Today's smorgasbord of tasty good news nuggets.
You're Never Too Old
A 92-year-old, who recently became the oldest person to cross the Grand Canyon rim-to-rim on foot, says he is proof that it's never too late to try something - because he waited until his mid-70s to start leading what he considers a healthy life. “I began living a healthy lifestyle really at age 76,” Alfredo Aliaga Burdio - a Spanish-born resident of Berlin - told the Guinness World Records in an interview. Aliaga added that he attributed his longevity to four factors: watching what he eats, drinking mainly water, walking 30 minutes daily and “sleeping in the dark of the night for eight hours”.
Wetlands Preservation
A landmark agreement to safeguard one of Europe’s most important wetlands underscores the importance of harnessing public opinion to drive the green transition and help mitigate the effects of the climate change, says Spain’s environment minister. The Doñana in western Andalucía - whose marshes, forests and dunes extend across almost 130,000 hectares (320,000 acres) in southern Spain and includes a Unesco-listed national park - has just secured a €1.4bn ($1.53bn) deal to protect Doñana and diversify the local economy to enable farmers to stop using aquifers to irrigate fruit crops, which was draining the wetlands.
Females Top Charts
Female artists had a record year on the UK singles chart, spending the most weeks at number one since records began in 1952. For 31 out of 52 weeks, female acts topped the chart either as solo artists or in collaboration with other musicians. Miley Cyrus had the biggest song of the year, with the break-up anthem Flowers attracting 198 million streams.
The Impossible Fish
When thinking of animals that live in the most extreme environments on Earth most of us probably don’t think of the snailfish. Its name may not hint at extraordinary physical capabilities but the snailfish has broken the record for living at the deepest ocean depths known to humanity. In fact scientists believed it was physiologically impossible for fish to survive conditions below 8,200 metres, reports The Conversation. Until recently, when Australian and Japanese researchers found one at a record-shattering 8,336 metres in the Izu-Ogasawara Trench, south of Japan. That’s 158 metres deeper than the previous record, also set by a snailfish during an encounter in 2017 in the Marianas Trench. The deep ocean has yet again shown us there is still much to be discovered if we only have the willingness to look.
Olympic Rap
Snoop Dogg will be joining NBC this summer to provide prime-time coverage of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. The news network said that having already proved to be an "Olympic gold medal commentator" after teaming up with comic Kevin Hart to cover the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, the rapper will now be heading to the French capital to "explore the city's iconic landmarks, attend Olympic competitions and events, and visit the athletes, their friends and families".
London Commuters
Two-wheeled transportation is dominating London’s rush hour these days. According to a recent report, bicycles now outnumber cars during peak commute hours. A November count - on a wet and windy day, no less - revealed that people on bikes represented 40 percent of non-pedestrian rush hour traffic (but pedestrians still make up the bulk of commuters.) The city has increasingly penalized driving in central London through congestion charges and additional fees for older, more polluting vehicles. The government says that the creation of “low emission zones” has contributed to a 50 percent drop in toxic nitrogen dioxide.
"The future doesn't belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave." Ronald Reagan
On This Day
4 January 1853: Solomon Northrup, a free Black man who had been kidnapped and sold into slavery, legally obtained his freedom, and he later wrote about his experiences in Twelve Years a Slave.
Ireland is considering a referendum on incorporating the rights of nature and the human right to a healthy environment. New rights...
Mood Booster
Bali's Bartering Monkeys: These macaques use stolen goods to barter for their supper.
Comentários