[LeThanhPhong]

Why do we have crooked teeth when our ancestors didn’t? - G. Richard Scott




Explore the prevailing scientific theory of why crooked teeth and impacted wisdom teeth are recent developments in human evolution.

--

According to the fossil record, ancient humans usually had straight teeth, complete with wisdom teeth. In fact, the dental dilemmas that fuel the demand for braces and wisdom teeth extractions today appear to be recent developments. So, what happened? While it’s nearly impossible to know for sure, scientists have a hypothesis. G. Richard Scott shares the prevailing theory on crooked teeth.

Lesson by G. Richard Scott, directed by Igor Coric, Artrake Studio.

Comments:

1/ Can you do another video on how vision problems came up? I find it hard to believe that so many modern humans need glasses and contacts due to poor eyesight when our ancestors were hunter/gatherers who would have heavily relied on perfect vision.

1a/ Vox has a good video on why vision problems are so common now

1b/ "Heavily relied of perfect vision," and that's exactly it. My optometrist did a study on this, and the greatest jumps in the number of people with glasses are after wars. He theorizes that the reason people need glasses today, is because all the people with perfect vision were the hunters, and the warriors, so they died more often, leaving people with better vision behind to have a better chance at survival. This is also why we don't see as many animals with vision problems, because there is no process for protecting them or selectively sending out to be the ones hunting and fighting.

1c/ I think Vox did a video on that. But basically, our environment and behaviour affects our eye sight.

2/ cries in 2 years of braces

2a/ Just removed mine which ive worn for 4 years😂😂

3/ I have a pretty small lower jaw & my teeth are really big. Had extremely crooked teeth with a bad overbite & had to get my wisdom teeth removed. Wore braces for 3 years in my teens & now I’m almost 30 & my lower teeth have shifted to become crooked again. This makes so much sense & is very insightful!

4/ This video makes so much sense. I had a eureka moment after watching it. I think that eating CARROTS🥕during childhood could be effective at creating straight teeth.

My parents both had crooked teeth and bad bites during adolescents and required braces to get straight teeth. Meanwhile me and 4/5 of my siblings developed naturally straight teeth. One sibling developed crooked teeth with a severe overbite and he had to have braces. We all ate the same diet except the sibling that developed bad teeth. One food that he never ate was raw carrots which the rest of us had as a daily snack.

4a/ I ate a lot of carrots and apples and still had crooked teeth

5/ Dr. Weston Price was a dentist who studied the jaws and diets of indigenous populations around the world. He found that Indigenous people that grew up eating their natural diet had almost always perfect dental arches, jaw width, straight teeth and no tooth decay. He found that changes in the diet were able to drastically descrease this kind of dental health within even 1 generation ( the kids of these people). This means the kids started eating a western diet (flour, sugar, canned, processed, etc) and developed the same problems, we nowadays have. NOW: while there may be a relation between chewing hard foods and dental health, he found the key in havin perfect development to be nutrient density, which is present in the indigenous diet and absent in the western diet.

[LeThanhPhong]

Trump creates 'an environment of fear' to win over voters




Jonathan Capehart is joined by a political panel to discuss Trump's recent dangerous remarks against Jewish voters, Catholics, and migrants. Plus, how the former President uses incendiary language to pit marginalized groups against each other.

Comments:

1/ Beware of Dictator Don! Vote! 🇺🇸 💙💙💙

2/ Hitler used this same method of blaming!

3/ I agree this election is the most consequential election of our life times!!!

[LeThanhPhong]

Medicaid Sues to Take Dead People's Homes for Payment, Families Say

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/me...s-BB1kvDVi

Americans are left in shock as Medicaid attempts to claim their homes to cover the health costs of recently deceased family members.    

Many U.S. citizens were unaware of the controversial recovery process and have been sued without warning.  

Medicaid is a tax-funded federal and state insurance program that helps cover medical costs for the nation's poorest citizens.

However, most Americans are unaware of the fine print, which allows the federal government to repossess a family home to pay off medical bills should a loved one die.

The federal government requires that each U.S. state attempts to recover the cost of care from deceased patients through their assets.

While family homes are typically exempt from this, for deceased family members who were over 55 when they passed, Medicaid is entitled to sue for the home to cover costs.

Unfortunately for one Massachusetts resident, this became her reality when her father passed after a lengthy battle with cancer, per Fox News.

After Sandy LoGrande went through the traumatic experience of losing her father, she was billed over $177,000.

LoGrande could not afford to pay back the hefty Medicaid expenses, which led to the program threatening to sue to repossess her father's home.

"The home was everything," LoGrande told The New York Post.

Following her father's passing, LoGrande found herself in a long and tiring two-year legal battle with the state of Massachusetts.

Speaking on the situation, LoGrande states a few years before her father passed, she was advised by a nonprofit group to sign him up for Medicaid.

When LoGrande asked the group about the potential to lose their family home, she was assured this could only happen if her father were placed in a nursing home.

She said, "He never would have signed on with anything that would put his home in jeopardy" (via Fox News).

After two long years, the state reached a settlement with LoGrande, and the claim on their home was removed.

However, the unfortunate reality is that thousands of other Americans have lost their homes to cover Medicaid costs.

According to an investigation by the Dayton Daily News, states like New York and Ohio recovered over $100 million in Medicaid costs by repossessing the homes of thousands of deceased people.

In contrast, states like Arizona and Alaska have only attempted to claim homes a handful of times in recent years.

A Democratic lawmaker who cites the program as cruel argues it's time to end the ability of Medicaid to claim people to pay off medical bills.

During a speech in March, Jan Schakowsky argued that many Americans aren't even aware of the potential to lose their home if they cannot afford the Medicaid bills.

Speaking with The Associated Press, Schakowsky says the program is both cruel and inefficient.

"It is one of the most cruel, ineffective programs that we see," Schakowsky told the AP, via Fortune. "This is a program that doesn’t work for anybody."

The 1993 rule that requires states to use the deceased's assets, such as estates, to cover costs may become optional.

A report by the Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission recommended that Congress repeal the law and make it optional for states.

[LeThanhPhong]

When US Navy Most Feared Jets Miss Landing on US Aircraft Carriers




Welcome back to the FLUCTUS channel for a discussion about what happens when the pilot misses landing on aircraft carriers and the role of the crew on the flight deck in such situations.

Comments:

1/ Thank you again for all your stories and your service 🤙

2/ Having spent 16 years in the navy, it's not the cat shots but the recoveries that always scared the hell out of me. One thing was drilled into my head, if you don't need to be on the flight deck, stay off it. Great video though.

3/ They spray foam not water. Water would carry any burning fuel (which floats on top) further around the deck which is asking for more trouble.

4/ My prayers are with all of our Navy Aircraft carriers and all branches of our Military for that matter!! My dad, is a Navy veteran (Vietnam Era), And I'll NEVER be able to thank our military men and women enough for their service to our COUNTRY!!

5/ I spent 1 week on a tiger cruise on the USS John Stennis. I was able to watch the aircraft takeoff and land from the tower. My daughter served on the tower and I was able to access her work station. It was the most exciting experience of my life. I stood in the rain for hours watching these aircraft. Thank you US Navy for allowing families access into the lives of our children who serve.

6/ i 've actually had the privilege to serve on submarines SSBN's and SSN's  and Been the Team Leader for ALRE (Aircraft Launch and Recovery Equipment ) at  ASO/ NAVICP Phila I can say without a doubt the Flight Deck on a Carrier is the Most Dangerous 4.5 acres on Gods earth.

[LeThanhPhong]

Got an electric shock





Comments:

1/ Moray eels don't give electric shocks, nor can an electric eel give shocks when it is dead! So much FAIL!!!!

2/ Eating that made him eel

3/ Komodo: oh, I don't feel so good.
(throws up an eel)
Komodo: ah, much better.
Komodo: ooh an eel.

4/ Thats moray eel not electric eel
Electric eel live in South America not Komodo Islands

5/ Had nothing to do with being shocked since its a morray eel and electric eels live nowhere near kamodo lands . Its a common/perfectly normal behavior of kamodos as well as other reptiles. They will regurgitate their meal for multiple reasons from being stressed ,disturbed ,or precieving a possible threat while eating or in the digestion process to be able to better defend itself. They will also spit up hard to digest whole meals or parts that are hard to breakdown like bone, or say tough/slimy skin. Though being scavengers they will still also regurgitate food with extremely poor taste or they determine may pose a possible health risks do to buildup of toxin/bacteria . Theres nothing odd about this behavior at all .

[LeThanhPhong]

Joy: Stormy Daniels could take down Trump — not stolen documents or Jan. 6




Donald Trump’s hush money trial involving a payment to Stormy Daniels is set to start on April 15. Could this be the trial that sees the former president convicted? Joy Reid and her panel discuss.

Comments:

1/ Michael Cohen went to prison for this. So should Trump

2/ Why does his attorney go to jail and not him?

2a/ He went to jail but got out early because of covid and then got put back in because he was writing a book about Trump, then got out when he appealed that.

3/ "Not spears, not swords, but the thorn in the paw that slayed the beast"

4/ 15 April is court date and Tax day... Remember to pay your taxes don....

5/ For the first time in modern history, the majority of people in the United States are seriously excited for April 15th!  🎉😁🥳🍾🥂

5a/ I wish the lord that joe would leave this man alone I have never Ever heard Any one having to go through as many court cases in law suits and trying to accuse him of everything that They makeup God bless president trump God bless America. Lord knows we need Lord

5b/ Trump brought it on himself.

5c/ "Joe" isn't the cause of Donald's problems. Donald is the cause of his own problems.  Lordy, why can't Donald leave We The People alone.

5d/ Joe didn't make Trump diddle this woman and then try to pay her off! Blame the guilty one.

[LeThanhPhong]

Taylor Swift JUST GOT THREATENED By Trump After HUMILIATION




Taylor Swift JUST GOT THREATENED By Trump After HUMILIATION

Trump never gets tired of claiming credit for things that he never did. A group of his supporters has spun an elaborate theory suggesting that Taylor Swift is secretly involved in a plot to boost Joe Biden's chances for reelection. According to them, Swift is part of a hidden government operation aimed at securing Biden’s victory, leading these supporters to attempt to tarnish her image.

But polls suggest that the hate towards Taylor Swift has backfired Trump. For starters, Taylor Swift isn't just any celebrity. She's one of America's sweethearts. A recent survey from Monmouth University highlights her massive appeal, showing that 75% of people who know her, like her. Even among Republicans, she has a notable number of admirers, with her favorable ratings exceeding the unfavorable ones.

Comments:

1/ Trump is a fool to go after her. She is kind and has followers who are fiercely loyal.

1a/ Trump is a fool, period.

2/ Let’s hope all of this doesn’t leave Taylor in any danger from a Republican nutcase.

3/ Real billionaire vs fake billionaire. No contest really go Taylor Swift.

3a/ Earns 13 millions a concert, donnie boy so Jealous.

4/ Taylor Swift represents everything that Trump is not.... beautiful, kind, sweet, talented, successful, generous.  A great role model for the youth of the 21st century.

5/ She’s a kind, caring and loving person. One word from her for Biden and her followers, fans will most definitely will follow suit! Do it Taylor!

6/ I never cared much for Taylor's music (consider the source; I'm 70 years old and I lived through a time when pop music was much better in my humble opinion), but she has earned my adoration for what she's doing politically. Her efforts just might turn the tables and save our country from becoming a dictatorship. You go, Taylor!

7/ You can’t even compare Swift & Trump. Like comparing an angel 👼 and the devil. 👿

8/ Trump's stupidity and arrogance has no limit. It's seems he never learns when he attacks Taylor Swift.

9/ Taylor Swift is more popular, more liked, and has lots more money then Trump. He will lose once more by bad mouthing her.🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

10/ He is just a typical mob boss.

[LeThanhPhong]

Trump Aides Vow 'HOLY WAR' on Taylor Swift If She ENDORSES BIDEN AGAIN: Rising Reacts




Briahna Joy Gray and Robby Soave react to reporting on Trump's inner circle and their view on Taylor Swift regarding the 2024 presidential election. #TaylorSwift #DonaldTrump

Comments:

1/ WHO CARES ABOUT HER????
If anyone does, and votes the way she tells them to, then that's the problem.

1a/ You literally have t-shirts that tell you who to vote for and flags and stickers. Still trump lost majority vote twice lol

1b/ Trump cares

2/ Taylor Swift has the right to endorse anyone she chooses. Nobody with any sense is going to be against her for her choice.

2a/ Encouraging people to register to vote? She has never told anyone who to vote for. I encourage people to register to vote all the time. Everyone should. It’s our civic duty. Stop being big mad for your orange king.

2b/ The most she has ever done is post a picture with Biden Harris cookies in 2020. But I bet you are ok with Kid Rock endorsing Trump, you’re just mad cause Taylor is more popular than him. The party of double standards!

3/ Just because she is famous does not mean that she isn't allowed to be political or have an opinion. They are trying to silence her but instead they will end up forcing her to publicly take a stance. Its bizarre how the snowflakes melt down seeing a strong opinionated woman who doesn't share their exact worldview merely existing.

4/ Trump aides? 😂 I'm sure she is worried

[LeThanhPhong]

(Quora) A 70 year old lady staying at a hotel.

Posted by Emily Palmer:

A woman decided to give herself a big treat for her 70th birthday by staying overnight in a really nice hotel.. When she checked out the next morning, the desk clerk handed her a bill for $250.00.  She demanded to know why the charge was so high "I agree it's a nice hotel, but the rooms aren't worth $250..00 for just an overnight stay - I didn't even have breakfast!"  The clerk told her that $250.00 is the 'standard rate,' and breakfast had been included had she wanted it. 

She insisted on speaking to the Manager. The Manager appeared and, forewarned by the desk clerk, announced: "This hotel has an Olympic-sized pool and a huge conference center which are available for use."  "But I didn't use them."  'Well, they are here, and you could have." He went on to explain that she could also have seen one of the in-hotel shows for which they were so famous. "We have the best entertainers from the world over performing here."  "But I didn't go to any of those shows.."  "Well, we have them, and you could have."  No matter what amenity the Manager mentioned, she replied, "But I didn't use it!" and the Manager countered with his standard response. 

After several minutes discussion, and with the Manager still unmoved, she decided to pay, wrote a check and gave it to him. The Manager was surprised when he looked at the check.  "But Madam, this check is for only $50.00"  "That's correct I charged you $200.00 for sleeping with me."  "But I didn't!"  "Well, too bad, I was here, and you could have." 🤣🤣🤣

[LeThanhPhong]

(Quora) Do children of parents who were close to or over 40 when they were born wish they had younger parents?

Answered by Amy Zanatta:

My parents were 42 and 43 when I was born, making them older than most parents of children my age. Despite being the only child due to unsuccessful attempts at siblings, my upbringing was filled with love and care. While some mistook them for grandparents, it didn't affect me much as a child.

My dad, with his perpetually gray hair, remained active and playful, while my mom, though hindered by knee issues and surgeries, always made an effort to engage with me. Their age brought wisdom and life experience, enriching my upbringing with invaluable insights.

However, my concern was their longevity and whether they would be present to witness my children grow. Fortunately, they are still going strong and share a deep bond with my young ones, often assisting with their care. I cherish my parents deeply and couldn't imagine life without them. Though their age is a factor of concern, their love and support are irreplaceable.

So I guess the answer is yes and no as well. I wouldn’t change them as parents but I do wish they were younger to stick around longer.



I pray for their continued health and presence in my life for many more years to come.

[LeThanhPhong]

Federal judge delivers rare response after Trump attacks the daughter of a judge




Former President Donald Trump criticized the daughter of Judge Juan Merchan, who is presiding over Trump's criminal trial relating to hush money payments, on social media. Federal judge Reggie Walton gave a rare interview to CNN's Kaitlan Collins and explained why he's concerned about these attacks. #CNN #News

Comments:

1/ As a law-abiding American I'm so shattered and disappointed with our authorities for allowing Trump to continue mocking our judiciary unabated

1a/ Blame Republicans. They could have stopped him but didn’t. Why? Because they want him to continue.

2/ Never,  ever has a past president got into our faces and behaved so badly.  Trump does not qualify for any position of employment.

3/ He’s cyber bullying. Charge him accordingly

3a/ Agree with you Peter. That's all Trump knows how to do--cyberbullying and scaring anyone who speaks out against him. As Bob Woodward's book title says "Fear: Trump in the White House."

4/ I would say that trump's statements qualify as stochastic terrorism.

5/ When a defendant threatens a Judge or his family or staff, he should AUTOMATICALLY be put in jail for contempt of court.

5a/ The guy is getting worse by the day presenting himself as a mobster and people seem to think that's reasonable bcos of politics. Why isn't he behind bars at least for the duration of the trial. Wish the gag order included any and all threats . I suppose that isn't the law. Belligerence is never good.

[LeThanhPhong]

Blind Triplet Contemplated Suicide Before Blind Man Adopted Them. Now Boys Are Pursuing Their Dreams (Exclusive) (1 of 2)

“Knowing the path that they were heading on and the path they’re on now, I just feel so grateful that we’re a family," Ollie Cantos tells PEOPLE

by Caitlin Keating   Published on March 30, 2024 09:30AM EDT

https://people.com/blind-triplet-contemp...ve-8601974


From Left to Right Steven, Leo, Ollie and Nick Cantos. PHOTO: COURTESY OLLIE CANTOS

This post is a collaboration between PEOPLE and StoryCorps, the largest collection of human voices ever archived.

When Ollie Cantos looks back on the 14 years since he first met triplets Nick, Leo and Steven, he has tears in his eyes and endless gratitude in his heart.

“I can’t believe how far we have all come,” Ollie, now 53, tells PEOPLE. “Knowing the path that they were heading on and the path they’re on now, I just feel so grateful that we’re a family."

"Having them as sons and seeing how they prosper and how they are making their own way in the world is really so heartwarming. It means I was able to help prepare them for adulthood and leadership," he adds.

That original path looked dire when he first met the boys through a friend at church in 2010. "He had this feeling like I had to meet them," Ollie previously told PEOPLE in 2016. "He also told me that they had never met someone else who was blind.”

The triplets were born with the same condition Ollie has: retinopathy of prematurity, a disease that occurs in premature babies and causes blindness. After meeting, they were mentored by Ollie, who recalled to StoryCorps in 2014 that the children’s lives looked bleak and filled with no hope for the future.

Leo explained at the time that he and his brothers' routine consisted of waking up, going to school, returning home and “staying there for the rest of the day." He added that he remembered wishing he could go outside and play in the snow like everyone else.

Added Nick: “It was getting so bad that I wanted to die. But it was one of the decisions I’m glad I did not make, because I would have missed out on everything.”
Soon after Ollie met the boys, who are now 24, he knew that they were meant to be his sons, and began the process to officially adopt them.

Looking back on his life, Steven told PEOPLE in 2016, “If dad weren’t here, two things would happen: either I’d be in a gang or I’d be dead.”

Ollie, the first blind person and first person with a visible disability to become a councilman in the city of West Covina, California, has been the perfect role model for his sons. The attorney, who previously worked with the U.S. Department of Education in Washington, D.C., made it his mission in life to raise his boys to be independent and happy.

After PEOPLE originally spent time with Ollie and his sons at their home in 2016, the then-16-year-old triplets went on to become Eagle Scouts, completing the same rigorous requirements as anyone else.

“They did it with no time extensions or accommodations,” says Ollie, who moved from Virginia to California in 2019. “I’m super proud.”

For their service projects, Steven collected supplies for low-income students, collecting enough for 130 kids, according to local outlet ARLNow. Meanwhile, Leo organized a blood drive and “literally saved hundreds of lives,” says Ollie, while Nick gathered hygiene supplies for a nonprofit that helps abused women and families.

“They deserve to rise to the very best, because that's how we make the world better and that's how we make our individual lives better in the process too,” Ollie says of his sons.

Soon after these extraordinary accomplishments, the triplets spent time at The Carroll Center for the Blind in Newton, Massachusetts, to work on numerous skills including cooking, cleaning, household chores, time management, technology skills enhancement, independent cane travel and exploration.

In 2018, it was time for the boys to leave the comfort of their home and head to college. Today, Leo is set to graduate from the University of Virginia, while Nick and Steven will graduate from Southern Virginia University. Although the distance is hard for Ollie, he is proud of the boys for pursuing their dreams.

“They didn’t want to leave because they felt the same way I did,” recalls Ollie. “They felt like, ‘My gosh, we’ve just been this intense family unit for this long,' and at the same time, they knew they needed to learn and to strike out on their own a bit."

He adds: “I barely had enough time with them. They first came into my life when they were 10, so I spent the first two years cramming in every childhood possibility they missed out on: Easter egg hunts, trick-or-treating, shooting squirt guns at each other... all that stuff. I crammed it in because I knew we were running out of time before they started growing up.”


From Left to Right: Leo, Ollie, Nick and Steven Cantos. COURTESY OLLIE CANTOS

Today, Nick feels "proud to be a member of our family," he tells PEOPLE, as Steven says the moment he officially became a Cantos felt like it was "completing my identity."

For Leo, "life has been good to me personally and professionally, and it will continue to be that way because I have a loving family at my side," he says. "I certainly am not the same person I was 10, even 15 years ago, way before dad came into the picture."

As Ollie looks ahead, he can’t wait to see his boys have a family of their own one day.
“I’m going to be granddad, not grandpa, for their future kids,” says Ollie, laughing, “and want them to be raised in the same spirit of love.”

Ollie also created a GoFundMe, and he says the money raised will continue to help the triplets as they mature. "It will help them eliminate outstanding college debt, assist with technology upgrades as they begin their careers, and assist with travel when being invited by organizations to give speeches to non-profits." he adds.


(L-R) Nick, Leo and Steven Cantos. COURTESY OLLIE CANTOS

Ollie knows that despite their successes, setbacks are bound to happen — and should be embraced as a family unit.

“Even when there are any setbacks I say, ‘I’m here with you. We've got this together. We have always been together. We’ve got this,’ " he says.

He adds: “I’m just so grateful to have them in my life as my sons, because my life wouldn't be as rich had it not been for having them. Nothing will break us apart.”

If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by dialing 988, text "STRENGTH" to the Crisis Text Line at 741741 or go to 988lifeline.org.

=====================

More about the above family.

https://www.thechurchnews.com/2021/7/25/...happiness/

Ollie is a Filipino-American who grew up attending Catholic schools, Olegario “Ollie” Cantos VII . 

In 2010, he was introduced to 10-year-old triplet boys who were born prematurely in Colombia and lived with their mother in South Arlington. They were often bullied by other kids and didn’t leave the house much. Starting off as their mentor recruited by a local social services agency, Ollie Cantos soon felt a desire to adopt them and show them a world of opportunity. 


Ollie Cantos, middle right, is pictured with his sons Steven, Nick and Leo. | Credit: Ollie Cantos Facebook


Steven, Nick and Leo Cantos are pictured as Eagle Scouts in uniform shorting earning the ranking in 2017. | Credit: Provided by Ollie Cantos


Ollie Cantos, middle right, is pictured with his sons Nick, Steven and Leo in the airport in January 2018 as the boys depart Arlington, Virginia, for Boston, Massachusetts, to advance their independent skills with students and alumni from Harvard, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and other institutions of higher learning. | Credit: Ollie Cantos Facebook

================

https://storycorps.org/stories/ollie-can...ven-argel/

Ollie Cantos (OC), Leo Argel (LA), Nick Argel (NA), and Steven Argel (SA)

OC: I had a lot of trouble growing up because I didn’t have any friends really. I was made fun of a lot. There would be people who would put their hands in front of my face and say, ”How many fingers am I holding up?”

LA: Same thing.

OC: Same thing with you guys, right?

LA: Yes.

OC: So, what were things like growing up?

LA: Well, every day was like wake up, go to school, come back home, and then you stay there for the rest of the day. There were certain things that I wish I could do like go out and play in the snow like everyone else. ’Cause I’ve heard kids through the window—we could hear that they were having fun. The only thing I remember when I was seven, we went to McDonald’s, and we went to the park. We rarely went outside.

NA: It was getting so bad that I wanted to die. But it was one of the decisions I’m glad I did not make because I would have missed out on everything.

OC: Do you remember that night when I first arrived?

NA: Oh yeah, I do. Because I…I certainly didn’t know that there were other blind people except me and my brothers.

OC: You didn’t believe me that I’m really blind. So, I’m like, ”Well yeah, here’s my cane.” And then you left and came back with a book, and you put my hand on it, and it was the Bible. You couldn’t believe that I actually read Braille.

NA: It just made me feel like I had a person that I could trust, because I didn’t trust anyone.

OC: I took you guys individually to learn how to use your canes better, and we’d just go to the corner store, and I remember, Leo, one day the store clerk—she said, ”Is that your son?” And, you know, before I could answer, you put your arm around me, and you said, ”Yeah, it’ my dad.” And I said, ”Do you know what that means?” You said, ”Well, you take us places, you protect us, you help us with our homework. Sounds like a dad to me.” Whenever I hear you call me “Dad,” it’s the highest compliment to me. You three used to be in the same situation that I was, and to see you come out of that and to be the way you guys are now, it’s impossible to describe how grateful I am that I get to be your dad.

================

Meet an Amazing Blind Man Raising Blind Triplets

https://www.washingtonian.com/2016/09/07...riplets-2/

Ollie Cantos was a workaholic lawyer—the highest-ranking blind person in the federal government. Then along came Steven, Leo, and Nick: blind triplets who needed a dad. What happened next changed their lives.

Written by Sherri Dalphonse   PUBLISHED ON SEPTEMBER 7, 2016


When Ollie Cantos (second from the left) met (from left) Leo, Steven, and Nick, he planned to be just a mentor. Then the relationship—and their lives—went in an unexpected direction. Photograph by Lexey Swall.

On May 22, 2010, Leo, Nick, and Steven had pancakes for breakfast. The date is as easy for the triplets to remember as their birthday. Because on that particular Saturday, a visitor was coming, a man named Ollie Cantos.

Ollie had something in common with the brothers. He was also blind.

A government attorney, Ollie had learned of the family through a friend from church. The boys—born in Colombia three months premature and weighing about a pound each—were ten at the time and being raised in South Arlington by their mother and grandmother. Their father, who had come to the States to work for the Colombian Embassy, had moved back home when the boys were four. They hadn’t seen him since.

Ollie’s friend believed that the brothers—who were being bullied by other kids and getting into fights—should meet him. Ollie had mentored children for years, and the triplets’ mother welcomed the visit.

“I had heard that Leo was Mr. Happy-Go-Lucky but yearned for friends,” Ollie recalls. “Steven was very serious and, again, didn’t have a lot of friends. Nick was the one, I heard, who was the most angry.”

Ollie, then 39, was confident he could make a connection, because his own childhood hadn’t always been easy. He had tried to hide his blindness for years, forgoing a cane and the use of Braille until he was an adult. “I was in denial,” he says. “I thought blindness was a bad thing. I thought it meant you were helpless and couldn’t do anything.”

When Ollie arrived, the boys were playing a made-up game show on their Casio keyboard. They immediately made him a contestant.

“The next question goes to Mr. Ollie,” Leo said. “Mr. Ollie, do you like candy?”

The brothers fired off more questions. They wanted to know: What had Ollie’s childhood been like?

Ollie told of the troublemakers who’d tripped him in the school halls or waved hands in front of his face and teased: “How many fingers am I holding up?”

As intrigued as the boys were, says Leo, “the first feeling I had was that it was probably going to be one of those one-day relationships and then he’d be gone.

“And then,” Leo goes on, “he introduced us to this thing called a shoulder ride.”

One by one, Ollie hoisted each boy onto his shoulders, then spun in circles and flipped them down and around. It was terrifying and intense and amazing, but most of all confusing: How was a blind man doing this?

• • •

The triplets’ lives had been extremely sheltered: school during the week, church on Sunday. Teachers and Columbia Lighthouse for the Blind volunteers took turns helping them have experiences common to others their age, such as ice-skating and trick-or-treating, and they went to a weeklong CLB day camp five summers in a row. But by and large, Leo, Nick, and Steven didn’t stray much from their routine. Their mother, Ceila Gracia, says she was working two jobs and had little time. She was also cautious: “My mother and I, we wouldn’t let them do some things like go outside alone. Always in order to protect them.”


While she worked two jobs, the triplets’ mom, Ceila Gracia, got help from volunteers. Photo by Mary Filicetti.

The tedium wore on the boys. They say they could hear other children laughing outside the apartment windows—including their older, sighted brother—but weren’t allowed to join in when kids were playing in the snow or kicking a soccer ball. Even inside, they didn’t do much for themselves; their mother and grandmother took care of everything, including picking out their clothes.

Steven fantasized about having a different life—he even thought about running away, although he didn’t fully understand what that meant. Nick says he wanted to die and go to heaven.

Ollie’s boyhood had been different. The eldest child of Filipino immigrants, Olegario Cantos VII had been raised in Los Angeles by parents who saw no reason to give their blind son special treatment.

“When I was a kid and there were chores around the house, I’d say, ‘Well, I can’t see the dirt.’ And my mother would say, ‘Well, use your hands to find it.’ My mom insisted: ‘You’re to wash the dishes. You’re to clean the floor. You’re to make your bed, and you’re to do it properly, and here’s how you do it.’ ”

Ollie believed the bullies who called him worthless. But he also adored his mother. If she saw no limits to what he could do, who was he to doubt? One day when he was 12 and playing at a cousin’s, he thought: Hey, if these kids my age can ride bikes, I can, too. “That really did not turn out very well,” he laughs.

(to be continued)

[LeThanhPhong]

(cont.)

Blind Triplet Contemplated Suicide Before Blind Man Adopted Them. Now Boys Are Pursuing Their Dreams (Exclusive) (2 of 2)

Only about 40 percent of working-age adults with significant vision loss are employed. The unemployed majority was no place for Mrs. Cantos’s son. Ollie went to law school at Loyola Marymount University, then moved to Washington at age 31 to become general counsel for the American Association of People With Disabilities. He later worked at the White House under President George W. Bush and at the Department of Justice. Today he works at the Department of Education.

At the time he met the triplets, his life was busy. He worked long hours, sat on nonprofit boards, and volunteered for political causes. His day often ended at midnight. Suddenly, that schedule changed. He had devoted years to his goal of shaping a better world for those with disabilities, and here were three kids he could help.

“At first it was just fun to spend time with them,” Ollie says, “but it became clear very quickly that there was more to this—so much more than I could ever have imagined.”

To free up time, he quit all his boards and volunteer efforts. He started visiting the boys every Saturday, then every Sunday, too. Eventually, he was also seeing them during the week to take them to doctors’ appointments and help with their studies.

Teachers and volunteers who had worked with and cared about Leo, Nick, and Steven for years grew curious. Who was this man? As the boys spent more time with Ollie and less with them, some of the adults did a bit of sleuthing. Satisfied that the boys were safe, they also saw how happy the triplets were to have a father figure around.

Ollie became like a coach, teaching the brothers all kinds of life skills. How to cut steak with a knife, how to make their beds, how to cross busy Columbia Pike.

“I taught them how to network within two months,” he says. “I’d take them to an event and I’d say, ‘Okay, guys, the one rule: Do not leave this room. Other than that, I’m sending you in three different directions. Go meet people. Go talk to people. See you later.’ ”

“The first time I did that,” Leo says, “it was nerve-racking.” But it paid off that fall: “We went into sixth grade, and we were very popular.”

When Ollie took the brothers out to eat for the first time, he realized they had no idea how to order—or even figure out what they wanted. Shortly afterward, he came up with a new challenge. He decided to take each one to the convenience store near their apartment. Leo was first, and once they arrived, Ollie asked what he’d like.

“He wasn’t used to making those decisions,” Ollie says, “so he said, ‘What do you think I should get?’ ”

For a few minutes, it was like a Laurel and Hardy skit, with Ollie repeatedly saying, “Well, what do you want?” and Leo replying, “What do you think I should want?”

Finally, Leo settled on a Coke. Ollie said, “Okay, go ahead and ask.”

Leo: “Me? I have to talk to them?”

Although the boys lived within a block of the mom-and-pop, the shopkeeper had never seen them before. She figured they’d just moved in. “Nope,” Ollie recalls telling her, “they’ve been here seven years.”

The woman then asked Leo, “Is that your dad?”

Before Ollie could respond, Leo wrapped his arm around him and said, “Yes, that’s my dad.”

Ollie crouched down to the little boy’s level and rested both hands on Leo’s shoulders. “Do you know what that means?” he asked.

Leo said, “Well, you take us places. You protect us. You help us with our homework. That sounds like a dad to me.”

They had known each other only two months.


Leo, Ollie, and Steven outside the convenience store where Leo first called Ollie “Dad.” Photograph by Andrew Hetherington.

• • •

“Let me tell you about the first time we went to Crystal City. That was way awesome,” Leo says. “Crystal City is a full 12 blocks of underground. We walked all 12 blocks, and we found this place called Chipotle and it was really nice. Then we went to [Ollie’s condo], and we touched everything that was there.”

The triplets opened every door and drawer at Ollie’s, grasping objects and asking, “What’s this?” One boy broke a $200 seal that Ollie—at the time a volunteer lawyer for the Coast Guard Auxiliary—used for official documents. Another locked the door to his clothes closet, to which he didn’t have a key. The third boy unscrewed the peanut-butter jar and dug in.

This is the point where a lot of people might wonder what they’d gotten themselves into—Ollie included. I don’t know if I’m equipped to handle this, he thought. His parents wondered the same. Yet once Ollie had made the decision to go all in, he would not abandon these boys.

He was determined to let them feel their way through the world. With a sighted friend, he brought them to a water park and let them splash around. He gave them a soccer ball with a bell inside so they could kick it around. Nick had dreamed of being in a boxing ring, so “Dad” arranged a lesson with a former welterweight champ.

It’s easy to get lost when you’re blind—although Google Maps talking to you from a smartphone is a lifesaver—so as the boys grew, Ollie explained how he used the sun, as well as traffic sounds, to figure out direction. Sometimes when he’s with them, he lets them get lost on purpose so they have to find their way back. He made them memorize part of the Metro map.


Photo by Paul Wood.

They also joined the Boy Scouts. Troop leaders didn’t say no when the boys wanted to cut wood with an ax, build a fire, or shoot an arrow like the other kids—instead, they found a work-around. At scout camp in the summer of 2014, they each built a shelter and slept in the woods for their wilderness survival badges.

They got to shoot guns, too, each boy squeezing the trigger while someone else held the Glock. Said Nathan Graham, then leader of the church that sponsors the troop, who has since passed away: “You should have seen the looks on the faces of the employees of the shooting range when we brought Nick, Leo, Ollie, and Steven out.”

• • •

Ollie had always assumed he’d be married by that point in his life, with his own children. Although he’d had some serious relationships, it hadn’t worked out that way. But here were three boys bonding with him. “It’s the strangest thing,” he says, “but I felt like they’d always been my kids.”

He also felt conflicted. Ceila, he thought, needed to know that her sons were calling him Dad. “What do you want me to do?” he remembers asking her. “I don’t want to be inappropriate.” At the time, she says, she thought it odd, but Ollie recalls she also said, “They need somebody. They need you.”

Yet tension developed. Ceila admits it was hard at first to see her children getting close to Ollie. He and the boys, for their part, would often get frustrated at her understanding of what the youngsters were capable of, when she wouldn’t allow them to do certain things.

There was also religion. Ollie is Mormon. Ceila is not. A year and half after they met, the boys asked to go to Ollie’s church. They say that when they went to the Salvation Army church with their mother, other kids excluded them when they played and also bullied them—yelling at them, for example, to “move out of the way” as the other kids ran around together. According to Ollie, Ceila put her foot down. Over her dead body, she said, would they miss church with her.

Eventually, they compromised: If the boys went with her to services on Sunday morning, they could go to Ollie’s church in the afternoon. Six months into the arrangement, Ollie says, Ceila let them skip the Salvation Army services. At the Mormon church, Ollie and the boys became a fixture in the front pew—Ollie usually in the middle, with his arms around two of the boys and his hand on the shoulder of the third. The boys were baptized into the Mormon faith under the name Cantos.

But in occasional disagreements with their mother, Ollie realized he had no paternal rights. Why not, he resolved, make it official?

When he broached the idea of sharing legal custody of the boys with Ceila, she refused. “No Hispanic mother gives her kids to another person,” Ceila explains.

By this time, Ollie was acting more and more like their father. They occasionally stayed with him on weekends—gradually it became every weekend. And there was little doubt the triplets were prospering. Before Ollie, they’d struggled more in school, despite having good teachers. (Mary Filicetti, their special-ed teacher at Barcroft Elementary, had learned Braille to work with them.) He met them almost daily to oversee homework and teamed up with their teachers to push them to excel—without special treatment. (Arlington County provides the boys laptops with screen-reading technology as well as talking calculators, and some assignments are translated into Braille.) When they started at Thomas Jefferson Middle School, Ollie required the boys to e-mail him weekly grade reports. Any grade below B means going the weekend without their audio-assisted video games.

“The odds are against us,” Ollie says. “To counter those odds, my sons can’t be just okay. They have to be really good. Would I rather they not have to? Absolutely. It’s a lot of work. But I also don’t play the victim card. It’s not the world’s fault we’re blind. It’s not the world’s responsibility to give us a job.”

Once when their grades were too low, Ollie forbade them to go on a field trip to a corn maze. The boys sneaked behind his back—neglecting to tell the teacher that Ollie had rescinded the already signed permission slip—and went anyway. When he found out, Ollie grounded them. He was livid, and Nick spit out: “What are you going to do—leave?”

“It’s not like we’re not used to it,” Ollie remembers Steven saying. “I said, ‘Steven, just because something happens, that doesn’t mean I’m going to go off and leave. You might get in trouble, but I am not leaving you.’ ”

In fact, even after Ceila rebuffed Ollie’s offer to share custody, he persisted in lobbying for the arrangement. Often it was the triplets’ grandmother, Margenia Pacheco, who acted as the buffer between her daughter and Ollie. One day several summers ago when Ollie telephoned the boys and Margenia answered, she summoned them by saying, “Su papá está en el teléfono”—“Your dad’s on the phone.”

The boys were thrilled to hear their grandmother call Ollie their “dad.” They’d never met anyone like him—someone who truly understood their situation and wanted to help. “He has a large heart,” Leo says. Ollie seemed somewhat glamorous at first, this new friend who could do so many cool things, says Steven. They soon realized he was genuine. He never broke a promise he made to the boys—which is what helped win over Nick, the slowest to trust that this would last.

Eventually, Ceila says, she also began to trust Ollie, especially when she saw how her sons were thriving. “It took time. First he won my mother over, then he won me over. I think that God sometimes sends someone to help us here,” she says. “Like an angel.”

Last November, after about two years of back-and-forth and paperwork, Ollie, Ceila, Leo, Nick, and Steven stood before an Arlington County judge, who granted Ollie joint legal custody. “When the judge signed the order, I was crying,” Ollie says. So were the boys, then 16.

Although, Ollie adds, “they said it was just something in their eyes.”

• • •

When Ollie, Leo, Nick, and Steven are out, it’s hard not to notice them. On several occasions at restaurants, a diner at a nearby table has paid their check. A few times when they’ve been out walking, strangers have offered to pray for them. “They’d say, ‘What should we pray for, your blindness?’ ” says Ollie. “And I’d say, ‘Forget the blindness. Pray that we win the lottery.’ ”

Olllie and his sons (by Evy Mages)




By now, the brothers are used to sharing a public persona. “Here’s what I think,” Leo told me when I first met him. “I think that people like us for the reason that we’re blind. That’s basically all they come up to talk to us about. It’s frustrating at times because you try to have a regular conversation about something other than your blindness.”

At school, they’ve been allowed to cultivate their individual identities by being assigned to separate classes. “We’re kind of happy about that,” Steven once explained, “because we hate being called the triplets.”

Leo is considered the warmest and most extroverted. He has played the French horn in the school symphony (because, he says, it sounds “cool”), but he hates the stereotype “that most blind people go into music—like Stevie Wonder.” What he really loves is computers. He wants to practice technology law.


Leo at the prom with Arian Argote. Photo courtesy of the Cantos family.

Nick is the most athletic—he used to be on the crew team—and is the one always offering to help others. He hopes to become a prosecutor. Family friend Rodney Neely calls him the jokester of the family, “the one who will most likely be a salesman or politician.”

Then there’s Steven, who comes off as stiff and gruff—the “Mr. Spock” of the group, Ollie says—but who mentors younger kids and is “a big, soft teddy bear,” says Alissa Salamone, Wakefield High School’s teacher of the visually impaired. The most ambitious of the three, he also wants to become a lawyer like his dad, but specialize in intellectual property.

Steven plays the baritone and the euphonium, and this fall he’ll be one of two drum majors leading Wakefield’s marching band—as far as Ollie can tell, the country’s first blind drum major at an integrated public school.

Ollie and his three sons credit some of their achievement to reading popular personal-development books—The Magic of Thinking Big, The Secret, Psycho-Cybernetics. Every night, they drift off to sleep with headphones on, listening to recordings about success, wealth, and other affirmations.

The idea of thinking big has sunk in as they set their sights on college. “No one’s going to expect us to go to Harvard,” Steven says. “They’re going to expect us to go to some community college.”

• • •

One day this past spring, Ollie was napping when he started dreaming about food. He woke up hungry—and to the unmistakable aroma of cheese, which he loves.

When Leo came into the room, Ollie asked if the boys had ordered in. “He said, ‘Oh, no, I made dinner.’ Then he came over with a plate, and he sat me up and gave me a sandwich he had made. It was a grilled cheese.”

Thanks to Ollie and their orientation-and-mobility instructor, Nina O’Neill, the brothers had been learning to cook for some time—guy food like scrambled eggs, French toast, and hamburger casserole. But before that day, none had made anything on his own. His sons, Ollie knew at that moment, were going to be just fine.

As would Dad, when it came time for him to send them out into the world and let go. “It’s funny—people say, ‘You’re so good with them,’ but I’m the one who feels like I get the better end of the deal,” Ollie says. “They give me such a sense of peace that I’ve never gotten any other way.”

Sometimes, he feels so happy that he starts singing in the grocery store. He’s less serious, more playful. “One time—this is really bad, I shouldn’t have done this,” Ollie says, “but one time I was in this really goofy mood. We knew someone was staring at us. We went up to the person . . . and I said, ‘Be careful, it’s in the water.’ And we walked away.”

Family friends are quick to underscore the sacrifices Ollie has made, the resources and time he has poured into making life better for the triplets. He still hopes to get married and have more kids someday but knows it will take a special woman to share life with him and the boys.

“It’s really funny—they want me to get married, and they want to have other brothers and sisters,” Ollie says. “They’ll say, ‘Dad, any luck?’ And I’ll say, ‘I’m working on it, sons, I’m working on it.’ ”

In the meantime, he’s forcing his sons to handle their own interactions at school and in the Scouts, and to make more of their own decisions—all to prepare them for the days when they could be practicing law, managing their own families, and who knows, maybe showing their children how a blind man can give a shoulder ride.

“The thing I’m waiting for that hasn’t happened—and I’m glad hasn’t happened—is I expected teenagers to not want me around, to not want their friends to see me around,” Ollie says. “But every time I’m with them in a school setting, they are always excited to introduce me to their friends. They’ve said to me, ‘We know what it’s like to not have a dad. We’re never, ever giving this up.’ ”

This article appears in our September 2016 issue of Washingtonian.

[LeThanhPhong]

James Bond and The Queen London 2012 Performance




Daniel Craig reprises his role as British secret agent James Bond as he accompanies Her Majesty The Queen to the opening ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games.

The Ceremony also featured appearances from Mr. Bean, Monty Python and a re-imagining of the British Industrial Revolution.

Every two years, the world's finest athletes gather at the Olympic Games - a spectacular celebration of sporting excellence that captures the attention of billions of people around the world. However, the Games are about much more than just sport. They bring the Olympic values to life and provide a global arena for a unique combination of sport, culture, education and ceremonies.

At the Olympic Games in London 2012, about 10,500 athletes from 204 countries compete in 26 different sports, comprising 302 medal events. Whether athletes win a medal or not, they can forever call themselves Olympians. The sporting competitions are undoubtedly the central focus of the Olympic Games and participating in the Games is the ultimate goal for most athletes.

Every edition has its own story to tell and will be remembered for some truly remarkable performances from sporting legends such as Jesse Owens, Abebe Bikila, Jean-Claude Killy, Nadia Comaneci, Katarina Witt, Michael Phelps and Usain Bolt, to name just a few.

--ooOoo--

Queen Elizabeth II Officially Opens The London 2012 Olympics - Opening Ceremony




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJG_Qu41IQw

Queen Elizabeth II announces the opening of the London 2012 Olympic Games at the Opening Ceremony held in the Olympic Stadium (27 July).

[LeThanhPhong]

We don’t want a spoil rich man which can’t handle someone telling him “No”. A good leader surrounds himself with people who can tell him the truth not what he wants to hear.

Now he's begging for money. How low will he go? He's sick.

=============

Republican Group Launches Ad Attacking Trump As 'Weak And Fragile Man'




The Republican Accountability PAC has put out a new ad on social media targeting Donald Trump as being a "weak and fragile" man. The ad specifically uses clips of Trump and his allies saying that they don't want certain groups of Republicans to be a part of their Party anymore, and the ad concludes by saying that normal Republicans don't want him either. This is a powerful ad that should be played on local TV stations across the country, as Ring of Fire's Farron Cousins explains.

=================

*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

The Republican controlled group called Republican Accountability Political Action Committee has put out a new ad on social media calling out Donald Trump for being, in their words, a weak and fragile man. So here is the ad that they put out on social media this week.

Donald Trump has made it clear. 
If you donated to Nikki Haley in the Republican primary, Donald Trump doesn't want you. 

Donald Trump warns. 
Anyone who donates to Nikki Haley's campaign will be blacklisted saying any donors will be permanently barred from the MAGA camp.

If you are a Republican who supports Mitt Romney, Donald Trump doesn't want you.
"We're getting rid of the Romneys of the world. We want to get Romneys and those out." 

And if you are a Republican and don't want Trump to be the nominee, Donald Trump doesn't want you.

Anyone who is not on board with seeing Donald Trump as the 47th president is, is welcome to leave.

This is the disposition of a weak, fragile man. A man whose ego is so delicate that he purges anyone who offers the slightest critique. So Donald Trump has made it clear he doesn't want us. Well, the feeling is mutual. We don't want him either, and we don't want him getting anywhere close to the White House. Again,

I love everything about this ad. You're using Trump's words. You're using his daughter-in-law's words. You're using the words of his other allies. You're, you're not paraphrasing, you're not having to read them out. You're using their words to show these people that Trump doesn't like you. But more than that, you are then coming to this conclusion that is a very obvious conclusion that Donald Trump is a weak and fragile man who cannot stand the thought of somebody not loving him and agreeing with him 100% of the time. 

A normal person in this situation, especially obviously a politician, is gonna look at these people who say, I don't like you and I don't want you to be my nominee. A normal politician would say, alright, fair enough. Let's talk.

Let's figure out what we can do to get us on the same page. How can I earn your support? You don't like me. Now I get it. That's fine. You're allowed to do that. What can I do to get you to like me? What do you want from me? That's how a normal politician would approach something like that. Like, let's have a conversation. 

Trump, on the other hand, as this ad points out, says, oh, you don't like me. Get the hell out. Go away forever. I don't ever wanna see you again. You have no place in this party. There is no place for dissent. We all have to be on the same page. And that page simply says, we love Trump. And if you're not on that page, you're not in the Republican Party. 

Meanwhile, over here on the left, what we, we frigging disagree on everything.

I mean, we really do. There is lots of room for dissent and argument and debate in the Democratic Party sometimes to our detriment. Sure. But we all have the same core beliefs. We really do. Over on the right. You can't have dissent, you can't have arguments, you can't have debates, you can't have actual discussions about things. If you do not agree, we will force you to agree, and they all end up agreeing in the end. That's what this ad is pointing out. These Republicans, all of these never Trump Republic.

Comments:

1/ We The People do not want trump.  Who cares what he wants!

1a/ Don't be surprised.
There are people who are our everyday neighbors who are completely under his sh!tty spell.
I encourage you to keep speaking the truth about the false god they are worshipping!!

I respect you and your 1st Amendment rights.
👍👍

2/ Most bullies are mentally weak, and put on a tough guy act. Trump is no different!

2a/ "I just wanna be loved."
          No love for you
                           trump.

2b/ I know how to straighten someone out who thinks bullying others constitutes strength 😁

3/ I am so sick of Trump. His presidency is like an never ending nightmare.

4/ This is childlike behavior.  Do we want a child as POTUS ?     No Way !

4a/ We don’t want a spoil rich man which can’t handle someone telling him “No”. A good leader surrounds himself with people who can tell him the truth not what he wants to hear.

4b/ This is straight up third grade school yard bully behaviour.

5/ We don't want Trump. EITHER!!!

6/ Being banned from the MAGA camp sounds like a badge of honor!

6a/ True… but never belonging, is even better!

7/ It's about time the real Republicans stand up and say something!!!!

8/ Weak ,fragile, and vicious and cornered. He is high on hate and greed. We never wanted him

9/ I’m so sick of this man!

10/ Now he's begging for money. How low will he go? He's sick.