Good morning and welcome to Thursday. A quick reminder before the news: April Fool’s Day is tomorrow… so keep your eyes peeled. (And get those pranks ready!!🤪)

But just so you know: you can feel safe here. This newsletter is a prank-free zone.🙅‍♀️

🚀⏰ Ready, Set, Go: Today’s news takes 4.04 minutes to read.

"What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from."

–T.S. Eliot (1888-1965)

🇺🇦 Despite Russian negotiators pledging on Tuesday to scale back fighting in northern Ukraine to “increase mutual trust,” local officials reported new attacks outside Kyiv and Chernihiv yesterday.

• Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday that Russia’s promise should not have been viewed as a turning point in peace talks.
• Over 4 million Ukrainians – roughly 10% of the population – have fled the country to date, per the UN’s refugee agency, exceeding the total number the organization predicted for the entire war.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and President Biden spoke for an hour by phone yesterday; Zelensky said they discussed additional defensive support, humanitarian aid and "a new package of enhanced sanctions."
• US officials confirmed that 100 Switchblade kamikaze drones were included in a $800 million weapons package for Ukraine approved earlier this month.
• Germany issued a warning about low natural gas levels and urged citizens to conserve energy amidst a standoff with Russia over fuel payments, while Poland announced plans to end all Russian oil imports.

+The latest news: From the Left | From the Right

Earlier this week, the House overwhelmingly passed (414–5) a bill that would change the design of 401(k)s and similar defined contribution retirement plans, with the aim of improving savings opportunities for workers. It’s now headed to the Senate.

💸📈 Some of the proposed changes…

• Required auto-enrollment: Any employer (with some exceptions for new and small businesses) introducing new retirement savings plans would be required to auto-enroll new employees into them, when eligible, at a pretax contribution of 3% of the employee’s salary. This level would increase annually by one percentage point up to at least 10%, but no more than 15%.
• For those still paying student loans: The bill provides a way for employers to incentivize saving for retirement by allowing companies to provide contributions to a worker’s retirement plan that match student loan payments.
• For those 50 and above: The plan would increase how much savers can contribute if they’re near retirement, and push back when retirees are mandated to pull money from their accounts.

📸 Big picture: Roughly half of American households are at risk of seeing their standards of living decline after retirement because of a shortfall in savings, according to Boston College’s Center for Retirement Research.

+In the know: The S&P 500 has historically averaged a 10.5% annual return. Using this number, if you invest $100/month into an index compounded annually for 45 years, you’d have more than $1 million sitting in your trading account. Bump that up to $500/month and we’re talking more than $5 million. (You can do your own compound interest calculations here. There’s a reason Einstein called it “the eighth wonder of the world.”)

If we were lazy writers, we'd insert a cliched "the future is here" quote here to start... because autonomous robots are slowly creeping into our everyday lives. 

On Tuesday, we covered a study that found self-driving trucks could one day replace up to 90+% of all highway trucking – and today, we’re back with three more examples.

🚁 Autonomous drone delivery: Flytrex, an Israeli startup that delivers food by drone, is expanding to Texas. Residents of a town outside Fort Worth will be able to get drone-dropped meals delivered in roughly five minutes. The company also recently received an FAA waiver to expand its North Carolina drone delivery service to 10,000 homes.

💊 Robot pharmacists: Walgreens is turning to autonomous pharmacists to fill prescriptions. The drugstore chain plans to open 22 robot-powered micro-fulfillment centers across the US over the next three years. A company official estimated that by 2025, as much as half of Walgreens’ prescription volume from stores could be filled by robots at those automated centers.

🚘 Taxis, but driverless: Waymo is sending fully autonomous vehicles onto the streets of San Francisco, marking its first attempt to operate cars without any human control in a major metropolitan area.

• Since 2017, the Alphabet subsidiary has been operating autonomous cars in suburban Phoenix – a much less challenging traffic environment.
• Waymo's expansion comes two months after its biggest competitor, GM-backed Cruise, started offering driverless rides to the San Fran public from 10:30 pm to 5 am local time.

🍩🌎 If you’ve been reading the DONUT for any length of time, you don’t need us to tell you that we’re living in some pretty weird times.

It’s a world where many of us are wearing many hats and juggling multiple jobs. And it can all feel like a real balancing act. ⚖️

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🏫💰 A nearly decade-long scheme to steal tens of millions of dollars from Yale University's School of Medicine is now officially over.

• Former administrator Jamie Petrone, 42, pleaded guilty this week to two counts of federal wire fraud and tax offense for stealing $40 million worth of computers and tablets from 2013 through 2021.
• In her role as director of finance and administration, Petrone had the authority to make certain purchases for Yale Medicine’s emergency department, as long as they were under $10,000.
• Over the years, Petrone would order – or have an employee order – thousands of electronics, including iPads and Microsoft Surface Pros. She would then arrange to have them shipped to a NY business in exchange for money when they sold.
• Yale officials periodically would ask Petrone about the high volume of purchases, but she forged documents claiming the equipment was for specific needs like fake medical studies, or students who didn’t exist.

🚨 How it all ended: The school eventually caught on after receiving an anonymous tip last August that said Petrone was ordering "suspiciously high volumes of computer equipment."

• ☝️ You’re looking at a reconstruction of an ancient reptilian fossil that could represent a transitional species between snakes and land vertebrates; the 308 million-year-old animal had a pair of legs, but no arms.

BUSINESS & MARKETS

• 🏛️ The SEC proposed a slate of new disclosure requirements for special-purpose acquisition companies (SPACs).
• 🗣️ Facebook reportedly hired a political PR firm to plant negative opinion pieces about rival TikTok in US news outlets.
• 🌿 Positive drug tests among U.S. workers have hit a two-decade high (4.6%), per the WSJ.
• 🥑 Avocado prices have hit a 24-year high as the temporary Mexico import ban strains supply; separately, a study published by the American Heart Association found that frequently eating avocados can reduce the risk of coronary heart disease by 21%.

SPORTS, MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT

• 🐉 House of the Dragon, HBO’s Game of Thrones prequel series, has a release date: August 21.
• 🎭 Bruce Willis is stepping away from his acting career after being diagnosed with a brain disorder called aphasia.
• 🏈 NFL safety Malcolm Jenkins announced his retirement following a 13-year career where he won Super Bowls in New Orleans and Philadelphia.

SCIENCE, SPACE & EMERGING TECH

• 👨‍🚀 NASA astronaut Mark T. Vande Hei returned to Earth yesterday after spending a record-breaking 355 days in low-Earth orbit.
• 🚰 A Bill Gates- and Blackrock-backed startup has developed hydropanels that can create fresh water out of thin air.
• ❄️🌋 The mysterious peaks and valleys on the surface of Pluto are likely recently active ice volcanoes, according to a new peer-reviewed study.
• 🌌 The Hubble Telescope took an image of the most distant individual star ever seen; separately, astronomers spotted a rare space object known as an odd radio circle for just the fifth time in human history.

EVERYTHING ELSE

• 💸 One in five Americans run out of money before payday, per a new survey from Salary Finance.
• 😨 Utah is the least-stressed state in America, according to a new report from WalletHub, while Louisiana is the most-stressed.
• 🇺🇸 The Biden administration is expected to end the pandemic-era Title 42 border expulsion policy by late May. (From the Left | From the Right)

💬 Quoted… "We would concur with the conclusion that Mr. Putin has not been fully informed by his Ministry of Defense at every turn over the last month."

• Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said the DoD thinks Russian President Vladimir Putin is being misinformed by his advisors on Russia's military performance in part because they’re afraid to tell him the truth.

📱 Stat of the Day: New social media app BeReal got more than 1 million downloads last month alone.

🤯 Did You Know?... NASCAR drivers can lose 5 to 10 pounds worth of sweat over the course of a single race.

📖 Worth a Read: Bitcoin and Refugees → (CNBC)

🚫 Eliminate them entirely (test-blind) (30%): “Standardized test scores are a direct reflection of zip codes, not student ability. Those from more affluent areas attend better-funded schools and have access to tutoring that helps them score higher.”

⚖️ Make them optional (43%): “I think there’s value in test scores that make it easier for colleges to see where you stand academically. However, I also understand people who can go to study sessions and buy test prep books, etc. tend to do better overall than those who don't.”

📝 Require them for admission (27%): “While not perfect, the ACT and SAT continue to be the best way to put everyone on a level playing field. There needs to be a standardized way to judge students’ academic prowess in some manner.”

+Note on sample size: We received 5,334 responses. 👏🥳 Some may have been lightly edited for grammar or clarity.

📊 Bonus poll results: The Slap Heard 'Round the World – whose side are you on?

Will Smith's – 18%

Chris Rock's – 29%

It was all staged – 14%

Who cares? – 39%

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Meet Charlie, a one-year-old cat with quite the bad boy reputation.

Dubbed the "Klepto-Cat," Charlie has made it his mission to find and steal as many odd bits-and-bobs as possible around his Bristol neighborhood.

🐱🦕 The dinosaur mystery... Alice Bigge, Charlie's owner, first noticed his klepto habits when small plastic dinosaurs started showing up around her home. As it turns out, Charlie had been taking them from a child's playroom down the street. 

• “I woke up with a diplodocus right next to my head on my pillow—which made me think of that moment from The Godfather," said Alice. "Charlie just sat there looking proud of himself.”

Hoping to return all of the stolen items to their rightful homes, Alice's daughter posted the sign pictured above on their front porch.☝️

❓🍽 The Great Recipe Game, aka Hungry Hungry DONUT… For those who missed it the first few go-rounds, here’s how the game works:

We give you a list of ingredients. You give us the completed dish they make. Easy peasy! (The rules, at least.)

☝️ Recipe #1:

• All-purpose flour
• Baking powder
• Salt
• Cold butter
• Cold buttermilk
• Honey

✌️ Recipe #2:

• Beef mince
• Soy sauce
• Sesame oil
• Brown sugar
• Minced garlic
• Spinach
• Bean sprouts
• Shiitake mushroom
• Carrots
• Sea salt
• Steamed rice
• Eggs
• Cooking oil
• Toasted seaweed
• Gochujang
• Sesame oil
• Sugar
• Water
• Roasted sesame seeds
• Vinegar

3️⃣ Recipe #3:

• Chicken breasts
• Plain whole-milk Greek-style yogurt
• Peanut oil
• Fresh lime or lemon juice
• Minced garlic
• Ground coriander
• Ground cumin
• Ground cardamom
• Ground nutmeg
• Paprika
• Cayenne
• Peeled fresh ginger
• Unsalted butter
• Onion
• Tomato purée
• Water
• Heavy cream or half-and-half
• Kosher salt
• Ground black pepper
• Cilantro

(keep scrolling for the answers)

Check out our referral prizes you can get just for introducing people you know to this newsletter. 👇

Here’s your unique link to copy & send to anyone you think would like the DONUT:

Recipe 1: Homemade buttermilk biscuits

Recipe 2: Bibimbap

Recipe 3: Chicken tikka masala