Decline of the dinner party, relief for severe depression, online dating revolution: Catch up on the day’s stories
By Daniel Wine, CNN
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👋 Welcome to 5 Things PM! Severe depression can upend your life. A promising new clinical trial suggests that stimulating the body’s largest nerve — with a device implanted underneath the collarbone — may offer relief.
Here’s what else you might have missed during your busy day:
5 things
1️⃣ A declining art: Hosting people in your home for dinner creates an intimacy that you just don’t get when meeting them at a restaurant or a bar. But people are busy, broke and burnt out. CNN culture writer Harmeet Kaur explains why the dinner party is all but dead.
2️⃣ Looking for love: Personalized chatbots dating on your behalf. AI concierges fielding questions about potential matches. Advanced algorithms predicting compatibility. Online dating is on the verge of radical change.
3️⃣ Building immunity: The holiday season can be intense with everyone traveling, shopping, hosting family and friends and other commitments. To reduce your chances of getting sick, make these three things habits.
4️⃣ Ancient predator: A saber-toothed creature that vanished more than 250 million years ago is believed to be the oldest of its kind. Experts say the discovery in Spain could help shed light on the earliest relative of mammals.
5️⃣ Don’t go there: From New York City to Paris to Kyoto, these are the tourist attractions you can’t visit in 2025 — or probably ever again.
Watch this
🤖 Household helper: Tech companies are racing to be the first to bring humanoid robots to people’s homes. One company’s prototype, known as NEO, can do laundry and make coffee — and it could be available to the public as soon as next year.
Top headlines
• What’s at risk if Congress doesn’t fund the government by Friday night
• Federal complaint reveals new details about notebook found with Mangione
• DOGE wants to ditch DEI. That would impact more people than you may think
458
❗That’s how many workplace murders there were last year — an average of nearly nine a week.
Check this out
🎄 Decked out: Nowhere does festive charm quite like Europe. From Vienna to Gothenburg, here are the towns and cities that revel in Christmas.
Quotable
💬 Family feud: Five-time NBA champion Dennis Rodman apologized to his daughter after she criticized him for being absent for much of her life.
Quiz time
🏈 Which one of the 12 teams in the College Football Playoff is undefeated?
A. Texas
B. Oregon
C. Boise State
D. Arizona State
⬇️ Scroll down for the answer.
Good vibes
🎷 Music therapy: Army veteran Wayne Hoey never leaves home without his saxophone. It paid off during a recent flight delay in Atlanta when Hoey got out his sax and began playing Christmas tunes for his fellow passengers.
Thanks for reading
🧠 Quiz answer: B. The Oregon Ducks are the No. 1 seed with a 13-0 record entering the playoff. Test your knowledge with CNN’s news quiz in tomorrow morning’s 5 Things newsletter.
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5 Things PM is produced by CNN’s Chris Good, Meghan Pryce and Kimberly Richardson.
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