Eminem’s dad, Marshall Mathers Sr., a 48-year-old Chula Vista factory worker, thinks his story is worth money. A recent issue of Star divulged that he wanted to reconnect with his multiplatinum-selling son. The two hadn’t spoken for two decades, according to the tabloid.

“I desperately want to meet him and tell him I love him,” the Star quotes the elder Mathers. “I’m not interested in his money. I want him to know I’m here for him.”

But while he doesn’t want his son’s money, he apparently wouldn’t mind some money to talk about his son.

“I was told to ask you how much you will pay,” he says on the phone.

I told him $50. (The Reader pays $25 per tip. I was going to throw in another $25.)

He scoffed at the offer. He said “Nicole,” a writer from the Sun in London, had offered him a lot more.

The next week I spoke with Mathers Sr.’s girlfriend. Her name, as reported in the Star, is Teresa Harbin, 40. She said she thought that the offer from the Sun had fallen through but that he still didn’t want to talk. “He’ll call you when he’s ready,” she said. “He had a bad experience with the Star.”

She said that that Star writer promised the elder Mathers a fee, but it never materialized.

The Star article, which showed photos of Mathers Sr. “attending an AA meeting in Chula Vista, California,” said Mathers Sr. hadn’t spoken to his son because his ex-wife Debbie [Eminem’s mother] had traveled so much with his son. It said he blames Debbie for teaching the rapper to hate his dad.

Eminem’s mother, Debbie Mathers-Briggs, who filed a $10 million defamation lawsuit against her son last year, has recently filed an additional $1 million civil suit based on comments Eminem made about the original suit, says Michigan’s Macomb Daily.

The 26-year-old rapper talks about slashing his dad’s throat in one of the songs on Eminem’s latest album, The Marshall Mathers LP.