We all know the hood loves hustling…and we all know the hood loves hustlers. This might be what allows a certain breed of hustlers to turn on a dime. A brother once told this author that hustling is about finding what the people want or need and providing it for them.
Easily this is what’s going on when those damn tents get set up on every block during weekends, holidays, big concerts, event sports, and such. Team car flags, the bootleg T-shirt of the month with the name of the ghetto hit song on the front, weird throw rugs, umbrellas when it rains, what have you. Back after the September 11th attacks happened, these folks were literally on it the very next day with American flags. One would swear there’s an all-purpose corner hustle warehouse all the street vendors converge on where the aforementioned is available along with the usual oils, incense, and fake Jordans.
I even once saw this Mexican cat selling boxing and martial arts equipment (because ya never know when someone passing by was thinking of training with a heavy bag for their living room). As said in a past post, it’s a bazaar every single day in the hood.
But by far this author’s favorite is when the people pop up with them funky *ss gift baskets (AKA ghetto grab bags). Without fail, every Valentine’s, Easter, Father’s Day, and especially Mother’s Day weekend, there they are…sometimes one on all four corners of an intersection.
And what’s in these baskets? Myriad bullsh*t, basically. One could probably slap together baskets with Smarties left over from Halloween, used panties, a jar of styling gel, dried-out incense, old condoms they got from the free clinic, bootleg DVDs they’re done watching, a pair of earrings that gave their previous owner keloids in her nose (!), and a stuck-together copy of King magazine, with a bed of dead grass clipped from their front yard, wrapped up in a see-thru trash bag and make a killing.
Since no two are alike, surely there’s some ghetto woman tacky enough to have a basket collection in her house akin to some nerdy fanboy who collects Transformers. Probably wants the hypothetical gift basket I just described. And some shrew(d) of a hustler was just given the idea to sell it to her.
Hell, there’s probably some cornball parent who bought one to stash away for the daughter’s prom gift…
2 responses so far ↓
#38: Michael Jackson « Stuff Ghetto People Like // June 25, 2009 at 4:25 pm |
[...] Trust, you saw bootleg t-shirts of the month when his albums and concert tours were churnin’? You gon’ see ‘em this weekend with EXTRA strength!! [...]
#49: Loving Mom and hating Dad « Stuff Ghetto People Like // October 24, 2009 at 6:41 am |
[...] in the parking lot when she comes back out…with an LCD TV, Coach bag, shoes from Aldo, and that damn basket gift wrapped in the trunk! All of this chipped in for by her doting offspring, as if she made them [...]