[goldie0608]

Penn State Professor Themis Matsoukas Charged With Having Sexual Intercourse With His Collie

"I do it to blow off steam," the professor reportedly told officials investigating his alleged bestiality.



A Penn State University chemical engineering professor is accused of repeatedly having sex with his dog in acts caught on trail cameras.

Themis Matsoukas, 64, was charged Tuesday in Huntingdon County with open lewdness, indecent exposure, sexual intercourse with an animal, cruelty to animals and disorderly conduct, the Centre Daily Times reported.

He’s been placed on leave by the university, where he has worked since 1991.

Matsoukas was identified by rangers who said they linked him to a North Face backpack and a Subaru Outback present in some of the footage from Rothrock State Forest, WTAJ reported.

Authorities said they determined that the collie in the clips from April and May was the same pet investigators found when they searched his home. They also said they found the backpack and an iPad shown in the trail cam pictures.

“I’m done, I’m dead. You don’t understand, I do it to blow off steam,” Matsoukas told rangers from the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources who arrived with a search warrant on June 9, according to WTAJ.

He begged the rangers to shoot him, Fox 43 reported, citing the charging documents.

Cameras that caught Matsoukas were being used to find out who was stealing hand sanitizer at the state park, StateCollege.com reported.

“Themis Matsoukas has been relieved of his responsibilities and is on leave,” the university said in a statement to StateCollege.com.

HuffPost did not immediately hear back from Matsoukas. His lawyer declined to comment to the Centre Daily Times.

Baby raccoons rescued from rubble after Utah demolition




Firefighters in Utah came to the rescue of eight baby raccoons found by a crew demolishing an abandoned house.

Morgan County Fire & EMS said in a Facebook post the demolition crew knocked down an abandoned home on Morgan Valley Drive and heard "chirping in the rubble."

The crew found the source of the sound was eight baby raccoons.

"With the help of Morgan County Animal Control, firefighters rescued the babies and safely brought them back to the station," the post said. "Firefighters kept them comfortable and fed while they waited for an individual with a permit to legally raise raccoons. All eight babies are now happily on their way to their forever homes."

[PennySerenade]

Parents Feared 'We Were Failing' Son. Now He's a 14-Year-Old College Grad with a Job at SpaceX



When college graduates around the country march across the stage this month to receive their diplomas, their number will include Kairan Quazi, who is just 14 years old.

He will collect an engineering degree from California's Santa Clara University, as the youngest graduate in the school’s 172-year history, and then will start work at SpaceX, as a software engineer on the Starlink program.

"My personal journey has really been about disrupting the status quo," Kairan tells PEOPLE, adding that the past few years in college "have been the happiest three years of my life."

Part of what inspires him is his desire "to be part of something bigger" and how technology can help humanity.

"Think of the benefits in let's say, precision farming, where satellite images can be used to help farmers with managing crop yields and monitoring water levels," Kairan says. "So the utilitarian idea of working on technology that has the greatest good for the greatest number really aligns with my personal values."

Kairan's journey has not always been easy for the entire Quazi family.

"For the longest time, we actually didn't know until he got tested at 9 years old that he was considered profoundly gifted," says his mom, Julia Quazi. "He's an extreme extrovert. His verbal fluency was so strong. So a lot of the things that seemed strange to us for years, we just chalked it up to very strong vocabulary and a strong personality."



But Kairan did some unusual things, even for a child with strong social and verbal skills. He would get up in the middle of the night in the family's home in the San Francisco Bay Area, and wake up mom Julia and dad Mustahid, a chemical engineer who now does technical sales, to discuss world events. As a toddler, Kairan wanted to address the Arab Spring. As a 4 year old, he wanted to debate why Turkey isn't an official member of the European Union.

The experience grew "disorienting and isolating," Julia says. "We actually felt every day that we were failing as parents because we did not know how to help him. We just didn't have the toolkit to help him feel validated and balanced because we had no idea what we were dealing with."

It turned out that Kairan qualified as “profoundly gifted,” with — not surprisingly — a very high IQ.

After much agonizing, the Quazis enrolled their only child in a local community college, and soon transferred him to Santa Clara University. The move made sense, with things falling into place there for Kairan, Julia says.

Their approach was not universally well received.

"To be honest, there was a lot of backlash for him starting college at age 9," Julia says. "So we had to really turn off social media and not look at comments and really just stopped going to a lot of social events in the Bay Area because the responses were not great. They just believe we were hothousing him."



Kairan thrived in the college environment, where his professors speak well of him.

"Working with Kairan has been amazing," says the teen's senior advisor, Dr. Nam Ling, who heads the school's Department of Computer Science and Engineering. "I have learned many things while serving as his advisor."

Most people presume that talented or genius kids are not sociable, the professor says.

"On the contrary, Kairan is very sociable and very easy to get along with," Ling says. "In my class and outside classes, he has asked more questions than any other student, keeping the class and discussions lively and stimulating."



Kairan has made lots of new college friends while retaining his age-group pals. He likes to play video games and read science fiction. He also has formed some clear opinions on what it's like to be a very young engineer in Silicon Valley.

"I think there's a very widespread belief that Silicon Valley looks for outliers, and most company websites try to sell you on that," says Kairan, who shares his experiences on his Instagram account. "But I can tell you from my own journey, that that is not the case. Despite having a resume and experience that's very rare for an undergraduate, despite proving myself in vigorous graduate areas, and despite the preparation and maturity that I have demonstrated in every opportunity I've been given, the majority of recruiters exercise a concept of dismiss, where my age exists as a solo metric in a vacuum, and my demonstrated abilities and achievements are dismissed."

To be specific: He applied for 98 jobs, and received three offers.

As for his college experience, have there been any drawbacks to being a very young student at university? Kairan counts one.

"I guess the only downside I found so far to being underage in college was when I tried to rush an engineering fraternity," Kairan says. "But apparently even the professional frats require you to be 18."

Overall, the experience has been a net positive for Kairan.

"I just feel really lucky because, you know, I guess to that point, I have a pretty cool story," he says.

Quebec woman finds message in a bottle launched 34 years earlier

By Ben Hooper

JUNE 15, 2023


Trudy Shattler found a message in a bottle on a Pagouatchiou, Quebec, beach that turned out to have been launched off the coast of Newfoundland 34 years earlier. Photo by marcmanhart/Pixabay.com

A Quebec woman taking a walk on the beach near her cottage discovered a message in a bottle that had been thrown out to sea by a Newfoundland man 34 years earlier.

Trudy Shattler said she was walking with her mother-in-law on the beach near her Pagouatchiou cottage when she found a bottle on the rocks containing a note that was dated May 29, 1989 -- 34 years and one week before the day she found it.

"I was so excited. I mean, what I'm looking for all the time is a note in a bottle," Shattler told SaltWire.

Shattler said some water had gotten into the bottle, so the note, written on the back of an Export A cigarette pack, was damaged.

Shattler could make out that the bottle had been thrown into the water at Fox Point, 10 miles off Port au Choix, Newfoundland, but she could only make out a few letters of the author's name.

Shattler posted photos of her discovery to Facebook, where they were shared nearly 200 times before coming to the attention of Port au Choix man Rick Hamlyn.

"As soon as I seen it, I knew the writing and I said, 'That's dad's,'" Hamlyn said.

Hamlyn said his father, Gilbert, was well known for launching messages in bottles -- always written on the backs of cigarette packs -- into the water while out fishing. Gilbert Hamlyn died two years ago at the age of 72.

Hamlyn said Shattler's bottle is the first he knows of to ever be found.

Shattler said she will send the bottle to Hamlyn, who plans to place it at his father's grave.

"Oh my gosh, wouldn't he love to say that someone finally got my message after all these years," Hamlyn said.

[Misstee]

TikToker arrives at his own funeral in helicopter after faking his death

Mary Walrath-Holdridge
USA TODAY




A Belgian man has gone viral after shocking guests by arriving at his own funeral in a helicopter – very much alive.

TikToker David Baertan, 45, pulled what he called a “prank” on his friends and family members earlier this month, faking his own death with the help of his wife and kids. Baertan and his family arraigned a funeral near Liege, Belgium after his daughter created a post on Facebook “mourning” her father’s apparent loss, telling him to “rest in peace” and notifying people of his “death.”

Videos of the “funeral” were shared on TikTok by Thomas Faut (@el.tiktokeur2), showing a small crowd gathering as a helicopter hovers for a landing over a grassy field. Confused bystanders look on as the helicopter lands, rushing out onto the grass as they realize that Baertan is the one stepping out of it. A camera crew emerges with him, recording the reunion as one onlooker exclaims: “Wow, he’s really here!” The caption on the video, translated from French, commends Baertan for pulling off the lie and says his family and friends are “happy he is among them.”

In another clip posted on the same account, Baertan can be seen tightly hugging a weeping man, accompanied by a caption reading: "You got us, I swear. I was crying and then after I was shocked. Buddy, we love you very much."
Going viral

While the videos themselves appear to show people happy to see Baretan alive and well, the comments weren’t so forgiving. Many criticized Baretan for “traumatizing” his loved ones for “ego” or “attention,” saying they could never do such a thing to their own friends and family. “Now we know why people don’t like him,” commented one viewer.

Baertan responded to the criticism on his own TikTok channel, explaining that he pulled the stunt to see who truly cared for him.



“We all grew apart. I felt unappreciated. That’s why I wanted to give them a life lesson,” he says in one, insisting that he grew much closer to his mother through the process of faking his death. While Baertan asks people not to hold the trick against him in one upload, he gets angry at commenters in later videos, telling them to stop denouncing him when they don’t know the full situation.

While Baertan says only about half of this relatives showed up to the “funeral,” the rest contacted him after the fact, something he says was ultimately a “win.”

Baertan later appeared on French talk show “Touche Pas à Mon Poste” telling the hosts that even his own children did not initially know their father was truly alive and that his wife had discouraged him from following through on the ploy. He admitted regretting the prank, telling hosts that he was “sorry for all the people I hurt.”

Cape Matapan Caves: The Original Gateway To The Underworld
Mentioned in the tales of Heracles and Orpheus, the entrance to the underworld is still there today.



To the Ancient Greeks, the underworld was a physical place that could be accessed by intrepid people if only they knew where to look. From Homer’s epic tales to the travel writers, classical stories are filled with references to such entrances where heroic individuals ventured into the subterranean world of the dead. Today, one of these "gateways to Hell" is still accessible to the living and is located at the tip of the Greek mainland.

The caves at Cape Matapan, also known as Tenaro or Cape Tainaron, lie at the end of the Mani peninsula in Greece. The entrance to the cave is located at sea level and leads into chambers under the cliff face; the exact location seems to be marked by the ruins of a Spartan temple on top of the cliff. Although the Ancient Greeks believed in several different entrances to the underworld, which they called “Hades” after the chthonic god, this is the most famous.

According to Classical mythology, the souls of the dead (at least those who received a correct burial) were transported to the House of Hades by Charon, an otherworldly ferryman who traveled along the river Styx.

In Homer’s epic poetry, the Iliad and the Odyssey, the underworld was a dark shadowy expanse where the dead – peasants, nobles, heroes, and kings alike – existed as pathetic flittering and squawking shades in a state of what can only be described as perpetual boredom. In later accounts, descriptions of the ancient underworld become more detailed and involved the souls of the dead, once they arrived in the House of Hades, being judged and sent to either Tartarus or, in rare instances, the paradise of Elysium.

In Greek mythology, when Orpheus, the legendary hero with superhuman musical talent, traveled to Hades to rescue his beloved Eurydice, it is said he passed through the caves at Cape Matapan. Tragically, Orpheus was close to retrieving his wife from the land of the dead with permission from Hades and Persephone, but, despite their warnings, he turned to look at her before they had reached the upper world, which caused her to disappear forever.

Similarly, Heracles (Hercules), the demigod son of Zeus, is said to have traveled through these caves to fetch Cerberus, the multiheaded guard dog, as one of his 12 labors. These trials were set for him as a rite of atonement for killing his wife and children while in a state of madness generated by Hera (they left that part out of the Disney movie).

In the second century CE, the travel writer and geographer Pausanias wrote:

“In the bend of the seaboard one comes, first, to a headland that projects into the sea, Taenarum, with its temple of Poseidon situated in a grove; and secondly, near by, to the cavern through which, according to the myth-writers, Cerberus was brought up from Hades by Heracles.”

The area surrounding the peninsula is also significant in its own right, without mention of the portal to Hell resting below its cliffs. To the Spartans, it was a highly significant place for worship. They erected temples to various gods along the headland, including a famous temple dedicated to Poseidon, the god of the sea.

According to Pausanias, the poet Arion was kidnapped by pirates while traveling from Italy to Greece. In an attempt to escape captivity, Arion threw himself into the sea and sung a song to Apollo, the god of poetry, who sent a pod of dolphins to save him. They carried him to shore where he ended up at Cape Matapan and the sanctuary of Poseidon.

The site is still used for religious services today, but it has long been converted for Christian worship. Visitors to the area can see a large bronze statue in the likeness of Arion and, if they are brave enough (and in possession of a boat), they can access the Hell Gate below.

https://www.iflscience.com/cape-matapan ... orld-69416

Ozempic finger is diet drug’s latest side effect — forcing women to spend more money



People on Ozempic aren’t just dropping pants sizes for hot girl summer — finger and wrist sizes are shrinking, too.

Now, women desperate to shed pounds who have turned to Hollywood’s go-to rapid weight-loss drug are terrified of losing their precious engagement rings and Cartier LOVE bracelets thanks to their slimmer hands and arms.

Jessica, a part-time preschool teacher from Houston, started Ozempic injections in October and claimed she lost 17 pounds in just six weeks.

She’s kept the weight off but noticed that she couldn’t keep her ring on.

“I never realized weight loss also happened in your hands, but my ring suddenly didn’t fit,” the 40-year-old told The Post.

“I noticed it was flipping and it almost fell off. I was worried I would lose it.”
Jessica wedding ring before Ozempic
Houston resident Jessica lost 17 pounds during her first round of Ozempic injections — but she noticed an unexpected side effect involving her ring finger.
Courtesy of Jessica

The mother of three immediately took her wedding ring back to jeweler LeMel and had them resize it in January for $75.

Jewelers have reported that women are coming in droves to size down their rings and bracelets, up 150% compared to last year.

“Usually the summer is a very quiet time for jewelers, but this year we are seeing a huge influx of jewelry repairs due to clients losing weight,” LeMel co-founder Melanie Fitzpatrick told The Post.
Jessica's wedding ring after Ozempic
The 40-year-old had to pay $75 in January to get her ring resized after losing weight — and she’s already desperate to get the ring resized again.
Courtesy of Jessica

“Customers are coming in left and right, getting their rings sized down and bracelets shortened.”

Often, the first place people notice they have lost weight is in their hands since rings are literally falling off their fingers.

“Weight loss doesn’t just happen in your stomach or butt — it’s your full body,” Fitzpatrick said.
Ozempic
Ozempic is being touted as a quick way to drop a few pounds.
Getty Images

While sizing rings have been the most common request, fashionistas are also coming in asking for help to shorten their necklaces and keep their $6,000 Cartier bracelets — which famously come with a tiny matching screwdriver to be locked on — from sliding off.
Keep up with today's most important news

Stay up on the very latest with Evening Update.
Enter your email address

By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.

“Cartier LOVE bangles are a common problem with customers losing weight in their wrists,” Fitzpatrick said.

“The bangles are too big, and they are unable to be sized.”

The fix she recommends?

Buy more bracelets.

“We have come up with a solution, having customers stack their bangles with $125 stretch bracelets on either side,” she said. “This helps keep the bracelet in place.”

Another option is to pay to have a beloved piece resized. LeMel Jewelers charges between $50 to $100 per ring for resizing and starts shortening bracelets at $40.

That means people paying upward of $1,000 a month for this weight-loss drug are adding yet another expense to the cost of rapidly dropping weight.

Jessica recently refilled her Ozempic prescription and dropped eight more pounds and another half of ring size.

“I actually need to get the ring sized again because it started to flip because I am continuing to lose weight,” she said to The Post.

“I luckily haven’t had any side effects from Ozempic. If altering my jewelry is my only side effect, that’s fine by me!”

But jewelry expenses aren’t the only added costs for many Ozempic users.
What do you think? Post a comment.

Those taking Semaglutide drugs have begun complaining of a worrying list of side effects including “Ozempic face” — when facial skin sags as a result of the dramatic weight loss.

People are now flocking to dermatologists and cosmetic surgeons for pricey fixes as they clutch their bracelets and wedding rings.

https://nypost.com/2023/06/15/ozempic-f ... ore-money/

[johngriffen]

I sometimes get REALLY DEPRESSED reviewing the news these days.
It's always about a global pandemic threatening life as we know it,
protests around the world, stupid politicians, natural disasters,
or some other really bad story.
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH

Welcome to The mobi weekly news magazine
IN OTHER NEWS
SATURDAY JUNE 17
What is it?
Here is your chance to become an "ACE REPORTER" for our weekly news magazine.
It is your job to fine weird, funny or "good feel" stories from around the world and share them with our readers in our weekly magazine

How do you play?
Just post a story that you have come across that made you smile, laugh, feel good...
BUT NOTHING DEPRESSING

EXAMPLE POST

​Naked sunbather chases wild boar through park after it steals his laptop bag

A naked sunbather was seen chasing wild boar through a park after it stole his laptop bag.
Amusing photographs from Germany show the man running after the animal to try and claim the plastic bag back.
But the cheeky boar and its two piglets appear to be too quick for the sunbather, who can't keep up with their speedy little trotters.
As the incident unfolds, groups of friends and family sat on the grass watch on and laugh.
Heads are seen turning in surprise and amusement in the hilarious photographs.
The incident happened at Teufelssee Lake - a bathing spot in the Grunwell Forest in Berlin, Germany.

Rules:
Each Edition of IN OTHER NEWS will be open for 7 days...
You can post as many stories as you like, but you will only get paid for One Story in any 24 hour period
So in other words, you can only earn WRZ$ once a day.
Each news day will start when I post announcing it
OR at:
9:00 AM CHICAGO TIME (UTC -6)
3:00 PM GMT (UTC -0)
on those days I space out and forget to post or can't due to Real Life
Stories may be accompanied with images - but No big images, please! 800x800 pixels wide maximum
Videos are allowed, but please keep them short, and post a short summary for those that don't like to click on videos
No Duplicate stories - Where a post has been edited resulting in duplicates, then the last one in time gets disallowed.
And please limit this to reasonably family friendly stories

Reward:
Each news story posted that I feel is acceptable (must be a real story, too few words or simply a headline are not considered acceptable) will earn you 50 WRZ$
If you post multiple stories on any given day, you will only earn 50 WRZ$ for the first story of the Day
All payments will be made at THE END of the weekly news cycle.
Special Bonus - Each week I will award "The Pulitzer Prize" for the best story of the week
The weekly winner of the "The Pulitzer Prize" will receive a 100 WRZ$ bonus
It's just my personal opinion, so my judgement is final

So help bring GOOD news to the members of mobi, and join our reporting team...

IN OTHER NEWS

[ozswede]

Let It Go: Austrian town that looks just like Frozen builds fence to stop selfie-taking tourists

Hallstatt’s Mayor told the Austrian press that the town’s residents just want to be left alone.

The stunning backdrop to the town of Hallstatt in the Austrian mountains is thought to have inspired Disney’s Frozen.

Over a million tourists descend on the destination every year with many wanting to snap a selfie with the famous view. So many that the town recently put up a fence to stop visitors from taking pictures.

It has since been removed due to backlash on social media but it was hoped that the barrier would prevent people from gathering in one popular selfie spot and disrupting residents by making too much noise.

Hallstatt’s Mayor Alexander Scheutz has now said he wants to put up a banner at the spot reminding tourists that people live in the area.


A provisional wooden fence partially blocks the beautiful view, as visitors take selfies with the landscape in the tourist community of Hallstatt.

Why do so many people visit Hallstatt?

Hallstatt is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Traditional houses sit against a dramatic backdrop of mountains and the clear waters of the Hallstätter See.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, millions of people visited every year and Hallstatt was particularly popular with visitors from East and South East Asia. It was featured on a Korean TV show in 2006 and a replica of the town was built in Huizhou, Guangdong Province, China in 2011.

The Austrian destination is also thought to have been the inspiration for the fictional village of Arendelle in the popular Disney movie Frozen.

Now numbers are picking up once again and the town is looking to curb overtourism. Hallstatt has already introduced daily limits on the number of buses and cars that can enter the town.

But it regularly reaches these caps and Mayor Scheutz told the Austrian press that residents just want to be left alone.


The traditional houses, mountain backdrop and lakeside steeple are thought to have inspired the Disney movie Frozen.

Selfie-bans are spreading across Europe

Hallstatt isn’t the only European destination looking to stop tourists from posing for selfies.

The picturesque town of Portofino on the Italian Riviera has introduced no-waiting zones. Anyone caught hanging around on the quay for too long between 10:30 am and 6 pm risks a fine of around €270.

It aims to prevent large groups of tourists from congregating on the pier to take photos in front of Portofino’s colourful buildings. With just 400 residents, the town is sometimes swamped by upwards of 10,000 tourists, resulting in overcrowded streets and traffic jams.

The no-waiting zones will be in place until the holiday season ends on 15 October.

Deepfake celebrity porn floods Twitter — despite explicit bans



X-rated celebrity deepfakes are in heavy circulation online, as artificial intelligence and advanced technology blur the lines between real images and doctored content.

Despite Twitter’s policies against misleading media and non-consensual nudity, digitally altered imagery of popular TikTok creators and celebrities has cropped up on the platform, according to an NBC report.

Twitter searches for TikTok creators Addison Rae Easterling, Charli D’Amelio and Bella Poarch revealed sexually explicit deepfakes — manipulated videos or images where a person’s face is superimposed on someone else’s body.

According to NBC News, one snippet showed the face of Easterling, 22, on the body of another woman laying on a bed seductively.

As of Tuesday, it had been viewed more than 21 million times, and the thread featured further explicit content of the deepfake.

The anonymous user behind the account told the outlet that they later deleted the tweet after blowback.

The outlet claimed to have discovered at least nine accounts that circulate pornographic deepfakes, six of which were later suspended, and some featured explicit content using Poarch’s likeness.

Other imagery of the D’Amelio family reportedly remains on the platform.

On Twitter, the content appears to violate two of the company’s strict content policies.

The first, the synthetic and manipulated media policy, prohibits misleading or fabricated content that is promoted as factual.

The content could also violate Twitter’s non-consensual nudity policy, which states users can not share “intimate photos or videos of something that were produced or distributed without their consent.”

Twitter responded to The Post’s emailed request for comment with a poop emoji.

Representatives for D’Amelio could not be reached, and The Post contacted Poarch’s and Easterling’s reps for further comment.

But the TikTokers, who are the most-followed female creators on the app, are among the slew of women who have been targeted by pornographic deepfakes.

This year, actresses Emma Roberts and Scarlett Johansson were the stars of a sexually suggestive advert for deepfake software, which was later removed by Facebook. Meanwhile, a Texas teacher was the victim of digitally altered nude photos, and two Twitch streamers lamented the emerging trend.

“This is what it looks like to feel violated. This is what it feels like to be taken advantage of, this is what it looks like to see yourself naked against your will being spread all over the internet,” one of the streamers, 28-year-old Blaire, otherwise known as QTCinderella, previously said in part.

But community guidelines and the law are cracking down on digitally altered imagery.

In April, a Long Island man was sentenced to six months in prison for posting lewd deepfake images of underage women on porn sites.

Meanwhile, TikTok flat-out banned deepfakes that not only mislead audiences about major events but also feature the likenesses of private and young people.

But deepfakes aren’t just limited to raunchy content — faux images of Pope Francis donning Balenciaga fooled millions of viewers.

Then, in the corners of the internet, deepfakes of former president Donald Trump’s first arrest emerged in March, prompting swift action from Google to label the images as AI-generated.

https://nypost.com/2023/06/14/deepfake- ... icit-bans/

[goldie0608]

Florida Dads Celebrate First Father’s Day After Adopting 6 Siblings: 'Instantly in Love'

Dustin and Daniel Johnson adopted the six siblings in May, officially becoming a forever family



A Florida family is gearing up for a very special Father's Day!

In May, Dustin and Daniel Johnson adopted six children, siblings between the ages of 3 and 11, who were living in five different foster homes before the couple entered the picture, Good Morning America reported.

Dustin and Daniel told GMA that they fell "instantly in love" with the kids the moment they saw them. And now, after having gone through the matching and adoption process, they're celebrating their first Father’s Day as a forever family.

The couple's journey to fatherhood began six years ago when Dustin and Daniel agreed to pursue adoption, according to GMA. The couple saw a need within their community near Tampa Bay and wanted to help.

“We knew we wanted a sibling group,” Dustin told Family Equality, a non-profit organization that supports LGBTQ+ families. “They are harder to place, and we’re starting from scratch so we were open."

In November 2021, the Johnsons told their adoption specialist that they were willing to adopt as many as six children. "Daniel and I kind of made the joke that we could fit six in the back of our Suburban," Dustin told GMA.

Just one month later, the adoption specialist reached out and asked, “How serious are you about that six number?" And they were.



The couple learned that they had been successfully matched with the kids in March 2022, per GMA. Then the family, who have been living together since last year, made things official on May 12.

“They have a life that they couldn’t dream of before," Dustin told WFLA. "They finally got their safe forever home."

The kids are happy, too. Reed, the oldest of the four sons, told GMA that “it’s been cool” to be part of the family while Maia, one of their two daughters, said she is “excited.”

The family recently visited Washington, D.C., where they met Rep. Kathy Castor, who offered them a tour after hearing about their story, according to WFLA. The family also attended a Pride Month event at the White House during their visit.

“Families like ours are new,” Dustin said, “and that was super important for our visibility.”

Meanwhile, Castor praised the Johnsons as “a beautiful example of what love can do,” according to WFLA. “When they say love wins, I think that’s exactly what they mean,” Castor said.

[prokroustis]

CHIMÚ CULTURE CONSTRUCTED 10 KM WALL TO PROTECT CAPITAL AGAINST EL NIÑO EVENTS



Archaeologists conducting a study of the Muralla La Cumbre, a 10 km wall in northern Peru, have concluded that the Chimú Culture constructed the wall to protect the capital of Chan Chan against El Niño events.
The Chimú culture emerged around AD 850-900 and controlled a territory encompassing 1,000 km (620 mi) of coastline from Piura in the north to Paramonga in the south.

The Kingdom was centred on Chan Chan, a large adobe city located at the mouth of the Moche Valley in an arid area of coastal desert. The city reached its peak during the 15th century AD, where it is estimated to have had a population of around 40,000 to 60,000 inhabitants.

The Chimú constructed the Muralla La Cumbre, a large trapezoidal stone wall during the 13th or 14th century AD, which runs from Cerro Cabras to Cerro Campana over a distance of 10 km.

Various theories for the purpose of the wall have been proposed, with the most prominent being as a territorial delimitation of the Chimú capital, to protect the city from Inca invasion, or as a ceremonial causeway.

Excavations led by archaeologist, Gabriel Prieto Burméster, Director of the Huanchaco (Pahuan) Archaeological Project, has suggested that the wall was instead built to protect Chan Chan from El Niño events.

El Niño events may have led to the demise of the Moche and other pre-Columbian Peruvian cultures. A recent study, titled “Global impact of the 1789-93 El Niño”, even suggests that a strong El Niño event caused poor crop yields in Europe, which in turn helped spark the French Revolution.

The researchers found an accumulation of almost two metres of sediment with multiple interstices of sand and mud which only occur on one side of the wall. There are 12 interstices detected, suggesting 12 climatic events.

A radio carbon analysis of roots found in one of the sediment layers has revealed a date of AD 1400-1450. This period coincides with a large sacrifice of 250 children and 40 warriors discovered near Chan Chan in 2019, which experts at the time suggest was to appease the gods for protection against natural catastrophes linked to El Niño events.

[Fatima99]

South Korea Created A Program that Reuses 90% of the Country’s Food Scraps–to Grow Crops Instead of Landfills



Of South Korea’s countless kilograms of annual food scraps, very few will ever end up in a landfill. This is because of two reasons—the first is that it’s been illegal since 2005, and the second is because they have perhaps the world’s most sophisticated food waste disposal infrastructure.

While representing a significant burden on the economy, the food waste disposal nevertheless produces ample supplies of animal feed, fertilizer, and biogas that heats thousands of homes.

As the New York Times’ John Yoo and Chang Lee reported from Seoul, South Korean cuisine tends to lend itself to creating food scraps, since many staple dishes come with anywhere from a few to a few dozen sides.

With the culture erring on the side of abundance rather than restraint, many of these small dishes of tofu, kimchi, bean sprouts, and other bites would be tossed in the landfill if it wasn’t illegal to do so.

The government put the ban hammer on it because the mountainous terrain isn’t ideal for landfill construction.

Instead, restauranteurs and street hawkers pay the municipality for a sticker that goes on the outside of special bins. Once filled with food scraps, they are left on the road for collectors in the morning who take 90% of all such waste in the country to specialized collection facilities.

At apartments and among residential housing areas, hi-tech food waste disposal machines are operated by a keycard owned by residents under contract with the disposal companies.

Once taken to the recycling facilities, the food is sorted for any non-food waste that’s mixed in, drained of its moisture, and then dried and baked into a black dirt-like material that has a dirt-like smell but which is actually a protein and fiber-rich feed for monogastric animals like chickens or ducks.

This is just one of the ways in which the food scraps are processed. Another method uses giant anaerobic digestors, in which bacteria break down all the food while producing a mixture of CO2 and methane used to heat homes—3,000 in a Seoul suburb called Goyang, for example. All the water needed for this chemical process comes from the moisture separated from the food earlier.

The remaining material is shipped as fertilizer to any farms that need it.

All the water content is sent to purification facilities where it will eventually be discharged into water supplies or streams.

While one such plant was shut down from locals complaining about the unbearable smell, many plants are odorless, thanks to a system of pipes built into the walls that eliminate it via chemical reaction.

It’s the way South Korea does it. Sure, it costs them around $600 million annually, but they have many admirers, including New York City which hopes to implement similar infrastructure in the coming years.

[PennySerenade]

One of the few remaining Tamagotchi clubs in the world is in Toronto



A '90s phenomenon is having a comeback in Toronto as nostalgic millennials dust off their Tamagotchis.

“I remember thinking to myself, 'I can’t be the last person in the city of Toronto playing Tamagotchi,'” Twoey Gray told CTV News Toronto.

The 27-year-old has had a palm-sized pixelated pet since she was 10 years old. Back in elementary school, she joined forces with other kids and organized play dates for their virtual companions.

As that memory recently resurfaced, she wanted to manifest it once again. So Gray created a poster in December reading,“My Tamagotchi has no friends,” and distributed it around town and online, inviting others to relish in nineties nostalgia with her at the Allan Gardens greenhouse.

To her delight, almost a dozen people attended, forming one of the world’s last in-person Tamagotchi clubs. William Maneja was one of them.

“I remember seeing Tamagotchis for the first time at summer camp, they were everywhere, around 2004,” he said.



He was cleaning his room during a pandemic-era lockdown when he came across his Tamagotchi, which also dated back to when he was 10 years old. “It was lonely,” he said. “I reignited my love for Tamagotchi.”

The 27-year-old launched an Instagram account dedicated to Tamagotchi-related posts, which has gained nearly 600 followers, including Gray who invited him to join the Toronto Tamagotchi Club.

“For me, the Tamagotchi has been helpful with my mental health. Last year I had a very distressing event and in the middle of that event, the thing that allowed me to return to myself was the Tamagotchi,” Gray said.

“I think Tamagotchis are a virtual pet, but it feels like a very analogue connection,” she added.



While Gray and Maneja resurrected their prized possessions from childhood, Tamagotchis are still sold on eBay and Amazon for anywhere between $4 to $300, depending on the rarity.

Tamagotchi even launched a new model earlier this month, aimed at tapping into the “worldwide virtual frenzy in the '90s,” with an update that can connect to the “Tamaverse,” the metaverse of the Tamagotchi world.

Jane Eva Baxter, an associate professor and chair of anthropology at DePaul University, said toymakers actually count on adults’ longing to return to their carefree associations tied to childhood objects.

She pointed to solving a Rubik’s cube or logging into FarmVille as comparable to reaching back to the time these audiences grew up, alongside the rise of these games.

“It’s a form of escapism,” Baxter said.

“Objects don't exist in isolation,” she said. “They are associated with time and space.”

Recently, Gray hosted a second Tamagotchi meetup in Kensington Market, and already has another one on deck for this summer.

“Being able to nerd out with people who share your experiences … is something a lot of people have been craving for a long time,” she said.

Missouri hotel agrees to honor 40-year-old gift certificate




A Kansas City, Mo., hotel has agreed to honor a 40-year-old gift certificate found by a local couple in their wedding album.

Tim and Melinda O'Brien said they spent their wedding night in 1983 at the old Muehlebach Hotel.

The couple, preparing to celebrate their 40th anniversary on June 25, said they recently found a 40-year-old gift certificate to the hotel.

"I was going through our old wedding album and there was a certificate right there," Tim O'Brien told KMBC-TV. "I wonder if they'll still honor this."

The Muehlebach Hotel, which opened in 1915, became part of the Kansas City Marriott Downtown complex in 1996.

The hotel said it will honor the 40-year-old gift certificate, which states that the bearer can use it any year on the month of their wedding anniversary to stay at the same price as their wedding night -- in this case, $38.

"I can't take credit for that marketing initiative, but we have some rooms that are very comparable," hotel manager Dustin Holcumbrink said.

The O'Briens said they will use the certificate on Sunday, the 40th anniversary of their wedding night.