To commemorate the multicultural harvest feast of 1621 at Plymouth Rock, about three million New Yorkers and visitors annually station themselves on freezing late-November streets to watch giant inflatable branded cartoon characters, all promoting a department store that filed for bankruptcy protection more than 25 years ago. Something like that. More than 40 million people watch it on television. Even compared to eating turkey, a dish that few people truly make well, the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, now in its 92nd year, is a bit of a head-scratcher. See historic photographies from the New York Times coverage.
On a snowy evening in New York City, David Hockney’s 1972 painting Portrait of an Artist (Pool With Two Figures) sold at auction for a jaw-dropping $90.3 million, shattering the previous world record for a work sold at auction by a living artist—Jeff Koons’s Balloon Dog, which went for $58.4 million back in 2013. It also far exceeded the estimated sale price of $80 million, which itself would have been a record. What do these kinds of prices say about the state of the art world, and of the world in general?
The few residents of the burned-out Northern California city of Paradise who were able to inspect their property on Saturday saw nothing but disappointment. Nearly the entire city of 27,000 residents lay in ruins and most were still barred from returning to the still hazardous town where small fires continued to flare. Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea said Saturday 14 additional bodies were found, bringing the death toll to 23. The victims have not been identified. Two people were found dead in a wildfire in Southern California, bringing the total number of fatalities for the state to 25.
People across the world are gathering together today to light lamps, feast on sweets and set off fireworks. It’s to mark the most important day of Diwali, the five-day festival of lights. Diwali comes from the Sanskrit word Deepavali, which translates as "rows of lighted lamps". It marks the beginning of spring in the southern hemisphere and coincides with the Hindu New Year. It also celebrates the spiritual triumph of light over darkness, and knowledge over ignorance. Diwali’s Light Festival is celebrated everywhere with Hindu, Sikh or Jainist populations, most notably in Asia.
