It's on, it's on, it's ON!

This is the day of a consumer spending boycott.

The man behind it: John Schwarz, who founded an organization known as The People's Union. The boycott's all about protesting corporate greed, corporate leaders doing away with their companies' diversity-equity-inclusion policies, and the current White House's efforts to cut out those same programs at the federal level.

In this boycott, consumers are encouraged not to spend a single red cent during this 24-hour-period...unless it can be done at a local business (and with cash instead of cards).

Major retailers are the targets (no pun intended) of today's boycott.

I know, I know...we're told consumer boycotts don't always work.

Still...what can rank-and-file Americans do to let corporate CEOs and the politicians these bigwigs bankroll know this country's everyday people, as a group, have real power, too?

If you'd like to learn more about Schwarz' group and the future events it's got planned to protest corporate greed and other maladies, log onto https://thepeoplesunionusa.com.

By the way...I'm also participating in the boycott.

I sure could've used a helpful smile last Thursday

I'll never again shop at the Hy-Vee Food Store at 7910 Cass St. here in Omaha.

Chalk that up to a young sacker named Kyle.

At 1:34 PM on 4-18-2019, I pulled into the parking lot of the supermarket in question. I'd been a steady, loyal customer at that Hy-Vee for twenty years, and that Thursday, I was in a hurry and trying to get shopping done prior to going to my own job in a local plastics factory.

After putting a trio of letters in the mailbox in front of the store, I ran inside the store...ahead of two other customers who were about to walk in.

Kyle, who was changing the trash bag in a wastebasket in front of the store, saw me, and told me: "Don't ever do that again...cutting in front of customers."

I turned around and saw Kyle.

I was flabbergasted.

I tried to explain myself, and that I was in a hurry, and that the week hadn't been too cool for me...but Kyle didn't want to hear from me.

I tried to apologize. Kyle still didn't want to hear from me.

Kyle told me- three times- to move on. Each time, he gestured me away from his view.

The way I see it, young Kyle was trying hard to show off his White Supremacist views.

I'VE BEEN ANGRY EVER SINCE!

At 1:36 PM, I found a manager on duty: Chris. And I told him about Kyle and about the way Kyle treated me.

Chris assured me he'd talk to Kyle, and assured me that I'd done nothing wrong and that I had no reason to apologize.

Got my shopping done at 1:48 PM that Thursday, still angry about the way Kyle treated me.

I even yelled inside the store...and that got me a reprimand from another manager on duty, Wendy.

So, to try and smooth things over, I apologized to Wendy and to the cashier who waited on me, Kay Lynne. (Kay Lynne and I had been able to get along quite well...and in fact, Kay Lynne showed much more understanding of the situation than Wendy.)

I continued to fume at my own job and couldn't wait to get home to send a nasty email to the store director at that Cass Street Hy-Vee (also known as the Peony Park Hy-Vee; a famous amusement park previously stood where that supermarket now does).

The angry email got sent off early last Friday; the next day, I heeded the message at the bottom of the receipt and took Hy-Vee's survey...and doggone right, I mentioned the 4-18-2019 incident.

In both documents, I mentioned that I'd never again shop at that particular Hy-Vee.

The store director emailed me and apologized for the whole thing.

Still, I'm going to start shopping at the Hy-Vee at 51st and Center Sts. here in the Big O.

I don't want to turn my back on the chain that promises "a helpful smile in every aisle."

I like Hy-Vee's wide selection...and that's the biggest reason I'd been shopping there all these years.

What I don't like is seeing racism in action.

And that's what Kyle, like too many others in my life, showed me.

Too many millions of Americans have felt emboldened ever since that walking toilet bowl gave that inaugural address on 1-20-2017...or ever since he won on 11-8-2016.

Kyle showed me he's one of the emboldened.

And I don't EVER want to be in his company again...for any damn reason. 

 

Guess what I'll be doing on Sundays this fall?

Well, I won't be watching National Football League action, that's for sure.

It's all because the owners of the league's 32 clubs have decided to ban kneeling during the singing/playing of "The Star-Spangled Banner."

Players must now stand during Francis Scott Key's claim to fame...or risk getting fined. 

The only other option for the NFL's athletes: Stay in the locker room until the song's finished.

I remember all the letters that appeared in the Omaha World-Herald during the 2017 NFL campaign...letters that asked those protesting football players to air their grievances "on their own time" rather than in front of stadiums full of people (as well as in front of millions of TV viewers).

Well, those Americans who gave their newspapers such letters have now gotten what they've been on their own knees begging for.

And it probably won't take long before some of those same letter writers attack any NFL players who actually use "their own time" to address issues such as police brutality. 

In time for last Wednesday's Washington Post, Shaun R. Harper (a professor at USC who runs the school's Race and Equity Center) turned in a heck of an editorial about the circuit's new kneeling ban. 

Harper talked about how the new edict is all about ethnicity. 

Out of over 1,700 NFL players who suited up last season, 70% are Black. Seven of the teams had African Americans as their head coaches.

Every last squad in the league is owned by White people.

And starting with head honcho Roger Goodell, most of the people who make up the power structure at NFL headquarters in New York City are Caucasian Americans.

Add it all up. 

Harper did just that, talking about how the kneeling ban signals that the team owners don't give a good, good hoot about fighting racism in America. In addition, he stated that "the league is only interested in Black men as laborers and entertainers, not as citizens with the right to use their influence to awaken our nation's racial consciousness, disrupt racism, and improve circumstances for members of their communities who are harmed by racist policies and practices."

The key word is "citizens."

Later on in that editorial, Harper (he's written a dozen books; his most famous one: "Scandals in College Sports") called on NFL players to sue the league over its efforts to hold back gridders' freedom of expression (we're talking First Amendment rights, you know!).  

SRH also talked about how he joined many other African-American football lovers in boycotting last year's NFL contests to show solidarity with Colin Kaepernick and other activist players.

Shaun, I'm a year late to the "party," but here I am.

I'll continue to read about the games in the paper and online.

I just won't watch the games on TV anymore...until the Jerry Joneses and Daniel Snyders lift that stupid kneeling ban and stop cozying up to a man who wanted one of those NFL teams earlier in this decade.

That's right...Donald John Trump.

Even if Trump and his enablers/supporters don't really get it, patriotism involves more than standing at attention when you hear, as George Carlin put it, the world's only national anthem that mentions rockets and bombs.

Much more. 

Tuesday, November 8, 2016

This date, too, will live in infamy.

That's because yesterday, hatred and bigotry won out.

That's all there is to it.  

Yesterday, American voters- as a whole- chose to replace Barack Obama with a PROVEN racist/sexist/misogynist/homophobe/Islamophobe who's studied Adolf Hitler's speeches.

And they were aided and abetted by the reporters, producers, and executives from the nation's biggest media companies...as well as by FBI director James Comey.

Many claim they never saw this coming. But they might have forgotten about how, in 2010, voters joined with those Democrats who chose to stay home in giving the US House of Representatives back to the Republicans...and, four years later, repeated the process with this country's Senate. 

Handing 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue back to the Elephants was the next step. 

Those who decided to go with Donald Trump just spat on the graves of all those American veterans who died during World War 2- people who gave up their lives in an effort to keep German/Italian/Japanese totalitarian rule from reaching America's shores. 

So now, as early as 1-20-2017, Trump could call a fascist government. 

I wouldn't put it past him, knowing his supersized ego.

It isn't as if we weren't warned, what with years of evidence that DJT doesn't give a hoot about rank-and-file citizens.

And when many of this country's Trump supporters find out he really doesn't give a crap about them, they'll express remorse over giving control of the US government to the one-time host of TV's The Apprentice...instead of letting one of the most qualified presidential nominees in history take the reins. 

Those Trump supporters' eventual tears and sadness will prove useless and meaningless. 

What's more, media personalities such as CNN's Dana Bash and NBC's Matt Lauer might privately express grief over allowing this con artist to become this year's Republican nominee, let alone the leader of the American people. And Bash's boss, Jeff Zucker (the same man who, when he was president of NBC Entertainment, got The Apprentice on the air), might eventually start expressing sadness...if only in private.

Me, I stopped watching corporate news programs the night of 11-4-2014. After all, news is news, not entertainment...contrary to what Zucker and CBS CEO Les Moonves teach.

But now, I'm going to stop watching ANYTHING the Big Media companies have to offer, now that this has happened. 

They have to pay for their part in bringing eventual (if not immediate) full-fledged fascist rule to the United States...just as those voters who thought Trump would be better than Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton must pay for their decision. 

If you're just as worked up about what just took place at the polls as I am (and yes, I voted yesterday), then you're welcome to join me in this boycott of CBS', Comcast's, Disney's, News Corporation's, and Time Warner's shows. 

Yesterday, America threw it all away.

With the whole world watching.

The Last One? (Part 2)

So far, the 41st Annual World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival had been some kind of fun (personal and otherwise)...from the Thursday tuneups at West Peoria's Sky Harbor Steakhouse to the ride on the Spirit of Peoria (an excursion I wouldn't have been allowed to take if the ticket seller at the dock hadn't recognized me from last year; I hadn't signed up in advance in 2015) to watching the New Rag Contest and the Duet Contest to playing in the party room (the very room where Duet and New Rag were staged). 

Still had an axe to grind.

Last year, at the very last moment at the very last OTPP afterglow party, I was jamming with two of the 2014 Regular Division finalists (including the man who'd just gotten through winning it all)...and the one who didn't win it all in 2014 liked what he was hearing from me.

He couldn't leave it at that.

This same contestant asked me: "Why don't you play like that onstage?" 

Then he instructed me to play alongside recordings.

I started doing that, first with a Sony Walkman, then- starting this past February- with an MP3 player I'd won at our company's picnic in September of last year.

When I can't take my MP3 player to a piano practice session, I'll work those rags out on an organ (in an effort to slow down). Or else I'll watch ragtime videos on YouTube and study them. 

Nevertheless, I was so darned put off by his (let's face it, Bill Edwards') question that I was all set to boycott the 2015 C&F party-room sessions. 

Boycott a party room? 

Isn't that a contradiction in terms?

Anyway, the Friday afterglow worked out fine, and I definitely was fired up about the next day...where nineteen contestants (eleven Regular Division ones and eight in the Junior Division) would duke it out. 

For 2015, the folks at the Old-Time Music Preservation Association changed some rules around to get more older contestants in there. (For a while, more JDs than RDs had gone out for OTPP 41.0.)

First of all, they decided to change the cutoff year for contest songs to 1939 (it previously was 1929). 

Second, contest coordinator Faye Ballard was given the green light to put her contestant's hat back on.

Then they did the unthinkable:

Ted Lemen and Co. opened this year's competition to Regular Division pianists who'd previously retired undefeated. 

Well, the philosophy was: "If we're going to go out...we're going out WITH A BANG!!"

And all nineteen of us were going to show our stuff on...a 2010s era Charles Walter studio piano. (The plan was originally to replace the famous 1883 Weber upright with a 2015, fresh-out-of-the-box Knabe studio model...but the Knabe proved too stiff for many of this year's hopefuls. So, the fresh-out-of-the-crate piano was put in the other party room and the Walter shifted over to the contest stage at the hotel's conference center.) 

And Michigander Will Bennett became the first OTPP competitor to show the contest audience what the Walter can do...and he took advantage of the new song rules by playing "Jeepers Creepers" and "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)."

The crowd got a second helping of the Wolverine State Sound when John Remmers stepped up to the stage. John (a retired college professor) decided not to dip his toes into the waters of the 1930s, feeling comfortable with "My Sunny Tennessee" and "Scott Joplin's New Rag."

The next two performers were new to the contest...and neither one was from Michigan.

Junior Division contestant (and Illinoisan) Amberlyn Aimone turned in a pair of rags also written by ol' Scott himself: "Swipesy" and "The Ragtime Dance."

Nina Freeman (a JD'er) made the trip that fellow Texan Melissa Roen Williams had signed up for a year ago (and didn't take). And Nina made the trip really count by polishing off "Fig Leaf Rag" (Scott wrote it) and "Russian Rag," one of George Cobb's most famous compositions.

David Cavalari (fresh off his New Rag Contest triumph) put the ball back in the RD court in his bid to get back to that division's finals...and he started his 2015 quest out with a bang, playing "Fingerbuster" and "The Finger Breaker." 

Then came the first performer to jump in on the most drastic rule change of all.

Instead of cohosting the ceremonies alongside Ted, Adam Swanson jumped back into the ring to add to his already matchless list of OTPP championships...and he launched his 2015 effort by saluting Eubie Blake (the most famous composer to come out of Adam's new stomping grounds, Baltimore, MD) with "Memories of You" and "Troublesome Ivories." 

Pennsylvanian Michael J. Winstanley was the fifth of the eleven Regular Division performers to go up to bat, and he played "Deed I Do" (one of my favorite 1920s tunes) and "That Eccentric Rag."

Then came the youngest of the three Duet Contest partnerships.

Nathan Beasley went up first; he knocked it out with Luckey Roberts' "Pork and Beans" and Mark Janza's "Aviation Rag."

Fellow JD'er Danny Souvigny was trying to hook a third championship in that division (to go with his 2012 and 2014 triumphs). This year, Danny took to the stage with "After You've Gone" and "Go Wash an Elephant."

Adam Yarian (a Marylander-turned-Californian; he now lives and works in Los Angeles) was the last to go to the Charles Walter studio piano prior to the Saturday session's lunch break. The first C&F contestant to win three JD titles and three RD championships, Adam Y. showed the Embassy Suites crowd just how he helped raise the bar at a time when Adam S. was starting out (and learning fast!) as a contestant. 

Adam Y. gave 'em "Handful of Keys" and "The Pearls."

Well, lunch time came and went; contest fans had a dizzying array of places to eat within (at the very least) walking distance of the Embassy Suites East Peoria...like the Steak 'n' Shake next door.

The place was packed.

In fact, that restaurant was so packed that Saturday afternoon that I had to leave that S 'n' S without eating a single bite.

This year, I drew eleventh position...and so, I had to kick off the second half of this year's prelims. (Yep...I followed Adam Y.)

I turned in a "Hardhearted Hannah" that had the same beat as Del Wood's version of "Down Yonder;" after that, I did "In My Merry Oldsmobile." 

For "Olds," I took inspiration from 1980s-1990s OTPP contestant Mark Lutton, who used the lower keys to "start" his car. When it came to reworking "Hannah," I started thinking about all the crap some people at the C&F had given me through the years- from Steve Foster scolding me for starting over in a practice session in 1993 to Bill Edwards' 2014 question- and I did something I'd never set out to do in competition before:

I hit the keys with my forearms during the middle of "Hardhearted Hannah."  

Well, the audience really liked it...and I'd never felt more comfortable about playing in C&F competition than on OTPP Saturday 2015.

Dan Mouyard- the first to win a Reg crown after taking a Junior title- came up to bat next, and he wowed 'em with "I Found a New Baby" and "Steeplechase Rag." (Morgan Siever, the top JD contestant in 2010 and 2011, rocked those same two numbers when she was in competition.)

And then came...the contest coordinator, a woman who, when she was twelve, almost won the whole ball of wax (at a time when everybody competed for just one top prize).

Faye's first foray into OTPP competition since 2010 worked out fine (well, I like to think so!)...and she turned in a couple of her old standbys, "Royal Garden Blues" and "Honky Tonk." (Sorry, Bill Doggett fans...not that "Honky Tonk.")

Speaking of JD...three more younger pianists weighed in at that moment. 

First up was the fifth of six Illinoisans to go at it in 2015, Megan Jobe (she came back after sitting out 2014).  

I'm glad Megan came back, for it gave the Embassy Suites crowd a chance to hear her unique style, which she brought to "Cleaning Up in Georgia" and "The Entertainer."

Fourteen down...five to go.

It would've been seven to go if Isaac Smith (who delayed Danny's march to three Junior Division championships by winning the division in 2013) hadn't gone to Des Moines to compete in the Iowa High School Track and Field Championships...and if Madeline Yara (from Mint Hill, NC; one of the Charlotte suburbs) had found two pre-1940 tunes to work on.

So...it was left to Isaac's and Madeline's younger siblings to carry on the family names in the OTPP battles.

And carry on they did. 

Mia Yara celebrated her thirteenth birthday by entering the New Rag Contest; the next day, she took to the Charles Walter to bat out "At the Jazz Band Ball" and "Mood Indigo."

Then the guitarist-keyboardist-vocalist in the Charlotte-area rock band Controll Freex (visit www.controllfreex.com) gave way to Eli Smith...who brought home "Grizzly Bear" and "Dizzy Fingers."

Two of last year's RD finalists were next...the two I jammed with at the final 2014 afterglow party at the Embassy Suites East Peoria.

Ethan Uslan (he's also Maddy's and Mia's old-time piano mentor) hadn't lost a beat in his effort to hang on to that Ted Lemen Traveling Trophy...and he started his defense of that title by firing up "Syboney" (I hope I spelled it right) and "Georgia on My Mind."

Bill himself (the only Bill in competition this time, since circumstances kept Bill McNally in the New York City area for Memorial Day weekend) was in fine, fine form himself as he brought back a couple of tunes he'd entered before: "Mississippi Rag" and "Toot, Toot Tootsie (Goodbye)." 

Leo Volker rounded out the 2015 prelims, using "Maple Leaf Rag" and "Magnetic Rag" to close out the Saturday leg of a one-Smith, one-Yara weekend in East Peoria. 

Well, that was it...nothing to do but (1) finish the food I'd finally gotten from Steak 'n' Shake and (2) join everybody else in finding out how the JD competition went. (To say nothing of wondering who was going to play the next day!)

When contest judges Paul Asaro, Patrick Holland, and Raymond Schwarzkopf came out of deliberation, they found out that Mia kept the Yara family rolling in the dough by pocketing $40 (good for fifth place in the Junior Division).

Nathan got fourth place among the J's (that's $60) and Eli made sure a Smith would get paid (he picked up $100, the third-place prize in the division). Meanwhile, Nina took her second-place prize of $125 back home to San Antonio, TX. 

And Danny S. still had the magic...and it made him $250 richer.

One question remained: "Who's gonna play in the Regular Division semifinals?"

Wait for my next post and you'll get the answer!