Warm Evenings

Finally, a comedy that can balance authenticity with mass appeal.  Damn refreshing, actually.  Check out the full take here.

Grant, my oldest friend, turns 28 today.  We’ve been pals since the 1st grade, so roughly 23 odd years now.  He grew up down the street from me in a large house on a sprawling plot oat the top of Crow Hill.  We spent countless hours dreaming up basketball plays and scouring the neighborhood for adventures, often on bikes, but just as frequently on his 4-wheeler.

Our personalities have never been remotely similar, save for a love of sports perhaps.  Yet, a friendship was forged early through the commonalities of youth.  Shared experiences bound us and we’ve stayed true to one another through the years.  Not without our squabbles and bumps, but I sit here on this Tuesday morning safe in the knowledge that Grant is most certainly a man I can always count on in life.  That sort of reassurance can’t be overstated.

Looking back, my favorite memory of our lives, the way I’ll always have Grant framed in my head, is in the mornings before school.  He waits with his bike at the bottom of his driveway, peering toward me with his thick glasses as I crest the last hill on Jackson Street.  There’s a flick of recognition then he’s off–pedaling for his life toward Cliff Drive as I barrel down the hill like a bullet, the thrill of wind rushing all around me.

Gravity takes hold, our bikes converge to a uniform pace and we pedal together toward school.  Toward adulthood and beyond.

A sobering movie about the realities of the sex-trade industry.  Check out the full take here.

The beautiful man would have been 77 today.

Rest on, my hero.

Aziz was funny, but you’d be better off just listening to his stand-up routine.  This was 80 minutes of going nowhere.  Click here to read the full take.