Coming May 18th and then every two weeks all summer long — First Time Last Time is back with a whole summer of stories. Subscribe now and don't miss a single one —go to firstlasttime.com/subscribe/ and click on one of the big gold buttons.

See you in a couple weeks!

— Ben

"My first apartment was this little one-bedroom coach house off Griffith Park Blvd. It was a beautiful apartment with wood floors and matchy match tile in the kitchen and bathroom. I remember laughing when the landlady, one of those Encino 70-year-olds with chunky gold jewelry, see-through shirts and extremely pert double-Ds, raised the rent to 600 a month. We were the first artists priced out of Silverlake, we said, as we packed up and moved to Echo Park."

This episode of First Time Last Time is a little different than previous ones. It comes out my residency at Tandem — the Tim and Neda Disney Experimental Media Artist Residency. It’s one of nine audio works that together all make a piece called “At Home.”

If you want to hear more of the pieces, I’m going to be posting them to the First Time Last Time website and Facebook page. Link to both of those at firstlasttime.com

Many special thanks on this episode: Tim and Neda Disney, John Adair, Shoshanna Scholar, Sarah Mesle, Abigail Scholar, Neda Casey, Kathleen Fox, Brandon Harvey, Eve Brenner, Walt Senterfitt, Ruth Sandoval and everyone who came into Tandem during my residency to record stories.

More info about the Tandem Residency is at tandemresidency.org

"So I didn't think that much of it because I hadn't written a song before. I just thought, oh, this was an interesting evening, you know. Happy to be of help. But he said, "No, no, no, this is going all over the world. You don't understand, this is a hit." And you know, Marvin said a lot of stuff. I said fine."

"You know, it's not the same as cancer. Someone's diagnosed with cancer of any kind, people always go straight to, 'Oh, how awful that he or she would have to go through that.' But when you tell someone you're HIV+ or that you have AIDS, even though I knew that I was a good person, there's something that still today has a negative connotation. That there's something dirty about it. 'Oh, you know, well, maybe I was promiscuous. Maybe I did sleep around. Maybe my perception of myself isn't really, you know – maybe I was a bad girl."

Connect with First Time Last Time and please help spread the word! I'm aiming to put podcasts out every few weeks. Also – new stories every few days on Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr and Twitter. Connect to it all via firstlasttime.com!

And please help me get the word out about this new project. Share with anyone you know who loves great stories.

“I remember being on the gurney in one of those tiny little aprons and looking down at my feet. I started seeing these lines growing up my legs – my blood vessels were turning blue. It was slow, like a vine was creeping around my leg. It was quite beautiful but also scary. I saw it disappear under the paper towel-y thing and I knew – I just knew – that if it hit my heart, that would be it.”

Connect with First Time Last Time and please help spread the word! I'm aiming to put podcasts out every few weeks. Also – new stories every few days on Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr and Twitter. Connect to it all via firstlasttime.com!

And please help me get the word out about this new project. Share with anyone you know who loves great stories.

"The first time I robbed a bank, I understood that I was amping up my game. … Here I am a petty criminal and I wanna innovate with my narrative, amp it up and become a serious criminal. So I’m like f–k it, I’m gonna go rob a bank. I had already committed to the idea that I was a new man, new life, f–k the world – this is the new Joe Loya. I’m gonna rob a bank.”

Joe Loya used to be a bankrobber. Now he's a writer. Grab his astonishing memoir, "The Man Who Outgrew His Prison Cell" from Amazon.

Connect with First Time Last Time and please help spread the word! I'm aiming to put podcasts out every few weeks. Also – new stories every few days on Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr and Twitter. Connect to it all via firstlasttime.com!

And please help me get the word out about this new project. Share with anyone you know who loves great stories.

Coming soon ... "First Time Last Time" ... stories about first times and last times at firstlasttime.com