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The pandemic has inspired many people to make big life changes. For Ashley Manning of Charlotte, North Carolina, COVID-19 was an opportunity to leave her job in pharmaceutical sales to become a stay-at-home mom. She even used her extra time at home to launch a small business, “Pretty Things by A.E. Manning.” The self-taught florist has always loved working with flowers and seeing the joy they bring to their recipients. She hoped to make just enough money to justify a babysitter while she worked, but the business turned out to be a bigger hit than she imagined. For years, she...

Spending Valentine's Day alone after losing a loved one can be hard - which is why a North Carolina woman is dedicating her Valentine's Day to delivering hundreds of flowers to widows. Ashley Manning, a florist from Charlotte, won't be celebrating the day of love by having a romantic date night with her husband, but will instead be offering comfort to those who no longer have a husband with whom to celebrate. With the help of 300 volunteers and thousands of donations, the mother-of-four plans to deliver more than 400 bouquets to women who will be without their significant other...

On Monday’s broadcast of CNN’s “At This Hour,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI) said that we have to look at the people who were behind the recent blockade of the Ambassador Bridge between the United States and Canada and look at what their motives were for doing the blockade, and that she believes that “they’re people trying to divide us, trying to really attack the foundations of our democracy.”

President Joe Biden on Monday expressed his approval on social media about the number of Super Bowl LVI advertisements promoting electric vehicles. “The ads during last night’s Super Bowl were clear: The future of the auto industry is electric,” Biden wrote on his social media account.

Ukraine's ambassador to the UK set off a firestorm today by appearing to suggest his country could drop its pledge to join NATO if it means avoiding a war with Russia. Vadym Prystaiko, a veteran diplomat who once served as Ukraine's foreign minister, was asked by the BBC on Sunday night whether Kiev might consider dropping the pledge - and responded 'we might'. But he rushed back on Monday morning to clarify the remark, saying his comments had been 'misunderstood' and that the commitment to join NATO remains enshrined in Ukraine's constitution. Ukraine's ambassador to the UK appeared to suggest...

I got contacted by a FAANG (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google) recruiter. I know. They are evil companies and every single of them requires a jab. Has anyone working in FAANG companies gotten a religious exemption for the jab? For new hires, I imagine it's hard to get an accomodation.

LATEST Feb. 14, 9:01 a.m. A spokesperson for Merlin Entertainments, the company that previously managed the San Francisco Dungeon, confirmed to SFGATE that it closed the attraction in June 2021. "The Dungeon brand remains intrinsically popular across the world, however the current climate allowed the brand to look at alternatives for the Dungeon experience in the US," the spokesperson said in an email. "Within San Francisco, Merlin Entertainments has the popular Madame Tussauds wax museum which remains a favorite for both tourists and locals." Feb. 13, 1:15 p.m. It’s the end of an era for one of the campiest tourist...

Pope Francis restructures major Vatican office tasked with defending the faithThe curial reform of the Vatican's doctrinal department comes as observers suggest Pope Francis may appoint pro-LGBT clerics to lead the CDF in the upcoming months. VATICAN CITY (LifeSiteNews) – Pope Francis today announced a re-ordering of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), splitting the doctrinal and disciplinary elements into two separate parts amid rumors that he is altering the Congregation to become more LGBT friendly.As predicted by MessainLatino, the motu proprio Fidem servare, released February 14 and signed by Pope Francis February 11, divides the CDF...

On Sunday, Canadian police arrested all the protesters who remained at the most heavily-trafficked bridge between the United States and Canada, as part of the ongoing vaccine mandate protests. Politico reports that the protesters were arrested near the Ambassador Bridge, which connects the Canadian city of Windsor, Ontario to the American city of Detroit, Michigan, a key hub of the automotive industry; the bridge is responsible for as much as 25 percent of all trade between the two neighboring countries. The few vehicles that remained were towed that same day. “Enforcement will continue in the demonstration area and there will...

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act on Monday in an effort to crack down on protesters that have shut down parts of Ottawa and various border crossings with the U.S.Trudeau informed his cabinet and Canada’s premiers of his intent Monday morning. The prime minister’s announcement marks the first time the act, which replaced the War Measures Act in 1988, has been employed.“After discussing with cabinet and caucus, after consultation with premiers from all provinces and territories, the federal government has invoked the emergencies act to supplement provincial and territorial capacity to address the blockades and occupations,” Trudeau...

Brooklyn artist Michael McLeer, who goes by the name Kaves, has filed a lawsuit in Brooklyn Federal court against the New York City Police Department demanding an immediate halt to a graffiti cleanup campaign that he says has wrongly destroyed authorized artworks in numerous instances. In April, according to the lawsuit, the NYPD destroyed Kaves’s mural Death From Above, created in 2008 alongside another artist, Revs, with the full permission of the property owner. “When I found out this piece was destroyed, I was devastated,” Kaves said in a statement. “When I made this work, I was full of pride....

Explanation: What excites the Heart Nebula? First, the large emission nebula dubbed IC 1805 looks, in whole, like a human heart. Its shape perhaps fitting of the Valentine's Day, this heart glows brightly in red light emitted by its most prominent element: excited hydrogen. The red glow and the larger shape are all created by a small group of stars near the nebula's center. In the heart of the Heart Nebula are young stars from the open star cluster Melotte 15 that are eroding away several picturesque dust pillars with their energetic light and winds. The open cluster of stars...

With the Republican control of Congress in the palm of their hands as a red wave sweeps across America, New Jersey Republicans are positioning themselves in a rather strange spot, in the crosshairs of former President Donald J. Trump. The anti-Trump sentiment is growing among the GOP establishment, who let’s face it, went all-in on people like Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich in the 2016 primary. It’s no secret to everyday Republicans living in New Jersey. The establishment Republican Party in New Jersey is fifty shades of purple with blue highlights. As the popular internet meme goes, this...

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Memphis police arrested a woman after she allegedly stabbed her boyfriend in Whitehaven. The incident happened Feb. 12 in the 3500 block of Weaver Road. According to an affidavit, police found a man suffering multiple stab wounds to the back. The man told officers he attempted to break up with his girlfriend, identified as Felecia Roach, at their home on Nora Road, police said. As he left the house, Roach allegedly hit him in the back of the head then began stabbing him in the back with a knife. He was taken to Regional One in critical...

DENVER (KDVR) — In one year, one person was arrested six different times for stealing cars in Denver. FOX31 Problem Solvers spoke one-on-one with Denver’s police chief about the spiking issue of car thefts and why the same thieves are getting the opportunity to strike over and over again. According to Denver police, they arrested a man named Illya Culpepper six times in 2021 for car thefts. Colorado Bureau of Investigations reports reflect these arrests for five car thefts in the first four months of the year and another in September. “Something’s going on and we need to get this...

Two days after Emma Roark went missing from her Rancho Cordova home on Jan. 27, her father got a call from a man who was using her cellphone. Gabriel Roark then called sheriff’s deputies and told them he was going to meet him. He found a man named Cedric Sandiford, who handed over the phone. Sandiford told Roark he had purchased it from Mikilo Morgan Rawls, the man now accused of killing Emma Roark, newly filed court documents say.

White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre refused to answer questions about the Durham probe during Monday's press briefing despite new revelations regarding Democratic efforts to link former President Donald Trump to Russia. "I can't speak to that report," Jean-Pierre told reporters on Monday. "I refer you to the Department of Justice." The exchange comes afters special counsel John Durham released in a filing Saturday alleging that lawyers for the Clinton campaign paid a technology company to infiltrate servers belonging to Trump Tower, and later the White House, in order to establish an "inference" and "narrative" to bring to government...

Tafoya told The Athletic’s Richard Deitsch that she will co-chair the campaign of Kendall Qualls, an Army veteran and businessman who is running for governor of Minnesota as a Republican candidate. “I got to a point in my life where I wanted to try other things, and there are some things that are really important to me,” Tafoya told The Athletic. “This is not to say that sports isn’t an important field, that my job isn’t an important job. But in my position, I was not as free to be as vocal about world events that I’m concerned about.

“‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven’” (Matthew 5:3). The Puritan Thomas Watson, in his book The Beatitudes, discusses many principles to help the believer recognize his or her humility—those spiritual fruits that enable us to determine whether or not humility is actually growing within us. Here are three. First, if we are truly humble, we will be weaned from ourselves and have no more constant self-preoccupation. Paul expresses it beautifully this way: “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the...

Today we are a nation that is headed toward tragedy unless we turn tragedy into triumph. I know that this is true, and I'm going to share what scripture says is the solution. Beginning in the book of Jeremiah, God had called the prophet into his service, and Jeremiah had to go and speak to a nation that had largely rejected God. They had reimaged God into a different kind of deity and had brought in false religions and false practices. God, through Jeremiah, repeatedly called them back to him for 40 years. God told them over and over, “If...