Monthly Archives: April 2013

atlanta, me

One Week In, One Week Removed From New York

Found copy of Iyanla Vanzant's #actsofaith that I got Christmas 1994.

I found up my old dog-eared copy of Acts of Faith by Iyanla Vanzant.  I am reading it along with Douglas Rushkoff’s Present Shock.

Today’s Meditation:  Identification with an organization or a cause is no substitute for self-realization.

It took me leaving New York City to realized how much I had incorporated being a New Yorker as a big part of my identity. Now that I am not there, I can take note of who I am wherever I be.

I am a woman.

I am Black.

I am a Southerner.

I am a blogger.

I love cupcakes.

I am the oldest of three girls.

My elevator pitch is too long.

My place has changed, but I am the same. Being present is nice.  The future is open but not as wide as it was in the past.

atlanta, me

Nuance, Nostalgia, New Chapter

3 Comments

Shorter blog post: I left Brooklyn because I couldn’t afford it. I was afraid that I would be a bag lady. That fear and high likelihood it could happen was stressing me the fuck out.

Longer Blog Post:
I don’t navel-gaze. It may be good for self reflection or my core but I probably have lint in my belly button so that’s kinda gross.

People are so not naive to think that the world is black and white, but they act that as if it were because nuance fucks them up.
Similarly, I can’t decide if I more left-brained or right-brained. The lack of nuance seems to have made my career all topsy turvy.
I have been writing creatively since I was a kid. I wrote poems and stories since I was about ten years old. However, I was also good at math and science. I like baking. I like physics. I tend to recite one of Newton’s laws as it applies to everyday life. A body in motion will remain in motion…

I have been in constant motion living here in New York for over a decade. It’s been fun and inspiring. It has been heartbreaking and frustrating. Being always on the precipice of an arbitrary measure of success has kept my stomach in knots.

Although I took psychology in college, I didn’t fully understand cognitive dissonance until I read “The Souls Of Black Folks” by DuBois while living here in New York. My goal became to manage the dissonance. I also read Florence Scovel Shinn’s “The Game Of Life and How To Play It ” and I took to repeating the affirmation, “I have elegant and perfect timing. I am at exactly the right place at exactly the right time.” Sometimes that helped me to be patient and present.

I am going to get all “LCD Soundsystem” for a moment and say I was there for Deep Dish Cabaret in a dance studio,Gothamist happy hours at The Magician and Jinx Debates at Nolita Bar. I miss WYSIWYG, Chicks and Giggles and Tainted Lady Lounge. The good old days were not always great, but had perfect timing.

One of the tag lines of my old blog was this: “Nichelle hopes for Oprah-like scratch but she is already wealthy with an abundance of friends.” I will miss my awe-inspiring friends when I leave even more than I will miss Brooklyn. Brooklyn is full of artisans, divas, evangelists, ninjas and rockstars. I am pretty sure Brooklyn is the ONLY place on the earth where a stranger would come up to me to gush that I am “twitter famous”.

I am moving to Atlanta. Am I writing a new chapter or conducting an experiment? I don’t know. I hope to carve out a niche of prosperity and creativity.

tech

iPhone Apps Get ‘Donor Class’ Treatment, Android Apps An Afterthought

1 Comment

A year ago, my world changed when Instagram became available on Android. I got to be a part of this (new to me) world of photo filters and over-tagging. It even changed my habits. As a food blogger, I was already taking photos of food, but my photo taking became prolific. I started taking photos of graffiti, skylines, and my shoes. Also, I have taken more photos of myself which is now known as selfies. The other benefit of Instagram on Android is that I stopped carrying around my digital camera, so I thank Instagram for saving me from potential back pain in my old age.

I am writing this post to let all the lovely and creative startup founders and developers to step up your Android game. I don’t want to wait a year to play around with Vine, Mailbox, or Timehop on my phone. The hype cycle of new apps is getting shorter and shorter so it makes sense to launch the Android app at the same time the iPhone app drops.

There are more Android app developers now than ever before and more people who buy smartphones are buying Android phones.
Everyone knows there is a bit of iPhone elitism in the tech start-up world. It seems that only venture capitalists want to invest in iPhone apps, which is analogous to politicians only paying attention to the “donor class”. It is shortsighted to ignore the Android user. For example, a year after Instagam became available on Android, about half of its users were Android phone people. Growth and widespread adoption of apps can happen quicker if developers become more platform agnostic and stop worshiping at the altar of Apple.

opinion post, personal finance, writing

The Economy Has A Donkey Booty

Yes, I am comparing the United States’ economy to a woman’s figure. If you watch ‘Real Housewives of Atlanta‘, then you may have heard Phaedra Parks wax poetically about the Donkey Booty. It is a curvy, round butt that stands out. Despite Wall Street profits and the S&P hitting record highs, the middle class is shrinking. The middle class is losing numbers like JHud whittled her waistline from Weight Watchers. The new jobs coming from the private sectors are not living wage jobs. The public sector is not doing enough to create jobs. Cutting spending and creating lopsided stimulus packages are the only tools Congress is using. To refer back to my analogy, Congress keeps cutting carbs from their spending diet and thinks that makes the economy healthy. You may fit into those skinny jeans, but it doesn’t mean you are fiscally fit. The majority of jobs is coming from the retail and restaurant industry which typically are low wage jobs even if in managerial positions. These jobs don’t pay enough for a family to get ahead or even cover basic needs. Some people who are vying for these positions are often college-educated and are over-qualified. The current labor market is slack with four generations who are eligible to work. The donkey booty is a synonym for a woman’s posterior, an onion. Basically, the economy is so bad at the low end that it can make you CRY.