A tiny state, more than a third of which represents conserved land, Vermont has done things its own way since the colonial era. Its Green Mountain Boys militia once fended off land claims from New York and New Hampshire, and for a brief moment, Vermont even functioned as its own republic. That don’t-tread-on-me energy still lingers today, blended with a deep respect for the arts, outdoors, history, and small business. In southern Vermont, less than five hours from Philly, the village of Manchester is a microcosm of that personality. Slung between the Green Mountains, the glowing town looks like something straight out of a Hallmark movie — especially in winter, when snow this time of year is nearly guaranteed.
Stone fireplaces, leather chairs, plaid wallpaper, draft-blocking drapes, a grand front porch … Kimpton Taconic hits the winter-in-New-England vibes hard. The 86-room boutique hotel sits right on Main Street, close to everything in town, and has a solid on-site tavern, the Copper Grouse (think cider-brined chicken and maple crème brulée). The hotel also offers seamless equipment rentals through a Ski Butlers partnership. Bookings also include two free adult tickets to Hildene.
📍 3835 Main St., Manchester, Vt. 05254
Visit: Hildene
Just south of town, surrounded by woods and snow, Hildene was built at the turn of the 20th century by Mary and Robert Lincoln, the only son of Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln. Run as a museum nonprofit since 1978, the Georgian Revival estate, gardens, and 12 miles of trails are open to visitors, making it a must-stop whether you’re into history, architecture, design, or horticulture. Train buffs will love Sunbeam, the restored Pullman carriage from Robert Lincoln’s tenure as president of the Pullman Co. from 1897 to 1911.
Take a short detour off Main Street into the forest and you’ll find Southern Vermont Arts Center. This estate includes classrooms, museum galleries, performance space, a yoga studio, and a café. Originally built in 1917 as a summer estate for an Ohio socialite and philanthropist, the property was acquired by the arts center in 1950. Grab a coffee at the café and walk — or snowshoe, or cross-country ski — through their epic sculpture park.
📍 860 Southern Vermont Arts Center Dr., Manchester, Vt. 05254
Shop: Northshire Bookstore
Northshire Bookstore is almost a caricature of Vermont: a rambling country house riddled with cozy alcoves. Opened in 1976 and now run by three sisters who grew up shopping there, the store leans hard into its indie roots — staff bios list genre specialties and years of service. They’ve got the bestsellers, sure, but it’s their rare-books collection that’s really special. A signed Jimmy Carter autobiography, for example, or an alternatively illustrated British edition of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.
Located only 10 minutes from town, Bromley Mountain’s 47 trails represent a solid mix of expertise levels. If you’re skiing experience begins and ends with the Poconos, maybe start with a few runs on the family-friendly Chase-It trail before leveling up to the Lord’s Prayer, the Plunge, and Havoc.
📍 124 Bromley Lodge Rd., Peru, Vt. 05152
Relax: Spa at the Equinox
After a day on the slopes, soothe those boot-bound feet and sore hammies at the Spa at the Equinox. Deep-tissue massage, Ayurveda treatments, cupping therapy, maple sugar scrubs — get one, get them all. You won’t want to leave the spa. It’s got cozy relaxation lounges, a huge indoor pool stretching out beneath an open-beam ceiling, and an outdoor hot tub perpetually cloaked in steam.
Points for the name alone. The Reluctant Panther, whose moniker nods to Vermont’s resistance to outside rule in the late 1700s, has been operating as a bed-and-breakfast since the 1960s — but its restaurant is open to the public. The food is exactly what you want to eat in the winter here: a Vermont cheese board, thick pork chops with German potato salad and smoked maple gastrique, venison osso buco, all served in a fireplace-warmed dining room. The wine list has earned Wine Spectator recognition four years straight. Meow.
Dirty Franks says ’25 and up’ — and the regulars reclaim the bar: B+
Dirty Franks banning 24-year-olds and under sounds, on paper, like the plot of a generational culture war. In reality, it’s a dive bar doing what dive bars have always done: protecting the room.
The catalyst? A fake ID featuring Ben Franklin that successfully scanned. Over the past year, Franks has been overrun by increasingly bold fake IDs, TikTok-fueled crowds, and behavior that doesn’t match the unspoken social contract of a place where regulars expect to sit, talk, and not babysit a bar.
This isn’t about hating young people. It’s about a bar that has never been a college bar suddenly being treated like one. Quantity over quality, as owner Jody Sweitzer put it. More bodies, same money, harder nights.
The temporary 25-plus rule is blunt, maybe even unfair to the responsible 22-year-olds who just want a cheap beer and a dart board. But Philly bars have always operated on feel as much as fairness. When something’s off, you fix it first and argue about it later.
And by most accounts, it worked. The room is calmer. Regulars are back. People can sit again. Staff aren’t playing bouncer-scanner-detective every five minutes, trying to outsmart IDs that look like they came straight out of a CIA prop department.
Is it sustainable? Probably not. Is it extremely Philly to say “we’ll relax when the nonsense stops”? Absolutely.
Groundhog Club handler A.J. Dereume holds Punxsutawney Phil, the weather prognosticating groundhog, during the 140th celebration of Groundhog Day on Gobbler’s Knob in Punxsutawney, Pa., Monday, Feb. 2, 2026. Phil’s handlers said that the groundhog has forecast six more weeks of winter. (AP Photo/Barry Reeger)
Punxsutawney Phil sees his shadow, condemning Philly to six more weeks of this: D
Six more weeks of winter doesn’t mean snowflakes and cozy vibes in Philadelphia. It means gray piles of ice that never melt, sidewalks that double as obstacle courses, and that specific kind of cold that seeps through gloves.
Phil seeing his shadow wasn’t news. The snow is still here. The side streets are still a mess. The wind is still disrespectful. And now we’re being told to mentally prepare for another month and a half of bundling up just to take out the trash.
Phil’s track record doesn’t help his case. He’s been wrong more often than right, but somehow still gets the power to set the emotional tone for an entire region. And the tone this year is simple: exhausted, sore, and deeply over it.
We don’t hate Phil. We just resent him for reminding us that winter in Philadelphia isn’t a season: It’s a long, drawn-out test of patience, balance, and civic infrastructure.
Six more weeks? Fine. We’ll survive. But we’re not happy about it.
Heavy equipment clears snow and ice from South Broad Street near Tasker Street in South Philadelphia, Tuesday, Feb. 3, 2026.
Philly sends in ‘snow ambassadors’ because the cleanup still isn’t done: C
At this point, the storm itself is old news. What isn’t: frozen crosswalks, ice-packed corners, and a city that still feels stuck in cleanup mode.
So now comes the next phase of winter in Philadelphia: improvisation.
The city is deploying 300 “snow ambassadors” to manually chip away at ice piled up at crosswalks and corners. We’re well past the point where plows and salt were enough, and if the choice is between stubborn ice lingering for weeks or sending people out with tools to break it up, the latter is the only real answer.
But it also says a lot about how this cleanup has gone.
The city is now in hand-to-hand combat with the leftovers of a storm that dropped 9.3 inches and then immediately locked them in place with days of deep cold. The fact that crosswalks still need this level of attention, days later, underscores how uneven the original response was, especially on side streets and pedestrian infrastructure.
Calling them “ambassadors” doesn’t change the reality: This is a workaround. A necessary one but still a sign that the system didn’t fully deliver the first time around.
That said, credit where it’s due. The city didn’t just shrug and tell people to wait for a thaw. It adjusted. It added manpower. It acknowledged that what’s left isn’t just inconvenient but dangerous. And focusing on crosswalks and ADA ramps is exactly where the effort should be right now.
This isn’t a win. It’s a course correction.
Phillies designated hitter Kyle Schwarber celebrates his solo home run with teammate J.T. Realmuto against the Kansas City Royals on Saturday, Sept. 13, 2025, in Philadelphia.
Phillies spring training hope (and the kids knocking): A
This is the part of the calendar where Philly collectively exhales.
Spring training is just getting started, and already the Phillies feel lighter. Not because anything’s been won. Not because the roster is flawless. But because February baseball is where optimism still gets the benefit of the doubt.
Clearwater represents a reset. New grass. Fresh routines. The annual illusion that this version of the team will be the one where everything clicks at the right time. It doesn’t matter how last season ended, spring training always feels like permission to believe again.
And for the first time in a while, the kids are actually coming. Justin Crawford looks like the opening-day center fielder. Andrew Painter is finally healthy enough to matter again. Aidan Miller is looming. The Phillies’ farm system has spent years as a drip-feed; now it feels like a faucet that might finally turn on.
That matters for a team that’s been built around a veteran core for so long. Bryce Harper and Kyle Schwarber anchoring things in Clearwater feels familiar in the best way, but the real intrigue is whether the next wave can actually stick. Whether this spring is the start of something sustainable, not just another “run it back.”
Spring training is baseball’s softest sell. No standings. No scoreboard pressure. Just story lines, roster battles, and enough sun to trick you into thinking October is guaranteed. Philly knows better than to fully trust it, but we still show up every year.
Because hope is part of the ritual. And for now, it’s earned.
If nothing else, pitchers and catchers reporting means one undeniable thing: Winter is losing leverage, and baseball is back in the conversation. Around here, that’s worth an A all by itself.
A rolling video screen above the admissions counter at the West Entrance at the Philadelphia Museum of Art Monday, Oct. 6, 2025, features a “youse should visit” slide and a new logo. The name change was eventually reversed back to its original – Philadelphia Museum of Art – but the griffin was kept.
The Art Museum walks it back (somewhat): B+
Four months after trying to rename itself the Philadelphia Art Museum, the Philadelphia Museum of Art has decided to do what Philadelphians do best: Stop pretending and call it what everyone was calling it anyway.
But this wasn’t a full rewind. The museum kept the updated look — the bold fonts, the sharper visual identity, the griffin logo pulled from the building’s roofline. The feedback was clear and consistent: People who know the institution (members, donors, staff) felt alienated by the name change.
The Philadelphia Museum of Art isn’t just branding; it’s muscle memory. You don’t casually swap that out without expecting pushback. But surveys also showed that the broader public didn’t hate the new look itself. So the museum split the difference.
It kept the visual refresh. It dropped the name change, which felt unnecessary and confusing. And it signaled, intentionally or not, that listening matters more than doubling down.
Philly gets its own Monopoly board, and the arguments have already started: A
A Philadelphia edition of Monopoly is coming this fall, and honestly, the game itself almost feels beside the point. The real action is happening now, in the collective act of imagining what would, and absolutely would not, be allowed on a Philly board.
The gaming company behind the project is soliciting public nominations for landmarks, businesses, and nonprofits, which means we’re about two seconds away from the most Philly fight imaginable: not about what belongs on the board, but what deserves Boardwalk money and what gets stuck near Baltic Avenue out of spite.
Picture it. Pass GO at City Hall. Community Chest immediately fines you for blocking a crosswalk. Chance card sends you directly to SEPTA delays — do not collect $200. Jail is the Roundhouse. Free Parking is somehow still under construction.
Some squares feel obvious: the Art Museum steps, LOVE Park, Independence Hall. Others are going to be chaos picks. Wawa utilities. Delco railroads. A corner bar that hasn’t changed since 1987 somehow costing more than Center City. Someone will nominate their neighborhood dive and mean it sincerely. Someone else will nominate their rowhouse just to prove a point.
And that’s where this gets interesting. A Philly Monopoly board isn’t really about the game. It’s about which places people think matter, and which ones they’ll argue should’ve made the cut.
‘We’ll shew ya whereta gew in the snew’: Visit PA leans into accents — and Philly winter energy: B+
If you’re going to tell Philadelphians to leave the house in February, you’d better sound like someone we trust. Preferably someone who says “youse.”
The Pennsylvania Tourism Office seems to get that, according to WHYY. Its new winter “Snow Day Hotline” is staffed by prerecorded Philly and Pittsburgh accents, plus live comedians during select hours.
Call the number and you’re greeted by exaggerated but affectionate regional voices walking you through things to do around the state, from museums to indoor hangs. It’s intentionally old-school, phone only, no app.
The Philly side of the operation is handled by comedian Betsy Kenney, whose accent isn’t natural but feels familiar anyway: a composite of neighbors, aunts, and the person behind you in line at Wawa explaining why something is “not worth it, but also maybe worth it.” The advice isn’t groundbreaking. The delivery is the point.
So when a highly accomplished Jeopardy! champion (16-game winner, nearly half a million dollars in earnings) visibly struggled to pronounce “Schuylkill” on national television this week, Philly collectively leaned forward and went, here we go.
To Scott Riccardi’s credit, he got the answer right. The river that runs through Pottsville, Reading, and Philadelphia? Yes. Correct. No notes. But the pronunciation (Skol-kull) sent Ken Jennings into referee mode, which is never where you want to be when the clue involves Pennsylvania geography.
For the record (again): it’s Skoo-kl. Two syllables. No drama. No extra letters pronounced.
Riccardi walks away with a B: smart, successful, and close enough to get partial credit. But full points are reserved for anyone who can say Schuylkill on the first try without breaking eye contact.
Lou Turk’s, a Delaware County strip club with more than 50 years in business, announced it will change its name to the Carousel Delco.
Lou Turk’s rebrands, Delco shrugs: A
Only in Delco could a strip club rebrand spark genuine cultural concern. Not about the name, but about whether Mother’s Day flower sales would survive.
Lou Turk’s, Delaware County’s lone strip club and one of its most stubborn institutions, announced it’s changing its name to the Carousel Delco. The response was immediate disbelief, light outrage, and a collective understanding that no one is actually calling it that. Ever. This is Gallery/Fashion District math.
Stephanie Farr laid it out perfectly: Lou Turk’s isn’t just a business, it’s a landmark. A place that exists in the Delco imagination as much as it does off Route 291, wedged between a Wawa and an Irish pub like it was placed there by a zoning board with a sense of humor.
The new name raises questions (mostly “why?”), but Delco culture is resilient. The club can swap signage, management, and branding buzzwords all it wants. It will still be Lou Turk’s. And more importantly, it will still sell flowers on Mother’s Day, preserving one of the county’s most unhinged and beloved traditions.
Accompanying one of the more-enduring snowpacks in the period of record, ice has continued to build in the Philadelphia region’s waterways, and all indications are that it’s going to intensify in the next three days, perhaps significantly.
With temperatures expected to fall to single digits by Saturday night and wind gusts up to 55 mph, the region is about to experience an assault from a “cold air gun,“ said Alex Sosnowski, senior meteorologist at AccuWeather Inc.
The combination, plus the below-freezing temperatures at least through Monday and the ongoing cold spell that began last month, will not only deepen the ice cover but will make it more uniform by freezing over breaks in the ice.
“You’re going to see the ice-over become more extensive,” Sosnowski said.
Earlier in the week, icing temporarily stranded a vessel on the Delaware River that was delivering much-needed salt supplies to Philly. (They did eventually get here.)
The U.S. Coast Guard was using a 175-foot-long cutter to break up ice on a portion of the river channel that runs from the mouth of the ice-covered Delaware Bay — where Cape May-Lewes Ferry service was disrupted this week — to Trenton.
As of Friday morning, the craft had been ramming ice for 45 hours since the freeze began at the end of last month, U.S. Coast Guard Petty Officer Matthew West said.
So far, however, the ice hasn’t reached crisis levels, said Ryan Mulvey, a spokesperson for the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority. For ship traffic on the river, it’s been more a matter of “road work ahead” rather than ”road closed.”
“We’re open as usual,” he said. “I think the largest ships help with breaking up some of the ice flow.”
One thing is certain, meteorologists are warning: The ice factory is going to be in full production mode until Tuesday.
And, ironically, even as precipitation deficits and drought conditions persist, flooding potential is a source of concern.
The short-term outlook for icing in the Philly region
A key to melting, said Sosnowski, is having a sequence of daily average temperatures above freezing, not just daytime highs above 32 degrees. Nights also have to warm up.
The prospects of that happening aren’t looking good for the next several days. Officially, Friday was the 12th consecutive day of a snowpack of at least 5 inches at Philadelphia International Airport, the seventh-longest such stretch in records dating to the winter of 1884-85.
Daily average temperatures have been below freezing every day since Jan. 23.
Highs on Saturday and Sunday, even in the city, may struggle to reach 20 degrees, with lows in single digits Sunday and Monday mornings.
A promised warmup during the workweek wasn’t looking as toasty on Friday as it was earlier in the week. Monday’s temperatures were forecast to top out in the 20s, and no daily average temperatures are forecast above freezing through Friday.
Some rain or snow also is possible Wednesday, said Nick Guzzo, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Mount Holly. A storm is possible next weekend, but computer models continue to disagree with each other, and themselves.
To erase the snowpack, the region could use a warm, moist air mass and rain that would produce “river rises” that would help break up the ice, the weather service says.
But not too much rain.
The long-term outlook: Flooding concerns amid a drought
Moist air preceding a rainfall all but erased the snowpack with a historic melt. When that air came in contact with the snow, it condensed, releasing latent heat that sped up the melting.
Rain followed, and liberated ice jams led to destructive flooding along the Delaware and the Susquehanna Rivers and a presidential disaster declaration.
NOAA’s Middle Atlantic River Forecast Center is well aware of the potential and is monitoring conditions, said senior hydrologist Johnathan Kirk.
“That’s what we have to watch for,” said Sosnowski, who well remembers 1996.
“It is going to take one of the more mild-mannered thaws to avoid ice-jam flooding,” he said.
A mild thaw is possible, Sosnowski said, but “the odds are stacked against it. It’s been so cold for so long.”
DEAR ABBY: I have grown children, grandchildren and a great-grandchild. I don’t know if they think I am senile, but they seem to think I must cater to their every whim. Most of them are self-centered, thinking only of themselves. They borrow money from me, and sometimes I let them know it is a loan. Other times I give it to them and tell them that it is a gift. Loans are to be paid back. When it’s given to you, it’s yours.
One daughter, “Marie,” borrowed a large sum of money and agreed to repay it in installments. She paid me back a portion of the money I had loaned her. When the next installment was due, she claimed her first payment was three times more than it had been. When I called her on it, she insisted she had given the higher amount.
I love all my family, but I don’t intend for anyone to play me. Marie has given me no further payments, and the borrowing has stopped. When Marie tried to get in my face and talk down to me, my wife of 30 years let her know she wasn’t to talk to me that way.
Since then, Marie has stopped speaking to us and has accused my wife of blocking her email, calls and texts. (That did not happen; I blocked them.) I just cannot see how a grown child could treat her parents the way we have been treated. I am deeply hurt, and I cannot seem to get past it. Your thoughts?
— OLD MAN IN THE MOUNTAINS
DEAR OLD MAN: Your hurt is understandable. Not only is your self-entitled daughter a deadbeat, but she’s also disrespectful. You treated her with kindness, and not only did she not repay the money you loaned her, but she attacked you verbally. I hope your other offspring have more character. That said, I don’t think blocking Marie’s ability to contact you was a wise decision. She may wish to apologize in the future, and you have been preventing that possibility.
** ** **
DEAR ABBY: My wife of 10 years has asked for a separation. She is set on divorce. She feels that, during the last four years since we had kids (2 and 4 years old), I have “chipped away at her self-esteem and self-worth.”
During the past two months since our initial conversation, I have started seeing a therapist, gone on antidepressants and joined an empathy group session for men. I now see the hurt and pain I caused due to my untreated depression and negative self-image, and I have committed to change and save our marriage.
I stood by her and supported her through a major depression episode a year ago, and now she wants out. I am still in love with her, but she says that while she’ll always love me, she is no longer IN love with me. I’m working on giving her space to heal. What else can I do?
— DISAPPOINTED HUSBAND IN MAINE
DEAR HUSBAND: Ask your wife if she would agree to couples counseling with a licensed marriage and family therapist. Remind her that there are children involved, and even if the counseling isn’t successful in healing your marriage, it could benefit all of you in the divorce process and beyond. Whether it will result in you and your wife reuniting is anyone’s guess, but it may improve your relationship later.
ARIES (March 21-April 19). You will be remarkably efficient and complete a task in record time, mostly because you have to. It’s nice to know how cool you are under pressure, and how constraint sharpens you. Next, invest your energy something that actually moves your life forward.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20). Emotion is linked to memory, and it’s part of the reason that your memory is remarkable. Because you feel things deeply, the lessons will stick. You may forget minutiae, but the essence and meaning resonates deep within you.
GEMINI (May 21-June 21). Outgrowing relationships is a natural part of life. People evolve, and when your needs shift, it’s normal to notice that some connections no longer work. You’re being honest with yourself and valuing your own growth.
CANCER (June 22-July 22). Your project is humming along. It’s infused with so much of you now. You’re in the perfect moment to refine things, this time with a fresh set of eyes. Invite outsider feedback. As an old Polish proverb goes, “A guest sees more in an hour than the host in a year.”
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22). Hunger is not a misunderstanding. Yearning is not immaturity. Longing for more is not the problem, especially not for someone like you who is willing to work for the “more” and take the risks necessary to bring home the prize.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22). Today favors learning through direct experience rather than theory. Ask better questions. Questions meant to confirm a position answer only that. Shift from “Is this right?” to “What’s actually happening?”
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 23). Sweep the corners and hang up the broom. A job half-finished drains energy. A job completed gives energy. Today’s joy comes from follow-through. You’ll sleep better knowing you brought it all the way home.
SCORPIO (Oct. 24-Nov. 21). Some small degree of self-sacrifice is all that’s required. The amount is barely detectible to you because you’ve been generous every day for such a long time that it’s natural and automatic. If you feel any loss at all, you’re giving too much.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21). You don’t need a grand adventure or sparkling treasure to tell you that you’re lucky. You know it, you feel it, you witness your good fortune everywhere, especially in unassuming blessings that send you straight to gratitude. Your gratitude keeps you oriented toward life.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19). You’ll bear witness to other people’s wins. You’ll celebrate them because you’re generous. You’ll ache with longing for your own wins because you’re alive. Both truths can be present at the same time. That’s the particular tension you’re living inside.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18). In many ways you’re an artist and not paid nearly enough for what you do. Just know that your artistry won’t disappear because it’s underfunded at the moment. Talents wait. Perceptions gather. Sensibilities sharpen. And your payday is coming very soon.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20). If a financial investment doesn’t pay off, you can always go make more money. But time is different. Time is a nonrenewable resource. That’s why waiting around feels like a violation of something sacred, and maybe it is.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAY (Feb. 7). Welcome to your Year of the Prosperous Weave, when earning power and enthusiasm combine. Healing and abundance braid together into a most fortuitous situation — you have much to share and the high energy to enjoy it, travel with it, spread it across the world. More highlights: restorative routines, a personal life populated by unexpected characters and activities, teaching moments that change lives. Virgo and Sagittarius adore you. Your lucky numbers are: 5, 10, 33 18 and 2.
For the sixth straight season, Penn took a quiet bus ride home from Jadwin Gymnasium.
On Friday, the Quakers (13-8, 3-5 Ivy League) took a familiar drive up I-95 to take on No. 23 Princeton (19-2, 7-1 Ivy League). Penn entered the game with confidence after beating Columbia, the only team in the Ivy League to take down Princeton, last weekend.
Despite impressive performances from Simone Sawyer (16 points ) and Mataya Gayle (16 points), the Penn women’s basketball team lost to Princeton for the 16th straight time. They fell, 69-50.
“The seniors haven’t won a game against Princeton,” head coach Mike McLaughlin said. “Instead of pretending that didn’t happen, we addressed it like, ‘You could be the group that gets a win here.’ I think they were just disappointed.”
Star Power
A familiar narrative unfolded for Penn in the first half as Gayle jump-started the offense.
Following a sluggish first frame, Gayle took over in the second quarter, dropping eight points to help Penn take a 30-28 halftime lead.
“She made plays off the dribble,” McLaughlin said. “They struggled to contain her. She made some attack, kicks, penetration. We just couldn’t convert.”
Katie Collins, Gayle’s most reliable second punch, didn’t have the same success — finishing with seven points and snapping her 13-game double-digit scoring streak against Princeton.
Can’t guard Hutcherson
Sawyer scored seven of Penn’s 11 points in the third quarter, but a flaming hot shooting performance from Princeton’s Olivia Hutcherson broke the game open for the Tigers.
The 6-foot guard scored nine of her total 19 points in the third quarter. Hutcherson’s efforts were capped off by an assist for a three-pointer and layup from center Fadima Tall, opening the fourth with a 14-point lead and a Penn timeout.
Penn couldn’t climb out of the hole, scoring only seven points in the final frame to finish with under 60 points for the third time in Ivy League Play.
“We were tough the first half,” McLaughlin said. “There were moments of really good play there into half time up to start of the third. End of the third quarter started, they start to pull away a little bit… we just struggled to get stops from them.”
Team Game
The Tigers played seven players for over 16 minutes in the matchup, with three players scoring over 15. On the flip side, Penn kept a tighter rotation — with only six players playing over 15 minutes despite playing in a physically demanding 3-2 zone defense.
“We’ve been working with them in practice trying to get that next kid or two,” McLaughlin said. “Honestly, they haven’t been overly productive in practice settings, to really get those minutes.”
Penn coach Mike McLaughlin says his needs “to find a little lightning here” with less than a month left in the regular season.
Four players scored in the double digits for the Quakers, but the end of the bench lacked punch as Saniah Caldwell and Brooke Suttle produced two points on six shots in a combined 47 total minutes.
McLaughlin is actively waiting for someone on the roster to step up and keep the program’s Ivy League Championship hopes alive — and will be expanding the team’s guard rotation next week versus Cornell and Columbia.
“We need to find a little lightning here,” McLaughlin said. “We need to find someone off the bench to get a basket for us. And I think this week’s a big week for that. We play back to back again. We’re not going to do it without someone stepping up. It’s not just two people. So see what this week looks like. But I’m with you. I think we need another person there, and that’s trying to connect.
Up Next
Penn looks to rebound on Friday against Cornell (8-12, 3-4 Ivy League) in Ithaca (6 p.m., ESPN+).
After her frozen car garnered tens of millions of views on TikTok, Tianna Graham is getting a new car for free, gifted to her by Carvana, whose car vending machine tower features prominently in the background of her videos.
Graham, a 24-year-old fifth-grade math teacher at Community Academy of Philadelphia, had a 2016 Honda Civic. The vehicle became thoroughly encased in ice following the snowstorm and arctic temperatures late last month.
On Tuesday, Graham reached out to Carvana, hoping she could leverage the car tower’s inadvertent virality in her videos to get a discount on a new car. Carvana soon responded, eager to help.
When Graham, a Fishtown resident, arrived at the facility on Friday afternoon with her mom and sister, she said, she expected Carvana would offer her some percentage off one of their cars.
Replying to @✨mrs.corby.nails✨ THANK YOU @Carvana MORE COMING SOON!!! I’m so incredibly grateful for this!!!! after all the details get sorted out, i’ll post a full update! and a big thank u to my lovely friends and family who have been helping me through this!
She was stunned to see a bright blue 2022 Honda Civic descend from the car vending machine with a big bow on it, school supplies inside, and an ice pick, “which I guess I do need,” Graham said with a laugh.
Carvana spokesperson Hayley Pollack confirmed Friday the car will be free for Graham once all the paperwork is finalized.
“I was shocked, in disbelief,” Graham said of learning the car would be free. “It’s a beautiful car.”
Tianna Graham in front of the car Carvana is gifting her.
The car is used and has about 28,000 miles on it, Graham said. She expects to have it in her possession next week based on initial conversations with Carvana, she said.
She plans to take it for a spin for the first time next weekend to drive to Ocean City, Md., for a National Federation of the Blind convention, she said. Graham, whose sister is blind, said she is currently pursuing her graduate degree to become an orientation and mobility specialist to help blind people learn to use canes.
“All things do happen for a reason,” Graham said she learned from this experience. “Anything bad that is happening, something good can always come out of it.”
MUSCAT, Oman — Iran and the United States held indirect talks in Oman on Friday, negotiations that appeared to return to the starting point on how to approach discussions over Tehran’s nuclear program. But for the first time, America brought its top military commander in the Middle East to the table.
The presence of U.S. Navy Adm. Brad Cooper, the head of the American military’s Central Command, in his dress uniform at the talks in Muscat, the Omani capital, served as a reminder that the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and other warships were now off the coast of Iran in the Arabian Sea.
President Donald Trump said the United States had “very good” talks on Iran and said more were planned for early next week. But he kept up the pressure, warning that if the country didn’t make a deal over its nuclear program, “the consequences are very steep.”
Trump has repeatedly threatened to use force to compel Iran to reach a deal on the program after earlier sending the carrier to the region over Tehran’s bloody crackdown on nationwide protests that killed thousands and saw tens of thousands of others detained in the Islamic Republic.
Gulf Arab nations fear an attack could spark a regional war that would drag them in as well.
That threat is real — U.S. forces shot down an Iranian drone near the Lincoln and Iran attempted to stop a U.S.-flagged ship in the Strait of Hormuz just days before Friday’s talks in this sultanate on the eastern edge of the Arabian Peninsula.
“We did note that nuclear talks and the resolution of the main issues must take place in a calm atmosphere, without tension and without threats,” Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi later told journalists.
“The prerequisite for any dialogue is refraining from threats and pressure,” he added. “We stated this point explicitly today as well, and we expect it to be observed so that the possibility of continuing the talks exists.”
The U.S., represented by U.S. Mideast special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, did not immediately comment on the talks. Araghchi said diplomats would return to their capitals, signaling this round of negotiations was over.
On Friday evening, in a display of force, the U.S. military published photos on X of the Lincoln carrier group sailing in the Arabian Sea with aircraft flying overhead, with the message “Peace through Strength!” The The carrier and accompanying warships arrived in the Middle East at the end of January as Trump threatened attacks on Iran over the killing of protesters.
Iran’s top diplomat offers a positive note
Araghchi offered cautious optimism as he spoke in a live interview from Muscat on Iranian state television. He described Friday’s talks as taking place over multiple rounds and said that they were focused primarily on finding a framework for further negotiations.
“We will hold consultations with our capitals regarding the next steps, and the results will be conveyed to Oman’s foreign minister,” Araghchi said.
“The mistrust that has developed is a serious challenge facing the negotiations,” Araghchi said. “We must first address this issue, and then enter into the next level of negotiations.”
Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi, who oversaw multiple rounds of negotiations before Israel launched its 12-day war on Iran in June, called the talks “useful to clarify both the Iranian and American thinking and identify areas for possible progress.”
Still, Oman described the talks as a means to find “the requisite foundations for the resumption of both diplomatic and technical negotiations” rather than a step toward reaching a nuclear deal or easing tensions.
The talks had initially been expected to take place in Turkey in a format that would have included regional countries as well, and would have included topics like Tehran’s ballistic missile program — something Iran apparently rejected in favor of focusing only on its nuclear program.
Before the June war, Iran had been enriching uranium up to 60% purity, a short, technical step away from weapons-grade levels. The U.N. nuclear watchdog — International Atomic Energy Agency — had said Iran was the only country in the world to enrich to that level that wasn’t armed with the bomb.
Friday’s talks saw in-person meetings at a palace near Muscat’s international airport, used by Oman in earlier talks Iran-U.S. talks in 2025. Associated Press journalists saw Iranian officials first at the palace and later returning to their hotel before the Americans came separately.
It remains unclear just what terms Iran is willing to negotiate at the talks. Tehran has maintained that these talks will only be on its nuclear program. However, the Al Jazeera satellite news network reported that diplomats from Egypt, Turkey, and Qatar offered Iran a proposal in which Tehran would halt enrichment for three years, send its highly enriched uranium out of the country and pledge “not initiate the use of ballistic missiles.”
Russia had signaled it would take the uranium, but Iran has said ending the program or shipping out the uranium were nonstarters.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday that the talks needed to include all those issues.
“I’m not sure you can reach a deal with these guys, but we’re going to try to find out,” he said.
The U.S. slaps new sanctions on Iran’s energy sector
Shortly after Friday’s talks, the Treasury and the U.S. State Department announced a new round of sanctions on Iran targeting its energy sector, imposing penalties, including freezes on assets in U.S. jurisdictions, on 14 oil tankers in a so-called “shadow fleet” that the U.S. says are used to try to evade sanctions, as well as on 15 trading firms and two business executives.
“Time and time again, the Iranian government has prioritized its destabilizing behavior over the safety and security of its own citizens, as demonstrated by the regime’s mass murder of peaceful protestors,” the State Department said. “The United States will continue to act against the network of shippers and traders involved in the transport and acquisition of Iranian crude oil, petroleum products, and petrochemical products, which constitutes the regime’s primary source of income.”
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s racist social media post featuring former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, as primates in a jungle was deleted after a backlash from both Republicans and Democrats who criticized the video as offensive.
Trump said later Friday that he won’t apologize for the post. “I didn’t make a mistake,” he said.
The Republican president’s Thursday night post was deleted Friday and blamed on a staffer after widespread backlash, from civil rights leaders to veteran Republican senators, for its treatment of the nation’s first Black president and first lady. The deletion, a rare admission of a misstep by the White House, came hours after press secretary Karoline Leavitt dismissed “fake outrage” over the post. After calls for its removal for being racist — including by Republicans — the White House said a staffer had posted the video erroneously and it had been taken down.
The post was part of a flurry of social media activity on Trump’s Truth Social account that amplified his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him, despite courts around the country and a Trump attorney general from his first term finding no evidence of fraud that could have affected the outcome.
Trump has a record of intensely personal criticism of the Obamas and of using incendiary, sometimes racist, rhetoric — from feeding the lie that Obama was not a native-born U.S. citizen to crude generalizations about majority Black countries.
The post came in the first week of Black History Month and days after a Trump proclamation that cited “the contributions of black Americans to our national greatness and their enduring commitment to the American principles of liberty, justice, and equality.”
An Obama spokeswoman said the former president, a Democrat, had no response.
‘An internet meme’
Nearly all of the 62-second clip, which was among dozens of Truth Social posts from Trump overnight, appears to be from a conservative video alleging deliberate tampering with voting machines in battleground states as the 2020 presidential votes were tallied. At the 60-second mark is a quick scene of two primates, with the Obamas’ smiling faces imposed on them.
Those frames were taken from a separate video, previously circulated by an influential conservative meme maker. It shows Trump as “King of the Jungle” and depicts a range of Democratic leaders as animals, including Joe Biden, who is white, as a jungle primate eating a banana.
“This is from an internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle and Democrats as characters from The Lion King,” Leavitt said by text.
Disney’s 1994 feature film that Leavitt referenced is set on the savannah, not in the jungle, and it does not include great apes.
“Please stop the fake outrage and report on something today that actually matters to the American public,” Leavitt added.
By noon, the post had been taken down with responsibility placed on a Trump subordinate.
The White House explanation raised additional questions about the control of Trump’s social media account, which has also been used to levy import taxes, threaten military action, make domestic policy announcements, and intimidate political rivals. The president often signs his name or initials after policy announcements.
The White House did not immediately respond to questions about its process for vetting posts and how it guarantees that the public knows when Trump himself is posting.
Mark Burns, a pastor and a prominent Trump supporter who is Black, said Friday afternoon on X that he had spoken “directly” with Trump about the post. He recommended to Trump that he fire the staffer who posted the video and publicly condemn what happened.
“He knows this is wrong, offensive, and unacceptable,” Burns posted.
Yet while it was still up, Trump’s post drew condemnation from across the political and ideological spectrum — and demands for an apology that had not come by the early afternoon.
The Rev. Bernice King, daughter of the assassinated civil rights icon the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., resurfaced her father’s words: “Yes. I’m Black. I’m proud of it. I’m Black and beautiful.” She praised Black Americans as “diverse, innovative, industrious, inventive” and added, “We are beloved of God as postal workers and professors, as a former first lady and president. We are not apes.”
The U.S. Senate’s lone Black Republican, Tim Scott of South Carolina, called on Trump to take down the post. “Praying it was fake because it’s the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House,” Scott, who chairs Senate Republicans’ midterm campaign arm, said on social media.
Another Republican, Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, is white but represents the state with the largest percentage of Black residents. Wicker called the post “totally unacceptable” and said the president should apologize.
Some Republicans who face tough reelections this November voiced concerns, as well, feeding an unusual cascade of intraparty criticism for a president who often has enjoyed a stranglehold over fellow Republicans who stayed silent over some of Trump’s previous controversial statements or fear a public spat with the president or losing his endorsement in a future campaign.
NAACP President Derrick Johnson pointed to Trump’s wider political concerns, asserting that Trump is trying anything to distract from economic conditions and attention on the Jeffrey Epstein case files.
“Donald Trump’s video is blatantly racist, disgusting, and utterly despicable,” Johnson said in a statement. “You know who isn’t in the Epstein files? Barack Obama,” he continued. “You know who actually improved the economy as president? Barack Obama.”
A long history of racism
There is a long history in the U.S. of powerful white figures associating Black people with animals, including apes, in demonstrably false and racist ways. The practice dates back to 18th-century cultural racism and pseudo-scientific theories in which white people drew connections between Africans and monkeys to justify the enslavement of Black people in Europe and North America, and later to dehumanize freed Black people as an uncivilized threat to white people.
Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence, wrote in his famous text “Notes on the State of Virginia” that Black women were the preferred sexual partners of orangutans. President Dwight Eisenhower, discussing the desegregation of public schools in the 1950s, once argued that white parents were concerned about their daughters being in classrooms with “big Black bucks.” Obama, as a candidate and president, was featured as a monkey or other primate on T-shirts and other merchandise.
In his 2024 campaign, Trump said immigrants were “poisoning the blood of our country,” language similar to what Adolf Hitler said to dehumanize Jews in Nazi Germany.
During his first White House term, Trump referred to a swath of developing nations that are majority Black as “shithole countries.” He initially denied using the slur but admitted in December 2025 that he did say it.
When Obama was in the White House, Trump advanced the false claims that the 44th president, who was born in Hawaii, was born in Kenya and was constitutionally ineligible to serve. Trump, in interviews that helped endear him to many conservative voters, repeatedly demanded that Obama produce birth records and prove he was a “natural-born citizen” as required to become president.
Obama eventually released his Hawaii records. Trump finally acknowledged during his 2016 campaign, after having won the Republican nomination, that Obama was born in Hawaii. But he immediately said, falsely, that his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton started those birtherism attacks on Obama.
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — A Colorado funeral homeowner who stashed 189 decomposing bodies in a building over four years and gave grieving families fake ashes was sentenced to 40 years in state prison Friday.
During the sentencing hearing, family members told Judge Eric Bentley they have had recurring nightmares about decomposing flesh and maggots since learning what happened to their loved ones.
They called defendant Jon Hallford a “monster” and urged the judge to give him the maximum sentence of 50 years.
Bentley told Hallford he caused “unspeakable and incomprehensible” harm.
“It is my personal belief that every one of us, every human being, is basically good at the core, but we live in a world that tests that belief every day, and Mr. Hallford your crimes are testing that belief,” Bentley said.
Hallford apologized before his sentencing and said he would regret his actions for the rest of his life.
“I had so many chances to put a stop to everything and walk away, but I did not,” he said. “My mistakes will echo for a generation. Everything I did was wrong.”
‘Motivated by greed’
Hallford’s attorney unsuccessfully sought a 30 year sentence, arguing that it was not a crime of violence and he had no prior criminal record.
His former wife, Carie Hallford, who co-owned the Return to Nature Funeral Home, is due to be sentenced April 24. She faces 25 to 35 years in prison.
Both pleaded guilty in December to nearly 200 counts of corpse abuse under an agreement with prosecutors.
During the years they were stashing bodies, the Hallfords spent lavishly, according to court documents. That included purchasing a GMC Yukon and an Infiniti worth over $120,000 combined, along with $31,000 in cryptocurrency, pricey goods from stores like Gucci and Tiffany & Co., and laser body sculpting.
“Clearly this is a crime motivated by greed,” prosecutor Shelby Crow said. The Hallfords charged more than $1,200 per customer, and the money the couple spent on luxury items would have covered the cost to cremate all of the bodies many times over, Crow said.
The Hallfords also pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges after prosecutors said they cheated the government out of nearly $900,000 in pandemic-era small business aid. Jon Hallford was sentenced to 20 years in prison in that case, and Carie Hallford’s sentencing is pending.
A plea agreement in the corpse abuse case calls for the state prison sentence to be served concurrently with the federal sentence.
Heartbroken families
One of the family members who spoke at the hearing was Kelly Mackeen, whose mother’s remains were handled by Return to Nature.
“I’m a daughter whose mother was treated like yesterday’s trash and dumped in a site left to rot with hundreds of others,” Mackeen said. “I’m heartbroken, and I ask God every day for grace.”
As she and others spoke of their grief, Jon Hallford sat at a table to their right, wearing orange jail attire and looking directly ahead. The courtroom’s wooden benches were full of relatives of the deceased and also journalists.
The Hallfords stored the bodies in a building in the small town of Penrose, south of Colorado Springs, from 2019 until 2023, when investigators responding to reports of a stench from the building.
Bodies were found throughout the building, some stacked on top of each other, with swarms of bugs and decomposition fluid covering the floors, investigators said. The remains — including adults, infants and fetuses — were stored at room temperature.
The bodies were identified over months with fingerprints, DNA and other methods.
Investigators believe the Hallfords gave families dry concrete that resembled ashes.
After families learned that what they received and then spread or kept at home were not actually their loved ones’ remains, many said it undid their grieving process, while others had nightmares and struggled with guilt.
Lax regulations
One of the recovered bodies was that of a former Army sergeant first class who was thought to have been buried at a veterans’ cemetery, FBI agent Andrew Cohen said.
When investigators exhumed the wooden casket at the cemetery, they found the remains of a person of a different gender inside, he said. The veteran, who was not identified in court, was later given a funeral with full military honors at Pikes Peak National Cemetery.
The AP previously reported that the Hallfords missed tax payments, were evicted from one of their properties and were sued for unpaid bills, according to public records and interviews with people who worked with them.
In a rare decision last year, Judge Bentley rejected previous plea agreements between the Hallfords and prosecutors that called for up to 20 years in prison. Family members of the deceased said the agreements were too lenient.
