THIS IS THE CHRONICLES OF EFREM: The Daily Buzz For Oct 16

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Pharrell Williams Goes Green For EBONY Mag's November 2014 Cover, Explains Why He LOVES Black Women

Pharrell Williams is green with everything but envy for the newest cover of EBONY magazine. In his provocative cover story on topics ranging from women to racism, P is speaking once again on the "black G I R L" controversy, his love for black women, and why he holds back on talking about race.

When all the drama popped off concerning the lack of black (or brown skinned women) on his G I R L album cover and promo materials, the creative genius explained that black women WERE actually involved. But when folks didn't let him off the hook, seeing that the women were all fair skinned, he's professing his love for black women once and for all:

“I love Black women,” says Williams. “If you don’t think I love Black women, then you don’t understand me.” He continues to add, “I have obsessed over Black women since the days of Jayne Kennedy, Beverly Peele and Roshumba Williams. Those are the women I daydreamed about growing up.”

Interesting.

About how the tragic death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo. impacted him as a Black man, husband and father:

“I don’t talk about race since it takes a very open mind to hear my view, because my view is the sky view. But I’m very troubled by what happened in Ferguson, Mo.”

“When things like that happen, we need to be a united cell. We need connective tissue to be linked by spirit and spirituality.”

“For every individual who gets killed, someone should build a school or teach a child. We really need to balance things with positivity.

NeNe Leakes Attempted to Reconcile Friendship With Former Friend Cynthia Bailey

This week, NeNe Leakes stopped by The Real to dish on her new role in “Cinderella” on Broadway and what fans can look forward to during the all new season of the “Real Housewives of Atlanta.”

NeNe Leakes-the real-kenya moore-cynthia bailey-the jasmine brand

During the conversation, NeNe spilled a bit of tea, revealing that while her friendship with cast mate Cynthia Bailey is over, the VERY RICH house wife did attempt to smooth things over:

We have not kissed and made up and uh…. Although, I’ve tried. I think when you guys watch the show this season you’ll see a lot of things that happened.

I felt like last season when we ended I was kind of being blamed. So I think this season you guys may see a different type of girl, that girl.

NeNe also throws what some consider a bit of shade to cast mate Kenya Moore.

When asked if a recent tweet (she tweeted: Have you ever met a person that truly wanted to be you? Never met them. It’s actually sad.) was about Kenya, she responded: "I have actually met some people that, you know, want to be you. You know what I mean? They just all of a sudden… they start posing like you, they start using the language you use, you know what I mean? They start taking pictures like you take ‘em and start hanging out with the people you used to hang out with. You know, and start trying to use your glam people. You be like, “Okay so… I know you really want to be me but girl bye.”

She continued:

…I generally don’t talk about her because she recently, you know…. Nobody was talking about her a few years ago. And so now, you know, I know this is a blessing that we are all speaking her name today.

WOW!!

Kansas City Royals head to World Series after sweeping Orioles in ALCS

In the moments after the Royals won the pennant, after their 2-1 victory carried them to a sweep over the Orioles in the American League Championship Series, joy flowed like the fountains beyond this ballpark’s outfield fences.

The last embers of afternoon sunshine still illuminated Kauffman Stadium. The voices of 40,468 revelers merged with a fireworks display. Greg Holland jumped into the arms of catcher Salvador Perez. Lorenzo Cain flung his glove skyward and skipped like a child. In the center of the diamond stood the Kansas City Royals, conquerors of the American League, ready to contend for their first World Series title since 1985.

With their eighth consecutive victory in these playoffs, Kansas City captured the American League crown for the first time since 1985. Thursday marks the 29th anniversary of their last pennant clinch, when Jim Sundberg drove in four runs and Charlie Liebrandt logged more than five innings of relief in the seventh game of the ALCS against Toronto. This year’s version of the Royals opted for their more traditional procedures.

They scored two runs in the first inning without a ball leaving the infield. Alex Gordon patrolled left field like a spider with an all-encompassing web. He crashed into a chain-link fence for a fifth-inning out and rose to a packed stadium chanting his name.

Manager Ned Yost has become Midas here in October. He managed his bullpen with aplomb on Wednesday. After Jason Vargas walked the leadoff batter in the sixth, Yost called upon Kelvin Herrera to snuff out the threat. Vargas allowed just one run across 51/3 innings. No Royals starter collected an out after the sixth inning in this series. The team did not skip a beat.

Herrera gave up a two-out single to Adam Jones to move the tying runner to third but. But when Nelson Cruz lined out to second baseman Omar Infante, Baltimore came up short once more. The result fit the pattern of this series, when the Orioles could craft no answer for their opponents.

At times this week, when baseball wasn’t being played, Kauffman Stadium resembled a teapot hosting a tempest. Jarrod Dyson boasted his team would capture this series in five games or less. Jeremy Guthrie sported a T-shirt mocking his former club after game three, and subsequently apologized for his fashion statement on Wednesday. In all, the Royals offered up a bevy of material for bulletin boards, which, the Orioles can now gaze upon all winter long.

Just 17 days ago, the Royals faced their 11th hour. The eighth inning of the American League Wild Card Game began a few minutes before 11 p.m. on Sept. 30. Kansas City needed to plate four runs before Oakland recorded six outs. With Jon Lester on the mound, the Royals’ probability of victory resided at 3.5 percent.

The rest now resembles folklore. The Royals scored three runs against Lester in the eighth. They tied the game in the ninth. They fell behind in the 11th only to walk off for a victory, floating all the way to a sweep of Anaheim and now another against Baltimore. Kansas City hasn’t lost a game in October, and they appear in capable of wrongdoing.

Take the first inning on Wednesday. Alcides Escobar led off with an infield single that skipped over the head of Baltimore starter Miguel Gonzalez and bounced off second base. Gonzalez drilled Nori Aoki with a 91-mph fastball. Up came Lorenzo Cain, perhaps Kansas City’s finest player in this series. He was hitting .667 in this series, and shining on a national platform.

So, naturally, he bunted. Cain did so on his own, as Yost informed the viewing public on the TBS broadcast.

The decision flew in the face of baseball’s mathematically oriented wisdom. It also fell within the team’s standard operating procedure. So did what followed.

After Cain advanced both runners, Eric Hosmer hacked at a changeup at his ankle. He tapped a grounder to second baseman Jonathan Schoop. The throw beat Escobar to the plate. Except as catcher Caleb Joseph pivoted for the tag, he lost control. The baseball trickled to the backstop, and no Oriole was in position to back up Joseph. Aoki followed Escobar home.

A welcoming party greeted the run-scoring duo. The Royals abandoned the comfort of their perches for a brief celebration. Jarrod Dyson strutted the length of the dugout, signaling for the fans to raise the roof.

YUP

The inning highlighted the fielding supremacy of the Royals. Baltimore sported a quality defensive unit. But they wobbled in crucial situations, whereas the Royals remained stalwart. In just the first two innings, Omar Infante ranged deep into the hole to record an out, Alex Gordon made a pair of nifty catches, and Escobar whipped a true throw from second to complete a double play.

Baltimore devised a solution for Vargas and his defense in the third inning. It was a method they relied upon more than any other club this season, one they had been unable to wield against the Royals: They hit a home run. A day after dropping a knee on Dyson on a pickoff play, Ryan Flaherty did some more damaging. He mashed a solo shot that hugged the right-field line and landed 411 feet away from the plate.

His blast represented Baltimore’s last gasp. Herrera gobbled up five outs in the middle innings. Wade Davis ignored a two-out single to complete a scoreless eighth. Greg Holland issued a leadoff walk in the ninth and nearly threw away a harmless grounder back to the mound. But Alcides Escobar snagged the throw to record an out and settle down the proceedings.

His teammates hung over the dugout railing. Scott Downs waved a towel toward the crowd. After Mike Moustakas fielded the final groundball, the Royals entered the field of play before the ball even reached the glove of first baseman Eric Hosmer. They knew. After all this time, they knew.

CONGRATULATIONS!

Phaedra Parks Opens Up About Split With Apollo On ‘Ellen’: ‘I Thought He Had Changed’

Phaedra Parks pretty much kept her mouth shut through the trial and conviction of her husband Apollo Nida, but as soon as he started a rumor that she was dippin’ out on her marriage with some African man named “Chocolate,” Phaedra pumped the breaks and broke her silence real quick! The Real Housewives of Atlanta stars are headed to divorce court now that Apollo has started his eight-year prison sentence for fraud, and Phaedra stopped by Ellen to give us a little bit of tea on what’s really going on in her marriage.

During the interview, she claimed that she had no idea that Apollo was involved in any criminal activity. She also said that she didn’t think that him being on parole when she met him was any sort of bad sign because she wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt.

On if she knew about Apollo’s shady dealings

I really didn’t. I mean, I work. I just got my fifth college degree. And so I’m pretty much an overachiever. I have two very small children. I just stopped breast-feeding three months ago and so, I didn’t have any idea this was going on until he called me and he said, ‘Hey, you know, I’ve been arrested and I’m having this problem, but it’s not true.’ So I went out of my way to get him the best attorneys, the best investigators, and to do everything I could, because I’m an attorney myself and so I wanted him to have the best so that we could fight this together, but obviously it did not turn out like that.

On if him being on parole when they met was a red flag

Well, to be honest, he had been to prison and he was a changed person. So the person I married, I thought he was changed.

On their kids

It is extremely hard. My heart aches for my two sons because they are the heart and soul of who I am. That’s the best thing we ever did together. I never wanted to do anything to diminish his character in public but we’ve had some times where he’s done things that weren’t so cool.

She also said it’s ridiculous to ever think she would cheat.

I think it’s totally absurd to say that I cheated. They’re saying that I had an affair with a man from Africa named Chocolate. Now, everybody knows that I do like a Snicker bar every once in a while, but it’s definitely not a man from Africa that I’ve ever had an affair with. I mean, it’s just absurd. I think sometimes when people are hurting they do things to hurt other people. There’s been a lot of lashing out from Apollo because I think he’s in a place, a very angry place, and I think you hurt the people who are closest to you sometimes. It’s unfortunate.

A woman who has a successful career as a lawyer and five college degrees marrying an ex-convict? You don’t see that often, but like she said, she was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Your Thoughts is she lying or NAH?

Trolling?: White Couple Releases Thug Kitchen Cookbook

There’s a new vegan cookbook by a White couple that has people wondering exactly what they’re up to. Until recently, no one knew the identity of the duo behind the profanity laced food blog, Thug Kitchen.

Keeping their faces a secret doesn’t mean that they knew they were doing something wrong, trolling for controversy (the blog has been around for a couple years) — or using trying to capitalize off of racial stereotypes with the unnecessary slang and cursing. Only, it probably does.

However, the couple says their new cookbook Thug Kitchen: Eat Like You Give A F*ck is a lighthearted effort at satire guys. Not racist.

From the Thug Kitchen blog:

As soon as Michelle Davis and Matt Holloway went public as the cooks inThug Kitchen earlier this month, the internet backlash was fast and harsh.The Root site called it “A Recipe in Blackface” and Jezebel reminded readers of professional football player Richard Sherman’s recent assertion that “‘thug’ is a new way to call somebody the n-word.” For many, the use of “thug” seems misguided, if not problematic.

In one of their first interviews, Davis and Holloway spoke with Charles Monroe-Kane about cooking, elitism, and the power of language. Drawing on the cultural association of “thug” with gang violence, Monroe-Kane asked them, “What makes you a thug?” Davis and Holloway say “thug” is not a demographic category, but a frame of mind.

Davis says, “We think of it as attitude. We understand that ‘thug’ is a loaded word and has gotten more loaded in the past year and a half. The site is about being a bad-ass in the kitchen. We joke that we are verbally abusing people into eating some more goddamn vegetables. That is the point.”

Holloway says, for him, being a thug means “just not taking ourselves too f___ seriously. I don’t see the word ‘thug’ being synonymous with any particular person. It’s a personality. It’s an aggression.”

Of course, there’s question as to why the couple would keep their identity a secret all this time?

So, let’s talk about some of their recipes. They’re broken into sections like, “Track List,” “Short Order Shit,” “Big-Ass Cup of Cozy,” and more weird stuff. The recipes fall between normal names such as Summer Squash Soup to the randomness that is Wake the Fuck Up Minestrone and Thug Kitchen Vinaigrette.

Thug Kitchen idea wouldn’t go over well if a black couple tried to do the same thing, as some would assume. Contrary to popular belief Black people don’t actually approve of any and everything foolish.

K. Michelle Bares All In “K. Michelle: My Life” Trailer

K. Michelle takes on New York City in her new reality show, K. Michelle: My Life. In the VH1 sneak peek, the former Love & Hip Hop Atlanta star hangs with friends, poses nude for a photoshoot, and gets in a few laughs while rolling through the city with her son. She’s also seen kicking a woman out of her house.

“You’re going to see K. Michelle as a mother. You’re going to see me recording this brand new album I have coming out this year,” she said while sharing what to expect from the show. “And you’ll just get to see me with my friends and my everyday life. And how I’m juggling everything and how you know, just because things are happening for me, there’s still a growth within me that I have to do in order to maintain it.”

“My Life” premieres Monday, Nov. 3rd at 9:00 PM ET/PT on VH1.

Get a peek HERE

Inside Usher’s Birthday Party

Usher celebrated his 36th birthday on Tuesday night in New York with some his of closest friends in the music industry, including Jermaine Dupri and Trey Songz. Good food, good drinks and good company … Based on photos posted on social media we’d say Mr. Raymond had a pretty epic time.

Check out photos from the soiree

Nice! Happy Birthday Ursh!

Keyshia Cole's Victim Files Restraining Order Over Injured Finger

Sabrina Mercadel (above), the woman whom Keyshia Cole attacked at apparent boyfriend Birdman's condo a few weeks ago, has filed court documents detailing the incident (which landed Keyshia behind bars).

In documents obtained by TMZ, Sabrina says she and four other people where at Birdman's condo around 4am when Keyshia attacked her during a jealous rage. As Sabrina exited the restroom, a source claims Keyshia yelled, "What are you doing with my man?!"

In her docs, Sabrina claims she was punched, scratched and her hair was pulled. Sabrina also says her neck and back were hurt and her finger was badly injured to the point where it does not function. She was granted a restraining order and now Keyshia has to stay 100 yards away.

We will keep you posted...

Iggy Azalea Dominates AMAs with Six Noms!

The American Music Awards nominees have been announced and breakout Australian rap star Iggy Azalea tops the list with 6 nominations in categories such as Artist of the Year, Favorite Female Rap Artist, and Favorite Rap Album (“The New Classic“)!

Check out the details below!

Following Azalea in multiple nominations are Pharrell Williams, John Legend, and Katy Perry with five nominations each. Other AMA nominees include 5 Seconds of Summer, Sam Smith, Bastille, Blake Shelton, Carrie Underwood, Chris Brown, and One Republic.

Azalea joins Imagine Dragons, Lorde, One Direction, Beyoncé, Pharrell Williams, Luke Bryan, Katy Perry, John Legend, and Eminem in the Artist of the Year category so she certainly has some steep competition to overcome. The amount of nominees in Artist of the Year category will be cut down to 5 after tallying fan votes from that are cast through November 13. If you want to join in and cast your vote, check out all the details on TheAMAs.com!

Be sure to catch the show when it airs live from the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles November 23 at 8 PM/7 Central on ABC!

Princess Love Lashes Out At Teairaa Mari And Ray J (Instagram)

Ray J’s ex Princess Love lashes out at Ray and Teairaa after their nuclear break-up. Over the weekend Ray J kicked Princess out of his house and yesterday Princess called Ray and Teairra the Coochie Cream Couple.

Did Todd Tucker says Kandi Burruss is “Three Months Pregnant”?

We all know Kandi Burruss wants to have another baby now that she is married. So could it be that she has finally got her wish?

The folks over at HipHollywood caught up with the Real Housewives Of Atlanta star and her hubby Todd Tucker at the premiere for his new reality show Hollywood Divas where he told them with a huge sneaky grin that Kandi is … “Three months pregnant”.

Unfortunately, the joke was on them. Todd was in a great mood at the premiere party for his new show, and couldn’t help but have a little fun with us on the red carpet. “I’m just playing, we’re working on it, we’re practicing,” he said.

Tucker is executive producer of the new TV One docu-series, and Burruss couldn’t be more excited, especially since many in the ATL (including her momma) were calling him an “opportunist.”

“I’m super excited for my husband Todd,” said Burruss. “Everyone has speculated forever like what does Todd do or whatever, well now you can see what he does as an executive producer through his own company.”

You can catch Tucker’s show Hollywood Divas, starring Countess Vaughn, Golden Brooks, Paula Jai Parker, Elise Neal and Lisa Wu on TV One every Wednesday night at 10pm

Nick Cannon Clears Up Amber Rose Relationship Amid Double Breakups

Hollywood actor Nick Cannon has come forward to clear the air on recent rumors about possibly having a romance brewing with model Amber Rose. Cannon addressed his status with Rose amid his own split from wife Mariah Carey.

Reports Sohh:Just a month and a half after publicly confirming his separation from Carey, Cannon says he no plans to move on in another relationship any time soon. “I think the wound’s too fresh to even be thinking about that right now,” he told Dish Nation’s Rickey Smiley. “That’s someone that I’m managing,” Cannon said of Amber Rose. “I’m really excited about everything she’s about to do in her career and building her brand. I manage a lot of people, but obviously that’s one, because she’s in the news as well and kind of a public figure, people just kind of latched onto that as the media does at times.” (Dish Nation)

There You have it!

Kevin Hart & Eniko, Nelly & Miss Jackson, Boris Kodjoe & More Hit The Real Husbands Of Hollywood Paley Center Event

Before the "Real Husbands of Hollywood" season 3 premiere on BET aired The other night, the cast got together at The Paley Center For Media to discuss how all the foolery came about.

Actors Duane Martin, Nelly, Boris Kodjoe, Kevin Hart, and actress Cynthia Kaye McWilliams hit the stage at The Paley Center last night in Beverly HIlls with moderator Kevin Frazier.

The event was called "An Evening with Real Husbands of Hollywood", and it was all fun and games before the season 3 premiere.

Kevin went for the plaid-on-plaid look aongside his sexy fiance Eniko Parrish.

She leaves little to the imagination in this For Love And Lemons dress, but she's got the bod to pull it off.

Nelly brought his chick Shantel "Miss Jackson" Jackson on the carpet. He's no stranger to parading THIS girlfriend around, unlike his previous ones.