Comment on Thursday school closings and delays January 13, 2011

Warning: Major spoilers for the Silo Season 2 finale ahead. Silo, based on the books by Hugh Howey and created for television by Graham Yost, has become one of the crown jewels of Apple TV+, recently earning a two-season renewal for Seasons 3 and 4 (the latter of which is set to be the show’s final installment).

After 15 months of agony, the potential Gaza ceasefire comes as a colossal relief not just for Palestinians and Israelis, but for the wider Middle East. True, the deal is narrow in size and scope. It covers a physical space scarcely bigger than Martha’s Vineyard. The actual terms of the first phase of the ceasefire agreement extend no farther than a pause in fighting, an exchange of some hostages and a partial Israeli withdrawal.

Heated elections, fraught presidential transitions, and strategic maneuvering for lame-duck appointments are nothing new in American politics—even in situations that historians deem to be dramatically escalated or wholly unprecedented in recent years. But not all of that happens in the open. Indeed, some of the most consequential developments occur off the record in social environments. Consider a dinner that outgoing president John Adams had with his newly almost-Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, John Marshall, in late January 1801.

MOSS LANDING, Calif. — Hundreds of people were ordered to evacuate and part of Highway 1 in Northern California was closed early Friday after a major fire erupted at one of the world’s largest battery storage plants. The fire started Thursday afternoon and sent up towering flames and black smoke, and about 1,500 people were instructed to leave Moss Landing and the Elkhorn Slough area, The Mercury News reported. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] The blaze was still burning early Friday with some containment and it had not gone beyond the facility, according to Monterey County spokesperson Nicholas Pasculli.

For 467 days, millions of Israelis were yearning for Wednesday’s announcement that Israel and Hamas reached a ceasefire and hostage release deal. The agreement is expected to see 33 Israelis in Gaza freed in the first 42-day phase, which starts on Sunday. The rest will follow if a permanent end to the fighting comes in the second phase.

The White House office in charge of preparing for the next pandemic is down a wide black-and-white checkerboard hallway in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building. Its windows look out across an alleyway toward the West Wing. In recent months, the staff there has been busy coordinating with state and federal agencies in response to the alarming spread of bird flu in the U.