Good morning, CivMixers.
 
The good news: it’s Friday.
 
The bad news: it’s Friday, the 13th.
 
As if we didn’t already have enough to worry about.
 
Did you know that fear of Friday the 13th is an actual official thing? It’s called “paraskevidekatriaphobia” and results in financial losses in excess of $800 million annually, as people avoid marrying, traveling or, in the most severe cases, even working.
 
There are many theories as to why the number 13 is considered so unlucky, one of which has to do with the fact that it follows “perfect” 12, and therefore could not possibly measure up.
 
Also, the seating arrangement at the Last Supper is believed to have given rise to a longstanding Christian superstition that having 13 guests at a table was a bad omen and would court death.
 
For the uninitiated, (like me), according to biblical tradition, the Last Supper, which was held on Maundy Thursday, included Jesus and his 12 apostles – one of whom, Judas, betrayed him. The next day was Good Friday, the day of Jesus’ crucifixion, a very unlucky day for him.
 
In modern days, there’s the whole “Friday the 13th” horror movie thing, which dates back to the 1980s. But even before that, apparently, there was also a book, published in 1907, that really caused the whole idea of this date being seriously bad news.
 
There have indeed been some very bad things that occurred on this date, including:
 The murder of Kitty Genovese in Queens, New York (March 1964)A cyclone that killed more than 300,000 people in Bangladesh (November 1970)The disappearance of a Chilean Air Force plane in the Andes (October 1972)The death of rapper Tupac Shakur (September 1996)The crash of the Costa Concordia cruise ship off the coast of Italy, which killed 30 people (January 2012) 
So, I guess if you’re a little leery of this day, well, based on the aforementioned occurrences, who could blame you, really? Better safe than sorry.
 
Ironically, given all those bad vibes, today is World Kindness Day. Yep, we’re got a whole day dedicated to the idea of being nice to people – even, and maybe especially, strangers – and expecting nothing in return.
 
If you’re looking for ideas about how to celebrate, click here.
 
This is actually an international holiday that was started back in 1998 as part of the World Kindness Movement to try to promote and diffuse this crucial human quality that brings people of every kind together.
 
In normal times, I might suggest that everyone think about paying it forward today, maybe by paying for the coffee of the person in line behind you or letting someone cut in front of you at the checkout line in the grocery store.
 
But since a lot of us aren’t going out that much these days due to the pandemic, random acts of kindness are a little harder to come by. Maybe just send a nice note to someone you haven’t spoken with in a while – just to let them know you’re thinking of them?
 
Or even better, give them a call.
 
There’s more rain in the forecast this morning, but it’s expected to clear up by the afternoon. Temperatures will be in the low to mid 40s.
As New York businesses and organizations reopen and re-calibrate to a “new normal,” the tremendous amount of information coming from all corners can be daunting and overwhelming. 

From our “what you need to know” COVID-19 updates to providing up-to-the-minute guidance on updated state and federal guidelines, Relentless Awareness – a leading public relations and advertising firm based in Albany with offices in Las Vegas and is here to assist your business and organization navigate the next chapter. Send over a note to  info@relentlessaware.com to obtain our portfolio and how we can move your organization forward.

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—In the headlines…
 
A Pennsylvania judge has sided with President Donald Trump’s campaign and ordered counties not to count a small number of mail-in or absentee ballots for which the voter didn’t submit valid identification within six days after the Nov. 3 election.
 
Nevertheless, more GOP members stepped forward to say that President-elect Joe Biden should receive national intelligence briefings and others began to acknowledge the long-shot nature of the President’s quest to stay in power.
 
The Chinese government has congratulated Biden on his victory in last week’s presidential election, having delayed doing so for several days even as other foreign nations lined up to support the former vice president.
 
Pope Francis, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, offered his congratulations to Biden, who will be the second Catholic president (the first was JFK), during a call yesterday morning.
 
Biden is projected to carry Arizona, which has 11 electoral votes, defeating Trump and providing Democrats and the universe of allied grassroots organizations in the state with a crowning achievement a decade in the making.
 
Biden, whose margin in Arizona is currently about 11,000 votes, or 0.3 percentage points, is the first Democratic presidential candidate to carry the state since President Bill Clinton in 1996. Four years ago, Trump won the state by 3.5 percentage points.
 
Trump unleashed a torrent of tweets denouncing Fox News, accusing the network of having forgotten “what made them successful, what got them there,” and also saying: “They forgot the Golden Goose.”
 
Twitter plans to continue its policy of labeling what it deems misleading information, despite persistent criticism from Trump and other conservatives that it silences their commentary on the election.
 
Trump has reportedly told some of his advisers that if Biden is officially certified as the winner of the 2020 race, he could announce his plan to run for the White House in 2024 shortly after.
 
Trump is reportedly receiving conflicting advice from his closest and most trusted advisers – his eldest children – as he strategizes his next move in the wake of his election loss.
 
Democrats and liberal commentators are criticizing the president for his fixation on challenging the election rather than ramping up efforts against Covid-19, which is surging nationwide.
 
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and U.S. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer demanded Republicans act immediately to address the spiraling coronavirus crisis — and drop their bogus claims that Trump didn’t lose the election.
 
One of the top chroniclers of the Trump administration, New York Times White House reporter Maggie Haberman, has a book deal to write about the president’s life and times in the White House.
 
Trump received tens of thousands more votes in New York City in the 2020 presidential election than in 2016, and some of his largest gains came from an unlikely area: the South Bronx.
 
Corey Lewandowski, a top Trump campaign advisor who has helped lead efforts to undermine Biden’s victory, has tested positive for the coronavirus, but says he feels “great.”
 
Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner yanked their kids out of school after fellow parents complained about the president’s top aide and his daughter failing to follow pandemic protocols amid a COVID-19 outbreak in the White House.
 
Americans should not be hoping for any authorization from the US Food and Drug Administration before the last half of December, experts agreed.
 
The U.S. yesterday recorded more than 152,000 coronavirus infections, surpassing a daily increase of 150,000 for the first time since the pandemic hit the country earlier this year.
 
California  became the second state in the U.S. to top 1 million total coronavirus cases, following Texas, per data from Johns Hopkins University.
 
The proportion of mental health-related pediatric visits to hospitals are on the rise during the coronavirus pandemic, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention analysis.
 
The number of children sickened by measles in 2019 was the highest in 23 years, according to new data published by the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
 
Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, called on Americans to double down on health precautions like wearing a mask or face covering, social distancing and more as COVID-19 cases continue to spike across the country.
 
Tesla Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk questioned the accuracy of COVID-19 tests after claiming that results showed he tested positive twice and then negative twice on the same day.
 
Another 709,000 Americans filed first-time claims for unemployment benefits last week on a seasonally adjusted basis, the Labor Department reported. It was a slightly smaller number of initial claims than economists had expected.
 
While weekly claims have fallen from a peak of near 7 million at the end of March, they remain well above levels of about 200,000 seen before the coronavirus hit this spring.
 
As the nation’s daily COVID-19 case count continues to set record highs, economic experts warn that the number of unemployment claims could soon follow.
 
Initial jobless claims in New York fell for a fourth straight week, a sign that layoffs are slowing. First-time applications for unemployment benefits totaled 44,237 in New York last week, a 36 percent decrease from a month ago, according to the state Department of Labor. 
 
Deutsche Bank researchers proposed a 5 percent tax on anyone working from home after the COVID-19 pandemic ends arguing that people working remotely enjoy economic privileges that do not extend to those forced to work in person.
 
Tech giants have begun to cut their blue-collar contractors in the food service and transportation industries amid the surging pandemic, a move that could leave them without health care.
 
The Commerce Department said it wouldn’t enforce its order that would have effectively forced the Chinese-owned TikTok video-sharing app to shut down, in the latest sign of trouble for the Trump administration’s efforts to turn it into a U.S. company.
 
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves said his state would not cooperate with any potential national economic lockdowns to curb the spread of coronavirus.
 
Trump signed an executive order prohibiting Americans from investing in a group of Chinese companies the U.S. says supply and otherwise support China’s military, intelligence and security services.
 
First-term Democratic Staten Island Rep. Max Rose conceded that he lost his re-election bid to his Republican challenger, Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis, following a hard-fought, bitter campaign.
 
Rose said he called Malliotakis to congratulate her and promised a smooth transition.
 
Rose’s loss was not completely unexpected. The district, which covers Staten Island and a portion of South Brooklyn, is the most conservative in the city; it was the only New York City congressional district that Trump won in 2016.
 
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez defended her support for “defund the police” after an election season in which Republicans weaponized the mantra to paint Democratic opponents as anti-cop and soft on crime.
 
“Ocasio-Cortez isn’t picking a fight because of ideology. She’s staging an intervention.”
 
Progressive groups conducting a postmortem on the 2020 race slammed Pelosi this week, saying her “showing off” of her flashy freezer full of ice cream was an “unforced error” that eroded Democrats’ majority in the House.
 
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, of California, urged the public to cut some slack to newly elected lawmakers who sympathize with the QAnon conspiracy theory.
 
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn is turning to the U.S. Supreme Court over coronavirus restrictions that Gov. Andrew Cuomo imposed that include limits on how many congregants can gather for religious services.
 
The filing is the latest pitting religious groups against city and state officials seeking to stop the spread of Covid-19 and could highlight the impact of Justice Amy Coney Barrett on the court.
 
Betsy McCaughey, a former Republican lieutenant governor of New York, slammed Cuomo as a “petty tyrant” for new lockdown orders in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
 
Newark, N.J., is implementing tough new restrictions on businesses and rolling out a curfew in some neighborhoods to stop a surge of Covid-19 infections sweeping through the city.
 
New York City schools will close if the share of people in the city testing positive for Covid-19 hits 3 percent over a seven-day average, Mayor Bill de Blasio said, as the rate ticked closer to that threshold.
 
The move — now regarded by some City Hall officials as a question of when, not if — would be perhaps the most significant setback yet for the city’s recovery since the bleak days of spring, when it was a global center of the pandemic and all the schools were shuttered.
 
New York City plans to pour more than $890 million into a new non-profit it is setting up to manage school bus services — a month after agreeing to buy out the largest private school bus contractor.
 
New Yorkers are still fleeing the city during the COVID-19 crisis — with a record 16,000 apartments sitting empty despite some of the lowest rent prices in years, a new report has found.
 
While some businesses have adapted to virus restrictions, New York City’s yellow cab industry is especially suffering.
 
Staten Island Borough President Jimmy Oddo hit back at a fellow Richmond County Republican, Councilman Joe Borelli, over his mockery of new state coronavirus restrictions, igniting a Thanksgiving feud just two weeks out from the holiday.
 
Four senior officials at the New York City agency that examines allegations of police misconduct were laid off abruptly in what officials described as a restructuring meant to expand its investigative muscle, but employees say was retaliation.
 
CUNY’s enrollment dropped by more than 5 percent this fall amid the pandemic and fiscal crisis, with community colleges taking the brunt of the losses, officials said.
 
Manhattan state Sen. Brad Hoylman has suggested that businesses get paid to stay closed until the COVID rates are under control.
 
Democratic incumbent Rachel May is claiming victory in the race for New York’s 53rd Senate District. She currently leads Republican opponent Sam Rodgers by about 9 points as absentee ballots continue to be counted.
 
Nassau and Suffolk county residents submitted more than 300,00 absentee ballots that have yet to be tabulated. The pandemic-driven explosion in absentee ballots means some contests are still in question.
 
New York nursing homes in COVID-19 hot zones will be testing staff more frequently and limiting visitation as part of attempts to protect frail and elderly residents from the coronavirus surge underway, under new regulations released this week.
 
The Capital Region set another record yesterday for most new coronavirus infections reported in one day.
 
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has managed to keep its COVID-19 numbers relatively flat, which officials say is evidence that their aggressive COVID-19 testing system and social distancing measures are working.
 
Warren County officials are advising shoppers and staff of three local chain stores to monitor for COVID-19 symptoms after positive cases associated with the stores were discovered this week.
 
Averill Park High School has extended virtual learning until after Thanksgiving as four new cases of COVID-19 were diagnosed involving three students and a staff member, Averill Park Superintendent James Franchini announced.
 
General Electric Co. and Albany International Airport have teamed up in an ongoing effort to protect travelers, airport employees and airline staff from Covid-19.
 
Almost eight months into the coronavirus pandemic’s arts shutdown and with no resumption in sight for performances in front of live audiences, the Palace Theatre this week laid off its executive director, Billy Piskutz.
 
Rensselaer County has replaced the head of its nursing home as the county is emphasizing the need to fill vacant nursing jobs at the facility.
 
A City of Albany police officer was suspended without pay after an Albany County sheriff deputy’s body camera recorded him calling Black people “the worst f__ing race.”
 
Robert Freeman, the longtime leader of the state’s Committee on Open Government, who was fired last year after an investigation into allegations he behaved in a “sexually inappropriate manner” toward a female reporter, has resigned from the state bar.
 
Former AIG CEO Maurice Greenberg’s defamation case against former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer was dismissed in state Supreme Court in a ruling that found the financier could not prove Spitzer acted with actual malice and with reckless disregard of the truth. 
 
New York’s massive 570-mile highway system connecting Westchester to Buffalo near the Canadian border will transition to a cashless toll system Saturday, which means toll booths will soon be a thing of the past.
 
Dozens of mourners gathered to remember the 265 lives lost when American Airlines Flight 587 crashed in a Queens neighborhood 19 years ago — an incident that briefly sparked terror fears on the heels of 9/11.
 
After more than 36 years in local radio, Chuck Custer is retiring. Custer is one half of the Chuck & Kelly show on 810WGY. Kelly is the one and only Kelly Lynch. 
 
Spectrum cable TV’s news operation in the Capital Region will be reorganizing its staff, with a number of title changes and a handful of possible layoffs, a company spokeswoman said.
 
There’s no significant difference in the way horses and humans can feel pain when whipped, according to a study published yesterday.
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Photo credit: Joah Alindato.