I’m ready to cut ties and let loose. Both in life and in my wardrobe. I think that maybe I am a cowgirl at heart.

Currently, I am obsessed with all things Junk Gypsy. I wrote about them not long ago when I got a care package from one of the owners, Jolie, who is a reader of this here blog. She is of the super cute and fun variety. We hit it on in rapid fire emails to one another and I’m pretty sure we are now cousins. The kind who show up at the family reunion and who sneak off to steal beers from Uncle Wally’s cooler, shake them up, and put them back in there to wait for it to explode all over him. Those kind of cousins.

Jolie is on the right and her mom and sister are next to her. If they get any more cute I’m going to have to hurt a baby horse.

Anyway. I love Jolie and her wares. I love them so much that I’m not going to do anything but show some of my favorite things from her little shop down in East Texas and hope that you take a visit. When I said I was doing this she actually agreed to give my readers a special offer so we’re partnering up to offer something special.

Check out a few of my favorite items:

The PoNchO ViLLA. This entire outift screams I AM MY OWN PERSON AND I AM FRINGY AND HAWT.

This is the EL CHeAPo ConCHo cuff which comes in turquoise, lapis, red coral and orange coral. I think you’ll need them all.

I simply adore the moonlight pendant. It has got to be one of the more versatile pieces from Junk Gypsy.

One of their many t-shirts outfitted with layered necklaces. A great, easy way to classy up a t-shirt.

Their TiE-DYE off the shoulder hippie ChiCK blouse. Innocently sexy. Purposefully sassy.

Lordy be, but I am all about the WANDERLUST these days.

Baby guitars. For when you’re feelin’ a little wild.

Here’s the special offer from Jolie and family over at Junk Gypsy. If you’re ordering something online you can add ‘MOCHA’ to your order and get free shipping. But wait just a second, little darlins. There’s more…

Coming soon I will be doing a giveaway of some Junk Gypsy goods that Jolie is sending to me. She has graciously agreed to outfit me for the BlogHer Conference in New York next weekend. If you happen to see me there, say “Howdy!” because I’m pretty sure I’m going to look like a seriously hipster cowgirl. While I love to get things, I also love to giveaway. So I’m taking some of those goodies she’s shipped to me and giving them away in a contest to be done the following week of BlogHer. I’m giving it away and not keeping it. GIVING IT AWAY will become my new mantra. To me, this was the best way to show off her stuff, garner new customers and lovers of Junk Gypsy, and do a good thing. In fact, I might just do Good Things Contests from now on without always seeking sponsorship. Because that’s how real cowgirls and gangstas and mommybloggers roll. Or so I hear.

The only thing I’m hanging onto, however, are a pair of Tony Lama boots because they are custom fit for my big ol’ country girl feet and you wouldn’t want them after I’ve broken them in anyway.

Yee haw.

Right here and right now I am going to apologize for overusing the word ‘whatnot’. It’s not my fault. One of the summer reading books I’m enjoying is an audible book that I’m listening to on my iPod. It’s Kathryn Stockett’s “The Help” and listening to it is affecting my non-existent southern accent because for the rest of the day I will suddenly add extra syllables to words. Early on in my listening one of the characters used the word “whatnot” and now I am killing that word. And whatnot.

Let me share my very sexy life with y’all for a moment. Today, I spent time cleaning out my refrigerator and there were too many things that had to be thrown away without me documenting it for my shame to be shared throughout the land. I am pretending that I am a princess today and it really helps to clean out your own muck while wearing a tiara. TRUST ME. So, I’m cleaning it out and listening to “The Help” and then my phone dings at me to say I have an email and I read that I was nominated for an honor at the closing ceremony for BlogHer this year. You can find the post here with all the other entries. Someone nominated me and I don’t know who it was, but thank you nonetheless and whatnot.

The blog entry that was nominated was “I’m Black Irish and I’m Proud” and it might be weird to say, but it’s one of my favorite posts that I’ve written and also one that was painful to write. Also currently on BlogHer is a piece on cyberbullying by Gina Carroll that I got interviewed for a while back. It sums up my frustration with dealing with it as an administrator and yet doesn’t even come CLOSE to the mess that this little gal is in right now. I watched the videos this morning just shaking my head that an 11-year old had that much power over what she was putting out on the web and then her screaming father reminded me all too well of the kinds of things I might hear when they want us to clean up the mess. She is a complete brat and plays with her bangs so much I kind of want to make her cut them off, but that’s neither here nor there.

A friend of mine also emailed me today that she nominated me for the Black Weblog Awards and reminded me that since they are now taking nominations I should go ahead and pimp myself out so there you have it and whatnot. If you’re inclined, please nominate me for Best Personal Blog.

Do it because you love me. Do it because I have no food in my refrigerator. Do it because I said please.

And whatnot.

First, my mom is feeling better and getting around nicely and losing lots of the water weight she’s been carrying around. Small blessings for health, I say. It’s made me far more aware of my own health and I’m exercising a lot and eating more vegetables and trying in general to be positive. Would you believe that I even tried a little bit of ice cream and that it didn’t make me violently ill now that I’m lactose intolerant? Weird. I can’t explain that one.

Next, I had some friends over this week for a movie night that was supposed to be outside on the projector but Mother Nature graced us with blazing heat so we settled for modern A/C  in my living room to watch  “I’m Gonna Git You Sucka” and shared wine and guacamole and black bean & corn salsa and Hypnotiq. The only thing I will say about that is that it pays to be friends with really young people who’ve just come off the college scene because they know how to make The Incredible Hulk drink from Hypnotiq (mix it with Hennessey) and do you know what happens then? THEN, you have a real party where you do dramatic readings of Twitter streams and it becomes a hilarious event. (I would upload some pictures from that night, but my cord is missing that goes from my camera to my laptop) (there should be a word for what that cord is, but I don’t know it). We have decided that next time we will view that blockbuster chick-flick, “Spice World” which is supposedly a great film. Yes. Film.

This is a video from my friend Alex who started taping Patrick doing these dramatic readings of DeShanee’s tweets. The background music is “Ashokan Farewell” because we were doing this a la Ken Burns.

You’ll also see friends Jeanette and Steve and Lynne as the camera (a la Ken Burns, remember?) pan slowly across the kitchen table. I spent most of my time finding new funny ones for Patrick to read and covering my mouth with my hands and laughing. Good times.

To cap off all the great things that are going on at Chez Mocha Momma I want to do a birthday shoutout to my friend Karen of Chookooloonks (you can tell she’s my friend because I mention her like all the time) who is happy to announce that she’s 43. I, however, am happy to announce that she wants nothing more for her birthday for you to go out in the next 24 hours and do something for yourself. Her words and an image from her book campaign below:

It could be having a great meal, taking a perfect bath, reading that book on your nightstand that you’ve been meaning to read, booking that holiday you’ve been tempted to book or just lying in the sunlight for 30 minutes.  Whatever it is that will make you happy today, please go do it.  In fact, I beg you to go do it.  I’d love to think that on my birthday, people all over the world are ensuring that they’re having a great day.

The comment I left for her was:

For your gift today I will do the following:

work on my book and devote a full 2 hours to writing

take a jacuzzi bath today now that I actually have a jacuzzi bathtub

give myself a pedicure

do one of those home facial kits that I’ve had in the bathroom cabinet for too long

read from one book on my nightstand (you caught me!)

and love the people in my presence with a fierceness (smothering with kisses, hugging, telling him pointedly that I love them).

So, Karen, my dear sweet, encouraging friend of a certain age, these are your gifts today. They are done in your honor. I love you. Happy birthday.

xoxo

Since I’ve moved, I now have a writing space where I am practicing daily to devote 2 hours to that craft. Devoting that much time to writing means that I can’t always put up a blog post and I’m willing to sacrifice that time. Many other things happen there like messing around with my colored pencils and organizing my bills and doing crafty workbook-y stuff in the book “How You Do Anything is How You Do Everything”. It’s a very Zen-y, Buddhist-y, self-discovery type thing that helps me work out some kinks and I highly recommend it since this is my second time through it. I like to think of it as my Artist’s Way with crayons and glue sticks.

My messy desk that somehow doesn’t contribute to my messy mind.

Besides that, I sit and look out the window where I have placed a photograph from Karen of a sunflower that she gave me years ago. It inspires me to see it and to read her words from time to time. (Maybe I’ve mentioned that? I’m not poking around in my archives to find out, though.)

The sunflower in my window.

Finally, a bit of good news that came for me from a friend I met in California years ago when I was there for work. Her name is Lara and she’s quite beautiful. Let me show you a picture of her she used for a post that makes me crack right up when I see it.

Anyway. Lara. Well. Remember how a few posts ago I was all woe is me? Well, this friend did something amazing. Lara sent me an email this week about a windfall of money that she received and she wants to buy me a plane ticket for BlogHer in August. It’s really hard for me to accept things like this especially since I resolved that I wouldn’t go and stretch my budget too far. After many conversations about her wanting to do this and how she didn’t know what she was supposed to do with it and how I just wasn’t sure about it, she convinced me. I usually hate publicly whining about things, but then I was talking to Karen again (REALLY. SERIOUSLY. I CAN’T GET ENOUGH OF THAT WOMAN.) and she said that for her birthday I must accept and she keeps teaching me to accept things, good and bad, and that all of those things contribute to the forward motion of life we’re in so, for whatever reason, I AM GOING TO ACCEPT AND GO.

Happy stuff, y’all. Accept and go.

Have something happy or positive to share? Please do. I can use all the goodness you can spare.

As much as I’d love to delve into the socially and politically conscious parts of hip-hop (as opposed to that media-baiting bullshit out there known to most people as “gangsta rap”) I just won’t do it. It’s a waste of time for me because I could instead just be listening to what I want to hear and plus, I’m just not good at writing like that. I’m pretty sure I’ve complained on my blog before about how iTunes still can’t get their genres cleaned up and put real hip-hop artists at the forefront and instead have it filled with mostly rappers. So I won’t go there again because it’s like the I told you so! line that people hate to hear. That is not to say that I don’t have a guilty pleasure in the occasional song from Straight Outta Compton, mind you, but that can’t possibly fill the space in my ears for too long before I get a bit weary of it. This list explains, I think, why I can’t get down with the crap shoved down our throats (I’m looking at you, Justin Beiber and Ke$ha) and if you listened to the lyrics on a few of these songs, you’d instantly get me which is what I want music to do to me.

Without further ado, this is what I’m listening to a lot of lately. Some old, some new, all amazing.

1. “Get By” by Talib Kweli. Clappity clap clap, y’all.

2. “Brooklyn” by Mos Def from his Black on Both Sides album.

3. “Lucifer” and “December 4″ by Jay-Z from The Black Album which is, to me, his best ever.

4. “Supreme People” and “The Craft” by Blackalicious. If you’ve got to get some songs by them, start with these two. I’m not responsible for what you buy after that.

5. “Kick, Push” and “Daydreamin’” (which features Jill Scott) by Lupe Fiasco on his Food and Liquor album.

6. “Worst Comes to Worst” by Dilated Peoples on their Expansion Team album and “Back Again” on their 20/20 album.

7. “Canto de Ossanha” by Jurassic 5. Also, “A Day at the Races” which features Big Daddy Kane, so YAY.

8. “Bring it to the Cypher” and “Ah Yeah” by KRS-One because no hip-hop list is complete without some KRS-One.

9. “Golpe de Estado” and “Harlem Renaissance” by Immortal Technique. Your brain will probably explode a little bit.

10. “It’s Bigger Than Hip Hop”, “Happiness” and “Mind Sex” by Dead Prez. Especially “Mind Sex”.

11. “Passin’ Me By” and “Otha Fish” by The Pharcyde. Both of these are real Pharcyde sounds to me and it takes my mind back a ways when I hear it and all of a sudden I’m in high school again. Except I’m not pregnant this time.

12. “Freakin You” by Jungle Brothers is just about the only song that will make me jump around like an idiot no matter when I hear it.

13. “Bells of DOOM” and “Potholderz” by MF Doom. Again with the brain explosions. Maybe pour yourself a glass of cabernet before settling in to enjoy these two.

14. “Heels” by Q-Tip. It makes me sad that it took this long for this album to be made when it was just sitting there for so many years on the shelf.

15. “Black Mags” by The Cool Kids. I can’t stop myself and yet I entirely blame Mallory for making me like this song as much as I do.

16. “I Ain’t No Joke” by Eric B. and Rakim. Never forget about “Paid in Full” because GAWD, I LOVE THAT SONG.

17. Several years ago my sister, Tracy, got me deep into The Foreign Exchange and while I want to list just one or two songs here, it’s hard so I’ll say the entire album Connected even though I really love “Von Sees” and “Nic’s Groove” and “Brave New World” and “Happiness” and SEE? I CAN’T STOP WITH JUST A FEW.

18. Lately, I am loving the newest song out by Big Boi called “Shutterbugg”. I exercise to this one, clean to this one, and generally dance around the house to this one when I think no one is looking. Check out “Royal Flush”, too.

I’m not even going to go into my deep affection for The Roots (”The Movement”), or my boyfriend Common (Too. Much. LOVE.), or Black Sheep (”The Choice is Yours”) because I am, by no means, an expert at hip hop music nor am I a critic. I just know what I like.

The library was actually a house that was converted into a library. The played movies on a projector and screen during the summer months and they had all the Nancy Drew books I could want to read. There was a section of the library that had music albums you could check out and I wore the hell out of Maurice Sendak’s Really Rosie and the musical Annie. I can clearly remember singing the words to those songs as I traveled back and forth to the library in the summer months. This was a daily trip since I could read a book a day and I made good use of the library that summer.

Not long ago I received a copy of Thomas Chatterton Williams’ book Losing My Cool: How a Father’s Love and 15,000 Books Beat Hip-Hop Culture. I figured from the press release information that I would like this book, but I didn’t realize how much until I was a mere chapter into it. Williams has, in my opinion, a unique existence and experience in that his father was not only present and active in his life, he even got out of his son’s way to allow him to make all the mistakes he wanted. When you read this book you can put yourself in his shoes. His tone and way of writing, his wording, and his extensive vocabulary already make him attractive to read, but listening to him tell how much he struggled with embracing hip-hop fully into his being is what captured me the most. Especially once he went in search of his own knowledge and did The College Thing where you start to think for yourself and break away from all that you know. I remember doing The College Thing and reading the book Lies My Teacher Told Me and feeling like I had a whole lot more education to acquire.

The book cover.

One point that he makes which sticks with me is how Blacks are inundated with hip-hop music. How they emulate and truly try to become that which they listen to repeatedly but how non-Blacks have permission to listen to it with a sense of irony. A sense of “I can listen to this and dress like them now, but sooner or later I have to give this up and get back to my own White world. This can’t go on forever.” It’s almost as if there is a social agenda to pursue anti-intellectualism within Black culture and that is driven through music. When I think about music and the hip-hop that I like, it’s not what the mainstream listens to via radio. In fact, the hip-hop that I know and love is not the anti-women, money-grabbing, ho-slapping, gang-banging type of hip-hop. It is the socially-conscious, make-a-difference, do-something-with-your-life, wake-up-and-smell-the-conspiracy type of hip-hop. And if I even mentioned artists here it would fall on deaf ears. “Who is that she’s talking about?” and “I’m not familiar with those artists.” I sincerely hope, however, that that doesn’t sound pretentious. My experience is that when I tell most people who I’m listening to musically they look confused as if I made it all up.

The author.

Growing up, my friends were Nancy Drew and Annie and Really Rosie. But they were also EPMD and Public Enemy and Tupac (and I’m not slamming these particular artists – in fact, some of their lyrics were lost on me until much later in life). My feet were in two worlds. I sang those same lyrics, blindly I might add, that Williams sang before that consciousness took ahold of him in the form of 15,000 books. So I can empathize fully with him on that front. Like Williams, I feel saved from the ignorance of poverty and the thinking that keeps people there. And I hope so much that others can break free from it if only they were lucky enough to have a father like he did. His dad kept pursuing knowledge along with his son and unfailingly waits it out with patience and enough books to keep him reading and full of accomplishment. He writes fondly of his father and captures who he is as a man and a parent. Williams truly makes his father come to life narratively speaking. On a personal level, he makes me want to know him as a mentor.

I can’t think of a single person who wouldn’t enjoy reading Losing My Cool, but if you were ever sucked into the belief that you could find success and happiness by following the tenets systematically detailed in mainstream hip-hop, then this book is for you.

You can read other book reviews of this at the TLC Book Tours website where other bloggers have written their own critiques of Thomas Chatterton Williams’ book.