BIG at LA: Business In Games at Los Angeles

So the Los Angeles Dodgers have been granted $150 Million in loans from the Bankruptcy judge on Tuesday so that Frank McCourt can meet the teams payroll by the end of this week. Which means that the players, Dodgers broadcast announcer Vin Scully, as well as everyone and everything that has to do with the ballclub will receive money that's not even from the team.

And now there's another notion that Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig wants to object this ruling. I think with Seling and the league taking over the team is much better and more efficient than the FOX broadcasting company's $3 Billion Television deal that would've lasted 17 years in which he also intercepted that ideal. The suits have already embarrassed the Dodgers long enough the past two years.

This season even got more worse from the opening day melee scuffle between San Francisco Giants fan Bryan Stow and the Dodger fans outside the parking lot. I thought the news outlets was gonna cover this for about a week, but that beating was so brutal that the media managed to keep dissecting into this story for the next few weeks, AND THAT SHIT'S STILL GOING ON NOW. Hell I won't be surprised if the keep covering his updates on his condition and those "unruly fans" that jumped on him during the postseason. Doesn't the media realize that the Los Angeles Dodgers have other problems to deal with, both off and on the field in terms of new management in Don Mattingly and the backlash for not making the playoffs for the first time in 3 years? Well... they don't, cause the media creates their own stories, or should I say they take real stories and make some tweaks on it, putting much more of a negative image on LA Sports fans like the reaction of the Lakers NBA Finals victory for example. There are several different ballgames like the Yankees vs Red sox regular season series, if not, the playoffs, and others outside of Major League Baseball that have fights MUCH worse than the one from the Dodgers opening day.

I lived in this city my whole entire life, well, the Valley to be more specific. I survived the Riots, the Earthquakes, the mountain wildfires from living in Granada Hills, and the brutal ass rush hour holiday traffic among other shit. I live in the same city where a different notable figure gets pulled over for a DUI late at night every week just to promote his or her self rather than knowing to face the consequences. Los Angeles was supposed to be known as a place where people want to come and start the rest of their lives there without leaving to another state. Well, that was 60 years ago after the World War II vets came home to start the unprecedented Baby Boom era, in which the influx of families have surpassed the population in Suburban neighborhoods around Los Angeles.

But now LA itself has gone through some other financial troubles, especially the school district. I mean shit, I can't picture starting high school in August and ending the year at the first week of June. That's private school shit. The city and the district had to get rid of the classes and programs in order to meet the budgets needs. Without cool stuff like the music programs and the Physical Education (there are some schools that no longer have that class), the students will feel bored and miserable. But thankfully, there are some after school programs that have these activities provided.

But back to the way the city of Los Angeles being viewed right now. If you drive around LA in its entirety, at first you'll feel like you're set in a movie or a TV crime-drama. Alot of films are shot here and majority of the stories are set here. Almost every movie that takes place in LA has to do with the Police chasing and some dude getting blown up. Unfortunately, its ACTUALLY like that here sometimes. To me, LA is much more than that in a positive way. I don't like how its being viewed like that just like how certain people view Miami as a place where Cocaine rules the night clubs on Ocean Drive. Regardless, I love living in this city just like the song says, and I wouldn't want to live any other place else. But just like another Hollywood couple here in Los Angeles, the divorce of the McCourts really did damage and overshadowed one of the most legendary ball clubs in sports. Believe me, I know about divorces.

My parents are probably the one of the only few Nigerians you'll know that had more than one divorce from each other (think Billy Martin and Geroge Steinbrenner see-saw at the Yankess front office back in the 1980's). Alright, two divorces then. Once back when I was in 9th grade which lasted 8 months and another one which was four years ago. Pops got remarried a year later and the moms is living the single life right now. Didn't care about the first one but the second one took me a while to get used to it. In December 2008, I was a bit upset when the stepmom costed me the relationship of a client of mine who happened to be a model. I said some shit about pop's new wife on Facebook with frustration that time, which seriously offended and ended my relationship with my client. Now if you see her portfolio, she's has several photos taken by 15 different other advanced photographers and also had traveled to different countries for her photoshoots. I can't imagine where I'd be right now if my parents didn't split. I'd still be living on my own, but probably at a nicer more affluent-ish type neighborhood instead of Sylmar. The only thing that matters is that both of them are happy with their lives, which I had to understand after getting into a few arguments with the pops and moving out from his place last year.

I think what the McCourts, both Frank and Jaime, should've done is hold a big-ass community group meeting with Dodgers fans instead of having meetings in the courtroom. It could've took place at Dodger Staduim, the Staples Center, or the biggest town hall in Los Angeles that can accommodate a decent number of those who take this ball club very seriously. Regardless if their divorcing or not, they both could've gone on stage sitting on stools with microphones in front of a thousand Dodger fans by honestly telling them the situation in regards to the teams business itself rather than just letting the fans have to rely on the media and some other source to figure out the problem. Then the McCourts could've spent the rest of the night hearing the opinions from every fan of all ages on what Frank and Jaime should do to fix and solve the problem with the team, so that the fans can feel more comfortable by watching their team play some baseball without the backstage business drama raining out the fans interest of one of the biggest, most recognized baseball teams in this country beside the Yankees. The McCourts could've pretended that there just two regular business owners instead of a married couple while they're at Dodger Stadium proceeding with day-to-day operations and then proceed as a married couple instead of business owners when they're in bed.

Yikes, that's was a nasty image I just threw out in that last sentence. My bad.

But yeah, that's just my view on this whole "white collar" ordeal that has been overshadowing one of my only favorite baseball teams. I went to three games over there in the last 12 months, and despite them losing at all three, I really enjoyed being there regardless. If there's a new owner after this season, that's fuckin' great. I really don't give a shit who it is, just as long as he keeps the players happy, Bud Seling in a good damn mood, and attracts a sellout type crowd at the Ravine every game. I'm just stating opinions like I always do on this site.

Some of you may not like whats been typed on here since discussions on this type of stuff can get very funky. The bottom line is that everyone is different and see a certain perspective that is not similar to someone elses. I read this quote that the homie Johnny Depp (met the dude for four seconds at Penelope Cruz's Walk of fame ceremony two months ago otherwise I wouldn't refer to him as a homeboy) said which I saw on the internet. He said that everyone is weird and that to express it without being scared or worrying about it. In other words, everyone's different, which is why the purpose of alimony is to bring two different people together and collaborate as one for the rest of their lives. My parents tried and failed after 20 years. Same with the McCourts.

Serving Laundry To Others

Well, I was supposed to recap my last weekend this past week, but we're already in this current weekend.

The reason why is because I spent majority of the past week busy taking care of some personal, yet minimal matters with my moms, including on Father's day which coincidently happened to be my little sister's 22nd birthday. That week started off by both my moms and I copping her a inexpensive Samsung laptop as a gift for her. Then the rest of the days went on from paying a $35 oil change for her '99 Altima at Nissan Mission Hills to driving all the way to the Anaheim Hilton to with the moms and the sisters yesterday only to miss an award ceremony that my moms was supposed to participate in, yet they gave her the certificate while they were taking down the sets at one of convention halls there.

Later on we picked up my brother and then headed out to the Hometown Buffet in Burbank and Empire next to the Burbank Airport. I haven't been to a Hometown Buffet since my 21st birthday two years ago and I forgot how worse it's gotten. The food they serve there doesn't have that much of an appeal that it had when my entire family used to go there after church before the parents split up. The place was full because there were a lot of families that were celebrating their kids graduation from elementary and middle school that day and watching all them feasting on the food makes it look like a bunch of virgin dudes consuming 30 boxes of pizza during a Hack-A-Thon session on Mark Zuckerburg's computers at his dorm room. I didn't realized that until I finished my plates of Enchiladas, Nachos and a Salad with the Ranch dressing that must've been stored at the wrong suggested refrigerator temperature. That shit was watery. The Pink Lemonade saved my dinner, but the dinner itself made me TOO FULL. I could barely move from my table. Hell, I felt like I gained 25 pounds or something like that cause I was hurting like crazy. I'm totally done with that place. By the way, shoutout to the fine Amy Winehouse looking Armenian hostess chick at the front counter that charged us for the dinner and table. The line to get inside got expanded like wildness outside when we left and she had to deal with all those impatient families who's kids just graduated.

The family and I then walked to the Best Buy not too far from the Hometown Buffet to kill some extra time. Moms and I was gonna buy my sister's notebook there on Sunday, but we went to the one at Glendale cause they had one that has decent specs at a good price. Again, I felt like complete shit from all that food I ate earlier, so I swooped all the way to the Magnolia Home Theater section at the back at the store, sat at one of the large sexy leather reclining chairs in front of one of their Big Widescreen HDTV sets and STAYED THERE for the entire time. I didn't want to get up while the food was still digesting.

What's also sexy was that a Shakira concert Blu-Ray was being played at the screen in front of me while every other TV screen there had ESPN on talking about the bullshit headlines happening in sports, so I was lucky and fortunate enough to get a good viewing experience. Man, I can believe that its already been a full decade that Shakira has been in the scene. I remember when her song "Whenever, Wherever" first played on the radio and MTV just two months after the terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center in New York and The Pentagon in 2001. Then a month later, my little brother got a PSone (the smaller compact version of the OG Playstation) for Christmas and the slogan, somewhat coincidental, for that console was "Whenever, wherever, forever". Ten years later, she's still fine doing the same thing and that concert was tight. Felt like I was there in person while I was watching it. I forgot how long my family was looking around the store, but we then left later since I had to go back to my place.

So yeah, that's pretty much my week. Mostly family stuff, along with working on photos for my business. Speaking of which, I did a last minute photoshoot for my friend Nicole Stetter's band Darger De Milo at her place on Thursday night. Shot it on 35mm film. It was fun getting some shots of them and listening to them work on some great new material which looked like an episode of MTV Unplugged. Major props to her group.

By the way, journalism was very weird this week. So many weak headlines. From the dude that founded Thrasher magazine (which I don't read, but I see that magazine alot in skate shops back when I used to buy Nike SB's) who offed himself, to Ron Artest legally changing his name to Metta World Peace (yes, that the name, which looks kind of tight) to a lot of top tier companies being hacked left and right and to Kim Kardashian posting a X-Ray photo of her ass (I really like her and all, but really? Selling yourself like that?) among other things. I don't even want to bring up that 29 year old mother who had to force her 6 month old inside a Microwave and a big "happy" party in New York City last night, which I'll leave that for you to figure out. Now there are other major world issues out there that are more important and valid, but I think alot of the media does not want to publish it because to them, and pretty much everyone else, those have nothing to do with them and they can't do anything about it since it doesn't affect certain people. Plus, those people have other priorities to worry about, like financially raising their kids or those university graduates trying to head start their career by landing interviews for a full time job on their own.

I didn't plan on making this post lengthy today, but somehow it just happened. Not everyone like to read stuff that's very long, which is why I created a separate site on Wordpress where its just photos with a mixture of interesting journalism from pop culture and some of my photography work. Six days from now, it'll be the mid point of 2011. Now before y'all think that I spent three quarters of my life on the social media webscene, that day means a lot to me, which sounds shady as hell but it really is. On July 1st, it'll be my fifth year on Facebook, my fourth year on Flickr, my third year on this site, two and a half years on Twitter and half a year on Wordpress and my website so far, and not to forget , my homegirl Jade Luber's 23rd birthday. For this new start of the "fiscal year" under the JustForSneaks Ent. production name, I'm planning on launching a new site on that day. I've been thinking about it for the past several months and since I'm a photographer trying to get better and better every now and then, I figured I'd expand my creativity to a broaden the viewership and be more recognized. This site will be photography related. So if you're a fan of my work (which you should be) and/or just appreciate photography as an art itself, then you'll like this site. The thing is that I haven't came up with a name for it. Already I have Random Shots for this Blogger-hosted site and Nobody Reads Anymore for my Wordpress-hosted site. This third blogsite needs a name that fits and sounds VERY similar to those other two names and if anybody on here who's reading this that can give me a very appealing name for the new site...

I'll hook them up with free In-N-Out T-shirt of their size and lunch from there.

I'm dead fucking serious about this, otherwise I wouldn't put this up. I like giving stuff away to other people. I'm more of a giver than a receiver which you hardly see now a days, especially in this economic recession. I'm a guy that doesn't give a shit about prices on certain things cause to me, money is just paper that causes problems, if not handled very well. If I feel like spending at least $200 a month on processing film and buying packs of 35mm rolls, I'll do that. If I want to spend my last $40 on packs of Gatorade and Little Ceasers pizza and fresh FinishLine socks to give out to the bums on Venice Beach? Shit, I'll do that... if I want to. That's my kind of philanthropy. If anyone disapproves with that, which has happened to me in the past because of me not having a legit decent job, then go ahead. I'm just trying to be nice. I get free stuff every now and then but sometimes I like to give it to those who I think need it more than I do.

But yeah, just give me a dope-ass title, and you'll get free lunch and a sick T-shirt. For inspiration of the name, just look (and when I mean look, I mean just spend at least 10 to 15 seconds looking at each photo) at my work on the sites below. Its that basic. All I'm doing is showcasing my profession for those who are seriously interested. Its what I like to do.

Here are the links to my other sites (which many of you get tired of seeing on Facebook and Twitter every other day)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/justforsneaks07

http://justforsneaks.wordpress.com/

and my Youtube page just for the fuck of it, which I had since March 2006 (before Google's acquisition)

http://www.youtube.com/mitube

again, hit me up on Facebook or twitter or shoot me a text message or write on the comments below if you have a great title for the site. Seriously, who doesn't want free In-N-Out? They can even give you a Double-Double without the beef for those who are vegans. But seriously, thanks for taking your time to do this. Totally appreciate it.

Oh and major shout to my mutual friend Annamarie Rhyne who's going on an epic trip to different countries this summer. I wish you the best and safe travels on your expedition, and thanks to you and Christina Campa for inviting me to your going away party last week.

Properly Impromptu Weekend

First and foremost, I just wanna say rest in peace to former NBA player Robert Horry's daughter who's life has been taken away at the age of 17. I can't even imagine feeling his emotions right now, especially since his teenage daughter was just one year away from entering the real world.

Now as for my past weekend, I didn't expect on doing shit for those past two days, but apparently I manage to survive with some decent experiences.

My weekend started off with an experience not so decent. As many of you who have been reading this website for the past two years or have known me for quite a while, you've probably already know that I sold my car on Thursday. That car was a '95 Nissan Sentra XE that I was given to by my parents five years ago. They've actually been driving it ever since they got it from the old Culver City Nissan dealership back in the summer of 1995, when the B14 Fourth Generation model first came out that year. After my moms switched the title from her name to mine a year after I got the car, this was the first and only vehicle I ever owned. I had to get rid of it cause the transmission was no longer functioning, and its been parked in front of my pop's driveway since the beginning of the year. But damn, I had SO much great moments while driving that whip. It went from driving 4 of my shit-wasted fimmaking roommates back to our place in Oxnard from a kickback that was busted by the cops in 2006 to driving all the way to Lancaster back in the summer of 2009 late at night on the 14 freeway without my license, in which I realized after I drove past Acton and there were 2 CHP patrol cars and a Sheriff's car that was behind me for a while without their lights who so happened to drive past by me later. I didn't get a whole lot for selling the car, and I don't give a shit about the price. But other that than, its been a great ride (pun intended) for the past five year with that vehicle.

Then on Friday, I literally spent the whole day with my little brother. It wasn't intended to be planned like that cause originally I was gonna go with him to the barber shop at Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza and back home that had supposed to be 2 hours, which then turned into 12 hours. My little brother's Ford Taurus kept awkwardly stopping several times on the road and once on the off ramp to La Brea Ave from the 10 Freeway east. I had to keep on depressing the gas pedal in order to start the engine every time the car stops. We actually did make it to the mall where my little brother got his haircut done. After that, it took us a very long time to get back home to the Valley, other than taking quick stops at Samy's Camera to develop and pick up my film prints and to eat at Carl's Jr. in Universal City. Also, the sun was setting when we were driving back, and obviously, every road in the Greater Los Angeles was filled with gridlock traffic, which took us even much longer.

We went on Ventura Blvd instead of the freeways, and to our surprise, the traffic on that road was smooth than usual at that time. By the time we approached Granada Hills, the temperature on my brother's Taurus spiked to the high reading and I had to pull over at the McDonald's next to the Knollwood Country Club to let the engine cool down. By the way, for those who know me very well, that's literally about a mile away to his house, which is where I used to live at. After about 30 minutes of waiting, I started the car up again, but this time, the engine wouldn't ignite just like before. My brother got really upset and he wanted me to call a tow truck to take it to his place. He assume that it wouldn't bee to much money since his house is less than a mile from where the car is parked at, but after I spoke with a tow truck company in Granada Hills, I told my brother that the base rate to get it towed is $70 and $5 extra per mile. So instead of risking to invest alot on getting the car towed, we just left it there and walked back home so that he can take car of it the next day.

As we were walking home, my brother expressed his emotions over his phone to my sister about the whole situation. I don't blame him cause gone through much more of the worst shit with my whip than his. I remember back in late August of 2006, I was driving on the 101 freeway to my parents house in Granada Hills from my old summer place in Oxnard (this was a week before I moved out of Ventura County to return back to the San Fernando Valley). Just as I was driving by Newbury Park and was about to approach Thousand Oaks, my car of a sudden slowed down, which I then had pull over, and then the engine blew off. Couldn't start or anything. There I was, an 18 year old filmmaker two months fresh out of high school stuck in the Conejo Valley with no money to get it towed to Granada Hills or back to Oxnard. Keep in mind, this was WAY before I got into cars and knew about automobiles like right now. I made my pops drive from my uncle's house in Mid-City to come out to Newbury Park so that he can help situate all this, which ended up having him tow my car all the way to a Pep-Boys in Westlake Village. That was a terrible way to start Freshman year at Valley College. (before I went to Pierce a year later)

Then on Saturday, I spent the whole day just scanning and touching up my prints that I just got developed a day before until my good friend Joanna Rodriguez wanted to meet up in Hollywood. So I took the subway down there and met her at the Egyptian Theater there on Hollywood Blvd. Now I haven't seen her in two years and it felt like I just saw her recently. We were about to go to the Hard Rock Cafe where the old Virgin Megastore used to be at, but it was just too damn loud in there. So we went to the bar inside the new Rolling Stone restaurant on Hollywood and Highland. Suddenly as the very last second when the bartender was about to approach us, I then told her that we should go to the California Pizza Kitchen across from the Rolling Stone restaurant. We just pretty much caught up with each others lives and bringing back that time that I did that epic photoshoot of her back in 2009. Later we walked by every club in Hollywood Blvd from Kress to the new Supperclub that just opened a month ago and poking fun at those people in the long ass lines who won't be able to get in one the clubs that reach at full capacity. We didn't want to go inside any of the clubs but we went back to our homes though. Thanks again for the lift back to Valley, Joanna. Wish you the VERY best in your Nursing career.

Next on Sunday, I got a text from my friend Marlene, who's the sister of Aftergloam's Elvis Galvez, saying that she's throwing a Barbeque party for celebrating one of their friend's birthday (HAPPY BELATED, JULIE CANIZALEZ). I gave her an 8x10 portrait I took of her when I first met her at Elvis' place last year on his birthday party. Plus, it happened on the same day when Game Six of the NBA Finals was taking place in Miami. I didn't think Dallas Mavericks would win on that day, but it was great to see the OG athletes like Jason Kidd finally getting a championship victory in his long career and Mark Cuban ACTING A DAMN FOOL ALL OVER THE CLUBS IN SOUTH BEACH WHILE CARRYING THE LARRY O' BRIEN TROPHY. I'm surprised he didn't get jumped or stuck up by some coked-up goons on Ocean Drive that night, but he's a billionaire and I'm sure he had the top of the line security that had their chest made out of bullet-proof muscles to protect the team owner's life. Other than that, it was fun being at the DLT's that day for another weekend kick back and taking photos there. Major shoutout to Marlene for checking out my websites. And another shoutout to Yvonne and her daughter Mia. Great seeing them again and I wish all of them the best.

One last thing. I've said this before and I'll say it again. May is now the new June. I say that cause last 2 weeks there have been a lot of graduations that usually supposed to take place this week or next week just like before. Many of those graduations were from people I knew from high school who have finally completed their University studies or the requirements to complete Community College. Alot of people will gripe about paying extra for tuition or having to give up a relationship to study for a test that's being assigned every other day or to only receive about 40% of the funds you paid for your textbooks that you bought at the beginning of each semester for the past 4 years during buyback week or having to give up traveling and clubbing with your roomates just to makeup some units during the summer sessions. Degrees aren't just for what you're pursuing in, but it shows how much challenges that you invested so much time (I won't say money for this purpose) you put in over the past four so years, and its worth it when you look back at it. It's very great to see my friends finally reaching that point. Seriously.

By the way, fuck Microsoft's Steve Balmer and his blue collar-ass staff in Redmond for their back to school promotion of getting a free Xbox 360 for buying a new Windows 7 Laptop or Desktop. Apple invented that shit with the free iPod Touch with a new Mac computer for the past several years. Hell, I'd flip the gaming console for some new textbooks or a years worth of scantrons, bluebooks and change to use for the Laundry machines at the dorms. And in terms, or mid-terms, of taking a break from homework? Shit, I'd rather take the semi-hot girl with the black thick rimmed glasses that I would meet at a study group to Skateland in Northridge than to increase the number of "kills" on the Call Of Duty series over Xbox Live.

The Weekend was, For Me, Good

Even though its Wednesday night, I still wanna bring up my past weekend review.

It actually started on Thursday afternoon. I had to go with my little brother to College of The Canyons in Valencia so that he can try to register some summer courses over there. I've driven by that campus many times whenever I have business to do in the Santa Clarita Valley but never had a chance to look inside there. Plus majority of my classmates from my high school graduating class spent the first two to three years there at College of The Canyons since its closer to Granada Hills aside from LA Mission College in Sylmar, which sucks.

What doesn't suck was how WONDERFUL the campus was inside. Think of Antelope Valley College replacing Pierce College. That place is just too nice. If it wasn't for Brooks Institute of Photography raining in with enrollments and interviews during my Senior year of high school, then I would've considered going to College of the Canyons. It looks like I missed out on alot at that place, ESPECIALLY THE WOMEN THERE! Damn, them Santa Clarita Valley chicks had me breaking my neck at every angle while I was walking around the school. You won't find females that attractive at Pierce or Valley College... well, the ones who don't try too hard to look attractive.

But seriously, I can say many other nice things about College of the Canyons, which makes me want to do a photoshoot there so fucking bad. While I was walking around, they had set up some chairs and a stage on one of the school court fields, which looked like they just had a commencement ceremony or they're setting up for a commencement ceremony the following day. My brother and I spent about 45 minutes there and we left to go back to the Valley down the 5 freeway.

The next day on Friday had me all over the place in Los Angeles, mostly the Fairfax area. Before that, I had to pick up a check from one of my clients in North Hills. I was planning on cashing it at a Bank of America close by, but I decided to do it on my way to the Fairfax District. After I cashed it, I then went to Battery City on 3rd and La Cienega, where they sell almost every type of batteries of different sizes and amperages you can think of at very decent prices, to pick up new CR123A size batteries for my Nikon N70 film SLR camera. Then I rolled over to Samy's Camera just a few blocks east on Third to go drop off some rolls of film and to pick up some Black and White prints that I had them develop. The photos, which I took during Ron Artest's meet and greet at Sportie LA in Melrose two months ago, came out spectacular as I expected. And with that, I rewarded myself to some Jack In The Box across from Samy's Camera.

My lunch was going great so far until this one black lady wearing tight clothing, looking like she came straight from a vintage Rick James music video walks in the restaurant. I took another look and see that not just another black lady, but THAT FOOL IS A TRANSVESTITE WITH BLEACH HAIR AND HIGHLIGHTS, AND HE DOESN'T HAVE ANY DAMNS TO GIVE! I thought you would find people acting like him on Sunset Boulevard back in the late 70's and early 1980's or at the Las Vegas Strip on a Labor Day weekend, not in Fairfax on broad daylight. It was a bad sight to see. Not to be disrespectful to the dude or anything, but I had to get the fuck out of Jack in the Box before I started to regurgitate my $5 lunch I bought there. Then suddenly, I remembered that Christina Aguilera was gonna do an appearance at The Grove on the same day and I wasn't gonna start in a few hours. So I killed some time at The Apple Store inside The Grove and just fucked around with almost every app on their iPads on display.

I didn't plan on checking out Christina Aguilera on that day since I already took some dope-ass shots of her last year during her Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony, but I didn't have anything else planned later that day so I decided to check it out for a bit. There was a grip of people there, not to my amazement. It was just a segment they had for the TV show Extra where they have Mario "A.C. Slater" Lopez hosting the event and Christina is one of the guests that he's gonna be interviewing, along with some contestants from NBC's The Voice, which also has Christina as one of the Judges. I didn't bring a DSLR camera or my film camera on purpose, so I just took a three minute video of her arriving in a stretch limo and then bounced afterwards.

As I was heading back to the Valley, I got a message from my homeboy Elvis saying that there's gonna be a birthday kickback for one of his buddies that I know. I stopped by there and stayed for a bit. Talked with some friends there and showed them my Black and White prints, which they liked of course. 45 minutes later, I went back to my house in Sylmar so that I can scan my prints and wake up early to go to my cousin's high school graduation on Saturday.

The next day, I woke up early and I had my brother drop me off to my cousin's commencement ceremony at Loyola High School since he was on his way to his church in LA. Venice Boulevard from Normandie and Vermont was shut down by the school so that they can accommodate parking for the parents to watch their sons (its an all boys school) receive their diplomas. The school is the oldest private high school in Los Angeles for over 140 years, before USC was built. The campus was large and the parents that showed up are rich people who looked as if the recession never happened. Not here to judge, but I don't blame them since Loyola is very hard to get into and has alot of wealthy students from rich neighborhoods in Los Angeles. I ran into my uncle from Lancaster who was covering my cousin's graduation. Other than that, the ceremony went well, but what did catch my attention was the graduation Seniors taking a puff and a wiff of Cigars after the ceremony was over, in front of their friends and their families during the photo-op sessions. I was like HOLY FUCKING SHIT, IS THAT EVEN LEGAL? Then my cousin told me that its a tradition that the school does for the past 100 years, and he doesn't smoke also. But as I was taking photos of my cousin with his friends, I could still smell the strong tobacco scent from the Cigars being used earlier.

Later on we went to go celebrate with the rest of the family at El Cholo on Western and had some great food and caught up with other stuff that my cousin has been doing since I last saw him on my 23rd birthday, which I also celebrated at El Cholo the day after my party at William and Ginger Galvez's place. My little brother swung by later and... what else can I say, we were having a damn good time there. My family getting together like its Thanksgiving again without the Turkey. My brother then gave my cousin and I some tickets to a streetball event at Cal State Northridge later that night, which my brother couldn't attend cause he had to work that night. So my cousin and I drove back up to the Valley to go check out the event there and left 25 minutes after we arrived, we bounced cause that's the time we spent in the line to get in. That shit wasn't even moving. We were told that the gym where the streetball event was taking place at has been already at full capacity. Afterwards, we then went to my pops house and chilled there for a bit. I gave him my old Hollister T-shirts and some other clothes that I stopped wearing cause they're taking up a lot of space from my closet, and then he left a hour later.

On Sunday, I borrowed my brother's car to escort with a old friend of mine to attend the 2011 MTV Movie Awards at the Gibson Amphitheater inside Universal Studios. I got hooked up with tickets to the event two months prior to that day from some mutual clients of mine. All that I can say was that it was a great experience. I've met and seen a lot of famous figures in person, but never THAT much high profile stars in the same building. I would list the people that were there, but I would then sound like a 19 year old house wife.

The bad part of the Movie Awards was the Twilight Saga winning every major awards and Emma Stone winning Best Comedy performance over Zach Galifinakis, who didn't show his "Rick Ross bearded" ass at attendance. The good parts of the show was Foo Fighters Dave Grohl striking a gong during a skit performed by the host Jason Sudeikis and Resse Witherspoon's speech on how sex tapes and naked pictures being distributed in order to get famous was seamlessly impossible back in the day. Bottom line, that show one of the best moments I've ever seen so far and it was broadcasted live on MTV. I though the Gibson Amphitheater was gonna be larger than I thought it was whenever I see it on Television, but it was a decent amount sized venue. I was told that cameras and cell phones were not permitted inside the venue so my friend and I left our phones in the car. While everyone got inside, there were females pulling out their iPhones and their Canon Powershots from their chests and little carrying purses and started taking pictures of the set before and during the show. Looks like the rules I was informed were not to be taken seriously.

I know recaps are usually meant to be typed on a Monday or a Tuesday, but, like I said before, its my site and I can write whatever and whenever I want. Before I forget, I just wanna give a large "Fuck You" to the NCAA for having the University of Southern California surrender their 2004-05 BCS National title, which I remember following up back in the 11th grade. My interest in College Football is starting to decrease because of this and the similar scandal at Ohio State University that has been making headlines. But back to USC, as much as I love that school and as much as I have to say this, my cousin picked Loyola Marymount University over that place. I strongly wish him and all three of those campuses the best in their education and future athleticism students.

And So It Begins...Again

Well, after three glorious months of uploading countless photos, I'm back in this bitch again...again.

What more can I say? That's what I've been actually doing, and then some. But before I get into my welcome back post, I wanna give a major thank you shout out to Frank Venadas and his Hear Gallery company. It was his company through my great, wonderful friend Nicole Stetter that helped boosted up my experience and work ethic into making me a more proficient photographer with his endless booking of shows all over the City of Los Angeles. Even though I haven't been to a few recent shows during May, I still enjoyed getting used to the underground atmosphere of alternative indie performances of different talented bands, as well as some fantastic artists, at the Five Star Bar, the Airliner and Dragonfly on Sunset among other places week after week. Shit, I REALLY wish I could've attended all the Artwalks and the Residencies shows to cover, but because of my photography business on the side with some other responsibilities to take aware of and with not having a decent vehicle to commute every other night aside from carpooling with Nicole, I wasn't able to make the full commitment of helping out more by attending more, otherwise things would've been different. Again thank you Frank and also another shoutout to Nadari, Corina, DJ Shane Love, JoshuaLovesLife Photography, and every other bands associated with the Hear Gallery. I'll be attending more shows in the future, not just as a photographer but to help support the Hear Gallery by paying double the price of the cover admission instead of getting in for free.

Other than that, alot has happened since I last typed on here back in the last week of February. Hell, this is the first blog post I've typed as a 23 year old. Man, out of all the birthdays I've had in the past, this recent one was ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC! Totally unforgettable for real. I've received so many countless debit gift cards, that I blew it all over some unnecessary shit in less than a week. On top of that, my homeboy Matt Sun of 7 years paid a visit to celebrate his birthday as well since his is a week after mines. We were both ACTING FOOLISH all over Los Angeles County. From driving all the way to Saugus in Santa Clarita to visit a hot sexy girl, to introducing him to Nicole's band Darger De Milo perform at The Mime in Echo Park and some other stuff I can't put on here. Thank you Matt and thanks to the Galvez family for making my birthday weekend one of the best I've ever experienced.

Oh and big thanks to the homegirl Molly Caitlin Murphy for finally meeting you in person and to work on the photoshoot that we've been discussing. I STILL HAVEN'T STARTED WORKING ON YOUR PHOTOS YET! I want to wait until I take care of everything else in terms of my photography so that I can find the perfect time to work on your photos. I wanna make them as professional looking so that you will be VERY pleased with them, even though I gave you the raw photos of the shoot, which I had a great time doing. Thanks again for your time and I hope all is well in your new life in Arizona.

Now there are several reasons why I haven't been on here in a very long time, but there are two main reasons that I wanna explain. The first is my T-Mobile G2 that I've been addicted to for the past three months. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I DON'T GIVE A FUCK WHAT ANY OTHER SMARTPHONE GROUPIE SAYS, BUT THIS PHONE IS THE SHIT!!! Forget the Blackberrys and the iPhones and the Windows Mobile, Android is taking over motherfuckers right now. It does better shit that no other mobile operating systems does. Fuck, if this was 10 years ago, then every rich, wealthy rapper or a twenty-something college graduate temp at a law firm in Brentwood would be using this device. Yes, there are other Android devices that are more sufficient than the G2 in terms of performance. Hell, they even resurrected the Sidekick phone under the Android operating system. But despite the quick bettery life and paying 95 bucks a month after taxes to T-Mobile under their unlimited everything plan, I think I think I'm good with the device I have right now. I don't see why everyone else has this phone. The fake rich chicks and those in the mega power businesses are being influxed with iPhone 4 and the Blackberry Bold/Curve by using it as a fashion accessory to flaunt whenever they're out in public.

The second most important reason why I haven't been on here was because I was mostly focusing on my other blogsite, which is being hosted by Wordpress. On that site, I mostly upload photos and sometimes type one liners to correspond with the photo being posted. I used to do this on here as you'll see on my previous Blogger posts, but I wanted to change some things. I moved this blog to my business website back in January, but then at around the end of February it was getting too inconvenient to type on my website, so I switched back to Blogger even though I vowed never to type on here again. My Wordpress is simply titled Nobody Reads Anymore, cause like the title says, no every one like to read anything with a lot of words. They just mostly look at the photos, which I don't really blame cause I'm a photographer. I've been doing blogs since 2006 from the old days of Apple's .mac service which is now referred to as MobileMe. I still wanted to update this site during the past two month, but the countless work has gotten in the way to the point that you can't jump any higher over the crowd to see the light. So if reading this site is making you lose interest from all the long paragraphs, you can't always jump to my other blogsite to look at some interesting photos that are uploaded. Here's the link: http://justforsneaks.wordpress.com/

So yeah, those are the two main things that kept me from typing on here alot like I used to since I launched this site 23 months ago, as well as covering different shows in LA and attending alot of parties every now and then and running into famous A listers like Jennifer Lopez and Lady Gaga (who happens to be a very chill person) Man, I gotta say that this past April WAS THE BUSIEST, MOST CRAZIEST MONTH I'VE EVER WORKED! EVER!!!

Do you want to know how wild the month of April was? It was SO wild that I shot 11 gigs of photos throughout that month. To those who aren't computer savvy like myself, that's up to 2,100 photos I took, which is the MOST I've ever, ever shot in a month . That's a years worth of photos I took when I started getting the hang of digital photography back in 2008. I know there will be more months which will be as bizarre like this again. Like I said, those photos that month consisted of the number of shows that I covered, a baby shower of my old Classmates Alberto Mujica and wife Beatriz, Penelope Cruz getting her star in the Hollywood Walk Of Fame (never thought that Johnny Depp would show up in person on that day since he rarely steps out and gives speeches to the public), the Hollywood Thai festival (where I got to meet Hot Import Nights model Sasha Singleton very closely) and my homegirl Tianna Edmonson's 22nd birthday weekend. By the way, I wasn't there for her official party that Saturday night cause I had to go to another birthday party (there were 4 other birthday parties I got invited to on that day that started at the same time) for Cyndi Campos, one of my very great friends back from my high school days. It was the first time in 5 years that I've seen her and WOW she looked great. The part that made the party more excellent was when the both of us jumped into the swimming pool WITH OUR CLOTHES ON! I ran out of damns to give cause I wanted to support my OG homegirls from senior year at Kennedy on her 23rd birthday. Thank you so much Cyndi for inviting me to your party.

Anyway, that's a lengthy synopsis on what I've been up to these past few months. I looked on my old blog post that I've written exactly one year ago on June 1st 2010. On there, I discussed about Gary Coleman's death and the start of the Lakers/Celtics rematch in that years NBA finals. Well, there is another rematch for this years NBA Finals against the Miami Heat and the Dallas Mavericks. The last time these two played in the finals, I was preparing to graduate high school that June, with the Miami Heat winning it all.

Throughout my senior year, I didn't plan on graduating on stage, but on the last week before graduation, my parents wrote me and my sister (who also didn't want to go on stage) a check to purchase a cap and gown. Somewhat a blessing in disguise, Its a good thing that I did go up on stage. That shit felt brilliant, especially capturing that last moment of high school before you step out to the rest of your life as an adult. There were so many graduations last month which made May the new June. My little cousin has an upcoming graduation from Loyola High School in Los Angeles this Saturday. Its one of the most prestigious all-boys private schools in the city. I've never been inside the campus, but I'm looking forward to checking it out for the first time this weekend.

Finally, I just want to point out that there's gonna be so many changes that's gonna happen from this point on, with my fifth year on Facebook coming up on July 1st. I want to do something on that day, something different. Probably create a second Facebook page for my photography business or whatever. The changes has already just started, with former Cleveland Cavaliers Head Coach Mike Brown becoming the new head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. This is gonna take some time to getting used to with his gameplans and tactics without the Triangle Offense that the Lakers are already used to, especially Kobe Bryant and how his relationship with Coach Brown could become an interesting factor during the offseason and training camp.

Yeah, a very long, overtyped blog post. But hey, its my thoughts. I want to be on here more often, regardless on how many gigs I'll be getting in the future. Keep a lookout for some more posts on here cause this, along with my other Wordpress site, where I'll say some uncooked stuff that I won't write on Facebook.