An Israeli spectator watches a giant T-Rex balloon during the Purim parade festival in Petah Tikva, Israel, Thursday, March 24, 2016. The Jewish holiday of Purim commemorates the Jews' salvation from genocide in ancient Persia, as recounted in the Book of Esther. (Photo by Oded Balilty/AP Photo)

Natalia Williams dressed as Corpse Bride Emily and Tony Knight as a Mandalorian, arrive at the Bradford Unleashed Comic-Con, an entertainment and comic book convention in England on March 8, 2020. (Photo by Danny Lawson/PA Images via Getty Images)

Students training to be flight attendants hold books on their heads, chopsticks in their mouths, and papers in between their knees, as they take part in a standing posture practice at a vocational school in Shijiazhuang, Hebei province, China May 4, 2017. (Photo by Reuters/Stringer)

Some creations from the new “Funny Food Made Easy” book by Bill and Claire Wurtzel. “Inspiring kids to eat healthy foods with creative works of plate art and easy-to-follow instructions and illustrations. Through finished plate art, detailed step-by-step illustrations, recipes, and tips, Funny Food Made Easy provides all you and your kids need to make, eat, and enjoy healthy breakfasts, lunches, and snacks” – roughly speaking so. Here: Egg, cucumber, olive. (Photo by Bill and Claire Wurtzel/Welcome Books)

Undated David Yarrow handout photo of a gorilla as the self-taught wildlife photographer promotes his book, Encounter. (Photo by David Yarrow/Clearview/PA Wire)

A model takes a picture of photographers outside the Anna Sui show at the Strand Rare Book Room in New York on February 10, 2024. (Photo by Jeenah Moon for The Washington Post)

“Cassowaries are large, flightless birds related to emus and (more distantly) to ostriches, rheas, and kiwis”, writes Olivia Judson in the September issue of National Geographic magazine. How large? People-size: Adult males stand well over five foot five and top 110 pounds. Females are even taller, and can weigh more than 160 pounds. Dangerous when roused, they’re shy and peaceable when left alone. But even birds this big and tough are prey to habitat loss. The dense New Guinea and Australia rain forests where they live have dwindled. Today cassowaries might number 1,500 to 2,000. And because they help shape those same forests – by moving seeds from one place to another – “if they vanish”, Judson writes, “the structure of the forest would gradually change” too. (Photo by Christian Ziegler/National Geographic)