Author: NY TIMES

Later, at home, I saw a photo on my phone from Dec. 12, 2022, exactly a year earlier, of Kiki flopped on the couch in sweats, hair in a ponytail, smiling up at me. A cardboard box of ornaments on the floor beside her, our tablecloth with the elves and candy canes draped over the armrest by her head. We had been laughing about how Christmas is hard work, all that decorating, and how we needed to eat and rest and make pecan squares and watch some old “Wife Swap” episodes.Eric was away. She had come up for the night…

This article is part of Overlooked, a series of obituaries about remarkable people whose deaths, beginning in 1851, went unreported in The Times.It was in northeastern Pennsylvania that Min Matheson earned her reputation for fearlessness. Over her 20 years as director of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union there, she repeatedly faced down mobsters in her fight for fair wages and safe conditions for women workers.In one incident, she confronted several menacing “tough guys,” as she called them, in Pittston, Pa., where she was marching on a picket line alongside other women.She told them, “You rotten hoodlums! What are you…

The bird flu virus sweeping across dairy farms in multiple states has acquired dozens of new mutations, including some that may make it more adept at spreading between species and less susceptible to antiviral drugs, according to a new study.None of the mutations is a cause for alarm on its own. But they underscore the possibility that as the outbreak continues, the virus may evolve in ways that would allow it to spread easily between people, experts said.“Flu mutates all the time — it’s what, sort of, flu does,” said Richard Webby, an influenza expert at St. Jude Children’s Research…

Han shot first.On this most hallowed of holidays — May the Fourth, also known as “Star Wars Day” because, you know, “may the Force be with you” — let us all agree that a long time ago, in a galaxy that now feels very far away indeed, Han shot Greedo first. No amount of special editions or George Lucas declarations will change that, even if, uh, Lucas actually did change that scene. If you seek the originals, these aren’t the films you’re looking for.A rebellion began in 1997, when Lucasfilm first released altered “special editions” of the first trilogy, adding…

A Palestinian doctor from the Gaza Strip, detained by Israeli forces and held for four months, has died in detention, Palestinian officials and detainee rights groups say.Dr. Adnan Ahmad Albursh, 50, the head of orthopedics at Al-Shifa Hospital, the Gaza Strip’s biggest medical center, was detained along with other doctors in December by Israeli forces when they raided a hospital, according to the Palestinian Commission of Detainees’ Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoners Club, which advocate for the rights of Palestinian detainees held by Israel.Israel’s military did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Times of Israel cited the…

In those few minutes after Niclas Füllkrug had scored, as the Yellow Wall swayed and roared, Borussia Dortmund must have felt the stirring of some distant memory. Waves of attacks pounded down on Paris St.-Germain, now dizzied and wearied. The world shimmered with possibility. A place in the Champions League final felt, for a moment, close enough to touch.This is how it used to be, or at least some approximation of it, back in the days when Dortmund made Europe shake. Gregor Kobel, the team’s goalkeeper, was pulling off daring turns in his own penalty area. Mats Hummels, a fixture…

She showed him her favorite spots around Paris, and they spent days walking around, getting lost, people-watching and drinking wine. They went to Le Champo, an art house theater, to see “An American in Paris.”“That was the most radiantly happy I’d ever been in my whole life,” Mr. Bramesco said.In October 2022, Mr. Bramesco took Ms. Whittle to dinner at Mominette, a French restaurant in Bushwick. After dinner, they returned to the bar where they’d had their first date. When they got home, he took her up to the roof of their apartment building. Through tears, overlooking the city skyline,…

In the world according to Mike Repole, everyone involved in horse racing is a dummy. Except him, Mike from Queens or the Commish, as some of his followers on X call him.Stuart S. Janney III, chairman of the nonprofit Jockey Club, is clueless and tone deaf and has run the sport into the ground, Repole says. Churchill Downs Inc., which hosts the Kentucky Derby, is cheap: The $5 million purse for America’s most famous race should be much more, and the racetrack treats Repole and other owners badly.Forget about John Stewart, a new owner bringing fresh energy and big money…

▶ Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube3. Spoon: “I Turn My Camera On”“Challengers” volleys back and forth from recent past to present so dizzyingly that sometimes the musical cues are the easiest way to remember if we’re in 2006 or 2019. This Spoon track, from the 2005 album “Gimme Fiction,” offers some temporal grounding and millennial nostalgia when it plays in the background of a scene at the 2006 U.S. Open Junior Championships. Guadagnino certainly loves himself a persistent bass line!▶ Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube4. The Psychedelic Furs: “Love My Way”In “Call Me by Your Name,”…

While the votes in local elections in England and Wales were still being counted on Friday, a picture has begun to emerge of significant losses for the governing Conservative Party.The voting on Thursday to elect councilors, mayors and police commissioners in local elections, seen as a last test of public opinion before a general election expected later this year, portends a difficult road ahead for the party.Here are four takeaways.The Conservatives could be in serious trouble.Leading up to the local elections, the question was not whether the Conservatives would suffer, but just how bad the blow might be. The party…