Les bonnes nouvelles (good news)

Some scenes from an afternoon bike ride through forest and orchard, and a pit stop at my favourite local café, where good news was on offer.

The forest was lush and green
Long grass in the orchard
Wildflowers aplenty: clover and buttercups here
A favourite café in the neighbourhood

A list of good news from around the world was displayed on the board on the pavement outside the café, including:

  • Mexico has banned glyphosate (a broad-spectrum herbicide, used in weed killers) and GM corn.
  • Kazakhstan has abolished the death penalty.
  • Electric fishing is banned in Europe.
  • Herrings communicate through passing gas (good news? Or just funny?)
  • A European law has just been passed against the obsolescence of smart phones and washing machines, which should now have a repairability rating.
  • In the state of Virginia, in the US, capital punishment has been abolished. It is the first southern state in the US to do so.
  • Species previously thought extinct are reappearing, including a species of turtle, wild dog and frog.

It’s a lefty, liberal, environmentally friendly kind of neighbourhood, and I love it for that. I haven’t fact-checked the items on the good news list, but it certainly added an extra touch of sweetness to my latte and crepe with lemon and sugar.

20 thoughts on “Les bonnes nouvelles (good news)

  1. Good new plus crepes along with a beautiful bike ride, what else do you need for a lovely day? I was particularly delighted to hear about the herrings.

  2. I want to come and live with you – can you adopt me please 😉 Lovely photos from your bike ride. I wish I had a cafe like that near me!

    1. Consider yourself adopted 😀 There are some lovely things about living here, this café being one of them, though I do miss things from ‘home’ too – fish and chips by the seaside…

      1. Oh well we can do an exchange – I live in Liverpool so not too far from the beach! Plenty of fish and chips here 😎

  3. From one lefty, liberal, environmentally friendly individual to another, that is a lot of good news. Re: the Virgina story…recently genetic evidence from a knife that was available at the time of trial but ignored by the prosecution revealed that a man (African American) was executed wrongfully as his DNA was not on the knife but that of another person. With all that is going on here in the past year or two, that was not surprising although very disheartening.

    Every once in a while a previously thought to be extinct animal comes back from the dead like that turtle. It is such a big world out there and some things just stay under the radar for a long time.

    Thanks for sharing all that “bonnes nouvelles” and the lush countryside of your bike ride, Sel.

    1. Those stories of innocent people wrongly convicted and then killed for it are just horrifying…but it’s good news that Virginia at least has turned the page. It’s so encouraging that good things are happening despite all bad stuff, and that our hopes and efforts are not in vain!

  4. Oh delightful selwa what a great way to see the world around us very funny about herrings human gas also?!😁🧿🚲🥰

  5. What a lovely idea. We need all the good news we can get! Looks like a lovely forest to ride through too. 😃

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