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Steinbeck’s famous ‘Western Flyer’ sails back to Monterey after years of restoration

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

The original captain’s desk sits in the wheelhouse, where legendary author John Steinbeck may have jotted notes for his Log from the Sea of Cortez. A guy wire like the one he wrote would “sing under the wind,” stabilizes the mast. Nearby is the galley ventilator where “the odor of boiling coffee” soothed his senses.Neglected, twice sunk and now painstakingly restored, the ‘Western Flyer’ — dubbed the world’s most famous fishing boat for bearing Steinbeck and his biologist friend Ed Ricketts on an ecological adventure — returns Saturday to Monterey for the first time in 75 years to begin a new life in science education.Now docked at the Moss Landing harbor, the Western Flyer will be escorted to Monterey by a decorated boat parade, honoring an end-of-season fishing community celebration held the day before Steinbeck and Ricketts headed out on their journey. The event will include tours of the boat, activities and live music.&...

Review: Legendary rock act kicks off 50th anniversary tour in grand style

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

The music kept right on building, growing more intense and fierce with each passing second, as the players onstage pushed both themselves and their instruments. Then, right as the music was hitting such an absurdly towering peak, Mark Mothersbaugh tore into the words of “Gut Feeling”:“Something about the way you taste, makes me wanna clear my throat,” the Devo vocalist belted out as the crowd pulsed sharply in rhythm with the music. “There’s a message to your movements that really gets my goat.”Um, wow. Really? This is what 50 looks like for Devo? Because the band — which got its start in 1973 and is currently celebrating a half century of making music — showed on Thursday night at the Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium that it can still rock with the best of them.It was opening night of the North American leg of the Devo’s 50 Years of De-Evolution tour, which also includes dates on Sunday (Nov. 5) and Nov. 14 at the Golden Gate T...

Big Ten schedule release: Breaking down the best and worst of the 2024 lineup for USC, UCLA, Oregon and Washington

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

As the final Pac-12 football season hurtles toward its conclusion, the next era crystalized Thursday for four departing schools. The Big Ten unveiled its weekly schedule for the 2024 season — the first with USC, UCLA, Oregon and Washington as members of the 18-team behemoth.The reveal came exactly four weeks after the Big Ten released the opponent rotation and protected games for a five-year period.The four Pac-12 transplants will make a slew of cross-country trips next fall, as anticipated. But the schedules weren’t created equally, especially when non-conference opponents are considered.Our breakdown of the master schedule …First, the parametersEach team will play nine conference games, including a rivalry game in late November. (On the West Coast, those are USC vs. UCLA, and Washington vs. Oregon.) The Big Ten is eliminating divisions next season; the teams with the best winning percentage in league play will advance to the championship game. Kickoff times for t...

Sam Bankman-Fried’s Stanford Law parents ‘defeated’ by his guilty verdict

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

If “saving” their son had become “the major project” of their lives, Sanford Law professors Joseph Bankman and Barbara Fried looked utterly “defeated” Thursday, with a federal jury taking a little more than four hours to find their adored oldest child, disgraced FTX mogul San Bankman-Fried, guilty in the largest cryptocurrency fraud trial in history.The couple, once highly popular and respected academics on the Stanford campus, “looked frightened” when they entered the courtroom Thursday in New York, The Verge writer Elizabeth Lopatto reported. Bankman put his arm around his wife as they sat down on the wooden benches. Fried put her head in her hands while their son, who had traded in his “schlubby” shorts and T-shirt for a suit, tie and shorn head for his trial, stood to hear the jury’s verdict.Barbara Fried and Joseph Bankman, parents of FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried, pose for a picture as they arrive to Manhattan f...

Review: Uneven ‘Bulrusher’ at Berkeley Rep shines light on magical world

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

A baby floating down the Navarro River in a basket gets tangled amid the tall weeds in Eisa Davis’ play. That’s why the locals, who speak the idiosyncratic patois of the Anderson Valley, Boontling, call her a “Bulrusher.”This lyrical drama bearing that term as title gets a delicate if inconsistent production directed by Nicole A. Watson at Berkeley Rep, in a co-production with Princeton’s McCarter Theatre Center. If Davis’ rhapsodic language can feel stilted in this staging, the gentle pace quickens as Bulrusher comes of age and finds her flow.Jordan Tyson imbues the title character with a feral kind of fragility. She’s a strange and sweet mixture of clairvoyant and innocent, living in ‘50s America but feeling rather timeless.Like all the denizens of this hamlet, she’s a poet in her own right, steeping her identity in the musicality of an idiosyncratic lingo. Davis, a Berkeley native, captures the charm of this language in which sex is “heel scratchin” and a cup of coffee is a...

Amazon’s Jeff Bezos moving to Miami, leaving Seattle

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

By Spencer Soper | BloombergAmazon.com founder Jeff Bezos said he was moving to Miami from the Seattle region, relocating to be closer to his parents and the Cape Canaveral operations of Blue Origin LLC, his space exploration company.Bezos — the world’s third-wealthiest man, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index — made the announcement Thursday via Instagram, which included video of him in his Seattle garage where he founded Amazon in 1994.“I’ve lived in Seattle longer than I’ve lived anywhere else and have so many amazing memories here,” Bezos said. “As exciting as the move is, it’s an emotional decision for me. Seattle, you will always have a place in my heart.”Related ArticlesBusiness | Amazon warehouse injuries more widespread than thought, study says Business | This company envisions a future where humanoid robots are as ubiquitous as smartphones Business | The cheap streaming era is over. Here’s why your bills are going up ...

Bay Area biotech company cutting 40% of workforce, closing Brisbane headquarters

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

(KRON) -- Sangamo Therapeutics, a Bay Area biotech company centered around genomic medicines, will be laying off 40% of its workforce and shutting down its Brisbane headquarters. In a news release sent out Wednesday, announcing the moves were part of a "strategic transformation and a corresponding restructuring of operations and workforce reduction."The layoffs and closure are part of a broader cost savings initiative aimed at reducing the company's annual operating expense by around 50%, the release said. "The restructuring announced today represents a further step towards simplifying the Sangamo organization," the release reads in part. 3 passengers sue Alaska Airlines after off-duty pilot accused of trying to cut engines mid-flight The restructuring will also see the January departures of two of the company's top executives, Executive Vice President D. Mark McClung and Senior Vice President Jason Fontenot.The restructuring and workforce reductions are part of an effort to reduc...

Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah leader threatens escalation with Israel as its war with Hamas rages on

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

BEIRUT (AP) — Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said Friday that his powerful militia is already engaged in unprecedented fighting along the Lebanon-Israel border and threatened a further escalation as Israel’s war with Hamas nears the one-month mark. In televised remarks — his first since the Palestinian militants’ deadly Oct. 7 incursion into southern Israel — Nasrallah stopped short of announcing that Hezbollah would fully enter the war, a move that would have devastating consequences for both Lebanon and Israel.The United States, Israel’s strongest backer, has warned Hezbollah and its patron Iran against entering the fray and has sent warships to the Mediterranean, a move Nasrallah said “will not scare us.” Hezbollah is prepared for all options, he declared, “and we can resort to them at any time.” The fighting would “not be limited” to the scale seen so far, he added. In recent weeks, Hezbollah has fired rockets across the border daily, mainly hitting military...

Meloni pushes change to let voters directly elect Italy’s premier in bid to make governments last

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

ROME (AP) — Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni’s Cabinet on Friday approved her proposal to make the office of the prime minister directly elected by voters in a bid to end the country’s chronic ailment of short-lived, unstable governments. Changing Italy’s Constitution would allow voters to elect a premier who would serve five years — to coincide with Parliament’s full term. The far-right leader insisted at a news conference that what she called the “mother of all reforms” will guarantee more stability in a nation where government coalitions sometimes last only months, even weeks. But there’s no guarantee the reform will become reality. It’s likely voters would have the final say. A referendum would take place if two-thirds of lawmakers fail to approve the reform. Although Meloni’s government, with the help of its right-wing coalition partners, commands a comfortable parliamentary majority, it would need opposition forces to reach the two-thirds margin. Italy...

Serbia’s pro-Russia intelligence chief sanctioned by the US has resigned citing Western pressure

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 20:50:00 GMT

BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Serbia’s intelligence chief, who has fostered closer ties with Russia and is under sanctions by the United States, resigned Friday after less than a year in the post, saying he wanted to avoid possible further embargos against the Balkan nation.In July, the U.S. imposed sanctions on Aleksandar Vulin, accusing him of involvement in illegal arms shipments, drug trafficking and misuse of public office.The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control said that Vulin used his public authority to help a U.S.-sanctioned Serbian arms dealer move illegal arms shipments across Serbia’s borders. Vulin is also accused of involvement in a drug trafficking ring, according to U.S. authorities.Vulin became the director of Serbia’s intelligence agency BIA in December 2022. The close associate of populist Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić had previously served as both the army and police chief. Vulin is known for advocating close ties with Russia instead ...