Roger Pasquier hunts for coins on NYC sidewalks and keeps track of how much he finds. He discovered an odd consequence of everyone having a smartphone: people don’t pick up change on the sidewalk anymore. From 1987 to 2006, he averaged about fifty-eight dollars a year. Then Apple introduced the iPhone, and millions of potential competitors started to stare at […]
Read more
■ South Central Los Angeles is more famous for drive-by shootings than well-kept gardens, but one native son is getting locals to trade their sawed-off shotguns for shovels. Ron Finley, who styles himself the “Gangsta Gardener” is encouraging Angelenos to cultivate vegetable and fruit gardens in vacant lots in deprived neighborhoods. He has co-founded a charity, L.A. Green Grounds, to […]
Read more
Tired of exercising to shed excess pounds? Scientists at Harvard University may have discovered a way to help you lose weight—just by taking a pill. The human body has two kinds of fat cells: white cells, which store excess calories in the form of flab, and brown cells, which burn energy to produce heat. “What we wanted to do is […]
Read more
Having a sense of purpose may add years to your life—and the benefit can be realized throughout adulthood. That’s the conclusion of a long-term study that tracked the physical and mental health of more than 6,100 Americans aged 20 to 75. Previous research has shown purposefulness to be one of the strongest predictors of longevity, but this is the first […]
Read more
■ A World War II veteran was able to hear a symphony he wrote 67 years ago for the first time, when the U.S. Army Orchestra premiered it in Washington, D.C. Retired Col. Harold Van Heuvelen, 93, was inspired by his experiences as a soldier to write a symphony in 1945, but it languished on the shelf for decades and […]
Read more
Anatoli Brouchkov, a scientist whose curiosity and thirst for knowledge drove him to go beyond the standard protocol of his experimentation by injecting himself with an ancient “Eternal Life” bacteria. In 2009, a 3.5-million-year-old bacteria strain called Bacillus F was discovered deep in the permafrost of Siberia’s Sakha Republic. Scientists later found that mice and fruit flies exposed to the bacteria seemed to […]
Read more
The Oakland Zoo RAISED money for conservation by auctioning artwork created by giraffes, bats, elephants and other resident animals. Thirty-two works of art by more than 20 species are on auction on eBay. Click here to view the current auctions if any are presently listed. The Oakland Zoo brings the world of wildlife to children and families, featuring 400 exotic […]
Read more
Residents of shorelines previously damaged by Hurricane Sandy turned to a cheap and plentiful resource to help them rebuild: discarded Christmas trees. The storm washed away miles of sand dunes, which protected the coast from flooding by serving as a buffer against wind and waves. Volunteers in New York and New Jersey piled thousands of the trees on top of […]
Read more
Of the world’s billion Internet users, one in three logs on in English. That’s no surprise. The technology got its start in the U.S., most Web pages are English, and more than 60 percent of the U.S., Canadian, U.K., and Australian populations are online. But China is catching up. The number of Chinese speakers using the Internet is five times […]
Read more
AAA says more than 76 percent of U.S. drivers are parking the wrong way. “U.S. drivers most frequently park their vehicle by pulling forward into a parking spot … a riskier practice that driving experts warn leaves pedestrians more vulnerable.” So it seems, we should really be backing into parking spots instead of pulling in head first. As part of a […]
Read more