Someone paid off 200 kids' student loans / The guy who got his Bitcoin back / Tarot readers need help from AI too

Gradually, then suddenly / How betting apps are recruiting your kids / Please stop poking the flight attendants

The Brookings Institution just released the most precise picture yet of American household financial fragility — and the number that should stop everyone is this: a single $1,000 increase in annual living costs would push 3 million more households over the edge. Also: prediction markets and sports betting apps are using memes, leaderboards, and social media to recruit users as young as 18 — and a UCLA gambling researcher says a young brain exposed to this "is going to want it again." And flight attendants are formally asking passengers to stop poking, tapping, prodding, and otherwise physically touching them to get their attention. One veteran of 20 years says it's a rare flight when it doesn't happen. Plus an excavator divorce, a kindergarten graduation brawl, a monkey in a Florida backyard, and an influencer banned from Cedar Point. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Gen Z is paying $300 to make friends at the gym / Time can go negative, apparently / The single parent happiness gap

Bloomberg reports that younger consumers are redirecting their entertainment budgets from bars to boutique gyms, and some are spending $300 or more a month to do it — because the gym has become the social infrastructure that everything else used to provide. Also: physicists at the University of Toronto just published a peer-reviewed study in Physical Review Letters confirming that photons can spend a negative amount of time inside a cloud of atoms — exiting before they enter. No, it's not time travel. Yes, it's still deeply unsettling. And a meta-analysis of 54 studies covering 2.5 million people across nearly 50 years confirms the happiness gap for single parents — and the specific reasons why it's worse in the US than anywhere else on Earth. Plus a Kit Kat truck, a murder investigation that wasn't, a dismissed phone charge, and a Florida man in a thong. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

The fun is gone and Dave and Busters knows it / Half of us regret our degree / What would Dublin say?

A new survey finds 48% of Americans say their lives are currently lacking fun — and the survey was commissioned by Dave and Busters, which tells you everything about the source and nothing about whether the finding is wrong. Also: a Harris Poll/Indeed survey finds 52% of professionals with degrees say their degree wasn't relevant to their current job, and among Gen Z that number rises to 51% who call it a waste of money outright. And a Chinese startup called Meng Xiaoyi has launched a $118 AI pet translator collar claiming 95% accuracy — with zero published data to back it up and 10,000 units already pre-ordered. Plus a robin nest that's holding a Ford truck hostage, a driver stuck in fresh concrete, a paraglider and a plane, and a toothpick world record. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Six in ten Americans cut back on groceries / Put down the laptop, pick up the pencil / Trust your gut

A new NYT/CNN poll finds 61% of Americans changed what they buy at the grocery store to stay within budget — a majority of Democrats, Republicans, and independents all said the same thing. Also: a rural North Carolina school district stopped students from using screens on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and a public health professor who studied the results shares what happened — including the kid whose eye strain went away. And a new PNAS study of 215,000 professional chess moves finds that faster decisions are consistently linked to better moves — and the reason why is more interesting than "trust your gut." Plus a mayor who tasered his own adviser, an AI girlfriend breakup, an airport hair removal evacuation, and some screws on a Florida highway. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.

Artemis II inspired a generation / Luis Salazar found $30,000 and did the right thing / 80% of how you age is your call

Space Camp registrations doubled after Artemis II splashed down — and the NASA administrator who attended Space Camp as a kid is now running the agency. Also: Luis Salazar walked into a Wawa bathroom in Riviera Beach, Florida, found a fanny pack with $30,000 in cash, spent days trying to find the owner, and returned every dollar. The owner was carrying it for a family emergency. He cried. He hugged Luis. And a new report from the Oxford Longevity Project presented at the Smart Ageing Summit finds that at least 80% of the health problems people experience in old age are driven by lifestyle and environment — not genetics. Plus Harvard capping A grades, a Google Translate robbery, mutant super pigs, and a 14-year-old with incredible dedication to avoiding school. ---------------------------------------- Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy [https://acast.com/privacy] for more information.