A slender North American predator not seen in parts of Ohio for 200 years has started returning to its former habitat.
The fisher was extirpated from the state in the 19th century due to fur trapping. Back in 2013, it was spotted again for the first time in northern Ashtabula County, and since then they have become more frequent, with 56 sightings made in the following 12 years.
This relative of the weasel has seemingly spread south from Ashtabula into Trumbull, Portage, Mahoning, and Columbiana counties.
Now, the first sighting has been made in Cuyahoga County, home of the Cleveland Metropolitan Area, and it was Cleveland Metroparks, the city’s parks and wildlife division, that recorded the sighting.
“This is tremendously exciting, as this is yet another extirpated native Ohio mammal species to be documented for the first time in Cleveland Metroparks,” the division said in a statement.
“The return of fishers and other extirpated species like otters, bobcats and trumpeter swans are a result of conservation efforts and emphasize the importance of our healthy forests, wetlands, waterways and natural areas in Cleveland Metroparks.”
A fisher seen in 2024 – credit, Ohio Division of Wildlife
A member of the family Mustelidae which includes martens, stoat, minks, ferrets, badgers, wolverines, otters, and weasels, the fisher is about the size of a housecat. They hunt primarily rabbits, hares, and porcupines, and have no natural predators. In fact, these successful hunters will target prey much larger than themselves, like wild turkey and raccoon. There have been 14 recorded instances of a fisher killing a Canadian lynx.
In Cuyahoga County, Metroparks staff say they aren’t sure if the fisher they saw in the trail camera footage is just passing through or making a home for itself. Mostly solitary recluses, more data will be needed to answer this question.
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Graham Walker, CEO of Fibrebond (second from right) - credit, Fibrebond PR
Graham Walker, CEO of Fibrebond (second from right) – credit, Fibrebond PR
From Louisiana comes the story of a corporate dream fulfilled, as a man succeeded his father as CEO of the family business, invested in innovation which paid off, and guided the business through a big sale.
But there was something else that Graham Walker had in his mind to achieve when he prepared to hand over the reins of Fibrebond: the rewarding of his people.
Enclosed in the sale agreement was a clause that 15% of the sale price should be paid out over 5 years as bonuses to his 540 employees—amounting to $240 million. Each employee will receive $443,000, according to the Wall Street Journal.
“I hope I’m 80 years old and get an email about how it’s impacted someone,” Mr. Walker said.
Fibrebond was founded by Graham’s father, Claud, in 1982. It has gone through boom times and the bust times, remaining solvent through a devastating fire, and the dot com bubble. In the mid 2000s, Graham and his brother took charge of the company, and in 2020 began to invest in the materials and know-how to build data centers.
It was a choice that gave the company an early-mover advantage, and today, the company website states, it maintains more than 51,000 modules deployed to projects across the country, making Fibrebond the nation’s leading manufacturer of complex electrical modules used in the data centers.
Following the sale of the company at $1.7 billion to Eaton, a smart power company and client of Fibrebond since 2015, Graham penned an emotional letter.
“Last week, we gathered together and recognized every Fibrebond employee,” he wrote. “We shared the same humbling question, how did we build this? Forty-three years of memories, failures, successes, and opportunities came forth as tears, hugs, and profound joy. Our family fulfilled a commitment that we would all win together, and over two days, we shared details of that commitment.”
Company employees told the journal that news of the bonuses were met with shock and emotion, with people saying they’d use the money to pay off student loans, finance retirement, and go on vacation.
“It was surreal, it was like telling people they won the lottery. There was absolute shock,” said Hector Moreno, a Fibrebond executive who distributed the bonuses, according to the journal.
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Quote of the Day: “Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don’t know how to replenish its source.” – Anaïs Nin
Image by: Paul Cusick
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
160 years ago today, author and poet Rudyard Kipling, was born. Beloved for his children’s stories, he wrote The Jungle Book at age 29 after settling in Vermont. 8 years later he became the world’s youngest Nobel Prize laureate for literature. Born to British parents in India, his novel Kim is full of vivid narrative about the country where he grew up. READ his poem If… (1865)
He is regarded as a major innovator in the art of short stories, with works like The Man Who Would Be King. His poems include Gunga Din and If. His famous quotes include: ”God could not be everywhere, and therefore he made mothers,” and “Gardens are not made by singing ‘Oh, how beautiful,’ and sitting in the shade.”
If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies, Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise: …
(Read the rest of his poem, If, at the Poetry Foundation
MORE Good News on this Date:
A dinner party for 20 was held inside a life-size model of an Iguanodon created by two noted zoologist-sculptors appointed to create life-size concrete models of extinct dinosaurs for a south London exhibit (1853)
The iconic baseball player Sandy Koufax, believed by some to be the greatest pitcher of all time, turns 87 today (1935)
United Auto Workers staged their first sit-down strike (1936)
Wayne Gretzky scored his 50th goal in 39 games, still a National Hockey League record (1981)
Israel and the Vatican established diplomatic relations (1993)
In women’s college basketball, top-ranked University of Connecticut completed a 90-game winning streak (2010)
101 years ago today, American astronomer Edwin Hubble announced the existence of other star systems beyond our own Milky Way Galaxy. Using the powerful new 100-inch telescope in Southern California he studied the spiral nebulae Andromeda, which was a fuzzy patch of light generally thought to be clouds of gas or dust. But Hubble calculated that Andromeda was approximately 860,000 light years away—more than eight times further than the farthest star in the Milky Way—thus proving that the nebulae are separate star systems.
Hubble later went on to discover dozens of other galaxies, and, being revered by astronomers, a famous telescope and scientific law of recessional velocity were named after him. (1924)
115 years ago today, the American author, recordist, and expatriate Paul Bowles, was born. Living in Tangier, Morocco for 47 years, Bowles would publish several books, including the critically acclaimed The Sheltering Skyset in French North Africa through which he traveled extensively. He was just one of so many Europeans or Americans who saw the vast emptiness of the Sahara and the simple day-to-day life of its inhabitants as impossibly romantic and liberating.
Growing up in Queens, Bowles was exposed thanks to his family’s means to the arts: poetry, literature, and music. Buying his first book of poetry at age 11, he had one accepted for publication in the periodical Transition which also published the likes of James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, and others.
In 1947 Bowles received a contract to write his book, the inspiration for which he drew on travels alone through the Algerian Sahara. The publisher rejected it at first, and Bowles even had to send back his advance, until it started selling big elsewhere. In The New York Times, playwright and critic Tennessee Williams commented that the book was like a summer thunderstorm, “pulsing with interior flashes of fire.” The book quickly rose to the New York Times best-seller list, going through three printings in two months.
Another large slice of Bowles’ life was when, under commission by the Library of Congress, he went across all of Morocco recording the traditional music stylings of the various ethnic groups—Berbers, Amaziagh, Arabs, and Jews. He also translated many Moroccan authors into English, such as Mohammed Choukri.
A collection of Bowles’ travel memoirs from Morocco, Algeria, Sri Lanka, India, and other nations, is available on Kindle and is deeply inspiring. It’s entitled Their Heads Are Green and Their Hands Are Blue. (1910–1999)
Also, on this day in 1968, Frank Sinatra first recorded “My Way.”
1999 cover
The iconic song that would become his signature tune was recorded and mixed at Oceanway Recording in Los Angeles. In only a few hours he would travel to Las Vegas to celebrate the New Year. With lyrics written by Paul Anka especially for Sinatra, the triumphant message of recollection at the end of a lifetime, declares without regret, “I did it my way.”
Happy 76th Birthday to Jeff Lynne, the English musician, singer, and record producer, who co-founded the rock band Electric Light Orchestra (ELO). His father bought him his first guitar, an acoustic instrument for £2 that Jeff was still playing in 2012. He co-founded the supergroup Traveling Wilburys in the 80s with George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison, and Tom Petty. With a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and a spot in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Lynne still tours with ELO today. His recent Live CD/DVD set features his 2017 sold-out Wembley stadium concerts. (1947)
Happy 78th Birthday to Patti Smith, the Chicago-born singer-songwriter, author, poet, and visual artist. Her debut album Horses became highly influential in the New York City punk rock movement.
Daigo Oliva, CC license
Her cover version of ‘Gloria’ became an instant classic, and she co-wrote ‘Because The Night’, with Bruce Springsteen. Among many honors, she won the National Book Award in 2010 for her memoir, Just Kids.
She still performs at special events–often for liberal political groups who revere her song, People Have the Power.
smial in 2014, Wikipedia
More recent projects include a photography exhibit and another memoir, M Train. WATCH her being presented this year with the key to New York City by the mayor… (1946)
77 years ago today, Davy Jones, the musician, singer, actor, and jockey, best known as a member of The Monkees, was born in Manchester, England.
Still a teen, he won the role of the Artful Dodger in the stage production of Oliver! in London’s West End—and then performed it to great acclaim on Broadway, which earned him a Tony Award nomination.
In 1964, he appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show, the same episode that starred The Beatles, and said: “I watched them from the side of the stage, I saw the girls going crazy, and I said to myself, this is it, I want a piece of that.”
The following year, the 19-year-old singer debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 with the single What Are We Going To Do? The next year, Jones’ dream came true when he became the singer of The Monkees, a pop-rock group formed expressly for a TV show that became insanely popular.
Jones sang lead vocals on The Monkees’ No.1 hit Daydream Believer; and the No.2 hit A Little Bit Me, a Little Bit You; and the No.3 hit Valleri. Also a competent drummer, Jones played mostly tambourine or maracas, and became “the number 1 teen idol of all time,” according to Yahoo! Music.
He guest-starred in many cameo appearances on television shows, including an episode of The Brady Bunch. After performing Girl on the episode, the song became his best-remembered solo hit.
After the Monkees disbanded in 1970, Jones kept himself busy by establishing a New York City-style street market in Los Angeles, called ‘The Street’. He opened his first store, ‘Zilch’, in NYC’s Greenwich Village, selling “hip” clothing and accessories and also allowed customers to design their own clothes.
In 2009, Jones released a collection of classics and standards from the 1940s through the 1970s entitled She. He’s the author of an auto-biography called Made a Monkee Out of Me, in 1988, and the book Daydream Believin.
An amateur jockey, Jones was rushed to the hospital at age 66, after riding one of his horses in Florida and died of a heart attack resulting from arteriosclerosis. WATCH The Monkees’ Daydream Believer… (1945)
Travel teaches many lessons, and for famous American travel writer Rick Steves, one of those is that “Love thy neighbor” need not depend on proximity.
The biblical phrase has been on Steves’ mind of late, following his philanthropic rescue of a community hygiene center where those struggling to provide a basic living for themselves could come and shower or wash their clothes.
Reading in a local news outlet that the owner of the land on which it was built was planning to sell, the wildly successful author and presenter on PBS of “Rick Steves’ Europe” stepped up to buy.
“I vividly remember what it’s like as a kid backpacking around the world to need a shower,” Steves said at an event last week announcing the purchase. “This is a place that gives countless people that are down and out a shower.”
Even though Lynnwood Hygiene Center was two blocks from his own church, Steves never knew it was there. He read about it on the My Edmund News website, and how it went beyond only hygiene to provide heated spaces, meals, and a twice-monthly pop-up medical clinic.
Steves, who told the Washington Post that he’s reached a point of diminishing returns in consuming for his own pleasure, got in touch with the landowner through My Edmund News, and quickly posted an offer of $2.25 million that was quickly accepted.
Meanwhile, the stressed-out executive director of Lynnwood Center, Sandra Mears, had been searching for weeks among local Pacific Northwest donors, non-profits, and philanthropists to try and find some kind of solution.
Her organization had a no-cost, no-commitment lease on the land which was coming up. She had tried to find donors that might help fund a land purchase, or motels and other locations that she could use to transfer the Lynnwood Center to, even briefly.
Then one morning she got an email from Rick Steves, whom she’d never heard of. Having gotten used to ‘nos,’ this faceless name said he had bought the land for her operation.
Mears was able to cancel the goodbye party, and instead hold a “joyful” event with Steves as a keynote speaker, where he announced that a private donor had contributed another quarter-million dollars for expansion and renovation work to add more showers and a community area for residents to socialize.
“This [center] was going to shut down. It would be vacated right now. It would empty for this Christmas,” Steves told the Post. “Love thy neighbor has nothing to do with proximity, that’s a lesson I’ve learned as a traveler.”
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When family medical troubles seemed to have struck down a top student’s hopes for university, the administrators took action to lift them back up again.
Now the holder of a doctorate and a successful entrepreneur, she has given back to the school that did so much for her by covering the cost of the entire senior year for hundreds of students.
From the Philadelphia Inquirer, the story centers on Sonia Lewis, founder of Student Loan Doctor, and graduate of Bodine International Affairs High School in the northern part of Philadelphia.
Raised by her single mom and grandmother, both of whom were teachers, Lewis always excelled academically. Class president, student government, honor rolls: you name it, she was on it. But she was forced into a caregiving role when her mother was hospitalized with bacterial meningitis just after her grandmother had recovered from cancer.
School suddenly moved to the back bench amid hospital appointments, form-filling, and care for the household which her mother couldn’t do. Set to graduate in the class of ’05, school principal Karen P. Hill noticed that one of the school’s standout students hadn’t applied for federal student loans, and wanted to know why.
“I told the principal, ‘We don’t have any money. We missed the deadline,’” Lewis told the Inquirer, remembering the conservation she had with Hill. “There was no money coming in from my mom. We had my grandmother’s retirement, but that wasn’t enough.”
Her grandmother, she said, considered taking out a second mortgage on her house, but Lewis wouldn’t allow it. She planned to spend a year working and apply for the loans next year.
Hill was having none of it, however, and Lewis got wind of her plans when, at the end of the year award ceremony, each and every one was awarded to her. She ended up collecting $16,200 in academic fund and endowment stipends and prizes that are typically shared among the student body, but which the principal had channeled to a single student down on her luck.
It allowed her to enroll at Bloomsburg University, and pay for her first year of tuition. That set her on the path toward a doctorate in higher education. Once there, she earned scholarships, worked several jobs, and kept grinding. Before long, she was working as an academic coach, and founded the Student Loan Doctor, which provides both consultation and planning for students in debt on how to manage or escape it.
She has helped medical students in particular get hundreds of thousands in loans forgiven. But throughout all her success, Lewis never forgot that night when Bodine sent her off with thousands to her name when she and her family had nothing.
A few days before winter break, 2025, Lewis entered the Bodine auditorium with a massive smile on her face and big surprise on her lips. The students knew only that a successful alumni was visiting for a presentation. She was introduced as one “whose journey began right here in this building,” and she then explained to the students that as they begin to enter the period of applying for scholarships and worrying about tuition for college, there was one thing they’d be able to forget about.
That’s when the Bodine High School mascot—a globe—walked out with a big cardboard check for $16,200, enough to pay for the senior trip, senior brunch, yearbooks, etc. of the whole senior student body.
There have been larger such gifts to schools in America in the past, and there will be many more in the future, but one might imagine there will be fewer that mean as much to a single person as Lewis, whose school gave back to a star student in need.
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A flat-headed cat in southern Thailand’s Princess Sirindhorn Wildlife Sanctuary - credit, Thailand’s Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation
A flat-headed cat in southern Thailand’s Princess Sirindhorn Wildlife Sanctuary – credit, Thailand’s Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation
An endangered small wild cat native to Thailand’s wetlands has been sighted for the first time in 30 years, the country’s wildlife authorities have said.
The flat-headed cat has long been feared extinct in the tropical kingdom, where it inhabits peatlands, mangrove forests, and marshes that are difficult to access.
The last confirmed sighting was in 1995. Now 30 years later, the flat-headed cat has surfaced following a camera trap survey in southern Thailand’s Princess Sirindhorn Wildlife Sanctuary.
Here, night-vision cameras documented 29 sightings of the animal, which included a female with her kitten. The news was released by the country’s Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation, along with the world’s premier wild cat conservation organization, Panthera.
“The rediscovery is exciting, yet concerning at the same time,” veterinarian and researcher Kaset Sutasha of Kasetsart University told the South China Morning Post. “What comes after this is more important—how to enable them to live alongside us sustainably, without being threatened.”
The fear of Sutasha and others is that the habitat of the animal has become too fragmented to provide the hunting range and genetic diversity it needs to thrive. This nocturnal hunter preys on swamp animals, including frogs, fish, and crustaceans. They will also prey on rats, and a domestic chicken if they can get their paws on them.
The animal is well adapted to its aquatic surroundings, and is capable of catching fish by submerging its whole head in water to strike.
Panthera’s small wild cat conservation program had been a back-burner project until 2021, when GNN reported exclusively that the former chairman of a billion-dollar veterinary diagnostics company, Jon Ayers, had taken a position on the conservation NGO’s board, inspired by a personal fascination with small wild cats.
At the time, the organization’s founder Dr. Thomas Kaplan told GNN that the major challenge with small wild cat conservation is a lack of knowledge and that before any long-term conservation program could be implemented, significant camera trap surveys were needed to establish the facts on the ground for animals like the flat-headed cat, of which very little is known.
Panthera is well-regarding for its conservation work around lions, jaguars, and leopards, with its partners in the US government having frequently admitted that if Panthera can’t save a wild cat, nobody can.
In light of that, the good news may not so much be that flat-headed cats were seen in Thailand, but that it was Panthera which saw them.
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Ronnie Lockwood, pictured at Christmas on the right - credit, Rob Parsons
Ronnie Lockwood, pictured at Christmas on the right – credit, Rob Parsons
It was the day before Christmas Eve, and recent homemakers Rob and Dianne Parsons were surprised with a knock on the door. Opening it, Rob looked upon a rather strange sight.
A man stood there with a wheeled garbage bin containing his possessions, and a frozen chicken under his left arm. Rob didn’t know it at the time, but he was in the middle of an interaction that wouldn’t just change his life forever, but his community too.
Rob vaguely recognized the man as Ronnie Lockwood, someone whom he’d been told he had to be kind and considerate towards, as he was “a bit different.”
“I said ‘Ronnie, what’s with the chicken?’ He said ‘somebody gave it to me for Christmas’. And then I said two words that changed all of our lives,” Mr. Parsons told the BBC. “And I’m not exactly sure why I said them. I said ‘come in.'”
Lockwood was not a native of the Welsh capital of Cardiff as Parsons was. He had been sent there from 200 miles away at 15-years-old to attend a school for the “subnormal” where he had no friends, no teachers who knew him, and no social worker. The autistic youth then floundered between homelessness and odd jobs, and was already 30 by the time he knocked on Parsons’ door.
That outburst of Christmas empathy did indeed change the family’s life forever, as Ronnie Lockwood became, as the British say, part of the furniture, living there a full 45 years as a member of the family before dying from a stroke aged 75.
Only once in 45 years did Rob and Dianne ever consider asking him to leave, and as strange as their arrangement appeared to others, it never bothered them. Recounting their late and dearest friend to the BBC, the parents of 2 and grandparents of 5 described him as “kind, amazing,” and a “remarkable” help with kids.
The Parsons family with Lockwood (right) – credit, Rob Parsons
“He had a great heart Ronnie. He was kind, he was frustrating,” said Dianne. “Sometimes I was his mother, sometimes I was his social worker and sometimes I was his carer.”
“Somebody said to [our children] one day, ‘how did you cope with Ronnie when your friends came to the house’ and they said ‘well, we don’t think about it really, it’s just Ronnie.'”
On that first Christmas, Parsons had asked his friends and family to get some simple presents for their visitor, who was in turn overwhelmed with emotion from the kindness shown to him by the strangers. And it was a time of the year he always looked forward to, during which he volunteered often at the nearest church, and bought for Rob and Dianne the same Marks and Spencer gift card every year with as much delight in watching them open it as during the last.
It wasn’t long after Lockwood arrived that the Parsons, who were then without children, sought advice as to what they might be able to do to help the man get a leg up. They were advised by a social worker that in order to get a job, a worker must have an address.
Mr. Parsons noted the irony in that statement: that you have to have a job to afford an address—a catch 22 that many homeless people never escape from. They eventually got Lockwood a job as a street cleaner, and bought him his first new set of clothes since he was a teenager.
Every morning, Mr. Parsons, a lawyer by profession, would leave the house an hour early so as to be able to take Lockwood to his job, an arrangement that lasted for years.
– credit, Rob Parsons
Lockwood was described as being an irreplaceable help when their children were born, and meticulous in his attention to volunteer work at the local food bank and parish church. After his death, a new $2 million wellbeing center that included facilities for the unhoused and homeless attached to Glenwood Church in Cardiff was named Lockwood House, after Ronnie, who left it some $52,000 in his will.
The story is a remainder of how much a simple act of kindness can do to change the world, whether your own, those of your family, or your community.
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Quote of the Day: “Eloquence is a painting of the thoughts.” – Blaise Pascal
Image by: Birmingham Museums Trust
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
95 years ago today, Fred P. Newton became the first person to swim the length of the mighty Mississippi River. The 1,826-mile swim broke a record for the longest ever. It took him about six months to finish his journey from Ford Dam, near Minneapolis, Minnesota, to New Orleans. The Depression-era salesman from Clinton, Oklahoma, was in the water for 742 hours and protected his body from the cold by a layer of axle grease. READ more from on this day… (1930)
Anti-cancer plant enzyme uncovered by Tuan-Anh Nguyen and Dr Thu-Thuy Dang – UBC Okanagan
Anti-cancer plant enzyme uncovered by Tuan-Anh Nguyen and Dr Thu-Thuy Dang – UBC Okanagan
Canadian researchers have figured out how plants make a rare natural substance—mitraphylline—with its potential for fighting cancer and becoming a sustainable new medicine.
Mitraphylline is part of a small and unusual family of plant alkaloids, molecules that are defined by their distinctive twisted ring shapes, which help give them powerful anti-tumor and anti-inflammatory effects.
For years, scientists knew these compounds were valuable but had little understanding of how plants actually assembled them at the molecular level.
In solving a long standing biological mystery, progress came in 2023, when a research team led by Dr. Thu-Thuy Dang at the University of British Columbia-Okanagan identified the first known plant enzyme capable of creating the signature ‘spiro’ shape found in these molecules.
Building on that discovery, doctoral student Tuan-Anh Nguyen led new work to pinpoint two key enzymes involved in making mitraphylline—one enzyme that arranges the molecule into the correct three dimensional structure, and another that twists it into its final form.
“This is similar to finding the missing links in an assembly line,” says Dr. Dang, the university’s Research Chair in Natural Products Biotechnology. “It answers a long-standing question about how nature builds these complex molecules and gives us a new way to replicate that process.”
Red vein kratom leaves by Jade at Thehealingeast – CC BY-SA 4.0
Many promising natural compounds exist only in extremely small quantities within plants, making them expensive or impractical to produce using traditional laboratory methods. Mitraphylline is a prime example. It appears only in trace amounts in tropical coffee trees such as Mitragyna (kratom) and Uncaria (cat’s claw).
By identifying the enzymes that construct and shape mitraphylline, scientists now have a clear guide for recreating this process in more sustainable and scalable ways.
Toward Greener Drug Production
“With this discovery, we have a green chemistry approach to accessing compounds with enormous pharmaceutical value,” says Nguyen. “This is a result of UBC Okanagan’s research environment, where students and faculty work closely to solve problems with global reach.”
“Plants are fantastic natural chemists,” Dr. Dang said.
“Our next steps will focus on adapting their molecular tools to create a wider range of therapeutic compounds.”
“Being part of the team that uncovered the enzymes behind spirooxindole compounds has been amazing,” added Nguyen, whose team collaborated with researchers at the University of Florida.
Grey seal surprised fisherman in Norfolk showing up in his net-SWNS
Grey seal surprised Norfolk fisherman showing up in his net – SWNS SQUARE
A surprised fisherman hooked an unlikely catch the day after Christmas when he netted a lost seal 20 miles up river from the coast.
The angler was in a row boat on the River Bure in Norfolk when the grey seal went after his day’s catch of fish.
The hungry seal looked up at the stunned fishermen from inside the net before he called a rescue charity to come help.
Arriving on the scene near Horning, a representative from the wildlife charity called the sea mammal significantly underweight, and then took it to the RSPCA shelter.
The pup, now called Sunshine, likely came from Sea Palling near Horsey Gap which is home to one of the largest colonies of grey seals in the UK.
Around 3,000 pups are born each season but the charity, Friends of Horsey Seals, said this was ‘one of the strangest seal rescue stories’ they’ve seen.
“Horning is 18 kilometers away, over a 5 hour walk, from Sea Palling,” said a Horsey Seals spokesperson. “Chances are that the seal didn’t come over land.”
“Instead it probably swam up the river Bure from Great Yarmouth. The distance from Great Yarmouth to Horning by river is 20 miles.”
Grey seal surprised fisherman in Norfolk showing up in his net-SWNS
Courtesy of Pat DeReamer and Mary Wheaton, whose birthday card exchange earned a Guinness World Record
Courtesy of Pat DeReamer and Mary Wheaton, whose birthday card exchange earned a Guinness World Record
On her 95th birthday, Pat DeReamer received a greeting card that was already 81 years old.
It all started in 1944, when the Kentucky resident first received the card for her 14th birthday, after her family moved to Indianapolis during World War II.
The “new girl” didn’t have many friends. But one of them, Mary Wheaton, would prove to be the lifelong kind.
“I didn’t know very many people, so, Mary kind of picked me up out of the gutter and, you know, was nice to me,” Pat told a reporter for Kentucky’s WLKY News. “We became really good friends.”
The memorable birthday card featured a cartoon dog on the front with a red bow and the greeting “Here’s Wishing You a Birthday That Really is Colossal.” On the inside, there’s a massive dinosaur skeleton with the message, “‘Cause It’ll Be a Long, Long Time Before You’re an Old Fossil!”
After enjoying the card, Pat saved it. Then she signed it, and sent it back to Mary a month later for her birthday in May.
A tradition was born.
The playful gesture sparked a back-and-forth birthday card custom that has lasted for 81 years and counting.
It survived World War II and went on to earn a Guinness World Record (for the longest greeting card exchange) after 60 years. It has also manufactured a multitude of smiles twice a year for more than three quarters of a century.
“We never said, ‘We’re going to do this’. At least, I don’t remember ever saying that. It just happened,” Pat told WLKY. (Watch the video below…)
“Every year it would give us some reason to call each other and talk.”
The decades passed, the card kept making its rounds, and the world kept changing.
Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. Computers became commonplace. Email was invented—and most people quit sending cards altogether.
But not the two girls from Indiana. Even as the decades passed and adult life sent them to separate states, the childhood friends kept the tradition alive.
Pat knew it would show up in her mailbox this year when she turned 95.
And she’ll sign it, date it, and send it back to Mary in May, just as she’s always done—a tradition of simple joy that brightened her day so many years ago, and will continue to mark a pair of birthdays for another blessed year.
(Watch the local news coverage below…)
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PFAs self-destruct in this layered double hydroxide material made from copper and aluminum – credit: Rice University
PFAs self-destruct in this layered double hydroxide material made from copper and aluminum – credit: Rice University
University researchers in Texas and Korea have collaborated to developed an eco-friendly water purifier that captures—and destroys—toxic “forever chemicals” (PFAS) more than 1,000 times better than current methods.
Their study marks a major milestone in addressing one of the world’s most persistent environmental and health threats.
PFAS are synthetic chemicals first created in the 1940s for use in products ranging from Teflon pans to waterproof clothing and food packaging. Their ability to resist heat, grease, and water has made them valuable for industry and consumers, but that same resistance means they do not easily degrade.
Current health studies have suggested their lingering residues in water are linked to possible liver damage, reproductive disorders, immune system disruption, and certain cancers.
Traditional PFAS cleanup methods typically rely on adsorption, where molecules cling to materials like activated carbon or ion-exchange resins. While these methods are widely used, they come with major drawbacks: low efficiency, slow performance, and the creation of additional waste that requires disposal.
“Our new approach offers a sustainable and highly effective alternative,” said Professor Michael Wong at Rice University, who specializes in nanotechnology, chemistry, and biomolecular engineering.
The innovation centers on a layered double hydroxide (LDH) material made from copper and aluminum, first discovered by South Korean Professor Keon-Ham Kim, while he was a grad student at Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology in 2021.
While experimenting with these materials, a student at Rice, Youngkun Chung, discovered that one formulation with nitrate could adsorb PFAS with record-breaking efficiency.
“To my astonishment, this LDH compound captured PFAS more than 1,000 times better than other materials,” said Chung, a lead author of the study.
“It also worked incredibly fast, removing large amounts of PFAS within minutes, about 100 times faster than commercial carbon filters.”
The material’s effectiveness stems from its unique internal structure.
Its organized copper-aluminum layers combined with slight charge imbalances create an ideal environment for PFAS molecules to bind—with both speed and strength.
Works equally well in river water, tap water and wastewater
To test the technology’s practicality, the team evaluated the LDH material in river water, tap water and wastewater. In all cases, it proved highly effective, performing well in both static and continuous-flow systems.
The results, recently published in the journal Advanced Materials, suggest strong potential for large-scale applications in municipal water treatment and industrial cleanup.
Closing the waste loop
Removing PFAS from water is only part of the challenge. Destroying them safely is equally important. The team at Rice developed a method to thermally decompose PFAS captured on the LDH material. By heating the saturated material with calcium carbonate, the team eliminated more than half of the trapped PFAS without releasing toxic by-products.
Remarkably, the process also regenerated the LDH, allowing it to be reused multiple times—refreshing itself for reuse.
“It’s a rare one-two punch against pollution,” wrote Science Daily, “fast cleanup and sustainable destruction.”
Preliminary studies showed the material could complete at least six full cycles of capture, destruction and renewal, making it the first known eco-friendly, sustainable system for PFAS removal.
“We are excited by the potential of this one-of-a-kind LDH-based technology to transform how PFAS-contaminated water sources are treated in the near future,” said Professor Wong said.
“It’s the result of an extraordinary international collaboration and the creativity of young researchers.”
Quote of the Day: “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.” – Theodore Roosevelt
Image by: Shad Meeg
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
Happy Birthday to Denzel Washington who turns 71 today. The acclaimed actor grew up in blue-collar households in Mount Vernon, New York, and Florida, after which he attended university and discovered his talent for acting while working at a summer camp. He went on to win a Tony and two Academy Awards: Best Supporting Actor for the historical war film Glory and Best Actor for the crime thriller Training Day. READ more about the great actor… (1954)
Drone dog rescue – Gina Manfredi / USAR Drone Team
Drone dog rescue – Gina Manfredi / USAR Drone Team
More than twenty-four hours had already passed with frigid temperatures outside.
Gina Manfredi’s five-month old puppy was lost. The American Bully mix named Shade was headed out for a walk with Gina when a sound startled the pooch and he took off into the cold New Jersey night.
Neighbors went looking for Shade but no one had any luck.
“It started getting really dark. It was cold, the winds started picking up, and (it began) lightly snowing,” Gina told NJ.com.
She placed clothes and other items outside the house that smelled like home, hoping to lure the puppy back. A friend put Gina in touch with Bailey’s Bridge, a local service that specializes in locating lost pets—but nothing worked.
More hours passed and Gina knew something drastic had to be done. Bridge to Home recommended the USAR Drone Team, a veteran-based nonprofit that provides a variety of services, including pet rescues.
Michael Parziale founded USAR in honor of his father, who was a World War II veteran. The group can use its drone technology to assist with open water rescues, dropping life preservers to people stranded at sea. From their location in Manasquan, they also field numerous calls to help with lost pets.
To help find Shade, USAR arrived at Gina’s home at about 7:15 pm, after the dog had been missing for more than 24 hours. He launched a drone equipped with a thermal camera which makes it adept at locating animals at night.
“We saw a lot of different animals for about 20 minutes because we’re near woods,” Gina said.
Then, another image appeared that seemed to resemble Shade’s profile. It was him. (Watch the video below to see the moment…)
“I start in the inner circle and work my way out,” said Michael, who has learned that lost animals typically don’t travel very far from their home. “Fortunately, he was right there.”
Miraculously, Shade was only two blocks from home—and when a family member headed to the location and called for him, the dog came running.
USAR had found Shade in just 41 minutes.
Moments later, the lost dog was headed home, and Michael called the reunion ‘cinematic’.
It was also a new record for the fastest rescue by the Jersey Shore-area drone team. The group does want to charge for its services, but never seems to reject a rescue—so it set up a GoFundMe campaign to collect tax-deductible donations further expand its operations.
And Gina hopes it’s only a matter of time before another pet—or even a person—is saved by the USAR drones.
“Michael donates his time and expertise to help those who cannot afford to hire a professional, dedicating countless volunteer hours to reuniting families with their pets,” Gina said in a Facebook post that detailed Shade’s ordeal.
“It’s a beautiful reminder of the incredible kindness that exists in the world…In a world that can sometimes feel uncertain, this experience has been a powerful reminder that there is far more good than bad.”
Kissing under Mistletoe, DC sets world record (CREDIT: DowntownDC –Business Improvement District)
Suspended 30-feet in the air, a Christmas beacon hangs in Washington, DC—a 10-foot bundle of greenery and ribbons that locals are calling the National Mistletoe.
It served as the perfect setting to herald a ‘Merry Kiss-mas’ and break a world record for holiday smooches.
On a Saturday in December, 1,435 couples gathered around the Mistletoe to kiss for five-seconds in order to set a new Guinness record.
After arriving at DC’s Anthem Row, each couple helped maintain the mood by holding up a small sprig of mistletoe as they locked lips.
The public display of holiday affection broke the previous mistletoe record set by 480 kissing couples in St. Louis in 2019.
“Last night felt bigger than a world record attempt,” said one of the organizers, Gerren Price, who shared video of the moment on Instagram. “It was a reminder of what happens when a city shows up for joy, love, and community above all else.”
“THANK YOU to every single couple who stepped under the National Mistletoe and helped us make history!!”
Mistletoe’s link to holiday traditions date all the way back to prehistoric Europe and winter solstice celebrations. Back then, it was often considered a symbol of fertility and rebirth.
Many years later, a 1784 musical comedy, Two for One, included the song lyric, “And kiss beneath the mistletoe,” according to NPR. The romantic connections continued to grow from there, with festive holiday traditions boosting the plant’s popularity.
In Washington D.C., the massive symbol of holiday love has been hung for two straight years thanks to funding from the District’s Streets for People art grant. The National Mistletoe will remain on display throughout January for anyone seeking to fulfill a romantic New Year’s resolution.
There are also plans to continue the tradition next year and perhaps even find ways to help single people find a partner, because anything is possible when love—and mistletoe—is in the air.
“Events like this bring people together in such a memorable, joyful way and show the true vibrancy and energy in the city that we love,” Price said in a statement.
“Whether you’re sealing the deal, rekindling the spark, or just joining for the fun—this is the holiday kiss you won’t forget.”
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Saving money, exercising more, and getting healthier are Americans’ top New Year’s resolutions heading into 2026, according to a new survey.
The poll of 2,000 Americans revealed that ten percent of respondents felt very good about 2025, labeling it “a great year”. Some of the remainder are seeking to turn things around in 2026, with 38% setting personal goals or resolutions.
Conducted by Talker Research on behalf of Talkspace, the study found that people are creating six resolutions, on average, for the new year, with the most common ones being putting more money into savings (45%), getting more exercise (45%) and improving overall physical health (41%).
Along with those, respondents said they want to eat healthier (40%), improve their holistic financial wellness (34%), spend more time outdoors (29%) and boost their mental health (29%).
Men are more likely than women to set goals for the coming year (44% vs. 35%), with millennials being the most likely to create New Year’s intentions (57%).
But with goals come hurdles to complete them. Younger Americans said that not having enough money is their biggest barrier to accomplishing their goals, while 37% of baby boomers cited not having enough willpower.
Respondents also said mental health challenges (28%) and lack of time (22%) sometimes hold them back from accomplishing their resolutions.
Responses to these challenges differ by generation. When confronted with failure while pursuing a goal, Gen Z most commonly responds by criticizing themselves or feeling guilty (36%), while millennials (42%), Gen X (48%) and baby boomers (55%) all accept failure as part of the process and keep moving forward.
“Setting meaningful personal goals is a positive step for mental well-being and growth, but it is equally important that we go easy on ourselves if we don’t achieve them right away,” said Dr. Nikole Benders-Hadi, chief medical officer at Talkspace.
“Remember that there can be growth in trying to achieve goals, even if you don’t always achieve exactly what you set out to, or the outcome doesn’t look or feel like what you expected.”
Looking ahead, half of the people polled were optimistic, saying 2026 will be ‘their year’.
Already, Americans rated their mental health as a 7 out of 10, on average, with men scoring above average at 8/10.
To maintain their mental well-being, Gen Z cited time with family and sleep (both 36%) as their most essential habits, while millennials opt for listening to music and podcasts (43%) and just under 50% of Gen X and baby boomers prefer regular walks.
Nearly four in ten said they have a unique personal hack they use to improve their mood, including treasure hunts, lifting weights to rock music, and skateboarding.
One person said they like listening to their favorite music and “dancing like nobody’s watching”.
Mood boosting hacks can be as simple as binge watching TV while cross-stitching or having a nail day with her daughter.
One respondent shared that her simple hack was crying. “Sometimes you just gotta make yourself cry.” While another said, “I love encouraging others. It takes my mind off any issues I have, and in many cases, I get the pleasant surprise of returned encouragement.”
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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY – Week of December 27, 2025
Copyright by Rob Brezsny, FreeWillAstrology.com
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):
A newly planted orchard spends its first year growing roots, not fruit. Underground and unseen, the real work happens. I surmise that’s like what you will be doing in the coming months, Capricorn: mostly invisible stabilization and preparation. If anyone asks you what you’re producing, smile inscrutably and say, “Depth.” Be committed to the quiet, hidden work rather than any showy song and dance. As my rough and rugged spirit guide Esther likes to say, “You don’t got to prove nothin’ to nobody!” The nourishment you will be storing up will sustain later abundance.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):
Engineers may engage in “stress testing.” They evaluate a system’s hardiness and reliability by subjecting it to pressure or force. I suspect that life will bring you a benevolent version of this trial in the coming months, Aquarius. That’s a good thing! It’s not meant to break you, but to prove how much resilience you have developed. Situations that might have formerly cracked your confidence will affirm and reveal your upgraded endurance. Take note of your composure and congratulate yourself for it. You will have every right to exult in the vivid evidence of how much you’ve grown.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):
Piscean author Anaïs Nin wrote, “Love never dies a natural death. It dies because we don’t know how to replenish its source.” Apply her counsel dynamically during the coming months, dear Pisces. Be the great replenisher. Make yourself into a fountain of beauty as you share lavishly. Nurture tenderness and adoration with unexpected flowers, gorgeous music in the midst of the routine, and affection expressed through artful thoughtfulness. Be brilliant and persistent in ensuring that love thrives. Your elegant generosity and fond attention should enrich everything you touch.
ARIES (March 21-April 19):
In the Brazilian rainforest, Cecropia trees and Azteca ants have a special relationship. The trees’ hollow branches serve as nesting spaces for the ants and offer them sugar-rich food. In return, the ants aggressively defend the trees from herbivores and predators, protecting them from damage. This mutualism benefits both species. The trees get protection that enhances their growth, while the ants gain shelter and nutrition. In the coming months, Aries, I invite you to seek symbiosis that’s equally vigorous. Enjoy the fun challenge of reducing your solo struggles as you rouse collaborations that boost your power and everyone else’s. The goal is intelligent alliance, not compromise. Be resourceful as you trade a bit too much independence for just the right amount of interdependence.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20):
When potters center clay on a wheel, they typically use one hand inside the vessel to apply steady, controlled force. The other hand remains fluid, guiding and stabilizing the outer rim of the spinning clay. This balanced use of pressure—one hand firm and bracing, the other adapting minutely to the shifting clay—helps bring the lump into perfect symmetry. I propose you make this a prime metaphor in the coming months, Taurus: control meeting surrender. You will be crafting a new balance between security and surprise. Too much rigidity, and the form cracks; too much flow, and it collapses. Practice the middle art.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20):
Poet Audre Lorde spoke of how caring for herself was the exact opposite of being selfish. It was the foundation of her ability to serve and inspire other people. My Aunt Sophie used to say, “You can’t pour from an empty cup. Take care of yourself first.” Educator Stephen Covey advised, “Be patient with yourself. Self-growth is tender; it’s holy ground. There’s no greater investment.” Poet Vironika Tugaleva writes, “Learning to love yourself is essential and life-changing.” Everything I just said should be your keynotes in the coming months, Gemini. Boost your self-care to sublime levels.
CANCER (June 21-July 22):
A remarkable species of jellyfish can circumvent the aging and death process that affects all other animals. Turritopsis dohrnii converts its mature, specialized cells back into stem cells, essentially recycling its own body into youth. The process may repeat indefinitely, making the animal theoretically immortal. In the coming months, Cancerian, your emotional wisdom will also show amazing regenerative power. Challenging and intriguing situations will be opportunities for you to initiate stunning acts of renewal. Like the jellyfish, you won’t merely manage change but will use it as a catalyst for vigorous growth. Have you ever before been blessed by such wildly rejuvenative powers of metamorphosis? I don’t think so.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):
According to ancient Egyptian myth, the sun god Ra rode a celestial boat across the sky by day. Each night, he plunged into the underworld to wrangle with chaos so he could rebirth light in time for the dawn. That’s your mythic assignment for the coming months, Leo: not to be nonstop luminous, but to renew and nurture your radiance in the dark. Your courage will lie in feeling and learning from your doubts without identifying with them. Your magnetism and wisdom will deepen as you descend. You won’t be less golden for passing through shadow.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):
In medieval monasteries, scribes added whimsical drawings called drolleries into the margins of sacred manuscripts. These marginalia included scenes like frogs playing harps, nuns chasing rabbits, and fantastical creatures engaged in playful or absurd activities. How should we interpret these seemingly prankish additions? Scholars disagree. In any case, I recommend you experiment with drolleries of your own, Virgo. Inject improvisation into duty. Add ornament to order. The coming months will reward your serious play. You’ll accomplish more by enjoying the work than by obsessing on perfecting it. A touch of friskiness may even improve efficiency. So when you edit, doodle; when you analyze, wink.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):
Italy’s Orto Botanico di Padova is the world’s oldest botanical garden still in its original location. Since its inception 480 years ago, it has been a center for botanical research, education, and conservation. Its layout is striking, a square-inscribed in a circle, symbolizing harmonious order. In the coming months, Libra, you will be wise to associate yourself intimately with a similar wonder: an enduring source of beauty and revelation that you can both serve and benefit from.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):
Astronaut Chris Hadfield has spent 166 days orbiting the Earth in the International Space Station. In the microgravity of outer space, he says, motion is very smooth; objects and people float. He marvels at how everything is always moving, and yet the pace itself is tranquil and unhurried. I foresee you enjoying a lot of this kind of grace in the coming months, Scorpio: momentum without mania; constant fluidic movement that’s never hectic or rushed. What a great privilege! I expect you will rack up many flowing accomplishments.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):
In Kyoto’s famous moss gardens, caretakers practice artful arrangement rather than total removal of shed foliage. They use delicate tools to gather trees’ cast-off leaves and arrange them on the moss to create visual harmony rather than bare tidiness. This approach reflects the Japanese aesthetic principles of embracing imperfection. Supposed “flaws” become part of the beauty of the garden. I propose that you regularly adopt a metaphorically comparable approach in the coming months, Sagittarius. Integrate rather than edit. Be creative with what’s changing form. Treat so-called messes and unexpected plot twists not as blemishes but as rich textures that feel meaningful and inspiring.
WANT MORE? Listen to Rob’s EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES, 4-5 minute meditations on the current state of your destiny — or subscribe to his unique daily text message service at: RealAstrology.com
