Boston premiere of "Night Catches Us"

The Color of Film Collaborative is presenting the Boston premiere screening of Night Catches Us tonight. If you haven't heard about this film yet, check out the trailer. You can also check out the description of the film from the official site:

In 1976, after years of mysterious absence, Marcus (Anthony Mackie, “The Hurt Locker”) returns to the Philadelphia neighborhood where he came of age in the midst of the Black Power movement. While his arrival raises suspicion among his family and former neighbors, he finds acceptance from his old friend Patricia (Kerry Washington, “Ray,” “Lift”) and her daughter. However, Marcus quickly finds himself at odds with the organization he once embraced, whose members suspect he orchestrated the slaying of their former comrade-in-arms. In a startling sequence of events, Marcus must protect a secret that could shatter everyone’s beliefs as he rediscovers his forbidden passion for Patricia."

The film also features original music by the legendary Roots crew, so I can't wait to check out the soundtrack. You can by advance tickets through brown paper tickets. Also, check back for my review in a few!

Beantown watching Barack

It's interesting to see that tonight's State of the Union address is so highly anticipated...maybe not as much as the Superbowl or the Oscars, but close. Here in Boston, folks will be watching the President with our newly elected NAACP President, Michael Curry. I'm hoping that my professor lets us out of Qualitative & Quantitative Research Data (ugh) class early so we can check out the address. If not, somebody send me the highlights!

Play with brown paper dolls and sip on "Milk and Honey"...

Thirsty for Black TV, lately it seems everyone has been glued to The Game, but that's just not my cup of tea. Me, I'm looking forward to a little taste of Milk and Honey. A web-based dramedy, Milk and Honey is executive produced by Golden Globe nominated actor, Idris Elba and brown paper dolls. HipHollywood.com quotes Elba as saying, “I decided to get involved with “Milk + Honey” because of the strong demand for content that is relatable and authentic. Brown Paper Dolls has an intuitive way of displaying positive images of women throughout the series.” The show is described as the story of four women in LA--their spiritual, professional and romantic journeys to pursue their dreams and stars Lance Gross, Faune Chambers, Bryce Wilson, Asha Kamali, Yaani King, Shauntay Hinton, Robert Smith and...DEBBIE ALLEN! I am SO excited to see Debbie Allen on screen again. She has been one of my role models since the days of Fame. I haven't seen a schedule for when episodes will air, but no doubt I'll be glued to the screen. 

Malcolm X's Grandson, Malcolm Shabazz, @ GIANT photo shoot

This is a beautiful short clip about a beautiful young man. The weight of the legacy he carries on his shoulders must be astronomical. I was particularly moved by the parallels between his life and that of his grandfather. I can't wait to see what this young brotha does next. Big ups to Giant Mag for continuing to bring us intriguing stories and images.

Northeastern's annual MLK Convocation - Hon. Roderick Ireland

Photo by Ted Fitzgerald Judge Roderick Ireland, Chief Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court, takes the oath of office administered by Governor Deval Patrick while his 93-year-old mother, Helen Ireland, holds the bible.

Northeastern University's annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Convocation will be held on Wednesday, January 19, 2011 at 11:45AM in Blackman Auditorium. Sponsored by the university's John D. O'Bryant African-American Institute, this year's keynote speaker will be the Honorable Roderick Ireland, PHD'98, H'98, recently confirmed as the chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.

Appointed to the high court in 1997, Justice Ireland grew up in Springfield, Massachusetts. He earned his bachelor's degree from Lincoln University, a JD from Columbia University Law School, and an LLM from Harvard Law School. He received a PhD in law, policy and society at Northeastern, where he has also served as a member of the faculty since 1978. He is the first African American justice in the 318-year history of the court.

Questlove Spinning @ Underbar

This is one of those night's I look forward to all year. This is one of those nights when I get to go out in my city and listen to music that I actually like, mixed in a way I've never even thought of before. This is one of those nights when I remember why the DJ is the foundation of HipHop culture. 

If you've never heard Questlove spin, then you are deprived. But fear not friends, he's in the Bean tonight:

Tickets are $20 in advance (+processing fee) and $25 at the door. A little pricey, but then again, heads are charging that much to get into a regular old night with w DJ who thinks JAMN 94.5's playlist is the business. 

See you on the dancefloor!

Nikki Giovanni on MLK Day

Nikki Giovanni for FREE on MLK Day? Sounds like a win to me. It's also a great day to engage in some local service projects:


1. Reggie Lewis Center
2. City Year
3. City of Boston

Snow Dazed

Ugh. We're about to get slammed by snow again. This time around, I'm thinking about putting my car in a garage, so that I don't have to deal with digging it out. The previous blizzard did a number on my car to the tune of $200 in damage to my muffler! Compared to that, spending $10-25 to park in a garage overnight sounds like a sweet deal. 

For folks who typically park on the street, the City of Boston offers some alternate parking locations during snow emergencies. There are even a couple of garages on the list!

Click HERE to search by neighborhood.

Learning by Osmosis

I can’t remember if I was drinking water when I watched the movie Erin Brockovich. It retrospect, it’s probably better if I wasn’t. According to a recently released report from the non-profit Environmental Working Group (EWG), Boston’s tap water is contaminated with the very chemical that so devastated Brockovich’s clients. Great. We’re all gonna die. So then who will be left to make the movie about it?

Determined to survive (and pay cinematic tribute to) this next aquapocalypse, I’ve been doing research into what we as individuals can do to deal with our dirty water.  While the government needs to wade through the mucky goo of insufficient water regulations, I need to figure out how to prevent from giving myself cancer by trying to stay hydrated. At the same time, conspiracy theorist that I am at times, I can’t help but think that this is all an elaborate ploy to get me to buy a fancy filtration system. Oh well, better safe than sorry.

After listening to a story about this issue on NPR, I learned that reverse-osmosis filtration systems are the most effective way to eliminate chromium-6 (hexavalent chromium) from water. Yeah ok, middle school science was awhile ago. Ummmmmm…what is reverse osmosis? Google to the rescue! The How Stuff Works website has a straightforward explanation of how reverse osmosis works. Awesome. Now that the science is clear, it’s time to think about the best way to actually get water that has been filtered through a reverse osmosis system.

I actually found a bunch of options pretty quickly. The EWG has a list of commercially available filters that remove chromium 6 right on their website (my inner conspiracy theorist finds this convenient, but whatever). For a few hundred dollars, anyone can have clean, fresh water in their homes (wait, weren’t we supposed to have that already for free?) The site also has a rated list of bottled water brands: 


Best Bottled Water Labels

	Filtered Tap Water	A
	Nestle Pure Life	B
	Ozarka	B
	Penta Ultra-Purified Water	B
	Sam's Choice	B
	Dasani	C
	Glaceau Smart Water	C
	Hinckley Springs	C
	Walgreens	C

During a quick run to Star Market, I found a variety of brands offering reverse osmosis filtered water myself:

Buying reverse osmosis filtered bottled water is pretty convenient, but the downside is in the packaging. The negative impact of plastic water bottles on the environment (as well as the toxic chemicals from the plastic that leech into the liquid) is too devastating. Enter PuraVida H20.

The other night, after getting my dance on with the legendary Derrick Davis at The Dance Complex, I ran across the street to Central Square’s Harvest Coop to grab a couple of quick groceries. As I walked through the café and into the store itself, I noticed a large machine to my right. It caught my eye because I saw the words “reverse osmosis” in big letters. I backpedaled a couple of steps and stopped to look more closely. PuraVida H20 offers consumers the ability to fill their own reusable (and hopefully environmentally friendly) containers with reverse osmosis filtered water. Their mission is to: “… dramatically change the way people purchase single-serve water for individual consumption while creating an environmentally-focused culture to drive success, reduce the carbon footprint, improve health, and increase savings.” Nice. The machine at the Harvest Coop was temporarily out of service, but I will definitely check back there soon to try out the PuraVida H20.

It seems that (for a well-educated, middle-class American) getting access to clean water might be possible with a bit of work. We still have a lot of work to do to ensure that our water is properly regulated and purified, to see that every citizen understands what they’re drinking and has equal access to high quality water, and even more work to do to ensure that the rest of the world has water that is clean by even the most basic of standards.

It’s amazing that for a planet and a people that so overwhelmingly composed of water that we still haven’t gotten our water right(s).  

Take a Sun Shower

Thinking about ways to save green and and stay "green" at the same time? Even if you weren't thinking about it, who doesn't want to save some loot while saving the earth? A new program is coming to Massachusetts in early February that will provide local residents with rebates on the installation of solar hot water projects. 

Click here for more info.

Pic Fros Not Fights!

Phrase of the day.

Il était une fois... les technologies du passé.

More fun with youtubery. The technological changes in just one generation have been amazing. Pretty soon, kids will be looking at an ipod touch trying to figure out why they can't control it telepathically.

Japanese way of folding T-shirts!

I probably shouldn't be so blown away by someone folding a t-shirt, but this is AMAZING!!!