Quote of the Day: “You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” – Malala Yousafzai
Photo by: Éric Deschaintre (cropped)
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quotes page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
A woman who needed help fostering a blind dog named Beau ended up finding both it, and a forever home for him after the help she found fell in love with the dog over video calls.
Samantha Hillstrom thought her own blind dog Finn could use the companionship of little Beau, a Pomeranian poodle mix who was rescued from an Iowa puppy mill. Now Hillstrom believes that Beau was brought to her by Finn, who died just 36 hours after the new pooch arrived.
It’s a touching story: Beau was set, along with his brothers and sisters, to be euthanized after there wasn’t enough demand for adoption. A New Jersey resident named Jennifer decided to save two from this fate, and took them into her home for foster care.
Jennifer learned that blind dogs sometimes use medium sized plastic rings called “halos” which provide a safe, circular bumper in front of their heads to help them avoid collisions.
Hillstrom explained that she lived in a neighboring town to Jennifer, and saw on social media that the foster mom was looking for a halo for Beau.
“I had a blind dog as well, I said I would be happy to share tips with her on how to take care of one,” said Hillstrom. “Jen and I sat on the phone Facetiming for hours, talking, getting to know each other. She was holding Nelson, now known as Beau and I was holding Finn and by the end of our conversation I just said ‘I have to apply for this dog.'”
On December 1st, after six weeks of waiting, Hillstrom welcomed Beau into her home, who learned very quickly how to use his halo, and made a dear friend out of Finn, who sadly passed away not two days after Beau arrived, as if passing a torch.
“If I were never Finn’s mom and I never learned how to take care of a blind dog, I never would have been able to take care of Beau,” said Hillstrom. “It’s a tragic, heart-breaking story and I can’t believe my dog just died but I do believe these things happen as they’re supposed to and it is a wild part of the story.”
Beau is learning how to recognize Samantha’s commands, map the apartment and make sure he knows how to get around effectively.
Hillstrom said the pair have changed her life in a way she never thought possible.
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Today the U.S. Department of Energy announced a breakthrough in nuclear fusion where more energy was gained from the process that was needed to heat atoms to temperatures hotter than the sun.
The electricity generated was only enough to boil 10 kettles of water, British fusion energy experts told CNN in anticipation of the release, but who nevertheless described it as “a true breakthrough moment which is tremendously exciting.”
Nuclear fusion is a potential new energy source with increasingly real potential to solve the West’s energy needs. It replicates the process of melding two atomic nuclei together which happens at the center of our sun, a function of physics which releases intense amounts of energy as heat through escaping neutrons.
Theoretically, it has the potential to generate enough energy to power a household for a human lifetime on a single glass of seawater, remarks MIT’s fusion company. It produces no emissions, and unlike nuclear fission, the currently-used method of nuclear power, generates no radioactive waste.
The breakthrough was achieved at the National Ignition Facility located in the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, California, where giant lasers bombarded a hydrogen fuel source, likely the heavy hydrogen isotope deuterium, with an array of 200 lasers. It produced around 5.6 kilowatt hours of energy.
Last year, GNN reported that this facility achieved a fusion reaction that put the equipment there on the cusp of generating clean energy at a rate greater than its expenditure.
“This is a landmark achievement for the researchers and staff at the National Ignition Facility who have dedicated their careers to seeing fusion ignition become a reality, and this milestone will undoubtedly spark even more discovery,” said U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm.
The press release also said the DoE is currently restarting a broad-based, coordinated fusion energy program in the United States. Combined with private-sector investment, there is a lot of momentum, they claim, to drive rapid progress toward fusion commercialization.
MORE FUSION NEWS: Australian Company Works to Make Energy From Nuclear Fusion – But Without the Fiery Ball of Plasma
Lasers are only one currently-used method of nuclear fusion. Others involve using supermagnets to create pressures many-times greater than at the bottom of our ocean in a machine called a tokamak. Neutrons and alpha particles from the compressed fuel source escape and it the liner of the tokamak chamber, whose energy is collected as heat, used to power turbines and generate electricity.
This method was used to generate 11 megawatts of energy in 5 seconds in the Joint European Torus tokamak in February.
Still others are using plasma, the fourth state of matter, contained within a swirling sphere of liquid lithium, in the case of one Canadian-UK partnership. It’s currently unclear exactly which configuration will produce the conditions for market-scale nuclear fusion.
All these methods are trying to tackle the same problems: can humanity create a system of these incredibly expensive, sophisticated, and energy-hungry machines that won’t cost billions of dollars, and can actually sustain a fusion reaction long enough for it to generate electricity to power buildings.
With today’s announcement those problems remain, but feasibility is always an important step in the road to developing anything.
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Football isn’t coming home for England, but the Three Lions are adding a fourth, albeit a small one, for the journey home.
The English National Football team is bringing Dave the Cat home from Qatar with them. The cat began to appear in players’ social media feeds, as the stray had taken to eating with the team and became their unofficial mascot.
That was center-back John Stones explaining the origin story of the little vagabond. Anyone who has visited the Muslim world will know that stray cats are neither rounded up by animal control, nor reviled, bothered, or considered a nuisance.
GNN has reported that in Istanbul, each street and neighborhood will have it own stray(s) and there are even parks for them to live and keep warm in winter.
England defender Kyle Walker said that Dave would come home if England won the World Cup, but as it turns out he’s coming home all the same.
"Dave's fine. Thank you for asking." @kylewalker2 gave the media an update on the #ThreeLions' popular resident cat 🐈 pic.twitter.com/YuxZlbnOIq
— England (@England) December 7, 2022
A member of the traveling support staff for the team was eventually charged with taking Dave to the vet, ensuring he receives vaccinations and that his paperwork is in order to come home to England, where it’s not been revealed which team member will be adopting him.
England were eliminated on penalties to tournament-favorites France, and go home after a powerful showing in the earlier rounds.
WATCH Dave on his way to the vet…
Dave the cat is coming home.
— PA Media (@PA) December 11, 2022
The England #FIFAWorldCup squad have adopted a stray cat in Qatar, who spent time around the players in between matches and has begun its journey to join them in the UK pic.twitter.com/eXMDEfSnIs
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On December 10th, teammates and fans of Northwestern State sounded their applause when their new freshmen basketball player scored his first points for the team.
It was an extra special applause for the point guard, since Hansel Emmanuel has only one arm.
A minute later he added to his total with a thunderous dunk in what became a 91-73 win over Louisiana-Monroe, bringing the crowd of 1,600 to their feet.
But this is far from the beginning of Hansel Emmanuel’s story: last year, ESPN was already reporting that college recruiting analysts were interested in the young man from the Dominican Republic.
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Playing on a cinderblock wall when he was six, it collapsed under him, crushing his arm and necessitating amputation. But like all champion athletes, he never stopped working, never let anyone feel sorry for him, and soon began to create a major social media following with small clips of him playing street ball.
Emmanual’s father was a professional in the Dominican Republic, and the social media videos caught the attention of one of his father’s former teammates—the head coach at Life Christian Acadmey in Florida. He brought Emmanual over on a scholarship, and soon the one-armed guard won the state championship, bringing interest from college scouts.
That journey began in January of 2021. Now just 23 months later, 19-year-old Emmanual has his first points at the college level. Last Saturday he was 2 of 3 from the field and 1 of 5 from the foul line, along with two rebounds in eight minutes.
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“I had to keep going after the layup—that was my first bucket,” Emmanuel said in a quote posted on the Southland Conference school’s website. “I know my family was proud. I had to keep working. You can’t give up.”
WATCH an ESPN mini-doc about Emmanual…
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Quote of the Day: “When you have a dream, you’ve got to grab it and never let go.” – Carol Burnett
Photo by: Bobby Johnson
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quotes page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
The Lesson: Philanthropy comes in many forms, and from many faces. Whether it’s the lifestyle we try to live, the purchasing decisions we make, the parents we were born to, or the careers we’re pursuing, there’s a role for everyone in leaving the world a better place than when we found it.
Notable Excerpt: “There’re so many choices we make, and I’m not saying you have to make 1,000 choices a day that are directed towards social impact, but planting that seed in your consciousness that you want to be here on Earth as a vehicle of social change for the better really starts to, in the most beautiful of ways, affect your decision making. So while most people think of social impact as big philanthropic gifts and massive moves from your investments into impact investing, I really think about it like a lifestyle.”
The Guest: Rachel Gerrol is Co-Founder & CEO of NEXUS, the leading global network of next-gen philanthropists and impact investors with 6000+ members from over 70 countries representing families with a combined net worth of over $650 billion.
Rachel has organized 40 NEXUS summits across 6 continents, including an annual summit at the UN and regional summits at The White House and No. 10 Downing Street. She led the “Media for Social Impact Summit” at the UN for 5 years and worked closely with the Obama/Biden Administration to create the renowned “It’s On Us” campaign to stop sexual assault on campus.
Rachel is recognized internationally for her work on next-gen philanthropy and has been featured in The New York Times, The Financial Times, Forbes, Vanity Fair and more.
[raw]The Podcast: Livin’ Good Currency explores the relationship of time to our lives. It focuses on learning how super-successful people align their purpose with their passions to do good for themselves and others daily, and features a co-host who knows better than anyone the value of time (see below). How do you want to spend your life? This hour can inspire you, along with upcoming guests, to be sure you are ‘Livin’ Good Currency’ and never get caught running out of time.
The Hosts: Good News Network fans will know Tony (Anthony) Samadani as the co-owner of GNN and its Chief of Strategic Partnerships. Co-host Tobias Tubbs was handed a double life sentence without the possibility of parole for a crime he didn’t commit. Behind bars, he used his own version of the Livin’ Good Currency formula to inspire young men in prison to turn their hours into honors. An expert in conflict resolution, spirituality, and philosophy, Tobias is a master gardener who employs ex-felons to grow their Good Currency by planting crops and feeding neighborhoods.
Episode Resources:
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A pair of Japanese researchers have launched a startup that turns food waste into cement with 4-times better bending resistance.
The potential applications are endless, and as well as being potential building material, the cement can produce any kind of simple object like tea cups or chairs; but it’s also edible, and aromatic, and biodegradable.
Tokyo University’s Kota Machida and Yuya Sakai are the brains behind Fabula Inc, a project to reduce food waste, help curb global warming, reduce pressure on landfills, and offer a new way of looking at production with their method of turning common types of food waste into cement that’s edible and strong.
Cement production, according to the UK thinktank Chatham House, produces 8% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, or around 3.5 times as much as the airline industry, and while modern “bio” or “green” cement usually incorporates wood ash, coffee grounds, or another previously-living substance into normal cement mixtures, Fabula’s product is 100% biological.
It took years of development but the method is simple. Food waste is dried, turned into a powder, and then heat-pressed into a mold. The difficulties originally arose from the fact that every food item needed different temperatures and pressures to correctly solidify.
Now they can make cement from Chinese cabbage, coffee grounds, orange rinds, squash and pumpkin waste, banana peels, seaweed, and onion scraps. They’ve turned this into tiles and panels for emergency shelter building, cups, plates, and other things as proof-of-concepts.
Chinese cabbage produces the strongest cement, oddly enough, with a 5 millimeter plate capable of supporting over 60 pounds of weight.
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Sakai told the AP he and Fabula are working with firms to produce various products like cup sets and furniture, but that his aspirations are a little bit higher—that of edible emergency shelters in disaster zones.
“For example, if food cannot be delivered to evacuees, they could eat makeshift beds made out of food cement,” he said.
Indeed the food waste cement is edible, if it is broken into pieces and boiled. For this reason, Fabula say that different mixes of materials, such as spices, can produce different flavors, colors, and even aromas in the cement.
RELATED: Breakthrough Zero-Carbon Fertilizer Set to Take Root Across the World as ‘Biochar’
One could build a literal gingerbread house, or a restaurant that offers booths which smell of component elements to their tasting menus.
Japanese news reports that the country produced around 5.7 million tons of edible food waste in 2019 and the government aims to reduce that around 2.7 million tons by 2030. Among industrialized and developed nations, Japan is the 11th largest producer of food waste per capita, so the practical need for edible cement is also there.
MORE LIKE THIS: From Beer to Biogas: Creating Green Energy Using Brewer’s Grain Farm Waste
As it’s entirely made of food, there’s no need to worry about disposal: it will eventually biodegrade if not treated.
“Our ultimate hope is that this cement replaces plastic and cement products, which have worse environmental impacts,” Machida told AP.
An evolutionary “missing link” species was just discovered, and it was a very big and scary link in a very big and famous chain.
The newfound species, Daspletosaurus wilsoni, is thought to be the direct ancestor of Tyrannosaurus Rex, and had a unique set of facial features like a set of ridges called “hornlets” above its eye socket.
Everyone knows T. rex, the giant almost 10,000 pound dinosaur that stood atop the pinnacle of the Cretaceous Era food chain, but scientists don’t know how it came to be, or what it evolved from.
The family Tyrannosauridae contains 9 known animals, and it’s believed that the genus Daspletosaurus were the progenitors of the genus Tyrannosaur. However a lack of substantial fossil remains has limited the possibility of drawing that connection until now.
Daspletosaurus wilsoni was identified from parts of a fossilized skull and skeletal fragments, including a rib and toe bone, that date to about 76.5 million years ago during the Cretaceous period (145 million to 66 million years ago).
Paleontologists from the Badlands Dinosaur Museum in North Dakota uncovered the fossils at the Judith River Formation in northeastern Montana, between 2017 and 2021, according to a new study published November 25th in the journal Paleontology and Evolutionary Science.
The team initially stumbled across the fossils after crewmember Jack Wilson noticed a small, flat piece of bone projecting out from the bottom of a cliff, which later turned out to be part of the dinosaur’s nostril. Excavating the bones, however, proved to be immensely challenging because they were buried beneath 26 feet (8 meters) of solid rock.
The researchers had to painstakingly chisel away large parts of the cliff with jackhammers before they could even start excavating the individual bones. Rather than something like “Sue,” the team named the specimen “Sisyphus” after the Greek character of legend who was forced by Hades to push a boulder up a mountain for eternity.
The new species displays a mix of features found in more primitive tyrannosaurs from older rocks, like a prominent set of horns around the eye, as well as features otherwise known from later members of this group (including T. rex), like a tall eye socket and expanded air-pockets in the skull. In this way, D. wilsoni is a “half way point” or “missing link” between older and younger tyrannosaur species.
In the Late Cretaceous of North America, many dinosaur families are represented by multiple closely-related species. These were previously thought to represent diversity, ie. that they lived at the same time, which would be evidence of branching evolution. However, a wealth of new specimens and a better understanding of their placement in time has changed what we think.
We can now see that many of these species are actually very finely separated in time from each other, forming consecutive ladder-like steps in a single evolutionary lineage where one ancestral species evolves directly into a descendant species.
RELATED: Canada Schoolteacher Finds Fossil that May Be 300 Million Years Old and Could Re-Write Fossil Record
This is called the “anagenesis” mode of evolution, and is contrasted with “cladogenesis”, where successive branching events produce many species that are closely related and therefore look similar to each other, but represent evolutionary “cousins” rather than ancestors and descendants.
The new study supports the addition of tyrannosaurs to a growing list of dinosaurs (including horned and duckbilled dinosaurs) for which anagenesis (linear evolution) has been proposed. This seems to suggest that linear evolution is more widespread in dinosaurs, with branching evolution being less frequent than previously thought.
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The most astonishing display of atmospheric variability came as giant ocean waves of clouds drifted over the Bighorn Mountains in Wyoming last week.
The incredible scene was captured by photographer Rachel Gordon, who shared them on the Wyoming Through The Lens Facebook group, and is a textbook example of “Kelvin-Helmholtz Instability.”
KHI results from differences in air density between the various layers of the sky—in this case probably from sun heating pockets of air between mountain saddles which rose rapidly into both colder air and strong winds.
“I think everyone should see this beautiful phenomenon,” Gordon wrote in the group.
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The Washington Post reported that wave clouds from KHI are not uncommon, but they are fleeting. Perfect examples like the one photographed by Rachel are rare.
Another group member caught a time-lapse video of their movement, which can see them hold their shape as they move across the horizon like tidal waves ready to smash into the coast.
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California just granted the first ever state license for Unicorn Husbandry, provided the young applicant can find one, and ensure it has appropriate exposure to sunlight, moonbeams, and rainbows.
Department of Animal Care and Control added that its horn needed polishing every month with a soft cloth.
“Dear LA County, I would like your approval if I can have a unicorn in my backyard if I can find one,” wrote a girl named Madeline.
In response, DACC sent an emblazoned “Permanent Unicorn License,” in fuschia-colored metal, alone with a white unicorn plushie with pink hooves and a silver horn.
DACC Director Marcia Mayeda praised Madeline’s “sense of responsible pet ownership to seek permission in advance” and for thoughtfully considering “the requirements of providing a loving home to animals.”
The agency posted images of the correspondence, the license, the medallion and the stuffed toy on its social media accounts.
The agency added that if the unicorn needed a topical treatment of sparkles and glitter, that they be exclusively non-toxic and biodegradable.
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Quote of the Day: “He who reforms himself has done much toward reforming others.” – Thomas Adams
Photo by: Max Harlynking
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quotes page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
In the 1998 comedy Waking Ned Devine, a multi-million dollar lottery jackpot is split between the stunned residents of a tiny Irish village.
Well, last week, the film’s storyline became a reality for the small Belgian village of Olmen, near Anterp.
165 Olmen residents divided up an unbelievable $150 million dollars won in the Euromillions lottery. The ticket will pay out $915,000 to every individual—tax free. (That’s around €870k.)
Local shopkeeper Wim Van Broekhoven, who regularly organizes a group pot for the drawing—with each person contributing €15 ($20)—said the residents are shocked by the lucky win.
According to Euronews, One person already knows what they want to do: fulfill a lifelong dream to spend a few months in America, and hike the Grand Canyon. Another said they will split it among 3 children and many grandchildren.
EuroMillions spokesperson Joke Vermoere told Reuters it was the first time in Belgium that such a big group had won this much.
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“It’s a lovely story, really.”
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Laser light therapy has been shown to be effective in improving short term memory, according to a new study.
Scientists demonstrated that the therapy, which is non-invasive, could improve short term memory in people by 10%, and even up to 25 percent.
Scientists at the University of Birmingham in the UK and Beijing Normal University in China demonstrated the treatment, called transcranial photobiomodulation (tPBM), which is applied to an area of the brain known as the right prefrontal cortex.
This area is widely recognized as important for working memory. In their experiment, the team showed how working memory improved among research participants after several minutes of treatment. They were also able to track the changes in brain activity using electroencephalogram (EEG) monitoring during treatment and testing.
Previous studies have shown that laser light treatment will improve working memory in mice, and human studies have shown tPBM treatment can improve accuracy, reaction time, and high-order functions such as attention.
This is the first study, however, to confirm a link between tPBM and working memory in humans.
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“People with conditions like ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) or other attention-related conditions could benefit from this type of treatment, which is safe, simple and non-invasive, with no side-effects,” said Dongwei Li, a visiting PhD student in the University of Birmingham’s Centre for Human Brain Health, and co-author on the paper.
In the study, researchers at Beijing Normal University carried out experiments with 90 male and female participants, age 18 to 25. Participants were treated with laser light to the right prefrontal cortex at wavelengths of 1064 nm, while others were treated at a shorter wavelength, or treatment was delivered to the left prefrontal cortex. Each participant was also treated with a sham (which was an inactive tPBM) to rule out the placebo effect.
After tPBM treatment over 12 minutes, the participants were asked to remember the orientations or color of a set of items displayed on a screen. The participants treated with laser light to the right prefrontal cortex showed clear improvements in memory over those who had received the other treatments. While participants receiving other treatment variations were able to remember, on average, 1.9 of the test objects, those with the targeted treatment were able to recall, on average, around 2.1 objects.
Data, including from electroencephalogram (EEG) monitoring during the experiment was analyzed and showed changes in brain activity that also predicted the improvements in memory performance.
The researchers don’t yet know precisely why the treatment positively affects working memory, nor how long the effects will last. But further research is planned, so don’t break out the LED lights just yet.
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“It’s possible that the light is stimulating the mitochondria – the powerplants – in the nerve cells within the prefrontal cortex, and this has a positive effect on the cells’ efficiency,” said Professor Ole Jensen, also at the Centre for Human Brain Health.
DON’T Forget to Share the Light With Forgetful Friends on Social Media…
An English fossil found in a museum’s storeroom has shifted the origin of modern lizards back 35 million years, according to new research.
The specimen, retrieved from a cupboard at the Natural History Museum in London, has shown that modern lizards originated in the Late Triassic period, and not the Middle Jurassic, as previously thought.
This fossilized relative of today’s lizards—such as monitor lizards and gila monsters—came to the museum’s collection in the 1950s, from a quarry near Tortworth in Gloucestershire. The late Pamela Robinson who recovered the fossils from the quarry did not have access to CT scanning technology to help her gather all the hidden precious details.
As a modern-type lizard, scientists say the new fossil impacts “all estimates” of the origin of lizards and snakes (together called the Squamata), and affects assumptions about their rates of evolution, and even the key trigger for the origin of the group.
The research team have named their amazing discovery Cryptovaranoides microlanius—meaning ‘small butcher’ in tribute to its jaws that were filled with sharp-edged slicing teeth.
Study leader Dr. David Whiteside, of Bristol’ University’s School of Earth Sciences, recalled, “I first spotted the specimen in a cupboard full of Clevosaurus fossils.
“Our specimen was simply labelled ‘Clevosaurus and one other reptile.’ As we continued to investigate the specimen, we became more and more convinced that it was actually more closely related to modern day lizards than the Tuatara group—the only survivor of the group, the Rhynchocephalia, that split from the squamates over 240 million years ago.
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“We made X-ray scans of the fossils at the University, and this enabled us to reconstruct the fossil in three dimensions, and to see all the tiny bones that were hidden inside the rock.”
The findings, published in the journal Science Advances, shows that Cryptovaranoides is clearly”a squamate as it differs from the Rhynchocephalia in the brain case, in the neck vertebrae, in the shoulder region, in the presence of a median upper tooth in the front of the mouth, the way the teeth are set on a shelf in the jaws, and in the skull architecture—such as the lack of a lower temporal bar.
Dr. Whiteside said there is only one major primitive feature not found in modern squamates, an opening on one side of the end of the upper arm bone, the humerus, where an artery and nerve pass through.
Study co-author Professor Mike Benton explained, “In terms of significance, our fossil shifts the origin and diversification of squamates back from the Middle Jurassic to the Late Triassic.
“This was a time of major restructuring of ecosystems on land, with origins of new plant groups, especially modern-type conifers, as well as new kinds of insects, and some of the first of modern groups such as turtles, crocodilians, dinosaurs, and mammals.
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“Adding the oldest modern squamates then completes the picture.
“It seems these new plants and animals came on the scene as part of a major rebuilding of life on Earth after the end-Permian mass extinction 252 million years ago, and especially the Carnian Pluvial Episode, 232 million years ago when climates fluctuated between wet and dry and caused great perturbation to life.”
“The name of the new animal, Cryptovaranoides microlanius, reflects the hidden nature of the beast in a drawer, but also in its likely lifestyle—living in cracks in the limestone on small islands that existed around Bristol at the time, where it would have preyed on arthropods and small vertebrates.” said PhD research student Sofia Chambi-Trowell.
“This is a very special fossil and likely to become one of the most important found in the last few decades,” concluded Whiteside.
SLITHER The News to Reptile-Loving Friends on Social Media…
It’s the most popular photography competition in the world—because the winning photos are some the funniest moments of mirth on Earth.
Some of the most famous photographers from 85 countries submitted their most spontaneous snaps, capturing the amusing side of nature, in a bid to win the Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards.
The contest was founded in 2015 by Paul Joynson-Hicks and Tom Sullam, both professional photographers and passionate conservationists who wanted create a competition that focused on the lighter, humorous side of wildlife photography.
The online competition is free to enter, yet both money and awareness are raised for a charity partner each year—in 2022, the fantastic Whitley Fund for Nature (WFN)—with 10% of net revenue donated.
The overall winner of this year’s competition, which saw 5,000 incredible entries, is Jennifer Hadley, for her perfectly timed photograph of a lion cub losing its grip on a tree trunk entitled ‘Not so cat-like reflexes.’
The image was captured in the Serengeti, when Jennifer managed to capture the exact moment a young 3-month-old cub attempted to descend from a tree, and it didn’t go so well. She had already positioned her camera, then the unexpected happened.
“I think part of what makes this contest great is that most of these photos probably happen by complete accident and that was certainly the case with the lion cub falling out of the tree,” she explained. “How often do cats fall out of trees?”
“It was probably his first time ever in a tree and he decided to just go for it. Happily, as cats do, he righted himself just in time.”
As the 2022 Comedy Wildlife Photographer of the Year, Jennifer won an African safari trip to Kenya. She also won the Affinity Photo Award and People’s Choice Award for her charming shot of two penguins (pictured above).
“I really love this photo contest because it’s just so different from anything else and really shows off the personalities of the animals,” says Jennifer.
The Creatures of the Air Category Award was won by Jean Jacques Alcalay with ‘Misleading African Viewpoints’, which shows a hippo looking like he’s about to scoff a great blue heron whole.
The bird seems completely oblivious—maybe that is because he knows that, in fact, the hippo is actually having a yawn.
“With so much going on in the world, we could all use a bumper dose of fun and laughter and this year’s finalists have definitely delivered that,” said Sullam in a press release.
Sullam summed it up perfectly: “When you see these amazing photographs, like the wallaby at sunset—seemingly about to launch another wallaby into space—it makes you smile and wonder at the incredible animals that are on this earth with us.”
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SEND These Adorable Moments of Nature to Your Flock by Sharing on Social Media… AND, Check out the 2021 winning photos: From Cheeky Bears to Goofy Gophers, See the Fun Finalists of the Comedy Wildlife Photo Awards
Quote of the Day: “To be free, you must have your own hypothesis about what you are called to do, and follow it, not giving in to circumstances.” – Andrei Tarkovsky
Photo by: Ken Brown, CC License
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quotes page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
According to a new survey, more than half of adults would welcome a pre-owned gift this Christmas—especially to save people money and act more sustainably by extending a product’s life.
The poll of 2,000 people who celebrate Christmas, showed 19 percent expected to receive a second-hand gift this year—with 29 percent expecting the practice to become more common in the future.
More than half (58 percent) would feel positive about unwrapping a pre-owned item, and 46 percent said they would happily give one.
Already, almost four in ten respondents have purchased a pre-owned gift ahead of Christmas at some year in the past.
The top reasons for doing so were saving money (50 percent), affording an item which would otherwise be out of their price range (44 percent), and to help products have a longer lifespan (41 percent).
Amazon Warehouse in the UK, which sells refurbished and pre-owned products, commissioned the survey, which also revealed that 38 percent plan to take sustainability into consideration when shopping for presents for this festive season.
But, overall, 26 percent believe there is a stigma about giving such gifts. Even so, 31 percent believe giving and receiving pre-owned products should be normalized.
“As a nation, we’re becoming more conscious consumers and it’s exciting to see so many people are open to shopping for nearly-new products,” said John Boumphrey, a UK manager at Amazon. “Pre-owned doesn’t have to mean worn or outdated, often products have simply been unboxed but still work as good as new.
The top pre-owned items people are happy to receive were books (50 percent), jewelry (31 percent), and artwork (30 percent).
And the most popular tech gifts to get ‘nearly-new’ were mobile phones (21 percent), laptops (20 percent), and tablets (20 percent).
The top places to buy pre-owned or refurbished gifts were eBay.com, thrift stores, and Amazon.
Nearly one in five estimated they had saved more than $244 annually over the past five years.
21 percent of those surveyed by OnePoll think it can be hard to tell the difference between these products and new goods—and 17 percent have noticed more retailers offering nearly-new or pre-owned items.
A team of neighbors, firefighters, and animal control officers worked for hours in the freezing weather to rescue four horses that fell through an icy pond.
The South Kalispell Fire Department responded to the scene near Patrick Creek in Montana, after the four horses fell through the ice, and were stuck up to their necks.
A video shared by Amber Countryman shows the numerous attempts to pull out the horses, each one failing until the rescuers eventually harnessed some extra ‘horse power’ when they brought in a tractor.
A dozen people, including firefighters, staff from Flathead County Animal Control, as well as neighbors, all worked together to free the horses.
They first tried to make makeshift pontoons from pallets and other pieces of wood in an attempt to make a ramp.
They then tried to pull one horse out of the water by using a long rope, taking care to avoid breaking any its legs, but they still couldn’t free the animal completely.
Eventually, all four horses were removed safely by using a harness attached to a tractor.
They were all taken to a veterinary clinic where they received care.
Watch the video below showing the community working together…
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A mom discovered that her son’s elf had mysteriously lost a leg while he was in school—so she spent hours concocting an elaborate back story to keep the magic alive.
Lauren Weir introduced the elf toy to her 4-year-old son Tommy for the first time on December 1st, but that evening she was horrified to discover that his right leg had been torn off and was now nowhere to be found.
“I completely panicked. It was only day one and he was already so in love, I was like ‘oh my god what am I going to do’. I didn’t have time to go out and get another one.
“If I didn’t fix it I knew he’d be devastated, yet I knew if it lost a leg he’d just accept it—but it needed to have a story about why it was gone.
The 30-year-old then scrambled to salvage her son’s beloved elf by stitching closed the hole so the white stuffing inside wasn’t showing. Then, she came up with an imaginative cover story to explain the missing limb.
She staged a dinosaur attack using the schoolboy’s toys and explained that the ‘naughty’ beasts had eaten the elf’s leg, rendering him an amputee.
“He was so excited when he came downstairs the next day, he was like ‘where’s his leg?’. I was like, ‘the dinosaurs must have eaten it!’
Eventually he grabbed his Iron Man action figure to fight back and teach the “naughty dinosaurs” a lesson.
The boy, in Hertfordshire, England, thinks it’s great that his elf survived a dinosaur attack—and the ruse has led to more fun surprises.
When Tommy expressed worry about how his elf would get around without his leg, the creative mom ‘put a call in to Santa’ and had an elf-sized wheelchair ‘delivered’ the next day.
“He was concerned about how the elf was going to get around only having one leg so I made a call to Santa in front of him and requested that he send some crutches or a wheelchair to the elf.
WATCH: Firefighter Dresses Like Buddy The Elf And Starts Pillow Fights With Shoppers–and it’s Hilarious
Lauren posted a video about the toy’s ordeal online with the caption: “This elf is going to take over my life,” after spending hours stitching his leg and building a Lego wheelchair.
The next day when the boy came down the elf was sitting on his wheelchair throne, which could be pushed to roll around the house.
“Santa’s really good at making Lego wheelchairs,” cooed Tommy.
“The wheelchair took ages because I was trying to be quiet sifting through the Lego—because it’s so noisy—trying to make it from Christmas colors, red and green.”
RELATED: When Dog Chews Girl’s Beloved Elf on the Shelf, Hospital Works Magic With a Little Help From Santa
The magical character has since gone on to bring more joy in the household.
Creative elf scenes in their home have included an ‘advent calendar truck’ delivery full of chocolate coins and sweets and a fishing scene on the top of their aquarium tank with a fishing rod made out of a shoelace.
“We’ll be keeping this elf; he loves him so much even with one leg.
“I’m praying that the leg doesn’t turn up because then I’m really going to have to wrack my brain to cover that up somehow.”
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