Dan Zinkand Communications

01/05/2024

… The doctors, social workers and nurses at the centre’s Social Pediatric Hub collect all these wishes, and then they write prescriptions, literally, to make them come true. They line up a tour of the police station, find a bike, book summer camp among the trees, a dance class at the National Arts Centre, a family outing to the RCMP Musical Ride stables.

Renée Aird, the program’s clinical co-ordinator, hands each child the instructions to stick on their fridge, and she asks them, “What’s this for?”

“This is a prescription for fun,” they tell her.

The one-year pilot project is testing an approach known as “social prescribing” to improve the well-being and quality of life for vulnerable children. Imported from Britain, the idea originally saw doctors writing prescriptions for community and wellness activities for patients, especially seniors, who were socially isolated

The doctors, social workers and nurses at the Vanier Community Service Centre’s Social Pediatric Hub collect wishes from children and write prescriptions, literally, to make them come true

12/13/2022

🥰🍁🥰

… Mihail started peeling potatoes at 11. He never thought he’d spend his life here — he didn’t want to, if he’s being honest, but he became his father’s business partner in the mid 1980s.

He made changes. Brought in salads, souvlaki and a pizza specialist. Married Sophie and had two daughters. He had dreams of expansion but was so busy with the restaurant and the kids that he never got around to it.

Now 60, selling the restaurant had always been his retirement plan, so he will find it a new home, and the Real McCoy will eventually rise again, location to be determined.

“We didn’t get rich you know,” Sophie says, “but we touched a lot of people.” 🥰

On the social media post announcing its closure, one user pondered, if you don’t know Real McCoy, are you even from Scarborough?

12/05/2022

Beautiful 😎💙🖤🥰

In 2014, 60 Minutes first attempted to answer the age-old question: does your dog really love you? "60 Minutes" is the most successful te...

12/04/2022

… On Thursday, Mayor Ted Wheeler told me, “This is well-trodden ground for me. People who speak out, and who don’t carry a far-left viewpoint, put themselves at risk in this city.”

He mentioned the vandalism at the Bison Coffeehouse in October after Loretta Guzman, the Cully café's owner, advertised a Coffee with a Cop event: “What she got in exchange for that was six people trashing the store.”

… You know who has really showed up? All of our elected officials,” Malek says. “There’s new leadership in a lot of positions. Windows are starting to open. I feel really hopeful for the first time in a few years. I think that’s so important for Portland to hear. We need some hope. We need a way out of this.”

Why did Kim Malek's cry for help inspire such disdain?

10/16/2022

Kimmerer is a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation. In “Braiding Sweetgrass,” she weaves Indigenous wisdom with her scientific training. The book is simultaneously meditative about the abundance of the natural world and bold in its call to action on “climate urgency.”

Kimmerer asks readers to honor the Earth’s glories, restore rather than take, and reject an economy and culture rooted in acquiring more. She invites us to learn from plants and other species, nature’s teachers. “If we use a plant respectfully, it will flourish. If we ignore it, it will go away,” she writes.

Her work is “an invitation into reciprocity,” Kimmerer says. “In return for these spectacular gifts of the Earth, say to yourself: ‘What am I going to do about that? What is my accountability in return for everything I’ve been given?’”

… “I was sensing, as an environmentalist, this great longing in the public, a longing to belong to a place,” Kimmerer says.

“I think about how many people have no culture, have no ancestral home. ‘I don’t belong here’ is what I was hearing from people. That sense of not belonging here contributes to the way we treat the land.”

Robin Wall Kimmerer, just named the recipient of a MacArthur ‘genius grant,’ weaves Indigenous wisdom with her scientific training and says that a ‘sense of not belonging here contributes to the way we treat the land’

10/16/2022

🍀 Jennifer Sirangelo, president and CEO of the National 4-H Council, says Scott’s donation came at a good time.
“25 million young people do not have access to positive youth development opportunities, which can provide the tools needed to realize their full potential,” she says. “Many are struggling in areas ranging from academics to mental well-being to developing social connections with others.”
With the use of Scott’s donation, Sirangelo says her team will help “bridge this opportunity gap” and offer support for America’s youth in a time of a need.

After six months of “extensive” input from industry leaders, the council has decided, over the course of the next five years, $10 million will be dedicated to workforce and program development plans.

10/16/2022

… “We were really thinking about how we can connect farmers and what they do on a daily basis with those who are not familiar with agriculture,” (Land O’Lakes CEO Beth) Ford said.

“And right now, that’s most people because less than 1% of the world population is directly involved in agriculture. Folks don’t understand farming, they don’t understand the food supply and they don’t understand the hard work that goes into it every day.”

Ford likened food security to national security:

“And I think of farmers as the original environmentalists, the original entrepreneurs; they’re constantly reinvesting in their land for all of us. And they need to be loud about that. We want folks to understand that farmers…solve big problems.”

Ford called the world population’s lack of of awareness about agriculture and the food supply “frightening, actually.”

10/15/2022

… Starlink terminals in Ukraine are using data as much as 100 times the amount of typical households, Musk added. A week ago he tweeted that Starlink in Ukraine had cost SpaceX $80 million, which would likely surpass $100 million by the end of the year.

Musk’s net worth is $209.2 billion, according to Bloomberg data.

Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s minister for digital transformation, has said previously the country is getting Starlink terminals free of charge, although he added there might be a different arrangement between Musk and the US Agency for International Development and European entities which provided Starlinks to Ukraine.

After receiving criticism online, billionaire says he cannot continue to fund the satellite access that has played a pivotal role in Ukraine’s fight against Russia.

10/12/2022

💔

… The river flows across 300 miles, yet only drops around 30 feet – making this river one of the slowest in the world, according to Scott Kelly, a forecaster at the National Weather Service in Melbourne.
“It is a very, very lazy river,” Kelly told CNN. “Very slow moving.”
Kelly suspects the flooding could go on “perhaps for a couple of months,” and officials expect this slow-moving disaster to creep north over the next few weeks.

… Now, forecasters are mostly concerned about preparing people for weeks of flooding.

“We’re not sure that people understand fully that this river is not going to go down very quickly,” said Kelly. “And so, yes, it’s crested in most places but it’s going to stay near or at that crest for many days and we don’t think people are prepared mentally for that.”

After torrential rainfall in Hurricane Ian, forecasters warn the St. Johns River in Florida could stay above flood stage through Thanksgiving.

10/24/2021

10/11/2019

💚💔💚.. I'm expecting massive crop losses — as devastating as we've even seen," said Jon Nelson, a state lawmaker who farms several hundred acres near Rugby in north-central North Dakota.

Unharvested wheat in the region probably will be a total loss, he said.

"A lot of the standing stuff is flattened to the ground," Nelson said. "It's shot and some guys are putting their combines away and won't bring them out again."

Erika Kenner, who ranches with her parents in Leeds, North Dakota, said she felt helpless Friday as she was unable to check on the family's herd of several hundred cows due to deep, drifting snow.

"I just hear the wind howling and think of those poor cows out there," she said. "Cattle are tough but this kind of weather just wears on them."

The National Weather Service issued a blizzard warning for northern North Dakota and winter storm warnings and watches elsewhere in the state and into parts of South Dakota and Minnesota through Saturday afternoon.