Cedya is back in the game, now that a UK charity has leveled the video playing field for hundreds of kids like her.
The little girl has cerebral palsy, making it almost impossible to maneuver around standard video gaming controllers. But with her custom-build system of buttons, levers, and switches, she can take on any one of her friends.
“I’m a gamer!” Cedya exclaimed the first time she took the controls.
The equipment is built by SpecialEffect: The Gamers Charity, which is dedicated to making video games accessible to all, regardless of physical disability.
SpecialEffect is based in Oxfordshire, UK. Its headquarters, the Accessible Games Center, is staffed with a mix of gaming technology experts who work alongside therapists.
The charity says there’s no “one size fits all solution” for what they do. They create technology ranging from modified joypads to eye-control that lets people play games to the very best of their abilities.
Just as they have done for hundreds of other people they help every year, members of SpecialEffect visited with Ceyda to gauge her particular needs. They then custom-built game controls that fit her abilities.
Her mother says she used to watch friends and family play games while she sat frustrated on the sidelines. Now her mother loves watching while Cedya plays.
(WATCH the video below – And Share With the Gaming Lovers in Your Life)
Imagine boarding a plane to find that the person sitting in your seat looks exactly like you?
That’s what happened to photographer Neil Thomas Douglas as he got ready to travel from Glasgow, Scotland to Galway, Ireland on Thursday night.
The two just had to take a once-in-a-lifetime selfie—and they thought that was the end of it.
Later, however, they discovered their doppelganger had checked into the same hotel. And that night, the pair ran into each other again at the same pub–and took a final selfie with a pint.
The photos were retweeted thousands of times, with media outlets clamoring for their story. Guys with full ginger beards were even tweeting photos saying they were twins.
Douglas, who says his bearded buddy is now a Facebook friend, tweeted, “Internet. You are crazy. Thanks for a surreal few days, highly amusing!”
(WATCH the video below from Inside Edition) Photo: Neil Thomas Douglas
The last Sumatran rhino in the entire western hemisphere has officially arrived in Indonesia to help save his species from extinction.
The 8-year-old hero, Harapan (“Hope” in Indonesian), left Ohio and traveled nearly 10,000 miles to the Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary at Way Kambas National Park–and officials expect he is ready to save the day.
Fewer than 100 Sumatran rhinos are left in the wild, yet only a handful of zoos and sanctuaries have been working to improve captive breeding programs to help keep the species alive.
The Cincinnati Zoo is the only one in the world to have successfully bred the rare rhino.
Harapan was born at the zoo eight years ago in a program that has provided some of the most important breakthroughs in Sumatran rhino breeding.
The zoo’s discoveries have been in practice at the Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary since at least 2007 when Harapan’s brother, Andalas, was flown there from Cincinnati to become part of the breeding program.
After he saved a baby deer’s life, he had a hard time returning it to the wild–the little thing refused to leave his side.
A Lithuanian outdoorsman happened upon a doe as she gave birth to twin fawns. He hung around to watch the baby deer take their first few steps, and that’s when he noticed something was wrong.
One of the fawns had an injured leg, causing the mother to instinctively abandon it.
Darius Sasnauskas couldn’t leave the little deer alone in the woods, so he brought it home to rehabilitate and release it.
Like the Australians did for this lamb, he made a leg brace from an oatmeal box and worked to get the fawn back on its feet.
The fawn quickly settled into life with his new family, sticking by Sasnauskas’ side and playing with their two big dogs.
When the fawn was ready to return to the woods, Sasnauskas hiked out to find a doe who might adopt the baby. It took several tries because the fawn didn’t want to leave the man who’d “fawned” over it for so long.
On his first attempt, the fawn rejected the herd to chase Sasnauskas home as the wild deer looked on.
“The deer are looking like, ‘What the heck is going on,’” Sasnauskas says in the video below.
He searched every evening for several days, until he found the deer he believed to the fawn’s natural mother. That time, the little deer left with its original family.
A few months later, he ran across the fawn and its family again. Sasnauskas and the herd eyed each other for a time, before the deer galloped away into the woods – the fawn able to keepe up just fine with the rest of its family, thanks to the man’s healing hand.
(WATCH the video below) — Photo: Darius Sasnauskas, video
Over the weekend, a team effort led to the successful rescue of a leatherback sea turtle that measured a full 1.4 meters (4-and-a-half feet).
The reptiles have normally already migrated through Massachusetts coastal waters by late October, but this one, entangled in fishing gear, was slow to get going off the coast of Pamet Harbor in Cape Cod Bay.
Fortunately, The Center for Coastal Studies’ Marine Animal Entanglement Response team and the US Coast Guard Truro Harbor Master successfully disentangled the turtle, and he swam off virtually unscathed—and pretty quickly—after he was freed.
Report any sightings of wildlife in trouble near Massachusetts waters to the USCG or the CCS hotline immediately (1-800-900-3622)
It’s been ten years since the glorious Frauenkirche church in Dresden, Germany, became the city’s jewel again, after being destroyed in firebombing during World War II and left in a heap of memorial ruins for almost 50 years.
The rebirth was only possible thanks to scores of archaeological volunteers and dedicated enthusiasts who raised $100 million in donations from around the world.
The Lutheran “Church of Our Lady” was two centuries old, a stunning example of architectural skill, when bombs in 1945 caused the huge stone dome to topple, leaving only small sections of two walls and an alter, amid a pile of rubble 55-feet high (17m).
Rebuilding the Baroque masterpiece was out of the question following the devastating war. Officials in East Germany left it as a memorial to the fallen in war. The blackened stones would lie in wait in the center of the city for the next 45 years.
Martin Luther statue in foreground of ruins
It was not until the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Germany in the 1990s that people began to dream of resurrecting the old skyline of Dresden, with its crown, the bell-shaped dome that rose higher than a football field over the city.
A citizens’ initiative founded by Dresden musician Ludwig Güttler began raising the $200 million needed to rebuild the church. Thousands of watches containing tiny fragments of Frauenkirche stone were sold, and people from other nations got involved. In the end, half of the money was collected from individuals.
One of those people was Günter Blobel, a German-born American who had seen the original church as a boy when his refugee family took shelter in a nearby town in the days before the city was bombed. He heard about efforts to reconstruct the church, and became a major backer, creating the US nonprofit Friends of Dresden. In 1999, he won the Nobel Prize for medicine and donated the award money, nearly $1 million, and became the single largest individual contributor to the project.
Meanwhile, hundreds of architects, art historians, and engineers sorted the thousands of stones, identifying and labeling each for reuse in the new structure.
Some large chunks of statues, like the one depicting Moses, and two thousand pieces of the original altar were cleaned and incorporated into the new structure. Nearly 80 percent of the altar (see photo at bottom) was reconstructed using the original materials.
About 46 percent of the original stones in the rubble heap were reused in the new structure. A computer imaging program that could move the stones three dimensionally around the screen in various configurations was used to help architects find where the original stones sat and how they fit together. The older blackened stones are easy to identify within the walls of the rebuilt church.
The new golden cross that tops the dome was funded by the British people and the House of Windsor and was made, using the original 18th-century techniques, by a British silversmith whose father was on one of the airplanes that dropped bombs on the city. The cross that once topped the dome, now twisted and charred, stands to the right of the new altar.
Most striking of all the church features was the towering dome. Dresden architect George Bähr had built a structure that critics of the day ridiculed. There was no way the eight slender church pillars and walls would withstand the weight of the colossal stone dome.
An engineering feat comparable to Michelangelo’s dome of St. Peter’s Basillica in Rome, the church’s 12,000-ton sandstone dome framed in wood proved to be exceptionally stable. So strong, witnesses during the Seven Years’ War in 1760 said that while the dome had been hit by more than 100 cannonballs, the projectiles bounced right off.
Today, the Frauenkirche can hold 1,800 people in the light-flooded interior, with a glowing painted ceiling applied in the same techniques of old. Not only church services, but concerts are held there, a tradition that goes as far back as 1843, when the famous composer Richard Wagner premiered the only piece he ever composed for choirs, involving some 1,200 singers.
The historical cobblestone streets and buildings surrounding the church were also restored to their former glory. With nearly 20 million visitors in the past 10 years, Dresden’s Frauenkirche has become not only a tourist magnet, but a landmark symbol of reconciliation between former warring enemies.
Photo credits: (top) David Müller; Bundesarchiv, Bild; (aerial) Wolfgang Pehlemann (interior) In Digo Photography and Gryffindor – CC
Twitch.tv is a platform that allows individuals to stream video game play and interact with viewers worldwide via chat. Predominantly populated by teens and young adults, the content and language can sometimes seem toxic to those of more sensitive dispositions. When I came across a streamer named A_Jaxx, I had no reason to think he would be different.
I saw a 24-year-old U.S. army veteran who was the embodiment of the good-looking, athletic, popular stereotype. In my mind, I wondered if he would end up being a jerk, intolerant, and homophobic – and his viewers, too. That is what I’ve come to expect, both in life and especially on Twitch. The good news is, I could not have been more wrong.
Over the course of the next few weeks, it became evident that this young man, who has every opportunity to simply follow the trend of casual bigotry often found online, was refusing to follow that trend–or to stay silent about it.
This amazing young man, who could not be more “straight”, will go out of his way to make sure everyone feels welcome, make sure that homophobia is not tolerated in his stream, and that his younger viewers are aware of his philosophy: Love is love and everyone deserves it, and deserves respect.
In the world of gaming, it is often difficult to find an ally as genuine and kind as this streamer. The influence he is having on his audience is invaluable. I can only hope that it becomes the new norm.
Recently accepted into Twitch’s exclusive partner program, A_Jaxx made a promise to his community. Earlier in his streaming career, he obtained an in-game item that was rainbow-colored. In fact, he obtained that item on the same day that same-sex marriage was legalized in all 50 states. He promised his community that he would dye his hair rainbow once he became a full Twitch Partner.
A_Jaxx lived up to that promise. But more importantly, he lives up to a bigger promise every single day: the promise that the world is becoming a better place, and that anyone struggling with coming to terms with who they are can find an ally, even in the most unlikely place.
Eating dark chocolate rich in cacao has been linked with numerous benefits, including stress reduction and improved heart health, but a new study has revealed it can potentially make your brain smarter and improve memory.
Dark chocolate, which is 70 percent cacao, is a major source of flavonoids– powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory components that are known to be beneficial to cardiovascular health.
The California team’s initial studies at Loma Linda University have shown that absorbed cacao flavonoids penetrate and accumulate in regions of the brain associated with learning and memory.
“We are tremendously excited about what these findings could potentially mean for brain health,” said Lee Berk, DrPH, MPH, who led the team. “This may open the door for potential restorative uses for individuals with memory/recall or dementia and aging-related issues.”
Berk now believes consumption of the cacao results in nerve-altering and protective proteins that promote nerve cell growth, increase brain function and brain communication, improve blood flow and promote the formation of blood vessels in the brain and sensory systems.
“We have for the first time shown that there is a possible connection of neuroelectric activities that initiate the mechanisms of cacao’s beneficial effects on brain reasoning and intellect, synchronization, memory, recall, mood and behavior.”
Cacao can regulate various levels of sensory awareness and increase the density of different electroencephalographic (EEG) frequencies. The most profound finding is that the EEG gamma wave band frequency associated with the brain’s highest level of mental processing, enhanced memory and recall, and physiological benefits.
Berk says that this study provides unbiased evidence that (EEG) gamma wave band frequency (γBA) is started by cacao consumption, with later modulation for brain, behavioral and physiological benefits.
Berk feels that neuroelectric activity initiated by cacao flavonoids on brain state will need further investigation, but also senses that it is the wave of the future for assessing effects on brain state modulation by healthy chocolate. Further studies are in progress by Berk’s research team at Loma Linda University Health to build on the findings.
Berk presented the findings in Chicago in late October at Neuroscience 2015, the Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, which is dedicated to developments in research of the brain and nervous system.
Many pet lovers would absolutely feed their pets before themselves if they had to. For the homeless, it’s a choice that often needs to be made, but one organization in New York City is helping change that, and more.
Collide, a program founded in 2010, provides more than just food essentials. Medical care, education and supplies are awaiting both humans and their pets in need.
Every Spring through the Fall, on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, Collide ministry works in conjunction with the Graffiti Church on the Lower East Side to serve a “family meal” to homeless folks and their animals. Resources and services remain available throughout the winter.
“Our clients come from a wide range of backgrounds, with many suffering from very daunting hardships,” Jeff Latzer, a spokesperson for the organization, told Good News Network. “Since companion animals can play such a vital role in peoples’ mental and spiritual health, we see a lot of very memorable relationships, with a lot of clients working to improve their lives partially out of love and devotion to their pets.”
Over the past five years, Collide has helped over 300 animals while actively support about 200 clients throughout the year.
Steve Weatherford’s story is one step away from a Hollywood movie where a coach, watching an injured player carried off the field, points to a minor league player in the stands and tells him to “suit up and get in the game.”
The National Football League New York Jets were in a bind. Punter Ryan Quigley had just injured himself and they had a big game with the New England Patriots the next day.
You can imagine coaches and managers, huddled in the front office, scratching their heads, wondering what to do, while ESPN radio played in the background. One of them might have jumped up and pointed to the radio shouting, “Hey, didn’t that guy use to play for us?”
Unfortunately for Weatherford, the big game didn’t end like it does in the movies. He wasn’t carried off the field in triumph, on his way to a comeback career.
After the team cut him five days later, he was paid the minimum wage for a NFL punter– $51,000 for the single game, about $12,000 per kick.
And he has a great story to take back to the radio airwaves.
Jonathan Mendes promised his children last year that he had run his last marathon– but he couldn’t stay away.
Last Sunday, the week of his 95th birthday, he was set to run the New York City Marathon.
How does the ex-Marine stays so young?
He eats lots of fish, vegetables and fruits, he told USA Today.
He used to run regularly in Central Park until his doctor told him his joints were taking a beating. Now, he walks two miles before breakfast and about two miles after. Twice a week, he works with a personal trainer at the gym in his building.
There’s literally a world of soul out there on the streets. And here is the proof.
Orchestrated by professionals in a group called Playing for Change, 19 street musicians around the world play together from remote locations using headphones, to produce a work of inspiration.
From five American cities and four other countries – Italy, Brazil, Cuba and Japan – comes this most diverse and soulful version of “Dock of the Bay”.
Roger Ridley and Grandpa Elliott handle the vocals, singing in Santa Monica, California, and New Orleans, Louisiana.
Playing for Change created the video as part of it’s ongoing mission to “inspire and connect the world through music.” It’s foundation raises money to build music and art schools for children around the world.
Of all their videos, produced using the same method, our favorite is Stand By Me, which was recorded in diverse places like Israel, South Africa and Venezuela, and tallied 80 million views on YouTube alone.
(WATCH it below and share it in your corner of the world…)
Congress passed a budget deal in the wee hours this morning that will keep the U.S. from defaulting on its debt for the next two years.
Leaders of both parties agree it should benefit the economy by putting off further debate on the so-called “debt ceiling” until March, 2017 – after the next presidential inauguration.
The bipartisan legislation also reduces the chances of a government shutdown in December, a move that will likely keep parks and museums open, government workers on the job, and Social Security benefits arriving on time.
The deal will keep Medicare enrollees from having to pay a scheduled 52% hike in premiums. It refills the Social Security disability trust fund that would have run out of money had no budget agreement gone through.
The plan also restores spending levels for several different programs relating to education and childhood health and their nutrition, that were facing drastic cuts.
Share This With Your Friends On Both Sides Of The Aisle (Photo: Martin Jacobsen, CC)
Naylor is not the first fish-owner to build a contraption like this: people have previously made mobility devices for their aquatic friends using materials like cork and tubing.
“People can be dismissive of goldfish as pets,” Naylor, who resides in Blackpool, England told SWNS.com. “But they are intelligent animals, as Einstein proves.”
The four-year-old fish looks very happy with his new rig.
To get past the bullies at school, Daniel Keyte tells them he has a special reactor in his chest, just like comic book hero turned movie star, Iron Man.
In reality, they are tubes for his cystic fibrosis treatments, attached to his chest and side.
His mother, Vicky Keyte, posted a picture to Instagram of Daniel showing his version of an ‘arc reactor’ and asking actor Robert Downey Jr, who plays Iron Man, to drop a friendly comment of encouragement.
Downey sprang into action — in a tiger suit instead of his usual Iron Man armor. He posted the picture to his Instagram account where he told Daniel he wears it to cheer himself up when he’s feeling down. Then, he invited the little boy to be a guest at the Hollywood premiere of “Captain America: Civil War.”
A photo posted by Robert Downey Jr. (@robertdowneyjr) on
Keyte couldn’t believe it when she saw Downey’s response.
“I was a blubbering wreck,” she wrote.
She promises to keep people updated as they prepare for the big night — right down to Daniel’s tuxedo fitting for the walk down the red carpet. Photo credit: Robert Downey Jr. via Instagram
This dedicated handyman is basking in the generosity of his very satisfied customers.
John Joyce has mowed lawns for years around the Pinellas Park, Florida area.
His 1995 truck broke down, but the 83-year-old man didn’t want to leave his clients in the weeds—he began pushing the lawnmower for miles on foot, with other yard tools stacked on top.
A local used car dealership sold them a 2004 Nissan pick-up at cost, so there was enough money left over for license plates, insurance, and even a new lawnmower.
Joyce had a hard time holding back the tears as he took the wheel.
“I feel like a millionaire,” he told WTSP News. “I feel like a millionaire.”
Joyce drove off the lot and got straight back to work.
“Anybody looking for a seal? I seem to have acquired one.”
That’s what a man named Vincent Fejeran playfully wrote, after he was out kayaking. A precocious baby sea lion just hopped aboard, nestled up against his back, and decided the two would be buddies.
The animal would not leave his vessel for almost 45 minutes.
Assuming I can avoid the treats until halloween :)
On another note... I have decided to rename what I do to "photoadayish" as that is more accurate haha.
Good news! Stories of tainted candy aren’t any more real than ghosts.
Halloween brings plenty of scares — vampires, zombies, even Monster Houses — but there’s one thing you don’t have to fear: strangers putting something dangerous into kids’ trick or treat bags.
The rumors come around every year and, just like the holiday, are full of legends and superstitions, but there’s never been a single documented case of a child hurt by a stranger purposely handing out tainted Halloween candy.
Don’t take our word for it—just ask Joel Best, a professor of Sociology and Criminal Justice at the University of Delaware who’s been studying the urban legends of candy laced with poisons, drugs, or sharp objects since 1985.
For 30 years, Best has been studying reports of tainted trick-or-treat candy. He’s even gone back as far as 1958 and has never found a single case where a stranger handed out candy that had been tampered with.
People tend to be more in tune with the idea of candy tampering at Halloween through something called the “Phenomenon of Notice” – like when you buy a new car and suddenly see the same model everywhere. At this time of year, any reports of people finding foreign objects in food become more noticeable, even though it happens year-round when accidents happen at factories.
In the last fifteen years, Best has found reports of only about 7 pieces of candy that had a foreign object in them or their wrappers — and no children were hurt in any of the cases.
[UPDATE: After we published this article, we learned of news reports from Ohio about a razor blade in a candy bar. Police say the wrapper was opened, of course. Officers seized all candy from a home and did not find any others like the one turned in by a youth, whose age remains unreported, and they recommend throwing away any candy in opened wrappers, and inspecting homemade food items.]
Those can account for some of the stories people pass along. Some other cases people hear about turn out to be illness or injuries that have no connection to trick-or-treating. One case was a family member adding something to the candy of their own child, which contributed to the myths we hear every year. But, Best says, the great majority of stories you hear about are hoaxes usually created by kids to scare their fellow trick-or-treaters.
This year, you might have seen on Facebook, a viral post about illicit drugs supposedly being readied to hand out to children. A photo of the party drug ecstasy was tagged with the suggestion that it was deliberately being made to look like candy.
The problem is, the drug traditionally is made in those shapes, as the name suggests, because it is a “party drug.”
Mr. Best discounts it as a non-threat, again repeating there has never been a case of anyone spending the money and time to taint candy with illicit drugs.
To be on the safe side of ‘fright night’, check your kids’ candy for open wrappers and other hazards and discard those. The American Academy of Pediatrics offers safety tips for Halloween costumes, many of which cause the numerous holiday accidents that happen in the dark. Make sure costumes aren’t dragging so low that kids could trip; make sure their peripheral vision isn’t blocked, so they can see vehicles; and prohibit sharp objects. These overlooked costume problems account for the only common Halloween dangers we need to worry about.
Pass Along the Facts: Click and Share… (Photo by Jeff Golden, CC)
Dozens of high school students have volunteered to help give the homeless or lonely one last moment of dignity.
Their mission: carry the veterans who have no families to their final resting place.
Six teenagers from the University of Detroit Jesuit High School in Michigan served as pallbearers this week at three funerals for deceased vets with no one to claim them.
“The men we honored today put their lives on the line for our country and now they deserve our dignity and service in return,” senior Leonard Froehlich, one of the pallbearers, said. “We honor these service members by being with them…and that in itself is a privilege.”
(WATCH the Associated Press video below) — Photo: University of Detroit Jesuit High School, Facebook
A simple gesture is having a huge charitable impact, causing more people to sign up to give blood in Stockholm, Sweden. And everyone is wondering why no one thought of it before.
Every time a donor’s blood has saved a life, they get a thank you text.
Blodcentralen, the Swedish blood service in Stockholm, started sending the messages to remind donors how important their contributions are.
Donors get their first “thank you” when they give blood, and later, they receive a follow-up text telling them when their blood has been used.
Blodcentralen also updates donors when blood supplies are running low so they can donate more.
“It’s a great feeling to know you made such a big difference and maybe even saved someone else’s life,” Karolina Blom Wiberg, a spokesperson for Blodcentralen, told The Independent.
The initiative came as a solution to the problem of declining blood donations throughout the country; Blodcentralen thought the service would be a good way to keep regular donors coming back more often.
It turns out, the texts have drawn in new donors, too.
People have been posting on social media their stories about the “thank you” texts they receive, and that’s encouraged their friends to think about donating, too.
Spread the Idea… (Click and Share) – Photo by DUP, CC
