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If you haven't tuned in to the RNC yet, here are 13 reasons why you should.

If you haven't tuned in to the Republican National Convention yet, you’re not alone.

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images.

Maybe you’re a Republican who gnashes their teeth every time Donald Trump opens his mouth. Maybe you’re a Democrat who’s already heard "Jail Shillary Clinton" enough for one decade. Or maybe you’re just a person who gets bored by boring speeches.

And yet, you still want to do your civic duty. You want to be able to participate in the watercooler conversation. Or, perhaps, you’re a nervous internet writer who dabbles in politics and you want to continue to justify your salary to the publication that employs you.

Fear not! Even if the speeches ramble, the music is suspect, and the balloon drop is anticlimactic, there are many ways to make watching the RNC a fun experience for the whole family:

1. Focus on the fun hats.

When you watch a baseball game, you see baseball caps. When you watch a rodeo, you see cowboy hats. When you watch bearded 27-year-old programmers in "Buffy" T-shirts hitting on college students, you see fedoras.

The hats at the RNC are in another league. A noble league ... like The League of Nations.

A league that peaked in 1918.

Cowboy hats?

Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images.

Check.

Coonskin caps?

Photo by Timothy A. Clary/Getty Images.

Check!

Hats directly from the costume chest for the West Oakport Community Players production of "The Music Man"?


Photo by Jeff J. Mitchell/Getty Images.

Check and mate.

If you’re a fan of delightfully anachronistic haberdashery, the Republican National Convention is the small-screen event of the mid-2010s.

2. Watch campaign operatives desperately try to spin obvious screwups into success stories.

Melania Trump's apparent cribbing of a passage from a 2008 Michelle Obama speech on the first night of the RNC has already sent Trump's surrogates into a flurry of questionably credible but extremely entertaining denials.

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images.

Some simply pretended it didn't happen. Some tried to explain it away as a case of the two women simply having the exact same thoughts on the exact same subject. Others suggested that — hey! — only 7% of the speech was plagiarized, which really isn't that much. (College students on deadline, take note!)

There's no feeling quite so warm and cozy as sitting back on your couch, knowing there's a problem out there in the world ... and it's someone else's job to deal with it.

3. Cheer on the dancing delegates.

2012 convention attendees get their clap on. Photo by Robyn Beck/Getty Images.

The RNC remains America’s #1 source of elderly people who’ve still got it, show it, and want you to know it.

Curious what style of arrhythmic jerking was popular in 1962? Looking forward to seeing some semi-coordinated American flag-ography? Want to watch a county commissioner from Ladysmith, Wisconsin, gingerly hip-bumping the state comptroller of Tennessee?

You only get one chance every four years. Seize it!

4. Gawk at the ridiculously over-the-top entrances.

For Donald Trump, last night's raucous, backlit entrance to "We Are the Champions" was actually pretty restrained.

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.

It can only get more grandiose from here. Will we see him riding in on a hoverboard? Descending from the ceiling on ropes? Time-jumping in from the future? It's only Tuesday! The possibilities are endless.

5. Feel nostalgic about celebrities you haven’t thought about since you were a kid/before you were born.

Sure, "celebrity" might not the exact right word, but it totally would be if you had a time machine.

Scott Baio (Chachi!) was there Monday night.


Ehhhhhhhhhh. Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images.

So was Antonio Sabato Jr., who totally was in something once.

Oh and hey, remember soap star Kimberlin Brown? No? Well, she’s speaking too.

Like Pogs, jelly shoes, and friendship bracelets, you might not have missed them and you might not have even loved them all that much even at the height of their popularity, but they're back, and sure, why not!

6. Cringe at the massive pandering fails.

In a Monday session with delegates from Pennsylvania, Paul Ryan took a few seconds to wave a Terrible Towel — an emblem of the Pittsburgh Steelers — in the air...

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images.

...which irked some in the city of Cleveland, where the RNC is happening. They were none too pleased to see the Republican leader brandish the banner of their bitter football rival.

In other news, Cleveland and Pittsburgh are apparently different cities. You learn new things when you watch the RNC!

7. Shovel popcorn into your mouth as Trump and his team pick random, hugely entertaining fights with GOP lawmakers.

Fittingly, for a candidate whose highest profile accomplishment is hosting a reality show, Donald Trump is really, really, good at draaaaaaaaaama.

Even before the speeches started, top Trump aide Paul Manafort attacked Ohio Gov. John Kasich — America's Republican uncle — as "petulant" for refusing to attend the convention.

Photo by J.D. Pooley/Getty Images.

"Manafort’s problem, after all those years on the lam with thugs and autocrats, is that he can’t recognize principle and integrity," Kasich strategist John Weaver fired back in an e-mail to The New York Times, calling out Manafort's public relations work for the former president of Ukraine.

Rawr! Go get 'em, boys!

8. Daydream about what LeBron James is doing elsewhere in Cleveland while all this is going on.


Photo by Mike Lawrie/Getty Images.

One of the great things about Cleveland hosting the convention is that, if you’re not feeling the program, you can just close your eyes and imagine what King James is up to just a few blocks away at any given moment. Maybe he's grabbing a beer at the Radisson lobby bar across the street or wandering around the perimeter of Quicken Loans Arena trying to catch a Pikachu!

Train your brain to conjure 'Bron, and you're sure to realize a truth that hardened political insiders have long known: The mental image of LeBron James doing anything beats watching the 19th lieutenant governor shuffle haltingly around the stage to Kid Rock’s "Born Free."

9. Enjoy the spectacle of news organizations testing out new technology with mixed results.

The Washington Post has a robot!


Come for the debut of an amazing, cutting-edge mass communication tool. Stay for the schadenfreude of when it inevitably, hilariously tips slowly forward and plants on its face.

10. Applaud the fact-checkers doing A+ work.

It's pretty hard to wallow in self pity about having to sit through three prime-time hours of the Trump Family Variety Spectacular when the heroes at FactCheck.org are spending their week watching every minute of both conventions evaluating every ridiculously hyperbolic claim made by every marginal elected official on that stage, presumably with their eyelids taped open.


Every single American owes these people a drink. At the very least, we need to all go in for a gift basket.

11. Savor the meme-worthy speech faces.

Like this one:

Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images.

11. Revel in the ramshackle production quality.

A delegate stands on stage. The lights are hot. He's got his suit, tie, and firmest scowl on. He's projecting a stern air of authority. He's feeling good.

And then, this happens:


One prop master's catastrophe is one potato-chip-eating, couch-slouching American's perfect television.

12. Rock out to the endless playlist of music you love to hate to love to wonder what even is it?

Between the speeches, the logistical announcements, and the arcane points of order, the playlist on the first day of the 2016 RNC featured a weird collection of B sides — "Limelight" by Rush, The Who's "Eminence Front," "Stay With Me" by Rod Stewart — that undoubtedly delighted your Uncle Craig:

"I have an extra ticket to see Yes with your name on it." Photo via iStock.

But it pretty much left everyone else scratching their heads. And you know what, scratching your head is immensely soothing and gratifying, so thanks, music team!

13. Appreciate that you are watching democracy happen in real time — weirdly — exactly the way it’s supposed to.

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.

You may not be thrilled about the election. You may think the ads are tacky. You may wish the participants were different (dear God, you may wish the participants were different).

You can hate everything about the American political process and still be grateful this is how our political transitions go down rather than when the guy in charge dies and his 9-year-old son takes over, or when a bunch of tanks plow over the White House while the president is in Bermuda, or when every federal employee is replaced by an alien impostor except for a single, mild-mannered Nebraska congressman who, luckily, is played by Kurt Russell.

New political administrations in America happen after a bunch of nerdy bureaucrats make a bunch of boring speeches about freedom, justice, and patriotism in support of candidates we don’t like very much but who we will dutifully go out and choose between in November.

It’s unglamorous. It’s stressful. It’s frustrating and exhausting. But I’m going to tune in. Because it really is the worst.

Except for all the other options.

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JPMorgan offered return-to-office perks that are remarkably similar to the show 'Severance'

The only thing missing was a "music dance experience."

Apple TV

Adam Scott and Tramell Tillman in Severance

While remote work has been a mainstay since the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, more and more companies are attempting to mandate that employees return to the office, on a full or part-time basis, including one now-infamous effort from JPMorgan Chase. The company announced that as of March 2025, all employees were required to return to the office five days per week. Their CEO even ditched the policy that allowed employees to work-from-home two days per week.

To mark the occasion, welcome everyone back ( and perhaps twist the knife a bit deeper?) the United State's largest bank unveiled a plan for a massive $3 billion, 2.5 millions square foot tower on New York's famous Park Avenue—which would house 14,000 workers and feature state of the art architecture and technology—in addition to loading up its new corporate headquarters with perks to help employees transition back to office life.

Some of these "perks" were truly great and truly enticing. Others were... questionable, to say the least.

Grace Tallon on LinkedIn even noticed that some of the benefits of working in the JPMorgan Office seemed like they were yanked right out of one of the most popular current TV shows on the planet: Severance.

If you don't know it, Severance is a psychological thriller on Apple TV that doubles as a dark and biting satire of corporate office culture and capitalism. Employees at a mysterious company called Lumon are "severed" — meaning their brains, memories, and personalities are literally split in half. While at work, they are a different person and retain no memories when they leave the office every night. In return for their sacrifice and for hitting key milestones, the employees receive ludicrous rewards like short dance parties with their boss, melon parties with carved watermelons, and handfuls of balloons. Employees are also expected to marvel at bizarre pieces of art that line the hall, featuring stoic images of Lumon's revered (and more than a bit creepy) founders.

Conversely, JPMorgan's new tower boasted 19-restaurants with at-your-desk delivery, an Irish pub, and on-site physical therapy and yoga. But that's not all!

Tallon notes, however, that JPMorgan also tried to entice employees with things like "personalized climate" in rooms and offices, a "signature scent" that wafts through the halls and somehow reinforced the brand, and, get this, even a "corporate art collection" that celebrates the company's history and values. Be more on the nose next time, will you JPMorgan? That's to say nothing of design elements that support worker's circadian rhythms and coffee machines that learn your favorites over time.

"Let’s stop pretending this is about connecting and doing better work," she writes.

Read Tallon's full post below on the striking similarities:

Commenters agreed that the perks came off more than a little tone deaf.

While some folks defended the corporation for doing their best to make employees feel cared for and taken care of, others didn't quite see it that way, especially when they compared it to the perks of WFH life.

"The climate in my own home office is just right. Along with my own coffee, artwork, lighting (window wide open), and other perks and it cost me zero dollars to drive there and I don't have to wear shoes! Way out of touch," wrote Alix Z.

"Those perks sound more like a high-tech museum experience than actual employee benefits. Instead of a 'signature scent,' how about giving employees real reasons to feel good about coming to work?" said Diana Alayon.

 severance, linkedin, jp morgan, return to office, work, work from home, jobs, workplace, wfh jobs Some at-home perk simply can't be beat. Photo credit: Canva

"Working at home perks: My own candle collection, curated to suit my preferences, Coffee and tea on tap, from our favourite brands, Comfortable cushions and blankets to help regulate my temperature at my desk, A variety of lighting options, ranging from warm white lamps to 'the big light', Freedom to work anywhere I want, such as my office desk, sofa, kitchen table or a coffee shop near by, Personalised art with photos of family and pictures we enjoy, Working space decorated to my own specifications, Plenty of spaces nearby for fresh air and dog walks" wrote Eloise Todd in a mic-drop comment.

There are of course benefits to working together in-person with your colleagues. And sure, if you're required to be there, nothing offsets discomfort quite like delicious lunches and free yoga classes. But to take away even the option of occasionally working from home and duct-taping over it with an algorithm that tracks coffee orders and temperature preferences, and filling the halls with strange paintings that move when employees walk by? It kind of loses the thread, and it's exactly the kind of thinking that the creators of Severance are so good at skewering.

 severance, linkedin, jp morgan, retseverance, linkedin, jp morgan, return to office, work, work from home, jobs, workplace, wfh jobsurn to office, work, work from home, jobs, workplace, wfh jobs Mark (Adam Scott) at the infamous dance party scene in Severance.  media0.giphy.com  

According to Forbes, there are 6 distinct reason companies might push for a return to the office. One, corporate heads believe employees get more "immersed in the company’s values." Two, they think it's easier to monitor whether or not an employee is actually working. Three, to justify the cot of that expensive office space. Four, to foster "spontaneous collaboration." Five, to give new employees a chance to observe and interact with more seasoned worker. and six, to restore a sense of belonging within the company.

But of course, none of these things have anything to do with what people really want: Autonomy. That, in addition to fair pay, some level of flexibility, and good benefits. Perks are nice — even the kind of weird ones — but they can only go so far. It remains to be seen if companies that dictate back-to-the-office edicts are willing to follow through on the things that really matter. Please note how waffle parties did not make that list.

This article originally appeared in February

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People swear by the unusual 'Solid Snake' conversation trend to conquer social anxiety

It's actually an easy Japanese active listening trick.

Canva Photos & Konami

People have found a really great active listening technique in a super strange place.

There is an art to being a good listener. Physically using your ears to hear what someone is saying, and your brain to process it, is only part of the battle. You also have to show the person you're talking to that you're listening and that you care. Asking questions is a great way to keep the conversation flowing and let your talking partner know you're engaged. But what if you're socially anxious, shy, or just can't think of anything to say? It's harder than it seems, especially when meeting new people!

The solution is easy. Just take a page out of Solid Snake's book. Who's Solid Snake? Just a former Green Beret, special ops solider, spy, assassin, and the protagonist of the popular Metal Gear Solid video games. You might wonder what the heck Solid Snake, aka David, knows about active listening. It turns out, quite a lot.

The "Solid Snake conversation method" is taking the world by storm. It's part trend, part meme, and 100% effective.

 conversation tips, social anxiety, small talk, socializing, etiquette, politeness, introvert, video games Solid Snake is here to help your social anxiety!  Giphy  

You don't need to know anything about video games to understand where the method comes from. Suffice it to say, Metal Gear Solid is a plot-heavy game series, full of cut-scenes that feature lots of dialogue and exposition.

It's become a bit of a joke in the gaming world that Snake, a man of few words, tends to fall back on one particular conversational technique over and over: He repeats, or echoes, bits of what the other characters say. It adds emphasis to important points, creates good conversational pacing, and allows the plot and dialogue to continue on smoothly.

Here's a (made up) example:

"Snake, we've got to get the blueprints!"

"The blueprints?"

"Yes, the bad guys are constructing a devastating bomb!"

"A bomb?"

"Indeed! You'll find the prototype in that bunker over there."

"A bunker?"

You get the idea. You can watch it in action here.


  - YouTube  www.youtube.com  

Why does this random video game character speak in this strange cadence? And why are people stealing it to use in real life?

You might think this dialogue is just a clunky tool for exposition or the result of bad writing, but you'd be wrong!

The Metal Gear Solid games are written and developed in Japan by a team led by legendary developer Hideo Kojima. Though translated into English and created in part for an American audience, the games feature a lot of bits and pieces of Japanese culture.

Frequent repetition and conversational echoes are extremely commonplace in Japanese. It's part of a polite active listening technique called "Aizuchi," which refers to frequent interjections to show interest, engagement, reassurance, and politeness.

Aizuchi includes interjecting with words or phrases (or their equivalents) like "I get it," "Yeah," "Really?" or even repeating back parts of the original speaker's words, a la Solid Snake.

According to Niko Smith at FluentU, "Perhaps you already use some of these interjections in conversation. While your friend is [telling you a story]... you might nod a few times or throw in a surprised 'No way!' or 'What happened next?' [Aizuchi] works in a similar way, but it’s more relentless. As the listener in a conversation, you might find yourself doing just as much talking as the speaker."

Smith adds that in America, young people are often taught specifically not to interrupt or speak while someone else is talking. In Japan, doing so frequently—in the right way—is a sign of respect and interest.

Better yet, Aizuchi doesn't require the listener to be particularly brilliant in conversation, charismatic, or creative. Even socially awkward people, or anyone who clams up in social situations, can muster a few polite interjections!

This technique exists outside of Japanese culture, too. In fact, it's a well-known wat to keep conversations flowing effortlessly, give you time to think about what you're going to say, and make your conversation partner feel heard and appreciated.

It's no surprise that people familiar with the game have been trying the technique in real life for years. In 2023, a viral 4chan post helped popularize the idea, and more recently a (now deleted) post on X went super viral referencing how effective the "Solid Snake conversation method" is for meeting new people.

 

The technique is hitting home with young people, especially gamers and the chronically-online, which makes for a really productive and much-needed discussion.

Gen Z has grown up with social media taking the place of many in-person interactions, screens everywhere, and of course, the COVID years. All of these factors affect the way they communicate with each other, especially in real life:

Maddy Mussen writes for The Standard, "Gen Z slang is all about shutting people out. It’s an inside joke, the more unintelligible the better. It’s in keeping with its etymology. When your whole modus operandi is being exclusionary, it doesn’t make for a lot of meaningful conversation."

It would be an unfair blanket generalization to say young people only speak in brainrot and have no idea how to operate in the real world. But Gen Z is racked with social anxiety to a far greater degree than previous generations. They need all the tools and practice they can get when it comes to operating in the real world and speaking to people they don't know well.

If they, or anyone else, can take a useful tip from their favorite video game character, there's nothing wrong with that at all.

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Science

Math professor shares thermo-dynamic hack to cool your sweltering car in seconds

You don't even have to use your A/C.

via Canva/Photos

A woman in a hot car.

Cars can become unbearably hot in the summer. Even at a seemingly mild 80 degrees outside, the temperature inside can soar to a scorching 109°F within 20 minutes. According to the CDC, in just 40 minutes it can escalate to a blistering 118°F. After an hour, it can peak at a searing 123°F. And that’s just the air temperature; a dark dashboard or seat can reach a staggering 200°F.

"These objects (e.g., dashboard, steering wheel, child seat) heat the adjacent air by conduction and convection and also give off longwave radiation (red) which is very efficient at warming the air trapped inside a vehicle," the CDC explained in their report. It can take five to 10 minutes for your car to cool down on a hot day by turning on the air conditioning, which probably means you burn your buttocks and thighs on the hot seat. That’s why Hannah Fry shared an amazing hack on TikTok, demonstrating how to cool your car down in seconds using the laws of thermodynamics.

Fry is Professor of the Public Understanding of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge. She is a mathematician, a best-selling author, an award-winning science host, and the host of numerous popular podcasts and television shows.

@fryrsquared

That age-old dilemma of choosing between having a non-sweltering car or baffling a passerby because you look like a fool who doesn't know how to use a door

Fry suggests that instead of turning on the air conditioning, which she claims is “not worth it” because of the time it takes, open one of the windows on the opposite side of the door. Then, rapidly open and close the driver’s side door, so it moves back and forth like a fan.

“The reason why it works is that when you open and close the door, especially if you do it quickly, the door, as it's moving outwards, it sweeps out all of the air that's in its way, creating this sort of area of low pressure that you get here,” Fry said. “And then that sets up something called bulk flow, which is where all of the hot, sweaty, horrible air inside the car is drawn outwards.”

 hot car, hot steering wheel, hot man, sweat, summer,  A man sweating in his car.via Canva/Photos

Fry’s super practical approach to a problem everyone deals with blew many people’s minds in the comments. “If I ever catch someone in real life doing this, I’m gonna know they’ve watched this exact video,” a commenter wrote. “I will give it a go, but while opening and closing the door, scream, ‘Be gone, heat demons! BE GONE!’” another added. “Going to remember this the next time my partner farts in the car,” someone joked.

The fact that the inside air temperature in a car and the outside temperature are often drastically different, especially in the summer, serves as a crucial reminder to dog owners everywhere to never leave their pet unattended in a parked car. "Most dog owners know that you can’t leave a pet in a hot car," the American Kennel Club writes. "Temperatures can rise to dangerous levels in just minutes, putting your dog at risk of heatstroke. But what if you open a window a little bit? Does that make it safe to leave your dog in the car? The answer is simple. You should never leave a dog alone in the car, even with the windows cracked. In some states, it’s even illegal."

The following video by The Dodo explains why leaving a dog in a hot car can be deadly, even when it doesn’t feel that hot outside.

  - YouTube  www.youtube.com  

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Cheeky list of 'reasons not to eat your food if you're a cat' has feline lovers cackling

Reason #2: the vibe was off.

Photo credit: Canva

Cat have their reasons for doing what they do…even if they perplex us.

Cats have their fair share of quirks, from midnight zoomies to baking invisible biscuits to those weird alien chirps. But the one eccentricity that seems to go against their very nature as descendants of apex predators is their finickiness around food.

As any cat mom or dad will tell you, these critters take picky eating to Olympian levels, rivaling that of any toddler. To really put that into perspective, below is a delightful TikTok (shared by @thecutestcatseveryes) outlining the very logical “reasons” why on any given day, a cat might suddenly refuse to eat…despite yowling out of desperate hunger mere minutes before.

The “reasons not to eat your food if you're a cat," include:

  1. Bowl was placed down too loudly.
  2. The vibe was off.
  3. Don't like chicken, as of today.
  4. Felt like I was being rushed.
  5. I'm a cat.

Even the kitty featured in the video seemed to approve this message.

 
 @thecutestcatseveryes Reasons not to eat your food if you're a cat 😸 #funnycat #catlovers #cattok #catsoftiktok #kittensoftiktok ♬ Funny video "Carmen Prelude" Arranging weakness(836530) - yo suzuki(akisai) 
 
 


In the comments, other cat parents shared their purrfectly reasonable reasons to refuse noms noms, such as:

“Bowl was faced the wrong way.”

“Same flavor twice in a row.”

“I eat at 4:30pm, not 4:31pm.”

“I can see the center of the bowl is empty therefore there is no food, edges don’t count.”

“I want the other can, not the open one in the fridge. New can every feeding."

“I’d rather eat what my brother is eating, which is exactly the same as what I’ve got but I want his specifically.”

Listen, we can joke all we want, but it turns out that cats likely come by these picky eating habits naturally—and don’t do it simply to make our lives harder. As PetMD explains, wild cats subsisted on frequent meals of whatever smaller mammals they were lucky enough to catch while hunting, usually during dawn and dusk. Domestic kitties still might have this instinct, which manifests in a predilection to eat a variety of small meals, which feel fresh as to mimic a fresh catch, throughout the day.

 cats, cat food, best cat food, cat refusing to eat, funny cat videos, pets, picky cats, cat treats Look at this wee little tiger munching on his meal. Photo credit: Canva

The site added that kitties could have learned to prefer a certain type of food thanks to their mother, or might have eaten a particular food during a moment of stress or illness, and thus maintain a negative association with it.

There are, however, certain things humans can do to make food more appetizing, PetMD explains. To mimic fresh prey, the site suggests warming up food to about 100 degrees Fahrenheit (same as a normal body temperature) and moisten dry food with a bit of water. Some cats might even respond better to food that has the specific shape and look of fresh prey.

 cats, cat food, best cat food, cat refusing to eat, funny cat videos, pets, picky cats, cat treats And if there's a loud noise during dinnertime, forget about it. Photo credit: Canva

Of course, even if we follow all these steps to a T, we still might get some finickiness from time to time for reasons unbeknownst to us (though “vibes being off” is a good catchall excuse). Still, it won’t keep us from loving our furry little weirdos any more.

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Pittsburgh airport staff heroically recover diamond that fell from woman's ring at baggage claim

She was sure the conveyor belt had eternally claimed her 33-year-old engagement diamond.

Photo credit: Canva

Pittsburgh airport staff heroically finds woman's lost diamond

An engagement ring isn't the start of a journey with a partner—it's a promise to continue the journey you've already started. That's why engagement rings hold so much sentimental value to the person who receives it. The ring is something they cherish forever in most cases, which is exactly why when April Schmitt realized she lost the diamond out of her engagement ring she flew into a panic.

She knew the stone was lost somewhere near or in the baggage claim area at the Pittsburgh International Airport in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Schmitt has been married to her husband for more than 30 years, so she knows her engagement ring like the back of her hand (literally). The diamond was sitting in its pronged setting when she landed at the airport and made her way to the baggage claim area, but she noticed it was gone shortly after her husband picked her up from the airport.

Once she realized her stone was missing from her ring, she became panicked. She said in a statement, “I panicked and my heart sank. I truly didn’t think I was ever going to see it again.”

 lost diamond; diamond; Pittsburgh airport staff; airport lost diamond; found diamond; good news; humanity Travelers wait at the baggage claim carousel.Photo credit: Canva

The couple, who live in Sewickley, just a quick 30 minute or less drive down the road, immediately made their way back to the airport to find the missing diamond. Some diamonds may appear large when they're placed on a band but unless they turn into a strobe light, they're nearly impossible to see in an open, bustling space. Schmitt knew finding the diamond was a long shot but there was no way she was going to let the stone disappear without trying her best to locate it.

When the couple returned to the airport, Schmitt informed the staff about her missing diamond and was met with immense kindness. In this instance, it would've been easy to brush off looking for a clear stone in such a large space but that's not what happened. Instead, the staff member she alerted contacted airport maintenance. Suddenly, they had an entire team of people looking for the diamond.

 lost diamond; diamond; Pittsburgh airport staff; airport lost diamond; found diamond; good news; humanity Elegant diamond rings sparkling in warm light.Photo credit: Canva

The maintenance crew came with flashlights and searched over, under, and in between the baggage carousel for the diamond. They searched so long that the Schmitts had actually given up and returned home assuming that the sentimental stone was lost forever. But the crew they left behind was determined. Tom Riordan, a stationary engineer, assured the upset woman that the next shift would continue to look for the diamond between flights until it was located, and they did just that.

It was Sean Dempsey, a fellow stationary engineer, who eventually located the missing stone. He told ABC News, "I just was crawling with a flashlight, and we had paint sticks to scrape all the dirt away,” he said. “The diamond caught a little bit of light and I found it.”

Schmitt was thrilled to get the call that her missing diamond had been found. “There were so many ways this story could have ended, but these guys were committed to helping me. I travel a lot, and I go to a lot of airports. To have this experience here and to be treated like an important person—those staffers were so concerned about my happiness and doing the right thing for me. I was not just a random passenger. They went out of their way to take care of me.”

The staff at Pittsburgh International Airport was happy they could be of assistance. Elise Gomez, manager of customer experience at PIT tells Blue Sky News, We’ve really invested in our passenger experience and do everything we can to ensure seamless travel. We know travel can be stressful, which is why we have a variety of programs from our PIT Paws teams to amenities like Presley’s Place for travelers with sensory sensitivities. And of course, at the end of the day, it’s about people. Our team is dedicated to assisting passengers whether that’s helping them find the right gate or finding a lost diamond.”

 lost diamond; diamond; Pittsburgh airport staff; airport lost diamond; found diamond; good news; humanity Vibrant cityscape with a classic red funicular and riverfront views.Photo credit: Canva

This isn't the first time the PIT crew has helped locate a missing diamond. In 2023 Kristen Tunno lost her grandmother's diamond ring while at the airport. April Laukaitis, a customer care agent located the family heirloom lodged between the tiles of one of the bathroom floors.

Airports aren't known for their hospitality so it's always nice to hear when airport staff go above and beyond to be compassionate to travelers.

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