Veterinary clinics see all kinds of things on any given day. Unlike medical professionals that treat humans, vets treat a wide variety of species—and they also have to deal with people bringing in all manner of wildlife that have no business being at the vet. Walter Brown is a vet tech at the University of Georgia College of Veterinary Medicine. He's also an aspiring comedian known as "Skinni," and he's begun mixing his professions by sharing veterinary advice on social media in the most entertaining way. A live video he shared on his Facebook page on Memorial Day weekend went viral, with more than 1.7 million views, as people discovered and shared his hilarious admonitions to leave animal "chirrin" alone when they're out on a nature hike. Brown wrote, "Let me nip dis one in da bud too.....leave these wild animals chirrin alone........" and then offered this advice:Brown shared another video this weekend, advising people in the South not to go running in the heat with their Nordic breed and Brachycephalic breed dogs. And again, he offers solid veterinary advice in a way that's highly entertaining. Like, if someone's going to lay out an admonishment to the public, it should be this man. Seriously, can all public service announcements from here on out come from Walter Brown, please? This article originally appeared on 6.8.20

When 6-year-old Blake Rajahn shows up to his first grade classroom on Monday, he will arrive bearing an uplifting a message for his fellow students.Blake's mother, Nikki Rajahn, runs a custom personalization business in Fayette County, Georgia, and she asked her son what kind of t-shirt he wanted for his first day of school. He could have chosen anything—his favorite sports star's number, a cool dragon, a witty saying—anything he wanted, she could make.Blake chose something unexpected—an orange t-shirt with a simple, sweet message for the other kids at his school to see. Five little words that might just mean the world to someone who reads them. "I will be your friend."Ouch. My heart.Rajahn shared the story on her business Facebook page: "I have to brag on my son. I told him that as a back to school gift, I will make him any shirt he would like. It could have anything—a basketball theme, football, etc. which are all his favorites. He thought a while and said, 'will you please make me a shirt that says "I will be your friend" for all the kids who need a friend to know that I am here for them?' Never underestimate your kid's heart for others! I love my sweet Blake! #stopbullying" Apparently, such a gesture is typical of Blake. "He has always had a heart for others and is very genuine," his mother told Upworthy. She said she's donating part of the proceeds of her t-shirt sales to the Real Life Center, a non-profit that helps families in need in Tyrone, Georgia, all because of Blake."During the summer we had a vacation Bible school that he went to," she said, "and they did a toothbrush and toothpaste drive for the Real Life Center. He came home saying we needed to go to the Dollar Store to get some that night. We told him we would go the next day, but he had to use his money for it. He said that was fine, so we asked how much he would like to spend. He said, 'It's for people who don't have any, right?' We said yes, so he very matter-of-fact said, 'Well all of it!' And he did!"Rajahn said everyone has been very encouraging and people are starting to order their own version of the t-shirt with "#blakesfriends" added to it. She also shared Blake's reaction to hearing that his shirt idea was starting to spread on Facebook—and again, it's just the sweetest darn thing."Ever since I posted about my son and his shirt, I have sold some and told Blake about it. He said, "Oh good! Now more and more people are going to have more and more friends!" He is just so flattered so many want to be his twin too ?"Sometimes all a person needs is one friend so they won't feel alone, and Blake going out of his way to make sure kids feel welcomed by him is an example even adults can learn from. If we all reached out to people who might be shy or who might feel excluded, and let them know in some small way that we are open to being friends, what a better world we could build. Thank you, Blake, for bringing some much-needed sunshine into our day. This article originally appeared on 8.2.19

Sometimes the story behind the movie is more interesting than the story in the movie. In her autobiography, Home Work, Julie Andrews shared some of her experiences filming The Sound of Music. Andrews spoke with BuzzFeed News about her book, revealing her thoughts on the actual von Trapp family house. The movie musical, which is based on a section of the real-life Maria von Trapp's book, The Story of the Trapp Family Singers, was shot in a Hollywood studio. The classic scene of Julie Andrews spinning in a meadow was shot in Bavaria, and the exteriors of the von Trapp house were filmed at a different house entirely. - YouTube Shop THE SOUND OF MUSIC Super Deluxe Edition, set for release on December 1, 2023 and available for pre-order now. Andrews did visit the von Trapp house in Salzburg, Austria later on in her life. "It wasn't until much later that I happened to visit the real villa where they actually lived," she told BuzzFeed News. During her visit, Andrews said she could "feel the evil that once permeated those walls." The evil Andrews refers to is, of course, the Nazis. "Because after they fled the country, which they had to do, as in the film, [Heinrich] Himmler took over that villa, and the atrocities there were just terrible," she continued.The story behind the von Trapp house is much darker than what's touched on in the splashy Hollywood musical. The actual von Trapp family lived in the house from 1923 until they fled Austria in 1938. In 1938, the Nazis annexed Austria, making life hard for the singing family. Georg von Trapp refused to fly the Nazi flag on his house, and declined a request to sing at Hilter's birthday party. There was fear their neighbors would spy on them and their children would become brainwashed by Nazi politics. Even though the family was offered fame, they decided to stay true to their principals and leave Austria. Not one year later, the house was occupied by Nazis. Heinrich Himmler used the house as his summer residence until 1945.Himmler was the second most powerful man of the Third Reich. Himmler set up and ran the Nazi concentration camps. The house was surrounded by armed guards and barbed wires. A barracks for the SS was built in the garden. Himmler also built the white wall around the house using slave labor. After the wall was completed, he had those who constructed the wall shot. Very monstrous.Now, the von Trapp house is a more peaceful place. In 1947, the property was purchased from the von Trapp family by the Missionaries of the Precious Blood. In 2008, it opened to the public as a hotel. - YouTube The Sound of Music movie clips: http://j.mp/1EgqF2W BUY THE MOVIE: FandangoNOW ... While the house has a heavy history, the previous residents of the property took satisfaction in knowing the von Trapps resisted the Nazi party. "What Himmler did here is a heavy weight on the house," Precious Blood Fr. Andreas Hasenburger, the rector of the Kolleg St. Josef, told the National Catholic Reporter. "But we are also proud to live in the von Trapp house, the house of the man who said no to the Führer."It takes a lot of guts to stand up for what you believe in, especially when you're pressured to forfeit your integrity. Knowing that the family gave up their life to stay true to their principals makes The Sound of Music so much better. This article originally appeared on 10.28.19

As far as modern parenting goes, there’s no tough love quandary quite so universal as setting phone boundaries. It can be difficult for parents to find the balance between being overly strict, potentially setting their kid’s up to be left out from friends groups, and being far too lax, exposing their still-developing minds to technology’s more harmful characteristics. Making it even more tricky is the fact that it’s still pretty much the Wild West when it comes to setting said phone boundaries. A parent might think their kid is ready to have a phone, only to realize after the fact that they should have waited. Then there’s the uncomfortable scenario of taking the phone away and being the bad guy. No parent loves that moment, even if they’re ultimately doing what’s best for their child. This is a situation experienced by regular parents and celebrity ones alike, apparently. Recently Drew Barrymore reflected on her own decision to take away her daughter's phone in a "vulnerable" message, captioned “Phone Home,” shared to her Instagram account on Aug 30. In the lengthy note the "E.T." star noted how the choice was influenced by her own rebellious childhood of "too much access and excess.” See on Instagram "I wished many times when I was a kid that someone would tell me no," she wrote. "I wanted so badly to rebel all the time, and it was because I had no guardrails."Barrymore has frequently gotten candid about how being thrust into stardom as a child left her vulnerable to very adult situations and in desperate need of parental guidance. Going to rehabilitation for two years luckily was a “blessing” that gave her a “hard reset.” And now that she’s a parent herself to two girls, Olive, 12 and Frankie, 10, she sees how phones are a repeat of this "too much access and excess” pattern. Understandably, she wants to be “protective” of her kids to go down the same path she once did. See on Instagram "Now that I am a mother, I cannot believe I live in a world that I know correlates to my own personal pitfalls and many of my peers who got into too much, too soon,” she wrote. In regards to her daughter Olive, Barrymore gave her a phone for her 11th birthday because “all her friends had one.” However, the phone was "only to be used on weekends and for a limited time with no social media."Even with those well intentioned restrictions, Barrymore made troubling discoveries. "Within three months, I gathered the data of the texts and behavior. I was shocked by the results. Life depended on the phone. Happiness was embedded in it. Life source came from this mini digital box. Moods were dependent on the device."Wanting to “put a stop to these high stakes emotions flying around,” Barrymore printed out every single text onto paper and handed Olive "a stack of pages,” reminding her that "they're permanent somewhere where we don't see it, so we don't believe in its retraceable and damning nature if we fail digitally to act with decency.” Barrymore then took the phone away, but made sure to let Olive know that it was not a “punishment on her character." It simply “was not time yet.” See on Instagram "I want to let parents know that we can live with our children's discomfort in having to wait. We can be vilified and know we are doing what we now know to be a safer, slower and scaffolded approach," she concluded. "I am going to become the parent I needed, the adult I needed."Barrymore did add that the current relationship most adults have to their phones only sets an example for kids, saying, “we are living in an á la carte system as caretakers, in a modern, fast-moving world where tiny little computers are in every adult’s hands, modeling that it is OK to be attached to a device that is a portal to literally everything.”But she argues that our own challenges with setting phone boundaries can actually be a point of connection, writing, “we can admit we’re learning, too, especially in tech, and things have to pivot from time to time.”Barrymore, whose “actions to move forward” included speaking with Apple to “discuss creating a new device without all the trimmings,” isn’t the only adult looking to create more helpful regulations. Many parents are rallying behind causes like the Away for a Day (AFTD) movement, which aims to remove smartphones from the classroom, and the Wait Until 8th organization, which is trying to set 8th grade as the official starting point for kids to receive phones. Technology is certainly not going away, nor would we want to give up the benefits that it bestows. But certainly, setting regulations, especially for kids, is something that everyone should be thinking of if we want to create a society that uses technology without being controlled by it.

Every parent has been there.The sink is overflowing with dishes. Legos cover the entire floor, piercing your foot every time you take a step. And you suddenly realize that you've made the kids chicken nuggets and mac n' cheese five nights in a row.Every parent has moments where it all seems to be spinning out of control.But this isn't momentary chaos. It doesn't mean everything is unraveling. Turns out this might just be a normal part of parenting.Mom and blogger Danielle Silverstein made an "admission" on Facebook: "I really AM a hot-mess mom."The post, on her page called Where the Eff is My Handbook?, detailed a seemingly never-ending list of the ways in which her household is in utter shambles."Never once have I thought to myself, 'OMG, I think I’m actually tackling this whole parenthood thing,'" she wrote.She continued:"I am that mom who doesn’t do dishes at night before I go to bed. I do dishes when I get around to doing dishes.I’m that mom who grabs her kids’ clothes out of the dryer in the morning because nothing is folded and put away.I’m that mom who forgets to send in forms and gets calls reminding me that, yes, I need to send in those forms.I’m that mom who forgets to RSVP and gets a last minute text asking if my kid is coming to the party.I’m that mom who packs a crazy, one-food-group lunch because I haven’t gotten around to going food shopping.I’m that mom who lets her kids have endless screen time sometimes (ok, more than sometimes) just because I don’t feel like fighting and need to get a few things done."You can read the entire hilarious and all-too-familiar post below:Ok, full disclosure: I really AM a hot-mess mom.I am consistently five steps behind where I should be in the world of...Posted by Where The Eff Is My Handbook on Thursday, January 25, 2018Near the end of the now super-viral post, Silverstein reaches an important realization."Do I think I’m a good mom? Yeah, I really do. But I don’t have it all together by any stretch of the imagination," she writes. "And that’s ok, I’m realizing."Because, despite the overflowing sink and the overdue paperwork, raising happy, healthy kids is what it's really all about:"I’m also that mom whose kids are safe.I’m also that mom whose kids are, for the most part, happy.I’m also that mom whose home has lots of love and laughter.I’m also that mom who cheers on her kids and is their biggest fan.I’m also that mom who is constantly working to show her kids they are accepted no matter what.I’m also that mom who takes her kids to do cool stuff and have great experiences.I’m also that mom who loves being a mom."The post has racked up thousands of shares and comments from other parents who want to say, "YES! THANK YOU!"The truth is that it's never been harder to be a parent. All the usual stuff is still there — the dirty diapers, the tantrums, the picky eaters — but in the age of social media, when every other parent seems to be totally nailing it, the pressure to be "perfect" has never been higher.Silverstein says enough is enough."We don’t deserve to feel down on ourselves," she writes in a Facebook message. "We deserve to feel celebrated. Our job is damn hard."(That's not an excuse to not try, never feed your kids a single vegetable, or let them get away with whatever they want! But if you have some off-days, you're forgiven.)We need less carefully filtered Instagrams and more brutal honesty. Silverstein's post was a much-needed rallying cry for moms she calls "hot messes," but in reality are just overworked and under-appreciated.So let's all raise a glass (or a haphazardly washed sippy cup) to all the parents out there barely holding it together. This one's for you.This article originally appeared on 01.31.18

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Kelly Bishop weighs in on this very important question: Which of Rory's boyfriends was the best?