Mary J. Blige - You Remind Me/Erykah Badu - On & On

I had a dream last night with toooooooooooooons of KFC in it. All the teachers I work with were walking around our school, and there were huge trays of KFC items spread throughout. For some reason Michael Jordan was there. He kept taking all the green beans, which were of course the only healthy option available. I remember being very excited that I scored like five green beans at the end, which somehow made me feel better about what I had ingested beforehand. I remember Jordan being kinda testy.

When we were in high school, we had an open campus and could drive to get lunch. There was a KFC buffet very close to school, so of course we hit that up occasion(3 times a week)ally. The dangerous thing, however, was this damn left turn arrow coming back from KFC to the school. It would take so long, and of course the caravan of cars coming back would be late returning to school. There would be no cars coming for five minutes, and still that red arrow would leer at us as we heard Ms. Dorensen's voice croaking in our heads. One time we ran it, and the cops pulled over three cars! It was brutal.

One good thing that did come out of these rides was hearing Mary J. Blige in my friend Glyn's car for the first time. I was way more into classic rock, grunge, and rap at the time, but "What's the 411" was a perfect album. Soulful singing with the hip hop beats I already loved. What a combination. She had extra cred cause she did that great "You're All I Need" duet with Method Man. I love the end of "You Remind Me" when she really lets loose.

I obviously didn't listen to Erykah Badu until later, but what can you even say about her. The video for "On and On" showcases her unique voice and amazing style. Talk about an old soul, she seems like she's been alive for 400 years, but she's still the coolest woman in the room. Her new music is good, too, including a song and video where she walks down the streets of Dallas undressing and gets assassinated like JFK. This is the first song that got me into her, though, and it's still my favorite.