Happy News Tuesday

Editor OGN Daily
Jul 1
4 min read

Some tasty bite-sized chunks of positive news to perk up the day.

John Travolta wearing a wig to look like he once did as Danny in 'Grease' — Credit: @johntravolta | Instagram

Surprise Appearance

John Travolta made a surprise appearance at a Grease sing-a-long event dressed as Danny Zuko, much to the delight of fans. In a video shared to his Instagram at the weekend, the star donned a leather jacket and a wig to recreate the iconic character’s signature look as he walked out on stage to thunderous applause. “Tonight at the Hollywood Bowl, for the first time I surprised everyone at the ‘GREASE’ Sing-A-Long and dressed up as Danny Zuko,” Travolta wrote in the caption. “No one knew. Not even the cast. Thank you for a great evening.” He posted the message alongside footage of him walking onto the stage to a standing ovation from the crowd.

You're The One That I Want: John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John strut their stuff in this classic scene from Grease in 1978.

Pills From Plastic

Strange but true: Bacteria can turn plastic bottles into paracetamol in 24 hours. Scientists in Edinburgh hacked E. coli by slipping in two extra genes to make missing enzymes, which then use a little phosphate 'kick-starter' to pull off a chemical flip (called a Lossen rearrangement) that converts plastic leftovers into paracetamol. The biochemistry mashup flips the painkiller’s supply chain from oil to waste plastic, creating the potential for “trash-to-tablet” factories that both slash emissions and hoover up litter.

Poor People's Car

The BBC recently published an excellent story about how China made electric vehicles mainstream. Here's the nub of it: "I drive an electric vehicle because I am poor," says Lu Yunfeng, a private hire driver, who is at a charging station on the outskirts of Guangzhou in the south of China. Standing nearby, Sun Jingguo agrees. "The cost of driving a petrol car is too expensive. I save money driving an electric vehicle," he says. "Also, it protects the environment," he adds, leaning against his white Beijing U7 model. It's the kind of conversation climate campaigners dream of hearing. In many countries, electric vehicles are considered luxury purchases. But here in China - where almost half of all cars sold last year were electric - it's a banal reality.

EV Affordability: There are remarkable geographical differences.

Cover of Enid Blyton's book 'The Naughtiest Girl Again' — Remarkable coincidence

Serendipity

An English book collector was riffling through a children’s novel he’d picked up from a thrift shop when he stumbled upon a happy surprise: notes his wife had written 50 years ago as a child. A collector of novels by the late Enid Blyton - a bestselling children’s author who penned an estimated 800 books over four decades - 67-year-old Steve Mills told the BBC he was “completely gobsmacked” by the discovery. He was going through some new additions when he found the writings from Karen, now 60, in a copy of The Naughtiest Girl Again, which had been donated by her mother in the 1970s. Steve said: “We’ve taken it as one of the universe’s strange coincidences.”

Mutually Beneficial

An ambitious re-wilding plan is aiming to turn Europe’s peatlands into conflict buffers and climate shields. Inspired by Ukraine’s flooding of the Irpin Valley, which stalled Russia’s 2022 assault on Kyiv, scientists and strategists are proposing a massive network of restored wetlands along eastern European borders. The plan would create peatland-based 'area-denial zones' from Finland to Romania, combining military deterrence with re-wilding goals.

Oldest Boomerang

In the 1980s, archaeologists discovered a well-preserved, curved boomerang made from a mammoth tusk in a cave in Poland. They later tried to estimate the crescent-shaped ivory artifact’s age using radiocarbon dating techniques but grew to suspect that their sample had become contaminated, skewing the results. Now, based on new analyses, researchers are more confident in the boomerang’s timeline. It’s likely more than twice as old as it was originally dated, having been carved by nomadic hunter-gatherers between 39,000 and 42,000 years ago. “It’s the oldest boomerang in the world," says lead author Sahra Talamo.

Taking a Stand

A leading UN expert is calling for criminal penalties against those peddling disinformation about the climate crisis and a total ban on fossil fuel industry lobbying and advertising, as part of a radical shake-up to safeguard human rights and curtail global warming. Elisa Morgera, the UN special rapporteur on human rights and climate change who presented her new report - The Imperative of Defossilizing our Economies - to the general assembly in Geneva yesterday, argues that the US, UK, Canada, Australia and other wealthy fossil fuel nations are legally obliged under international law to fully phase out oil, gas and coal by 2030 – and compensate communities for harms caused.

“Human beings are a meaning-making species.” Susan Cain

On This Day

1 July 1979: Sony began selling its Walkman, a portable cassette player; an international sensation, the device changed the way people listened to music.