At times, Week 13 made it fair to wonder what year it was. Russell Wilson was lighting up an opposing secondary. Geno Smith was chucking the ball around MetLife Stadium. The biggest showdown of the week was between a pair of superstar running backs. Here is what to know: In the first week of November, Buffalo left tackle Dion Dawkins reflected on the eighth Bills team he has been part of. The defining trait of this version, he believed, was its pervasive happiness. “This is a different team,” Dawkins said then. “Everybody is just happy all of the time. No complaints. Honestly, it’s because the sun is shining. When it’s sunny outside, everybody is happy. I haven’t seen that dark cloud that just lays over Buffalo just yet. But we’ll see. We’ll see how it goes when Dec. 1 comes, when it’s real cloudy and mucky and they got to scrape ice off their windows.” Dec. 1 arrived with a wicked storm cloud, and the Bills discovered the muck suits them just fine. In a majestic snowstorm, the host Bills annihilated the once-dominant San Francisco 49ers, 35-10, in a victory that clinched the AFC East title and showed what makes these Bills different from their predecessors. For years a finesse offense, the Bills finally have a team designed to play in the nasty weather that occurs so often in their city. Offensive coordinator Joe Brady has emphasized the running game more than Ken Dorsey, the man he replaced last season. The Bills’ personnel reshuffling included the addition of multiple large, strong skill players — wideout Mack Hollins and rookie running back Ray Davis each scored a touchdown Sunday. They still revolve around Josh Allen, who added a defining moment to his MVP résumé. Allen executed a hook and lateral with Amari Cooper that resembled a basketball give-and-go: He fired a quick pass to Cooper in the left flat, sprinted toward him, caught a lateral and dived into the end zone for a 7-yard touchdown. Allen became the fourth player in NFL history to be credited with a passing touchdown and a receiving touchdown on the same play. For good measure, he added an eight-yard touchdown run that made it 35-10 and brought “M-V-P!” chants. Russell Wilson threw a pick-six to Cincinnati Bengals cornerback Cam Taylor-Britt on the Pittsburgh Steelers’ first possession, which a few hours later stood as an odd way to begin one of the best days of his exceptional career. Wilson rebounded from Pittsburgh’s snowy loss in Cleveland — and that interception — by throwing for 414 yards in a 44-38 victory that effectively eliminated the Bengals from playoff contention and maintained the Steelers’ place atop the AFC North. Wilson had exceeded that total only once in his 13-year career, in October 2017. There were few signs such an explosion was coming. Even in his Seattle prime, Wilson rarely punched up massive statistical totals. With the Steelers, he had been piloting a ball-control offense, relying on his running game and short passes while making a few key throws per game. Against the Bengals’ dismal pass defense, though, Wilson was an explosive-play machine. He passed for 257 yards by halftime, the highest first-half total of his career. George Pickens caught a 36-yard moonball down the right sideline. Wilson fired a running, sidearm dart to Pat Freiermuth for a 25-yard touchdown. A remarkable eight Steelers receivers caught at least one pass that gained at least 20 yards. Wilson won’t have another game like Sunday’s anytime soon. The Steelers probably wouldn’t even want him to. For one day, at 36, Wilson turned back the clock and threw the ball as well as he ever has. The Eagles’ 24-19 statement victory over the Ravens in Baltimore included the dominance of Jalen Carter in the middle of the NFL’s best defense, the brilliance of Saquon Barkley and, for much of the afternoon, the Ravens’ defense rounding into form. The most lasting development may be the continued deterioration of Ravens kicker Justin Tucker. The Ravens were forced to go for a fourth-and-8 on their side of the field with 6:18 left because they trailed 21-12 after Tucker had left seven points on the field with three misses. He doinked an extra point off the left upright, pulled a 47-yard field goal wide left and pushed a 53-yarder wide right. Tucker’s struggles have persisted all season. He entered Sunday having made 17 of 23 field goals, a 73.9% success rate that ranked 28th in the NFL. Tucker, the best long-range kicker in league history, has made just 4 of 9 field goals from 50 yards or beyond. After a cosmetic late touchdown, Tucker’s extra point barely sneaked inside the right upright. For most teams, a struggling kicker presents an annoying problem with a straightforward solution: Cut him and find a replacement among the many candidates who, if given a chance, might become one of the most accurate ever. The current depth and quality of kickers, including those on the periphery of the league, mean never having to trot out a lousy one. The Ravens are not most teams because Tucker is not most kickers. Tucker may be the greatest kicker in NFL history, even if this season has cost him that title from a statistical standpoint. He was automatic from almost anywhere inside midfield for more than a decade. He was the rare kicker who gave his team swagger. The equity Tucker has built demands the Ravens give him time to solve his problems. They also can’t allow that equity to undermine their realistic Super Bowl aspirations. To this point, coach John Harbaugh has been steadfast that the Ravens are not considering a kicking change, reiterating his stance Sunday night that it “wouldn’t be wise.” He will have to ponder it now, whether the kicker in question is a legend or not. The Minnesota Vikings have not been a dominant team for the past two months, but they are still 10-2 because they continue to outperform expectations in close games under Coach Kevin O’Connell. The Vikings squeezed out another victory — and stayed on the heels of the Detroit Lions — with a two-minute drill touchdown to beat the Arizona Cardinals, 23-22, in Minneapolis. The Vikings have played 47 games under O’Connell, one playoff game included, and 34 have been decided by one score. Those are coin flips for most NFL teams. The Vikings have gone 24-10, including 7-1 this season. The Vikings trailed Arizona for nearly the entire game, and they didn’t lead until Sam Darnold hit Aaron Jones for a five-yard touchdown with 1:13 left. On fourth and five just before the two-minute warning, Darnold found Justin Jefferson for 12 yards. Coordinator Brian Flores’s defense forced the Cardinals to kick four field goals after reaching the red zone. Time and again, the Vikings are prepared to make crucial plays and execute at their highest level when they most need to. The number of close games they play may indicate they are not one of the NFL’s elite teams. But their record in them is a reflection of the infrastructure O’Connell (with Flores’s assistance) has built.

NEW YORK – A federal judge is signaling that Rudy Giuliani’s contempt hearing next Friday might not end so well for the former New York City mayor and onetime personal lawyer for President-elect Donald Trump as two Georgia election poll workers try to collect a $148 million defamation award they won against him. Judge Lewis J. Liman in Manhattan issued an order Friday in which he was dismissive of what he described as attempts by Giuliani and his lawyer to dodge providing information to the election workers' lawyers. Recommended Videos And he said the litigants should be ready at the contempt hearing to explain why he should not grant a request by lawyers for the two election workers that he make adverse inferences from evidence in the case that would put Giuliani's Palm Beach, Florida, condominium in danger of being surrendered to satisfy the defamation award. The judge also said he may rule on the contempt request at the hearing. Giuliani has maintained that the Palm Beach property is his personal residence now and should be shielded from the judgment. He faces a Jan. 16 trial before Liman over the disposition of his Florida residence and World Series rings . Lawyers for the election workers filed the contempt request after saying Giuliani had failed to turn over a lease to his Manhattan apartment, a Mercedes, various watches and jewelry, a signed Joe DiMaggio shirt and other baseball momentos. The judge ordered Giuliani to turn over the items in October. Giuliani’s lawyers have predicted that Giuliani will eventually win custody of the items on appeal. A request for comment was sent to a lawyer for Giuliani, who was supposed to be deposed on Friday. The contempt hearing follows a contentious November hearing in which Giuliani, a former federal prosecutor, became angry at the judge and said Liman was treating him unfairly. Giuliani was found liable last year for defaming the two Georgia poll workers by falsely accusing them of tampering with ballots during the 2020 presidential election. The women said they faced death threats after Giuliani falsely claimed they sneaked in ballots in suitcases, counted ballots multiple times and tampered with voting machines.

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Once a countercultural symbol of rebellion, tattoos are now so mainstream that a neck or hand tattoo is no longer an impediment to becoming a cop in Victoria. The recent change in heart is mostly about boosting recruitment to that State’s police force. But it also reflects changing societal norms, with about one-in-three Australians under the age of 30 now inked up. WA’s police force still bans face, neck and hand tattoos, as well as any body art considered offensive or culturally insensitive, but tattoos elsewhere are not an issue. Perth people love their tattoos so much that hundreds queued for up to six hours earlier this year when East Perth tattoo parlour Arcane Tattoo Studio offered free 50¢-sized tattoos for a day. Tattoos were already big business 15 years ago when Emma Commander of Fine Line Studios in Nedlands started in the industry. Since then she’s seen their popularity grow and sees everyone from 18-year-olds to those in their 70s embracing the needle for the first time. “The industry has changed a lot,” she says. “Advancements in technology, the introduction of social media have had big effects. “The accessibility of tattoos to the masses has grown and the options for styles have broadened . . . tattoos have always been popular since I started out but they are becoming so with a broader range of people. “I think it has been a gradual growth towards becoming mainstream within a larger culture in Australia. It’s continuing to grow.” But, while it’s estimated that as many as one in four Australians now have ink on their body — up from 10 per cent in 2000 — there are still pitfalls to consider before taking the plunge. You have probably heard the stories about tourists who thought they were getting the Chinese symbols for “hope” or “integrity” tattooed on their body and wound up with insults like “illiterate foreigner” instead. Some of those may be apocryphal. But choosing the wrong design can have long-term consequences and even limit future career options. US president-elect Donald Trump last month tapped former Fox News presenter Pete Hegseth to lead his Department of Defence. But Mr Hegseth, a US Army National Guard veteran, was previously flagged as a potential “insider threat” by a fellow service member because the words “Deus Vult” are tattooed on his bicep. The phrase, which translate as “God Wills It”, was once used by Christian crusaders in the Middle Ages and has since been co-opted by white nationalists. It is unclear whether Mr Trump would consider such an association a drawback. Ms Commander has received some “colourful” requests during her time in the industry. “Some I said yes to, some I said no to. . . I probably can’t go into too much detail about the nos, though,” she said. “You do have to learn to not be too judgmental in this job.” High on the right arm of Hollywood actor Johnny Depp’s arm is a tattoo that says: “Wino Forever”. But once it read “Winona Forever”, in tribute to Depp’s former fiancee Winona Ryder. Depp is not the first person to have a tattoo outline a paramour and he is certainly not the only celebrity to be left with a visible reminder of an ex. Channing Tatum and Jenna Dewan got their matching “side by side” tattoos while on their honeymoon in Bali in 2009 — only to divorce nine years later. When Arianda Grande and Pete Davidson split up, the Thank U, Next singer covered up the matching tattoo she had acquired during the relationship with the name of another ex’s dog. New York tattoo artist Jon Mesa claimed to have staged something of an intervention with Davidson after being called in to help conceal the image of a former partner’s face. “I did a huge cover-up,” he told the New York Post. “After we were done, I told Pete, ‘hey, dude, let’s just stop with the girlfriend tats”. One survey found as many as 30 per cent of tatted-up Australians had at least one they regretted. It did not specify how many involved an ex-partner’s name. Social media is full of complaints about new partners whose skin still bears the mark of an ex. Ms Commander has tattooed clients with their partners’ names before but says it’s not an “overly common” request. So far she has never had someone return asking for a Wino Forever-style cover up. “Again, withholding any judgement, it’s not my place to make a call on whether that’s a good idea or not,” she said. “I’m sure some of them regretted it but I’ve never redone one of mine for that reason.” Ms Commander receives messages “almost daily” from people unhappy with tattoos they have had done elsewhere, hoping to have them altered or covered up. “It’s something I choose not to do personally, as it’s quite often not straightforward and doesn’t always have the desired outcome of making the tattoo more like what the client wanted.,” she said. At least in WA tattoo studios must comply with the Health (Skin Penetration Procedures) Regulations 1998 and Code of Practice for Skin Penetration Procedures, which impose basic standards for hygiene, disinfection and sterilisation. Not everywhere is quite so strict. Just ask Englishwoman, Kirsty Griffiths, who recently paid the equivalent of $250 to get a tattoo while on holiday in Turkey and got a lot more than the floral design she had wanted on her ankle. According to the Daily Mail, Ms Griffiths contracted a bacterial skin infection called cellulitis, which spread to her stomach and gall bladder. “Two different surgeons came to visit me and one said if this doesn’t clear up, I might have to have my foot amputated. I was crying and screaming every night in pain,” she said. “It was morphine drip after morphine drip and I could still feel the pain through the painkillers.” Ms Griffiths kept her foot but has decided to take a break from getting any more tattoos. For now.

LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) — Tahj Brooks ran for a season-high 188 yards and three touchdowns in the final home game for Texas Tech's all-time leading rusher, and the Red Raiders rolled to a 52-15 victory over West Virginia on Saturday. Texas Tech (8-4, 6-3 Big 12) kept alive faint hopes for a bid in the Big 12 championship game by winning at least eight games in the regular season for the first time since 2009 under the late Mike Leach. The Red Raiders scored at 50 points for the second week in a row and had a resounding response to consecutive home losses. “It was a big deal for us to play well at home,” coach Joey McGuire said. “Our last two home games, we’ve had incredible crowds that had great energy, that had our backs and we played really, really bad. We were embarrassed.” Garrett Greene threw an interception and lost a fumble on Terrell Tilmon's strip sack in the final three minutes of the first half as the Mountaineers (6-6, 5-4) raised more questions about the future of coach Neal Brown by falling behind 35-3 before the break. Behren Morton threw for 359 yards and two touchdowns, including a 31-yarder to Caleb Douglas to put Texas Tech in front 42-3 early in the second half. Josh Kelly had 150 yards receiving. “I don’t think the first half of football defines who they are, who they are as individuals, who we are as a team,” Brown said of the Mountaineers. “Not pleased with that.” McGuire, who will have his third winning record in three seasons, called timeout with 5:57 remaining and his team leading 45-15 to take Brooks out of the game. Brooks was mobbed by teammates as the crowd gave him a standing ovation. Brooks ran for at least 100 yards in all 11 regular-season games he played, breaking the single-season school record of 10 he shared with Byron Hanspard and Bam Morris. Brooks pushed his career total to 4,557 yards in his first home game since breaking Hanspard's 1996 school record of 4,219 yards two weeks ago at Jones AT&T Stadium. Two of Brooks' TDs came on 2-yard runs from direct snaps, and the other was a 37-yarder when he stumbled on a cut but stayed on his feet and bounced off defensive back Ty French. Brooks has 17 TDs rushing this season and 45 for his career. Brooks set up one of his short TDs with a 30-yard catch. Jahiem White ran for 124 yards with a spinning 21-yard touchdown for West Virginia, and Greene had a 15-yard scoring toss to Rodney Gallagher III. Greene threw two picks. West Virginia: A perfect season on the road in the Big 12 ended with a thud. The Mountaineers were 3-0 away from home in conference before allowing 29 second-quarter points followed by another TD just 2:12 into the third. Texas Tech: Tight end Jalin Conyers, one of Brooks' fellow seniors playing his final home game, made up a for a dropped pass in the end zone with a juggling, diving catch for 18 yards to set up Morton's 1-yard scoring toss to Mason Tharp. Conyers, an Arizona State transfer, also had a 2-point conversion run on a swinging gate play from the PAT unit. Both teams are eligible for bowl games. At game's end, Texas Tech's fate for a spot in the Big 12 title game was still up in the air. ___ Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here . AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-footballIntuit's EVP Laura Fennell sells $5.06 million in stock

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'It doesn't matter': Reform deputy dismisses court records that say MP kicked his girlfriendNEW YORK (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump’s lawyers formally asked a judge Monday to throw out his hush money criminal conviction , arguing that continuing the case would present unconstitutional “disruptions to the institution of the Presidency.“ In a filing made public Tuesday, Trump’s lawyers told Manhattan Judge Juan M. Merchan that anything short of immediate dismissal would undermine the transition of power, as well as the “overwhelming national mandate" granted to Trump by voters last month. They also cited President Joe Biden’s recent pardon of his son, Hunter Biden, who had been convicted of tax and gun charges . “President Biden asserted that his son was ‘selectively, and unfairly, prosecuted,’ and ‘treated differently,’" Trump’s legal team wrote. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, they claimed, had engaged in the type of political theater "that President Biden condemned.” Prosecutors will have until Dec. 9 to respond. They have said they will fight any efforts to dismiss the case but have indicated a willingness to delay the sentencing until after Trump’s second term ends in 2029. In their filing Monday, Trump's attorneys dismissed the idea of holding off sentencing until Trump is out of office as a “ridiculous suggestion.” Following Trump’s election victory last month, Merchan halted proceedings and indefinitely postponed his sentencing, previously scheduled for late November, to allow the defense and prosecution to weigh in on the future of the case. He also delayed a decision on Trump’s prior bid to dismiss the case on immunity grounds. Trump has been fighting for months to reverse his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal a $130,000 payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels to suppress her claim that they had sex a decade earlier. He says they did not and denies any wrongdoing. The defense filing was signed by Trump lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, who represented Trump during the trial and have since been selected by the president-elect to fill senior roles at the Justice Department. Taking a swipe at Bragg and New York City, as Trump often did throughout the trial, the filing argues that dismissal would also benefit the public by giving him and “the numerous prosecutors assigned to this case a renewed opportunity to put an end to deteriorating conditions in the City and to protect its residents from violent crime.” Clearing Trump, the lawyers added, would also allow him to “to devote all of his energy to protecting the Nation.” Merchan hasn’t yet set a timetable for a decision. He could decide to uphold the verdict and proceed to sentencing, delay the case until Trump leaves office, wait until a federal appeals court rules on Trump’s parallel effort to get the case moved out of state court or choose some other option. An outright dismissal of the New York case would further lift a legal cloud that at one point carried the prospect of derailing Trump’s political future. Last week, special counsel Jack Smith told courts that he was withdrawing both federal cases against Trump — one charging him with hoarding classified documents at his Florida estate, the other with scheming to overturn the 2020 presidential election he lost — citing longstanding Justice Department policy that shields a president from indictment while in office. The hush money case was the only one of Trump’s four criminal indictments to go to trial, resulting in a historic verdict that made him the first former president to be convicted of a crime. Prosecutors had cast the payout as part of a Trump-driven effort to keep voters from hearing salacious stories about him. Trump’s then-lawyer Michael Cohen paid Daniels. Trump later reimbursed him, and Trump’s company logged the reimbursements as legal expenses — concealing what they really were, prosecutors alleged. Trump has said the payments to Cohen were properly categorized as legal expenses for legal work. A month after the verdict, the Supreme Court ruled that ex-presidents can’t be prosecuted for official acts — things they did in the course of running the country — and that prosecutors can’t cite those actions to bolster a case centered on purely personal, unofficial conduct. Trump’s lawyers cited the ruling to argue that the hush money jury got some improper evidence, such as Trump’s presidential financial disclosure form, testimony from some White House aides and social media posts made during his first term. Prosecutors disagreed and said the evidence in question was only “a sliver” of their case. If the verdict stands and the case proceeds to sentencing, Trump’s punishments would range from a fine to probation to up to four years in prison — but it’s unlikely he’d spend any time behind bars for a first-time conviction involving charges in the lowest tier of felonies. Because it is a state case, Trump would not be able to pardon himself once he returns to office. Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission. Get local news delivered to your inbox!

"Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum." Section 1.10.32 of "de Finibus Bonorum et Malorum", written by Cicero in 45 BC "Sed ut perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem accusantium doloremque laudantium, totam rem aperiam, eaque ipsa quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi architecto beatae vitae dicta sunt explicabo. Nemo enim ipsam voluptatem quia voluptas sit aspernatur aut odit aut fugit, sed quia consequuntur magni dolores eos qui ratione voluptatem sequi nesciunt. Neque porro quisquam est, qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit, sed quia non numquam eius modi tempora incidunt ut labore et dolore magnam aliquam quaerat voluptatem. Ut enim ad minima veniam, quis nostrum exercitationem ullam corporis suscipit laboriosam, nisi ut aliquid ex ea commodi consequatur? Quis autem vel eum iure reprehenderit qui in ea voluptate velit esse quam nihil molestiae consequatur, vel illum qui dolorem eum fugiat quo voluptas nulla pariatur?" 1914 translation by H. Rackham "But I must explain to you how all this mistaken idea of denouncing pleasure and praising pain was born and I will give you a complete account of the system, and expound the actual teachings of the great explorer of the truth, the master-builder of human happiness. No one rejects, dislikes, or avoids pleasure itself, because it is pleasure, but because those who do not know how to pursue pleasure rationally encounter consequences that are extremely painful. Nor again is there anyone who loves or pursues or desires to obtain pain of itself, because it is pain, but because occasionally circumstances occur in which toil and pain can procure him some great pleasure. To take a trivial example, which of us ever undertakes laborious physical exercise, except to obtain some advantage from it? But who has any right to find fault with a man who chooses to enjoy a pleasure that has no annoying consequences, or one who avoids a pain that produces no resultant pleasure?" 1914 translation by H. Rackham "But I must explain to you how all this mistaken idea of denouncing pleasure and praising pain was born and I will give you a complete account of the system, and expound the actual teachings of the great explorer of the truth, the master-builder of human happiness. No one rejects, dislikes, or avoids pleasure itself, because it is pleasure, but because those who do not know how to pursue pleasure rationally encounter consequences that are extremely painful. Nor again is there anyone who loves or pursues or desires to obtain pain of itself, because it is pain, but because occasionally circumstances occur in which toil and pain can procure him some great pleasure. To take a trivial example, which of us ever undertakes laborious physical exercise, except to obtain some advantage from it? But who has any right to find fault with a man who chooses to enjoy a pleasure that has no annoying consequences, or one who avoids a pain that produces no resultant pleasure?" To keep reading, please log in to your account, create a free account, or simply fill out the form below.