Maybe you’ve heard that little voice: What if I could make a little money from this? The urge to monetize your hobby can feel tempting, but is it worth it?
Reema talks with people who’ve tried to turn their pastimes into side hustles and finds out what they’ve gained, lost and learned along the way. Then, she speaks with a leading expert on creativity about how money can quietly reshape our motivation – and how to keep our hobbies from turning into just another job.
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Suburban Batavia, just 30 miles west of Chicago, used to be known as the windmill capital of the world. But eventually, technological advances took the wind out of the industry’s sails.
In our last episode, we looked into why there are no wind turbines in the Great Lakes even though conditions are favorable. Legal and political hurdles continue to challenge the offshore wind energy business in the Midwest.
Today, we’re going to take an historical look at the wind industry in our region. In modern times, Batavia is known for Fermilab, America’s particle physics and accelerator laboratory. But long before that, Batavia was on the map for hosting six windmill factories.
Batavia Mayor Jeff Schielke and City Clerk Kate Garrett dive into the town’s history. They take pride in the past, but look forward to the future.
From 1977 to 1978 the Brazilian Air Force investigated a series of alleged UFO sightings, with multiple witnesses, in and around a city called Colares, located in northern Brazil. The official investigation closed without concluding anything unusual was afoot -- but that may actually be where the real story begins. Tune in to learn more about the strange claims, the oddly specific commonalities between witness accounts... and the mysterious events that haunted the investigators, inspiring them to continue their own investigation after the official operation was shut down.
Three commercial oil tankers were attacked in the Strait of Hormuz as U.S. and Israeli airstrikes continue on Tehran — Iran may be losing the war in the air, but it is strangling one of the world's most vital waterways and shaking global markets. President Trump, who campaigned on bringing gas prices down, is now tapping the strategic petroleum reserve as the war drives prices up. And the Pentagon has determined the U.S. is responsible for a missile strike on a girls school in Iran that killed at least 165 civilians on day one of the war — NPR has learned the school had been walled off from a nearby military base years before the strike.
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Today’s episode of Up First was edited by Andrew Sussman, Rebekah Metzler, James Hider, Mohamad ElBardicy and Alice Woelfle.
It was produced by Ziad Buchh and Nia Dumas.
Our director is Christopher Thomas.
We get engineering support from Neisha Heinis. Our technical director is Carleigh Strange
Our deputy Executive Producer is Kelley Dickens.
(0:00) Introduction (01:58) Strait Of Hormuz Crisis (06:17) Gas Price Politics (10:25) Iranian School Strike Investigation
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A continuing military investigation has determined that the United States is responsible for a strike that hit an elementary school in Iran, according to U.S. officials and others familiar with the preliminary findings. Iranian officials have said the death toll was at least 175 people, most of them children.
Malachy Browne and Julian E. Barnes, who have been covering the strike, discuss what probably led to one of the most devastating military errors in decades.
Guest:
Malachy Browne, the enterprise director of the Visual Investigations team at The New York Times.
Julian E. Barnes, a reporter covering the U.S. intelligence agencies and international security matters for The New York Times.
Photo: In a photograph made available by an Iranian semiofficial news agency, rescue workers and residents searched through rubble in Minab, Iran, after a strike heavily damaged a school. Mehr News Agency, via Associated Press
For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.
Iran attacks a series of oil tankers around the Persian Gulf, as several countries decide to draw on their strategic oil reserves. California police departments are warned of potential Iranian drone attacks. And lawmakers demand answers on a strike that hit an Iranian elementary school.
Borneo—split between two countries, home to some of the world’s oldest rainforests and a vast array of animal and plant life—is back in the news. The island is set to be home to Nusantara, Indonesia’s new planned political capital set to, maybe, open in 2028. And the Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak—different from the rest of Peninsular Malaysia—are griping for more rights and authority to control its own wealth.
Author Olivier Hein tackles the long history of Borneo in his latest book titled, appropriately, Borneo: The History of an Enigma (Hurst, 2025). He tackles Borneo’s indigenous communities; the spread of Hindu, Chinese, Muslim and European influence; the rise of the White Rajah; and how Borneo is treated by today’s modern nations.
A former diplomat with the UN, the OSCE and the UK, Olivier Hein has undertaken postings in Kosovo, Turkmenistan, the USA and France. He is also the author of Star and Key: The Historical Adventure of Mauritius and Mother of the World: The Remarkable History of Turkmenistan. He is also a regular contributor to The Chap magazine.
The war with Iran has already killed more than a thousand Iranians, including 175 people killed at an elementary school on February 28th. According to multiple news outlets, a preliminary report from the U.S. military says the U.S. was at fault for that strike. President Donald Trump previously said Saturday that Iran was at fault for the attack and then, on Wednesday, replied, "I don't know about it," when a reporter asked him about the investigation. It's part of a larger pattern in the Trump administration's messaging about the war. From why we're in this conflict in the first place, to what our goals are, to when this war will end, there's a fog around everything. Arizona Democratic Senator Mark Kelly joins the show to discuss how members of Congress are dealing with the White House's stonewalling.
And in headlines, President Donald Trump travels to Ohio and Kentucky to downplay concerns about the economy, no one has any idea what Kristi Noem's new job entails, and newly released deposition videos show a former DOGE staffer struggling to answer basic questions about DEI.
Is the Strait of Hormuz safe? Is the U.S. going to put boots on the ground? Did we obliterate Iran’s nuclear facilities? And why are we at war with Iran… at all?
Guest: Tommy Vietor, political commentator on Pod Save America and Pod Save the World, spokesman for Obama and the National Security Council in 2011 and 2012.
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Podcast production by Elena Schwartz, Paige Osburn, Anna Phillips, Madeline Ducharme, and Rob Gunther.
