I was doing some research on Establishment Clause cases, and noticed the plaintiffs in several leading cases were Jewish. I’m sure I’m missing others.
In Braunfeld v. Brown (1961), Abraham Braunfeld and the other plaintiffs were “member[s] of the Orthodox Jewish faith, which requires the closing of their places of business and a total abstention from all manner of work from nightfall each Friday until nightfall each Saturday.”
In Engel v. Vitale (1962), Steven Engel was described as a “devout Reform Jew.”
In Flast v. Cohen (1968), the lead plaintiff was Florence Flast. Several sources indicated he was Jewish, but nothing definitive. The other plaintiffs were Albert Shanker, Helen D. Henkin, Frank Abrams, C. Irving Dwork, Florine Levin. I would surmise that at least some of these plaintiffs were Jewish as well. Cohen, the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, was Jewish.
In Lee v. Weisman (1992), student Deborah Weisman was Jewish, and objected to a graduation message delivered by Rabbi Leslie Gutterman, of Temple Beth El in Providence.
In Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow (2004), Michael Newdow’smother was “Jewish but secular.”
In Town of Greece v. Galloway (2014), Susan Galloway was Jewish.
In Lemon v. Kurtzman (1971), Alton Lemon, the lead plaintiff was not Jewish, but the respondent, David Kurtzman, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, was Jewish.
Mike Garson will host three tribute concerts at The Sun Rose in West Hollywood on Jan. 8, 9, and 10, 2026. The shows mark 10 years since David Bowie died, and they celebrate what would’ve been the icon’s birthday. Billy Corgan, Chad Smith, Luke Spiller, Carmine Rojas, and Judith Hill will appear as guests.
The performances carry the title Bowie’s Piano Man: A Decade in the Stars. Each show will feature a distinct setlist, and unannounced guests might drop by. Garson was the pianist for David Bowie.
“David Bowie was one of the closest people in my life,” Garson said, according to American Songwriter. “Nothing brings me more joy than honoring 10 years since his passing and his birthday by collaborating with this all-star lineup to carry his legacy forward.”
These concerts also celebrate Garson turning 80. They kick off 10 new performances slated for 2026 at the venue. Garson has held residencies at this 80-seat space for years now.
“I’ve toured the world with Bowie and played with artists from Smashing Pumpkins and Nine Inch Nails to Duran Duran, but my shows at Live at The Sun Rose remain among the best of my career,” Garson added. “There is a real sense of community here.” He started working with Bowie in 1972, and he became one of the musician’s most trusted collaborators, contributing to over 10 studio albums throughout their partnership.
Tickets became available on Dec. 15. VIP packages offer three-show passes with reserved seats and tables, meet-and-greet access, and photo sessions. The venue caps attendance at 80 seats nightly.
The Sun Rose West Hollywood has rolled out hotel packages beginning at $1,236 for a stay-and-show combination. A three-day VIP overnight package starts at $4,069. It includes front row tables for two each night, dinner credit at Merois restaurant, and a meet-and-greet with the performer on January 10.
The hotel will provide a Moon Age Daydream Facial priced at $305. Guests can order an A Lad Insane cocktail for $23 at all food and beverage outlets throughout the three-day event.
When modern German restaurant Schmankerl Stub’n closed for good after being open less than a year, chef-owner Daniel Gabor vowed to return “anywhere but downtown Orlando” and in a “better established area for restaurants, foot traffic and parking.” That place? Ocoee.
It’s not exactly known for its walkability score, but it’s certainly a departure from downtown’s party atmosphere and occasional gunfire. Which is somewhat ironic, given Gabor’s redo is modeled after an Alpine hunting lodge, or jagdschloss, presumably one in the German Alps. What struck me was the spartan decor. I mean, if you’re billing your restaurant as an Alpine hunting lodge, go full Alpine hunting lodge. Apart from the handful of antlers on a bare green wall and the vintage spider chandeliers hanging from the drop ceiling, the main dining room — once home to Bella Tuscany and RusTeak — seems very much a work in progress.
The menu, on the other hand, is a finished product. Gabor, a native of Upper Bavaria schooled at the Culinary Institute of America, serves what he calls “fresh takes on the Alpine region’s comfort food.” Many are grounded in the German dishes people loved at Schmankerl, but there’s a dry-ager near the entrance containing steaks and duck. Long day of hunting and pecking at the keyboard? Why, dig into a 12-ounce, three-week-dry-aged ribeye ($75) with a side of beef-fat chimichurri. Or perhaps a charcuterie board ($18) with luscious cuts of spice-cured, dry-aged duck prosciutto, rounds of chorizo, air-dried lonzo and paper-thin filetto. Gabor does it all in his scratch kitchen, right down to the addictive horseradish dip served with that board.
Credit: Matt Keller Lehman
Alpine comfort, however, comes in other forms — in the Gruyère fondue for two ($36), served with potato sourdough made with trimmings from hash browns (a brunch item) and potato peels, and in the onion soup ($10) flavored with Irish whiskey and cognac and cheesed with Gruyère and cheddar. The paper napkins set inside a stein with cutlery at our table were no match for the dribble on my chin, yet I noticed cloth napkins sitting on empty tables with no mouths to wipe. Our server obliged when I asked for a sturdier serviette, but I thought it odd that every table didn’t have them.
Another thing every table should have, in addition to a refreshing Bitburger Pils or a crafted cocktail from the bar, is an earnestly presented plate of smoked and spiced Gruyère sausage ($20), which Gabor makes in house. The snap of the porky tube is matched only by the crackle of a potato pancake and pop of sauerkraut. It’s the kind of dish a strapping Teuton would eat after chasing down a sure-footed chamois on a rocky slope. Not as substantial, yet equally gratifying, is the wiener schnitzel ($31) served with a side of butter spätzle. Of note is the expert soufflieren — that puff in the crust that separates a proper schnitzel from a subpar shit-zel. Gabor dredges the veal cutlets in flour, egg, cream and breadcrumbs before its swirl in hot shortening.
There ought to be a German term for the intense enjoyment one gets from eating Black Forest cake ($12) — gaumenfreude, suggests Google — because that’s precisely what I felt after gorging on the chocolatey slab wondrously executed by pastry chef Samantha Bosen. If there’s a better BFC being served in the city, do let me know. A warm apple strudel ($10), crisped on top and set in a pool of crème anglaise, also made a worthy ender. Our only knock was that heavy saucing — it made the bottom of the strudel soggy. No biggie. Besides, here at Daniel Gabor’s Alpine Bar & Grill, I wasn’t going to make a mountain out of a molehill.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy dropped an AI bombshell on employees today, announcing that Rohit Prasad—who has led Amazon’s so-called AGI (artificial general intelligence) team since 2023, overseeing the development of the company’s Nova models—will depart at the end of the year.
Prasad previously served as the head scientist behind Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant, a role he held from the product’s earliest days. When he was appointed to lead the new ambitious AGI effort after ChatGPT launched in November 2022, as part of ascramble to develop a competitive LLM that could help reinvigorate the Alexa voice assistant. it was led almost entirely by ex-Alexa executives.
In a blog post, Jassy announced that longtime Amazon Web Services (AWS) executive Peter DeSantis will lead a new organization that drives the development of its AI models, custom computer chips (which include its Graviton, Trainium and Nitro chips), and quantum computing efforts. DeSantis had overseen the many teams designing AWS’ global infrastructure.
“With our Nova 2 models just launched at re:Invent, our custom silicon growing rapidly, and the advantages of optimizing across models, chips, and cloud software and infrastructure, we wanted to free Peter up to focus his energy, invention cycles, and leadership on these new areas,” Jassy wrote, adding that DeSantis would report directly to him.
Jassy also said that as part of the organizational change, Pieter Abbeel, an Amazon Distinguished Scientist in robotics who is also an AI and robotics professor at UC Berkeley, will lead the company’s frontier model research team. Abbeel came to Amazon in 2024 along with other cofounders of his robotics startup Covariant, in a deal that also saw Amazon licensing Covariants software, which included AI models that gave robots the ability to quickly adapt to new environments and tasks.
“Pieter is one of the world’s leading AI researchers, and co-founder of Covariant, which pioneered the first commercial foundation model for robotics,” Jassy wrote. “His deep expertise in generative AI and reinforcement learning makes him well-suited to advance Amazon’s AI research as we push the boundaries of what’s possible for customers.”
The news of Prasad’s departure comes as somewhat of a surprise, given that he was recently at Amazon’s Re:Invent conference discussing the latest Nova models. However, over the past two years there has been significant media coverage suggesting that Amazon’s Alexa AI and AGI-related efforts have struggled and fallen behind competitors.
A year ago, for example, Fortune’s Jason Del Rey reported exclusively that leaked Amazon documents identified critical flaws in the delayed AI reboot of Alexa. And in June 2024, Fortune reported that Amazon’s had blown Alexa’s shot to dominate AI, according to more than a dozen employees who worked on it—partly due to a lack of adequate data, even though Prasad, pushed the AGI team to work harder and harder, with a message to “get some magic” out of the LLM.
In addition, last week’s Amazon layoffs fueled concerns about whether Amazon’s was still lagging behind in AI, and whether the cuts reflected slowing growth. That came on the heels of comments in October by analyst Mark Shmulik of Bernstein, who said Amazon’s AWS was in “last place” in the AI cloud race.
However, The Information as well as Bloomberg reported this week that Amazon was in talks to invest $10 billion in OpenAI. OpenAI, in turn, had agreed to use Amazon’s Tranium AI chips, perhaps helping to counter the narrative that the company is behind in AI. OpenAI had previously agreed to spend $38 billion using AWS for computing.
Amazon also has a deal with AI company Anthropic, in which Amazon has invested $8 billion. Anthropic has agreed to use AWS’s Trainium chips for training and Anthropic’s Claude model is being used to answer some queries in the new Alexa Plus.
Dynamo Phyllis Kao led Sotheby’s The Now and Contemporary Evening Auction, which scored a $178.5 million result with strong participation from Asia. Julian Cassady Photography / Ali
After a challenging 2024—marked by a 25 percent contraction in the auction market—both Christie’s and Sotheby’s are closing 2025 with a clear rebound, according to newly released year-end results. Sotheby’s reported projected consolidated sales of $7 billion for 2025, a 17 percent increase over 2024. Christie’s, on a similar upward trajectory, expects to finish the year with $6.2 billion in global sales, up nearly 7 percent from last year’s $5.8 billion and broadly in line with its 2023 total. Following a slow start dampened by subdued May auctions, both houses regained momentum after the summer as the market strengthened, culminating in a multibillion-dollar fall season across London and New York.
While the blockbuster results of November’s marquee sales may not be sufficient on their own to signal a full recovery—concentrated as they are at the very top of the market—the broader picture reflected in these year-end numbers offers more substantial grounds for optimism. This year’s gains were driven not only by fine-art trophies but also by the continued rise of luxury collectibles and design—categories that are proving especially effective at attracting new buyers, often younger and from emerging markets, and ultimately broadening the base of the market overall.
Sotheby’s record year, led by trophies and luxury
Sotheby’s recorded a 26 percent year-over-year increase in auction sales to $5.7 billion, with a sharp acceleration in the second half of the year, which brought in 59 percent more than the same period in 2024. Private sales contributed an additional $1.2 billion, slightly below the prior year but still substantial.
Fine art sales generated $4.3 billion in revenue for the auction house in 2025, marking a 15 percent increase from the previous year’s downturn. The rebound was fueled by the exceptional quality of consignments secured for the fall season, including record-breaking masterpieces such as the $236.4 million Gustav Klimt—the most expensive work ever sold by Sotheby’s—and the $54.7 million Frida Kahlo, which set a new record for a work by a female artist.
November’s inaugural sales at the Breuer delivered the year’s biggest revenue surge, with six white-glove auctions totaling $1.173 billion in just a few days. Single-owner collections played a decisive role, including the $527.5 million Lauder collection in New York and the $137 million Karpidas collection earlier in London—high-profile consignments that helped lift market sentiment at a critical moment. “Our strong performance in the second half of the year demonstrates clear momentum in our markets, driven by more high-quality, major collections meeting Sotheby’s record levels of buyer demand,” confirmed Sotheby’s CEO Charles F. Stewart.
At the same time, Sotheby’s “Another World” strategy—transforming its major regional headquarters from Hong Kong to Paris and now the iconic Breuer building into cross-category boutique destinations—is beginning to deliver tangible results. The luxury sector is becoming increasingly central to the business, generating $2.7 billion in revenue, up 22 percent year-over-year and surpassing $2 billion for the fourth straight year.
Luxury is also emerging as a primary driver of market expansion, capable of attracting younger collectors while opening doors to new and rising markets. This was underscored by Sotheby’s successful $133 million Collectors’ Week in Abu Dhabi, whose cross-category luxury offerings drew collectors from 35 countries. Of those bidding, 28 percent were new to Sotheby’s and nearly one-third were under the age of 40.
The $10.1 million sale of Jane Birkin’s original Hermès Birkin in Paris this summer focused attention on both the rising value and estate-planning complexities of luxury collectibles. Sotheby’s also reported a record year for watches, with a $42.8 million white-glove December auction in New York immediately following Collectors’ Week. That sale was led by the record-breaking complete four-piece set of the Patek Philippe Star Caliber 2000, which sold for $11.9 million.
Jewelry maintained strong momentum in Abu Dhabi and globally, with sales up approximately 18 percent. Meanwhile, RM Sotheby’s automotive division exceeded $1 billion in revenue for the first time, propelled by multiple records—including a 1994 McLaren F1 (chassis 014), the most expensive McLaren ever sold at public auction, and the highest-priced new Ferrari ever to hit the auction block during Abu Dhabi Collectors’ Week.
Sports collectibles continue to attract bidders, but the standout among today’s collectibles may be dinosaurs, as demonstrated by the juvenile Ceratosaurus that soared to $30.5 million at Sotheby’s—more than seven times its low estimate.
The Design category also continues to gain traction and importance, with 65 percent growth over last year. It closed with a $50.2 million auction earlier this month—the highest total ever for the category—led by Lalanne’s Hippopotame Bar, which reached a record-setting $31.4 million.
Taken together, these categories are central not only to sustaining the market but to reshaping Sotheby’s identity—from a traditional auction house catering primarily to connoisseurs into a broader luxury-experience destination capable of attracting bidders across multiple price tiers. This represents a key strategy in today’s market. By expanding participation and transaction volume, Sotheby’s can continue to drive revenue growth even as the ability to consistently secure multimillion-dollar fine-art masterpieces—this season included—remains neither guaranteed nor sufficient on its own to support headline results year after year.
Adrien Meyer sells the top lot of The Collection of Robert F. and Patricia G Ross Weis, Mark Rothko’s No. 31 (Yellow Stripe) for $62,160,000. Christie’s
At Christie’s, the right pricing strategy met sustained bidding
Christie’s also reported what CEO Bonnie Brennan described as a “healthy and successful year,” with total auction revenue rising 8 percent to $4.7 billion. Combined with $1.5 billion in private sales—representing approximately 24 percent of the total—this brought the auction house’s global sales for 2025 to $6.2 billion, a 7 percent increase from the previous year.
One of the clearest indicators of how sustained bidding aligns with pricing strategy on the auction-house side is sell-through and sold-by-lot performance—an obsession of Christie’s global director Alex Rotter, as he recently revealed in an interview with ARTnews. Christie’s reported a sell-through rate of 88 percent and a hammer-to-low estimate index of 113 percent, both notably higher than in 2024.
The MEA region (Europe, Middle East, Africa) also expanded its share of Christie’s global total, rising from 32 percent in 2024 to 36 percent in 2025, with $1.435 billion in sales. Asia-Pacific, by contrast, declined for the second consecutive year, generating $686 million—5 percent less than the year before—and now accounts for 23 percent of Christie’s global business. Sales for Asian Art and World Art were also down 6 percent this year.
The 20th and 21st century category remains Christie’s core revenue driver, generating $2.859 billion in 2025, a 6 percent increase from the previous year. However, the Classics and Old Masters segments posted even stronger growth, generating $285 million and $182 million, with increases of 15 percent and 24 percent, respectively. Leading the Old Master category was Canaletto’s Venice, the Return of the Bucintoro on Ascension Day, which sold in July in London for a record-setting £31.9 million ($43.9 million).
Meanwhile, the importance of the Luxury and Automotive markets continues to rise. Luxury sales reached $795 million, up 17 percent from 2024, while automotive sales through Gooding Christie’s totaled $234 million—an increase of 14 percent and the highest-grossing year in the company’s history.
Crucially, luxury is proving to be Christie’s most effective tool for attracting new and younger buyers. It accounted for 38 percent of new bidders in 2025, outperforming even the 20th and 21st century category, which contributed 33 percent. Asia-Pacific buyers in particular were highly engaged, with regional president Rahul Kadakia noting that they contributed 37 percent of global Luxury auction spend. This underscores the strong potential of Eastern markets—especially Southeast Asia—when engaged through categories aligned with their growing and increasingly affluent populations.
Christie’s also saw increased engagement from the Indian diaspora and broader participation across the Asia-Pacific region, which remains one of the strongest growth opportunities alongside rising spending power in the Middle East, particularly in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
For Christie’s—as for all the major auction houses—sustaining revenue growth hinges on expanding the market: both by tapping rising geographies and by attracting new generations of collectors capable of growing with the brand.
The demographic shifts are promising. In 2025, 46 percent of new bidders and buyers were millennials or younger, up roughly 5 percent from the previous year. The female client base also grew by about 10 percent. These trends align with wealth management forecasts and the 2025 Art Basel & UBS Survey of Global Collecting, which found that high-net-worth women outspent their male peers by an average of 46 percent on art and antiques in 2024. Women were also more likely than men to collect digital works, pieces by unknown artists, and emerging talent—pointing to both rising influence and evolving preferences that are reshaping the market.
All of this is unfolding in the context of the so-called “Great Wealth Transfer,” as economists forecast trillions of dollars passing from older generations to younger ones, boosting disposable income and discretionary spending among buyers already demonstrating a strong interest in collecting. Women are projected to inherit a substantial share of this wealth—some estimates suggest up to 70 percent—and by 2030, they are expected to control trillions in investable assets, a dramatic rise compared to previous decades.
Equally critical to attracting new buyers is the diversification of offerings across price points and categories, paired with technology designed to reach a generation that lives and buys online. In 2025, 63 percent of Christie’s new buyers made their first purchase online, where the average price (excluding wine) rose 14 percent year-on-year to $22,700.
Christie’s plans to continue investing in tech through 2026, including its collaboration with Dubbl on the Christie’s Select app for Apple Vision Pro, which offers immersive, spatial auction previews, and the ongoing Art+Tech Summits.
But attracting new buyers is only half the equation. Retention and long-term engagement—especially with younger collectors—are equally important. New buyers acquired in 2024 returned in 2025 and increased their total spend by 54 percent, with 22 percent purchasing in a different category from their original acquisition. These figures point to encouraging momentum not just for Christie’s but for the broader art and collectibles market, suggesting that even amid recalibration, a more diverse audience is emerging—one ready to support the market’s next chapter, even as tastes and trends continue, as always, to evolve.
Videos from Hormoz Island in Iran could be confused with scenes from a NASA mission to Mars, but it isn’t science fiction, just science.
File photo: A woman walks along the beach on Hormoz Island in the Gulf Strait of Hormuz, off the Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas, on April 29, 2019. (Photo: ATTA KENARE/AFP via Getty Images)
After recent rain on Dec. 16, the island’s coast turned crimson as the rain created a unique and wild phenomenon on the mineral-rich island. A video recorded after the rain showed a red waterfall rushing down the cliffside and ruby-colored waves crashing against the shoreline.
So here’s what makes Mars and this natural beauty look alike — sometimes.
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On the island off the Iranian coast, the soil is rich with iron oxide. Iron oxide is a key element in determining the reddish color of Mars and the rusting of metals on Earth.
When rain mixes with iron oxide in the soil, the water runoff rushes into the ocean, turning the tide blood red. This otherworldly phenomenon differs from 'blood rain,' when raindrops mix with dust or dirt high in the atmosphere, causing the raindrops to fall to Earth with an eerie color.
Staples is offering 100% back in Staples rewards on Crayola purchases up to $50
The Fine Print
Valid on purchases of Crayola® products made in Staples® U.S. stores and online at staples.com.
Not valid on Instacart, DoorDash or Uber Eats orders.
Staples Easy Rewards member may earn up to $50 in points.
While supplies last. Offer available to Staples Easy Rewards member only. To be eligible for the offer, member must activate offer in their Easy Rewards dashboard on staples.com or Staples mobile app and provide membership number at checkout.
Points will be earned on the purchase amount paid at checkout after application of all promotions, coupons, instant savings and point redemptions.
Taxes and shipping are not included in calculating the total purchase amount.
May be used up to one time per Staples Easy Rewards member within the promotional period, non-transferable.
Offer may not be combined with any other Staples Easy Rewards promotion in a single transaction.
Not valid on prior purchases or purchases made with Staples Advantage In-Store Purchase Program.
Offer is subject to change or cancellation at any time.
Staples Easy Rewards program terms and conditions apply.
Expires 12/20/2025
Our Verdict
Good way to get some free Crayola products if you need to make a purchase at Staples anyway. Can make great donations as well.
When it comes to convenience, it’s hard to beat Amazon. And that rationale isn’t limited to consumers: Many local districts shopping for supplies with public funds apply the same logic. But the Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR) published a study earlier this month (via The American Prospect) that illustrates the cost of that bargain. It suggests that Amazon’s “dynamic pricing” has led many schools and other localities to overpay for supplies.
Public schools and local governments have historically bought supplies by soliciting competitive bids from local suppliers. Those vendors then respond with fixed price lists, delivery timelines and other terms. This competition — all out in the open, part of the public record — encourages low prices and transparency.
On the surface, ordering from Amazon appears to offer competition, too. After all, the platform includes third-party vendors fighting for your dollars. But turning taxpayer funds over to Amazon’s algorithms isn’t quite that simple. That’s because the platform’s “dynamic pricing” (algorithmically driven real-time changes) is inherently opaque.
According to the report, Amazon’s contracts with public entities don’t include fixed price lists. Instead, they include language built around swings. “This contract has a dynamic pricing structure in which the price for items listed on the online digital marketplace is driven by the market,” Amazon’s contract with Utah reads. “This contract will not need to be amended when prices fluctuate.”
Below are some examples of wild price discrepancies for these districts. All of ILSR’s examples are from localities buying supplies from Amazon Business with public funds in 2023.
A City of Boulder, CO employee ordered a 12-pack of Sharpie markers from Amazon Business for $8.99. On the same day, a Denver Public Schools worker ordered the same markers for $28.63.
Amazon charged Clark County, WA, $146,000 for 610 computer monitors. On another day, that same order would have cost $24,000 less.
Pittsburgh Schools bought two cases of Kleenex for $57.99 each. On the same day, Denver Schools paid $36.91 for a single case.
On a single August day, Denver Schools placed two separate orders for bulk cases of dry-erase markers. One cost $114.52. The other was $149.07.
In March 2023, Denver Schools paid $15.39 for a Swingline stapler (sold by Amazon). A few days later, the same school system paid $61.87 for the same product (sold by a third-party seller).
Even in that last example, ILSR says Amazon’s algorithms are the culprit. “It might be tempting to blame the seller for putting a $62 price tag on a stapler or the employee for not noticing the cost,” the nonprofit argues. “But that overlooks Amazon’s pivotal role in the transaction — and the profit it makes. Amazon’s algorithms steer shoppers’ attention, selecting featured products and organizing search results. The platform routinely prompts users to ‘buy it again,’ even when the price has jumped. For busy public school employees, it’s all too easy to simply click the buy button, under the assumption that Amazon is surfacing the best option.”
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy (Noah Berger via Getty Images)
One portion of the study looked at repeat orders for 2,500 “high-frequency items.” (These included Amazon-brand copy paper, Elmer’s glue, BIC pens, Lysol cleaning wipes and Crayola crayons.) In total, the jurisdictions in the study spent $3 million on those items. But based on the lowest prices Amazon charged during that period, they would have paid only $2.5 million. Across those same items, one school district could have saved 17 percent (about $1 million) if it consistently received Amazon’s lowest prices.
What would fair market value have been for those items? Well, it’s hard to say because the algorithms are steering pricing silently in the background. A more thorough study that included the same items, bought exclusively through the traditional procurement method, would tell us much more. And recent history has taught us that trusting Big Tech’s algorithms to serve the public good (rather than its own bottom line) is a fool’s errand.
In at least some cases, the practice routes public funds away from local vendors and toward overseas ones — and, of course, Amazon itself. In Berkeley County, WV, the school district spent $1.3 million on Amazon Business in 2023. What portion went to sellers in the state? A measly $142.
On top of all of that, the practice has snuffed out many of the smaller vendors that traditionally competed for these contracts. “The disappearance of these small and mid-sized businesses weakens local economies and tax bases,” the report concludes. “And it leaves governments increasingly dependent on Amazon, paving the way for the kind of monopoly control that ensures higher prices, poorer service, and less innovation.”
In a statement sent to The Guardian, Amazon disputed the study’s conclusions. “Pricing research is notoriously difficult to conduct accurately and typically lacks reliable methodology, including cherry-picked product selections, mismatched product comparisons and comparing in-stock items with products out-of-stock at competitors,”
ILSR’s report drew in spending data from 128 local governments (including cities, counties and school districts) and 122 state agencies. It also gathered contract documents and interviewed public officials, procurement experts and vendors.
We’ve teamed up with Unprocessed guitarist Manuel Gardner Fernandes to show off the riffs that taught him! From Metallica to Kreator and beyond, the dude’s got some serious chops. Unprocessed just released their new album Angel, which you can get here.
Unprocessed is composed of vocalist and guitarist Manuel Gardner Fernandes, bassist and synth player David Levy, guitarist Christoph Schultz, and drummer Leon Pfeifer. Angel features high-profile guest appearances from Zelli of Paleface Swiss and Jason Aalon Butler of Letlive and Fever 333. These collaborations add new layers of urgency and intensity to a record that explores themes of conflict, duality, and inner transformation.
On the record, Unprocessed said: “This album is more than just a record by four boys from Germany – it’s a light shone upon the unknown, like memories from the afterlife. We explored the concept of Angel in various ways: becoming an angel through real-life actions, hearing angels serenade, a fallen angel telling his story and becoming the Antichrist, or seeing someone as an angel through glorification.
“This concept inspired both the music and the lyrics. While we’re leaning more into a polished metalcore sound, the record still maintains the essence of what makes Unprocessed unique. It features some of the craziest guitar, bass, and drum work we’ve ever showcased as a band. At the same time, we believe it’s more accessible to the broader metal and metalcore audience, with our strongest and catchiest hooks and melodies to date.”
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Over the past few years, Portlanders have heard little about the plan to rebuild the old Dairy Queen on Southeast Division and 56th Ave. The Dairy Queen, which was demolished in 2019 after more than 50 years in business, was always supposed to be reborn in its spot across the street from Franklin High School. But the lot remains vacant.
Earlier this month, people who live near the DQ site received an update—and a call to action—from the franchise owner. Letters distributed to neighbors explained the franchisee and property developers have been in a stalemate with the city of Portland over their right to include a drive-thru in the rebuilt Dairy Queen.
The letters appealed to neighbors’ nostalgia for the ice cream chain, and urged them to contact the city with words of support for the drive-thru.
The problem? New drive-thrus have been banned in Portland for several years now, as part of a broader effort to limit auto-oriented development and make it safer for people to bike and walk around the city. City policy allows some drive-thru facilities to be reestablished on properties where they used to exist. The old Division Dairy Queen, mostly known for its walk-up window, previously featured a small drive-thru.
That policy seemed like a slam dunk for the business owner, but it came with a caveat. The city stipulates that drive-thrus cannot be reestablished if use of the former drive-thru facility is discontinued for three continuous years. It’s been more than six years since the Dairy Queen on Division shut down.
Mohanbir Grewal, the Dairy Queen franchisee, isn’t walking away from his drive-thru plans without a fight. Grewal, a requested the city engage in a land use review process to determine if he retains the right to construct the drive-thru at the Dairy Queen property—a nonconforming use under Portland’s zoning code. That land use review is currently underway and seeking public comment.
Grewal’s effort has found support from people who have fond memories of the old Dairy Queen, as well as those who see this situation as an example of the city of Portland’s broader mistreatment of business owners and developers. Complaints over the city’s permitting and development process are nothing new, but this particular situation has dragged on much longer than average, even considering Portland’s Covid-era permitting and construction delays.
Others question the need for a drive-thru in such a walkable part of Portland, especially on Division, which is home to the city’s only frequent express bus service. Those who oppose the plan say if Portland allows this Dairy Queen to bypass the rules and proceed with a drive-thru that doesn’t conform to the city’s zoning code, it’ll pave the way for other businesses to do the same.
Inside scoop on the DQ delays
Grewal, a Beaverton-based franchisee who owns several Dairy Queen stores in Oregon with his company Akum Investment Group, purchased the store on SE Division in 2017. Prior to that, the store was a fixture in the area—a 2010 Oregonian profile featured customers whose love for the Dairy Queen extended through multiple generations. But when Grewal bought the restaurant, he had lofty goals for the place. He set out to demolish the original building with a plan to replace it with something bigger and better.
In an email to the Mercury, Grewal said the old Dairy Queen could’ve stayed as it was, but he wanted to “make it better for our customers with better design” to “uplift the neighborhood look.” The new Dairy Queen was designed to accommodate a larger drive-thru that would fit up to 10 cars, so those waiting in the line wouldn’t clog up traffic in the street. (The old drive-thru only fit two cars.)
Grewal submitted an initial permit application for the new Dairy Queen building in 2018, and was approved for demolition in 2019. Since then, Grewal, his architects, and staff with franchisor Dairy Queen of the Pacific Northwest have gone back and forth with city planners about various aspects of the project. To date, Grewal has paid about $350,000 in fees to the city for permits, inspections, and system development charges (SDCs), including about $250,000 in SDCs to the Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT). PBOT charges significantly higher development fees to restaurants featuring a drive-thru window.
Grewal says he has also taken on additional expenses, including for architectural, civil engineering, and consulting work, as well as for building materials. Grewal said he invested about $620,000 in the project as of October 2025, with about $200,000 more still obligated.
In July 2022, a city planner informed the applicants that their right to include a drive-thru at the new Dairy Queen would be terminated if they didn’t secure a necessary permit by October of that year—three years after the city issued the demolition permit for the original property. They managed to get the needed permit, giving them another three years to build the new Dairy Queen and establish a drive-through at the site.
Portland Permitting & Development (PP&D) Public Information Officer Ken Ray told the Mercury “it would have been an easy call to allow the drive-through lane at the former Dairy Queen site” if construction ever began on the plans the city approved in October 2022. But the Dairy Queen franchisee didn’t start construction, and ended up resubmitting another set of revised plans six months later, forcing the review process to start again.
In September 2025, city planners notified Grewal that he had less than a month to build an operational drive-thru at the site, or the nonconforming use would expire. That would be an impossible task, considering construction hadn’t even begun on the restaurant.
Grewal and his associates took issue with the city’s position. He claims the drive-thru was already approved as part of the project earlier this year, and says the city is now reneging without cause. Grewal also believes he shouldn’t be held responsible for construction delays, which he blames on the city’s slow permit approval process.
“Ever since the demolition permit was issued in 2019, the City of Portland’s review and permitting process for the building permit application, and application to revise the plans, has been extremely slow, fragmented, and inconsistent,” Grewal wrote in a declaration appealing the city’s decision about the drive-thru. “The process of getting these permits has been plagued by substantial and continuing delays far beyond what several industry professionals have indicated I should expect for a project of this type.”
Grewal is far from the first business owner to complain about working with the city of Portland on permitting and development. PP&D has been underfunded and short-staffed for years, leading to construction delays. Still, plenty of buildings and businesses have gone up since Grewal filed for the DQ permits more than six years ago. According to Portland’s permit review dashboard, it has taken the city an average of 95 days to approve business building permits over the last six years.
City staff say it took much longer than average to approve Grewal’s initial Dairy Queen building permit application, submitted in 2018 and issued four years later, because the franchisee made so many changes to the building plans and took a long time to pay permit fees and schedule building inspections.
“Permitting is a partnership between the City and the customer,” Ray told the Mercury. “Prompt issuance of permits and approvals of inspections relies on both parties to be timely and responsive.”
Trapped in the drive-thru
The Division Dairy Queen drive-thru saga represents more than the sum of its parts. The letter Grewal distributed to nearby residents seemed designed to incite emotional responses from people who are nostalgic for the days when the Dairy Queen was still around. The letter claims that without the drive-thru, a Dairy Queen would “likely no longer be fit for this location,” stating that the drive-up window “helps elderly, people with disability and all of us in rain/snow when we do not need to park and come out of the vehicle.”
The letter also attempts to convince neighbors that if the Dairy Queen isn’t built, they may see “another branded restaurant or high-rise building” take over the lot, although Portland’s zoning code generally limits building height to four stories in this part of the city.
Judging from reactions to the situation on social media, Grewal’s approach seems to have been somewhat effective.
A sign outside the DQ site asking neighbors for support. courtney vaughn
Dan Krause, who identifies as an outer Mount Tabor resident on Nextdoor, used the app to encourage neighbors to support the project, writing that the old Dairy Queen “was a very important part of my life and my neighbors’ [lives].” Many commenters used the situation as a launching pad for their general grievances with the city of Portland. Milwaukie resident Brian Case warned others to “take your business somewhere else, don’t give a penny to these knuckleheads in Portland… it’s clear they just can’t help themselves from f’ing up everything they touch.”
But others in the neighborhood have expressed their concerns about putting a drive-thru at that location. A heated exchange in the South Tabor neighborhood Facebook group featured many drive-thru naysayers, who pointed to their tendency to cause traffic congestion, especially on a street like SE Division.
Drive-thrus have long been a target of ire for transportation reform advocates and environmentalists. In addition to the emissions created by idling cars in the drive-thru line, the feature may encourage people to drive more, and lead to unnecessary traffic conflicts. People walking and riding their bike may be especially impacted by long drive-thru lines, which can snake across sidewalks and bike lanes, blocking access for other road users.
The Dairy Queen franchisee claims his drive-thru would fit enough cars to avoid traffic impacts. He and others involved in developing the store say it’s unrealistic to suggest a fast food restaurant like Dairy Queen could succeed without a drive-thru. With so much money invested in the project, Grewal wants to make sure the store is successful. He also has said that the corporate Dairy Queen franchisor would revoke his franchise license if a drive-thru is not included in the design.
“Simply put, there will be no Dairy Queen at 5605 SE Division Street, Portland, Oregon, without the drive-through and my investment will be lost,” Grewal wrote in his declaration to the city.
Opponents, however, say the situation is bigger than just this singular drive-thru.
“The implications of such a determination [in favor of the development] would be vast and set a troubling precedent that would essentially prohibit zoning code from evolving, by allowing an absolute minimum effort of maintaining a no-longer-allowed use,” Rob Galanakis, who serves on the board of the Mount Tabor Neighborhood Association, wrote to the city planner in charge of the land use review. “Drive-throughs are currently prohibited for new development by the city, for good reason. An approval of this drive-through is not just an approval for this fast food seller. It would re-establish a land use the City of Portland does not want to allow, and establish it in perpetuity.”
The city is accepting public comments about the Dairy Queen drive-thru until December 22.
Selena Gomez laughed off a comment on her “mustache.”
In a video she shared via Instagram on Tuesday, December 16, Gomez, 33, explained why it might look like she has a shadow on her upper lip while going makeup-free.
“Someone made me laugh because they asked me, ‘How do you shave your mustache?’” she said. She then confirmed that she doesn’t have an actual mustache, but the shadow is actually “melasma.”
“I take care of it and treat it, but yeah, it’s there,” the Only Murders in the Building star added. Gomez noted that she wasn’t upset at the fan who asked. “I totally get it,” she said. “It’s from the sun.”
Only Murders in the Building star Selena Gomez responded to fan speculation regarding the cosmetic surgeries she’s supposedly undergone over the years. Gomez, 32, commented on a video shared via TikTok by a physician’s assistant working in a plastic surgeon’s office that addressed the rumors. Though the original video was from 2023, Gomez commented on […]
Melasma is a skin condition that causes dark spots on the face, which are triggered by sun exposure.
Gomez has been open about what beauty treatments she’s tried. In December 2023, she revealed that she got Botox while clapping back at an internet troll who told her to “remove [her] cheek fillers/implants,” because it was “messing with [her brain.”
The singer replied, “Hahahaha I’ve had Botox bb girl.”
In July 2024, she again shut down rumors that she’s had any other work done after a social media user asked an injector to guess what Gomez had done.
Courtesy of Selena Gomez/Instagram
“Honestly, I literally have no idea what she has gotten done,” the injector said. “I think she’s been through so much in her life, especially medically related, so I don’t think it’s fair to speculate whether or not she’s gotten cosmetic things done.”
Marissa, the New York City based injector, added, “I don’t know what to attribute any of these changes to. I think when it comes to Botox and filler I do [these celebrity videos] when I’m pretty confident I know what someone has gotten done, but when it comes to Selena, I literally have no idea.”
The TikTok user continued, “people say Lupus, people say other things; I don’t know and at the end of the day, lets just leave her be. She’s beautiful regardless.”
Telling it like it is. Selena Gomez got candid about why her hands shake after fans began showing concerns for her health. “I shake because of my medication for lupus,” Gomez, 30, wrote in the comments section of a TikTok video on Wednesday, January 25. “Also, read my disclaimer. I ain’t no pro.” Gomez’s reply was […]
Gomez was diagnosed with lupus, an autoimmune disease that causes inflammation in the skin, joints, kidney and other organs, in 2013. Four years later, in 2017, she underwent a kidney transplant, which she received from her friend Francia Raisa.
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After healing, Gomez shared a pic of her and Raisa, 37, holding hands in the hospital.
‘I’m very aware some of my fans had noticed I was laying low for part of the summer and questioning why I wasn’t promoting my new music, which I was extremely proud of,” she captioned the post. “So I found out I needed to get a kidney transplant due to my Lupus and was recovering. It was what I needed to do for my overall health.”
Gomez thanked Raisa, adding, “There aren’t words to describe how I can possibly thank my beautiful friend Francia Raisa. She gave me the ultimate gift and sacrifice by donating her kidney to me.”
Evergreen High School in White Center was placed under a three-hour lockdown Wednesday morning after staff were alerted to a report of weapons on campus.
Deputies from the King County Sheriff’s Office responded to the high school around 9 a.m., shortly after the lockdown began. The incident started when a concerned student flagged staff about a weapon. King County Sheriff spokesperson Brandyn Hull noted that authorities take any report of weapons in a school very seriously, adding that students also want to feel safe at school, as they should.
During the response, deputies searched the school grounds and ultimately recovered two weapons. The lockdown was lifted following the subsequent arrests.
Three students were taken into custody in connection with the incident. While one student was released back to the school, two others were booked into a juvenile facility. Authorities confirmed that no injuries were reported in connection with the incident.
The lockdown shook up students and parents.
Sheriff spokesperson Hull mentioned that while police resources were stretched thin due to crews helping with weather response—specifically the marine unit and air support, public safety duties continue as regular police business. Evergreen Senior High School, while under the emergency, posted a message on its website advising: “Do not call or come to the school,” as students and staff were following emergency procedures.
After Amazon Fresh pulled out of the Trelago Market in Maitland, word comes that Trader Joe’s will open a 12,500-square-foot store in the shopping plaza. No opening date has been announced … Guntur Kitchen, specializing in South Indian dosas, uthappams and biryanis, has opened at the Wildmere Plaza in Longwood at 525 S. Ronald Reagan Blvd. … Over in Lake Mary, Kelly’s Homemade Ice Cream has opened its seventh scoop shop in the Lake Mary Village plaza at 3801 W. Lake Mary Blvd. … Tacos Don Andres, a Tulum-style contemporary Mexican restaurant, has opened its third area location, this one at 2433 S. Hiawassee Road …
Ocean Buffet, from the same ownership group as Natsu Omakase in the North Quarter, has opened at 3019 E. Colonial Drive near the Fashion Square Mall. The almost 15,000-square-foot restaurant offers everything from dim sum and grilled dishes to hibachi items and sashimi. The AYCE affair goes for $17.99 during lunch and $28.99 during dinner … Haraz Coffee House, the Michigan-based Yemeni café pouring creative Eastern- and Western-style coffee beverages using beans picked from the mountainous region of Jabal Haraz, has opened in the building next to Pig Floyd’s at 1561 Lee Road in Winter Park … Korean pastry house Tous Les Jours has rebranded to N’Grano Cafe & Bakery at 1230 W. Fairbanks Ave. in Winter Park. Before the Tous Les Jours rebrand, it was Bread & Co.
Restaurant news & events:
Pom Moongauklang took to social media to say she’s no longer involved with Pom Pom’s Sandwiches in Sanford, a venture she took on with partner Vinnie Nguyen. She cited recipe alterations and said that the brand no longer reflected her values or vision …
Kaya will host a New Moon & Christmas Market from 5-10 p.m. Friday, Dec. 19, with food, drink, music, art, yoga and plenty of vendors …
Camille in Baldwin Park will host a Year-End Celebration, serving a seven-course tasting menu highlighting the aromas and flavors of premium black and white truffles courtesy of Tartufo Prestige on Dec. 26 and 27. Cost is $395.
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Good riddles can leave high school students both stumped and laughing. Trying to solve them and find the answer encourages creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. It’s also a lot of fun! Want to share some riddles with your class? Here’s a list of riddles for high school students to bring some energy to the classroom.
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Classic Riddles for High School Students
1. Which month has 28 days?
All months have 28 days!
2. What do you break before you use it?
An egg.
3. Trees are my home, but I never go inside. When I fall off a tree, I am dead. What am I?
A leaf.
4. I have hands, but I cannot shake your hand. I have a face, but I cannot smile at you. What am I?
A clock.
5. I have no doors, but I have keys. I have no rooms, but I have space. You can enter, but you cannot leave. What am I?
6. If you drop me on the ground, I survive. But if you drop me in water, I die. What am I?
Paper.
7. What has a bottom at the top?
Your legs.
8. You can hear me, but you cannot see or touch me. What am I?
A voice.
9. What is black and white and read all over?
A newspaper.
10. How can a man go for eight days without sleeping?
He sleeps at night.
11. You live in a one-story house made entirely of redwood. What color are the stairs?
There are no stairs—it is a one-story house.
12. What do you find at the end of a line?
The letter “e.”
13. Name three consecutive days that aren’t the days of the week.
Yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
14. There are two fathers and two sons in a car. How many people are in the car?
Three people—a grandfather, a father, and a son.
15. Poor people have it. Rich people need it. If you eat it, you die. What is it?
Nothing.
16. What five-letter word reads the same right side up and upside down when written in all caps?
SWIMS.
17. What has a thumb and fingers but is not alive?
A glove.
18. What is full of holes but still holds water?
A sponge.
19. A man shaves throughout the day, yet he has a beard. How?
He is a barber.
20. What has a head and a tail but no body?
A coin.
21. What gets wetter the more it dries?
A towel.
22. What has a neck but no head?
A bottle.
23. What can’t be kept until it is given?
A promise.
24. What goes up but never comes down?
Your age.
25. When I am young, I am tall. I grow shorter as I become older. What am I?
A candle.
26. What has a mouth but cannot eat and runs but has no legs?
A river.
27. What has branches but no leaves or fruits?
A bank.
28. What has 13 hearts but no brains?
A pack of playing cards.
29. What speaks but has no mouth and reproduces but has no body?
An echo.
30. What has no beginning, end, or middle?
A circle.
31. What grows bigger the more you take away from it?
A hole.
32. What do you place on the table and cut but never eat?
A pack of playing cards.
33. What breaks the moment you say its name?
Silence.
34. During which month do people sleep the least?
February—it has the fewest days.
35. The person who buys me cannot use me, and the person who uses me cannot buy or see me. What am I?
A coffin.
36. You can hear me but cannot see me. I don’t speak until you do. What am I?
An echo.
37. I am hard to find, difficult to leave, and impossible to forget. What am I?
A friend.
38. I have seas with no water, mountains with no land, and towns with no people. What am I?
A map.
39. What can be caught but is impossible to throw?
A cold.
40. When you have me, you want to share me. But if you share me, you don’t have me any longer. What am I?
A secret.
41. What goes all around the world but stays in one place?
A stamp.
42. What has one eye but cannot see?
A needle.
43. Everyone has me but nobody can lose me. What am I?
A shadow.
44. There was a plane crash and every single person died. Who survived?
Couples.
45. What invention lets you look right through a wall?
A window.
46. They come out at night without being called and are lost in the day without being stolen. What are they?
Stars.
47. What has four legs but can’t walk?
A table.
48. What goes up when rain comes down?
An umbrella.
49. I am your mother’s brother’s brother-in-law. Who am I?
Your father.
50. What has a tongue but never talks and has no legs but sometimes walks?
A shoe.
51. Born in an instant, I tell all stories. I can be lost, but I never die. What am I?
A memory.
52. With shiny fangs, my bloodless bite will bring together what’s mostly white. What am I?
A stapler.
53. A plane crashed on the border of the United States and Canada. Where do they bury the survivors?
Nowhere—the survivors are alive.
54. What can you hold in your right hand but never in your left hand?
Your left hand.
55. What’s always in front of you but can’t be seen?
The future.
56. What can’t bite you even though it has many teeth?
A comb.
57. Two boys are born at the same time to the same mother, but they are not twins. How is this possible?
They’re two triplets.
58. What is purple and smells exactly like green paint?
Purple paint.
59. Veronica’s birthday is on February 3, but her birthday falls in summer. How is that possible?
She lives in the Southern Hemisphere.
60. The more of this you encounter, the less you’ll be able to see. What is it?
Darkness.
61. I grow richer with alcohol but die with water. What am I?
Fire.
Food & Drink Riddles for High School Students
62. I’m layered and if you peel me, I’ll make you weep. What am I?
An onion.
63. You throw away the outside and cook the inside, then eat the outside and throw away the inside. What is it?
Corn on the cob.
64. My first letter is in chocolate but not in ham. My second letter is in cake and jam, and my third is in tea but not in coffee. What am I?
A cat.
65. You are alone at home and sleeping. Your friends ring the doorbell. They have come for breakfast. You have cornflakes, bread, jam, a carton of milk, and a bottle of juice. What will you open first?
Your eyes.
66. How can you drop a raw egg from up high onto a concrete floor without cracking it?
Concrete floors are very hard to crack.
67. I am made of water, but I die when you put water on me. What am I?
Ice.
68. When do you go at red and stop at green?
While eating a watermelon.
69. I am a bird, I am a fruit, and I am a person. What am I?
A kiwi.
70. I am a fruit with seeds on the outside. What am I?
A strawberry.
71. I’m a cookie you might like to eat, and I have brown arms, eyes, and don’t forget my feet. What am I?
A gingerbread man.
Math & Science Riddles for High School Students
72. If you multiply this number by any other number, the answer will always be the same. What number is it?
Zero.
73. An apple is 40 cents, a banana is 60 cents, and a grapefruit is 80 cents. How much is a pear?
40 cents. The price of each fruit is calculated by multiplying the number of vowels by 20 cents.
74. Find the number less than 100 that is increased by one-fifth of its value when its digits are reversed.
45 (1/5*45 = 9, 9+45 = 54)
75. Which weighs more, a pound of iron bars or a pound of feathers?
They both weigh the same.
76. An electric train is traveling from east to west, and the wind is blowing from north to south. In which direction does the smoke go?
None—electric trains don’t produce smoke.
77. It is lighter than a feather, but you can’t hold it for more than two minutes. What is it?
Your breath.
78. I can fill up a room but take no space. What am I?
Light.
79. I am easy to lift but hard to throw. What am I?
A feather.
80. I am smooth as silk and can be hard or soft. I fall but cannot climb. What am I?
Rain.
81. If you are running a race and you pass the person who is running second, which position are you in?
Second.
82. Forwards I am heavy, but backward I am not. What am I?
Ton.
83. I can be hot, I can be cold, I can run, I can be still, I can be hard, and I can be soft. What am I?
Water.
84. Feed it and it will live. Give it water and it will die. What is it?
Fire.
85. Born in the ocean and white as snow, when I fall back to water I disappear without a trace. What am I?
Salt.
86. What can eat a lot of iron without getting sick?
Rust.
87. A word I know, six letters it contains. Remove one letter and 12 remain. What is it?
Dozens.
Animal Riddles
88. A woman builds a house with all four walls facing south. A bear walks past the house. What color is the bear?
White. It is a polar bear since this must be the North Pole if all walls face south.
89. I have a head like a cat and feet like a cat, but I am not a cat. What am I?
A kitten.
90. A farmer walks toward his field and he sees three frogs sitting on the shoulders of two rabbits. Three parrots and four mice run toward him. How many pairs of legs are going toward the field?
One pair—the farmer’s.
91. How do you spell “cow” in 13 letters?
CEE O DOUBLE YOU.
92. What jumps when it walks and sits when it stands?
A kangaroo.
93. I sleep by day and fly at night, but I have no feathers to aid my flight. What am I?
A bat.
94. I am an animal named after the animal that I eat. What am I?
Anteater.
95. My wings are used as flippers, so in water I can swim. Sometimes when on land I slide on my belly in the snow. What am I?
A penguin.
96. The strangest creature you’ll ever find: two eyes in front and many more behind. What am I?
A peacock.
School & Learning Riddles for High School Students
97. How many books can you pack inside an empty backpack?
One. It is no longer empty after that.
98. What is the longest word in the dictionary?
Smiles, because there is a mile between each “s.”
99. Where does divorce come before marriage?
In the dictionary.
100. What starts with a P and ends with an X and has hundreds of letters in between?
A postbox.
101. What can be found at the beginning of eternity, the end of time and space, and the beginning of every end?
The letter “e.”
102. What vehicle is a palindrome?
Racecar.
103. There is only one word spelled wrong in the dictionary. What is it?
W-R-O-N-G.
104. What begins with T, finishes with T, and has T in it?
A teapot.
105. What gets sharper the more you use it?
Your brain.
106. Which English word has three consecutive double letters?
Bookkeeper.
107. What becomes shorter when you add two letters to it?
The word “short.”
108. What can you find in a minute or an hour but never in a day or a month?
The letter “u.”
109. What is the only English word with “ii” in it?
Skiing.
110. What is the only English word with “uu” in it?
Vacuum.
111. Kate’s mother has four daughters: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and _____. What is the name of the fourth daughter?
Kate.
Holiday & Seasonal Riddles
112. I’m a cookie you might like to eat, and I have brown arms, eyes, and don’t forget my feet. What am I?
A gingerbread man.
113. I am opened each day and have many doors. Inside each is a small surprise. What am I?
An advent calendar.
114. I’m covered before I’m seen and torn open to be used. What am I?
A wrapped present.
115. I arrive at midnight without footsteps, and my first act is to change every calendar. What am I?
New Year’s Day.
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There is a long intellectual lineage of psychologists and business theorists who have pointed out that organizations routinely work on the wrong problem.
This tendency to misdiagnosis isn’t a failure of intelligence or effort. It’s a cognitive default. Humans are inexorably pulled towards the symptoms they can see, not the structure underneath. Behavioral scientist Daniel Kahneman called this theory-induced blindness, while management consultant Peter Drucker warned of the dangers of getting the right answers to the wrong question.
Yet all these thinkers faced the same constraint: humans, and our factory-installed limits: Limited cognition. Limited time. Limited perspective. Limited data.
AI, and its ruthless objectivity, removes those limits.
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Problem-finding revelations
AI changes the game in ways that would have delighted Kahneman and his behavioral cronies, by providing cognitive diversity on-demand:
1.Pattern chaos
At the core of working on the wrong problem is an inability to zoom in on an issue because the trees are distorting the forest view.
The solution:
LLMs trained on trillions of tokens recognize structures across marketing, psychology, operations, economics, and design. They make cross-functional and competitive connections instantly.
AI will aggregate and curate how others have successfully triangulated to the actual problem in the forest.
2. The white flag of satiation
Business leaders are so overwhelmed with data that synthesis becomes impossible and so they return to the corporately accepted and institutionally normative definition of the problem.
The solution:
AI reads, synthesizes, and identifies implications from whatever you throw at it. It thrives on heterogeneous data. It finds correlations and latent drivers that are scattered, buried, and obfuscated in data like:
Demographic and psychographic segmentation
Sales reports
Financials and spreadsheets
PowerPoints and emails
Sales call transcripts
Web analytics
Marketing plans and results
Customer reviews, social media commentary, NPS scores, research and survey data
This creates a single interpretive surface no human could replicate.
3. Assumption-challenging prompts
AI responds to the most pointed and disruptive prompts in search of lasering in on the right problem, not the expected one. AI can also sharpen those prompts, pushing for narrative inconsistencies
The solution:
A new epistemology of leadership will emerge, one that puts assumptions under a savage microscope and helps straw man the other side of the argument. (This is a process I have written about here.)
Some of that brutal questioning is embodied in prompts like:
“Viciously challenge the assumption that pricing is our core friction.”
“Show my team up big time; Identify more plausible root causes than they found
“Dig deep – horizontally and vertically – to show what our data implies that we never articulated.”
“Show how wise you are by finding contradictions in our internal narrative.”
“Destroy my problem statement.”
“Reverse-engineer the problem from customer behavior.”
“Reveal the problem we would discover if we weren’t afraid to see it.”
Fixing the misdiagnosis economy
Here are eleven examples that instantly demonstrate how AI, with access to your data, can help find the actual problem across the organization:
1.“We have a churn problem.”
AI reveals: Your product is becoming irrelevant faster than your update cycle. Customers aren’t leaving because of service, it’s that the category moved and you didn’t.
2. “We need more leads.”
AI reveals: Your targeting is generating massively unqualified leads, and your salespeople are wasting their time.
3. “Our pricing is too high.” AI reveals: Your value narrative is off. Customers don’t reject the price—they reject the framing. Your language, or comparison sets distort perceived value.
4. “Competitors are out-innovating us.”
AI reveals: They are only out-innovating you with a small percentage of buyers, who are not your customers anyway. Your opportunities lie in finding the large market you are overlooking.
5. “We have a talent gap.”
AI reveals: You have a feedback gap. Patterns in internal messaging show employees don’t know how to improve.
6. “Our emails aren’t working.”
AI reveals: You don’t have a subject line problem, you have an over-promotion problem. Social media is overrun with snarky mockery of the number of times you insist that “This sale won’t last.”
7. “We need more people.”
AI reveals: Your people are working at cross-purposes, and you are burdened with bureaucracy and project collisions.
8. “Our meetings suck.”
AI reveals: The meetings aren’t the problem; the issue is an absence of clarity about goals, and faux delight in simply ending the meeting with the aura of progress.
9. “Our close rate is terrible.”
AI reveals: Considering how unqualified your leads are, your close rate is good.
10. “Our innovation record is weak.”
AI reveals: The problem is a lack of risk-taking and a paucity of imagination, as your prompt reveals patterns showing that teams only generate ideas adjacent to what they already know.
11. “Engagement is poor”
AI reveals: Ambiguity, not workload, is crushing morale. The most common sentiment revealed in internal communication is “I’m not sure what matters.”
The automated brilliance of blind-spot detection
Problem-finding might be the most effective management application of AI yet. As a synthetic extension of executive function, it can integrate every form of data, see what humans overlook, challenge leadership assumptions, and hypothesize hidden causes.
What’s moreis that AI doesn’t just find problems.It helps fix them. Once AI identifies the subsurface challenges, it moves into solution design, ranging from prototyping new product features to reshaping pricing architecture to identifying the smallest change with the greatest impact.
This all happens after AI finds the real problem – often the most deniable one – that was hidden in plain sight.
Go ahead. Start now, upload your messy data, and push the delete key on your assumptions.
Because your biggest business threat isn’t the problem you see. It is—you guessed it— the iceberg you don’t.
The opinions expressed here by Inc.com columnists are their own, not those of Inc.com.
6 Ways Founders Can Empower Teams To Innovate Independently
For startup businesses, founder dependence is often not even a problem, but rather the reality of a limited number of employees working to get a business off the ground. However, maintaining such a practice once the business has grown in size can have particularly negative effects on its success, scalability, and longevity. Founder dependence creates a single point of failure and makes it harder for your business to adapt to industry trends by making swift decisions. For these reasons, and many more, it is essential to shift the focus away from the founder and start sharing the responsibility with the rest of the workforce. In this article, we explore 6 effective strategies to foster innovation beyond leadership by empowering employees of all levels to take ownership of their work.
Fostering Innovation Beyond Leadership In 6 Steps
Foster Psychological Safety
Perhaps the most important factor in driving innovation and initiative within your organization is fostering psychological safety for your employees. You can’t expect employees to take ownership of their work or experiment with new ideas and approaches if they fear being criticized or punished for every mistake they make. Experimentation and change often come through failure, which is why employees need to be given a safe space to try new things. Start by practicing honesty and humility and share with employees some past mistakes and how those contributed to future successes. Then, encourage them to challenge established processes and workflows, inviting them to propose innovative solutions that could have a significant impact on your organization.
Create Clear Operational Processes
Innovation is always the goal for organizations, but you must first create a foundation upon which the organization is meant to build. Beat founder dependence and encourage innovation across all levels by standardizing processes and workflows. When employees know where to find information about specific processes, they don’t immediately rush to the founder for guidance. Instead, they are encouraged to actively search for information and take the responsibility of completing a task independently. Innovation can also be given a structure by integrating experimentation and brainstorming into employees’ routines. This can be achieved by establishing regular cross-departmental meetings for idea exchange and collaboration, as well as implementing rapid experimentation cycles to provide employees with a clear framework to test new ideas quickly and effectively.
Encourage Problem-Solving Instead Of Task Completion
In founder-dependent organizations, it is common for employees to receive tasks to complete rather than problems to solve. This means that the founder has already analyzed the situation and is now asking employees to simply carry out the steps needed to address the issue. What is missing from this interaction is a clear explanation of the thought process behind the task and how it is expected to impact the problem. An even better approach than simply explaining the issue to employees would be to present it to them and invite them to propose and test their own solutions. Then, you can discuss the outcomes together, helping employees hone their critical thinking and problem-solving skills instead of giving them solutions. Ultimately, this method helps employees become more independent and capable of successfully solving problems without the founder’s assistance.
Recognize And Reward Innovation
Recognition plays a critical role in fostering innovation beyond leadership, giving employees the motivation they need to become actively involved in projects instead of passively following instructions. To encourage employees to continuously strive for improvement and innovation, you need to reward them for taking the initiative. For example, you can publicly recognize and reward employees who participate in pilot programs or cross-departmental collaborative projects. Additionally, incorporate achievements in creativity, problem-solving, and innovation into performance reviews to show employees their efforts are being noticed and valued. If this recognition also leads to better career advancement opportunities, then taking initiative will become a common practice for more and more employees.
Invest In Leadership Development
What better way to drive innovation beyond the founder than by investing in the training and development of employees and middle management? Provide access to training courses, mentorship programs, seminars, and workshops that will support employees in building their confidence and knowledge, enabling them to take initiative and successfully lead projects. Moreover, this approach will help you create a succession pipeline of capable leaders who don’t need to turn to the founder for every problem and question. As a result, founders will be able to gradually remove their input from all meetings, tasks, and projects, so that the organization can continue its operations without disruptions in their absence.
Give Employees Space To Take Initiative And Drive Innovation
Speaking of gradually stepping back, founders who care about fostering innovation need to understand that they can’t be indispensable to their organizations. While their experience and knowledge are valuable, it is essential that other employees “get their spot in the sun” to prove that they can also make a meaningful impact. For that to happen, founders need to take a series of steps, starting with reducing their involvement in daily operational decisions. This will empower other employees to take on more responsibility. It’s important to do this slowly, gradually increasing the difficulty and significance of the tasks passed on. Founders can also allow leaders and managers to run key meetings, thus boosting their confidence. This shift will eventually extend to more projects and processes, allowing employees of all levels to be independent and drive innovation.
Conclusion
Driving agility and innovation is essential for businesses that want to remain relevant despite continuous advancements in technology and their respective industries. However, this is something that a person alone cannot accomplish. It is essential for organizations to foster innovation beyond leadership and trust their workforce enough to share responsibility and give them the freedom to take initiative without fearing the consequences. This can be done by fostering psychological safety, leadership development, establishing clear workflows, and rewarding innovation, among others. This way, founders can successfully transition their organization from being a founder-centric entity to a resilient and scalable enterprise.
Lauren Branning’s theft of the charity money was exposed in EastEnders tonight (Wednesday, December 17) as she was forced to come clean to Peter and her family. Viewers will remember that a desperate Lauren stole the cash to fund a medical procedure to help baby Jimmy… a procedure which turned out to be a scam.
With Peter aware that the money’s gone missing, a suspicious Max soon begins sniffing around. And, after noticing how close Ian and Lauren have grown in his absence, soon theorises that Ian stole it – and started the fire – as an insurance scheme.
Backed into a corner, Lauren was forced to admit the truth. But what happens next?
It wasn’t long before Max was causing a scene again (Credit: BBC)
Max confronted Ian over the fire
As his return to Walford continued, Max waited at Oscar’s side as he recovered in hospital from the fire. He soon grew suspicious over recent events – namely, the missing charity money, and Laurena and Ian suddenly becoming inseparable.
Returning to Albert Square with Oscar and the family, Max headed across the street to pay a visit to his old flame Linda. Oblivious to Annie (and her shock of red hair), he asked Linda for a room at the newly-established Peacock Palace.
The pair then headed to The Albert, where she filled him in on everything (well, not everything) that had happened over the past five years. He revealed that he planned to stick around, even revealing that he hoped to bring Abi Jr. (currently staying with ex-wife Tanya) back to Walford when he was all set up.
Afterwards, still suspicious about the fire, Max headed back to the scene of the fire, where he confided in Jack that something was amiss. He was convinced that Ian had started the fire as some kind of insurance scam.
And, at The Vic, an ugly confrontation took place. Max accused Ian of stealing the charity money and starting the fire.
And, as he began throttling his former rival, Lauren was forced to admit that she’d stolen the money.
Lauren blurted out the truth (Credit: BBC)
EastEnders spoilers for tomorrow: All the fallout as Lauren admits she stole the charity money
As the soap continues tomorrow (Thursday, December 18), the Beales and the Brannings reel in shock from Lauren’s admission. Max, still set on being there for his children, steps up in support of Lauren.
But how will Peter and the family react to news that she stole the money? Will Max ignore another crime on the behalf of his family? And can Ian and Max settle their differences?
Whatever happens, it seems as though the families attempt to move forward in time for Christmas – with next week’s spoilers revealing that an awkward Christmas dinner between Max, Ian and his children is on the cards.
