April 16, 2007
![][1]Note: My People's Court show airs Wednesday (4/18) ... 9 a.m., 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.!I haven't owned a Tv in about 6 years, but I'm not going to insult you by pretending that I don't know what's popular, or how entertaining it is. One thing that always confused me about people that have decided to get rid of their Tv too, is that they pretend that they have absolutely no connection to popular culture, which can be argued tv solely creates (mainstream anyways). For example, I was recently flown to New York to appear on "The People's Court" (bare with me, i'll get to that). It was an amazing adventure, and guaranteed to be a show stopping story no matter who you are. This was to be my ace in the hole for any uncomfortable gathering, party, or dinner date. Right? Well, I thought so, but a couple of weeks ago while hanging out with a new friend, I ran out of things to talk about. So I drew the "People's court" card. It was met with "uh, I have no idea what the People's court is, we don't own a Tv". This always confuses me. Not only was I bummed that I lacked the people skills to continue on with a different subject, but I'm pretty positive they HAD to know what the People's Court was. Isn't The People's court a pop culture icon at this point? When you think Hamburgers, Mcdonald's comes to mind, and when you think totally awesome TV Justice the People's court comes to mind, correct? I can understand if someone does not know who someone like Borat is, but isn't it a bit of a stretch to honestly not know who Judge Wapner is or what show he starred on? I was shot down. I personally don't care much for Tv save for a few sci-fi shows I download off of itunes, plus my prized collection of every Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode ever aired. Am I a hypocrite because my iPod is basically a little Tv? Absolutely I am, but the purpose of my family not owning a Tv is not to make sure everyone else know it (even though it's the first thing I've blogged about here, but please give me some grace here folks), it's because it interfered in our lives and I took the logical step to combat that. It was a personal decision I rarely bring up. I always notice that folks always use commercials that are popular to illustrate things they are trying to say. It usually starts with "you know, like that commercial...."I always nod and usually say "oh yeah! Ha Ha!" because it usually seems to upset people that you don't own one. It's kind of like when you ask someone how they are doing and they tell you all of their problems. You aren't really looking for an answer other than "fine" or "ok". Same with this, just agree and giggle. But the point I'm trying to make here is that I know who pop culture icons are, I know what tv shows are popular, you can't avoid it and there is no use pretending you can. Take notice how many people talk about Tv shows with you at work tomorrow. It's how people seem to bond, share their opinions on what they do and don't like in general. You can almost categorize them by it. Do they like Battlestar Galactica, or are they still holding on to a thread of hope that Lost is going to get good again. Do they only watch the news, or are they closet Desperate Housewives fans? You get the point. But since I didn't get to tell my story about the "People's court", and the fact that the thing is going to air next wednesday (4/18/07), I'm going to blog the holy heck out of it. Blog it till it's wheezing for air, bleeding from it's nostrils, and then I'm going to blog on it's throat until it's finally dead. And this will all be a memory, except ofcourse being syndicated and destined for reruns and all that.![][2]It all started last fall when our finances at work were completely out of control due to Deadbeat Managers and Bands (I work at a place that prints shirts for touring bands). I had to do the annoying, which was put people into collections, something I'd never done before. This is something I personally hate to do because the collections company we use are severe hard asses and I like to think of myself as a nice guy (most of the time). I usually extended 30 day terms to 60, then 90, then pretty soon it was a year or so before I knew it. It's my experience that people will take advantage of you if you let them, and I'm talking bills in excess of $2,000.00 each. You add 10 or so of those together, and you see I had a problem. So into collections they all went. There was this one bill though I was unsure about though. See there is a band that fell on some hard luck in 2005 with a lot of their stuff getting destroyed in a fire, and everyone in town came to their aid, including us. The thing that was weird is I never heard from the band, everything was organized by their manager. I didn't think much of it since I know the manager, and he's a pretty alright guy, so we extended him. When he didn't have the money for that bill, we extended him again. When he didn't have the money for that second order and first combined as promised, he took his business elsewhere. Pretty sleezy. When we asked one of the band members what was going on, they told us to talk to the manager, that he makes all of those decisions. I reported all of this information to the collections company, and asked them to talk to their lawyers and then put whoever owes the money into collections. Easy enough. They pulled the LLC paperwork, found the managers name on it as a representative, saw the bill had his name on it, read his emails to us saying he would pay it, and so that was that. Their lawyers said he owed it, so into collections he went. I guess it was in there for several months, and the only response I got back from the manager was "take me out of collections, it's ruining my credit", or "the band is breaking up" not understanding that the first was the point, and the second was of no consequence to us anymore. So I let them do their job, and let the manager keep dodging the bill, since he had no intention of paying it. Then, one late night in November, after some overtime poster printing, and a few beers, my buddy Jim suggested that I "don't take justice into your own hands, take it to court, the People's court". I thought this was an amazing idea. See, the deal with the People's Court, is if you are the defendant, and you lose, the show will pay your bill for you. This seemed like an amazing deal to us. We get to go to New York for a weekend, he looses, we get paid, and He doesn't even have to pay the bill. Win win situation! So I fired off an email and the very next day they called me on the phone wanting to know more about the case. They took the case, and after much coaxing from the manager, they scheduled the case for taping. It should have dawned on me how janky this was though. They literally had me go to court the next morning and file paperwork and fax it. So basically, I had to sue him real quick so the case would be a "real" case and not a fake one. I did all they asked, and we were on a plane to New York 3 days later.![][3]When we arrived, we were picked up in a seriously tacky white stretch limo. I've been to New York many times, but always in a Van with 5 stinky guys and band equipment, I had never been there before rolling like some dork on his high school senior prom, so that had me and Jim giggling the whole way to the hotel wondering if we should eat at the Olive Garden to match our ride. The main thing we did all night was walk Times Square and pick up trinkets for folks back home, and we blew our entire food budget they gave us on these amazing steaks at some crazy expensive steak house. The kind that grinds pepper for you, and puts the napkins on your lap for you. The fact that I got Jim to come with me all expenses paid because I told them I needed "moral support" was the big kicker, so trust me I'm not complaining, we had a great time.![][4]The next morning a sedan picked us up and dropped us off in front of the studio, at the same time as the manager we were suing. I wish I had the look on his face in a picture. He was so pissed, it really shocked me. We just weren't taking this serious enough, and the fact was that this manager was just worried about his reputation! He was still under the impression that he was a legitimate business man who could manage anything but a disaster. They then led us to a room with some other defendants and the manager was taken somewhere else. We basically had to stew in this room and fill out a bunch of paperwork for a pretty long time. Refreshments consisted of condiment packages, and an empty hot water pitcher, and an empty cold water pitcher. I imagined it would be this classy studio with pictures of Wapner up there, and nice folks helping us everywhere. but instead, it really looked like a low rent warehouse with Tv's mounted in the corners of the rooms showing live airings of cases going on in the studio just behind the wall. I would not have been surprised if someone told me that a porn shoot was going on and we had to wait, it was that kind of vibe. In general it was pretty unorganized, they even managed to loose tons of paperwork from other defendants while we were there making them loose their cases, or at least it seemed to. We went into make up, and then into a second holding tank. Now this room was a piece of work. It is right behind where they interview you coming out of the court room, where the "hallway guy" asks you stupid questions and you are so pissed off you can't spit out a coherent sentence. Which by the way I swore I would not do, but that's later. This room was basically some 2 x 4's holding up unfinished drywall, and what walls it did have in there were completely covered in graffiti. Your usual assortment of genitalia, and swastikas. Seriously, I was like we were at CBGB's, and not the People's Court. We stayed in there a while longer and then we finally got to go to court! Finally! The People's Court baby!![][5]I can't express how cool it was to push those doors forward and walk into court like you are some big stuff. We got to our stand, and they actually play that "duh duh dum dum" music and the synopsis of the case over the speaker while you walk in. The one thing I did notice is they really take liberty while describing your case. Man, to hear them talk, I wanted to stab this guy in the eye and leave him for dead on the street, which simply wasn't the case. But hey, it's Tv right, got to give them some zing! The synopsis they read when the Manager came in was really funny, he compared the case to suing a Walmart cashier if Walmart doesn't pay a bill or something to that effect. That had me laughing a little bit, since I was under the impression that this was a done deal. Lawyers looked at this case, he knew he owed it, the show would pay the bill, we all got to go to New York expenses paid, everything would be cool. Not quite. The manager actually fought the case with everything he had. He didn't want the bill to be paid, even after we thought going on some silly show who would pay the bill was actually a gift. Apparently he was so offended that we had the audacity to want him to pay a bill that was almost $2,000.00 he was going to make us really work for it. This was all fine with us, but I don't feel I spoke up enough and this is where I made my fatal mistake. You would think all those years on tour as a front man, I wouldn't get nervous, but I was totally out of my element. And by the way, I'm saying "manager" and "the band" because I agreed to not name any names, or try to get publicity for the company I work at, etc, but I will share the story as a blogger. Plus, this is Lawrence, come on. Most of the case was basically the Judge unashamedly destroying the manager as a manager, business man, and human being in general. She really embarrassed him badly, and for that I do feel bad for him. It really was mesmerizing watching one human being tear down another for that long, It was like driving by a really bad wreck on the highway. Then she asked me point blank "why do you think this guy owes you the money", I was caught off guard and said "because he is the one who ordered the merch", when the correct answer should have been "because the collections agency researched this case and found him to be the responsible party for the band llc and the debt". That is where I went down in flames, right there. It was all down hill from there. The only thing that made me feel a little better is she made a point to note that the case was an extremely difficult one, and even had to take a 20 minute recess to research it. She told the manager how amazingly close the case was and that she found for the defendant and hit the gavel. That was that. I bet watching it, you could pull a Bart Simpson from the "I love Lisa" episode. "Watch this, you can actually pinpoint the second when his heart rips in half"! But it wasn't over yet, I still had to talk to the Hallway guy and answer whatever questions he had. I know I swore that I wouldn't be like those other people, but damn, I was so pissed that we lost, I followed suit like all other losers on that show in a stupor of rage. I mumbled some crap and I think I said I would sue the band or something. I honestly don't remember, but I know it was embarrassing whatever it was. I guess I'll find out next week. After the taping was over, it was basically, "Get in the car, we're dropping you off at the airport, and we'll send a postcard when it airs. Now get out of here kid." And so we did just that, texting everyone that we lost the whole way. What a bummer that was, I don't even think a tacky white stretch limo ride back would have helped even. ![][6]The funny thing about this, is after we got home, we got a call from the Judge Mathis show wanting our case too for their show. I informed them that it was already on Tv so of course they passed, but It makes me curious just what about our case got 2 Tv court shows all hot and bothered to have us on. Regardless, we never saw or heard from the manager again, and kinda thought that because the case wasn't that exciting it wouldn't make it to air, but apparently it did. We got our postcard just like they promised so we'll see how big of a jerk I came off as then!So that was my adventure. I think it was a pretty darned good one for someone with a life as generally boring as mine, and you don't even have to own a TV to enjoy it, even if it is wordy. I think the next time someone expresses that they don't know who pop icons are because they don't own a TV, they are getting the long version of this story as punishment. Complete with detailed descriptions of the genitalia graffiti I saw at the good old People's Court.update 4/19/07PART 1 PART 2 PART 3 [1]: http://seaningram.net/iamthis/pics/postcard.jpg [2]: http://seaningram.net/iamthis/pics/judgemarilyn_hot.jpg [3]: http://seaningram.net/iamthis/pics/refreshments.jpg [4]: http://seaningram.net/iamthis/pics/graffiti.jpg [5]: http://seaningram.net/iamthis/pics/gettingready.jpg [6]: http://seaningram.net/iamthis/pics/withbalif_lost.jpg
Comments
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OnShakedown (Chris Tackett) says...
wow. this is long. no wonder you haven't had time to meet w/ me! (jokes jokes)
seriously though, looking forward to the show. especially this part
"Most of the case was basically the Judge unashamedly destroying the manager as a manager, business man, and human being in general."
that's always entertaining. too bad you lost, though. is there any appeal process in the TV justice system?
April 16, 2007 at 4:50 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
PatrickJoseph (Patrick Giroux) says...
How would someone not know what the "People's Court" was?
C'mon, Judge Wapner? Really? How is that not common knowledge even without a TV?
April 17, 2007 at 3:57 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
ladylaw (Terry Bush) says...
Thanks for writing this up. For the longest time I've been curious who gets paid what and how these shows operate. Thanks for the inside "Scoop"!
April 17, 2007 at 5:03 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Compy (anonymous) says...
anyone ive met who's been smug or even proud not to own a tv is still an idiot.
if you cant own a tv without letting it take over your life, not only should you not own a tv, you should not own reproductive organs.
they know wapner. they just like the idea of being that person who's SOOOOOO different, they dont even have a TEE-VEE.
big deal. i dont have a car. try that.
April 17, 2007 at 9:24 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Eric_Melin (Eric Melin) says...
Sean-
I watched this horrible show for an hour at 8pm tonight & you were nowhere to be seen. The blog was great, though! Any further airings?
April 18, 2007 at 8:57 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
smingram (Sean Ingram) says...
i actually got video footage of it, i'll update this blog later with a youtube. man, i'm glad yesterday is over!
April 19, 2007 at 9:21 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Kenedamick (anonymous) says...
Crazy story and a fun read. I need to tivo this thing when it re-airs.
Mike M.
April 19, 2007 at 1:14 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
Jester (Nick Spacek) says...
Oh, man.
That's rich.
April 19, 2007 at 8:14 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )