thedailywhat:

Survivorman of the Day: A 45-year-old man in Sweden has reportedly managed to survive for two months trapped inside a snowed-in car with no food and only a sleeping bag to keep warm.

Snowmobilers who spotted his vehicle near the northern city of Umea initially believed it to be an abandoned wreck. Upon clearing away the snow, they discovered a dangerously thin person living inside.

“Just incredible that he’s alive considering that he had no food, but also since it’s been really cold for some time after Christmas,” said a rescue team member.

Doctors believe the man managed to survive by going into a “dormant-like state,” similar to ursine hibernation. “Humans can do that,” said doctor Stefan Branth. “He probably had a body temperature of around 31 degrees (Celsius) which the body adjusted to. Due to the low temperature, not much energy was used up.”

It remained unclear how the man found himself stuck in the snow to begin with.

[msnbc / photo: photoblog.]

thedailywhat:

Adorable Old People of the Day: On the day she officially became a centenarian, Dana Jackson and her boy toy, 87-year-old Bill Strauss, tied the knot at a wedding ceremony hosted by the Rosewood Health Care Center in Bowling Green, Kentucky. 

The best part? Ice cream cake.

[aarp.]

thedailywhat:

Faith In Humanity Chaser of the Day: Noah Lamaide’s grandma needed $10,000 to stave off foreclosure of her home, so he did what any 12-year-old would do: He turned to the online charity he set up to help victims of Hurricane Katrina and asked for assistance.

The preteen from Stevens Point, Wisconsin, launched Noah’s Dream Catcher Network in 2010 to raise money for people affected by the natural disaster.

When he learned that his grandma has fallen behind on her mortgage due to illness and would need at least $10,000 to keep her family home from being auctioned off, he began soliciting donations through the charity.

“I didn’t think I was going to make it,” Noah said, so when he ended up raising $10,500, effectively saving his grandma’s house, “it was surprising.”

“I’m grateful for all the people who donated,” Noah told local reporters. “There’s a lot more good people in the world than I thought.” 

[wdh / video: myfoxwausau.]

thedailywhat:

Afternoon Snack: Jamie’s husband knows how much she loves penguins so for her birthday he took her to Sea World where she met an “extra affectionate” King Penguin named Johnny Five who gave here a king-size hug.

[@alex_ogle.]

thedailywhat:

Caught On Camera of the Day: A snowmobile rider stuck in the snow is rescued after getting buried in an avalanche triggered by a fellow snowmobile rider — and it’s all caught on helmet-cam.

In the video’s comments, the rescued snowmobiler says:

The guy on the white sled rode the avalanche down and knew right where to look for me. These guys saved my ass and got me out fast. Seemed like a whole lot longer when in the snow but thanks for the quick work guys. Looking forward to the next ride with you beacon and all.:)

Here’s a tip for next time: Make sure your companions know not to ride above you when you’re stuck in the snow because it has a tendency to trigger avalanches.

[jalopnik.]

thedailywhat:

Inspirational Motivational of the Day: Yesterday afternoon, British badass Felicity Aston successfully completed her treacherous 59-day trek across Antarctica, becoming the first woman to solo-ski the length of the continent’s icy terrain.

Armed with nothing but a pair of skis, a pair of poles, and her arms, Aston dragged two sledges across 1,084 miles from Leverett Glacier to Hercules Inlet. “When I saw the coastal mountains that marked my end point for the first time, I literally just stopped in my tracks and bawled my eyes out,” Aston said.

A meteorologist by trade, the 34-year-old Kentish woman had been tweeting her record-setting schlep. “Just in case I was in danger of feeling sentimental, a violent wind has appeared from nowhere and is beating the tent like the bad old days,” she wrote her followers while awaiting a lift back to base camp after crossing the finish line.

Speaking of the hardships she endured along the way, Aston said the “mental side” was tougher than the physical side. “Being alone sounds like such a simple thing, but when was the last time you spent a whole day without seeing any person?”

[ap / guardian / @felicity_aston.]

Ladies and gentlemen, you are currently looking at the newest employee of Bernardsville Newspapers taking a bite of her celebratory breakfast sandwich. 

thedailywhat:

Lucky To Be Alive of the Day: World-renowned wingsuit flyer Jeb “The Birdman” Corliss survived a harrowing, 200-foot near-freefall after BASE jumping off Cape Town’s Table Mountain.

“He managed to release his emergency chute and we believe he would have died without it,” said Table Mountain spokesman Merle Collins.

The entire ordeal was caught on tape by an HBO camera crew.

This was Corliss’s second jump off the South African landmark. It was unclear what went wrong, but his jumping partner Joby Ogwyn suggested Corliss may have either hit a ledge or been a victim of the elements.

The daredevil is currently resting in a private hospital with two broken legs. “I saw him in the emergency room and asked whether I could release details of his condition,” said a spokesperson for the hospital. “He smiled at me and said ‘Tell them I feel the best I ever have’.”

[telegraph / video: dpaf.]

thedailywhat:

Heartwarming Tearjerker of the Day: The hunting, fishing, trapping, ATVing outdoorsman behind AULTimate Outdoors recently shared this remarkable video of a dog named Charlie being rescued after falling into a frozen lake.

He writes: 

 I am not a fireman so I basicaly just kept talking to the dog to encourage him to keep his head up. He kept fliping on his back and going with the current of the water. We would yell to him and he would fight back to the ice. I didn’t start filming until the fire department got there and I knew he would be rescued. I didn’t wanna just film the dog drowning. 

The dog was rescued and treated in an ambulance after. He then was taken to the vet and spent the night. He made a full recovery.

Happy endings are my favorite kind of endings.

[@alex_ogle.]

thedailywhat:

Food For Thought of the Day: McDonald’s UK has announced that it will be temporarily replacing the toy commonly found in the company’s familiar “Happy Meal” with a book.

The fast food chain will thus become — at least for the duration of the giveaway — Britain’s biggest retailer of children’s books, as distributes nine million copies of War Horse author Michael Morpurgo’s Mudpuddle Farm titles.

Morpurgo will reportedly be donating his royalties from the promotion to benefit his charity, Farms for City Children.

In an amusing twist, the Children’s Food Campaign has expressed concern that giving away Mudpuddle books will “make fast food more attractive to children.”

I’ll take fat and well-read over skinny and illiterate any day.

[telegraph / guardian / eater.]