Putting the Jersey on the table

I fear change.

Three words when put together reign so true over me. I like my routine. I like my few possessions. I have a few jerseys. I have never traded a jersey away in my life. Friends of mine like 808 and Cuzzi are way down for trading but I'm scared of it. Today I secured two jersey trade with my good friend Smalls from Riot in Seattle. We're doing a two Jersey switcheroo, I got a Riot jersey when I visited last summer for a jersey to be named later. Now she's come back from Colombia and she got me a Dominican Republic Domino Jersey which she claims (and I believe in full) is just absolutely filthy. I'm trading her one of my most coveted jerseys, the white Cruz jersey, I'll still have the green, but I love that white one. This is the first time I've put it out there and I have wanted to put all of my jerseys on the table before, but here we go, there's a first for everything, right? I'll make a post about that domino jersey sometime soon.

Reading the News

Being in San Diego taking care of my grandparents the last few days, I've had the displeasure of reading one of the worst newspapers on earth, The San Diego Union Tribune. Really the only redeeming quality of this newspaper is that it relentlessly writes articles about the Chargers, and I can appreciate that being a Chargers fan.

Reading the newspaper was something I learned to do with a grain of salt, or maybe a whole salt shaker. Reading two articles today about these young Americans who have been arrested in Pakistan after they disappeared from the States and were thought to have become radicals potentially joining up with some radical groups. The article does not touch on the alienation that people experience in this country, the fear and hatred of white christian Americans towards anyone with a darker phenotype than theirs, or the fact that these young adults likely had larger problems than the simplistic view of hating Americans if they were in the mood to join up with groups of un-sanctioned non-government supported violence.

The second article that caught my attention revolved around a prison riot where they said that the riot was caused by rival gangs of "blacks and Latinos." They did not touch on the difficulties of prison life, the stresses, or the fact that society largely abandoned and turned its back upon people who are from low socio-economic status.

Why would anyone actually say that in a media outlet? I don't know, but I'm just pissed off as always...too bad for me.

Injury

Two weeks ago I injured my right quadriceps. For ten days I was bed ridden. My quadriceps atrophied horribly. I got a massive contusion and subsequently could not bend my leg and to this day I'm still only at about 90 degrees, which is actually a huge step up from where I was even a few days ago. Now I can walk up and down stairs and I'm slowly becoming more and more capable of stretching my leg. The physical therapy is painful. It hurts but I know that the more it hurts now the sooner I'll be back on my feet. I can't bike, this means I can't dumpster or work at the farmers' market. Life is hard when you injure yourself. I can't wait to get back on and start dumpstering again.

Thanksgiving Morning Social Theory

It is generally regarded that Austrian-born Economist Rudolf Hilferding was the first theorist to describe organized capitalism or the monopolistic finance capitalism that is predicated on the use of credit finance and capital that is based in no actually currency. It was not until the US dollar became the international standard currency in the early 1970s (Smithsonian Agreement) that the United States could rise to prominence so heavily with an aggressive platform of finance capital. This move was pushed heavily by Richard Nixon. Deregulation of banking under the many presidential administrations but most notably Ronald Reagan. This deregulation coupled with supply side economics, supported by anyone without a brain for economics (including democrats mind you), allowed for the swollen credit economy and the current situation of mass debt and the collapse of the financial system because of credit allowing for unsound investments that in the short term made a few people very wealthy leaving the rest of us to shit our pants when everything went to shit. Since the international economy is based in the US dollar and the fact that US, China, Canada, and other large economies are all intertwined, if one fails, they all shall fail. That doesn't necessarily mean the elites of these systems will be poor, it just means our financial systems as we know it shall be turned upside down. Oh boy.

I took the time to wonder today what would occur in event of this. If something falls, something else comes in to take its place. I wondered who would take the place of economic prominence. What will be the new currency? All I know is that if we do enough community building and try to make ourselves as self sufficient and sustainable as possible, we just might not send ourselves into dystopic hysteria and be able to survive.

Capitalism succeeds when it disconnects us from the skills to understand and employ the means of production to help us achieve our basic consumptive needs to survive. Get crackin' on those skills y'all.

There's a new spot in town...

There is a spot not far away. That lies much closer to the Bay. In which you find great treats no wait. Once you jump over the gate.

As the title of this post suggests, there's a new spot in town. This spot makes my old dumpstering a bit of a joke. There is no schedule, it's hard to know the pattern, I don't even think there is one because you can only go under cover of darkness; or so I think. Basically below San Pablo in West Berkeley, there lies a bakery I'm quite keen on. I've just recently started hitting them up and I haven't had a chance to consolidate or find something people like at the farmers' market so I have yet to start trading but prospects are good. Walnut bread is a hot commodity. And who even knows if they've got pastries, but I'll find that out soon enough.

To hit this spot you have to lock your bike up, then climb a side fence about ten feet high, then scale a smaller fence and hide behind trucks. Then you sneak into all the dumpsters and check it out. Then the reverse. It's all fairly sketchy and I have no idea if employees give a damn, but I'm sure as I do it more I'll find that out.

Rest in peace, Pro.

Though I never actually met Protik Mia, he touched my life. I have heard many stories about what he has done, the way he has touched others, even how his first child was conceived and a subsequent team was created. He sounded like an awesome guy and I learned of his lore at Kaimana in Hawaii. If that's not personality then I don't know what is.

Last May I was talking with Quinn "Chucky" Kinnett at an ultimate function and he told me about how Pro was in a bad situation. He had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. I immediately decided to contact him and send him my thoughts. He quickly responded, I had no idea whether he would or not, but I certainly not expecting one thing or another. I figured the inundation of correspondence he was received would have made it difficult for him to respond, but he did it all the same. He told me that he was glad that I had a great time at Kaimana (thanks to Alice Chen by the way who helped me out big time with getting onto Almos Pau, Try Wait when I had no idea that I would even go) and in the Bay Area. He expressed his appreciation for my effort to send him a note and wished me the best. It's the only communication we've ever had. Yet when I found out of his passing from my friend Korin this evening I knew that I and many other people would be sending their thoughts and love to his loved ones while simultaneously missing him dearly. He put a long hard fight against one of the most aggressive and lethal cancers we know to exist and spent the time at the end of his life near his wife, children, and many loved ones. Despite the harsh circumstances, he remained positive and gave all he could to this world.

You will be missed, Pro. I send my thoughts and love to your loved ones.

The day the pastries died.

On October 21st, the pastries died. The dough stopped being made. The flour was never even delivered. Semifreddi's Bakery, the location of all of my underground economic adventures for the last 10 months has official shut its doors and moved. Instead of being about 3 miles away and on the way to everything, it is now 8.5 miles out of the way, making it a 17 mile round trip. It moved to Bay Farm Island, an island adjacent to Alameda where a bunch of golf courses exist and a corporate park in which it resides. Sad. I went to check it out and I thought there was a chance, but it was DOA. The dumpsters just had trash in them. None of the old bread dumpsters were there. I checked the loading docks and would have had to steal in order to get what I wanted. One might tell me to "Boost It" but I'm just not in the mood to burgle. Robbery takes this game to a whole new level. A level I'd prefer to not be taking it to.

Over the course of these past 10 months, I have to guess that I've been getting hooked up with an average of $30 of produce per week. I'm thinking I got produce that would have cost me $1,200 to buy, and all for a collective 30 hours that I'm guessing I spent obtaining the goods(15 minutes at a time, 3 times per week). Worth it? I think so.

Now I have to shift focus. Where am I going to direct my energy for my underground economic ventures? There's plenty more dumpstering to do, but none of it will beat the 100% organic Farmers' Market trade. I might just going to stores and buying Cinnamon Twist loaves to trade, it still comes out to my benefit.

Either way, Semifreddi's is now dead. The spot is now officially a bust. I can bet I'll keep my ear to the ground for the next big spot.

RIP Semifreddi's (This was my last haul)