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Bars, bowling alleys and movie theaters cost too much to run and visit. Americans have run out of places to hang out and we’re paying with our health

Best ideas for free things to do out there in the world?

‘True Love’ Comes With A Salary Requirement: $106,417

That’s a very specific number. I guess if you had to find one of those free activities listed above, you probably don’t have the salary to qualify for dating

More Stories Below, but first some new content in the News Sidequest Podcast Universe…

Auditory Anthology

SCI-FI SHORT STORIES - NARRATED BY DARREN MARLAR & PRODUCED BY KEITH CONRAD

Maiden Voyage - Chapter One: The Artifact - When a mysterious, unyielding artifact—made of an impossible extraterrestrial material—begins responding to a precise frequency, senior researcher Chen Liang realizes his team isn't just analyzing an unknown object; they are waking something up.

On the maiden voyage of the MV Atlas, the world’s largest cruise ship, a ghost operative team attempts a silent extraction of a high-value defector carrying an impossible secret: an ancient, non-human artifact. Hidden amongst twenty-two thousand passengers and stalked by an elite foreign intelligence network, the team must execute a precise, high-stakes tradecraft operation in international waters. One wrong move could blow their cover and trigger a confrontation that could break the global order.

Maiden Voyage - Chapter One: The Artifact (Free Preview) Keith Conrad / Darren Marlar Episode

Substack | Listen on Apple | Listen on Spotify | Listen on Amazon | RSS Feed

New chapters post ever Sunday, and will be available to Auditory Anthology paid subscribers

Also Worth A Look…

• Grades, Pressure, Fear Of Failure: How Our Education System Wires Teens For Lifelong Anxiety - My experience was actually the opposite. After years of being stressed out by school and then adding work to the college experience, when I got into the real world and only had a job to worry about that seemed like a breeze

• Americans get married after how many months? How engagement times have changed over the years - I guess Misty and I were an outlier. We were only engaged for about 6 months before we got married, and that was even with the COVID shutdown

• Comcast store punished low sales by smashing pies in workers’ faces, lawsuit claims - I guess motivation by humiliation is one strategy

• She left her ex. He secretly tracked her through a network of policing cameras - I’m sure that’ll win her back. Good thinking. Sadly this isn’t just a police camera issue, there are enough privately owned cameras out there that are hackable and could produce the same result

• Preflight Sermon Gets Plane Preacher Kicked Off Alaska Airlines Flight - I’m not sure I think of a worse time to try to win people over to anything than when they’re crammed into an airplane together

• TSA finds stolen Civil War-era cannonballs in a passenger’s suitcase at an Alabama airport - They were in a checked bag. Imagine the fees that would have racked up

• Pilot issues ‘flying saucer’ alert over London airport as mystery disc passes jet - I hope the pilot got on the PA system and told everybody to take a look

• French student pleads guilty and is fined for a straw-licking stunt in Singapore - He licked a straw and then put it back. The fine is only $500. Not enough. We’re trying to have a society here

• Archaeologists found a skeleton wearing an amulet that may change the history of Christianity - It’s pretty amazing that we we’re still learning things about time periods when there were fairly detailed written records

• Iowa Woman Busted On Lawn Mower OUI Rap - Friends don’t let friends drink and mow