Doomsday watchers of the US economy did not get the depressing monthly jobs number they were perhaps hoping for. The country’s private sector businesses added 172,000 jobs in July, the most in five months, the US Labor Department reported this morning.
That is well above the forecast of 100,000 that most economists had predicted.
Manufacturing was one of the bright spots, adding 25,000 jobs.
A Stradivarius violin – possibly worth several million dollars – has been handed in to a lost-and-found office in Switzerland office after a hapless musician left it on a train.
The owner had lent the precious instrument to a musician friend who took it on a train on Friday but forgot it when he got off at Bern, police said.
This is the third time in four years that a musician’s priceless Stradivarius was returned by kind strangers. Two cabbies from Newark and New York City were each hailed for their honesty toward forgetful musicians in 2008 and 2009.
(READ the story in the Telegraph)
Half Million Dollar Violin Left in Taxi, Returned to Owner (2009)
Violinist Reunited with $4M Stradivarius Left In Back of NJ Cab (2008)
Crowds cheered as Kieran Maxwell, donning a cane and heavy prosthetic leg, carried the Olympic flame through northeast England in June.
During the torch relay, the young teen, who became an amputee after a battle with a rare form of cancer, was tripped up by the awkward artificial leg.
His parents had been fundraising to buy him a lighter replacement limb, and this week Britain’s biggest lottery winners stepped in to supply the money.
His mother Nicola said he started “yelling and dancing” when he found about the “brilliant” donation.
The limb will allow him to do “everything”, the same as other kids.
(READ the story from the BBC – Watch Kieran carry the torch below)
Crowds cheered as Kieran Maxwell, donning a cane and heavy prosthetic leg, carried the Olympic flame through northeast England in June.
During the torch relay, the young teen, who became an amputee after a battle with a rare form of cancer, was tripped up by the awkward artificial leg.
His parents had been fundraising to buy him a lighter replacement limb, and this week Britain’s biggest lottery winners stepped in to supply the money.
Feeling good usually makes us smile, but does it work the other way around? Can smiling actually make us feel better?
In a study to be published in the journal of the Association for Psychological Science, scientists Tara Kraft and Sarah Pressman of the University of Kansas investigated the potential benefits of smiling by looking at how different types of smiling, and the awareness of smiling, affects individuals’ ability to recover from episodes of stress.
“Age old adages, such as ‘grin and bear it’ have suggested smiling to be not only an important nonverbal indicator of happiness but also wishfully promotes smiling as a panacea for life’s stressful events,” says Kraft. “We wanted to examine whether these adages had scientific merit; whether smiling could have real health-relevant benefits.”
Smiles are generally divided into two categories: standard smiles, which use the muscles surrounding the mouth, and genuine or Duchenne smiles, which engage the muscles surrounding BOTH the mouth and eyes. Previous research shows that positive emotions can help during times of stress and that smiling can affect emotion; however, the work of Kraft and Pressman is the first of its kind to experimentally manipulate the types of smiles people make in order to examine the effects of smiling on stress.
The researchers recruited 169 participants from a Midwestern university. The study involved two phases: training and testing. During the training phase, participants were divided into three groups, and each group was trained to hold a different facial expression. Participants were instructed to hold chopsticks in their mouths in such a way that they engaged facial muscles used to create a neutral facial expression, a standard smile, or a Duchenne smile. Chopsticks were essential to the task because they forced people to smile without them being aware that they were doing so: only half of the group members were actually instructed to smile.
For the testing phase, participants were asked to work on multitasking activities. What the participants didn’t know was that the multitasking activities were designed to be stressful. The first stress-inducing activity required the participants to trace a star with their non-dominant hand by looking at a reflection of the star in a mirror. The second stress-inducing activity required participants to submerge a hand in ice water.
During both of the stressful tasks, participants held the chopsticks in their mouth just as they were taught in training. The researchers measured participants’ heart rates and self-reported stress levels throughout the testing phase.
The results of the study suggest that smiling may actually influence our physical state: compared to participants who held neutral facial expressions, participants who were instructed to smile, and in particular those with Duchenne smiles, had lower heart rate levels after recovery from the stressful activities. The participants who held chopsticks in a manner that forced them to smile, but were not explicitly told to smile as part of the training, also reported a smaller decrease in positive affect compared to those who held neutral facial expressions.
These findings show that smiling during brief stressors can help to reduce the intensity of the body’s stress response, regardless of whether a person actually feels happy.
“The next time you are stuck in traffic or are experiencing some other type of stress,” says Pressman, “you might try to hold your face in a smile for a moment. Not only will it help you ‘grin and bear it’ psychologically, but it might actually help your heart health as well!”
For a copy of the article “Grin and Bear It: The Influence of Manipulated Positive Facial Expression on the Stress Response”, visit www.psychologicalscience.org.
Feeling good usually makes us smile, but does it work the other way around? Can smiling actually make us feel better?
In a study to be published in the journal of the Association for Psychological Science, scientists Tara Kraft and Sarah Pressman of the University of Kansas investigated the potential benefits of smiling by looking at how different types of smiling, and the awareness of smiling, affects individuals’ ability to recover from episodes of stress.
“Age old adages, such as ‘grin and bear it’ have suggested smiling to be not only an important nonverbal indicator of happiness but also wishfully promotes smiling as a panacea for life’s stressful events,” says Kraft. “We wanted to examine whether these adages had scientific merit; whether smiling could have real health-relevant benefits.”
It’s a case of star-spangled larceny that mystified a New York town.
It happened just before the 4th of July. Local TV and newspapers started reporting on the dozens of flags stolen, ripped right off the flag poles.
Town residents were angry and disgusted by the “dirtbag who did this.”
When the flags were replaced, they were stolen again.
Some good news was celebrated Sunday on Global Tiger Day by the 13 countries where big cats still live.
In Nepal’s Bardia National Park, the wild tiger population doubled, from 18 to 37, in the two years before 2011. Camera traps in the park showed the marked increase, according to the conservation group World Wildlife Fund.
Remember Aaron’s Last Wish, the video showing his family giving a waitress five hundred dollars, as a last remembrance of their brother?
Well, that cash was raised online from friends and family to fulfill Aaron’s request to leave an “awesome tip… like $500” for pizza.
Yesterday NPR reported that three weeks later, the family has collected $50,000 and three more lucky servers have been surprised with $500 gratuities. “The Collins family members are posting videos as they spread the good cheer.”
Remember Aaron’s Last Wish, the video showing his family giving a waitress five hundred dollars, as a last remembrance of their brother?
Well, that cash was raised online from friends and family to fulfill Aaron’s request to leave an “awesome tip… like $500” for pizza.
Yesterday NPR reported that three weeks later, the family has collected $50,000 and three more lucky servers have been surprised with $500 gratuities. “The Collins family members are posting videos as they spread the good cheer.”
First the drug tester told American beach volleyball player Jake Gibb that he was suspended.
Then he said to call a doctor, because the abnormal levels of hormones in his blood might be caused by testicular cancer.
Gibb was expected to miss the Olympics while recovering, but the surgery got all of the cancer and he wouldn’t need chemotherapy. He got back on tour with his partner and qualified for the London Games at the last minute.
With the sluggish British economy, it’s never been more difficult for young people to get a job. In fact for many graduates and teens, finding their way into employment can often feel like an impossible challenge rather than a right of passage. Factors such as the government cuts, economic recession, the closure of many High Street chains and up to 100 candidates applying for each entry level vacancy have left as many as 1.1 million 16-24 year-olds currently out of work in the UK.
Despite research that suggests a 21% unemployment rate for this age group, there are still many ambitious young people who are creatively making their way in the world. Their persistence, initiative and success in times of such economic difficultly are doubly inspiring. Here are some of the top young entrepreneurs to look out for this year and the dynamic, forward thinking companies that have seen them make their fortune:
Production of pure cocaine in Colombia decreased by 25 percent in 2011 capping off a decade of decline during which the potential for production had dropped by 72 percent, according a U.S. government survey of drug production released yesterday. –AP
In a nation wrenched by decades of war, perhaps it is of no surprise that one of Afghanistan’s most successful brands manufactures what is sorely lacking from the conflict-scarred landscape: joy.
The Herat ice cream factory in western Afghanistan dips rectangular vanilla bars in chocolate, builds orange sorbets on sticks, and tops the frozen cones that are sold in all of the country’s 34 provinces — a rare success for a business benefitting from no foreign investment.
Michael and Margaret Snell of Salsbury, England came to British Columbia for a fishing adventure and, boy, did they find one. On their first day out, their first catch of the day, Michael hooked a Great White Sturgeon weighing 1,100 pounds (500 kilos).
Their Canadian guide, Dean Werk from Great River Fishing Adventures, says the 12 feet 4 inch long catch, is likely the largest freshwater fish ever landed in North America.
The amazing story of Hilde Back proves how many ripples can change countless lives directly from a single act of generosity.
When she was a schoolteacher in Sweden, Hilde decided to sponsor one child’s education in Kenya. High school is tuition-based in many countries, and without that secondary education, poverty is often guaranteed for the child and his family for the rest of his life. The payment for Hilde’s sponsorship of Chris Mburu cost about $15 per month.
After Chris graduated from high school, he attended the University of Nairobi and then pursued a law degree from Harvard. He got a job as a U.N. Human Rights Advocate, and started a charity in order to repay the kindness originally shown him as a boy.
It’s not all hard work and no play for the U.S. swimming team.
A light-hearted, spoof video filmed by the team during the run-up to the London Olympic games has gone viral on the internet with more than three million viewers clicking to watch top names such as Michael Phelps, Ryan Lochte and Missy Franklin dancing and lip-syncing to hit “Call me Maybe” by Carly Rae Jepsen.
Four years ago, Dana Vollmer, devastated and dispirited by injuries, considered walking away from the sport she loved, but instead, with the help of her Berkeley coach, made a dramatic turnaround that led yesterday to a gold medal victory in London and breaking the world record in the 100-meter butterfly.
She became the first woman to break the 56-second barrier, winning her signature event at the Olympics Sunday in 55.98 seconds.
Vollmer, 24, from Granbury, Texas, has been a huge inspiration throughout her career. She overcame two heart defects as a teenager to qualify for the 2004 Olympic team and win her first gold medal in a relay.
Four years ago, Dana Vollmer, devastated and dispirited by injuries, considered walking away from the sport she loved, but instead, with the help of her Berkeley coach, made a dramatic turnaround that led yesterday to a gold medal victory in London and breaking the world record in the 100-meter butterfly.
She became the first woman to break the 56-second barrier, winning her signature event at the Olympics Sunday in 55.98 seconds.
Vollmer, 24, from Granbury, Texas, has been a huge inspiration throughout her career. She overcame two heart defects as a teenager to qualify for the 2004 Olympic team and win her first gold medal in a relay.
A bear howled beside a dumpster throughout a long New Mexico night.
The next morning some creative humans came to help.
WATCH the wonderful video below…
(From Ruidoso, New Mexico)
