s777org ST. PAUL — Kris Bolle is living the “van life” these days with Annie, his mini Australian shepherd. Bolle, 46, bought a 2020 Dodge Ram ProMaster cargo van this past fall. The Hayfield resident planned, essentially, a studio apartment inside. The van with a high roof has room for a full bed, a small kitchen area and a writing desk. ADVERTISEMENT He saves money by forgoing rent, but there is a cost — isolation. It’s a lifestyle he’s grown accustomed to since he had to hide his sexuality over the years, including in the Navy under the now-defunct “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, which allowed gay and lesbian service members to stay in the military as long as they weren’t out, he said. “I had to be very, very tight-lipped about me ... so I’m used to it,” Bolle said. “But yes, it wears on you. It wears you down, and you feel isolated and you feel left out.” About 48% of Minnesotans feel left out some of the time or often, according to the “Minds of Minnesotans” survey conducted by APM Research Lab. The poll also finds that about half of Minnesotans feel lonely, at least some of the time. More specifically, 13% say they “often” lack companionship and another 35% lack companionship “some of the time.” Results were similar when Minnesotans were asked how often they feel left out and isolated from others. Bolle was one of 3,399 participants surveyed by the firm Lumaris. He said he often feels a lack of companionship as well. He hasn’t been in a relationship since 2009. He often feels left out and sometimes feels isolated. “I’m isolated in the sense where I really can’t find a suitable partner,” he said. His social connections are at his nursing assistant job, which he looks forward to, Bolle said. He’s never thoroughly enjoyed a job as much as his role at a skilled nursing facility, he said. ADVERTISEMENT “Work is great. I get to see people, I get to interact with people. I get to chat and talk and all the things that you know, that people do,” Bolle said. “That’s really hard to find.” The APM Research Lab included these questions in the survey, conducted this year between July 20 and Nov. 22, to better understand what the U.S. Surgeon General has called “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation.” The three questions used in the APM Research Lab survey were replicated from the widely used UCLA Loneliness Scale to help assess Minnesotans’ state of mind in the post-pandemic era, and possibly to help identify groups of Minnesotans that are faring better or worse with feelings of loneliness and isolation. In 2023, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy issued a report calling loneliness an epidemic, posing significant health risks akin to tobacco usage, obesity and addiction. Loneliness intersects with various aspects of people’s lives, said Carrie Henning-Smith, an associate professor in the Division of Health Policy and Management at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. “Social isolation and loneliness have profound impacts on health, on mortality risks, on all of the ways that our lives play out within health, within that sphere, but in so many other ways, too,” said Henning-Smith, who conducts research on rural populations as the co-director of the University of Minnesota Rural Health Research Center and the Rural Health Program. According to the U.S. Surgeon General report, “the physical health consequences of poor or insufficient connection include a 29 percent increased risk of heart disease, a 32 percent increased risk of stroke, and a 50 percent increased risk of developing dementia for older adults.” ADVERTISEMENT A lack of social connections increases the risk of premature death by more than 60%, the report added. Mary Jo Kreitzer, the founder and director of the Earl Bakken Center for Spirituality and Healing at the University of Minnesota, said the report is significant. “Just by him [Murthy] touching that subject, everybody remembers that he did,” she said. “People remembered that. Because I’m sure that everybody has somebody like that in their life, or they themselves are feeling lonely.” There’s also a stigma surrounding the idea of loneliness. “People are reluctant to admit that they feel lonely. It somehow means like that you’re unlikable or unlovable or there’s something wrong with you,” Henning-Smith said. “It’s important to have these conversations, because the truth is, just about everyone will feel lonely at some point in their life.” she added. “It's a universal part of being human.” Kreitzer said the data reported by APM Lab is comparable to other global and U.S. data on the subject. ADVERTISEMENT “Other studies, like this one found that loneliness peaks in younger age groups,” she said, calling it “a very interesting finding.” The survey found that the Gen Z cohort of 18 to 27, were the most lonely. “That surprises a lot of people, but I think it’s consistent with other data,” Kreitzer said. She said people assume that older people suffer from loneliness because they lack the social connections they once had earlier in their lives. The survey data, instead, showed that baby boomers, currently aged 60-78, are the least lonely of adult-age generations in Minnesota: 63% score as “rarely lonely” and only 7% indicated frequent loneliness. “Sometimes, like in the boomer generation, when people have retired, they actually have more time to build and strengthen connections,” Kreitzer said. “Boomers can be great at joining groups, pursuing interests, be that hobbies or fitness activities or book clubs or volunteering, and all of those are ways that can really help us build social connections.” She said her local YMCA in Grand Rapids is a hub of activity with engaged older folks. She sees them playing cards, working out, swimming and more. Gen Zers, however, are experiencing numerous life transitions. “During that age, they’re expected to separate from their family, to find a partner, to launch a career,” Kreitzer said. “So there’s been a lot of disruption in social connections that they probably have had in their life for a long, long time.” ADVERTISEMENT Henning-Smith called the loneliness rates among young adults “concerning.” Social media and technology may explain part of the higher rates. “People who live their lives online, people who are digital natives and were born into a world where they’re living their lives online, have fundamentally different ways of connecting with other people,” Henning-Smith said. “I worry that some of those skills and some of the infrastructure for connecting with people in meaningful ways and in-person connections might be lacking for some folks in younger generations.” Kreitzer suggests to those who may have frequent bouts of loneliness to acknowledge the feelings. Don’t ignore them. She advises them to reach out to family and friends to try to build or rebuild social connections. She also encourages people to join groups based on their interests. Kreitzer highly recommends volunteering because of the health benefits associated with it. “There’s actually research on that that, like, volunteering helps improve our own well-being,” she said. “It can actually improve our overall positive outlook, our mental health and well-being.” ADVERTISEMENT Back in Hayfield, Bolle said he tries to find community to fend off his loneliness. His location is a challenge because he finds groups in the Twin Cities some 90 miles away. He belongs to a spiritual group that meets once a week in Rochester, but that’s a 52-mile round trip, so he only goes from time to time. Bolle also prepares himself to encounter situations that bring on feelings of loneliness when he goes to Rochester on his weekends to run errands. “When I see families out having fun together, or groups of people, groups of young people, you know, out together and having fun, that can trigger pangs of loneliness,” he said. “I just feel like I’m missing out on human connection.” He said when he was younger, he bought into society’s emphasis on rugged individualism. “But it just doesn’t work, because you will almost ultimately, always end up feeling lonely,” he said. When he traveled the world with the Navy, Bolle said he saw community and family as top priorities in other countries as well as in the Mexican and Latino communities of Southern California where he grew up. “You really do need that connection with other people,” he said. “It’s almost as important as food and shelter, you know?” The data and the heart appear to agree. This story was originally published on MPRNews.org ______________________________________________________ This story was written by one of our partner news agencies. Forum Communications Company uses content from agencies such as Reuters, Kaiser Health News, Tribune News Service and others to provide a wider range of news to our readers. Learn more about the news services FCC uses here .

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NoneThe Packers have only 26 plays for 112 yards, have a turnover and a failed fourth down. They trail the Vikings 13-3 at halftime in a key NFC North battle. The Vikings did nothing with the game’s only turnover. Cam Bynum recovered a Josh Jacobs fumble at the Minnesota 38 that Jerry Tillery forced, but the Vikings gained only 17 yards before punting. They reached the Green Bay 39, 31, 7 and 32 on their next four drives of the half. Will Reichard missed a 57-yard field goal after the kick hit the crossbar, but he later made a chip-shot 25-yarder. Reichard missed a 55-yard attempt wide right on the final play of the half, but officials called Edgerrin Cooper offsides. The Packers were livid on the sideline with the call as Reichard then made a 50-yarder. The only touchdown of the first half was a 31-yard throw from Sam Darnold to a wide-open Jalen Nailor. The Vikings have 224 yards, with Darnold going 17-of-22 for 184 yards and a touchdown. Aaron Jones has eight carries for 30 yards, and T.J. Hockenson five catches for 68 yards. Justin Jefferson has two catches for 13 yards and Jordan Addison three for 29. The Packers settled for a red-zone field goal with Brandon McManus making a 22-yard chip-shot kick. The eight-play, 49-yard drive ended at the Minnesota 4. They went for it on fourth-and-2 on another drive that reached the Minnesota 23, but Jordan Love’s pass intended for Jayden Reed was incomplete. Love is 7-of-12 for 45 yards, and Josh Jacobs has 13 carries for 61 yards.US stocks experience mixed fortunes on quiet day of trading

L ooking for a new social media platform because X, Threads and Mastodon just aren’t cutting it? You could try Bluesky. People seeking to avoid chaos, noise and political bluster in the aftermath of the U.S. elections are noticing a different mood on the Bluesky social platform, where the vibe is seemingly welcoming and there are noticeably fewer trolls. The site announced it had rapidly added more than a million new users in the week after Election Day, and has emerged as one of the fastest growing rivals to Elon Musk’s X and similar platforms. If you’re tempted to check out the new space, here’s a guide on how Bluesky works: Maybe you’re not ready to commit to adding yet another social media account. No problem — you can still look around on Bluesky without signing up because all posts and profiles are public. You might get a sense of deja vu, because the platform’s look and feel are very similar to X. That should be no surprise because Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey was an early Bluesky champion. (Dorsey’s no longer involved with Bluesky, which is owned and run by its executive team as a public benefit corporation.) If you take the plunge and get an account, you’ll need a username. You’ll notice Bluesky handles are a little bit different because they end by default in the site’s domain, .bsky.social. You can personalize your handle to make it more memorable, by using your own website’s domain or buying a custom one through Bluesky. But it might not be something most newbie users need or want to do right away. Bluesky boasts that it gives users “algorithmic choice” to tailor the content they’re shown instead of leaving it up to the whims of a centralized system. “Our online experience doesn’t have to depend on billionaires unilaterally making decisions over what we see,” it says. What it means is that you can follow custom feeds set up by other users, or design your own. If you tap #Feeds in the menu on the left, you’ll see some default offerings like Cat Pics and Gardening. My Bangers is a list of your most popular posts by likes and Catch Up shows the site’s most popular posts from the past 24 hours. You can find more by doing a search and tapping the Feeds button. There’s also the usual “Discover” feed of suggested posts and a chronological feed of accounts that you follow. To help new users settle in, Bluesky has starter packs of recommended feeds and accounts to follow, which anyone can create and share. They don’t show up in Bluesky’s search results but can be found in directories online. Or someone might share one with you. After I signed up, a colleague pointed me to one for major news outlets. There are tens of thousands of starter packs, ranging from broadly appealing topics like Taylor Swift to niche interests like cargo bikes or U.K. comedians. You can follow the whole pack or scroll down the list to choose individual accounts. What about people you followed on X? There’s a browser extension tool called Sky Follower Bridge that will help you find X users who’ve migrated to Bluesky. But check before clicking the follow button to make sure it’s not a different user using the same display name or handle. Ready to join the conversation? You can write posts or reply to others but keep it short because there’s a limit of 300 characters — 20 more than on X. You can also upload photos and videos, though videos can’t be longer than 60 seconds. GIFs and emojis are, of course, available too. You can still @ people by typing in their username, like posts by tapping a heart icon or use hashtags to highlight a theme. Bluesky has added a menu to hashtags, so when you click on one you’ll get different options for seeing, or muting, posts on that topic. Bluesky’s decentralization ethos extends to the content control options it offers. For starters, users can choose in their settings menu whether to see replies, reposts or quote posts in their feed. Specific words or tags can be muted temporarily, or forever, while accounts can be muted or blocked individually, or in bulk by adding them a moderation list. You can even fine tune the level of adult content that shows up in your feed. Bluesky has a team of content moderators to police the site for material that’s illegal or breaks the rules. But it’s also taking a different approach by open-sourcing its content moderation system in an attempt to resolve problems with traditional moderation services which it says “lack transparency and user control.” So, individuals or groups can set up their own content filters, or labelers, that go beyond what Bluesky offers. These labelers can be used to categorize content or users, which can then be blocked or hidden. But they could also be used for informational or creative purposes, like curating or verifying content.White House says at least 8 US telecom firms, dozens of nations impacted by China hacking campaign

An investor in DMC Global Inc. (Nasdaq: BOOM) claims in a recently filed class-action lawsuit that key executives at the oilfield-services, construction-products and infrastructure firm intentionally withheld information about potential weakness in its largest business unit, a decision that hurt shareholders when DMC’s stock price plunged this fall after disclosures painted a less-than-rosy picture of DMC’s performance and outlook. Subscribe to continue reading this article. Already subscribed? To login in, click here.

The S&P 500 fell less than 0.1% after spending the day wavering between small gains and losses. The tiny loss ended the benchmark index’s three-day winning streak. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.1% and the Nasdaq composite fell 0.1%. Trading volume was lighter than usual as US markets reopened following the Christmas holiday. Semiconductor giant Nvidia, whose enormous valuation gives it an outsize influence on indexes, slipped 0.2%. Meta Platforms fell 0.7%, and Amazon and Netflix each fell 0.9%. Tesla was among the biggest decliners in the S&P 500, finishing 1.8% lower. Some tech companies fared better. Chip company Broadcom rose 2.4%, Micron Technology added 0.6% and Adobe gained 0.5%. Health care stocks were a bright spot. CVS Health rose 1.5% and Walgreens Boots Alliance added 5.3% for the biggest gain among S&P 500 stocks. Several retailers also gained ground. Target rose 3%, Ross Stores added 2.3%, Best Buy rose 2.9% and Dollar Tree gained 3.8%. Traders are watching to see whether retailers have a strong holiday season. The day after Christmas traditionally ranks among the top 10 biggest shopping days of the year, as consumers go online or rush to stores to cash in gift cards and raid bargain bins. US-listed shares in Honda and Nissan rose 4.1% and 16.4% respectively. The Japanese car makers announced earlier this week that the two companies are in talks to combine. All told, the S&P 500 fell 2.45 points to 6,037.59. The Dow added 28.77 points to 43,325.80. The Nasdaq fell 10.77 points to close at 20,020.36. Wall Street also got a labour market update. US applications for unemployment benefits held steady last week, though continuing claims rose to the highest level in three years, the Labour Department reported. Treasury yields mostly fell in the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury slipped to 4.58% from 4.59% late on Tuesday. Major European markets were closed, as well as Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and Indonesia. Trading was expected to be subdued this week with a thin slate of economic data on the calendar.Vikings defense has had a big boost this season from the indefatigable Jonathan Greenard

By Molly Farrar Rachael Rollins, the former U.S. Attorney who resigned amid a federal investigation into ethical violations last year, weighed in on the public corruption charges against Boston City Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson. Rollins appeared with At-Large City Councilor Julia Mejia online for “Woke Women Wednesdays,” hosted through WWOC Media . Mejia asked Rollins questions about the indictment against Fernandes Anderson, who represents District 7 consisting of Roxbury, Dorchester, Fenway, and part of the South End. Fernandes Anderson, who was arrested last week , is accused of orchestrating a kickback scheme involving a family member who she hired as part of her staff. She allegedly gave a large bonus to the staff member who agreed to give $7,000 back to the councilor. Rollins called into question the federal jurisdiction of the case. The bonus check involved in the scheme was made payable from a city account with Citizens Bank, a Rhode Island-based bank that processed the payment “via interstate wire communications,” federal prosecutors allege as part of their justification for a federal case. The City also received $10,000 in federal grants money in 2023, the indictment says. “Do you see what bullsh– this is? Excuse my language,” Rollins told Mejia. “This isn’t ‘Rachael Rollins was running drugs from Massachusetts to Rhode Island to New Hampshire, human trafficking people from Maine’... It seems petty.” Rollins hinted that prosecutors chose to target Fernandes Anderson with federal charges. The councilor is facing five counts of aiding and abetting wire fraud and one count of aiding and abetting theft concerning programs receiving federal funds. “I’m not saying she’s innocent, I’m not saying she’s guilty,” Rollins said, but “we can find a federal nexus for anything we want,” referring to the fine details of the allegations of Fernandes Anderson. Rollins also mentioned the 28 alleged customers of the brothel network in Boston that prosecutors have said included “wealthy and well-connected clientele” like politicians, military officers, lawyers, and tech and pharmaceutical executives. The alleged customers are facing charges in district court. “They don’t want to find a federal nexuses for people who look and live like them,” Rollins said. Rollins did not return a request for comment about her statements. Molly Farrar Molly Farrar is a general assignment reporter for Boston.com, focusing on education, politics, crime, and more. Boston.com Today Sign up to receive the latest headlines in your inbox each morning. Be civil. Be kind.Clinical Research Organization Global Template Market Set For 9.8% Growth, Reaching $86.33 Billion By 2028