- The paradox of horror: How scary films can soothe your anxiety
- Matt Berninger, lead singer of The National, traded his notebook for a baseball. And the words kept coming.
- I didn’t realize until reading a recap at The Athletic that on Saturday night Will Smith hit the first extra-inning Game 7 homer in the history of the World Series. Oh, and the nail-biter peaked at 33.1M viewers and beat the last Game 7 (in 2019) by 10%, making it the most-watched MLB game since 2017.
- The New England Aquarium built a geriatric island for aging penguins to live in safety and dignity.
- Take a walk! A modest increase in physical activity can delay cognitive decline by three years or more, and Alzheimer’s symptoms decrease with just a few thousand steps a day. And new research shows exercise could help reduce anxiety as effectively as traditional talk therapy in as little as 8 to 12 weeks.
- This is pretty wild: [M]ost Americans in 1790 consumed an average [of] 5.8 gallons of pure alcohol a year. (Today the average is closer to “just” 2 gallons per year.)
- Adults ruined “6-7” for Halloween – via my wife
- The University of Florida Gators 7-foot-9 Olivier Rioux became the tallest college basketball player ever.
- I’ve long loved The Point, but never knew the full story of the brilliant, baffling rise and fall of Harry Nilsson. – via my dad
Things Can Only Get Better:
- Federal agents drive off with 1-year-old girl after arresting her father in Los Angeles
- Louisiana officials waited months to warn public of whooping cough outbreak – via @elizabethjacobs
- One analytical model shows that the dismantling of U.S.A.I.D. has already caused the deaths of 600,000 people, two-thirds of them children. – via @newyorker.com
- The United States of America continues to extrajudicially murder people.
- A Food and Drug Administration official who resigned on Sunday was sued by a Canadian pharmaceutical company, which accused him of soliciting a bribe and tanking its stock with false statements as part of a revenge campaign against a former colleague.
- Employees at The Washington Post uploaded a fake video to 8 social apps. Only one told users it wasn’t real.
- East Wing ballroom donations by corporate owners create awkward moments for news outlets
