Road trips and underground railroads

Just got back from an 11-day road trip where I traveled to north Jersey, northwestern PA, upstate NY, back to Jersey, then back upstate, and finally to the Philly area to watch the Super Bowl with other angry Eagles fans. It was exhausting and kind of a blur, but the highlight of my trip was the show I did at Auburn Public Theater in Auburn, NY. Auburn is a great little town. It’s the kind of place where even the Days Inn is nice (not that I stayed there; I’m just sayin’). The trip in was absolutely beautiful. As I drove thru neighboring Skaneateles, I had to pull over to take photos, it was so pretty:

The theater and its owners, Carey and Angela, were great too.

      

When I got there Carey told me about some of the tourist attractions in town. He mentioned that Harriet Tubman used to live in Auburn and that her former home was a soon-to-be national landmark. I was so bummed I didn’t know that earlier in the day when I was lounging around Skaneateles so I could have taken the full tour. I usually research the places I visit so I don’t miss out on cool stuff like this, but I’d been running so much it slipped my mind for this trip. Thank goodness for Carey! Continue reading →

I… I’m so in love

So proud of my fellow Howardite, Stefanie Brown, who was just named African-American Vote Director for the Obama re-election campaign’s Operation Vote outreach effort. Stefanie is just awesome, and though she was a few years behind me at Howard, I had the pleasure of watching this dynamic young lady rise through the ranks of student government while I was employed in the University’s Office of Admissions. Google her and get familiar. You’re going to be hearing a lot more about her in the years to come!

On a not-so-unrelated note, I (like most of you, probably) was sent this YouTube clip of President Obama singing at a fundraiser on last nite:

How cool is this? And President “O” can saaaang! This just made me ride for him even harder. Not to minimize the challenging work Stefanie will now be doing, but I feel like that ish right there… just made her job a tiny bit easier. ;)

Go Stefanie!!! We’re all so, so proud of you!!!

Also, I love my President.

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Marriage and mean mugs


I went home to Jersey this weekend to attend my friend Keisha’s wedding. So. much. fun. She was a gorgeous bride! And on top of seeing one of my oldest friends marry her Prince Charming, all my best girlfriends from high school were there. We’re all so spread out: Tennessee, Texas, Jersey, Virginia. The six of us hadn’t all been together since another wedding 8 years ago. Crazy.

I stayed with BFF Michelle and her husband and of course their daughter (my goddaughter) Maia. She just turned 2 in August. And I love when kids start developing their little personalities. She’s so much fun now. Spunky just like her mom. The first night I got there, we watched Toy Story 3. This is us holding hands during the scene where the toys are headed for the furnace.

After that, we had a mean mug contest:

I’m pretty sure I won, but she got more votes I think because of the cuteness factor.

We played dress-up too, but she wasn’t too happy about it. Haha. She made this sad mug on her own.

All in all, I had a great weekend! My girl Dionne and I are the only two in the group who are still single. Hope she ties the knot soon cause if we have to wait til my wedding to see each other again… well, Lord only knows… ;) Anyways, congrats to the new Mr. & Mrs. Barnes!!! I wish you a life full of love and happiness and more babies for me to ice grill, dress up, and love up on. LOVE YOU ALWAYS!!! Muah!

Told y’all she be double dutchin’

I recently came across this photo of Michelle Obama playing double dutch with some children as part of her “Let’s Move“ campaign and I immediately burst out laughing thinking about this joke I made — it was actually more of a side comment — a few years ago about why I love her so much and why I think she’s so cool. This was a Valentine’s Day show just a few weeks after President Obama’s inauguration in 2009. Sooo jealous of these kids…

I apologize for the video quality — I wasn’t HD-ing it back then. But check it out and maybe you’ll have a chuckle too!

Beats and Rhymes and also… Life

On Wednesday I went to see “Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of A Tribe Called Quest” — the Michael Rapaport-produced documentary on my FAVORITE hip hop group of all time. It was playing at the indie movie theatre in DC and I’d heard so many great things about it from my friends in NYC that I couldn’t wait. It followed the guys for approximately two years from the time they reunited in 2008 to some time in 2010. I bought my best friend Rock The Bells tour tickets for her birthday in ’08 the year they reunited and joined that tour. We went to the Jones Beach show, and put in over 12 hours that day but had to leave before Tribe… I KNOW. I don’t even wanna talk about it. Damn day jobs… Anyway, there were tons of hip hop and radio greats featured in the film — faces and voices I haven’t seen or heard much since I left Jersey (and more importantly, NYC radio). I’d read several articles about how some group members (Q-Tip) weren’t happy about how they were portrayed, but you get that with any “reality” project. Plus from what I know about those guys from following them on wax, in print and digitally for over two decades, I think it was pretty true to who they are.

Sidebar, what ever happened to the other Leaders of the New School? My cousin suggested Busta ate them. But I told her that was mean… after I caught my breath.

If/when this movie comes to your town, please support it. Whomever profits from this film deserves your dollars — even if it’s that annoying ass Michael Rapaport. If you grew up in the 80’s and 90’s and you had a radio, chances are you loved Native Tongues and ATCQ in particular. This is what hip hop was… Is. It doesn’t get much better than this: