What we lose when we surrender care to algorithms | Eric Reinhart

A dangerous faith in AI is sweeping American healthcare – with consequences for the basis of society itself

The computer interrupted while Pamela was still speaking. I had accompanied her – my dear friend – to a recent doctor’s appointment. She is in her 70s, lives alone while navigating multiple chronic health issues, and has been getting short of breath climbing the front stairs to her apartment. In the exam room, she spoke slowly and self-consciously, the way people often do when they are trying to describe their bodies and anxieties to strangers. Midway through her description of how she had been feeling, the doctor clicked his mouse and a block of text began to bloom across the computer monitor.

The clinic had adopted an artificial-intelligence scribe, and it was transcribing and summarizing the conversation in real time. It was also highlighting keywords, suggesting diagnostic possibilities and providing billing codes. The doctor, apparently satisfied that his computer had captured an adequate description of Pamela’s chief complaint and symptoms, turned away from us and began reviewing the text on the screen as Pamela kept speaking.

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:00 pm

Trump tariffs and strict US border rules threaten flight of Canada’s ‘snowbirds’

Annual migration from frigid Canadian winter to Florida sunshine could become thinner as travellers look elsewhere

The annual migration of hundreds of thousands of Canadian “snowbirds” escaping freezing temperatures in their homeland and heading to warmer US states such as Florida for the duration of the winter could be about to become noticeably thinner.

Many have ditched plans to visit their southern neighbor and are looking to spend their valuable dollars elsewhere, largely put off by Donald Trump’s escalating economic war with Canada and strict new immigration rules that have created fear and confusion.

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:00 pm

A year on from Trump’s victory, resistance is everywhere | Rebecca Solnit

Americans have shown a tremendous amount and variety of opposition – more than some may realize

A young white woman in yoga clothes berating masked ICE agents in a parking lot this spring. A pope speaking up again and again for immigrants. Furious judges dressing down the Trump administration and ruling against it time after time after time, in response to the blizzard of lawsuits filed by human rights and environmental groups, states, cities and individuals. A senator speaking nonstop for 25 hours and another flying to El Salvador to find out what happened to his kidnapped constituent. The biggest day of protest in US history as an estimated 7 million people showed up for No Kings on 18 October in small towns and red counties as well as big blue cities.

Weekly protests at Tesla salesrooms earlier this year that succeeded in damaging the brand, depressing global sales and prompting Tesla CEO Elon Musk to retreat from his Doge slash-and-burn project. Federal workers resisting sometimes merely by adhering to law, truth and fact, and sometimes by speaking out as whistleblowers or in protests, as with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention staff who staged a walkout in late August in solidarity with senior staff who’d just resigned in protest against the health and human services secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr’s anti-vaccine policies.

Rebecca Solnit is a Guardian US columnist. She is the author of Orwell’s Roses and co-editor with Thelma Young Lutunatabua of the climate anthology Not Too Late: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility

Published: November 9, 2025, 11:00 am

She left her desk job and walked 3,541 miles from Mexico to Canada: ‘Give yourself permission’

Jessica Guo hiked 30 miles a day, becoming the first woman to continuously hike two historic US trails in a calendar year

Jessica Guo had only slept for two-and-a-half hours on an overnight bus when she arrived at the Mexico-US border near Lordsburg, New Mexico, in April. Out of the window she saw a flat, shadeless landscape. First-day jitters had Guo questioning what she was doing there.

The former consultant had left corporate America to attempt something no woman had completed: a single, continuous hike of the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) and the Great Divide Trail (GDT) in one calendar year.

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:00 pm

‘They treat men like vending machines’: inside the hidden world of social media sperm selling

Parenthood can seem an impossible dream for many, and online sperm donor groups offer a solution, but they can be a murky world

A man going by the name “Rod Kissme” claims to have “very strong sperm”. It may seem like an eccentric boast for a Facebook profile page, but then this is no mundane corner of the internet. The group where Rod and other men advertise themselves is a community where women and couples come, in many cases, to fulfil a lifelong dream: parenthood.

There is a growing number of online sperm donor groups on social media. They offer people the chance of parenting children in an unregulated, dangerous but surprisingly straightforward way.

Published: November 9, 2025, 7:00 am

Dining across the divide: ‘I was expecting some leftist, anti-capitalist, socialist Guardianista’

They agreed on the importance of financial education, but how would a Trump supporter and a Green voter approach the issues of immigration and ICE?

Celestino, 55, Bristol

Occupation Retired

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:00 pm

Trump’s assault on voting intensifies as midterms loom:‘a wholesale attack on free and fair elections’

White House is manipulating voting system, from redistricting to rule changes, to affect midterms

A year out from the 2026 midterms, with Republicans feeling the blows from a string of losses in this week’s elections, Donald Trump and his allies are mounting a multipronged attack on almost every aspect of voting in the United States and raising what experts say are troubling questions about the future of one of the world’s oldest democracies.

While Democratic leaders continue to invest their hopes in a “blue wave” to overturn Republican majorities in the House and Senate next year, Trump and some prominent supporters have sought to discredit the possibility that Republicans could lose in a fair fight and are using that premise to justify demands for a drastically different kind of electoral system.

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:00 pm

Border patrol chief reprimanded for lying claims shots were fired at immigration officers in Chicago

Gregory Bovino was called out by a judge only two days earlier for lying about being assaulted by a protester

A border patrol chief claimed on Saturday that his agents came under fire in Chicago while conducting immigration enforcement operations, just two days after a federal judge said that he had lied to her about having been struck by a rock during a previous confrontation with protesters in the city.

Gregory Bovino, the border patrol chief and frequent Fox News guest who has become the face of the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts, said on social media that his agents had been “shot at”, and subjected to “vehicular assaults, physical assaults, impeding, violent mobs, vehicular blockades”, for a number of hours.

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:35 am

Utah’s oldest LGBTQ+ bar closes amid workers’ union push: ‘We feel extremely disposable’

Workers at the SunTrapp – opened in 1973 in Salt Lake City – claim the shuttering was a ‘stunt’ to prevent unionization

Salt Lake City’s oldest and longest-running LGBTQ+ bar has closed, with workers claiming the shuttering was a “stunt” to prevent unionization.

The SunTrapp, widely considered the oldest LGBTQ+ bar in Utah was founded in 1973 and is one of the few safe havens for the community. It shut on 31 October after workers pushed to unionize.

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:00 pm

California’s drying Salton Sea harms the lungs of people living nearby, say researchers

Experts suspect that dust from the sea contains endotoxic bacteria membranes caused by fertilizer runoff

Chemical-laden dust from southern California’s drying Salton Sea is likely harming the lungs of people around the shrinking body of water, and the effects are especially pronounced in children, new peer-reviewed research from the University of California, Irvine, shows.

A separate peer-reviewed study from the University of California, Riverside, also found the Salton Sea’s contaminated dust seemed to alter lung microbiome, which could trigger pulmonary issues that have been reported around the lake.

Published: November 9, 2025, 1:00 pm

Near Ohio air force base, food pantries and businesses grapple with effects of shutdown

As tens of thousands of military personnel work without pay and others are furloughed, a local pantry sees its numbers increasing as restaurants are losing customers

When Jane Doorley and her husband Bill arrived at the Fairborn Fish Food Pantry they help run on 28 October, they couldn’t get into the parking lot, such was the number of cars belonging to people seeking food.

“Our numbers are way up. Last Friday was really bad too,” says Jane. “Around 250 families, including 300 children, come to the pantry every day it’s open.”

Published: November 8, 2025, 3:00 pm

Ukraine facing widespread power cuts after generating capacity reduced to ‘zero’ by Russian attacks

Power to be cut for as much as 16 hours a day across most of Ukraine while repairs are carried out

Power will be cut for between eight and 16 hours across most regions of Ukraine on Sunday, state transmission system operator Ukrenergo has said, after Russian attacks targeting energy infrastructure reduced the country’s generating capacity to “zero”.

Moscow, which has escalated attacks on Ukraine’s infrastructure in recent months, launched hundreds of drones at energy facilities across the country from Friday into Saturday, which killed at least seven people, according to Ukrainian officials.

Published: November 9, 2025, 5:23 am

More than 1 million evacuated in the Philippines as Typhoon Fung-wong draws near

At least two people found dead as super-typhoon heads for Philippines, days after Typhoon Kalmaegi killed at least 224

More than 1 million people have been evacuated and at least two people killed as flood waters rose in the Philippines before Typhoon Fung-wong’s expected landfall on the east coast.

The super-typhoon is expected to bring wind and heavy rain to large parts of the archipelago. It comes days after Typhoon Kalmaegi hit the country, killing at least 224 people and leaving another 135 missing. Searches for those still missing had to be suspended on Sunday due to safety concerns for rescue workers.

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:07 pm

Drax still burning 250-year-old trees sourced from forests in Canada, experts say

Exclusive: report by Stand.earth says subsidiary of power plant received truckloads of whole logs at biomass pellet sites

Drax power plant has continued to burn 250-year-old trees sourced from some of Canada’s oldest forests despite growing scrutiny of its sustainability claims, forestry experts say.

A new report suggests it is “highly likely” that Britain’s biggest power plant sourced some wood from ecologically valuable forests as recently as this summer. Drax, Britain’s single biggest source of carbon emissions, has received billions of pounds in subsidies from burning biomass derived largely from wood.

Published: November 9, 2025, 8:00 am

Rescued California hunter thought he’d have to watch family ‘from heaven’ – and offers advice

Ron Dailey, 65, survived nearly three weeks in the frosty, mountainous wilderness after taking a wrong turn

The California hunter who spent nearly three weeks stranded in the frosty, mountainous wilderness reportedly survived by rationing out the little food he brought with him – eating 70 or fewer calories daily for a stretch – as well as consuming melted snow to stay hydrated.

Yet before his 1 November rescue, 65-year-old Ron Dailey was so unsure whether anyone would save him that he tried to text his family regrets for possibly missing the rest of their lives – while assuring them that he would watch them “from heaven”.

Published: November 9, 2025, 11:00 am

Trump’s dollar delusion: how trade war risks ending the US’s ‘exorbitant privilege’

Trump’s team flirts with weakening the dollar, threatening US influence, low borrowing costs and global stability

Magical thinking is indispensable to understanding Team Trump’s economic policymaking. The White House often seems to believe two opposing policies can work together while one policy can do two or three contradictory things.

A heavy dose of hocus pocus will be needed to make the administration’s dollar policy work in the interest of the United States, for it appears that they want to end the US dollar’s supremacy in global finance.

Published: November 9, 2025, 11:00 am

‘Godfather of the Trump presidency’: the direct through-line from Dick Cheney to Donald Trump

A proponent of the unitary executive theory, Cheney helped expand the vast presidential powers Trump enjoys today

He spent the twilight of his career denouncing Donald Trump as a threat to the republic he loved. But Dick Cheney arguably laid the foundations of Trump’s authoritarian takeover of the United States.

The former vice-president died on Monday aged 84. The White House lowered flags to half-mast in remembrance of him but without the usual announcement or proclamation praising the deceased.

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:00 pm

Trump claims the national guard makes cities safer. Birmingham halved its homicide rate all on its own

Local observers cite a reversal of social dynamics, a revitalized police department and violence intervention

The national conversation about crime is being driven by rhetorical attacks – and national guard call-ups – by Donald Trump, who routinely demonizes places like Chicago, Washington DC, Portland and even New York City, which has a lower homicide rate than Orlando, Florida, home to Disneyland.

Somehow, we don’t talk about Birmingham.

Published: November 9, 2025, 1:00 pm

DHS head reportedly authorized purchase of 10 engineless Spirit Airlines planes that airline didn’t own

Wall Street Journal reports Kristi Noem arranged purchase to expand deportation flights and for personal travel

The secretary of the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Kristi Noem, reportedly authorized the purchase of Spirit Airlines jets before discovering the airline didn’t actually own the planes – and that the aircraft lacked engines.

The bizarre anecdote was contained in a Wall Street Journal report released on Friday, which recounted how Noem and Corey Lewandowski – who managed Donald Trump’s first winning presidential campaign – had recently arranged to buy 10 Boeing 737 aircraft from Spirit Airlines. People familiar with the situation told the paper that the two intended to use the jets to expand deportation flights – and for personal travel.

Published: November 8, 2025, 4:47 pm

‘Existential and urgent’: what impact will ICJ climate ruling have on Cop30?

Decision by international court of justice hailed as a gamechanger for climate justice and accountability

In July 2025, the international court of justice delivered a landmark decision that clarified that all states were bound under international law to tackle the human-made climate crisis, which the judges unanimously concluded posed an “urgent and existential threat” to the planet’s life-sustaining systems and therefore humanity itself.

The ICJ advisory opinion built on rulings from hundreds of climate lawsuits across the world over the past decade or more, and added further legal weight to strong decisions from the inter-American court of human rights in July 2025 and the international tribunal on the law of the sea in May 2024.

Published: November 9, 2025, 3:36 pm

How Mamdani is defying immigrant expectations by embracing his identity: ‘His boldness resonates’

New York City mayor-elect refused to ‘be in the shadows’ in the face of Islamophobic attacks during his campaign

Across the country, Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigrants has shaken neighbourhoods, torn apart families and engendered a sense of panic among communities. But in New York, on Tuesday night, Zohran Mamdani, the first Muslim mayor of New York, and an immigrant from Uganda, chose to underline his identity. “New York will remain a city of immigrants: a city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants and, as of tonight, led by an immigrant,” he told an ecstatic crowd at Paramount theater in Brooklyn.

The son of a Muslim father and a Hindu mother, he was born in Kampala, raised in New York, and identifies as a democratic socialist. Almost every aspect of Mamdani’s identity had been an issue of contention during the election. Earlier this week, the Center for Study of Organized Hate published a report highlighting the surge in Islamophobic comments online between July and October, most of which labelled Mamdani as an extremist or terrorist.

Published: November 9, 2025, 10:00 am

Saturday Night Live: Nikki Glaser takes hold of raunchy, fast-moving episode

The buzzy comedian becomes one of the only female stand-ups to host the show, following in the footsteps of Joan Rivers and Amy Schumer

It was a night of fresh faces at Saturday Night Live. In the illustrious half-century-and-counting history of the variety series, there have been a shocking lack of female stand-up hosts. Even during the height of the stand-up boom in the 80s and 90s, there were just three: Joan Rivers, Roseanne Barr and Rosie O’Donnell. In the past decade, Amy Schumer and Tiffany Haddish serve as the only two examples. Now, Nikki Glaser joins the select group hot off her star-making “Roast of Tom Brady”, which led to her acclaimed Golden Globes hosting gig, which she will return to in January. Last night, she made her debut in 8H alongside breakout musical guest and just-announced best new artist Grammy nominee Sombr, who is the first SNL talent to be born after Kenan Thompson became a cast member. Feel old yet?

“Oh, hi! Didn’t see you there. Someone was dying in my office.” So far this season, the writers at SNL have been trying to skewer Trump in a roundabout way. Recently, they plopped him in the middle of a Property Brothers gag on the East Wing renovations. In this episode, they zeroed in on the Thursday headlines when a man collapsed in the Oval Office during an event on drug prices. “A guy collapsing in the Oval Office, who would have thought it’d be not me,” James Austin Johnson’s ace Trump quips in a nod to past rumors concerning Trump’s health. “RFK Jr booked it out of here like someone was trying to give him a vaccine.” Johnson’s Trump has been less preachy and more biting than Alec Baldwin’s caricature of the man, with each line leaving no stone unturned. “They’re Stephen Miller’s policies,” Trump says of his agenda. “I don’t write that stuff.”

Published: November 9, 2025, 3:44 pm

This is how we do it: ‘The sex is so good I walk around with a ridiculous smile on my face’

Claudine and John both found a new lease of life on dating apps – and now put time aside to do things properly

• How do you do it? Share the story of your sex life, anonymously

With John there’s never any pressure, unlike in my old relationship

Published: November 9, 2025, 11:00 am

I’m as capitalist as they get but Medicare for all is the best hope for US healthcare | Gene Marks

With the US government shut down over impending rises to insurance premiums, it’s clear the status quo cannot continue

Deductibles. In-network. Out-of-network. Concierge medical services. Out-of-pocket expenses. Co-payment. Co-insurance. Benefit advisers. Insurance brokers. Healthcare consultants. ACA. HMO. PPO. EPO. POS. HDHP. HSA. FSA. HRA. EOB. COBRA. SHOP. Single coverage. Dependent coverage. Premium tax credits.

Confused? You should be. Who understands all this stuff? Not the typical business owner. Nor the typical employee. Choosing the right healthcare insurance for our business – or for our families – seems like it requires a PhD in healthcare.

Published: November 9, 2025, 3:00 pm

‘Ambition is a punishing sphere for women’: author Maggie Nelson on why Taylor Swift is the Sylvia Plath of her generation

What do Swift and Plath have in common, and should Kamala Harris have spoken out about her political ambitions? The Argonauts author turns her lens on poetry, pop and patriarchy

Maggie Nelson is an unapologetic Taylor Swift fan. She knows the discography, drops song lyrics into conversation and tells me she took her family to the Vancouver leg of the Eras tour. So she’s a dyed-in-the-wool Swiftie? Nelson seems not entirely comfortable with the breathless connotations of that term but yes, the love is real. So much so, she has written a book about the billionaire singer-songwriter, or rather, a joint analysis of Swift and Sylvia Plath, who recurs in much of Nelson’s oeuvre.

The notion of uniting these two cultural titans, who are seemingly poles apart in sensibility – one a melancholic American poet, the other an all-American poster girl – came to her when she heard Swift’s 2024 album, The Tortured Poets Department. Alongside its literary references to F Scott Fitzgerald, Dylan Thomas and Shakespeare, there are heavy resonances of Plath in its introspection and emotional tumult. But the book only started to take shape after a chat with her 13-year-old son’s friend, Alba. “We were making bracelets and she said ‘Have you ever heard of Sylvia Plath?’ I thought that was funny because I’d written my undergraduate thesis on Plath and I was [almost] 40 years older than her. So I said: ‘I have heard of Sylvia Plath.’ As I sat there, I thought, these kids don’t want to hear me talk on this topic but I have a lot to say because I’ve been thinking of it all.”

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:00 pm

The man who shot Al Capone: Jun Fujita’s Chicago – in pictures

Disasters, riots, gangsters and construction … early 20th-century Chicago is seen here through the lens of the pioneering Japanese-American photojournalist, poet and artist Jun Fujita. His life and work is covered in Behind the Camera by Graham Harrison Lee, published by Hat & Beard Press, with an accompanying exhibition planned in Los Angeles next year

Published: November 9, 2025, 7:00 am

Does Trump truly care about Nigerian Christians? Of course not – he just knows faith sells | Simon Tisdall

In a bid to exercise absolute power, today’s crop of authoritarian leaders is recruiting – and exploiting – believers

Donald Trump’s crusading threat to invade Nigeria and save Christians from Islamist terrorists is typical attention-seeking. Surely even he must realise that unilateral US military intervention would invite disaster. And he’s got his facts wrong. The threat of Islamist terrorism is real, but it affects Nigerian Muslims as much, if not more, than Christians. There’s no evidence of genocide, contrary to the alarmist claims of US far-right internet warriors. Trump’s intervention was about politics, not faith.

In speaking out, he was massaging a key domestic constituency, not acting from genuine, God-fearing concern for “our cherished Christians” in a land he’s never visited. Christian nationalist votes helped clinch Trump’s two presidential victories despite the obvious insincerity of his professed beliefs. His support among white evangelical Protestants is much higher than the average – 72% in April, compared with 40% among all US adults. Trump’s histrionics about Nigeria were primarily for their (and his) benefit.

Simon Tisdall is a Guardian foreign affairs commentator

Published: November 9, 2025, 8:00 am

Welcome to 21st-century politics: a bitter revolt against power that will consume Labour and the Tories | John Harris

A mood of turbulence and insurgency against the two main parties has been building for years – and could claim new victims

Westminster has a habit of staging occasions that are at once both lacklustre and ridiculous, and last Tuesday saw yet another one. Rachel Reeves’s speech, we were told, was an act of “pitch-rolling”, performed because – in the words of Treasury sources – the chancellor and her colleagues were “desperate” to get her message across to the public. Here, unfortunately, was the essence of the event’s absurdity: as if to confirm people’s most cynical views of politics, she served notice that she is about to do something hugely significant, but refused to explicitly say what it is.

But thanks to nods, winks and the usual anonymous briefings, what she was signalling was obvious: she could no longer honour her party’s manifesto pledge not to raise national insurance, VAT or income tax – and that, in a gambit last tried by a chancellor in 1975, the basic rate of the last is likely to go up.

John Harris is a Guardian columnist

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:00 pm

US states must stop the power shutoffs during the shutdown | Edward J Markey and Mark Wolfe

Americans are choosing between heating their homes and putting food on the table. Officials and utilities can prevent this

As the stalemate over government funding and healthcare benefits continues, winter is approaching – but federal heating assistance, blocked by the shutdown, isn’t arriving in time. Millions of American families are about to face an impossible choice: heating their homes or putting food on the table. As the senator for a state known for its volatile winters and as executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association, we call on states and utilities to choose a different outcome for those families and shut off the shutoffs. A nationwide freeze on utilities’ ability to disconnect customers from heat for nonpayment isn’t about politics – it’s about public safety.

The breakdown in federal budget negotiations has frozen the release of funding for many of the essential services families rely on nationwide, including the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (Liheap). Liheap helps struggling households keep their heat and lights on by helping eligible families pay their utility bills. With those dollars locked up in Washington gridlock, America’s seniors and working families are now at risk of losing power – just as temperatures start to plummet.

Edward J Markey represents Massachusetts in the United States Senate and is a long-time advocate for affordable energy, consumer protection, and climate action. Mark Wolfe is an an energy economist and serves as the executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association, representing the state directors of the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, and co-director of the Center on Climate, Energy and Poverty

Published: November 9, 2025, 1:00 pm

I’m a committed introvert – but no AI will take away the joy I get from other people | Emma Beddington

While it might be soothing to think you could replace social interactions like book clubs with ChatGPT, subcontracting human thought out to a bot will never bring happiness

This is depressing: according to the Cut, people are using AI to solve escape room puzzles and cheat at trivia nights. Surely, that is the definition of spoiling your own fun? “Like going into a corn maze and just wanting a straight line to the end,” says one TikToker quoted in the article. There’s also an interview with a keen reader who uses ChatGPT as a book club replacement, scraping the internet and aggregating “stimulating opinions and perspectives”. All well and good (actually, no, it sounds bleak as hell) until he had a character’s death spoilered in the fantasy epic he had been enjoying.

Meanwhile, Substack seems to be clogging up with AI-generated essays. The nu-blogging platform is an earnestly artisanal space where writers craft their stuff; subcontracting that to a bot seems like the acme of pointlessness. Will Storr, who writes about storytelling, examines this boggling trend and the tells that give it away on his own Substack, including a penchant for what he calls “the impersonal universal”: sweeping statements that sound deep but aren’t. There is, he says, “A white-noise generality to its insights, an uncanny vagueness that makes the mind glaze over.”

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:00 pm

If you’re feeling anxious, take a moment to pause before pouring that glass of wine | Diane Young

Anxiety can can disrupt relationships, affect sleep and lead to harmful coping behaviours. Early awareness is crucial

• The modern mind is a column where experts discuss mental health issues they are seeing in their work

When Mia*, 35, walks into my office, she looks composed and ready to start her day fresh with a counselling session. But having seen Mia for almost half a year now, I know she masks the truth behind her polished facade, and I notice the subtle tension in her shoulders that gives it away.

Mia tells me that the night before, she had poured herself “just one glass of wine” to unwind after a long day. One glass became two, then three. It’s a pattern she has grown used to; a quiet ritual that helps her “switch off” from the racing thoughts that flood her mind when the day finally slows down.

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:00 pm

Anti-ageing trousers? There really is no fashion or beauty claim too wild

According to a neuroscientist, our brains are hardwired to keep falling for the latest beauty fads. It’s a booby trap too many of us fall down – and I should know

Kim Kardashian once admitted that if someone told her eating faeces every day would make her look younger, “I just might”.

I’d like to think I wouldn’t go that far, but yesterday I clicked on the link for an article about anti-ageing trousers, so if the theory behind it was convincing enough, who knows.

Published: November 9, 2025, 5:00 am

Everybody panic – the workplace has become too ‘feminized’! | Arwa Mahdawi

This week, Mexico’s president was groped in public. But a New York Times podcast is fretting about excessive wokeness

Are you a woman? Do you want to rapidly raise your profile and get booked on the speaking circuit? Are you good at mental gymnastics?

Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist

Published: November 8, 2025, 2:00 pm

NFL week 10 live: Indianapolis Colts v Atlanta Falcons in Berlin – live

• Live NFL updates from seven games at 6pm UK time

• Send Graham an email with your thoughts

Colts 13-7 Falcons 4:36, 1st quarter

And our commentary team kindly informs us that Pierce’s brother played basketball in Germany. So him scoring today was meant to be I suppose.

Published: November 9, 2025, 3:58 pm

America’s men’s grand slam drought is not Taylor Fritz’s burden to carry

Back at the ATP finals one year after reaching the last hurdle, Fritz remains a top-five talent. It’s a reminder that a certain major-title drought is not his burden to bear

I would like to have some words with ESPN broadcaster Chris Fowler about what he said after Novak Djokovic beat Taylor Fritz, for the 11th straight time, in the US Open quarter-finals. Look – Fritz is American, Fowler is American – and sports often lend themselves to nationalism. A little bit of disappointment was appropriate. Instead, Fowler invoked the continued drought of American men at the majors: none of them had lifted a trophy since Andy Roddick in 2003, and Fritz had been the last one standing in the tournament.

We all love a narrative, myself included. But come on. Even if Fritz had beaten Djokovic for the first time, force of nature Carlos Alcaraz was waiting in the next round, who Fritz has yet to beat in an official match. And if he’d somehow survived that, it would have been defending champion Jannik Sinner in the final, against whom Fritz had lost 10 of the last 11 sets. Alcaraz and Sinner had also split the last seven major titles (and Alcaraz went on to thrash a fatigued Djokovic in the next round). Fritz said in press after the loss that he actually liked his draw, because it presented the opportunity to beat the three best players in the world in succession. Fritz is more than within his right to aspire to the accomplishment; an athlete is meant to believe in themselves. But going into that Djokovic quarter-final who else in their right mind had the drought of American champions on the brain?

Published: November 9, 2025, 9:00 am

Crystal Palace v Brighton, Brentford v Newcastle and more: Premier League clockwatch – live

• Live updates from Sunday’s 2pm (GMT) kick-offs

• Share your thoughts with Tom via email

Newcastle were horrible last week against West Ham, as Eddie Howe just admitted in his pre-match interview. “We have to deliver something different. That day (against West Ham) was painful for us. Hopefully, we have learnt a lot. Now we have to start picking up points.”

On Anthony Gordon: “He wasn’t close in the end. The scan revealed a very slight problem in his hip and it’s a good opportunity for Harvey (Barnes) to come in.”

Published: November 9, 2025, 4:00 pm

Manchester City v Liverpool: Premier League – live

• Live updates from the 4.30pm UK time kick-off

Manchester City (4-3-3ish) Donnarumma; Nunes, Dias, Gvardiol, O’Reilly; Bernardo, Nico, Foden; Cherki, Haaland, Doku.

Subs: Trafford, Reijnders, Stones, Ake, Marmoush, Ait-Nouri, Savinho, Bobb, Lewis.

Published: November 9, 2025, 3:29 pm

Trump reportedly wants new NFL stadium in Washington named after him

• Trump wants name on Commanders home, per ESPN

• White House source says move ‘will probably happen’

• $3.7bn, 65,000-seat stadium expected to open in 2030

Donald Trump is pressing the NFL’s Washington Commanders to name their planned $3.7bn stadium after him, a bid he is pursuing through back-channel conversations with ownership and by leaning on the government bodies that must approve the project, according to multiple sources familiar with the discussions.

A senior White House official said Trump has conveyed his wishes directly to a member of investor Josh Harris’s ownership group. “It’s what the president wants, and it will probably happen,” the official told ESPN. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt added in an email: “That would be a beautiful name, as it was President Trump who made the rebuilding of the new stadium possible.”

Published: November 8, 2025, 5:17 pm

Arteta frustrated and disappointed by Arsenal’s inability to see off Sunderland

• Manager feels ‘pain in tummy’ at end of clean sheet run

• Régis Le Bris praises his team’s character in ‘masterclass’

Mikel Arteta told of his “disappointment and frustration” after Arsenal were denied a win by an injury-time Sunderland goal at the Stadium of Light. A 94th-minute strike from the substitute Brian Brobbey claimed a point for the home side, who are fourth in the table.

“It’s not a nice feeling,” said Arteta. “It’s disappointment and frustration, because we wanted the three points. We had to navigate through a tough game. We knew that. [They were] very disruptive. We had to deal with situations that were obviously difficult to deal with.”

Published: November 8, 2025, 9:59 pm

The LA Dodgers won the World Series but for Latino fans, it’s complicated

The fact that Latino stars were at the forefront of the victory over the Toronto Blue Jays sits alongside the club’s near silence on the immigration raids roiling the city

For Natalia Molina, a lifelong fan of the Los Angeles Dodgers and a third-generation Mexican American, the crowning moment of baseball’s World Series didn’t come in last Saturday’s nail-biting finale, when her team performed one death-defying escape act after another before prevailing in extra innings over the Toronto Blue Jays.

It came a game earlier, when two of the team’s second-tier players, Kike Hernández, who is from Puerto Rico, and Miguel Rojas, from Venezuela, pulled off a thrilling, game-winning sequence that simultaneously upended the many negative stereotypes Donald Trump has been touting about Latinos since he first ran for president a decade ago.

Published: November 8, 2025, 11:00 am

Explosive ending cannot mask flaws of Tottenham and Manchester United | Jonathan Wilson

This match was as dismal as last season’s Europa League final and in a routine league game nerves are no excuse

Never underestimate the haplessness of this Manchester United. Never underestimate the haplessness of this Tottenham Hotspur. Never underestimate the capacity of the Premier League to uncover drama in the least plausible situation. The embers of a game of little quality seemed cold and dead but somehow burst into glorious flame in the final six minutes plus stoppage time.

What it means is anybody’s guess, other than that these are two sides who remain deeply flawed. The shadow of Bilbao and last May’s Europa League final was unavoidable; in purely technical terms, that game was just as bad as the first 84 minutes of this one, but it at least had a sense of edge. Nervousness is permissible if there is something to be nervous about. Such scrappiness in a routine league meeting is far less explicable.

Published: November 8, 2025, 4:04 pm

Norris soars to F1 São Paulo GP pole as Piastri stumbles and Verstappen flops

• Oscar Piastri fourth as teammate Lando Norris excels

• Verstappen’s title hopes hit as he is 16th and out in Q1

Lando Norris is finding his form with almost perfect timing, demonstrating confidence, touch and precision when it really mattered in claiming pole position for the São Paulo Grand Prix. The Briton is looking increasingly like the man who would be king as his championship ambitions were backed with a statement of intent, having already secured victory in the sprint race.

His success was given added impetus as both his title rivals, Oscar Piastri and Max Verstappen, suffered disappointment in Brazil. Piastri’s championship hopes took yet another blow as he crashed out of the sprint and qualified only in fourth, while Verstappen could manage only 16th on the grid.

Published: November 8, 2025, 7:32 pm

North Carolina police officer fatally shot in hospital emergency room incident

Campus police officer Roger Smith was killed during a struggle and a ‘person of interest’ is in custody, police say

A police officer was shot and killed during a struggle in the emergency department lobby at a North Carolina hospital Saturday.

The shooting happened around 9am at the WakeMed Garner Healthplex, killing WakeMed campus police officer Roger Smith, according to a WakeMed statement.

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:31 pm

Water levels below 3% in dam reservoirs for Iran’s second city, say reports

Storage dwindles in Mashhad, home to 4 million people, as country struggles with drought

Water levels at the dam reservoirs supplying Iran’s north-eastern city of Mashhad have plunged below 3%, according to reports, as the country suffers from severe water shortages.

“The water storage in Mashhad’s dams has now fallen to less than 3%,” Hossein Esmaeilian, the chief executive of the water company in Iran’s second largest city by population, told the ISNA news agency.

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:37 pm

James Watson obituary

Nobel prize-winning biologist whose discovery, with Francis Crick, of the structure of DNA solved the mystery of genetic inheritance

James Watson, who has died aged 97, had an extraordinary gift for science, combined with ruthless ambition and an arrogant disregard for most of his peers. These combined qualities earned him a key role in one of the 20th century’s most profound scientific revolutions, a share in a Nobel prize, a bestselling memoir, a place in science history and the anger of many of his colleagues.

With Francis Crick, at Cambridge University in 1953, Watson discovered the structure of the giant molecule DNA – deoxyribonucleic acid, found in almost every living cell – and demonstrated that all inheritance, and even life itself, could be explained by chemistry and physics. The discovery revealed new horizons in evolutionary, biological, medical, archaeological, conservation and criminal sciences, and launched an industrial revolution, all within the working lifetime of the discoverers.

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:10 pm

Three dead and 15 hurt after rough seas pull people into the ocean in Tenerife

Two men and a woman died in separate incidents after sudden sea surges battered the Spanish island

Three people have died and at least 15 were injured in separate incidents linked to rough seas battering the Spanish island of Tenerife pulling several people into the ocean, emergency services said.

A rescue helicopter airlifted a man who had fallen into the water at a beach in La Guancha, a municipality in the north of the island, but he was pronounced dead on arrival at hospital.

Published: November 9, 2025, 11:32 am

Syria carries out preemptive raids against Islamic State

Security operations came as Syrian president Ahmed al-Sharaa arrived in Washington to meet Donald Trump

Syria has carried out nationwide preemptive operations targeting Islamic State cells, a spokesperson for the interior ministry said on Saturday, as the country’s president arrived in the US for talks with Donald Trump.

Syrian security forces carried out 61 raids, with 71 people arrested and explosives and weapons seized, the spokesperson told state-run Al Ekhbariya TV.

Published: November 8, 2025, 9:15 pm

Car fleeing police slams into bar in Tampa, killing 4 people and injuring 11

Police say vehicle was involved in street racing before driver fled from authorities and then crashed into Ybor City bar

A speeding car fleeing police slammed into a crowded bar early on Saturday, killing four people and injuring 11 in a historic district of Tampa, Florida, known for its nightlife and tourists.

An air patrol unit with the Tampa police department spotted the car driving recklessly on a freeway at about 12.40am after police said the silver sedan had been seen street racing in another neighborhood, according to a police department statement.

Published: November 8, 2025, 8:29 pm

Britain sends RAF specialists to help Belgium combat disruptive drones

Incursions halted flights at Brussels and Liège airports last week with Russia said to be the most likely culprit

Britain is deploying Royal Air Force specialists to help Belgium counter drone threats to the country’s airports after disruptive sightings last week that some politicians blamed on Russia.

Sir Richard Knighton, the head of the UK’s armed forces, said the British military would provide “our people, our equipment” to help Belgium, though he was careful to say “we don’t yet know” the origin of the drones seen last week.

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:31 pm

Driver livestreams herself on TikTok as she apparently hits and kills man in Chicago

TikTok video shows woman speaking into camera and reacting to a loud thud before she says ‘I just hit somebody’

Authorities are investigating a newly surfaced video that suggests a woman who hit and killed a man while driving in the Chicago suburb of Zion, Illinois, on Monday night was livestreaming on TikTok at the time of the crash.

The video in question was reportedly taken by a user in Zion, and it shows a woman behind the wheel of a car reacting to a loud thud by saying, “Fuck, fuck, fuck … I just hit somebody.”

Published: November 8, 2025, 4:08 pm

Retired Australian teacher discovers the oldest fossil of its kind in southern hemisphere – and a new species

Robert Beattie, 82, has found specimens of a 151m-year-old midge that challenge what we know about how the insects evolved

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As a boy, holidaying with his family in the New South Wales coastal town of Gerringong, Robert Beattie found a shell in a rock. It turned out to be hundreds of millions of years old – a Permian fossil, common to the Sydney basin.

“I couldn’t believe it,” Beattie recalls. “I’ve been interested in fossils ever since.” That childhood discovery, made in 1948, sparked a lifelong passion for palaeontology, one that that has taken him to dig sites across Australia’s eastern states, seen him present his findings internationally – and discover a fossil that changes what we know about how insects evolved.

Published: November 8, 2025, 7:00 pm

Amid squabbles, bombast and competing interests, what can Cop30 achieve?

Climate summit in Brazil needs to find way to stop global heating accelerating amid stark divisions

“It broke my heart.” Surangel Whipps, president of the tiny Pacific nation of Palau, was sitting in the front row of the UN’s general assembly in New York when Donald Trump made a long and rambling speech, his first to the UN since his re-election, on 23 September.

Whipps was prepared for fury and bombast from the US president, but what followed was shocking. Trump’s rant on the climate crisis – a “green scam”, “the greatest con job ever perpetrated”, “predictions made by stupid people” – was an unprecedented attack on science and global action from a major world leader.

Published: November 9, 2025, 6:00 am

Lula’s balancing act: Cop30 Amazon summit juggles climate and social priorities

Brazil’s president welcomes world leaders while navigating divided government, promising action on deforestation and emissions

• How could the Tropical Forest Forever Facility tackle deforestation?

Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has welcomed world leaders to Belém for the first climate summit in the Amazon, where conservationists hope he can be a champion for the rainforest and its people.

But with a divided administration, a hostile Congress and 20th-century developmentalist instincts, this global figurehead of the centre left has a balancing act to perform in advocating protection of nature and a reduction of emissions.

Published: November 8, 2025, 2:00 pm

The premier, the poet and the fight to save an extraordinary Australian frog

As amphibian enthusiasts get ready to hop into FrogID Week, hope persists that one of Australia’s most bizarre creatures may survive

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It’s a story almost too preposterous to believe, starring a group of young uni students, an infamous state premier, a legendary Australian poet and an extinct frog which gave birth by vomiting its young – all at the dawn of the Australian conservation movement.

Yet the tale of the southern gastric-brooding frog, which once inhabited the rainforest streams of the Conondale and Blackall ranges in south-east Queensland, continues to perplex and inspire a new generation of citizen scientists as they hop into FrogID Week.

Published: November 8, 2025, 8:35 am

Olivia Rodrigo condemns Trump administration’s use of her music for ‘racist, hateful propaganda’

Pop star rebukes DHS and White House for video demanding undocumented immigrants self-deport

Olivia Rodrigo has criticized the Trump administration after one of her songs was featured in a government video promoting deportation efforts.

A clip posted on the official Department of Homeland Security and White House Instagram accounts encouraged undocumented immigrants to voluntarily leave the US. The video used a segment of Rodrigo’s song all-american bitch as its soundtrack.

Published: November 8, 2025, 6:28 pm

Palestinian American hails Virginia win: ‘You can be bold on the Gaza genocide and still be victorious’

Democrat Sam Rasoul, a Muslim, won re-election to the state legislature despite accusations of antisemitism

Sam Rasoul, the Virginia Democrat who is currently the longest-serving Muslim state lawmaker in the US and who faced accusations of antisemitism over language condemning Israel’s assault on Gaza as genocide, scored a resounding victory in Tuesday’s election that he believes shows voters are craving honesty from politicians.

Rasoul, an American Palestinian state legislator since 2014, strengthened his majority as he was re-elected to an area of Virginia where the city of Roanoke leans Democrat and the surrounding areas are deeply conservative. In an election seen as a referendum on Trump’s policies, which have disproportionately affected Virginia, Rasoul increased his vote share from four years ago by more than 5% as Democrats trounced Republicans from the legislature to the governor’s mansion.

Published: November 8, 2025, 3:00 pm

Trump pardons former New York cop convicted of helping Beijing harass Chinese expatriate

Michael McMahon was sentenced to 18 months in prison for what a judge called ‘a campaign of transnational repression’

Donald Trump granted a presidential pardon on Friday to a former New York police sergeant who was convicted of helping China try to scare an ex-official into going back to his homeland, a prominent case in US authorities’ efforts to combat what they claim are Beijing’s far-flung efforts to repress critics.

Michael McMahon was sentenced this spring to 18 months in prison for his role in what a federal judge called “a campaign of transnational repression”. He insisted he was innocent, saying he was “unwittingly used” when he took what he thought was a straightforward private-investigator gig. McMahon said he was told he was working for a Chinese construction company – not the nation’s government.

Published: November 8, 2025, 4:50 pm

Maha movement helps to kill bill seeking US food-safety rollbacks

Public health advocates praise rewrite of legislation backed by big-food influence operation AFIT

A bipartisan group of public health advocates have defeated a proposal to kill state food safety laws that was pushed by what some critics have called a “faux Maha” big-food influence operation.

The industry-funded group, called Americans for Ingredient Transparency (AFIT), suggests it is part of a grassroots Make America Healthy Again (Maha) movement, but opponents say it is waging a campaign on behalf of big food companies that Maha figures typically criticize – ConAgra, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Hormel and Nestlé, among other food giants.

Published: November 8, 2025, 1:00 pm

Palestinian man dismissed from Gaza border assistance role to sue EU

Exclusive: Mohammed Baraka’s case alleges discrimination on basis of nationality after EU counterparts were transferred

A Palestinian man who was dismissed from his job in Gaza after the war broke out is suing the European Union for allegedly breaching Belgian law.

Mohammed Baraka, who worked at the EU border assistance mission (EUBam) at Rafah after its inception in 2006 as an unarmed civilian third-party presence, has filed his case in a Belgian court.

Published: November 9, 2025, 1:00 pm

UK to announce plans to emulate stringent Danish immigration system

Shabana Mahmood’s proposals draw scorn from some Labour MPs, while others want government to go further

• Why does the UK want to copy Denmark?

Shabana Mahmood is to announce changes to the UK’s immigration rules modelled on the Danish system, largely seen as among the most stringent in Europe, the Guardian understands.

Last month, the home secretary dispatched officials to Denmark to study its border control and asylum policies. Denmark’s tighter rules on family reunions and restricting some refugees to a temporary stay are among the policies being looked at.

Published: November 8, 2025, 1:55 pm

Guyana in turmoil after opposition leader arrested and faces US extradition

Azruddin Mohamed had emerged as a surprise contender in the presidential election and claims political persecution

Guyana has been thrown into political turmoil following the arrest and possible extradition to the United States of the country’s main opposition leader just two months after he emerged as the surprise contender in the presidential election that kept incumbent Irfaan Ali in power.

Azruddin Mohamed, 38, and his father, Nazar Mohamed, 73, two of Guyana’s wealthiest figures thanks to their gold mining empire, were arrested on 31 October in the capital, Georgetown, in response to a formal extradition request from the US government.

Published: November 8, 2025, 1:00 pm

Tanzania police arrest opposition party official after deadly election protests

Chadema party says deputy secretary general arrested and calls election of incumbent president fraudulent

Tanzanian authorities have detained a senior official from the main opposition party, Chadema, amid a spate of arrests in connection to deadly protests during elections last week.

More than 1,000 people were killed by security forces during the demonstrations, according to Chadema and human rights bodies. The Tanzanian government has said these figures were exaggerated but did not give its own figures.

Published: November 8, 2025, 3:17 pm

Could urban farming feed the world?

From back gardens to hi-tech hydroponics, the future of food doesn’t have to be rural

In 1982, artist Agnes Denes planted 2.2 acres of wheat on waste ground in New York’s Battery Park, near the recently completed World Trade Center. The towers soared over a golden field, as if dropped into Andrew Wyeth’s bucolic painting Christina’s World. Denes’s Wheatfield: A Confrontation was a challenge to what she called a “powerful paradox”: the absurdity of hunger in a wealthy world.

The global population in 1982 was 4.6 billion. By 2050, it will be more than double that, and the prospect of feeding everyone looks uncertain. Food insecurity already affects 2.3 billion people. Covid-19 and extreme weather have revealed the fragility of the food system. Denes was called a prophet for drawing attention to ecological breakdown decades before widespread public awareness. But perhaps she was prophetic, too, in foreseeing how we would feed ourselves. By 2050, more than two-thirds of us will live in cities. Could urban farming feed 10 billion?

Published: November 9, 2025, 12:00 pm

‘Anastacia is a big inspiration for me – raspy, raw and heartfelt’: Ella Eyre’s honest playlist

The singer was inspired by her mum’s love for Basement Jaxx and spent 69p on Jamiroquai, but what does she put on when she’s feeling down?

The first song I fell in love with
The first song that I remember really feeling inspired by was Good Luck by Basement Jaxx. My mum had all their CDs. Good Luck was the first song I sung for my managers before they took me on board, so I still have a big love for it.

The first single I bought
My mum gave me money to go and buy Feels Just Like It Should by Jamiroquai for 69p from HMV in Oxford Circus. It was the first time I’d bought a physical CD.

Published: November 9, 2025, 9:00 am

Trespasses: ​Gillian Anderson steals every scene in this miraculous TV heartbreaker

Lola Petticrew and Tom Cullen’s chemistry in this tale of secret passion during the Troubles will floor you. But it is Anderson as a sour, ragey alcoholic who truly mesmerises

It’s cliché to compare a love story to Romeo and Juliet. It’s like saying a detective reminds you of Sherlock Holmes. Yet it’s hard to avoid, watching Channel 4’s drama set in 1970s Northern Ireland. Trespasses follows Cushla Laverty, a 24-year-old Catholic teacher who falls for a swashbuckling Protestant, Michael Agnew. They begin seeing each other secretly, around Michael’s high profile establishment job: he’s an outspoken barrister, who campaigns for justice on behalf of young Catholic boys caught up in police bullying. This puts him, and those close to him, at risk of violent reprisal from both sides. Puts your commute into perspective, eh?

There’s much to admire. The show’s vintage palette for one, dripping with melancholy browns and orange. Was it perpetually autumn in the 70s? Michael and Cushla, played by Tom Cullen and Lola Petticrew from Say Nothing, have chemistry. And then there’s Gillian Anderson, who plays Cushla’s widowed mother, Gina. She steals so many scenes I wonder if she’s been hanging around the Louvre.

Published: November 8, 2025, 7:00 am

‘They’re not wolves – they’re sheep’: the psychiatrist who spent decades meeting and studying lone-actor mass killers

From Port Arthur to Hoddle Street, Paul E Mullen has had a front-row seat to the men behind some of the worst public massacres. He says it’s possible to ‘disrupt the script’ for future violence

Dr Paul E Mullen and his family were living near Dunedin, New Zealand when, one evening in November 1990, they heard gunfire. The shots continued into the night, followed by the distant sound of police and ambulances. At 9pm, a hospital colleague told him that a few kilometres away, in Aramoana, someone with a gun had started shooting.

As it turned out, Mullen had heard of the perpetrator before; one of his long-term patients was the man’s nextdoor neighbour, and soon Mullen would learn that many other people he knew had been injured or killed.

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Published: November 8, 2025, 7:00 pm

‘I had a year to write it from scratch’: the 2025 Booker finalists on the stories behind their novels

A newspaper report about a missing girl, the memory of a midwinter emergency … Susan Choi, Andrew Miller, David Szalay and others on what inspired their shortlisted books

The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny

Published: November 8, 2025, 9:00 am

Guitar Hero at 20 – how a plastic axe bridged the gap between rock generations

Guitar Hero’s controllers let anyone become a star in their own living room – and made the bands featured in the game household names again

It is 20 years since Guitar Hero was launched in North America, and with it, the tools for the everyday gamer to become a rock star. Not literally of course, but try telling that to someone who has nailed Free Bird’s four-minute guitar solo in front of a packed living-room audience.

Developed by Harmonix, published by RedOctane and inspired by Konami’s GuitarFreaks, Guitar Hero gave players a guitar-shaped controller with which to match coloured notes scrolling down the screen in time with a song. Each riff or sequence corresponded to specific notes, creating the feel of a genuine performance.

Published: November 8, 2025, 10:00 am

Paul Kelly: ‘Imagine by John Lennon is probably one of the worst songs ever written. I can’t stand it’

The legendary Australian singer on bad songs, good advice, disastrous gigs and why he feels lucky to reach 70

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Your new album is called Seventy. You are 70 years old. And I hear you like the number 70.

It’s a biblical number. It’s a very pleasing number to me. I like the sound of it. Turning 70 feels like a real marker. I wouldn’t say it’s an achievement, but I must have had my fair share of luck to reach 70. I was pretty reckless and I took risks – so I feel lucky to reach 70. Everything else after this is just extra.

Published: November 8, 2025, 7:00 pm

The kindness of strangers: a man I’d just met helped me land the job that changed my life

Because he’d gone to the trouble of setting it up, I went to the interview – even though I didn’t have a visa

• Read more in the kindness of strangers series

In the late 1980s, I was setting off on a backpacking trip to Europe with a friend. They were interested in doing a master’s degree in New York, so we’d booked a two-week stay in the Big Apple on the way to London.

We arrived at the postgrad residence, a big 10-storey building on the Upper West Side called International House which had been set up by Rockefeller to house postgraduate students. We dropped our bags and went straight to the canteen, where we grabbed food, took a seat and started talking to other diners.

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:00 pm

The moment I knew: when we reunited in our 60s, it felt like coming home

Lynne Besant met Paul as a teenager. After 40 years apart, she discovered she still had feelings for him

• Find more stories from the moment I knew series

In the mid-60s, my family followed my father’s work to a caravan park in Gladstone, central Queensland. He worked in construction and the sprawling transient accommodation for the hundreds of families who’d relocated to build an aluminium plant became our home. I was going on 16 and sulking about having to change schools, again. Then I met Paul.

Back in those days people made their own fun. We often had huge parties at the caravan park, and Paul, an apprentice electrician, would volunteer to rig up the lighting.

Published: November 8, 2025, 7:00 pm

The best Advent calendars in the US: 19 unique picks for a delightful Christmas countdown

From wine to whisky, beauty treats to candy surprises, these are our favorite Advent calendars to make the holidays merry and bright

• In the UK? The best beauty Advent calendars in 2025: 13 favourites for a festive glow-up, tested by our expert

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Once the Halloween decorations have been put away, my house immediately transforms into holiday mode. While some may think it’s too soon to bust out the twinkly lights and tinsel, I love the winter holiday season so much that my Thanksgiving dinner isn’t complete without a fully bedecked Douglas fir and soft jazz in the background.

If you also savor the season – or know someone who does – Advent calendars are a fun way to elevate every day with a new surprise, whether that’s an exotic new coffee to start the day, a sweet treat for the afternoon, or a premixed nightcap to wind down with. As a yuletide aficionado, I’ve tried plenty over the years, and these are some of my favorites for adults, kids – and kids at heart.

Published: November 8, 2025, 8:15 pm

Blind date: ‘The most awkward moment? Trying to get the lighting right for our cute little selfie’

Will, 33, a government officer (left), meets Fred, 29, a business analyst

What were you hoping for?
To have a fun Saturday night with someone kind and easygoing.

Published: November 8, 2025, 6:00 am

‘You Britons go to the pub, we go to the swimming pool!’: the European health habits worth adopting

Daily swims, power naps and five meals a day – not tips from the latest hit wellbeing podcast, but longstanding traditions that have kept generations healthy in Iceland, Ukraine, France and more …

Iceland: swimming pool culture

Published: November 9, 2025, 6:00 am

Why do we feel nostalgia?

The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical concepts

Why do we feel nostalgia? And why do some things trigger it more than others? Jules, Fife

Post your answers (and new questions) below or send them to nq@theguardian.com. A selection will be published next Sunday.

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:01 pm

Woman’s Hour host Nuala McGovern: ‘I’d like to try being a man for a day’

The BBC radio presenter on her raucous parties, living in New York during 9/11, and her love of hurkle-durkling

Born in Ireland, Nuala McGovern, 54, joined the BBC in 2009. In 2012, she went to the BBC World Service where she presented, Newsday, its breakfast programme, and then Outside Source from 2014 to 2022. In May 2024, she took over as lead host of Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour and she fronts The Woman’s Hour Guide to Life podcast. She is married and lives in London.

When were you happiest?
I’m at my happiest in the ocean, and even better if my husband is there throwing me around.

Published: November 8, 2025, 10:00 am

‘There is bounty almost everywhere’: why you’ll always find me in the flea market on my travels

Forget sightseeing, secondhand shopping is now a major draw for tourists. A seasoned bargain-hunter shares her tips on picking up the best vintage finds when travelling abroad

Marburg, Germany. It’s a fairytale city, not only because of the hilltop castle that overlooks its cobbled streets and half-timbered houses, but also because this is where the Grimm brothers once lived and studied, starting the collection of folklore stories that would eventually become their famous anthology of fairytales. Throughout the city, sculptures – some perched in improbable places – pay homage to this past, forming a mile-long route known as the Grimm Path. It’s very much like a treasure hunt.

But on my visit to Marburg, I had a different type of treasure hunt in mind and, once done with enchanted mirrors and kissy-lipped frogs, headed straight for the SecondHand by DRK (Deutsches Rotes Kreuz – the German Red Cross) to scout for pre-owned items.

Published: November 8, 2025, 7:00 am

Tim Dowling: life on the road was so much simpler than being at home

On tour with the band there were no snapping tortoises, no dog kerfuffles and certainly no peeping scaffolders

It is early morning, the low sun is glinting off wet tarmac. I’m in a coffee shop next to a petrol station, across the car park from the Travelodge where I spent the night, somewhere just north of Brighton. The middle leg of the band’s autumn tour is complete, and I’m on my way home. But first I want coffee.

“Can I take a name?” says the woman behind the counter.

Published: November 8, 2025, 6:00 am

Elon Musk makes himself far-right fixture after White House departure

The Tesla CEO once hinted he was done with politics – but he’s been leaning further into the international far right

When the far-right activist Tommy Robinson emerged from a London courtroom this week after a judge cleared him of a terrorism charge, he gave thanks to the man he said had bankrolled his defense.

“Elon Musk, I’m forever grateful. If you didn’t step in and fund my legal fight I’d probably be in jail,” Robinson said. “Thank you, Elon.”

Published: November 8, 2025, 12:00 pm

‘Everyone said it was impossible’: disabled hikers find freedom through off-road wheelchairs

Using an all-terrain vehicle that’s essentially the Jeep of wheelchairs, a New York tour group helps disabled people get on the trail

Former firefighter Gina Kothe’s right foot was crushed in an aerial-ladder accident during a 2010 blaze in Kingston, New York.

After months of false hope and a failed surgery, doctors decided her foot would have to be amputated. She fell into depression. “I had a slight addiction to painkillers,” she recalled. “I would shower every three or four days, and wear the same barbecue-stained T-shirt for two or three days in a row.”

Published: November 8, 2025, 4:00 pm

Remembrance Sunday and a Pride parade: photos of the weekend

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Published: November 9, 2025, 2:07 pm