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With a little help from magnetic fields and a grandpa (not theirs), baby turtles find their way.

Grandpa found some baby turtles on his doorstep. So he took 'em to the ocean ... and it got adorable.

I stumbled upon this video called "Funny Grandpa Releasing Sea Turtles."

In case you were unsure, it's a video of a funny grandpa releasing sea turtles. And it's pretty adorable:


Take a minute to put yourself into the awestruck shoes of this grandpa holding a plate of baby turtles...


Of course, the cute part is that they're babies. And they are being released by a grandpa who is as in love with baby turtles as I am.

But the part that really blew my mind: Despite being adorable tiny babies, they know exactly where to go!

And they know exactly what to do! I didn't understand how a bunch of baby turtles being let go into the big, bad world somehow all instinctively knew which direction to swim. So I did some digging to find the answer to one simple question:

How is that happening? And here was the pretty amazing answer:

Magnetic FIELDS, more specifically.

You know how your compass always knows where true north is? It's kinda like that, only inside a baby turtle. These guys are moving along with geomagnetic field lines (think latitude and longitude lines) that communicate to the turtles what latitude they're on.

Scientists who study these lil' dudes can't FULLY explain how these turtles are belly flopping onto the beach and making it happen, but they do have some good leads.

One experiment released turtle hatchlings at different latitudes. The result? They changed directions to swim toward their normal migratory pattern. These results essentially mean that those turtles were approximating their own latitude.

Um, wow.


But how are they doing it? What's going ON?! This is when the story got deep. And it brought me to the slugs.

A promising sea slug with a simple and easy-to-study nervous system might hold the secret clue. The mollusk called Tritonia diomedea.



Yeah, it's a sea slug. Don't judge. Image via Dr. Paul S. Katz/Scholarpedia.

Studies show that this slug has neurons in its brain that respond to changes in magnetic fields. And those neurons appear to be attached to the motor neurons that tell that slug where it is and where it wants to go.

Its brain is essentially a compass!

The turtle nervous system is WAY more complex than the sea slug, but these specific neurons are the beginning of figuring out how it works!

Loggerhead turtles aren't the only animals that use the earth's magnetic field for navigation. Others include honeybees, homing pigeons, trout, and whales! Additional studies suggest salmon (and lobsters) and dolphins (and deer and bats) could be on the list too. :)

How cool is nature, huh?? It uses sea slug technology (we think!) to teach infant turtles how to go into the ocean and survive. Ya gotta respect that.

*High-fives Mother Earth*

And that is how I ended up watching "Funny Grandpa Releasing Sea Turtles" with a newfound appreciation for nature and science and, yes, slugs.

All in a day's Internet. Gotta love it.

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Making new friends as an adult is challenging. While people crave meaningful IRL connections, it can be hard to know where to find them. But thanks to one Facebook Group, meeting your new best friends is easier than ever.

Founded in 2018, NYC Brunch Squad brings together hundreds of people who come as strangers and leave as friends through its in-person events.

“Witnessing the transformative impact our community has on the lives of our members is truly remarkable. We provide the essential support and connections needed to thrive amid the city's chaos,” shares Liza Rubin, the group’s founder.

Despite its name, the group doesn’t just do brunch. They also have book clubs, seasonal parties, and picnics, among other activities.

NYC Brunch Squad curates up to 10 monthly events tailored to the specific interests of its members. Liza handles all the details, taking into account different budgets and event sizes – all people have to do is show up.

“We have members who met at our events and became friends and went on to embark on international journeys to celebrate birthdays together. We have had members get married with bridesmaids by their sides who were women they first connected with at our events. We’ve had members decide to live together and become roommates,” Liza says.

Members also bond over their passion for giving back to their community. The group has hosted many impact-driven events, including a “Picnic with Purpose” to create self-care packages for homeless shelters and recently participated in the #SquadSpreadsJoy challenge. Each day, the 100 members participating receive random acts of kindness to complete. They can also share their stories on the group page to earn extra points. The member with the most points at the end wins a free seat at the group's Friendsgiving event.

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The Tax Foundation addressed many of these shortcomings using the most recent (2015) Bureau of Economic Analysis data to provide a familiar map of the United States overlaid with the relative value of what $100 is "worth" in each state. Granted, going state-by-state still introduces a fair amount of "smoothing" into the process — $100 will go farther in Los Angeles than in Fresno, for instance — but it does provide insight into where the value lies.

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Every night around 5:30 p.m., she stood up and told the staff at her Ohio nursing home that she needed to leave. When they asked why, she said she needed to go home to take care of her mother. Her mom, of course, had long since passed away.

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When Munger passed, his estimated worth was $2.6 billion. Buffet, 93, is believed to be worth $119 billion.

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If you're grieving a loved one this holiday season, here's a gift you can give yourself

After losing her almost-4-year-old daughter to epilepsy, Kelly Cervantes created a "grief companion" that meets people wherever they are in their grief journey.

Images courtesy of Kelly Cervantes

Kelly Cervantes wrote her way through grieving the loss of her daughter, Adelaide.

Kelly Cervantes begins the Introduction to her book with five words: "Grief sucks. It's also weird." It's a concise truth that anyone who has lost a loved one knows all too well.

Grief is a universal experience—none of us get through life without loss—but it's also unique to each person. Most of us are familiar with the popular "stages of grief" theory, but denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance (along with guilt and a host of things) are less like sequential rungs on a ladder and more like pools you fall into at various times as you stumble your way through the grief process. Grief is not linear and it's not neat and tidy and it's not predictable.

Take it from someone who's been there. Kelly Cervantes lost her daughter, Adelaide, to epilepsy just shy of her 4th birthday. Using writing as a therapeutic tool to help her process Adelaide's medically complex life, death and everything that came after, Kelly created the book she wished she'd had as she was trying to navigate her own grieving process.

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