You Should Snitch

Quick heads up I’m not the center piece of this story.

I’m a firm believer that if you see the homie’s significant other acting out of pocket you should immediately let the homie know. I know people have apprehensions about the messenger getting shot and what not but if you can’t notify the homie when someone is doing them wrong then why is that the homie? Especially if the repercussions could be possibly devastating and you could have aided in the avoidance of the entire situation.

Anyway on with the story…

Let’s call the homie Mike and let’s call his girl Mary in the spirit of anonymity and shit.

In my younger days I used to section off my friends; I had my club friends, my hood friends, my basketball friends, my real friends and so on and so forth. Mike was a glorified club friend I used to see at the gym and then I kept running into when I was out in these streets. He was an excellent wingman next to Slick and Jolly he might have been the best I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. During our wingman adventures this man went out here and found love; it was like when Michael Jordan retired from the Bulls (the second time) it was the ending of an epic era. Fast forward 7 months and Mike and Mary moved in together I came to the house warming I bought them a fifth Hennessey VSOP and a George Forman grill. Mike went from club homie to “I’m getting the fight on PPV”/occasionally get a beer after work friend and of course I was still out in these streets.

Fast forward another few weeks and I’m out at Eye Bar on a Tuesday and it was lit because some of the bench warming Wizards were in the building. I’m standing at the bar and to my left stands Mary with a crew of her homies. She sees me and comes over to greet me with an overly friendly lingering hug. I did like Jamie Foxx and blamed it on the liquor. As the night passed she made her way over towards my section several times continuing to be very friendly and once even sitting on my lap. She was doing the absolute most but I was still going to stay on the blame it on the liquor path until I was heading out and saw pushed up against the wall kissing some dude whose hands were on her ass. Definitely an unignorably red flag and yup; I was snitching. I figure it wouldn’t be the best move to shoot off a text at quarter to midnight on a Tuesday to let Mike know her girl was out here wilding all the way out. I could imagine him there sitting in the living with the lights off smoking a cigarette waiting for her to drunkenly stumble in and then I’d see the end result on the morning news while getting dressed for work. Yeah, probably wouldn’t be the best. I decided, I’d just catch him at the gym tomorrow but he didn’t come, so I waited until 4:30pm on the dot and called him.

Mike – What’s up bro?
JD – I saw Mary out last night…
Mike – Yeah told me
JD – Bro, she was out there wilding all the way the fuck out. I was leaving out and some random dude was tonging her down with both hands on the cheeks.
Mike – Oh yeah?
JD – Nigga
Mike – Stop playing with me
JD – Nigga, go handle that ASAP
Mike – Good looking out son. I appreciate you.
JD – It’s nothing son. Gone.

I didn’t hear from Mike after that; not that I was expecting him to give me an update. I didn’t even see him in the gym for whole month and when I did he looked at me sideways, but I just went to get about my issue. We ended up leaving out at the same time so I rolled up on him…

JD – What’s up kid?
Mike – Nothing is up. Mary told me about all you were doing that night.
JD – All I was doing?
Mike – She told me you were trying to feel her up and shit.
JD – Me?
Mike – Yeah nigga you
JD – So after I called you and said what I said you spoke to her and then she said whatever?
Mike – Yeah she wasn’t trying to fuck up our friendship
JD – OK kid you be cool like you be cool

I stepped off right then and there. He never called my phone, hit me up on social media; he ceased to exist the moment I turned my back.

Fast forward 4 years later and I’m in Target minding my fucking business and attempting to spend less than $100. I’m browsing the Blue Ray aisle looking for some of those $5 gems and I hear someone yelling my name. I look left. I look right. I don’t see a familiar face now I’m back to eyeballing this director’s cut edition of Terminator 2 and I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn around to see a guy with dreds and a beard looking me in my face “Jean”. It was Mike but he was clean cut and a few pounds lighter the last time I saw him so I had no fucking idea who he was. This was also the beginning of the era that random people from the internet was running up on me to tell me I’m funny. Anyway it was Mike, but instead of doing another JD/Mike back and forth section I’m just going to give you the gist of it…

Mike and Mary continued to date and cohabitate. Mary ended up pregnant and Mike went to Jared to cop a ring. The kid was born. He was playing daddy for a whole year and a half. Then one day he was leaving out of the apartment building and some random dude came to him woman to woman in the parking to tell him his son might not be his son. Fast forward to a nasty break-up, a broken lease, a DNA test and a few court dates later and Mike’s baby turned out not to be his baby. Parking lot dude was the real father off some Maury shit. Life comes at you fast. Yeah he really shed his entire soul in the Blue Ray aisle and I was still holding the director’s cut edition of Terminator 2.

Mike – I was tripping back then because you only wanted to put me up on game
JD – Shit happens. You live. You learn.

After that we had that awkward “what you been up to/we should hang out like old times” convo for about 5 minutes. I ended up not buying the director’s cut edition of Terminator 2 and still managed to spend well over $100 for those that were wondering.

The moral of the story is trust the homie when the homie is telling you about snakes in your yard
Jean DeGrate has spoken

I might be a hoe

Or at least a tad bit forgetful

Anyway I have a story to tell and something on one of my Facebook status updates just reminded me. So here we go…

Let’s rewind back a few years to the good old days when you weren’t required to have a separate app to check your messages on Facebook. The golden era; insert several heart eyed emojis.

History has taught me that women will shut down and delete a social media account at the drop of a dime. They will also change a phone number like Sprint ain’t charging them for it. Any type of drama will prompt these actions and I do mean any kind; heartbreak, bird shit on the windshield, missed the season finale of Empire, her son got an F in PE, etc…

That entire passage above is kind of a cop out for what’s coming next. That doesn’t make it any less TRUE but it’s still a cop out. Father forgive me.

Sometimes my Facebook is lit. Sometimes girls slide in my DM’s and on a much smaller occasion I respond. This is the story of what happened when I responded this one time.

So I’m just kicking on the timeline talking my shit per usual trying to get through another the work day and I get a friend request from a cute girl. I went thru standard protocol when a cute girl sends you a friend; you know the Catfish/Scammer/Spammer test, scroll thru a few pictures, see if her timeline goes back further than a month, see if she has any friends in common that aren’t thirsty ass dudes and read a few status updates. If everything lines up I click accept and immediately forget she exist. Let’s call her Shay in the spirit of anonymity. Fast forward a couple of days later and Shay is in my inbox. Women rarely ever go smack (smack – the act of being direct in an aggressive nature) in the DM’s. They’ll small talk you to death waiting for you to shoot your shot and I let her small talk me for 3 days. We’d exchange short bursts of dialog throughout the day to the point that she was asking me about the family shit was getting kind of personal. She forced my hand and trying to hold detailed conversations while typing with my thumbs wasn’t exactly the wave. I couldn’t go back and forth anymore with the small talk so I gave her my number. Now we talking on the phone, flirting and shit; she even shot the boy a few almost nudes. I spread this thing out over a few weeks before asking her out. I figured she wasn’t going to ask so I did it.

The plan was to meet up for drinks at some arbitrary restaurant/bar in downtown DC and in classic woman fashion she was running a bit behind so instead of walking inside and waiting like a lonely nigga I stood outside while smoking a black and mild. I saw her walking up from like 10 yards out and she sort of looked familiar, but not familiar in “you look just like your pictures” familiar it was more like “I think I know you in real life” familiar. Anyway I shrugged it then off greeted her with a hug and proceeded to enter the spot. We grabbed seats at the bar and I asked her what she was drinking. We cut through a couple appetizers and a few rounds. It was shaping up into being a great night or so I thought. She got up to use the bathroom and in her absence I ordered the shrimp cocktail. It was the beginning of the end and I didn’t even know it.

She gets back to the bar at the exact same moment the bartender placed the shrimp cocktail in front of me.

Shay – You greedy and you didn’t even order me anything.

JD – You can have some. These are community shrimp.

Shay – You know I’m allergic to shrimp.

JD – Do I?

Shay – I told you.

JD – Did you?

Shay – I told you when we were supposed to go to McCormick & Schmick’s

JD – When was that?

Shay – Oh my God. You don’t know who I am do you?

JD – What’s going on here?

It was a bit more dialog after that but it was mostly profanity based so the super abridged version is “We’ve had sex and you don’t know who the fuck I am; FUCK YOU” and then she stormed out of the restaurant. Pretty much everybody within earshot was staring at me and I’m not 100% sure there isn’t a video of me getting cursed out at the bar floating around the internet somewhere. After I finished my drink and paid the tab I doubled back to Facebook to look thru her pictures hoping to jog my memory, but she was way too swift I was already blocked. I thought of calling and texting but would I say “Hey I don’t remember you but I’d like to know you again.” Yeah, that probably wouldn’t go off well. I spent the greater portion of the trip home trying to figure out who she was and yup you guessed it, no dice. I still don’t know who she is or was and here where are years later.

Does that make me a hoe because I don’t remember a woman I slept with?

Jean DeGrate is perplexed. No I’m not. I’m a hoe

He Switched Up and Fell Off After You Let Him Hit

He Switched Up and Fell Off After You Let Him Hit. Switched up (in this instance) – to drastically change behavior towards party or parties involved in a romantic/sexual situation. There are 3 main reasons men switch up after 1 to 3 visits to the vagina; 1. He is already involved in a relationship/situationship that he doesn’t wish to gamble with any further with his current status. This shit should cover all the explanation needed and sometimes men ain’t shit. It’s the cost of doing business. 2. He was exclusively interested in sex. All the sweet talk, wining and dining was all means to an end. All that say what you want and keep it 100 foolishness doesn’t actually work so the game is the game. Life comes at you fast. 3. The box was trash or at least not good enough to support your other perceived character flaws and package. More eloquently the juice isn’t worth the squeeze. Today I’m here to expound on this so let’s go… Everything isn’t for everybody... This is normally when I say your pussy isn’t the great equalizer. Normally I would say life should have shown you by now that your vagina isn’t the game changer. Today I won’t say that. I’m going to go with a different approach. I like chocolate cake. I almost exclusively eat chocolate cake. It’s safe to say I’m a chocolate cake type of guy. I also know chocolate cake isn’t for everybody but it’s perfect for me. Ya’ll see where I’m going with this right? Oh ok, good. You might have some pound cake pussy and once a guy like me comes across your pound cake pussy (which isn’t bad pussy) other things come into factor which leads me to my next point… We all have our pros and cons... It’s a strong possibility that you’re not as dope as you think you are. We as people tend to side step most of our character flaws and pat ourselves on the back for things we’re supposed to do as adults and decent human beings. Like being in shape, taking care of your kids, paying your own bills, being employed, staying out of jail and shit like that. I mean if you accomplished all of that it’s dope for you for managing to be fucking average. Scroll to the bottom of this post and I have a trophy with your name on it. Sometimes your particular combination of attributes, baggage, morals, assets and character flaws doesn’t really go over as well as you might imagine with potential suitors but they’re holding out to see what that pussy is hitting on. You meet a guy however you meet a guy... We all know the game has changed and we are all a bit phony (some of you are an outright sham) so when he pulls up at happy hour or slides in your DM’s after strategically liking pictures for the last 3 months while waiting to see if a boyfriend pops up; either way he’s here now. He’s on your line and you’re on his. He makes you smile and you tell him silly shit like “You lucky I like you a little bit” but you don’t know him and he doesn’t know you. Everybody is putting their best foot forward and hiding their hands. You don’t know he has an 8 year car note for 1200 on that 2014 S Class Benz and he doesn’t know that under that layer of Mac foundation the bumps on your forehead look like braille. Then he captures the flag... Ok 12 DM’s, 45 “Good Morning” text messages, 6 $200 dates, 7 nudes, 3 car make out sessions and 1 Netflix & chill later, now here we are. After first time sex it’s a time of reflection. Your value to our life is being evaluated and we’re going down a list. It’s shallow shit on the list like that weird mole on your neck with 3 hairs growing out of it that you refuse to pluck or the fact that you think The Fresh Prince of Bel Air is a better show than Martin. It’s important shit like you work a job that you love instead of taking a job where you could cash out with your degrees or the fact that you live in Waldorf which technically makes you an immigrant and Trump could close off the borders at any moment. Post vagina you can really see a person’s life in HD and the sex is a determining factor on the path we take from there. Pre-cheeks he might have thought you were the one and now you’re a “You up?” text at 3 am after the club or worst you might get your contact info deleted. It’s a lot of pressure on that pussy boo Jean DeGrate has spoken P.S. for those unfamiliar with Waldorf it’s the most northern province of Zamunda

Part 2 of The Get Down Sucked and I’m Going To Tell You Why

I know this is my unpopular opinion but the first half of “The Get Down” was just ok. Maybe if I was from BX and I rode the 6 train and I lived in a bodega and I wore tan Tims to prom it probably would have tugged on all of my heart strings. Unfortunately I was born and raised in DC with a black mayor, black police and pretty much everything else black. Total side note DC was once the black utopia; you know like what they pretend what Atlanta is but doesn’t come compare. Back on task… the first half was cute and shit on some after school special with a dope nostalgic sound track plus they casted a dude that looks just like Grandmaster Flash. If the series was just 6 episodes I would have been like “Yeah that was cool I don’t need anything else”. But nope they gave us 5 extra episodes of wild ass fuck shit.

Before I get into this if anybody gets on this “you’re downing our black films and entertainment” you people are the reason Tyler Perry had 150 movies starring himself in a dress and a grey wing.

The cartoon
I don’t know what budget cuts, new writers or filming conflicts that motivated the switch to the Fat Albert style animation for every 4th scene but the shit was rubbish. The whole Jaden Smith mailing letters via paper plane to homie/boyfriend in prison was extra trippy and way over the top. Every segue passed thru a corny little cartoon world like “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?” in shades of brown. I sat there and suffered through it waiting for a payoff that never came; waiting for some sort of purposeful explanation to it all.

Shaolin Fantastic Lost His Fucking Mind
On the first half Shaolin was a reluctant drug dealer, graffiti artist and wannabe DJ carrying crates of records for Grandmaster Flash. He even walked away from the dope game momentarily and tried to be a full time DJ. The second half Shaolin went full on ape shit. He pull up to Zeke’s Catalina Wine Mixer internship on a dirt bike causing a scene and then whips out a pistol on some cocaine snorting white boys in the bathroom. You know how crazy that is that your homie pulls you off the job and yall ride off into the sunset on a dirt bike like you don’t have to see these people tomorrow?  He pistol whipped drug lord Fat Annie over record deals and has the whole crew on the run from a team of killers. Not to mention he was moving the most dope during every event; I felt like I was watching an episode of Power.

Mylene is the coldest chick alive
Mylene went from being a church girl with disco dreams being passionately pursued by Zeke (who seemed to be the only character that didn’t radically change from part one to part two) to being forced into being the figure head of her “father’s” mega church dreams. That arch was realistic. Ramon Cruz was definitely riding her wave and vehemently attempting to drive her career while she was trying to break out into her own lane. Then she found her “dad” dead from a suicide in his church and nothing made sense ever again. She found out Papa Fuerte was her dad, went to Ramon Cruz’s funeral then ran off to Jackie Moreno’s apartment where they and a team of cross dressers wrote a song. Turned around and solidified a movie deal gave Zeke a kiss and ran off to Hollywood. Oh and left moms solo dolo in the projects.

All the other fuck shit
I can’t even begin to imagine how 3 teenaged boys get punished and forced to give up hip hop then immediately turn around to doing shows, going on dates, selling dope and Dizzee overdosed. I had to watch it again because somehow someway Ron Cephas Jones was a better dad on “This is Us” as former junkie dying of cancer then he was as a live in father on The Get Down.  How was Shaolin getting all this money still living in an abandon building? He wasn’t about that secure door life? I’m still befuddled about that. The last episode I guess the writers and director was like “we not about to do 2 more episodes so everything got to get crammed into this.” Pape Fuerte caught a charge out of nowhere.  Cadillac quit being a gangster after being forced to attend a rap concert and decided to chase his dreams of getting “Disco Biscuit” on the radio.  Fat Annie (who may have molested her son Cadillac) shot a kitten and patched things up with Shaolin (whose real name is Curtis like that was some sort of fucking big reveal).

Nope it was trash writing this made me angry
Jean DeGrate has spoken