Good morning, it’s one day away from Friday – AKA Thursday.
I’m on a roll with the whole Halloween-themed thing…though by the time we actually GET to that actual date next Monday, I might be completely out of steam. Caveat emptor. (Why do we not use this phase more? It’s SO much more elegant than “buyer beware”).
If you are a dog person, you might want to skip this one. You probably know by now that I used to be a cat person, and have since experienced a full 180 and am now 100 percent Team Dog.
Cats are actually MORE popular than dogs in 91 countries across the globe when it comes to pet preference, but the U.S. isn’t one of them. While New Yorkers aren’t, comparatively speaking, big pet people, we also collectively own more dogs than cats.
It turns out that black is the most common coat color for cats. The pigment necessary to make fur black is eumelanin. A cat usually gets two copies of a gene – one from each parent – if ONE of the genes codes is for black fur, the resulting offspring will be black. They also usually have yellow eyes, though, like human babies, they’re often born with lighter colored eyes that darken as they age.
There’s a misconception out in the ether that black cats are adopted less frequently due to the superstition that they are unlucky. The real reason, it seems, is that there’s a disproportionate number of black cats in the word so they show up in higher numbers at shelters, and therefore might more frequently be euthanized.
Truly black cats are actually fairly rare. Most of them do have some other colors mixed in – if even only in their whiskers. If they do have some lighter markings, then they’re more likely to have light-colored foot and toe pads (pink or gray), as opposed to black.
There’s just one breed of cat that is almost always black – the Bombay – with cooper or green eyes. Some say they resemble a mini panther. All told, the Cat Fanciers’ Association recognizes 22 black cat breeds, each with its own unique traits and personalities.
The Egyptians consider black cats to be good luck. In fact, the Ancient Egyptian god Bastet was often portrayed as a woman with the head of a black cat.
But generally speaking, they’ve been seen as bad luck – even evil – more often than not throughout history, and were associated with witches starting around the 1500s or so, which is a characterization that has somehow stuck.
And that, my furry friends, brings us to the point of this post as we continue our lead-up to All Hallows Eve: It’s National Black Cat Day. Meow.
The balmy and unseasonable weather we’ve been (rather guiltily on my part, I must admit) enjoying is coming to an end. We’ll be back into the 50s today, though we might see 60 if we’re lucky. Skies will be partly cloudy.
In the headlines…
President Joe Biden compared Republican plans on taxes and spending if they take control of Congress in November to the economic plan rolled out by Britain’s former Prime Minister Liz Truss, warning of similar results.
The president said that Republicans, if they win the majority in the House, want to extend former President Trump’s tax cuts.
With the midterm elections looming, Biden predicted that gas prices would continue to come down as he delivered a speech about actions his administration is taking to curb various costs paid by Americans, including so-called “junk fees” at banks and elsewhere.
“They’re unfair and they hit marginalized Americans the hardest,” Biden said. “They benefit big corporations. Not consumers. Not working families. And that changes now.”
His speech announcing the new actions also highlighted his administration’s efforts to provide more “breathing room” relief to American consumers as the economy and inflation remain top concerns to voters 13 days before the midterm elections.
Onondaga Community College cancelled all classes today due to a “major Micron event,” (AKA a visit by Biden).
Biden will be the first president to visit OCC in the college’s 61-year history, college officials said.
The Strathmore neighborhood house where Biden lived in while studying at Syracuse University Law School is for sale.
The midterm election is coming down to the voters who don’t like Biden — but don’t hate him, either.
Despite public displays of confidence, anxiety is growing within the White House and allied Democrats that Republicans will capture at least one chamber of Congress and possibly both.
Democrat Lt. Gov. John Fetterman’s debate performance left party officials newly anxious, injecting a fresh dose of unpredictability into one of the country’s most important contests for a Pennsylvania Senate seat less than two weeks before Election Day.
As Democrats nationwide grow increasingly anxious about their midterm prospects, Sean Patrick Maloney, the leader of the party’s House campaign arm, is racing to protect the current majority, helping vulnerable Democrats as they try to hang on in tough races.
Americans die younger in states with more conservative policies, while states with more liberal policies are associated with lower mortality rates, according to a new study published in the scientific journal PLOS One.
Nearly all Americans hospitalized for monkeypox infection had weakened immune systems, most often because of H.I.V. infection, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.
The WHO has released a ranking of fungi that threaten human health in its most ambitious effort to draw attention to a constellation of largely overlooked pathogens, even as they become increasingly widespread, resistant to treatment and deadly.
Amid projections that tens of thousands of Americans could die needlessly this winter if they don’t get free vaccines or treatments, White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain summoned health officials to a meeting and asked: What can we do to prevent this?
The Chinese city of Shanghai started administering an inhalable COVID-19 vaccine in what appears to be a world first.
Which Covid symptoms you get depends on your vaccination status, a new study suggests.
New York announced applications are now being accepted from small businesses that have successfully completed the pre-screening process to become certified for the COVID-19 Capital Costs Tax Credit Program.
Selena Gomez’s scheduled appearance on “The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon” last night was cancelled after she tested positive for Covid.
Chris Churchill: “The gubernatorial debate was largely unedifying, unpleasant and added little to a race that is tighter than many of us expected. And the voters of New York deserve more of it.”
The family of Saheed Vassell, a man killed by the NYPD in 2018, is pleading with Rep. Lee Zeldin to remove footage of Vassell’s final moments from Zeldin’s first major TV ad, saying it has caused his relatives “terrible pain and suffering.”
Gov. Kathy Hochul used the old “bait and switch” to avoid post-debate questions from the city’s press corps, luring reporters away from a campaign event in Brooklyn and then ducking out a back door.
Zeldin has snagged the first endorsements of the race by Orthodox Jewish groups, getting the support of the Queens Jewish Alliance and a group of Far Rockaway activists.
State Assemblywoman Stacey Pheffer Amato and Senator Toby Ann Stavisky’s historic and first-of-its-kind bill providing women with insurance coverage for aesthetic flat closure was signed into law by Hochul.
Albany County District Attorney David Soares in a lengthy statement sought to rebut New York officials’ claims of success with a law meant to keep guns away from people deemed to be a danger to themselves or others.
Hochul received her seasonal flu shot yesterday and urged New Yorkers to prepare for the colder weather months by guarding against respiratory virus infections.
Hochul said she felt good about how she performed in her one and only debate against Zeldin.
The brother of slain New York City Councilman James Davis crossed party lines to back Zeldin for governor after accusing fellow Democrat Kathy Hochul of being a “no-show” in addressing surging crime.
A bill announced by Democratic state Assemblyman Angelo Santabarbara would waive fees to obtain or renew a nurses licenses in New York for the next two years.
The chairman of New York’s ethics oversight body characterized a fellow commissioner’s attendance at a campaign fundraiser as a “slight lapse in judgment.”
The race between Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, a Republican, and Max Rose, a Democrat, is a rare look at how national political campaign themes are playing in New York.
In the latest sign of trouble for the Democratic Party in the midterm elections, Biden reportedly called a prominent Hudson Valley rabbi to urge that he back the re-election of embattled Democrat incumbent Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney.
With less than two weeks until Election Day, Democrats appear to be on the defensive, spending millions on ad buys in New York and New Jersey congressional districts that Biden easily won in 2020.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s political career may have reached great heights, but Lin-Manuel Miranda is still offering him a hand with his bid for a fifth term in the Senate by appearing in a campaign ad.
In the backdrop of a midterm election dominated by a contentious gubernatorial race and a battle for Congress, state AG Letitia James is facing her first reelection challenge after she had briefly pursued but then abruptly bowed out of a run for governor.
With the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Sandy around the corner, Mayor Eric Adams unveiled new details about the city’s resiliency efforts around its coastline and its long-term plans to guard against severe storm-surge flooding.
Adams got drawn into a debate over policing and increased patrols on subways … with a cartoon talk show host.
New York City needs $8.5 billion for coastal resiliency projects to protect against climate change-driven storms like Superstorm Sandy, which struck 10 years ago this week, Adams said.
The flood of migrants coming into New York City has slowed to a trickle, Adams said, as he praised Biden’s “decompression” strategy to lower the number of asylum seekers who’ve strained the city’s social services system.
National Guard troops are being deployed to city homeless shelters to assist day-to-day operations as the shelter system remains near a breaking point due to a huge influx of Latin American migrants.
The reservists will help with routine operations at the shelters, including food distribution, capacity management and supplementing the stretched-thin staff, a city Department of Social Services official said.
More than 104,000 public school students in New York City were homeless during the last school year, according to new data released Wednesday, a number that grew even as overall enrollment in the city’s public schools declined.
The MTA is facing a new legal challenge from New Yorkers with disabilities — just months after the transit agency settled two other lawsuits that resulted in a commitment to add elevators or ramps at most subway stations by 2055.
Adams downplayed the latest subway attack by highlighting the overwhelming majority of riders who emerge unscathed — and said anxious straphangers were just “feeling unsafe.
The city’s beleaguered transit system has already seen people violently shoved from the platform at least 25 times this year, eclipsing the total from last year.
The NYPD has issued a public apology over its lackluster response to the calls of a distraught dog owner who tracked down the man suspected of beating her dog, Moose, to death in Prospect Park.
The FDNY’s acting commissioner, Laura Kavanagh, is to be appointed to the job permanently becoming the first female commissioner in the department’s 157-year history.
The City Council is expected to pass a package of anti-rat bills, responding to New Yorkers’ growing frustration with the out-of-control rodent infestation in the city.
“New York, New York” is coming to Broadway. A theatrical take on the 1977 Martin Scorsese film starring Robert De Niro and Liza Minnelli will arrive on the Great White Way next spring, producers announced.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other New York progressives — who helped kill Amazon’s plans for a Queens headquarters in 2019 — have been conspicuously quiet about an upstate semiconductor plant that’s expected to become far pricier for taxpayers.
A person was killed yesterday after being struck by a train in Albany, police said.
Activists and community members want Albany County DA Soares to reconsider his decision to prosecute a man shot during an encounter with city police earlier this year.
A judge denied a request by Nauman Hussain’s attorneys to have his ankle monitor removed as he awaits trial for the 2018 limousine crash in Schoharie that killed 20 people.
Most Niskayuna residents who spoke at the public hearing on the preliminary 2023 budget this week agreed that the $4,700 raise requested by recently elected Supervisor Jaime Puccioni is long overdue.
What was initially heralded by the town of Bethlehem as a historic effort at preserving a sizable chunk of farmland is now facing opposition — from farmers.
NewsNation, the fledgling cable TV network that hired Chris Cuomo, recently fired a correspondent who complained about the broadcast of a Trump rally.
Chris Licht, the chairman of CNN, told employees in a memo that executives would take a hard look at spending across the business, signaling budget cuts and layoffs before the end of the year.
Discount chain T.J. Maxx joined the list of retailers distancing themselves from Ye in the aftermath of numerous anti-Semitic comments made by the artist this month.
Sketchers said Kanye West, the rapper and fashion-brand owner who goes by Ye, was escorted from one of its California corporate offices after visiting unannounced and engaging in unauthorized filming there.
The Justice Department’s antitrust investigation into professional golf includes the powerhouse bodies Augusta National Golf Club and the United States Golf Association, in addition to the PGA Tour, according to people familiar with the matter.
