These are some things I came across this week that made me smile:

  • The fake French minister in a silicone mask who stole millions (BBC News) — "For two years from late 2015, an individual or individuals impersonating France's defence minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, scammed an estimated €80m (£70m; $90m) from wealthy victims including the Aga Khan and the owner of Château Margaux wines."
  • No, You Don’t Really Look Like That (The Atlantic) — "The global economy is wired up to your face. And it is willing to move heaven and Earth to let you see what you want to see."
  • Can You Unwrinkle A Raisin? (FiveThirtyEight) — "Back when you couldn’t just go buy a bottle of wine, folks would, instead, buy a giant brick of raisins, soak them in water to rehydrate the dried-out fruit and then store that juice in a dark cupboard for 60 days."
  • What Ecstasy Does to Octopuses (The Atlantic) — "At first they used too high a dose, and the animals “freaked out and did all these color changes”... But once the team found a more suitable dose, the animals behaved more calmly—and more sociably."
  • The English Word That Hasn’t Changed in Sound or Meaning in 8,000 Years (Nautilus) — "The word lox was one of the clues that eventually led linguists to discover who the Proto-Indo-Europeans were, and where they lived. "

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