This funny cat cartoon byScott Metzger gives us an insight into the lives of pets and what they have to put up with from their human owners. With this kind of pressure some cats need to undergo therapy, as shown in this Bizarro cartoon by Wayno & Dan Piraro. Their other cartoon shows a dog on the psychiatrist’s couch, but for a different reason. Other cartoonists worth checking out for a few more laughs Gary Larson’s cartoons are funny because they make us see the unexpected humor in things Funny cartoons make us laugh ‘cuz they’re true This funny and wise cartoon from David S ..read more

Today, Serbian pianist and harpist Nadja Dornik posted her performance of Claude Debussy’s Suite Bergamasque, L.75 – III. Clair de Lune. The whole composition was recorded on August 30, 2022 at the Belgrade Philharmonic Concert Hall, including the first and second movements — I. Prélude and II. Menuet — posted 4 and 3 weeks earlier, respectively. Historically, Clair de Lune, was a French poem written by Paul Verlaine in 1869, and became the inspiration for the third and most famous movement of Debussy’s 1890 Suite Bergamasque of the same name. You can actually hear Debussy playing C ..read more

NEWS RELEASE 3-MAR-2023 Transcendental Meditation highly effective in rapidly reducing healthcare worker burnout symptoms during the height of the Covid crisis Healthcare providers (HCP) at three Miami hospitals during the height of the Covid crisis, who practiced the Transcendental Meditation technique (TM), showed a rapid and highly significant reduction in stress-related burnout symptoms such as somatization, depression, anxiety, sleep disturbances, and emotional exhaustion, as well as significant improvement in mental well-being, compared to a parallel matched lifestyle-as-usual group ..read more

Cartoonist Gary Larson, creator of The Far Side, is a genius because he shows us the humor in the obvious, but from a different perspective, one we normally wouldn’t think of. Here is an unexpectedly funny example. Visit The Far Side Comic Strip by Gary Larson official website, www.thefarside.com. The Daily Dose includes selections of classic The Far Side comics, updated daily. Two animated versions were produced for television: Tales from the Far Side (1994) and Tales from the Far Side II (1997). I saw them both. They’re hilarious and the music is great!! See 11 Twis ..read more

This is real cool! Using simple, illuminative paper-cut puppetry, this enchanting video imagines the moment of witness that inspired Gwendolyn Brooks to write her landmark poem, “We Real Cool.” It was created by Manual Cinema in association with Crescendo Literary, with story by Eve L. Ewing and Nate Marshall, and music by Jamila Woods and Ayanna Woods. Poetry Foundation posted We Real Cool on June 6, 2017 as part of the upcoming centennial celebration of her birth that year. Everything about this video is excellent—the background story, Brooks’ dialogue, the poem read by her and sung by ..read more

This figure shows the within-group effect sizes (mean change divided by pooled standard deviation) for the Transcendental Meditation group and the treatment-as-usual control group on burnout, as measured by the Maslach Burnout Inventory, and depression symptoms, as measured by the Beck Depression Inventory-2. Between-group statistics comparing TM to the control group yielded significant differences between groups on both burnout and depression symptoms (p values <.02). CREDIT: Maharishi International University Research Institute. (Image posted on EurekAlert!) According to a randomized cont ..read more

Guitarist Jeff Beck’s unexpected passing earlier this year took the rock world by surprise. He died suddenly of bacterial meningitis. He was 78. R.I.P. (June 24, 1944–January 11, 2023) A guitar player’s guitar player, Jeff Beck was considered one of the top five of all time. An eight-time Grammy winner, he was inducted twice into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame—as a member of the Yardbirds, and for his own Jeff Beck Group. Jeff was a humble person, admired and liked by all. Read Jeff Beck, Rock’s Quiet Guitar Virtuoso, Dead at 78. It includes loving quotes from members of Rock and Rol ..read more

This is a very funny cartoon with a Jewish New Yorker sense of humor! Emily Carey posted it on her Instagram as Confrontation therapy — imagined by Bob Mankoff. To learn more about this celebrated cartoonist and humorist, visit bobmankoff.com. In response, Selena Palmer posted a joke, but with this self-deprecating ethnic twist: How many Jewish mothers needed to change a lightbulb?…None…I’ll suffer here, in the dark. Speaking of suffering, cartoons by David Sipress: thinking one was a writer and the frustration of being one (added at the bottom of that post) cracked me up. And when it comes t ..read more

The more I read this poem—Once in the 40’s by William Stafford—the more I love it. It may seem simple, but it quietly surprised me at the end. I subscribe to the Academy of American Poets newsletter and it appeared in a list of poets whose birthdays are in January. Stafford’s is the 17th. Once in the 40’s We were alone one night on a long road in Montana. This was in winter, a big night, far to the stars. We had hitched, my wife and I, and left our ride at a crossing to go on. Tired and cold—but brave—we trudged along. This, we said, was our life, watched over, allowed to go where we wanted ..read more

I love this sweet and rare interaction between this girl and a bird. It’s as if Snow White and The Sound of Music collaborated to create “a golden hour miracle.” The description below explained what had happened. A bird had crashed into their window and was dazed. We see their delighted daughter holding the bird and singing Edelweiss to it while compassionately caressing it. You can hear the bird chirp feebly. This must have helped to get it back on its feet, or in this case, off, since “she flew away fit as a fiddle.” What a magical moment! Gable Swanlund’s mother posted this video of her and ..read more