Squeaking by

Poor Peter Brady. Puberty is awkward enough, but when you have to record a new single and your voice keeps cracking, it’s the worst. Thankfully for him, Greg stepped up and wrote a new song to accommodate those changing pipes. 

Like all growing boys, Peter’s voice eventually settled into a lower register. Not everyone winds up liking where their voice settles though. In fact, Billy Joel of all people just revealed he hates his own singing voice! 

C’mon Billy, take your own advice ;)

Black Friday may be the perennial retail shopping day, but that didn’t stop Americans from getting a head start this year, and on Thanksgiving Day of all days, too.

According to Adobe Analytics, Americans spent $6.1 billion on Thanksgiving Day this year, representing an 8.8% increase compared to last year. Thanksgiving last year also saw an increase compared to the year before, with sales jumping 5.5%.

These metrics are a mark of success for retailers and marketers who’ve long been making efforts to expand the shopping frenzy at this time of year beyond just the 24-hour window known as Black Friday.

“Cyber Week is off to a strong start, where bigger-than-expected discounts on Thanksgiving propelled impulse shopping in categories like electronics and apparel,” Vivek Pandya, lead analyst of Adobe Digital Insights, said in an emailed report.

A healthy percentage of this year’s gains came from the “buy now, pay later” trend, in which an item’s total can be paid for in multiple instalments rather than all at once. According to Adobe, $430 million of the sales made on Thanksgiving came from this category.

It was never really off the menu, but it just got easier to proverbially order with the elusive northern Danish territory’s new international airport.

The airport opened on Thursday in the capital city of Nuuk, and contains a 2,200-meter runway, allowing for jet airplanes to take off and land, and forging a stronger connection between the largest island on earth and the rest of the world.

Tourism is of course expected to ramp up with this key infrastructural addition. Travel to and from Copenhagen will pick up rather quickly, along with Reykjavik, Iceland. In June, United Airlines will begin flights out of Newark to Nuuk.

Until the opening of this airport, larger flights destined for Greenland would have to land further north at what were once American military bases, then fly into Nuuk on smaller aircraft.

Jens Lauridsen, CEO of Greenland Airports, says the Nuuk airport will likely add $200,000 to the Greenland economy—a not-insignificant number for a fairly remote destination.

“We’re located in the Arctic,” he told CNN, saying tourists are “in for an adventure when you come here.”

Global coffee prices continue their meteoric rise, and just reached their highest level since 1977, at which time the world was going through the oil-shock inflation crisis.

Arabica futures for March of next year rose to $3.2305 per pound, marking what’s now a 70% annual increase. Robusta beans, which are used mostly in instant coffee, rose to $5,533 per metric ton, marking an 80% annual rise.

The almost unbelievable pace of coffee inflation has been driven heavily by climate-related factors, including droughts, floods, and disease, which have also triggered global stock-piling behaviour as big businesses try to mitigate retail price hikes by hoarding beans before they cost even more.

At the same time, producers are stockpiling for the exact opposite reasons—prices will rise further, so they’re waiting to sell. 70% of Brazilian coffee producers are reportedly doing this after the same amount saw their yields disrupted by generational droughts, followed by generational floods.

1.7 million bags of arabica were reportedly stranded at Brazilian ports recently amid chaos in the country’s coffee supply chains.

Cosmo Kramer is likely not allowed in Barrington, Nova Scotia for the month of December, as the town has gone all out making its Christmas tree extra special and Nova Scotia-centric.

Instead of evergreen and tinsel, they used recycled lobster traps and a lighthouse as the star, symbolizing the small Canadian Maritime town’s “deep-rooted connection to the sea.”

“We’re the lobster capital of Canada, so it makes sense for us that our Christmas tree is made of these traps,” says Suzy Atwood, the director of marketing and tourism development for Barrington. 

The lobster trap tree is actually a Barrington tradition that’s been going on for the last 15 years, and its sentimentality isn’t just for the town’s proximity to the ocean, but its history in the ocean. Nearly 200 buoys adorn the exterior, many of which commemorate fishermen lost at sea.

“Just like how each lobster boat has its own colour and markings, each buoy has its own story, representing the lives dedicated to the ocean,” says Atwood. “It’s very meaningful.”

AC/DC announced they’d embark on a 13-date North American stadium tour next year, which will be the first time the band tours the continent in nearly a decade.

The North American leg of the Power Up tour will kick off in Minneapolis on April 10 and wrap up on May 28 in Cleveland, home of the Rock ‘N Roll Hall of Fame.

The last time the band played North America was for last year’s Power Trip Festival in Indio, California, but that marked the first show for the Aussie rock outfit since 2016’s Rock or Bust tour, which was interrupted by the departure of long-time frontman Brian Johnson.

The circumstances surrounding his departure aren’t completely clear. It was said to be due to hearing loss, but he’s suggested over the years that the reasons given didn’t tell the full story.

After being replaced for the final 23 dates on that tour by Axl Rose, Johnson returned to the band to record 2020’s Power Up, which topped charts across the world. The 2025 tour will belatedly support that record after the pandemic prevented any such promotion from happening.

Those are some pretty interesting Christmas trees they got out there in Barrington, Nova Scotia. You know who else had an interesting tree? Charlie Brown!

If you’re a fan of one of the most iconic Christmas specials of all time, you’ll love today’s trivia ;)

Have a great day ahead Staker!

Trivia courtesy of funtrivia.com. Today’s issue written by Michael Cowan, Joey Cowan, and Maureen Norman.