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Samuel Girard returns to Avalanche after time in players’ assistance program

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

Samuel Girard has rejoined the Colorado Avalanche after spending nearly a month away from the team.Girard participated in the team’s morning skate Thursday ahead of a game against the Ottawa Senators. He entered the NHL/NHLPA Players Assistance Program last month, which the league announced Nov. 24.Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said Girard will not play against the Senators.“We’ll treat it like any injury,” Bednar said. “He’s healthy now, 100%. Get him up to speed and get him back as soon as we can, but we’ll just monitor him and keep him an eye on him while he’s on the ice. Converse every day and when he’s feeling like he’s ready to play, then he’ll go in. It won’t be today.”Girard released a statement through his agency, CAA, when he entered the program, saying he needed to take care of his mental health. He was seeking help for severe anxiety and depression, which had led to alcohol abuse.Bednar said mem...

These shows will return to the Disneyland Resort in 2024

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

Disneyland is calling all dreamers! The Anaheim-based resort announced Thursday its entertainment lineup for 2024, which includes the return of fan-favorite shows and nighttime spectaculars. Shanghai Disneyland’s Zootopia-themed land could come to Disneyland Resort in Anaheim Here are the entertainment offerings Disneyland fans can expect to see in 2024.At Disneyland:  “Mickey’s Mix Magic”: Disney’s most popular tunes will be enhanced by projections, lighting and laser effects to transform the atmosphere at Disneyland Park into a family-friendly dance party. On select nights, fireworks will accompany the show. The show will be performed from Jan. 8 to March 21 and again from April 15 to 25.“Magic Happens” parade: The daytime event will return to Disneyland Park beginning on Feb. 2. The parade features Mickey Mouse and other characters as moments from Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios films are brought to life.“Wondrous Journeys”: The fireworks show, wh...

Man Fatally Struck in Pedestrian Accident on Dinuba Boulevard [Visalia, CA]

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

Man Pronounced Dead after Pedestrian Collision near Prospect StreetVISALIA, CA (December 21, 2023) – One man died Monday night in a pedestrian crash on Dinuba Boulevard and Prospect Street. Dispatchers responded to the intersection around 8:20 p.m.Investigators found that a male pedestrian was hit by the driver of a northbound white Chevrolet near the intersection. The driver stayed at the scene and collaborated with the investigation.Emergency responders transported the pedestrian to Kaweah Health Medical Center, where he succumbed to his injuries. The identity of the deceased victim has not been disclosed to the public.After initial investigations, authorities do not believe drugs and alcohol played a role in the collision. Visalia officials will release more details about the crash as they become available.The team at Sweet James offers their warm and sincerest sympathies to the friends and family of the deceased man. May you find comfort and strength during this devastatin...

Strategists: Biden needs to keep reaching out to Black voters

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

By Bill Barrow | Associated PressATLANTA — Some top Democrats are worried that a dip in Black voter turnout, along with other challenges, could doom President Joe Biden and his party in 2024.A group of Democrats is offering a new analysis of the most recent campaigns in Georgia and Michigan, pitching those battlegrounds as models for drawing in more Black voters next year and beyond. They argue that Democratic power players need to think — and spend money — in new ways, going beyond efforts that can be last-minute or superficial as they try to reassemble Biden’s 2020 coalition.“The days of the symbolic fish fry and one-time church visit are over,” wrote the authors of the analysis by strategists widely credited for helping flip Georgia and Michigan to Biden. “Black voters have always required an approach to voter engagement as diverse as the Black voting coalition.”Biden has long depended on Black voters — first as a Delaware senator and most notably in...

Ravens ‘disrespected’ by point spread favoring 49ers on Christmas

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

As the NFL’s lone two 11-3 teams standing, the 49ers’ and Ravens’ clash on Christmas Day should be a gift for football fans.But the Ravens seem to think the point spread is a lump of coal and are intent on making it bulletin board material.In comments this week, via ESPN’s Jamison Hensley, the Ravens expressed defiance in the face of the point spread that lists San Francisco as 5.5-point favorites in Levi’s Stadium.“I don’t want them to pick us,” Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson said. “I like being the underdog. I believe we play better when we’re doubted and [when] people aren’t choosing us to win the game. I feel like we play better all the time, so just do it all the way to February. That’s all I ask.”It’s not surprising that the 49ers would be favored at home, but 5.5 is a substantial mark. Baltimore has only been an underdog once this season, when it upset the Bengals in Cincinnati.Ravens head c...

San Lorenzo attempted robbery suspects take jail, probation in plea deal

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

OAKLAND — Two suspects in a San Lorenzo bank robbery attempt were sentenced to jail and probation after pleading no contest to lesser offenses, court records show.Kevin Perry, 22, and Dewey Nguyen, 21, were originally charged with attempting to rob a Citi Bank on Paseo Grande in San Leandro last August. But last month, Nguyen was given 180 days in jail and Perry was sentenced to one year in a plea deal that required prosecutors to drop the bulk of the charges.Perry pleaded no contest to leaving the scene of an accident, where police say he struck a “juvenile pedestrian” — whose age isn’t listed in court records — during a police chase to avoid capture for the attempted bank robbery. Nguyen pleaded no contest to possessing a stolen Lexus the day after the robbery, where authorities arrested both men in Alameda after a brief foot chase.Last Aug. 28, Perry and Nguyen allegedly entered the Chase Bank, with Nguyen keeping watch by the door and Perry wa...

Sales finally start for condos at fraud-tied San Jose housing project

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

SAN JOSE — Sales are finally underway for condominiums at a San Jose housing complex that’s among the properties engulfed in a vast Bay Area real estate fraud case that arose after hundreds of investors were swindled.The 91-unit residential complex is at 1821 Almaden Road in San Jose, a project that was launched by real estate entrepreneur Sanjeev Acharya and his Silicon Sage Builders firm, which both are accused of wide-ranging fraud allegedly perpetrated against investors in several Bay Area projects.A federal judge shoved Acharya’s real estate empire into receivership after the Securities and Exchange Commission filed a fraud case against the disgraced developer and his company. The judge appointed David Stapleton to act as receiver for the company’s assets.Stapleton has been overseeing efforts to sell the condos at the 1821 Almaden Road site as a way to raise cash to provide the investors even a tiny amount of compensation for the cash they lost by invest...

This cargo plane flew over Northern California with no pilot on board

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

One of the world’s most widely used cargo planes completed an entire flight with no one on board for the first time.Lasting approximately 12 minutes in total, the flight departed from Hollister Airport, in Northern California, and was operated by Reliable Robotics, which has been working since 2019 on a semi-automated flying system in which the aircraft is controlled remotely by a pilot.The company recently announced that the 50-mile flight took place in November. The plane was a Cessna Caravan, a robust single-engine aircraft that is a popular choice for flight training, tourism, humanitarian missions and regional cargo.“Cessna has made 3,000 Caravans — it’s the most popular cargo plane you’ve never heard of,” says Robert Rose, CEO of Reliable Robotics. “Pilots will tell you it’s the workhorse of the industry.“But the challenge with this aircraft is that it flies at lower altitudes and more adverse weather conditions than many large aircraft do today. So operating it is much more d...

Santa Clara County reports low COVID-19 vaccination rates for latest booster shot

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

Despite the recent rise in COVID-19 cases, Santa Clara County health officials say a much lower percentage of residents have gotten the latest vaccine compared to previous booster shots.Only 19% of county residents have received the updated vaccine, which was released in September. Vaccination rates among certain populations are even lower, with only 9% of Latinos and 11% of African Americans having received up-to-date shots. That’s in comparison to 22% of white residents and 19% of Asian residents.“One of Public Health’s most important roles is to track systemic factors causing health inequities and to raise the alarm about the impact on Santa Clara County communities,” Dr. Sarah Rudman, the deputy health officer for the Santa Clara County Public Health Department, said in a news release. “Culturally centered outreach and education must be strengthened to remove barriers and to connect people to the preventative care they need.”The county said that whi...

How Cord Jefferson’s backstory figures in his hit ‘American Fiction’

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:01:57 GMT

Satire often leans toward one of two directions — a scathing critique where no one gets spared or an outright farce that broadly spoofs the absurdity of a given scenario.Filmmaker Cord Jefferson took a more compassionate path with “American Fiction,” his triumphant adaptation of Percival Everett’s acerbic 2005 novel “Erasure.” In this highly entertaining look at one modern Black American family in the Boston area, and a woke culture that isn’t nearly as woke as Americans like to think it is, Jefferson takes on hot-button issues such as race, ambition, family, sexual preference, academic pretense, the publishing industry, media misrepresentations about being Black, even aging.Whew!Jefferson’s feature debut focuses on a self-centered Black writer/professor (Jeffrey Wright, whom Jefferson envisioned in the role as he read the novel) who’s forced to reunite with — or, at the very least, try to engage with — his dysfunctional, highly intelligent family. He’s...