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Science

Cemetery posts a singles ad for a 'lonely, widowed' goose and finds her a loving partner

She found a gander who was a widower.

geese, riverside cemetery, love story
via Pexels

Geese swim beside each other on a pond.

Employees at the Riverside Cemetery in Marshalltown, Iowa, noticed that Blossom, a goose who lived on the grounds and in the pond, wasn’t doing well after her mate, Bud, passed away last August. CBS News reported that Blossom would often sit in front of shiny model tombstones and look at her reflection as if searching for a companion.

"We started to notice that she was really seeming lonely and isolating herself," general manager Dorie Tammen told the CBC. "It was clear that she was lonely and she needed a partner."

So Tammen created a personal ad for Blossom to find her a friend or a new mate. It’s possibly the only singles ad in history where someone was looking for a partner to live with them in a cemetery. The ad read:


“Lonely, widowed domestic goose seeks life partner for companionship and occasional shenanigans. Come share life with me at Riverside Cemetery, where you'll enjoy swimming in the lovely lake, good food, numerous friends, and peeking in the door of the office building at the strange but kind humans there, who feed us lots of goodies. I'm youthful, adventurous and lively, and I've been told I'm beautiful."

The ad caught the attention of Deb and Randy Hoyt, who owned a gander named Frankie, who was also a widower. Frankie was initially known as Handsome and his mate, Gretel.

"He was sad. He was lonely," Deb Hoyt told the CBC. "He just hung out with us, you know, whenever we were outside. In the winters, it was especially hard because we're not outside very much."

Deb and Randy decided to take Frankie to the cemetery to meet Blossom on a Valentine’s Day date and Blossom greeted him with open wings. The two immediately hit it off, and now they’re inseparable.

"They started walking off together and they haven't really left each other's side since," Tammen told CBS News. "I don't think they've been more than a few feet away from each other,” she told the CBC.

Deb Hoyt also told the CBC that when she visits Frankie at the cemetery, Blossom is wary of her new in-laws. "She hisses at us and so he gets in between, like, 'Uh, these are my people. Don't you be hissin' at them,'" Hoyt said with a laugh. "It's hilarious."

It may seem strange that geese mate for life like humans, but monogamy isn’t rare in the avian world. According to How Stuff Works, geese are socially monogamous but are known to stray occasionally for sexual liaisons outside of the relationship. But the monogamous social relationship between the two birds is instrumental in assuring that their offspring, who are susceptible to harm, survive into adulthood.

Deb Hoyt is happy that Frankie and Blossom have found happiness after their losses. Their story shows that even in the avian world there are second chances at happiness. "I think he's happy there," she told the CBC. "That second chance at love was pretty awesome." Ultimately, the story proves the old cliche: "What is good for the goose is good for the gander.”

Our home, from space.

Sixty-one years ago, Yuri Gagarin became the first human to make it into space and probably the first to experience what scientists now call the "overview effect." This change occurs when people see the world from far above and notice that it’s a place where “borders are invisible, where racial, religious and economic strife are nowhere to be seen.”

The overview effect makes man’s squabbles with one another seem incredibly petty and presents the planet as it truly is, one interconnected organism.

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Health

Here’s how we can use the power of awe to make our lives more fulfilling

Being amazed by things outside ourselves is tremendous for our mental health.

A young man looking into the sky

The exhilaration of a rock concert. The feeling of deep serenity you experience during a religious ceremony. That sense of connectedness you get while walking through a dense forest. The lightness that flows through your body while dancing and the dissolution of the ego you experience on psychedelics. These are all experiences that give us the feeling of awe.

Most of us love having at least a few of these experiences and believe they help us grow. But now, a team of psychologists has explained why cultivating a sense of awe can benefit our minds and bodies and how we can create these experiences ourselves.

Maria Monroy and Dacher Keltner posit that a sense of awe can help solve the crises of individualism, excessive self-focus, loneliness and a culture of cynicism, and can even improve our physical health. They explain it in a research article titled “Awe as a Pathway to Mental and Physical Health.”

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Brianna Greenfield makes nachos for her husband.

A viral video showing a woman preparing nachos for her "picky" spouse after he refused to eat the salmon dinner she cooked has sparked a contentious debate on TikTok. The video was shared on April 26 by Brianna Greenfield (@themamabrianna on TikTok) and has since earned over 2.5 million views.

Brianna is a mother of two who lives in Iowa.

The video starts with Brianna grating a massive hunk of cheese with a caption that reads: “My husband didn’t eat the dinner that I made…So let’s make him some nachos.”

“If I don’t feed him, he literally won’t eat,” she wrote. “This used to irritate me. Now I just blame his mother for never making him try salmon,” Greenfield wrote. The video features Meghan Trainor’s single “Mother” playing in the background.

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Pop Culture

Woman flawlessly breaks down how luxury bags—and other designer brands—keep people 'poor'

"They're targeting the people who want to look rich—middle and lower class folks who don't have a lot of money or savings. That is the bread and butter of designer brands."

Cara Nicole/Youtube

Not worth it.

It feels safe to say that we are all hoping to be more mindful about how we spend our money these days, whether it’s to be kinder to the environment, align better with our values, improve our finances or simply exercise free will against the siren call of consumerism.

That’s why this video essay created by Cara Nicole (who gives all kinds of financials and sustainability education on her Youtube channel) feels so timely.

In just under twenty minutes, Nicole astutely breaks down how luxury brands like Hermes, Louis Vuitton and Rolex create the fake illusion of wealth through “manufactured exclusivity” and getting free marketing from celebrities and influencers—who often don’t even pay for the products themselves. Meanwhile, most real rich people wouldn’t be caught dead in the flashy brands, and in reality consider them "overrated." But still, the illusion persists. Because advertising.

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@keepingalfoatwiththejoneses/Instagram

Inexpensive and tranquil…what's not to like?

Saving money and living comfortably don’t always go hand in hand, but people do find ways to accomplish it. Sometimes all it takes is thinking a little outside the box—getting a job that allows you to travel the world or swapping out a traditional mortgage for more creative, less costly home ideas.

Take this couple in North Carolina, for example, who gave up living on land to move into a floating cabin and apparently saved $27,500 annually by doing so.

According to Good News Network, Sarah Spiro, 27, and her boyfriend, Brandon Jones, 40, break down the math: Their one-bedroom floating home, which they bought in March 2021, originally cost less than $30,000. The pair then spent two months and $23,000 renovating, for a total initial investment of less than $50,000. And now, they pay $2,500 a year to live on the lake. Yes, you read that right. $2,500 a year. They used to pay that much per month on their combined individual rents.

Obviously, it was a “no brainer,” said Spiro.

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@katherout/TikTok

Just another unsolved mystery

Who doesn’t like a good mystery?

A video creator known as @katherout certainly does. At the gym Kath frequents, there’s a whiteboard with a revolving prompt with simple questions like “What are you listening to?” or “What city were you born in?” Gym goers then write their responses anonymously on the board.

Kath recently became enthralled—and tickled—by a person who somehow manage to write the word “monke” (as in the word describing a group of monkeys, apparently) on every single one of their answers.

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