Neighbors

The Grand Rapids Lipdub Video

June 2, 2011

In a January article at the Newsweek magazine website, Seth Fiegerman named Grand Rapids, Michigan one of America’s “dying cities”. The folks in Grand Rapids weren’t amused. On May 22nd, 5000 awesome people in that town came together to film a monster lipdub set to Don Maclean‘s “American Pie”. This amazing video — which Robert […]

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Pearl Fryar, Unlikely Titan of Topiary

April 25, 2011

Photo by Duane Burdick To some people, a shrub is just a shrub; to Pearl Fryar, a shrub is a canvas. Fryar is an artist with plants. But he didn’t start out that way. When he bought his home in 1981, Fryar didn’t know anything about gardening. Still, he wanted to win Yard of the […]

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Ben Underwood, the Boy Who Could See with Sound

April 15, 2011

Ben Underwood was your average teenager. He liked to goof around with his friends, skate in the street, and waste time playing videogames. The only difference? Underwood was blind. In July 2006, People magazine published a profile of Underwood, the boy who saw with sound. The opening paragraph is awesome: There was the time a […]

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Dozens Work to Save the Life of Heart-Attack Victim

April 13, 2011

We hear a lot about the bystander effect, the socio-psychological phenomenon in which average people stand by idly instead of helping a victim during an emergency situation. This concept was made famous by the murder of Kitty Genovese in 1964, but has been reported as recently as yesterday in other traumatic situations. It’s refreshing, then, […]

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Olga Kotelko, the 91-Year-Old Star of Track and Field

April 4, 2011

Most of my life, I’ve been fat. I’ve been a sedentary man, sitting in front of a computer, eating corn chips and Sno-Balls. Over the past couple of years, though, I’ve changed. I’m eating well and have even started exercising. In fact, I exercise a lot. Physical fitness is hard work. Some days, I wonder […]

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Tsunami Survivor Searches for Wife and Mother

March 28, 2011

The Los Angeles Times reports that while the Japanese government is trying to help survivors of the recent earthquake and tsunami, resources are spread too thin. Rather than waiting for help that might never arrive, some folks are taking action themselves. For instance, 43-year-old Hideaki Akaiwa donned scuba gear (or perhaps a wetsuit) and swam […]

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