Greetings!
Greetings to all you Gnusies, Gnubies, occasional drop-ins, silent regulars, and first-timers! Come sit with us to find and share messages of hope and to celebrate all the ways good people are solving problems and triumphing over evil-doers. The task we have set ourselves here in Gnuville is to search out hope no matter how difficult the situation might be. We learned during TFG’s four years of terror that hope can be found even in the darkest times. And with the Biden era off to a roaring start, there’s a lot more good news, though there are also disappointments and challenges. Which means that our mission of bringing hope to our readers continues.
Don’t forget that the Good News Roundup is a collaborative effort. We warmly encourage you to add your own good news finds in our comment section, The Best Comment Section on the Internet™, where sanity reigns, Gloomy Guses and Debbie Downers are encouraged to see the light, and pie fights are forbidden.
Settle in with your favorite morning beverage and get your day going with some good news, some “hot” music, and some food for thought. It’s another long one today — there were just too many stories that I didn’t want to edit out.
Introduction
This isn’t good news, but the big event of the past ten days for me was the “heat dome” that settled on the usually cool, green Pacific Northwest on Friday, June 25th and didn’t lift until around 9:00 p.m. on Monday, June 28th. It’s the only experience I’ve ever had that I can honestly describe as “apocalyptic.”
My husband and I live in a house in Portland that was built in 1908. It has no AC because we’ve never needed it. Of course, we’ve experienced a few days over 90˚ but we tend to stay cooler than most homes in Portland because we live on a bluff where there’s almost always a brisk breeze, and there are two very large old trees (an oak and a horse chestnut) overhanging our house and shading it both east and west. And we have a powerful attic fan to lift hot air and vent it out of the house.
None of that helped much. The temperature inside our house gradually rose to 88˚. We kept it from getting higher in our living room by improvising a swamp cooler with blue ice and a box fan, and kept our pets and ourselves as cool as we could with frequent sprays of cold water, drank as much water as we could hold, and put ice packs on the back of our necks. But by Monday, it was clear that we couldn’t out-think the relentless heat. Going to a cooling center wasn’t possible with a dog, a cat, and a bird in tow.
Fortunately — miraculously, actually — a young friend of mine reached out to us on Monday morning, and when she found out we had no AC, she told us she would be over immediately with a portable AC unit that she didn’t need. I think it quite literally saved our lives. Looking back, it’s clear that both my husband and I were experiencing weakness and confusion that had snuck up on us so slowly that we were unaware of it. It was only after a couple of cool days and nights that we began feeling like ourselves and realized how close we’d come to collapse.
The first thing we did after we cooled down on Monday was to order a window AC unit for our bedroom, expedited delivery. Getting it upstairs took all our strength, but working together we were able to install it correctly without snapping at each other, which we’re extremely proud of. It works like a champ, and we feel as ready as we’ll ever be for another heat wave, though we doubt we’ll ever see anything like that insane “heat dome” again.
For a silver lining in all this, see the first item in the “Politics” section. Meanwhile, here’s some appropriate music:
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Good news in politics
Ron Wyden Says Portland’s Heat Is Persuading Senators That Climate Change Is Real
From Willamette Week:
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) says the extreme heat and destructive wildfires in the Pacific Northwest are grabbing the attention of his colleagues who are otherwise skeptical that the planet is warming.
“I’m not going to tell people ... that we’ve got everybody there and it’s a kumbaya moment,” Wyden says. “But when it’s 109 degrees [in Portland], you bet it’s getting senators’ attention.”
Wyden discussed the 116-degree heat storm [on a] podcast this week, in an interview focused on climate change and what, if anything, Congress can do to arrest it. Wyden argued that fighting the effects of global warming might become the public works project that could unite an otherwise polarized nation. (He’s introduced a bill for a 21st Century Conservation Corps to fight wildfires across the West.) ✂️
The beginning of the end for ‘surprise’ medical bills
It’s great news that the Biden administration is moving ahead speedily on this vital consumer protection.
From Politico:
Biden’s HHS is out with its first of several rules for enforcing a long-awaited ban on “surprise” bills — a complex undertaking that will have far-reaching consequences for health care in the U.S.
Over 411 pages of regulations, HHS details how federal departments should help keep patients from unknowingly signing away their new protections and how patients should challenge unexpected charges, POLITICO’s Rachel Roubein reports.
Under the policy, which is to take effect Jan. 1, health providers must publicly post rules banning surprise bills on their websites and in notices given to patients. The administration is also creating a complaint review process for patients who think they’ve been surprise-billed anyway.
Those protections are the result of years of stops and starts in Congress, before lawmakers finally managed to pass a ban on surprise out-of-network bills late last year. Yet even then, they left some of the most politically fraught details for the Biden administration to sort out. ✂️
One final fine-print detail: In early June, UnitedHealthcare said it would start retroactively denying emergency room claims it later deemed to not be actual emergencies. But the administration sought to head off that practice on Thursday, spelling out that it would be disallowed under both the surprise billing ban and the broader Affordable Care Act.
Bragg Set to Be Manhattan’s Next D.A., and a Potential Trump Scourge
From the New York Times:
Alvin Bragg, a career prosecutor with experience taking on white-collar crime and corruption, is poised to become Manhattan’s next district attorney, a job that will include overseeing the most prominent and contentious criminal case in the United States: the prosecution of former President Donald J. Trump’s family business.
Given the overwhelming edge Democrats hold in Manhattan, Mr. Bragg is heavily favored to win the general election in November after his foremost opponent in the Democratic primary, Tali Farhadian Weinstein, conceded on Friday.
If he wins, Mr. Bragg would immediately take over a high-stakes inquiry that on Thursday yielded a 15-count indictment against the Trump Organization, the Trump family business, and one of its key executives, Allen Weisselberg. ✂️
In an interview on Friday, Mr. Bragg acknowledged the highly consequential nature of the investigation into Mr. Trump, but he said he was equally focused on other important tasks.
“We’re also talking about the gun-trafficking issues, the scope of the entire system and the collateral consequences,” he said. “It’s all a profound responsibility.”
Mr. Bragg, 47, would be the first Black person to lead an office that still prosecutes more Black people than members of any other racial group.
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Good news from my corner of the country
Gov. Kate Brown: Oregon has begun review of heat wave response
Too little, too late, as usual. But at least we may be better prepared for the next time, because there damn well will be a next time. Fortunately, Biden is stepping up to try to assist our inept state leadership.
From the Oregonian:
Gov. Kate Brown on Sunday said the state has begun a review of its preparation for and response to a heat wave that killed at least 94 residents.
During an appearance on CBS News’ “Face The Nation,” Brown said state leaders had worked to spread the word, open cooling centers and distribute water.
“Unfortunately, we still lost too many lives,” Brown said. “Absolutely unacceptable. Following events like this, we always do reviews and see what we can do better next time.”
The Oregonian/OregonLive’s review of the state and local response published Sunday morning found that Oregonians struggled to reach agencies that could provide help, that the state and local leaders could have done more to explain how deadly the event could be, and that state emergency planners don’t have a plan for handling extreme heat.
Brown also said she had spoken to President Joe Biden earlier in the week.
Biden, she said, wanted to know how the federal government can assist the Western states in future heat crises, ones that are now predicted to occur more frequently.
“We need resources, and we need boots on the ground,” Brown said. “For example, we need financial resources to be able to purchase critical, essential equipment like aircraft to help us fight fire. We need to make sure that we have adequate boots on the ground.”
Brown also voiced concern about the fact that minority communities are affected disproportionately. She compared the heat wave to fires that have previously swept through southern Oregon, after which undocumented immigrants who lost their homes weren’t able to access federal aid.
Small change to far-reaching wildfire bill brought bipartisan support
Given the hard feelings between the Dems and the GQP in the Oregon legislature, this bipartisan compromise is truly good news. We desperately need more resources and smarter responses to deal with the wildfires that are becoming increasingly routine here.
From The Oregonian:
After some last-minute jockeying and wordsmithing, both backers and advocacy groups who had opposed elements of Oregon’s omnibus wildfire response bill say they are satisfied with the version that lawmakers passed Saturday.
Senate Bill 762, which comes with a $185 million price tag, contains myriad provisions to up the state’s game when it comes to fighting wildfires, preparing communities for them, and making forests more resilient to fire. It comes after the state’s devastating Labor Day fires last year, and as it enters what many experts believe will be another challenging fire season this year.
The bill garnered bipartisan support after lawmakers agreed to sidestep the biggest sticking point over lands subject to property restrictions intended to slow the spread of wildfire. Lawmakers removed a key definition from the bill so that it could be outlined with more input later, assuaging some Republicans.
Sen. Jeff Golden, D-Ashland, the chief sponsor of the bill, said he was looking to hold the line on any amendments that would water down the bill and was fine with the outcome.
“When it became clear that we needed to have one more amendment to get a real bipartisan vote, the only thing I wanted was to make sure that no category of land would be categorically excluded from regulation,” he said. “I got that.”
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Musical break
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Good news from around the nation
Boy Scouts reach $850 million settlement with sex abuse victims
This settlement comes to about $14,000 for each victim. I wish they were getting more, but getting this much plus the vaildation that comes with it is a good step toward closure.
From Reuters:
The Boy Scouts of America has reached an $850 million settlement with groups representing tens of thousands of men with sexual abuse claims, a major step toward addressing a deluge of accusations that sent the organization into bankruptcy.
In a filing on Thursday with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware, the Boy Scouts (BSA) said the settlement with the Coalition of Abused Scouts for Justice and two other groups covers claims by about 60,000 abuse survivors.
It said the accord provides a framework for a global resolution of abuse claims and could allow it to emerge from Chapter 11 protection "late this year."
"Bringing these groups together marks a significant milestone ... as the BSA works toward our dual imperatives of equitably compensating survivors of abuse and preserving the mission of scouting," the 111-year-old nonprofit said in a statement.
The groups separately called the accord a "significant accomplishment that achieves consensus" among most claimants, the Boy Scouts and more than 250 local councils.
Thursday's settlement requires a judge's approval and could face opposition from insurers that would be on the hook for payouts. ✂️
The bankruptcy filing covered the national organization, not the local councils.
In rural North Carolina, an investigative center supports local print news
Local print news is vital for keeping people informed about local issues, especially in places like these four rural North Carolina counties where “only 18 percent of households are using the internet at the FCC’s stated basic broadband speed.” So this new initiative is a rare piece of good news for local journalism.
From Columbia Journalism Review:
Les High—publisher of The News Reporter in Whiteville, North Carolina—has been concerned about the state of local journalism in his part of the state. “You look at high-poverty, rural areas like ours,” on the state’s Southeast border, “and newspapers just don’t have the capacity to do the type of investigative and in-depth reporting that we need to do and people deserve,” High said. To address the gap in enterprise coverage and support the local newspapers that remain in his four-county region, High founded the Border Belt Reporting Center, an investigative nonprofit. The center aims to finance hyper-local investigations and in-depth reporting, and provide it to local outlets for free. Stories will also run on the nonprofit’s website. “We’ve drawn a very clear line,” High says. “We’re not competitors; we’re partners.”
The four counties covered are not quite news deserts: Bladen County has one newspaper, as does Scotland county; Columbus County has two. Robeson County has one local newspaper in addition to The Pine Needle, the student newspaper at the University of North Carolina Pembroke. To High’s mind, it’s critical that the county’s newspapers succeed, and he wants the Border Belt Reporting Center to be part of that success. ✂️
The Border Belt Reporting Center’s model is built for a particular community with its specific needs, but High and his team hope that if they’re successful, communities with similar challenges might be able to replicate their model. In a world where a significant portion of nonprofit funding goes to communities where wealth is already concentrated, the Border Belt Reporting Center has gathered support to supplement pre-existing reporting in four high-poverty, rural communities. Not only do they hope to provide local community members with more accountability reporting; they want to keep local papers alive, because they know that access to local print newspapers is especially valuable in low-income communities.
Jimmy and Rosalynn celebrate their 75th anniversary
Our favorite political couple has hit the milestone of 75 years together. The Washington Post has a wonderful story about their marriage, which I wish I could embed in full. If you can get past the paywall, do read it.
Inseparable
On Wednesday, the Carters will be married 75 years, the longest in presidential history. Jimmy, 96, and Rosalynn, 93, will mark the occasion in the town where they met nearly a century ago. “They will probably just sit and hold hands,” said a friend and neighbor, Jill Stuckey.
Three days later, family, friends and Carter administration officials will travel to Plains for an anniversary party in the local high school auditorium. ✂️
Eleanor Rosalynn Smith and James Earl Carter Jr. have known each other virtually since birth. Their love story blossomed in World War II and survived the searing scrutiny of political life. Two years ago, the length of their marriage surpassed that of George H.W. and Barbara Bush. Jimmy is also the longest-living president in history.
The Carters’ union has evolved with the times, starting as a traditional “father-knows-best” marriage in the 1940s and ’50s and eventually becoming a full partnership.
Born in the Deep South in 1924, Jimmy became a champion of gender equality. He appointed record numbers of women to the federal bench, including Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who went on to serve on the Supreme Court.
Rosalynn, born in 1927, was at first a stay-at-home mom, but she gradually took a leading role in the family business and politics. By the 1960s and ’70s, when many women were demanding equality, she had become a pioneering voice in the State Capitol and the White House.
“Over the years, we became not only friends and lovers, but partners,” Rosalynn said at Jimmy’s 90th birthday celebration. “He has always thought I could do anything, and because of that, I/we have had some wonderful adventures and challenges.”
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Good news from around the world
Europe’s night trains are making a comeback amid concern about the climate
I find the idea of resting comfortably in a spiffy train compartment with a private bathroom while the train carries me from one European city to the next incredibly appealing. No doubt too pricey, though...
From Positive News:
With travel restrictions set to be eased across Europe from 1 July, the continent is preparing to welcome visitors back. But travellers’ aspirations appear to have shifted during the pandemic, amid growing concern about the climate crisis. ✂️
Pushed towards extinction by budget airlines, Europe’s forgotten sleeper services are being revived as travellers seek sustainable transport options, and revel in taking it slowly. Nightjet, the Austrian rail operator, and Snälltåget from Sweden, are among those relaunching overnight services between EU cities.
Startups are also sensing opportunity. European Sleeper, an upstart railway company, raised €500,000 (£430,000) in seed capital in May to launch a sleeper service between Brussels and Prague. That service, calling at Amsterdam and Berlin, is scheduled to commence in April 2022.
Then there’s French startup, Midnight Trains, which last week announced that it was rebooting the sleeper train concept entirely with a fleet of rolling hotels. The firm’s carriages will feature plush private bedrooms, bathrooms, dining cars and even cocktail bars.
International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) backs Controlled Digital Lending
Good news for education and intellectual freedom worldwide.
From Internet Archive:
...the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) [has] voiced its strong support for the longstanding and widespread library practice of Controlled Digital Lending (CDL). In doing so, they join a host of libraries and library associations in asserting the right of libraries to own, digitize and lend materials online.
IFLA is the leading international body representing the interests of library and information services and their users. It is the global voice of the library and information profession. The COVID-19 pandemic has underlined the need to be able to provide digital access to library collections and CDL provides an effective, lawful tool for doing so. IFLA writes that CDL helps “to fulfill the mission of libraries to support research, education and cultural participation within the limits of existing copyright laws.”
IFLA’s Statement on Controlled Digital Lending, which was approved by IFLA’s Governing Board in May 2021, builds on the U.S.-oriented Position Statement on Controlled Digital Lending, which has been endorsed by 55 institutions and 120 individual copyright experts and librarians, bringing the discussion into the international context. IFLA’s Statement makes a powerful economic and legal case for supporting CDL in all countries around the world.
Vatican judge orders cardinal and nine others to stand trial for alleged financial crimes
This start on cleaning up corruption in the Vatican’s financial doings is long overdue.
A Vatican judge has ordered 10 people, including an Italian cardinal, to stand trial for alleged financial crimes including embezzlement, money laundering, fraud, extortion and abuse of office.
Those indicted include Cardinal Angelo Becciu, who was fired by the pope last year, the former heads of the Vatican’s financial intelligence unit, and two Italian brokers involved in the Vatican’s purchase of a building in a luxury area of London.
Becciu, whom the pope fired last year and who has maintained his innocence during a two-year investigation, became the highest ranking Vatican-based church official to be indicted for alleged financial crimes.
In accordance with church law, the pope personally approved the judge’s decision to investigate and indict Becciu. The charges against him include embezzlement and abuse of office. ✂️
The trial is due to start on 27 July in the Vatican, a statement said.
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Good news in science and the environment
Swiss start-up develops world’s first ‘personalised skin’ machine
This is one of those “indistinguishable from magic” scientific developments.
From SwissInfo:
A Swiss company is offering hope to the more than 11 million people worldwide who suffer serious burns every year. The company is launching a revolutionary machine capable of generating skin that can be grafted in large quantities using a sample provided by the patient.
“It’s not artificial skin, but it’s not exactly natural skin either,” said Daniela Marino, cofounder and director of CUTISS, launched in 2017 at the University Children’s Hospital Zurich. “To be precise, it’s a skin-tissue equivalent produced by bio-engineering.”
Using a small sample of healthy skin from a burns patient, cutaneous (skin) cells are “grown” in a laboratory and then combined with a hydrogel to produce new skin. The result, denovoSkin, is one millimetre thick, the same as the average natural dermis and epidermis.
The big advantage over traditional techniques is that a sample the size of a stamp can end up as a piece of skin almost the size of a place mat.
Florida Just Enacted Sweeping Law to Protect Its Wildlife Corridors and Save Panthers
This wonderful news items has been mentioned here before, but this is a slightly deeper dive.
From Good News Network:
From Everglades to Okefenokee, Florida legislatures just created one of the biggest wildlife corridors in the developed world with a $400 million funding seed.
The Florida Wildlife Corridor Act, signed into law by Gov. DeSantis, ensures that animals can travel—without seeing a car or a human, from the Everglades Estuary to the borders with Georgia and Alabama—while protecting existing and new conservation areas, securing natural resources, and more.
Between the beach-bustle of Miami, Daytona, Fort Lauderdale, and elsewhere, and the lazy waters of the Gulf of Mexico on the western coast lies a mosaic of swamps, pastures, rivers, farmland, and forest. Among these varied ecosystems, 700 imperiled species live in habitat that may be owned privately, as state recreation areas, and as federally-protected wilderness.
The total bipartisan support the bill received, typical of American conservation legislation, has seen $300 million secured to protect these varied ecosystems, as well as to buy new conservation areas or to secure conservation easements—a subsidized incentive to conserve a particular feature on private acreage.
Another $100 million was earmarked for the general conservation program called Florida Forever, the largest state-controlled pubic land acquisition program of its kind in the U.S.
Norway Closes Down Its Last Arctic Coal Mine and Transforms Land into Giant National Park
The first of two international stories celebrating the creation of new protected areas.
From Good News Network:
Norway is dismantling their last Arctic coal mine piece by piece and turning the area it sits in into a national park twice the size of Grand Teton in Wyoming.
The goal is to turn the Svalbard Archipelago, in particular the Van Mijenfjord, into a howling wilderness once again—the best managed wilderness in the world where polar bears, seals, and countless other Arctic species can thrive in what experts say will be one of the most resilient areas under threat from climate change.
Seeds aren’t the only thing famously stored underground on Svalbard. Coal has been mined there under state monopoly for 100 years. Despite climate change pressures mounting throughout the 21st century, it wasn’t until 2016 that a government white paper announced a moratorium.
Seven national parks, 15 bird sanctuaries, one geopark, and six reserves dot two-thirds of the 23,500 square mile (61,000 square km) archipelago of islands, fjords, mountains, and glaciers. 3,000 polar bears inhabit the area, and during the late summer more than 20 million birds of 80 different species nest on Svalbard. ✂️
“Our goal is for Svalbard to be one of the best-managed wilderness areas in the world. That requires us to implement measures to deal with climate changes, and pressure caused by increased traffic. The protection of the Van Mijen fjord and surrounding area is a direct response to this,” says minister Sveinung Rotevatn...
North Macedonia ready to create huge new national park
From AP:
After decades of being exploited by loggers, a vast, cross-border area of breathtaking beauty in the Balkans centered on Shar Mountain is close to becoming a national park, one of the largest in Europe.
North Macedonian lawmakers are expected to shortly pass a bill granting Shar Mountain that status. The area of over 240,000 hectares (593,053 acres) that ranges through Albania, North Macedonia and Kosovo is a treasure of natural beauty and diverse and unique wildlife.
Shar Mountain has 37 glacial lakes, 25 of them in North Macedonia and the rest in Kosovo, which glint in the mountain’s folds like a myriad of gray-green eyes scanning the skies.
Especially impressive is the region’s biodiversity, which counts 200 endemic plant species, 167 species of butterflies, 12 of amphibians, 18 of reptiles, 130 of birds and 45 of mammals. That is almost half of the total number of mammal species in North Macedonia.
Astonishing ‘Fairy Lanterns’ Found Growing in the Darkest Depth of Malaysian Rainforest
There’s still so much to discover about our amazing planet!
From Good News Network:
So-called ‘fairy lanterns’ are among the most extraordinary-looking of all flowering plants.
These curious, leafless plants (genus Thismia) grow in the darkest depths of remote rainforests where they are seldom seen.
There are some 90 species worldwide, distributed across the forests of Asia, Australasia, South America, and the USA. They all lack true leaves and chlorophyll, obtaining their food from root-associated fungi shared with other green plants. ✂️
Scientists at Oxford and in Malaysia have just described a species of fairy lantern completely new to science.
It was first discovered by rainforest explorer Dome Nikong in 2019 who, astonishingly, found the plant growing along a popular tourist track on Gunung Sarut, a mountain located in the Hulu Nerus Forest Reserve in the state of Terengganu. ✂️
The plant’s unique and remarkable ‘mitre’, color, and surface texture make Thismia sitimeriamiae among the most eye-catching plants ever described from Peninsular Malaysia.
The beauty of pollination
A stunning reminder of what we’re fighting for when we fight to save our environment.
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Good news for and about animals
Brought to you by Rosy, Nora, and Rascal.
Chinese Monk Dedicates Life to Rescuing 8,000 Dogs – He Finds Them New Homes Around the World
Rosy, a rescue herself, picked this sweet story.
From Good News Network:
Since 1994, Zhi Xiang has rescued over 8,000 homeless pooches from the streets of the Chinese mega-city, caring for all of them. ✂️
With help from volunteers and his own Bao’en Temple workforce, Xiang currently cares for hundreds of cats and dogs. Costing nearly $2.5 million every year in labor and supplies, Xiang tries to get as many of them as he can into family homes overseas, using social media to reach out to perspective pet owners.
So far 300 dogs have been adopted by families in Canada, the United States, and Germany.
Native mouse believed to be extinct for 150 years found off Western Australia
Nora chose this story because she wishes she could chase one of these mice.
From The Guardian:
Scientists have discovered that an extinct native mouse thought to have been wiped out more than 150 years ago is thriving on islands off Western Australia.
Researchers compared DNA samples from eight extinct native rodents and 42 of their living relatives to study the decline of native species since the arrival of Europeans in Australia.
The results showed the “extinct” Gould’s mouse was indistinguishable from the Shark Bay mouse, which is found on several small islands off the coast of WA.
“The resurrection of this species brings good news in the face of the disproportionally high rate of native rodent extinction,” Australian National University evolutionary biologist Emily Roycroft said.
Eyes of Robins Have Magnetic Field-Detecting Protein that May Be Long-Sought Migration Sensor
Rascal is grateful that he doesn’t have to migrate, but he’s certain that he’d ace it if he ever tried.
From Good News Network:
Within the European robin’s eye, scientists have identified a protein which they believe acts as the bird’s biological attunement to Earth’s magnetic field, the key to the long-sought mechanism behind how they are able to migrate mass distances. ✂️
‘Cryptochromes’ are ... a group of light-sensitive flavoproteins found in the retinas of birds and other groups of animals. Cryptochrome 4 (cry4) is posited in a new study to be the organ behind magneto-sensitivity.
Following an experiment using quantum mechanics, The Scientist reports that researchers at the University of Oxford, searching for such a means, were left with “overwhelming evidence that cry4 [is] the hottest candidate.”
One of the reasons for this was that, of the three other cryptochromes in the robin’s eye, cry4 was the only one that bound to a particular molecule which gave it the ability to sense light, an important first step in the ability to sense magnetic fields.
Furthermore, unlike the other three which had 24-hour responsiveness, cry4 was not attuned to the day-night cycle, but instead had seasonal variation, which in turn the other three did not possess.
The cryptochrome proteins in chickens and pigeons, birds which don’t migrate, could not detect the magnetic field generated in the laboratory, further reinforcing the theory.
Favorite recent animal photo
This portrait of a smiling balloon fish won photographer Daryl Duda an award in this year’s Ocean Conservancy photo contest in the “Up Close and Personal” category:
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From the archives
Here’s a new category for my roundups, inspired by my wanting to share this lovely story with you, about the connection between the great saxophonist Paul Desmond and the most enchanting human being ever to appear in films, Audrey Hepburn. In the February 8, 2021 New Yorker, writer/cartoonist Paul Rogers recounted it in a full-page 10-panel illustration. I can’t embed the wonderful drawings, so please click the link to see them.
Audrey Hepburn’s favorite song
In the spring of 1954, Hepburn was starring in “Ondine” at the 46th Street Theatre. The Brubeck Quartet was playing at Basin Street, a night club a few blocks away. Every night, Paul asked Brubeck to call an intermission at the same time. Desmond would duck out of the club and cut across Times Square. He’d stand in an alley to watch Hepburn walk out the stage door and climb into her limo. That year, Paul wrote a song called “Audrey,” which appeared on the Columbia Records album “Brubeck Time.” Desmond died from lung cancer in 1977. He was single, and never knew whether Hepburn had heard the song he wrote for her.
When Hepburn died in 1993, her ex-husband Andrea Dotti called Brubeck to ask if his quartet would play “Audrey” at a memorial service at the United Nations headquarters. This took Brubeck by surprise. “I had no idea you’d be aware of ‘Audrey’...”
“My wife listened to that song every night before she went to bed.”
Here’s that song.
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Hot lynx
www.theatlantic.com/… The Pandemic Did Not Affect Mental Health the Way You Think. The authors, all academic psychologists, write: “We were surprised by how well many people weathered the pandemic’s psychological challenges. In order to make sense of these patterns, we looked back to a classic psychology finding: People are more resilient than they themselves realize.”
www.newyorker.com/… After the Lost Cause. A thought-provoking essay on what the re-thinking of America’s history of slavery does and doesn’t mean for our society now.
www.newyorker.com/… The Man Rewriting Prison from the Inside. “Quntos KunQuest has been in Angola for twenty-five years. But his début novel, “This Life,” isn’t the usual story of time behind bars.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqt7oRzn2X8. Let's talk about the New York Times documentary about the 6th....Beau of the Fifth Column strongly urging us to watch the 40-minute NY Times documentary on the insurrection. Here’s the link to the documentary: www.nytimes.com/...
www.theatlantic.com/… Photos of the Week: Heat Wave, Paddy Day, Big Buddha. The Atlantic’s choice of the best photos of the week. All of them are worth scrolling through.
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Wherever is herd…
A tip of the hat to 2thanks for creating this handy info sheet for all Gnusies new and old!
Morning Good News Roundups at 7 x 7: These Gnusies lead the herd at 7 a.m. ET, 7 days a week:
- The Monday GNR Newsroom (Jessiestaf, Killer300, and Bhu). With their five, we survive and thrive.
- Alternating Tuesdays: NotNowNotEver and arhpdx.
- Wednesdays: niftywriter.
- Thursdays: pucklady the 1st Thursday, Mokurai the 2nd, oldhippiedude the 3rd, MCUBernieFan the 4th, and Mokurai the 5th (when there is one).
- Fridays: chloris creator. Regular links to the White House Briefing Room.
- Saturdays: GoodNewsRoundup. Heart-stirring and soul-healing introduction and sometimes memes to succumb to.
- Sundays: 2thanks. A brief roundup of Roundups, a retrospective, a smorgasbord, a bulletin board, an oasis, a watering hole, a thunder of hooves, a wellness, a place for beginners to learn the rules of the veldt.
hpg posts Evening Shade diaries at 7:30 p.m. ET every day! After a long day, Gnusies meet in the evening shade and continue sharing Good News, good community, and good actions. In the words of NotNowNotEver: “hpg ably continues the tradition of Evening Shade.” Find Evening Shades here.
oldhippiedude posts Tweets of the Week on Sundays at 6:00 p.m. Central Time — New time! Our second evening Gnusie hangout zone! In search of a TOTW diary? Look here or here.
For more information about the Good News group, please see our detailed Welcoming comment, one of the first comments in our morning diaries.
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Closing music
A final comment on the events of the past week in the NW:
❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️
Thanks to all of you for your smarts, your hearts, and
your faithful attendance at our daily Gathering of the Herd.
❤️💙 RESIST, PERSIST, REBUILD, REJOICE! 💙❤️