Here’s How to Prepare for a Storm

Severe thunderstorms are set to intensify and affect much of the Midwest region, growing Friday afternoon and striking overnight and potentially throughout the weekend.

The mid and lower parts of the Mississippi Valley, as well as parts of the Ohio Valley, will experience “widespread damaging winds with gusts from 70 to 90 m.p.h., and scattered large hail up to baseball size will be possible,” according to the National Weather Service. They also warned that a tornado outbreak is possible in the Deep South and the Gulf States on Saturday.

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Amid rising concerns about the big storm system threatening the U.S., here are the best ways to prepare for a storm.

Secure your home

Before a storm, try to trim trees and cut down branches near your home. By removing branches that are likely to break or fall during a storm, you can prevent them from damaging homes, vehicles, power lines, or causing injuries. Further, it can help prevent a tree from becoming uprooted and falling during a storm, and makes the cleanup post-storm less chaotic.

Beyond trees outside the home, the National Weather Service suggests that those preparing for a storm “secure loose objects, close windows and doors, and move any valuable objects inside or under a sturdy structure.”

Effort to stay updated

Those within an affected-area of a severe storm can stay updated with the forecasted storm, its intensity and movement through multiple avenues, whether that be through NOAA Weather Radio, The Emergency Alert System (EAS), or their local weather channel.

Oftentimes, communities have specific ways to send warnings, from outdoor sirens to alerts via smartphones. By learning how your community alerts residents to severe incoming weather—including warnings for storms and tornados tornados—you can make sure you stay updated in real-time.

Clean your gutters

During a storm, you want your gutters to move as much water as possible, as easily as possible. The best way to ensure this is to clean your gutters prior to the storm hitting, in order to prevent water build up during the weather event—at which point it likely wouldn’t  be safe to go outside and clear any blockages. Water build up can cause damage to home roofs, and create leaks and structural damage to your home.

Build an emergency kit

To prepare for a storm—and the days after a storm passes, in which necessities like electricity may still be out—it’s a good idea to build an emergency kit to help you and your loved ones power through. A disaster supply kit includes basic items that your household may need.

According to Ready.gov, a national public service campaign formed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) dedicated to educating Americans to prepare for and mitigate emergencies, a disaster kit should include water, food, a flashlight, a first aid kit, a mask, garbage bags, a whistle, a can opener, a cell phone with extra chargers and batteries, and more. You can read the full list here. 

After assembling the kit, Ready.gov recommends keeping canned food in a dry place and storing boxed food in tightly closed plastic or metal containers in order to ensure they remain edible, should a severe weather event or disaster strike. 

They also recommend keeping a kit in your car, in case you ever become stranded.

Consider buying surge protectors

According to FEMA’s preparedness sheet for thunderstorms, lightning, and hail, buying surge protectors, lightning rods, or a lightning protection system can help protect your home’s appliances and electronic devices in the event of lightning strikes during the storm.

source https://time.com/7268239/how-to-prepare-for-a-storm/

Trump Threatens Retaliatory 200% Tariff on European Wine After E.U. Proposes American Whiskey Tariff

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Thursday threatened a 200% tariff on European wine, champagne and spirits if the European goes forward with a planned tariff on American whiskey.

The European tariff was expected to go into effect on April 1.

Trump in a social media posting called the EU “one of the most hostile and abusive taxing and tariffing authorities in the World, which was formed for the sole purpose of taking advantage of the United States.”

Read More: What Are Tariffs and Why Is Trump In Favor of Them?

“If this Tariff is not removed immediately, the U.S. will shortly place a 200% Tariff on all WINES, CHAMPAGNES, & ALCOHOLIC PRODUCTS COMING OUT OF FRANCE AND OTHER E.U. REPRESENTED COUNTRIES,” Trump said. “This will be great for the Wine and Champagne businesses in the U.S.”

source https://time.com/7267724/trump-threatens-retaliatory-tariff-european-wine-eu-american-whiskey/

How UTIs Became One of the Most Common Misdiagnoses in American Medicine

It’s one of the most common misdiagnoses in American medicine, and it usually happens like this: An old and frail person gets confused, tired, or a little dizzy. Maybe she just doesn’t feel like eating. Or she stumbles.

These are classic geriatric syndromes that usually receive a classic medical response: the senior is ordered to pee in a cup for testing. The leading suspect is a urinary tract infection.

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Too often, it’s the wrong suspect.

The urinary tract infection (UTI), has become the medical bogeyman that will not go away, a default but often incorrect diagnosis that seems to come up every time an older person has some ill-defined health presentation but still lacks the most reliable symptom of painful urination. As a career geriatrician, I don’t enjoy calling out colleagues, but health professionals need to spend less time ordering people to pee in a cup and more time figuring out the true causes of the problem.

UTIs are one of the world’s most commonly reported health problems. More than 400 million cases are diagnosed globally every year. In the U.S., UTIs are responsible for 10.5 million office visits and 3 million hospital emergency department treatments per year. More than half of all women in their lifetimes will be diagnosed with at least one UTI. The frequency of UTI diagnosis increases dramatically as people age, especially after they reach 65 years old. 

At the same time, many studies around the world have confirmed the systemic overdiagnosis of UTIs, including three of four patients in a 43-hospital study in 2020; 28 % of all cases at 46 hospitals in Michigan and up to 85% of diagnosed patients in California in two separate studies published in 2022.  

The problem with the wrong diagnosis of UTIs is that we put people, especially people with advanced age, on antibiotics they don’t need. That heightens the risk for three bad outcomes: Unwarranted gut infections from using an unneeded antibiotic. Increased antibiotic resistance that makes it harder to treat actual infections. Overlooking and failing to treat the serious root causes of geriatric syndromes.

Read More: 7 Things Every Woman Should Know About UTIs

Why do medical professionals get it so wrong so often? One of the biggest reasons, I’m convinced, is the shortage of geriatric training. Aging baby boomers mean America is older than ever, but somehow the number of board-certified geriatricians has plunged 25% over the past two decades. Fewer health professionals are experts on what to look for in our senior population. 

Most physicians in family practice or internal medicine don’t even receive training on the unique challenges of treating older people. Only 10% of medical schools require a rotation in geriatric care, compared to 96% that require a rotation in pediatric care, according to a 2024 John A. Hartford Foundation study of the U.S. health care workforce. Too many doctors just don’t know where the pitfalls are when working with older people. In fact, a 2022 online survey of 1,700 doctors and nurses in New Hampshire found they improperly diagnosed UTIs 34% of the time.

There are technical medical reasons for the misdiagnoses, too. It’s rare for a frail older person to be able to pee in a cup in a sterile way. To collect a urine sample free of contamination, you have to clean the labia and the urethra. You have to place the cup without touching any skin; start and stop urinating; and then put a sterile cap on the sample. It’s not an easy thing to do for a 30-year-old nurse, but it may be impossible for an 80-year-old incontinent person with mobility issues who is wearing an adult diaper. In my own professional experience, I’d say most of these urine samples are contaminated and therefore yield undependable results. 

Another complicating factor is that many older people have complex conditions and are colonized with bacteria in their bladders in a way that is normal for them. This is called “asymptomatic bacteriuria. “And people with urinary catheters have this 100% of the time. Most people with asymptomatic bacteriuria won’t develop symptomatic UTIs, but too many are treated anyway with antibiotics, a case of the “cure” truly being worse than the “condition.”

The upshot is that too many urine samples are either contaminated or testing positive for reasons other than UTIs.

Let’s be clear: There’s no question that legitimate UTIs do exist, and that elderly people are at risk for a potentially lethal complication of UTIs called sepsis. Nobody wants to miss that. But medical professionals and caregivers should avoid jumping to conclusions and assuming that UTI is the default diagnosis. Taking a good medical history, paying attention to vital signs, performing an examination, ordering pertinent bloodwork, considering other possible causes for the symptoms, and doing close follow-up monitoring are good ways to avoid missing serious infections.

A urine test is easy to order—but that doesn’t mean it’s always the right thing to do.

source https://time.com/7267223/uti-common-misdiagnosis-essay/

Long Bright River and the Fantasy of the Lone Female Cop Who Redeems the Police

Mickey Fitzpatrick is not like other cops. In fact, she seems to have little in common with anyone in her world. Played by Amanda Seyfried, with a disconcerting intensity that echoes her Emmy-winning portrayal of fraudster Elizabeth Holmes in The Dropout, the protagonist of Peacock’s Long Bright River is a bright young woman and a talented English horn player. She was supposed to get out of Kensington, the crime-ridden Philadelphia neighborhood where she grew up, but only lasted a year at her hometown Ivy, Penn. Now a single mom to 7-year-old Thomas (Callum Vinson), she patrols the beat in Kensington, where many of the women she’s known since childhood are now strung-out sex workers, and practices her horn alone at night.

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In her loneliness and, paradoxically, in her peculiarity, Mickey embodies a recognizable archetype: the righteous female cop protagonist of a prestige crime drama. Like the conflicted women in blue at the center of Mare of Easttown, True Detective: Night Country, Under the Bridge, and many others, she is at once an insider and an outsider—too close to the people she polices because she has roots in the community but alienated from them because they have judged her to be fundamentally different. Like her predecessors, she will see the line between work and her personal life blur to nonexistence. And like them, she will be forced to confront corruption within the very system that employs her. Long Bright River, whose eight-episode season will stream in full on March 13, is neither a transcendent nor an incompetent example of this type of show. But in its familiarity, it illustrates the limitations of the popular fantasy that one extraordinary woman can right the entrenched wrongs of a broken patriarchal institution.

Adapted by showrunner, writer, and executive producer Nikki Toscano (The Offer, Hunters) from the best-selling novel by Liz Moore (also a writer and executive producer on the show), Long Bright River joins Mickey at an especially rough moment. Her ex, Simon (Matthew Del Negro), has abruptly ceased parental duties. She’s lost touch with her former partner, Truman (Nicholas Pinnock), who also seems to have been her only friend. And her new partner, Lafferty (Dash Mihok), an old buddy of her dismissive boss (Patch Darragh), would rather babble about his digestive woes than help the desperate women of Kensington. Summoned to the site of a suspected overdose death, Mickey freezes upon encountering the pink-haired, hoodie-shrouded corpse. In a bit of forced suspense, we don’t know for sure until the end of the premiere that she reacts this way because her younger sister, Kacey (Ashleigh Cummings), is an opioid addict with pink hair living on the street. Kacey has been missing for weeks. But the body isn’t hers.

As more Kensington sex workers are found dead, and evidence increasingly points to homicide rather than accidental overdose, Mickey becomes obsessed with two potentially connected mysteries: Who is the murderer? And where is Kacey? Could her disappearance be related to the killings—and if so, is she even still alive? But, true to its thematically ambitious subgenre, Long Bright River wants to be about more than just whodunit. In an early scene, as she ferries the precocious Thomas to a private school she can’t afford, Mickey plays the boy Liszt’s Faust Symphony and recounts to him the story of Faust’s “very bad choice” to strike a bargain with the devil. “There are certain choices that you can never undo,” she lectures. “So that’s why it’s really important to make good choices.” The idea that smart decisions are the key to a successful life recurs throughout the series, only to ultimately be challenged in a way that feels superficial.

The shoddiness of this thematic throughline is one of several relatively minor problems that make the show fall short of a standout like Mare. It’s excessively grim; a smidge of gallows humor would go a long way. It is, like most streaming miniseries, too long. While some of the twists work well, others are either easily predictable or too far-fetched to be anything but the red herrings they obviously are. The child characters, not just Thomas but also younger versions of Mickey and Kacey who appear in flashbacks, are inconsistently written, sometimes veering from babyish to mini-adults within a single scene in a betrayal of the young actors who play them. River is somewhat redeemed by the vividness and empathy with which it depicts opioid-crisis-era Kensington as well as the adult performances—notably from Seyfried, Pinnock, and Cummings—that bring rich detail to thinly written characters.

But in a TV landscape crowded with murder shows (River is, along with Hulu’s Deli Boys and Apple’s Dope Thief, one of three Philly-set crime series premiering within an eight-day stretch), its familiarity does it no favors. Though it foregrounds choice, contrasting the apparently good decisions Mickey has made with poor ones attributed to Kacey, then predictably flipping the script, this is really another story of a lone female cop charged with redeeming an institution that has been disgraced by her colleagues and superiors. Toscano and Moore reinforce the hopeful perception that such an outsider, one whose freedom from the cronyism and predatory impulses of the corrupt men around her is supposed to be inherent in her gender, can singlehandedly change the system, or at least be trusted to take justice into her own hands. “The force needs cops like you,” a high-minded detective (Joe Daru) tells Mickey in the finale. “Cops who care.”

For all Seyfried does to humanize her quirky character, she can’t save her from coming across as a trope. And it’s not hard to see why this trope has become ubiquitous. Detective dramas are more popular than they’ve ever been. Yet even as years’ worth of political backlash has drowned out calls to defund or abolish forces, perceptions of police shaped by tragedies like George Floyd and Uvalde aren’t so easily forgotten. If characters like Mickey and Mare and Night Country’s Danvers (Jodie Foster) and Navarro (Kali Reis) are overrepresented on TV, maybe it’s because they help justify the persistence of cop shows at a time when viewers inclined to root for strong female leads may not see the typical police officer as a hero.

source https://time.com/7267233/long-bright-river-review-peacock/

California Woman is Reunited with Beloved Cat 2 Months after Wildfire Destroyed Home

It appears the tall tale that all cats have nine lives may be true for a California Maine coon named Aggie.

The beloved feline was feared dead for two months after the Palisades wildfire in Los Angeles left her family’s home in ashes. But her owner, 82-year-old Katherine Kiefer, held out some hope.

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Over the weekend, Kiefer got a call from the West Los Angeles Animal Shelter. Her daughter Carolyn Kiefer shared their reunion Saturday in a TikTok video that quickly garnered more than 1 million likes. It shows tears pouring from Katherine Kiefer’s eyes as Aggie curled up in her arms.

“I was very much worried that I was going to wake up and (discover) it had been a dream,” she said.

Read More: How Architects Are Designing for Disaster Resilience

Kiefer was at a medical appointment the day fire engulfed her neighborhood and her children couldn’t find Aggie — who was prone to hiding — when they tried to rescue her.

“The one thing my mom asked was: ‘Did you get Aggie?” Carolyn recalls.

Many pet owners struggled to reach their domesticated animals during the frantic rush to evacuate from the Palisades wildfire in January.

Aggie, who is about 5 years old, was gifted to Katherine Kiefer by a friend during the COVID-19 pandemic. Social media users have been so touched by the pair’s reunion video that many have been asking for daily updates. The family’s $30,000 GoFundMe campaign for Aggie’s vet bills had topped $21,000 by Tuesday afternoon.

The cat has undergone several blood transfusions and is now seeing a specialist.

“She was basically skin and bone, and in a state of absolute starvation,” Carolyn said.

The family will officially be reunited with Aggie when she is released from the hospital Thursday. Kiefer said she’s anxiously waiting, and she has a message for other pet owners: “Don’t underestimate cats,” she said.

source https://time.com/7267144/california-woman-reunited-with-cat-wildfire/

Cooper Flagg Is So Good You Might Even Root for Duke

Duke University’s men’s basketball success over the years—the national championships, the Final Four appearances, all the NBA players who’ve honed their craft down in Durham—has created a blue-chip brand. It’s also spawned that most uniquely American sports specimen: the Dukie everyone loves to hate.

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Christian Laettner, the 6-ft. 11-in. sharpshooter with the matinee hair and icy stare, won back-to-back March Madness titles with Duke in 1991 and 1992, but once stomped his foot on a Kentucky player during an Elite Eight game, and was the subject of a documentary called, fittingly, I Hate Christian Laettner. Shooting guard Grayson Allen, now a member of the Phoenix Suns, gained a reputation for tripping people; big man Kyle Filipowski, a rookie for the Utah Jazz, caught flak for the same last season, when he tripped a player from Duke archrival North Carolina, though he said the incident was unintentional. JJ Reddick, the current head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, got under the skin of opponents and fans alike as a Duke All-American in the mid-aughts. Nineties point guard Steve Wojciechowski’s signature move was slapping the floor when getting ready to guard an opponent, to show the world he was rarin’ to go.

But as the NCAA men’s tournament tips off on March 18 with the “First Four” play-in games, and the round-of-64 bracket gets going on March 20, basketball fans will have a new Duke star to watch–one they might actually like.

Read More: 2024 Athlete of the Year: Caitlin Clark

Hoping to lead the powerhouse to its first national title in a decade is freshman Cooper Flagg, the 18-year-old Duke phenom who’s the most exciting do-it-all player to compete in college basketball since Kevin Durant spent his freshman year at Texas nearly two decades ago. And unlike some of his predecessors, Flagg, the likely national college player of the year who’s also the consensus top pick in the 2025 NBA Draft—in the very likely case he decides to go pro—seems more inclined to let his talent do the talking.

Just take a peek at his March 5 performance against Wake Forest, in what was likely his final game at Cameron Indoor Stadium, Duke’s iconic home gym: in Duke’s 93-60 victory, the 6-ft. 9-in. Flagg scored 28 points to go along with 8 rebounds, 7 assists, 3 blocks, and a couple of steals. He displayed his full arsenal: driving in the lane and finishing with his left—or weak—hand, a one-legged mid-range step-back jump-shot, a three-pointer dribbling to his left, a three-pointer moving to his right, spinning and dishing to the open man, a crossover dribble and two-handed slam on a fast break, and more.

Flagg had every right to flaunt his superior ability, and taunt his opponent, in one instance earlier this year, when he absolutely posterized Guillermo Diaz Graham, a 7-ft. junior from Pittsburgh, with a one-handed jam at Cameron. He did come face-to-face with Diaz Graham for a brief tick after the dunk—a perfectly human reaction, especially since Diaz Graham also fouled him on the play–but that was more because Diaz Graham was standing in Flagg’s way while he moved toward the adoring crowd.

Read More: Exclusive: After an Unparalleled Career, WNBA Star Diana Taurasi Announces Her Retirement

“What I would say about Cooper Flagg is that he has an appropriate ego,” says USA men’s basketball national team director Sean Ford, who watched Flagg dominate a scrimmage against the 2024 U.S. Olympic team in Las Vegas last summer. Flagg hadn’t even turned 18 when he hit a three-pointer in Anthony Davis’ face. “He knows how good he is. But he also doesn’t try to be flamboyant about it,” says Ford. “He plays as hard as he can. He brings everything he has. That’s what makes you want to root for him.” 

A Duke Blue Devil to cheer for? My word. 

Flagg’s unlikely trajectory also makes him appealing. He’s from Maine, the only contiguous state to never have a school in the men’s Division 1 NCAA tournament. The last Maine native selected in the NBA Draft was Jeff Turner, 41 years ago, by the New Jersey Nets–and he grew up in Florida. Flagg and his twin brother Ace—a high school senior who has committed to play at the University of Maine next year—were born and raised in Pine Tree State. Their parents, Kelly and Ralph, both played collegiately in Maine: Kelly at the University of Maine, Ralph at Eastern Maine Community College.

(Kelly, who had some choice words for North Carolina fans after Duke’s 82-69 win over the Tar Heels on March 8, may be the trash-talker of the family.)

On the high school travel circuit, Cooper Flagg eschewed the more nationally dominant club teams to suit up, along with his brother and their buddies, for Maine United. The team thrived in front of college coaches during summer showcase tournaments. “There were a lot of doubters, because Maine doesn’t have that history of producing NBA players,” says Matt MacKenzie, Flagg’s Maine-based basketball trainer. “It took some time for people to really believe in the hype. Any time that we put an expectation on him, he just continued to blow it out of the water.”

At Duke, he’s filled the stat sheet all season, averaging 19.4 points, 7.6 rebounds, and 4.2 assists per game. On the defensive side of the ball, he’s also averaged 1.5 steals per game, with 1.3 blocks. Duke is 28-3, and finished 19-1 in Atlantic Coast Conference play. “He’s going to be a coach’s dream in the league,” says Chris Brickley, a basketball trainer who’s worked out Flagg as well as many prominent NBA stars, such as Durant, LeBron James, Jimmy Butler, Donovan Mitchell, and Carmelo Anthony.

That league, of course, is the NBA, which Flagg will almost certainly join this summer. As Flagg was subbed out of the last home game of Duke’s season, the Cameron faithful serenated him with cheers of “One more year! One more year!” Flagg responded by yelling to the crowd, “Run it back!” Flagg has expressed a desire to return to Duke—by all accounts, he’s enjoying the college experience. And now that college athletes can earn lucrative Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) deals—Flagg has sponsorship agreements with New Balance, Gatorade, and Fanatics, among others, and reportedly makes a healthy seven figures—a sophomore season at Duke could pay dividends. But he’s bound to make much more in the NBA—his second contract in the league could be worth close to $400 million. Why risk that windfall by returning to college another year and possibly getting hurt?

“I think he’s going to go and enter the NBA draft,” says MacKenzie, who has continued to work with Flagg during his freshman year at Duke. “Right now his goal is to make a Final Four and win an NCAA championship. He just doesn’t want to look too far beyond that.”

Hoops is a star-driven sport, and one of the most highly touted NBA prospects ever going on a deep tournament run, for a team like Duke—a draw for both supporters and haters—is sure to brighten up March. Duke’s third-year coach Jon Scheyer, who’s been tasked with the difficult job of succeeding the all-time winningest coach in men’s college basketball history, Mike Krzyzewski, is forging his own path with the likable Flagg. 

Go Duke? 

source https://time.com/7266544/cooper-flagg-duke-march-madness-ncaa/

Southwest Airlines Will Now Make Passengers Pay for Checked Bags

Southwest Airlines said Tuesday that it will begin charging customers a fee to check bags, abandoning a decades-long practice that executives had described last fall as key to differentiating the budget carrier from its rivals.

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Southwest, which built years of advertising campaigns around its policy of letting passengers check bags for free, said people who haven’t either reached the upper tiers of its Rapid Rewards loyalty program, bought a business class ticket or hold the airline’s credit card will have to pay for checked bags.

The airline did not outline the fee schedule but said the new policy would start with May 28 bookings.

“We have tremendous opportunity to meet current and future customer needs, attract new customer segments we don’t compete for today, and return to the levels of profitability that both we and our shareholders expect,” Southwest Airlines CEO Bob Jordan said in a statement.

Less than a year ago, the Dallas-based airline announced it was doing away with another tradition, the open-boarding system it has used for more than 50 years. Southwest expects to begin operating flights with passengers in assigned seats next year.

Southwest has struggled recently and is under pressure from activist investors to boost profits and revenue. The airline reached a truce in October with hedge fund Elliott Investment Management to avoid a proxy fight, but Elliott won several seats on the Southwest board.

The airline announced last month that it was eliminating 1,750 jobs, or 15% of its corporate workforce, in the first major layoffs in the company’s 53-year history.

The job cuts, which were scheduled to be mostly completed by the end of June, are part of a plan to slash costs and transform the company into a “leaner, faster, and more agile organization,” Jordan said at the time.

Southwest’s stock rose more than 6% before the market open Tuesday.

As recently as Southwest’s investor day in late September, airline executives described the bags-fly-free as the most important feature in setting Southwest apart from rivals. All other leading U.S. airlines charge for checked luggage, and Wall Street has long argued that Southwest was leaving money behind.

The airline estimated in September that charging bag fees would bring in about $1.5 billion a year but cost the airline $1.8 billion in lost business from customers who chose to fly Southwest because of its generous baggage allowance.

Southwest said Tuesday that it would continue to offer two free checked bags to Rapid Rewards A-List preferred members and customers traveling on Business Select fares, and one free checked bag to A-List members and other select customers. Passengers with Rapid Rewards credit cards will receive a credit for one checked bag.

People who don’t qualify for those categories will get charged to check bags. The airline said that it also would roll out a new, basic fare on its lowest priced tickets when the change takes effect.

In a regulatory filing, Southwest disclosed that it now anticipates first-quarter revenue per available seat mile will be up 2% to 4%. Its prior forecast was for an increase of 5% to 7%. The airline said it expects capacity to be down about 2%.

The airline announced last year that along with giving passengers assigned seats, it would charge them extra for with more legroom and offer red-eye flights.

source https://time.com/7266818/southwest-airlines-checked-bag-fee/