My Robot Is Pregnant theme song!

Folks here’s your chance to ask Doug some questions about his fabulous Hollywood lifestyle.
Put them in the comments, there’s a follow up interview with him coming soon.
It’s valentines and that’s all I can do for tonite, George. Forgive me.

Imagine the building inspector red tagging the remodel on your camper. Is government out of control or ineffectual at that point? Who’s in that Toyota? A gulf war vet with issues in a job market with no jobs?

We can punish the poor, get some money for the city by impounding the vehicles, but studies suggest we’re all getting poorer by and large.

Why can’t we force these people to Afghanistan where there is a lot of work to be done?

If we could loosen restrictions on big business a reality tv show could change this persons life. In exchange for exposure companies would donate materials. A crew would come in and put on some siding, match up all the chrome rims, put a fresh coat of paint on the cab and BLAMMO this person is back in the race. No longer a burden to the community.

If I had a million dollars I’d fill a pool up with pulled pork sandwiches but I got no dollars man, I’m so broke I search the dial for a public radio pledge drive so I don’t feel all alone in this thing.

So many of us out there reading right now have done the same thing, they’ve gone to a foreclosure auction without a dime in their pocket just to see someone lose something bigger than they’ve lost.

That time you lost your job and backtracked the city, visiting the coffee shop you bought a bagel at that fateful morning, you asked around in Spanish to the barista if she’d seen anything, you pulled back a table and peered in the dark.

It’s hard to understand, at this time, the effect of Corporations being granted the rights of personhood and allowed to donate undisclosed funds to politicians.

It feels more like the weather’s fault. It’s so tiresome to hear people complain about big business. Who else can handle the job? Shouldn’t we stop giving money to poor people instead? They’re poor because they can’t handle money!

The rain has traffic slowed down and the buses are splashing the downtrodden waiting at the curbs, who curse the water, always ungrateful for government assistance.

We’ve become a society dependent on price tags. We can’t judge value for ourselves. Everything comes out of a box that was shipped over from China and there’s no personal connection to value, time or materials.

Perhaps price tags give people a sense of security. $75 for a salt and pepper shaker may seem high, but it can’t be a lie.

The bartering process, one that involves talking, offers, counter offers and explanations is where we can lie. Be lied to. So price tags evolved.

When a sale comes up and the sign in the window proclaims “20% off”, we don’t drive by and feel lied to for the 20% more we paid last week, instead we consider going back and spending more money at the store.

A rewards program for frequent shoppers is much the same method for training a cat. Give us a treat for our “good” behavior and watch us perform.

Place a 5 cent value on used aluminum cans and watch as the cans are rounded up and herded to a recycling facility. That’s a price tag my friend.

The flea market has no price tags. There are invisible guidelines and common knowledge and eBay searches, but nothing is set down on paper for all to pass by and understand. The playing field is not level.

A lot of people, shoppers, don’t like this aspect because they don’t know how to judge value. They’ve lost the skill due to a lifetime at the mall making choices based on advertising image.

The flea market goods have very little to promote them. The vendor may know more than you but he may be lying to you as well. You have to know what you want, and you have to create a value personal to you.

It’s amazing really. Coming from the conformity of price gun world to the true wild west of retail out in a parking lot with stuff laid on folding tables and agreements reached by work – this freedom is frightening and therefore thrilling.

So it’s Sunday morning. Are you going to the flea market?

Of course my neighbor’s son must take all his clothes off before he can poop so maybe he isn’t the best example of proper bathroom etiquette.

Don’t ask for permission, ask for a blind eye.

People ask my girlfriend, “What are you?”, wanting to know if she’s Chinese or not. I interrupt and answer, “She’s mostly beautiful with a bit of drop dead in her, but not enough to kill you.”

When you go out to dinner or a movie and you’re tired and ready to leave, do you say “let’s go to the landlord’s” or “let’s go home?”
(Wait for response)
You call it your home, and you deserve to get the dirt out of your home don’t you?
(wait for response)
*notes on a envelope from a Kirby vacuum salesman

This garbage needs your help. Please bring it to the store so it can be sold and avoid the landfill.

The Pacific Ocean is gnawing away the bluffs of San Francisco’s western-most shore a mere 15 blocks away from the swinging doors of Mixed Nuts, the shop Jimbo and I are opening March 2nd.

There’re a few dim sum opportunities and a movie rental/photo copy combination place between here and there, and the non descript typewriter repair shop no one can believe is still in business.

3 story apartment buildings line the boulevard and just before the concrete beach wall is reached, the sodium lights of Safeway’s parking lot spill light towards the lifeless night of the ocean. But after us, you can’t stop in and buy a black light poster of Pegasus, or a small lot of embroidery floss, no matter how much money you have.

There’s something odd about choosing a place others would choose not to live. The foggy edge of town built on shifting sand dunes and skipped over by transit authority upgrades.

People these days need to shop to have human interaction, it’s the only crowd the police will tolerate. That is the only hope Mixed Nuts has out here in the Outer Richmond voting district.

Before the 1930′s this was all undeveloped dunes and referred to as the Outside Lands. There was no way to farm it, no reason to visit it, just a geographical two mile hurdle before you landed at the ocean.

To many, the Richmond continues to be a place to tolerate, an ugly blight of treeless same after same stucco front triple deckers that act as an apertif to the eyes, opening them wider and expectant to the beauty of the waves crashing over rocks at the edge of the continental shelf colloquially known as Ocean Beach.

Jimbo and I can’t give a fuck about all that. We gotta sell several thousands of dollars worth of garbage every month if this things gonna pan out.

Los Angeles is a city of opportunity! He went from playing a banjo that wouldnt hold a tune in San Francisco to playing in the largest sporting event in America. Did anyone hear what team he was on? What’s that? Not on a team, on a commercial? Oh. Okay. A Superbowl commercial is like the superbowl of commercials though, right? So we’re still excited, right?

After watching the commercial I gave Douglas a call and we talked about it.

MRIP: Has anyone stopped you and recognized you?

Doug: This Mexican lady I was serving asked if she saw me on the Superbowl, but later she found some of my hair in her casserole so it kinda took a little glamour off the moment.

MRIP: Your hair in her casserole?

Dougy: My hair’s gotta be in a ton of these entrees.

MRIP: Where you working?

Doogles: 11 to 2 Thursday and Friday at Rocket Pizza. Right downtown where we went to that bar.

MRIP: So you didn’t get rich off the thing?

Dr. Doogies: I don’t have any control, neither does the agency, it just depends on how much airtime it gets. So to have a complete LA experience I’m a server . Needs me some walkin’ around money.

MRIP: Where are you now?

Chug-a-lug-Doug: In traffic coming back from Santa Monica. Had an audition with Austin…some guy kicks a box of chicken strips out of our hands and yells, “CHICKEN COPS!” I didn’t feel good about it. Frankly, I felt sickened.

MRIP: This is the first thing you’ve been in that got airtime. Give us some behind the scenes details.

Purple Hayes: In the description of the character there’s backstory that I’m a team mascot going off to college. That was my motivation, but all that stuff gets lost. I had a 6 am call time – luckily it was ten minutes from my house, over in South Pasadena. Ate egg muffins in a trailer. Spent 2 hours in a wardrobe fitting. I was wearing pants a stylist chose for me that the world will never see.

Everyone has problems. The neighbor came over and told me his in laws are back again.
“He won’t shut the door when he takes a dump! My five year old knows to do that much.”
All we can do as good neighbors is listen. There’s no advice to give.
I’ve been a bit overwhelmed with this shop and the other work i do slowing down since January and my body rolling closer to 40.
It was nice then, tonite, when I got a call from a complete stranger by the name of George who wanted to tell me he’s been enjoying the website and thinks I’m lucky to have the opportunity to open a shop.
So thanks for the encouraging words George, and I’m gonna get back to writing something every day.

Hooray for the flea market

So here’s jimbo’s sign and my pile of garbage

Jimbo got a new hat. Don’t fit too well.