Wednesday, November 22 2017

Your complete guide to Thanksgiving and Black Friday in Columbus 🦃🛍🛒

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Welcome to Wednesday. It's James.

Let me be the first to wish you a Happy Thanksgiving! (I hope anyway, given that we're still a day out - but no newsletter tomorrow, so gotta do it now.)

I hope you have a happy and warm day filled with good food, relaxing time with family and/or friends, and as little family political discussion as possible.

Once that is behind you, thoughts may turn to Black Friday. Everyone seems to have strong opinions on the day, but if you're someone that likes to get your Christmas shopping done when there are savings to be had, then we have put together a guide for you. We have links to all of the major retailers ads, as well as info on what local businesses are doing, including some off the beaten path offers and deals.

Navigator full story: Your Guide To Black Friday Shopping Deals In ColumbusBonus shopping: 10 Local Spots To Check Out On Small Business SaturdayOur Thanksgiving coverage:Don't feel like cooking this Thanksgiving? These 18 Columbus restaurants will be open.And if you're feeling ambitious, here's our guide to Thanksgiving Day Turkey Trot options.

Wednesday Weather 🌡38 - Mostly sunny. 🌤

Navigator Originals ✏️Columbus’ First Dedicated Mountain Biking Trail Is Set To Open Late 2018It might surprise you to hear that Columbus has no dedicated space for mountain biking, but that will change in 2018. A three mile trail, starting at Berliner Park and running along the Scioto River, will be created and it'll have space for clinics and areas for riders to test balance and agility.Thankful For Nature? Spend Black Friday Camping–For FreeThis was included in our Black Friday guide up above, but we thought this offer was worth breaking out and highlighting in it's own piece. ODNR is waiving all camping fees for Friday, November 24 as part of REI's #optoutside campaign. If you're tough enough for cold weather camping it's your time to shine.

Around Town 🏘Our Columbus Crew tied Toronto FC 0-0 in the first leg of the conference championships. Not the result they were looking for, but on the plus side they didn't give up an away goal (which is a tiebreaker in these things). It'll come down to next Wednesday's game at Toronto. A national writer from NBC Sports noted the lack of gates being open before the game and called it outright sabotage by owner Anthony Precourt. Fans had to wait in a half mile long line to enter the stadium, causing empty seats at kick off (here's a picture of the insane lines 20 minutes before the game). [NBC Sports]The stadium proposal from Monday is a no go, as Abbott quickly made it clear they are not willing to give any of their downtown land to efforts to keep the Crew. The corporate response to all of this is something that will have to be discussed by the community in more detail once more of this has played out. It's been heartening to see medium sized businesses stepping up for the city [Statement from Doug Kridler walking back proposal]This is better than it really has any right to be: Ohio State's game winning touchdown vs. Michigan last year. In stop motion video LEGO form. [LandOf10]The Dispatch deployed a drone to take a look at what Cooper Stadium looks like now, and it looks about like what you're probably expecting: like a potential filming location for The Walking Dead. The stadium at one time was going to be a racetrack, but plans stalled - one change you'll notice: at some point half the bleachers were ripped out. [Dispatch]Did you use Uber before October 2016? Hackers got your data. And instead of letting everyone know, as they are legally required to do, Uber paid off the culprits in exchange for the data not being released (a thing that happens quite often, but isn't often talked about). [Bloomberg]

Longread 🏥There are just a handful of people using iron lungs in the U.S. And the machines they rely on to live are wearing out.Gizmodo: The Last of the Iron Lungs

Something to say? Hit reply - we read it all.Have a great Thanksgiving weekend.- James