RIP Mr. Sunny

none of you probably knew Mr. Sunny, but he lived directly across from me on my mom's block.



He was my homeboy Art's dad.

ya know, out of all the homies from the block, Art was the only one who lived with a mom and a dad.


Art's moved on, he's got a wife and family in Florida, and Mr. Sunny was still on the block...



Till This past Thursday.



Mr. Sunny lost his battle with the big C.



Mr. Sunny and I used to have a lot of conversations, when I ran into him fixing his van, or watering his garden.



I'm gonna miss him... I'm gonna miss the way he always called me by my nickname, in a growling kinda way... "Raaah RAHH!"

Mr. Sunny hated hip-hop. He thought it was just a bunch of rascals yellin and cussin'.



I remember a great story, my homie bought a CD of young lady by the name of BOSS. she made an album, Born Gangstaz, which my then next-door neighbor bought and blasted on the steps of the crib.

now Boss had a nice little diddy on her album called "I Don't Give a F&%" which contained these quotable lyrics...

CHORUS-

I don't give a f, not a single f***
not a single solitary f&&& I don't give a fuck motherf***!

[Bo$$]
I don't give a f*** about none of y'all!
Big ballin' a** BO$$ takin' two to
Ya head with a sawed off shotgun
Give it up cuz I'm one crazed b****!
Rollin' thick, gang full of lunatics bailin
Runnin' through the mud
Escaped from the cell block searchin' for the g** d*mn judge
Cuz its simple to get revenge on a punk
Pop the trunk, grab the pump and pull the trigger my n***a!

now that's some indubitable sh*t, son (c) Thugnificent.



Now, Mr. Sunny, like anyone who heard this, immediately wrote hip-hop off as some stupid nonsense.



So ever since then, we'd have chats about hip-hop and what it was, and what it wasn't... and I don't think I ever convinced him that hip-hop was good, but he always was willing to listen, unlike most adults at that time.

No matter what was going on, "Pops," as the fellas called him, was always around...always cracking a joke, always smiling..with his signature cigar in his mouth. I never remember him being in a bad mood.

Imma miss you, Mr. Sunny.... Thanks for enlightening us young brothers. May God bless you and your family.

My Day off

since everyone wasn't off work today (i was, yay!) DN3 and myself decided to do some volunteer work with Habitat for Humanity over the weekend, so we helped to build a house.



now in that 6 hours of time, we did a lot, including helping to construct the 4 walls and put them in place.



I got to meet the woman who was going to be moving into the home, and she was ecstatic..



really felt good to do some good.



I highly recommend checking out www.makeadifference.org and finding something you can do in your community, it's very fulfilling.



So, what did you guys do on your 3-day weekend?



and don't feel bad if you didnt do anything, or if you didnt get a day off, you have every other day of your life to do something good for people.





Also, peep our special MLK day edition of RAHM Radio West at



http://rahmradio.mypodcast.com

with special joints by Common, Ohene, Freeway, Maja and more, and an interview w/ Haj of Dumhi.

Peace.