reading

The “Reading Rainbow” is officially back, with internet-famous librarian Mychal Threets at the helm.

Following the reboot’s premiere last Saturday, the new host responded to the audience’s wishes for a Latino lead in a recent social media post. He wrote, “You’re not going to believe this… I am [Latino]! My dad is Black, my mom is Mexican and white. I’m a mixed kid, homeschool kid, library kid, PBS kid, and @readingrainbow kid!”

Threets, who got his start as a Bay Area librarian, tells The Times that because he was home-schooled, he was able to learn about his heritage mostly through books. He says he was raised to be proud of his heritage and looks up to both his grandfather and mother as examples of what it means to be Latino. Much of his childhood was also marked by the sounds of Selena Quintanilla, whom he recently got memorialized in a tattoo.

“My heritage and being Latino will hopefully be reflected in my appearance on the show,” said Threets in a statement. “I hope people will see me and see a happy, jovial person who has the same heritage as them.”

Threets started to gain online popularity in 2020. He started posting short-form videos of himself reading and sharing stories from working in a library. Many of those videos garnered more than a million views and earned him several hundred thousand followers.

The original “Reading Rainbow,” hosted by LeVar Burton, first launched on PBS in 1983. For over two decades, Burton taught literacy skills and helped instill a love for reading in children across the country. The show ended in 2006, having earned a handful of Emmy and Peabody Awards. It ran for a total of 155 episodes and is recognized as one of the longest-running children’s programs ever.

At the time, the show was funded in part by the Department of Education. The reboot comes at a time when public media, including television, has been subject to sizable budget cuts. The revitalization will instead appear on the kids’ YouTube channel, Kidzuko, which is owned by Sony Pictures Television, as well as the Reading Rainbow’s website.

The reboot, which premiered over the weekend, has mostly stayed true to its roots with a new rerecorded theme song and a trivia segment. Celebrity guests will include “Dancing With the Stars” performers Rylee Arnold and Ezra Sosa, “The Bear’s” actor Ebon Moss-Bachrach, John Legend, Chrissy Teigen and Gabrielle Union. New episodes air every Saturday, until Oct. 24.

“Reading Rainbow seeks to make reading fun for everyone, all races, all backgrounds, all levels of reading! The reactions have been out of this world,” said Threets. “I am overwhelmed in the best of ways.”

HOUSEHOLDS need to take and submit meter readings ahead of bills rising for millions this autumn.

Regulator Ofgem confirmed last month that prices will increase by 2% to £1,755 a year from October 1.

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Prices will rise by £35.14 per year for households, having reduced at the beginning of July when the price cap went down. 

This will affect 22million households who are on the standard variable tariffs.

Those who don’t take their electricity and gas bill readings as close to October 1 as possible, and are on a standard variable tariff as opposed to a fixed deal, could be faced with higher bills.

Some providers will even give you an extra fortnight to submit your reading, but double-check what applies at yours.

The October rise is 1% higher than industry experts anticipated. 

Those on fixed tariffs will not see their bills change from October. 

The energy price cap was first introduced in January 2019 and sets a maximum unit price that energy suppliers can charge households. 

Despite the price cap increasing in October, experts estimate that it will be reduced at the next three-month change in January. 

This will depend on geopolitical movements, weather patterns, and any changes in government policy. 

Experts also warned that any reduction in prices would be minimal for the foreseeable future. 

How to take a reading

The easiest way to take a reading is by taking a photo of your gas and electricity meters.

This means you have evidence in case you need to dispute.

You can send in your meter reading online via your energy account.

Some providers will also let you send in the numbers by text or through their app.

If you have a electricity meter then you will see a row of six numbers.

Five of them will be black and one in red.

Write down the five numbers in black, which are shown from left to right.

If you have a traditional dial meter then you need to read the first five dials from left to right.

If the pointer is between the two numbers then write down the lowest figure.

If it is between nine and zero then write down the number nine.

For gas meters you need to write down the first five numbers that are shown before the decimal point.

Digital imperial meters are four black numbers and two red numbers.

And for smart meters then you do not need to send your supplier a meter reading, it will be sent automatically.

Help available

If you struggle with your energy bills there are several ways that you can get help. 

The Winter Fuel Payment offers £300 to pensioners to help cover the cost of heating during the winter months. 

Struggling families can also get access to money for their energy bills through the Household Support Fund (HSF). 

Each council was allocated a slice of the £742million fund earmarked for extra support.

Additionally, millions will receive the Warm Home Discount, which is worth £150. 

This discount is means-tested and given to households on a low income or claiming benefits such as Universal Credit. 

British Gas also announced a £140million support package to help customers facing financial hardship. 

What energy bill help is available?

There’s a number of different ways to get help paying your energy bills if you’re struggling to get by.

If you fall into debt, you can always approach your supplier to see if they can put you on a repayment plan before putting you on a prepayment meter.

This involves paying off what you owe in instalments over a set period.

If your supplier offers you a repayment plan you don’t think you can afford, speak to them again to see if you can negotiate a better deal.

Several energy firms have schemes available to customers struggling to cover their bills.

But eligibility criteria vary depending on the supplier and the amount you can get depends on your financial circumstances.

For example, British Gas or Scottish Gas customers struggling to pay their energy bills can get grants worth up to £2,000.

British Gas also offers help via its British Gas Energy Trust and Individuals Family Fund.

You don’t need to be a British Gas customer to apply for the second fund.

EDF, E.ON, Octopus Energy and Scottish Power all offer grants to struggling customers too.

Thousands of vulnerable households are missing out on extra help and protections by not signing up to the Priority Services Register (PSR).

The service helps support vulnerable households, such as those who are elderly or ill.

Some of the perks include being given advance warning of blackouts, free gas safety checks and extra support if you’re struggling.

Get in touch with your energy firm to see if you can apply.

COPS are desperately hunting a woman and an eight-year-old girl who vanished more than three weeks ago.

Sally-Jean, 37, was last seen with eight-year-old Ava in Tilehurst, Reading on August 25.

The pair were reported missing on Monday with a frantic search for them launched immediately.

Police said they are “extremely concerned” for the safety of the woman and the youngster and are appealing for the public’s help finding them.

Ava is described as black with an afro hairstyle while Sally-Jean is white, about 5ft 4in tall, with long brown hair, green eyes and tattoos.

Sally-Jean has links to Reading, Caversham and Tilehurst and has one large and distinctive tattoo on her right lower arm, cops said.

Anyone with information on the whereabouts of either Sally-Jean or Ava is asked to contact Thames Valley Police as a matter of urgency.

Inspector Iain Watkinson said: “We are extremely concerned for the welfare of Sally-Jean and Ava and we have been working hard to find them since they were reported missing on Monday.

“We are now appealing for the public’s help.

“Anyone with information on their whereabouts should call 101 or make a report on our website.”

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Long Beach resident Ashley Likins was pages away from finishing “Onyx Storm,” the third installment in Rebecca Yarros’ fantasy book series, when a long-haired black kitten hopped into her lap.

Given the foster name Soup Enhancements, the cat was one of the rescues boarding at Cool Cat Collective, a cat-themed boutique at the eastern end of Long Beach’s Fourth Street Corridor. The store, which offers all manner of cat-themed merchandise from kitty treats to cat-printed coasters, doubles as a shelter for cats rescued by TippedEars, a local trap-neuter-return, or TNR, nonprofit.

These resident kittens at Cool Cat Collective spend most of their time in a luxury “catio” in the back corner of the boutique, but twice a month, they are released to roam about during after-hours fundraising events. A popular silent reading party, co-hosted by reading club LB Bookworms, mimics a cat cafe, and according to the book club’s founder, Martha Esquivias, the event has sold out nearly every month since its debut last November.

Deb Escobar reads a book as foster kitten Poolboy creeps around her during a silent reading night at Cool Cat Collective.

It was during the silent reading event in early August that Likins sat, second-guessing the decision she’d made a few days prior to adopt Soup Enhancements. She adored the cat; still, she worried she’d been impulsive and wasn’t truly ready for the responsibility of pet ownership.

But as she watched the kitten nod off in her lap, she glimpsed the future in which the pair would do this routine a thousand times over with Likins devouring a book and the cat sleeping soundly below.

“I’m not just in a kitten craze,” Likins recalled thinking to herself. “This is my cat.”

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It’s that kind of moment Jena Carr, 39, had dreamed of when she and her husband, Matt, 40, opened Cool Cat Collective last year.

Former Washington, D.C., restaurateurs, the Carrs moved to Long Beach in 2022 to be closer to Jena Carr’s family. Once they settled in, Carr threw herself into kitten rescue, a longtime interest. She started as a foster owner and kitten rescue volunteer before assisting TippedEars with its work tracking and capturing cats in Compton.

“Once you start realizing the extent of the cat overpopulation problem, you quickly realize that we can’t foster or adopt our way out of it,” Carr said, calling TNR “the solution that gets to the root of the problem.”

One day during peak kitten season, Carr was out with TippedEars co-founder Renae Woith when she was struck by the number of sick and injured cats on the streets and the challenges of understaffed rescues working to home them.

“It kind of got her wheels working, like, ‘What can I do as a business?’” Woith said.

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1. Foster kittens Bisque, Poolboy and Chauffeur play together during a silent reading night. 2. Foster kitten Sesame walks around a display in the store.

Almost a year later, Cool Cat Collective was born.

It was still warm outside on an early September evening as the last of the daytime visitors left the cat boutique. Once they were gone, Carr made her final touches for the night’s silent reading party: laying cushions in store corners and scattering toy mice across the floor.

In the catio, Poolboy, a domestic shorthair, licked a Churu treat from a visiting reader’s hand. When he and his siblings — all named after blue-collar jobs — arrived in late July, they were timid. But at this silent reading party, they bounded about the room, crawling on attendees’ laps between wrestling matches.

“It makes me so happy when the shy ones become social,” Carr said.

A sign hanging outside the catio tallied good news: 93 adoptions since July 2024. TippedEars co-founder Vita Manzoli said that’s about double the numbers the rescue used to see before the boutique opened.

TippedEars’ partnership with Cool Cat Collective has been a boon for the nonprofit, which receives 100% of the proceeds from the cat boutique’s “First Thursday” silent reading parties and “Third Thursday” doodle nights, which both cost $15 to attend. But it’s not only the financial support that has made a difference for TippedEars cats.

“We’ve gotten volunteers from them — donors, adopters, obviously, but the byproduct of that is really just educating people about the cat overpopulation crisis, what TNR is and how they can help,” Woith said.

Placing rescues at Cool Cat Collective, where they are comfortable and their personalities are on full display, has also allowed TippedEars to give them a better chance at being adopted.

“The cat they may not have looked twice at online, they now are the one [adopters are] taking home, because they actually got to meet them,” Woith said.

“This is a beautiful marrying of my interests,” silent reading party attendee Regan Rudman said of the event. “It also provides a great third space that we’re really missing nowadays.”

Carr has a spreadsheet of potential resident kittens always on her mind, so she’s eager to facilitate adoptions. But everyone is welcome at Cool Cat Collective, whether they’re looking to adopt or not.

“You don’t even have to be shopping,” Carr said. “That was part of our goal: to create a space with a really low barrier to access for people who are cat-curious or just need a little moment of cat joy in their day.”

Regan Rudman, a recent Long Beach transplant, can’t have a cat of her own for health reasons. Still, she visits Cool Cat Collective every month. She tried for three months to snag a ticket to the store’s silent reading night before she secured a spot for the September event.

“Getting to actually interact with cats in an environment that they feel comfortable in just makes my heart so happy,” Rudman said.

Rudman, who works at a publishing company, made an effort to focus on her book during the silent reading hour, but she also hoped her ruffled leg warmers would entice a curious kitten to come over.

“I think everyone is a little distracted by the cats,” said silent reading party attendee Mathilde Hernandez, who befriended foster cat Gumball.

Other attendees, lounging on cushions throughout the boutique, gazed down at their e-readers but peeked as cats bounced around like pinballs in their periphery.

Poolboy and sibling Chauffer, who would find their forever home together that weekend, were particularly rowdy. On the other hand, Bisque — from a litter Carr called “the Soups” — hid in a cardboard house for an hour before she finally stretched a paw out, like a jazz hand through the “front door.”

“There’s always some antic happening,” Carr said. “People are reading, but they also have one eye on the cats as they’re reading. I’d be curious asking people, like, how far into their book they actually get.”

Attendee Lien Nguyen, whose love for the kittens overrode her cat allergy, admitted she’d drop her book the second a cat came into her vicinity. But no matter how hard they tried, scarcely an attendee could successfully attract a kitten. The cats chose their company, not the other way around.

“Part of our goal was to create a space with a really low barrier to access for people who are cat-curious or, you know, just need a little moment of cat joy in their day,” said Jena Carr, co-founder of Cool Cat Collective.

“It was like rejection therapy whenever they went away,” Nguyen said.

That’s why Likins was so touched when Soup Enhancements found her at the August silent reading party. She nearly burst into tears, she said.

Later that evening, she was moved even more when her boyfriend, Max Mineer, bonded with his feline soulmate, Handyman. Happily, Handyman happened to be the only cat Soup Enhancements tolerated.

Now, the two cats live together in Likins and Mineer’s Long Beach apartment. They sleep together, clean each other and, despite being from different litters, generally behave like siblings.

The day Likins brought the cats home, staffers at Cool Cat Collective and TippedEars gave her every resource imaginable, including a 20% off coupon for Chewy products and scratch post recommendations. And there was an easy out: If anything went wrong, the couple could bring the cats back, no questions asked.

“It really made me trust them more to know that they were thinking to the future about these cats,” Likins said. “It wasn’t just a process of making sure that a cat got a home. It was making sure that a cat got a life.”