Feb. 4, 2025

Conan the Bacterium and The Great Google Eyes Mystery

Show Notes
Transcript

In this episode, Jenny Mac presents five uplifting news stories. First, Nigel Richards, a Scrabble world champion who doesn't speak Spanish, wins the Spanish Scrabble Championship. Next, Notre Dame Cathedral's restoration uncovers ancient artifacts. Scientists discover 'Conan the Bacterium', a bacteria resilient to extreme radiation, potentially aiding space missions. LEGO celebrates five years of its Replay sustainability initiative, allowing consumers to donate used LEGO bricks. Finally, a mystery involving googly eyes appearing on sculptures around Portland, Oregon, stirs local reactions. For an ad-free experience, visit Caloroga Shark Media.

00:11 Scrabble Champion Nigel Richards
00:54 Notre Dame Cathedral Restoration Discoveries
01:26 Conan the Bacterium: Surviving Extremes
01:49 LEGO's Sustainability Initiative: Replay
02:36 Googly Eyes Mystery in Portland

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Caalaroga Shark Media. Hey there, Jennie Mack with five good

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news stories. Congratulations to five time English language Scrabble World

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champion Nigel Richards. He has now won the championship in Spanish.

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What's interesting about that is he doesn't speak Spanish. That's right.

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He won the Spanish World Scrabble Championships in Spain back

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in November. He lost only one game out of twenty four.

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He speaks no Spanish. He started memorizing the language's scrabble

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word list a year ago. His friend Liz told the

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AP he can't understand why other people can't just do

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the same thing. He can look at a block of

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words together and once they go into his brain as

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a picture, he can just recall it very easily. He's

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done this before. In twenty fifteen he became the French

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language Scrabble champ. He doesn't speak French either. He studied

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that list for nine weeks. I think everybody was pretty

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psyched when the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris reopened during

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the rest of some archaeologists were allowed to dig under

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the foundations. They uncovered hundreds of fragments, many from limestone sculptures,

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of men and saints, including Jesus. A thirteenth century screen

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that previously separated the choir and sanctuary from public view

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was among the more significant architectural finds. Also found were

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some heavy iron clamps ten to twenty inches long used

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to bind stones together. They think those are from around

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eleven sixty Wow. Scientists have named a bacteria conan the

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Bacterium for its ability to survive the harshest of extremes.

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It can withstand radiation doses twenty eight thousand times greater

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than those that would kill a human being, so we

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know who will rule the world after the next war.

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Scientists are trying to figure out how this works. They're

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hoping they can protect astronauts from high doses of cosmic

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radiation on future deep space missions across the Solar System. Meanwhile,

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Lego celebrates five years of success for its sustainability initiative

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Replay that allows consumers to ship used in unwonted Lego

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bricks back to Lego for redistribution to others. In Boston

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and Richmond, they shared some giant Lego birthday cakes bearing

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the number five. Those were decorated by children who then

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got to take sets made of donated Lego bricks home

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with them. Tim Brooks works for Lego and says most

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people don't want to give away or throw out their

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Lego collection. The vast majority hand them down to children

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and grandchildren, but others are vasts for a safe way

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to dispose of would donate their bricks. With Replay, they

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have an easy option that's both sustainable and socially impactful.

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The donation process is simple. Collect any loose Lego you have,

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put them in a cardboard box and visit Lego dot

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com slash Replay, print out a free ups shipping label

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and send your package off to Lego. All right. In Portland, Oregon,

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we've got a mystery. Googly eyes have been appearing on

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sculptures around the city of Bend. The city shares some

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photos on social media. One photo shows googly eyes placed

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on a sculpture of two deer, while another shows them

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attached to a sphere. No one knows who's doing this,

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the city said. With the googly eyes placed on the

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various art pieces around town, they might give you a chuckle,

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but it costs some money to remove them with care

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and not damage the art. Some Facebook users said they

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like the googly eyes. One said, My daughter and I

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went past the Fleaming Chicken today and shared the biggest laugh.

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We love the googly eyes. This town's gett to be stuffy.

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Let's have fun. The city so far has spent over

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fifteen hundred dollars. I'm removing googly eyes. I'm going to

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investigate this more and update you as soon as possible.

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Those are your five good news stories for today. If

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you like the program, till a friend about it. They

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might like it. To share an episode with them, and

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you have an awesome day.