Dovi’s Digest Volume 54
A weekly newsletter for all your intellectual, spiritual and physical needs
Hi all! Welcome to Volume 54 of Dovi’s Digest.
The older I get, the more I find myself mired in nostalgia. Conceptually I know that things weren’t necessarily better, whether it was 10 years ago or 100 years ago. What felt like endless summers with friends, pools and, if we were lucky, the beach. Or the Johannesburg winter mornings where I’d pretend to smoke because my breath was condensing, moving to those afternoons with the golden sun streaming through the trees. Things were cheaper (wages were lower too), I had no real responsibilities, and life seemed much less complex.
I try to not mention the good old days, and in fact, people who tell that they were born in the wrong generation annoy me. Many times, I’ve heard “I should’ve grown up in the 40s/50s, I’m an old soul”. I’m sure you love pastels, cars with rear fins, and diner culture. But do you really want to live in a time where polio was a real danger, where the world was much more unequal than it is now, and where there was the very real threat of total global destruction? I didn’t think so. What you mean to say is that you love 1950s aesthetic. I love the aesthetic. Give me people wearing suits with an overcoat and a fedora any day of the week. Or the white t-shirt tucked into the unwashed jeans with the slicked back hair (a la Grease). Real old school cool. However, I digress. I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m not actually nostalgic, I just miss when the good times lasted forever.
This week’s edition is rather eclectic, even for the digest. The headline article is about the 14 mountains that are above 8,000m and whether any one person has climbed them all. Those of you who know me know that I have a fascination with all things mountaineering. So much so that I still keep a poster of Everest on my wall, with all the routes from Hillary and Norgay to today clearly marked out. In fact, knowing that it’s climbing season (due to the aforementioned obsession), while writing this I googled when Everest was first conquered and see that tomorrow is actually the 58th anniversary of the feat. (I won’t go into the Irvine/Mallory debate here, although I do think they may have summited). Nevertheless, the article itself is less an article and more a pictorial journey.
There is also an article about how the Pokémon card market has gone absolutely haywire, with cards selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars each. In addition, you can learn about an open-source diamond mine, how high stakes poker can change the way you think, how tech may help use cure forms of paralysis, why you’re not actually in control on the road, and how being a social media influencer is far from all fun and games.
There were FIVE correct answers to last week’s brainteaser, well done to Adam Frame,Isaac Lipschitz, Ivor Berger, Simon Myerson, and Cheryl Geliebter!!! The answer and this week’s riddle are below.
A small note about this week’s Headlines of the week: there were too many to choose from, so I just posted the best of them. You can click on each pic to access the article itself.
Keep those articles (and everything else) coming,
Have a great week,
Dovi
And now, the articles:
Has Anyone Really Summited the Earth’s 14 Highest Mountains?
Only 44 people have reached the summit of all 14 of the world’s 8,000m peaks. Or maybe no one has.
“How a $10k Poker Win Changed How I Think”
When amateur player Alex O'Brien unexpectedly won an online poker tournament, little did she know that she'd be pitted against one of the game's most controversial players. A stellar team of poker pros offered to train her, and she discovered how poker can transform how you see the world.
I Need to Explain to You Just How Dire America's Pokémon Card Crisis Is
Pokémon cards aren't just expensive. Card grading services are being completely overwhelmed in an “avalanche of cardboard.”
Plug and Play
Brain prosthesis could change how people with paralysis use implants.
We Should All Be More Afraid of Driving
Two terrifying car accidents taught me that, despite what we like to believe, we can’t control what happens on the road.
Finders, Keepers
Deep in southwest Arkansas is a state park that charges visitors $10 to search for gems that can be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
“I Was Addicted to The High”: I Became an Influencer as A Joke – Then It Nearly Broke Me
Comedian Bella Younger thought wellness Instagrammers were ripe for parody. Soon she was drawn in herself. Could Deliciously Stella find her way back to reality?
Quote of the Week:
“[A] quotation is a handy thing to have about, saving one the trouble of thinking for oneself, always a laborious business." ― A.A. Milne, If I May
Facts of the Week:
In the Second World War, kegs of beer were flown to the frontline by Spitfire pilots.
One proposal to stop plane hijackings to Cuba in the 1970s was to build a fake Havana airport in south Florida.
In 2016, a man from Wigan sent a pie into space to promote the World Pie Eating Championship.
A smartphone contains more computing power than the whole of NASA had in 1969.
In 1985, New York City had 2,000 mobile phones, but only 12 of them could be used at any one time.
A man in New York makes $500 a week collecting fragments of golden jewelry from the city's pavements.
New York cabs and Hertz rental cars have yellow branding because they were founded by the same man.
Headlines of the Week:
(Courtesy of Ori Tobias, Elliot Djebreel and others)
Cartoon of the Week:
Brainteaser of the Week:
Paper plates can be recycled to make new plates.
Nine used plates are required to make each new plate.
If there are 145 used plates, how many new plates can possibly be made in total?
Last week’s Brainteaser and answer:
What number should replace the question mark?
143 - - - 22
26 - - - 4
104 - - - 16
65 - - - ?
Answer:
10. Divide by 6.5.
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