• A Mesa County resident has died and 26 other Coloradans were sickened by an E. coli outbreak linked to McDonald’s restaurants.
• Denver Broncos wide receiver Josh Reynolds was shot while leaving the strip club Shotgun Willie’s at 3 am. Reynolds has been on Injured Reserve and hasn’t been playing due to an unrelated finger injury.
• A surfer in Indonesia died after she was impaled by a swordfish mid-ride.
• UCHealth has postponed some non-emergency surgeries due to an IV fluid shortage. The North Carolina company that supplies 60% of the nation’s IV fluids, including to UCHealth apparently, still hasn’t recovered from Hurricane Helene.
• The U.S. Department of Transportation fined American Airlines $50 million for “cases of unsafe physical assistance that at times resulted in injuries and undignified treatment of wheelchair users, in addition to repeated failures to provide prompt wheelchair assistance.”
• The Denver Nuggets lost their first game of the 2024-2025 season, giving Denver sports talk radio plenty of “the sky is falling” fodder.
• Sephora is the latest national chain to abandon the 16th Street Mall.
• The leader of a large-scale car-theft ring that targeted cars primarily at DIA was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
• Denver‘s Infinite Monkey Theorem will close at the end of the year, citing declining wine sales locally and nationally.
• The Michelin-starred restaurant Brutø in Denver has been forced to close for a month due to an issue with the kitchen’s hood vent.
• Speaking of restaurants, you can almost hear restaurant owners groaning after The Denver Post reported on our city’s best 50 restaurants as voted on by Yelp reviewers.
• Three members of the Los Angeles Times editorial board have now resigned after the paper’s billionaire owner, Patrick Soon-Shiong, reportedly refused to allow it to make a presidential endorsement.
• What would have been a little noticed interview between The Verge‘s Decoder podcast and the CEO of Intuit became newsworthy when Intuit demanded that Decoder delete an entire section of the recording focused on Intuit’s efforts to stall legislation that would simplify tax returns. The Intuit Chief Communications Officer called the line of questioning “inappropriate,” “egregious,” and “disappointing.”
• Speaking of Intuit, the fee for standard parking spaces at the Los Angeles Clippers’ new Intuit Dome is $70.
• Former Denver Broncos QB and reality TV star Jay Cutler was arrested in Tennessee and charged with driving under the influence, possession of a handgun while under the influence and failure to exercise due care to avoid a collision.
• Former WWE CEO Vince McMahon has been sued for allegedly allowing a ringside announcer to use his position to sexually exploit children as young as 12 years old.
• Fun fact: The Denver Broncos lead the NFL by serving more than 700 Uncrustable peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to players and staff each week. NFL teams combined serve more than 80,000 of the processed sandwiches each year.
• A California man claims in a lawsuit that his French bulldog died from stress related to being downgraded from first class to coach on an Alaska Airlines flight.

Who won the week?

• Boulder‘s Comprise has been named “Agency of the Year” for the fourth straight time by Business Intelligence Group.
• Philosophy Communications added Phyllis Offee to its team. I’ll give you a minute.
• The Denver Post healthcare reporter Meg Wingerter will be on maternity leave beginning Monday.
• A crowdfunding effort has at least temporarily saved The Denver Voice. The Voice’s editor is Elisabeth Monaghan who is well known and loved in Denver’s PR community.
• University of Colorado QB Shedeur Sanders earned more NIL money – $5.6 million – this year than any other college athlete in the country.
• Seven friends in England who were testing a new metal detector discovered $5 million-worth of Norman-era coins.
• Taylor Trammell, currently a 27-year-old minor league outfielder enjoying the offseason, played in 10 major league games this year – five for the Los Angeles Dodgers and five for the New York Yankees. As a result, he is assured of a championship ring when the two teams play in the World Series.