Holiday News Bits and a fun video
Let’s read and watch some good things.
A merry tradition: Christmas dinner free at Tennessee diner — Wow, can’t afford a meal? Don’t have anyone to eat with on Christmas? Here’s a group of people making a difference.
A Tennessee diner serves up a free Christmas Day meal to anyone who walks into the restaurant and it delivers to those who otherwise can’t make the trek.
O’Brien’s Southern Diner owner Candice O’Brien Beasley knows what it’s like to go without food or to have nothing in the house on holidays, she told the The Washington Post. So she started the tradition as soon she opened her Ashland City restaurant in 2013.
Local businesses help by donating much of the food and preparations began yesterday.
“My entire family comes out to help, so we celebrate our Christmas either the day before or the day after,” she said. “But we’re fine with that. To us, this is Christmas.”
Shelter volunteers drive 2K miles to reunite family with their missing dog — Man’s best friend gets a series of lifts to get him home. After their dog was stolen, he wound up in a shelter halfway across the country but was too big to be flown home. No worries. A group of volunteers stepped in to help.
Partnering with Many Paws Volunteer Transport group, the nonprofit worked to find people who would be able to transport the dog over 2,000 miles back to Montana. Fifteen different people volunteered to drive Zeus across the country and both organizations detailed the dog’s travels on social media.
A Louisville family is celebrating Hanukkah by performing 18,000 acts of kindness in 2020 — Focusing on those in need in Kentucky, Project Friendship gives brand new coats, shoes, and other clothes to those in need from their nine distribution centers.
“In the world that we’re living in today, there are many different forms of darkness: poverty, hate, racism, antisemitism, bigotry,” Litvin said. “Our goal with Project Friendship is to invigorate, energize and support each other.”
Thousands of years later, the eight-day holiday that falls near Christmas is less sacred than Yom Kippur and the Jewish New Year of Rosh Hashanah, but it’s an important time of the year for giving back to the community.
Kids read holiday ‘tails’ at shelter to help get dogs adopted — A few months ago, I reviewed a series of books about a young reader who gained reading confidence by practicing with a library dog and then shelter dogs. Now, here’s a story about the real thing.
For animals like dogs and cats, animal shelters are often a sad and stressful environment to be in.
But a week ago at the Humane Society of Missouri, it was nothing but holiday cheer with books and treats at their annual “Deck the Howls” event. “We’re trying to comfort [the animals] and we’re also trying to recondition them to come to the front of the kennel to greet, to feel comfortable around people,” said JoEllyn Klepacki, the director of education at the Humane Society of Missouri.
After taking part in a 90 minute training session, children are able to read to as many shelter dogs as they want. The program has helped the average length of stay be reduced by six days and many of the young readers and their families end up adopting dogs.
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Yeah, so it’s not actually a Christmas themed video as it takes place before, during, and after Waterloo but it’s labeled “Alan Rickman: A Christmas Special” so enjoy!
Thank you Jayne and Dear Author. After a tumultuous day for Romancelandia, your Holiday Bits and News are a gift.
What a lovely assortment of articles to brighten one’s day! Thank you. And happy winter holidays to all who celebrate.
@Mzcue: @Kareni: You’re welcome. I’m glad I can do a little to make the world a teensy bit less sucky.
The Alan Rickman piece was in a BBC Christmas special “Victoria Wood with all the trimmings”, likely why it is labelled “Alan Rickman Christmas special”. Victoria Wood was a beloved British comedienne, died the same year as Alan Rickman. She is the one playing the character of Miss Tweed in this and wrote the whole skit. The line up of recognisable British actors in this shows you how popular her work was.
Thanks for posting this, I have just dug out my DVD of the whole show and plan to watch later
@Helen Cooper: I thought perhaps it was originally aired near Christmas. I can’t remember who told me about it or posted a link but the first time I saw it, I laughed the whole way through and re-watch it frequently. The whole skit is brilliant.