While your entire newsfeed is occupied with the coronavirus, we decided to put together a compilation of interesting news from the past week that is NOT related to the pandemic. Let it distract you at least a little from your anxious thoughts.
The artist depicted such an Ikaria wariootia – it is believed that the creature lived on the seabed. The worm-like creature that lived on the ocean floor more than 500 million years ago could be the key to understanding the evolution of much of the animal kingdom. Paleontologists at the University of California, Riverside, have named the newly described creature Ikaria wariootia – according to dating, it lived before the Cambrian period. The rice-grain-sized organism is described as the earliest known example of a bilaterally symmetrical fossil animal, meaning it was multicellular and had an anterior-posterior body axis. Ninety-nine percent of animals on the planet, including humans, are considered bilaterally symmetrical. The identification of Ikaria wariootia was aided by 3D scans of rocky sediments in Nilpena, South Australia.
This is what the Village People looked like at the height of their fame: each member of the group had their own image. The hit song of the American pop sextet Village People, YMCA, made it into the Library of Congress in the United States as a song of historical value. This also means that the single will be added to the National Registry of Sound Recordings as a “work of enduring importance” to American culture. There are only two requirements for a record to be added to the registry: it must be at least ten years old and it must not be considered lost. Co-writer of YMCA, Victor Willis, noted that this song was written from autobiographical motives and is considered an anthem for having a good time. Additionally, the track is considered to be one of the most popular in the queer community.
Billy Porter stunned the world with his performance at the Met Gala. Star of the series “Pose” actor Billy Porter launched a challenge among fans – to recreate his outfit from the Met Gala. Last year, the actor’s costume consisted of golden ornaments with giant wings and an unconventional headpiece that, according to the designers, referred to Egyptian mythology. Some Porter fans took the task very literally and tried to recreate his makeup and background. Someone recreated his image from recycled materials. Others, however, took the challenge with a sense of humor, wearing a bunch of bananas on their heads. The opening of this year’s annual Costume Institute exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum has been postponed from May to October, and the preceding ball has been postponed indefinitely.
Earlier in the week, the FBI officially invited anyone interested to download the Physical Fitness Test application on “Twitter” to do exercises at home. The description on Google Play and the App Store says that the application includes squats, push-ups and standards for special service personnel. However, the technology publication Popular Mechanics suggests that these standards can be demotivating: “To determine whether a user can pass the FBI’s physical fitness test, they must score 12 points in a limited amount of time by performing a series of exercises, including running. But the main problem is that the application wants to collect the maximum amount of user data: precise location, access to cloud storage, contacts, call logs and Wi-Fi connections, and it won’t even allow the phone to go into sleep mode. The publication warns readers that although the FBI released this application during the height of the quarantine and isolation period, that is no reason to trust it with such a large amount of personal information, especially considering the fact that it does not provide fitness advice for home workouts – or any comprehensive fitness program, for that matter.
Britney’s relationship with sports has been inconsistent throughout her career, but now the singer is very actively involved in fitness. The pop singer wrote on Instagram that she ran 100 meters in 5.97 seconds. The world record, set by Jamaican Olympic champion Usain Bolt, is 9.58 seconds. “Getting over the fear before you start [training] is the key… once I did it, I beat 5 [seconds]!!!!. Usually I run in 6 or 7….my first attempt was 9 [seconds]…and now I did it!” the star said. “Fans, haters and just observers were very surprised by the singer’s statement”. “Britney skips every Olympics – both summer and winter – because it would be unfair to all the athletes who have trained their whole lives if she won gold in every sport. It is so charitable of her, and for that we should all be grateful,” says music critic Anthony Fantano, not hiding his sarcasm. It is unclear what prompted the pop star to write the post. It was later deleted. Bolt set his record in August 2009 at the World Track and Field Championships in Berlin.
Chester Zoo is proud of its lemurs. After 4.5 months of pregnancy, a lemur in Chester, England, gave birth to two offspring whose gender remains a mystery. The twins will spend the first weeks of their lives on the back of their mother, Fiona. The children of Fiona and Dog were born 15 centimeters tall and weighed no more than half a kilogram. Zoo staff say the infants already have a characteristic lemur coloration – light and dark rings alternate on the babies’ tails. The unique pattern of their fur allows lemurs to distinguish themselves from each other. In their historic homeland of Madagascar, these large-eyed mammals are threatened by deforestation and poaching, resulting in their listing as an endangered species in the International Red Book.