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19 musicals that are not only catchy—they could help with dementia, according to science

Back in 2013, researchers in the U.S. stumbled upon a novel new treatment for dementia patients: listening to show tunes. Seriously.

musicals, theater, art, dementia, treatments
Photo by Jordhan Madec on Unsplash

A picture taken of the Broadway street sign in New York City.

Back in 2013, researchers in the U.S. stumbled upon a novel new treatment for dementia patients: listening to show tunes. Seriously.

A study of nursing home patients found that residents who sang show tunes — specifically from "Oklahoma!" "The Wizard of Oz," and "The Sound of Music" — demonstrated increased mental performance, according to a report in the New York Daily News:

"Researchers working with elderly residents at an East Coast care home found in a four-month long study ... that people who sang their favorite songs showed a marked improvement compared to those who just listened."

A similar study in Finland, cited in The Guardian, demonstrated that singing not only helped dementia patients feel better and focus, but actually improved certain types of memory as well.

Even better? There are tons of classic show tunes specifically about remembering.

Here are 23 tunes every Broadway fan needs to memorize for the day when it's not so easy to remember. It'll help to start brushing up now.

1. The one about remembering the good old days.

"Those Were the Good Old Days," "Damn Yankees"

If you're the devil in "Damn Yankees," that means the Great Depression, the Black Plague years, and when Jack the Ripper was running around. Good times!

2. The one about remembering a parade that probably never happened.

Any playlist of show tunes about memory has to include this standard from "The Music Man," in which Professor Harold Hill remembers the best day of his life, when "Gilmore, Liberati, Pat Conway, The Great Creatore, W.C. Handy, and John Phillip Sousa all came to town."

Whether or not any of it actually happened is ... up for debate, to put it mildly.

3. The one about remembering a really fun trip you took to a medium-sized Midwestern city.

"Kansas City," "Oklahoma"

"Oklahoma's" Will Parker is so psyched about his Kansas City vacation he can't help bragging about it to all the other cowboys. And why not? It's a neat city! Have you been to Joe's Kansas City Barbecue? Neither has Will Parker, since he was there in 1906, but you should totally go.

4. The one about remembering how fun it was to murder that guy that one time...

"Cell Block Tango," "Chicago"

...while glancing nervously over your shoulder to make sure Queen Latifah isn't around.

5. The one about remembering the questionable choices it's too late to go back in time and not make.

"Where Did We Go Right?" from "The Producers"

Looking back doesn't always go well for characters in musicals. It definitely doesn't for "The Producers'" Bialystock and Bloom, as they tear around their office wondering how their incompetently directed, poorly acted, aggressively pro-Hitler musical wound up becoming a massive hit despite their every attempt to make it fail.

6. The one about remembering the little things.

"I Remember/Stranger Than You Dreamt It," "Phantom of the Opera"

Perhaps the greatest testament to how emotionally transporting "Phantom of the Opera" is: Christine, removing the phantom's mask for the first time, can just straight-up claim to remember mist — like, one mist in particular — and no one calls her on it ever.

7. The one about remembering the worst day of your life.

"The Barber and his Wife," "Sweeney Todd"

No character in musical theater is more nostalgic than Sweeney Todd, who, just moments after we meet him, croons this delightful ditty reminiscing about the time he was framed for a crime he didn't commit and banished from England so that an evil judge could rape his wife who subsequently poisoned herself.

A tune you can hum!

8. The one about remembering things differently than everyone else around you.

"Satisfied," "Hamilton"

Not sure if you've heard, but "Hamilton" is good, you guys.

After Alex and Eliza Schuyler meet and fall in love in "Helpless," Angelica Schuyler basically goes "Wicked" on her sister's song, recalling how agonizing it was watching her sister and the man who she herself is super into get together. But she sucks it up and buries it! Older siblings are the best.

9. The one about remembering that cute girl you just met like five seconds ago.

"Maria," "West Side Story"

A classic from "West Side Story." Sure, it's about remembering a meet-cute that literally just happened — Tony and Maria's orchestral-swell-assisted gaze across a crowded gym — but Tony is super jazzed about it, so it makes the list.

Gosh, I sure hope those crazy kids work out!

10. The one about remembering all the worst things from when you were a kid, and one kind-of-OK thing.

"At the Ballet," "A Chorus Line"

The ballet isn't that great, but it's better than devastating childhood trauma. Score one for the ballet! Thanks, "A Chorus Line!"

11. The one about remembering old hobbies.

"Dentist!" from "Little Shop of Horrors"

"Little Shop of Horrors'" Orin Scrivello, DDS, is just misunderstood. I mean, who among us didn't "shoot puppies," "poison guppies," or "take a pussycat and bash in its head" now and again as a kid? The '50s were a simpler time!

12. The one about remembering watching a dude die on the battlefield and feeling feelings about it.

"Momma Look Sharp," "1776"

47 years before "Hamilton" brought us the swaggery, ass-kicking side of the Revolutionary War, "1776" tore our guts out with this song, in which a courier to the Continental Congress recalls watching a mother comfort a young soldier as he dies at the battles of Lexington and Concord.

Hercules Mulligan does the guest rap. (Just kidding. There is no guest rap. It's just gorgeously somber for a while and then over.)

13. The one about remembering the best four years of your life.

"I Wish I Could Go Back to College," "Avenue Q"

Of course the sad-sack puppet man- and woman-children of "Avenue Q" want to go back to college! Who among us doesn't long for the days of term papers, humiliating romantic encounters, and crushing, debilitating debt? And meal-plan ice cream, too!

14. The one about remembering some A-plus advice from your best friend.

"Cabaret," "Cabaret"

Ladies and gentlemen, Sally Bowles from "Cabaret" is no fool! No matter how many lovers leave, or how much her career nosedives, or how nutty local politics get, she always remembers this important life lesson she learned from her good friend Elsie.

If only you had such a great, wise friend, maybe your outlook would be as good as Sally's. You could be so lucky!

15. The one about remembering last Christmas.

"Halloween," "Rent"

When it comes to the science of memory and cognition, "Rent" asks the big questions:

"Why are entire years strewn on the cutting room floor of memories? When single frames from one magic night forever flicker in close-up on the 3-D Imax of my mind?"

Poetic? Pathetic? We report, you decide.

16. The one about remembering everything and realizing how terrible it all was.

"Rose's Turn," "Gypsy"

Ah, yes. "Rose's Turn." The 11 o'clock number to end all 11 o'clock numbers in "Gypsy," the most musical of all musicals. Truly, there aren't many things more enjoyable than listening to Mama Rose replay the events of the last decade and change inside her own brain in a slow-motion nervous breakdown as the notion that her entire life has been completely worthless gradually dawns on her with ever-increasing dread.

Did I mention how fun musicals are?

Trivia time! You know that thing in music where trumpets go, "Ya da da da daaaa DA. Da DA da DA!" You know that thing? This is the song that thing comes from.

17. The one about remembering the first time you knew what you wanted to be when you grew up.

"Ring of Keys," "Fun Home"

There's nothing better than a song that makes you want to shout: "I am so glad I'm watching a musical instead of a basketball game right now." This moment in "Fun Home," where Alison recalls seeing a delivery woman — the first person who looked like the woman she felt like — is really, really one of them.

"This is a song of identification that is a turning moment, when you think you’re an alien and you hear someone else say, 'Oh, me too,'" composer Jeanine Tesori told Variety. "It’s a gamechanger for Alison. And that’s just Musical Theater 101."

...And the entire audience bursts into happy tears forever.

18. The one about remembering a nice dream you dreamed.

"I Dreamed a Dream," "Les Misérables"

When your life isn't going so great, it's good to remember the positive! Things didn't exactly go super well for Fantine in "Les Mis." But, hey, she had a pretty good dream once!

19. The one about remembering your single greatest regret and vowing to never remember it again.

"Turn It Off," "The Book of Mormon"

What's the ticket to living as fun-loving and guilelessly as the Mormon elders in "The Book of Mormon?" Don't just bury those traumatic, scary, impure memories — CRUSH THEM, OK?!

20. The one about remembering a really successful first date.

"Sarah Brown Eyes," "Ragtime"

Ah, young love. Even in "Ragtime," a musical that features racism, state violence, attempted child murder, and terrorism, at least we have this song, in which Coalhouse Walker Jr. recalls how he got his beloved Sarah to fall truly, madly, deeply in love with him with his peerless piano skills? So romantic.

Gosh, I sure hope those crazy kids work out!

21. The one about remembering a scary dream.

"Sit Down, You're Rockin' the Boat," "Guys and Dolls"

With, perhaps, only a smidge more credibility than grifter-from-another-mother Professor Harold Hill, "Guys and Dolls'" third-most-degenerate gambler Nicely-Nicely Johnson recalls a terrifying dream where he had to convince a group of skeptical evangelical crusaders that he's decided to give up the dice once and for all.

Side note: People in musicals are unbelievably good at remembering dreams. This is, like, full detail. I'd be like, "Um, I was at the Statue of Liberty, and you were there? I think? It wasn't really you, it was like a combination of you and my dad. And we were in prison. But at the Statue of Liberty."

22. The one about remembering how it used to be when you were young and full of hope instead of old and bitter and jaded.

"Our Time," "Merrily We Roll Along"

The closing number of "Merrily We Roll Along" is actually the first chronologically, since the musical goes backward. It's the play's happiest moment — Frank, Charley, and Mary on a roof watching Sputnik go by, giddily talking about how thrilling, perfect, and successful their futures are going to be. It's so hopeful! But so sad, 'cause you already know all the achingly bittersweet stuff that's going to happen.

Ach! So poignant! I'm dead from poignant.

23. The one about remembering.

"Memory," "Cats"

"Cats." The OG.

All right team, what did I miss?

This article originally appeared on 02.26.16

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Woman says we are 'severely underreacting' to octopuses, then proves she's not wrong

"However impressed or fascinated you are by octopuses, it's honestly probably not enough."

octopus, octopuses, wildlife, ocean life, marine life
Photo credit: Canva

Octopuses are just wildly interesting creatures.

What creatures have eight legs, nine brains, and dozens of fun and fascinating facts about them? Octopuses, of course. (Wait, is octopuses or octopi? Octopodes, perhaps?)

However interesting we think our suction-cupped, cephalopodic friends are, we're probably selling them short. That's the contention of Sarah, a comedic content creator on TikTok who's been sharing everything she's learned about octopuses, because they're far more bizarre than we might think.

"However impressed or fascinated you are by octopuses, it's honestly probably not enough," she says. "We are severely underreacting to octopuses collectively."

Once you see her video, it's clear she's not wrong.

@sarahmakesmelaugh

Octopuses are fascinating and I DO want to hold a tiny guy if possible just putting that out in to the universe 😬🐙#creatorsearchinsights #octopus #weirdanimals #animalfacts #didyouknow

With a hilariously understated sense of humor, Sarah shares facts like the idea that octopuses don't have tentacles, as many of us have been led to believe, but arms instead. Tentacles have suckers only at the end, while an octopus's arms have them from top to bottom.

"They decorate their front yards with shells and other shiny things they find in the ocean," Sarah says, adding, "I wonder if they judge other octopuses for how they decorate their front yard. Like, is there an octopus HOA?"

Sarah points out that The Beatles' song "Octopus's Garden" was inspired by this delightful fact.

Many of us know that octopuses are smart, but we may not know that they have a brain in each arm in addition to the brain in their heads, which is shaped like a donut. They can solve mazes and complete tricky tasks. And if their beak can fit through a hole, so can their whole body.

"So a fully grown giant Pacific octopus, which can literally be 30 feet long, can fit through a hole the size of a lemon," says Sarah. "And I don't care for that, particularly. I would never say that to an octopus's face because, evidently, they can recognize us, which I find unsettling. Note to self: Do not be mean to an octopus."

Because each arm has its own brain, it can operate independently, complete with its own sensory system.

Octopus, octopus arms, ocean life, marine life, octopus brains Each of those arms has its own brain?Photo credit: Canva

"I feel like they're smarter than us," Sarah says. "Are we confident they're not smarter than us? For instance, they will prank their prey. You know the joke where like old men will tap you on one shoulder, but surprise, they're at the other shoulder? Octopus do that. If they're hunting a shrimp, they'll tap it on the faraway shoulder so the shrimp runs directly into them. Like, 'gotcha!' I don't want octopus to do gotcha."

On a positive note, Sarah shows some examples of exquisitely colorful octopuses, though some of the most "fancy and beautiful" ones are also highly venomous.

That may have been the end of Sarah's video, but she wasn't finished. There's a part two that features blanket octopuses, the female superheroes of the sea. And that's not even the wildest part:

@sarahmakesmelaugh

Replying to @LalainID did yall know about the blanket octopus and didn’t tell me? Except those of you who did thank you 😂 #octopus #animalfacts #science #learnontiktok #learnwithme


A male blanket octopus is basically an inch tall and the female can grow to over six feet. The males can fit inside the pupil of the female's eye. What?! Basically, their only job is to produce sperm, which just raises way too many questions.

Sarah also talks about the mimic octopus, which she calls "the Jafar of the ocean" because it's basically a sorcerer (and one of them genuinely looks like Jafar from Aladdin).

That wasn't all. Even after the second video, she still wasn't done. Part three was every bit as fascinating, terrifying, wonderful, and chuckle-worthy as the first two (and also slightly NSFW in the most PG way possible):

@sarahmakesmelaugh

More Octopus species, this could go on forever y’all 😂 #octopus #weirdanimals #learnwithme #funfacts #creatorsearchinsights

The blob octopus? Who even knew? The eighth-arm situation is too much. Sarah was 100% right. We are, collectively, not reacting to octopuses nearly as strongly as we should be.

You can follow Sarah (@SarahMakesMeLaugh) on TikTok.

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Sleuths debunk 5 supposedly healthy things that are actually terrible ideas

"Detoxes / cleanses are great for clearing out your wallet."

healthy food; healthy options; unhealthy food; fasting; juicing; supplements
Photo credit: Canva

Sleuths debunk 5 supposedly healthy things that are actually terrible. 5 things to do instead.

A lot of people reach for convenient items advertised as healthy when they're short on time. The rise of health and fitness influencers has also contributed to the proliferation of confusing information about what is considered healthy, and what actually is. It's no wonder people sometimes make unhealthy choices, believing they're doing right by their body.

Some people took it upon themselves to parse out the gimmicks from the multi-million dollar health and fitness industry. Their revelations may surprise you. If you've fallen for the hype of an item or product that turned out to be a dud, it's not your fault. Some things are heavily marketed as healthy, while others are things we've grown up believing were healthy. In a world that can feel oversaturated with information, it can be difficult to have time to research everything.

Suddenly, everyone's drinking green juice or swearing by a new protein bar. Since the bars promise to taste like raw cookie dough without the risk of salmonella, you throw a few boxes in your grocery cart, hoping for the best. After all, it claims to provide all of the vitamins for the day, and you don't have time to cook.

healthy food; healthy options; unhealthy food; fasting; juicing; supplements Homemade granola bars with chocolate chips – perfect for a delicious snack!Photo credit: Canva

Instead of wondering, here are some things people think are healthy, but actually aren't, and what you can replace them with instead:

1. Cereal, granola, and protein bars

Cereal bars are quick to grab when you're running late. The same goes for granola and protein bars. Some people even use them as a meal replacement, but they're not as healthy as people like to believe. If you flip over the package, you'll be met with a high sugar content and very little actual protein in many cases. One person in the Ask Reddit thread is aghast, "We all need to be taught how to read nutrition labels. I was and am still absolutely shocked by the amount of sugar and sodium that are in most packaged foods, throw serving size in there, and it's totally bananas."

Try this instead:

If the goal is to make a healthier morning selection while still packing in a little extra protein, eating whole fruits with a side of peanut butter will fill you up. Whole vegetables, cheese cubes, or mixed nuts are also easy to grab but are full of needed vitamins and healthy fats, minus the high sugar content. Good RX reminds people, "Eggs aren’t just a morning treat. Make a batch of hard-boiled eggs to have on hand as a high-protein snack. One hard-boiled egg contains over 6 g of protein."

healthy food; healthy options; unhealthy food; fasting; juicing; supplements Refresh with a healthy green juice boost.Photo credit: Canva

2. Detoxes

There's a detox for everything. One person shares in a Reddit thread about things people think are healthy, but aren't, because detoxes don't work in the area you're expecting. They write, "Detoxes / cleanses are great for clearing out your wallet." According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), some detoxes contain laxatives that may cause acute diarrhea, which can lead to dehydration and malabsorption. The organization also explains that, "Some juices used in 'detoxes' and 'cleanses' that haven’t been pasteurized or treated in other ways to kill harmful bacteria can make people sick." Others may result in kidney stones for some users due to the high amount of oxalate found in leafy green foods, often used for green detox juices.

Try this instead:

Instead of taking your chances on a detoxing cleanse, Alix Leestma, RDN, CSOWM, senior dietitian at MultiCare Center for Weight Loss & Wellness, tells MultiCare Vitals that staying properly hydrated and eating a balanced diet will allow your body to detox properly. People's liver and kidneys are designed to detox your body naturally. “When dehydrated, our blood is more concentrated," Leestma says, "But when adequately hydrated, you’ll have the same amount of toxins in the blood but in smaller concentrations, which is easier on the kidneys to filter through.”

healthy food; healthy options; unhealthy food; fasting; juicing; supplements Making fresh orange juice in the kitchen. 🍊Photo credit: Canva

3. Juicing/fasting

Juicing is a way people are fasting while still feeling like they're getting in their nutrients. One person voiced concerns that juicing alone wasn't effective in maintaining the nutrients of the fruit, so it's best to eat the whole fruit. Northwestern University recently did a study exploring the effects of juicing. The results were surprising.

"The juice-only group showed the most significant increase in bacteria associated with inflammation and gut permeability, while the plant-based whole food group saw more favorable microbial changes. The juice plus food group had some bacterial shifts but less severe than the juice-only group. These findings suggest that juicing without fiber may disrupt the microbiome, potentially leading to long-term health consequences," Northwestern writes. Senior author Dr. Melinda Ring, director of the Osher Center for Integrative Health at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and a Northwestern Medicine physician, says, “Most people think of juicing as a healthy cleanse, but this study offers a reality check."

Try this instead:

“If you love juicing, consider blending instead to keep the fiber intact, or pair juices with whole foods to balance the impact on your microbiome,” Ring explains. You can also eat the fruit whole to ensure you're getting the fiber needed if blending it doesn't sound as appetizing as juicing.

healthy food; healthy options; unhealthy food; fasting; juicing; supplements Be careful with supplements.Photo credit: Canva

4. High doses of supplements

There's a supplement for everything, and some people take as many as they can in an effort to fill in the gaps of their diet. But excess supplements can cause issues, one person reveals: "I got a kidney stone this way. Wasn't fun." According to Healthline, water-soluble vitamins are more benign, even when taken in higher doses, because the excess is excreted in the urine. Fat-soluble vitamins found in some supplements can cause dangerous toxicity levels that cause irreversible damage.

Katie Mohan, a 57-year-old woman, was close to needing a liver transplant after beginning a regimen of a turmeric supplement. A report of an increase in liver damage due to supplement use on NBC prompted her to seek medical care. She was hospitalized for six days. Dr. Dina Halegoua-De Marzio, a hepatologist at Jefferson Health in Philadelphia, tells NBC, “Natural does not mean safe. When you cook with turmeric, that could be really safe. But some of the supplements now are 2,000 mg-plus, which is a very high dose of turmeric." According to the World Health Organization, a daily dose should be no more than 0-3mg per kilogram (2.2 pounds) of body weight. Which means, even a man weighing 200 pounds should only take less than 300mg of turmeric a day.

Try this instead:

Get the appropriate nutrients through a balanced diet and stick to one multivitamin daily, instead of several different supplements. Adding more nutrient-dense foods can also aid in boosting the vitamins you're hoping to make up for with supplements, according to the Navy and Marine Corps Public Health Center.

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15 years ago, a Russian gymnast was interrupted by her 2-year-old daughter. It became a historic performance.

"This is beyond beautiful. 🥲"

dance, motherhood, mommy daughter dance, mother daughter relationship, parenting, wholesome
Umi4ika/Youtube

Svetlana Putintseva with her daughter Masha.

In 2005 at only 18 years old, Russian rhythmic gymnast Svetlana Putintseva became a world champion, after which she retired and eventually became a mom. Then, in 2011, Putintseva came out of retirement for one special Gala performance.

Little did anyone know that her then two-year-old daughter named Masha would be the key to making that performance so special.

As the story goes, the young child refused to leave her side that night. But rather than stopping the performance, Putintseva did what so many incredible moms do: she masterfully held space for two different identities.

As we see in the video below, Putintseva simply brought Masha onto the dance floor and incorporated her into the routine—holding and comforting her at times, performing impressive moves while she ran around at others…letting it all become a lively, endearing interaction rather than a rote routine. It became something really touching:

Watch:

Now, a bit of fact-checking as this video has once again started going viral. Despite what many captions say, Putintseva‘s daughter was likely always a planned part of the performance (the tiny leotard is a bit of a giveaway). But that doesn’t really take away from the message behind it: motherhood weaves another soul into one's identity, forever. And one of the biggest lessons it teaches is how to hold someone else steady, all while becoming ourselves.

Every day, moms are engaging in a similar type of “dance”: navigating through the world while guiding and nurturing their little ones. It probably doesn't always feel quite as graceful as what Putintseva put out, and, yet, it is just as beautiful.

dance, motherhood, mommy daughter dance, mother daughter relationship, parenting, wholesome A mother hugging her daughter.Photo credit: Canva

Maybe so many thought it was an improvised moment because improvising is a very real parent superpower. That’s certainly the takeaway we get from some of these lovely comments:

“You cannot control life but you can learn to dance with it. 🤍”

"This is beyond beautiful. 🥲"

“If this isn't a metaphor for motherhood. We improvise so much.”

“A mother’s unconditional love 🥹❤️ She just made my whole month.”

“I do this sometimes while deejaying. My daughter comes up so I hit the slicer and let her chop it up. A few chops and she is happy and goes about her business. 🥰”

“I can see my daughter doing this to me soon whenever I get up on stage on perform. She already stares long and hard at me whenever I am onnstage singing. She doesn't take her eyes off me. Sure she would be running up to stand with me when she starts walking 😂😂 i look forward to it tho”

“Sobbing 😭😭😭😭 As a dancer who hasn’t performed since having a kid, this inspires me in so many ways 🥹🥹 So beautiful and it’s clear that she admires her mom so much 🥰”

- YouTube www.youtube.com

Though not much is written on Putintseva following this performance, one blog post says that Masha has followed in her footsteps by getting into rhythmic gymnastics. Maybe it all started with this one performance. ❤️

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A grainy 1991 QVC infomercial 'starring' two terrifying porcelain dolls is triggering the best reactions

Did anyone actually buy these?

90s, Gen X, QVC, Hello Dolly, vintage dolls, porcelain dolls
Photo Credit: QVC, @80svintagevisions, Instagram

Two porcelain dolls being sold on QVC in 1991.

One of the most wonderful attributes of a QVC host is their ability to sell the heck out of anything. In 1991, this was the job of one such woman tasked with selling two porcelain dolls from the “Hello Dolly” collection by Albert E. Price. (A few online sleuths pegged her as Judy Crowell, though Upworthy spoke with her and she didn't recall.)

Whoever she was, this was quite a feat as these weren’t just any dolls. They were wide-eyed, cleft-chinned little siblings named Jaime and Jason. And they were certainly unique. Described as 16 inches and porcelain, the “brother/sister team” were selling for $50 each. (On screen, there’s a note that they retailed at $82 apiece.)

A clip of the set being hawked on QVC is making the rounds on social media, and it has many people genuinely intrigued. In the @Totally80sroom clip, we see two almost puppet-looking dolls, a boy and a girl, each clad in overalls with golden blonde hair. Jason is wearing a red hat, while Jaime has white bows in her hair. But it’s their expressions that truly stand out: both might be described by some as “frightened-looking” thanks to their intense, unique stares.

The camera zooms in on Jaime, who seems as if she’s side-eyeing the host with a tiny tear in one eye. The host asks, “Do they remind you of your two little ones? Or do they remind you of you and your brother when you were this age? Up to no good! Being put on restriction!”

She then laughs and tells a delightful story from her childhood. “Who was it… Jeff said to me, ‘Restriction? Who gets put on restriction? You get grounded!’” She lets out a hearty laugh. “Well, I was put on restriction! In first grade. And I remember my restriction was I couldn’t leave my own front yard. So I used to go up to the border. My border, where the grass—our grass—met the neighbor’s grass, and stand right on the edge. And say, ‘Nope! I can’t come over! I’m on restriction.’ So by the time the spanking was over, and all the sadness is gone from your eyes, then it became kind of a game.”

She pauses as if she's just remembering that she has a job to do. “And that’s probably what will happen to these two too. Fifty dollars for Jaime. And fifty dollars for Jason. It is your choice of porcelain dolls from Hello Dolly.”

dolls, clowns, porcelain, QVC, vintage dolls A white porcelain doll with a tear stain. Photo by Monique Layzell on Unsplash

The comments are fabulous. One points out the obvious. “They’re cute until you wake up in the middle of the night because of a noise and they’re sitting there staring at you!” Another has a similar thought. “They’ve looked like they’ve seen some stuff they weren’t supposed to.”

This person focuses on the excellent professionalism of the QVC host: “This hostess deserves an Academy Award for filling time talking about those horrendous dolls.”

These wouldn’t be the first dolls to raise some eyebrows. If TV and movies were an indication of the toys that kids had back in the '80s and '90s, it would seem we were all surrounded by clowns and Chucky dolls. While yes, we did have a few such things, they became more of a symbol of fear in media than in real life.

In a piece for Collider, feature writer Jenna Rae Isley discusses the 1982 Spielberg-written classic Poltergeist, in which a child’s toy clown becomes a nightmare for the audience. “In reality, a clown doll is just a clown doll. But in our imaginations and in Poltergeist, a clown doll is a sinister, watchful force, lurking ominously in the corner of our rooms, keeping us perpetually on edge until it ultimately makes its move.”

The very scary clown scene from the film Poltergeist. www.youtube.com, Moyer Movies

But according to research conducted by Scientific American staff, there are actual reasons that people across many cultures are afraid of clowns. After sending out a questionnaire with various clown-based scenarios, more people answered that they had coulrophobia due to ‘negative portrayals of clowns in popular culture’ rather than actual ‘frightening experiences with clowns.’” In other words, movie makers and artists determined them to be scary…and so they became scary. (Though according to the same research, some are truly afraid of the unsettling makeup, even that of Ronald McDonald.)

It’s worth noting that most people, at least according to this survey, are afraid of clowns because they’re masked. “In fact, the strongest factor we identified was hidden emotional signals, suggesting that for many people, a fear of clowns stems from not being able to see their facial expressions due to their make-up. We cannot see their ‘true’ faces and therefore cannot understand their emotional intent.”

To that point, Jaime and Jason do not seem to be hiding their true intent. They just seem scared…perhaps because they saw a clown.

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Guy finds long-forgotten album in a thrift shop, reunites the band, and is sharing their music with the world

The damaged vinyl record was first released 58-years-ago

feel good story, music, rock music, lost and found, musicians
Photo credit: Marcus Pollard on Facebook

Marcus Pollard is reviving a 77-year-old warehouse worker's lost rock music.

In the 1960s, Norman Roth and his band, The Glass Cage, were Canadian indie rockers who played small local shows and built enough of a following to land gigs in bigger cities. When Roth was 18, the band recorded a live performance that was never officially released and was eventually lost after they broke up shortly afterward. Now, thanks to a four-dollar thrift store purchase, the band's music is reaching a wider audience—58 years later.

In 2016, veteran rock music promoter Marcus Pollard bought an unlabeled vinyl record at a thrift store on a whim, despite the album being physically damaged. He fell in love with the six songs recorded on it and spent the next two years trying to track down any band members connected to the record.

"I searched in vain for two years trying to get any clue as to who was on the record, but to no avail," Pollard wrote on Facebook. "Then, in a last ditch effort I posted a clip on the Canadian Artists Records Appreciation FB page and... I got a hit!"

Pollard eventually received a reply that read, "Hey, that's my record!" from Roth, now 77 and working as a warehouse manager. Roth was floored that his band's long-lost recording had resurfaced, and he was able to listen to songs he hadn't heard in more than 50 years.

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After reuniting Roth with his lost music, Pollard went a step further. After consulting with the other band members, he set out to bring The Glass Cage's music back to life after remaining dormant for generations. Pollard spent the next eight years using his industry connections and expertise to officially release the album. Working with a team of professionals, he refurbished the damaged record, digitally remastered the songs, designed elaborate packaging, and developed a booklet detailing the band's impact on the Vancouver indie rock scene of the 1960s before they broke up.

The finished vinyl album, titled Where Did the Sunshine Go?, is scheduled for release on February 24, 2026.

"I feel like everyone has done something in their life that was dismissed," Pollard told CTV News. "And I wanted them to feel like what they created was actually important."

While Roth and his former bandmates are excited about the album's release, they aren't trying to relive their youth or chase the rock star dreams they once had. They're just happy that others will now have access to their music and are enjoying the ride.

"I'm not looking for accolades or super stardom—that's long gone," Roth told CTV News. "It's just saying to the world, 'I was here.' And I hope they enjoy it."

If you'd like to hear Roth's music, you can stream tracks by The Glass Cage on Bandcamp and purchase the vinyl when it's released.

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