Nadine Kalinauskas

    Good News Writer
  • Never upstage a bride, and other proposal etiquette rules

    Whether he was just trying to take advantage of an already romantic day, or he was well aware of the etiquette crime he was committing, it didn’t seem to matter to Redditors — or the unamused-looking bride: you don’t propose at someone else’s wedding. “The new husband seems to be amused, but you can see the wife’s face already beginning to contort into the wrath-like trance of hellfire and fury befitting a woman upstaged,” wrote Redditor PainMatrix.

  • Teens terrorizing themselves with #CharlieCharlieChallenge and filming the results

    Move over Ouija boards and “Bloody Mary.” There’s a new creepy game in town, and it involves a sombrero-wearing demon named Charlie. Teens everywhere are convinced they’ve been able to summon a Mexican demon named Charlie through a new Ouija board-inspired game called the Charlie Charlie Challenge.

  • Tightrope walker sets world record by completing 150m-high sStunt backwards and blindfolded

    A Chinese stuntman wrote himself into the record books for the seventh time by walking backwards between two buildings on a tightrope 150 meters above the ground.

  • April Fools' Day: The best online gags of 2015

    Be careful out there, folks. Anything you read this morning could be a lie.

  • Too soon? Father takes nine-month-old son bodyboarding

    “It is the first time we have ever seen a baby getting barrelled!” wrote Sam Bennet for Surf-Report. "My son [sic] first try,” the boy’s father, Jorge Tirado, wrote under the viral video. Viewers are feeling just as torn about the video of the little guy’s time in the water as he is: Was it a fun introduction to the waves, or a too-dangerous one? Sandra Gartland, a surf instructor and mother of two, watched the video and took no issue with teaching such a young child about the ocean — she took her own son out on a surfboard when he was 10 months old — but she did have some safety reservations.

  • Woman falls asleep outside in Saskatchewan, gets terrifying frostbite on her hands

    The Australian woman was visiting Saskatchewan a couple of weeks ago when, after a night of heavy drinking, she got separated from her friends. The woman’s hands were already exhibiting signs of frostbite, her fingertips purple. Worst case, I lose my hands,” Quirk recalled. Dr. Friesen told Quirk that she’ll “probably” keep all of her fingers, although she won’t find out until June.

  • #GiveBenAJob: Family starts campaign to help man with Down syndrome find a job

    Ben Small wants to be a baker one day. He has his NVQ 2 (a national vocational qualification) in catering. “He’s done quite a bit of work experience in the community but unfortunately no-one’s willing to take him on, pay him and give him the credit for it,” Small’s father, Mike, told the Liverpool Echo. As “a last-ditch attempt to find him a job,” Small’s stepmother, Fiona Hodge, launched an online campaign to help him land his dream job using the hashtag #GiveBenAJob.

  • South Carolina cat missing since 2013 shows up in California

    His owner, Cheryl Walls, eventually assumed he was gone for good. The cat’s microchip helped track down Walls. Today, Kevin will be making the trip from Palm Springs back to North Carolina. "We have handled some pets with crazy back stories, and this is one more for the list," Riverside County Department of Animal Services Director Robert Miller said.

  • Dog flies out of bad situation on a private jet

    Reddit user blahblahblahokay had to leave her dog, Mango, with a friend in Florida for health reasons and move back in with her parents in Pennsylvania. When she was healthy enough, she returned to Florida to visit — and was shocked by what she found. “[Mango] was living in a crack house, didn’t have dog food, covered in fleas, and my friend is now an addict,” she wrote, herself a recovering addict. The dog owner didn’t want to leave her dog behind, but was due to fly out of state without her.

  • Ohio woman’s rude note over parking spot goes viral

    When a neighbour parks in your parking spot, leaving a note on their windshield — instead of immediately calling a tow truck — is a polite way of asking them to park elsewhere next time. Ashley Brady, 26, was on the receiving end of the cruel note. So the complex designated a parking spot for Brady that was closer to her door.

  • Just in time for St. Paddy’s Day: How to open a beer bottle with a sheet of paper

    If you’re stuck without a bottle opener, try this hack from 21-year-old Cardiff University student Rhys Morgan: open the beer bottle with a sheet of paper. Morgan insists that the trick works with high-GSM printer paper like he has in the video, thinner paper and even paper towel. “I was at a garden party with, tragically, a broken bottle opener.

  • In this tiny Japan village, scarecrows outnumber humans

    In recent decades, the population of Nagoro, a village in southwestern Japan, has dwindled to just 35 people. Its scarecrow population, by comparison, is booming. Tsukimi Ayano, 65, made every single one of them. She told NBC News that she made her first scarecrow — in the likeness of her father, to honour him after his death — about 13 years ago.

  • Teacher wins $1M Global Teaching Prize, plans to donate it to her school

    Yesterday, at a ceremony in Dubai, the Varkey Foundation handed out its first-ever $1-million Global Teaching Prize to 63-year-old teacher Nancie Atwell from Edgecomb, Maine. Atwell’s million will help replace two furnaces, buy new books and go toward tuition assistance at the private school. Her independent demonstration school, the Center for Teaching and Learning, is considered a training ground for elementary school teachers from all over the U.S., where they can test new teaching methods first-hand. I started the Center for Teaching and Learning because I wanted to work with colleagues to develop new methods, and send them out into the world for the benefit of other teachers and students.

  • 100-year-old South African woman skydives for her birthday

    It’s not every centenarian’s idea of a birthday party, but this great-grandmother wouldn’t have it any other way. This weekend, Georgina Harwood of South Africa celebrated her 100th birthday by skydiving over Cape Town. It was the third tandem skydive for the adventurous Harwood, who hoped to raise awareness and funds for the National Sea Rescue Institute through her birthday jump.

  • Maine country inn could be yours — for 200 words

    The owner of the Center Lovell Inn and Restaurant in southwestern Maine is set to retire — and is ready to give away the 210-year-old country inn, valued at $905,000, to the winner of an essay contest. Applicants are to outline both their eagerness to run the business and their qualifications to do so in a 200-word essay, owner Janice Sage told Reuters earlier this week.

  • You’ve never heard ‘Gangsta’s Paradise’ performed like this

    Postmodern Jukebox has done it again.

  • Smart pig shines at Seattle Kennel Club Dog Show

    Amy, a 45-pound, 6-month-old miniature pig, recently showed off her new tricks — and a few dance moves — at the Seattle Kennel Club Dog Show, unfazed by the canines surrounding her. “Amy will work for lettuce. There’s nothing I can’t teach her,” owner Lori Stock told the Seattle Times. "Amy has been the most trainable ‘dog’ I’ve ever worked with.

  • Customer leaves touching note, tip for waitress in honour of late brother’s birthday

    A couple dining at Mac’s Grub Shack in Spring Hill, Tennessee, left a tip to remember. After finished their burger, beers and hot dogs, they left a handwritten note scrawled on the back of the receipt for waitress Claire Hudson to find. Every year I go eat his favourite meal (hot dogs) and tip the waitress his age. "I love Reddit and felt like it was a great picture that should be shared," she said.

  • Sick Georgia teen gets prom dress of her dreams

    Abby Gladin, 17, has missed a lot of school in the last ten years. When Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta learned how important prom was to Abby, hospital officials arranged a special prom dress shopping trip for her.

  • Viral Facebook photo helps reunite woman with long-lost mother

    When Stacey Lee was two years old, she and her two brothers went to live with their father. Lee, now 23, hadn’t seen her mother, Brenda Drake, in the two decades that followed — until a viral Facebook post helped reunite the women. After years of trying to locate her long-lost mother, the British woman took her boyfriend’s advice and took a photo of herself holding up a cardboard sign of her mother’s information on it and posted it on Facebook. “When I clicked on my mum’s Facebook profile I couldn’t believe it – she looked just like me!’ Lee told the Daily Mail.