[DrCaleb]

$1:

Calgary surgeon saves 2 men with CPR, then performs their heart operations



r. Corey Adams should perhaps buy himself a superhero costume.

A cardiac surgeon at the University of Calgary's Libin Cardiovascular Institute, Adams has saved two men in the past 18 months — by first performing CPR on them in public and then, days later, operating on them.

In June of last year, Adams and his wife, Jennifer, who's also a doctor, were hiking near Canmore, Alta., when someone called for help. A man had collapsed and was turning blue.

Adams did 20 minutes of CPR on the 60-year-old. Days later, a patient on whom he was performing a quintuple heart bypass turned out to be the same man.

Then it happened again in August.

The couple was on an outing with their children when Jennifer Adams spotted a man who had collapsed while running.

"He was face down. Nobody else was around and we pulled over. He didn't have a pulse, so I started CPR and we called people and all that stuff," Corey Adams told The Canadian Press.

"If he [had been] 10 feet down the road or in the woods … nobody would have seen him and they would have found him dead."

The patient, Eric McVeigh, was born with a heart defect.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/ ... -1.6242854

[Thanos]

Fearless veteran not scared of right-wing punks:

https://www.rawstory.com/ww2-soldier-te ... y-bastard/

$1:

Wearing a military beret and a Polish wartime resistance armband, 94-year-old Wanda Traczyk-Stawska stunned the crowd at a pro-EU rally when she thundered "Be quiet, stupid boy! You lousy bastard" at a member of a far-right group attempting to disrupt the gathering over a loudspeaker.

Despite her advancing years and tiny stature, the Warsaw Uprising veteran has lost none of her fighting spirit when it comes to defending Poland's presence in the European Union and migrant rights.

Tens of thousands of people had turned out in October in support of Poland's EU membership after the Constitutional Court contested the primacy of EU law, in what experts saw as a step towards a "Polexit" given the nationalist ruling party's euroscepticism.

"I'm a soldier, I tell it like it is," Traczyk-Stawska told AFP, smiling coyly as she took a sip of tea at her home in Warsaw filled with Polish and EU flags.

Traczyk-Stawska was a 12-year-old girl guide when the German army invaded Poland. She joined the resistance movement and went on to carry out acts of sabotage under the sweet pseudonym of "Doughnut".

At the outbreak of the Warsaw Uprising on August 1, 1944, she was one of 50,000 fighters to revolt against the Nazis -- as well as a rare girl with a machine gun, an assignment usually reserved for men at the time.

Over the course of 63 days of battle, nearly 200,000 civilians and fighters died and the city was reduced to a pile of rubble.

Traczyk-Stawska later passed through four German prisoner-of-war camps, before Polish forces operating in the Netherlands and Germany freed her from a camp in Oberlangen, northwest Germany, in 1945. Once back home, she worked as a teacher at a centre for handicapped children.

The last order she received, her life's mission, has been to watch over the cemetery bearing the remains of nearly half of the wartime dead found in the ruins of the Polish capital.

Remaining in the EU "is a question of national security... Were we to quit the union, where would that leave us?" Traczyk-Stawska asked.

"We already know what 1939 was like," when Poland found itself alone in the face of a two-front invasion by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.

"It's our greatest danger... We'd end up like a fly up against an elephant," she added, her robust voice contrasting with her fragile frame.

She said she was "furious" at the rally when she chose to call out the far right, who have received funding from the state and plan to go ahead with a march through Warsaw on Thursday, Poland's Independence Day.

The controversial march, which has drawn upwards of 10,000 people in past years and has often turned violent, has been the subject of intense legal wrangling.

"I got up on stage to speak of the Poland of our dreams, us veterans of the uprising... a Poland that is kind and tolerant," Traczyk-Stawska added.

She soon received death threats.

Traczyk-Stawska also expressed concern over how migrants and refugees trying to cross the Belarus border into Poland have been treated. Most are repeatedly sent back and forth by the two countries, left to wander around the cold and humid woods.

At least 10 migrants have already died, including seven on Polish territory, according to the Gazeta Wyborcza daily.

The EU accuses Belarusian strongman Alexander Lukashenko of orchestrating the unprecedented influx in retaliation for the bloc's sanctions over a brutal crackdown by the regime on the opposition.

The Polish government has adopted a hardline approach, imposing a state of emergency that bans journalists and charity workers from the immediate border zone.

It has also reinforced the area with thousands of troops and legalised pushbacks, even in the case of women and children.

"I am invested in the case of the children at the border. If we don't change our attitude towards these children, they will die," Traczyk-Stawska said.

"You can't abandon a child in danger. It's shameful to treat the border children that way," she added, recalling the days when as a 12-year-old she witnessed Nazis "entertaining themselves by firing at babies".

Speaking of the veterans of the uprising, Traczyk-Stawska observed that "we are all very old, on the verge of death. For us, this situation is a disgrace."

"We no longer have the strength to take a stand. All we can do is weep. Well, not everyone. Me, I'm not used to crying. I was a soldier," she said.

"But I regret that I'm so old and frail."

The scum on today's right wing aren't even worthy enough to lick the soles of this hero's boots.

[DrCaleb]

$1:

First 20 tenants expected to move into Edmonton's ATCO Veterans Village in December

Edmonton’s first veterans’ housing project is expecting its first tenants to move in on Dec. 1.
Article content

During the grand opening of the ATCO Veterans Village, the president and CEO of the Homes for Heroes Foundation said there are too many veterans in Canada currently experiencing homelessness.

“There are more than 5,000 veterans experiencing homelessness across Canada and that is unacceptable. Homes for Heroes is dedicated to building these tiny home veteran villages with full support services across the country,” said David Howard. “There’s over 200 veterans experiencing homelessness in the streets of Edmonton.”

The tiny village on 152A Avenue is home to 20 units — 18 standard units and two accessible units with ramps to access the home, all with working kitchen utilities, bathrooms and a bed. Separating the accessible units from the other 18 homes is a resource centre where tenants can access programs and services or gather to watch TV with fellow residents.

https://edmontonjournal.com/news/local- ... n-december

[raydan]

Need help, call Doughnut.

[DrCaleb]

[DrCaleb]

Alberta man fixes old video game consoles to create Christmas joy for needy families

[DrCaleb]

This Ontario high school teacher mailed handwritten letters to each of her 80 students. Here's why

[Strutz]

$1:

Students in Western Pennsylvania had a snow day on Monday, but instead of staying home or meeting for an indoor workout, these teens on a high school football team were instructed by their coach to get outside and help their neighbors.

Coach Brian DeLallo at Bethel Park High School near Pittsburgh, took to Twitter to announce that Monday’s weightlifting session in the gymnasium was cancelled—but he had an alternative assignment for the young men.

“Due to the expected severe weather, Monday’s weightlifting workout has been cancelled. Find an elderly or disabled neighbor and shovel their driveway… that’s our Monday workout.”

https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/hs-foot ... neighbors/

Awesome!

[DrCaleb]

‘Selfless acts’: B.C. received record-breaking number of deceased organ donations in 2021

[DrCaleb]

$1:

Now cancer-free, Canada’s Max Parrot takes Olympic gold with run of a lifetime in snowboard slopestyle

Hodgkin’s lymphoma and rounds of chemotherapy laid him low after a silver medal-winning performance in Pyeongchang. Now he’s cancer-free and has Canada’s first gold medal at Beijing

After winning Canada’s first gold medal of the Beijing Winter Olympics on Monday, snowboarder Max Parrot thought about where he had been exactly three years earlier: in a hospital bed undergoing chemotherapy.

The 27-year-old from Bromont, Que., was wrapped in a Canadian flag and beaming boyishly as he excitedly relived the run of a lifetime that earned him Olympic gold in men’s slopestyle, an upgrade to his silver at the 2018 Pyeongchang Games. Then Parrot recalled just as vividly how 12 treatments of chemotherapy had drained his body in a Granby, Que., hospital while tangling with Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

“I had no more muscles, no more energy, no more cardio,” recalled Parrot. “I almost wanted to quit because it was so hard to get to the next morning. And to be standing here three years later and winning gold, that is completely crazy.”

He was diagnosed at 24, just 10 months after taking silver in Pyeongchang. He’s cancer-free now.

“I was scared a lot of the time,” said Parrot. “You don’t know how the treatment is going to work. You don’t know what life has got in store for you.”

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/ ... s-joy-and/

[raydan]

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

$1:

Now cancer-free, Canada’s Max Parrot takes Olympic gold with run of a lifetime in snowboard slopestyle

Hodgkin’s lymphoma and rounds of chemotherapy laid him low after a silver medal-winning performance in Pyeongchang. Now he’s cancer-free and has Canada’s first gold medal at Beijing

After winning Canada’s first gold medal of the Beijing Winter Olympics on Monday, snowboarder Max Parrot thought about where he had been exactly three years earlier: in a hospital bed undergoing chemotherapy.

The 27-year-old from Bromont, Que., was wrapped in a Canadian flag and beaming boyishly as he excitedly relived the run of a lifetime that earned him Olympic gold in men’s slopestyle, an upgrade to his silver at the 2018 Pyeongchang Games. Then Parrot recalled just as vividly how 12 treatments of chemotherapy had drained his body in a Granby, Que., hospital while tangling with Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

“I had no more muscles, no more energy, no more cardio,” recalled Parrot. “I almost wanted to quit because it was so hard to get to the next morning. And to be standing here three years later and winning gold, that is completely crazy.”

He was diagnosed at 24, just 10 months after taking silver in Pyeongchang. He’s cancer-free now.

“I was scared a lot of the time,” said Parrot. “You don’t know how the treatment is going to work. You don’t know what life has got in store for you.”

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/ ... s-joy-and/

I was watching his interview this morning, love these stories.

[DrCaleb]

'Hero' boy recognized for saving family in Moncton house fire

[Strutz]

A Denver man saw too many people standing at bus stops. So he built them a bench

[Strutz]

Gotta love this gal!

98-year-old B.C. competitive swimmer strives to inspire after surviving war and losing love

[Strutz]

Dad builds his son an Oilers Zamboni over his wheelchair for Halloween

How cool is that for a costume?