The holiday season is filled with traditions, and one of the most iconic among them is getting hold of family holiday cards. When an 18-year-old girl, who goes by u/daisydelo on Reddit, felt left out after her parents excluded her from the family pictures, she took matters into her own hands. In a Reddit post, she shared the story of how she decided to pull off a prank on her parents by posing for cheesy “family” pictures with her friends and sending those out instead.

Representative Image Source: Pexels I Photo by Anna Shvets
Representative Image Source: Pexels I Photo by Anna Shvets

She gave a brief introduction about her family and herself, “I was born to a teen mom, my mom had me at 17. She later married my stepdad and they had my siblings who are 9 and 12 respectively. I’m 18 and in college now.” The 18-year-old revealed how she was excluded from the family photo, “Before Easter, I was at college. And I found out that my mom and stepdad took family photos without me for the cards.”


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She told the audience how her mom tried to justify the decision instead of apologizing. “My mom said that it was just because she needed them printed in time and I was at college… But college is only 25 minutes away and I feel like my stepdad is resentful that their family includes some other guy’s child. He also described the photo as of “close family” but then backpedaled and said I just wasn’t as close physically because I’m at college,” she wrote.

Representative Image Source: Pexels I Photo by RDNE Stock project
Representative Image Source: Pexels I Photo by RDNE Stock project

The 18-year-old mentioned how she had decided to prank her family and as part of her joke, she included her siblings and friends. Describing the prank, she said, “And we took deliberately cheesy family photos, all wearing blue jeans and jean jackets. My friends dressed as my mom and stepdad, my female friend wore a bald cap to be my stepdad, and my male friend wore a wig and a denim dress to be my mom.” She lauded her friend who was “talented with makeup and honestly did a great job making them look like them.”


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The woman described, “We took a bunch of pictures, with props and picked a favorite of us all standing in silly action poses wearing raccoon skin hats. Between the makeup, hair, and big hats, we all agreed my friends looked like my parents when the picture was postcard-sized. It was honestly a really fun photo, really different than the serious ones my family always takes.” The woman revealed how she took the prank to the next level by swapping the cards in the envelopes her mom had prepared and resealing them with the sort of stickers she used.

Representative Image Source: Pexels I Photo by Aline Viana Prado
Representative Image Source: Pexels I Photo by Aline Viana Prado

She later revealed that her prank came off successful and even turned out to be a hit amongst other family members. She added that her joke was eventually caught when her “aunt sent a photo of the card to the family group chat and asked her mom, “This isn’t you, is it?” The woman revealed, “My mom was furious at me for sending out the joke cards and embarrassing the family, and also for not sending the cards she had made and written in.”


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But the daughter had an apt reply ready for her mom. “I told her that I didn’t get why she was upset about being left out of the family photo, apparently, it isn’t a big deal to be treated like you’re not part of the family!” In response, her mother had said she and her husband felt mocked by having “crossdressers” in the photo. The 18-year-old replied, “I said that I just wanted a photo with my close family, just like my stepdad did and I consider those friends of mine my closest family! Because I guess that’s just something we can choose now! My mom got so mad at me for ‘sassing’ her that she told me to leave and I went back to college.”


via GIPHY


The Reddit post has received over 15,000 upvotes and has seen tons of comments in support of the young woman. One user, u/MerelyWhelmed1, commented, “I’m totally on board for this. It’s exactly how their level of callousness should be addressed…with pointed humor. Well done!! I especially love that you don’t hold anything against your siblings, and hope you continue to have the loving relationship with them that allows for this kind of thing.” Another user, u/Disastrous-Bee-1557, joked, “I hope you have something equally awesome planned for when they try this again at Christmas.”

Image Source: Reddit I u/zephyreblk
Image Source: Reddit I u/zephyreblk

Image Source: Reddit I u/thisisbunkum
Image Source: Reddit I u/thisisbunkum

  • 10 boys and 10 girls were left alone in separate houses. The results were shockingly different.
    A girl plays with block while two young boys play a gamePhoto credit: Canva
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    10 boys and 10 girls were left alone in separate houses. The results were shockingly different.

    Videos showed the children living normally for the first two days, but then the experiment took a chaotic turn.

    It sounds like the plot of William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, but in the mid-2000s, it was a very real, and very controversial, reality television experiment. Footage from the UK Channel 4 documentary “Boys and Girls Alone” is captivating audiences all over again, offering a fascinating—and chaotic—look at what happens when you remove parents from the equation.

    The premise was simple but high-stakes: 20 children, aged 11 and 12, were split into two groups by gender. Ten boys and ten girls were placed in separate houses and told to live without adult supervision for five days.

    While there were safety nets in place—a camera crew was present (though instructed not to intervene unless safety was at risk), and children could ring a bell to speak to a nurse or psychiatrist—the day-to-day living was entirely up to them. The houses were fully stocked with food, cleaning supplies, toys, and paints.

    As the resurfaced footage shows, the results between the two houses could not have been more different.

    In the boys’ house, the unraveling was almost immediate. The newfound freedom triggered a rapid descent into high-energy chaos. They engaged in water pistol fights, threw cushions, and in one memorable instance, a boy named Michael covered the carpet in sticky popcorn kernels.

    The destruction escalated to the walls, which the boys covered in writing, drawing, and paint. But the euphoria of freedom eventually crashed into the reality of consequences.

    “We never expected to be like this, but I’m really upset that we trashed it so badly. We were trying to explore everything at once and got too carried away in ourselves,” one boy admitted in the footage.

    Their attempts to clean up were frantic and largely ineffective, involving scraping paint and messily mopping floors. Nutrition also took a hit; despite having completed a cooking course, the boys survived mostly on cereal, sugar, and the occasional frozen pizza. By the end of the week, the house was trashed, the garden was littered with garbage, and the group had fractured into opposing factions.

    The girls’ house, however, looked like a different planet.

    In stark contrast to the mayhem next door, the girls immediately established a functioning society. They organized a cooking roster, with a girl named Sherry preparing their first meal. They baked cakes, put on a fashion show, and drew up a scrupulous chores list to ensure the house stayed livable.

    While their stay wasn’t devoid of interpersonal drama, the experiment highlighted a fascinating divergence in socialization. Left to their own devices, the girls prioritized community and maintenance, while the boys tested the absolute limits of their environment until it broke.

    This article originally appeared last year.

  • A ‘Severance’ fan with Stage 4 cancer made a ‘bucket list’ request. Ben Stiller’s reply is perfect.
    Ban Stiller with a quote card overlayedPhoto credit: Frank Sun via Wikimedia Commons
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    A ‘Severance’ fan with Stage 4 cancer made a ‘bucket list’ request. Ben Stiller’s reply is perfect.

    After a fan reached out with a “bucket list” wish to meet the cast, Stiller’s immediate response proved the internet can still be a force for good.

    Due to their serialized format, terrific TV shows can create a real sense of community, sparking our imaginations in ways other mediums simply cannot. The very best, like Apple TV+’s mind-bending dystopian mystery series Severance, can also offer a comforting form of escapism.

    Ben Stiller, the show’s primary director and executive producer, was reminded of that fact over X, when a hardcore fan reached out with a seemingly long-shot request:

    “Hi @BenStiller! Severance is the best show my husband and I have ever seen,” wrote Emily Powell-Heaton. “I have stage 4 cancer. A great bucket list item to check off would be to meet you and any of the cast and crew from the show. We can fly anywhere. We live near Toronto, Canada. Would this be possible? Thanks for your help!”

    Stiller, who has 5.3 million followers on the platform as of this writing, responded on the same day, asking for a DM. While we don’t know the specifics of their conversation, it appears they made plans to meet up in some fashion—potentially even with other people involved in the acclaimed show.

    “Thank you so much @BenStiller and team for making my wish come true!” they wrote. “My husband and I are over the moon about meeting you and the many other incredible people who work together to create #Severance! I am so happy.” The filmmaker replied, “Look forward to meeting you xx.”

    While social media can be a dark, depressing, divisive place, this connection highlights how it can be harnessed for good. Even the replies to their exchange were disarmingly positive, with strangers praising Stiller’s kind gesture and sending well wishes to Powell-Heaton.


    – “What a good guy. Prayers up for you, Emily!”

    – “YES!!! Fantastic… when the internet works well it really does. Xx”

    – “He is a legend! He’s made such an important dream come true!”

    – “You’re the man @BenStiller”

    – “Good on you, Ben. Emily, I hope you enjoy all things good and wish you wellness. XO”

    After the interaction with Stiller went viral, Powell-Heaton reposted an article about the news, writing, “He is a legend! He’s made such an important dream come true!”

    Powell-Heaton, who, according to their X profile, is 34 and has metastatic breast cancer, shared a health update shortly after the interaction with Stiller: “The spinal surgery is a go. No date set up yet but it’s likely to be in April. The spinal surgeon has to consult with some ENT specialists and I have to get a [CT] scan done on my face and neck area. This will determine if the surgery will be done from the back of the spinal cord or the front. A metal cage will be placed around the crumbling part of my spine to strengthen it.”

    Metastatic breast cancer, according to the Cleveland Clinic, is a cancer “that’s spread from your breast to other areas of your body.” The article states that there is no cure, “but thanks to newer treatments, more people with metastatic breast cancer are living longer than ever before.”


    In a study published in February 2025 in Cancer Causes & Control, researchers from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health analyzed data from all 50 U.S. states, concluding that breast cancer cases are increasing for women under 40. “From 2001 to 2020, breast cancer incidence in women under 40 increased by more than 0.50 percent per year in 21 states, while remaining stable or decreasing in the other states,” according to a news release about the study. “Incidence was 32 percent higher in the five states with the highest rates compared to the five states with the lowest rates.”

    Rebecca Kehm, PhD, the study’s co-author and an assistant professor of Epidemiology at Columbia Mailman School, wrote that these increases are “alarming” and cannot be solely explained by genetic factors or changes in screening practices.

    This article originally appeared earlier this year.

  • Aaron Paul recalls heartbreaking exchange with his daughter that made him rethink smartphone use
    Aaron Paul recalls how his daughter made him rethink his smartphone use. Photo credit: Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0

    If you own a smartphone and aren’t addicted to it, I sincerely salute you from afar. It’s so easy to grow obsessed with the passive dopamine rush of browsing internet headlines and scrolling our social feeds.

    In any brief moment of everyday silence—sitting in the dentist’s waiting room, riding in the passenger seat during an argument with my wife, even waiting for commercials to end during a TV show—I find my hand unconsciously reaching for my pocket. That feels…not normal, and I often think about the effect it must have on my relationships with friends and family. It’s not like magically rewinding the clock to the dial-up era would fix everything, but maybe certain situations call for leaving our phones undisturbed.

    Actor Aaron Paul, best known as the co-star of the acclaimed series Breaking Bad, explored this subject during a recent video interview with The Wall Street Journal. Paul recalls that he was checking his email via iPhone when his daughter excitedly entered the room—and their interaction (or, at least initially, lack thereof) led him to make a profound personal change.

    “I wanna say I’m sorry”

    “I try not to use my phone in front of my kids,” he said. “My daughter comes running in, and she’s asking me a question, something, and I’m trying to just finish this quick email. And then she stopped asking, and she kind of went and started playing. And she’s 7 [now]—this is when she was 6. And I put my phone down and I went to her. And I go, ‘You know, I wanna say I’m sorry for not being responsive to you…I wanna make a pact with you right now. I wanna promise daddy’s not gonna be on his phone when he’s with you anymore.’”

    Her “one-word response” wound up leveling him. “She looks at me and she goes, ‘Really?‘ You know, just, ‘really?‘” he recalled. “And it broke my heart, you know what I mean? It really did break my heart. I go, ‘I promise you I won’t.’ And she just jumped up and threw her arms around me like she won the biggest prize. We owe it to our kids to at least give it a shot…[With] technology as a whole, you can choose whether the technology controls you. You should control the technology.”

    Can smartphone usage impact parent-child relationships?

    It appears there’s some data to support these ideas. Robin Nabi, a professor of communication at UC Santa Barbara, led a study analyzing how parents’ various media usage—including smartphones—can impact the “emotional intelligence” of their children. The findings suggested there’s a link.

    “We know that how parents express, reflect, and talk about emotions with children influences their EI (emotional intelligence) development,” she said in 2023. “And we know how easy it is for parents to be absorbed in their own phones, which could limit the interaction and feedback they give to their children. So we thought it would be important to see what role parents’ screen time and phone use around their child might play in their child’s EI development.”

    The research, which involved 400 parents of children between the ages of 5 and 12, found that “parental use of cell phones” around their kids was the only activity associated with “lower child emotional intelligence.” Nabi noted, “Kids respond to their parents. And no matter what type of content a parent may be viewing on their phone, the outward appearance to the child is a lack of responsiveness.”

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