My son just graduated from high school and is headed to college in the Fall. We haven't shopped for backpacks, binders, notebooks, dorm accessories, or pens and pencils. But like many parents, my wife and I have already ordered him a couple Narcan kits in case he or a classmate comes into contact with a heavy opioid dose. We're hardly alone in buying this now readily available product and repeatedly giving our kids the "no pills or powders" talk. The opioid overdose problem is widespread in America, from sea to shining sea—including the seas. "Since the opioid crisis hit the United States in the late 1990s, no community has been spared. First with prescription painkillers, then with heroin after tighter prescription rules pushed people dependent on opioids to underground markets, and more recently with illicitly manufactured fentanyl and its many analogues, the epidemic has killed roughly 800,000 people by overdose since 1999, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. With fatalities averaging more than 80,000 a year for three years running, it is the nation’s leading cause of accidental death." C.J. Chivers in the NYT Magazine (Gift Article): The Mayday Call: How One Death at Sea Transformed a Fishing Fleet. "On the water, pedigree and background checks mean little. Reputation is all. In this way, the vessels preserve a professional culture as old as human civilization and bring to shore immense amounts of healthful food, for which everyone is paid by the pound, not by the hour. Taken together, these circumstances pressure deckhands to work through fatigue, ailments and injuries. One means is via stimulants or painkillers, or both, making it no surprise that in the fentanyl era fishing crews suffer rates of fatal overdose up to five times that of the general population." 2Still Storming the BeachNPR: Biden commemorates D-Day invasion's 80th anniversary, linking it to the Ukraine conflict. "'The autocrats of the world are watching closely to see what happens in Ukraine, to see if we let this illegal aggression go unchecked. We cannot let that happen.' Worldwide, he added, democracy is more at risk now than it has been at any other time since World War II ended." That risk is quite pronounced right here at home. But we're not alone. 3Fizz Fizz Plop PlopWe appear to be in a bubbles bubble. But a new generation is just saying no to fizz. "Dropping carbonation might bring younger consumers to the party. As Molson Coors Beverage Company conducted research on of-age Gen Z drinkers, the company discovered that 'bloating or feeling full was a real pain point.'" (When I was young we loved bloating!) Why Bubble-Free Booze is on the Rise. 4Time for a Sweet Surrender?To keep my glucose monitor in check, I am a regular consumer of sugar-free products. But the more I read about sugar substitutes, the more I worry that they may exact a sweet revenge. WaPo (Gift Article): Sugar substitute xylitol linked to increased risk of heart attack, stroke. "The results challenge the popular understanding of sugar alcohols such as xylitol and erythritol as healthy, natural sugar alternatives. People view them as natural because our bodies produce them as part of our energy metabolism; however, our cells produce them at much lower levels. When these sugar alcohols are manufactured, they are industrially prepared, using bacteria or yeast that’s put through brewing and fermentation processes to create a chemical that tricks our taste buds." 5Extra, ExtraCovering the Spread: I'm not covering the daily ins and outs of the Hunter Biden trial, just like I never gave much coverage to the Hunter Biden laptop story. I don't see either as major news. But in some quarters, the Hunter trial is just about as big as the trial of a former president. And that coverage has an impact. WaPo: The link between the news Americans consume and the things they believe. "We should not be surprised, then, when we see that people who watch Fox News or consume conservative media that takes a similar approach to coverage have diverging assessments of the country — and of reality." In some ways, Trump and his allies being in legal trouble is becoming the ultimate dog bites man story. Trump ally Steve Bannon must surrender to prison by July 1 to start contempt sentence. 6Bottom of the News"The pressure to succeed, to be a 'girlboss' at work, as well as the perfect girlfriend or wife or mother or daughter, takes its toll on women’s physical and emotional health. It’s no wonder, then, that women are moving from girlbossing to girl mossing." On TikTok and Instagram, people are “girl mossing”: lying on a forest floor, staring up at a leafy canopy or caressing moss.
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