Wear your seat belt

I’ve been a paramedic for almost two decades. As much as it makes me sound jaded, I have seen a lot, and it’s hard to make me break down these days. Oddly enough, the one that makes me break down the most is one where everyone turned out completely fine...

The lady who called us is the passenger. She’s hysterical, moving and screaming because her legs are trapped by the crumpled dashboard. She’s got glass cuts all over her hands, face, and chest, but nothing is bleeding profusely. I breathe a sigh of relief; it’s not always a sure thing, and she could definitely have internal injuries, but we love to find a patient awake and alert. We prod at her legs, and she can feel everything; she’s just really stuck. She is crying that she can’t wake up her husband and she can’t turn in her seat to see her kids or dog. She says her baby was crying before and isn’t anymore, and she can’t hear her four-year-old at all.

Happy ending: Everyone survived with almost no injuries (although there are some bits that are frightening): https://notalwaysright.com/moments-like-this-make-the-horrible-ones-worth-it/306563. 1,600 words but easy reading, except for the topic. Also check the comments, people have many stories of being saved by their seat belt.

Remember: “There are only two kinds of paranoia: Total… and insufficient.” Always wear your seat belt.

Good news from Fix the News:

Hungarian state television stopped broadcasting, and then apologised for lying. On the 8th of July 2026, M1 and the Kossuth radio station suspended news output as the government began dismantling the propaganda apparatus that Viktor Orbán built over 16 years. The screen carried a plain white-on-black message:

Public media must not lie. We apologise for having done exactly that for many years! Public media is now being transformed so that in future it will be independent and credible. News service is temporarily suspended. Stay with us!

And an image from my collection:

How to safely lower your body temperature in extreme heat

Given recent record high temps all over the world, and the likelihood that these will continue due to global warming, here are some ideas that may help:

Who is at risk for heat exhaustion?
How can you safely lower your body heat?
Which drink is best for staying hydrated in extreme heat? ((Water))
What should I eat if I have heat exhaustion?
Should I avoid pain relievers when overheated?

https://time.com/article/2026/06/25/how-to-safely-lower-body-heat. Under 800 words.

Good news from Fix the News:

United States: murder fell 18% in 2025, the sharpest drop since 1937.
Mexico: daily homicides down 48% since September 2024, 12-year low.
Brazil: just hit lowest homicide rate in its recorded history.
Argentina: 3.6 murders per 100,000 in 2025, lowest rate ever recorded.
Ecuador: homicides down 28% in March after a security crackdown.
Across Latin America and the Caribbean, murders fell over 5% in 2025.
England and Wales: homicides down to their lowest level since 1977.
Ireland: homicides down 25%, mostly fewer fatal road crashes.
France, Germany, Italy, Spain: murder down 30-50% since late 1990s.
Iraq: overall crime down 18% year-on-year.
South Africa: murders down 20%, helped by load-shedding’s end.
Philippines: focus crimes fell 34% in April from a year earlier.
China: police crime cases fell 13% in 2025, lowest this century.
Vietnam: social-order crimes fell 13% nationwide year-on-year.
Thailand: scam offences fell nearly 60% during a national crackdown.
Malaysia: index crime fell 6.4% amid stepped-up security operations.

And an image from my collection:

The U.S. will pay for the chain reaction Trump set off in NATO

An excellent overview of significant changes to NATO and the NATO/US relationship as a result of the President’s actions:

Even people who dislike Donald Trump tend to give him credit for one thing: getting NATO to pay its fair share. American presidents have long grumbled about burden sharing…. Non-American NATO countries collectively spent 1.4 percent of their combined gross domestic product on defense in 2014; in 2025, it was close to 2.3 percent.

The usual assumption is that if Europe spends more, the United States will spend less. This is demonstrably wrong. European defense spending is at its highest level in decades, yet Trump has proposed a staggering $1.5 trillion defense budget for fiscal 2027….

As Europe’s spending increases, the continent will become less dependent on the U.S., and less deferential to it… Then there is the issue of weapons. One of the hidden benefits of American leadership in NATO has been that Europeans buy American arms. They have bought F-35s, HIMARS, Patriots, P-8 aircraft and many other systems not simply because they are good but because they bind Europe to the United States. Common equipment makes joint operations easier. It also reassures frontline states that American troops will remain engaged.

But European officials now speak openly of the need to reduce dependence on U.S. hardware. They fear that the Trump administration could in the future withhold software upgrades, spare parts or operational support. When Denmark has to worry about an American president threatening Greenland, it will think thrice before buying its next generation of weapons from the United States. For American defense companies, this could be a major loss….

We have set off a chain reaction. Over time, Americans will come to miss the old NATO — not because it was fair, but because it was the most successful security system the world has ever known, with America at its center.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2026/07/10/trump-got-nato-pay-up-america-may-regret-it/. About 840 well-written words.

Good news from Fix the News:

A veteran car reviewer’s verdict: EVs have improved more in two years than petrol cars did in a decade. Mack Hogan tallies the gains: fast-charging times down from about 18 minutes to 11, the number of 300-mile models rising from 21 in 2023 to more than 60 this year, and the Lucid Air’s 516-mile range now $10,000 cheaper, while a $25,000 electric pickup nears launch. Petrol engines, he argues, are near the end of their development road. InsideEVs

And an image from my collection:

Mel Brooks at 100

People sometimes call Gogol the father of Russian realism, yet in Dead Souls, especially, he explores the human condition with the unmistakable verve of a comedian—seizing on preposterousnesses hiding in plain sight, piling absurdities atop one another until the tension cannot hold, generally dazzling (and, yes, sometimes confounding) the reader with his originality and playfulness…

Tolkin happens to be the mentor who said of Brooks: “Half of Mel’s creativity comes out of fear and anger. He doesn’t perform, he screams.” This was an era in which a still-unknown Brooks would show up late to the writer’s room—a habit that drove his colleagues nuts—and then get the biggest laughs out of them anyway. He was outrageously funny, and had unbelievable range. One minute he’d be doing an impression of a rabbi, and the next he was writhing around on the floor pretending to be a harpooned whale (a Melville reference, naturally). The playwright Neil Simon, also a writer on the show, called Brooks “the most uniquely funny man I’ve ever met.”…

Mel Brooks gave us, among other comedic gifts, The Producers; Blazing Saddles; Young Frankenstein; Silent Movie; High Anxiety; Spaceballs; History of the World, Part I; and Robin Hood: Men in Tights. You could have been born at any point in time, but here you are, alive when ice cream, antibiotics, and indoor plumbing have all been invented, and Mel Brooks is turning 100. If that isn’t extraordinarily good luck, I don’t know what is.

https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/2026/06/long-live-mel-brooks/687730. 3,450 words.

Good news from Fix the News:

Brazil has made spectacular progress on one of its most stubborn public health problems.

In 1996, almost 656,000 adolescent girls gave birth; by 2025, that had fallen to around 276,000, a 58% drop driven by three decades of free contraception. The latest shift came in 2025, when a three-year contraceptive implant called Implanon became universally free nationwide for women aged 14 to 49.

This has made a big difference. Without government assistance the implant costs around $200, almost two-thirds of the monthly minimum wage — and that’s before the doctor’s fee. Some cities, including Campinas in São Paulo, Pinhais in Paraná and Fortaleza, the capital of Ceará, have gone even further, offering implants to girls as young as 11. Despite the howls of protests from traditionalists it’s worked; between 2010 and 2024, births among girls under 14 in Fortaleza fell by more than half.

And an image from my collection: