Good morning, it’s Wednesday.
I have a lot of nostalgia around my childhood playthings, with fond memories of spending hours on end building elaborate structures with wooden blocks, tinker toys, and Playdough.
I really enjoyed making things, which I guess is kind of par for the course when you’re the grandchild of a tailor. When I got old enough, I spent a lot of time crafting – sewing, crocheting, making collages, etc. I think there was so much glue worked into my playroom carpet that it had to be practically sawed into pieces when it came time to replace it.
Somehow, though, I never really got into Legos. Maybe there were too many fiddly pieces? (As an aside, you have not truly known pain until you have stepped squarely on a stray Lego with bare feet – or even fins, IYKYK) I remember playing with Legos at school and in other people’s houses, but don’t recall having any of my own.
In this, I am very much in the minority.
Legos have been around for going on 100 years and consistently rank among the world’s most popular toys, selling more than 70 million bricks annually across the globe and more than 220 million sets. (This averages out to about seven sets sold every SECOND).
At one point, Legos were even voted the greatest toy of all time by a consortium of industry experts and included in a TIME magazine list of the world’s most influential toys, along with Cabbage Patch Kids, the Rubik’s Cube, the View-Master, and others.
The name “Lego” is a combination of two worlds, “leg godt,” which translates into “play well” in Danish and “I gather/put together” in Latin. That second piece is a happy accident and was not part of the consideration when it was coined by a Danish carpenter named Ole Kirk Christiansen.
Christiansen’s company originally built wooden toys, but transitioned to manufacturing into the modern-day version of interlocking plastic bricks in 1949. These were later patented on this day (Jan. 28) in 1958 by Ole’s son, Godtfred Kirk Christiansen.
The staying power of legos is that they have intergenerational appeal. For young kids, they are a way to refine fine motor skills and encourage creativity. For adults, the creativity remains an appeal, but the lego can serve as a building block in ever more complex designs that have applications in architecture, science, art and more.
Today, Lego Group is the world’s largest toy company by revenue, with 25,000 employees around the world and record sales of 74.3 billion kroner ($10.8 billion) in 2024 – an expansion of 13 percent in sales from the year before.
What’s so amazing about this is the fact that the company came close to bankruptcy in the early 2000s – literally, the company was bleeding money at a clip of about $1 million a day.
It made a strong comeback by refocusing on updating and modernizing its core product (ie: legos) but also through brand partnerships with other big-name companies like Nike and Formula 1, and strategic expansions into media, games, and Legoland theme parks.
Happy patent day, Legos! AKA National Lego Day. As an aside, I had zero idea just how popular legos were until I dipped a toe into the many online sites dedicated to those who dedicate their lives to the plastic brick in all its glory. Rock on, nerds!
It’s going to be mostly clear but cold today, with highs reaching only into the low 20s. There might be a few flurries or snow showers popping up later int he day.
In the headlines…
President Trump hit the campaign trail in Iowa yesterday, marking the first of many stops ahead of November’s midterm elections.
Trump talked up the strength of the U.S. economy during a speech meant to try once again to convince Americans that he was focused on “affordability” ahead of this year’s midterm elections. But he said affordability was a fake issue made up by Democrats.
Trump said that “we’re going to de-escalate a little bit” when it comes to his immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, the latest indication that the mounting backlash to the fatal shooting of a protester Saturday had prompted him to try to shift perceptions.
A preliminary review by U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s internal watchdog office found Alex Pretti was shot by two federal officers after resisting arrest, but did not indicate that he brandished a weapon during the encounter, as Kristi Noem claims.
From Democratic Party leaders to the nation’s leading advocacy organizations to even the most centrist Congress members, calls are mounting for the Homeland Security secretary to step aside after the shooting deaths in Minneapolis of two people.
“The country is disgusted by what the Department of Homeland Security has done,” top House Democratic Reps. Hakeem Jeffries of New York, Katherine Clark of Massachusetts and Pete Aguilar of California said in a joint statement.
“Kristi Noem should be fired immediately, or we will commence impeachment proceedings in the House of Representatives,” the trio of Democrats wrote. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, of Alaska, became the second Republican senator to call for Noem to step down over her handling of the Minneapolis shootings.
Noem’s aggressiveness has sometimes given Trump heartburn. She got a rebuke from him after a second killing by federal immigration agents but soon seemed to be back in his good graces.
A federal judge has temporarily blocked the deportation of a 5-year-old boy and his father who were arrested in a Minneapolis suburb in an operation that further stirred the outrage over the Trump administration’s deportation efforts.
Democrats handily won two special elections for state House seats in Minnesota, the first contests held in the state since growing backlash to the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
A man was tackled to the ground after spraying Democratic Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar with an unknown substance during a town hall in her district yesterday, where she called for Noem to resign.
The man sprayed Omar with a strong-smelling liquid from a syringe before being tackled by security. He was arrested and booked into jail on suspicion of assault, said Trevor Folke, a spokesman for the Minneapolis police.
The National Transportation Safety Board determined that the FAA had approved dangerous flight routes that allowed an Army helicopter to fly into the path of a passenger jet over the Potomac River on Jan. 29, 2025, to calamitous results.
The investigating board also castigated the agency for not doing enough to respond to warnings about longtime risks to safety and found a complacent culture within the air traffic control tower at Ronald Reagan National Airport that relied too heavily on pilots.
They also determined that insufficient warnings from the air traffic controller to pilots of the Army Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines passenger jet involved in the crash, and altimeters that habitually gave faulty readings of altitude were to blame.
Gov. Kathy Hochul is poised to select her third running mate in five years. The decision is reportedly coming down to the wire.
Hochul announced early labor union endorsements for her re-election bid from HTC, CSEA and RWDSU.
The governor’s race is shaping up as a choice between continued resistance to Trump’s mass-deportation campaign, as Hochul has vowed, or full support of Trump’s expulsions, as her likely GOP opponent, Nassau County executive Bruce Blakeman, has promised.
Hochul announced an expansion of child tax credits for New York families. This will increase the child tax credit up to $1,000 per qualifying child under the age of four. The credit is for the 2026 filing season, 2025 tax year.
Gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman demanded that New York state adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Association’s definition of antisemitism on the 81st anniversary of the fall of Nazi Germany.
New York is projected to lose two seats in Congress if the state’s rate of population growth doesn’t improve, according to new data released yesterday by the U.S. Census Bureau.
Republicans appealed a judge’s decision to throw out the lines of New York City’s only GOP-controlled House seat, a case that could have national reverberations in the fight for control of Congress.
Construction on the first new set of Hudson River train tunnels in more than a century will halt next week if the Trump administration doesn’t resume funding mandated by Congress, the project’s leaders said.
A “significant coastal winter storm” could hit the eastern U.S. this weekend, just days after Winter Storm Fern wreaked havoc across much of the country, according to the National Weather Service.
Temperatures in New York City have remained below freezing since Friday — and they’re expected to stay that way until at least early next week as arctic air has settled into the region.
The New York City Ferry suspended its service yesterday afternoon and warned it may be closed “for several days” due to thick layers of ice floating on the rivers.
The death toll from the major winter storm that pummeled New York City with snow, ice and frigid temperatures has risen to at least 10, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said.
In response, Mamdani said, the city has expanded emergency measures to protect people experiencing homelessness during the city’s most severe cold in eight years because “Code Blue is not enough”.
The mayor said he has directed city workers, nonprofits and faith-based groups to ramp up street outreach in an effort to find and relocate people to shelters or other locations.
Mamdani made three commissioner appointments for departments overseeing citywide administrative services, probation and environmental protection.
“Each of these New Yorkers shares a common commitment to service, a desire to place the city and its needs before their own and a real ambition to deepen what New Yorkers expect from their government,” Mamdani said.
Mamdani will have to wait at least six months before he gains one of the biggest powers under mayoral control: appointing the majority of the school board.
City officials are asking New Yorkers to be patient as workers continue to clear snow from pedestrian pathways, but the city remains an obstacle course in the days following the weekend winter storm.
Unlike two years ago when they pivoted to remote, New York City schools did not see a systemwide meltdown this past snow day, but pockets of families and educators from across the city shared instances of glitches and snafus.
Mamdani will give his first budget address today laying out his case for why Mayor Eric Adams’ administration is responsible for, as the mayor put it last week, “gross fiscal mismanagement.” He’ll be joined by his budget director Sherif Soliman.
Mamdani made a private visit to the Manhattan apartment of an 82-year-old Holocaust survivor, a gesture to a Jewish community divided over his positions, and reflecting his focus on affordability and dignity for New Yorkers living on fixed incomes.
Holocaust survivor Sami Steigmann, 86, a frequent public speaker, said Mamdani offered to help him find new housing, as his current building in Harlem has no elevator and he has difficulty climbing the stairs.
Mamdani appointed Sharun Goodwin to lead the city’s Department of Probation, which has been led by controversial Commissioner Juanita Holmes. Goodwin spent her entire career with the DOP, came out of retirement this week to lead the agency.
Mamdani’s new appointments include the city’s first-ever “World Cup Czar”, Maya Handa, who will coordinate city agencies, mayoral offices, and private partners ahead of the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Trump said that Mamdani has a “really good personality” — but said he needs to stop the city from “losing people” and that he should convince the New York Stock Exchange to reverse the opening of an office in Dallas.
“I think he’s got a really good personality,” Trump said in an appearance on right-wing radio host Sid Rosenberg’s show. “I think he’s got tremendous assets, but he’s got some things … policy, concepts, that really haven’t worked over the last 10,000 years.”
A trio of bills to reform New York City government’s abuse-ridden system for awarding contracts gained traction yesterday, despite testy opposition from Mamdani’s fledgling administration in its first hearing before the City Council.
Rikers Island’s new remediation manager will have authority even beyond that of the city’s correction commissioner to push forward reforms — one of the most aggressive steps yet in a decade of federal oversight of the troubled jail complex.
Nicholas Deml, a former CIA officer who most recently headed the Vermont detention system, will have sweeping powers to enact highly-anticipated reforms at the troubled jail complex.
The New York City chapter of the DSA announced its endorsement of Darializa Avila Chevalier, a community organizer from Harlem who is looking to unseat Bronx Democratic Rep. Adriano Espaillat – a major test for the party after its success helping Mamdani win.
In new court papers, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg detailed concerns raised by a top buildings department official who was concerned that a planned hotel renovation former Adams aide Ingrid Lewis-Martin was pushing was potentially unsafe.
Prosecutors added new details to their case against Lewis-Martin, accused of using her position to help associates in exchange for bribes, saying she received jewelry and other gifts and then pressured city regulators to approve projects despite safety concerns.
Dozens of demonstrators were arrested in Manhattan last night after occupying the lobby of a TriBeCa hotel where, they said, federal immigration agents were staying while carrying out the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
A Brooklyn judge cut decades off a prominent Orthodox Jewish figure’s sentence for repeatedly sexually assaulting a teenaged girl — and the outraged victim warned she fears he’ll return to his manipulative ways when he’s free in just a few years.
Late last week, the city sued Radiant Solar and its owner, William James Bushell, demanding $18 million in restitution and about $1.7 million in penalties — the largest sum the city has ever sought from a home improvement contractor.
Amtrak has agreed to restore all suspended or combined Empire Service trains between New York’s Penn Station and the Albany-Rensselaer Station by early March, according to Hochul.
The move means a plan to extend Metro-North to the Capital Region will no longer move forward, after Amtrak said it would not allow the temporary service to proceed. The proposal would have offered cheaper, fixed-fare trips along the Hudson Line.
A Mohonasen school board member is suing the state over a memo that warns boards not to allow discussion about transgender students using school facilities.
Friction between Republican Mayor Carmella Mantello and the new Troy City Council — largely due to disagreements over finances — has reached a fever pitch less than a month after Democrats took full control of the chamber.
Albany police responded to a fatal double shooting on the 600 block of Myrtle Avenue around 3:15 p.m. yesterday, but said there is no danger to the community.
The aquarium in the mall off Campbell Road is closed after an electrical fire, and so far has not announced a reopening date.
Zacceus Cancer was sentenced to 30 years in prison for shooting a man last year near an Interstate 787 exit ramp in Albany.
The winter storm that blanketed the region in snow was well-publicized. What may have been unexpected is that Mayor Dorcey Applyrs declared a snow emergency that will take effect more than 24 hours after the storm has moved out of the area.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
