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Heroes

Serene and beautiful photos of the world's first eco-friendly underwater burial ground.

Losing a loved one is hard for a number of reasons.

While the grieving process itself takes a toll, you might also find yourself needing to make several difficult decisions. There are legal issues, people to notify, decisions about the person's property or belongings, and a million choices about funeral arrangements.

If the death is unexpected or isn't thoroughly planned for, those decisions get even harder.


One of those decisions is what to do with your loved one's remains, and believe it or not, there are a lot of options.

Sure, you can go the traditional burial route, and there's always cremation, where you can either keep the ashes around or do something cool like toss them into your grandpa's favorite fishing spot (cue single manly tear).

This is for you, grandpa. You urn'd it. (Sorry just trying to lighten the mood.) Photo by Chris Hondros/Getty Images.

There are also an increasing number of creative options for paying tribute to your loved ones. You can turn your loved one into a tree or a diamond or even a toaster, and if they were a music lover, you can even have their ashes pressed into a vinyl record. Really.

Another option sits off the coast of Miami in Key Biscayne. It's called the Neptune Memorial Reef, and it's the first underwater graveyard.

It's also the largest human-made reef ever built. Naturally occurring coral reefs exist all over the world, but they can also be made artificially.

A reef is essentially just a complex group of shapes underwater. They're important because they can provide shelter for small fish, protection from storms, surface area for algae and coral to grow on, and they generally help promote diversity within an ecosystem.

To make an artificial reef, you can sink something like an old ship to the bottom of the ocean, where coral and algae can grow on it and create a safe home for dozens of species.

When it comes to burying a loved one at the Neptune Memorial Reef, you can have their ashes spread at the site or purchase a plaque with their name on it to become part of the reef itself.

A memorial plaque at the Neptune reef. Photo by Todd Murray/Flickr.

They also offer various cremation and memorial services.

The reef was carefully designed in order to promote the healthiest ecosystem possible — something anyone who loves the ocean and environment can appreciate.

"Every angle and texture of the Reef was engineered by a marine biologist to attract and support certain marine life to build an ecosystem," their website says, explaining that the vertical structures are home to "corals and coraling algae" while decorative holes were added to the design as a hiding place that "allows prey animals passage while blocking predators."

Appropriately, the Neptune reef was also made to resemble Atlantis — a fictional city that was lost underwater in Greek myths.

What better way to celebrate the life of a loved one than by preserving their memory in a way that helps protect and promote life?

Whether your loved one was an ocean-lover or just someone who loved this planet we all call home, an underwater grave site is a pretty beautiful — and special — resting place.

A pitbull stares at the window, looking for the mailman.


Dogs are naturally driven by a sense of purpose and a need for belonging, which are all part of their instinctual pack behavior. When a dog has a job to do, it taps into its needs for structure, purpose, and the feeling of contributing to its pack, which in a domestic setting translates to its human family.

But let’s be honest: In a traditional domestic setting, dogs have fewer chores they can do as they would on a farm or as part of a rescue unit. A doggy mom in Vancouver Island, Canada had fun with her dog’s purposeful uselessness by sharing the 5 “chores” her pitbull-Lab mix does around the house.

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Representative Image from Canva

Let's not curse any more children with bad names, shall we?

Some parents have no trouble giving their children perfectly unique, very meaningful names that won’t go on to ruin their adulthood. But others…well…they get an A for effort, but might want to consider hiring a baby name professional.

Things of course get even more complicated when one parent becomes attached to a name that they’re partner finds completely off-putting. It almost always leads to a squabble, because the more one parent is against the name, the more the other parent will go to bat for it.

This seemed to be the case for one soon-to-be mom on the Reddit AITA forum recently. Apparently, she was second-guessing her vehement reaction to her husband’s, ahem, avant garde baby name for their daughter, which she called “the worst name ever.”

But honestly, when you hear this name, I think you’ll agree she was totally in the right.

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A woman looking at her phone while sitting on the toilet.


One of the most popular health trends over the last few years has been staying as hydrated as possible, evidenced by the massive popularity of 40-oz Stanely Quencher cups. The theory among those who obsess over hydration is that, when you pee clear, you’ve removed all the waste in your body and are enjoying the incredible benefits of being 100% hydrated. Congratulations.

However, according to Dr. Sermed Mezher, an NHS doctor in the UK, peeing clear isn’t always a sign of being healthy.

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A beautiful cruise ship crossing the seas.

Going on a cruise can be an incredible getaway from the stresses of life on the mainland. However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t an element of danger when living on a ship 200-plus feet high, traveling up to 35 miles per hour and subject to the whims of the sea.

An average of about 19 people go overboard every year, and only around 28% survive. Cruise ship lawyer Spencer Aronfeld explained the phenomenon in a viral TikTok video, in which he also revealed the secret code the crew uses when tragedy happens.

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Joy

Kudos to the heroes who had 90 seconds to save lives in the Key Bridge collapse

The loss of 6 lives is tragic, but the dispatch recording shows it could have been so much worse.

Representative image by Gustavo Fring/Pexels

The workers who responded to the Dali's mayday call saved lives with their quick response.

As more details of the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse in Baltimore emerge, it's becoming more apparent how much worse this catastrophe could have been.

Just minutes before 1:30am on March 26, shortly after leaving port in Baltimore Harbor, a cargo ship named Dali lost power and control of its steering, sending it careening into a structural pillar on Key Bridge. The crew of the Dali issued a mayday call at 1:26am to alert authorities of the power failure, giving responders crucial moments to prepare for a potential collision. Just 90 seconds later, the ship hit a pylon, triggering a total collapse of the 1.6-mile bridge into the Patapsco River.

Dispatch audio of those moments shows the calm professionalism and quick actions that limited the loss of life in an unexpected situation where every second counted.

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Joy

Yale's pep band had to miss the NCAA tournament. University of Idaho said, 'We got you.'

In an act of true sportsmanship, the Vandal band learned Yale's fight song, wore their gear and cheered them on.

Courtesy of University of Idaho

The Idaho Vandals answered the call when Yale needed a pep band.

Yale University and the University of Idaho could not be more different. Ivy League vs. state school. East Coast vs. Pacific Northwest. City vs. farm town. But in the first two rounds of the NCAA basketball tournament, extenuating circumstances brought them together as one, with the Bulldogs and the Vandals becoming the "Vandogs" for a weekend.

When Yale made it to the March Madness tournament, members of the school's pep band had already committed to other travel plans during spring break. They couldn't gather enough members to make the trek across the country to Spokane, Washington, so the Yale Bulldogs were left without their fight song unless other arrangements could be made.

When University of Idaho athletic band director Spencer Martin got wind of the need less than a week before Yale's game against Auburn, he sent out a message to his band members asking if anyone would be interested in stepping in. The response was a wave of immediate yeses, so Martin got to work arranging instruments and the students dedicated themselves to learning Yale's fight song and other traditional Yale pep songs.

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