Author: NY TIMES

DENVER — It’s hilarious to say that the Minnesota Timberwolves’ magic begins and ends with Rudy Gobert.they are frustrated 20 He scored against the defending champion Denver Nuggets with 22 minutes remaining, and the NBA’s most controversial player sparked a turnaround in years.History was on the Nuggets’ side, as teams that led by at least 15 points at halftime in Game 7 were up 21-0 by that point (Indiana joined that group earlier in the day against the Knicks list). So does Charles Barkley, the Hall of Famer and TNT analyst calling out Minnesota head coach Chris Finch “Take Gobert…

Charlotte De Syllas, 78, is known for her carved hardstone jewelry, but don’t call her a lapidarist. “I don’t know why everyone uses that word now,” she said, somewhat exasperated. “I’m just a jeweler!”A jeweler certainly, but one whose main practice consists of carving stone. She is equally adept at carving a gemstone, like tourmaline or amethyst, which has a certain translucency and is often more valuable, or a hardstone like jade or lapis lazuli, which is often opaque and considered an ‘ornamental’ stone that lends itself to being cut into softer-looking organic forms, sometimes abstract, sometimes literal.It may be…

Conservative media has been preoccupied for weeks with Justice Juan M. Merchan, the New York judge presiding over the Manhattan criminal trial against former President Donald J. Trump.Mr. Trump has long attacked Justice Merchan and his family in social media posts and on his campaign website. But Justice Merchan did not earn a starring role in conservative media until after he issued a formal gag order against the former president, forbidding attacks against various people involved in the trial, including jurors and witnesses.Since then, right-wing commentators, most prominently on Fox News, have condemned the judge nearly daily in their coverage…

C. Gordon Bell, a technology visionary whose computer designs for Digital Equipment Corporation fueled the emergence of the minicomputer industry in the 1960s, died on Friday in Coronado, Calif. He was 89.The cause was pneumonia, his family said in a statement.Called the “Frank Lloyd Wright of computers” by Datamation magazine, Mr. Bell was the master architect in the effort to create smaller, affordable, interactive computers that could be clustered into a network. A virtuoso at computer architecture, he built the first time-sharing computer and championed efforts to build the Ethernet. He was among a handful of influential engineers whose designs…

Dr. Paul D. Parkman, whose research was instrumental in identifying the virus that causes rubella and developing a vaccine that has prevented an epidemic of the disease in the United States for more than 50 years, died on May 7 at his home in Auburn, N.Y., about 60 miles east of Rochester in the Finger Lakes region. He was 91.The cause was lymphoblastic leukemia, his niece Theresa M. Leonardi said.Rubella, also known as German measles because German scientists classified it in the 19th century, is a moderate illness for most patients, identified by a spotty and often itchy red rash.…

Pixar will stop making original shows for Disney+ as part of a broader retrenchment, resulting in layoffs that will reduce its work force by 14 percent.Jim Morris, the president of Pixar, announced the layoffs in an internal memo on Tuesday that was viewed by The New York Times. He cited “the return to our focus on feature films.” About 175 employees will be let go.Questions about Pixar’s health have swirled in Hollywood and among investors since June 2022, when the Disney-owned studio released “Lightyear” to disastrous results. How could Pixar, the gold standard of animation studios for nearly three decades,…

Israel’s Communications Ministry confiscated camera equipment from The Associated Press on Tuesday, claiming the agency had violated a new broadcasting law by providing images of northern Gaza to Al Jazeera.The seizure was an escalation in Israel’s efforts to punish Al Jazeera, the pan-Arab broadcaster that the Israeli government voted to shut down two weeks ago. It raised questions about how far Israeli authorities would go to cut off the Qatari-funded channel, which has provided extensive coverage of Israel’s military offensive in Gaza.Lauren Easton, The A.P.’s vice president of corporate communications, denounced the Israeli government’s action, calling it “an abusive use”…

Russia sent a pointed reminder on Tuesday that it could use battlefield nuclear weapons in Ukraine, releasing video of its forces beginning exercises to practice their use, two weeks after President Vladimir V. Putin ordered the provocative drills.Video released by the Russian Defense Ministry showed a caravan of military vehicles moving down a wooded road, as well as mobile Iskander missile systems — which can deliver conventional or nuclear explosives — getting into position to launch, with their warheads blurred out. The footage also showed a supersonic strategic bomber armed with missiles and an attack aircraft being prepared for takeoff.In…

Welcome to briefingevery Monday during this season, Competitor Three of the biggest questions arising from weekend football will be discussed.It was a weekend at the end of another long and eventful Premier League campaign. Manchester City were crowned champions, Arsenal fell short and Liverpool bid farewell to Jurgen Klopp.Here we ask whether we should expect Manchester City’s record-breaking dominance to continue, whether Arsenal can take some solace from finishing runners-up again, and whether we should pay more attention to Jean-Philippe Matata.What are the chances of Manchester City winning five games in a row?That’s basically that old Gary Lineker saying, isn’t…

Finally Finding “The Magic”Since childhood, I yearned for love. Once, I came within weeks of marriage before it abruptly fell apart. He said we were missing “the magic,” and, admittedly, he was right. A few men came and went. I’m now 59 with Stage 4 metastatic breast cancer. I still don’t have a partner, but I’ve fallen desperately in love with life. Exquisite beauty emerges everywhere: my cat on my lap, a cashier extending an unexpected smile, sunlight skipping across a lake. I use each day to soak up the world’s splendor. “Not yet,” I whisper to the heavens. “I…