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Five good things · Three minutes
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MEDICINE • Smithsonian Magazine
A python survived cancer, and she's back to feistyThe first tumor came out. Then a second one grew.
A 15-foot reticulated python at England's Chester Zoo has become the first snake known to receive electrochemotherapy for cancer, and she is now disease-free. Her name is Jodie Foster, after the actress, because her intake paperwork read "JF" for juvenile female. She arrived at the zoo roughly 20 years ago. About two years back she stopped eating and turned lethargic, and keepers found a malignant tumor in her jaw. Surgery removed it. Then another grew. Rather than operate again alone, veterinarians combined surgery with electrical pulses that make cancer cells absorb chemotherapy drugs more easily, a treatment first used in humans in the 1990s. The October 2025 procedure required pushing two operating tables together to hold her 110-pound body. Heated blankets kept her stable through 90 minutes under anesthesia. Her mouth healed fast, and she started eating and gaining weight again. The zoo describes her as back to her "bright and feisty" self. Read the full story → | |||
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PROGRESS • Optimist Daily
The trees were never gone. 200 million came back.The trees were never gone. They were waiting underground.
Niger has restored five million hectares of savanna, roughly 12.4 million acres, without planting a single seedling. The country formally recognized the method as a national soil restoration approach in 2020. The trick, discovered in 1983 by an Australian agricultural adviser named Tony Rinaudo, was that the trees were never really gone. Beneath the depleted Sahel soil, root systems were still alive, waiting for farmers to ease the pressure of overgrazing so green shoots could return. The technique, called Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration, asks farmers to identify which shoots to protect and which to prune. Because the trees belong to them, the value is direct. Shade, firewood and fodder come with the deal, so protection is self-interest rather than a program obligation. By 2020, groups including the World Agroforestry Centre estimated more than 200 million trees had returned, benefiting roughly 2.5 million people. The method is now being tested in more than 20 countries. Read the full story → | |||
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DELIGHT • Good News Network
A prank turned kind. Now every freshman hugs mom goodbye.The seniors could have gone crueler. They went with a kiss.
Freshmen arriving at Bishop Kelly High School in Tulsa, Oklahoma face one demand from the senior class on day one. Kiss your mom, dad, or grandparent goodbye before the opening bell, in front of everyone. The seniors swarm the parking lot, mob the arriving cars, and make sure the newcomers do what, as one put it, "we all had to do." Asked by CBS News' Steve Hartman what could possibly be more embarrassing for a 14-year-old, a senior said, "That's why it's perfect." The tradition is younger than it looks. Seniors used to prank freshmen like everyone else, until the class of 2001 decided the ritual should be kinder, if no less mortifying. The result is a parent driving away feeling good and a freshman walking in with red cheeks. Parents, it turns out, are the ones who need the goodbye more. Read the full story → | |||
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NATURE • Nice News
Buffalo Soldiers became America's first park rangersSomeone had to protect the land. The Army sent soldiers.
The National Park Service turns 110 this week, and its history includes a detail that rarely makes the brochures. Some of the country's first park rangers were Buffalo Soldiers, the African American troops who served in all-Black U.S. Army regiments starting in 1866. When Yellowstone and other early parks needed protecting from herders grazing sheep across the land, the Army stepped in. The 24th Infantry became the first Buffalo Soldier regiment to take on the job at Yosemite in 1899. "The farmers knew the trails into the Sequoia long before anybody else," historian Brian Shellum told History. In 1903, Captain Charles Young became the acting superintendent of Sequoia, the first African American to hold the role. The NPS now spans 433 sites across all 50 states. On Tuesday, the official anniversary, parks that normally charge entry fees will waive them for U.S. residents. The rangers who started it rode in on horseback. Read the full story → | |||
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MEDICINE • Woman's World
Nearly half of dementia cases trace to changeable habitsNo cure exists yet. But nearly half the risk is yours to change.
Up to 45 percent of dementia cases can be traced to risk factors people can actually change, according to the World Health Organization's newly updated guidelines. That figure is doing a lot of quiet work, because it means everyday choices carry real weight against a disease most of us fear. Amy Shah, a double-board certified women's health expert and author of Hormone Havoc, offered the simple shifts she recommends most. Build meals around vegetables, whole grains and quality protein while cutting back on ultra-processed food and alcohol. Manage blood pressure and cholesterol with the checkup you have been putting off. Treating hearing loss early matters too. "Studies suggest that plays a huge role in long-term brain health," Shah said. Then there is the easiest one. "Spending time with family, friends and your community appears to play an important role in healthy brain aging," she noted. A phone call with a grandchild counts. So does coffee with a neighbor. Read the full story → | |||
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With love, The Editor
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