Uncategorized Archive

A few years ago, I interviewed Doug Sohn as he prepared to shutter Hot Doug’s, his nationally recognized hot dog and sausage shop in Chicago’s Avondale neighborhood. In his early 50s at the time, he decided to close his wildly popular restaurant simply because he wanted to move on to something else before running the shop became “work” for him. I also interviewed his girlfriend …

While watching the first season of Lifetime show UnREAL with a young lady, I described Nathalie Kelley’s character Grace, who was essentially crafted by the fake dating show to be the resident Latina sex bomb contestant, as a “bad-decision woman.” She asked me to explain myself. So here I am. A bad-decision woman is preternaturally attractive member of the opposite sex who, through genetics, dedication …

There’s no darkness of night quite as inky as the darkness following a breakup. I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t an element of excitement when I found out for sure that I was going to be divorcing my wife. The weeks between the separation and securing my own crib were defined by the fact that I felt like a dog tethered by a …

I recently sat down to two episodes of the new HBO show 2 Dope Queens. Hosted by The Daily Show alum Jessica Williams and comedian Phoebe Robinson, the show is a live stage adaptation of the popular podcast of the same name, on which the two black Millennial girlfriends riff off of each other about any and everything. The podcast was clearly popular enough to …

Now that we’re nearly weeks into its release, let’s put the success of Black Panther into perspective. Those of y’all who clogged theater lobbies taking group pictures while donning geles and kente cloth helped shoot the film north of $200 million on its opening weekend. It’s the biggest opening ever for a black director (Ryan Coogler). It’s $520 million first-week take put it ahead of …

I originally intended to wait on writing about this, but Blac Chyna forced my hand. Chyna, former stripper, makeup entrepreneur, reality television “star” and baby mama to Tyga and Rob Kardashian – who are both likely somewhere right now locked an oil wrestling match battling for the mantle of the Wackest Nigga Drawing Breath – made news this week as the subject of a purportedly …

I’ll start with a story that I’m absolutely not proud of and is no way characteristic of how I comport myself today. Honestly. Nearly 13 years ago, fresh off a breakup with the college sweetheart and living in Rockford, Ill. – which is Utopia if you want a whole family by age 25 and a BDSM porn addiction by age 30 – I got balls-deep …

On Tuesday morning, I was featured in a story for the Chicago Tribune, titled “The Struggle – and Bright Side – of Online Dating for People of Color.” I was chosen as a subject because of a piece about online dating while black that I wrote for Very Smart Brothas last year. The Trib piece happens to coincide with the two-year anniversary of my wife texting me from …

About a year ago, I put together a “Best of Pete Rock” iTunes playlist. He has a 28-year catalog of consistent (and consistently dope) music, so I knew it would be quite the undertaking. I knew it would be especially tricky considering the Chocolate Boy Wonder has never been a mainstream name, and much of his oeuvre contains hard-to-find tracks for underground 1990s rappers whom …

I’m an early-1980s baby, which put me squarely in the crosshairs of Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No” anti-drug use campaign. It was quite effective on me – during my formative years, I was entirely convinced that smoking marijuana would lead me down a path of self-destruction and utter iniquity; I figured just one snort of cocaine would kill me instantly. Decades later, I’m still scared …