Category: Life Style

5-letter word for fun? Hasbro & NYT create Wordle board game

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Read time : 2 mins

Level : Intermediate

A Wordle game is seen on a mobile phone, Friday, July 15, 2022, in Boston. Hasbro Inc. and The New York Times, which owns Wordle, announced Thursday that Wordle: The Party Game will be available for purchase in North America in October. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer)

By MARK PRATT Associated Press

The company that makes some of the world’s most iconic board games including Scrabble, Monopoly, and Clue is developing a new one based on Wordle, the obsessively popular digital word-guessing game.

Hasbro Inc. and The New York Times — which purchased Wordle earlier this year — announced Thursday that Wordle: The Party Game will be available for purchase in North America in October, with preorders already being accepted. Continue reading

Some schools build affordable housing to retain teachers

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Read time : 4 mins

Level : Advanced

A view from the third floor of the courtyard, of a new housing complex for Jefferson Union High School District teachers and education staff, in Daly City, Calif., Friday, July 8, 2022. The school district in San Mateo County is among just a handful of places in the country with educator housing. But with a national teacher shortage and rapidly rising rents, the working class district could serve as a harbinger as schools across the U.S. seek to attract and retain educators. (AP Photo/Godofredo A. Vásquez)

By JANIE HAR Associated Press

DALY CITY, Calif. (AP) — San Francisco Bay Area high school teacher Lisa Raskin moved out of a cramped apartment she was sharing with a roommate and into her own place this month, paying a deeply discounted $1,500 a month for a one-bedroom with expansive views within walking distance to work.

It was once an impossible dream in an exorbitantly priced region hostile to new housing. But her employer, a 4,000-student school district south of San Francisco, was the rare success story in the struggle to provide affordable housing and in May, it opened 122 apartments for teachers and staff.

“I have a sense of community, which I think is more valuable than anything else,” the 41-year-old San Francisco native said. “More districts really need to consider this model. I think it shows educators that they value them.”

The Jefferson Union High School District in San Mateo County’s Daly City is among just a handful of places in the country with educator housing. But with a national teacher shortage and rapidly rising rents, the working-class district could serve as a harbinger as schools across the U.S. seek to attract and retain educators. Continue reading

Super League clubs face UEFA in soccer’s big legal match

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Read time : 4 mins

Level : Advanced

FILE – A man walks by the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg, Oct. 5, 2015. A group of top soccer clubs face Champions League organizer UEFA in court on Monday, July 11, 2022, for a legal match that risks the biggest upheaval in European soccer for more than 25 years. The Super League project failed at launch 15 months ago but the company formed by the 12 rebel clubs — now led by Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus — has brought a case to the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg. (AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert, File)

By GRAHAM DUNBAR AP Sports Writer

GENEVA (AP) — A group of top soccer clubs face Champions League organizer UEFA in court on Monday for a legal match that risks the biggest upheaval in European soccer for more than 25 years.

The Super League project failed at launch 15 months ago but the company formed by the 12 rebel clubs — now led by Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus — has brought a case to the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg.

Judges from 15 of the 27 EU member states will hear arguments over two days with a majority of those national governments supporting UEFA.

The clubs will accuse UEFA of alleged abuses of market dominance with control of soccer competitions that breach European law. Continue reading

Japan eases foreign tourism ban, allows guided package tours

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Read time : 2 mins

Level : Intermediate

(AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

By MARI YAMAGUCHI Associated Press

TOKYO (AP) — Japan on Friday eased its borders for foreign tourists and began accepting visa applications, but only for those on guided package tours who are willing to follow mask-wearing and other antivirus measures as the country cautiously tries to balance business and infection worries.

Friday is the first day to start procedures needed for the entry and arrivals are not expected until late June at the earliest, even though airport immigration and quarantine offices stood by for any possible arrivals.

The Japan Tourism Agency says tours are being accepted from 98 countries and regions, including the United States, Britain, China, South Korea, Thailand and Singapore, which are deemed as having low infection risks. Continue reading

America’s Affair With Plastic Money and How Credit Card Issuers Treat Consumers Differently

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

By Ram Chakradhar

When it comes to credit card usage, spending habits, and saving money, men and women behave differently. The study also shows varied treatment of credit card issuers based on gender. You may be surprised to learn that men were more likely to have their credit card limit reduced than women during the pandemic.

Key Findings

Men were 1.5 times more likely to have their limits reduced than women. 82% of the men are less careful about their credit card dues than 71% of women. Men also carry over balance every month than women. When applying for a new credit card, men’s primary reason is a balance transfer, while women do it for spending rewards. Both agree that high-interest rates and annual fees are the biggest annoyance.Forbes Advisor, a financial comparison site, studied 2,005 American adults’ credit card usage, spending habits, frustration, and Covid-19 pandemic impact. The survey shows that 53% of the men saw their credit card limit reduced in the past two years compared to 37% of women. Continue reading

Red-hot summer job market awaits US teens as employers sweat

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Advanced

(AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

By PAUL WISEMAN and MAE ANDERSON AP Business Writers

WASHINGTON (AP) — Mary Jane Riva, CEO of the Pizza Factory, has a cautionary message for her customers this summer: Prepare to wait longer for your Hawaiian pie or calzone.

The Pizza Factory’s 100 West Coast locations are desperately short of workers. With about 12 employees per store, they’re barely half-staffed — just when many more Americans are venturing out to restaurant chains like hers.

“The days of 15-minute orders,” Riva said, “may not be happening anymore.”

Talk to other employers in America’s vast hospitality sector — hotels, restaurants, public pools, ice cream parlors, pick-your-own strawberry farms — and you’ll hear a similar lament. They can’t fill many of their summer jobs because the number of open positions far exceeds the number of people willing and able to fill them — even at increased wages.

Some help may be coming: School’s out for summer, cutting loose millions of high school and college students for the next three months. Riva, for one, is hoping to field more job applications from students seeking summertime spending money. Continue reading

En plein air: NYC aims to keep outdoor lifestyle post-virus

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Advanced

(AP Photo/John Minchillo, File)

By BOBBY CAINA CALVAN Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — As COVID-19 ravaged New York City, virus-wary denizens locked out of indoor public places poured into the streets, sidewalks and parks. They dined with friends in outdoor sheds hastily erected by restaurants, and went to health classes, concerts and even therapy sessions on streets closed to traffic.

Now as the city continues on its path of recovery, the pandemic could be leaving a lasting imprint on how the city uses its roadways: More space for people and less room for cars. Continue reading

In election misinformation fight, ‘2020 changed everything’

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Read time : 4 mins

Level : Advanced

(AP Photo/Jenny Kane, File)

By AMANDA SEITZ Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Beth Bowers grew up in the 1960s and 1970s with parents who marched in protests, wrote letters to members of Congress and voted in elections big and small.

Her father, a World War II veteran, and her mother, an educational counselor, did not use social media sites in their lifetimes. But Bowers is sure they would be disheartened to see how easily falsehoods about the U.S. elections are disseminated online to millions and millions of people.

That’s why the Evanston, Illinois, mom spends a few hours each week scouring Facebook groups for conspiracy theories or lies as part of a nationwide volunteer effort to debunk misinformation about voting.

“The good thing about this work is, it’d be so easy to become incredibly cynical and hopeless, but I think we feel like this is something we can do and make a difference,” Bowers, 59, said in a phone interview. Continue reading

Got a dime? Businesses seek Treasury help with coin shortage

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

(AP Photo/Jenny Kane)

By FATIMA HUSSEIN Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Got a dime you can spare? Coins are in short supply — again.

Retailers, laundromats and other businesses that rely on coins want Americans to empty their piggy banks and look under couch cushions for extra change and “get coin moving.”

A group of trade associations that represent individual businesses including banks, retail outlets, truck stops, grocery stores and more is asking the Treasury Department for more help convincing Americans to get coins back in circulation.

The consequences of the circulation slowdown hit people who don’t have an ability to pay for items electronically, they say. Continue reading

Iconic tapestry of Picasso’s `Guernica’ is back at the UN

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Read time : 2 mins

Level : Intermediate

By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The iconic tapestry of Pablo Picasso’s “Guernica,” which is considered by numerous art critics as perhaps the most powerful anti-war painting in history, returned to its place of honor at the United Nations on Saturday after a year-long absence that angered and dismayed many U.N. diplomats and staff.

The tapestry of the painting, woven by Atelier J. de la Baume-Durrbach, was re-hung Saturday outside the Security Council, the U.N.’s most powerful body charged with ensuring international peace and security. Since February 2021, the yellow wall where it had hung had been empty.

The tapestry was commissioned in 1955 by former U.S. vice president and New York governor Nelson Rockefeller and offered to the U.N. on loan in 1984.
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