What I Found Interesting: February 19, 2025

Today is day 50 of 2025.

Only 28 days until spring arrives in the Northern Hemisphere.

I can be optimistic, can’t I?

A bitter cold week in southeast Michigan, with wind chills in the negative double digits at night, makes me glad for bright spots of sunshine during the day.

Thank you to everyone sharing positive news and uplifting blog posts.

Here are a few stories, posts, and resources I’ve read and enjoyed over the past month.

Hope you enjoy them, too!

What I Found Interesting

• Egypt announced the first discovery of the lost tomb of Thutmose II, the fourth Pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt.

  Found near Luxor, it’s the first discovery of a royal tomb since the first discovery of a royal tomb belonging to an Ancient Egyptian pharaoh since the discovery of King Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922.

• It won’t happen again until October 2028. Mark your calendar this month to watch the planetary parade when seven planets align in the evening sky.

  It will be relatively easy to spot the five brightest planets throughout February—Venus, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, and Saturn—visible to the naked eye.

  Uranus and Neptune join in, but you’ll need binoculars or a telescope to see them.

• Congrats to Wisdom and her partner! The 74-year-old Laysan albatross, the world’s oldest known bird, has been seen this month caring for her young chick.

  Albatross parents share the responsibility of feeding their young by taking turns hunting while the other stays at the nest to watch over the chick.

  Biologists estimate she’s produced 50-60 eggs in her lifetime.

• With Windows 10 support ending in late 2024, and many Windows users not wanting to (or can’t) upgrade to Windows 11, some Windows users are considering a switch to Linux.

  If you have a Chromebook, you have another option: convert your Chromebook to run Linux.

• Writing things down gives you background on what really happened.

  News stories of tragedies, weather events, and government upheavals can be so overwhelming we can shut down and forget what is happening.

  Write it down.

  It’s a way of being able to look back and ask “Did I really experience that?

  Did that really happen?” and see that, yes, it did.

  Dan Sinker recommends you write it down with pen and paper. Use your hands.

• Good news for book lovers! Bookshop.org is now selling eBooks, with up to 100% of profit going to independent bookstores.