A Brothers Gotta Work: Part One

Contrary to popular belief, I am not a billionaire. Yet.
Sure, I released a pretty successful album and I've toured the country a few times over. But that don't mean I'm loaded. It costs money to record albums and definitley costs money to tour. The Denny's and IHOP bills alone are in the thousands. Not to mention my jewelry, sneaker, and tee shirt expenses. Bottom line is, sometimes I have to take a less than glamorous job to keep up with my tastes. That's right! I'm a hustler, baby. I've had jobs you wouldn't believe. So what if they didn't last long? I still had em.

The first job I ever had was at Hollywood Video. I had just turned 17 and was pretty desperate for cash. They hired me as a "video associate", but I think that's just the H-Wood term for front clerk. The job had some perks. I got to stock my own shelf of staff favorites and there was free candy! At least I think it was free. I pocketed those sour patch kids like it was nobodies business. Plus, they let me wear as much jewelry as I wanted. That may not sound like a perk, but in 2006, I was all about my jewelry.

The job had lots of disadvantages though. I had to listen to the same 30 minute loop of commercials and songs over and over again. I mean, I would literally dream about that loop. That shit honestly haunted me! I still shudder every time I hear Gnarles Barkley's Crazy. And then there was my mouth breathing, morbidly obese coworker. We'll call him "Tom". Tom was a borderline terrifying dude who loved telling me about the screenplay he was writing. You wanna know the plot of his screenplay? It was about a video store employee who murdered his co-workers and put their decapitated heads in the video return box. Yep, you heard that right. So between the insessant loop of songs and the fear of having my head chopped off, I only stayed there about three months.

Whatever. I took the money and ran. Next up was a job at Entertainment Tonight, where I was put on Jon Benet Ramsey duty. What a joy it was looking at videos of John Mark Karr for hours! Anyway, that's another blog for another time. Don't worry. I've just begun. I have plenty of work-related horror stories to share.