Weekly News Recap: July 21, 2023

July 20, 2023 Vincent Duckworth

Weekly News Recap: July 21, 2023

Spain's Carlos Alcaraz celebrates after winning his final match against Serbia's Novak Djokovic. Credit...Andrew Couldridge/Reuters

Tennis uses the language of life. Advantage, service, fault, break, love – the basic elements of tennis are those of everyday existence, because every match is a life in miniature. -- Pete Sampras

SOME GOOD NEWS

The 2023 Comedy Pet Photography awards – in pictures (The Guardian) These make me happy. "Shortlisted entries for the 2023 Comedy Pet Photography awards. The competition was created by professional photographers Paul Joynson-Hicks and Tom Sullam to celebrate the positive and vital role that pets have in our lives and to encourage engagement around animal welfare."
Hundreds of golden retrievers gather in Highlands (BBC) #SoMuchCuteness "Hundreds of golden retrievers, and their owners, have gathered at the Highland ancestral home of the breed. The first golden retriever puppies were born at Guisachan House in Glen Affric 155 years ago. They were bred by aristocrat Sir Dudley Marjoribanks, who wanted a gun dog suited to Scottish Highland terrain."
Here are all the positive environmental stories from 2023 so far (Euronews) #Hope "Eco-anxiety, climate doom, environmental existential dread - as green journalists, we see these terms used a lot - and often feel them ourselves. While there's a lot to be worried about when it comes to the climate and nature crises, we must not lose hope - because hopelessness breeds apathy. The media has an important role to play in combatting climate doom. It's our job to be truthful and accurate in our reporting, not trying to downplay or greenwash the situation. But it's also our job to show that there is hope."
Homeless World Cup makes US debut in California and scores victories beyond the field for players (AP News) #Inspiring "Lisa Wrightsman was a former college soccer player whose life was derailed by drug addiction before she eventually made her way back to the sport through a tournament for players from around the globe who have experienced homelessness. Wrightsman qualified for the Homeless World Cup in Brazil. It was a competition that would forever change her life."
Raw fish and rainwater: Sailor and his dog survive 3 months adrift in Pacific (CBC) #Grit "An Australian sailor who had been adrift at sea with his dog for three months has been rescued by a Mexican tuna boat in international waters [...] Timothy Lyndsay Shaddock, 54, was aboard his incapacitated catamaran Aloha Toa in the Pacific Ocean about 1,900 kilometres from land when the crew of the boat from the Grupomar fleet spotted them [...] The company said Shaddock and his dog, Bella, were in a 'precarious' state when found, lacking provisions and shelter."
New Toronto café hires people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (CBC) TORONTO STORY I love this. "A new coffee shop at the intersection of Yonge Street and St. Clair Avenue is providing employment opportunities to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Lil E Coffee Cafe officially opened its second location in Canada last week."
She's been cooking a stew for 40 days — and it's attracted hundreds of new friends (CBC) TORONTO STORY #Yum "How do you find human connection in our modern times? One way, Annie Rauwerda recently discovered, is stew. Last month, she began simmering potato leek soup in a Crock-Pot. The vegan melange has now been consistently simmering for 40 days, transforming from a humble broth into a mighty perpetual stew. Eventually, she started inviting people to come try and add to it with their own ingredients, which hundreds of people did. And the results have surprised her. 'In a big city, it's easy to feel alone. It's also very possible to create a community, even if it's a community around weird things like a stew that doesn't stop cooking,' Rauwerda told As It Happens host Nil Köksal."
VIDEO: Watch St. John's seniors get the tea on the latest Gen Z slang (CBC) ST JOHN'S STORY "When it comes to the slang of Generation Z, you either know it or you don't. If you don't, it may end up with someone calling you basic. The sayings of today's youth can often sound like a foreign language — like finding out the tea, giving off good vibes and making sure your photo captions on Instagram hit different. To help us learn more about the meaning of words and phrases, The St. John's Morning Show's Amy Feehan stopped by Bishops Gardens Seniors Living in St. John's to give residents a pop quiz."
VIDEO: Boy Has Adorable Reaction When He Sees Baby Brother Waking up on Monitor (We Have Kids) #BrotherlyLove "When you have more than one child, the dream is that they'll get along and play together and love each other through thick and thin. This doesn't always happen. Sometimes, though, it does. In this heartwarming video from @theslaneybrothers, a boy sees on the baby monitor that his little brother is starting to wake up and gets super excited, running off to the baby's room for the sweetest wake up greeting ever."
He's been obsessed with John Deere tractors since he was a kid. Now he's opening his own museum (CBC) ONTARIO STORY #TractorNerd "Dave McEachren's love of John Deere tractors began when he was a youngster growing up on a farm in southwestern Ontario. 'I was a backyard sandbox farmer before I was a full-time farmer,' said McEachren, 43, of Glencoe, who also worked at a John Deere dealership as a teenager. For years, McEachren's family farmed — beef cows, then cash crops — almost exclusively using John Deere tractors. It's what inspired McEachren to start collecting the equipment, and he's now amassed over thirty 1950s-era tractors and thousands more pieces of memorabilia. The cream of the crop? McEachren is opening a museum on his own property later this summer."
VIDEO: Baby ospreys rescued from burning nest reunited with parents (CBC) NOVA SCOTIA STORY "Two baby birds barely bigger than a ball of feathers have been reunited with their parents in a brand new home after they were rescued — smoky and singed — from their fiery nest in Musquodoboit Harbour, N.S., two weeks ago. The reunion was a collaborative effort between firefighters, the Hope for Wildlife rescue organization, Nova Scotia Power and the Department of Natural Resources."
VIDEO: Nurse performs Halifax hospital's 1st smudging ceremony — for her sister's baby (CBC) HALIFAX STORY "Nurse Courtney Pennell gets goosebumps whenever she thinks about performing her hospital's first-ever smudging ceremony on her twin sister and newborn nephew. Pennell is the Indigenous health consultant at IWK Health Centre in Halifax. For years, she has been advocating for the hospital to allow smudging for Indigenous mothers and their babies. That policy finally came into effect last month — just in time for the arrival of Beau Joseph Bear Pennell. 'It's hard to choke back the tears,' Pennell told As It Happens host Nil Köksal."
Vancouver Island marmot travels long distance looking for love (CTV) VANCOUVER ISLAND STORY "Camas, a three-year-old Vancouver Island marmot, went looking for love and was found in Errington last week—which is nowhere near where he was supposed to be. Using a radio transmitter, the Marmot Recovery Foundation last located the lonely marmot around Green Mountain in the Nanaimo Lakes region last month and he eventually went out of range. They figure he travelled 30 to 40 kilometres as the crow flies to Errington, where someone contacted the foundation saying they spotted a marmot in the area. Camas was then captured by crews from the recovery foundation and taken to their breeding facility on Mount Washington."

TOP TEN STORIES OF THE WEEK

Why Philanthropic Giving Declined in 2022 (Nonprofit Quarterly) "Total US philanthropic giving decreased significantly in 2022, one of only four times the metric has dipped in the last 40 years. The latest annual report by Giving USA shows that total giving for 2022 declined by 3.4 percent in current dollars (or 10.5 percent after adjusting for inflation) to a total of $499 billion—down from $517 billion in 2021."
Some young Canadians would rather die earlier or not have sex than lose social media, study shows (CBC) CANADIAN STORY "A study of 750 Canadians ages 16 to 30 has yielded some shocking results. It asked the sample group what they would rather give up than social media. While most would only sacrifice things like alcohol or video games, nearly 10 per cent of respondents said they would accept being unable to have children, give up sex, or forfeit one-year of their life to maintain their social media connections."
Nike announces it will permanently end sponsorship of Hockey Canada (CBC) CANADIAN STORY "Nike announced Monday that it will permanently cease its sponsorship of Hockey Canada in the wake of its handling of a high-profile alleged group sexual assault case. "Nike is no longer a sponsor of Hockey Canada," a company statement issued Monday said. 'We will continue to provide on-ice product for Hockey Canada athletes as part of our partnership with the International Ice Hockey Federation, but our individual partnership with the federation has ended.' The sportswear giant first announced a temporary suspension of support last October, at a time when corporate sponsors Chevrolet Canada, Scotiabank and Canadian Tire had also pulled their financial support."
10 years after bankruptcy, Detroit is a city on the rebound (CBC) "Detroit had $18 billion US in debt when it filed bankruptcy. The city emerged in December 2014 with a new mayor, Mike Duggan. He's led an effort to change the way Detroit invests in all its neighbourhoods, according to the city."
Margaret Atwood among thousands of authors demanding compensation from AI companies (CBC) CANADIAN STORY "James Patterson, Suzanne Collins and Margaret Atwood are among more than 8,000 writers endorsing an open letter from the Authors Guild urging AI companies to obtain permission before incorporating copyrighted work into their technologies. 'Millions of copyrighted books, articles, essays and poetry provide the 'food' for AI systems, endless meals for which there has been no bill,' the letter reads in part."
Hearing aids, counselling may slow cognitive decline for some seniors, new study finds (CBC) While I am not yet a senior, I do wear hearing aids...for partly this reason. "Seniors at risk of dementia who were given hearing aids and counselling had less cognitive decline over a three-year period, a randomized trial finds. Research published [...] in The Lancet medical journal found that at-risk seniors saw their rate of cognitive decline nearly cut in half over three years if they wore hearing aids, compared to seniors who just received education. While past research has shown a link between hearing loss and cognitive decline, experts say this study supports the need for seniors to use devices to mitigate the risk. In Canada, audiologists estimate that around three million people have some degree of hearing loss that could be improved with hearing aids, yet 80 per cent don't wear them."
What is the fediverse and why does Threads want to join? (CBC) "If you recently downloaded Meta's new Threads app — a social media platform some say rivals Twitter — you may have noticed it plans to join the fediverse. Before you can join Threads, a disclaimer pops up: 'Future versions of Threads will work within the fediverse, a new type of social media network that allows people to follow and interact with each other on different platforms.' What exactly does that mean?"
Carlos Alcaraz wins Wimbledon title, embodying a changing of the guard in tennis (The Globe and Mail) #Congrats "The 20-year-old Spaniard from the suburbs of Murcia had only played four tournaments on grass and he hadn’t gone beyond the fourth round at Wimbledon. And here he was taking down the seven-time Wimbledon champion, a 36-year-old legend who was gunning for his 24th Grand Slam title and who hadn’t lost on Centre Court in 10 years."
Physicists Just Figured Out How Wormholes Could Enable Time Travel (Science Alert) CANADIAN CONTENT "Theoretical physicists have a lot in common with lawyers. Both spend a lot of time looking for loopholes and inconsistencies in the rules that might be exploited somehow. Valeri P. Frolov and Andrei Zelnikov from the University of Alberta in Canada and Pavel Krtouš from Charles University in Prague probably couldn't get you out of a traffic fine, but they may have uncovered enough wiggle room in the laws of physics to send you back in time to make sure you didn't speed through that school zone in the first place."
Benefactor pulls six figure donation from Arizona State University, citing ‘left-wing hostility and activism’ (Fox News) "A real estate magnate who has donated millions to Arizona State University over the last two decades pulled back on a six figure donation he had pledged to the college. His move was prompted by faculty condemning a staff member for organizing on-campus events with prominent conservatives. In a recent statement, Scottsdale real estate investor Tom Lewis claimed he would not go through with his annual $400,000 pledge to the university’s honors college – where he has a center in his name. His decision came after one of its faculty claimed the school fired her for inviting conservative commentators Dennis Prager, Charlie Kirk, and Robert Kiyosaki to speak on campus."

SEVEN LIFE AND CAREER HACKS

Knowledge Graphs & LLMs: Real-Time Graph Analytics (Neo4j Developer Blog) A very helpful way of looking at the world.
Graphic Design Trends 2023 (Codeart) Lots of change in this space.
Back-To-Back Meetings Create an Illusion of Productivity — Why The Best Leaders Keep an Empty Calendar (Illumination) I try. I really try. And, mostly, I am successful.
15 Books you must read(2) (Abdullah Basaran) Not your usual list. I like unusual.
8 Japanese Techniques to Overcome Laziness & Achieve Success (Mind Cafe) Japan has lots to teach us.
10 powerful equations that will rewire your mindset (Harsh Darji) Some interesting and thoughtful equations here.
Mise En Place of Note-Taking (Shu Omi) Such a smart approach.

TOP THREE GIFTS OF THE WEEK

Jeff Bezos’ Latest Donation to the Smithsonian Is a $12m Grant (Observer) "A new donation to the Smithsonian won’t be funneled towards one of the institution’s numerous art or history museums. Instead, the $12 million grant from Jeff Bezos will support the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI), a Panama-based facility focused on analyzing and preserving tropical ecosystems."
Nederlands Fotomuseum Gets $42.8 M. Donation for New Home, Rain Shutters Hamptons Art Fair, and More: Morning Links for July 18, 2023 (Art News) "The Nederlands Fotomuseum acquired a new home in Rotterdam with a €38 million donation (about $42.8 million) from the philanthropic organization Droom en Daad, de Volkskrant reports (via NL Times)."
Tulane University receives $12.5M donation in support of data science (New Orleans City Business) "Libby and Robert Alexander, longtime Tulane supporters, are donating more than $12 million to advance a university-wide data science initiative. The money is meant to transform teaching and research across all disciplines at Tulane and position the university. It’s also aimed to establish Tulane as a leader in data pedagogy."

LAST WEEK'S MOST POPULAR STORIES

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