Good morning, and welcome to the Essential California newsletter. It’s Wednesday, April 7, and I’m writing from Los Angeles. Newsletter The stories shaping California Get up to speed with our Essential California newsletter, sent six days a week. Enter email address Sign Me Up You may occasionally receive promotional content […]
pandemic
Dale Pearson is no stranger to adventure — often with an element of danger — such as working with Discovery and History channels on deep ocean dives, including hunting and wrestling a giant Humboldt squid. The retired military contractor and dive specialist now concentrates on his business reconditioning the interiors […]
The cozy, sturdy structure in our backyard that my husband built last year has cycled through several names, some of them even before the walls were up. At first, we called it the “learnin’ shed,” planned for our kids’ distance learning. Then it was the “instead shed,” built with money […]
New pastor finding her way Pastor Darcy Metcalfe just arrived in Springfield in January for her new assignment at Covenant Presbyterian Church. Covenant and Northminster Presbyterian Church returned to live services for Palm Sunday, March 28, a welcome time for Metcalfe and the Covenant congregation to be formally introduced. ExploreBond […]
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The Easter Bunny is hopping into town and while kids may not be able to give him hugs or sit on his lap for a photo again this year, they are finding creative ways to make memories. Although this will mark the second year in a row we’ve had a […]
Apr. 2—Annie Mendez shifted from restauranteur to store owner during the pandemic. Fifteen days before Christmas, Mendez dropped plans to revive her restaurant and instead opened House of Envy to sell women’s clothes in the Laurel Mall near Hazleton. “During COVID people aren’t coming out. Money is tight. We are […]
Mar. 31—Groton resident Julia Pacheco received a scam call in December from someone purporting to be a law enforcement official in Texas asking her to make arrangements to pay several thousand dollars to have a federal warrant vacated that he alleged had been issued for her. “I knew I had […]
Groton resident Julia Pacheco received a scam call in December from someone purporting to be a law enforcement official in Texas asking her to make arrangements to pay several thousand dollars to have a federal warrant vacated that he alleged had been issued for her. “I knew I had not […]
Then, earlier this month, she contracted the coronavirus and had to spend more than a week in isolation housing. She couldn’t be around friends and was barred from playing sports. Alone, she consumed herself with schoolwork. “I felt like I was spiraling,” Brownell said. She adds that she doesn’t think […]
When it comes to the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic, it was clearly a tale of two economies. Business such as hotels, theaters, restaurants, bars and entertainment venues that are dependent on care-free travel or the ability of people to gather in groups were clearly hit hard by the […]
Change can be scary, but it can also be good — particularly if you plan ahead. As vaccines find their way into more arms and the number of COVID-19 cases decreases in some areas of the country, it’s natural to wonder what the world will look like once the coronavirus […]
Borrowing at San Diego’s city libraries is down more than 50 percent during the COVID-19 pandemic as residents transitioned to a world dominated by curbside checkouts, electronic books and branches where browsing is not allowed. Circulation plummeted even farther, about 90 percent, last April and May, but it bounced back […]
As we look ahead to summer travel, VRBO has released a report on travel trends for 2021. Many pandemic trends will likely stick around, including driving instead of flying. Families are making up for travel time lost during the pandemic. According to VRBO, 82% of families have vacation plans for […]
Grace Barbic | Capitol News Illinois SPRINGFIELD – The Illinois Education Association, one of the largest teacher unions in the state, on Tuesday released its third annual state of education report examining attitudes towards public education in Illinois. The poll, conducted by Normington Petts and Next Generation Strategies, surveyed 1,000 […]
Lowe’s is preparing for home improvement’s busiest sales season. This spring, it will sell garden-to-go kits and supplies to help people enjoy a staycation. Lowe’s Gardening tools. Backyard grills. And supplies for a staycation? As home improvement’s peak sales season begins, Lowe’s said it expects shoppers’ spring purchases to continue […]
While parents kept scanning the horizon for solutions to this seemingly impossible task, many eventually realized there was no one-size-fits-all fix. They’d have to rig up their own way to cope. For some families, it was abandoning screen time limits, converting a playroom to an office or getting a pandemic […]
It was one year ago that the terrifying free fall for the stock market suddenly ended, ushering in one of its greatest runs. On March 23, 2020, the S&P 500 fell 2.9%. In all, the index dropped nearly 34% in about a month, wiping out three years’ worth of gains […]
For those hoping to make it in the industry, the past year has been particularly brutal and recovery feels slow to come. Diana Romero had reached what she thought was a pivotal moment in her entertainment career in the early months of 2020. Romero, who started in physical production but […]
Social distancing is easier outside. That simple maxim drove Americans outdoors in a huge way last year. Local, state and national parks usage shot up substantially in 2020 as people searched out leisure and fitness activities that weren’t precluded by COVID-19 rules limiting indoor entertainment and exercise options where the […]
Several years ago, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez released an overview of the Green New Deal that mentioned guaranteeing “economic security” for people who are “unable or unwilling to work.” When conservative critics noticed those last three words, they pounced. Fox News waxed poetic about the “dignity of work” and Breitbart sneered at the “self-described Democratic Socialist” whose […]
A year after the U.S.’s initial wave of coronavirus shutdowns, there is light at the end of the tunnel. The vaccine roll-out is finally gaining steam—nearly one-quarter of Americans have now received at least one shot—and last week, President Biden announced a plan to open vaccinations up to the general […]
You probably didn’t realize how many words begin with the prefix “pan-” until we found ourselves living through a pan … demic. On social media, we are in a “panorama,” a “pandemonium,” a “pandemi moore,” a “panini.” Over the past year, a new lexicon has emerged online: “quarantinis” to describe […]