I went to my brother’s home this morning, to sweep his driveway. My brother is serving his second tour of duty in Iraq, and my mom and I try to make his home look “lived in” while he’s overseas. We rake the yard, sweep the driveway, feed his dog, etc.

Well, as I’m sweeping the driveway this morning, the school buses were picking up kids in his neighborhood to take to school. But what I noticed was that this one bus driver stopped in front of several homes, some just two doors down from each other, and blew the horn for the kids to come out to board the bus.

Say what? You mean to tell me that the kids are not standing on the corner to catch the bus anymore? I remember when I was a kid, we had to walk a block or two in the rain, sleet or snow to catch the bus. Hell, we were like the mailman, we walked, whether we wanted to or not. Sometimes our parents dropped us off at the bus stop, but that’s neither here nor there.

I say it all the time, and I’m saying it again right now. What kind of punk ass kids are we raising that your child can’t walk a block, not even a damn block most times, to catch the bus? This is a public school bus, not a taxi cab. The bus driver should not be pulling up to your driveway and honking the horn every damn day for your child to take his or her time to board.

If you live in a rural area, then you get a pass. Otherwise, get your lazy ass kids up and make them walk to the bus stop. This adds to the reason why childhood obesity is so rampant in the USA. If the child can’t walk to the bus stop, then how do you expect them to get any exercise? And don’t get me started on the public school system eliminating PE in some schools. Lazy bastards!

All this week, I have been taking my godmother’s great-granddaughter to daycare. My godmother is a retired school teacher, who has been teaching every other semester since her retirement. Well, this semester is her semester to teach, so she has to leave home early in the morning to go to work.

Her granddaughter is attending a conference this week, so she’s unable to take her daughter to daycare. Normally, my godmother does it for her, but since she’s teaching again, there was no one to take the baby to daycare this week, so Nikki was drafted to do so.

And this morning when I dropped the baby off at daycare, I met DJ. DJ is about 2 years old and he’s a very charismatic and fun kid. His smile just lights up a room and he has a way with the ladies. As DJ’s mother was exiting the daycare, she yelled to DJ, “I love you, DJ!” DJ’s reply was cooler than ice………”Everybody loves DJ!”

I instantly thought about how Keenan Ivory Wayan’s character of Frenchie from In Living Color would always sign off, “I’m slick, I’m pretty, and all the ladies love my cologne!” That’s just how DJ’s response to his mom sounded. Everyone in the daycare fell out laughing.

You know, some people just get what they deserve. I hate saying that, but in this case, I really mean it. 26 year old Fort Lauderdale resident, Kevin Kearney, was kite surfing on yesterday as tropical storm Fay was ashore in Florida. He was slammed into a building and is now in critical condition.

Have you seen the video footage? Forrest Gump would say, “Stupid is as stupid does.” Fool, this is a damn tropical storm! What in the hell were you thinking? You can’t take on Mother Nature. She does not take kindly to those who try to defy her!

Why do doctors and beauticians schedule a group of patients and clients for the same appointment time? This morning I had an appointment to see my orthopedic surgeon at the sports medicine clinc in regards to my fractured right ankle. My appointment time was for 7:45am. I signed in and sat in the waiting area until the nurse called my name to see the doctor.

But not only was my name called. The nurse called the names of 5 other patients to see this same doctor as well. This is the part that I hate. Why call me back to see the doctor if the doctor isn’t going to see me at my appointed time?

So the nurse places me in a room to wait some more until the doctor is ready to see me. Now I’m sitting in that room while the doctor is probably seeing 4 other patients before she gets to me. Look, don’t schedule me if you’re not going to see me on time. I know you want to make that money and attend to each and every patient, but don’t rush over that patient to get to me and vice versa.

Many time the doctor doesn’t even touch you, yet you still have to pay an astronomical amount of money for the office visit. I mean damn, at least violate me or something if you’re gonna charge me that much money. It’s like herding cattle. Get them in, hold them in a pen, then let them go.

The same thing goes for beauty salons. I’ve seen beauticians stack customers in their appointment books for the same appointment time, then when the client comes in, they are not waited on until maybe an hour later. Or either the beautician slaps some perm on the clients hair to keep them quite while they work on another client’s hair.

Look, work on my damn head and complete it before you start on someone else’s hair. At least put me under the dryer and then start on someone else. Don’t scald my scalp with perm because you wanna wash and set some other person at the same time.

Furious Styles to his son Tre: “Want you to rake up these leaves off the lawn. Boy, don’t look at me funny if I ask you to do something.”

So I’m watching Boyz N The Hood last night for like the gazillionth time. It’s one of those films where I know every line verbatim. Anyway, when Reva (Angela Bassett) drops her son, Tre, off at his father’s house, there’s like a truckload of leaves on Furious’ front lawn.

After a touching goodbye from mother to son, Furious thanks Reva for letting Tre come to live with him. And after Reva drives away, Furious asks some boys (Lil Chris and Doughboy) who are talking to his son if they want to rake the leaves on his lawn for $5.

The boys refuse Furious’ measly offer of $5 stating that they could make more money doing nothing. Furious responds by saying, “That’s too bad. I guess I just have to get my son to do it for me.” Tre looks at his father as if he’d lost his mind, but after a stern warning about his defiance from his father, Tre rakes the leaves.

Now, here’s what I noticed for the first time last night after having watched this film many times over the years. Where did the leaves come from? There was no tree in Furious’ front lawn. All of these years I felt bad for Tre raking a shitload of leaves by himself, and yet there was no tree in the yard.