Waiting around at the airport can be a drag and American ones are getting creative in finding ways to keep passengers entertained:

• Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport has brought in miniature horses – which it calls therapy unicorns – for irate passengers to pet and interact with.
• San Diego has hired circus performers to help travelers stay calm.
• Yet another avoids such gimmicks and straight up hands out free lollipops to anybody who wants one.

Read more here.

Source: The Telegraph

Via: Marginal Revolution

Natalie Zarrelli wrote about grooms that get their own cake:

• Until the 1940s it was tradition for a wedding to have two cakes – one for the bride and one for the groom.
• While the tradition has faded in parts of America it’s still strong in the south.
• The bride’s cake is the main one. It is larger and fancier and embodies the colours and the theme of the wedding.
• The groom’s cake is usually more representative of the groom’s personality and a way for them to leave their own mark on the wedding.
• Thus the groom’s cake might have R2-D2 on it, the logo of a favourite sports team, or be in the shape of an Xbox.

Read more here.

Source: Atlas Obscura

William MacAskill had a fascinating article about unintended consequences:

• Sponsoring first-time skydivers is a popular way to raise funds for charity. One study of 1,500 such events over a five-year period found that all in all they raised £120,000.
• However, since some of the funds are used to pay for the event ultimately only £45,000 was sent directly to charities.
• And since these were first-time skydivers with limited training there were 103 injuries which, on average, required nine days of hospitalization.
• This cost a total of £610,000 in medical expenses – which was paid for by the government through its funding of the NHS.
• All in all, for every £1 raised, the government had to kick in £13 to deal with the fallout from the charity effort.
• Bringing the story full circle: often times the sky-diving events aimed to raise money for health-related charities.

The full article has more information about the the study and contains a wider analysis of our blind-spots when supporting charities. Find it here.

Source: Time

Via: Reddit

Ben Valentine wrote about a company that redesigns the atmosphere for your viewing pleasure:

• A company in Cambodia uses a mixture of compressed air and soapy liquid to make “clouds” that gently float into the sky.
• Their most popular customers are businesses that hire them for corporate events.
• Their services can be had for $500 an afternoon.
• They’re an effective daytime replacement for sky lanterns that are popular in the region but work best when it’s dark.

You can read more details about the clouds here. Looking for something more upmarket? We’ve previously covered a service that will create meteor showers on demand.

Source: Hyperallergic

Via: Mental Floss

Alex Tabarrok wrote that in certain circumstances requiring safety features on cars can actually detract from, rather than enhance safety:

• Indian auto manufacturers recently released a series of low cost cars that have a safety rating of zero stars, due to their lack of features such as air bags.
• Because they lack any bells and whistles such cars are incredibly cheap – one can be had for as little as $4,000.
• Adding air bags could cost as much as $400, increasing the price of the vehicle by a substantial 10%.
• Only 6% of Indian households have cars, but 47% have motorcycles.
• Any kind of motorcycle is more dangerous than a car. And not even the most advanced motorcycle has features like airbags.
• If low cost cars can convince Indians to switch to four wheeled vehicles, safety will dramatically improve – even if the cars themselves lack common safety features.

Read more of the argument here.

Source: Marginal Revolution

As market uncertainty continues after the United Kingdom voted in a referendum to leave the European Union, Vipal Monga and Tatyana Shumsky wrote about one sector that could see a boom:

• At a minimum the UK will require two years to extract itself from the EU, requiring months of discussions involving international law experts.
• Some law firms have set up 24 hour hotlines to respond to the deluge of requests they’re getting in the wake of the referendum results.
• The need for private sector aid is especially acute because the UK hasn’t had to conduct its own trade negotiations in a long while – this was largely taken care of by the EU.
• If EU laws ever stop applying then the UK will have to start drafting its own laws on subjects as varied as food safety requirements around the making of cheese, and ensuring routes for the migration of honey bees.

Read more here.

Source: The Wall Street Journal

The Association for Psychological Science wrote about a study that examined the behavioural impact of having bad dating prospects:

• A series of experiments suggested that if people believe that gender ratios in their area are skewed in a way that lengthens the odds of finding a romantic partner, they are more likely to engage in risky behaviour.
• From an evolutionary perspective it sort of makes sense. If it’s difficult to find a mate then high risk-high reward behaviours and a willingness to do whatever it takes may be the way to go.
• Crucially though the high risk behaviour isn’t limited to finding a mate – those with poor romantic prospects seem to engage in risky behaviour in all domains in life.
• Thus people who struggle to find a date may engage in high-risk behaviour related to investments, gambling, and sports.
• In countries such as India and China with heavily skewed gender ratios this has implications for the kinds of societies that such pressures may create.

Read more about the experiments and their methodology over here.

Source: Eureka Alert

The Economist writes that the American university experience is increasingly a family one for Chinese students:

• Hundreds of thousands of students from China come to the United States to study every year.
• Now Chinese parents are increasingly opting to come and stay with them.
• As a result of the one child policy many parents have just the one child to take care of, and they want to make sure that they do well in the United States.
• It’s usually the mothers – fathers will often stay behind – and they see their role as cooking and cleaning, ensuring that their offspring don’t just survive on Red Bull and ramen.
• There are so many of them that Connecticut now even has a “Yale Chinese grandparents’ village”.
• In fact, as much as 70% of Chinese investment in American real estate may relate to parents wanting to support a child’s education.
• By purchasing a home outright parents also help make their children more attractive marriage prospects.

Read more over here.

Source: The Economist

The latest Game of Thrones episode, Battle of the Bastards, received critical praise and is a leading contender to win several Emmy awards. James Hibberd and Jethro Nededog looked at the numbers behind the episode:

• 500 extras were hired for the various armies involved. They trained separately from one another to create on-screen rivalry.
• 70 stunt horses were used – the use of real-life horses in battle is incredibly rare for a TV show.
• A typical episode takes about two weeks to shoot. Battle of the Bastards required 25 days.
• There were four camera crews responsible for capturing the action on all the various points on the battlefield.
• The entire season is thought to have cost over $100 million, and this episode is estimated to have been responsible for up to $25 million of that.

Read more here, and here.

Source: Entertainment Weekly, Business Insider