Tag Archives: Valley

COVID-19: CVS Expands Vaccination Sites To These Hudson Valley Locations

With the newly approved Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine providing health officials with an additional option for vaccinating those eligible, CVS announced it will be expanding its vaccination program to nearly 150 more locations in New York, including many in the Hudson Valley.

CVS Pharmacy, which had already been receiving vaccine doses as part of the Federal Pharmacy Program, which are earmarked for specific chains, announced this week that it will be ramping up its vaccination program due to an increased allocation of the vaccine.

Those who are eligible and interested in getting vaccinated are now able to register for appointments, with scheduling beginning as of Friday, March 5, and inoculations planned to begin the following day.

In the Hudson Valley, CVS locations will be scheduling COVID-19 vaccine appointments in:

Westchester

  • Ardsley;
  • Bedford Hills;
  • Briarcliff Manor;
  • Bronxville;
  • Croton-on-Hudson;
  • Eastchester;
  • Elmsford;
  • Harrison;
  • Katonah;
  • Larchmont;
  • Mamaroneck;
  • Mount Vernon;
  • New Rochelle;
  • Peekskill;
  • Rye;
  • Rye Brook;
  • Scarsdale;
  • Tarrytown;
  • Thornwood;
  • Yonkers.

Putnam

Rockland

Dutchess

Ulster County

Orange County

Dutchess

Those eligible to receive the vaccine at CVS must be a New York resident over the age of 65. Teachers, daycare and preschool workers, and staff members are also within the state’s eligibility.

Click here to sign up for Daily Voice’s free daily emails and news alerts.

(function(d, s, id){ var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) {return;} js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));

Read original article here

Stardew Valley Creator Thanks Fans for Sticking With the Game on 5 Year Anniversary

News

Just yesterday, Stardew Valley celebrated its five year anniversary, which sounds pretty insane if you think about it. It’s already been five years since the game’s release, yet it still feels consistently fresh and exciting with how much work has been put into it post-launch.

Eric Barone, AKA ConcernedApe and the creator of the game, took to Twitter on the game’s five year anniversary to thank fans and players for sticking with the game for so long. And with how the game has been constantly improving over the years, it’s entirely possible that Barone will continue to work on patches and updates to add more content to it.

Just a few months ago, we got update 1.5, which was the biggest content drop Stardew Valley’s seen in quite a while. It added new dungeons, new animals, tools, along with new early and late-game goals for players to work towards, and the patch got released for consoles just a couple weeks ago.

There’s still plenty of content to dive into in Stardew Valley even if you’ve been playing since launch, which is a testament to just how solid this farming sim is. Stardew Valley is now available on PC, consoles, and mobile devices.



Read original article here

NC coronavirus update February 28: Group 3 COVID-19 vaccine appointments open at Cape Fear Valley Health

RALEIGH, N.C. (WTVD) — Here are the latest updates about COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, in North Carolina.

SUNDAY

9:40 a.m.
Cape Fear Valley Health’s COVID-19 vaccination clinics are now open to frontline essential workers, including all of Group 3.

Due to high turnout of local childcare school workers combined with decreasing demand in other eligible groups, Cape Fear Valley Health is moving forward with the next phase, ahead of schedule.

“This is a very broad category that includes most workers, if they are working in-person with others or the public,” said Chris Tart, PharmD, Vice President of Professional Services at Cape Fear Valley Health. “If you’re not sure whether your job fits in this category, we encourage you to go online to www.capefearvalley.com/covid19 to schedule your vaccination and find what group you fit in.”

NCDHHS defines “frontline essential workers” as people who must be in-person at their place of work and work in one of the eight essential sectors including: education, critical manufacturing, essential goods, food and agriculture, government and community Services, health care and public health, public safety and transportation. Any frontline essential workers ages 18 and older are now eligible as part of Group 3 to receive their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine from one of Cape Fear Valley Health’s vaccination clinics, in addition to individuals in Groups 1 and 2 – healthcare and long-term care workers and anyone aged 65 and older.

7:20 a.m.
According to data from Johns Hopkins University, there have been 28,554,724 COVID-19 cases in the United States since the pandemic began.

SATURDAY
6:15 p.m.
The U.S. is getting a third vaccine to prevent COVID-19, as the Food and Drug Administration on Saturday cleared a Johnson & Johnson shot that works with just one dose instead of two.

FDA advisers sign off on Johnson & Johnson vaccine: Here’s what happens next

12:05 p.m.
North Carolina is reporting 2,643 new COVID-19 cases, bringing the total to 858,548.

There have been 26 deaths due to the virus, bringing the total of deaths to 11,212.

Throughout the state, there are 1,414 patients hospitalized with COVID-19. That is 51 down from Friday,

The state’s percent positive test rate 5.4%, which is up slightly from Friday’s 4.7%.

There will be no NCDHHS COVID-19 dashboard update on Sunday, Feb. 28.

7:25 a.m.
According to Johns Hopkins University, there have been 28,486,562 COVID-19 cases throughout the United States.

Fauci warns progress in COVID fight appears to have stalled

Overnight, the House approved a $1.9 trillion pandemic relief bill that was championed by President Joe Biden, the first step in providing another dose of aid to a weary nation as the measure now moves to a tense Senate.

The overall relief bill would provide $1,400 payments to individuals, extend emergency unemployment benefits through August and increase tax credits for children and federal subsidies for health insurance.

MORE: Highlights of the COVID relief bill as it heads to the Senate

FRIDAY
6:26 p.m.
The Chatham County Public Health Department began vaccinating Pre-K-12 teachers and staff and child care workers ages 45 and older against COVID-19 during a mass vaccination clinic at the Chatham County Agriculture and Conference Center in Pittsboro.

Along with 20 doses administered Thursday, the 560 doses administered Friday brought the CCPHD’s total to more than 4,000 doses of the COVID-19 since vaccinations began in early January. Well over half of the doses have been given to people 65 and older.

“We are honored to be able to continue to vaccinate healthcare workers and older adults while also serving Chatham County’s school and child care staff,” said Chatham County Public Health Director Mike Zelek. “We have all benefited from the hard work and dedication of these teachers and staff, both at the child care and PreK-12 level, and to vaccinate them against COVID-19 is the least we can do to repay them for their service.”

According to the NC Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) COVID-19 vaccination database, 14,660 Chatham County residents had received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine through Feb. 25, accounting for 19.7% of the county’s population. Additionally, 9,551 Chatham residents have received their second dose, representing 12.8% of the population. Both of these percentages are among the highest in the state.

The CCPHD is anticipating receiving 600 first doses of the COVID-19 vaccine next week in the second installment of a three-week guaranteed allocation from NCDHHS. These doses will be used at future vaccination events.

The CCPHD’s upcoming COVID vaccination event schedule includes:

  • Monday: First and second doses for Groups 1 and 2, and first doses for PreK-12 staff and child care workers
  • Friday: Second doses for individuals that received their first doses during the Feb. 5 event at Roberts Chapel Missionary Baptist Church in Goldston

5 p.m.
Many COVID-19 restrictions placed upon bars, restaurants and many other venues are now at ease for the first time in a year.

Read the loosening of restrictions here.

4:55 p.m.
The Lee County Government Health Department announced that it will expand vaccine registration to include all individuals in Group 3 of the North Carolina vaccine rollout plan beginning Monday.

People will be allowed to register but they will not receive vaccine until or after March 10.

The health department also reported that six county residents have died of COVID-19 related complications. This raises the total number of COVID-19 deaths confirmed in Lee County to 73 since the first case was reported in March.

4:32 p.m.
Orange County has a total of 7,623 cases, including 156 in the past seven days. In all, 93 COVID-19 related deaths have occurred in the county.

3:40 p.m.
The Moore County Health Department has been notified of the deaths of two Moore County residents whose deaths were determined to be related to COVID-19 infection.

The two are both men older than 75. In total, 166 deaths have been attributed to COVID-19 in Moore County.

Of the deaths, 92 are linked to outbreaks in long-term care facilities.

2:53 p.m.
The Durham County Department of Public Health has closed its online scheduling system effective immediately as the health department explores “new online options.”

Appointments already scheduled through the online booking system are not expected to be canceled, but people who have scheduled these appointments will be contacted with more information.

“With our original booking system, there were challenges in ensuring we’d have sufficient supply to meet the number of appointments scheduled,” said Health Director Rod Jenkins. “Because supply remains uncertain, and upon the recommendation of the State, we hope to move toward an online scheduling system that allows us to more easily book appointments that are in line with the vaccine supply we have been guaranteed.”

When public scheduling reopens, the health department said it expects to provide appointment options no more than two weeks in advance of the appointment date. New scheduling processes will also aim to ensure appointments are only filed by individuals who are currently eligible to be vaccinated, the department said.

“With the old online system, our team was spending time canceling appointments for individuals who were ineligible to be vaccinated or who had already received vaccinations elsewhere. Fortunately, our waitlist was in place and allowed us to fill large numbers of appointments that became available on short notice, but we are always looking for ways to make our processes faster and more efficient,” Jenkins said. “When we are able to provide a new online booking option, we will prioritize making sure our appointments are filled only by individuals who still need them and are eligible to receive them.”

Also, the department’s scheduling phone line remains closed for public use because of limited vaccine supply. A reopening date has not been determined.

Durham will continue to use its waitlist to notify people of doses that become available because of appointment cancellations, no-shows, or other last-minute vaccine availability.

2:44 p.m.
The Halifax County Health Department reports 20 new cases for a total of 4,992 positive COVID 19 cases. One additional death was reported for a total of 97.

2:25 p.m.
The Durham VA Health Care System said it just received authorization to expand which veterans are eligible for COVID-19 vaccines. This means the COVID-19 Vaccine is available for more veterans.

There are 800 first-dose appointment slots available for the VA’s Veteran Vaccination Blitz event this weekend to be held Saturday from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and from 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Sunday.

Veterans should call (919) 286-0411 then press “0” to speak with the operator to determine eligibility and schedule their appointments. Veterans who schedule their first-dose appointments this weekend should plan to attend their second-dose appointments on March 20 in Durham.

Veterans are required to be enrolled in the Durham VA Health Care System to be vaccinated but it is not required that you receive care through the Durham Medical Center to be vaccinated in Durham. Any eligible veteran who has transportation to Durham can schedule an appointment.

2:04 p.m.
Sampson County reports 103 new cases, more than double the previous day, for a total of 6,922 positive test results. The death toll remains at 91 countywide.

There is a drive-through vaccination clinic planned for Saturday for childcare and grade-school employees at the Sampson County Expo Center from 9 a.m. – 4 p.m. This is a first-dose vaccination event. Participants are encouraged to bring their teacher IDs or another form of employee identification. Vaccines will be available as supply allows.

12:25 p.m.
Friday’s report from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services included 2,924 newly-reported COVID-19 cases. There were a total of 1,465 hospitalizations.

The daily percent positive rate was 4.7%, a slight increase from yesterday’s 4.5%.

Sadly, 11,186 deaths have been reported since the start of the pandemic.

11:16 a.m.
Wake County Public Health has confirmed an outbreak of COVID-19 at Spring Arbor of Raleigh, an assisted living and memory care facility located at 1810 New Hope Road.

This is the first outbreak at this facility.

8:18 a.m.
Cumberland County continues to offer free drive-thru COVID-19 vaccination clinics for those in Groups 1, 2 and the first sector of Group 3. An online application form now allows individuals to choose their own appointment date and time for the first dose of the vaccine.

Individuals from Group 3 who are now eligible include workers in PreK-12 schools (public, charter, private/non-public schools) and childcare settings only.

All County clinics take place at the Crown Expo Center (1960 Coliseum Drive, Fayetteville NC).
Appointments are available on Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Fridays from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. A Standby lane (first-come, first-served in eligible groups) opens on Fridays, from 3 to 5 p.m., or as supplies last.

  • Tuesdays: 2nd dose appointment only. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. No standby lane
  • Wednesdays: 1st and 2nd doses appointment only. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. No standby lane
  • Fridays: 1st dose only. Appointments from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Standby lane from 3 to 5 p.m. for individuals eligible in Groups 1, 2, and 3 (childcare/Pre-K-12 school staff) only.

Anyone who has received their first dose at the Crown Expo Center on or before Jan. 26 should request an appointment for their second dose or use the standby lane. Individuals who received their first dose at the Crown Expo Center on or after Jan. 27 are automatically scheduled for their second dose and do not need to request an appointment.

FRIDAY MORNING HEADLINES
Some COVID-19 restrictions in North Carolina will be lifted at 5 p.m. today.

Restaurants, gyms and stores will be able to open past 10 p.m., and alcohol sales can take place up to 11 p.m.–which is two hours later than the current curfew.

Bars, movie theaters and smaller venues can operate at 30 percent capacity. Gyms, restaurants, museums, pools and outdoor amusement parks can open at 50 percent capacity. Big indoor sporting and entertainment venues–like PNC Arena and the Dean E. Smith Center–can open at 15 percent capacity.

WATCH: Gov. Cooper explains decision to lift COVID-19 restrictions

Plus, another COVID-19 vaccine could be authorized for emergency use today.

The Federal Drug Administration will have a hearing on the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. If approved, the company said it could ship up to 4 million doses Monday.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine is a single-dose vaccine and it does not require ultra-cold storage.

If approved, health experts said the three vaccines should account for enough doses to vaccinate 130 million adults–or about half of the US population.

THURSDAY
9:45 p.m.
Cumberland County Schools – 43% of its 8,000 full-time and part-time employees have been vaccinated. At this rate, Director Of Health Services Shirley Bolden believes every employee who wants a vaccine will get one before their March 15 in-person start date.

Durham Public Schools’ officials tell Eyewitness News 422 doses were given out to employees on Thursday.

Johnston County has vaccinated more than 2,000 of their more than 5,000 staff.

ABC11 reached out to Moore, Hoke, and Harnett County schools for numbers; we’re still awaiting a response.

Sampson County Schools has had a few dozen teachers get vaccinated with more than 500 signed up. Health care officials will hold a drive-thru vaccination clinic for this new group on Saturday morning at the Sampson County Expo Center.

5 p.m.
Wake County plans to announce updated spectator guidelines sometime next week that are in line with Governor Cooper’s ease of restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic

The update follows after calls for increased outdoor sports viewing count. As of Wednesday, one petition making rounds in the state has 45,000 signatures.

In the meantime, Wake County sports officials will continue to work on guidelines and keep attendance capped at 100 for outdoor events and 25 for indoor events.

4 p.m.

Starting this weekend, UNC will welcome back its fans with 30 percent capacity at outdoor stadiums and 15% for indoor stadiums with at least 5,000 seats.

This means, starting at 5 p.m. on Friday, a limited number of fans will be able to spectate UNC Men’s Basketball, Baseball, Women’s Lacrosse and Men’s Lacrosse games this weekend.

6 p.m.
After months of waiting, 63-year-old Perry Tharrington is one of the first public school teachers in Durham to get the COVID-19 vaccine on Thursday.

“I feel unbelievable. I feel relieved,” said Tharrington. He is a special needs teacher with the district and has a chronic health condition.

The shot makes him feel more comfortable going back into the classroom.

“A real game-changer to have the vaccine before going back live,” He said. “So if we do get COVID-19 hopefully it will not be nearly as severe or life-threatening.”

Today, the health department vaccinated Durham Public School employees who fall under Group 3. So far 1,800 DPS employees, which is at least 35 percent of its workforce have signed up.

Staff are then prioritized and given appointments based on who will be around the most people at school, which starts next month.

Yesterday in Johnston County, nearly 2,000 teachers received a shot in the arm.

It’s not clear if everyone who registered in Durham for the vaccine will get it by the time school starts. And that’s a concern for leaders at the Durham Association of Educators (DAE).

“We are the City of Medicine I just feel like if we want our teachers to be face to face with students, our bus drivers, our child nutrition workers, our custodians, all those folks then we can figure out a way to start doing this at a large scale,” said Michelle Burton with DAE.

DPS says it’s hopeful it will vaccinate all employees but it depends on supply.

In a statement, the district says: The CDC and NCDHHS say that schools may reopen with safety measures in place without full vaccinations, but we realize how reassuring the vaccine is and we are working to provide it as quickly as possible.

In Raleigh on Thursday, 310 Wake County Public School teachers received the vaccine at Southeast Raleigh Magnet High School. On Saturday, another clinic for teachers will take place at Knightdale High School. Health officials at Wake County Health Department say neighborhoods around those two schools have high rates of COVID-19 spread.

The fastest and most efficient way for Group 3 people to be vaccinated right now remains signing up on our WakeGov.com/Vaccine request form. Group three consists of frontline workers and childcare workers and educators.

In Durham, employees in daycares, other childcare centers, and schools not in the DPS system should have their principal or director email PhPlanning@dconc.gov to coordinate appointment scheduling. All Group 3 vaccination appointments are being scheduled through employers at this time.

2:35 p.m.
The first known case of the B.1.1.7 variant of COVID-19 — first identified in the UK — has been confirmed in Durham County.

The county public health department identified the case on Wednesday.

“There have been variant cases found in several other counties across the state, as well as in at least 45 states across the nation, so we did expect that eventually, we would see variant cases here as well,” said Durham County Health Director Rod Jenkins.

The Durham County Department of Public Health said the person is currently in isolation and all known close contacts have been contacted.

2 p.m.
At least 3,500 incarcerated people will be granted early release from North Carolina state prisons, according to the NC NAACP and ACLU, after a settlement was reached in NC NAACP v. Cooper, a lawsuit brought by civil rights organizations, three individual incarcerated people, and a spouse of an incarcerated person, challenging the conditions of confinement in North Carolina’s state prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Under the terms of the settlement agreement, the state has 180 days to release 3,500 people currently in its custody.

That window begins once the trial court grants a request to stay the case during that period. The parties jointly filed the stay request Thursday.

“Today’s historic settlement is a step forward after nearly a year of advocating for the human lives of our neighbors who, in too many cases, have been treated as disposable,” said Rev. Dr. T. Anthony Spearman, president of the NC NAACP.

1:22 p.m.
The Halifax County Health Department reports 12 new cases for a total of 4,972 positive COVID 19 cases. One additional death has been added for a county total of 96 — 1.9% of cases.

1:10 p.m.
Dr. Anthony Fauci says if a novel coronavirus vaccine is available, regardless of which one, take it.

The top U.S. infectious disease expert told NBC’s “Today” show a third vaccine becoming available “is nothing but good news” and would help control the pandemic. U.S. regulators announced Wednesday that Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose vaccine offers strong protection against severe COVID-19. It’s expected to be approved soon by the FDA.

Fauci warns people not to hold off on getting the Johnson & Johnson vaccine while waiting for the slightly more effective two-dose Pfizer or Moderna shots.

He says it’s a race “between the virus and getting vaccines into people” and “the longer one waits not getting vaccinated, the better chance the virus has to get a variant or a mutation.”

Fauci says public health officials are always concerned about virus variants and stressed following public health measures of wearing masks and social distancing.

The predominant coronavirus variant in the United States is from Britain. Fauci says the vaccines distributed in the U.S. “clearly can take care of that particular strain.”

1 p.m.
NCDHHS on Thursday reported 3,351 new COVID-19 cases in the state.

1,498 people are currently hospitalized with COVID-19. 171 confirmed patients were admitted in the last 24 hours.

The percent of positive tests is at 4.5 percent.

The number is a drop from previous days, but an increase in tests was also reported in the last 24 hours, which could lead to a sharper decline in the percentage.

11,137 people have died in North Carolina from COVID-19 since last March.

835,244 people in North Carolina have received both doses of the vaccine.

12:45 p.m.
Sampson County reports 49 new cases for a total of 6,819 positive test results. One additional death was reported for a county total of 91.

There is a drive-through vaccination clinic planned Saturday for childcare and grade-school employees at the Sampson County Expo Center from 9 a.m. – 4 p.m. This is a first-dose vaccination event. Participants are encouraged to bring their teacher IDs or another form of employee identification. Vaccines will be available as supply allows.

11 a.m.
Two separate teams of researchers said this week they have found a worrying new coronavirus variant in New York City and elsewhere in the Northeast that carries mutations that help it evade the body’s natural immune response — as well as the effects of monoclonal antibody treatments.

Genomics researchers have named the variant B.1.526. It appears in people affected in diverse neighborhoods of New York City, they said, and is “scattered in the Northeast.”

10:30 a.m.
There’s new evidence that connects testing positive for COVID-19 antibodies from prior infection with a significantly lower risk of becoming infected again in the future.

A study, published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine on Wednesday, found that people who tested positive for COVID-19 antibodies were at a decreased risk of coronavirus infection compared with those who tested negative for antibodies.

THURSDAY MORNING HEADLINES
High School football returns to the Triangle on Thursday night after an extended absence caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Leesville Road High School is hosting Cardinal Gibbons High School at 6:30 p.m. in the ABC11 Game of the Week.

Student-athletes and fans in the stands will be required to wear masks at all times. There will be fans in the stands, but for now, it will only be the immediate family of players on the home team.

That is a Wake County Public School System policy. However, it’s unclear if that policy will be adjusted as the season moves forward–especially in light of Gov. Roy Cooper’s decision to ease some COVID-19 restrictions starting Friday.

SEE MORE: Details behind Gov. Roy Cooper’s rollback of COVID-19 restrictions

Cooper’s decision means Caniacs will be back at PNC Arena soon. The Carolina Hurricanes will be allowed to host about 2,800 fans at home games under the new restrictions.

Team President Don Waddell said that won’t give the teams a major boost financially, but it is a significant moral victory.

“We want to prove to everybody and make sure that we do everything in a very safe manner,” Waddell said. “But more importantly, for our customers to feel like they’re being watched out for. So they feel that they can come back to the hockey game and enjoy it without having to worry about it.”

Duke University said it plans to finish the season without any spectators inside Cameron Indoor Stadium.

UNC Athletics Director Bubba Cunningham welcomed the new guidelines. He said the university is working on ways to safely bring fans back to games. He said the university would place a priority on getting family, friends, students and Rams Club members into the Dean E. Smith Center.

One of the largest crowds in North Carolina will be at Charlotte Motor Speedway during the Coca-Cola 600 on Memorial Day Weekend. The large outdoor venue will be allowed to fill 30 percent of the seats.

Meanwhile, the peak of the 2020-2021 flu season features a stark decrease in infections as compared to previous years.

Flu cases and hospitalizations are the lowest they’ve been in decades. Experts say mask-wearing and social distancing related to COVID-19 precautions are the main reason for the low flu numbers.

Copyright © 2021 WTVD-TV. All Rights Reserved.



Read original article here

Valley teen still battling COVID-19 symptoms more than one year later

A Valley teen is still battling the symptoms of COVID-19 more than a year after contracting the virus.

Lydia Pastore, a 16-year-old junior at Red Mountain High School became incredibly sick in February 2020. For the past year, she has experienced intense fatigue, body aches, and a slew of other symptoms ranging from burning eyes and face to hand tremors.

“That was the worst sickness that I had ever endured in my life,” said Lydia. “It’s just been constant muscle aches and fatigue where I just can’t snap out of it. Walking to the end of my driveway, it would exhaust me to the point of having to recover for two days.

All year long, Lydia was plagued by chronic fatigue, sleeping on average 15 hours a day. After multiple doctor’s visits, she began a journal as therapy for her hand tremors that turned into a tracking method for her own symptoms.

“I made a monthly symptom tracker, just because there were so many symptoms to keep track of,” said Lydia. “I wish that at the beginning of my infection I had had a resource like that because every specialist I had visited asked me, ‘What has changed? What is new? What are the symptoms you’re experiencing?’ And it was always frustrating trying to remember all that.”

Lydia decided to turn her ailments into a chance to connect with other teens who are battling the long-term effects of COVID-19. She created the website chronicconnections.org, where teens can share their personal journey with COVID-19, and request a symptom-tracking journal that Lydia sends out free to anyone in America.

“I would hope that it would be a place for teens to connect with others who are going through the same thing as them. To find comfort in similarity,” said Lydia, who has already received four letters from teens about their struggles. “I’m just so happy already with these four stories already that I’ve had so far and I’ve given these journals to, but I just feel there are so many more teens out there.”

What is “Long COVID?”

Lydia said she has seen eight different health specialists find out why she is still experiencing COVID-19 symptoms months after her illness. Her tests for Valley fever came back negative. Although she was never tested for COVID-19, her doctors believe that Lydia has “Long COVID,” when a person experiences COVID-19 symptoms long after contracting the virus.

“This post-viral syndrome occurs where you’re done with the initial infection but for some unknown reason, we continue to have some of the symptoms you had before for a length of time that doesn’t really make sense scientifically,” said Dr. Gary Kirkilas, spokesperson for American Academy of Pediatrics.

To doctors, Lydia is considered a “long hauler.” Dr. Kirkilas said once the virus clears in long haulers, there is a residual effect from COVID-19 that could be caused by remaining low amounts of the virus that are undetectable by COVID-19 tests, but still require a response from the body’s immune system. Another reason could be that the initial virus caused internal organ damage that is still not healed.

On Tuesday, The National Institute of Health (NIH) announced a new initiative to study “Long COVID” to “identify the causes and ultimately the means of prevention and treatment of individuals who have been sickened by COVID-19, but don’t recover fully over a period of a few weeks.”

According to the NIH, symptoms include fatigue, shortness of breath, “brain fog,” sleep disorders, fevers, gastrointestinal symptoms, anxiety, and depression.

“The thing that separates them is this brain issue, this brain issue of this fog,” said Dr. Frank LoVecchio, ER Physician at Valleywise Hospital. “In the hospital, we call it encephalitis (or inflammation of the brain). They can’t concentrate as well. They tend to be more forgetful.”

In December, the U.S. Congress provided $1.15 billion in funds to the NIH to study the long-term effects of COVID-19.

appId : '1561178210822538',

xfbml : true, version : 'v2.9' }); }; (function(d, s, id){ var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) {return;} js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js"; js.async = true; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));

Read original article here

Stardew Valley is a board game now

If you’ve ever played Stardew Valley and thought hey, running a farm seems real nice, I’d like to do that without any of the manual labor, today is your lucky day. The hit indie farming game has been adapted into what may turn out to be a hit board game, and it’s available right now.

The surprise announcement was made by developer Eric “ConcernedApe” Barone on the Stardew Valley website. In it, Barone notes that he has been working with board game designer Cole Medeiros for a little over two and a half years to adapt Stardew Valley’s cozy blend of manual labor, rural life, and friendship to tabletops, and the result seems just as charming as the digital game. There’s even a trailer:

Per the game’s store page:

Stardew Valley: The Board Game is a cooperative game where players work together to restore the Valley. They accomplish this by growing crops, raising animals, expanding their farm and collecting resources from across the Valley.

By befriending the local villagers, players earn hearts that allow them to reveal hidden goals. Only by working together will they keep Joja Corporation from moving in and spoiling everything.

Barone also warns that Stardew Valley: The Board Game is “not a short, casual game,” emphasizing that he wanted it to have the same level of complexity and customization as the original game — going so far as to share the rulebook online for anyone who isn’t sure if it’s a good fit for their table. With that caveat out of the way, cardboard Stardew looks like just as charming a way to while away the hours as its digital sibling.

Stardew Valley: The Board Game is available now via the Stardew Valley Shop.

Read original article here

SPACs, long shunned in Silicon Valley, going mainstream in tech

The New York Stock Exchange welcomes Desktop Metal Inc. (NYSE: DM), today, Thursday, December 10, 2020, in celebration of its listing. To honor the occasion, Ric Fulop, Co-Founder and CEO, rings The Opening Bell®.

NYSE

Roger Lee of Battery Ventures says that “SPAC” used to be a “bad four-letter word” in Silicon Valley.

Now, the board of every high-profile start-up is discussing special purpose acquisition companies as a legitimate way to go public, according to Jeff Crowe of Norwest Venture Partners.

In the eyes of Lux Capital co-founder Peter Hebert, SPACs are “stealing from the 2021 IPO calendar.”

“We have encouraged our highest-quality companies to seriously consider this,” said Hebert, whose firm raised its own health-tech SPAC in October and is looking for a target. “The vast majority of companies looking at doing traditional public offerings are dual-tracking SPACs.”

Within Lux’s portfolio, 3D-printing company Desktop Metal went public through a SPAC in December. Others like real estate software companies Latch and Matterport have announced deals this year with so-called blank-check companies.

The sudden burst of SPACs reminds some long-timers of the dot-com bubble in the late 1990s. Pre-revenue businesses with far-out goals are going public at astronomical valuations, and famous athletes and other celebrities are getting in the mix. Mention the acronym to any well-known start-up CEO and you’ll likely hear about the non-stop calls they receive from sponsors with hundreds of millions of dollars to spend.

To Wall Street skeptics, it looks like the finance industry’s latest scheme to make money from speculators in a low interest rate environment with the market at a peak and investors hungry for all things tech. SPACs have raised more than $44 billion so far this year for 144 deals, according to SPACInsider. That’s equal to more than half the money raised in all of 2020, which itself was a record year.

While there’s undeniable mania in the SPAC boom, there’s another story playing out in parallel. Venture-backed tech companies with high-growth prospects are shunning the IPO process, which has its own flaws. Instead they’re getting comfortable with the idea of hitting the market in a way that would have been unfathomable just a year ago.

In a SPAC, a group of investors raise money for a shell company with no underlying business. The SPAC goes public, generally at $10 a share, and then starts hunting for a company to acquire. When it finds a target and a deal is agreed upon, the SPAC and the company pull in outside investors for what’s called a PIPE, or private investment in public equity.

The PIPE money goes onto the target company’s balance sheet in exchange for a big equity stake. The SPAC investors get stock in the acquired company, which becomes the publicly-traded entity through what’s known as the de-SPAC.

One major advantage: SPACs allow companies to provide forward-looking projections, which companies typically don’t do in IPO prospectuses because of liability risk.

“An IPO is what I would call backward-looking,” said Betsy Cohen, who led a SPAC that recently took car insurer Metromile public. “Because a SPAC is technically a merger, you’re required to tell investors what the merged companies will look like after the merger and project forward.”

It’s also a much faster process than the IPO, which involves spending many months with bankers and lawyers to draft a prospectus, educate the market, carry out a roadshow and build a book of institutional investors.

Fin-tech companies have been big SPAC targets

Many of the better-known SPAC targets so far have been at the intersection of tech and financial services. For these companies, cash burn rates are high and real GAAP profits often won’t come for years, even under the best circumstances.

Metromile, whose technology allows drivers to pay by the mile rather than a monthly fee, started trading on Wednesday after merging with INSU Acquisition Corp. II, a SPAC led by Cohen and her son, Daniel. Chamath Palihapitiya, the venture capitalist turned mega SPAC sponsor, and billionaire Marc Cuban invested in a $160 million PIPE.

As of Friday’s close, the stock was trading at $17.23, giving Metromile a valuation of over $2 billion based on the fully diluted share count.

“Metromile enters the insurance market at a time when telematics are installed in virtually every car going forward, so there’s the opportunity to look at insurance on an individualized customized basis, which is huge,” Cohen said in an interview. “We felt it was an important company to bring to the public markets and allow them to have access to capital in way insurance companies do.”

Cohen, who founded The Bancorp, said she will have closed seven SPACs by later this year, including payments company Payoneer and boutique investment bank Perella Weinberg.

Metromile CEO Dan Preston told CNBC this week that around the middle of 2020, as his board was evaluating financing options, he expected to raise a large round of private capital and then go public in four to six quarters. The company had been around for a decade and raised hundreds of millions of dollars in funding.

Metromile CEO Dan Preston

Winni Wintermeyer

Other insurance-tech businesses like Lemonade and Root held traditional IPOs last year. But Preston says the more he learned about SPACs, the more he realized it was the better approach for his company, which faced the high costs of operating in the heavily regulated insurance industry — and a pandemic that slashed the amount of miles driven.

“The sweet spot are companies that are pretty close to being public but need a little more historical data to get ready,” said Preston.

Metromile said in its merger filing that it expects insurance revenue to increase 39% to $142.1 million in 2021, and then jump 81% in 2022 and more than 100% in 2023. Adjusted gross profit will increase from $11.1 million last year to $144 million in 2023, the filing says.

Online lender SoFi said in January that it was going public through a SPAC run by Palihapitiya in a deal valuing the company at $8.65 billion. In the merger agreement, SoFi projects annual revenue of $980 million this year, increasing annually to $3.7 billion in 2025, while contribution profit will more than quintuple over that stretch to $1.5 billion.

In other finance SPACs, Palihapitiya led the reverse-merger of digital real estate company Opendoor, which went public last year and is now worth over $20 billion. He did the same with health insurer Clover Health (which said this month that it’s under investigation by the SEC) and is leading the PIPE for solar financing provider Sunlight Financial.

Top-tier investors joining the fray

He’s also doing software deals. In January, Palihapitiya was a PIPE investor in Latch, a developer of smart lock systems sold to real estate companies. Latch generates recurring software sales and said 2020 booked revenue jumped 49% from the prior year to $167 million.

Blackrock, Fidelity and Wellington are also part of the PIPE, meaning they’ll be equity holders when Latch goes public. Those names, viewed as top-tier public market investors, are becoming familiar to SPACs, with at least one of them showing up in the PIPE for SoFi, Matterport, Opendoor and consumer genetics company 23andMe.

For companies that can attract investors of that caliber, and have sponsors they trust to stick with them through the ups and downs of the journey, a SPAC can be the most efficient way to raise money. Large private rounds typically require hefty dilution, while IPOs often come with a discount of 50% to 100% for new investors.

In a SPAC, the target ends up handing up to 20% of shares to the sponsors and additional stock to PIPE investors. The rest primarily remains with insiders. When public, the company has the ability to raise follow-on capital at market rates. For example, Opendoor just announced it’s raising $770 million at $27 a share, marking an increase in valuation of about 200% from the time of the PIPE investment.

Norwest’s Crowe, whose firm was a venture investor in Opendoor and online therapy provider Talkspace, another SPAC target, said that pricing is favorable for the best companies because there are so many SPACs going after them.

“Pricing is nuts,” Crowe said. “There’s enormous pent-up demand for all these companies. A lot of companies that would’ve gone public in a relatively even fashion over 2021 and ’22, if markets hold, now are all going out in a mad rush.”

Venture investors are jumping in as well. In addition to Lux, firms including FirstMark Capital, Ribbit Capital, Khosla Ventures and SoftBank have raised their own SPACs. Separate from their firms, venture capitalists Steve Case, Reid Hoffman and Bradley Tusk have followed Palihapitiya into the SPAC sponsor arena.

Growth stage venture firm G Squared announced this week the close of a $345 million SPAC. Founder Larry Aschebrook, in an interview, called it “just another tool in our toolbox” to help companies access capital. He said it can be a good option for a CEO who’s ready to run a public company and a business that’s raised a lot of money in the past and can benefit from ready access to the capital markets.

G Squared Ascend I Inc. SPAC IPO at the New York Stock Exchange on Feb. 5th, 2021.

NYSE

“There are only a handful we think are super high-quality companies,” Aschebrook said about the tech SPAC deals that have already been announced. “Companies we’re interested in are teetering on profitability or are profitable and are logos that everyone knows.”

While Battery’s Lee no longer views SPACs as equivalent to a curse word, he said there hasn’t yet been one out of his firm’s portfolio. However, Battery is an investor in Coinbase, which is going public through a direct listing, following the lead of Slack, Spotify and Palantir in allowing existing stakeholders to sell in the debut rather than issuing new shares as a company.

Lee said he wouldn’t at all be surprised to see a SPAC from one or more of his companies this year, acknowledging that it’s become a third viable mechanism to go public.

“The direct listing was the first thing new thing to happen in the capital markets in 50 years — and the rebranding of SPACs is the second thing,” Lee said. “At the end of the day, you’re still running a public business and you have to be capable of withstanding the rigor and scrutiny.”

WATCH: Matterport CEO on going public through SPAC deal with Gores Group

Read original article here

Stardew Valley patch 1.5 released on consoles: Switch, PS4, and Xbox One

In December, Stardew Valley was updated with the huge 1.5 patch, which added a new farming biome and a whole new island to the game. On Thursday, Stardew Valley creator and developer, ConcernedApe, announced that patch 1.5 is now on available on consoles as well.

The biggest addition in this patch is Ginger Island, a new island for players to explore. Ginger Island has its own NPCs, quest lines, minigames, puzzles, and secrets to discover. The island also has a few unique locations to the game, including a volcano-themed dungeon that changes each time you enter it.

Patch 1.5 also added the Beach Farm, a new type of farming environment that can make the game a little tougher for experienced players. The farm has lots for foraging and fishing, but the soil is all sand. This means that you can’t use the sprinklers you would normally rely on, so you have to be a little more attentive to how your crops get water.

While the patch is available now on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X, it is not available on mobile devices yet. This patch brings hundreds of other changes to Stardew Valley as well, but it doesn’t seem to have its own console-specific patch notes quite yet. Instead, we’ve included the patch notes for the PC version of the patch, which should be fairly close, to give you an idea of all the changes.


Stardew Valley patch 1.5 notes

New world area

1.5 adds an entire new region of the world, Ginger Island (part of the Fern Islands):

  • Added new locations, dialogue, events, minigames, puzzles, and a quest line involving multiple NPCs.
  • Added Leo, a new NPC with his own backstory, plot line, events, etc.
  • Added new secondary NPCs: Birdie, Gourmand Frog, and Professor Snail.
  • Added a volcano dungeon which changes each time you visit it similar to the mines.
  • Added Qi challenges which unlock rare or unique items.
  • Added an unlockable island farm and farmhouse area, where you can plant crops in any season but can’t construct buildings.
  • Added an unlockable resort you can open to let villagers visit the islands, including new beach attire and schedules.
  • Added hidden pages of a lost sailor’s journal to uncover his story and learn about the islands.
  • Added Golden Walnuts hidden throughout the islands, which can be used to unlock new areas and content.
  • Added Golden Coconuts, which Clint can crack open to find rare island items.
  • Added gem birds which spawn in a random island area when it rains, and drop gems when approached.
  • Added secrets and puzzles to discover around the island.
  • Added new enemies:

Dwarvish Sentry;

False Magma Cap;

Hot Head;

Lava Lurk;

Magma Sprite;

Magma Sparker;

Magma Duggy;

Spiker;

Stick Bug;

Tiger Slime.

  • Added new cosmetic critters: crabs, caldera monkeys, overhead parrots, marsupial, and tropical butterflies.
  • Added new Island Obelisk building.

New farm features

  • Added a new beach farm layout.
  • Added ostrich as a farm animal.
  • The immovable dressers found in Farmhands’ cabins have been removed.
  • Added home renovations, which let you further expand and adjust the farmhouse after it’s fully upgraded.

Beds are now normal furniture you can pick up, move around, and replace.

  • You can even have a house with no bed, but your spouse might have something to say about that.
  • Once unlocked, the greenhouse can now be moved at Robin’s shop.
  • The default shipping bin can now be moved or demolished at Robin’s shop.
  • Added Advanced Game Options, which can be used to customize a new game:

Set seed value used in randomization;

Choose default vs randomized community center bundles;

Choose default vs randomized mine chests;

Can make Red Cabbage Seeds guaranteed to sell at least once at the travelling cart in year one, so it’s always possible to finish the community center in the first year.

Can access the profit margins and cabin related options that were previously inaccessible when creating a single player farm.

Can toggle monsters spawning

  • You can now apply cosmetic paints to the farmhouse and buildings.
  • Ducks can now swim in water, and certain coop animals will now follow adults around.
  • Slimes now drink from slime hutch troughs in random order.

Other new content and features

  • Added Dwarvish forge and weapon enchanting.
  • Added the ability to combine two rings into one.
  • Added Special Orders, more dynamic late-game quests which let you help villagers with their personal projects through a special orders board in town. These can include more varied goals and rewards, temporary world changes, permanent changes (e.g. new shop inventory), and post-completion events.
  • Added a second Community Upgrade to Robin’s shop.
  • Added a more difficult version of the mines and skull caves. These can be accessed late game, and can optionally be toggled permanently using the Shrine of Challenge:
  • The following new monsters appear in the more difficult mines:

Shadow Sniper;

Skeleton Mage;

Spider (jumps, often found near webs that can trap players and dust sprites);

Putrid Ghost (causes nauseated debuff);

Blue Squid;

Royal Serpent;

Slime Stack.

  • Added new fishing TV channel (not available until certain conditions are met).
  • Added new crops and trees:

Mahogany Tree (drops hardwood);

Fiber Seeds;

Ginger (forage);

Banana;

Mango;

Pineapple;

Taro Root (paddy crop);

New palm tree variant;

Qi Fruit (available during Qi special quest).

Added year 2 dialogues for Egg Festival.

Added shops to the Dance of the Moonlight Jellies, Feast of the Winter Star, Festival of Ice, and Luau.

Added new items to various festival shops.

  • You can now change your name and gender in the Wizard’s basement shrine.
  • You now have a perfection rating which tracks the percentage of game content you’ve completed. Reaching full completion lets you buy Golden Chickens, adds a random Golden Witch event, unlocks access to The Summit with a new event, adds new bird critters, and unlocks various items.
  • You can now further customize sprinklers with attachments:

Enricher automatically applies loaded fertilizer while planting seeds nearby;

Pressure Nozzle increases watering range.

  • Added new craftable items and machines:

Bone Mill turns bone items into fertilizer;

Coffee Maker brews a fresh cup every morning;

Cookout Kit lets you cook on the go;

Dark Sign displays an item without consuming it;

Deconstructor destroys crafted items, but salvages their most valuable material;

Farm Computer scans the farm and displays useful information;

Geode Crusher consumes coal to break open geodes.

Heavy Tapper works twice as fast as a normal tapper;

Hopper auto-loads items placed inside into the machine in front of it;

Junimo Chests are linked to a global shared stash;

Mini-Obelisks let you warp between two obelisks when placed on the farm;

Mini-Shipping Bin is a smaller shipping bin that can be placed outside the farm;

Ostrich Incubator when placed in a barn, hatches ostrich eggs into baby ostriches;

Solar Panel slowly generates batteries when left in the sun;

Statue of True Perfection produces a prismatic shard each day;

Stone Chest is a variant of chest crafted with stone instead of wood;

Telephone calls stores to check hours and inventory, and occasionally receive random phone calls (no effect on gameplay);

Warp Totem: Island warps to the Fern Islands.

Bug Steak;

Banana Pudding;

Ginger;

Ginger Ale;

Ginger Beer;

Mango Sticky Rice;

Piña Colada;

Poi;

Taro Root;

Tropical Curry;

Squid Ink Ravioli (temporarily prevents debuffs).

Deluxe Fertilizer increases chance of higher-quality crops;

Deluxe Retaining Soil always keeps soil watered overnight;

Hyper Speed-Gro increases growth rate by at least 33%.

Bone Fragment;

Fossilized Skull, Spine, Tail, Legs, and Ribs and Snake Skull, Snake Vertebrae;

Cinder Shard;

Dragon Tooth;

Tiger Slime Egg;

Fairy Dust can used on a machine to have it finish processing;

Golden Walnut;

Magma Cap;

Monster Musk causes more monsters to spawn;

Mummified Bat and Mummified Frog;

Ostrich Egg;

Qi Gem;

Qi Seasoning increases quality of cooked recipes;

Radioactive Ore and Radioactive Bar;

Taro Tuber;

Horse Flute summons your horse when outside;

Mushroom Tree Seed.

Auto-Petter… a late-game Joja route item, but also obtainable very rarely by other means

  • Added new fishing tackle:

Curiosity Lure increases the chance to catch rare fish;

Quality Bobber increases fish quality;

Magic Bait catches fish from any season/time/weather for a given location.

Advanced TV Remote;

Arctic Shard;

Ectoplasm;

Gourmet Tomato Salt;

Pierre’s Missing Stocklist;

Pirate’s Locket;

Prismatic Jelly;

Stardew Valley Rose;

War Memento;

Wriggling Worm.

Glowstone Ring provides both light and increased item collection radius;

Hot Java Ring increases your chance to find coffee drinks when slaying monsters;

Immunity Band reduces chance of status debuffs by 40%;

Phoenix Ring restores some health after being knocked out once per day.

Protection Ring keeps you invincible longer after taking damage;

Soul Sapper Ring restores a bit of energy after slaying a monster;

Thorns Ring damages enemies when they attack you.

???;

Dark Cowboy Hat;

Deluxe Pirate Hat;

Forager’s Hat;

Goggles;

Golden Helmet;

Mr. Qi’s Hat;

Pink Bow;

Qi Mask (secret);

Radioactive Goggles;

Star Helmet;

Sunglasses;

Swashbuckler Hat;

Tiger Hat;

Warrior Helmet.

Banana Shirt;

Ginger Overalls;

Hot Pink Shirt;

Magenta Shirt;

Tropical Sunrise Shirt;

Yellow Suit.

Cinderclown Shoes;

Mermaid Boots;

Dragonscale Boots;

Crystal Shoes;

Dwarf Sword, Dwarf Hammer, and Dwarf Dagger;

Dragontooth Cutlass, Dragontooth Club, and Dragontooth Shiv;

Infinity Blade, Infinity Dagger, and Infinity Gavel;

Iridium Needle;

Ossified Blade;

some previously inaccessible items have also been made accessible.

Stingray;

Lionfish;

Blue Discus;

Legendary fish:

Glacierfish Jr.;

Legend II;

Ms. Angler;

Radioactive Carp;

Son of Crimsonfish.

35 paintings (many only found in festival shops or while fishing certain locations);

14 bed variants;

ten rugs:

Blossom Rug;

Funky Rug;

Icy Rug;

Large Cottage Rug;

Large Green Rug;

Large Red Rug;

Light Green Rug;

Modern Rug;

Oceanic Rug;

Old World Rug;

eight ‘floor divider’ rugs that can be placed between rooms to join visually different floor types;

five fish tanks you can put fish in;

Decorative Trash Can;

Gourmand Statue;

Iridium Krobus;

Large Brown Couch;

Plain Torch and Stump Torch;

Squirrel Figurine;

Tropical Chair.

  • Added a new ‘sconce’ furniture type with seven options.
  • Added new flooring:

Rustic Plank Floor;

Stone Walkway Floor.

  • Added new debuffs from enemies:

Darkness (dims lighting, making it harder to see in caves);

Nauseated (prevents you from eating anything);

Weakness (-20 Attack).

  • Added 15 new hair styles.
  • Added mail from Krobus with his own stationary.
  • Added new decorations and tweaks to many maps.
  • Added new easter egg on the title screen.
  • Added easter egg when you change your name at the The Shrine of Illusions to include item spawn codes.
  • Emily now visits Sandy on her birthday.

Quality of life changes

  • Added lost & found box in Mayor Lewis’ house. This can be used to retrieve items donated to failed special orders, lost quest items and tools, items from offline players, hats from children that have been turned into doves, and items left behind in the Stardew Valley Fair grange display.
  • You can now sit on chairs (both placed furniture and chairs that are part of the map).
  • You can now place most furniture outside.
  • You can now talk to people while mounted on a horse.
  • You can now donate items of different qualities for the same community bundle ingredient.
  • You can no longer plant fruit trees on tiles they won’t be able to grow on.
  • Improved game menus and HUD:

The social tab now shows whether you talked to an NPC today.

The cooking tab now shows the recipe for an item when you hover over it.

The cooking tab now fades icons for recipes you know but haven’t made yet.

The cooking/crafting tooltips now show the number produced.

The inventory menu’s organize button now combines partial item stacks.

The inventory menu for a chest chest now shows the Community Center button.

The shipment screen now shows the unit price of shipped items instead of displaying the shipped quantity twice.

The quest log now shows an arrow in the morning when you have pending completed quests.

Buff icons now subtly pulse when they’re close to expiring.

Added a notification when you enter a farm building if an incubator is ready but the building is at max capacity.

The “infestation” indicator in the mines is now drawn alongside the floor number, rather than replacing it.

You can now press ESC or controller B to move the held item to your inventory (or drop it if you have no more inventory room).

While holding a purchase, the inventory now highlights items you can stack it with.

Sprinklers can now water Slime Hutch troughs.

Hoes no longer remove sprinklers.

  • Improved Journey of the Prairie King:

Progress can now be saved and resumed, so it can be completed in multiple sessions.

You now also replay the original difficulty even if you’ve already completed it. (Previously it would increase difficulty automatically, which is now a New Game+ mode.)

added option to choose between multiple fish-bite chime sounds;

added option to mute farm animals and pets;

you can now scale the UI independently of the view zoom;

increased maximum zoom from 120% to 200%.

The jukebox now has a “Random” setting.

Removing a crystalarium that isn’t ready for harvest will now drop the gem that was placed in it.

You can now push chests containing items by holding the interact button on them with no tool equipped (the same way you could previously remove empty chests without using a tool).

  • Improved inventory sorting:

no longer changes tool order;

now sorts by quality too;

now sorts names in alphabetical instead of reverse alphabetical order.

  • Improved museum donation interactions:

Clicking an item now grabs one instead of the whole stack.

Pressing back while placing an item now returns to the inventory instead of closing the whole UI.

Other minor improvements.

Balance changes

Immunity now reduces the chance of status debuffs.

Changed special move cooldowns on daggers (6→3 seconds) and clubs (4→6 seconds).

The dagger special attack now pins the target in place until the last stab (which then knocks them back), so dagger hits are less likely to miss.

Reduced desperado profession’s damage bonus from 3x to 2x.

Slightly improved dagger critical hit chance.

Changed Skull Brazier recipe (was 10 Hardwood + Solar Essence + Coal; now 10 Bone Fragments).

Repairing a fence now restores full fence health, instead of half the health of a new fence.

Lowered the cost of ducks (2000→600g).

Doubled the value of duck feathers.

Slightly increased the duck feather spawn rate.

Fishing rod tackle no longer loses endurance when catching junk.

Catching a non-fish item no longer triggers the minigame.

Reaching an effective fishing level of 15+ now increases the rod casting range by one tile.

Gem nodes now provide mining XP and can drop diamonds.

Gem node drops are no longer limited by mine level.

Stumps and hollow logs now have a 10% chance of dropping Mahogany Seed.

Any monster in the Secret Woods now has a 10% chance of dropping Mahogany Seed.

Skeletons now have 4% chance of dropping a Bone Sword.

Wilderness Golems now drop rice shoots more often.

Some Skull Cavern monsters now have a small chance of dropping Red Cabbage Seeds.

Pure-white slimes now drop diamonds and refined quartz.

Some containers now drop better items after reaching the bottom of the mines at least once.

Different drops now unlock on mine levels 60/80/100 and the first level of the Skull Cavern.

Reduced chance of Lead Rod drops on mine levels 60–79 (or Skull Cavern level 40+ before the previous fix), and added chance for Shadow Dagger and Wood Mallet.

Mine wood barrels can now drop Basic Retaining Soil instead of Sap.

Mine frost barrels can now drop Quality Retaining Soil instead of Sap.

Reduced chance of frost barrels dropping Aquamarine, Frozen Geode, Hardwood, Jade, or equipment from 35% to 26%.

Pierre will now sell his seasonal items year-round once you complete a certain new quest.

Added two more items to the Stardew Valley Fair star token shop.

Reduced Workbench price (3000→2000g).

Coconuts can be purchased from Sandy on Monday. This is now limited to ten per day.

Some machines’ processing time was previously affected by the time of day. These have been standardized so they’re always ready when the morning starts: Bee House (every 4 days), Mushroom Box (2 days), Strange Capsule (3 days), Tapper (depends on input), and Worm Bin (every morning).

  • Doubled star token rewards for the slingshot and fishing minigames at the Stardew Valley Fair.
  • Fertilizer in the greenhouse no longer disappears on season change in some cases.
  • The random Stone Owl and Strange Capsule night events are now much less rare.

Multiplayer changes

  • Added local split-screen multiplayer mode.
  • The join co-op screen now remembers the last IP you entered.
  • Farmhands can now move buildings through Robin’s menu. The host can configure how this works (disabled, enabled, or only for a player’s own cabin).
  • Using the return scepter now returns farmhands to their cabin’s front door instead of the host’s farmhouse.
  • Added various new chat messages when a player does something.
  • When viewing a shared event in multiplayer (such as the Community Center event, or Morris’ introduction), you are no longer forcibly warped to the event location.
  • When the host player sees the year 3 event, Grandpa’s Theme is now added to all players’ jukeboxes even if they didn’t weren’t in-game at the time.

Interaction changes

  • Reworked slingshot controls: it now aims at the cursor position, and is fired by holding and releasing the mouse/gamepad fire button. The previous mode (where you’d hold the button and pull back on the cursor to aim) can be re-enabled in the options menu if desired.
  • To simplify bulk actions like harvesting, holding down a button while moving will no longer repeat weapon special attacks, open/close barn/coop doors, or interact with boulders, chests, furniture, hollow logs, meteorites, shipping bins, or scarecrows.
  • Constructed shipping bins now have a click-to-ship hitbox that better matches the original map-based shipping bin’s hitbox.
  • Flooring can now be applied by clicking on the tile the farmer is standing on. Previously, flooring had to be applied to a tile next to the farmer.
  • Purchasing recipes with a full inventory no longer shows a message that the inventory is full.
  • Clicking an empty tile right above an interactive element (like a machine or chest) now activates the element, similar to clicking below it in previous versions.
  • Trees chopped from above or below will now take into consideration the player’s horizontal position when falling to the left or right.
  • Clicking near the bottom-left corner of the screen no longer brings up the chat box.
  • You can no longer open the quest log by pressing the on-screen journal button if you’re currently doing something.
  • You can now use the “Y” key to answer dialogue boxes for holes and exit ladders in the mines.
  • Controller improvements:

When buying/betting tokens in the Stardew Valley Festival with a controller, holding the number selection button now causes the amount to increase faster.

Events can now be skipped on the controller even if a dialogue box is on-screen.

Pressing B on a controller while on a specific quest page now returns to the quest list instead of closing the menu.

Pressing B on a controller while an item is held on the crafting menu now snaps to the trash can (similar to the inventory screen).

Other changes

  • Save names are now based on the farm name instead of the player name. (Saves originally created before 1.5 will continue using the player name.)
  • Penny and the Dwarf now like artifacts.
  • Improved dinosaur sleep sprites.
  • Characters now face you when you talk to them instead of when the dialogue box closes (in singleplayer).
  • On the final day of a tracked quest, the timer now says “final day” instead of “1 day” for clarity.
  • Added many changes for modders.
  • Cosmetic tweaks to various sprites.

Fixes for multiplayer

  • Fixed an issue where fences would degrade faster in Multiplayer.
  • Fixed issue where a farmhand crashing while completing the final bundle could permanently prevent the unlock from properly triggering. It is now unlocked the next time a character enters the area.
  • Farmhands are now properly positioned under the elevator instead of the ladder when using it to navigate the mines.
  • Fixed an issue where other farmers’ emotes would not playback properly if you were watching an event.
  • Fixed a minor issue where multiple players getting the free coffee gift at the Night Market at the same time could prevent anyone from receiving it.
  • Fixed the note from Grandpa reappearing for farmhands.
  • Fixed issue where cows in Haley’s photoshoot event could be seen sliding around for farmhands. (Non-actor characters in events are now controlled by the host.)

Fixes for player interaction

  • Fixed rare controller and mouse input drops.
  • Fixed being unable to remount a horse after dismounting it behind a shipping bin.
  • Fixed issue where it would sometimes be impossible to name an animal with a controller because the onscreen keyboard would appear and disappear in the same frame.
  • Fixed character customization screen’s hair color slider not properly updating when hair color is randomized.
  • Fixed some farm tiles incorrectly preventing buildings from being placed on them.

Fixes for visual or cosmetic issues

  • Adjusted the sorting of item ready indicators for tappers.
  • Unified when night tiles get applied to fix inconsistencies when windows change from light to dark.
  • The critters list is now cleared out overnight. This fixes an issue where having a Butterfly Hutch in your house and repeatedly sleeping without leaving would spawn endless butterflies in the house.
  • Improved various text:

Fixed some localizations using inches for fish measurements to reference centimeters.

Fixed mill description not mentioning rice.

Fixed typos in dialogue and events.

Fixed missing characters in Chinese and Korean fonts.

Fixed credits not showing localizer names correctly if the current language’s font doesn’t have the needed characters.

Improved many translations.

  • Fixed various cosmetic/layering issues with character shadows.
  • Fixed characters in events snapping to strange animation frames when skipping an event.
  • Fixed various instances where the camera would pan unnecessarily after changing locations.
  • Fixed greenhouse trees taking on seasonal appearances.
  • Fixed tooltip for purchasing edible but non-health-restoring items (like crocus) showing price outside of the tooltip.
  • Fixed a single-frame flicker in Haley’s 10-heart event.
  • Fixed a single frame flicker of the farm when starting a new game.
  • Fixed stamina bar showing sweat particles when fishing during the fishing competition.
  • Fixed the scythe showing the weapon ability cooldown effects.
  • Fixed the erroneous door tile visible on the south end of the standard farm during winter.
  • Fixed issue where unlocking multiple community center bundles at once would make the screen pan to the same room multiple times.
  • Fixed various issues related to the Festival of Ice map, like being able to escape the festival bounds or prematurely end the festival from certain tiles, and minor visual fixes.
  • Fixed terrain features showing an “interact” cursor when mousing over their tiles during festivals.
  • Fixed options page scrollbar sometimes going past the end of the scrollbar region.
  • Fixed various text overflow issues on the options page.
  • Fixed chests spawned on certain Skull Cavern floors being shifted down by 4 tiles.
  • Fixed tiling of…

floor tiles in the farmhouse so applied flooring in adjacent rooms appear contiguous instead of having hard edges;

wall tiles in the farmhouse to fix sorting of certain objects that extend outside normal tile boundaries (e.g. grass starter).

the fountain so that it has a more consistent appearance throughout the seasons;

Pierre’s stand at the Egg Festival to fix layering issues.

Other bug fixes

  • Fixed crash when resizing game window in some cases.
  • Fixed rare crash on launch due to invalid game window size options.
  • Fixed Iridium Bat kills not counting towards Adventurer’s Guild bat eradication goal.
  • Fixed an issue where the Mermaid Show reward was delayed incorrectly.
  • Fixed some events showing a dark blue screen after fading out when viewed during rainy days.
  • Fixed museum-related rarecrows not sold at the Night Market after being unlocked.
  • Fixed issue where non-wooden gates would revert to wooden gates after saving & loading a game.
  • Fixed being able to add staircases to the Luau.
  • Fixed an item duplication exploit related to chest organization.
  • Fixed a minor desync in character pathfinding that could happen when characters pathed to the JojaMart on modded games.
  • Fixed Penny walking through walls on rainy days if you’ve completed the community upgrade.
  • Fixed Penny’s 4-heart event not accessible once you finish the community upgrade.
  • Fixed fences not collected correctly after a divorce or Penny’s 14-heart event.
  • Fixed characters greeting you when you enter a location when they’re not present.
  • Fixed characters you divorced still greeting you when you enter a location.
  • Fixed issue where an NPC spouse fails to pathfind when a player/NPC is blocking the front door when they check, causing them to stand in place instead.
  • Fixed crops sometimes growing a day slower than they should.
  • Fixed applying flooring for the first time in an upgraded house sometimes causing the flooring in the kitchen to switch to the default wooden flooring.
  • Fixed issue where riding a horse while travelling from one location to another diagonally would repeatedly warp back and forth between the two locations.
  • Fixed watered slime hutch troughs emptied when you load a save. (This mainly affects loading a mid-day save on mobile.)
  • Fixed the community center not properly loading the refurbished map variant on game load. This caused characters like Maru to path incorrectly in them if the player had not visited the Community Center during that playthrough.
  • Fixed the weekly friendship boost for giving an NPC two gifts not applied if you also gave them a third gift for their birthday.
  • Fixed overnight lightning not randomized correctly, so either every overnight lightning would strike or none of them would.
  • Fixed issue where stones, wood, and weeds could spawn on top of terrain features when a new year begins.



Read original article here

Santa Maria Valley, California, will pay tourists to visit

For officials in one small town, it was a wake-up call to develop a plan to help the local businesses.

The result was a program called “Visit Santa Maria Valley,” which will pay tourists $100 to travel there and stay for a minimum of two nights at one of the many hotels in the area. The payment comes in the form of a voucher that can be used at any of the town’s wineries, breweries or restaurants. The promotion starts on February 4 and ends March 31.

Santa Maria Valley, which lies about 65 miles north of Santa Barbara, offers many of the same amenities as the more well-known California destinations, but at a lower price, officials said.

“Santa Maria Valley has so much to offer,” Jennifer Harrison, Direct of the Santa Maria Valley Visitors Bureau, told CNN. “We have beautiful beaches, hotels and wineries that are such a great option for budget-conscious travelers during a time of economic rebound.”
Indeed, the Central Coast region boasts 13 beaches and 34 tasting rooms all within a 30-minute drive, according to the Santa Maria Valley website which lists dozens of activities including hiking, golfing, art exploration and birdwatching.

Safety first

Harrison said her team is working diligently to follow CDC safety protocols, adding that Santa Maria Valley is less crowded than other California destinations and can more easily enforce social-distancing guidelines.

She also mentioned that the town typically attracts visitors that come by car, rather than plane, due to the somewhat remote location.

“‘Visit Santa Maria Valley’ is calling on visitors to discover the region in a safe, responsible way,” Harrison said. “Our wine-tasting rooms, outdoor spaces, restaurants and hotels have worked together to evolve health and safety protocols so that visitors can experience the charm of the area.”

The program was launched as Yelp’s 2020 Economic Average report recently found that small towns which rely on tourism have been significantly affected by the pandemic.

Read original article here

Winter Storm For Susquehanna Valley Sunday & Monday

WINTER STORM WARNING FOR THE SUSQUEHANNA VALLEY 3 AM SUNDAY TO 5 AM TUESDAYThe Susquehanna Valley should prepare for an impactful winter storm starting late Sunday morning, continue through Monday, then end early Tuesday morning. The Susquehanna Valley could see moderate to heavy snow at times, especially late Monday morning through Monday evening if conditions are favorable and a developing coastal low sets up in the right spot. High pressure centered over the region will keep weather cold and quiet for Saturday night. Temperatures fall to the lower 20s to upper teens for our overnight lows. Cloud cover from the approaching storm moves in from the southwest by dawn Sunday morning. The snow is expected to fall in two waves. The first wave of snow for us will start to fall late Sunday morning to early Sunday afternoon while the storm is moving across the Ohio River Valley. Temperatures will be in the mid 20s in the morning and then only rise to around 30 degrees by the mid afternoon. Steady light snow is expected through much of Sunday afternoon and early evening. By dusk, snowfall totals could be between 2 to 4 inches across the Valley. Be prepared for minor travel disruptions starting early Sunday afternoon and intensify through the early evening. The Ohio Valley storm will then begin to transfer its storm energy to a developing coastal storm Sunday night. As it does so, there may be a lull in the snowfall. Also, because of a more northerly track of the Ohio Valley storm, some warmer air may mix into the storm at cloud level. This could allow for a changeover from all snow to a wintry mix of snow/sleet/and rain for areas along and south of the Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76). This switch over may glaze over some roads Sunday night into early Monday morning, making travel more difficult. It may also greatly impact our snowfall forecast totals. If we see more of a mix, or less intense precipitation, our overall snowfall totals may be lower. Our second wave of snow arrives Monday. By dawn Monday, the coastal storm will have fully developed and begin to head northward or northeastward. The bulk of our snow is expected to fall from late Monday morning, through the afternoon and early evening hours. Where this storm is located off the East Coast will have a huge role on just how much snow we could see through the day Monday. A 50 mile shift in track could mean the difference between seeing just a few inches of snow or possibly upwards of a foot of snow. Right now the current WGAL News 8 Storm Team believes much of the Susquehanna Valley should prepare for at least a plowable snow and possibly upwards of a foot of snow by Monday night. There is also some indication that there could be prolonged heavy snowfall in a few narrow bands due to the way the storm is forecast to be positioned off the East Coast. Where these heavy bands set up is yet to be determined. There is still a chance the storm could stay far enough out to sea drier air gets pulled into the storm and the storm shuts down completely earlier in the day Monday. There are a lot of moving parts and with this forecast, so please check back frequently for more updates through the weekend. The snow tapers and ends Monday night into Tuesday, but some light additional snowfall is possible. This snow is expected to be lighter, fluffier than the snow that falls for most of Monday, so some minor drifting is possible for travel late Monday night into Tuesday. Highs Tuesday will be in the lower 30s.Extended forecast:Wednesday: Partly sunny. High: 38. Thursday: Partly sunny. Chance of few snow showers late. High: 40. Friday: Mostly cloudy. Chance of rain/snow. High: 44. Saturday: Partly sunny. High: 40.

WINTER STORM WARNING FOR THE SUSQUEHANNA VALLEY 3 AM SUNDAY TO 5 AM TUESDAY

The Susquehanna Valley should prepare for an impactful winter storm starting late Sunday morning, continue through Monday, then end early Tuesday morning. The Susquehanna Valley could see moderate to heavy snow at times, especially late Monday morning through Monday evening if conditions are favorable and a developing coastal low sets up in the right spot.

High pressure centered over the region will keep weather cold and quiet for Saturday night. Temperatures fall to the lower 20s to upper teens for our overnight lows. Cloud cover from the approaching storm moves in from the southwest by dawn Sunday morning.

The snow is expected to fall in two waves. The first wave of snow for us will start to fall late Sunday morning to early Sunday afternoon while the storm is moving across the Ohio River Valley. Temperatures will be in the mid 20s in the morning and then only rise to around 30 degrees by the mid afternoon. Steady light snow is expected through much of Sunday afternoon and early evening. By dusk, snowfall totals could be between 2 to 4 inches across the Valley. Be prepared for minor travel disruptions starting early Sunday afternoon and intensify through the early evening.

The Ohio Valley storm will then begin to transfer its storm energy to a developing coastal storm Sunday night. As it does so, there may be a lull in the snowfall. Also, because of a more northerly track of the Ohio Valley storm, some warmer air may mix into the storm at cloud level. This could allow for a changeover from all snow to a wintry mix of snow/sleet/and rain for areas along and south of the Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76). This switch over may glaze over some roads Sunday night into early Monday morning, making travel more difficult. It may also greatly impact our snowfall forecast totals. If we see more of a mix, or less intense precipitation, our overall snowfall totals may be lower.

Our second wave of snow arrives Monday. By dawn Monday, the coastal storm will have fully developed and begin to head northward or northeastward. The bulk of our snow is expected to fall from late Monday morning, through the afternoon and early evening hours.

Where this storm is located off the East Coast will have a huge role on just how much snow we could see through the day Monday. A 50 mile shift in track could mean the difference between seeing just a few inches of snow or possibly upwards of a foot of snow. Right now the current WGAL News 8 Storm Team believes much of the Susquehanna Valley should prepare for at least a plowable snow and possibly upwards of a foot of snow by Monday night. There is also some indication that there could be prolonged heavy snowfall in a few narrow bands due to the way the storm is forecast to be positioned off the East Coast. Where these heavy bands set up is yet to be determined. There is still a chance the storm could stay far enough out to sea drier air gets pulled into the storm and the storm shuts down completely earlier in the day Monday.

There are a lot of moving parts and with this forecast, so please check back frequently for more updates through the weekend.

The snow tapers and ends Monday night into Tuesday, but some light additional snowfall is possible. This snow is expected to be lighter, fluffier than the snow that falls for most of Monday, so some minor drifting is possible for travel late Monday night into Tuesday. Highs Tuesday will be in the lower 30s.

Extended forecast:

Wednesday: Partly sunny. High: 38.

Thursday: Partly sunny. Chance of few snow showers late. High: 40.

Friday: Mostly cloudy. Chance of rain/snow. High: 44.

Saturday: Partly sunny. High: 40.

Read original article here