Taking a look at recent, positive, uplifting, news stories and yarns, from New Zealand and all around the world, to bring a smile and a bit of cheer.
Tom Cruise ‘performs’ at Olympics closing ceremony for free
Sure, he’s one of the richest actors on the planet and may well not need the money but it’s to his credit that Tom Cruise performed at the Paris Olympics closing ceremony and didn’t charge a bean for his services. People’s opinions seem to be divided on Mr Cruise – some love him, some don’t. I’m somewhere in the middle. I’ve seen the vast majority of his films and while they don’t always set my world alight, I find them entertaining. Plus, he performs many of his own stunts on screen, which is quite impressive.
“According to Casey Wasserman, chairman of the LA2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Cruise was all for his jump from the Stade du France to accept the official Olympic flag from Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Olympian Simone Biles.
“The ‘Mission Impossible”star then cruised (no pun intended) through the streets of Paris on his motorcycle to board a plane near the Eiffel Tower before reappearing for a skydive into the area near the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles in a pre-recorded segment.” (Source: “Tom Cruise’s payday for that Olympic stunt may surprise you,” by Lisa Respers, 11th September, www.edition.cnn.com).
When pitched the idea initially, Cruise’s only condition was that he would do all the stunts himself and that he would do the whole thing for no fee.
5 stars – anyone doing something for anyone else to entertain them is a good thing. Not charging for it is even better. Nice one Tom!
Rare coin kept in vault for decades up for auction
I’m no collector of stamps or coins but i do know that value is driven by rarity. The rarest coins are those that are minted incorrectly and their ‘flaws’ then end up making them incredibly valuable.
In the United States, one family may well be in for a significant windfall when a dime (face value: US cent cents) they have secured in a bank vault for over 40 years comes up for auction soon.
“The extraordinarily rare coin, struck by the US Mint in San Francisco in 1975, could bring more than US$500,000 (NZ$809k) said Ian Russell, president of GreatCollections, which specializes[sic] in currency and is handling an online auction that will end in October.
“What makes the dime depicting US President Franklin D Roosevelt so valuable is a missing “S” mint mark for San Francisco, one of just two without the mark known to exist. The other one sold at a 2019 auction for US$456,000 and then again months later to a private collector. While serious coin collectors have long known about the existence of these two rare dimes, their whereabouts had remained a mystery since the late 1970s. ‘They were hidden for decades.’ Russell said. ‘Most major collectors and dealers have never seen one.'” (Source: “Huge payout expected for a rare coin bought by US farm family and hidden for decades,” by John Seewer, 9th September, www.stuff.co.nz).
5 stars – it’s nice to think some families have a few ten cent pieces stored away that are worth half a million dollars. I should ask my Dad if he has any, next time I talk with him.
Stonehenge mystery deepens
In the 1990s I had the good fortune to visit Stonehenge. Truth be told, I wasn’t overly excited by the prospect and thought it would probably be some big rocks in a field. I was wrong. It’s an impressive monument with a palpable sense of otherworldliness to it. When I visited you could still walk up to the stones, now they are roped off to protect the site from tourists.
A few weeks ago some scientists believed they had ascertained the geographical source of the stones that that make up the altarpiece of the henge. Seemingly, the rocks had come from the Orkney Islands – which is a significant distance from where Stonehenge is.
“However, the newest study, which was conducted separately from August’s Australian-led paper but involved some of the same scientists, found the chemical and mineralogical makeup of the stone was dramatically different from those in Orkney. Scientists used portable X-rays to examine Orkney’s two great stone circles – the Stones of Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar – as well as field samples of rock deposits across Orkney’s islands.” (Source: “New finding rocks Stonehenge as mystery gets ‘weirder’,” 6th September, www.stuff.co.nz).
So it seems it may still be a while before scientists are able to concretely establish where the stones originally came from. No matter, however, because the monument itself is more than impressive as it is.
