Conversation For Adults

Monique Judge - aka The Journalista and staff writer at The Root.Com - hails from California and is only the second non-Clevelander I've had on the podcast thus far. We talk about her sex life, her time as a side-chick and advice I should give my daughter, guns, social justice, and getting our nails done. Also, about the love I want her to have. She's also got company - and the bruise to prove it.

Chris Gresham starred alongside John Travolta's awful hairpiece in "Criminal Activities," but that's not how I know him. I met him while hanging with Charles Ramsey, American Hero, who freed Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry, & Michelle Rodriguez from over a decade of captivity on Cleveland's west side. Butters is maybe one of the nicest people I have met in Cleveland ever; a sweet human being. So I got to his place, and we start talking, then his roommate Charles bursts in. Butters and I talk about movies, Judaism, racism, weed, and Cleveland, before Charles suggests that Donald Trump's strongest qualification for president is his whiteness.

Clevelander Sid Allen is the writer and publisher of "It's A Rap," one of hip-hop culture's first magazines. Allen talks how rap freestyling started in Cleveland, smoking weed with Biggie, how the Midwestern work ethic killed the rap business, Cleveland gang history, and rare book-hunting.

Anna Krogern is an ex-Jehovah's Witness and complete stranger. She comes by the pad and we talk about the history of the JWs, old JW print propaganda, JW lawsuits, how she got flim-flammed into marriage by #Jesus, JWs who didn't go to college because #Jesus (haha), why angels cry every time you give or get head, plus she pitches something she can't talk about. We roleplay, wherein she plays the proselytizing Jehovah's Witness. Also, we exchange hood names and credentials. She was the "ghetto" white girl in her crew. OK. I won't judge that.

Kisha Foster is one of Cleveland's best-known, most well-traveled poets - she's not a stranger, but we've never talked for so long about so much. She talks about her book, the late-night fellatio habits of lesbians and other queer theory culled from Facebook, how she came to poetry as her life, her stay at Pink Doors (a woman's literary retreat), the definition of feminism, and losing her father and her son.

Actor and comedian Cocoa Brown takes some time to talk about her road from tragedy to comedy. We talk about me meeting her parents, and my grandmother's pitch to her boss, Tyler Perry.

Dr. Lester Spence is a public intellectual, author, and Associate Professor of Political Science and Africana Studies at Johns Hopkins University and the Center for Emerging Media Scholar in Residence. When NPR's Michel Martin asked me to put together a squad, he was the first call I made. Not a stranger, strictly speaking, but in 15 years, we'd only met four times, and never had a one-on-one conversation longer than 10 minutes. In Cleveland, on his book tour, he sits in my kitchen and tries to steal a few grapes while we talk about politics, NPR, how "The Barbershop" changed radio and television, my phat child support earnings, divorce and fatherhood, and why Donald Trump would never be elected president. Also, he talks about being there the moment I met my future wife, Teshima Izrael.

Donna Nowak is mesmerizing - see what I did there? She is a consulting hypnotist, regression therapist, and ballroom dancer. We talk about her journey from corporate America into hypnosis, how she met her husband, hypnotizing racism out of people, and we talk about Trump as if he were a client of hers. Donna and I were virtual strangers before this sit-down.

Dr. Lyz Bly's work and study is centered on gender, race, sexuality, and popular culture in post-World War II United States. She's the author of a new book, "Diary Of A Feminist Thug." She comes to the loft to talk about feminism, her love of black men, and that time she tried to Bigfoot me into giving her kid a better grade, which is technically how we met.

Caroline Renko is a physics and philosophy major from Zimbabwe, and she also voices the drops for Conversation For Adults. Her accent is mellifluously nondescript. We know each other directly, but not well, so she is virtually a stranger. She comes by the loft to talk about fitting in, African vs. Black American work ethic, dating Black American guys, Al Sharpton, how many planes are in an African air force (more than one), why I can't holla at her moms, and the correct pronunciation of her first name. I am the ugly, ignorant Black American and she is not.