The Metro UK has a sweet story about a hippo who saved two young animals as thousands migrated across the Mara River.

Visitors to a safari near where Out Of Africa was filmed saw a hippo intervene twice to to save two young animals -- a wildebeest and a zebra -- who were struggling to make it through the currents .

First, the kindly hippo helped a tiny gnu who had been nearly swept away to the river bank. Then, 10 minutes later, the same hippo escorted a struggling zebra ashore.

‘It was an unforgettable incident,’ said Abdul Karim, head guide at Sanctuary Olonana in the Masai Mara, Kenya. "Maternal love can be so strong it can even surpass species boundaries.’'

And stories about maternal love offer succor to bloggers on a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad news day.