On Saturday, Reality Leigh Winner was arrested and charged with “removing classified material from a government facility and mailing it to a news outlet.” The 25-year-old National Security Agency contractor allegedly gave a classified document about Russian attempts to hack the 2016 presidential election to The Intercept, a national security news outlet. It’s believed that Winner was easily caught because she contacted the website via her computer at the NSA.
Filmmaker Michael Moore announced Tuesday he’s making it safer for insiders who want to undermine the Trump administration with a new website that could have helped Winner: TrumpiLeaks. The site allows people with information to communicate directly with Michael Moore through end-to-end encrypted messaging. Whistleblowers can also talk to reporters securely through the Signal app. “This site provides the most high-powered encryption technology to enable courageous whistleblowers to privately communicate with me and my team,” Moore said.
While it’s fair to criticize Moore for encouraging people in government to violate the law, he sees it as a way to prevent further damage by the Trump administration. “Patriotic Americans in government, law enforcement or the private sector with knowledge of the crimes, lies, and general misconduct committed by Donald J. Trump and his associates are encouraged to blow the whistle in the name of protecting the United States of America from tyranny,” Moore wrote on the site.
The Trump White House has been besieged by leaks over the first five months of his administration. “These leaks have been going on for a long time and my administration will get to the bottom of this,” Trump said in a written statement last month. “The leaks of sensitive information pose a grave threat to our national security.” It’s believed that Trump’s inexperienced staff and his helter-skelter leadership style have a created a leak-prone environment. Trump officials have also leaked insider information to the press to avoid taking blame for the administration’s chaotic actions.
Mimi Fletcher has the prototypical origin of a successful working actor: moving out from the Midwest to Los Angeles to become a star. She got her start doing background gigs and now is doing recurring guest roles on television. However, one acting gig she’ll treasure forever was when she got to work with Harrison Ford.
Ford is a part of the main cast of Shrinking, an Apple+ show starring him and Jason Segel. The show is about a therapist (Segel) who, motivated by grief, takes a more proactive and candid approach with his patients. Ford plays Paul, a senior therapist at the practice who suffers from Parkinson’s disease.
When Fletcher met Ford
In 2023, Fletcher got to do scenes with Ford and Segel. It would be one of the biggest highlights of her career so far. However, recently on Threads, Fletcher shared that it was also a highlight of her life that she’ll never forget.
Fletcher shared that her father was a big fan of Harrison Ford. Her dad was also a big fan of his daughter and very encouraging of her acting dream. She shared how her father supported and believed in her, even when she made decisions that her dad wouldn’t approve of. Her dad passed away in 2005 before Fletcher truly “made it” as a Hollywood actor. She wishes she was able to make him proud.
Before going on set, Fletcher was waiting in the holding room with both Harrison Ford and Jason Segel. As they were all waiting, Fletcher thought of her father. She approached Ford and said:
“You know, Harrison, my Dad was a big fan of yours. I remember him taking me to see Witness when I was a little girl. I did some things that I know disappointed him, but he still supported me. He never got to see me do any professional acting, but I’d like to think that today, he’d be proud of me.”
Actor Harrison Ford encouraged graduates at Arizona State University to “build something that didn’t exist yesterday” in a rousing commencement speech on Monday, telling them to “go change the world.” “When opportunity presents, recognize it. This is your time. Own it.” #harrisonford#arizonastateuniversity
Fletcher tried to keep it professional, but the tears she was holding back spilled out. Immediately, Ford rushed to give her a hug.
“He wrapped me in his arms, and held me as I cried. He then kissed my forehead and said, ‘Your dad’s here, he sees you, and he’s proud of you.’”
In sharing the story, Fletcher expressed her gratitude to Ford and everyone on Shrinking. Fletcher felt compelled to tell this story since her father passed away over twenty years ago this June. And since June is also when we celebrate Father’s Day, he’s been on her mind. While Fletcher still mourns her loss, she treasures this happy memory.
Harrison Ford doesn’t need a whip or a blaster to prove he’s a hero. When he was presented the lifetime achievement award at The Actor Awards last night, Ford used his platform to share an incredibly beautiful, masculine, and humbling speech. Please take the time to watch these clips and learn from some of the lessons he tries to share. Han Solo and Indiana Jones ain’t got nothing on Harrison Ford.
Due to the rising price of gas and other issues, more people are looking for various hacks to make the most out of their purchases and cut down costs. As a result, more people are brewing coffee at home rather than grabbing a latte to-go from Starbucks. Now, making coffee at home doesn’t just save money on caffeine fixes; it can also save money on dishwashing soap, facial scrubs, pest control, and many other household needs.
Coffee grounds are the secret cleaning supply you brew each morning. It sounds odd, but it’s true, effective, and reduces expenses. Whether you use a French press or a can of Folgers, coffee grounds could do the job that several other cleaning or home products can.
Here are five reasons you keep your coffee grounds around:
1. They help scrub cookware (and yourself) better
You’ve likely seen ads for dish soap that specialize in cutting through grease or burned on stains on pots and pans. It turns out dried coffee grounds can be just as, if not more, effective when paired with cheap dish soap.
After used coffee grounds are dried up (if you’re impatient, you can use your oven to bake them dry), they become incredibly fine and coarse. Paired up with basic dish soap, the coarse grounds gently scrape off grease, grime, and tough-to-scrub burn stains. This can apply to nearly any metal or porcelain cookware. Since coffee grounds are so refined, they can do heavy-duty cleaning without damage. If a food stain is incredibly stubborn, adding salt to your coffee grounds with the dish soap can act as a safer sandpaper for those stains.
While great for dishes, coffee grounds can do the same thing with stains and gunk clinging to grills, sinks, tubs, kitchen floors, and other surfaces.
Coffee grounds aren’t just safe for scrubbing dishes; they’re also safe for scrubbing you. If you’ve been handling sticky or greasy items while cleaning the kitchen, coffee grounds can reduce the amount of hand soap needed to wash it off.
Leftover coffee grounds can also be DIY’d into an effective exfoliant for your face. In fact, there could be health benefits, too. A 2013 study found that caffeic acid in coffee facial scrubs may increase collagen production to reduce wrinkles and signs of aging. Like any exfoliant, it sloughs off extra oils and dead skin cells. The difference is in the cost: used coffee grounds do the trick just as well (if not better) than expensive store-bought scrubs.
While many people can enjoy the scent of coffee, the grounds can eliminate other scents in your home. This doesn’t mean that you’re covering up bad smells with coffee smells. Far from it. Coffee contains nitrogen which neutralizes odors much more effectively than sprays and air fresheners.
The good thing is that coffee grounds can help improve or remove smells in almost any part of the home. Place a small bowl of coffee grounds in the refrigerator and freezer to remove food smells. Put a small cup of grounds in your closet to reduce odor from the laundry hamper. Pour some dry grounds in some old socks and put them in your shoes to deodorize them overnight.
Here’s the other benefit: While humans tend to like the scent of coffee, pests don’t.
3. Most bugs hate coffee
No one wants a bug infestation of any kind in their home, and one of the best nontoxic ways of keeping them out is with coffee. No sprays, no traps, and no need for an additional purchase. Just coffee grounds.
The scent of coffee is intense to many insects’ heightened sense of smell, so they tend to shy away from its source. Affected insects include ants, wasps, bees, slugs, and fleas among others.
In moderation, used coffee grounds can help deter outdoor pests in your garden while also acting as fertilizer for some plants. If you enjoy the outdoors, burning dry coffee grounds like incense can also keep mosquitoes away.
4. They can buff out scratched wooden furniture
Before you spend money on wood filler, scratch repair kits, or the like to fix surface scratches on dark wooden furniture, you may want to try coffee grounds instead. Spread a paste made from dried grounds and water onto the scratches. Let it “soak” for a few minutes and then wipe the coffee ground paste away. It may take a few tries, but many light scratches look better. Some outright disappear after absorbing the coffee and its color into the surface of the wood.
Coffee grounds are a waste product for sure, but they’re a waste product that could save money in the long term—and hat shouldn’t go to waste!
West London’s Greenford Tube station had an ongoing problem. Due to climate change, the station would often flood during heavy rains. The rain would cause a nearby creek to overflow, flooding the ticket office and beyond. But in 2023, officials tried a natural method to help offset the flooding. All they had to do was bring back a vanished species to the area: beavers.
A family of five beavers was released through the Ealing Beaver Project to act as “nature’s engineers” and help solve London’s flooding problem. Within weeks, the beavers built a dam in the creek, causing it to pool into a pond. Along with that, the beavers created new pathways and tributaries that further diverted water from the main creek. The small group of beavers not only built seven dams in their first year but also expanded biodiversity near populated areas.
The combination of rerouting water and felling trees has brought new animals and species into the area. Some of the new additions inhabiting the creek are freshwater shrimp, two types of bats, a rare brownstreak butterfly species, and eight new species of birds. A whole new nature preserve is forming remarkably close to urban areas. In fact, the beavers are working just 100 meters behind a McDonald’s.
What happened to the original beavers?
The whole project is addressing the changing climate, but also undoing another man-made issue. The Eurasian beaver had been hunted to extinction in England and Wales more than 400 years ago. At the time, beavers were a valuable source of meat, fur for coats, and castoreum. Castoreum is a secretion from beavers that was used to enhance perfumes and flavor food. Had beavers still thrived, one could argue that the climate change-related flooding might not have occurred in the first place.
The Ealing Beaver Project is one of several efforts to bring beavers back to the United Kingdom. One of the first attempts to repopulate beavers occurred in Scotland, where Norwegian beavers were introduced to Inverness-shire. Norwegian beavers were chosen because scientists determined they were the most genetically similar to the extinct U.K. beaver population.
This beaver introduction hasn’t just solved a climate-related flooding problem, but it has also brought other benefits. Visitors and residents enjoy the newly biodiverse nature reserves by going on “beaver safaris” to see the creatures at work in person. Then there is the obvious benefit of the beavers solving these flooding problems effectively free of charge.
Beavers are an international solution
The U.K. isn’t the only place using beavers to address climate issues. Beavers were brought in to create dams and conserve river water during droughts in Utah. Similarly, beaver reintroduction into California’s streams and rivers was so beneficial that it was codified into state law.
This shows that something as funny-looking as a swimming rodent with buck teeth and a paddle tail can make a huge difference in whether a place has enough natural water or too much. Humans just have to give a dam about them.
