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Christmas Tree Shops is closing all 70 stores

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

New York (CNN) — Christmas Tree Shops will liquidate all of its stores and go out of business unless a white knight comes out of the woodwork at the 11th hour.The discount retail chain, which sold a variety of home goods, disclosed in a court filing last week that it defaulted on a $45 million loan and is closing its roughly 70 stores in the coming weeks.The closure comes after it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May in a bid to turn around the 53-year-old company. However, its sales continued to decline and Christmas Tree Shops ran out of the money it needed to go forward with the bankruptcy plan. Late last week, the company decided to permanently close its business instead.Bed Bath & Beyond, now also bankrupt, sold Christmas Tree Shops in 2020 to Handil Holdings, which had hoped to revitalize the discount chain.The retailer started in the 1950s as a small holiday store in Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Years later, the company expanded its assortment into “quaint, treasu...

Russia reports intercepting a missile over annexed Crimea and briefly halts traffic on key bridge

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

Russian-installed authorities in the Crimean peninsula on Sunday reported shooting down a cruise missile near the city of Kerch and briefly suspending traffic on the Kerch bridge that links the annexed territory to Russia. The Moscow-appointed governor of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, said the interception of the missile by Russian air defenses didn’t result in any damage or casualties. He didn’t offer any details, including the type of the missile and its origin. In the nearby Russian region of Rostov, authorities on Sunday also reported shooting down a missile. Gov. Vasily Golubev said the missile was Ukrainian, and its debris damaged the roofs of several buildings. No casualties have been reported. Such attacks far beyond the front line on Russian regions on the border with Ukraine or the annexed Crimean peninsula have become common during the war in Ukraine that has just surpassed its 500-day mark. Officials in Russian regions and Moscow-appointed authorities in Crimea, w...

Hundreds gather in Sarajevo to pay their respects to Srebrenica massacre victims

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — Hundreds lined the Bosnian capital’s main street Sunday as a truck carrying 30 coffins passed on its way to Srebrenica, where newly identified victims of Europe’s only acknowledged genocide since World War II will be buried on the 28th anniversary of the massacre.As the truck, covered with a huge Bosnian flag briefly stopped in front of the country’s presidential building in Sarajevo, people from the crowd tucked flowers into the canvas hiding the remains of the victims found in mass graves and identified through DNA analysis.“It is devastatingly sad that hundreds of victims still have not been found and that some people still deny the genocide (in Srebrenica),” Ramiza Gandic, who came to pay her respects, said.Newly identified Srebrenica massacre victims are reburied annually on July 11, the day the killing began in 1995, at a vast and ever-expanding memorial cemetery outside the eastern town.So far, the remains of more than 6,600 people ha...

NATO unity will be tested at upcoming summit. Ukraine’s possible entry may be the biggest challenge

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — As the Russian invasion of Ukraine continues with no end in sight, NATO’s much-celebrated unity faces fresh strains when leaders gather for their annual summit this week in Vilnius, Lithuania.The world’s biggest security alliance is struggling to reach an agreement on admitting Sweden as its 32nd member. Military spending by member nations lags behind long-standing goals. An inability to compromise over who should serve as NATO’s next leader forced an extension of the current secretary-general’s term for an extra year.Perhaps the most difficult questions are over how Ukraine should be eased into NATO. Some maintain admitting Ukraine would fulfill a promise made years ago and be a necessary step to deter Russian aggression in Eastern Europe. Others fear it would be seen as a provocation that could spiral into an even wider conflict.“I don’t think it’s ready for membership in NATO,” President Joe Biden told CNN in an interview airing Sunday. H...

Multiple armed robberies conducted on Divvy bikes in Loop: CPD

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

CHIAGO -- Chicago police issued an alert over multiple armed robberies conducted on Divvy bikes in the city's Loop over the past month. According to police, a group of two to four armed individuals approached victims, threatening force and taking their belongings. In one incident an automobile was taken. Police also said Divvy bikes were also used by individuals in many of the incidents.100 block of South State St on June 19, 2023 at 2:30 AM.400 block of South LaSalle St on June 25, 2023 at 1:50 AM.0-100 block of North Michigan Ave on June 25, 2023 at 2:04 AM.0-100 block of West Congress Pkwy on June 25, 2023 at 2:16 AM.100 block of North Dearborn Ave on June 25, 2023 at 2:40 AM.0-100 block of East Madison St on June 25, 2023 at 3:00 AM.0-100 block of South Wells St on June 25, 2023 at 4:22 AM.600 block of South Plymouth Ct on June 26, 2023 at 5:20 AM.600 block of South State St on June 26, 2023 at 5:30 AM.0-100 block of South Michigan Ave on June 26, 2023 at 5:35 AM.1100 block of S...

Sunday Forecast: Partly cloudy, warmer afternoon

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

Sunday: Sunny AM, partly cloudy afternoon & warmer. WNW 3-7 mph. Air quality is Good with areas of Moderate air quality. High 83, upper 70s by the lake.Sunday Night: Partly cloudy. WSW 3-15 mph. Low 63Monday: Sunny, hot & more humid. Cooler lakeside. SW 10-15 mph. High near 90 Chicago Weather | Tom Skilling and the WGN Weather Center's Forecast (wgntv.com)Extended outlook calls for hot and humid weather again on Tuesday with highs likely in the mid to upper 80s—though a few spots could hit 90. Chance of showers/thunderstorms and some of those in the afternoon and evening could be strong to severe. Wednesday looks like on off showers and thunderstorms with highs in the upper 70s. 

At least 23 injured after fiery CTA bus crash on LSD: CFD

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

CHICAGO -- Chicago Fire reported of a fiery CTA bus crash on DuSable Lake Shore Drive that left at least 23 injured in the city's Kenwood neighborhood early Sunday morning. According to Chicago Fire Department, Lake Shore Drive northbound is closed due to a crash involving a car and a CTA bus near the 4400 block of South DuSable Lake Shore Drive. Multiple armed robberies conducted on Divvy bikes in Loop: CPD Fire said six were transported to the hospital, 13 are in good condition and three are in critical condition. Seven individuals refused medical attention.WGN is following the incident and will update as more information is available.

Heat Advisory returns

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

AUSTIN (KXAN) -- A Heat Advisory goes into effect at 1:00 this afternoon. Counties under this latest advisory are shaded in orange. Maximum heat index values this afternoon will climb up to 106° to 112°. Heat Advisory for some of Central Texas starting early this afternoonHighest heat index readings Saturday afternoon included 109° at La Grange and 107° at Camp Mabry.Saturday's high at Camp Mabry was 102° making it the 17th day of a high reaching three digits. This number will increase to 24 by Saturday. This afternoon's normal high is 97°The upper-level ridge of high pressure will be near El Paso this afternoon. It will maintain a hold on the weather pattern all week even as it moves away by the end of the week. Its reach into Central Texas means, as aforementioned, highs reaching 100° and higher going out to at least Saturday.Upper high to dominate all weekThe presence of the high will continue to serve as a lid over the atmosphere meaning that we face seven more days of no rain f...

At East Side arts organization Second Shift Studio Space, four new artists-in-residence will explore Native beadwork, geology, dreams

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

Growing up in the Oglala Lakota Nation, Jaida Grey Eagle didn’t see many contemporary fine-art portraits of Native people.So now, the St. Paul-based photographer and bead artist is creating them herself.Starting this month, Grey Eagle will be one of four yearlong artists-in-residence at Second Shift Studio Space of St. Paul, a nonprofit arts organization on the East Side.Made by St. Paul-based Oglala Lakota artist and photojournalist Jaida Grey Eagle in 2022, “Isabella in Blue” is a cyanotype portrait on canvas with Native beadwork. Much of Grey Eagle’s work focuses on portraits of people, particularly women from her tribe in South Dakota. (Photo courtesy Jaida Grey Eagle)Other resident artists are Dahn Gim, who uses a variety of materials, including water, to explore isolation, displacement, and women’s bodies; Anna Lehner, who creates glass sculptures and other installations inspired by the Earth’s tectonic plates and geologic change; and Ivonne Yáñez, originally...

No lawyers for miles: Rural Colorado’s shortage of attorneys is “hitting a crisis point”

Published Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:52:27 GMT

Attorney Kim Verhoeff has taken to recruiting her neighbors to the legal profession.Buried in work and worried about her town’s future, she’s pitched career changes to friends and acquaintances, a teacher, a social worker — you can make a good living as an attorney, there’s lots of work to be done, I’ll help you get established. It’s become a practiced spiel, occasionally taking the tone of a used car salesman.“Do you want to be an attorney?” she asked a reporter during a recent phone call.When Verhoeff started her career 30 years ago, close to a dozen private attorneys worked in Lamar, the town of about 7,600 people in southeast Colorado where she lives. But in the decades since, attorneys have retired or moved away without new lawyers arriving to fill their shoes. Just three or four private attorneys work in town now, she said, and there’s more demand for legal services than they can collectively handle.“It’s a prob...