"...If God made light on the first day, what was giving the light, since the sun doesn't appear until the fourth day?... " - David Plotz, Blogging the Bible

Wow, that's a deep thought! What was giving the light on the 1st day, if not the Sun? Hmmm....

So maybe the light isn't the kinda light we automatically think of. So what's going on here?

My first thought: the Truth is the Light. That sounds like a good biblical saying, but now that I'm looking, I can't actually find that anywhere in the Bible. Where did I hear that from?

My next thought: II Corinthians 4:6 - "...the light of the knowledge of the glory of God...". Was the glory of God somehow manifested physically on the first day? Was this manifestation necessary to continue His work?

What about Matthew 5:16 - "...let YOUR light so shine before men...". Hmmm. So obviously even I have a light that can shine w/o the benefit of the Sun.

Interesting. I'm gonna vybe on this in my head for a while - wait, better yet - I'm gonna vybe on this in my spirit for a while (big difference). Let's see what we can see.

what are your thoughts?....

"Yoo Le-Hoo, mon cherie! I am looking somewhere to find you!..." - Pepe Le Pew, Looney Tunes

Looks like I get a lot of hits to this blog from people who are searching the 'Net for The Boondocks. Kool!

To you all you Boondocks fans, holla at ya boy! Lemme know what you think of the show. Like for instance:


- How kool was the fight sequence between Huey and the kung-fu brutha in "Let's Nab Oprah"?!

- Do you think Uncle Ruckus' religious campaign of black self-hate could work in the real world? Or is it already working?

- Did you fall out laughing when little Jazmine was in the pulpit talking about "Praaaise Santa!" in the Xmas episode?

- Did you have to sit and think seriously for a moment about some of the statements made by Martin Luther King, Jr. in the "Return of the King" episode?

Holla!

"...You humans, when're you gonna learn that size doesn't matter? Just 'cause something's important, doesn't mean it's not very, very small...." - Frank the Pug, Men in Black


This week during lunch I attended a rally in support of a new bill against puppy mills in Ohio. My employer is a supporter of this, and encouraged us to attend. I went home and got my puppy to take him along - I figured he was a supporter also. :)

This was his first real interaction with other dogs since I've had him. He was so excited! More so, I think, than the other dogs. But then, to be fair he was the youngest guy out there.

Little did I know, lil' Kwali is a fighter! Every time he would 'greet' another dog, next thing I know he's throwin' dem 'bows! I guess they call them Boxers for a reason.

But what really tickled me was when a guy came by with his 120 lb (that's one-hundred twenty pounds) Great Dane. Mind you, this small horse was only 8 months old! So I guess I shouldn't say that the guy came by, but rather the dog came by dragging his master helplessly behind him.

The Great Dane bends down to greet Kwali. Kwali sniffs him and what not. Next thing I know, Kwali's all over his face! The Dane was kool about it tho - he had an expression on his face like, "...sigh...silly baby puppy..." But I was concerned - the Dane could literally have swallowed Kwali in one gulp.

To be honest, Kwali wasn't fighting anyone - just being really playful like puppies do. He was the life of the party, tho - everybody wanted to meet him & pet him and I kept overhearing folks say "that's a beautiful dog".

Uh, hello...I'm here, too. Can I get some love? :-)

"No need to worry
No need to cry
I’m your messiah and you’re the reason why
'Cause, I would die for you..." - I Would Die 4 U, Prince

Was I the only one that didn't know that Prince's "I Would Die 4 U" song was about Christ? I was chillin' today and having a nostalgic Prince jam session (music, old videos, etc), and started listening to the lyrics of this song like "what?" Then I looked up the lyrics, and it seems to me like this song is clearly about Christ dying for us. Wow! This was a like a mainstream radio song in 1984. Interesting...

"What is 'real'? If 'real' is what we can hear and taste and touch and see, then real is nothing more than electrical signals sent to our brain..." - Morpheus, The Matrix

I found this really kool article about scientists making a machine that can 'read thoughts' - well, sorta. Here's a little excerpt:

"...During calibration, the person imagines moving his left or right hand. The signals picked up by the electrodes are processed in a specially written computer program that filters out signals from thoughts not related to moving the object and homes in on the brain activity responsible for the imagination of movements. Once the person is in sync with the computer, he can imagine moving his hands or feet or rotating an object to trigger an action on the screen...."

So of course, this all made me think of the story of the Matrix, and Morpheus' quote above. In other words, if I can figure out what the electrical signal looks like that goes from nose to my brain when I smell a flower, why can't I duplicate that electrical signal, and make your brain think you're smelling a flower?

That's why The Matrix is so deep is cuz, why can't that actually happen? The reason the robots were able to create the Matrix for humans is cuz, according to the story, they had mapped every single part of the human brain - they knew exactly how it worked, and how to interface with it.

That's the same thing these typewriter guys are doing - today they're learning what part of the brain does the left hand, next the right, then all the fingers, then which part of the brain can see red, which sees blue, then they put all that 'eye' data together and they can display what you the person is looking at right onto the monitor!

So far, they're dealing with output [from the brain] only. But maybe one day they'll find a way to INPUT. That's where it gets kool, as well as scary. Imagine uploading your college textbook into your brain. But then again, also think of 'Total Recall' (w/Arnold Schwarzenegger) where they screw with your mind - not good.

If only we could all live another 100 years, and I bet we'd be there. Maybe my 4-year old nephew will be able to experience playing a video game using only his brain!

"I'm waiting for the Easter Wabbit. When he comes in looking so fwuffy and cute with his wittle basket of Easter eggs... BANG! Easter Wabbit stew. He he he he...." - Elmer Fudd

Well, another holiday is here, and even tho I don't get a day off from work for Easter, I still have time to reflect on the history of holidays. In my house, we ain't to big on holidays, cuz most of them have some kind of wack meaning or origen. Easter is another example. Of course, the death and resurrection of Christ is important, but Easter as a holiday observance is not.

Of course, every year I'm conflicted during Thanksgiving. I know the origin of that holiday is bad, too. But DANG! that's some good eatin'!!

"Whoever said you can't buy happiness forgot little puppies." - Gene Hill

When all else fails, post a Puppy Pic!

Gin: "So basically, 'nigga technology' is anything that doesn't plug into a printer. Does that [pocket text messenger] plug into a printer?"
Ed: "No."
Gin: "You know why?"
Ed: "Why?"
Gin: ".....Cuz niggas never have anything to print."

- Gin Rummy & Ed Wuncler III, Boondocks


It's official! The Boondocks Complete First Season DVD is due out in June 2006! And yes, it's uncut & uncensored. I finally get to hear the cussin', instead of all those [bleep] [bleep] bleeping sounds! yeah!

....I'm such a heathen......

"I think that if I'm going to be a secret agent, I should have a better name. I was thinking, "Toto Annihilation!..." - Lou the puppy in "Cats & Dogs"


We got a new puppy today!

To everyone out there in blogland, I'd like to introduce you to lil' Kwali!

And for those of you who remember Crunch & Mansa, I assure you that we're committed to this little guy. No plans to give lil' Kwali away.

You can be sure that more pics are on the way!

"...By the way, don't worry about any of them reading this letter, remember, THEY DON'T READ!!!..." - Anonymous


An email I received from a friend:

-----Original Message-----
From: XXXXX
Sent: Wednesday, April 05, 2006 7:15 AM
Subject: Fw: A STATEMENT READ ON NY RADIO/Our Spending

>>> STATEMENT ABOUT BLACK PEOPLE>>>

Not to make you all angry so early in the morning but any thoughts about thecomment below? This was apparently read on a New York radiostation.........I tried to look it up to see if there was any validity to itand to see if it was just something to get us riled up but I couldn't findanything......

Signed,
XXXXX

>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> Sent: Monday, March 20, 2006 10:40 AM
>>> Subject: Re: FW: A STATEMENT READ ON NY RADIO

http://thebwp.com/wire/DA.cfm?ArticleID=431

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>


My response:

From: Ricardo W
Date: Apr 5, 2006 9:20 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: A STATEMENT READ ON NY RADIO/Our Spending]]


I don't think there's really anything to prove here in terms of validity - it's more of an editorial, and yes it's meant to rile folks up, no matter if it was written by a white or black person. Whether or not the statistics are accurate is irrelevant - it's just meant to make you mad.

It's kinda funny, cuz i feel like these are the kind of unconfirmed and haphazard writings that make up the "critical thinking" literature of the part of our community that never reads books. this is the closest they come to reading anything with a little bit of knowledge in it. where would we be without email forwards???

i think back to folks i've seen whose first attempt at activism came when they received the email that Blacks were losing their voting rights in 2007. Or folks who tried to unify the community in order to save the US Postal Black Heritage stamps.

now what is we gon' do?

-Ricardo

"A poet can read. A poet can write. A poet is African in Africa, or Irish in Ireland, or French on the left bank of Paris, or white in Wisconsin. A poet writes in her own language. A poet writes of her own people, her own history, her own vision, her own room, her own house where she sits at her own table quietly placing one word after another word until she builds a line and a movement and an image and a meaning that somersaults all of these into the singing, the absolutely individual voice of the poet: at liberty. A poet is somebody free. A poet is someone at home. How should there be Black poets in America?..." - June Jordan

Did you know I used to be a bit of a poet back in college? Yeah, I wrote me a verse or two. I happend to come across this one online - I remember it was posted in a newsletter in college. Ahh, the memories:

Black Gold
by Ricardo Wilkins
Copyright 1997

This is a poem
About a woman
That other men wish they could know
And I feel

Life with this Queen couldn’t get any sweeter, like
Canine to master, I’m running to meet her, and
Blind men are weeping, for they cannot see
Her vision of shining black gold.

Sincerely and truly,
This is no joke
Your loveliness
Makes my mind’s mental eye choke
Looked around and found no crowns
On colorless women
So my mind gets flashbacks to black skin
And obsidian dreams

And it seems
That just hearing your name
Makes me take mental journeys
To African plains
And lovely savannas.
A vision so bright
She matches the stars
In an African night.

Black Woman, your beauty
Flows out through your smile
Like the waters that flow
Through the African Nile.
Black Woman, the name,
Yes, I hear it again,
And like violets in bloom I explode from within…
Ka-Boom!

And soon
I come off of my high
But if I couldn’t puff on Black woman I’d die
And no poem by poet
No scripture by scribe
No song dressed in rhythm
Has power to describe
The essence of sensual
Style of a Queen
A fluorescent expression
Of African dreams
Like pearls from an oyster
Like diamonds from coal
I know a true treasure
I call her black gold.

"Danny, see your future, be your future. May, make, make it, make it. Make your future Danny...." - Ty Webb talking to Danny Noonan in Caddyshack

We did our weekly mentoring session with our 7th and 8th grade boys today at a local middle school. Talked about peer relationships. At some point we got into talking about all the fights that these boys get into. I brought up how interesting I thought it was that all the kids assumed that they could get into a fight, and always just walk away with just a busted lip or something. "Don't you know of people that come to a fight with knives and guns?," I asked. "Yeah," was their reply. Just matter-of-factly. Do they hear what we're saying?

One young man said he didn't regret any of the fights he's been in, cuz he learned from them all. He didn't seem to grasp the fact that they could have ended up with someone dead. Especially in the fights that he gets into.

This kid was 13 years old, and already in a gang. No, I'm not saying that he's just hanging out with a bad group of hooligans. I'm saying he's literally a card-carrying member of a group that people make documentaries about. And he's thirteen.

We explained to him (one of our members knew a lot about the local gang activity in our community) that the next step in his membership process was going to be participation in a drive-by. He casually agreed that such a thing was probable.

Here I am sitting 3 feet away from a little boy who's looking down the very imminent path of starting a life filled with crime & punishment. And I can't even tell if he's hearing the message we're trying to speak. It didn't seem like he was even entertaining the idea of alternatives. Not that he was one of those who refused to listen to advice - he was listening to us. Not that he had violent tendencies - he was a sweet little kid. He just happened to be a 2nd-generation member of a family immersed in the _____ gang - most of his family were in it, and he admitted that most of them were in-and-out of jail.

And he's thirteen.

After the kids left, my colleagues and I just sat there quietly for a few seconds.

Now what is we gon' do?.....

"But thou hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, longsuffering, charity, patience, persecutions, afflictions, which came unto me at Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra; what persecutions I endured: but out of them all the Lord delivered me...." - II Timothy 3:10-11

In the book of Timothy, Paul is mentoring his apprentice Timothy. I can imagine that Timothy felt very blessed to have someone like Paul as his mentor. I look back on the many mentors in my life, both those that I acquired formally as well as informally, and I can say that they definitely had an impact on my life.

But I found it very interesting when Paul says that Timothy has "fully known" about Paul's life. As if to say, "you know good 'n well about what I been thru", or, "don't act like you don't know a brutha!". :-) But more importantly, BECAUSE Timothy knows about Paul - his life, his walk, his hardships - it's for that very reason that Paul's testimony and teaching in Timothy's life is so real! Paul brings up the fact that Timothy knows about his life in order to punctuate why Timothy should heed his words of advice.

What do people know about me? Is my testimony as effective as it could be if those that I talk to don't know about me, and where I've been, and what God's brought me thru?

But, I don't like folks in my biz-nazz, tho. :-) Nevertheless, when I read this I thought, perhaps it's a good idea to be more conscious of opportunities to "tell my story". Certainly, we should all be able to receive a word from someone about our situation, even if they haven't experienced it themselves. But how much more do we listen to someone when we know they've gone thru the same thing we're going thru!

Maybe I'll try to share a little more of my biz-nazz... not too much, just a little. Cuz they ain't ready for the WHOLE story!... ;-)

"No Malcolm X in my history text
Why is that?
Cuz he tried to educate and liberate all Blacks
Why is Martin Luther King in my book each week?
He told Blacks if they get smacked
Turn the other cheek..."
- Tupac Shakur, "Words of Wisdom"

I saw Michael Eric Dyson on TV speaking at a bookstore for his new book. As I waded thru his machine gun barrage of big & complicated school words, I heard him speak on how the media did not correctly report on the Katrina aftermath. He talked about how the numbers reported of death & violence were not as bad as was thought, how they said white folks were "finding" food and Blacks folks were stealing it, and he even suggested that the "thugs" that the media claimed were shooting at helicopters were doing so not so much cuz they're some crazy nigras, but because they were trying to say "Hey! We're down here, too! Come get us too!"

I'm one of the last people who you'd have to remind to be skeptical of the media, but I must admit I had to check myself and remind myself of how irresponsible the media can be as it relates to our Folk. I can remember letting the media coverage at that time paint for me a picture of the Katrina situation, but instead I should have been constantly suspicious of everything they reported. Shame on me. I have to remember that the media has an agenda also, and someone is telling the story that they want to be told - writing history as THEY see it. And this Somebody is usually not someone interested in MY best interests.

Not that Dyson is necessarily telling the truth, either. But the point is, question everything.

"It's been a long time...We shouldn't have left you
Without a little beat to step to...." - Timbaland

"The Fat Boys are back [back, back..]...
And you know they can never be wack..." - The Fat Boys

[Chuck D sample] "...Once again back is the incredible..."
"It's the return of the Wild Style fashionist
Smashin hits, make it hard to adapt to this
Put pizazz and jazz in this, and cash in this
Mastered this, flash this and make em clap to this..." - Rakim, "Guess Who's Back"

Whoooooaaaaaaaaa!!!!! It's been like 3 months since I posted on this mickey-fickey! Daaannngg!

But The Ric' is back, and now the only question is..... do I have anything to say?

Of course I do! I mean, Life gets so busy some times, it be like Life is telling me to shut the ___ up. .....I be quiet.... but when it's not so busy..... I be talking again... :-)

Yo, but where does a brother begin??? Shoot, lemme just do an M3™ on you (Mental Medley Moment, patent pending):

• "Boondocks" continues to be one of my favorite shows. So glad that a Season 2 is in the works! And big ups to Asheru (who spits the verse in the intro). Check out his other music - nice.
  
• The new Sergio Mendes CD ("Timeless") is off the hook! - includes John Legend, Jill Scott, Will-I-Am, Black Thought, India Arie, Stevie Wonder (my all-time favorite), Pharoah Monche, Mr. Vegas (Heads High!), Erykah Badu, Jurassic Five, and Q-Tip! So far, the best album of '06!
  
• Yo - wutchall think about this Covenant book? Does Tavis and dem be caring about Black folks, or is this another way for them to pay the rent? Is it practical and profound? Or political froo-froo?
  
• In a couple of weeks, me and the brothers from the 100 Black Men will be doing our book club on the book "Warrior Method - Raising Black Boys". No, Angie and I are not expecting, but still - I need to be prepared, right!

Lemme stop there. I'mma talk about all this stuff in due time. But for now, it's back to the grind... As the young urban youth like to say - "I'll holla!"