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Andy Mackie of Washington state had undergone nine heart operations and was taking 15 different drugs when he decided to quit. He gave up the medicine and started using the money he saved to give away harmonicas and music lessons to local kids. Mackie figured it would be a gift before he died.
“I really thought it was the last thing I could ever do,” he says.
And when he didn’t die the next month, he bought a few hundred more.
Harmonicas in hand, he explains, “I just started going from school to school.”
It’s now 11 years and 13,000 harmonicas later.
The now 70-year-old Mackie also makes and buys other musical instruments for interested children, and arranges for his older students to give lessons to younger kids.
Mackie says, “I tell them music is a gift, you give it away – you give it away and you get to keep it forever.”
Link -via Metafilter
(image credit: CBS)
Remember this cute little loris who loved getting tickled? Well, it seems it’s a she, her name is Sonya, she’s from Russia and she loves her worms! I’ve always been a sucker for a gal with big brown eyes. *swoon* 
TGIF Nom nom nom!
Andre chewed off his front left and rear left paws to escape an illegal trap he encountered in Alaska. He then lived for weeks hiding under a camper shell. The Shepherd-Rottweiler-Lab mix was taken in by Alaskan Dog and Puppy Rescue, who contacted a company named OrthoPets to see if they could help. A year later, Andre has received his prosthetic legs in Denver, Colorado. Martin Kaufmann of OrthoPets says Andre stood up just two days after his new legs were attached.
“This is the first time that Andre has been able to stand on four legs in over a year and a few months now, so it will be an interesting challenge as he learns, instead of having to survive with two legs how he can actually thrive on all four,” said Kaufmann.
For a second he hesitated, and then Andre hopped up and started running around like any dog with four legs would.
“It’s just such an amazing moment to see this guy who’s learned how to be very adaptive on two legs and watch how fast he’s able to go back to four legs. Just feels good to see he’s able to be normal again, such a proud moment,” Kaufmann said.
Andre will go up for adoption in a few weeks. Link -via Arbroath
From Bloomberg News:
Half a glass of wine a day may add five years to your life, a new study suggests. Drink beer, and you’ll live only 2 1/2 years longer.
Dutch researchers followed 1,373 men for more than four decades, noting their eating and drinking habits. Men who had about 20 grams of alcohol daily — equivalent to a half a glass of wine — had 2 1/2 years added to their life expectancy at age 50, compared with men who didn’t drink at all, according to the research published today in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health. Men who consumed only wine had twice as much added longevity.
Your assignment: in the comments, devise rules for a Neatorama-themed drinking game.
Image via flickr user rpeschetz
Joe Strummer was a highly political-minded musician with a love of music from all over the world. While many of you may only know a few of The Clash singles like “Rock the Casbah,” the group had a lot of diversity and is celebrated as one of the most unique and innovative punk bands in history. Even fewer people seem to be familiar with Joe’s work after The Clash, but if you’re a fan of the band, I highly recomend checking it out.
Everything I’ve learned, I’ve learned from Star Trek. If no one has written that book, perhaps someone should. And this should be one of the chapters: io9 blog described 7 types of bad bosses, according to Star Trek (and how to survive them without setting phasers to kill). Take, for instance, this guy:
The bully. He alternates between jolly and grouchy — but even his jolly side is a little scary sometimes. He enjoys "teasing" his subordinates, especially anyone who’s different in some way, like having funny-shaped ears. "Notices" his female underlings a little too closely. He does give an inspiring speech about risk-taking, but that’s usually just to drag you into some weird body-switching scheme that will leave you with a weird rash for a month. He’s also the original "I want it done yesterday" boss, who’s "sick of hearing the word ‘can’t.’"
How to handle him: If he yells, yell back. Say "Dammit" a lot. If he asks how long something will take, exaggerate by at least 200 percent. If he starts cracking jokes at you, just ignore it, and he’ll probably go away. But never, ever make fun of him back. (I’ve totally had this boss, like twice, and thinking of him as Captain Kirk really helped.)
Link – via Miss Cellania
The world is filled with people with strange fetishes, but even considering the Intertubes’ jaded standard, this particular fetish is really, really, really weird: behold the Woolies, people who like to esconce themselves in wool. Itchy, scratchy wool.
No actual nudity, though there are some – um, how shall I say it – knitted private parts: Link (original link in French at Doctissimo) – via Rue The Day! and Laughing Squid
In this little country ditty, Social Media Blues, Scott Rodgers described his futile attempt of getting the attention of a girl through web 2.0 shenanigans.
Twitterphobics: don’t watch it, it’ll just make you mad! Link [embedded YouTube clip]
What do the rich and famous do with all their dough? Some of them, it turns out, collect weird things – here is a neat post about a few weird collections of the rich over at mental_floss:
Imelda Marcos
When Ferdinand Marcos and Imelda hastily fled the Philippines and Malacañan Palace when Ferdinand’s regime was overthrown, they left behind nearly all of their possessions, which were quite numerous. Imelda was first thought to own more than 6,000 individual shoes, a number which was later downgraded to a mere 1,060 pairs. She also abandoned 65 parasols, 15 mink coats, 888 purses, 508 floor-length dresses and 71 pairs of sunglasses.
Link – via i met a possum
Previously on Neatorama: 25 Strangest Collections on the Web
There are furniture, and then there are artistic furniture. It’s often difficult to combine form and function, and it’s almost always impossible to do it in such an artistic form. Yet, Korean designer Chul An Kwak did just that with his tentacle-y table:
With serpentine legs that resemble nothing so much as octopus tentacles, the ‘r.n.i.’ series of tables by Chul An Kwak is actually inspired by images of running horses. Sculpted from wood, these designs offer the same sort of flat surface you’d see in a conventional table but with legs that seem kinetic and alive.
See more selections of amazing and artistic furniture designs at WebUrbanist: Link
Look closely at the image above – do you see anything unusual?
In his series "Don’t Judge People According to Their Appearance," Peter Chmela creates photos that spell out each word of the sentence. Check out the entire gallery here: Link – via Swiss Miss
I think this is as close to a nightmare scenario to computer companies and gadget makers everywhere: not that their new stuff aren’t any good – it’s that the old stuff are good enough so that except for hardcore enthusiasts, people just don’t see any point in upgrading.
TechRadar UK explains:
The problem of ‘good enough’ is a huge headache for the tech industry. When your computer isn’t good enough – when a slow processor, meagre memory and tiny hard disk struggle with even everyday tasks – you’ll buy a better model as soon as it becomes available.
Now, though, the weakest link isn’t your PC: it’s you.
Will a 200-core processor make you type an email more quickly, make you work more productively or make your Facebook status updates any more amusing?
I ran across this excellent tutorial while looking for things to do with unwanted phone books (for some inexplicable reason, they magically show up at my doorstep year after year).
Chica and Jo has the perfect solution if you’re crafty: turn those phone books into office organizers! Link – via Make
While we’re still in the subject of being crafty, here’s a spiffy project if you have kids (or if you’re simply young at heart): make your very own giraffe sock puppet.
Craft Jr. has the step by step guide: Link – via One Crafty Place
The Pew Research Center conducts a lot of surveys – but this one yielded a very surprising result: churchgoers, especially Evangelicals, are more likely to support torture than those unaffiliated with any religious organization.
The more often Americans go to church, the more likely they are to support the torture of suspected terrorists, according to a new survey.
More than half of people who attend services at least once a week — 54 percent — said the use of torture against suspected terrorists is "often" or "sometimes" justified. Only 42 percent of people who "seldom or never" go to services agreed, according to the analysis released Wednesday by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.
White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified — more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did.
(Photo: sduffy [Flickr])
Comic Continued: Option A or Option B
I’m a sucker for science cartoons, so imagine my delight when someone told me about Steve Wolfhard (monstro-draw on LiveJournal – turns out he’s been on Neatorama before, how about that!). See the two possible endings of the cartoon above.
Also, be sure to check out the shenanigans of Cat Rackham, Steve’s wonderful new comic series.
Link: monstro-draw’s LiveJournal blog – Thanks Daylight!
Because I’m not Facebook savvy, Neatoramanaut Becky took charge and created a Neatorama Fan page on the popular website: Link
Be sure to go there and do whatever you Facebookers do on such a page (what do you do on such a page anyways?) Now, maybe we can take care of that Twitter thingy (who owns that anyhow?) – Thanks Becky!
