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 February 24, 2024

It's always fun to look at the list of most-visited National Park Service sites in the US. While the top spots are pretty consistent, I love that they truly showcase the whole "sea to shining sea" thing we have going on. The Blue Ridge Parkway, which runs through Virginia and North Carolina, took the top spot in 2023 as usual with 16.5 million visitors. But then we take a long trip west for #2, with the Golden Gate National Recreation Area near San Francisco. The rest of the list takes us to New York, the shores of the Gulf, the nation's capital and the scenic southwest. If you're just looking at national parks (as opposed to recreation areas), you get the same breathtaking range: the Great Smoky Mountains in the South,  several western wonders, and Acadia National Park in Maine; a jewel of the North. It's a great reminder that wherever you live, the beauty of nature is never too far away. 

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Our favorites this week

Get going with some of our most popular good news stories of the week

Moon art
The lunar touchdown of the Odysseus spacecraft this week brought the very first "authorized*" work of art to the moon! American artist Jeff Koons had a new sculpture series hitch a ride with Odysseus (also known as “Odie”), which just completed the US’ first landing on the lunar surface in more than 50 years. Koon's work consists of a clear plastic box containing 125 mini-sculptures of the moon, each measuring about one inch in diameter. Called “Moon Phases,” they show 62 phases of the moon as seen from Earth, 62 phases visible from other viewpoints in space, and one lunar eclipse. Each sculpture is inscribed with the name of a groundbreaking figure in human history, including Aristotle, David Bowie, Leonardo da Vinci, Gandhi, Billie Holiday, Gabriel García Márquez, Andy Warhol and Virginia Woolf. 

Read the whole story here. 

* We say "authorized" because it's not technically the first art on the moon. In 1971, Apollo 15 crew members left an aluminum figure by the Belgian artist Paul Van Hoeydonck, as well as a commemorative plaque for 14 astronauts and cosmonauts who died in service. It’s also long been believed that six famous artists — Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg, John Chamberlain, Claes Oldenburg, Forrest Myers and David Novros — covertly sent a joint artwork aboard Apollo 12 two years earlier.

Hellooooooooooooooooo there!
Scientists think they've unlocked a mystery behind one of the most majestic sounds on Earth. While whale songs have been studied for decades, it's been tough to say how, exactly, some of these ocean giants produce such haunting tones. While toothed whales, which include dolphins and killer whales, developed a vocal organ in their nose to produce sound, a new study claims baleen whales actually use a larynx — or voice box — in their throat. Using computer simulations, researchers concluded that the baleen whales’ voice box has "a completely novel mechanism that is not described in any other animal." Among the specialized structures was a fatty cushion that vibrates when air is pushed out from the lungs, allowing the whales to create low-frequency sounds underwater to communicate over large distances.

Read the whole story here. 

Now that's using your head
You probably don't think of toilets often outside of a few critical moments every day. And yet there they are, unsung heroes of our routines. However, current toilet designs are also pretty wasteful. Good thing there are plenty of designers, environmental engineers and sanitation experts already rethinking how we can stop wasting our, well, waste. “Waste is not waste, it’s a resource,” said Arja Renell, a Finnish artist and architect who brought the topic to last year’s Venice Architecture Biennale as the curator of her country’s pavilion. She is a proponent of the "dry toilet" solution. Users layer the contents of the toilet’s bin with peat or sawdust after doing their business; once full, they move the homemade poo trifle to a larger airtight container over the course of several months so that any microorganisms die out. The remaining material, rich in nitrogen and phosphorus, can be used as natural fertilizer. Sounds like something our behinds ... could get behind (I'm so sorry).

Read the whole story here. 

A round of applause for ...

Ashwath Kaushik, an 8-year-old chess prodigy who just became the youngest player ever to beat a chess grandmaster in a classical tournament game. The previous record was just set last month by Leonid Ivanovic, who was 8 years old at the time. Ashwath, who is from Singapore, was five months younger than Leonid when he beat Poland’s Jacek Stopa, 37, in round four of the Burgdorfer Stadthaus Open in Switzerland. Here's the best part: Ashwath’s father said neither he nor his wife has a history of playing chess, so their son's talent and commitment (his parents say he practices seven hours a day) are all his. 

Read the whole story here. 

Hear, hear!

It’s never been about how many records I sell, or how many awards I win. It’s not about trying to write hits or being calculated or formulaic. It’s about enjoying and being grateful for the journey and using the gifts that God gave you. Never follow the trends. Set your own pace and recognize that the best is right here, right now, in front of you.

- Lenny Kravitz, who brought down the house with an inspiring speech after accepting the Music Icon Award at the 2024 People’s Choice Awards.

Who knew?

What's the brightest known thing in the universe (other than your smile, of course)? It's a quasar, powered by the fastest-growing black hole on record, according to a new study. Quasars are the luminous cores of distant, ancient galaxies. These gleaming phenomena are without a doubt the most dazzling objects in the cosmos — and scientists believe they are fueled by supermassive black holes that are the central engines of large galaxies. You're welcome for the new pickup line.

Read the whole story here. 

Rec of the week

Brought to you by CNN Underscored

Shameless animal video

There's always time for cute animal videos. That time is now.

This cute little creature is a skeleton panda sea squirt and it's Japan's newest species. (Click here to view)

Made with love by CNN's 5 Things team. 

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