Good morning, it’s Monday.
This time of year always makes me think about…candy. It’s hard not to when every supermarket and drug store has their Halloween displays front and center already, along with all the pumpkins and apples and doughnuts etc.
Also, back-to-school time was, for me, a moment of freedom from my mother’s rather strict dietary rules – notably the ban on most added sugars (she was very much before her time, as I’ve written about in this space before).
When I hit fifth grade, I was able to walk to school in the mornings, which took me past the local deli, putting a wide range of candy within reach if I managed to leave early enough.
Technically speaking, we weren’t supposed to have candy in school outside the cafeteria. Anything contraband was ripe for confiscation. So what you really wanted was something that was easy to conceal and also long-lasting, because sneaking multiple treats throughout the day increased your chances of discovery – and punishment.
Enter the gobstopper.
More commonly known as a jawbreaker here in the U.S., this iconic candy is a round ball of different colored sugar layers that reveal themselves as they melt away, one by one, in your mouth.
The taste is, well, pretty bland, as candy goes, just a flavorless generic sweetness – at least to my palate. Technically speaking, they’re supposed to taste like a variety of fruits, and some of the modern-day versions have a sour powdered sugar or bubble gum core that spices things up a bit.
To me, though, the appeal of a gobstopper isn’t the taste, but rather the bang they offer for your buck.
A standard gobstopper lasts between 10 and 12 minutes, assuming you don’t lose patience near the end and start chewing. (Doing so earlier is a good way to crack or even break a tooth…or worse, more on this in a moment). The giant variety, which might be as much as three inches in diameter, can take hours, days, or even weeks to finish because you usually can’t fit them entirely into your mouth.
A giant gobstopper strikes me as overkill, and also unhygienic. Where and how do you store the thing when you’re not working away at it? And doesn’t it get sticky? A drippy, lint and hair-covered candy? Just yuck, no thanks.
Jawbreakers can apparently be dangerous. A few years back, a college student went viral for having her jaw wired shut after she broke it biting into an extra large gobstopper. Long before that, there was a freak incident in which a jawbreaker inexplicably exploded, burning a 9-year-old girl’s face.
Gobstoppers are a boiled sweet, which sounds kind of unappetizing, honestly, that got their name from the British and Irish slang for mouth – “gob” – so this is literally a candy that stuffs up your mouth and stops you from speaking. They are now largely produced by the Ferrara Candy Company, which acquired the former Nestlé U.S. candy line (including Wonka brands) in 2018. There are intermittent shortages, causing fans considerable consternation. But so far, gobstoppers have not been fully discontinued.
Jawbreakers have existed for many years – at least since the 1800s, which is long before Roald Dahl published Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in 1964. The book included a reference to Willie Wonka’s creation, the Everlasting Gobstopper – a candy that ostensibly lasted forever – and spurred a rebrand of the candy that has since become a cult classic.
Happy National Gobstopper Day, which exists for no rhyme or reason that I can see, but is nevertheless fun. And right about now, I feel like we could all use a little more fun in our lives.
After a mixed-bag, weather-wise, of a weekend, we’re in for a lovely day – just in time to get back to work! It will be clear, bright, and sunny, with highs topping out in the low 70s. Hopefully, you can sneak out for a walk during lunchtime.
In the headlines…
The CEO of Anthropic said Saturday the artificial-intelligence industry should slow its fast-moving development to give safety measures time to catch up.
Without such a slowdown, Dario Amodei warned that within six to 12 months AI could be capable of leading a swarm of agents that could take over the entire internet.
“I won’t lie to you – there are real dangers,” Amodei said about the development of artificial intelligence. “And I think for too long the industry lied to people about the fact that this technology had risks.”
President Trump on Sunday appeared to dismiss calls from top artificial intelligence leaders to slow down development of AI models, saying that the United States needed to maintain its competitive edge over China.
President Trump has been at the forefront of the “what-me-worry?” crowd, refusing to engage on how to balance the risks and rewards of A.I.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said Sunday that Congress won’t lead the charge on regulating AI safety.
In an interview with CNN, the Louisiana Republican argued Congress has already instituted AI guardrails and that “there is an obvious corporate responsibility that the people who are creating these models have to ensure that their products are safe.”
Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries criticized Johnson for moving too slowly, saying in an interview on ABC that the House should take “decisive action.” But when he was asked for specific restrictions that he might back, Jeffries would not elaborate.
Former President Obama warned during a private fund-raising event that AI technology could be “dangerous” if not properly managed, as he implored Democrats to aggressively develop political and governing agendas to prioritize the issue in the coming years.
Speaking alongside Jeffries at the New-York Historical Society in Manhattan, Obama said he is neither a “doomer” nor an “accelerationist.”
King Charles III of Britain will meet with leaders from major artificial intelligence companies this week in Scotland amid mounting fears that rapid, unchecked development of the technology could lead to a global catastrophe.
The Trump administration plans to announce today that the United States will no longer limit the planet-warming pollution that power plants pump into the air while burning coal and gas, according to two people familiar with the proposal.
President Trump made a surprise trade announcement at the Irish Open golf tournament on Sunday, saying before the trophy ceremony that he plans to rescind the U.S.’s 10% tariff on Irish whiskey.
“Everybody’s been bugging me” to do it, the Republican president said. “And I said, ‘On behalf of the United States of America, I am going to take the tariffs off’” of Irish whiskey.
The Supreme Court will no longer hear an oral argument for a case on bond rights for noncitizens detained for lengthy periods, ruling the case moot after Gov. Kathy Hochul pardoned a lawfully present Dominican citizen, who pleaded guilty to second-degree assault.
Hochul joined local and state leaders in Buffalo on Saturday to open the New York Democrats coordinated Buffalo field campaign office.
In Amherst on Saturday afternoon, politicians and local labor leaders decried gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman’s “Trumpian” policies and rallied for Hochul’s re-election.
The head of a Staten Island nursing home says low Medicaid funding has long left his facility struggling to make ends meet despite Gov. Hochul pointing the finger at Trump’s administration.
Ahead of the upcoming midterm elections this year, voting rights groups statewide are pressuring Hochul to sign a measure into law that will extend the time polling locations are open if something happens to delay voting.
On the 25th anniversary of 9/11, three major firefighters unions – the Uniformed Firefighters Association, Uniformed Fire Officers Association and New York State Professional Fire Fighters Association – endorsed Hochul for reelection.
Hochul dipped out of the ceremony marking the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks early on Friday to do an interview on CNN.
New York Attorney General Letitia James often taps campaign funds to cover thousands of dollars in lodging bills, including for high-end out-of-state hotel stays in top destinations as far away as Los Angeles.
New York is exploring plans to open a more than 3,000-bed correctional facility somewhere in the state, procurement documents show – a surprising shift for a state that has eliminated more than 15,000 correctional facility beds and closed 26 prisons since 2011.
The state Corrections Department is seeking proposals to construct the massive proposed $750 million facility somewhere in the state, according to documents released last week.
Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman promised to end a New York state “war on drivers” by killing Democrat-driven green energy mandates if he’s elected.
New York state is buying books from Dolly Parton’s library charity to distribute to kids under age 5 in a touching fitting tribute to the late country-music icon’s literacy legacy.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and former Mayor Rudy Giuliani had an awkward exchange at the 9/11 Ground Zero ceremony.
Over the chorus of Republicans demanding that Mamdani skip the city’s Ground Zero ceremony, Staten Island Borough President Vito Fossella appears to have put politics aside and hosted the mayor at his office’s remembrance event at the Postcards memorial.
President Trump slammed Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Mamdani for appearing to laugh during the solemn reading of victims’ names at the 9/11 Memorial, calling their behavior “terrible” and “inappropriate.”
Mamdani led thousands across the Brooklyn Bridge on Sunday in a walk and run remembering the military personnel who served the city post 9/11.
A new group of city business leaders, called the NYC Child Care Business Council, has formed to make the case that expanded child care is not a progressive fantasy but an economic necessity for a city that has seen an exodus of young families with children.
Three months after Mamdani said a long-delayed street redesign in Midtown Manhattan was moving forward, there are no signs of progress, raising concerns that the project has hit another snag.
Ofir Akunis, Israel’s consul general in New York, likened Mamdani’s support for the Israel boycott movement to tactics used by Nazi Germany, called him an “antisemite,” and said he bears direct responsibility for attacks on Jews and Jewish institutions in New York.
Scandal-plagued NYC Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels promised a total overhaul of the city’s dysfunctional procurement system — without mentioning that he remains under investigation over alleged procurement violations of his own.
New York City schools are set to deploy attendance cops to combat their ongoing chronic absenteeism epidemic.
The bacteria that causes Legionnaires’ disease has been detected at 10 South Bronx cooling towers, including the one overseeing Yankee Stadium, the New York City Health Department said Sunday.
In a statement, the Yankees said the organization installed new cooling towers in 2024 and conducts weekly bacterial and water quality checks. It added that it completed the city’s mandated cleaning on Sunday morning.
After a gut renovation, the five-bedroom, three-bathroom Queens home in which Trump grew up sold for $1.93 million last week, according to real estate records and the buyer’s agent. The new owner plans to live in the home long-term and remains anonymous.
Over the last three years, Jewish institutions across New York City have added millions more to their budgets for security protections amid an increase in antisemitic attacks, rabbis and Jewish community leaders say.
A young man and woman, both 24, were caught on chilling video calmly sitting on subway tracks in Downtown Manhattan early Sunday before being fatally struck, law-enforcement sources said.
Steven Kolb, chief executive of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, the leading trade organization for the fashion industry, was involved in an altercation at a runway show for Cos, a contemporary fashion brand owned by H&M, the Swedish retailer.
As students return to classrooms this month, school districts are once again priming staff and families on how to respond if federal immigration enforcement activity reaches their school communities.
Chris Gallant, 37, the Democratic nominee running against Long Island Rep. Nick LaLota (R-NY) was previously involved in a very different kind of campaign: selling toys as a model for a fetish sex shop.
Albany County Young Democrats is getting backlash from state Democratic Party leaders after issuing a statement accusing Israel of committing “a genocide and gross violations of international law” against Palestinian people in Gaza.
Beleaguered beech trees are facing a new threat as beech leaf disease appears to be sweeping across the Adirondack region faster than expected.
After nearly a week of searching, East Greenbush police shared an update Sunday in the missing case of Dominick Bianchi, 35, who was found dead in a wooded area.
Albany County voters will decide in November whether to replace the county’s four part-time coroners with a centralized medical examiner office.
The Latinx Festival came back for its 6th year in the Capital Region. Organizers said that the new location at the Columbia County Fairgrounds gave them more room for music, food and activities.
For Capital Region builders and remodelers, the biggest concern with the escalating U.S.-Canada trade dispute may not be any single tariff, but the uncertainty over when rules will change and how much those changes will ultimately add to the cost of construction.
A western Montgomery County slaughterhouse faces a suspension from the U.S. Department of Agriculture after the agency accused a worker of beating two lambs with a shovel.
Ichabod Crane Central School District residents demanded to know who was responsible for years of inaccurate budgets at a presentation and question-and-answer session last week at the high school’s auditorium.
A report from a medical examiner confirmed what Mechanicville police suspected — a grandmother and mother used fatal doses of diphenhydramine, an over-the-counter allergy and sleep medication, to kill the younger woman’s four children in June.
Heather Scribner could take on two new jobs – assemblymember and Fulton County GOP chair – by next year in the fallout of a political shake-up in the Adirondacks.
The Town of Galway’s longtime highway superintendent has resigned after residents questioned whether he was fulfilling the duties of the elected position while working a full-time job for a construction equipment distributor in Albany.
Niskayuna town officials are considering taping departmental committee meetings instead of live webcasting as a way to save money and shield municipal workers from public orneriness.
Germany’s Alexander Zverev, the No. 1 seed, dashed Ben Shelton’s hopes of making American men’s tennis history Sunday at the U.S. Open.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
