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Ghouls, goblins … and gummy bears.Trick-or-treaters may find more fruity candy than chocolate among their Halloween handouts this year. That should be fine with younger consumers, who have been gravitating for years toward non-chocolate candies like gummies, freeze-dried treats and other sweets that come in a variety of shapes, colors and flavors. Last year, 52% of the total volume of Halloween candy sold in the U.S. was made of chocolate, according to Dan Sadler, a principal for client insights at the market research company Circana. But in the 12 weeks ending Oct. 5, chocolate accounted for 44% of the Halloween…

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Find a shady spot under a tree, take a breath of fresh air and call me in the morning.Health care providers have long suggested stressed-out patients spend time outdoors. Now hundreds of providers are going a step further and issuing formal prescriptions to get outside. The tactic is gaining momentum as social media, political strife and wars abroad weigh on the American psyche.Of course, no one needs a prescription to get outside, but some doctors think that issuing the advice that way helps people take it seriously. “When I bring it up, it is almost like…

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The stakes. The famous faces. The posh private rooms. The clever cheating schemes. The federal indictment of a big-money poker ring involving NBA figures on Thursday, in which unsuspecting rich players were allegedly enticed to join then cheated of their money, echoed decades of movies and television, and not just because of the alleged Mafia involvement. Fictional and actual poker have long been in sort of a pop-cultural feedback loop. When authorities described the supposed circumstances of the games, they might’ve evoked a run of screen moments from recent decades. Poker in ‘Ocean’s Eleven,’ ‘Molly’s Game’…

BOSTON (AP) — When David Arsenault takes down a worn, leather-bound 19th-century book from the winding shelves of the Boston Athenaeum, he feels a sense of awe — like he’s handling an artifact in a museum. Many of the half a million books that line the library’s seemingly endless maze of reading room shelves and stacks were printed before his great-great-grandparents were born. Among fraying copies of Charles Dickens novels, Civil War-era biographies and town genealogies, everything has a history and a heartbeat. “It almost feels like you shouldn’t be able to take the books out of the building, it…

BOGOTÁ, Colombia (AP) — At age 72, Rosalba Casas finally celebrated her 15th birthday on Friday, donning a flowing pink dress and a tiara for the quinceañera she dreamed of as a teenager.“This is the happiest day because I’m celebrating my 15th birthday,” Casas said, adding that she’d stayed up all night thinking about the big day.It was the first time she wore professional makeup or a formal gown, or rode in a limousine, where she joined 28 other older women chosen by the Sueños Hechos (Dreams Come True) Foundation for belated birthday celebrations.Quinceañeras are a time-honored tradition in Latin…

For a quarter century, President Vladimir Putin has faced the specter of Russia’s shrinking and aging population.In 1999, a year before he came to power, the number of babies born in Russia plunged to its lowest recorded level. In 2005, Putin said the demographic woes needed to be resolved by maintaining “social and economic stability.”In 2019, he said the problem still “haunted” the country.As recently as Thursday, he told a Kremlin demographic conference that increasing births was “crucial” for Russia.Putin has launched initiatives to encourage people to have more children — from free school meals for large families to awarding…

PARIS (AP) — It was shortly after the stunning heist of the crown jewels at the Louvre when Paris-based Associated Press photographer Thibault Camus caught in his frame a dapperly dressed young man walking by uniformed French police officers, their car blocking one of the museum gates. Instinctively, he took the shot.It wasn’t a particularly great photo, with someone’s shoulder obscuring part of the foreground, Camus told himself. But it did the job — showing French police sealing off the world’s most-visited museum after the brazen daylight robbery last Sunday. Plus, Camus figured, the guy walking past the officers was…

CONAKRY, Guinea (AP) — Street art graffiti is spreading in West Africa. In Guinea’s capital, an artist from Senegal is transforming city walls and public perceptions. Omar Diaw says graffiti was seen as vandalism in Conakry not even a decade ago. He decided to change minds by starting with public awareness murals. This is a photo gallery curated by AP photo editors. Motorcyclists ride past a mural depicting a powerful woman on a street wall in Conakry, Guinea, Sunday, Oct. 19, 2025. (AP Photo/Misper Apawu) Motorcyclists ride past a mural depicting a powerful woman on a street wall in Conakry,…

LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — Conservationists and students cheered as three rescued sea turtles, endangered in this part of the world, made their way back into the ocean at a private beach in Nigeria’s economic hub of Lagos. Weeks after the turtles were rescued from fishermen, they were released back into the ocean becoming the latest of dozens of sea turtles saved by the Greenfingers Wildlife Conservation Initiative in recent years. This batch was released last weekend.“For fishermen, they are just food,” Chinedu Mogbo, founder of the Greenfingers group told The Associated Press. “There is no knowledge out there of wildlife.”…

ISTANBUL (AP) — On the streets of Istanbul, porters hauling massive sacks wrapped in white plastic — on their backs or in handcarts — are a ubiquitous yet often overlooked part of the city’s fabric. Known as hamallık in Turkish, porterage is a profession that has endured from the Ottoman Empire to the present day.It remains especially common in Istanbul’s historic trade quarters — the Egyptian Bazaar, the Grand Bazaar, and the Eminönü district — where traditional commercial buildings known as hans contain workshops and businesses that produce jewelry, textiles and other goods. Porters haul loads up the stairway in…