Episodes

Ep #153: I Did That: Celebrating Yourself When You Finish Something Big with Ayana Major Bey You finished the thing. Did you stop and say I did that, or did you just move on to the next thing? It's my birthday, and I'm spending it catching up with Ayana Major Bey, the actress, voiceover artist, podcaster and multi hyphenate creator who came back on the show right as I was coming up for air after 31 Days of Black Business. This one is a shoot the breeze, artist to artist conversation about celeb...

Ep 152: The Red Pill Is Not the Only Option with Rayviation A room full of men, four cameras, one boom pole, and a conversation most of them had never had out loud. This week I'm talking with Rayviation, a Chicago based producer, filmmaker, playwright and teaching artist, about Loving Men, the film he made with the Boston Ujima Project, the vintage store documentary he's making now, and why he thinks we are living in a golden age of indie filmmaking. Recorded live at Lumpen Radio, no edits, n...

Ep 151: I Make Films for Black People and Everybody Can Watch with Barbara Allen Two little girls saw a movie camera in a mail order catalog and spent a whole week on the phone building a case to bring to their parents. They both got a yes. Fifty some years later, one of them is a filmmaker and the other one is her writer. This week I'm talking with documentary filmmaker Barbara Allen, the person behind Paper Trail: 100 Years of the Chicago Defender, DuSable to Obama: Chicago's Black Metropolis...

Recorded live on Lumpen Radio 105.5 FM, Saturday, September 12, 2026 A teacher looked at her painting in front of the whole class and called it a knowledgeable failure. She took it as a compliment. Chicago painter Megan Williamson has been painting for decades and is nowhere near finished figuring out what painting can do. From a hundred Zoom portraits to a room full of circus figures, her work is about looking, searching, and following an idea wherever it goes. What We Talk About What a teach...

Ep 149: All That and a Bag of Chips: 31 Days of Black Business Reflections No guest. No theme song. Just me, a cup of coffee, and whatever came out of my mouth. 🖤 We made it. Thirty-one days, thirty-one Black business owners, every single day of August. And then two days into September, because that's how it goes. This one is unscripted. I sat down and talked off the top of my head about what this series actually took, what it reminded me of, and the thing I realized halfway through that I...

Ep 148: Serious Training for Everyday People with Sean Armstead of Phenomenal Fitness Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 He trained 33 people last Saturday. Starting at 4 in the morning. Sean Armstead is a former Marine Corps infantry officer who served in the Persian Gulf, and he's been running Phenomenal Fitness since 1997. The slogan hasn't changed in almost thirty years: serious training for everyday people. His whole book of business comes from referrals. He calls it...

Ep 147: Vintage Is a Form of Luxury with Jennifer Kelly-Nichols of Vintage Frills Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 She was too scared to sign a lease, so she bought a short school bus and painted it pink instead. She'll tell you she cheated a little. Jennifer Kelly spent years as the logistical backbone at Chanel, Tiffany's, and Neiman Marcus before burning out during COVID. Now she runs Vintage Frills, a Chicago boutique organized entirely by color: a red room, a blue ...

Ep 146: Your Customers Are Doing Economics Whether You Are or Not with Dr. Kristi-Warren Scott Bishop of Verity Consulting Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 She was going to call herself the corniest economist. Her friend said no, you're the baddest economist I know. She was terrified to use it. Her friend said do it scared. Dr. Kristi-Warren Scott Bishop is a PhD economist and the founder of Verity Consulting, which she launched in fall of 2025 after spending over a dec...

Ep 145: Leadership Without Burnout with Janelle Alba Garner of Tanglaw Advisory Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 How do you keep a mission alive without burning out the people carrying it? Janelle Alba Garner is the founder of Tanglaw Advisory. She spent years supporting founders doing genuinely great work and watched them sacrifice themselves to do it. She doesn't think that's the deal. Tanglaw is a Tagalog word meaning guiding light, and that's roughly the job. Wha...

Ep 144: Ten Toes Down and Chasing Goals with Rob Marley of Stay Focus Society Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 Self-motivated. Determination. Commitment. Those are the three stars on the logo, and they're not decoration. Rob Marley was going through the worst of it around 2010. No support system, no outlet. He kept telling himself two words to get through the day, and then figured a whole community of people probably needed them too. He didn't know graphic design or com...

Ep 143: Coaching Is Not a Meritocracy with Serena Hicks Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 Heads up: this conversation touches on grief and family loss right up front. You might have a life coach. Your life coach also has a life coach. Serena is who the coaches call. Serena Hicks got pushed out of a corporate job at 40. Two weeks later her older brother died of cancer, thirteen months from diagnosis. She was broke, grieving, and living paycheck to paycheck after what she ...

Ep 142: Sustainable Swimwear That Actually Fits with Tiffany Asamoah of BOLD Swim Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 She went looking for a swimsuit before a vacation. Nothing past a size large. Nobody in the marketing looked like her. Tiffany Asamoah found a tailor, watched her make one, and started asking better questions. BOLD Swim is sustainable swimwear designed to fit and feel good in and out of the water, and it's since expanded into underwear, accessories, and a s...

Ep 141: Split Ends Are the Devil with Charita Golden of Golden Tresses Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 She wants you to love the hair you have, not the hair you wish you had. Charita Golden is the natural hairstylist behind Golden Tresses here in Chicago, and full disclosure, she is my actual hairstylist. So I went into this a little nervous, because if I mess it up I still have to go sit in her chair. She's been natural for over 25 years, since before it was a movemen...

Ep 140: Private Investing Is Not What You Think with Victoria Watkins of Inrichmint Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 I learned a new term recording this one: family office. I was today years old. Victoria Watkins is a lawyer and the founder of inrichmint, where she helps people invest in companies that aren't on the stock market. She'll tell you private investing is not the gated thing you think it is, and that your friend's flower shop counts. She's also the author of ...

Ep 139: Your Credit Report Shows Your Stress with Cierra Michelle Jones of The Credit School Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 She got denied on her first house, couldn't afford a credit repair company, and went to Google instead. She calls herself her own first client. Cierra Michelle Jones is the Founder and Executive Director of The Credit School. She joined the Army at 17, spent years running from her credit problems, and got denied and scammed trying to buy a house ...

Ep 138: Two Introverts Built a Wine Bar on the South Side with Charlette Stanton and Jacare Thomas of Park Manor 75 Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 Recorded live on Lumpen Radio 105.5 FM on August 21, 2026. No edits, no retakes. What happens when the people who've spent decades bringing everybody together finally create a place of their own? Charlette Stanton and Jacare Thomas met as teenagers and have been building community for more than two decades: social clubs, ar...

Ep 137: Not Everybody's Life Is a Movie Scene with Adrienne Randle of Evryday Blk Magazine Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 Not everybody's life is a movie scene. That's the whole idea. Adrienne Randle founded Evryday Blk Magazine, a bi-monthly publication in digital and print, because she wanted something that felt good to read. No gossip, no trauma, no celebrity culture. Just four-generation Black farms, a man who chases waterfalls, and the small local film festivals ...

Ep 136:Trades Aren't a Backup Plan: Building a Business With Your Hands with Shawn Ellis of Handyman Ellis, LLC Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 His grandfather used to take his quarters and hand them back as tens. Called it magic. Then one summer he said, come work with me and I'll show you what the magic actually is. Shawn was thirteen. Shawn runs Handyman Ellis LLC in Chicago, providing professional services for homeowners and businesses: mounting, assembly, installa...

Ep 135: From a Craft Class to Ten Years in Business with Ticina Williams of Creativiti Custom Designs and Events Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 Ticina Williams started designing her own party supplies because the licensed images never looked like her sons. She founded Creativiti Custom Designs and Events in Chicago — that's Creativiti with an i, because everybody calls her T and she's the T in Creativiti. It started with a craft class at Michael's she only took bec...

Ep 134: Semoine Boyer of CocoaLuxe: Routine to Ritual, and Fragrance for When You Can't Get Away Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 She started making these products because she needed somewhere to go when she couldn't actually go anywhere. Semoine Boyer is the founder of CocoaLuxe Home and Spa: candles, body butters, scrubs, oils, and body sprays, all made with fragrance blends she creates herself. She started making them because she needed downtime from being a wife, a ...

Ep 133: Type C Energy and Design With Soul with Sunni of Sunni Aesthetics. Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 Only about 4% of designers in the US are Black. She named her podcast after that number, and it's gone down since. Sunni runs Sunni Aesthetics, a creative studio doing branding, creative direction, and visual storytelling. She came up through film production and set decoration in Atlanta, flunked out of design school right before the pandemic, spent quarantine dra...

Ep # 132: Sun Food and Decolonizing What We Eat with Radius of RA's Natural Abundance (noseyAF Classic) Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 This conversation originally aired on Lumpen Radio on July 28, 2025, as Ep #77. Bringing it back for the series. He'll tell you the box never existed. Radius is a musician, photographer, chef, and community builder out of Chicago's South Side. He runs ETC Records, publishes photo zines from his travels, co-founded The Love Fridge Ch...

Ep 125: We Heal Together with Aya Nikole Cook of Haji Healing Salon Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 Recorded live on Lumpen Radio 105.5 FM What happens when the person who built the healing space finally has to heal herself? Aya Nicole Cook built Haji Healing Salon because everything she needed growing up on the South Side required leaving the South Side to find. Ten years later, she's in the middle of what she calls a death portal, undoing a decade of go-go-go and reb...

Ep 131: From Black and White to Living in Color with Alexis "Lexi" Williams of Aloha Glamour Part of noseyAF's 31 Days of Black Business series 🖤 A Black woman from Mississippi became a Queen Mother in Ghana. It was not on her bingo card. Alexis "Lexi" Williams founded Aloha Glamour after losing her daughter Lauren Taylor, who was born and died in Hawaii in 2015 while Lexi was stationed there. Everything was black and white for a long time after. When she started seeing color again, she st...