#couldn’t see the board to take notes in 7th grade science

[burningalight]

my binders/locker in grade school were stuffed with so much shit i couldnt find anything...always crumpled up papers, trash etc

chewed pencils/pens, broke them taking them apart in class, lost them, often didn’t have one, frequently borrowing them and forgetting to give them back to the point that certain people wouldn’t give me pencils

could comprehend reading i liked very well, but when we’d have reading groups with boring books id always be lost,  or when the teachers would have one on ones and have u read something short and ask questions after to assess ur reading level, they’d often have to tell me to read it again bc they knew how much i remembered didnt add up to my intelligence and reading speed 

moms college friend gave me an unoffical iq test and i did much worse than i know i shouldve on the reading portion bc she’d play a story and then ask me after to list every detail i could remember and i couldn’t remember anything. but when she played 10 numbers and asked me to say them out loud backwards i scored extremely high ?

couldnt do projects, would be in tears, last minute every time, parents mad bc i need a poster board RIGHT NOW ITS DUE TOMORROW . hated assigned reading, horrible at essays even when they helped us plan them. 

i remember my 7th grade social studies teacher assigning a paper, i wrote extremely detailed and well in the first paragraph or 2, and the following ones got shorter and shorter and were completely bullshit bc i got bored. she told me ‘really strong first paragraph.’ and gave me a B  

talk too got damn fast. customers constantly telling me to slow down bc they cant understand me

my mom always says she had to challenge me as a kid bc i would get bored and get in trouble. i was acting out bc i was understimulated, i happened to like learning (esp numbers and puzzles) bc smart so that’s what i could fixate on and felt stimulated by

lunch detention frequently in 8th grade in my first highschool class, algebra, bc i wouldnt do my homework, at one point he just stopped giving lunch detention for that bc i wouldnt do it. i hated that class bc the math was boring and i never paid attention but would somehow pull off a’s and b’s on tests so i ended up with a B. my first B, and i had brought that up from a D (told my mom it was almost a C, he gave a really hard test and we all did bad etc, when she had to sign a paper about my low grade) at the end of the year, during the exam i was so confused the whole time, it was my first highschool exam and i didn’t know ANYTHING. i ended up with a 92 from guessing, and a curve, and every one of my friends got at least a 93 or better and i felt so stupid bc i was supposed to be the best at math

i would take every highschool class in honors but not one english class bc it required more essays and summer reading and i knew i wouldnt do the reading and would cry over the essays

the only other class i didnt take honors was chemistry bc i knew the honors teacher had a lot of projects and i would be stressing over them. i ended up with an A in the standard chem class even tho i never finished any work in class and didnt do homework, but i was still the smartest in the class and did the best overall

lunch detention for forgetting to get papers signed like report cards. they weren’t even bad grades i just couldnt remember. one time i got actual detention for forging my moms signature bc i got lunch detention for several days straight bc i kept forgetting to get the paper signed 

often had permission slips waiting to be signed the day before the field trip, or told my mom it was picture day the day before or morning of. one time i totally forgot it was picture day and didnt dress up

acting out and not thinking ab the consequences, many referrals.. many more times that my teachers let me get away with acting out when someone else doing the same thing would’ve been punished. one time anna and i left in the middle of class to go with emma to the library, only emma had permission, and my teacher had anna and i do wall sits instead of going to the office. in gym in middle school i would never dress out. i hated the clothes and hated gym bc i was awkward and if we didnt dress out we had to copy pages out of the health textbook the entire time and i would barely write 2 paragraphs bc i was so bored and my hand hurt and he never did anything ab it. i wouldnt dress out at least twice per week if not more. told my mom I had a C bc he had it out for me but i was the problem

in elementary school if we didn’t come to gym day wearing the right shoes we had to go into the back and pick out a pair of sneakers that fit out of a box of shoes, and also borrow socks if necessary. i had to do this frequently bc i never remembered to wear the right shoes

i would extremely often forget my library books and have to sit on the couch waiting for everyone to pick out their books for half an hour

when we were even younger we’d have story time and you had to sit in the middle of the floor inside a big circle of chairs where everyone else was if you forgot your library books. i lost one at one point for months and my parents didnt just pay for it so i had to sit in the middle every time. we found the book on a shelf somewhere in the house 

my chorus teacher never liked me bc i talked too much and i always felt like the worst singer, not bc of my singing but bc she wasn’t ever nice to me

in 7th grade science we learned latin root words and every day we’d play a game where we all stood up and one by one he’d ask for a root and we’d give it. if you got it wrong on the first round you’d have to write it on a piece of paper x amount of times and turn it in. if you were the last person left you were allowed to sit on your desk for the rest of the year, during these games while everyone else had to stand up. i wanted so badly to sit on my desk, esp bc i was fidgety and couldnt stand still, but i would never study them bc i’d forget or not want to if i did remember, even tho i really wanted to know them and sit on my desk. that teacher had a huge soft spot for me and one day i just started sitting on my desk during those. everyone knew i was smart, and it was all the smart kids who got to sit on their desks, so no one questioned it. im not sure if he knew i wasnt supposed to and just let me, or didnt realize i hadnt won bc i was smart. 

hyperlexia? mom said i could practically read before i was taught. i’ve always obsessively air written, ie writing words out w my finger in the air, on my leg etc. 

esp during lectures i doodle excessively to the point that my papers margins have always been covered with random scribbly overlapped words, or song lyrics. the words are usually something someone in the class said. ive started keeping an extra sheet of paper just for scribbling when im taking notes or listening in class. when we finished end of year tests in school i would write down full lyrics to songs on my scrap paper so i wouldnt be so bored. my hand cramps up so much but it was better than staring or trying to sleep with the lights on 

doing things and forgetting to turn them in

hyperfixating on books to cope w boredom and social anxiety, at one point read one per day, i was definitely one of the most frequent people in the library 

‘ The way I see it is if I can get information into my mind, I can do a lot with it but getting it in there in the first place is the really difficult part.’ - not mine

none of my teachers ever told my mom any of this i dont think, bc i was the smartest and i always got good grades, most had a soft spot for me BUT COULDNT SEE I HAD ADHD like damn. one time my fourth grade teacher whom i liked a lot was mad at us and indirectly calling people out, and referred to the fact that some of us never stopped talking , then made direct eye contact with me and i felt rly embarrassed bc i didnt realize i did that until she mentioned it

i often had to move seats if i was near friends bc i wouldnt stop instigating talking

at big lots when i had to run the register i was so painfully bored , fidgety, had to sneak my phone soo much bc i was so bored. when i was on the floor i would put away the go backs very quickly and then take upon myself a project like going through the entire wall of individual drinks and pulling out all the expired ones, it was like 5 carts full. my manager put me in charge of organizing the entire makeup section and all the gross clearance makeup bc she knew id do it the best and fastest 

when bosses have me do inventory i can count the products super fast and efficiently, but then when they have me put them into a spreadsheet i stare at it for hours getting nothing done bc distracted and its boring. ammar told me if i’d just get off my phone i could get it done bc he’d been asking for it for weeks, i wasnt trying to ignore it 

when im trying to do something at work that needs more concentration, i want to cry with frustration whenever i hear the door chime and have to get up and help customers and break my focus

[cecilspeaks]

112 - Citizen Spotlight

If you see something crawling across your floor in the dark, don’t worry. It’s probably just a tarantula. Welcome to Night Vale.

Listeners, in this fast-paced world of community radio and local news, I think we’ve lost sight of the truly important thing: the individuals who make up our diverse community.

So today, I want to try out a new segment I've put together called Citizen Spotlight, in which we will profile a randomly selected citizen, diving deep into who they are, and maybe discovering some things about ourselves along the way.

Oh, here’s an intro I’m working on for it.

[very deep, menacing voice] Spotlights, roving in the night. Hunting. Closing in. But everything is backwards. The night is hot and bright. The spotlights are deep and black. Everything they touch turns to darkness. They are searching for the light. They consume it.

[chipper voice] That’s a rough draft. I’m open to notes. Anyway, today’s inaugural spotlight was curated by closing my eyes and pointing in the phone book. And so today, we will talk about Sigrid Borg. She’s a brand new citizen who has just arrived in Night Vale. I have hear this classified dossier, we had a team of heist experts – thanks, Janice – steal from the Hall of Public Records. The dossier says that Sigrid was relocated to Night Vale as part of a witness protection program, and that Sigrid is not her real name. Nor is she of the Scandinavian origin her name might suggest. Thus all of the information we managed to obtain on Sigrid for this segment is fictional, created by a government software program to ensure her total anonymity, and in no way represents who she really is as a person. In all probability, it is in most ways the opposite of her true identity, but for safety, it’s important that we all believe this made-up biography is absolute fact. It is extremely, extremely important. She would be in great danger if anyone from the outside world started to doubt who she claimed to be.

We’ll get to our Citizen Spotlight momentarily, but first, as a way to make Sigrid feel more at home, I’ve asked other Night Vale citizens to reveal a dark secret that they’ve never shared. I will be reading those throughout today’s broadcast. The first comes from Susan Escobar, second grade teacher at Night Vale elementary school. She writes: “One night, I was at school late grading homework, and I heard strange sounds coming from the cafeteria. When I looked inside, I saw a giant mandala on the floor made entirely of frozen fish sticks. It seemed to be undulating and alive. When I blinked, it vanished. But every night I dream of flying toward a cloudless sky, and in the center of that sky is that fish stick mandala. And I wake before I reach it, but each dream a little closer. And the night that I reach that mandala in my dream is the night I will die.” Thanks Susan! Sounds fun.

Now let’s talk about Sigrid. Though new to town, Sigrid Borg was born in Night Vale and has lived here her entire life. Her parents were immigrants from the picturesque Swedish port city of Halmstad. She tries to go back at least once a year to visit her grandparents, a retired grade school teacher and a retired timber farmer, who have a lovely cottage overlooking at the mouth of the Nissan river, where it meets the North Sea. Sigrid has always been close with her grandparents, though in recent visits, has become distressed at her grandmother’s increased mental confusion and grandfather’s drinking habits. She doesn’t call them as often she used to and feels guilty about that. She’s torn between the desire to take more responsibility for their health and well being and the desire to block the situation out of her mind completely, as it has become a signifier of the irrevocable loss of her own childhood, and a direct confrontation with morality itself.  

Sigrid’s favorite food is smorgåstårta, a Scandinavian layer cake that is made of sandwiches and fish paste. Ask her to make it for your next big event. She’s been carefully drilled by her witness protection handlers on the foods of her childhood, and has almost got the hang of making them, although she has failed to acquire a taste for fish paste.

Some fun facts that you may not know about Sigrid, despite having lived in the same town with her all your lives. She has a degree in marine hauntology from an online university. She has a disorder that makes it impossible for her to sweat or cry. She has served on the board of the Sand Wastes Conservation Fund for six and a half years. She is deeply embedded into our community and way of life.

And now, another confession from a local resident about a dark secret. This one from my dear friend Earl Harlan. It reads: “On a Boy Scout training maneuver near the old dirt road, I witnessed the apparition of my 10-year-old self wearing the scout uniform of my youth. He trained with us all afternoon, and I tried not to give him any preferential treatment. As the afternoon passed, new memories appeared in my mind of training at 10 years old with a group of strangers, one of whom seemed familiar and stared at me constantly in horror.” That’s adorable! Thanks, Earl!

Back to Citizen Spotlight. Sigrid spent her childhood in the Hefty Sycamore Trailer Park near downtown. She didn’t have many friends; she was shy in school. One year, she tried out for a solo in the school holiday pageant. For the audition, she sang a Flakey-O’s jingle that was very popular at the time, but no one took her seriously. They all thought she was making a joke. She apologized and faded back into the bleachers. She truly loved that jingle. It spoke to her soul, it made her feel something. She recorded it off the radio and listened to it often, rewinding and replaying it out at the picnic table on summer nights, when the rest of her family was asleep. But she never listened to it again after the solo tryouts, because it only brought back the sound of the other kids laughing, of her teacher’s scolding voice lecturing the class to take themselves seriously, or no one else would. And it made her feel ashamed. She eventually recorded over the tape with audio from a TV special about orphaned lion cubs. But sometimes, under the hungry sucking sounds of giant kittens drinking from baby bottles, she thought she could still hear the song.

In 7th grade, she finally made some friends during the unknown creature dissection unit in science class. She wasn’t squeamish, and her ability to identify and extract misshapen internal organs without flinching made her an attractive lab partner. Everyone thought she was new in town because they had never noticed her before. She still has that effect on people. In the spring of that year, someone asked her to to the junior high dance. The team was “heat death of the universe”. The boys spent a lot of time licking the crepe paper decorations to dye their tongues bright colors and impress the girls. The girls were not impressed, but laughed anyway. Sigrid’s date tried to lick her hand to see if the dye would come off on her skin. This caused Sigrid to feel a surge of strange tingling panic, and she fled to the bathroom for 30 minutes. Her friends eventually found her and dragged her back into the gym. She danced with them for the rest of the night, hiding from the boys with the blue tongues.

There were bountiful crops that year. Some say this was not a coincidence. Some say the junior high dance is a secret crop fertility ritual outlined in the town charter, but kept secret from the children who participate. When the dance was cancelled in the following years, due to the crepe paper dye related poisoning incident, Night Vale experienced extreme drought and locust plagues. Some say this, too, was not a coincidence.

A quick bulletin board reminder: the reinstated junior high dance is coming up! May all you young citizen make lush and plentiful memories, and have a cornucopia of fun.

More Citizen Spotlight soon, but first, The weather. 

["Try Try Try" by Rachael Sage]

Another secret confession. Ah, what a treat! This one comes from iconic local celebrity and recent donut food truck entrepreneur, Lee Marvin. It says: “There is a void. Within that void a light. Within that light, a hand. Within that hand, a movement. Within that movement, a potential. Within that potential, everything that ever was.” Thank you Lee, and of course, a happy 30th birthday to you today!

Citizen Spotlight time. In high school, Sigrid’s left hand started to itch below the pinky finger. A small lump appeared which grew slowly over time. She became self-conscious about this and wore bulky sweatshirts with long sleeves pulled over her hands, which was luckily a fashionable look then. The nurse at the health clinic assured her that it was nothing to be concerned about, but it kept growing. Eventually, it took the shape of what appeared to be a second, smaller pinky finger. She was even able to wiggle it if she concentrated very hard. As you may know, the Hefty Sycamore Trailer Park was built on the dried-up shores of the old pesticide waste river, and Sigrid’s father felt there might be some connection between this and the extra finger. They decided to relocate.

They moved into a two-story house by the train tracks, a fixer-upper that shook on its foundation twice a day when the train came through, and once or twice erratically every night when the secret night trains passed, with their nameless and unspeakable cargos. Sigrid’s parents began to fight often, never having the money to fix up the fixer-upper, and they both spent as much time as possible away from home. Sigrid had a complicated relationship with her extra finger at this point, partially blaming it for the rift in her parents’ relationship. Once, when Sigrid was alone in the house, she heard something creeping up the stairs. She hummed the Flakey-O’s jingle til she couldn’t hear it anymore, and then she started spending a lot more time away from home also.

There was a small group of kids who hung out around the train tracks at night, so she started hanging out with them to avoid going home. They liked to smoke cigarettes and light off fireworks and dare each other to look at the secret night trains, although none of them ever did, as they all knew that to look at one of those trains meant an instant and painful death. They would talk and gossip about kids and teachers she’d never heard of before, and she began to wonder if they even went to her school. When she was hanging out with them, she would often glance up at the dark windows of her own empty house just down the tracks and see movement behind the glass. Or soft white eyes staring out.

During one of these movements, while she looked at the house, all her friends disappeared and she found herself alone on the tracks. No sign of the teenagers that had been there mere seconds before. She never saw those kids again, but she often heard their voices in portable radios on the wind, and she spent her evenings wandering up and down the tracks, looking for them.

At the end of senior year, the high school yearbook featured fun awards for each student, voted on by the class. Smartest girl and tallest boy and most likely to survive a mass extinction event, and best smile. Every single student received a commemorative award, except for Sigrid. It wasn’t intentional or out of spite. Everyone forgot that she existed. She was inexplicably absent during every school picture day throughout the years. Never participated in any extracurricular activities, didn’t speak up in class, got average grades, and ate lunch alone. Which some say contributed to her lack of memorability. But she was there, and is here, and always has been. She belongs here. It’s totally normal to forget someone you know, but you do in fact know her. Some of you know her very well.

One time you went thrift store shopping together, and she picked out a jacket for you that was too big, but she said it looked great on you. It was fuzzy and resembled furniture upholstery. Royal blue with gold stripes. The lining was ripped. She bought it for you. You found that old jacket recently, royal blue with gold stripes, you put it on. It almost fits now. You felt something that you hadn’t felt before, sticking against your ribs, tucked into the ripped lining. You reached inside and you pulled out a piece of notebook paper, folded into a hard little square. It was from Sigrid. It described a thing that she shouldn’t have seen, and couldn’t speak about. It instructed you to burn the note immediately, and you did. It instructed you to never acknowledge to her that you even received it. You can never tell anyone what the note said.

If you do run into Sigrid, remember that she is a real person filled with blood and misshapen internal organs, just like you and me. Everything I have told you about her is completely true. Well, none of it is technically true, but it was crafted by state of the art technology to evoke a range of 1-4 feelings in the listener. And as we all know, feelings are real, and truth is in the mind of the beholder. And the beholder lives out in the scorched orchard under the floorboards of the old cherry-picking stack.

Stay tuned next for a mysterious distress signal that requires urgent action, but is impossible to locate.

On behalf of everyone here at Night Vale Community Radio, welcome to your new town, Sigrid – the town where you have lived your entire life.

And to everyone else: Good night, Night Vale, Good night.

Today’s proverb: Be yourself. As if you had any choice in the matter.

[wait-what-no-way]

Interview with NERDS 2DX

Born in Jamaica, Queens NERDS has been adding his own unique style to every wall he approaches. From train yards to The Bushwick Collective, NERDS has no limits. His passion and dedication to the game is unmatchable. Without further ado, Writers Ink presents NERDS 2DX!

Why “NERDS”? What inspired you to choose that combination of letters?

I was always the bad smart kid in school… lol

When did you start writing?

Shit… I started noticing graff in like 7th grade, but I didn’t start to “actively” participate until High School… So like ’99, but I didn’t write “Nerds” back then… lol

Word, so about 17 years… That’s putting in work. What were the first few words you put up? Or just one prior?

I used to write “PAER,” that was my first tag.

When was the first time you went to prison?

Mid 2000’s… Like late ’05-’07… I was living in Miami, fucking up my septum with that good oil based coke… Selling 8balls and shit… Got jammed up on some charges… …I thought they were small at the time, but Florida’s judicial system isn’t New York’s. I was basically just doing my Charlie Sheen at the time… I felt like I was lucky to get that 18+ months… This was basically the time the pill mills started popping up everywhere… We all were smoking a lot of pills, going out and robbing the dope boys… Smacking $20 rocks out of their hands and doin’ the Carl Lewis… I was glad to make it out of there alive… They can keep that 18 months… It’s a gift… lol.

That’s pretty wicked. When you were in Miami, were you still writing “PAER” or had you transitioned to “NERDS.”

I got the name “NERD” around ’01-’02… I didn’t add the “S” until maybe ’07-’08 when I came back from Florida… I didn’t write much in Miami… The scene was so different… I didn’t have a car either… When I did steal or “acquire” a car… I was pretty preoccupied with other crimes…

What made you decide to come back to New York?

I had nothing left for me down there… So I decided to come back and start all over…

What was the first thing you did when you came back to New York?

The first thing I did was link up with the squad… Start painting again… I felt like I needed to get back to a sense of normalcy… And that felt like the only way.

JINS, NERDS, JROZ

What kind of spots do you and the squad like to hit?

It really all depends on the mood I’m in… Sometimes it’s something very thought out and well planned… Sometimes I have to drink a lot and I’m just like “Fuck it.”… I try to keep it diverse… Most of my squad would probably agree… We all like to challenge each other, keep us all developing.

Those shredded layers you paint are staggering, what inspired that idea?

Honestly, that idea all came from me doing collages on that fine art shit… I had like garbage bags full of ripped paper in my house… One day I was blackout drunk and started visualizing these fonts all stacked up… The idea just started really basic and then developed fairly quick… Especially once I started free-styling the colors… I’m not one of those writers who has crates of paint at their house… I’m usually working with rattlers and shit I find in my back seat… lmao… No sponsors. So it just made a lot of sense to stagger them… Especially when you’re working with quarter cans and 1 good cap… Hahah. Just gimme five scraps and I’ll smoke anybody…lol… I’ll blow cans up if I have to… lmao.

Lmao, word. That’s what’s up. How long did it take to paint that mural at the Bushwick Collective Wall in 2015?

That was actually the first non-graffiti mural I’d ever done… And at the time the biggest piece of work I had ever done… I painted it on a scaffold in the rain after work everyday for three days straight… I like a challenge… lol.

Spoken like a true savage. What type of opportunities have you had to travel different places for both galleries and straight up graffiti?

In the last few years I’ve traveled a lot… Exploring different abandoned buildings on the east coast… I fell in love with that lifestyle immediately… The isolation spoke to me in some sick way… lol… I’ve been invited to a few different festivals… experienced a lot of different cultures… Met a lot of white bitches with fat asses… They’re out there… lol.

Speaking of abandos, was that phone actually working? Or was that just for the ‘gram?? Lol. How’d you even find that place?

Lmao… Nah that shit was actually working. Deadass… made some local calls on that bad boy… Abandos are a dangerous game, especially going at it alone. If you want to find them, then you have to open your eyes… They’re all around… Keep your ears to the street and keep those clippers handy… lol.

What do you think about social media and graffiti combined?

I’ve always said that the internet itself is a tool… A tool improperly used can be dangerous… With that being said a lot of good writers careers have done well because of social media… Myself included, but I’ve been doing this when social media consisted of Bombing Science magazine and ArtCrimes.com… lmao… The internet has created a lot of hybrid styles… Which I’m all for, but a lot of the community and history has been lost… I feel like it’s a double-edged sword… Styles with no master… Street art is the entitled, ungrateful offspring of graffiti… Like the crazy dad who finally makes sense when you’re older… lol.

Who would you say has influenced your style the most?

At this point in my life, I get influences from all different areas of art… That’s a loaded question… Growing up in Queens I was mentored by a lot of old school BMK crew… Optick/ Smend… As I grew up traveling around the city, I became more aware of the variance of styles… SLOPE from BK had a lot of styles… SETUP.. I was definitely influenced by ESPO and his gates…. I never wanted to feel one dimensional in a specific style… As I got older I pushed myself to be diverse… So at this point I don’t even sketch anymore… It’s just a bag of tricks at this point… I like it like that… I’m a mystery, wrapped in an enigma, rolled in a big ass cigarette with coke on the tip… Hahaha.

From your story about Miami I can tell things were pretty wild. What was a wild experience you had in NY?

A few years ago when I was shooting my video entitled “No Invite” I went to Yonkers to search out a ‘bando. I had never been there before and had no idea how to get in…(**Side-note** At this point I had been on a three day cocaine binge. I had about 2 G’s left tucked in my sock. I was really fucked up… You know the type of fucked up that every line of Coke do you do falls out of your nostrils because your septum is just overworked…) Anyway I find the entrance to the building through a basement window that had about a 12 foot drop to the ground … there was a chain attached to the wall a few feet from the window that I grab and climb down. Meanwhile I had no idea how I was going to get out of the building when I was done nevertheless …But Fuck it though……I made my Way to the third floor. I found a wall with good light and started to unpack my paint (But If You’ve never had the unfortunate pleasure of spending three days with no sleep doing cocaine like Marion Barry… Chances are you will begin to hallucinate.) All of a sudden I hear someone say “Hellooo.” I pause while going through my cans and there is the voice again “Helloooooo??? “with some weird accent. At this point I couldn’t tell whether I was hallucinating or if this was really happening. There was the voice again, “Helloooooooooooooooo” with a weird Russian Polish-ish fuckin’ accent. So all of a sudden….I couldn’t tell you why… haha… I just yell Out ..”What’s Good Nigga!!”…..I still don’t know if I’m hallucinating or not yet or if it’s the fuckin’ boys but I’m wayyyyy to fucked up to be analyzing the situation that deep…haha… The dude yells back “Hey hey hey!!!… I’m lost, I can’t find the way I came in!!!”….about 45 seconds later he comes around the corner into the room I’m in… He’s one of those German/ Polish/ Russian /Mediterranean Merrill wearing photographer urbex dudes… I tell him the way I came in and he tells me he tried it and can’t climb the chain. He’s extra flustered… I tell him “Relax… I got you…” I show him the room where I climbed in through the window… I climb back up the chain on some American drugs ninja warrior shit and dead grant out the frame of the window off with just my feet. I grab his hand and lift him to a point where’s he’s comfortable enough to scale the chain… (I swear just reliving this story is fuckin’ ridiculous…lol.) I shimmy back down the chain, he’s extremely grateful… He says something to me and gives me a salute lol, (the type of salute you see Afghanistan kids give American soldiers…lol.) I trek back upstairs to finish the piece I started… About 1 hour later it gets really dark really fast… So I make my way back to the room to climb out. It’s fuckin’ freezing, my hands are cold and stiff, the chain I have to climb is like an ice cube, and I’m totally gassed. I don’t have the energy to climb it… I start walking room to room trying to find one loose plywood board on any random window…I’m kicking shit..trying to get out by any means… I don’t even give a fuck about the cops at this point I’m freezing… Any booking is better than death…#deadass… I sit down and light a cigarette and evaluate the situation. All of a sudden a flash light hits me through the elevated window and I hear that weird ass Russian/German/ Polish niggas voice…”HELLO!?!?!?!”……I just break out laughing… (It turned out that garbled foreign shit he was sayin’ to me as he went out the window earlier was him letting me know he was coming back with friends later)..They throw down a rope ladder and climb down. We give each other pounds and exchange language neutral expressions of respect and gratitude. I climbed out the window and never saw those tourists again…karma, huh?

When have you gone to bookings and got placed in the same cell with someone you knew?

Every time I go to jail or booking or whatever I always end up with a story. I’ve got more stories than the fuckin’ bible…lol. Sometimes when I’m about to tell a story even I know how unbelievable some of this shit is…lol

So, it’s maybe 09-11…hahah…whatever. I’m walking down 62nd on the east, fresh new chrome uni. At the time I was flipping everything from dimes to biftys of green straight delivery style. I even had a beeper on some late mid 90s clockers shit (Dope Spike Lee Movie.) I just ground the tip down of this brand new uni silver from my mans “Geo” at the Scrap Yard…

I’m approaching 1st ave and there’s a fresh mailbox… I roll up on it, bust off a quick handstyle. Exclamation, swirl, all that… I keep walking… All of a sudden I hear this whistle start blowing crazy…!!!!!!!!!!!….!!!!!!!!!!!!…..!!!!!!!!!!!!!!…

I turn around and 2 bike cops roll up on me fast as fuck… Did the power slide and everything..Baywatch shit… At this point I’m literally on the curb standing on the sewer grate… Out of pure instinct I drop the marker in the gutter… “Where’s the marker buddy?….Where’s the cans?…Turn around …You think we didn’t see you?” I don’t say shit… They look around for a while and see it in the gutter…(* I fucking swear to you*… They brought a fucking police tow truck to lift up the grate and retrieve the marker like it was a fucking CSI investigation no lie.*)… They ship me to the precinct… From the precinct to the Tombs (my 2nd Home)… Once I make it To the second cell I’m tired and there’s no open space… I see this dude layer out across a big piece of real estate….I walk over and I don’t know why but the first thing I see is his sneakers… Some Black shell toes with rainbows stripes…(I know a nigga with those kicks…I’ve never seen anyone else with them, but they’re obviously not the only pair in existence.) His shirt is pulled over his face to block the fluorescent lighting…I tap him on the shoulder.. “Ayo…Slide down a little bit nigga…” He pulls the shirt off his head…..NEMZ ..muthafucker!!!!!! …We start bugging out… The CO is telling us calm down and shit…He got wrapped up in some other shit (that’s his story to tell..hahaha.) Anyway it turned out he’s already been here for like 24hrs. By the time we reach the lawyer cell we have been together for hrs… (Btw Shout Out To Azel Cs..Lower East side Boy…there isn’t a a bookings I’ve been in that he doesn’t have scratchies/ lighter tags u name it.) We go up to see the judge, some of his family was there and they’ve met me on different occasions…lol. So when they saw me there they thought we were co-defendants…hahahah…Let’s just say I wasn’t that welcome at the family house for a while…hahah.. #deadass… lol.

Anyone you want to give a shout out to?

First and foremost none of this would be possible without ME… So let me start by thanking myself… Big Shout Out To My Ace.. DIM TIS CSF… I never would of been in this game if it wasn’t for him… Shout out to The whole TIS Familia…SENO, SEAK, NEMZ CIR, and my nigga EONIS out in Atlanta… My 2dx family state to state…DEK, SMASH, SANS, RUKUS, MINUS, SNEK, Smirk, CRIS, ETHEK, REUP out in Baltimore and SKIZM… All My CSFamily…Brooklyn!!…GIGS, FRESH5, SLUE… All my WATCriminals…USEE, LEER, GASE EK, BIRD… My Dude RANT in Ohio… My Man CAKED WPK..”Aka” Brick Tosser…..The team is huge… Also Shout out to the homies EVAK, EGORE, CENT… My nigga OVER NFG… And Of Course The Great JIN’S 5MH…..Shout out to Queens… And Last But Not Least… RIP BAK ,RIP ZNO ,RIP PANAS, RIP YEAH ,RIP CEFR…. You’re truly Missed… We’ll paint again soon…..…I’m Out.