Another Decade's Bitten the Dust
I remember being a 12 year old kid in 1980 wearing a catholic school uniform, daydreaming daily in
class…'In the year 2000, I'll be 32 years old. I wonder where I'll be."
Little did I know I'd be living in Seoul Korea spending New Year's Eve 2000 in a woody black Western bar in Cheonho dong Seoul drinking with old Navy North Dakota Jim, while my then Filipina wife was home in Baguio city. I feebly ushered in new years 2001 in Siem Riep with my then Korean mistress, who is now happily married and living in America. She, the Filipina ex wife is completely off my
radar. The Korean, is and always will be a member of the Bravofold.
In 2003, I lived in Cheongju; 2004-2006 Pusan; 2007-2009 Cheju Island. Now it's 2010! I'll be 42 this
April. I swore I'd never again live in LA and here am I living in LA.
Happy New Year! The OUGHT YEARS are officially over and the Bravos did it in pure Bravo fashion.
THE BRAVO THREE ushered in the New Year in style. My mother, brother and myself rented a car and
drove to Vegas spending two nights at the posh Orleans Hotel and Casino and concert hall (the Family
Stone was playing, no Sly / I caught the free funky Filipino band at the bar, chatted up Filipinos at the
bar) They also had a movie theatre, bowling alley, etc. I just ate, drank, watched sports, gambled, smoked
cigs and herb, and loved every minute of it. It was a little chilly. In LA we get 70+degrees sunny weather
everyday. It’s awesome in LA.
The morning of the final day of the year in the West LA Condo that my mom and I share, my brother
entertains us on piano as we finish packing. My mother, my brother and I… we’re going to Las Vegas!!!
Viva Las Vegas!
I footed the bill for the hotel room via the internet and a car rental, a brand new bright red Hyundai Elantra,
which was a funny joke between me and my bro because we both like Married with Children and we both
like Kelly Bundy and we remember the episode where she is auditioning for a spot modeling for a car
called, the Elantra. She has her bit, “The new E-lan-tra!” She says with a spin and her hands going up. She
doesn’t get the part though. Tia Carrera does.
www.cheapovegas.com is a really good site for figuring out your hotel and stuff before going to Vegas.
They break down all the hotels very nicely and with good humour.
We hit the road by one pm Thursday and by 7 pm we were all checked into our swank 450 sq ft room with a
commanding view and two big beds. We had a nice prime rib dinner at a ritzy rest in the Excalibur then
watched fireworks from the strip. We returned to the room and after some time, my mother and brother
were sleeping. I drank and gambled all night, retiring only after the sun came up with 180 bucks still in my
pocket as I made my way alone up to the room.
I arrived in Vegas with 50 bucks and never withdrew money or used a card the entire time I was there. The
next day my bro and I met a childhood friend whom I hadn’t seen for nearly 30 years. He now lives in
Vegas. Facebook has brought my older brother together with several of our childhood pals, even his entire
8th grade graduating class. I don’t use Facebook and I’m not missing anything. We all bet on and won and
watched the Rose Bowl on the bar’s big screen so it was fun watching with them. I haven’t been into sports
since living in Asia sucked me of my ability to watch my teams regularly; subsequently causing me to
lose all interest in watching sports until the time that all the players that I knew were either retired or on
different teams and all the newcomers’ names I could never keep straight. They were both sports nuts –
my bro and stevewebb – who looks the same as he did 30 years ago only bigger. I won at video blackjack,
video keno, roulette, the Rose Bowl.
By 3am the night before we left, my mom and bro asleep, I had 240 bucks in my pocket and I’d been
spending money most freely so unlike many cheap people of nationalities or ethnicities I will not mention,
but you know whom I am talking about. I bought my brother a pack of 8 dollar cigarettes. I took my mother
out for a nice brunch of ‘the usual.’ That’s the kind of stuff I missed most when I lived in Korea. Real diner
breakfasts with the crisp bacon and the hash browns and biscuits and gravy. From 3 am to 7 am I spent
100 on the video poker/blackjack/keno that was built into the bar while drinking white Russians all night
chatting up people from the same barstool. I even got hit on by an African American puta.
-- let’s go back to your room
-- my mother and brother are sleeping there
-- we can go in the bathroom
At 7 am when I went up and woke my mom and bro for our drive back to Los Angeles I was down to one
hundred dollar bill. I’d bought an 8 dollar pack of cigarettes that I smoked almost all of, had 8 or 9 free
Caucasians and it was the best hundred dollars I ever spent.
I could go on about this but what I really want to say is this:
MY NEW YEARS RESOLUTION
I’m publishing my own book. TS Eliot, I’m told, self published The Wasteland and it was edited by Ezra
Pound. I can’t be sure if either of those claims is accurate, but what I do know is that I’ve just made the
table of contents, each entree is an essay ranging from 1 page to 30 pages, most in the 5-10 page range,
with full color pictures and I have the book 90% done. It’s about 150 pages in total. Some of its entrees
has/had been blogged. Most of it is original. In 10 days, I’m going to Kinkos and make 5 copies – one for
me and one for each of the major players. They’ll read it and I’ll get their feedbacks and do the final editing
on that – just knowing that someone is reading it will affect how I look at it as much as their comments
will. In any event, I’ll be the only editor, publisher, distributer. Me and the Bravo Fold.
What kind of book is it?
Well – it reads like a novel but every word of it is true. And all the characters are real people: People I have
had the pleasure of knowing, some biblically, most familiar, like family. And I use their real names. Lots of
sex and drugs and rock n roll and my friends and people I’ve met. Everything happens for a reason,
right? By definition, this is not a novel. If anything it’s a graphic novel cuz it’s full of full color photos that I’ve
taken.
It’s kind of a bio, my bio, but I’m nobody, so bio don’t fit as apt neither. I talk spirituality and history and
society and current event politic but CULTUREBOOK, she’s not academic enough to be in that number,
when the saints go marching in. It’s lyrical, but it’s a lot more prose than poetry. And there’s more about
Barrington Hall in Berkeley than I’ve ever seen printed elsewhere. And it takes place all over the world with
all sorts of people from around the world.
It’s the great American novel, self published and I’ve decided this is the year of CULTUREBOOK. MMX. I’d
been pondering doing something with all my photos, vids and writing on line but I’m too old school. I
wanna give my audience entertainment they can enjoy with nothing more than a reading light. People can
even jerk themselves to the pictures of hot Filipinas and one Cambodian broad that look sweet as. I don’t
mind. They can even jerk to my graphic depictions of their “moist turgid flesh…” I never use that phrase,
but Jerzy Kozinski, author of Being There does. More than once. He was invited to dine at the LoBianco
house the night Sharon Tate was killed. Airport mixup. I guess he knew all about being there or not.
FEB 14th The first new moon of the new year, also Valentines Day MMX I’m going to have a book release
party at TBA place. I may rent a place or possibly get a rest or bar to back me.
Basically, it was November 09 I was in Seoul recently back from 6 months on the road and I was with my
buddy of 10 years and I told him – I’m returning to LA to try to make it as a writer and his reply was, “In this
economy?” He wished me the best of luck and tried to be positive. AB is one of the smartest people my age
I’ve ever met, I understood his point. He wished me the best of luck, but he wondered as did I, how could I
expect to make money writing in this day and age?
I returned to the USA thinking about it. Let’s say I do it the traditional way. I start sending stories out to
publications and let’s say after a few months I develop a following and I meet publishers and they want to
publish my book. Let’s say it’s really popular and sells five or ten thousand copies. How much of that
money is going to be mine? Basically, I’m not making any real money till my 3rd or 4th book and popularity
and distribution and basic ownership is my publishers.
Well, what if I put together a nice book on my own, then sell it and advertise it and promote it and sell it for
10 bucks a pop direct from me, or half for me same price for you via a bookseller. I could deal directly with
independent booksellers in America and do this completely off line. One friend of mine whom I asked
about publishing recommended that I have it done in China. Why not Korea? I’ll definitely have to contact
the guy who runs WHATTHEBOOK as well as Belle, the Filipina wife of the owner of JejuBookTown. They
will both be carrying my book by April. I wonder what a good bookstore in Pusan is? I’ll have a big market in
Korea I forsee. It’s been a long time since there’s been a unifying text circulating among expats. Spook
Larson wrote a novel. I held a copy. I never read it, nor did I ever hear anybody ever talk about it. I’m hoping
the buzz alone sells me a thousand copies. If I sell 100,000 copies, at 10 dollars a book, that’s a million
dollars to me and my people direct.
That’s my new year’s resolution. To make this happen. Wish me luck.
Bravo 1-6-10
PS Showbiz has a cameo, both photo and line of involvement. I guess that means he gets a free
copy. Trey’s in it too, and Tugginmapuddha from Arizona and maybe Denis.
This may be the funnest, coolest thing ever experienced by so many. I can’t see why people wouldn’t want
to get involved. Nobody has to do anything but let me use their association with me. I need to send out
permission slips to all parties involved to make sure they don’t object to being in my book. I don’t make
anyone look bad, and furthermore, I want to have clear upfront permission to do what I do. The girls in the
photos and stories from Southeast Asia I will try to contact and if I do turn a profit I will kick down some
towards them. It’s not about the money. It’s about me doing what I want to do with my life and my time.
Los ANGELES
Korea town bbq
ANGELES CITY
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