h. Play

I see this “no politics” stance as censorship and dictatorship, really.

Everything is political, by default. Inherently.

Being in love with a fat person is political.

Dating someone who’s disabled is political.

Adopting a black kid when you’re white as hell, is political.

Being an independent business is political.

Wanting a two-lane boulevard because I use both bicycle and car daily, and that boulevards are for cars and side streets are for bicycles, which is in a way fucking common sense, is political yet doesn’t follow any narratives out there.

Everything that we do sends signals, and those signals build values at large. Asking folks to never engage about those from 9 to 5 five days a week, is not only quite impossible, it is very unhealthy and leads to fascism taking over, which is something we’re witnessing these days.

We don’t want that.

Good trouble. We need it. Things are moving so fast, we need folks to question and halt things if needed. From Google to USC, from Palestine to Ukraine and Sudan. From sharing information, doing the work to understand our accountability, voting to straight up immolation, shake things up. Be relentless.

Every single time I’m thinking “OK, let’s stop masking” after a dinner party or in public in a venue, the week after I feel fucking funny. Heavy running nose, some stomach issues, etc. Most people hide their symptoms these days so I’m like “I’m paranoid, haha!” And then they’re coughing sounding like they have 1800s tuberculosis and I’m like “yeah, no”.

But every single time I mask up, avoid most folks and bask in the sun? I soon physically feel better than ever.

Not practical.

Parking lot. Los Angeles. December 2023.

On a scorching hot day, seeing this felt like it happened in 1972 or something. Did it even happen?

2012 is probably the last year before the majority of folks is absorbed by their phones. In 2012 we’re still making eye contact in this b.

This whole past decade dominated by technology is rather sad, truly.

I see a lot of people lament about that and how it’s destroying jobs.

Yeah, but that’s not the whole story.

The whole story for me is all my graphic designer friends through the years. They’ve always giggled at the fact that they were getting paid handsomely (and sometimes, far too much) to design a few web buttons or to draw a nice illustration. Work that would take them a couple hours or an afternoon, and sustain them for weeks/months.

I used to think “lucky bastards, I can’t do that designing audio!”. Well, they’re not lucky bastards anymore. 90% of them are competing with AI aka a 24/7 slave who’s getting better at its craft 24/7 as well.

And so here comes the cognitive dissonance.

“But making art is about making it!” Well, keep making it then. You won’t get paid much now though, but art isn’t about getting paid, is it?

“But it used to be a great career, working with tons of different clients!” Yeah, not anymore I guess. This is why there’s no choice but to demand UBI.

Folks prefer to struggle financially and mentally rather than accept the fact that humankind has reached a point where work doesn’t yield enough money for folks to live decently. Which means we need to focus on that part.

So don’t hate progress, just understand that you won’t live off of your art. And that it is fine.

It serves 6, or 1 day per Harold (1d/h.).

Physics. There’s nothing you can do.

Cheers to that, bro.

I was logged in with my Gmail account and needed to submit a review. I didn’t want to use my account, so I logged out. Turns out, I couldn’t submit a review without being logged in, so I logged back in. No worries.

Denied.

Super weird knowing that my 20-year-old Gmail account is only accessed on a couple devices at home, always the same for 5+ years, and secured with a 25+ character password. It is decently secure. I try again.

Denied.

The super smart folks at Google claim that they don’t have enough information to know that it’s me logging in. On the exact same device I was logged into 2 minutes ago? With a password long enough that it’s extremely unlikely that a hacker is trying to log in? On an account that doesn’t have suspicious activity at all? On the same IP/Gateway/Network? I didn’t do anything. Flagged.

I had heard about how it’s impossible to get anyone at Google to help with those things, and I’ve been experiencing that first hand since last night. Holy fucking shit.

Of course they’re making a lot of money, they don’t invest in support at all. I can’t even get a live chat thingy! Every single company out there has those. How on earth Google doesn’t, is beyond wild.

My Gmail emails are forwarded to another email so I still get them and can respond. But I cannot use my “Google” account, aka Gmail account to do anything, because I logged out once. And that’s worth locking me out for Google.

Absolutely unhinged.

On one hand, journalists demand to be respected.

On the other hand they write and publish that type of insane shit.

What would help unite Americans in trouble times is narrowing the wealth gap by a factor of ten, not staring at the goddamn sky in the middle of the afternoon, you brainless ghouls.

Bro sounding just like Too Short: “YOU GOT THAT OBAMA NOSE” “YOU BEEN IN THE AIR FORCE??”

Me: “OKAY!” “NO SIR!”

Considering those interjections, I didn’t feel like having a whole conversation.

Strangely, the whole affair reminded me of being on a porn set, and I couldn’t shake the idea that porn stars and black Germans are a lot alike. Two neglected and attention-starved communities of people who, despite their public nakedness, remain “invisible” to a society that pretends not to see them.

Paul Beatty cutting deep in Slumberland, p. 179. It’s the story of a L.A. based DJ in Germany and I finished this book flying back.

I don’t know any black German, but I believe that this description works for all black Europeans.

When in the Paris suburbs, it’s easy to think that half the French population is black or brown. Yet, all black folks there have this emptiness in their eyes. I remember it. The sense that you don’t really feel like being part of this. It doesn’t matter what you’re doing. You’re still not fully part of it. And I guess, never really will, even when you score 2 goals against Italy.

Yes, I can technically die faster in America, from a cop or a brother. But I do exist more. I am considered which leads to respect and opportunities. The difference between how customs gauge me in Los Angeles or Paris is… Interesting.

Sometimes I feel like white folks’ propension to being obsessed with the past is to avoid dealing with the now, which is about making a better society by for instance, truly embracing diversity instead of telling it how it should be invisible. It is not and it can’t be.