Spring Happenings, March Madness, and New Emojis

Episode
Written By Tracy Kaplan

10 Things You Need to Know: Episode 632

10 Things You Need to Know

1. Happy St. Paddy's Day ☘️

2. Spring Equinox 🌞

3. Highlights from the Oscars 🎥

4. March Madness is Back 🏀

5. A Thoughtful Wish ❤️

6. BIG Buckets by Bam 💥

7. Formula 1 Fame 🏁

8. New Emojis Coming Soon 👀

9. Fortnite Price Hike 💸

10. Crust Worthy Career 🍕

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TRANSCRIPT

INT. TEN NEWS STUDIO

RYAN: It’s the most, wonderful time, of the yeeeear–

PAM: Ummm, that’s a holiday song, Ry…

RYAN: Yeah, but it IS the most wonderful time of the year. Spring is finally here! And I’m feeling LUCKY, and it’s March Madness and new emojis are coming and and and–

PAM: Take a breath, my friend.<SFX DEEP BREATH FROM RY> It sounds like we’ve got a lot to cover. 

RYAN: And I’m exciiiiiited about iiiiiit! Cause I’m Ryan Willard.

PAM: And I’m Pamela Kirkland. It’s Thursday, March 19th..

RYAN: This is Ten Things You Need to Know. 

PAM: Tuesday, March 17th, was perhaps the luckiest day of the year - St. Patrick’s Day! Did you know that St. Paddy’s Day is celebrated in more countries than any other single-day national festival? While it’s not officially a holiday in America, Americans certainly love to celebrate it! Ironically enough, the first parade held in honor of St. Patrick took place in St. Augustine, Florida, in 1601… not in Ireland! And the first actual St. Paddy’s Day parade also took place in America, in the streets of Boston, as a few Irish Protestants honored the patron saint. 

RYAN: Saint Patrick, by the way, is the patron saint of Ireland, although he didn’t always live there. He was born in Britain, and at the age of 16, he was sent to work in Ireland, where he became interested in Christianity and began teaching it to others. It’s believed that he converted many of the country's residents to Christianity, and because he is thought to have died on March 17th, we celebrate St. Patrick’s Day on that date each year!

RYAN: And now I’m fast-forwarding to tomorrow because I can’t wait: it's the first day of Spring! In fact, the Spring Equinox will arrive at 10:46 am EDT for those of you in the Northern Hemisphere. We typically celebrate the first day of spring on March 21st, but calendar creators and astronomers now say that the season begins on March 20th across all North American time zones. 

PAM: Since the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, our hours of daylight have been increasing slightly each day. Leading us to the spring equinox, where the sun's rays shine down on the equator, creating the effect of equal day and night, plus or minus a few minutes. After tomorrow, the direct rays of the sun will migrate north of the Equator, steadily increasing the hours of daylight until we reach the summer solstice, which will be in exactly 93 days!

RYAN: Now we rewind to Sunday, which was a big day for college basketball, but first, we’ve got to recap the Academy Awards! The Academy Awards, also known as the Oscars, honor excellence in the film industry with prestigious annual awards presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. This year’s ceremony was a big one, as Paul Thomas Anderson’s film, One Battle After Another, took home six Oscars, including Best Picture, which is considered the top honor, as it recognizes the overall best film of the year! Paul Thomas Anderson himself was also awarded Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay. In his 30 year career, he’d been nominated 14 times, and this was the first year he’s ever won! 

PAM: Another standout film was Sinners, starring Michael B. Jordan, who won Best Actor for his dual role as twins. And perhaps most notably, it was a big night for the cinematographer for Sinners, Autumn Durald Arkpaw, who became the first woman and the first person of color to EVER to win Best Cinematography. 

RYAN: From movie madness to March Madness, it’s time for college basketball's biggest moments of the year. Selection Sunday took place this week, locking in the men’s and women’s college basketball brackets. UConn, as no surprise, is number 1 overall on the women’s side after the team finished its season with a perfect 34-0 record. Other number 1 seeds include UCLA, Texas, and South Carolina. And, on the men’s side, Duke, Arizona, Michigan, and Florida claimed the number 1 seeds in the men’s tournament. But the Duke Blue Devils take the first seed overall after the team finished the season with a 32-2 record and an ACC Tournament win. The First Four round to determine the final spots are already under way and The women’s NCAA championship game will be played on Sunday, April 5th, followed by the men’s on Monday, April 6th. MARCH MADNESS HAS BEGUN!

PAM: Up next, a teen who’s making big moves to help others in his community. When Jude Baker was 12 years old, he was diagnosed with Ewing sarcoma, a rare type of cancer that affects the bones or nearby tissue. But instead of just focusing on himself, Jude used his Make‑A‑Wish gift in a truly heartwarming way. Make-A-Wish is a non-profit organization that grants wishes to children diagnosed with critical illnesses. Most children wish for a fun trip to their favorite place or to meet one of their favorite people, but Baker’s Make-A-Wish was about helping others. After enduring chemotherapy, Jude decided he wanted to help others who experience situations like his, so Make-A-Wish collected sleeping bags, packed backpacks filled with supplies, and prepared hot meals for homeless individuals for one day in Jude’s Georgia community, helping more than 300 people! 

RYAN: Kindness is the coolest. Jude Baker, you are a legend. Let’s take a quick break so I can think about some ways I can help MY community!

OWEN: Hey Ten’ers, Owen here, with an interesting Saint Patrick's day tradition. Did you know every year the city of Chicago dyes the Chicago river green? The tradition started in the 1960s and continues to this day. The city uses natural dyes to keep animals living in the river safe   and to protect the environment. Now, back to Pam to tell you about something super cool that happened in sports recently.

PAM: We are back… with the Wild World of Sports <SFX Wild World of Sports> Over in the NBA, a player surpassed one of his heroes when he scored the second most points in a game, EVER. In 1962, Wilt Chamberlain scored 100 points and set the record for the most points in a single NBA game. The next closest was Kobe Bryant with 81 points…but on March 10th, 2026, the Miami Heat’s Bam Adebayo went off and had the biggest game of his career and scored 83 points. His previous career high was 41 points…but in this game, Adebayo scored 20 shots from the field, made 36 free throws and hit seven 3-pointers! His insane game helped the Heat beat the Wizards 150 to 129, and it was all in front of his home crowd AND his mom. 

RYAN: And in the world of Formula 1 <SFX F1 Cars zooming by>, one of the youngest drivers just made history at the Chinese Grand Prix. The Italian, 19-year-old, Kimi Antonelli, from Team Mercedes, has been one of the most fun drivers to follow. And at the beginning of his second season in Formula 1, he won his first Grand Prix and became the second youngest driver to ever win a Grand Prix. The record was previously held by Max Verstappen who won the 2016 Spanish Grand Prix at only 18 years old. The last time an Italian driver won a F1 race was 20 years ago, before Kimi Antonelli was born. 

PAM: Over in tech, <SFX Tech Yourself Before You Wreck Yourself> New emojis for Apple and Android will be dropped in the coming weeks! When you next update to the newest operating system, you’ll have access to the Distorted Face, as well as: Trombone, Treasure Chest, Fight Cloud, Orca, Landslide, Ballet Dancers and a Hairy Creature… that last one looks like a big foot or a sasquatch. In case you didn’t know, Apple and Android don’t pick them all by themselves. A group called Unicode Consortium decides which emojis become official across phones everywhere… They say emojis are approved based on “Expected usage, distinctiveness (or if they break new ground), and a broad scope.” And after that, Apple designs its own versions of all of its products. 

RYAN: You know I love my <SFX GGs!> but this one is NOT so great. Fortnite might be free to play, but they’re raising the price of V-Bucks, the in-game currency, and players aren’t happy about it. $9 dollars used to get you 1,000 V-Bucks but now will only get you 800. And $23 used to get you 2,800 V-Bucks but will only get you 2400. Fortnite Crew subscribers will get less each month too and Epic is removing the bonus v-bucks rewards from the main battle pass. The one piece of good news is that the OG, Music and LEGO pass will be cheaper than they previously were. The developer, Epic Games stated in a blog post that: “The cost of running Fortnite has gone up a lot, and we’re raising prices to help pay the bills.” 

PAM: And for the last thing you need to know, let’s go to our Trivia Master, Owen. 

OWEN: Thanks, Pam. We missed one of our favorite days of the year, Pi Day, on March 14th, so we’re celebrating accordingly on today’s trivia! Pizza Hut, one of the most iconic pizza chains, is hiring for a new, unique position. Can you guess what it is? Is it:

  1. Topping taster

  2. Cheese Tester Extraordinaire

  3. Pizza Sauce superstar, or

  4. Hut Crust Connoisseur?

RYAN: I don’t know but I want to do all of those jobs!!

OWEN: The answer is D! Pizza Hut is looking for a Hut Crust Connoisseur to taste-test crust and review new pizza innovations. The chosen connoisseur will receive $31,415.92 for their hard work, plus free pizza for a year! For a chance at the position, applicants must try Pizza Hut’s new Hand-Tossed pizza, post an Instagram review with contest tags, and submit the post through pizzahutcrust.com as a part of their official application. 

PAM: And that was Ten Things You Need to know. 

RYAN: Okay Pam, I’m feeling lucky…I think I should go for that dream job as a Crust Connoisseur….

PAM: I don’t know if you need luck for that, you’re pretty–

RYAN: <SFX SNIFF SNIFFS> (yells down the hall) ADAAAAM! Are you making pepperoni pizza bagels and not offering any to us??

ADAM: NO! Leave me and my lunch alone! 

RYAN: Yeah I’m gonna go make sure he shares…

PAM: We gotta give Ten News Snaps out though!

RYAN: That’s right! But first, here’s a quick note for the grown ups.

<AD BREAK>

RYAN: Time for Ten News Snaps!

PAM: A Ten’er named Abeeman left us a five star review on Apple Podcasts and said, “Welcome to the Butterfly Free Zone. my hobby’s are coin collecting and I love Zelda.” Thanks for writing us Abeeman, what kinds of coins do you collect? What a cool hobby!

RYAN: And thank you for the butterfly free zone, it was glorious and appreciated. Also, I also love Zelda. YUP!

PAM: And two extra notes for the grown-ups, you can now get ad-free versions of our episodes when you join the Ten’ers Club on our website. 

RYAN: And if you want to help support the Ten News, you can make a tax-deductible donation at the link in our show notes. The whole team thanks you for your support!

PAM: “The Ten News” is a co-production of Small But Mighty Media and Next Chapter Podcasts, and part of the Airwave Podcast Network.

RYAN: The Ten News creative team is frolicking because it’s juuuust about the Spring and includes Tracey Not a Crooks, Adam the Great Bambino Bernard, Brian Not Ryan Douglas, the Duke of Earl Davis and Carson Not So Harry Potter. Big thanks to Owen, Not Slowin Down for Anybody.

PAM: Our Production Director is Jeremiah Tittle, and our Executive Producers are Donald Albright, Albright, Albright! and show creator Tracy Takes the Leeds Kaplan. I’m Pamela Kirkland.   

RYAN: And I’m Ryan Willard, thanks for listening to the Ten News.

Tracy Kaplan
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