All posts tagged: Times

The Phrase I Texted My Kids 133 Times

The Phrase I Texted My Kids 133 Times

Published by Daniella Wilson

Too loud. Too loud. Too loud. If you were to scroll through my archive of texts with my children—from the start of the coronavirus pandemic, in 2020, to the end of last year—you would find that I sent 133 of these messages. I discovered this a few weeks ago, sitting alone on the couch in my living room, when, on a whim, I searched for the phrase on my phone. My youngest daughter, age 19, has been the most frequent recipient of the text, though each of my three children appears in the archive. Typically, I sent these messages between 10 p.m. and 2 a.m. The backstory to each, I’m sure, was relatively consistent: I was in bed, thinking about my schedule for the next day—a board meeting, a difficult conversation I needed to have—when from downstairs came the noise. Shrieks of laughter. Trash talk escalating over a video game. A heated debate about a book or a TV show or a person, infused with teenagers’ fierce intensity. Or perhaps it was someone deciding at …

From Gilead to Ladyland: how the rebellious women of literature offer hope in dark times | Books

From Gilead to Ladyland: how the rebellious women of literature offer hope in dark times | Books

Published by Sam Flores

In the spring of 2024, I am finally able to visit Banishanta, the island in southern Bangladesh that has been haunting my dreams. When I arrive I find it is little more than a long patch of grey mud, with a string of flimsy huts lining a craggy shore. Thirteen years earlier, I was on a boat on my way to the Sundarban mangrove forest when a guide casually pointed out the island and told me it was a state-licensed brothel that had been there since the time of the British. When I went home, I didn’t want to think about Banishanta, because if I did, I would have to imagine the terrible things the women there were enduring while I lived a life of casual entitlements many thousands of miles away. Yet the women squatted in my imagination, refusing to leave. I resolved to never write about them, because it would say things about the world I didn’t want to know. It was only when I decided I could write a novel, set on a fictional island, about a rebellion …

Why have immigration agents detained this American citizen three times?

Why have immigration agents detained this American citizen three times?

Published by Sam Flores

When immigration agents pulled U.S. citizen Leonardo Garcia Venegas from his car this month and shackled him, he wasn’t surprised. He wasn’t scared. He was tired. As ProPublica detailed last fall, he had already been detained twice before. A year ago, Garcia Venegas was filming his brother’s arrest during a raid on their coastal Alabama construction site when he was tackled by agents, who ignored his pleas that he was a citizen. A few weeks later, an officer entered the home Garcia Venegas was building and refused to trust the now-26-year-old’s Alabama REAL ID, which only citizens and legal residents can get. Videos of the incidents went viral. He appeared before Congress. He also has a suit pending against the Trump administration. But all the attention hasn’t changed much. On May 2, agents followed him back to his home. They again didn’t believe his claims of citizenship or the REAL ID he once again tried to show them. Now, after that latest detention, Garcia Venegas sounds demoralized. “Honestly, it feels terrible,”  Garcia Venegas told ProPublica. …

Here’s the latest. – The New York Times

Here’s the latest. – The New York Times

Published by Sam Flores

President Trump said on Saturday that the United States was close to reaching an agreement with Iran toward ending the war and reopening the Strait of Hormuz. Mr. Trump provided few details about the preliminary agreement, which he said was “largely negotiated.” It is unclear whether the latest negotiations will succeed in extending the current cease-fire and reach a more permanent peace, or break down over the sticking points that have kept the war unresolved for months. In a post on Truth Social, Mr. Trump said he had spoken by phone with several Arab leaders about a memorandum of understanding “pertaining to PEACE.” He said the agreement was “subject to finalization” by the United States, Iran and other countries. “Final aspects and details of the Deal are currently being discussed, and will be announced shortly,” he wrote. There was no immediate confirmation from Iran or Israel. But three senior Iranian officials said Tehran had agreed to a memorandum of understanding that would stop the fighting on all fronts, including Lebanon; reopen the Strait of Hormuz …

‘I laughed out loud dozens of times’: authors choose books to make you fall back in love with reading | Books

‘I laughed out loud dozens of times’: authors choose books to make you fall back in love with reading | Books

Published by Sam Flores

Malala YousafzaiActivistI have loved going to the theatre ever since I saw my first musical (Matilda in London, when I was 15 years old) – and I love reading about it, too. In Enter Ghost by Isabella Hammad, a British-Palestinian actor travels to the West Bank to see family and finds herself pulled into a local production of Hamlet. I was moved by the rehearsal scenes: arguments over translations, personal relationships, the question of whether a performance is even possible under Israeli occupation. To me, Hammad proved that theatre is capable of carrying weight that other art forms cannot hold. David Miliband CEO of the International Rescue CommitteeFree: Coming of Age at the End of History, a book about growing up in Albania, the last Stalinist country in Europe, doesn’t sound like a rollicking good read, but Lea Ypi’s book, published in 2021, is at once hilarious and serious, appalling in its description of the lies and tentacles of the regime of Enver Hoxha and touching in its humanity, particular in its focus and universal in …

The birthday of cool | Radio Times

The birthday of cool | Radio Times

Published by Daniella Wilson

Jazz Family Trees is on Monday at 9pm on Jazz FM. Add it to your collection The centenary of Miles Davis’s birth on 26 May is an opportunity to celebrate one of the most influential musicians of all time, with blanket programming scheduled across not only Jazz FM, but Radio 3 and 4 as well as online station One Jazz. And when comedian Marcus Brigstocke presents a special edition of his Jazz Family Trees show on Jazz FM dedicated to the musician, its branches will spread over the entire landscape of music. Dubbed the “Picasso of Jazz”, between the 1940s and his death in 1991 trumpeter, bandleader and composer Davis was at the forefront of innovations in bebop, “cool” jazz, hard bop and jazz-rock fusion, working with everyone from Charlie Parker, John Coltrane and Herbie Hancock to Scritti Politti and Prince. “He changed the course of music at least three times,” says Brigstocke, who first encountered Davis through a love of hip-hop. “A friend gave me Doo-Bop, the record Miles made with [hip-hop producer] Easy …

Some like it hot | Radio Times

Some like it hot | Radio Times

Published by Daniella Wilson

Add Springwatch to your watchlist Step outside and you can’t fail to notice the changes. Whether you’re a gardener whose daffodils bloom earlier, a birder following the northward shift of glossy ibis, or a farmer with thirsty crops, climate change is taking hold around us. The last four years have been within the five warmest on record. We should all take notice, however, of what’s happening in London. The capital offers a glimpse into what the future might hold for all of us and how our hotter and drier summers will change the nation’s wildlife. Its location already places it in one of the country’s warmest spots, but all its heat-retentive concrete, steel and tarmac mean it’s around 3°C warmer than the surrounding countryside. While it’s further down that road than the rest of us, it shows us what’s coming our way. One colourful bird – the ring-necked parakeet – demonstrates the capital’s predictive properties. These hardy parrots – pets who escaped or were deliberately released into the wild – were recorded breeding in the …

Labour Lost Almost 4 Times As Many Voters To Greens Than To Reform In Local Elections, Poll Finds

Labour Lost Almost 4 Times As Many Voters To Greens Than To Reform In Local Elections, Poll Finds

Published by Sam Flores

Zack Polanski, Keir Starmer and Nigel Farage Labour lost almost four times as many voters to the Green Party than to Reform UK during the local elections, according to a respected pollster. Voters brutally punished Keir Starmer’s party when voting for more than 5,000 council seats in England on May 7. Reform picked up more than 1,450 council seats in the major elections, particularly in former Labour strongholds. Starmer’s party lost more than 1,460 seats across the country, a catastrophic defeat which triggered calls for the prime minister to step down so Labour can fight Reform under a new leader. However, YouGov has found 22% of Labour’s 2024 voters switched to the Green Party in the local elections. In comparison only 6% of 2024 Labour voters supported Reform UK. Overall, 46% of that voting cohort were loyal to the party, compared to 55% of the 2024 Tory voters who continued backing the Conservatives. Four in 10 Labour and Lib Dem voters also said wanting to stop another party from winning was one of the top …