The Olympics: What Will You Do? Enter The World in Marseille, France’s oldest city, and the Most (Samone Monk’s book The Most)
If you prefer sports over politics, this week’s quiz is for you. Go for the gold by testing your Olympics knowledge with an unusual amount of sports questions. How well do you think you’ll do?
The book by Vérane Frédiani is titled “Taste The World in Marseille” and it leads readers through the oldest city in France. The new French cookbook offers readers a discovery of Marseille’s recipes and culinary traditions from a native.
There is music. For 60 years,Meredith Monk has performed in numerous roles, from singer to pianist to dancer and recording artist. Now, at 81, she reflects on her music-making journey.
📚 Books: Jessica Anthony’s new novel, The Most, takes place over the course of a day, allowing readers to get to know a couple’s alternating points of view — from their aspirations, personalities and backgrounds to their infidelities and secrets they’ve kept from each other.
The Making of Floods: Paul Downs and Lucia Aniello’s Comedy Hack When Gideon Mendel Photographed Climate Change
A show about what it means to be a comedy hack was born from an idea that was conceived on a road trip. Paul W. Downs and his wife, Lucia Aniello, created the show. He tellsNPR about the series that just ended.
Gideon Mendel, an award-winning photojournalist, wanted to document climate change from a young age. That’s exactly what he did when he started photographing floods. Scientists in the U.S. know that floods are becoming more frequent and severe due to extreme precipitation and sea level rise from climate change. Storms leave behind trauma. He meets and engages with the people who live in impacted communities and, if they agree, photographs them and their reality at that moment. He describes his style of photography as moving away from documentary photojournalism and somewhere into art and activism.
The American Olympic Gymnast Simone Biles Is GOAT: A Russian Prisoner-Swap Silicone Biles
Simone Biles cemented herself as the greatest gymnast of all time after she became the third woman ever to win a second gold medal in the individual all-around final at the Olympics last night. Her win comes two days after she led the U.S. women’s team back to the gold medal in the team event. The win did not come easy. An unusually poor performance on the uneven bars put her behind two strong competitors. But, that setback did not stop her from standing on the winner’s podium with her sixth Olympic gold and her ninth medal overall — more than any other U.S. gymnast in history.
Israel and Lebanon are bracing for the possibility of even stronger attacks after Israel’s killing of top leaders from the militant groups Hamas and Hezbollah. Hezbollah’s leader made clear at the funeral of their second in command, Fuad Shukr, that the group would retaliate. Hezbollah will stop attacks for Shukr’s death. Israel announced it had killed the head of the Hamas military wing, Mohammad Daif, in an attack in Gaza on July 13. This morning, Israel said it had killed a senior commander in Islamic Jihad.
Source: Who are the Americans freed in a Russian prisoner swap? And, Simone Biles is GOAT
The First American Gymnast to Compete in a High-Sensitivity Games: Julia Biles’ Yurchenko Double Pike
President Biden and Vice President Harris welcomed home a group of Americans imprisoned by Russia last night in what was the largest prisoner exchange between the West and Russia since the end of the Cold War. Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was among those who landed at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland to reunite with their families. The exchange was months in the making and depended on several American allies, including Germany, Slovenia, Norway and Poland. Three U.S. citizens, one legal resident and 13 German nationals were included in the swap. Here’s everything we know about them so far.
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But soon after, Biles was robbed of her chance to perform it at the Tokyo Olympics when she was beset by a sudden and unexplainable loss of her ability to control her body through the air known as the “twisties.” She withdrew from the vault final and most of her events that summer due to the affliction.
The vault, also known as the Yurchenko double pike, was officially named after Biles when she became the first gymnast to land it at an international competition in 2023.
The difficulty of the gymnast’s attempt and quality of her execution are both taken into consideration in the calculation of the final score. The difficulty of Biles’ vault is the highest in the women’s sport and helps to cover fractions of a point lost due to an extra step.
“I’ve never had an athlete that close, so it definitely put me on my toes,” Biles said Thursday. “It brought out the best athlete in myself, so I’m excited and proud to compete with her.”
Biles has two events remaining in Paris, the balance beam and floor exercise finals. They are an opportunity to match her medals from the 2016 Rio Games, when she won four golds and a bronze at the age of 19.