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PODCAST

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun

Caloroga Shark Media / Happiness Good News Lab

Every day the news feels heavy. 5 Good News Stories is your daily antidote — five short, uplifting stories about human kindness, scientific breakthroughs, unexpected heroes, and moments that remind you the world isn"t as broken as the headlines suggest. Hosted by John McDermott, each episode is under 10 minutes and designed to start your morning right or reset your afternoon. If you"re looking for a positive news podcast, a feel-good daily listen, or just five minutes of happiness — this is your

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All Episodes

5:39

America’s Most Misspelled Words, a Pay-What-You-Can...

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/28

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories, starting with Unscrambler.com’s analysis of Google searches for spelling help, led by “bougie,” followed by “favorite” and “through,” plus state-by-state examples like Florida searching “school” and Georgia “chihuahua.” He highlights The Long Table, a restaurant with one or two dishes nightly where everyone sits together and pays what they can; it served 38,305 meals last year, about half below cost and 10% free, and its founder Tom hopes others adopt the

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4:49

Elephants get cool audio system

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/27

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: RMIT researchers in Australia are adding about 1% cigarette butt material to clay to make bricks that need less kiln energy, are lighter, and insulate better, helping address the over six trillion plastic, toxin-leaching cigarette butts discarded yearly. At Zoo Atlanta, a Georgia Tech PhD student designed an audio enrichment system for elephants—computer vision detects trunks entering a wall’s holes and triggers low-frequency tones that the elephants find

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5:12

Charlie the Cow Saved, AI Spots Pancreatic Cancer...

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/25

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: Charlie the Cow, raised in a Florida 4-H program, was at risk after a weigh-in found him too skinny, but animal lover Leslie raised funds (including paying out of pocket) to buy and transport him to Bell Family Farm sanctuary in Polk City with help from donor Sarah; researchers at the Mayo Clinic developed an AI model that detects early signs of pancreatic cancer on CT scans up to three years before typical diagnosis and performed three times better than

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5:01

Off Campus Star Kidney Chain Hero, $1.9M for a...

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/23

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: actor Belmont Cameli’s two abdominal scars are from donating a kidney in 2018, triggering a 14-person paired exchange that gave seven patients transplants and eventually helped his childhood friend Brendan after six years waiting; 88-year-old Michigan veteran Ed Bambas, who returned to work as a grocery cashier after his wife died and his pension was cut, received over $1.9 million via a GoFundMe started by creator Samuel, and they’ve launched the “For Your

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5:22

Mister Rogers Stamp Returns, Whale-Spotting AI, ALS...

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/21

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: the USPS is reissuing the 2018 Mister Rogers Neighborhood stamp after it won an encore contest by over 40,000 votes, returning as a Forever stamp with souvenir sheets. In San Francisco Bay, an AI detection system called Whale Spotter uses thermal cameras to spot whales day and night and alert ships to slow down, addressing a rise in gray whale deaths, many from ship strikes. A JAMA study reports tofersen (Qalsody) slowed and sometimes reversed symptoms in a

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4:18

Cat Adopts Bunny! The World's Largest Blanket Fort!

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/20

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: a Canadian group celebrated the World Cup by setting a Guinness record for human foosball with 254 people attached to giant rods; a Noah Kahan lyric highlights Strafford, Vermont’s Elizabeth Mine cleanup and its 20,000-panel solar farm producing about 8.7 million kWh—powering over 1,300 homes; Southern California’s Wallace Annenberg Wildlife Crossing over all 10 lanes of US 101, under construction since 2022, has already been used by a hummingbird and aims

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5:00

Ricky Gervais Donkey, McDonald’s Hacks, Professional...

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/18

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: Safe Haven for Donkeys named a foal “Gervase” after Ricky Gervais donated £100,000 as part of £2.5 million split among 22 animal charities; the charity treats donkeys across Israel, the West Bank, Gaza, and parts of Egypt, and rescued a pregnant donkey, Debra, who gave birth at its Israel sanctuary. A McDonald’s employee says the drive-thru is usually faster due to timed metrics, suggests ordering a double cheeseburger “dressed like a Big Mac” for less, and

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4:24

Each State has its own Replica Liberty Bell

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/16

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: in 1950 the Treasury commissioned 2,080-pound Liberty Bell replicas for each state as part of a savings bond drive—cast in France with matching markings and a fake crack—touring on flatbed Ford trucks before being given to states; bell hunter Tom has tracked down 40 via tomlovesthelibertybells.com, while the Washington, DC bell has been missing since the early ’80s. Scientists developed a hemp-based plastic alternative that can stretch up to 1,600% and

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4:17

Nature Festival Dress Code Requires Clothes, the...

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/14

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: Organizers of England’s Cumbria Nature Festival clarified on social media that it’s for naturalists, not naturists, asking attendees to dress appropriately and offering genuine refunds to anyone expecting a nudist event, though none have been needed. In Durham County, North Carolina, the sheriff’s office warned residents about a very large pig on the loose, urging people to report sightings but not attempt capture, and noting the owner is unknown. A

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4:25

The World's Richest Cat Is Broke

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/13

Johnny Mac shares five stories, including that Karl Lagerfeld’s famed cat Choupette has not received the reported $1.5 million inheritance seven years after his death due to a dispute involving the estate and French tax authorities; under French law pets can’t inherit directly, so money would go to her caretaker, who says she has received nothing and works part-time to support the cat. In Miami, 500+ soccer players and 5,000+ people broke a Guinness World Record by juggling a soccer ball in unison

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3:53

KITT from Knight Rider gets a ticket in NYC

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/11

The car from Knight RIder got a ticket in New York City!5 Good News Stories is a daily podcast with five positive, uplifting news stories to brighten your day. New episodes every day. Follow on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. Part of the Caloroga Shark Media networkJohn also hosts Daily Comedy NewsUnlock an ad-free podcast experience with Caloroga Shark Media! For Apple users, hit the banner which says Uninterrupted Listening on your Apple podcasts app. Subscribe now for exclusive

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3:41

The Jacket in the Carpool Lane

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/09

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: In Chicago, two automated delivery robots—one from Serve Robotics at Grand and Racine and another from Coco Robotics at North and Halsted—crashed into bus shelters and shattered glass, with no injuries reported, prompting a petition to end the program with nearly 4,000 signatures. Pickle the pony, rescued at nine months old in critical condition with strangles, equine flu, and repeated salmonella positives, has recovered at the Penny Farm Rescue and Rehoming

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4:24

The $812,000 bottle of wine John can't pronounce

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/07

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: a single bottle of 1945 Domaine de la Romanée-Conti sold for $812,000, a record driven by its last pre-replant vintage from century-old Burgundy vines, and John calls it the greatest wine he has tasted. A 19-year-old mustang named Gringo set a Guinness World Record by performing 38 tricks in 2:47 using clicker training and positive reinforcement. In North Sumatra, an orangutan finally used a canopy rope bridge installed to safely cross a road splitting a

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3:37

Would you use Used Diapers as recycled toilet paper?

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/04

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: Japanese towns facing shrinking landfill space recycle used diapers into new diapers and even toilet paper by having residents separate and label waste, then washing, shredding, breaking it down, and sterilizing pulp with ozone gas to meet strict hygiene standards. Luis, a 45-year-old with MS symptoms and past vision loss, is alerted by his guide dog Jerry, who persistently pressed his chin to Luis’ left leg; doctors found deep vein thrombosis exactly there

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3:50

The Goldfish that can Drive a Car

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/06/02

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: In the Netherlands, engineer Thomas built a motion-sensing car with a water-tank seat for his goldfish Blub, who drove 40 feet 3.46 inches in one minute to set a world record; Thomas hopes the technology can be useful for mobility issues. In New York, 270 people in Mario costumes gathered at a GameStop on March 10 to celebrate Mario’s holiday and beat the prior record of 230 set in China in 2010. In England, an ancient Phoenician coin used as bus fare in

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3:51

Dog fights off bear, saves chickens!

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/05/31

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: In New Mexico, Honey, a 12-year-old half-blind dog, fought off a bear threatening a chicken coop and her family, suffered serious head and neck injuries, and recovered after emergency surgery. In Australia, conservationists helped endangered regent honeyeaters relearn their mating song by placing wild adult males with captive young birds so they could learn directly. In the Netherlands, 8-year-old Feline won a national contest and had her “Sweet Monster

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3:44

Zeus the Zebra escapes twice in four days

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/05/28

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: Aubrey, a manager at an Applebee’s in Michigan, guided staff and dozens of customers into a windowless prep kitchen and pulled people in from outside just before a tornado hit, with glass shattering as it passed. In Venice, the Galleria dell’Accademia is letting visitors watch conservators restore Giovanni Bellini’s 500-year-old "Madonna and Child Enthroned" in real time, a two-year, $580,000 project using UV and infrared imaging to remove old varnish,

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3:36

The World's Deepest Marathon

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/05/26

Jenny Mac shares five good news stories: a Guinness World Record for the deepest marathon, run 3,669 feet 10 inches underground in a mine by 55 runners from 18 countries over 11 laps in hot, humid, dusty conditions, raising about $1 million for charity; an English woman whose German Shepherd’s unusual sniffing led her to a scan that found a golf-ball-sized stage-one lung tumor that was removed, highlighting how dogs can detect disease-related odor molecules and efforts to build sensor-based

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4:40

Catman walks across Australia

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/05/24

Host Johnny Mac shares “five good news stories” (ultimately “four”): a Japanese man nicknamed Catman completes a 4,000-mile, two-year walk across Australia from Carnarvon to the Sydney Opera House in a full-body cat costume, pushing a wheelbarrow, raising about $50,000 for children’s cancer research, and gaining 850,000 Instagram followers; inspired after a breakup, he describes harsh, smelly conditions and plans to walk around the world. A 31-year-old woman camps three weeks at Arkansas’ Crater of

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4:04

The Felled Sycamore Gap Tree to become art

5 Good News Stories - happiness and fun ·

2026/05/21

Johnny Mac shares five good news stories: the felled Sycamore Gap tree is becoming a national art project, with six shortlisted artist teams using the preserved, seasoned wood and a public vote helping shape its legacy, aiming for completion by 2028. CrossSense is developing AI-powered glasses for people with dementia, using an assistant called Wispy to recognize objects, label them in-lens, and give audio guidance; trials found three in four patients reported a significant quality-of-life

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614 results

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