I have no data to back up this claim, but I’d bet a so fresh and so clean (clean) $20 that probably 75 percent of the people I know have seen Netflix’s Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness.

So there’s an unpopular opinion prompt thing going around Facebook—where you’re asked to list 10 things everyone loves but you kinda hate. I sometimes get annoyed with these sort of things because people don’t follow the rules and just start listing things that everyone hates (“1. funerals.”), but thankfully people…

I grew up on a block with killers, crack dealers, dope fiends, stick-up kids, at least two arsonists, arbitrarily unchained pit bulls that “don’t all bite like that, really,” niggas with cases, girls with bids, aunties with bounties, snitches and cops from the actual show Cops (they used to film in my neighborhood).

I see you, fam. Really, I do.

If your soul so beckons you to fly to Atlanta in April, right now, you can literally buy a round-trip ticket from Washington, D.C., for $36. You might not be able to do shit while you’re there, but hey, that ticket price is hard to beat. Granted, it’s on Spirit Airlines, but shit, Door Dash-ing two cheese pizzas right…

The compulsion to convince ourselves that bad things will eventually happen to bad people can be seductive and cathartic. It’s also embedded in most of the lessons taught to us as kids. Children’s stories and fairytales usually end with the “good” winning and the evil receiving some sort of punishment. The concepts of…

Like a lot of black men who grew up in the ’90s, hip-hop is the soundtrack for my life and has been for as long as I can remember. I can remember “borrowing” cassette tapes from my older sister—she had a new music plug in high school—dubbing them, and sneaking them back into her room before she noticed. It was through…

I closed on my house in June 2012. At that point, when moving from my apartment into my house, I made some choices about things to unpack because in the years that I lived in my apartment I never used them. For instance, I own thousands of compact discs (CDs). Well, when I moved into my apartment in 2010, I never…

It’s a question I’m asked during book talks, while signing books after said talks, on panels, in emails, through DMs, at happy hours, and even once in between games at LA Fitness. I try to be as transparent as possible, but the honest answer (“I can tell you what worked for me, but there’s no universal template.”) can…

The coronavirus has most of us staying inside the house—if possible—and that’s creating some new realities for our country. Parents are becoming teachers as well as employees while having to learn time-management skills. People who never want to leave the house under normal circumstances are itching to hit the CVS for…

It feels like months ago when word started coming down that the coronavirus might shut down our whole lives for weeks, maybe even months. Turns out it was really, like, last week when the “stay your ass at home” hammer became a real thing. Of course, as soon as that happened, the charge to “use that time to be…

Back in October 2019—in a version of the world that is very different from the version we live in now—my nephew, along with probably a hundred other prospective students, visited the campus of Morehouse College, in Atlanta, Ga., during our annual homecoming weekend. On the Friday of that week, my nephew sat in on…

Nothing.

If you’re the type of person who believes, for instance, that AIDS can be cured with paprika, your belief is definitely dangerous, and you probably need some lotion. But because the Venn diagram of “people who think mailboxes cause diabetes” and “people living in their aunt’s basements who still write their names on…

My real name, while not traditional, isn’t exactly unique. This means that I remember when Gmail first dropped, and I did a mad dash (did you have to be invited back then? I can’t remember) to get my FIRSTNAME.LASTNAME@gmail.com account. And I did. I’ve had that email account for well over a decade now, and…

When faced with a life-altering and potentially life-ending crisis—a cancer diagnosis, for instance, or a terrorist attack—the performance of resilience can be an anesthetic; an anxiety-engulfing balm that allows us to make space for an effective counter-punch. Also, it just feels good to tell ourselves and others…

I went to Target today. Actually, I went to PetSmart and Target today because one of our fish went to be with his ancestors and one of my kids was despondent over this fact. Now, we told him that because he was sick that Petco came to pick him up when the UPS guy stopped by a few days ago. We thought we were sparing…

While many of us are responsibly stuck at home during this time of pandemic concern, the need for entertainment and mental stimulation is high. For many, that means scouring the catalogs of the various streaming services available to us, or rewatching classic movies and series. Perhaps it involves marathon games of…

If you know me, it shouldn’t be a shock to you that this social distancing thing feels specifically tailored for me—-a bespoke social mandate. (If you don’t know me, I’m a Capricorn and apparently an INTJ; distinctions that greatly matter to the people they matter to, and don’t mean shit to anyone else.)

Very few albums in hip-hop were as highly anticipated as the debut album from Elpadaro F. Electronica Allah, aka Jay Eletronica. Ever since he came into the public consciousness in the late aughts with Act I: Eternal Sunshine (The Pledge) and further dropped classic songs with Just Blaze, popped up on features with…