Eddy's Good News: Young initiative turns into a big hit and nature on prescription?!

Virgin Radio

31 Jan 2022, 10:02

Every day during his show on Virgin Radio, Eddy Temple-Morris brings you Good News stories from around the world, to help inject a bit of positivity into your day!!

Be sure to listen each day between 10am and 1pm (Monday - Friday) to hear Eddy's Good News stories (amongst the finest music of course), but if you miss any of them you can catch up on the transcripts of Eddy's most recent stories below

Friday 11th February 2022

A heartwarming story from the USA and a toddler who slips a book he wrote into the kids section of his local library and it’s led to his being a surprise hit!

Say hello to Dillon Helbig who’s from Boise Idaho. 8 year old Dillon wrote a story book in one of those bound notebooks, and illustrated it himself. It’s called ‘The Adventures Of Dillon Hedbig’s Crismis’. Dillon has been writing stories since he was 5 and he’s a regular at the local library and made it his life’s ambition to write one of the books on their shelves…so he did! He wanted to share his story with other kids so much that he just slipped his 81 page Magnum Opus onto the shelf for anyone to read. His family got the shock of their lives when the library contacted them some time later to say the book was so popular with kids that they’d officially added it to the library and that it now had a waiting list over a year to read it, making it probably the most popular book in the library!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Good news from Canada as patients are now having nature given to them on prescription!

Say Hi to the thousands of healthcare professionals currently working in British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Ontario who are now able to prescribe the annual Adult Parks Canada Discovery Pass from the Canadian parks authority - normally costing $72—this would be like your doctor prescribing you a National Trust membership free of charge. I’ve shared with you here so many scientific studies that have proven time and time again that getting amongst nature is good for your mental health, your physical health and your longevity, (to the tune of around 33% across the board by the way). The pass gives people free entry to over 80 National Parks including marine parks and historical buildings, things that inspire awe in people and because modern medicine has now acknowledged that spending time in these places makes us happier, healthier and live longer, it’s wonderful to see them actively prescribing this.

We know numerous plants can heal you if you eat them, but they can also heal you just by spending time with them :)

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Thursday 10th February 2022

Good news from here in the UK as ‘Bonnie Scotland’ is making a huge effort to save their salmon. It’s good news that starts with bad news.

Global heating has got so bad that last year for at least a day, 70% of Scotland's salmon spawning pools became too warm for salmon eggs to survive. Obviously this is potentially catastrophic for the noblest fish that return to these pools each year to have families. So the Scottish government have come up with a plan to line their rivers with trees that will provide shade and lower the water temperature in the hot - and getting hotter - summer months.There are 64,000 miles of beautiful scottish riverside salmon habitat and the planting of more trees, like willow, hawthorn, Scots pine, native rowan, juniper, birch and aspen is a double win because not only will they help salmon, which supports important leisure fishing as a massive tourist attraction but it will increase biodiversity in one of the most gorgeous places on earth.

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Good news from here in the UK as ‘Bonnie Scotland’ is making a huge effort to save their salmon.It’s good news that starts with bad news.

Global heating has got so bad that last year for at least a day, 70% of Scotland's salmon spawning pools became too warm for salmon eggs to survive. Obviously this is potentially catastrophic for the noblest fish that return to these pools each year to have families. So the Scottish government have come up with a plan to line their rivers with trees that will provide shade and lower the water temperature in the hot - and getting hotter - summer months.There are 64,000 miles of beautiful scottish riverside salmon habitat and the planting of more trees, like willow, hawthorn, Scots pine, native rowan, juniper, birch and aspen is a double win because not only will they help salmon, which supports important leisure fishing as a massive tourist attraction but it will increase biodiversity in one of the most gorgeous places on earth.

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Wednesday 9th February 2022

Amazing news from the USA and a Maths and Sciences graduate who’s aiming to inspire kids by breaking world records, and he’s now broken over 200 of them!

Say hello to David Rush, who’s from Idaho and he’s made it his personal mission mission to inspire young students to take up science, maths and tech careers by proving that you can do anything you set your mind to: whether that’s the highest number of  kiwifruits sliced over one minute, with a samurai sword, while standing on an exercise ball (!), the most amount of razor sharp axes juggled and caught or simply the highest number of we soap bars stacked in a minute. David has hit the news again because his latest feat is that he’s broken 52 Guinness World Records in a year, which must be 53 because surely that’s a record in its own right!?He saved the hardest one for last, the fastest 100m sprint while blindfolded and while you’re thinking about that now, let me tell you it’s much less about the speed and much more about staying in your lane, because of course you’re disqualified if you cross lanes, and those things are narrow! Watch his AMAZING video recap of his incredible year right here :)

Via: youtube.com

Stay with me to meet a cat burglar who’s become a celebrity down under - why is this good news? Theft is devastating - but in this case the burglar is actually a cat and he’s been stealing toys!

Say g’day to ‘Pirate Kitty’ a ginger Tom from Brisbane, his actual name is Johnny, but Kay McCall didn’t know that when they moved into a new house and started getting visits for welcome cuddles and petting. But soon the McCalls noticed that their garden was starting to fill up with unexplained toys: toy cats, dogs, monkeys, zebras, the odd wombat and even a lemur. Dolls too! They thought a neighbour’s kid might be lobbing them over when they caught Johnny red handed, well ginger pawed. The friendly feline had been frisking all the neighbours, taking as many toys as he could find and giving them to his new friends. When they decided to fill their large kitchen table with their toy haul and put it on Facebook, ‘Pirate Kitty’ became an overnight sensation, making TV news and, of course, a lot of neighbours' kids became aware of what happened to that toy beaver they loved. Oh, and socks, he’s fond of nicking socks too…which could explain a lot couldn’t it!? That’s where they go!!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Tuesday 8th February 2022

An inspiring story from the USA and another to add to the pantheon of good news stories I’ve shared right here about teachers going above and beyond for their students.

Say howdy to Florida Kindergarten teacher Robin Hughes who realised while they read a book about snowmen together that her students had never seen snow in their lives. She couldn’t take them to the snow, Florida is pretty much tropical, so she arranged for snow to come to them. She contacted a family member who lives in the Kentucky mountains where there is currently several feet of snow and asked for something that sounds impossible: “Can you send me a snowman?”. So her sister built her a little snowman, complete with carrot nose, blueberry eyes and buttons and twig arms and sent it about 700 miles, in a cool box, by post. Amazingly it arrived in Florida only a little smaller, with all but a fallen blueberry eye which was easily replaced. The kindergarten kids had their minds blown by their first ever snowman and Robin is, until we hear otherwise, teacher of the year!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

So yesterday I had to admonish our Chris on his own show because he was extolling the virtues of butter over olive oil so I thought it would be a good advice to give you advice that’s from the latest scientific study and not James Martin, a man who is currently unable to see his own wedding tackle.

On Jan 10th the American College Of Cardiology published their latest report which analysed 60,582 women and 31,801 men, looking specifically at only their olive oil intake and how that panned out in their life and health. Their robust research concluded that Replacing margarine, butter, mayonnaise, and dairy fat with olive oil was associated with lower mortality risk from diseases. More specifically eating more than 7 grams of olive oil daily (1 and 1/2 teaspoons) is associated with considerably lower risk of mortality from cardiovascular disease, cancer, and neurodegenerative and respiratory diseases. They studied all these people for 28 years and even tried replacing olive oil with other oils, which showed no health benefits, so this is a really important study that absolutely proves olive oil is much better for you than pretty much everything else you use. Like I said yesterday don’t use it for high temperature wok cooking but feel free to fry!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Monday 7th February 2022

Good news from Switzerland as a new study shows further proof that there’s one easy thing we can eat that helps our immune system and helps us fight off cancer.

There is a magic mineral present in plenty of foods, especially in nuts, it’s Magnesium. We already know this stuff is really good for you but a team of researchers at the University Of Basel have been looking specifically at how magnesium affects our immune system and the relationship between those and cancer cells in our body. They performed new studies and looked at past studies and found that magnesium deficiency was strongly linked to a faster progression of the disease and that our immune system is measurably boosted by magnesium rich diets. Simply put, everything from a cold to cancer hates magnesium, so if you keep your nut game strong, then you keep your immunity strong too. If you’re allergic to nuts don’t worry, leafy veg will do the same thing. Spinach is fantastic, your kales and spring greens are great too. Good news that dark chocolate is also a great source, also avocados, beans and seeds too. It’s easy and delicious to max your mag!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Fascinating news from Canada and how astronauts are going to be considerably better off in space, thanks to squirrels!

Well, OK, technically it’s the rodent boffins that have been studying their hibernation, but that made for a better headline, as we say bonjour to The University Of Montreal. They’ve been trying to unlock one of nature's mysteries which is this: When squirrels (and other mammals) hibernate, they go months without eating, yet their muscles aren’t deteriorated when they emerge in Spring. But the muscles of astronauts in space, lose mass, or protein more specifically. So how does a small furry rodent out perform NASA’s top minds? The answer - as it turns out - is in the animal’s gut biome, a metabolic mini miracle where urea, which is normally let go as urine, is recycled, using the nitrogen that’s in it to build new proteins to make tissue with, while they’re asleep. Scientists' understanding of this opens the door for long space trips where astronauts can emerge from those pods the same size and shape they were when they entered them, just like in the films :)

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Friday 4th February 2022

Awesome news from here in the UK and how you can be crowned a King, for real, I’m not making this up, you’ll even have an oak carved throne.

Say hello to Piel Island, off England's northwest coast, and to The Ship Inn which is looking for a new manager. With that comes the traditional title of ‘King Of Piel Island’, you’ll be crowned and soaked in beer, as is the 300 year old tradition, and after your coronation you’ll have a pub, its kitchen and 50 acres of land to manage, along with some holiday cottages, just one neighbour on the island, plenty of visitors in the summer and a lot of seals all year round! There’s also a derelict 14th century castle that you might want to make something of. It’s near Barrow and it’s quite a commitment, they’re looking for a ten year lease and for the new King to be crowned in April, so if you fancy running a pub and being called Your Majesty, follow the link here!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Amazing news from the avian world and scientists studying the animal that’s closest to humans in terms of complexity of language and you might be surprised when I tell you it’s a bird brain!

Say hello to the song sparrow, who’s complex tweets have been painstakingly recorded and analysed by biologists at Duke University and The University Of Miami. They recorded days worth of male sparrows, it’s the guys that sing to attract the ladies and defend their territory and their analysis has revealed some fascinating data. These birds have a catalogue of up to twelve two second calls, which they rotate in playlists that can last half an hour. They discovered these so-called bird brains have a musical memory of at least thirty minutes - what they sing at any one time might depend on what they sang half an hour ago - which beats what scientists thought was the bird with the best memory, the canary. And it’s not a beating here, it’s a stout thrashing, a round pounding, the sparrow’s memory is 360 times larger! The canary can only juggle up to five seconds worth of songs in its playlist. 

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Thursday 3rd February 2022

Cool news from Finland and a new startup that’s making sustainable trainers out of your morning cup of coffee, and I’m not talking about the cup!

Say hello to RENS who are fed up with how unsustainable the trainers market is so they’ve made them out of coffee grounds and recycled plastic bottles! It’s so clever, they use a low heat environment to combine the grounds from 21 cups of coffee with the plastic from 6 bottles to make a tough yarn which is woven to make the upper, and the soles are made from those bottles plus a biodegradable tree sap that’s like rubber. They come in 9 different colours, they’re designed to slip on and off easily and they’re totally waterproof. They cost less than the average pair of Nikes and they’ll ship them for free anywhere in the world. So far they’ve turned three quarters of a million cups of coffee and a quarter of a million bottles into Rens and they’re taking orders from all over the world from people who want a literally more sustainable carbon footprint. 

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Inspiring news for any quadriplegics with a musical hankering as a tech designer is inspired to make a musical instrument you can play with just your eyes!

Say hello, or maybe cali-mera, to Zacharias Vamvakousis, whose Phd in Musical Technology combined with his computer expertise came in useful when one of his best friends had a motorcycle accident which stopped him being able to play the guitar. This inspired Zacharias to design the ‘Eye Harp’ which is currently in its fifth generation and features a colour coded wheel on a computer screen that allows the player to select notes, the types of scales to play and even allows them to riff by looking and blinking instead of clicking a mouse. This all happens in real time, so they can play in a band with other musicians easily. There are currently 650 people around the world using Eye Harp, including those with cerebral palsy, who are now confidently playing and giving new meaning to the phrase “eye tunes” ;)

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Wednesday 2nd February 2022

Paw warming news from here in the UK and a lost cat that was found in the most brilliant way.

Say hello to the Lawrence family, from Braintree in Essex. They have two cats, Barnaby and Torvi, but unfortunately Barney went missing and after eight months the family lost all hope of ever seeing their missing moggy again.Then the most awesome thing happened. Barnaby’s mum, Rachel was on the phone to her local vet about Torvi, who’d recently undergone an operation. Then she heard a ‘meow’ in the background and instantly recognised it as their black cat, Barnaby. She asked the vet if the cat making this distinctive meow had a white flash on one of his back feet. The vet was amazed when he found the flash, sent a photo, and the missing meowser’s identity was confirmed!Barnaby and the Lawrence family are now reunited thanks to Rachel’s amazing ears and Barney’s marvellous meow!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Buzzing good news from here in the UK as a local council makes it mandatory for new buildings to include something that’ll help the struggling bee population.

Did you know there are 270 species of bee in the UK? And did you know that all but twenty of those are solitary bees that don’t use hives? You often see bee hotels on footpaths and increasingly in parks, but what if every house had a place that not only you, but local bees can nest? Say hello to Brighton City Council who’ve just passed a law making it compulsory for developers to include a ‘Bee Brick’ in every new house. It just a normal brick but it’s got holes bored into it that are perfect for these solo bees to nest in. Studies in the last two years have showed Bee Bricks work, not just as nests, but the bees also cap the entrance and hibernate in them. I guess this gives new meaning to the phrase ‘Plan Bee’ ;)

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Tuesday 1st February 2022

Awesome news from the skies above Slovakia as the authorities green light the first officially recognised as fit to fly - flying car!

Cast your mind back to my Good News story in June of last year about a car that had sprouted wings and taken off from Nitra in Slovakia and landed 35 minutes later in Bratislava, where its wings folded back and it drove off the runway, straight onto the road and drove off, like something out of a James Bond film!? In fact the only thing missing was “double take man” - you know - the guy in classic 70s/80s Bond films that looked at the car, then at his bottle, then back at the car (!) Well the so called AirCar has now done that journey 200 times, over 700 hours of flight time so their Civil Aviation Authority has just given it the thumbs up with official certification as reliable and safe as any aeroplane. I’ll remind you of the stats. It’ll get to 100mph on the ground, 8,000 feet in the air and it takes 2 minutes 15 seconds to get its wings out or back in and as from this week, it can now be mass produced!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

News that may or may not make you laugh now from the USA but it’s definitely a bit of a laugh. Say hello to boffins at UCLA who’ve been studying laughter, something that was once thought to have evolved to be uniquely human, but of course everybody now knows that primates can laugh, but what about our pets and the animals around us?

You might be surprised by their findings, which are that at least 65 species of animal that definitely laugh. Laughter is simply a signal audible to our peers that we are really enjoying something. The researchers didn’t just observe animals, and study reams of research into vocalisation, but they really tested it out by experiments like tickling rats. Rats' pleasure noises are at a frequency that we can’t hear, but if you record them and slow them down you can clearly hear a rat laughing when it’s tickled and you know from observing that it loves having its back tickled. In the list of 65 laughing animals are lots of primates, obviously, but also cows, dogs, foxes, seals, mongooses, and at least three bird species, including parakeets and magpies, which I hope tickles you as much as it tickles me!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Monday 31st January 2022

Great tech news from the USA and a clever new device that can turn wasted heat from a pipe into electricity!

For a good while now we’ve had F1 cars and even some commercial cars now that can harvest electricity from the energy created by their brakes…imagine if we could do the same thing with the heat escaping from your central heating pipes? Well thanks to boffins at Penn State University, you can! They’ve invented a device that looks a bit like a metal watch strap and it wraps around hot pipes then converts the energy that would just be lost to the atmosphere into useful electricity. It’s called thermo electric generation and anyone familiar with heat exchange will know you can exploit differences in temperature to generate electricity, they’ve just made it a lot more efficient. You can wrap this thing around anything hot, where energy is being wasted, and harvest electricity. Now imagine a power plant or factory with miles of hot pipes, you could wrap these things around the lot and generate kilowatts of electricity from just wasted heat. Could be a game changer couldn’t it?!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

We’re getting nothing but bad news from Russia these days, so let me remind us that a great country is not defined by its leader as we say privyet to Kefir, the biggest cat in the world!

This porcelain coloured puss is a Maine Coon, a breed of cat renowned for its size but this monstrous moggy is so big that people mistake him for a dog!Weighing in at a whopping 28lbs, Kefir is only 1 and Maine Coons keep growing till they’re between 3 and 4, so this mog is multiplying!He looks like a floofy lioness with lynx ears and my using words like monstrous is actually misleading because Kefir, named after the gut loving white yoghurt drink, is actually a pussycat, literally and metaphorically. He’s really chilled and loves to be stroked so you can add him to that reassuring list of things that might look terrifying but are actually lovely. Like Keith Flint from The Prodigy! Have a look for yourself, your jaw will drop!

Via: Instagram