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 S59A Sunset Toast to Jimmy Buffett   When I heard on Saturday that Jimmy Buffett had died, I wrote a condolence e-mail to his longtime friend Thomas McGuane, the novelist. McGuane, who is married to Buffett’s sister Laurie, was the go-between when I was trying to get Buffett to talk to me last year, when I was reporting a story about Latitude Margaritaville, the retirement community, or communities, really, that are, notionally, a manifestation of the beachy/breezy/boozy ethos expressed in his songs. Buffett had got rich and even more famous by converting his body of work into a life-style brand. That success, the freedom it gave him to say no, and maybe some lingering if unacknowledged misgivings over the relationship of his attainments in business to his songwriting made him squirrelly about interviews, or this one anyway. McGuane, who referred to Buffett as Bubba, put in a word. Bubba and I Zoomed. He was delightful.McGuane, in his reply on Sunday, wrote that he’d just returned from Telluride, where he’d helped introduce a new documentary about Buffett and their friends, and their lives as artists and fishermen in Key West a half century ago. It is called “All That Is Sacred” and is directed by Scott Ballew. (The film has yet to find a distributor.) Buffett was supposed to have been in Telluride, too, but, alas, he lay dying, at his home in Sag Harbor, on Long Island. Of the people featured in the film—among them Jim Harrison, Richard Brautigan, Russell Chatham—McGuane was now the lone survivor. “There were two of us left at the Friday showing, and by Saturday I was it,” he wrote.
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S70Why not all urban foxes deserve their 'bin-raiding' reputation  Ever since their colonisation of British cities sometime during the last century, urban red foxes (Vulpes vulpes) have become somewhat of a cultural phenomenon. Some people love them for their striking marmalade coats but others, including former prime minister Boris Johnson, think of them as a menace.In recent times, people seem to think urban foxes are becoming bolder and more cunning, “wreaking havoc in central London” by scavenging in bins for food scraps. But our recent study suggests that this popular portrayal may only be partially true for the species.
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S58S6310 Years Ago, Vin Diesel Made a Refreshingly Gonzo Sci-Fi Thriller  It’s easy to forget that Vin Diesel’s entire life’s work wasn’t always making Fast & Furious movies. In the early aughts, Diesel gambled his fortunes on making an epic Dune-ish sci-fi franchise, teaming up with writer and director David Twohy to make two movies featuring the improbably compelling space badass Richard B. Riddick. At a time when Diesel was too good to do more than cameo in Tokyo Drift, he was doing his damnest to make Riddick’s world into the biggest thing ever.Sadly, the collected Chronicles of Richard never really grabbed the public’s imagination, and so by 2013, nine years after The Chronicles of Riddick hit theaters, Diesel and Twohy attempted a soft reboot. The result was a movie that’s much more fun to watch than it has any right to be. Released on September 6, 2013, Riddick may be the worst of the three Riddick movies, but watching it today feels like a breath of fresh-ish air.
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S39UN invasive species report reveals scale of threat to nature and people - and how to manage it  More than 3,500 invasive alien species are seriously compromising human wellbeing and causing irreversible damage to ecosystems, according to the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). While some alien species actually benefit humans, the UN organisation estimates 10% threaten nature and people.Alien species are plants, animals or other organisms that are introduced to new regions by human activities. A subset of them, known as invasive alien species, can make native species go extinct, spread diseases such as malaria, Zika and West Nile fever, and damage food crops.
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S62"Swift Justice" Looks Inside a Sharia Courtroom  In August, 2021, when tens of thousands of government officials, interpreters, and Westernized élites fled Afghanistan following the Taliban's capture of Kabul, they were joined by nearly the entire foreign press corps. The Times evacuated not only its reporters but also its translators, cooks, and drivers. Amid one of the biggest international news events in two decades, many bureaus stood empty. Gone were the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and the major networks. Victor Blue, a photographer who was in-country on assignment, was asked to flee with his colleaguesâand declined. He was one of a handful of reporters who stayed behind, and he spent months travelling the country, exploring the dark corners of Taliban rule.Much of the press saw U.S. troops as defending a pro-Western populace against a deeply unpopular Taliban insurgency. But Blue quickly realized that, in the insurgent heartlands, which lie in rural areas, the story was much more nuanced. To begin with, U.S.-occupied Afghanistan had been a divided realm; Afghans living in areas of relative calm tended to oppose the Taliban, but those living in war-racked regions often saw the Taliban as a better alternative to the corrupt U.S.-backed government. The Western media missed this story. Part of the reason was that the war-torn countryside had been difficultâthough not impossibleâfor foreign reporters to access, so the scale of the crimes committed by U.S. forces and their allies went undocumented. This violence turned many rural Pashtun communities against the Americans; in some villages, nearly every adult had been involved, directly or indirectly, in the insurgency.
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S66New 'Ahsoka' Episode 4 Clip Shows the Action Finally Heating Up  The Disney+ series' unusual release schedule means Episode 4 will arrive sooner than you think.It may have just started, but Ahsoka is almost halfway over. While the first three episodes set up the treacherous mission Ahsoka and Sabine have ahead of them, we’re now firmly in the second act of the series, and the action will definitely heat up as they get into the meat of their quest.
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S64You Need to Play the Most Cathartic Indie on Xbox Game Pass ASAP  Video games aren’t usually the first place most people look for emotional release. Plenty of games offer emotional depth, of course, but those often come after bouts of challenging gameplay or hours of narrative buildup. When you’ve had a bad day or work or gotten broken up with, it’s much easier to just sink into your couch and put on a movie to cry to.The first game from Nomada Studio, Gris, breaks that mold. This short, not particularly challenging platformer won’t interrupt your catharsis with any major difficulty spikes, so you can focus on its story of overcoming trauma.
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S34Voices of Black youth remind adults in schools to listen -- and act to empower them  The idea of inviting students into classroom conversations that teach them to define and express their concerns, ideas and opinions takes inspiration from the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). The right to be heard is the general principle, and Article 12 of the UNCRC provides for children’s involvement in decision-making that affects their lives. It includes the right for children to express their views.
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S654 Years Ago, a Trippy Sci-Fi Adventure Changed Video Game Storytelling Forever  Remedy Entertainment stepped into the spotlight with Max Payne in 2001. The gritty action game brought The Matrix’s bullet-time into games and put lots of eyes on the developer. In 2010, Alan Wake gained Remedy a whole new crop of fans thanks to its moody atmosphere and intriguing thriller plot. A much more sedate experience than Max Payne, Alan Wake prized tension and survival-horror elements rather than slick action.Then in 2019, Remedy found a way to merge the immaculate tone of Alan Wake with the wild action of Max Payne, and stuff it all into one ordinary-seeming office building. The result, Control, brought Remedy to a whole new stratum of success and set up one of the most exciting video game crossovers ever.
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S42How much period blood is 'normal'? And which sanitary product holds the most blood?  Heavy menstrual bleeding or heavy periods affect up to a quarter of women and people who menstruate, and can impact quality of life. Women who have had heavy periods for a long time often consider this normal, or something to be simply put up with. Diagnosing heavy periods has traditionally been based on the nature of bleeding. Women might describe bleeding through clothing, having to change pads and tampons every two hours or sooner, or passing clots larger than a 50 cent coin. Doctors consider a woman to have heavy periods if she regularly loses more than 80 millilitres of blood during one menstrual period. That’s four Australian tablespoons’ worth. Women diagnosed with heavy bleeding should follow up with their doctor to establish the cause of their bleeding and guide treatment.
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S36Friends with benefits - what a sex and relationship therapist wants you to know  There are many kinds of sexual situations people can get into – everything from committed monogamous relationships to a one-night stand. But friends with benefits (FWB) situations are often still seen as controversial, perhaps because of the potential for heartbreak. Typically, FWB arrangements involve two people engaging in casual sexual activities without the expectations and constraints often associated with romantic partnerships. Unlike a fling or a hook up there is often an understanding that the situation is indefinite and that the friendship may resume or continue even if the physical relationship ends.
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S46Mixed-use solar and agricultural land is the silver bullet Alberta's Conservatives have wished for  The Alberta government recently announced a much-maligned seven-month pause on renewable (including solar) energy development in the province. While the exact reasons are up for debate, one specific factor has been the desire to investigate ways to make renewable energy, particularly solar, more integrated within the province over the long term. Specifically, there is a real concern among some in the party and the general public that industrial solar will displace farming and raise food prices as well as create end-of-life problems with potentially abandoned equipment.
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S702023's Twistiest Time-Travel Movie is Sci-Fi Romance at Its Boldest  Famed philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche once said, “Hope in reality is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.” It’s a depressing, sobering concept that, when one thinks about it too long, may just lie in some real truths.In Bertrand Bonello’s latest film The Beast, this adage is played out over a lengthy science fiction odyssey that spans across timelines and connections, proving that love, hope, and fear are all intertwined within us. It’s the deepest and most human tragedy of the self, and one that is often unavoidable.
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S43'No woman in the usual sense': Ilse Koch, the 'Bitch of Buchenwald', was a Holocaust war criminal -  In her indictment, the prosecutor described Ilse Koch as “a sexy-looking depraved woman who beat prisoners, reported them for beatings, and trafficked human skin”. Ilse’s husband, Karl Koch, had been commandant of Buchenwald, one of the first and largest concentration camps within Germany’s 1937 borders, from August 1937 to October 1941. He would then briefly serve as a commander of Majdanek, another notorious concentration camp.
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S50The Conversation launches in Brazil  In a recent article in the Sydney Morning Herald, Alan Sunderland, a former editorial director at the ABC, put his finger on the ethical crisis facing the media: “In 2023, you can’t talk about the problems of the world without talking about polarisation, disinformation and conflict. The media, far from being seen as a solution to those problems, is generally recognised as being part of them.”Everyone paying any attention knows he’s right. According to the latest Reuters Digital New report trust in news is falling and active avoidance of the news media remains high. When Q&A presenter Stan Grant recently quit the ABC he said he feared that by working in the media he was becoming part of the problem. (He’s since signed up to lead a project at Monash University aimed at furthering constructive journalism.)
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S41Krishna Janmashtami: Celebrating the birthday of a beloved Hindu god, renowned for his compassion and his wisdom in the Bhagavad Gita  Many Hindus around the world will celebrate Krishna Janmashtami, the birthday of the Hindu god Krishna, on Sept. 6. The birth celebrations occur on the eighth day after the full moon in the month of Bhadrapada, or during August-September; in some parts of southern India the celebrations are held during the fifth lunar month of Shravana, which is in July-August. In Sanskrit, Krishna means “dark” or “black,” and like the deity Vishnu with whom he is associated, Krishna is often depicted as dark-skinned. He is identified as the eighth avatar, or incarnation, of the deity Vishnu in many texts, while other sources identify Krishna as the highest divine being. He is especially loved for his divine attributes of compassion, protection and friendship.
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S61Who Owns This Country?  By signing up, you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.© 2023 Condé Nast. All rights reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. The New Yorker may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of Condé Nast. Ad Choices
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S60What a Musical Life Leaves Behind  What do we lose when we lose a pianist? The question is on my mind today, the anniversary of the death of the German pianist and conductor Lars Vogt, who succumbed to esophageal cancer on September 5, 2022, just three days shy of his fifty-second birthday. Vogt was a musician of rigorous but unshowy virtuosity and distinctive intelligence, but also, and above all, a profound humanism and a deep moral and emotional imagination. He was renowned as a chamber musician and accompanist and also celebrated as a soloist. (Only a dozen of his fifty-odd recordings were solo albums.) Though he played everything from Bach to Schoenberg and beyond, he was most closely linked to the music at the very heart of the Romantic piano repertoire, particularly the agonies and the ecstasies of Johannes Brahms.“With him I always felt a very close connection,” Vogt said of Brahms in an unforgettable final interview, with the pianist Zsolt Bognár, on an episode of the excellent series “Living the Classical Life.” There is a “slight melancholy that basically is always there” in Brahms, he continued. “Even if he writes very joyful music, you know, then it’s in spite of the melancholy, but that’s the thing that from childhood was always very close to me, the dark harmonies that he often chooses.”
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S57Word from The Hill: Danielle Wood to head Productivity Commission, Alan Joyce bows to public anger, PM jets off again  As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation’s politics team.In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn discuss the latest national accounts and Jim Chalmers’ announcement that Grattan Institute CEO Danielle Wood will take over as head of the Productivity Commission. The appointment came as a surprise, after Chris Barrett, chosen for the position only recently, decided he had a better offer – he will become head of the Victorian Treasury.
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S68'Starfield' Just Solved One of Game Pass's Biggest Problems  Gamers worldwide have been waiting years to get their hands on Starfield, which finally releases on September 6. But Starfield's Premium Edition presented a solution for those who couldn’t wait: early access to the game. While Game Pass subscribers will be able to play Starfield on release day, Bethesda’s offering a Premium Edition Upgrade to give even Game Pass subscribers early access. The cunning pln may just have solved one of the biggest perceived problems of the subscription service — sales.
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S67Marvel's Most Anticipated Show Has Been Delayed -- But Fans Should be Happy  Ironheart is the latest casualty of Marvel’s new Disney+ strategy, but both fans and the brand could benefit. As Hollywood writers and actors (and, possibly, visual effects workers) strike against the industry’s biggest heavyweights, all eyes are on Disney. The company has been at the center of disputes concerning sustainable pay and the rising prevalence of AI, but the dual strike is just one of the things that’s forced Disney to reevaluate its omnipresence.
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S44S45S49S56S35S40Who will win the 2023 Rugby World Cup? This algorithm uses 10,000 simulations to rank the contenders  Despite New Zealand’s record loss to South Africa in August, All Blacks fans can take heart from statistical modelling that has them as favourites to win the 2023 Rugby World Cup (RWC).According to Rugby Vision, a well-tested algorithm I developed to predict outcomes for major rugby competitions, New Zealand has a 33.5% chance of winning their fourth RWC title. The next most likely champions are South Africa (26.2%), followed by France (20.6%) and Ireland (11.9%).
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