I love corn. I love casserole. When you put corn and casserole together, it’s a match made in my heaven (in my mouth). I usually buy the savory corn pie at Trader Joe’s, but it is a seasonal product only sold in the fall. I had to figure out a way to eat this treat year-round!
I have been wanting to do this recipe for a while, and finally got around to do it. It tasted really good! This version of corn pie is very popular in Trinidad, it is also vegan.
Like many people on YouTube, I am a big fan of Tim and Fred Williams, 22-year-old twins from Gary, Indiana, who have been uploading reaction videos to the music they heard for the first time. At first, they were just reacting to rap music, but then they started getting recommendations to listen to music outside of their usual taste like rock, pop, and R&B. They went viral when they reviewed Phil Collins’s “In the Air Tonight.” The joy they get out of discovering new music is the same joy I get when I hear a cool jam.
But I always wondered how they are just hearing this music for the first time. I get it if certain music isn’t your jam, but not hearing it at all amazed me. Here is their explanation.
Okay, I get that they had a sheltered, religious upbringing, but what about other Gen Z kids?
It is so different for kids today. Tim and Fred are mostly likely the norms in their cohort when you think about it. Most young people are digital natives and get all their music from streaming services. They don’t listen to top 40 radio, and MTV doesn’t really show music videos anymore. Today, it is very easy to create a whole musical experience where you only listen to a particular type of music with a few clicks on Spotify, Pandora, or Apple Music.
When I was a teenager growing up in the 1990s, life was so different. Long before the internet was a thing, I used to watch MTV all the time. It was the only TV network geared towards teenagers at the time, and it was the tastemaker for what was hot in music. Like many teens, I would watch MTV for hours and watched a lot of music videos. I always looked forward to new videos from Michael Jackson or Madonna. I primarily listen to hip-hop and R&B. Although I wasn’t into rock music, I definitely knew who Pearl Jam and Nirvana were because they were in heavy rotation on MTV at the time. I also watched VH1 for the classic rock and pop. You were exposed to all types of music at that time, and because of that exposure, I love all types of music. I love anything with a good beat!
I love music so much that at one time, I wanted to be a music journalist who covered all the hot musical acts for Rolling Stone or Vibe magazine. Music is literally the soundtrack to my life. If you ever see me about time, I am most likely listening to my playlist of over 2,000 songs on my phone or iPod Nano (Yes, people still use them).
It’s just too bad a lot of kids today don’t have that same exposure. I am always on the lookout for good music, no matter the genre. Since June, I have been listening to this playlist of protest jazz from WHRB and learning about its history in the fight for equity and justice. Check it out.
The current political divide in our country has resurfaced the issue of free speech and book access. I have been following this recent controversy surrounding Powell’s Books‘ decision to carry Unmasked: Inside Antifa’s Radical Plan to Destroy Democracy, a new book by Andy Ngo. The conservative journalist has made a name for himself after the 2019 Proud Boy march, as well as this year’s Black Lives Matter protests in Portland, Oregon. His new book focuses on his reporting of Antifa.
The bookstore’s decision to carry the book has caused a major uproar in Portland, with angry protesters in front of the store. The store decided to no longer carry the book in the physical store, but sell it on their website.
“In the interest of fostering thoughtful dialogue and illuminating American discourse as it stands — as opposed to how we wish it looked — we allow both righteous and deplorable books to share our virtual and physical shelves,” the bookstore said in a statement.
I agree. Bookstores are supposed to be defenders of free speech, even speech they don’t agree with. It is antithetical for bookstores to censor books. Just because the store sells a particular book, it doesn’t mean that it endorses the book, nor is anyone forcing customers to buy the book!
I once worked in a bookstore, and we sold many books I didn’t personally agree with or had any interest in reading myself. Also, it is not good for business, and not in the way you would initially think. Book censorship becomes a slippery slope into a rabbit hole you can’t come back from. If you come out against one book, then you would have to also ban other similar books. Then when you don’t ban the other similar books, you are accused of hypocrisy. Powell Books also sells Mein Kampf on its website, and I don’t see protesters trying to ban it. I bet these protesters would be singing a different tune if this was a conservative-leaning bookstore censoring a liberal book!
Free speech is not a liberal or conservative issue; it’s a democracy issue. There are more people on the democratic side than the other side.
In addition, this also affects customer psychology. Most customers expect to browse a physical or online store and explore different books and ideas of their choosing, But once you become the bookstore known for censoring books, it changes how customers view your store. They might think the store is making judgments about their reading choices, and that might turn them off from shopping with the store. I have a friend who stopped shopping at a particular bookstore because a store cashier continuously gave her ugly looks whenever she asked about libertarian-leaning books. She now buys all her books from Amazon. Ultimately, independent bookstores are only hanging by a thread financially, and need every customer they can get.
Honestly, Ngo’s book probably wouldn’t have been gotten all the attention it has received if it wasn’t for the protesters. Without the protests, the book probably would have sold meagers copies and faded into obscurity. If I was the bookstore owner, I probably would have buried the book in the book stacks instead of a floor display, sold it online, and did special orders if customers came in requesting it.
It’s a democracy issue.
At the beginning of the pandemic last year, I needed to find comfort in things that would distract me from the COVID. I read a lot of books and binged watched Netflix, but I always had a hard time concentrating. I realized how stressed and anxious the pandemic was making me.
Then I happened upon this little gem on Animal Planet called “The Vet Life.” I always found comfort in watching animals, but there was a whole lot more to love about this wonderful reality show. “The Vet Life” follows three black veterinarians who run an animal hospital in Houston. There is so much to like about it; the three stars are HBCU grads, they run the hospital like a family business, and they have beautiful black families. It is also very educational. I have learned so much about animal health and behavior from this program.
This is a great example of a positive black reality show. I wish there were more shows like “The Vet Life” and less of the garbage like “Love and Hip-Hop”…