Archie Gets Married

I mentioned that as a kid I loved reading Archie Comics. I not only am an Archie fan, I also like Josie and the Pussycats as well.

I was even surprised to discover there was a trans themed storyline in Issue 516 which Mrs. Andrews imagines what it would be like if Archie had been born a girl.

Well, the news broke in May that the love triangle that has fueled the sales of Archie comics for over 70 years was taking a new turn starting with Issue 600.

Archie decided that he was going to marry Veronica, and that story is going to play out over a six episode arc.

Well, my roomie read the post I'd written about my love of the Archie comics.

When Issue 600 hit the stands a few weeks ago, I was surprised to come home from work after a very crappy day and find that issue sitting on top of my computer keyboard.

Well, whatever leftover pissivity I had about my jacked up day melted as I settled into a chair and read that issue.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Issue 600 but I really felt for Betty. She now has to deal with the reality that her rival snagged the guy she wanted.

At the same time Archie confesses to Jughead, who was with Betty when she witnessed the proposal, that Betty was the first person he met when his family moved to Riverdale.

To add to her shock over witnessing the engagement, Betty is asked by Veronica to be her maid of honor.

I just picked up Issue 601, which chronicles Archie and Veronica's wedding, the hype leading to it and even the conversation that Archie and Betty had prior to it happening.

It also skips ahead a year at the end of their honeymoon to Archie dealing with his workday life in his father-in-law's company and Veronica making an interesting announcement.

I won't spoil the surprise that's at the end of Issue 601, and we still have four issues in this six issue story arc yet to go.

I Like Meat, I Eat Meat!

Since it's a holiday weekend here in the States, it has me thinking about home and weekends past while I'm enjoying the smorgasbord of college football that been on the tube.

It's Labor Day weekend here, and one of the things we Texans absolutely love doing on a regular basis besides watch football is chow down on barbecue.

Whether it's done over a barbecue pit at home, a friends house or we're dining out at our favorite barbecue place, we consume a lot of beef in the Lone Star State.

My love of beef and other meats such as chicken and fish sometimes brings me into conflict with my vegan friends. While I love hanging out with them and respect their choices they've made for their lives, they also as a condition of having me in their lives as a friend have to deal with my choices as well.

I chow down on burgers, ribs or brisket. I love scarfing down some chicken and enjoy eating seafood.

I'm a Texan who likes meat and I'm not planning on giving it up anytime soon.

The Penguins Of Madagascar

When I watched the original Madagascar movies, I fell in love with the antics of Skipper, Kowalski, Rico and Private.

Those lovable action oriented penguins made both movies even more entertaining for me than chuckling over the antics of Alex, Gloria, Melman, Marty and King Julien.

I was thrilled to find out that Nickelodeon gave them their own animated series called The Penguins of Madagascar.

After their globetrotting adventures in the two Madagascar movies, they're back at the Central Park Zoo. Unfortunately for Skipper and the gang King Julien, Maurice and Mort are next door at the lemur house. They've also added another character in Marlene the otter, whose habitat is next door to the penguins as well.

As the stories evolve you occasionally see the monkeys and other zoo denizens as Skipper and the gang conduct their various hilarious missions inside and outside the zoo.



King Julien and Skipper cross swords every now and then because he annoys Skipper, but every now and then the penguins come to his rescue and bail him out of some jam Julien's bombastic personality gets himself himself into.

It's a guilty pleasure of mine that I'll probably add to my DVD collection along with the two Madagascar movies I already own as soon as they release it.

Frenchy's Is 40!!

In the process of doing some research on my fave Houston eateries, I discovered that one of my favorite places to partake of the yardbird celebrated its 40th Anniversary on July 3.

Percy 'Frenchy' Creuzot and his wife Sallie opened the Scott Street Frenchy's location in 1969 as a humble po-boy sandwich stand. He's served up his Creole style chicken, Creole seasoned Frenchy fries, po-boy sandwiches and other Louisiana Creole treats and sides to millions of hungry Houstonians.

It goes without saying that Frenchy's founders, Percy and Sallie Creuzot, are extremely humbled by how Houston has embraced Frenchy's over the past 40 years.

"We are thankful to the Houston community," said Mrs. Creuzot on the Frenchy's website. "We have been able to maintain our family business and make good friends along the way."

It was and still is by far one of my fave places to eat. Dad would sometimes stop by on the way home from work and pick up a huge box of Frenchy's chicken for us to eat on Friday nights.

Since the Scott Street location is located halfway between the Texas Southern University and University of Houston campuses, throughout the years myself and other hungry college students along with kids from nearby Burger King High (oops, Jack Yates High) would buy our Campus Specials and get our grub on.

As I keep reminding you peeps, I'm a proud Jesse Jones Falcon. We don't like anything that wears red and gold.

And since the Scott Street location is next door to Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church, be prepared to wait if you hit it immediately after Sunday services conclude.

Frenchy's even went Hollywood for a moment. If you remember the movie Jason's Lyric that starred Allen Payne and Jada Pinkett Smith that was set in my beloved hometown, you can see a glimpse of the Frenchy's Scott Street location because Allen Payne's character's mother worked there.

Frenchy's has become an iconic part of Houston, and has spread its Creole seasoned wings to include seven locations around town. The last time I was back in H-town in 2005 it was one of my first stops before heading to my mom's house.

Yo, can somebody from H-town please FedEx me some?

Congratulations to Frenchy's for 40 years of great eating. May you continue to live up to your ad slogan of 'The Taste That Lasts Forever' and be around for the next generation of Houstonians to partake of your delectable Creole seasoned food.

Whataburger

Every now and then I get a little homesick and start missing all things Houston. While I can always head to the local Walgreen's to get my fix of Blue Bell Homemade vanilla ice cream, there are other guilty pleasures of mine that can only be picked up in the proximity of the Houston area.

One of the pleasures of living in Texas that I most definitely miss is Whataburger. I had one three blocks up the street from my old apartment that I frequently visited.

If I was fiending for a double Whataburger with bacon and cheese at 3 AM I had no problem taking a little walk up Bissonnet or hitting the drive thru lane to indulge myself.

I love their milkshakes, but had to back off of them and the nocturnal Whataburgers for a while when my weight climbed to 275 pounds in the early stages of my transition.



So what's Whataburger? It's a Corpus Christi based slice of Texas that has been around for over 50 years and is open 24 hours to the delight of us party animals, third shifters and night owls.



Damn, I'm getting homesick just thinking about it. Time for some Blue Bell.

Krispy Kreme

They started in Winston-Salem NC in 1937 with a secret doughnut recipe from a New Orleans based French chef. From those humble beginnings, they expanded to become for many peeps who grew up in the South, THE doughnut.

When the 'Hot Fresh Doughnuts' sign gets lit, the stampede is on.

Everyone has a regional favorite food or guilty pleasure unique to where they grew up. You've heard me wax poetic about Blue Bell ice cream on this blog, but as a Houstonian I didn't get introduced to them until 2000.

They are Krispy Kreme doughnuts, but I call them 'Krispy Krack' because once you eat one, you won't stop until the box is empty.

I grew up on Shipley's, a local Houston chain's doughnuts. I loved them so much that when I drove back home in 2005 for my brother's wedding I hit the drive-thru and bought a dozen to eat on the long drive back to Da Ville.

One of my former flight attendant co-workers Lorna Etheridge, grew up in Charleston, SC. She was positively giddy when she heard another flight attendant mention during a conversation we were having at my gate that Houston was finally getting Krispy Kreme franchises.

One of the initial Houston franchises opened up near my old southwest side apartment on the corner of Westheimer and Dairy-Ashford Road, and I was amazed to see peeps standing in long lines at various times to eagerly devour them. Most of the peeps in line were transplants who missed their favorite doughnuts and were happily getting reacquainted with them.

One day I finally decided to see what the fuss was all about and bought two glazed ones to try, and ended up buying a dozen of them to take home.

I have a Krispy Kreme location not far from where I live here in Da Ville on Bardstown Road near the Watterson Expressway. I prefer to get them there even though they are sold at local convenience stores because they taste better when they're hot. Even if they've been sitting around for a minute, I stick them in the microwave before chowing down on them.

Don't look now, but Krispy Kreme is coming to your hood if it isn't already there. They opened their first international store in Toronto in 2001 and are expanding to other countries as well.

On that note, time for me to roll and get some. Maybe I can get there just as the 'Hot Fresh Doughnuts' light comes on.

Playa Playa Archie Picks Veronica

I used to collect and read the Archie comic books back in the day and still occasionally peruse them from time to time.

Thanks to the TG Graphics and Fiction Archive site, I ran across an interesting gender bending Archie one in Issue 516 called 'The Other Side Of The Fence'.

His mother Mary Andrews was frustrated about the trials and tribulations of raising a teenage son and imagined what life would be like if Archie were her daughter instead of her son.

After imagining a grass is greener idyllic scenario, a lunch date with Mrs. Lodge and Mrs. Cooper gives her the 411 about the difficulties of raising teenage daughters.

Both women confide to Mary that they considered her the lucky one and the trio of mothers quickly agree that whether you have sons or daughters, it's still a tough job to raise them.

It then concludes with Mrs. Andrews coming home, hugging her son and realizing she wouldn't change that for the world.

One of the long running stories in the Archie comic book series is the love triangle between Archie Andrews, sophisticated spoiled rich girl Veronica Lodge and the loyal girl next door with the big heart Betty Cooper.

After 68 years Archie and the gang finally grow up starting with Issue 600, which hits the stands in August.

They skip the story ahead five years after their graduation from Riverdale High and as they are just starting their fresh out of college post-graduate lives.

The story is going to play out over the next six issues, but it's already leaked out which one of his high school honeys Archie proposes to.

It's Veronica.

I've always been rooting for Betty as you can tell, and hoped one day Archie would see the light and they'd one day get hitched.

Hey I'm an unabashed romantic, so sue me.

While Betty was doing things for Archie, Veronica always seemed to me to keep Archie at arms length until she sensed that Betty was getting the upper hand. She'd then start paying more romantic attention to Archie until he was focused on her to Veronica's satisfaction, then once Archie's eyes were back on her, the cycle would start all over again.

Well, as you can see on the Issue 600 cover, Archie is proposing to her just as Betty is walking past the jewelry store and witnessed the whole thing.

But knowing how indecisive Archie has been, Betty may still have a fighting chance. Veronica only has the ring. Neither she nor Archie have walked down the aisle and said 'I do' yet.

So stay tuned, this could get interesting.

Uncle Ruckus-The Mascot Of Black Conservatives

I'm a huge fan of Aaron McGruder's cartoon 'The Boondocks' (which doesn't appear in my local paper The Courier-Journal for some strange reason). I have the first two seasons of the Boondocks DVD happily parked by my TV and own two of the Boondocks books.

He started on the TV show, but has now migrated to the strip. There's a character called Uncle Ruckus, who is the embodiment of all self-hating sellout blacks.

But you don't have to believe me. Watch the video montage of Uncle Ruckus.

And oh yeah, video is questionable for work environment and has language issues.




Every time I see Uncle Ruckus, it reminds me of all those Oreo-cookie chomping Stepford Negroes falling all over themselves to appear on Faux News and elsewhere to look and act more conservative than thou.

And screwing their people in the process.

The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency

As a writer I love shows that are well written and have great acting. I stumbled across just such another show on HBO with the The No.1 Ladies Detective Agency.

The six episode show and the pilot movie is based on the series of ten novels by author Alexander McCall Smith and is shot entirely on location in Botswana. The HBO show stars Grammy award winner Jill Scott in the lead role as Precious Ramotswe and Tony Award winner Anika Noni Rose as Grace Makutsi, her awkward but very efficient secretary.

As the owner of the only woman owned detective agency in Botswana's capital of Gaborone, Precious has realized the achievement of her dream. She's kept busy solving various cases while also dealing with the problems and foibles of her clients lives as well.

It's also shined a spotlight on one of the more successful nations in sub-Saharan Africa. Botswana has been politically stable since independence in 1966, well run, prosperous and managed to avoid the drama that has plagued other emerging African democracies. The show has given us a chance to see the beautiful countryside and the wonderful nation as well.

It's enjoyable television, and I'm planning to catch up on the episodes I missed.

Arsenio Hall Show 20th Anniversary

Damn, has it been 20 years since The Arsenio Hall Show graced our late night television screens?

January 3, 1989 was the date the first of 1,284 shows aired, and judging by the sorry state of what passes for late night television these days, we desperately need him or someone else on the air

So to show you the flava that's missing from late night TV, I'm posting some YouTube video to illustrate what a quality late night show looked and sounded like.














Late night TV hasn't been the same without him.

25 Writers Shaping My World

Educator Marva Collins once said 'readers are leaders'. Nowhere has that statement proven to be so emphatically true as to note the major difference between the last two presidents.

Our current one loves to read and wrote two books of his own, the last one brags he never did despite being married to a woman with a library science degree. You can see how the country turned out as a result of being under the misleadership of a non-reader.

I've been reading since I was two, when to my mom's surprise I picked up one of her college textbooks and wasn't 'scurred' to read and pronounce the 'big words' contained in them.

So you can thank Electronic Villager for this post since I got tagged by him. I get to tell y'all who are the twenty five readers who shaped my world.


1. Martin Luther King
2. Alex Haley
3. Ralph Ellison
4. Toni Morrison
5. Alice Walker

6. Randall Robinson
7. John Hope Franklin
8. Barack Obama
9. Malcolm X
10. W.E.B DuBois

11. Eric Jerome Dickey
12. Kayla Perrin
13. Omar Tyree
14. E. Lynn Harris
15. Terry McMillan

16. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
17. Zora Neale Hurston
18. Pat Califa
19. Susan L. Taylor
20. James Carville

21. Marcus Major
22. Jimmy Carter
23. Molly Ivins
24. Tavis Smiley
25. Farai Chideya

The 25 writers who made my list contributed different things to shaping my world. Some gave me a different way of looking at the world in terms of theory. Some armed me with the information I needed to be able to articulately whack racism, prejudice, and right wing conservatism. Some expressed their hopes for an America that lives up to its Constitutional promise and warned us when it was veering off track.

The fiction writers infotained me. They not only drew me into the worlds they created and made me laugh or cry, they also provided some insightful commentary at the same time on love, relationships and various other issues pertaining to the Black community.

Some authors I tuned to for inspiration, education, enlightenment and empowerment.

There are also various books on my shelf that I read such as biographies, history, self-help, sci-fi, writing books to perfect my craft, or cover various issues that pique my interest.

And if you think I'm sleepin' on the facts, I'm armed with the last six issues of the World Almanac that I read cover to cover and keep within easy reach of my computer along with books to help me select the right quote to fit into what I'm writing.

Those 25 writers and many others not only shaped my world, they continue to do so.

Battlestar Finale

The cast, producers and writing team said we'd be blown away by the finale, and we weren't disappointed. After four seasons of twists, turns, a million light year journey across the galaxy, and one final climactic battle, the journey ends at a shining planet called Earth after a final FTL jump from the proud warship breaks its back to where it can never jump again in the solar system of a habitable planet.

The habitable planet the final 39,000 survivors arrive at is OUR Earth, 150,000 years ago.

Hmm. Life here began out there.

Like 'errbody' else who is a Battlestar Galactica fan I took a break from all the NCAA basketball games on the tube and checking out how accurate my predictions were for the 2009 version of the tournament to use the big screen TV to watch the final episode of the show. All of the loose ends were tied up and a few surprises were thrown into the mix as well.

Still it was sad to see Laura die even though we all knew it was going to happen at some point. Seeing all the backstory flashbacks with the various characters was nice and how cool was the scene in which the Galactica and the entire spaceship fleet that got them to Earth were sent hurtling toward the Sun to the tune of the original Battlestar theme song.

While this is the end for the regular series, we still are about to be treated to a possible movie, the upcoming Caprica series, and the Battlestar Galactica story in miniseries format from the Cylon point of view just before the fall of the Colonies.

The Battlestar story isn't going to die, it's multiplying. And that's fine with me.

Damn, Dee's Dead

For those of you who are Battlestar Galactica junkies, y'all know that the Dee I'm referring to is Lt. Anastasia 'Dee' Dualla. For those of you who don't, the final episodes of Battlestar Galactica are being broadcast.

They ended with a startling cliffhanger of the fleet arriving at Earth after three years of interstellar travel and discovering it's a nuked out cinder.

In this episode we find out that Earth was not only nuked 2000 years ago, but it was inhabited by Cylons. We also discover that Kara Thrace died on the planet and before you holler 'she's the fifth Cylon', she isn't.

The fifth Cylon is survey says, Ellen Tigh

But the thing that shocked me more than all those discoveries was the suicide of my fave character on the show. Seems as though Dee was very troubled by the discovery of the nuked out Earth and finding jacks buried in the scarred landscape.

We see her babysitting Hera, going out on a date with Lee after encouraging him to take the reins of colonial political leadership and then retreating to her quarters after kissing him goodnight, putting a pistol to her head and pulling the trigger.

Even though Battlestar Galactica's my favorite show, one of the things I griped about when it first was reimagined was the lack of main African-descended characters on the show. Elosha, the priestess and spiritual adviser to President Roslin was killed off in the second season, and with Dee's suicide, the only African-American character left on the show is the Cylon Simon.

But one of the things I've always hated about sci-fi is that it seems as though if there's an African-American character on the show or an episode of it, they'll be killed off.

One of the few exceptions to that rule has been Lt. Uhura on Star Trek, Capt. Benjamin Sisko on Star Trek DS9, Lt. Tuvok from Star Trek Voyager and Lando Calrissian from Star Wars.

But unfortunately Lt. Anastasia Dualla won't be one of those characters.

'Caprica' Trailer

Battlestar fans like myself have been impatiently waiting for the final ten episodes of our favorite show to come on next month.

We're anxious to find out who, what, how, and what time period Earth got fried to a nuked out crisp, but who the final Cylon model is among all the other questions raised during the four season run of the reimagined BSG.

In the interim, the news for BSG's spin off prequel show Caprica is beginning to trickle out.

I posted a few months ago about Caprica being greenlighted as a two hour pilot and a series with 18 one hour episodes for the first season. The casting for the various roles has begun or been completed and the trailer has finally been released.



It looks interesting to say the least. The show will kick off with a two hour special, then the series will go into production for a projected debut of 2010.

Unlike BSG, the Caprica action is going to be planet based. More details of the basic storyline have been divulged

It will follow the lives of the Graystone and Adama families 51 years before the events of BSG. Wealthy technologist Dr. Daniel Graystone (played by Eric Stoltz) and civil rights attorney Joseph Adama (played by Esai Morales) cross paths when their daughters die in a religious terrorist attack initiated by Zoe's boyfriend Ben.

Zoe Graystone inherited her dad's technological smarts and as kids do, one upped them. Before she died stored some of her rudimentary personality elements and DNA into an avatar of herself called Zoe-A. The grief-stricken Graystone discovers them, takes these basic building locks, some stolen technology from a Tauron rival and uses cybernetic breakthroughs to create a robotic copy of his daughter called Zoe-R, the first Cylon.

Joseph Adama has overcome his Tauron roots and Caprican prejudice against non-Capricans to become a hugely successful civil rights attorney. He lost his wife and daughter Tamara in the same attack, and Graystone creates a robotic copy of Tamara for him as well.

But ethical and moral concerns about the questionable directions Graystone is taking these cybernetic experiments lead Adama to become a vehement critic of the Cylons.

It is a sentiment passed down to his son, William, the future commander of the Galactica.

As many sci-fi fans know, today's science fiction sometimes becomes tomorrow's science fact. The ethical and moral questions raised on Caprica will probably be some of the same ones our own society will have to sort out soon.

Thanks to ongoing research in robotics and the increasing exponential knowledge gained about our DNA from the Human Genome Project, we are probably close to or soon will have the ability to create our own versions of Cylons.

But we'll get the pleasure of watching it being hashed out on a weekly basis thanks to the executive producing team that brought us Battlestar Galactica, Ron Moore and David Eick with 24 writer Remi Aubuchon.

Chic Nominated Again For Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Pardon Nile Rodgers and the rest of Chic if they're starting to feel like All my Children's Susan Lucci. Susan was nominated 18 times for a Daytime Emmy Best Actress Award before she finally won it in 1999.

They've been nominated in 2003, 2006, 2007, and now 2008 for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and when the votes are counted, they fall just short of becoming one of the five inductees in that year's class.

Chic is one of my my fave groups from my high school days (and still are). For those of you with knee-jerk reactions to disco, you can stop right now because this band was cutting edge.





Ask the Sugarhill Gang, because without Chic's Good Times song, Rapper's Delight, the song that catapulted hip hop into prominence doesn't happen.



Ask Sister Sledge, who thanks to Nile and 'Nard's production talents, created a song that became a championship anthem for the 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates.



Once again Chic has been nominated along with Jeff Beck, Wanda Jackson, Little Anthony and the Imperials, Metallica, Run-D.M.C., the Stooges, War and Bobby Womack, but only five of these outstanding nominees will get in. After the votes are tabulated, the announcement will be made next month as to who will comprise the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Class of 2009.

The induction ceremony will take place in April, and this time I'm hoping along with other Chic fans that they'll FINALLY get in.

The Hippest Trip In America

Don Cornelius getting busted last Friday in LA triggered memories about my favorite way in my teens to enjoy a Saturday besides watching my favorite cartoons.

The show was Soul Train and to me and every other African-American kid growing up in the 70's, 80's, 90's and part of the 2K's, it was Must See TV.

It was our version of American Bandstand and Don Cornelius was our Dick Clark. I tuned in to KHTV 39 at noon to see the latest dances, the latest fashions and hear the latest music.

And because I was on the wrong side of the gender fence at the time, I was also jealously envious of the sistahs on that show.




You also got to see the Soul Train Dancers forming that world famous Soul Train Line and either coolly or in some cases acrobatically moving and grooving their way down the end of it.







Some of the peeps who danced on Soul Train over the years included Rosie Perez, Carmen Electra, Nick Cannon, MC Hammer, Jermaine Stewart, Fred "Rerun" Berry, Pebbles, and NFL legend Walter Payton. Jody Watley and Jeffery Daniel danced on the show before becoming (along with Howard Hewitt) two-thirds of the group Shalamar.

It was also the place where we tuned in to see our artists (even if some of them were lip-synching to the songs).


The Commodores 1974



Chic 1978



Teena Marie 1980



Morris Day and The Time 1982



Vanity 6 1984



After a 35 year run, 1117 episodes and several guest hosts after Don Cornelius stepped down in 1993, Soul Train ended its historic run in 2006.



Wishing you love. peace and SOUL!

Nightmare on Hillcrest Ave

Happy Halloween, peeps!

GLBT people aren't the only folks that like to celebrate what we jokingly call in the community the 'Gay National Holiday'

One fast growing tradition here in Da Ville is checking out a group of Crescent Hill homes by the reservoir on Hillcrest Ave. It's a must walk through destination for pint sized ghouls, goblins and costumed candy seekers of all ages.

For twenty years those homeowners in that stretch have done lavish decoration jobs for Halloween. It has grown so popular that they draw crowds of up to 20,000 people from all over the Louisville metro area to see them. Some of the owners bought their homes specifically so that they could participate in this annual neighborhood frightfest.

My favorite in that four block stretch of homes between Frankfort Ave and Brownsboro Rd is 'Dante's Disco Inferno'.

The owner of this house puts down an authentic flashing lights disco floor, has mirrored disco balls, has tombstones with death dates for disco and Tony Manero (John Travolta's character in Saturday Night Fever) and plays disco hits all night long. Usually people walking along that stretch will hear a song they like, stop and shake their booty's.

Themes range from the Peanuts gang Linus welcoming the Great Pumpkin to ghostly cemeteries. Freddie, Leatherface and various Hollywood horror monsters pop out from behind trees at inopportune times to scare you.

They spend tons of cash on candy, and sometimes to one up each other. One memorable Halloween Dawn and I stopped by this house that rented a 16 piece orchestra. They played Halloween and Christmas music as they served hot chocolate and passed out candy on a clear but cool night.

Others will show screenings of classic and current horror movies. The Peanuts themed one runs the classic 'It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown' cartoon all night long.

Many of the homeowners say that the annual project has helped them get to know their neighbors and built a close knit community in the process. Neither they, the civic association or any group gives out an official prize for the best decorated home, but it's obvious there's a little bit of a competitive streak going when it comes to putting together these themed decorations.

And it's deeply appreciated by all of us looking for interesting stuff to do on Halloween night.

Oh Oh Oh-Love The Tom Joyner Morning Show

When my alarm clock radio turns on, Magic 101.3 is the local station it's tuned to. In addition to hearing my fave classic and current R&B songs, from 6-10 AM I join 11 million African-Americans in getting my early morning news, laughs, commentary and information from radio hall of famer Tom Joyner and crew.

Tom Joyner is a radio legend and icon in our community. He's an unabashed HBCU supporter who puts his money where his heart is with his foundation that sends and keeps African-American kids in HBCU's. The Fantastic Voyage cruise that funds the foundation is always sold out and it's one of the things the TransGriot wants to experience. The Tom Joyner Family Reunion in Orlando on Labor Day weekend is fast becoming a must attend event in Orlando.

And this website, BlackAmericaweb.com, is where I and other African-Americans can peruse commentary on various issues geared toward our community. Every now and then I'll paste some of those commentaries to this blog since I feel you need to know what my America is thinking and feeling.

The other cool thing about it is that prominent African-Americans also pop in from time to time to talk about various issues. Tom was also an early and proud supporter of Sen. Barack Obama.

As the child of a retired radio professional, I know how important Black radio has been and still is to the advancement of my people. Dr. King even commented that without Black radio and black deejays, the Civil Rights Movement of the 50's and 60;s wouldn't have happened. Tom Joyner and Cathy Hughes have been the driving forces toward carrying that proud legacy forward into the 21st century.

And me and 11 million other African-Americans enjoy every entertaining minute of it.

Where's the 'A Different World' Season 2-6 DVDs?

I love collecting my favorite Black shows on DVD. I already own the first three seasons of Girlfriends, own the first season of Living Single, and I'm working on acquiring the various Good Times seasons as well.

I'm a huge fan of A Different World, and even though I hated the first season, I bought the DVD set just to satisfy me in anticipation of purchasing Seasons 2-6. I'd even bought the Season 2 DVD online, but when Urbanworks got bought out, it delayed the release date twice and Season Two's release was eventually canceled.

Now I'm hearing that Viacom, who subsequently bought Ventura after it bought Urbanworks, will not only not release the Season 2 DVD of A Different World, it won't release Seasons 3-6 of the show either. Their excuse is that the poor sales of the Season One DVD is evidence that the show doesn't have a fan base.

Excuse me?

Umm, A Different World was a Top 5 show for five of the six years it was on the air from 1987-1993. Many HBCU's (historically Black college and university) credit this show with increasing enrollments at HBCU's by 25% during the 90's.

So the claim that this show doesn't have a fanbase is about as credible as Sarah Palin's claim to be more qualified for the presidency than Sen. Barack Obama.

Besides, the major reason the Season One DVD didn't sell well is how can I put this, season one sucked.

You had a writing team that had never attended, much less set foot on an HBCU campus try to recreate one on TV. Season One didn't even come close to having the authentic feel of an HBCU and it didn't happen until my Houston homegirl Debbie Allen took over as producer.



Under Debbie Allen, the show not only made a light years leap in quality, it actually began to have the flavor of an HBCU campus. Debbie was not only drawing from her experiences as a Howard University alum, she had the writing staff take an annual trip to Atlanta's Spelman College and talk to students, faculty and administrators about the issues they deal with.

The claim that there aren't enough A Different World fans to justify releasing seasons 2-6 of the show on DVD is crap. It's interesting to note that Seinfeld and Roseanne, Top 10 shows that were on during the same decade as A Different World have been fully released on DVD, but a quality show that tackled some interesting topics back in the day such as teen pregnancy, date rape, homelessness, divesting from South Africa, Black history, interracial dating, HIV/AIDS and the Gulf War isn't?

It's interesting to note that Living Single, another quality African-American show with Top 10 ratings, a loyal fanbase and topical shows hasn't been released beyond Season One either. But I'll save that debate for another post. A Different World's 2-6 seasons not being released on DVD is a travesty that needs to be corrected ASAP.

I'd love to see some of my favorite episodes again such as the battle for Dwayne's affections between Kinu and Whitley, Patti LaBelle's always humorous turns playing Adele Wayne, the always elegant Diahann Carroll playing Whitley's mom Marian, Sinbad's crazy self, Freddie and Ron's love-hate relationship, Jenifer Lewis playing Dean Dorothy Davenport and Debbie's recurring psychiatrist character Dr. Langhorne...well, you get the picture.



But what I'm really hoping to get is an opportunity to purchase and add to my television DVD collection season's 2-6 of A Different World.

P-Funkin' In Da Ville

Later today I'll be taking a refesher course so that I can maintain my Doctorate of Funkology.

Yep, I'm a serious Funkateer. and this evening Parliament-Funkadelic is headlining a free concert at Waterfront Park's Great Lawn as part of the Waterfront Independence Festival. It's been advertised on Magic 101.3 for a week (yes, we have Black radio stations here in Da Ville), and it's been a major topic of discussion for those of us who remember the heyday of Parliament-Funkadelic and how cutting edge their music was (and still is) back in the day.

My love of P-Funk started when I was in the 8th grade. My Dad came home from work that afternnon, tossed a promo album in my room and said, "You need to be listening to these guys."



The album he tossed in my my room was Parliament's 'Mothership Connection'. I took it into the den, put it on our quadraphonic stereo turntable, slapped on my headphones and the rest is history. From that day forward I eagerly awaited their album releases and didn't miss a Parliament-Funkadelic concert whenever they hit town. One of the first concerts I was allowed in my teen years to go to unsupervised by the parental units was a P-Funk one at The Summit.

I enthusiastically watched a documentary late one night that was done about the P-Funk phenomenon on PBS called Parliament-Funkadelic - One Nation Under A Groove for Independent Lens. The website for it even has a trivia quiz that tests your P-funk knowledge.

Far from faking the funk, I revel in it. I'm looking forward to seeing one of my favorite bands perform once again on the banks of the Ohio.