I had a signing today with a middle aged black lady who had a lot to say. She was in her late thirties, average looking, and lived in, well, the hood. She said she bought the property because it was cheap, and compared to other properties of similar size in Los Angeles, it was. She thought it wouldn’t be so bad living in a neighborhood with her “brothers and sisters” as she called them, but she had very quickly changed her mind. Referring to most of them as criminals and degenerates who wanted to bring down those more successful then themselves, she was pretty much ready to leave the area and rent it out to a friend. She also elaborated on her romantic life with way too much information. Stating that black men were a bunch of head case losers with no money or jobs and with emotional or physical baggage (i.e. children from previous relationships), she had pretty much given up on ever getting married. Also, the successful black men that she did meet didn’t want to date black women; they preferred white ones. This was a vocalization of a trend I’ve seen in my travels as a notary; there is a surprising number of single black women and a distinct lack of black men owning property. It seems that these women manage to make it themselves while the men do god knows what in the meantime probably living at home or off their girlfriends. I think that movie Baby Boy had a message somewhat like this; lots of black men refusing to grow up. It’s a tragedy, really. Black women seem to have an even bigger disadvantage than just being black; they literally can’t find a good man. The lack of fathers in the ghetto is obviously one of the main causes of this situation. Hopefully, now that welfare reform has been enforced, it’ll force people to be more responsible. It’s the only thing I can think of to fix it; not more laws or bills. The government’s done enough damage.