Today's bite sized chunks of news nuggets to put a spring in your step.
A restored 3,400 year old road connecting two ancient Egyptian temple complexes in Karnak and Luxor has been unveiled in a lavish ceremony aimed at raising the profile of one of Egypt’s top tourist spots. The celebratory procession to reopen the 1.7-mile (2.7km) road included a re-enactment of the ancient Opet festival, in which statues of Theban deities were paraded annually during the New Kingdom era in celebration of fertility and the flooding of the Nile.
Canada is releasing nearly half of its strategic stockpile of maple syrup as it faces soaring demand from a pandemic home cooking boom. The Quebec Maple Syrup Producers, a government-sponsored cartel representing 11,000 producers responsible for 73 percent of the global supply, said more than 22,000 tonnes of syrup would be released. It represents the biggest release of syrup in 13 years. Helene Normandin told National Public Radio in the US that the reserve was in place to make sure that the syrup was always available. Phew!
If you enjoy drinking coffee or tea you'll be pleased to hear that it's associated with a lower risk of stroke and dementia, according to a study of healthy individuals aged 50-74. Researchers at Tianjin Medical University studied 365,682 participants from the UK Biobank, who were recruited between 2006 and 2010, and followed them until 2020. People who drank 2-3 cups of coffee or 3-5 cups of tea per day, or a combination of 4-6 cups of coffee and tea had the lowest incidence of stroke or dementia. Individuals who drank 2-3 cups of coffee and 2-3 cups of tea daily had a 32 percent lower risk of stroke and a 28 percent lower risk of dementia compared with those who drank neither coffee nor tea.
Solar farms are proliferating on undeveloped land, often harming ecosystems (but sometimes aiding ecosystems, as per Agrivoltaics is a Brilliant Solution). But placing solar canopies on large parking lots is a blindingly obvious opportunity and offers a host of advantages - making use of land that is already cleared, producing electricity close to those who need it, and even shading cars.
Some like it hot: NASA's Parker Solar Probe has survived yet another close encounter with the Sun (its 10th) breaking two more world records in the process. The other day, the explorer came within 5.3 million miles (8.5 million km) of the Sun's surface at a speed of 363,660 mph (586,864 km/h). This makes it both the closest satellite to survive such a near pass of the Sun and the fastest-ever artificial object. The craft is in good condition, operating optimally, and will begin sending solar data on 24 December for two weeks.
Bans on various plastics in the UK have helped cut beach litter to its lowest level in more than 20 years, according to the Marine Conservation Society (MCS). Its 2021 Great British Beach Clean recorded an average of 385 items of litter per 100 metres, down from 425 in 2020, 558 in 2019 and 835 in 2014. “The ongoing downward trend we’re seeing in litter levels on UK beaches is a positive sign that the actions we’re taking at a personal, local and national level are working,” said Lizzie Prior of the MCS. “But we can’t sit back and relax, now is the time for even more ambitious action.”
Did you know? The word “clue” derives from Greek mythology and comes from the word “clew”, meaning a ball of yarn. In Greek mythology, Ariadne gives Theseus a ball of yarn to help him find his way out of the Minotaur’s labyrinth. Because of this, the word “clew” came to mean something that points the way. Appropriately enough, Theseus unravelled the yarn behind him as he went into the maze, so that he could work his way back out in reverse. Thus the word “clew” can be understood in this context and in the context of a detective working his way backwards to solve a crime using “clues”. The word gained its modern-day spelling in the 15th century, a time when spelling was rather more fluid than it is today.
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Lavender Firlds of Provence
Enjoy the stunning colours of lavender fields in southern France.