Dear Democrats in Georgia's 6th House District:

You've got no excuses now.

If you want Donald John Trump out of there, you're going to have to vote for Thomas Jonathan Ossoff this coming Tuesday.

That's all there is to it.

You just can't afford to sit this one out...the way some of you not only sat out last year's US presidential election, but also the 2010 and 2014 midterms. 

Some people here in America don't think any sort of anti-Trump resistance is taking place. After all, Democrats are 0 for 2 in special elections thus far this year. Kansans in what used to be Mike Pompeo's US House district rejected James Thompson, the Democrat who was trying to take the seat out of Republican hands. 

And Montanans just got through demonstrating that they wanted Republican Greg Gianforte (who beat up a reporter, Ben Jacobs of The Guardian, on the eve of Big Sky Country's US House election, the effort to replace Ryan Zinke) instead of Democrat Rob Quist. 

You folks are the firewall. You can't afford to wait until next year and cross your fingers.

Registered Democrats have GOT to end their history of staying away from polling places whenever there's a midterm election or a special election.   

I mean, don't you understand, after all these years, that if you don't go out and cast a ballot, you give the opposition the choice?

Don't you remember how millions and millions and millions of Americans put their lives on the line- even gave up their lives- to expand the right to vote beyond White male landowners? 

You've got no excuses. None.

The cat didn't eat your homework. What's more, if you electronically turned in your homework, the cat didn't walk across your laptop and hit "Delete."

Matter of fact, I researched Ossoff's platform and that of his opponent, Karen Handel (who, in 2007, became the first elected Republican to serve as the Peach State's secretary of state). 

*First of all, the 30-year-old Ossoff has made suggestions that could save the US government $16 billion (an assertion Politifact agrees with). For example, if the government consolidated its data centers, it'd mean $5.4 billion extra to spend. And if the Department of Defense could try strategic sourcing, $4 billion would be freed up.

*If our businesses played with money the way America's government does, those firms would be in deep doo-doo. TJO wants to bring our government up to private-sector standards. (Think about this: The General Accounting Office found out that, in fiscal 2014, Uncle Sam made improper payments totaling $124.7 billion. Also, GAO found out 6.5 million active Social Security numbers have been set aside for people over the age of 112...despite the fact that only 42 such people the world over are currently drawing breath!)

*Jon Ossoff wants to promote high-tech and biotech research...at a time when today's GOP-led Congress wants to cut funding for the Centers for Disease Control, one of Georgia's top fifteen employers. 

*On top of that, he's out to prioritize STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) programs, colleges, universities, and technical schools. Ossoff would like to let college students refinance their loan repayment programs and, in the process, reap the benefits of lower interest rates.

*Atlanta native Ossoff supports abortion rights and access to contraceptives.

*He doesn't want nonviolent drug offenders imprisoned. (With those nonviolent drug offenders clogging up the jails, where's the room for the convicted murderers, sex offenders, what have you?)

*Jon won't raise your taxes; in fact, he's in favor of lowering taxes for small businesses.

*Ossoff wants the United States to stay in the Paris climate accord.

*Although he doesn't want a single-payer health-care system, he's in favor of keeping the Affordable Care Act the law of the land. (Don't get him started on the proposed ACA replacement, the so-called American Health Care Act.)

*To top it all off, this son of an Australian mother will work for comprehensive immigration reform...the kind that strengthens enforcement along the US-Mexico border and makes a citizenship path for America's 11 million undocumented immigrants.

If you flip this platform around, you can just imagine what Handel's platform looks like. 

Still, here it is:

*Handel wants to repeal the ACA (as did Tom Price, the new HHS secretary whose House seat Ossoff and Handel are after) and replace it with the AHCA...a proposal that, contrary to Republican assertions, reduces protections for preexisting conditions (in addition to taking health insurance away from at least 23 million Americans!). 

*She's made it clear that she opposes the minimum wage: "I do not support a livable wage."  
*Handel opposes abortion rights, government funding of Planned Parenthood, and embryonic stem-cell research.

*Karen wants to limit Uncle Sam's role in combating climate change; she'd rather leave it up to the states and their cities. What's more, she doesn't believe that we human beings are the biggest reason the world's average temperature has gone up.

*And, of course, Handel doesn't want an automatic (or any kind of) path to citizenship for those undocumented immigrants. 

*Do you remember when the 55-year-old Handel was an executive with Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure? Remember when, in 2012, the foundation pulled back a $700,000 grant to Planned Parenthood to fund mammograms and other breast-cancer-related services?

The cutoff was completely and totally political.

And it had Handel's fingerprints all over it.

The same woman who purged voter rolls as soon as she became Georgia's secretary of state five years earlier. 

So there you are, Democrats in GA-6. Take it from me, a man who, in 1986, failed to cast a ballot in an historic election here in Nebraska.

Two women- a first here in these fifty states- fought for Bob Kerrey's gubernatorial seat as he sought a seat in the US Senate. Instead of former Lincoln Mayor Helen Boosalis keeping the governor's mansion in Democratic hands,

State Treasurer Kay Orr put it back in the GOP's lap.

My excuse: "I ran out of time before I had to go to work."

I got raked over the coals for my decision...and ever since, I've made it a point to cast a ballot every chance I could get.

This one's too important to pass up...especially if you want Trump impeached and then convicted (before he and his people do further damage to America and its reputation).

Please...get up off your excuses and VOTE for Jon Ossoff! 

Sincerely, Jim Boston

Let's write carefully out there...or at least try to

Last week, a memo was placed on the bulletin board just inside the apartment building I live in.

The message was to get tenants to move their vehicles out of the parking lot used by the residents of the whole apartment complex...because the lot was going to be STRIPPED. 

We were warned that if we didn't move our cars/trucks/SUVs/vans by this morning, our gas guzzlers (or gas savers) would be towed...at tenant expense.

Today, this work began. (To prepare for it, I moved my car- the same car from last month's post- into an adjacent parking lot. That lot used to belong to a bowling alley...but now the lot belongs to the church that bought the building where bowlers used to roll strikes, spares, and gutters.) 

I spent this morning looking for heavy construction equipment.

The backhoe(s) never showed up.

That's because the parking lot in front of the building I live in got STRIPED. 

Abso-freaking-lutely right: A truck pulled into the lot to repaint stripes for parking spaces. 

And now, after less than an hour's work, the lot's ready for use again.

Just like that. 

Funny the difference an extra "R" makes...especially in a world where certain journalists (and some of the media executives paying them) here in the world's most talked-about nation have spent the last 130 days professing to rediscover the truth after spending the last two years treating it like a toothache or like a migraine headache. 

Oh, well...

Carjacked!

At 11:35 PM on Wednesday, 4-19-2017, I parked my car on 49th Street between Hamilton and Caldwell Streets, next door to the apartment building I live in. (No space was available in the building's parking lot.)

Before I could shut the ignition off, a man in his twenties or thirties approached me. I went ahead and rolled my car's left front window down.

First thing he asked me: "Do you have a cigarette?"

"No," I told him. "I don't smoke."

"Do you have a cell phone that works?" he asked me.

"No, I don't," I answered.

This same man then pulled a gray semiautomatic handgun, pointed the gun at me, and asked me for my car keys. After I turned the ignition off and relinquished the keys, he instructed me to "Run down the street. I won't try to hurt you." 

He pointed toward Caldwell Street, and I ran down Caldwell...for a few seconds. 

I then turned around and saw him speed up 49th Street before he made a right turn to Hamilton.

After that, I jogged (and eventually walked quickly) toward home. 

At 11:45 PM, I called the Omaha Police and reported the theft. About a half hour later, two officers and, later, a detective stopped to interview me about the carjacking.

This incident DOES have a happy ending:

At 1:57 AM that Thursday morning, the police phoned me to let me know that my vehicle was found...in a parking lot at the 3000 block of South 104th Plaza.  

Two more OPD officers stopped by outside the apartment building I live in to deliver my car...and I was able to drive it again at 2:56 AM that Thursday morning.

The car was left intact.

In fact, the thief not only left $2.14 in change in my 2006 car...he also left a Black & Mild cigar band inside the car (as well as the cigar's wrapper).  

I LUCKED OUT!!

Even so, the second-guessing already has begun: A loved one told me that "I would've just rolled the window back up and driven off."

With my luck, I would've been shot and killed for rolling the window back up. 

This is why I've felt reluctant all these years to tell loved ones about personal troubles. When I make a move to try and change all that, this is what I get: "I would've just rolled the window back up and driven off."

Things just AREN'T that simple! 

This morning, a reporter from one of the local TV stations interviewed me about the incident as part of that station's report tonight about local carjackings.

I originally intended to tune in...but because of tonight's second-guessing by this loved one, I won't watch tonight. 

I mean, it's not enough that the last 94 hours have been ruined because of this carjacking.

It doesn't matter to that second-guesser that I'm safe and that I got my car back. 

Here's my question for the second-guessers out there:

"With all that I've been going through these last sixteen months, how would you feel if this carjacker had gone on and shot and killed me?

"Who would you turn to next to dump on? HUH?" 

An Omaha landmark for 22 years

On Saturday, 3-11-2017, one of the Omaha/Council Bluffs/Bellevue area's best and most famous places to eat called it quits.

I'm talking about the Pizza Shoppe and Pub (AKA Pizza Shoppe Collective), located at 6056 Maple St., Omaha, NE 68104.

From the day in 1995 that the restaurant first opened its doors, the Pizza Shoppe served up some of the best pizza in town (well, I like to think it did!), along with a variety of sandwiches, salads, and oven-baked pastas. 

PSP/PSC served up something else that was superb: Live entertainment.

Some of the best local bands (such as Clark and Co.) played the Pizza Shoppe

...as did some of the best solo acts in the Omaha Metro.

And down through the years, restaurant owner Amy Ryan and operations manager Carla Kerrigan opened up the Pizza Shoppe and Pub to different nonprofit organizations so that the groups could do fundraisers.

One such group was Omaha Together One Community, which held a 2013 fundraiser at the Maple Street eatery. (Man, that fundraiser was a success!)

The OTOC fundraiser inspired the Great Plains Ragtime Society (the folks responsible for the local Ragtime to Riches Festival) to try its luck at drawing a crowd at the Pizza Shoppe. 

Result: Starting in 2014, Amy, Carla, and the rest of the staff greenlighted the first Sunday night in November for Ragtime Night at the Pizza Shoppe. 

For the 2014 and 2015 events, Bob Arsenault and I teamed up to play for the eaters.

Last year, though, things didn't work out for Bob (what with the busy, busy schedule he and his wife Pat went through during 2016)...so I ended up being the whole bill. 

Still, all three Ragtime Nights at the Pizza Shoppe were fun! 

We drew some good crowds for Ragtime Night, with 2015 being the most successful incarnation (GPRS earned $99 that time...10% of what the restaurant took in that entire Sunday).

Here's what prompted the decision to close down the Shoppe: Amy accepted a new gig...that of operating the Benson Theater, next door at 6054 Maple St.  

But beginning next month, if you're still looking for a deep-dish delight (or a thin-crust one) at 6056, you'll be in luck: David and Brenda Losole will start up a new eating place, Virtuoso Pizzeria. [Currently, David's still at the family restaurant, Lo Sole Mio (3001 S. 32nd Ave., 68105).] 

Here's wishing David and Brenda...as well as Amy and Carla...all the very best. 

Now, you KNOW I love me some "Storytime!"

Every Saturday morning at 9:00 AM (Central time), KPAO- Omaha's public-access TV station that's available on Cox Channel 22 and CenturyLink Channel 89- shows a half-hour program called Storytime with Lydia. 

I started watching it last year...after finding out about the show online. (Oh, the power of the Internet!)

Storytime with Lydia first came on the air a couple of years ago, occupying the 9:30 AM-10:00 AM slot on KPAO. And initially, it was a mother-daughter collaboration as far as hosting was concerned: A local teacher named Jill Bruckner and her then nine-year-old daughter, Lydia.

Also at first, the series' name was Story Time. 

As first conceived, the show featured Lydia talking about what she'd read and why she enjoyed what she'd read. It was really fun to watch Lydia and her mom banter away. (I'll never forget the time Lydia told the viewers about what it was like to read "Morgan and the Artist," a children's book James Cross Giblin and Donald Carrick came up with in 1985. It was about a troll- Morgan- who inspired a painter. Eventually, Jill playfully asked Lydia how people get snail mail...and Jill tried to tell the folks trolls deliver it. But Lydia playfully exclaimed: "No trolls!") 

That lively, unrehearsed mother-daughter banter sold me on the show. 

In time for the show's second campaign, a "BYOB" segment was added; in it, the Two Bruckners invited a guest to bring his or her own favorite book and discuss the publication. 

Now in its fourth season, it's no longer Story Time. Instead, it's Storytime with Lydia. (Jill went upstairs to become the show's executive producer.)

I loved the old format...and this new format (unveiled on 2-18-2017) rocks, too!

The new setup starts out with Lydia talking shop with SWL's newly-hired floor director, Gladys Schmadys. (It's basically the same playful banter that Lydia and Jill got into in the former setup.)

After the opening credits roll, the next segment is "Author's Corner," where Lydia interviews a local writer. [You'd be surprised how effective this eleven-year-old girl is as an interviewer. (Take THAT, Matt Lauer!)]

Some more Bruckner-Schmadys banter takes over, then it leads to the next segment, "Lydia on Location," in which the young host visits a local business or some other attraction (in the season opener, it was Don Carmelo's Pizzeria)

to show the viewers just how things tick over there.  

This whole season is dedicated to Jim Nelson, the KPAO station manager who died last month.

At KPAO, Jim mentored Jill, Lydia, and Lydia's big sister Madeline Lynch (who, at first, was the show's director).

And it was all because Jim thought it'd be cool to bring a show like this- where a youngster talks about how cool reading actually is- to the airwaves. 

If you think it's cool, too, get on Facebook and "like" Storytime with Lydia, check out the show's YouTube channel, and if you live here in the Omaha/Council Bluffs/Bellevue area...just tune in every Saturday morning.

Don't be surprised to find out that Lydia Bruckner will blow you away.

A playoff cycle for the books!

The first six-touchdown performance in the history of these "shoulda-coulda-woulda" Division 1-A football playoffs...the first second-round loss by a Number One seed in six years...a team that'd been 0-2 in playoff appearances finally rising up to win a pair of postseason contests...a Mid-American Conference team making the Final Four for the first time...and a new color in the throne room.

Well, I'm just going to cut to the chase and tell you how the 2016 edition of this version of a big-school NCAA football playoff went down: 

FIRST ROUND (seeding in parentheses): Michigan (9) 63, Oklahoma State (24) 21; San Diego State (16) 28, Toledo (17) 7; Colorado (13) 30, USC (20) 23; Wisconsin (12) 31, Nebraska (21) 0; Florida State (19) 41, Western Kentucky (14) 34; Stanford (22) 24, South Florida (11) 21; Louisville (18) 28, Temple (15) 14; West Virginia (10) 31, Appalachian State (23) 27

SECOND ROUND: Michigan 37, Alabama (1) 22; San Diego State 28, Boise State (8) 7; Ohio State (5) 21, Colorado 13; Washington (4) 42, Wisconsin 10; Penn State (6) 46, Florida State 7; Clemson (3) 30, Stanford 21; Oklahoma (7) 28, Louisville 21; Western Michigan (2) 19, West Virginia 3

QUARTERFINAL ROUND: Michigan 42, San Diego State 17; Washington 13, Ohio State 12; Penn State 38, Clemson 27; Western Michigan 35, Oklahoma 28

SEMIFINAL ROUND: Washington 20, Michigan 6; Penn State 34, Western Michigan 20

CHAMPIONSHIP GAME: Penn State 29, Washington 13

Now...on to the highlights!

FIRST ROUND: Freshman RB Chris Evans (12) keyed the Wolverines' rout of the Cowboys by scoring six TDs- four on the ground, one on a catch, and the other on an 84-yard punt return- to break Ki-Jana Carter's one-game record of five, set in 1994 (still the mark for a championship game)...after two first-round failures (1986 and 2015), Aztecs rode RB Donnel Pumphrey's 18-carry, 200-yard spree to victory over the Rockets...Hilltoppers' 30 first downs (and 574-527 yardage edge) weren't enough to stop the Seminoles, who won the game when WR Kermit Whitfield ran it in from seven yards with 3:05 to go in the fourth quarter...in a battle of Mountaineers, West Virginia pulled it out with 4:15 left in the fourth on RB Justin Crawford's two-yard scoring jaunt after K Michael Rubino's 48-yard field goal gave Appalachian State a brief 27-24 lead...Buffaloes avenged a 20-5 loss to the Trojans when QB Sefo Liufau scooted to paydirt from the USC 11...Badgers capitalized on Husker QB Tommy Armstrong's absence (due to an injury against Iowa) by limiting Nebraska to 229 total yards and by avoiding turnovers and penalties...RB Christian McCaffrey (20 runs, 133 yards, 2 TDs) helped Cardinal overcome Bulls' 14-10 halftime lead.

SECOND ROUND: Broncos dismissed the Men from Morgantown by holding WVU to a sickening 76 total yards (44 on the ground, 32 in the air)...RB Saquon Barkley (23 rushes, 101 yards) and QB Trace McSorley (two TD passes, two rushing scores) keyed Nittany Lions' dismantling of Seminoles...QB Baker Mayfield hooked up with WR Dede Westbrook for a 54-yard TD to advance Sooners over Cardinals (and their Heisman-winning QB, Lamar Jackson)...McCaffrey took the opening kickoff 100 yards for a score, but Tigers overcame all that with QB Deshaun Watson's three TD tosses (and 20-of-29 passing for 187 yards)...the Pumphrey Express flattened Boise State (he gained 131 yards on 23 tries and scored a TD)...QB Jake Browning's four air scores (18-29-359 yards-2 INTs on the night) helped Huskies oust Badgers...Crimson Tide outgained Wolverines, 334-253, and kept Evans out of the end zone- but six sacks by Michigan's defense led to Alabama's demise (six years after Wisconsin embarrassed top-seeded Auburn, 28-21, in the second round). 

QUARTERFINAL ROUND: 19 Tiger penalties (for 131 yards) caused Clemson to waste Watson's 38-49-358 yard-3 TD-2 INT effort...for the first time ever, a team from the Mid-American Conference reached the semifinals- because WMU QB Zach Terrell flipped a one-yard scoring toss to WR Corey Davis with 4:54 remaining in regulation to kick the Sooners out of the playoffs...in what was a game of three-pointers, WR Aaron Fuller won it for the Huskies by running a punt back 80 yards to daylight (after returning just one other punt during the season- and that for five yards)...QB Wilton Speight's five TD throws (he went 20 for 31 for 311 yards and two picks) helped the Wolverines bury the Aztecs.

SEMIFINAL ROUND: Terrell outdueled McSorley (316 passing yards to 290), but Trace flicked three air scores to Zach's two- and got help from Barkley, who ran 24 times for 121 yards...Huskies held Wolverines to 272 total yards- 54 on the ground (in 28 carries); meanwhile, Browning and WR Chico McClatcher hooked up for two scoring strikes.

CHAMPIONSHIP GAME: Barkley (this season's playoff MVP) toted the Nittany Lions on his back by scoring a pair of TDs (while running 24 times for 88 yards).

Result: Penn State won it all for the first time since 1994 (when the team from State College, PA crushed Kansas State, 63-14, in Carter's monster game).

The Nittany Lions kept the "shoulda-coulda-woulda" crown in Big Ten Conference hands (Iowa was last season's champ after stopping Alabama, 14-7, in overtime).

The Blue and White became the fourth club in the history of these playoffs to win it all under two different head coaches- joining Nebraska (Tom Osborne in 1982, 1989, 1990, 1993, and 1997 and Frank Solich in 1999), Miami (FL) (Dennis Erickson turned the trick in 1992, followed nine years later by Larry Coker), and Ohio State (which won in 1996 under John Cooper, then did it again in 2005, 2007, and 2010- all on Jim Tressel's watch).

And 22 years after Joe Paterno brought the crown to Happy Valley, James Franklin got it done...and became the first African American to head up a champion in this version of a D-1-A playoff. 

Had Washington come through, Chris Peterson would've made "shoulda-coulda-woulda" history, too...as the first head coach to take two different teams to the top. (His Boise State squad went all the way in 2006 and 2008.)

This playoff cycle was truly one for the books.

Can the 2017 playoffs top that? 

I'm Jim Boston...thanks for reading this blog!

Good riddance to 2016

For billions (well, at least millions) of people all over the world, 2016 was a trying, bad, horrible, no-good twelve-month period.

From personal problems all the way to global issues, this year was a testing one...to say the least. 

The way I see it, the clincher came on 11-8-2016.

Because 62 million Americans preferred this man to run this country's government (and he got the magic number of electoral votes as a result), most of the world's remaining 7.1 billion people (including the 65 million US voters who wanted the first woman who ever won a major political party's presidential nomination here in these fifty states) received coal in their stockings. 

The Chinese didn't term this "The Year of the Monkey" for nothing...and they weren't talking about a dance from the 1960s. 

I hope we all can survive 2017...let alone see it turn into a Happy New Year.