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5 Things You Should At Least Pretend To Know Today | January 13, 2020

Keeping up with the news is a full-time job. And not a very fun one! But learning about a few things going on in the world today can’t hurt — if for no other reason than having something to make awkward-small talk about at your office or during happy hour!

These are some things we think it mostly can’t hurt knowing today:

1. Carrots are being airdropped to help endangered wallabies after Australia bushfires.

As the wildfires continue to rage in Australia, the endangered brush-tailed rock-wallaby population of New South Wales is among those facing food and water shortages, and the government has decided to intervene by arranging an airdrop of thousands of pounds of vegetables to fire-affected areas as part of ‘Operation Rock Wallaby.’

https://twitter.com/Matt_KeanMP/status/1215900857436270592

“Initial fire assessments indicate the habitat of several important Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby populations was burnt in the recent bushfires. The wallabies typically survive the fire itself but are then left stranded with limited natural food as the fire takes out the vegetation around their rocky habitat,” Australian Prime Minister Kean said.

“The wallabies were already under stress from the ongoing drought, making survival challenging for the wallabies without assistance.”

https://twitter.com/Matt_KeanMP/status/1216106489523232768

2. A Japanese billionaire is giving away $9M on Twitter as an experiment to see if free money boosts happiness.

Japanese fashion tycoon Yusaku Maezawa is giving away $9 million to his Twitter followers in what he says is a “social experiment” to see if the payment boosts their happiness.

Maezawa will give 1 million yen ($9,000) to 1,000 followers selected at random from those who retweeted a Jan. 1 post, with the impact of the money to be tracked through regular surveys.

Here’s the post, in case you’re feeling lucky.

https://twitter.com/yousuck2020/status/1212025675055452160

3. The NFL Conference Playoff bracket is set.

Well, we’re down to four teams and three games to determine the Super Bowl champion for the 2019 NFL season.

A wild, divisional-playoff weekend has placed the AFC Championship Game at Arrowhead Stadium, where the Chiefs will host the Titans. The Titans pulled off a huge upset of the Ravens on Saturday, while the Chiefs mounted a 24-point comeback against the Texans, who could not have possibly imploded more, on Sunday.

The NFC Championship Game is at Levi’s Stadium, where the 49ers will host the Packers. San Francisco kept Minnesota at bay in its divisional-round matchup, while Green Bay held off Seattle to advance to the final four.

4. Iran protesters demand that leaders quit after Iran admits to shooting down a passenger plane.

Over the weekend, Iran admitted to shooting down the Ukraine International Airlines jetliner that crashed last week, killing all 176 people on board. For a while, Iran insisted it had nothing to do with this (naturally) – blaming a technical issue. But Canada, the US, and Ukraine suggested that an Iranian missile hit the plane. Now, after three days of issuing denials, Iran admitted responsibility.

As a result, thousands of Iranian protesters have been turning out, with some calling for their supreme leader to resign. Cause, you know, killing innocent people isn’t good.

5. LSU and Clemson face off tonight in the College Football National Championship.

While I attended Alabama, and therefore cannot truly root for LSU, I also think I hate Clemson more than any other team in college football, so I’ll be taking the Tigers by 5.5.

Anyway, they play tonight at 8:00 PM EST and the quality and mood of tomorrow’s funny pic dump will very much depend on whether LSU crushes Clemson or not.

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Jason Mustian

Jason Mustian

Jason is a Webby winning, Short-Award losing humor writer and businessman. He lives in Texas with his amazing wife and four sometimes amazing kids.