i’m beginning to think i am jinxed. everytime i’ve been in the midwest in the past year i have gotten stuck there – delayed, sometimes overnight. this time it was merely a delay BUT they got us on the plane before deciding we’d have to wait. thank god for chili’s margaritas and buffalo wings! and brookstone massage chairs.

on the plane i met this fabulous ny original named christos who kept me thoroughly entertained with unpretentious stories that exposed his proper knowledge of music, shoes, politics and all else. hurray for half-greeks.

gideon yago was on the plane –  but you know when you could do a polite catch-up or just look back at your magazine?

plus i was still reeling from my last 24 hrs. i had a great strategy session with the columbus league group, then drove back to the nati and met up with dani and local poet idrissa and we all headed over to the greenwich – WONDERFUL spot where the bartender will make you something magical if you say you drink whiskey and want the best thing he can make. mad folks came over and we watched the fight – bernard hopkins losing his title to bad ass jermaine taylor. i LOVE boxing!!!

then we – including this HOT PIMP mennonite named Sam – retired to gavin leonard’s hot tub (gavin is the primary administrator/$raiser for this amazing youth program in cincinatti – elementz – if you’re ever through there GO CHECK IT) where kofi provided mind expansion and kathy y wilson, my nati love, gave me cause to leave the hot bubbly. hot tubbing in cincinnati is not like hot tubbing in canada. we had to wear clothes. BOOOO. some unnamed person did slip out of his clothes though. OOPS! somehow its scandalous that way, it’d be so much easier if we started off bare…

this morning we made a fast dash to tuckers for the best breakfast potatoes outside of my uncle wimp’s house…the dude hooks them up with cheese, mushrooms, scallions, tomatoes, they taste like heaven. everything he makes tastes perfect. ah nati, so many reasons to come back.

theme lyrics for the weekend, dedicated to the NATI:

Much more is what we got in store

Just believe me

  "And what we have is much more than they can see"

Much more than they can see

is how it’ll always be, believe me (gotta believe)

  "And what we have is much more than they can see"

– De La Soul, the Grind Date