— Nick's Guff —

What’s Goin’ Down in the Boogie

It seems that every time I tell someone I live in the Bronx, they crinkle their brow and make sad puppy dog noises. Let me just grab my little Marcus Dairy milk crate over here and prop myself up, O.K., I’m ready to go. Living in the Bronx is not a terminable disease, CAN … YOU … DIG IT? I love the Bronx, there, I said it.

Depending on who asks me, I’m flexible, I either live in the Bronx, the Boogie or Riverdale. For example, when I’m chillin’ with fellow Bronx compadres like say, KRS-ONE, it’s the Boogie. When I’m going for Kosher over on Johnson Avenue and walking past all the bluehairs hunched over, then I’m in Riverdale and when I’m rapping with people from out of state, there’s few things that pique curiosity more then letting someone know I live in Da Bronx. However, to appropriately communicate where you live, the conversation must go as follows:

- Where do you live?
- New York.
- Oh, where in New York?
- Da Bronx motherfucka, WHAT?!?!?

Neighborhood News
They just put a Target in down the block from me, 225th and Broadway. Now that my friends, is a cluster-fuck. Shopping in the Bronx and Yonkers at mass chains is like trying to get a decent loaf of Challah in communist bloc Russia. But now we know the Bronx has made it. When the big chains start moving in, hey, it’s official, we’re hot. How hot remains to be seen. We do have the Yankees, still residing in the Bronx, (South Bronx, Sou-South Bronx) but seeing as they suck lately, we might need some consistent representatives. Since Target and Applebee’s aren’t true roughnecks, we need some homegrown talent to step up big. I have a few people in mind but they won’t call me back, the fuckers. Big Pun was on the fast track to Bronx stardom until his star faded out in the form of inhaling a steady diet of Bronx Staples, IHOP, Pizza, Big Macs, and Mexican food bought at Chinese owned and operated Taco joints.

History
Stanley Kubrick was born in the Bronx but that guy is disowned after that bullshit Eyes Wide Shut. That and he’s dead so he’d never show up to events. Kubrick is Bronx though, baby. There’s Danny Aiello but he seems more like a tub of goo than a barrel of monkeys; we got Red Buttons, Tony Curtis, Ace Frehley (booya), Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren (huh? coincidence? I doubt it Bronx: borough of fashion), and the black man everybody claims for their own, Colin Powell. Powell should come represent.

One famous dude we were robbed of by those Long Island twits was Billy Joel, born in the Boogie. Then his parents robbed him of his childhood by moving him to that God-forsaken Island. Blech. Just think what kind of an edge his music would have had if he grew up on the Streets instead of the cookie cutter houses of L.I.? He wouldn’t have gone down as the depressed pussy boy he is because he would have gotten the snot beaten out of him. Poor Billy, sappy puppy.

Anyway, my point is, the Bronx is not a shithole. Well, yes it is, in parts, in the majority. But it’s so easy to find a good sandwich there and there’s even an Indian restaurant that doesn’t cater to the American fare like the Chinese-Mexican, Mexican-Chinese places do.

Come visit the Bronx, I’ll give you the tour. And don’t mind the garbage, graffiti and bad driving on the way up. It’ll put hair on your chest.

Word.