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Tag: human interest

  • Girl Gets Stuck in Storm Drain Trying to Save Blackberry

    Not worth it. Not even remotely.

    A 16-year old Dover, U.K. teen had to be rescued by firefighters after she descended (about half-way) into a storm drain in a misguided attempt to fetch her Blackberry, which had apparently fell out of her pocket.

    “I was talking to somebody and I went to put my phone in my pocket and it fell down the drain…I thought to myself, ‘I’m not leaving this’ and I jumped down to get it. I wasn’t really even stuck, I just needed somebody to help lift me out but my mum got all panicky,” she said.

    “Stuck” or not, girl, you couldn’t get out of the drain.

    You can’t make this stuff up, folks.

    As for the phone, well, it’s broken. I guess it’s time for an upgrade.

    You gotta admire the girl’s tenacity, I guess. I’ve gone to some fair lengths to save my phone from peril, so I can relate. If you’re going to jump in a hole, however, just make sure you have the arm strength to push yourself back up. Or just say screw it and buy a new phone.

    Image via Kent 999s, Twitter

  • Man Finds $98K in $150 Craigslist Desk, Returns It

    In man, I guess people aren’t all bad news, a New Haven, Connecticut Rabbi has returned a woman’s entire inheritance after he found it in a bag inside a desk he purchased on Craigslist.

    Rabbi Noah Muroff and his wife purchased a desk for $150 on the online classifieds site, only to find that it wouldn’t quite fit through their office door. Upon deconstructing the desk to make it fit, the Muroffs found a plastic bag filled to the brim with $100 bills. After laying all the cash out on a table and counting it, they discovered that their $150 purchase had come with a secret stash that totaled $98,000.

    “My wife and I both knew immediately that we would return it,” Muroff told WTNH. When I was picking up the desk, the lady, who wasn’t Jewish, told me that she had bought the desk at Staples and put it together herself. We knew the money was hers and she was speechless when we called her to tell her we had found it.”

    Yep, they returned it. Every dollar. Humanity +1.

    The woman said that the money was her inheritance and that she had hidden it and forgotten about it. She forgot about $98,000?

    Muroff received a handwritten thank you note for his kind and honest act:

    I can not thank you enough for your honesty and integrity. I do not think there are too many people in this world that would have done what you did by calling me. I do like to believe that there are still good people left in this crazy world we live in. You certainly are one of them. I work in the non-profit sector and I see people with hardships and struggles every day. So I truly believe that no good deed goes un-noticed. Please accept this gift for you & your family along with my thanks. I will be forever grateful.

    So she did pay out a reward. Muroff did not disclose the amount, but he did say that when the relieved woman learned that he had four children, she upped it.

    Hooray! People don’t suck!

    Image via WTNH, YouTube

  • Reddit Users Surprise Terminally-Ill Man

    Reddit Users Surprise Terminally-Ill Man

    Scott Widak, a forty-seven year old with Down syndrome who is now terminally-ill with liver disease, recently received a lot of encouragement from the Reddit community. Widak, who got tons of letters after a blog post, lives at home with his 85-year-old mother, who helps provide hospice care.

    His nephew, Sean O’Connor, reached out to the Reddit community in a blog post that asked people to send his uncle letters. One of Widak’s favorite things is opening mail, and O’Connor thought opening a lot of it would cheer him up.

    The post recieved over 1,300 comments in three hours, most of them stating they would love to send mail. O’Connor then included a link to a story The Sun Chronicle did on Widnak and his artwork. He also included some of his uncle’s interests, like Johnny Cash and art.

    Reddit soon removed the post for including personal information, but not before it had drawn enough attention that Widnak began receiving tons of letters from all over the world. Some of the mail he received included hand written letters, custom artwork, art supplies, CDs and DVDs, and personal keepsakes. They came pouring in from The U.S., Sweden, Finland, Australia, Japan, and the U.K.

    “The mail that’s arrived has all been extremely positive and thoughtful,” said O’Connor, in an interview with Mashable. “My family and I are amazed at how so many strangers could come together for a random act of kindness.”

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    O’Connor and family shared these photos with Mashable, and they are starting to circulate among blogs.

    [Source: Mashable]

  • Twitter Helps Homeless Man Reconnect With His Daughter

    As December rolls on, we will undoubtedly be inundated with year-in-review materials – “top this” and “best of that.” Some of this is incredibly uninteresting, simply due to the fact that it feels so obligatory. But Twitter’s kick off to their year-in-review happens to be a great story.

    That’s because it has to do with Twitter Stories, Twitter’s initiative to showcase the more human element of Twitter by highlighting various interest stories about how Twitter has impacted the real world. For instance, one of the top “Twitter Stories” from November told how a man saved his mom’s independent bookstore from going under with a single tweet.

    Part one of Twitter’s year-in review doubles as December’s best of Twitter Stories, and they are choosing to highlight one story about a homeless man who used Twitter to reconnect with his estranged daughter.

    Oh yeah, and he meets his grandchildren for the first time. It’s sappy and such but dammit, it’s the holiday season!

    A New York-based group that helps the homeless connect through social media provided a man named Daniel with the tools to get started on Twitter. One thing led to another, and his daughter found out about his attempts to contact her through the site. Check out their story below:

    The December edition of Twitter Stories highlights ten remarkable moments of 2011. From the man who inadvertently live-tweeted the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound to the homeless dad who was reunited with his daughter after years of separation, this list, which doubles as the annual “Year in Stories,” chronicles how people use Twitter to make a difference in ways that are both personal and universal.

    You can check the rest of the stories out here.

    There will be four more parts to Twitter’s year-in-review, all to be unveiled at undisclosed times throughout December.

  • Twitter Stories Attempt To Show The Human Element Of Tweeting

    Today, Twitter has launched Twitter Stories, a site dedicated to human interest stories that revolve around the real-world impact that a single tweet can have.

    According to the official Twitter blog –

    Today we’re launching the first in a series of Twitter stories. Read about a single Tweet that helped save a bookstore from going out of business; an athlete who took a hundred of his followers out to a crab dinner; and, Japanese fishermen who use Twitter to sell their catch before returning to shore. Each story reminds us of the humanity behind Tweets that make the world smaller.

    Twitter users with a good story to tell can submit by mentioning @twitterstories or by tweeting with the hashtag #twitterstories. Twitter suggests that submissions include either a photo or video that helps to get the story across. Twitter will pull together a selection of stories each month to share.

    As of right now, the stories.twitter.com site is live, and there are numerous stories that you can browse through. For example, you can watch a video about how a Portland, Oregon man saved his mother’s bookstore with a single tweet offering burritos in exchange for book purchases.

    Or there’s the story about how NFL player Chad Ochocino routinely uses Twitter to invite dozens of his fans out to dinner – and pays for all of it.

    Charlie Strouth used Twitter to say, “Shit, I need a kidney,” which led to 19 people offering to get tested to see if they were a match. Strouth eventually got a kidney from a Twitter user.

    As you can see, the types of stories vary, and they come from celebrities on the service to average, everyday people. Do you have a Twitter story? Let us know in the comments and tweet it to @twitterstories for your chance to be included in the collection.