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Joy

10 things that made us smile this week

Upworthy's weekly roundup of joy

family laughing, baby dancing, family crying with joy

Lots of joy and laughter in this week's list

Hey ho, happy humans!

Whether you're feeling stressed over end-of-the-school-year chaos, depressed over the challenges our world faces or refreshed by the beautiful spring blossoms blooming everywhere, you can surely use some extra doses of joy.

In this week's list, we have some delightful interactions between parents and young adult children, a hilarious take on millennials getting older, some helpful and entertaining animals, a throwback to one of the most iconic (and earwormy) jingles of all time, a photo that has been blowing people's minds and of course, some utterly adorable toddlers.

We hope these little nuggets brighten your day! Enjoy!


1. Watch this first-generation college student find out he got accepted to Harvard

So much pride and joy. These videos never get old.

2. The Holdernesses welcome millennials to the Gen X club, and it's too accurate

"The younger generation calling all your clothes 'vintage.'" HA. It happens to all of us eventually. Read the full story here.

3. If you thought a chinchilla couldn't be a ninja, you thought wrong

Sound up, and wait for the end. Such impeccable timing.

4. Daughter pranks her parents with a fake scholarship video and her mom can't keep it together

This family is hilarious.

5. This photo is blowing people's minds because it's not photoshopped or A.I.-generated or anything

Egret standing in water

Egret standing in the water

The All-Japan Association of Photographic Societies, used with permission

It's a genuine photo. No editing tricks. the brown on the top right is a wall and below is its reflection. Still hard to picture, I know. Find the full explanation with other visual proof that there's nothing altered in the photo here.

6. Check out these stories of animals sensing when someone needed medical care

Swipe through to see all of them. Our furry friends can be much more than just cuddly companions.

Speaking of which:

7. Cat thinks they're fighting, doggo makes it clear he thinks they're playing

Those are some impressive spins there, buddy. Cat doesn't even know what to do with that.

8. Footage of the Chili's "Baby Back Ribs" song being recorded is pure nostalgic joy

Everyone who lived through the 90s had this song stuck in their head on repeat for years. Learn more about the famous vocalists behind the iconic jingle here.

9. Kiddo figures out how to give a thumb's up and it's 10 seconds of adorableness

You can see those gears turning. Tiny humans are the best. Speaking of which…

10. Wee one has his moves to 'Uptown Funk' totally down and it's so smooooooth

@kelley_renee2

He's got it pretty much nailed now 🤣 @brunomars

Can't even talk, but he can sing along with Bruno. And the timing of those foot stomps. May we all dance with such abandon.

Hope that brought some smiles to your faces! Sign up for our free newsletter, The Upworthiest, here to get more posts like this one delivered to your inbox.

Can we bring back some 50s fridge features, please?

There are very few things that would make people nostalgic for the 1950s. Sure, they had cool cars and pearl necklaces were a staple, but that time frame had its fair share of problems, even if "Grease" made it look dreamy. Whether you believe your life would've been way more interesting if you were Danny Zuko or not, most would agree their technology was...lacking.

All eras are "advanced" for their time, but imagine being dropped off in the 50s as someone from the year 2023. A recent post by Historic Vids on Twitter of a 1956 commercial advertising a refrigerator, however, has some people thinking that when it came to fridges, maybe they were living in the year 2056. I don't typically swoon over appliances, yet this one has me wondering where I can purchase a refrigerator like this.

Of course, there's no fancy touch screen that tells you the weather and asks how you'd like your ice cubed. It's got more important features that are actually practical.

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Couple investigating noises accidentally awaken a bear.

It's not uncommon to hear something outside of your house, especially if it's close to trash pick-up day. Raccoons and stray cats treat an overflowing trashcan like a holiday dinner, and even if you weren't sure if you heard something or not, the torn trash bags confirm your suspicion.

This is a pretty universal experience in America, so hearing a rustle under your house typically conjures images of a trash panda that got stuck. But for one family, the noises weren't coming from a raccoon at all. In a viral video on TikTok that has over 10 million views, a couple is outside looking for the source of the noises they've been hearing. The woman is filming at a fairly safe distance, while the guy investigates their crawl space.

Everything is going well. They hear what sounds like a hiss and with relief exclaim that it's a raccoon.

They were wrong. Like pee your pants, everyone for themselves, wrong.

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Australian comedy group Axis Of Awesome

Singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran was found not liable on April 4 in a lawsuit where he was accused of stealing elements of the Marvin Gaye classic "Let's Get It On" for his 2014 hit, “Thinking Out Loud."

The case called attention to the fact that there are motifs and musical structures common in pop music that no one owns, and all are free to use. When it comes to chord progressions, the 12-bar blues and basic I, IV, V, I progressions you hear in country and folk have been used and reused since people first picked up the guitar.

In the wrong hands, the progressions can result in music that is boring and formulaic, but in the right hands, they can be a springboard for fresh ideas.

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Pop Culture

What Hollywood gets wrong about corsets, and how the Victorians actually got a tiny waist

Bernadette Banner, a content creator focused of fashion history, breaks down how Victorians were "masters of illusion."

Bernadette Banner/Youtube

You'll never look at a corset with disdain again.

Usually when we think of corsets, the words suffocation, fainting and shifting organs probably come to mind.

This is certainly what Bernadette Banner has come across in the comments section of her Youtube channel, where she shares all kinds of fashion history education. The general consensus is that Victorian women were either all incredibly tiny or that they went to extremely dangerous lengths to achieve the highly exaggerated signature silhouette of the era, which was to have the bust 10 inches larger than the waist, with the hips 15 inches larger. 34-26-36, for example.

This notion is certainly backed by Hollywood, where we normally see women of that time period being laced up so tightly they can barely breathe, suffering under the crushing weight of whalebone and the patriarchy.

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Ted-Ed/Youtube

Technology isn't everything.

Crooked teeth is a very, very common occurrence in our modern world. Nine out of ten people have at least some misalignment going on in their mouths. Over 4 million people wear braces in the United States alone. I don’t know about you, but I can still feel the utter sticker shock from my own teeth-straightening journey. (I call it a “journey” so it feels a little more whimsical and less devastating.)

And yet, this is not something our ancestors dealt with. Like…at all. How could it be that no one experienced this normal modern-day conundrum in a time when we had exponentially less technological advancement?

As it turns out, technology might be the culprit, and a video from Ted-Ed explains it all.
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Joy

Willow the Cat honored as a Cat Awards finalist for saving her diabetic owner's life

Cats have an incredible way of knowing when something is wrong with their human.

Willow and her owner, Amanda Jameson

Cats, like adorable, four-legged therapists and nurses, have an uncanny ability to pick up on subtle changes in our emotions and health. Research suggests that their tremendous sense of smell allows them to sense illness in humans, often before we know we're sick.

The feline olfactory system is 14 times more powerful than a human's, so cats can detect subtle differences in someone’s scent that may indicate if there is something wrong with their health.

An incredible example of this sense put into action comes from Liverpool, England, where a cat named Willow saved her owner’s life by noticing when she wasn’t well. Amanda Jameson, a 51-year-old diabetic, went to bed one night with dangerously low blood sugar. Somehow, Willow noticed something was wrong with her, so she went to get help.

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