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Herds On the Road: 20,000km Climate Quest with Life‑Sized Animal Puppets
The Herds finish a 20,000‑km odyssey — from jungle vibes to Arctic chills

What the journey was all about

The Herds was a bold, climate‑change art stunt that followed a strange convoy of animals across continents. Think Congo rainforests turning into Norwegian tundra — all while partying with a narrative that made the planet’s urgent conversations unforgettable.

Key milestones on the trek
- Congo (Start) – The expedition kicked off in the dense, green heart of Africa, echoing the urgency of deforestation.
- East Africa – The herd pushed through sprawling savannahs, testing the limits of herd dynamics and long‑haul human support.
- Middle Kingdoms (Turkey, Iran) – These stop‑overs turned into natural “layer‑ups” of cultures and climate advocacy.
- Mediterranean Crossing – Swimming across a sea of voices, the project captured the winding dialogue on climate policy.
- North‑European Finale – The crew arrived in the frigid Arctic Circle of Norway, a chilling reminder of the angles of global warming.
Why it matters

Touring 20,000km on foot, bike, and ship, The Herds turned ecological science into a visual, lived experience. It filled a storytelling gap: real‑world physics meets “feel‑good” art, and the result was a swell of community buzz and renewed calls for a more sustainable future.

Quick takeaways for the eco‑skeptics

• The journey highlights how far carbon footprints travel.
• It proves movements can
cross borders.
• It gives us a tangible seconds‑long
soundtrack to the intangible
consequences of climate change.

From Congo to the Arctic: The Giant Puppet Herd’s Epic Trek

The Curious Cast of Characters

Picture this: a lineup of life‑sized animal puppets—elephants, giraffes, antelopes, and lions—hang their heavy boots in Kinshasa, deep in the Congo rainforest, and hit the road in April. These weren’t just plush toys; they were fully rigged, human‑backed figures meant to symbolize the journeys of wildlife and people fleeing climate turmoil.

Stepping Stones Across Two Continents

As the herd marched northward, they turned the trek into a living canvas, bringing climate change to the streets in a way that felt incredibly personal and visceral, not just numbers on a chart.
- 20,000 km of waggle, wiggle, and swag
- Crossed two continents—Africa and Europe
Picking Up New Companions Along the Way

In every country they passed, the troupe adopted new “family” members—local animals fashioned from recycled cardboard and plywood. Think of it as a traveling zoo that doubles as a recycling workshop.

Training the Team

Over the course of this odyssey, they rallied 1,000 puppet‑savvy volunteers, each taught to bring these heroes to life. That’s a full‑time crew in a circus‑style international rollout!
- 56 public events
- 11 countries touched by the stage’s humor and heart
Finite Destination: Jostedalsbreen & Nordkapp

Finally, the herd scaled Norway’s Jostedalsbreen glacier—the biggest ice sheet on the European mainland. From there, they headed north for a dramatic arrival at Nordkapp, the point that reaches the Arctic Circle, and were set to greet the sunrise on 1 August. A snowy finale, indeed.

Why This Matters

It’s more than a puppet parade; it’s a storypoint that turns the climate crisis into something audiences can feel and follow. And who knew a clown car of elephants and giraffes could get a sleep‑over on a glacier?

London’s Plot‑Twist: The Herds Brings Life‑Size Animal Puppets to the Stage

Picture this: the bustling streets of London, the scent of fresh pastries drifting from the cafés, and right in the heart of the city, an unforgettable spectacle that goes something like, “What’s that creeping along the aisle?” It’s the The Herds – a troupe of budget‑friendly, oversized animal puppets – ready to put the “wild” in “wild‑life.” The big day? 27 June 2025.

What Makes This Performance Tick?
- Huge, hearty puppets – Think giraffes with necks that could poke the ceiling, ferocious lions that roar in a thousand-yard radius, and goats that just keep saying “blee… blee.”
- Central London venue – The show kicks off at the iconic Leicester Square, bringing theatre vibes and a dash of chaos into the concrete jungle.
- Audience engagement – The Herds love a good crowd joke. Get ready to laugh, cheer, and maybe even throw a few sarcastic spots of applause.
Why You’ll Want to Be There

Besides the literal, laugh-out-loud fun, the performance is a clever commentary on how our urban animals are a blend of the real and the imagined. It’s a chance to beat the tourist crowds and see London’s creative side in a fresh, eye‑popping way.

© AP Photo

Picture This: Cardboard Zoo Goes on a Canoe Cruise in Lagos

Imagine a bunch of puppeteers pushing tiny cardboard beasts through a swampy lagoon, right in the heart of Makoko’s river‑side slum. On April 19, 2025 they pulled off this quirky spectacle as part of a bigger show called The Herds. If you’re wondering what’s going on, let’s break it down.

The Crew Behind the Curtain

The Walk Productions is the mastermind here. They’re the folks who built Little Amal, the 12‑foot giant puppet that journeyed across 15 countries in 2021 to shine a light on refugees. Now they’re tackling a climate change headline, but with a theatrical twist.

Emotion Over Data: The Big Idea

David Lan, the producer, said the goal of The Herds is to make climate change feel real without drowning us in graphs and jargon. “We want people to feel the heat, the storms, the sinking of coastlines,” he told Euronews Culture. “It’s all about the human heart, not just the numbers.”

Amir Nizar Zuabi: A Humble Hero

Amir Nizar Zuabi, the artistic director who helped bring Little Amal to life, is honest about impact. “I’m not claiming we’ll change the world,” he told us, “but if we stir even a flicker of emotion, that’s worth it. It’s less about preaching science and more about tasting the crisis through art.”

Why It Matters
- Clothing the catastrophe with a feel‑good, heart‑warming narrative.
- Giving people a safe space to discuss climate without feeling like a lecture.
- Strengthening the connection between the audience and the environment.
Catch the Show

Number one, check the video above to see the cardboard animals paddle to victory. Feeling inspired? Join the movement; support climate drama that feels human, not humorous.
2025-09-28
Pentagon Taps 600 Military Lawyers To Serve As Temporary Immigration Judges For DOJ

According to a federal government memo reviewed by The Associated Press, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has directed the branches of the armed services to transfer up to 600 military lawyers to the Justice Department to serve as temporary immigration judges, following an urgent request for assistance from the Department of Homeland Security. The move is intended to ensure that President Trump’s deportation of criminal illegal aliens proceeds smoothly.

The Aug. 27 memo stated that the military will send the first tranche of 150 attorneys – both military and civilian – to the DOJ “as soon as practicable.” The first group is expected to arrive at the DoJ next week.

Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell told Bloomberg that members of the Judge Advocate General’s Corps, or JAG, would “augment existing resources to help further combat a backlog of cases by presiding over immigration hearings.”

Parnell did not confirm whether the AP’s report about 600 military lawyers was accurate but noted that the request for legal personnel came from the DoJ.

This comes as immigration courts face mounting backlogs amid Trump’s nationwide crackdown on criminal illegal aliens. It is important to note that immigration judges determine whether individuals are eligible for relief or face removal.

Bolstering immigration court capacity comes as the administration sent in National Guard troops into Washington, DC, to restore law and order after violent crime waves sparked by years of failed progressive policies transformed parts of the nation’s capital into crime-ridden “no-go” zones.

Violent crime has fallen across the DC metro area in the last several weeks due to Trump’s move to shore up the struggling police force…

On Tuesday, Trump told reporters about plans to deploy federal law enforcement to crime-ridden, far-left-controlled Chicago and Baltimore to combat violent crime.

If it’s deporting illegal aliens or restoring law and order in cities, the Trump administration is cleaning up the mess left behind by the Democratic Party’s nation-killing progressive policies that transformed parts of some metro areas into “hell holes.”

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2025-09-24
Judge Orders Trump Admin To Release Billions In Frozen Foreign Aid Funding

Authored by Jackson Richman via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A federal judge ruled that the Trump administration cannot withhold billions of dollars in foreign assistance approved by Congress, including aid that the White House recently said it would not spend.

President Donald Trump holds a Cabinet meeting with members of his administration in the Cabinet Room of the White House on Aug. 26, 2025. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

The Trump administration must release $11.5 billion in foreign aid that is set to expire at the end of the month, said U.S. District Judge Amir Ali in a Sept. 3 decision.

“There is not a plausible interpretation of the statutes that would justify the billions of dollars they plan to withhold,” Ali wrote in his ruling.

“To be clear, no one disputes that Defendants have significant discretion in how to spend the funds at issue, and the Court is not directing Defendants to make payments to any particular recipients. But Defendants do not have any discretion as to whether to spend the funds.”

The Trump administration last week requested that Congress rescind $4.9 billion in foreign aid. The $11.5 billion figure includes the $4.9 billion.

In accordance with the Impoundment Control Act, a rescission is when the White House requests Congress to reverse government funding that has been appropriated by Congress. Typically, it must be approved within 45 days of the request being sent to Congress, or else the money must be spent.

Given that this request was made within 45 days of the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30, the cancellation could take effect without Congress approving it. This maneuver is known as a pocket rescission.

Ali wrote that the funding is to be spent since Congress appropriated it.

“It is undisputed the relevant appropriations acts have been valid law from the time they were enacted to today. For almost all that period, Defendants did not even dispute that the laws were mandatory and required them to spend the funds,” he wrote. “The President never asked Congress to rescind the funds at issue even though he successfully sought rescission of analogous funds in May 2025.”

The Trump administration filed a notice of appeal on Sept. 4.

“President Trump has the executive authority to ensure that all foreign aid is accountable to taxpayers and aligns with the America First priorities people voted for,” White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a statement.

Republicans and Democrats have criticized the pocket rescission.

“With the Trump Administration’s attempt of the so-called ’pocket rescission,’ it is clear that Republicans are prioritizing chaos over governing, partisanship over partnership, and their own power over the American people,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a Sept. 2 letter.

“Republicans should not accept Russ Vought’s brazen attempt to usurp their own power,” Senate Appropriations Committee Vice Chair Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said in an Aug. 29 statement, referring to the director of the Office of Management and Budget.

“No president has a line item veto—and certainly not a retroactive line item veto.”

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) called the pocket rescission “unlawful.”

“Congress alone bears the constitutional responsibility for funding our government, and any effort to claw back resources outside of the appropriations process undermines that responsibility,” she wrote on X.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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2025-09-05
Boost productivity and stop wasting man hours in meetings. Starting from now …

Totalling the cost of paid employees sitting in meetings for hours vs. effective productivity was a hot topic pre-Covid, however it’s not one that’s gone away despite people working from home.

So much psychology has been poured into the correct procedures to boost productivity, with the ‘future of work’ spawning many worldwide conferences and consultants offering their services to fix the problem of solving problems in or outside of the meeting room.
To pull people from their task-lists to congregate within a meeting room to discuss a way of moving forwards within an industry actually sounds proactive, yet if these meetings are mismanaged with no clear form of action to be taken ascertained, it’s become a very expensive way of making people late on their task lists.

Why do we even have meetings?

Many would say for feedback on how a particular campaign is going. Others would say to discuss solutions to problems – some would say to air problems in the first place.
A meeting is a discussion to ascertain how to move forwards on a particular issue.
Execution of work comes outside of the meeting arena. It’s important not only to remember this but to enforce it within the team. Your staff need to be out of meetings long enough to still be able to do their task list. Endless zoom meetings at the moment are having a detrimental effect on staff members working from home who don’t have enough hours in the day offline to actually execute their day job.

Anything and everything is being collated into the ‘meetings’ category but is that correct?

It’s so easy to say ‘let’s have a meeting about that’, however even the word ’meeting’ can conjure up quite dull and flat thoughts. If you’re a leader looking to inspire, take the time to delve into the different functions that a group of your staff can achieve. It can be quite powerful to do this – there are succinct differences between each ‘get together’ which are the opposite of dull and flat. Start renaming all of the various options and you might actually start getting excited about running them yourself.
Staff strategy days aren’t meetings, neither are ideas blasting sessions when working on a particular project.
Meetups – what are these to you? Quiz and a coffee on a Friday or a quick ten minute ideas blast?
A daily or weekly huddle can be organised in a regular fashion to gee up the team. Freelancing within many agencies and companies, I’ve borne witness to many teams do this at the start of the day, to do it well it requires the leader of the team to prepare a quick run through of what projects are working on, notifications of any staff events/milestones and wish everyone well.
This can be a great thing to do for company culture, especially if you’re noticing that your company is getting more and more segmented into the various staffing genres. If your company has or is growing at a dramatic rate it encourages people to realise that there’s more sides to the business that need to be contemplated and brought into the picture. They may take more consideration of how their role affects others. It’s also good for the CEO to be seen at these where possible.

With task management systems and Zooms taking over from physical meetups, the rules pertaining to progressive meetings still apply. If the goal is not to waste valuable productivity time by hoarding your staff into one place, likely disrupting their already extensive to-do list, follow this method for bossing your next company meeting:

Everyone in the company should be clear on the rules and formation for requesting and delivering a meeting.
The meeting should be planned with at least 48 hours notice
An email/task created should be sent around to the members asking them to confirm. Inside the memo it should list the main bone of contention and the need for each participating team member
The organiser should think carefully who to invite. Only members of vital importance and relevance must attend. Feedback can be fed down the chain or up where needed. For feedback to be effective, notes of minutes must be taken. If staff member’s are stuck on time for typing this up, use a voice recording and transcribing system such as otter.ly to expedite the process
A time must be set for the meeting. Jason Shah, founded do.com on the basis that meetings only ever needed to be ten minutes long. Speed talking solutions. OK perhaps sometimes that won’t be long enough. Instead, ensure that each staff member attending knows that they have a specific amount of time to talk and share their solutions. It will make them hone their concepts beforehand and really help them to consider options to drill down on within their time frame.

If all else fails when you’re back in the office …

Stand up meeting room tables – the psychology behind this one is simple: humans love to sit. So place them in a situation whereby they can only return back to their beloved office chair once they’ve resolved whatever situation is on-hand and the meeting will naturally run faster.

2023-07-30
Spotify Now Lets Family Plan Members Access Audiobooks in the US!
Spotify Turns Up the Audible Volume—Now You Can Bundle Audiobooks & Family

So, big news for anyone who’s ever dreamt of being “just a minute away from the next chapter.” Spotify has just added a brand‑new Audiobooks+ plan for the US, costing just $11.99 a month. What is it, you ask? Think of it as a monthly membership that gives you 15 extra hours of audiobooks—and, for the first time ever, it’s open to your entire family or your Duo buddies.

What’s All the Fuss About?
- Before this move, only the person holding the Spotify card could sip on audiobooks. The rest of the household had to wait.
- The plan allows a household member on a Family or Duo plan to add 15 hours of listening each month on top of the normal Premium allowance.
- For the studiously voracious, this isn’t a budget catch but a way to keep the stories flowing.
How Does It Fit into the Existing Spotify World?

With Spotify Premium, you already get 15 hours of audiobook listening per month—plus you can buy more ticks if you’re a “whoops‑there‑was‑more‑to‑hear” kind of person. The Audiobooks+ plan is essentially a subscription add‑on: you’re paying for those 15 hours recurring every month. It’s a neat little upgrade that keeps the extra hours coming, like a steady high‑quality coffee supply for your ears.

Who Gets the New Bonus?

Beyond the cardholder, the new “Audiobooks+ for Plan Members” feature opens the library up to all other family or duo participants – the first time anyone outside the main account can actually dive into Spotify’s vast audiobook catalog. It’s a win for those of us who love to binge‑read—or, well, binge‑listen—without hitting a “family share limit.

Where Else Is This Happening?
- The rollout isn’t restricted to the US ribbon; your tunes are rolling out in many countries already.
- It’s especially available in Ireland, Canada, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and a slew of European spots — Ireland, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Liechtenstein.
Long story short: if you’ve been catching the “good vibes” on your Spotify and you’re itching for more stories on the go, this new plan is a no‑brainer. Grab it, share it, and enjoy the side‑by‑side adventure of music and books with your loved ones. Happy listening, folks!

Spotify’s New Book‑ish Move: Audiobooks+ Goes Global

Why the hype matters

After a rough quarter of stunted revenue, Spotify’s CEO Daniel Ek blames a failing ad market for the shortfall. Meanwhile, the company’s user base is still a bright‑spot – 696 million active users and 276 million paying subscribers, a growth of 11 % and 12 % respectively. The new Audiobooks+ subscription is their way to get a bigger slice from that loyal crowd.

What went wrong with family plans

Yep, folks were upset. The original family plan let only the card‑holder tap into audiobooks – no love‑birds, no siblings, no kids. HarperCollins CEO Brian Murray publicly warned Spotify in December that they’d tweak the “technical glitch.” Fast‑forward to last month: Spotify finally opened up audiobook streaming to all book‑ish family members in select markets outside the U.S.

How Spotify feels about the rollout

“We’re listening, and we’ve fixed it,” the company said, launching Audiobooks+ in several European, Asian, and Australian territories. Even though Spotify never disclosed how many of its Premium users actually switch to books, it announced that audiobook hours jumped >35 % YoY in the U.K., Australia, and the U.S. All before the add‑on even hit the market.

The price‑pushing side‑kick
- The platform nudges subscription fees up from €10.99 to €11.99 across the Middle East, Africa, Europe, Latin America, and the Asia‑Pacific.
- “We’re experimenting with other options, like direct book sales,” Spotify teased, hinting at future twists for book lovers.
What’s next?

For the adventurous, Spotify isn’t just adding a new subscription line – they’re testing new ways to monetize the next-gen library. Get ready for some new curves in the book‑market, as they explore direct sales and other clever perks.
2022-04-30