It wasn’t all bad
At age 104, Dorothy Hoffner has broken a Guinness World Record by doing something many younger people wouldn’t dare: skydive from 13,500 feet. The Chicago native, who survived both the Spanish flu and the Covid pandemic, first skydived when she was 100 years old. This week, she left her walker on the ground, leaped out of a plane, and landed in Ottawa, Ill. The adventurous centenarian, who used to drive across the country in her Dodge Coronet, suggested that a third jump and a hot-air balloon ride might be on her horizon. “Age is only a number,” she said. When Clare Runacres told her boyfriend, Mike Ramsden, the aggressive cancer she’d been diagnosed with at age 20 had returned after nine years, she believed she only had six months left to live. About a month later, Ramsden proposed to her—and the London couple just celebrated 20 years of marriage. Runacres had surgery right before the wedding, but still worried for years the cancer would come back. It did not, and the couple decided to start a family, and they eventually had two daughters, now 13 and 15. In September, they celebrated their two decades together. “Mikey, thank you for taking a chance on me,” she said. “You are my miracle. For those living with cancer—keep hoping, believing, dreaming.” NASA astronaut Frank Rubio last week set a record for the longest American spaceflight after spending 371 days on the International Space Station. Planned as a six-month trip, Rubio’s mission was extended after the Soyuz capsule that transported him and two Russian cosmonauts was hit by a micrometeorite, which made it unsafe to travel in. The father of four had to wait until a backup Soyuz spacecraft arrived, and had to miss one of his sons’ college graduation. The backup vessel made its way up a few weeks ago, and Rubio and colleagues came safely back to Earth, landing in Kazakhstan. “It’s good to be home,” Rubio said.