🌊 Adolescence Lasts Into Your... 30s?

Happy Thanksgiving, Roca Nation.

Allow us to say just two words: Thank you. We couldn't imagine a more fun and engaging community of readers than you all. You inspire us to rage against the Big News machine every day. If someone told us in November 2020 that RocaNews would have millions of readers just four years later, we’d have spat out our Yoo-hoo.

We also want to thank all of you who sent in responses to yesterday’s question asking who you’re grateful for this year. We highlighted the two giveaway-winning responses below.

Finally, make sure to do this week’s comedy-themed 20 Questions.

–Max and Max

KEY STORY

Study Shows Adolescence Lasts into 30s

A new brain study found that adolescence lasts into your 30s

• Researchers at the University of Cambridge published a study in Nature Communications on Tuesday where they studied MRI scans from 3,802 people between the ages of 0 and 90

• The team found the brain undergoes five broad phases throughout life. The second phase – adolescence – runs from age nine to 32, when the brain's communication networks become more refined and efficient

• The researchers said their findings could help scientists understand why certain mental health conditions and neurological disorders emerge at specific points in life, with the results providing important context for what brains might be best at or more vulnerable to at different life stages

Dig Deeper 

• The transition at age nine, when adolescence begins, coincides with the period when the risk of mental health disorders increases. One of the researchers said understanding that brain development occurs through major turning points, rather than a steady progression, could help identify when the brain's wiring is most vulnerable

KEY STORY

Consumer Confidence Drops in November

US consumer confidence in the economy fell in November by the most since April

• The Conference Board reported on Tuesday that its consumer confidence index dropped to 88.7 in November, down from 95.5 in October and the lowest number since April, when Trump's tariffs announcement caused the stock market to fall

• Economic expectations for the next six months fell to their lowest level since April, while people's views of current economic conditions were the most negative they have been in over a year

• Survey respondents cited several concerns affecting their outlook. Prices and inflation remained the top issues, followed by tariffs and trade policy. Many also mentioned the government shutdown, which ended earlier this month after becoming the longest closure in history

Dig Deeper 

• Americans also expressed growing anxiety about employment, with the share of people saying jobs were "plentiful" falling to 27.6%, down from 37% in December 2024. Meanwhile, 17.9% said jobs were "hard to get," up from 15.2% in September

• Major companies, including Amazon, UPS, Target, and Paramount, announced a wave of layoffs in October as they worked to restructure or integrate AI into their businesses

• The share of consumers expecting their incomes to rise over the next six months fell to the lowest level since February 2023. Buying plans for major purchases like cars, appliances, and homes all declined

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KEY STORY

Google Gains as AI Leader

Google’s new AI model has shaken up the AI race by leapfrogging ChatGPT/OpenAI as the new AI favorite

• Last week, Google released Gemini 3, its latest large language model. Tests, analysts, and investors believe the model’s capabilities surpass OpenAI's ChatGPT, long the market leader

• Unlike ChatGPT, which was trained using Nvidia chips, Google trained Gemini 3 using its own Tensor Processing Units (TPUs). Nvidia stock dropped sharply on Tuesday as a result

• Reports also emerged that Google was pitching potential clients, including Meta, on using its TPUs in their data centers instead of Nvidia's chips

Dig Deeper 

• Meta is considering using Google's chips in its data centers in 2027 and may rent them from Google's cloud division next year

• Google's parent company, Alphabet, has seen its stock rise sharply, pushing it close to a $4T market value for the first time. The company has added more than $1.5T in value this year, but remains $700B behind Nvidia's world-leading $4.5T market value

QUOTE OF THE DAY

KEY STORY

Ukraine Peace Talks Advance

Ukraine agreed to a US peace proposal while Russia signaled it may reject the plan

• US and Ukrainian officials met in Geneva over the weekend and revised a controversial 28-point Ukraine peace plan to 19 points, leaving sensitive issues for Trump and Zelensky to decide directly

• Ukraine told the Trump Administration on Tuesday it would sign the revised peace deal. Ukrainian officials said they reached agreement with American negotiators on most terms discussed in Geneva

• Russia's foreign minister said that Moscow would reject any plan that strayed from understandings reached between Trump and Putin at their Alaska summit in August

Dig Deeper 

• Ukraine's national security chief said President Zelensky hopes to travel to the US in the coming days to finalize remaining issues directly with Trump, including territorial questions and whether Ukraine can eventually join NATO

• A Kremlin spokesman called Trump's previous 28-point framework the only substantive proposal on offer and said it could be a basis for talks

• Russia launched missiles and drones on Kyiv on Tuesday that killed at least seven people. Zelensky said the attacks contradicted efforts to end the war, and Ukraine also carried out strikes on Russia overnight that killed three people in the Rostov region

RUNDOWN
Some Quick Stories for the Office

📣 DC Mayor Muriel Bowser announced that she will not seek a fourth term, ending more than a decade of leading the city.

🪖 The FBI has requested interviews with six Democratic Congress members who appeared in a video telling military personnel they can legally refuse unlawful orders.

🤖 Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Geoffrey Hinton, known as the "Godfather of AI," discussed the impact of artificial intelligence on working Americans during a conversation at Georgetown University's Gaston Hall.

🪙 Klarna launched KlarnaUSD, its first stablecoin, marking a shift for the payment company whose CEO previously criticized cryptocurrency.

✈️ Venezuela's aviation authority gave international airlines 48 hours to resume flights or lose their clearance to operate in the country.

What does Roca Nation think?

🍁 Yesterday’s Question: Who is someone you are thankful for this year?

20 Questions!

Ladies and gentlemen, the Weeknd.

President Trump apparently told Larry Ellison's son David Ellison that Hollywood needs to make more buddy comedies. Shortly after the conversation, they greenlit Rush Hour 4. Per Semafor: "Trump convincing the Ellisons to make a new installment of Rush Hour, whose broad racial humor might have been unwelcome a few years ago (if not much earlier), may be one of the capstones of his cultural influence as president this time around." So in honor of Rush Hour 4, we're doing a comedy-themed 20 Questions. Happy Thanksgiving and hope you enjoy!

Link to 20 Questions!

Last Week’s Responses

Average ratings for last week’s Thanksgiving ratings edition of 20 Questions.

mashed potatoes - 8.4
sweet potatoes - 6.6
turkey - 7.3
watching football during dinner - 4.3
gobble gobble sweaters - 3.3
hot cider - 5.8
political debates at the dinner table - 2.5
going around the table to say something you're grateful for - 6.5
stepping outside for a walk before eating - 6.7
pumpkin pie - 7.3
apple pie - 7.8
wearing formal attire - 3.2
eating before 5 pm - 7.6
falling asleep on the couch after eating - 7.1
macy's thanksgiving day parade - 5.5
stuffing - 7.7
leftovers the next day - 8.7
college football rivalry weekend - 5.7
weather being colder than 40 degrees - 5.6
reuniting with family - 8.6

POPCORN
Some Quick Stories for Happy Hour

🎼 Bach to the Future: Two previously unknown organ pieces by Johann Sebastian Bach were performed for the first time in over 300 years at St. Thomas Church in Leipzig.

🧸 Bear-ly Holding On: A teddy bear launched into the stratosphere by English students has gone missing after becoming dislodged from a weather balloon at 16.7 miles high.

🚶🏻‍♀️‍➡️ March of the Machines: A Chinese humanoid robot completed a 100km walk from Suzhou to Shanghai, earning a Guinness World Record for the longest journey walked by a humanoid robot.

🖼️ Garage Sale of the Century: A painting discovered under a garage workbench in Oxfordshire, UK, sold for £685,000 ($750,000) after being identified as a potential work by Renaissance master Pietro Perugino.

🗳️ Who’s on the Ballot?: A Namibian politician named Adolf Hitler Uunona is set to win reelection in his local constituency after previously securing 85% of the vote in 2020.

ROCA WRAP
The First Thanksgiving

Squanto

On a March day in 1621, a Native American walked into one of the earliest English settlements in North America. To the settlers’ astonishment, he spoke English.

The man – Tisquantum, or "Squanto" – was born around 1580 near present-day Plymouth, Massachusetts. He was a member of the Patuxet, a tribe of the Wampanoag confederation of Native Americans. In 1614, English traders lured Squanto onto a ship to sell him into slavery in Spain. But upon arrival there, a group of Spanish monks bought him instead.

After a few years with the monks, Squanto escaped to England, where – much darker and taller than the locals – he became a celebrity. He learned English and was hired as an assistant by a prominent merchant. In 1619, the duo traveled to Canada, where Squanto met an English explorer with whom he traveled down the coast to his home, in modern-day New England.

Upon arrival, Squanto found a tragedy: Plague had destroyed his village. “We arrived at my savage's native country (finding all dead),” the explorer he was with wrote.

Between 1616 and 1619, a disease likely introduced by the British had wiped out tens of thousands of Native Americans. While there, a local native village took Squanto captive.

Then in 1620, a group of English religious separatists – the Pilgrims – arrived on the Mayflower and settled nearby Plymouth. Squanto was sent as a translator, and he negotiated a treaty on behalf of the local Wampanoag chief that established peace between the settlers and natives.

Some natives branded Squanto a traitor who sold out to the Pilgrims. For that reason or others, he became even closer with the settlers. He taught them how to use fish for fertilizer, extract sap from maple trees, and plant beans and squash around corn, among other tricks. Reports credit him with helping up to half the original pilgrims survive until spring.

In autumn 1621, the pilgrims’ had their first successful corn harvest. To celebrate, their governor invited native allies to a celebratory feast. Among them was Squanto, who was introduced as the man who saved the settlement. Natives outnumbered pilgrims as much as 2 to 1 at the feast, remembered today as the first Thanksgiving.

The treaty Squanto negotiated on behalf of the local tribes lasted 50 years, although it tarnished him among the natives as a traitorous, self-serving politician. He fell out with the tribes and died soon after. Nevertheless, without him, Americans may not be celebrating Thanksgiving today.

EDITOR’S NOTE
Final Thoughts

For our latest video, we visited the data center capital of the world in Northern Virginia, where hundreds of MASSIVE data centers exist and 100 more are under construction. The scale of what we saw is hard to describe, but we did our best to show it and interview locals who live around them.

Hope you enjoy and have a wonderful, wonderful Thanksgiving!

–Max and Max