>book excerpt from "The Art Of
Secrets"
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The day is Monday, October 30th, 2000, the morning Crispus
plans to scoop every news outlet on the Web and in print by reporting UBO.com's
(Urban Box Office) imminent demise. The plan this morning is add icing to
his scoop, and perhaps twist the knife, by actually branding the front of
UBO's building with the Urban Exposé name. Crispus shows me the chalk
that will deliver his digital message made physical. I ask, "Why not
spray paint?" He counters, "That would be a crime." Lesson
learned. After circling the block three times, Crispus gets out of the car
and proceeds to scrawl, in letters five feet tall, the Urban Exposé
moniker on the front entrance of the UBO building for all to see.
Stealthily situated across the street, recording the process,
I get frequent humorous spy-esque quips over the walkie-talkie from Crispus
as he does his work. Cops glide by, halting the process from time to time.
A homeless man ambles through the scene, oblivious to the goings on. A post-party
couple strolls past my position wondering what the hell I'm doing at nearly
4 a.m. standing in a dark doorway on a deserted street with a video camera
in my hand. Suddenly, I ask myself the same question. The answer I give
myself answers most of my questions about Lee: because it's fun. Later that
morning we find out that the building management managed to erase the evidence
before most UBO employees could be greeted with the slap. But on the UrbanExposé.com
Web site the damage has already been done.
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