Do you really know?

Ever checked the time on your phone or TV set and seen a quirky number like 13:13, 11:11 or 20:20? Well of course you have, but what you may not know is there’s actually a name for such numbers: mirror hours! Basically, when you’re looking at a digital time display, you see a mirror time if the minute number and the hour number are the same. It refers to the symmetry you see on either side of the...

Not getting a good night’s sleep can certainly leave you feeling grumpy and groggy, but can it also make you selfish? Sleep experts at the University of California, Berkeley certainly seem to think so, and  apparently even losing just one hour of sleep is enough to make you less generous towards others and that includes friends and family.    How did they discover this? What impact could this have...

With the summer holiday season drawing to a close, many university students are preparing to leave home for the first time and head to campus accommodation. While they’re enjoying freshers week, chances are their parents may be finding it unsettling that their child is no longer present at home. That’s even more likely when it’s their last child who’s just left home. This form of grief is known as...

"Quiet quitting" has been getting a lot of attention of late. So many young people have been rejecting “hustle culture”, which puts work at the centre of a person’s life and can lead to burnout. On this podcast, we’ve talked about a lot of factors affecting young workers and their mental health in recent times. It’s pretty well established that the Covid pandemic was a game changer, in that flexib...

Woofing consists of working on a farm while travelling to reduce costs. These volunteers help out their hosts for five half-days per week during their stay. The world is still in the middle of a health crisis. And while travel has resumed with the reopening of borders, more sustainable tourism practices have come to the fore in the past two years. One such example is wwoofing, which started growin...

To understand where white spots come from, we must first explain how nail growth works. If you’ve ever had white spots on your nails before, you may have been dismissively told that it's down to a lack of calcium or zinc. Basically, some mineral-deficiency. But this popular belief doesn’t really have any basis in fact. According to Healthline, nails grow an average of 3 millimeters per month. Thei...

Periods can greatly impact sleep, which has led to what’s known as the period sleep gap. Periods are different for everyone. Some people might have painful cramps, feel fatigued, or in some cases have no symptoms at all. But periods don’t just happen during the daytime. Periodsomnia is referring to the effect that menstruation can have on sleep. During menstruation, insomnia is far more frequent,...

The windscreen phenomenon is the observation of the gradual disappearance of insects on the planet. If you regularly use your car for long trips, you’re probably accustomed to seeing squashed flies, wasps and gnats on your windscreen from time to time. This is totally normal, but in recent years, it’s become a much rarer sight for drivers, and the significance is greater than you might first think...

HouseParty is a video chat app that was created in the United States in 2016 and became particularly popular among millennials. Those who download it use it for an average of 51 minutes per day. That’s comparable to Facebook and higher than other popular apps like Instagram, Messenger and Snapchat.  What is HouseParty? The coronavirus-related lockdowns have led to a resurgence in the app’s popular...

High blood sugar can make your mouth dry, make you feel thirsty, give you blurred vision and make you need to pee often. This is known as hyperglycemia. When we think of those who have high blood sugar, we tend to think of people with diabetes, as they often have to monitor their levels and sometimes undergo insulin treatment. But actually everybody can have blood sugar spikes, and many of us do w...

One of the most rapidly increasing synthetic cathinones is 3-Methylmethcathinone, or 3-MMC for short. In March 2022, the European Commission announced new measures to control the substance. The UK MDMA drug market has seen great change following Brexit and the Covid pandemic. A study carried out by non-profit The Loop found that there was a surprising decrease in MDMA detection between 2019 and 20...

In the days following the start of the invasion, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky created the country’s International Legion and appealed to foreign nationals to join.  Since the invasion of Ukraine began on 24th February 2022, governments have been reluctant to send troops into the warzone, despite expressing outrage at Russian aggression. Nevertheless, media reports have shed light on the...

We all yawn regularly, without giving it much thought most of the time. Harvard Health Publishing says that people yawn between 5 and 20 times per day on average. Indeed, it’s a completely involuntary reflex which sets in very early on in our existence, as fetuses in our mother’s womb. Yawning mobilizes the respiratory, face and neck muscles, and is often associated with a feeling of relaxation an...

The term cyclothymia was coined in the late 19th century by German psychiatrist Karl Ludwig Kahlbaum. It describes a clinical situation which has many similarities with bipolar disorder, although its symptoms are less severe. We talk about something being a disorder when it has an impact on everyday life, and that’s the case with cyclothymia. It usually comes on during adolescence or early adultho...

From 28th August to 5th September 2022, Burning Man is set to return to the Black Rock Desert in Nevada for the first time since 2019, with an authorised population of 87,000 people. This event sees artists, creators and community-makers gather to celebrate self-expression. Every August, a temporary real city is set up to accommodate the festival. It actually becomes one of the most populated citi...

One of the unsuspected consequences of a global pandemic is a re-evaluation not only of how we work but what work means to us. For some the flexibility was a breath of fresh air, others missed the office and even the commute but with employee happiness more important than ever and people feeling overwhelmed and stressed at work the question of how to achieve a work-life balance has never been more...

Flying is far from being the most eco-friendly means of transport. Right now it’s responsible for around 2% of global carbon emissions, but that could grow to as high as 16% by 2050. With the notable exception of travel restrictions in the last two years, the airline industry has gradually been transporting more and more passengers for decades now. While that continued growth is impressive, we hav...

The last two and a half years have caused a lot of us to reassess our priorities in life. Are we really living our lives to the full? Are there new experiences that we should be trying out? Within that context, an alternative nomadic lifestyle called vanlife has seen a resurgence.  It’s been around since the 1960s, when hippies would travel across the United States in vans. But social media has ma...

Last chance tourism is a travel trend whereby tourists increasingly seek to experience the world’s most endangered sites before they vanish or are irrevocably transformed, according to the definition given by the Current Issues in Tourism magazine. Last chance tourism is also sometimes referred to as doomsday tourism. The term was first coined in the early 2010s in Britain, before catching on in o...

Some visitors can be so shocked by the reality of Paris compared to their expectations that they can experience psychiatric breakdowns or symptoms such as hallucinations, depersonalization, anxiety, dizziness and nausea. This is known as the Paris Syndrome. Romance, sophistication, croissants and sipping fine wine with the Eiffel Tower in the background spring to mind when thinking of a visit to P...

Masturbation tends to be somewhat of a taboo topic in society, often down to religious or spiritual beliefs.  You’ve probably also heard some of the common myths about it leading to blindness, erectile dysfunction or infertility. Needless to say, these are false. And the air of shame around masturbation need not be there, as it’s  perfectly natural and in fact there are several health benefits.  W...

The Azov Battalion takes its name from the Sea of Azov which is bounded by Ukraine and Russia. You’ve more than likely seen images of these Ukrainian fighters on social media since the Russian invasion began in late February. They can be recognised by their tattoos and Nazi emblems on their uniforms. The neo-Nazi group are battling at the heart of the Ukrainian army, which has led to Vladimir Puti...

One of the biggest indirect impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic has been that on people’s mental health. Limited social interactions have led to feelings of loneliness increasing for many, all across the world. In light of this, it comes as no surprise that people have been actively seeking friendships and connections with others more than ever before. Data from Tinder suggests that the average numbe...

It might sound like a theme park or the latest sci-fi comic series, but Oceanix City is actually a futuristic architecture project thought out for the climate refugees of years to come. It’s a mobile floating city, designed to welcome those whose homes are under threat from rising sea levels. That could apply to a high percentage of the world’s population in the not so distant future, as it’s esti...

COVID-19 lockdowns led to the revolutionary rise of remote work. But while working remotely may have been a necessary adaptation made during an unprecedented global health crisis, many experts say that not only is remote work here to stay, it will even continue to increase as we head into 2023. Employees save time and money by not having to commute, and they essentially have more control over thei...