Out goes the bad air

The Police really hit it big with Every Breath You Take. Killer video? You bet. #1 on the charts? For several weeks. Best selling single of ’83? Yep. Song of the Year? Check. All these years later it continues to be be the biggest revenue generator from the band’s catalog.

When it comes to living, breathing is as essential as it gets, but it can do more than keep us alive. Focused breathwork can help curb anxiety and depression. Here are some tips on how to approach conscious breathing.

Sometimes it’s all you need ;)

Starting tomorrow, we’re launching a revamped version of the daily retro trivia that you can find every day at the bottom of the newsletter.

What does that mean? More nostalgia for all us ’60s kids, all new questions, and best of all, a daily prize.

Each day, we’ll randomly draw from everyone who plays and give away a $25 Amazon eGift Card to one lucky player. Yes, you read that right, all you’ll have to do is play for a chance to win!

It’s gonna be a blast 😎 

The Henley Passport Index was published the other day, revealing what countries currently possess the most powerful passports. The index documents the strength of a passport based on how many countries it allows the holder to visit without needing a visa.

These power rankings are in constant flux, which is why Henley & Partners publishes the index on a quarterly basis.

Reclaiming its seat atop the passport mountain this quarter was Singapore, the world’s 20th smallest country. According to Henley, a Singapore passport will allow you entry into 195 of 227 countries and territories around the world visa-free.

Japan squeezed into second place at 193 destinations after regaining visa-free access to China, a status rescinded during the COVID-era lockdowns.

France, Germany, Italy, Spain, South Korea, and Finland all tied for no. 3 at 192, followed by Austria, Denmark, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway and Sweden in fourth place at 191. Belgium, New Zealand, Portugal, Switzerland and the United Kingdom tied for fifth place at 190.

Canada and the United States came in 7th and 9th place, with citizens of each country enjoying visa-free access to 188 and 186 countries/territories, respectively.

According to a new study published in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, those with jobs that involve more sedentary work and unconventional or sporadic schedules experience more symptoms of insomnia.

The study surveyed 1,000 workers over the course of ten years, and identified three health categories: good sleepers, catch-up sleepers, and insomnia-like sleepers. It found sedentary work led to a 37% increase in insomnia symptoms, while 66% often felt the need to catch up on sleep.

"The way we are designing work poses serious, long-term threats to healthy sleep,” said University of South Florida psychologist and study lead, Clare Smith. “Healthy sleep involves more than just getting your eight hours. It’s also falling asleep easily, sleeping through the night and having a consistent sleep schedule. Companies should be aware of the specific sleep risks of their workforce to improve detection and intervention."

Smith said sedentary work can mess with circadian rhythms, making it harder to fall asleep and stay asleep but leading to frequent daytime fatigue.

The study suggests those who work sedentary jobs should look for ways to include more movement in their daily routines to improve the health of their sleep patterns.

Amazon Prime members have been able to leverage the Try Before You Buy program for nearly seven years, allowing them to order clothing items and try them on before actually having to pay. According to Amazon, the program will be discontinued on Jan. 31.

The company says it’s ending the service because so few items offered by Amazon actually fall under the program’s umbrella along with technological advances that ostensibly render it obsolete.

For example, according to Amazon spokesperson Maxine Tagay, customers can use Amazon’s Virtual Try-On AR feature when shopping for shoes, which allows them to use their smartphone’s camera to superimpose the shoes they’re browsing onto their feet to see how the shoes would look and if they fit.

“Given the combination of Try Before You Buy only scaling to a limited number of items and customers increasingly using our new AI-powered features like virtual try-on, personalized size recommendations, review highlights, and improved size charts to make sure they find the right fit, we’re phasing out the Try Before You Buy option, effective January 31, 2025,” Tagay said in a statement provided to The Verge.

In a new study published in Antiquity, researchers from Georgia, the United Kingdom, and the United States documented their discovery of an ancient fortress in Georgia that’s actually 40 times larger than previously thought.

Named Dmanisis Gora, the fortress surrounds a Bronze Age settlement in the Caucasus mountain region that sprawls through parts of Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Russia.

“The use of drones has allowed us to understand the significance of the site and document it in a way that simply wouldn’t be possible on the ground,” said Nathaniel Erb-Satullo of the Cranfield Forensic Institute—who participated in the study—in a Cranfield University statement. “Dmanisis Gora isn’t just a significant find for the Southern Caucasus region, but has a broader significance for the diversity in the structure of large scale settlements and their formation processes.”

Erb-Satullo and his team say the discovery of the sheer magnitude of this settlement sheds light on the urbanization patterns of early civilizations, along with how their societies functioned in general, including their trade, agricultural, security, and general economic practices.

That story about the ancient fortress in Georgia got us thinking about another fortress—the one that belonged to the Man of Steel.

Back in ’78, Superman had us believing that a man could fly, but do you believe you know the movie well? Find out 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.