Casual Dress Friday: Where Did Carlton Alfonso Go?

Its a Casual Dress Friday and its been a crazy last 24 hours for me. Here's a list of the things I've done:

1. Watched Shorty move from healthy, to deathly ill, to OK, to sick


2. Realized that I made one of the biggest mistakes of my life in the last few months


3. Finally broken ground on a top-secret project that will change our (yes, that's you and me) lives forever


4. Redesigned the blog, a whole 10 posts ahead of schedule (theres a column on the left side now!)

See? I've been very busy. And that list doesn't even factor in the start of the college football or NFL seasons this week or my brother getting married last weekend. Busy times!

You know what I like to do when I get busy and feel like I don't have enough energy? Stay up a little later than I should and mix in some old-school Fresh Prince featuring former man-crush Will Smith.

Most of the time that cheers me up. But last night my mind drifted off on Carlton Alfonso Ribeiro. On a side note, until today I always thought it was Riveiro, not Ribeiro, huh. How did a talent like this just drift off into the sunset? He was clearly a higher profile guy than Will Smith going into that show - so how did he fall off. If nothing else, I guarantee you that he had more street cred thanks to dances like this.



That scene right there may have very well propelled the next few years of Carlton's Alfonso's life. He got a record deal featuring the single Dance Baby, was featured in a Pepsi commercial with Michael Jackson and wrote a book in which he discusses how to break dance (it even comes with a fold-out breaking board and a soundtrack). Here's the advertisement for the book.



I want to know how many people that couldn't/shouldn't dance, bought "Breakin' and Poppin'" and tried to learn to dance (and rap). Let's be honest, I would have been one of those people. For $19.95, I'm upset I missed out on that hot-ass deal...I just tried calling that number from the commercial. No one answered. If you get through, let me know.

So, Carlton Alfonso was on TV, had a MTV commercial, a CD and a book deal all 5-10 years before Will Smith even appeared on TV. So how come no one thinks of Carlton Alfonso anymore. I mean, he was in an Andy Williams Christmas Special. He could have had his own Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade Float. How come he's not in feature films or making CD's called Big Carlton Alfonso Style? I guess we'll never know.

If nothing else, couldn't some one get Carlton Alfonso on the newest edition of DWTS? I mean Kelly from 90210 (it looks like Brian Austin Green should have watched "Breakin' and Poppin'") is on there and she was a shady biatch when she stole Dillon from Brenda (not that I hold a grudge or anything).

Update: I just put my check in the mail and mailed it to that Breakin' and Poppin' address. I expect to receive my book pronto or else I'm coming for you Carlton Alfonso.

Have a good weekend.