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timbers players celebrate with confetti on a stage
The Portland Timbers will play in the MLS Cup match this Saturday. Alika Jenner / Getty Images

It’s gift season! Don’t miss the Mercury’s Holiday Gift Guide, featuring only the coolest gifts and where to find them locally!

In local news:

• Last weekend a driver veered into a tent on the side of an off-ramp, killing unhoused Portlander Terrence Tombe. Tombe had recently relocated his tent to the dangerous camping area after the city swept his previous campsite, highlighting one of the (many) issues with the city shuffling unhoused people from place to place through sweeps. Alex Zielinski has the details.

• The Portland Police Bureau identified the alleged carjacker fatally shot by officer John Hughes this week as Brandon Keck. The statement also said that the woman the PPB previously reported as shot by Keck was not injured by gunfire. New bystander footage of the police shooting also shows two Portland police officers drawing their weapons as a stolen SUV crawled along I-5. In the video, ten gunshots can be heard.

• The Portland Thorns traded forwards Simone Charley and Tyler Lussi to Angel City FC in Los Angeles. Good luck, gals—you will be missed!

• In more soccer news: The Amazon Web Services outage this week coincided with the day tickets for the Timbers MLS Cup match went live, leaving fans facing long loading screen times and, for some, an inability to get ticketing service SeatGeek to work at all. By the time non season ticket holders made it through the buggy system, all of the 500 tickets reserved for them were already sold.

In national and international news:

• Finland’s prime minister went out clubbing until 4 in the morning after knowingly being exposed to COVID-19. The PM said she was told she didn’t have to isolate after being exposed, contrary to Finland’s quarantine guidelines.

• COVID-19 vaccines for kids (which are proven to be safe and effective at preventing illness) have been a divisive topic amongst parents—but what about co-parents? New Hampshire Public Radio talked with several co-parents who are navigating the pandemic with differing views on vaccines for their kids. For some parents, the fight over vaccines has destroyed their co-parenting relationship.

• New Zealand plans to ban smoking for future generations by raising the age limit yearly, ensuring that the country’s current youth population will never be old enough to buy cigarettes. The legal smoking age of 18 will increase yearly starting in 2027.

• Canada has officially banned conversion “therapy”—a discredited practice that aims to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity (if they’re not heterosexual or cisgender) through talk and behavioral therapy, as well as medical treatments. After trying to pass legislation twice before, the ban was approved Wednesday and will go into effect on January 7. Many US states still allow the practice.

• I got mad thinking about conversion therapy, so I watched MUNA’s Silk Chiffon music video. It’s a bandaid over a disgusting, homophobic wound, but it’ll do the trick for today!