Better together

Brat Packers Rob Lowe and Demi Moore treated us to a yuppie classic in ’86. About Last Night was more than your average rom-com. It was a surprisingly honest portrayal of two young lovers who came of age in the ’80s. 

Dan and Debbie from the film weren’t the only pair that got together that year. In ’86, star-crossed lovers Alena and Chad started off as penpals on other sides of the world and are now celebrating 30 years of marriage. 

Now that’s what love is ;)

We hope you’ve been enjoying our look back at 2024. We’re taking tomorrow off and will be back in your Inbox with our first issue for 2025.

Wishing you all a very Happy New Year from everyone here at Stake Your Day! 🎉

The Federal Aviation Administration handed down its final regulations for what is deemed the first completely new class of aircraft since the helicopter was introduced in 1940.

Powered-lift vehicles lift off and land vertically like a helicopter, but after reaching a certain height, transition to airplane-like vehicles, moving forward with fixed wings.

These aircraft are described by experts as electric vertical takeoff and landing, or eVTOL. They were initially set to be regulated under Part 23 of the Code of Federal Regulations’ Airworthiness Standards. This would have meant they’d be governed by standards applying to regular aircraft.

In 2022, the FAA changed its mind, saying instead they’d be governed under Part 21, meaning they’d be considered a new class of aircraft in need of new standards, a new set of rules for training, operations, maintenance, and more.

These were needed because “existing regulations did not address this new category of aircraft, which can take off and land vertically like a helicopter and fly like an airplane during cruise flight,” the FAA said.

Manufacturers like Joby Aviation, Archer, and Wisk intend to offer eVTOL vehicles for air taxi and automated delivery services.

Your eyes are not deceiving you; that’s a life size photo of what will officially be the world’s smallest working Rubik’s Cube, set to be released next year by a Japanese toy company ironically named MegaHouse. 😜

It’s a somewhat cruel invention if you think about it, as if solving a Rubik’s Cube wasn’t already hard enough.

This one will test the patience and the dexterity of those who dare to solve it, though as you can see in the picture, you’ll likely need a special companion device to actually turn the faces of the cube (or find out if the machine from Honey I Shrunk The Kids actually exists somewhere…).

According to MegaHouse, the cube works exactly like the original, but is about 1,000 times smaller. It weighs just 0.3 grams (0.01 ounces) and each face is just 1.6 millimeters (0.06 inches) wide.

Think you have what it takes to solve this almost microscopic contraption?

It took Courtenay, B.C. resident Ron Perrier 18 years, but he’s finally managed to visit all 193 U.N.-recognized countries, and he’s got some solid—and slightly hilarious—advice for travellers hoping to see the world themselves.

“Unless there are no other options, I avoid tours, guides, hotels, restaurants and taxis,” he said in interview earlier this week. “I don’t buy souvenirs, not even fridge magnets. I don’t take photographs but look at things for visual memory. I travel alone with no fixed itinerary.”

It’s possible Ron is the most interesting man in the world (and frankly, kind of looks like the ‘Dos Equis Guy’). He enjoys solo travelling as he lives with Asperger’s syndrome, which makes it difficult to form social relationships; he used to have a medical practice in Castlegar, worked in the Canadian Arctic, and started travelling in 1995 when a woman he was seeing invited him to tag along on a trip to Patagonia.

“That planted a seed and I just developed a cheap lifestyle and saved until I thought I would never have to work again,” Perrier said. “And that’s what happened, I was 53 and I’ve never had to work again.”

There are 1,201 U.N. heritage sites, and he’s visited 896, the sixth most of anyone on earth.

Read on here to learn more about Ron’s stories from the road.

Best of My Love isn’t necessarily the first or even fifth song that may come to mind for Eagles fans, but that doesn’t change the fact that it was the band’s first chart-topping hit.

Even Glen Frey was skeptical, having expressed frustration while recording 1974’s On The Border. The band parted with producer Glyn Johns and relocated from London’s Olympic Sound to join producer Bill Szymczyk in recording at the Record Plant in Los Angeles.

Already Gone was born after the relocation, but depending on who you ask, the damage—or success—had already been done with the recording of Best of My Love at Olympic Sound.

Perhaps some of the issue was how the song kind of wrote itself. In a 2003 interview with Cameron Crowe, Frey described the writing process for the song as difficult and confusing.

"I was playing acoustic guitar one afternoon in Laurel Canyon," Frey told Crowe, "and I was trying to figure out a tuning that [then-girlfriend] Joni Mitchell had shown me a couple of days earlier. I got lost and ended up with the guitar tuning for what would later turn out to be 'The Best of My Love.'"

A year ago we didn’t even know the comet Tsuchinshan-Atlas existed. Now we’re feeling melancholy, knowing the next few weeks will be the last time we’ll see the visitor from afar for 80,000 years.

The comet was discovered by two separate star seekers in China and South Africa, and is named after the observatories they spotted it from.

It’s expected to make its closest pass this Saturday (Oct 12) and will be visible above the western horizon around an hour after sunset if skies are clear.

Tsuchinshan-Atlas originated in the Oort Cloud, which can best be described as an icey shell beyond the termination shock in the deep outskirts of the solar system. It’s comprised of frozen rocky remnants of the solar system’s nascent period.

Chaotic collisions happen all the time in the Oort cloud, sometimes causing these giant frozen rocks to fall into the Sun’s orbit. As they get closer to the Sun, they start to melt, generating a beautiful million-mile-long tail—a comet’s signature move.

Halley’s Comet is of course the most famous of them all, but won’t return to Earth’s neighbourhood for another 38 years. Until then, enjoy Tsuchinshan-Atlas’ Saturday night show!

New Year’s Eve is upon us, and that got us thinking about the ultimate New Year’s flick—the Dan Akroyd and Eddie Murphy classic, Trading Places!

If you’re a fan of one of the best comedies from the ’80s, then start getting ready to ring in the New Year with today’s trivia ;)

Have a great day ahead Staker!

Trivia courtesy of funtrivia.com. Today’s issue written by Michael Cowan, Joey Cowan, and Maureen Norman.