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Colts 13-7 Falcons 4:36, 1st quarter

And our commentary team kindly informs us that Pierce’s brother played basketball in Germany. So him scoring today was meant to be I suppose.

Margot Robbie’s company to make movie based on Northern Ireland academics’ stories of poverty and prison

It started as a trawl of dusty archives for an academic project about female Irish emigrants in Canada and the US by two history professors, a worthy but perhaps niche topic for research.

The subjects, after all, were human flotsam from Ireland’s diaspora whose existence was often barely recorded, let alone remembered.

With the US government shut down over impending rises to insurance premiums, it’s clear the status quo cannot continue

Deductibles. In-network. Out-of-network. Concierge medical services. Out-of-pocket expenses. Co-payment. Co-insurance. Benefit advisers. Insurance brokers. Healthcare consultants. ACA. HMO. PPO. EPO. POS. HDHP. HSA. FSA. HRA. EOB. COBRA. SHOP. Single coverage. Dependent coverage. Premium tax credits.

Confused? You should be. Who understands all this stuff? Not the typical business owner. Nor the typical employee. Choosing the right healthcare insurance for our business – or for our families – seems like it requires a PhD in healthcare.

• Lionel Messi scores two and assists two in 4-0 win

• Cincinnati eliminates Columbus on late Brenner goal

Dayne St Clair scored and Andrew Thomas hit the crossbar in a penalty-kick shootout that was decided by the goalkeepers in the 11th round, and Minnesota United staged a shorthanded rally to beat the Seattle Sounders on Saturday in the rubber match of the best-of-three first-round series for the MLS Cup after a 3-3 tie in regulation

Thomas, who replaced starter Stefan Frei in the 89th minute with a shootout looming, appeared to injure a finger on a miss by Joaquín Pereyra to begin the shootout. He finished with a heavily taped hand.

• Rai wins on first playoff hole with eight-foot birdie

• Rory McIlroy third after record final round of 62

Aaron Rai held his nerve to win the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship on Sunday, beating Tommy Fleetwood on the first playoff hole after a dramatic final day.

The 30-year-old sunk a birdie from just over eight feet to seal victory, emulating his only previous Rolex Series win. That came at the 2020 Scottish Open, and was also a playoff victory over Fleetwood.

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Because he’d gone to the trouble of setting it up, I went to the interview – even though I didn’t have a visa

• Read more in the kindness of strangers series

In the late 1980s, I was setting off on a backpacking trip to Europe with a friend. They were interested in doing a master’s degree in New York, so we’d booked a two-week stay in the Big Apple on the way to London.

We arrived at the postgrad residence, a big 10-storey building on the Upper West Side called International House which had been set up by Rockefeller to house postgraduate students. We dropped our bags and went straight to the canteen, where we grabbed food, took a seat and started talking to other diners.

Jessica Guo hiked 30 miles a day, becoming the first woman to continuously hike two historic US trails in a calendar year

Jessica Guo had only slept for two-and-a-half hours on an overnight bus when she arrived at the Mexico-US border near Lordsburg, New Mexico, in April. Out of the window she saw a flat, shadeless landscape. First-day jitters had Guo questioning what she was doing there.

The former consultant had left corporate America to attempt something no woman had completed: a single, continuous hike of the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) and the Great Divide Trail (GDT) in one calendar year.

While it might be soothing to think you could replace social interactions like book clubs with ChatGPT, subcontracting human thought out to a bot will never bring happiness

This is depressing: according to the Cut, people are using AI to solve escape room puzzles and cheat at trivia nights. Surely, that is the definition of spoiling your own fun? “Like going into a corn maze and just wanting a straight line to the end,” says one TikToker quoted in the article. There’s also an interview with a keen reader who uses ChatGPT as a book club replacement, scraping the internet and aggregating “stimulating opinions and perspectives”. All well and good (actually, no, it sounds bleak as hell) until he had a character’s death spoilered in the fantasy epic he had been enjoying.

Meanwhile, Substack seems to be clogging up with AI-generated essays. The nu-blogging platform is an earnestly artisanal space where writers craft their stuff; subcontracting that to a bot seems like the acme of pointlessness. Will Storr, who writes about storytelling, examines this boggling trend and the tells that give it away on his own Substack, including a penchant for what he calls “the impersonal universal”: sweeping statements that sound deep but aren’t. There is, he says, “A white-noise generality to its insights, an uncanny vagueness that makes the mind glaze over.”

A dangerous faith in AI is sweeping American healthcare – with consequences for the basis of society itself

The computer interrupted while Pamela was still speaking. I had accompanied her – my dear friend – to a recent doctor’s appointment. She is in her 70s, lives alone while navigating multiple chronic health issues, and has been getting short of breath climbing the front stairs to her apartment. In the exam room, she spoke slowly and self-consciously, the way people often do when they are trying to describe their bodies and anxieties to strangers. Midway through her description of how she had been feeling, the doctor clicked his mouse and a block of text began to bloom across the computer monitor.

The clinic had adopted an artificial-intelligence scribe, and it was transcribing and summarizing the conversation in real time. It was also highlighting keywords, suggesting diagnostic possibilities and providing billing codes. The doctor, apparently satisfied that his computer had captured an adequate description of Pamela’s chief complaint and symptoms, turned away from us and began reviewing the text on the screen as Pamela kept speaking.

Anxiety can can disrupt relationships, affect sleep and lead to harmful coping behaviours. Early awareness is crucial

• The modern mind is a column where experts discuss mental health issues they are seeing in their work

When Mia*, 35, walks into my office, she looks composed and ready to start her day fresh with a counselling session. But having seen Mia for almost half a year now, I know she masks the truth behind her polished facade, and I notice the subtle tension in her shoulders that gives it away.

Mia tells me that the night before, she had poured herself “just one glass of wine” to unwind after a long day. One glass became two, then three. It’s a pattern she has grown used to; a quiet ritual that helps her “switch off” from the racing thoughts that flood her mind when the day finally slows down.

Alex de Minaur had a chance to win the first set, leading 5-3 in the tie-break, but Carlos Alcaraz would not be denied, coming back to take it 7-5 before playing a wondrous second

…and here comes the genius.

Here comes the Demon…

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Newcastle were horrible last week against West Ham, as Eddie Howe just admitted in his pre-match interview. “We have to deliver something different. That day (against West Ham) was painful for us. Hopefully, we have learnt a lot. Now we have to start picking up points.”

On Anthony Gordon: “He wasn’t close in the end. The scan revealed a very slight problem in his hip and it’s a good opportunity for Harvey (Barnes) to come in.”

Americans are choosing between heating their homes and putting food on the table. Officials and utilities can prevent this

As the stalemate over government funding and healthcare benefits continues, winter is approaching – but federal heating assistance, blocked by the shutdown, isn’t arriving in time. Millions of American families are about to face an impossible choice: heating their homes or putting food on the table. As the senator for a state known for its volatile winters and as executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association, we call on states and utilities to choose a different outcome for those families and shut off the shutoffs. A nationwide freeze on utilities’ ability to disconnect customers from heat for nonpayment isn’t about politics – it’s about public safety.

The breakdown in federal budget negotiations has frozen the release of funding for many of the essential services families rely on nationwide, including the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program (Liheap). Liheap helps struggling households keep their heat and lights on by helping eligible families pay their utility bills. With those dollars locked up in Washington gridlock, America’s seniors and working families are now at risk of losing power – just as temperatures start to plummet.

Edward J Markey represents Massachusetts in the United States Senate and is a long-time advocate for affordable energy, consumer protection, and climate action. Mark Wolfe is an an energy economist and serves as the executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association, representing the state directors of the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, and co-director of the Center on Climate, Energy and Poverty

Experts suspect that dust from the sea contains endotoxic bacteria membranes caused by fertilizer runoff

Chemical-laden dust from southern California’s drying Salton Sea is likely harming the lungs of people around the shrinking body of water, and the effects are especially pronounced in children, new peer-reviewed research from the University of California, Irvine, shows.

A separate peer-reviewed study from the University of California, Riverside, also found the Salton Sea’s contaminated dust seemed to alter lung microbiome, which could trigger pulmonary issues that have been reported around the lake.

Reform’s leader may hope to tread a similar path to Italy’s prime minister, but she is an experienced parliamentarian open to collaboration and compromise

One of the more striking images from June’s G7 summit showed a small group of world leaders engaged in an impromptu and informal evening chat at the venue’s restaurant. In the foreground of that photo was a familiar blond head: Giorgia Meloni.

During her three years as the Italian prime minister, Meloni has moved beyond her hard-right populism, not to mention her fascism-adjacent origins, to earn at least the respect of other leaders – Keir Starmer among them – for her pragmatism and flexibility. Among those watching this transformation from the sidelines will be the man hoping to be Starmer’s replacement: Nigel Farage.

No wait! This richly flavoured cornerstone of the US midwest is a treat on a cold day – here’s how to perfect it

Beer and cheese, two ingredients that don’t immediately scream soup to much of the world, are the cornerstones of one such midwestern speciality, particularly beloved in Wisconsin, with its prominent dairy and brewing industries. Beer soups are also found from Alsace to Russia (and, indeed, Wisconsin has a significant northern European heritage population). The cheese, however, appears to be an inspired American addition (though, seeing as Germany boasts both beer and cheese soups, I’m prepared to stand corrected), playing off the bittersweetness of the beer to produce a richly flavoured dish that’s perfectly suited to harsh midwestern winters. That said, it’s a treat on a cold day wherever you are.

(Note: this is not to be confused with German obatzda, while a thicker version is a popular hot dip in Kentucky, in particular.)

Exclusive: Mohammed Baraka’s case alleges discrimination on basis of nationality after EU counterparts were transferred

A Palestinian man who was dismissed from his job in Gaza after the war broke out is suing the European Union for allegedly breaching Belgian law.

Mohammed Baraka, who worked at the EU border assistance mission (EUBam) at Rafah after its inception in 2006 as an unarmed civilian third-party presence, has filed his case in a Belgian court.

Storage dwindles in Mashhad, home to 4 million people, as country struggles with drought

Water levels at the dam reservoirs supplying Iran’s north-eastern city of Mashhad have plunged below 3%, according to reports, as the country suffers from severe water shortages.

“The water storage in Mashhad’s dams has now fallen to less than 3%,” Hossein Esmaeilian, the chief executive of the water company in Iran’s second largest city by population, told the ISNA news agency.

Incursions halted flights at Brussels and Liège airports last week with Russia said to be the most likely culprit

Britain is deploying Royal Air Force specialists to help Belgium counter drone threats to the country’s airports after disruptive sightings last week that some politicians blamed on Russia.

Sir Richard Knighton, the head of the UK’s armed forces, said the British military would provide “our people, our equipment” to help Belgium, though he was careful to say “we don’t yet know” the origin of the drones seen last week.

After 45 years as chief fake blood thrower, Ingrid Newkirk is still waging war on everything from leather to cashmere. Is she still relevant?

Ingrid Newkirk was 54 when she thought she was going to die in a plane crash. It was late summer and the founder of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta) was flying from Minneapolis in the US to the company HQ in Norfolk, Virginia when her plane encountered strong wind shear. The pilot attempted an emergency landing, but failed; back up they went.

On the third attempt, with “a teaspoon of fuel” in the tank, he finally got the plane down safely. During those moments, Newkirk, now 76, scribbled a will on a napkin. She has tweaked it over the years, but it still reads like a horror movie prop list: her liver is to be sent to France to be made into foie gras, her skin to Hermès to create a handbag and her lips to whichever US president is in power, to shame them for granting a “patronising” pardon to a turkey each Thanksgiving. As wills go, it’s straight out of the Peta playbook: an audacious stunt of the kind that has made them the world’s most well-known, successful and in some quarters reviled animal rights organisation. “I know I’ll never be made a dame,” Newkirk says, laughing. “I’m too controversial.”

From back gardens to hi-tech hydroponics, the future of food doesn’t have to be rural

In 1982, artist Agnes Denes planted 2.2 acres of wheat on waste ground in New York’s Battery Park, near the recently completed World Trade Center. The towers soared over a golden field, as if dropped into Andrew Wyeth’s bucolic painting Christina’s World. Denes’s Wheatfield: A Confrontation was a challenge to what she called a “powerful paradox”: the absurdity of hunger in a wealthy world.

The global population in 1982 was 4.6 billion. By 2050, it will be more than double that, and the prospect of feeding everyone looks uncertain. Food insecurity already affects 2.3 billion people. Covid-19 and extreme weather have revealed the fragility of the food system. Denes was called a prophet for drawing attention to ecological breakdown decades before widespread public awareness. But perhaps she was prophetic, too, in foreseeing how we would feed ourselves. By 2050, more than two-thirds of us will live in cities. Could urban farming feed 10 billion?

They agreed on the importance of financial education, but how would a Trump supporter and a Green voter approach the issues of immigration and ICE?

Celestino, 55, Bristol

Occupation Retired

White House is manipulating voting system, from redistricting to rule changes, to affect midterms

A year out from the 2026 midterms, with Republicans feeling the blows from a string of losses in this week’s elections, Donald Trump and his allies are mounting a multipronged attack on almost every aspect of voting in the United States and raising what experts say are troubling questions about the future of one of the world’s oldest democracies.

While Democratic leaders continue to invest their hopes in a “blue wave” to overturn Republican majorities in the House and Senate next year, Trump and some prominent supporters have sought to discredit the possibility that Republicans could lose in a fair fight and are using that premise to justify demands for a drastically different kind of electoral system.