From 12 pm to 6pm on Friday, March 19th, DC to BC and The Great Progression, along with several other fine organizations, will be hosting Quality!, a South By Southwest showcase in Austin, TX. How did this all happen? If you’re interested, you better read on.

Several years ago, probably in either late high school or early college, I was put on to a remarkable boutique music blog by the name of Blind I For The Kids. Headed by music buff Suli, or $ as he goes by on the internets, Blind I has been hipping me to the vast majority of the eclectic jams I’ve had in rotation. Every other rarity and B-side in my 22,000+ patchwork collection of legally and illegally acquired music has been downloaded from Blind I. They were the biggest inspiration in starting this site that you see today, providing support and motivation while I tried my hand at building a safehaven where people could revel in music, trillness, and tomfoolery.

Almost two weeks ago, Suli reached out to me and said, “Modi, you tryna do a showcase at South By Southwest with me?” I thought it was a joke. As you can see by the flyer, it wasn’t a joke at all. 10 or so later, I got my $#!t together. The wonderful team behind Blind I (especially Noah, Maiya, and $) obviously gave this endeavor much thought before I was involved, from gathering sponsors to finding the acts, from securing the venue to getting the little intangibles dealt with. I’m honored to be a part of this experience, and it’ll be a journey. If you’re interested in following it all, follow @DCtoBC (me) or @QualitySXSW on Twitter. Below is a nice little summary of exactly what’s going on.

We present to you “QUALITY,” an eclectic progressive musical display showcasing some of the best and brightest in 2010’s new musical landscape. Hosted by the tastemakers of Blind I and DC to BC / The Great
Progression, “QUALITY!” aims to provide the community of burgeoning talent that Blind I, DC to BC, and The Great Progression promotes virally with a visual showcase during the famed South by Southwest (SXSW) week.

DATE: Friday, March 19th, 2010
LOCATION: Soho Lounge (217 E. 6th Street, Austin, TX)
Expected Attendance: 600+ (600 people!? My goodness!)

Performances by: Theo Martins, Vandalyzm, Classy Hand Favours, TiRon, The Paxtons, KJ, Project Mayhem, Mic Terror, Black Spade, Brittany Street, Bad Rabbits, Phil Ade, U-N-I, Kinky Notti, Tabi Bonney, Brittany Bosco, Peter Hadar, Sulaiman, YP, Big Homie Doe, Rockwell Knuckles, House Shoes, BBU, Coultrain, L.E., Pugs Atomz, and some special guests.

Yeah, and if all those names didn’t ring too many bells (and some should, but some shouldn’t, because it’s a showcase. It’s where relatively known and unknown artists give you a reason to check for them in the future.), we’ve done you a favor and compiled a smooth sampler mixtape to prepare you for what you’re about to see, or for you to live through vicariously if you can’t make it to Austin for the weekend. Click artwork or the link below that to download!

DOWNLOAD: QUALITY! Showcase Sampler Mixtape

Quick note: U-N-I was a last-minute addition, so the song you played while reading this post was a song of theirs. Wasn’t that some crafty thinking? Ha. Grab it below.

DOWNLOAD: U-N-I – Windows

]]> http://DCtoBC.com/2010/03/south-by-southwest-showcase-quality/feed/ 8 http://DCtoBC.com/2010/02/shy-guy-in-the-club/ http://DCtoBC.com/2010/02/shy-guy-in-the-club/#comments Thu, 25 Feb 2010 17:00:57 +0000 modi http://www.dctobc.com/?p=1132

note: it’s the week of the re-up. new readers love it, old readers loathe it, and i’m just tryna get my blog respect back. i put this in “hall of fame post” categories, and i’m looking for more to add to this section. let’s get it.

shy guys typically have visions of grandeur, but most times things just don’t work out in the end. keep living vicariously through those music videos, like this one.

that’s what the shy guy wants the club to be like. in reality, the club will never look like that unless you make 6 figures or higher, or are cool with the promoters. and even in those circumstances, you need to find some video vixens to sprinkle around the place, just to be safe.

truth be told, the typical shy guy will always be outside of his element at the club. it’s not terrain they feel comfy in, and there’s little they can do to change this. apart from spending precious time to differentiate himself with the proper outfit, as well as spend some paper on the crucial shape up, just getting into the venue is in itself intimidating. the thing is, it doesn’t matter if a shy guy tries to pump himself up for the occasion, jamming the ultimate party playlist and sipping on that liquid courage. once he drops $20, steps through the metal detector, and has security give him a roughhousing that is more commonly known as the “pat down,” he freezes up.

why!? i’ll tell you why. because there’s way too much stuff going on in there. just look at that picture. it’s chaos in an enclosed space. everybody looks like they’re doing something different. you have the ballers, t-paining the megan good look-alikes with patron shots all night. there’s also that clique of fine dimes that will never stop dancing in their private circles with each other. you know it’s possible for even the lamest guy to leave the club with some digits, a name, a dance, something! so you and your homies focus, and work on getting yours for the night.

it’s a jungle out there. similar to vietnam during the war, almost. it’s too loud and packed for you to concentrate, let alone rap to the cute, dark-skinned beauty in the corner. but you try your luck anyway, and make your way through the crowd, spilling your long island iced tea on like 7 angry broads while in transit. when you get there, it doesn’t work out like how you envisioned it in your mind. somehow, she confuses your harmless “hey, what’s going on?” with a creepy “i wanna see your thong,” and storms away ferociously, but not without cursing you out in front of everybody.

now what!? you’re a little shook. you lost all desire to go approach that chick with the frizzy fro because you know something similar could happen. and besides, you’ve seen dudes getting iced all night! i mean, how about that awful glance that they throw a guy while dancing with them, to make sure they’re cute enough! nobody wants to go through that, that’s horrible. it’s even worse when her friends make that call for her, and you don’t even realize what just happened until they’ve migrated away and you’re sitting there like a sucker in the middle of the dance floor while the song is still playing. goodness.

by the time you’ve devised your next plan of action, the lights are on, and you’ve made virtually no moves the whole night. my advise? stick to the house party. people are more friendly there. plus, nobody will ever misinterpret your words, either.

Clearly, that’s me. not in 5th grade though. More like when i was a toddler. but that’s not the point.

The point is, puppy love is something serious. Around valentine’s day, I got an email from an old friend. Her name? Christina Vittas. She was my first official girlfriend from back in 5th grade, and the e-mail was titled “5th grade love letters”. I already knew what was inside.

First thing’s first. Jam this while you read.

I need everybody to realize Tina was baaad. I was doing pretty big things with this fine young lady as my girl. I know this was 5th grade, but she was the baddest chick in the middle school. If anybody went to Sidwell for middle school (shout out to my Quaker school bredren across the globe), or matter fact, if you ever went to Sidwell, you knew how beautiful this girl was. This was before the secondary sex characteristics developed; a female’s body wasn’t even an afterthought for me, so her skinny self was perfect for me. Half korean, half greek. A smile that perfect, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear Crest and Colgate fighting over her for their latest ad campaign. Could solve some of the hardest math problems in her sleep. Very quiet and unassuming, but that was okay back then. I was a goofy looking kid (and arguably, still am), but I was funny enough to still get girls to engage in conversation and laugh a little bit. I don’t really remember how I pulled it off, but one day, after some recess and some note passing and whispering, I walked out of the building with tina as my boo slice.

Do you know how happy it was? I felt like Lupe Fiasco after he got the girl. I felt like NBC4 just reported a third straight consecutive snow day on Friday, and an unexpected 5-day weekend was created. I felt like a young Michael Jordan after winning his first championship, tears fist pumps and all. My problem was, I was the ultimate shy guy. You know how you can talk to people normally, but when it’s your crush that you have to speak to, you get as nervous as a long tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs!? Well, that’s how it was with me when I got around tina. Remember, this relationship was probably solidified over a few saltine crackers and a quick “do you like me?” poll scribbled on some notebook paper before break time. At this point, face-to-face time was almost scary. I preferred everything but that. So what did I do? Wrote tina some crucial love letters. 12 years later, and she still had these! She typed them up and threw them my way. Let’s read these joints, shall we? I’ll warn you now – these are copied verbatim, and I’ve done no altering to the letters themselves.

LOVE LETTER #1:

Dear Tina,
Waz’ up?  I just finished my piano lesson and I decided to write again.  So… I can’t do the movie thing this Friday, but maybe on the weekend.  Ask Genevieve and Daisy if they can come.  I’ll ask Andy and Andrew.  Do you think Ariana can come?  If she can go let me know.  Andy and I can do it on Saturday, but it has to be before 515-30, because we have a basketball game at 645 and we’ve got to get there early.  I want to know if we are going to sit next to the person we like.  Tell me tomorrow, okay?  Also, Andrew Wallace is daring me to ask you if you wanna go out alone.  I’m taking the dare, but I will only do it if you want to. I wanna know are you going to Genevieve’s party?  I am.  Do you know what we are going to do there?  Well, there’s nothing else to talk about so I guess I’ll talk to you later.  Well, see ya!
Sincerely,
Modi

Damn. I was a young Cassanova. A little nerdy, and super sprung, but that was okay. Besides, do you see how considerate I was? Only taking the dare if she was ready for it. You gotta admit, although my writing style wasn’t the smoothest, I was trying. And trying damn hard.

LOVE LETTER #2 (BIRTHDAY CARD, COMPLETE W/ AWESOME PICTURES):

front:
Dear Tina,
Since I’m not gonna be here for your real birthday, I decided to give you half of your birthday present.  I have more stuff to get for you, though.  So be prepared!  Here is your card, along with this gift certificate!  I hope you like it!

middle:
I’ll give you the other part of the present sometime.  Maybe we could go to the mall together.  Write me a letter back.  Please?  With 500,909,333 cherries on top?  Okay, see ya!
Modi
P.S. If you wanna know where I’m going, I’m going to Antigua.  It’s in the Caribbean.

back: (and TINA’s personal favorite, as noted in her e-mail):
Created just for you (and I mean JUST for you) by your boyfriend, Modele

Tina says: The gift certificate that accompanied Letter #2 has pictures from the computer of cartoon-ish dogs and then in the top center there is a heart and on each side of the heart there is a dog holding the number 10 (I guess it was my 10th birthday).  Then the certificate says:
A certificate for a “date” at Montgomery Mall with Modele, valid for the rest of 1998!  Can be used anytime!
(and then your signature at the bottom)

Please, hold your applause. I’d like to change my name to Rico Suave. I was so damn creative. How many 5th grades were so determined to make their girl happy, making birthday cards on the computer at age 10!? You bammas weren’t even on the internet around then. I was ahead of the curve.

LOVE LETTER #3 (VALENTINE’S DAY CARD THAT I MADE ON MY COMPUTER):

front: (where there is a picture of a guy with his arms spread wide open):
Tina, I know it’s not V-day yet, but I still have a card.  Why do I love (or should I say like) you?

middle:
I guess I just have a lot of patience and a good sense of humor.  Oh, and if you’re wondering why I didn’t draw this, it’s because I can’t draw well all the time.
Happy almost Valentine’s Day!

Such honesty at age 10? Stunning. Admitting their flaws like lack of artistic creativity so effortlessly? I was giving the girl love before Love Day even came around yet.

Funny thing is, a week after that, Tina broke up with me. I remember it like it was yesterday. I felt some ill vibes coming from her and her crew. Only way I knew how to deal with that was to chase her and her best friend, Haley, all the way down the stairs from the classrooms until we spilled out by the basketball courts. I was fast, and they didn’t want me to catch them, because I was a rough kid on the playground. Who knows what would have happened. Haley finally turned around, her chubby self huffing and puffing, out of breath. “Modi, she doesn’t like you anymore!” she screamed, with an evil, twisted grin on her face. “Don’t you get it?” It probably made her day saying that nine word combination. “Shucks,” I thought. All that time and effort into ol’ girl, and she had to get her henchwoman to shake me off!? I sulked all the way to the car, holding back tears.

Tina was the third girl I had ever really liked in my life. After reading these letters I wrote, it’s apparent that I would have given her the world if she wanted it. I guess she didn’t want it.

]]> http://DCtoBC.com/2010/02/5th-grade-love-letters/feed/ 52 http://DCtoBC.com/2010/02/shy-guy-vs-dime-on-the-subway/ http://DCtoBC.com/2010/02/shy-guy-vs-dime-on-the-subway/#comments Mon, 22 Feb 2010 15:40:08 +0000 modi http://www.dctobc.com/?p=64

note: Re-Up! Tryna get some new readers while appeasing the old ones with a throwback joint that people appreciated. Ha.

you know exactly who that girl above is. sure, you don’t know her by name or anything like that. but you know the role she plays. she’s one of the two dimes in the subway ride home. like, cheat-on-your-girl, must-have dimes. i’m talking like spend-your-entire-paycheck-on-a-date type dime. it may sound intense, but i’m just being real. i’m a man, so i know how men think. even if they aren’t all that, you gotta show them some love, because they’re just right there on the train, posted like a mailbox. and they are dying to get hit on. or so you think.

some people have the balls to approach these girls. i call them the hero. gutsy, risk-taking dudes. they have pick-up lines for days, and they can start conversations anywhere, anytime. they don’t even care if the woman has worked 10 crazy hours in the office, because they know that they can make it all better. they believe they can fly, like jordan, or a pre-pee-on-you kelz. i just can’t fade it. i feel like the last thing they want is me tryna put that metaphorical bug in their ear, spitting game on the train. and i think that’s what qualifies me as a certified shy guy.

tabi’s fly, but i’m shy.

what is a shy guy!? i haven’t even come up with the true definition yet. i just know how they act. shy guys only thrive in environments where there’s little or no pressure. like house parties where you know everybody. or like a school dance, because everybody you dance with, you sat behind in math class or their mom used to pick you up from the carpool line from school. or you took the bus one and a half hours with them every day. like me. or maybe i’m totally wrong, but you know what i mean. no pressure environments, you thrive. because you don’t have to commit to anything, or be too decisive.

the subway definitely isn’t that spot. too many unfamiliar faces. if you want anything to happen on the subway, you’ve gotta put yourself out there like max did in a goofy movie. and if you don’t know what i’m talking about, then that should be number one on the netflix queue. conversation is one thing, but conversation with one of those two dimes on the train is a completely different thing. and that’s why shy guys typically don’t do good work on the subway. the club is even worse, and i need a completely different entry devoted to that sometime in the future.

i feel like all shy guys eventually transition into the hero. it happens, but there’s a right time and place, and all that good stuff. karma, or something like that. i tried it one day. NYC. subway. last year. she was bad, too. like michael’s 3rd album, for real. dominican and black, i think. kinda like homegirl in the picture, sans the turtle neck. in fact, she was extra fly. dressed like she just came from brunch with jay and beyonce. i hit her with my camera while it was dangling from my wrist, and she just smiled. and then i worked magic.

her number is still in the phone book. 917…blah blah blah. and i fumbled it. she just never got the crucial call/text, and i don’t even know why. who knows. that’s probably why i don’t sport the cape and mask just yet. but i’m ok with that. besides, i got like a million and one things going on in my life, like that old juvenile song. but a girl ain’t nothin.

sike.

I know this is borderline abusing my privileges as the owner of this site. but i just re-subscribed to NetFlix after grabbing this PlayStation3, and I’m itching to put 10 solid movies that I can abuse on the MacBook and the new Vizio during my downtime.

If you’d be so kind, just leave suggestions and brief synopses of movies (if they aren’t typical joints that everybody and their grandma’s heard of). Everybody can add something to this list, so just throw the suggestions out there. Maybe we’ll have a nice little dialogue pertaining to movies and such. Ha. Thanks! and i like it all, so don’t think i won’t consider musicals, documentaries, foreign films. actually, fuck a foreign film. i have no time for subtitles.

Let the games begin. Oh, and those who don’t believe that The Great Progression is upon us, more sneak peaks:

Yeah. Like I said before, stay in the loop via Twitter, @TheGeePee and @DCtoBC.

Anyway, movies. Let’s get it.

Brought to you by the geniuses over at Holy Taco.

In other news, I’m still working on The Great Progression. It’s all in the designer’s hands now, because my work is basically complete. Stay up to date with the movement via Twitter: @TheGeePee. Oh, and me too (@DCtoBC). I know I always say it, but thanks for the support. Thanks for all you guys who grabbed the S.A.D. #2 as well; we did over 2,000 downloads total, and with no real promotional push besides some vicious word of mouth and a couple of blogs that I really f*ck with posting it. Thanks again for all that.

The Great Progression. Coming shortly, I promise.

It’s here. Dedicated to all maneaters, heartbreakers, and hopeless romantics – you know who you are. Proceed to download. It’s an epic one, I think.

I appreciate all the support greatly. Like the last one, there’s no playlist. 38 songs, all different artists, and all in the theme of the mixtape’s title in some way, shape, or form. All feedback is appreciated, and if it’s really in depth or you’d rather it not be in the comment section or something, send me an e-mail: modi[at]DCtoBC[dot]com.

DOWNLOAD: Singles Awareness Day 2 [S.A.D. #2: The Mix Compilation]

Alternate Link! [PC Users, Try This!] (uploaded 2.13.2010, 12:45 pm)

Yeah. So don’t give up on me just yet. The movement is still in motion, and things are going on behind the scenes! @TheGeePee! Don’t forget about it. Just follow that account on Twitter, as well as myself (@DCtoBC), and you’ll be in the loop. Don’t think you’re too cool to do so, either. It’s the easiest way to stay informed. Ha. I make it sound like I’m doing something important! Regardless, I appreciate you if you fuck with it all. Surprises are in store. Besides, I didn’t come to New York City for nothing.

The last cool thing I did before I left Maryland was this incredibly awesome photo shoot for AnmlHse, a clothing line out of Philly. My homegirl Juleidys invited me to come down and shot some pictures for their second “Big Deal” project. The pictures all turned out pretty awesome, and I hadn’t ever done anything like that before. I’m not really good at it, but luckily I had a natural, rapper Phil Ade, at the shoot with me. He gave me some pointers and helped me loosen up at the shoot.

Word of advice: drink before you do anything like that. It brings a candid version of you out that is okay with strangers watching you pose in strange positions. They took probably 200 pictures of me alone, but only three made it into the campaign book. Glad to be a part of such a powerful clothing line’s lookbook for the new season, and I thank the good folks at AnmlHse as well as 1st Impressions and JuJu for taking care of the photos and stuff. Check out the rest of the people in the campaign (so many shout outs, a lot of my homies were involved!) and grab your AnmlHse goods here.

Singles Awareness Day [S.A.D.] 2, dropping in a little over 12 hours. Get ready.

If you haven’t already guessed from the blog entry’s title, this post is about how a fat, homosexual man swindled the $#!t out of me during my first weekend in New York City. It’s also about how comedian Aziz Ansari (or Raaaaaaaandy, his ridiculously named alter-ego with whom you may be more familiar) came through in the clutch for me, which is why his picture headlines this post. This isn’t a short post. In fact, it’s rather long, and quite unfortunate, to be honest. If you’re up for a read, then continue.

Jam this.

So I moved here with the help of my buddies Amina and Marcel on the last day of January. The ride took 7 hours from DC because there was a fire (I mean a f*cking huge ass fire. I’m actually gonna upload a video of this fire after I write this post, so check back in a little bit and you’ll see what I’m talking about. Ridiculous.) on the New Jersey Turnpike, and we were like the third car behind it. If I didn’t go back in the house and get some last minute things I didn’t need, we wouldn’t have been in this position.

Anyway, so my buddies moved me in that weekend, and helped me make critical runs to places like Ikea and Sam’s Club. (And I know this isn’t Xanga or Live Journal, but let me say this: shout out to all the real fucking friends out there who sacrifice time and energy to help other people. The way they offered to help me move in to my spot was something that good friends do. If you don’t have people like that on your team, find some. Let’s get back to the story.) I start interning on Monday. All goes well in the office; all the interns are great, the editors and writers in the building are some of the smartest people I’ve ever been around, and I’m immediately getting involved in important things with the company. Awesome experience, and I’m very happy.

By Wednesday, I’m feeling myself a little. Not too much, but enough to think that I deserve a little fun in my life, even during my first week in the city. I thought, “why don’t I get a couple of friends together to catch this last Aziz Ansari comedy show on Saturday? He’s been here for a while, and it’d be a great ‘Welcome to NYC’ present to myself.” I look for the tickets online, but it turns out that his show has been sold out for weeks. So I do what any self-respecting man with an achievable goal in mind would do in my situation: check Craigslist.

And my ninja Craig came through. Or at least, I thought he did. In no time I found a great deal on 4 tickets to Aziz’ show for $40 a pop. A quick and desperate e-mail to the seller (“dude! i really need those tickets, and i can get up with you tomorrow any time to get them off your hands! call me or e-mail me back asap, i appreciate it!”) on Wednesday night translated into an early morning e-mail. Now if you’re me, a seasoned Craigslist veteran, then everything checks out. The prices of the tickets straight. The tickets were $35 originally, so $5 over face value isn’t horrible in my eyes. And the number of tickets didn’t seem weird to me, either. The guy could have been a professional scalper and this could be his side-hustle. I can’t be mad at that.

The only thing that was somewhat suspicious was this brother’s e-mail situation. The e-mail sender was Hsin-Shen Kuo, but he signed the e-mail as “David”. I have enough international friends to know that an English name isn’t uncommon by any means (sidenote: I even tried to fake like I had one, replacing Modele with Michael. But eventually, I realized that I had just given myself that name because nobody could pronounce my actual name. I was like 7 then. Give me a break.), so I didn’t really hesitate there.

Now, you normally weed out fake Craiglisters when they don’t call after you tell them to. But I e-mailed him back and gave him a time to hit me, and low and behold (I hope I used that phrase right), he hit me. He was very jovial, very flamboyant, and very excited about comedy. He was speaking to me about actual comics and even said that there was a Jewish comic named Modi and that he had thought I was him after receiving the e-mail. I was more interested in the tickets, so I cut down all small talk and focused on how the transaction would take place. I told him to meet me in the Best Buy lobby during my lunch break, and he agreed. For those not hip to Craigslist deals, they’re very much like drug deals (I don’t do any drugs but I sure as hell can imagine what a drug deal is like), and you’re either all for it, or it’s not for you. Clearly, you know the kind of guy I am.

A rotund, balding Caucasian man dressed in all black (“I’m just on my way to theatre practice!“) walks through the automatic doors of Best Buy, four passes to Aziz Ansari in hand. He’s holding them as if he’s Willy Wonka, and I’m fixated on them like they’re one of the golden tickets that Charlie and the rest of the kids in the book (or movie. The original is better than the Johnny Depp one, I think. I actually haven’t seen that version yet. So I’m just talking. But still, I prefer OG Charlie and his gramps. Nobody can top them.) won to gain entrance to the factory. He shakes my hand. “Hi, I’m David,” his voice sweeter than the strawberry jam I put on my toast earlier that morning. The names (and the flamboyance) match, but the Asian heritage? None whatsoever. And  I have best friends from Korea and Japan, so best believe I can tell. For some reason, I still think everything is kosher, and that this deal is too legit to quit. More small talk before he leaves, although I’m barely listening. He rambles on about how he checked out DC to BC (I sent my request for the tickets from my DC to BC e-mail address, so he does some snooping on my site I guess) and that he enjoyed it earlier in the day. He even extends an invitation to dinner before the concert (him and his friends, because they were apparently going, and me and mine. At least, I’m assuming that’s what he met. I don’t even know this guy, but he was literally all for it.), which I immediately sidestep as kindly as possible. Was it an advance? I didn’t even think about thinking about it. I coughed up the cash to the faux Asian man, and those golden tickets were finally in my possession. I had ended a fantastic first week and was about to enter the ultimate first weekend.

Fast forward to Saturday evening. I do nothing all day, in anticipation of this concert, which I believe is going to be the most hilarious show I’ve ever seen. And it probably would have been, too;  my comedy show tally is at three or four shows, none of which were insanely popular comics. I invited my man Jordan, who decided to take a date (sidenote: this girl of the Caucasian persuasion hollered at him at a McDonalds at 3am the weekend prior. She’s like 27, he’s 23. He saved her in his phone as “McNuggets”. Somehow, someway, they end up actually going on a real date a week later. I’m not lying, everything I just typed really happened, just as I typed it.), and I had a couple other friends in mind but they all ended up flaking on me, partially because of my poor planning, and partially because they probably just didn’t really understand how funny the show was going to be. I found somebody to take the ticket last minute, but I eventually had to tell them to forget about it for reasons you’re about to read about.

Let’s switch up the jams to something more fitting.

I show up about 30 minutes early, just to make sure everything runs smoothly. It’s freezing and there’s a long line outside, winding around the building. The venue’s bouncer tells me you can only get inside if you already have your tickets. I flash all four of my golden goodies and he waves me in. The authorities in there tell me I need to use my tickets to get a wristband, so again, I flash my golden goodies, this time to the two hostesses.

Let’s stop for a second, and step into my shoes. Imagine how happy I was. I couldn’t even tell you the last time I was this pumped for anything. I just moved to a city in the snap of a finger – up and left. My parents are probably still confused as to how I’m surviving. My support group in NY Do or Die isn’t nearly as strong as it is at home, albeit a few good friends. Not to get all Panic! At the Disco emo on you guys or anything, but it’s a little lonely, and these early nights and harsh weather conditions don’t help much. From Wednesday to that Saturday evening, my mind was only concerned about how hard I would laugh when all the opening acts finished performing and Aziz took the stage. It was the one thing that helped me get through my week.

Back to reality. The girls take one look at my tickets and frown. “Oh no,” one of them says. I’m perplexed as sh!t. “What’s wrong,” I ask her. The other one chimes in. “These tickets…they’re counterfeits. I’m so sorry.”

What? Did that guy I had had a legitimate 5 minute conversation with right in front of Best Buy hit me with a serious okeydoke? Long story short, yeah. And he deserves a pat on the back for getting me. What a harsh way to be welcomed to NYC. I probably deserve it, and this is just payback for something I did a while back. Maybe it was stealing those Pokemon cards from that card store in Cabin John Mall. Or maybe it was habitually punishing the leftovers in the fridge from my college roommates because I was too broke to get my own food. Whatever it was, my crimes obviously caught up to me. All I really could do is complain to the manager of the venue. He was very apologetic, and even bought me my company drinks from the bar. Jordan was pissed, and his girl was a little perturbed too. I apologized to them, and told them to go on with the night while I sorted things out. In the end, nothing could really be done. I was assed out, and this fat, homosexual man named David handily won the battle.

So what happened next? The unthinkable.

I had to let my man know that I tried to support him but got rocked like the AggroCrag, so I tweeted him.

About an hour or so later, I have a direct message. It’s Aziz. The famous comedian with over 100,000 followers who worship the ground he walks on decided to hit me up. The odds of him seeing that tweet (because of the rate at which his name is mentioned in Twitter conversations around the world) is equivalent to me becoming the next Donald Trump. But somehow, someway, he sees it, and reaches out.

I needn’t say anymore. Aziz Ansari is the man. What person with this much going on in their lives has the chance to listen to a whiny chump such as myself who purchased scalped tickets above face value when he shouldn’t have? Aziz, that’s who. I thanked him profusely for his act of kindness, and supplied him with my address. I’m assuming a DVD is coming soon, but even if it doesn’t, I don’t really care. The fact of the matter is the thought. He wins for that one, and he just got a lifetime fan, and probably a couple more after they read this post.

The moral of this story? Stay away from Craigslist, because it’s creepier than that giant Venus Flytrap in Little Shop of Horrors. Support Aziz and grab his comedy album and DVD here.

P.S.: If you made it all the way down to here, you deserve some kind of prize. Leave a comment so I know you did, and I’ll figure out something to hook you up with.

P.P.S.: This story is really only for me to read to look back upon, and I’m posting it here so that people can enjoy it with me. I have no problem with homosexual people, but since I don’t know that many, it only made sense in my head to refer to the guy as the fat, homosexual man who sold me those fake tickets. If you take offense, I don’t know what to tell you. Thanks for reading.

First week at Complex. Hectic, but I’ll make it out alive. My goal? To produce, produce, produce. So before you think this clip is just a random funny moment in Wedding Crashers, take a second to think about it. When you’re an intern (which is what I am), nobody cares about what you did to get to where you are. It’s all about what you can do now that you’re in the spotlight. So like the little man says, “shut your mouth, funny guy, and MAKE IT.” Ha. Shout out to all the fellow interns and employees that embraced me thus far.

Oh, and the updates on this site will be more sporadic than the periods of pre-menopausal women. Please look for me either on Complex or on Dr. Jays Live. The Great Progression is coming soon. Please follow on Twitter (@TheGeePee, and I’m not launching til the account has 1,000+ followers. We at like 250 now. Help me get it up, please.) #ohletsdoit