The middle of the week is upon us. Welcome to Wednesday. I love to start the day with a little alliteration.
It certainly feels like winter to me, and I’m sure residents from Ohio to Western New York who got hit by heavy lake effect snow would say the same. Technically speaking, though, winter doesn’t officially start until Dec. 21 (the winter solstice).
If this concept fills you with dread, it might make you feel better to know that winter on average lasts for just 89 days in the Northern Hemisphere and 93.6 days in the Southern Hemisphere. Feel better now? No? Well, I tried.
People are already well into the holiday spirit, and that includes the folks down at Rockefeller Center, who will be hosting their annual tree lighting ceremony today. The event always takes place on the first Wednesday after the Thanksgiving Day Parade.
The tree lighting ceremony will be broadcast on NBC at 8 p.m. EST, though the actually throwing the switch part won’t happen until a few moments before 10 p.m.
Because the moment we live in is what it is, the NYPD is reportedly preparing for protests at the event. An Instagram post by the account wolpalestine – for the pro-Palestinian community organization Within Our Lifetime – is calling for demonstrators to “flood the tree lighting for Gaza” starting with a rally at 6 p.m.
And boy, will that tree be LIT! It is wrapped with about 50,000 multi-colored LED lights on approximately five miles of wire. At its tippy top is a three-dimensional star that was designed by architect Daniel Libeskind in 2018. It weighs in at a whopping 900 pounds (basically, the same as a grand piano) and features 70 spikes festooned with 3 million crystals.
The tree, a 12-ton, 80-foot Norway spruce, which is VERY big – it takes about about half a city block when laying on its side – has been in place since the middle of the month. It traveled 200 miles strapped onto a 115-foot-long trailer from the Town of Vestal.
Apparently, it wasn’t the first choice. Erik Pauze, Rockefeller Center’s head gardener, who has been selecting this iconic holiday centerpiece for the past three decades, scouring private and public properties across the tri-state area, spotted the spruce while en route to visit a different tree altogether.
“I had driven to the other tree and took a slow road back, and saw this one,” Pauze said. “I went back this spring and decided to knock … The McGinley family told me that not too long before I knocked on the door, someone told them, ‘that looks like a Rockefeller Center Christmas tree.'”
Rockefeller trees are typically donated, and the “owners” (does one really OWN a tree?) generally consider it a big honor to participate in such a long-standing and historic tradition.
The Rockefeller Christmas tree dates back to the 1931 – the height of the Depression. The first tree was a 20-footer that was decorated with strings of paper chains and cranberries – even a few tin cans – by Italian-American workers on Christmas Eve.
The first official tree lighting occurred two years later, and two years after that (1936) the skating rink was opened beneath the tree in the plaza, making it a popular family holiday-time destination. There was a brief lull in the action from 1944 until the end of WW II in1945, the tree went unlit due to blackout regulations.
The tree lighting ceremony, which has been broadcast live since 1997, mark the start of the holiday season in New York City for many – visitors and residents alike. The tree will stand until Jan. 13, 2024.
My favorite Rockefeller Christmas tree story remains the one about the stowaway adult Saw-whet owl, which hitched a 170-mile ride to the Big Apple from Oneonta in 2020.
The owl, later dubbed “Rockefeller” (AKA “Rocky“) was found dehydrated and hungry within the wrapped branches of the newly delivered tree while it was being installed.
After receiving much media coverage, she was relocated to a wildlife center in Saugerties, where she received treatment, grew strong, and was released back into the wild. I hope she’s living her best owl life, munching on mice and reminiscing with her owl buddies about that time she traveled to the big city.
It will be just a hair warmer today – flirting with 40 degrees – with a mix of clouds (in the morning) and some sun in the afternoon.
In the headlines…
President Biden is facing deep anger over his solidarity with Israel among supporters and even from some staff members who have said they feel disenchanted with the president.
Twelve more hostages taken from Israel on Oct. 7 were released yesterday in exchange for 30 imprisoned Palestinians. Most of the hostages were Israeli women, but two Thai nationals were also freed.
The decision by Israel and Hamas to extend their brief truce in Gaza has created short-term benefits for both sides but amplified uncertainty about how, when and whether Israel will continue its invasion of Gaza.
The first U.S. government flight with humanitarian aid for Gaza landed in Egypt’s northern Sinai yesterday, according to a spokesperson for the U.S. Agency for International Development.
With the release of more than 50 hostages over the past three days, more details are trickling in from family members of those who have been freed as part of the temporary cease-fire agreement about the conditions their loved ones endured.
William J. Burns, the C.I.A. director, arrived in Doha, Qatar, yesterday for a new round of negotiations aimed at freeing more hostages held in Gaza, according to U.S. officials.
Overcrowding and lack of food, water, sanitation and basic hygiene are hastening spread of disease in Gaza, according to the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO).
In a post on X, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the lack of functioning infrastructure or access to medicine had resulted in a growing number of infections among the approximately 1.3 million people displaced in Gaza.
Jewish students have filed a federal civil rights lawsuit accusing the University of California of allowing the “longstanding, unchecked spread of antisemitism” at its Berkeley campus.
A Montana man accused of threatening Biden and Democratic Sen. Jon Tester has agreed to a plea bargain, according to a court document.
An ill wind knocked over the National Christmas Tree outside the White House yesterday afternoon, two days before it was set to be officially lit by President Biden.
The toppled tree alarmed federal park workers and temporarily threw plans for the national tree-lighting ceremony into question.
People who don’t much like the president have already compared the tree to Biden’s economic policies, and criticized his inability to keep the tree from falling over – as if he could control the weather.
First lady Jill Biden unveiled the White House holiday decor and announced this season’s theme is “Magic, Wonder, and Joy,” which was inspired by how children experience the holidays.
Hunter Biden is open to testifying publicly before the Republican-led House Oversight Committee on Dec. 13, his lawyer said in a letter sent to the panel.
Comer pushed back in a statement posted to X: “Hunter Biden is trying to play by his own rules instead of following the rules required of everyone else. That won’t stand with House Republicans.”
The political network founded by the billionaire industrialist brothers Charles and David Koch has endorsed Nikki Haley in the Republican presidential nominating contest, giving her organizational muscle and financial heft.
Then-Vice President Mike Pence considered skipping the congressional count of the 2020 Electoral College votes on Jan. 6, 2021, worrying that his attendance would be “too hurtful” to former President Donald Trump.
Fulton county prosecutors reportedly do not intend to offer plea deals to Trump and at least two high-level co-defendants charged in connection with their efforts to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia.
In her new book, former Rep. Liz Cheney condemns former colleagues and party leaders as “enablers and collaborators,” who after the 2020 election were “willing to violate their oath to the Constitution out of political expediency and loyalty to Donald Trump.”
When Deutsche Bank loaned Trump’s company hundreds of millions lawyers of dollars, it always followed its own guidelines that include checking out information that would-be borrowers provide, an executive testified at the former president’s civil fraud trial.
Fox News will host a 90-minute debate between Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida and Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, starting at 9 p.m. Eastern time tomorrow.
Former President Jimmy Carter emerged from hospice care to join a cast of political heavyweights paying tribute to his late wife, Rosalynn, Carter, who died at 96 last week at her home in Plains, Ga.
The 99-year-old former president had a new suit made Monday for the occasion, and was accompanied by a physician when he left his home in Plains en route to the church. He was seated in the front row draped in a blanket with his wife’s face etched on it.
Pope Francis, following his doctor’s orders, will not attend the United Nations climate summit in Dubai later this week, the Vatican said.
Embattled Rep. George Santos is defiantly insisting he won’t resign from Congress even as an expulsion vote looms as soon as later this week.
House Republicans are pinning their hopes on a last minute resignation from Santos to avoid what one top GOP leaders said would be “tough votes” on expelling him.
Santos remained defiant yesterday afternoon ahead of a looming expulsion vote on the House floor — saying he didn’t care about the procedural move that triggered another push to oust him.
Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia of California has put forward a resolution to expel the indicted Santos in the wake of a damning House Ethics Committee investigation into the New York Republican.
A 15-foot-high inflatable version of Santos met the unusually strong winds from the west-northwest in DC yesterday.
Many lawmakers who voted against expulsion now say they will support it following the release of a damning Ethics Committee report on Santos just before the Thanksgiving recess.
A bill banning the use of neonicotinoids pesticide treated corn, wheat and soybean seeds awaits the signature of Gov. Kathy Hochul, but the state Farm Bureau is making a final push for her to veto the legislation citing concerns about its impact on farmers.
Supporters of a bill that would outlaw noncompete contracts said that they are concerned about a big business lobbying effort to stop the measure from becoming law.
A left-leaning lobbying group is spending at least $20,000 on TV commercials and digital ads to pressure Hochul to sign legislation that would ban economic noncompete agreements.
New York state is ditching the terms “feminine hygiene products” and “sanitary napkins” in favor of more inclusive language, according to Hochul.
The multinational food corporation Sysco has mounted a quiet campaign to lobby Hochul as she decides whether to sign what is arguably the most consequential climate legislation on her desk.
Hundreds of migrants trying to get back into the Big Apple’s overwhelmed shelter system have been flooding an East Village block as Mayor Eric Adams warned the crisis would soon be more visible than ever.
One of the loudest critics of Adams’ handling of the migrant crisis, city Comptroller Brad Lander, headed to Washington yesterday to demand federal lawmakers cough up more funding to pay for the crisis.
After months of insisting that the best way out of the migrant crisis is getting the asylum seekers to work, the Adams administration announced that 2,850 have at long last been granted employment authorization by the federal government.
The Adams administration is proposing changes to the zoning law to make it easier for casinos to locate in New York City.
One of the threads federal investigators are tugging at in their probe of Adams’ 2021 campaign and its connections to Turkey is his travel to that Middle Eastern country over the years.
Adams of New York said the 25-year-old woman who managed his political fund-raising was no longer working in that role, weeks after an FBI search of her home revealed a federal investigation into his campaign and plunged his administration into turmoil.
Brianna Suggs has hired a new attorney to represent her in connection with an apparent federal investigation into the mayor’s campaign — raising the possibility that she could be cooperating with federal investigators.
Attorney Rebecca Ricigliano, a former federal prosecutor in the Southern District and first deputy in New Jersey’s Attorney General Office, will take the lead on Suggs’s defense, the law firm confirmed.
Two people were shot on a Manhattan-bound subway train in Brooklyn yesterday evening, the NYPD said. The victims, a teenager and a man in his 40s, sustained minor injuries after a gunman opened fire on a C train, the police said.
Hate crimes targeting Jewish New Yorkers in the subway system have soared in the aftermath of Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack and Israel’s subsequent invasion of the Gaza Strip, new statistics show.
At least 4 million New Yorkers’ private information could be at risk of identity theft after a data breach at a medical transcription company that works with hospitals in New York, state Attorney General Letitia James said.
Four months after the city disbanded a celebrated but largely illegal Queens street market that became popular during the pandemic, vendors are expected to return this week with far fewer stalls and, for now, none of the food that brought them acclaim.
Pablo Guzmán, beloved journalist and New York native, has died. He was 73.
Two state-run correctional facilities in Ulster County garnered mixed reviews in audits recently conducted by the state’s prison watchdog group, including allegations of abuse and inmates reporting spotty access to essential services.
The attorney for the suspended Saratoga Springs city fire chief hopes the next public safety commissioner will not pursue misconduct charges against Joseph Dolan for alleged double-dipping, and return Dolan to his role as head of the fire department.
Price Chopper ended speculation over what is happening with ShopRite’s five shuttered locations by announcing it finalized purchases of the buildings’ leases, store equipment and fixtures.
Diddy is temporarily stepping back from his role as chairman of Revolt after ex-girlfriend Cassie leveled sexual assault allegations against the producer last week.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
