Category: Coping with COVID
Just how germy are airplanes?
Washington Post On a flight from Cancún to Orlando, I didn’t notice any bodily fluids caked on the seat or coursing down the aisle, a relief after several recent incidents involving excretions. But gross organisms are not always visible. Most likely, I was sitting in a pool of germs. With a quick swab test, I confirmed this […]
Oct 4, 2023
What is Fat Bear Week? Everything to know about the big, beefy event.
Washington Post ’Tis the season to be jolly, and I’m not talking about Christmas. It’s Fat Bear Week, a pure and wonderful treat for people who need a break from the harsh realities of life. The competition champions the brown bears of Katmai National Park and Preserve as they complete their transformations from scrawny to elephantine for […]
Sep 27, 2023
Paul Simon unlikely to perform live again due to sudden hearing loss attributed to a severe case of COVID
Datebook Paul Simon says he suffered sudden hearing loss while recording his new album, making it unlikely that he will ever be able to tour or perform live again. The 81-year-old Rock & Roll Hall of Fame musician and co-founder of the folk duo Simon & Garfunkel told the British newspaper the Times that the hearing in his […]
Sep 20, 2023
Cascades of red wine flood a city’s streets in Portugal after huge tanks rupture
NPR There is so much surplus red wine in Portugal, it’s flooding the streets. That’s one way of deciphering the incredible scene that unfolded in São Lourenço do Bairro, a small town where millions of liters of wine recently overwhelmed the roads. The roughly 2.2 million liters of wine (some 581,000 gallons) poured out of […]
Sep 12, 2023
Live Worm Removed From Woman’s Brain
MedPageToday A live, wriggling parasitic roundworm, 80 mm long, was extracted from the brain of a 64-year-old woman in Australia. The worm was a third-stage larval form of Ophidascaris robertsi and was surgically removed from the patient’s right frontal lobe, reported Sanjaya Senanayake, MBBS, of the Canberra Hospital in Australia, and co-authors in Emerging Infectious Diseases The helminth […]
Aug 29, 2023
‘Don’t Kiss or Snuggle Your Turtle,’ C.D.C. Warns Amid Salmonella Outbreak
NYT Twenty-six people have been sickened in recent months in an outbreak linked to small turtles, health officials said. In recent years, health officials have warned those who have bearded dragons, hedgehogs, ducks and chickens as pets to do their part in preventing the spread of salmonella infections. Now, an outbreak of salmonella cases across 11 […]
Aug 22, 2023
Scientists Recreate Pink Floyd Song by Reading Brain Signals of Listeners
The audio sounds like it’s being played underwater. Still, it’s a first step toward creating more expressive devices to assist people who can’t speak. Scientists have trained a computer to analyze the brain activity of someone listening to music and, based only on those neuronal patterns, recreate the song. The research, published on Tuesday, produced a recognizable, […]
Aug 15, 2023
At-Home COVID-19 Tests Under $20 at Amazon
Because COVID is still circulating, and tests are hard to find on store shelves.
Aug 15, 2023
The special ingredient for Mars travel meal prep? Astronaut breath
NPR The ingredients for space yeast are fairly simple. “Astronaut breath, water, yeast starter, electricity, a rolling pin and we can make it happen,” Stafford Sheehan, a finalist in the NASA-sponsored Deep Space Food Challenge, told NPR. Put air, water and yeast starter into Sheehan’s handy machine, wait about two hours and voila: a protein shake […]
Aug 8, 2023
