"The funniest part is he has three whole albums. I only have one full album and I've been a musician for 20 years."
- Adam Gold, member of Sophistafunk/co-owner of Funk N' Waffles/ToTs' roommate

For two weeks I worked, for what seemed, endlessly on a feature story for our music magazine on campus, 20 Watts. It's a profile on Michael Heagerty, a local Syracuse rapper. I did several interviews with him, his family members and his friends and also went to see him perform at Funk N' Waffles, a fun cozy waffle joint/concert venue near campus. I actually knew him before I decided to take on the story and it was really great talking to him and learning more about his rapping and life in general. It's been fun but also ridiculously time-consuming. I seriously did not focus on anything else these past two weeks but doing the interviews, research, making sure the words sound right... writing is such a stressful process for me sometimes, but as I've said many times before it's always worth it . I'm really excited to see it published. It's the longest piece I'll have published to date! (1,800 words) so this is huge for me and I'm really happy about it and hope everyone likes it too. I think the issue will be released towards the end of March. I'll definitely post about it when it is :)

Last Spring, I decided to do a short profile piece for A-Line Magazine on campus. The profile was on Makoto Takada, a talented fashion designer who, after graduating from the Fashion Institute of Technology and winning a competition, was determined to make a name for himself in the fashion industry. The article is here. I remember it being really awesome because I was only supposed to gather bits of information based on what I could find online but there wasn't much. So instead, I searched him on Facebook, found him and messaged him. He got back to me almost immediately, eager to do a phone interview. He was extremely nice and super talented and it was just a pleasant surprise to be able to interview him since I wasn't expecting to. A couple of months later, I sent him the issue when it came out and he seemed to genuinely like the piece, which pleased me.

Anyway, to the point. I decided to send him an e-mail a few days ago to follow up and see how he was doing. Turns out, he is now the Associate Designer for up and coming fashion label, Thakoon. (The label has been profiled a few times by major magazines; Michelle Obama wore a Thakoon dress to the Democratic National Convention in 2008). Last time I spoke to Takada he was still working as a pattern maker and trying to figure out where he wanted to go next and how he would do so - so to learn that a year later he's quickly moving forward and loving it is really inspiring. He's prepping for Fashion Week with the label's Fall '10 line. How exciting! It makes me so happy to see the transformation from dreamer to a dream come true.

Just thought I'd share. :)