A long stretch of hot, dry weather has left the Mississippi River so low that barge companies are reducing their loads as shipping costs soar

Ryan Porteous watched his Scotland team-mates gearing up for their summer holidays after Tuesday’s win over Georgia while preparing to start his next campaign the following day. The defender was due back at Watford for a team meeting and day three of pre-season training hours after helping Scotland to victory in difficult conditions. The former Hibernian player is happy to get back to England, though, and get to work under new head coach Valerien Ismael, who was appointed on May 10. “All the boys are jetting off on holiday but I’m back in,” Porteous said. “There will be a big rebuild probably at Watford so I’m looking forward to getting started there. “I had a holiday before. We finished up on the 10th (of May) so I got away for a couple of weeks. “Listen, I will be in good shape going back. That’s what you want as a player. Pre-season is hard enough but if you are in good physical state, as you need to be in this day and age, then it will be of benefit to me.” The defender’s return to club duty might have been delayed at one point as the Euro 2024 qualifier looked in severe doubt because of a waterlogged pitch, with rules stating any abandoned game continues the next day. Porteous got away from Hampden after midnight but the fans were not far in front of him after a near two-hour delay while water was swept off the pitch following a torrential downpour. Speaking after a 2-0 win for the Group A leaders, the 24-year-old said: “We wanted the game to go on because there were 50,000 fans there. For them to come to the game, spend all that money on travel and tickets and then go home very disappointed that the game was the next day, wasn’t what we wanted. “We wanted to play the game. We understand why they (Georgia) wouldn’t because they were 1-0 down, that’s completely understandable, but most of the fans stayed to the end. “The fans were brilliant, because it was a late night for a lot of kids and working people as well.” The victory made it four wins from four in Group A, Scotland’s best start to any qualifying campaign, and sent them eight points clear halfway through their schedule. Porteous said: “It’s exactly where we want to be, but the manager keeps reiterating to us and the press that we have done nothing yet. “We have put ourselves in a fantastic position but it’s one game at a time that will get us there. We need to stay grounded. “Four wins probably doesn’t get you there, you have to keep going.” Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Almost two thirds of football fans oppose VAR, survey finds Leicester and Sale to face holders La Rochelle in Heineken Champions Cup pool Range of armband options for Women’s World Cup as FIFA aims to avoid repeat row

Taylor Swift fans have shared feelings of forgetfulness after seeing the pop-star performing on her highly anticipated Eras Tour. Speaking to Time, Jenna Tocatlian, 25, spoke about her experience seeing Swift at Gillette Stadium in Massachusetts. Speaking about one of Swift’s nightly surprise songs At the concert that Tocatlian attended the song was 'Better Man', but she said: ‘If I didn’t have the 5-minute video that my friend kindly took of me jamming to it, I probably would have told every that it didn’t happen.’ She added that as she waited to leave the stadium, during an hour-long wait, she found it difficult to grasp the reality of a night she had waited so long to experience. ‘It’s hard to put together what you actually witness,’ she told Time. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter It seems Tocatlian isn’t the only one experiencing ‘post-concert amnesia’. Taking to social media, many users have shared their inability to recall the events of the show, from small details to even significant parts of the concert. Some described having feelings of guilt after waiting so long to attend the show and leaving without explicit memories. Ewan McNay, an associate professor in the psychology department at the State University of New York in Albany, told Time that the experience may be a result of too much excitement. He explained that ‘this is not a concert-specific phenomenon - it can happen any time you’re in a highly emotional state.’ This is because as a result of feelings of excitement, the body’s stress levels increase, which in turn causes neurons associated with memory to start firing indiscriminately. McNay shared that this makes forming new memories ‘really hard.’ The biological explanation for this occurrence is due to the body seeing excitement as a state of stress. The body then starts pumping out the brain’s favourite molecule for memory: glucose. Because the body thinks it’s stressed, it doesn’t want to waste energy on memory formation. Your vagal nerves, which regulate internal organ functions, also become stimulated as a result of the perceived stress. All this causes the part of your brain responsible for emotional processing - known as your amygdala - to release a neurotransmitter called norepinephrine. This helps to categorise memories as having high emotional content, increasing the likelihood that they’ll be stored vividly in your mind. However, McNay goes on to explain that too much of this chemical release can actually invest the process, especially if caffeine or alcohol are included. Which leads to your brain struggling to create and store new memories. For those who want to try and have a better memory of an important event, whether it’s seeing Taylor Swift, or getting married, McNay shared some helpful techniques. He says to try and achieve a ‘semi-meditative state’ and relaxing. He also adds that physical responses such as screaming at a concert tells the body that you must be scared. If you stand still in a more relaxed state, your brain will know not to get too excited, and aid the formation of new memories. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

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