Year: 2024

Americans everywhere are dealing with subscription fatigue. A report by the financial experts at the Motley Fool found that 57% of respondents to their survey believe they are overpaying for subscriptions and 40% say they have too many.

The worst part is checking your bank account and find you’re being charged for a subscription or service that you don’t even use.

A fast way to cut back on your subscription payments is to unsubscribe to services on your phone. Content strategist Marvelle Reed, aka the “Marketing Misfit,” recently shared a video on TikTok explaining how to see what you’ve subscribed to on your iPhone and cancel the services you don’t need.

“If you’ve got a bunch of charges coming from Apple that you don’t know where they came from or you don’t know why they still trying to charge you and you want to cancel all them checks, this is what you do,” Reed opens the video.

#greenscreenvideo #greenscreen

@marketingmarvy

#greenscreenvideo #greenscreen

1. Go to “Settings” on your device

2. Click on your profile

3. Go to “Media and Purchases”

4. Click on “View Account”

5. Scroll down to “Purchase History”

6. Review all of your charges and turn off subscriptions you no longer want

The video was a big help to those who discovered they were being charged for services they didn’t need. “You are sent from heaven!!! The way I was just talking about all the random charges on my credit card that I can’t keep up with. Thank you, my friend!!” Summertime wrote. “Thanks for this. There were two charges for an app that I canceled,” Aailyahalexis added.

Reed’s post is also a great reminder for everyone, even if they don’t have an iPhone, to check their bank account once a month for unnecessary services or subscriptions and those that may have raised their prices. In a world where an increasing number of services are on a subscription model, staying one step ahead of unnecessary charges is a big part of staying financially fit.

1. Go to “Settings” on your device

2. Click on your profile

3. Go to “Media and Purchases”

4. Click on “View Account”

5. Scroll down to “Purchase History”

6. Review all of your charges and turn off subscriptions you no longer want

The video was a big help to those who were being charged for services they don’t need. “You are sent from heaven!!! The way I was just talking about all the random charges on my credit card that I can’t keep up with. Thank you, my friend!!” Summertime wrote. Thanks for this. There were two charges for an app that I canceled,” Aailyahalexis added.

Reed’s post is also a great reminder for everyone, even if they don’t have an iPhone, to check their bank account once a month for services they didn’t know they were paying for or subscriptions that may have raised their prices. In a world where an increasing number of services are on a subscription model, staying one step ahead of unnecessary charges is a big aprt of financial fitness.

It’s not a secret that nearly all golden retrievers are identical. Honestly, magic has to be involved for owners to know which one belongs to them when more than one golden retriever is around. Seriously, how do they all seem have the same face? It’s like someone fell asleep on the copy machine when they were being created.

Outside of collars, harnesses and bandanas, immediately identifying the dog that belongs to you has to be a secret skill because at first glance, their personalities are also super similar. That’s why it’s not surprising when one family dropped off their sweet golden pooch at daycare and to be groomed, they didn’t notice the daycare sent out the wrong dog.

See, not even their human parents can tell them apart because when the swapped dog got home, nothing seemed odd to the owners at first. She was freshly groomed so any small differences were quickly brushed off. But this accidental doppelgänger wasn’t fooling her feline siblings.

Once the dog was in their house, they noticed that their cats started behaving strangely towards their canine sibling. The cats started attacking the dog, likely trying to get it to tell them what they did with their real dog sister. Cat slaps and a house full of strange people didn’t dampen the imposter’s spirit though, in fact, that’s what helped reveal the switcharoo.

This dog kept handing out face kisses and had no interest in seeing her favorite neighbor. After putting all of those things together, the owners decided to hightail it to the vet’s office to scan the dog’s microchip. Alas, they indeed had the wrong dog.

“We just never even thought that that would happen, and of course we thought we would know right? Like we’re her parents, we would know something was wrong, we would know right off the bat that it wasn’t Emmy,” Kebby Kelley told Fox 9 Minneapolis-St. Paul.

Seems both golden retrievers got to go on a really strange adventure that deserves a lifetime of delicious dog treats for the confusion.

See both sweet pups below:

This article originally appeared on 9.21.23

Most episodes of “Saturday Night Live” are scheduled so the funnier bits go first and the riskier, oddball sketches appear towards the end, in case they have to be cut for time. But on the February 4 episode featuring host Pedro Pascal (“The Mandalorian,” “The Last of Us”), the final sketch, “Lisa from Temecula,” was probably the most memorable of the night.

That’s high praise because it was a strong episode, with a funny “Last of Us” parody featuring the Super Mario Brothers and a sketch where Pascal played a protective mother.

In “Lisa from Temecula,” Paul, played by Pascal, takes a few friends out for dinner, played by Punkie Johnson, newcomer Molly Kearney and breakout star Bowen Yang. The trouble comes when Johnson’s sister Lisa, played by Ego Nwodim, orders her steak “extra, extra well done.”

The sketch is a play on the notion that it’s a faux pas to order well-done steak, especially in a fancy restaurant. However, Lisa doesn’t care and won’t tolerate “one speck of red” on her steak.

The sketch is one of the rare moments on “SNL” where things are so funny that the cast breaks character. Pascal has difficulty getting through his lines and Yang has to cover his face because he can’t stop laughing. But Nwodim only has one small break in the scene and keeps it together as the sketch’s comedy core.

“Lisa from Temecula” got a lot of attention on social media and Nwodim later thanked the sketch’s writers Alex English, Gary Richardson and Michael Che.

u201cwe have @alex3nglish + Gary Richardson and Che to thank for Lisa. love them 4Life.u201d

— Ego Nwodim (@Ego Nwodim)
1675645093

This article originally appeared on 2.6.23

Macy Avis, a 9th-grader with Down Syndrome, had a reaction to receiving a birthday party invite that was so pure and joyous that it quickly went viral on Instagram.

Heather Avis, Macy’s mom, wrote in the video’s caption that she could “count on one hand the amount of birthday parties” that Macy had been invited to throughout her childhood.

Understandably, when a friend from Macy’s life skills program handed her an invitation, her joy was “palpable.”

“To me it spoke of a longing fulfilled. All I could do was laugh with her and then cry as I celebrated with her,” Avis wrote.

In the video, we hear the proud mom say, “You got invited to a birthday party?” followed by absolute squeals of delight from Macy.

Watch:

See on Instagram

Macy and her mom weren’t the only ones feeling celebratory. So many viewers chimed in to share their own joy at the news, and offer some encouragement.

“Thank you for sharing this wonderful moment with us! I got goosebumps listening to the glee in Macy’s voice. I am so incredibly happy for her and can’t wait to hear all about the amazing time she’s bound to have!” one person wrote.

Another declared, “This is the best thing on the whole internet.”

The birthday party invite is the result of Avis’s “fight” to find inclusive spaces for her daughter, a journey she noted has “only just begun” in a pinned Instagram post.

Avis explained up until recently how Macy was in general education, where they had experienced some “amazing inclusive classrooms,” but still overall “felt a longing for belonging.” This led Macy to joining a life skills program with other disabled students, where she has been able to nurture a solid community—complete with birthday invitations.

As for how that party went, this follow-up video speaks for itself:

See on Instagram

Along with celebrating Macy’s victory, Avis used the moment to note that “the party was inclusive not because a student in the general education program invited Macy, but because a person with an intellectual disability invited both disabled and non-disabled individuals. It was inclusive because people like Macy and the young man we were celebrating, who are often excluded, truly understand how to include others. Let’s reflect on that for a moment!”

While it’s important that students with Down Syndrome are placed in environments with the resources they need, not including them into the general community doesn’t help break through the stigma they regularly face—including being treated as children even when they are adults, or assuming they are entirely dependent. This was an issue recently tackled in the “Assume I Can” ad starring Madison Tevlin.

Moreover, Avis added that prioritizing diversity and inclusion offers the “beautiful gift” of “recognizing our shared humanity” among those who might at first seem different from us. That’s why she continues advocating for both her daughter and the Down Syndrome community through her The Lucky Few Foundation and podcast.

Many kids are seriously struggling in school. According to US News, an estimated 49% of public students started off the 2022-2023 school year behind in at least one subject as last year. That’s only a small fraction better than the 50% of students behind in the previous year.

And while there are several factors contributing to this issue—recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, a lack of resources for many public schools, a teacher shortage, etc.—several educators feel that a majorly overlooked aspect is the parents’ involvement, or lack thereof, in their child’s education.

Recently, one former teacher bluntly stated that it was parents’ “denial” that’s to blame. Odion, who now works as a flight attendant, made her case in response to another teacher asking parents “Why don’t y’all know that your kids aren’t performing on their grade level?” on TikTok.

In the original video, the teacher (@qbthedon) laments that even though he teaches 7th grade, most of them still perform on a 4th grade level, and, despite his efforts, those kids still move onto the next grade. The worst part is that the parents don’t seem to be aware that their kids are struggling.

@qbthedon Lets chat!! #fyp #viral #teachertok ♬ original sound – QBSkiiii

This lack of awareness and engagement dates back further than the pandemic years, says Odion, who taught Pre-K and Kindergarten in 2013.

Case in point: parent-teacher conference nights, where virtually no parent would show up. Odion then recalled one father who did attend with his daughter, called Tia for the story, but would not believe that Tia did not know the full alphabet.

“In kindergarten, you have to at least know, I think it was 80% of the 52 letters, as in uppercase and lowercase, and you have to be able to identify at random. So, I’m telling the dad that she barely knows 10 letters. And he’s in denial. ‘Nah, you know, she knows her letters,'” Odion says.

She then acts out that night, using a makeshift flashcard like she did to test Tia.

“I literally said, ‘What letter is this?’” Odion says while holding up the letter “M.” “She said something that’s not it. Put another one down. ‘What letter is this?’ She don’t know it.”

Even still, the dad insisted that Tia knew her letters, then eventually blamed Tia’s older brother, who, despite only being a sixth grader himself, was apparently “supposed to teach her.”

“It is not up to a child in elementary school, or middle school, or really any of your older kids, as someone who’s an older child… It is not up to the kids to teach younger kids,” Odion says in the clip.

Using another example, Odion states that a fifth grader in her class was reading at a kindergarten level and could only process basic sentences like “I see you” and “I like to see.”

In this instance, the students should be held back in order to fully learn the year’s curriculum. But Odion argues that parents fight against it “because they are more concerned about the optics of a child being held back than actually taking care of the child’s needs.”

In this instance, the students should be held back in order to fully learn the year’s curriculum. But Odion argues that parents fight against it “because they are more concerned about the optics of a child being held back than actually taking care of the child’s needs.”

While the research shows that holding kids back a grade doesn’t necessarily improve their academic performance, and that there are pros and cons either way, the biggest point Odion seems to be trying to make is that parents need to be more proactive in their child’s education.

“Parents, y’all can’t be backseat drivers about your child’s learning. You have to help reinforce it at home. You put a kid in front of that phone or iPad whenever they come home, it better be on YouTube, and it better be learning about letters and sight words. You can’t tell me you can’t read to the kid. It takes 10 minutes to read to the kid. No one is that busy,” she concludes.

Watch the full video below:

@bodacious_bobo #stitch with @QBSkiiii ♬ original sound – Odion • $OdionE

This article originally appeared on 1.5.24

In 1996 there was a moment that was captured on camera that took place that would become a piece of social justice history. In Ann Arbor, Michigan, the Ku Klux Klan held a rally when counter protestors showed up as a means to show that white supremacist group was unwelcome in their town. The historic moment came when a man, Albert McKeel Jr., wearing a confederate flag shirt with SS tattoos enters the counter protestors’ side alone.

Keisha Thomas, then just 18-years-old was in the crowd to protest the KKK being in Ann Arbor when things . People in the crowd at first attempted to chase the man out of the crowd when it was announced he was there, but the group quickly became violent. That’s when Thomas was shocked into action.

Though she is Black and the man was wearing symbols that depict his alleged hatred of Black people, Thomas didn’t let that stop her.

The teen threw herself on top of the man demanding that the crowd stop hitting and kicking him. In that moment, she let compassion for another human being lead the way, possibly saving his life. In an update video with The Fire, a non profit organization, Thomas said it felt as if two angels lifted her in that moment.

Years later, Thomas ran into the man’s son at a coffee shop where he thanked her for stepping in to save his dad. The two stayed in touch over the years, allowing Thomas to speak to McKeel’s 12-year-old daughter after his passing in 2016. The little girl also thanked the woman expressing that if it weren’t for her then she wouldn’t exist.

Thomas tells MLive, “When I heard that, I thought this was the future and the past of what peace has created,” Thomas said. “The real accomplishment of all this to me is to know that his son and daughter don’t share the same views. History didn’t repeat itself. That’s what gives me hope that the world can get better from generation to generation.”

To think she made a piece of history before she even graduated high school. The photo of her throwing herself on top of McKeel won Life Magazine’s best photo of the year for 1996. The now iconic photo even landed Thomas an interview with Oprah.

But what is Thomas up to now? It seems she still has a passion for social justice and human rights. According to the Michigan media site, MLive, she’s done everything from volunteering after 9/11 to distributing food to Hurricane Katrina victims. She also walked from Selma, Alabama to Washington D.C. for voting rights with the NAACP and volunteered at a hospital in Haiti.

Thomas has been on the move to help other people in any way she could since that photo was taken nearly three decades ago. The moment didn’t just inspire her to keep showing up for other people, but it continues to inspire others every time it goes viral on social media.

Watch her update video below:

Last year, Halsey ended their partnership with Capitol Records after a public falling-out with the label, signing a few months later with Columbia. Today, they offered the first new music from that partnership with “The End,” a strained reflection on her lifetime of hardships. “If you knew it was the end of the world, would you like to stay a while?” she asks of a potential companion. “Would you leave when it gets hard.” Listen to the gutting track below.

Contrary to its title, though, “The End” appears to be just the beginning. In a statement accompanying its release, Halsey wrote:

long story short, I’m Lucky to be alive.

short story long, I wrote an album.

it begins with The End. Out now.

This corroborates comments Halsey made late last year, when she told fans she is working on a new album during a livestream. “The album is not about feeling good,” she said, “The album is about feeling bad, but about feeling bad together.”

Earlier this week, she also sent out letters to fans with cryptic clues to her upcoming work, as well as launching a website revealing possible song titles. You can find the link to that website here.

A previous Alien: Romulus teaser trailer set up the atmosphere that we expect from Fede Álvarez, who has already scared the pants off audiences with maddeningly quiet moments in Don’t Breathe, and now, he’s in space, where (as the iconic tagline goes) “no one can hear you scream.” With that said, Álvarez is also the guy you want when you need skilled hands on an existing movie franchise, as with 2013’s Evil Dead, and he’s here to do justice to what the original Alien movie (from Ridley Scott) did best: use the spaceship’s confines to help craft merciless terror.

This film goes back to the franchise’s late 1970s/early 1980s roots (and blue-collar beginnings) with an official interquel that takes place in between Scott’s Alien (which occurred in 2090-ish) and James Cameron’s Aliens (which happened in 2179). As this trailer shows, group of young-adult scavengers find themselves being hunted on a ship, and there are plentiful callbacks on display like the water scene (you can still hear Newt’s piercing scream from Aliens, right?), and oh god, Álvarez really is intent upon us seeing the penetration action from the facehuggers as they move in to plant the eggs.

The simple synopsis of this movie reads, “Young people on a distant world find themselves confronting the most terrifying life-form in the universe.” The story stands separate (although obviously in the same universe) from FX’s upcoming Alien series from Noah Hawley, and if you were wondering whether Álvarez prefers Alien or Aliens, he wisely will not go there. There is, however, a taste of Alien 3 mixed into the end of this trailer when Cailee Spaeny’s Ripley-esque character finds herself corned by a xenomorph. Eek.

Spaeny will be accompanied by Isabela Merced, Archie Renaux, David Johnson, Aileen Wu, and Spike Feam. Please enjoy this poster because it goes seriously hard. Lots of Evil Dead flavor here, too:

Alien: Romulus arrives in theaters on August 16.

Terius Gesteelde-Diamant (aka Nash), better known as hit-making songwriter and producer The-Dream, has been sued for sexual battery by a former protege, according to the New York Times.

The plaintiff is a singer named Chanaaz Mangroe, who performed as Channii Monroe. She alleges that Gesteelde-Diamant “repeatedly forced her to have sex, strangled her and once made a video recording of an intimate encounter and threatened to show it to others” after enticing her into a relationship with promises to help advance her career. Mangroe also names Epic Records in her complaint, saying they failed to respond to her reports against him, and eventually dropped her when he did not deliver her music to them.

In a statement, Mangroe said, “What Dream did to me made it impossible to live the life I envisioned for myself and pursue my goals as a singer and songwriter. Ultimately, my silence has become too painful, and I realized that I need to tell my story to heal. I hope that doing so will also help others and prevent future horrific abuse.”

Meanwhile, Gesteelde-Diamant denied the allegations through a representative, responding, “These claims are untrue and defamatory. I oppose all forms of harassment and have always strived to help people realize their career goals. As someone committed to making a positive impact on my fellow artists and the world at large, I am deeply offended and saddened by these accusations.”

According to the suit, Mangroe began a relationship with Gesteelde-Diamant after sending him samples of her work. He allegedly told her he could make her “the next Beyoncé and Rihanna,” but began pressuring her for sex within days. She says that over time, he began having his security follow her, demanding regular check-ins and exploding with anger at perceived signs of disloyalty or ingratitude.

Mangroe is represented by Douglas H. Wigdor and Meredith A. Firetog, who also filed Cassie’s sexual assault case against Sean “Diddy” Combs, which was settled a day after being made public.

This isn’t the first time The-Dream was accused of violence aganist women. In 2014, he was charged with assault on allegations that he kicked, punched and choked a former girlfriend; however, prosecutors dropped the charges due to a lack of evidence.

Jamie xx released his last solo album, In Colour, nearly ten years ago, in 2015. Today, he shared some good news with long-suffering fans who’ve been waiting for a follow-up all that time: The wait is nearly over.

On September 20th, Jamie xx will release his third studio album, In Waves, via Young. Featuring 12 tracks, including the recently released “Baddy On The Floor,” the album will feature collaborations with a diverse array of artists from across multiple genres and disciplines. Honey Dijon, John Glacier, Kelsey Lu, Oona Doherty, Panda Bear, and Robyn will all appear on In Waves, as will Jamie’s The xx bandmates Romy and Oliver Sim.

According to the press release announcing the album, Jamie created In Waves over the course of four years, during which he picked up surfing — a likely inspiration for the title along with its stop-and-start creation process. He’s also been working on a new project for The xx, contributing to the odd rhythm of In Waves‘ creation.

He also says of the project, “It’s been a while… and a lot has happened in that time. Ups and downs, growing up, figuring stuff out and then forgetting it all many times over. Life-changing events and world changing events. These waves that we have all experienced together and alone. I wanted to make something fun, joyful and introspective all at once. The best moments on a dance floor are usually that for me. I can’t wait to share it with you.”

In Waves is due 9/20 via Young. You can find more info here and see the tracklist below.

Tracklist

1. “Wanna”
2. “Treat Each Other Right”
3. “Waited All Night” Feat. Romy & Oliver Sim
4. “Baddy On The Floor” Feat. Honey Dijon
5. “Dafodil” Feat. Kelsey Lu, John Glacier & Panda Bear
6. “Still Summer”
7. “Life” Feat. Robyn
8. “The Feeling I Get From You”
9. “Breather”
10. “All You Children” Feat. The Avalanches
11. “Every Single Weekend” (Interlude)
12. “Falling Together” Feat. Oona Doherty

Deluxe LP Bonus 12” Package

1. “F U” Feat. Erykah Badu
2. “It’s So Good”
3. “Do Something”
4. “Let’s Do It Again”
5. “Kill Dem”