like a significant other. It's that I'd rather focus on being the best me for the day that woman walks into my life. If I'm focused on you, I'm missing out on every other day that I could be pulling out all the stops for ME, not a likeness of romance that you've injected into everyone else's head.

V-Day, I appreciate your recognition and the 'wonders' (subjective) that you've done for the expression of love worldwide. That doesn't mean I'm going to be another love-blind drone spewing my heart out all day. To boot, eschewing your idiocy will most definitely be showing some SERIOUS love to my wallet. At the end of the day, not only will I be well on the road to being the best me possible, you'll mean that much more in the event that next year I'm not spending it single. So, V-Day, I say live and let live. You do your thing, I'll do mine, and maybe we can talk in another 365...

Kanye West - Christmas in Harlem (ft. CyHi Da Prynce & Teyana Taylor)

With Selita Ebanks on my arm, hell, I'd be in the Christmas spirit year-round...


Kanye West - Christmas in Harlem (ft. CyHi Da Prynce & Teyana Taylor)

Now, before I get into the semantics of this track, let me say this: I had yet to find out what exactly it was that Teyana Taylor was famous for until I heard this song. I knew she was involved in music in some capacity, but not that she was capable of holding a tune, much less an entire chorus. I wonder if that makes Kanye's cosign that much better, because everyone he's worked with in the last few months has elevated their game. G.O.O.D. Music accolades aside, Ye' decided to spread some Yuletide cheer in the mold of Run DMC by releasing 'Christmas in Harlem'. I suppose it's Harlem simply because of Teyana, but ignoring locale, this is a pretty nice track. It's cool to see Yeezy bringing back the holiday-themed track. Let's just hope he doesn't bring back Horrorcore too...

Dear Halloween

Has nothing to do with my reasoning, but I thought it was hilarious... Deal with it.

Let's get this straight: I've never celebrated you, Halloween. Everything I will say in this letter is a third-party observation. Halloween, I grew up in a devout Christian household, so quite frankly, I've never been exposed to all of your 'greatness'. That said, I can see your allure for small children, whose addiction to sweet treats and dressing up like cartoon characters is almost crack-like. My beef with you, Halloween, is what happens when constituents of my age bracket start planning for you.

Enter the waning weeks of October. Everywhere I go I see parties (the adult version), decorations and general regalia dealing with you. And I wonder, 'Why?'. As young adults, what really is the point of dressing in costumes to do what they do on weekends anyway? Drinking and dancing seem a lot more cumbersome when donning masks, bad makeup and other random props. Also, not to be sexist, Halloween, but your occurrence is nothing more than an excuse for women to be half naked during the late-fall freeze. Why wait until a kids holiday to do that? Why not walk around drunk in a cutoff pirate uniform in mid-January? For men, you're an even stranger holiday. What do I look like dressing up as a policeman, at night nonetheless?

It's not that I'm against you. It's that after a certain age point, you don't have any use. In the same way that Christmas loses it's magic when one finds out that Santa was indeed their father, and one's birthday falls off when their parents stop throwing extravagant theme parties, you become another day on the calendar with a funny font. Halloween, maybe it's the cynic in me causing this feeling. Maybe its the household I grew up in. Maybe it's that I hate wigs more than I hate waiting in line at the convenience store. Whatever the case, Halloween, I won't be dressing up. Sure, I'll be at the gatherings and engage in whatever buffoonery taking place. But I won't do it simply because you're here. Holidays tend to make people into fools for that holiday. Ghosts and the like aren't real. Nor are the traditions we make up. In fact, the real reason behind the costumes was to disguise oneself for the impending influx of dead spirits that would be wandering as the portal between our world and the underworld opened momentarily. Does that mean after you, some spirits will still be hobbling around? No. It means most will have spent their hard earned cents on apparel that won't be of any use on November 1st. That I can pass on... Even if my sweet tooth does lead to some serious binge candy eating. Happy All Hollows Day to my future cavities and those that won't be scraping fake blood and cobwebs off for the next week...

Dear Independence Day

Call me unpatriotic for this one. I don't care.

Hot dogs, hamburgers, barbecues, fireworks and American flags!!! YEEEE-HAWWWW!!! It's the most patriotic time of the year. July 4th is your day. Independence Day. You're the superhero of holidays. Christmas makes most of the money, New Year's makes people feel the worst, and Columbus Day essentially has no purpose. But you... You, Independence Day are the fat, fun, always semi-inebriated member of the holiday family that everyone always looks forward to. You always seem to come on a sunny day. It's a wonder we don't celebrate you every month! I suppose therein lies the problem, I-Day.

America was built on the tenet of freedom, liberty and the right to a fair life based on hard work. Yet, all around me, I see the opposite. I see Latin Americans in Arizona being told how to live their lives and being accosted because they 'look' like illegal immigrants. I see fighting left and right over every issue known to man, whether it's medical marijuana, health care, gay marriage or the economy's direction. I see politicians lying, stealing and taking advantage of their positions. I see our country war-mongering overseas and destroying our natural world with oil spills and lack of environmental awareness. There's still rampant poverty everywhere in the nation, but we still have time to celebrate you, Independence Day. As long as we can funnel food, booze and fireworks into our systems, it's fine. No, I'm not saying we shouldn't celebrate you and feel good about the indenpendence of our country. We just shouldn't ignore the ills of our country under the guise of celebrating our independence.

Ironically, I'm writing this letter while in Canada. Even more ironic is the fact that I feel more unpatriotic writing this letter than I do being here. Is that a bad thing or not? After all, the point of you being a holiday is the freedom to write such a letter. Yet, I'm sure there's some Tea Party, gun-wielding, Confederate flag-donning hokie doing the same somewhere else, bashing the same things I am but on the opposite side of the spectrum. I suppose patriotism goes both ways as long as we wave the same flag, Independence Day. The founding fathers (including the ones who were doing all the work, ie: slaves) wanted it that way. Then again, a lot of the things they wanted didn't turn out too peachy. On that note, I'm going to go celebrate my 4th of July the Canadian way, whatever that is... *kicks back with maple syrup*

Dear Valentine's Day

All the Charlie Browns out there can relate...

There are soooooooo many things I could say about you V-Day. So many. I could call you a corporate creation, a devious idea devised by Hallmark and DeBeers to capitalize on our romantic insecurities. You could be the crutch that Hallmark relies on, since no one really buys greeting cards anymore. You could be an excuse for everyone to rush to their local Walgreens at 5:57 today to pick up various red-colored and heart-shaped wares that lose their value in 2 days. That's the most popular reason for hating you these days, so I'll go somewhere different to keep from beating dead Cupids horses with sticks. I could call you a day of exclusion and isolation for those unfortunate enough to not have a significant other, but that would be me being bitter and angry at my own lack of romance. It would certainly be easy, but probably the most depressing letter I've ever written. No one likes to be reminded of the fact that they're alone, so I'll steer clear of that one too. I could call you a lot of things, but instead I'm going to pose a hypothetical:

What do people born on February 14 do?

Simple, yet puzzling isn't it? Seriously though, V-Day. If a person's birthday just so happens to lie on February 14th, their personal day of conquest and admiration turns into a lovey-dovey heart-fest. If the person decides to go to dinner, they're privy to the oodles of couples playing tonsil hockey, whether its Applebee's or Mr. Chow. If the person goes to work or school, they're subject to everyone trying to infect them with the Red Fever. If the person turns on the television, they have to watch bad Valentine's Day episodes of every show, from the Seinfeld to Sesame Street. Hell, if they want to go to the movies, they have to be tortured by the sight of a movie, dedicated to your namesake and ideology: that love can conquer all. It's like there's a hex on today if you're single or don't feel love's oh-so-icky (taking it back to kindergarten) pull. V-Day, I don't buy it, nor will I be buying anything.

No, this isn't an 'I hate love' post, nor do I intend to take money love out of your pockets heart, by disparaging the lameness love that goes into your day. If you're meant to touch a couple, then do your thing V-Day. If someone happens to have a storybook ending on your day, then that's just peachy (the opposite happens so much more often than we like to admit). Just know that my Sunday, and my weekend will be dedicated not to you or any significant other. I will be bumping the hardest, hood-ded-est, ignorant of all hip-hop (Ready to Die is inevitably part of that playlist), writing some more of these blogs, and watching NBA All-Star Weekend, hoping that the Red Fever comes nowhere near these shores. Valentine's Day, ironically, instead of loving others more after you, I love myself all the more, as selfish as that sounds. Hopefully more people do the same instead of having insulin shock delivered in a heart-shaped box...

How can any sane, single person not want to murder the creators of this movie??

Dear Dr. King

Everyone remembers the letter. Most don't remember why you were in jail in the first place...

Writing letters to the dead... Clearly losing it. Regardless, here goes.

Dr. King, it's been over 40 years since the fateful day you were murdered. In 1986, Ronald Reagan (oh, the irony) signed the bill to make your namesake into a holiday, and since then we've had the 3rd Monday in January off. There are three issues that I have with your holiday, never to take anything away from you. The first is the fact that your holiday is watered-down. Everywhere I look, instead of reverence, thoughts of action and new levels of racial equality, I see commercials for McDonalds, jokes on Twitter, and vapid school assemblies about your name. The 'I Have a Dream' and 'Letter from Birmingham Jail' are played, posted and quoted everywhere. It's not that the attention isn't deserved, it's that the holiday is a misdirected attempt at respect that's ended up as a day off for most people. We supplement that day with ceremonial (more so than sincere) reverence so that people don't think we're 'anti-MLK' or the one kid in the class who never memorized your speeches.

The second issue with your holiday is that it more or less overshadows every other black person ever associated with any type of freedom-fighting or liberal agenda. Guys like John Lewis (#shoutout to Sojourn to the Past; no, seriously) Marcus Garvey, W.E.B. Du Bois, Medgar Evars, Stokely Carmichael and Huey Newton who all helped drive the Civil Rights movement that you are crowned king of, all get reduced to random names in a history book. Dr. King, with this holiday, your namesake has taken on a Messiah-like aura to it. You're seen as THE Civil Rights hero, rather than A Civil Rights hero. My forefathers will probably balk at this, but I don't think one person should be above a movement, especially when that movement is for an entire race. Is it your fault that you were assassinated and cast as a martyr? Probably not. That said, I don't think you'd be that hyped to have this day if you were still alive.

My last issue is the fact that literally minutes after MLK Day is over, we all pretty much just go back to living, rather than take any lessons from today. Your holiday feels like New Year's Eve all over again, with people coming up with aspirations they won't or can't hold up. Today, your name is to black people what Gasundheit is to a sneeze. For the minute, the saying and the feeling will suffice, but after the moment has passed, we don't remember the sentiment until the next time we sneeze. Dr. King, I linked the Boondocks video for the simple reason that before you died, you were telling everyone else the truth about racism. In that video, you're telling US the truth about our own race, which is ironic. Maybe it's that black people back then had enough KOS (knowledge of self) to know what was good for us. Nowadays it takes a holiday for us to remember. I can't wait till February when I get my yearly dose of Black History...

#ihaveadream that this really happened...

Dear New Year's Resolutions

You and about 10 billion other heads...

It's that time of year again. The time of year when everybody says '20xx is gonna be my year!' or 'let's get it, 20xx' or 'leaving the negative in 20xx, and makes a bunch of you, New Year's Resolutions. Now, there is nothing wrong with trying to improve ourselves, but why do we always wait until a new year to make a list of you guys?? I suppose that the turning of a calendar offers some the hope of a new beginning. That said, why do our grandiose plans and goals have to have a calendar? New Year's Resolutions, you give us a contrived sense of ambition because we see everything in such up-and-down terms.

People, instead of letting their ambition have some sort of continuity, wait until the new year to come up with ways to improve themselves. The problem is, resolutions, that you last as long as the New Year's spirit does: maybe a few days. That's not to say that everyone has the same, weak mental fortitude, but NYR (that's what we're calling you for the rest of the post), how many weight loss, or money management versions have we seen? How many vows to stop drinking or smoking or cursing have passed through the tenet of NYR's?? Hell, an even better question: How many of you have actually been kept until the next new year?? I'd say more resolutions come and go in the first week of the new year than drinks on New Year's Eve. No offense, but this year, instead of making a promise to do something, I'm just going to do the same thing I've been doing, just better. That's a resolution I can keep, and will probably not forget a week later...

X-Mas Pranks Going too Far

Something about this video screams 'TOO MUCH TIME ON YOUR HANDS'. Apparently, some guy left his friend his apartment keys for a vacation, and that friend decided to pull the prank of all pranks by wrapping his entire apartment. When I say his entire apartment, I mean EVERYTHING. It's funny until you realize that his friends didn't just stop at his furniture, but also took it upon themselves to wrap the food in his fridge. With friends like this, it's understandable why people are losing their Christmas cheer. Then again, I'd laugh if I saw a friend's apartment like this, too...

Office X-Mas Party Gone Terribly Wrong

Everyone has THAT friend (or co-worker in this case). You know. The one who can't hold their liquor and suddenly becomes the love child of Rush Limbaugh and Kurt Cobain; inebriated and outspoken. This video is like a public service announcement to those people, as well as the friends who let them dip a little too far into the deep end of the liquor pool. This holidays, don't let a few too many drinks on Christmas Eve turn into a CRAPPY New Year. Be safe, friends...

The Mailing List: November 2009 (#3)

3. Thanksgiving


Ahh, if only political cartoonists ran the world...

Thanksgiving. Turkey Day. Everybody knows and loves it. Who can resist a mouthwatering helping of turkey, gravy, stuffing, biscuits, ham or whatever other fauna line your table on the third Thursday in December? I know I can't. But Thanksgiving is so much more profound than what we give it. For one, it was one of the first peaceful contacts between the Native Americans and the 'Pilgrims'. While we can wax philosophical about the happenings, we all know what happened in the end. Native Americans ended up in reservations and casinos and the rest is history. If you can't understand that significance, then off yourself.

We give thanks for every inane pleasure we take in life, not understanding that the foundation of our country is built on bloodshed. Whether the blood of Native Americans, slaves, Brits, Mexicans or whoever, America has more blood on it's hands than Tom Hanks in Castaway when he found Wilson. But it's always going to be cool as long as we have our stuffing and our football. Friends, while you're stuffing your piehole today, remember to give thanks for your sovereignty and your ability to make choices for yourselves. Remember that every Thanksgiving after the first one, the Pilgrims were thanking God for a freshly scalped Injun, not the bountiful harvest that those Injuns had bestowed upon the Pilgrims years before. Remember that life is more precious than gold, and that we should be thankful for it every day, not just Thanksgiving. That's not some 3rd grade paper (I actually did write that paper), that's some real shit.

For everything you have, for everything you don't have to deal with, all the BS and drama you've gotten through, everything you COULD have, and all the potential you have (everyone has it, nearly no one uses all of it), you should be thankful. So today, as @akzionz would say, 'give thanks'...