Aliya S. King

Okay, dear readers. It’s Wednesday. Hump day. And if you’re on the East Coast it is BRICK outside and you, like me, are happy to be out of the cold. Let’s snuggle up together and have some fun.

It’s time for the first http://www.aliyasking.wordpress.com CONTEST!!

(Damn. Wish I had chosen a more catchy name for my blog. That’s a mouthful.)

And actually, this is our second contest. The first one came about in my post on getting my own office. I mentioned that I had to give up my daily Starbucks habit in order to pay the rent. I dared anyone to top my extra-long order. Here’s the quote from that post:

I even adopted my very own super long annoying Starbucks order: a grande triple shot caramel macchiato, extra hot with soy milk, no foam and no whip. ( The first reader who can top that long ass order will get a Starbucks card worth the value of your own long-ass drink order. Seriously.)

Well, my dear reader Kim Osorio was first, in the comments section, with an order that makes absolutely no sense:

Ridiculous.

Skim? And whip? How does that combination make sense? And what does it mean to order something “wet”? And will they really heat it up to a specific temperature that you request? And isn’t 145 degrees WAY too hot?!

Anyway, Kim, I was going to just go to Starbucks and buy you a card worth $4.92, which is what that drink costs at my Starbucks. But I wanted to buy one online, customized with your order. It’s so cute how you can do it. BUT. The smallest denomination you can buy is 15.00.

Now here at http://www.aliyasking.wordpress.com, I want to keep it real with my prizes. So I sprung for the personalized card with enough cash for THREE of your silly drink orders. I designed it with the instructions for your order and it even has your name on it:

Cute, right? Well whenever I get around to actually SEEING Kim in person, her card is ready! I had to scan it so that my dear readers know I am no slouch. If I say we’re having a contest (with prizes!) we’re having a contest!

Okay.

We’re gonna play a game called Guess Who. I’ll play a clip from an interview I’ve done. You will listen and try to figure out who it is. First a few housekeeping rules:

1. I don’t know how to make my audio player embed on my site. (Grrrrrr!!) So each time  you click on the audio link, when you’re done listening, you will have to use your back button to come back here. Sorry about that. I don’t know how to fix it and the wordpress people won’t help me!

2. The sound quality from one of the clips is a bit crappy. It sounds like its fading in and out. That’s because I downloaded some software for editing audio. And until you pay 42 bucks for the license, they distort your audio. Some nerve! Anyway. I ain’t paying for no license just yet. So deal with it.

3. The winning response will come from the Comments section of this wordpress page ONLY. If you respond to the Note on Facebook or the facebook mesage or my status or my inbox, you will be disqualified. It’s only fair that there be ONE place for the winner to be culled. First one with all the correct answers who posts in the comments section HERE, (not on Facebook), is the winner. I will announce the winner before posting tomorrow’s post, around this time.

3.You have to give me the person’s first and last name. And you have to tell me what high school they went to. (Yup. I’m making it a challenge).

4. There are certain people who are BANNED from this contest. Please note the following names. I apologize. But you know how when you participate in a sweepstakes for Kellogg’s or something and it clearly states in the rules that no one who works for the company or is related to anyone who works for the company can claim the prize? Well yeah, that’s how its going down over here. There are certain people a little too close to these stories. Not fair for the rest of my dear readers…

Here’s the list of banned folks:

Jermaine Hall, (and by default, his lovely wife Leslie, ’cause I know Jermaine would cheat and give her the answers), Anita Johnson, (and by default, her dad and her uncle for the same reasons), TheHusband, (whom I believe may lurk on this site but I have no clue), Victoria Pratt, my nephew Jordan Cagle and his girlfriend Tiffany, my assistant, Shydel James and TheGirl, who sat by my desk while I transcribed each of these interviews.

Now let’s get started.

Celebrity No. 1.

I interviewed this person last year. I liked her a lot but she was very subdued during the interview. The only time she got really excited was when I asked her about what singers she really liked. She thought about it for a second and then she remembered who her favorite singer was at that time and in this clip, she tells me about whose music she’s loving to death…whoisthis1

Celebrity No. 2

This interview took place early last year. It has not yet been published. But will be published this summer. I have interviewed this person on several occasions for an in-depth piece I have been working on for quite some time. Occasionally, he gets frustrated with me and the whole interview process. This was one of those times…whoisthis2

Celebrity No. 3

This is my favorite interview. Ever. And one day, I will devote an entire post to this woman’s sheer awesomeness. I thought I wouldn’t like her–at ALL. But she had me at hello. This interview took place in her home, over the span of two days. (The first night, in mid-interview, Jay-Z popped up to visit and she had to kick me out. She called me the next day and invited me to come back and finish the interview…)  In this clip, she talked about how the home we were in for the interview was the first place she’d ever lived on her own completely…whoisthisclip3

Now, for the prize….(*looks around her house*).

I don’t have one. So I’ll give you a choice. You can either have:

1. An autographed copy of Keep The Faith. But um, it will only be autographed by me. Not Faith. She’s in LA.  And just so you know, this was NOT a freebie. I bought this copy myself with my own money on the day it came out. You know I had to do that. I had to go to Barnes and Noble and look for the book on display. I was so geeked it was ridiculous. I stood online and I came thisclose to telling the cashier THIS IS MY BOOK!! But I didn’t. I just bought it and kept it moving.

Oh. And I did that like three times. That same day. At three different bookstores. But I digress. You can also have…

2. A copy of a really good CD I heard recently. His name is Anthony David. And he has a song called “Words” with India.Arie that I just love.

Can we talk for a minute about how BEAUTIFUL India’s looking in this video?! I don’t love the hair. (Are those braids? In a headwrap that’s only semi-wrapped?) But you know: She is not her hair and all that. But the dress and the shoes and that banging body is doing it!!

Anthony David’s whole CD is pretty good. And I’m sure my FacebookFriend, Elise Wright, who works at UniversalRepublic, would love to send our winner an (autographed?) copy of the CD as a prize. (Um. Right Elise? Right!) And if not, hell, I’ll go find a record store and buy it for ya.

So there we have it. Get to it my dear readers. Enjoy!

This entry was posted on January 15, 2009 at 2:24 am and is filed under Hump Day Contest: Guess Who!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.