Table of contents for November 2013 in Reader's Digest

As I write, Yosemite burns. My story begins on the opposite coast. The summer before my dad died, the whole family spent a week in North Carolina’s Outer Banks, one of the last places my father wanted to see but never had. The sound side beckoned, and then we learned that it was home to a rather populous group of water moccasins (one bite can kill). Our intrepid group decided to rent Jet Skis anyway. Terrified of snakes, I sat out the excursion and watched with alarm as the guides clomped around in the water, pitchforking the sandy bottom as the guests made their way to their watercrafts. As this potentially dangerous spectacle unfolded before me, I sat on the dock with Dad and asked him if the Outer Banks…

Howard dies and waits in line for judgment. He notices that some souls go right into heaven, while Satan throws others into a burning pit. But every so often, instead of hurling a poor soul into the fire, the devil tosses it aside. Curious, Howard asks Satan, “Excuse me, but why are you tossing them aside instead of flinging them into hell with the others?” “They’re from Seattle,” Satan replies. “They’re too wet to burn.” Would You Like to Join The Yoko Club? Oh no. The German Philosophy Club? I Kant. The Compulsive-Rhymers Club? Okey-dokey. The Codependence Club? Can I bring a friend? The Procrastinators Club? Maybe next week. From gcfl.com “I’d like to see you again, but first I’d like you to read this book I’m writing about stuff…

1 I had a patient who wanted a brow lift because she thought she looked grumpy all the time. I sent her for a brow wax instead. It took 15 minutes, she looked great, and she saved herself $5,000. I’ve also seen patients get results similar to eyelid lifts with over-thecounter firming serums and eyelid-lift creams. The results are temporary, but they do work to reduce lines and puffiness. 2 It drives me crazy when parents call from the emergency room because their kid got a scratch on his face. It’s not going to look any different if I sew it up instead of the ER doctor; it’s probably just going to cost you a lot more money. Unless the injury is severe, you don’t need a plastic surgeon for…

FOR YOUR Turkey … Southwest Casserole Combine turkey, squash, and sweet potatoes with gravy, diced potatoes, and roasted green chilies; cover with cheddar. Bake. Jeremy McMillan, executive chef at the Bedford Post Inn Autopilot Pizza Throw sauce, cheese, turkey, and veggies on refrigerated pizza crust, and pop it in the oven. Southern Living Grateful Eggs Benedict Serve poached eggs over stuffing and sliced turkey; cover with gravy and a dollop of cranberry sauce. closetcooking.com FOR YOUR Pumpkin Pie … Pump-King Ice Cream Turn pumpkin pie into pumpkin-flavored ice cream by blending it into vanilla ice cream and adding maple syrup. Curtis Stone, host of Bravo’s Top Chef Masters Pumpkin-Honey Corn Bread Add ¼ cup pumpkin puree and 1 tbsp. honey to your corn bread recipe for a twist on the…

FROM Mental Floss 1 Friend (as a verb) When did friend become a verb? The answer is sometime in the 1400s. In the Oxford English Dictionary, the verb friend means “to make friends or to help someone out.” One example of its usage from 1698: “Reports came that the King would friend Lauderdale.” 2 Unfriend If you could friend someone, it was only natural, according to the productive rules of English word formation, that you could unfriend her too. The word appears in Thomas Fuller’s 1659 book The Appeal of Injured Innocence: “I Hope, Sir, that we are not mutually Un-friended by this Difference which hath happened betwixt us.” 3 Dude In the 1880s, dude had a negative, mocking ring to it. A dude was a dandy, someone very particular…

Which Word Describes You? Whatever your personality type, you’ll win friends and influence people with a good vocabulary. See which of these words related to character you can define—and perhaps which defines you—and then analyze the next page for answers. 1. craven (’kray-ven) adj.—A: reckless. B: fussy. C: cowardly. 2. picaresque (pi-kuh-’resk) adj.—A: like a daring rascal. B: goodlooking on camera. C: standoffish. 3. recluse (’reh-kloos) n.—A: group leader. B: hermit. C: problem solver. 4. narcissist (’nar-suhsist) n.—A: generous giver. B: self-absorbed sort. C: analytical type. 5. ingratiate (in-’grayshee-ayt) v.—A: eat impulsively. B: attempt to control. C: try to gain favor. 6. acolyte (’a-kuh-liyt) n.—A: follower. B: braggart. C: daredevil. 7. bon vivant (bon-vee-’vahnt) n.— A: good listener. B: trusted ally. C: lover of fine dining. 8. sanguine (’san-gwin) adj.—A:…

FROM THE BOOK Still Foolin’ ’Em Ishouldn’t complain so much. Life at 65 is good. I have had one house, one wife, my real nose, my real name, and most of my teeth. And the last part is a major reason why life is pretty good. Because when you hit your mid-60s, you have to take care of your teeth. It’s a generational thing—I learned it from my 86-year-old grandmother. Susie Gabler had perfect teeth. White beauties with no cavities. She took great care of them—always kept them by her bedside in a glass of water. The first time I saw them come out of her mouth, she was in bed, and I was sitting next to her. In the middle of saying how proud she was of me, she…

FROM Mental Floss To Catch a Fly How the world’s best flyswatter will make soldiers safer Anyone who’s wielded a rolled-up newspaper to combat a housefly knows just how evasive the bug can be. Flies always seem to know where you’re coming from—and how to get away. “Flies are incredibly good at what they do,” says Michael Dickinson, a professor of biology at the University of Washington. To study the insects in action, Dickinson coaxed flies through a tube that opened onto a tiny platform. Over this stage, a disc loomed, ready to flatten the flies from various directions—front, side, and back—while a high-speed camera filmed the insects’ reactions to the impending attack. After running hundreds of bugs through his machine, Dickinson discovered something interesting. Within 300 milliseconds of a…

Before we all plugged in and logged on, news of a loved one’s death traveled from one person to another. The passing was memorialized in a church or temple, sobbed over at a graveside, or suffered in silence. Today, texts and e-mails share the story. And social networks offer many more people the opportunity to both honor and grieve the departed. Facebook is the new funeral. “With a funeral, there is a specific time and place for people to mourn,” says Jed Brubaker, a University of California, Irvine, social media scholar. “On Facebook, anyone at any time can engage in this process.” Some experts suggest that these electronic elegies impersonalize grief, even trivialize death. Likewise, some families choose not to keep their loved one’s memory alive online. Others, though, find…

If someone is talking loudly on his phone on the bus or in another tight space, is there a nice way to ask him to keep it down? No. So try subtle tactics. 1) The bored stare: Gaze at Loudmouth until he gets self-conscious enough and quiets down. 2) The pleading pantomime: Lift your finger in a hush motion and smile. 3) The tune-out: Put on earbuds and ignore. If guests are late to Thanksgiving dinner, can we start without them? It’s a numbers game. If half or more of the seats are empty, you have to wait and sacrifice the soufflé. If just a few folks are missing, cater to the majority and keep the plates warm for the stragglers. Is it OK to correct someone who says “Nice…

A good friend is a connection to life—a tie to the past, a road to the future, the key to sanity in a totally insane world. Lois Wyse Nobody likes to fail, but failure is an essential part of life and of learning. If your uniform isn’t dirty, you haven’t been in the game. Ben Bernanke My biggest regret—and I regret it every day, yet I don’t do anything about it—is that I’ve never kept a diary. Barbara Walters Smiling is definitely one of the best beauty remedies. Rashida Jones Not only can you not plan the impact you’re going to have, you often won’t recognize it even while you’re having it. Richard Costolo, CEO, Twitter A pessimist gets nothing but pleasant surprises. Rex Stout There’s no drum roll or…

LETTERS ON THE SEPTEMBER ISSUE A Refreshing Read Thank you for the September issue. It is full of interesting, uplifting, inspirational, and funny articles. It is so refreshing to read positive pieces. Keep them coming! Tommie Rogers, Tyler, Texas Divine Intervention I agree with your daughter (“A Divine Accident,” Editor’s Note). God knows what we need before we do! My mom has had ovarian cancer for 12 years. I believe God keeps her going to help my dad in his walk with Him. Deb Quinones, Chatham, Massachusetts I’m not much on divine intervention, considering the natural disasters that bring death upon innocent lives and the children born with defects (I had a child who was born with seizures). It finally hit me that it is certainly well and good to…

INSPIRATION A Fateful Knock One terrible night, her mother’s fierce protective instinct taught Robin McGraw to stand strong AS TOLD TO LIZ VACCARIELLO “I vowed that no one would ever cross the threshold of my home without an invitation,” says McGraw. I’ll never forget the night that changed my life. I was 13 years old and asleep in bed when I heard a loud noise. I came out of my bed-room, and my mother was standing in the front door. There were drunk men on the porch. I heard them say, “We’ve come to get what’s ours.” My mother, Georgia, said, “What are you talking about?” She was fumbling to tie her bath-robe, and I could hear her voice shake. They said, “We’ve come to get our furni-ture. We won…

When Sarah landed on my operating table for an emergency procedure for ongoing chest pain, I had only a few minutes to talk to her before we started: Do you smoke? No. Have high blood pressure? No. Diabetes or high cholesterol? No and no. Do you have a brother, sister, or parent with early heart disease? No. The Framingham Heart Study began teaching us more than 50 years ago that these were the big risk factors for heart disease, but she seemed to have none. How was this possible? We now know that there may be dozens, if not hundreds, of factors that contribute to heart disease. These less well-known issues have been affecting my patients: Too Little: Sleep While you snooze, your body works hard to repair DNA, replenish…

FROM THE New York Times Every Thanksgiving, Mom, Dad, my three siblings, and I piled into the station wagon and headed to Grammy Hall’s Spanish duplex on Range View Avenue in Highland Park, California. Dad pulled the car up the concrete driveway to the home of his mother, Mary Alice. Nobody knew where she’d gotten the money to buy a building, but she had. And she managed to hold on to her 3,000-square-foot stucco box until she and her sister, Sadie, died next to each other on hospital beds in the dining room, the same room where we ate our annual Thanksgiving dinner. When we opened the door, it was always the same: a huge spread was ready to go. There were no prayers of gratitude, no chitchat. We ate.…

FROM THE New York Times A new study reveals an unexpected source of “fake” negative online reviews. Surprisingly, they are not necessarily penned by a competitor—they may come from a company’s most devoted consumers. “For every 1,000 customers, about 15 of them write reviews, and one is writing negative reviews of products he hasn’t bought,” says study coauthor Duncan Simester of the MIT Sloan School of Management. The study, by Simester and Eric Anderson of Northwestern University, examined some 325,000 reviews written about an unnamed apparel company. Overall, they estimated that for nearly 16,000 reviews (about 5 percent), the customer had not bought the item. They also noted that these reviews skewed much more negative than the others. Simester said the reviews go something like this: “I should have read…

Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don’t. That’s true for everyone, not just candy bars. The problem is that when you do feel like a nut, you can go even more nuts worrying about it: How nutty am I on the nut continuum? Almond Joy? Fruitcake? Jif Factory? We asked experts to analyze questions from our readers about the behaviors, thoughts, and fears they worry about. The results are below. Generally speaking, if you’re aware enough to ask about your quirks, you haven’t snapped (yet). But ask yourself this: Is my idiosyncrasy interfering with my ability to go about my life? If it is, says Alan Hilfer, director of psychology at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, “that’s worth exploring” with a professional. If it’s not, your issue isn’t…

FROM THE BOOK Ties That Bind It began as a small oral history project in New York City’s Grand Central Terminal, then blossomed throughout the United States: People from all walks of life recounted their true stories in popup recording booths. Over the past ten years, almost 100,000 people have participated in StoryCorps; often family members interview each other. One theme that keeps emerging: love and gratitude. We chose these heartwarming tales of connection. To watch interviews with these storytellers, download the Reader’s Digest app. He Took His New Baby to College Wil Smith, 43, and his daughter, Olivia Smith, 16 Wil: Four weeks after you were born, I was deployed. The hardest thing for me was leaving after spending just a few weeks with you. And I knew, had…

FROM THE BOOK This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage ARL DECIDED TO GO to the Mayo Clinic to have a physical. He’d never done anything like that before. In fact, like many doctors, he never got physicals. If he made an appointment to see one of his medical partners, he’d wind up never going, and if he did go, they would just sit around and talk. “Is everything all right?” I asked. He told me he was fine. He’d only be gone one night, and no, he didn’t want me to go with him. It was the beginning of March. I drove him to the airport early in the morning. He didn’t call until that night. “Well,” he said. “I failed a test.” I was standing in front…

Zambian tennis player Lighton Ndefwayl once explained his loss to fellow countryman Musumba Bwayla by insisting, “He beat me because my jockstrap was too tight.” Hmm. Did anyone believe him? We didn’t. So we were inspired to collect other whoppers, arranged by theme into four scripts for those times when honesty may not be the best policy. Will anyone believe them? Ask Mr. Ndefwayl how that went. Bogus Breakups A woman told Cosmopolitan, “I flew across the country to see my ex-boyfriend, and he told me that he couldn’t see me because all of his clothes were dirty.” Nice. Here are other lines (in quotes) we’ve heard, arranged as a speech from a woman to her soon-to-be ex. “I just don’t have time for a relationship right now.” You see,…

“I hate backpacks.” After leaving the Army, I applied for a hunting permit but was told I would first need to take a hunter’s safety course. “I’m a veteran, trained in handling firearms,” I said. “Why wouldn’t I get a waiver?” The clerk replied, “Because we teach you not to shoot people.” Fred Jarrett, Norfolk, New York Sign above the toilet in a women’s latrine at Camp Ripley in Minnesota: “If you are reading this sign while using this latrine, you are in the wrong one.” Mike Lins, Savage, Minnesota As I headed into a liquor store, a colonel came out carrying two bags. I snapped to attention and saluted. The colonel responded in kind. The result: the soul-crunching sound of both bags crashing to the sidewalk. As liquor seeped…

Five-year-old Jocelyn Rojas spent all day playing happily with her friends outside her grandmother’s apartment building. Her mom, Jaimee, kept her eye on the little girl from a window. At about 4 p.m. on this lazy July afternoon, Jocelyn walked around the corner of the building to get her bicycle and disappeared. “I took my eyes off her for five minutes, and she was gone,” says Jaimee. The frantic mother called out to her daughter as she searched the complex. “I knew something was wrong,” she recalls, especially when she saw that Jocelyn’s bike was still there and found an old credit card her daughter had been playing with abandoned near the bike racks. Jaimee called 911. A short time later, police officers and firefighters swarmed the area, blockading streets…

BLACK PEPPER To brighten tablecloths That new burgundy tablecloth is fantastic … until it fades to a mauve hue after too many washes. To maintain its crisp color, add a teaspoon of ground pepper to the wash load every time it needs a rinse. SALT To remove red-wine carpet stains Don’t cry over spilled merlot. Quickly pour some white wine onto the spot while it’s still wet to dilute the color. Then blot the area with a dry sponge, and sprinkle with salt. Wait about ten minutes before vacuuming up the mess. KETCHUP To polish silver Drop silverware, candle-holders, or jewelry into a small bowl of ketchup for a few minutes. If the item has a tooled or detailed surface, use an old tooth-brush to work ketchup into the crevices.…

Lenses That Always Adjust Change your prescription just by twirling a couple of knobs on the sides of your Adlens glasses. The lenses are filled with a bit of clear liquid trapped between two flexible membranes, which respond to the knob by changing shape and thus the power of the lens. Switch each eye’s lens between nearsighted and farsighted use, tweak it for different activities, or share the glasses with others. Or snap off the knobs to lock the prescription in place. Available now, Adlens glasses range from $70 to $150. For every pair you buy, the company donates one to Rwanda, where only 14 eye doctors serve 10 million people. Source: Adlens, Inc., Oxford, United Kingdom, adlens.com App for “Trying on” Frames at Home It’s hard to buy glasses…

FROM cracked.com Scandinavian Ice Cream Not only has Häagen-Dazs always been an American brand, but it turns out that Häagen and Dazs aren’t even real Danish words—Polish immigrants Reuben and Rose Mattus founded the company in the Bronx in 1960 by putting some random letters together that sounded vaguely Scandinavian. The twist: They tried to sue someone else for doing the exact same thing. In 1980, the Mattus couple took Richard Smith to court when he began selling his own ice cream under the name Frusen Glädjé, which means “frozen joy” in Swedish. The lawsuit alleged that Frusen Glädjé had stolen several of the Mattuses’ ideas, including (a) pretending to be European, (b) using a map of Scandinavia in its advertising, and (c) including serving directions on the package. Ultimately,…

That Reminds Me of a Joke FROM THE NEWS: A German banker fell asleep on his keyboard halfway through a transaction. Instead of transferring 62.40 euros from a retiree’s account, he deducted 222,222,222.22 euros, or the equivalent of $311 million. abc.net.au THE JOKE: An accountant is having a hard time sleeping and goes to see his doctor. “Doctor, I just can’t get to sleep at night,” he says. “Have you tried counting sheep?” asks the doctor. “That’s the problem. I make a mistake and then spend three hours trying to find it.” As for That Raise … Here are actual comments bosses made to employees during their salary reviews: “I’ve got great news. You managed to avoid a salary decrease.” “No, we don’t promote family members first. It’s just coincidence.”…

FROM THE BOOK S.O.S. Spirit of Survival On January 13, 2012, the Ananias family—Dean, 66, Georgia, 63, and their daughters Valerie, 32, and Cindy, 25, of Los Angeles—set off on a dream cruise aboard the luxurious Costa Concordia. (A third daughter, Debbie, 30, had just gotten married and was not on board.) Carrying more than 4,200 passengers and crew, the enormous vessel left Rome for what was to be a seven-day cruise, visiting ports in Italy, Spain, and France. Instead, the ship slammed into rocks on the first night. As the scene on board turned to mayhem, here’s how one family survived: DEAN While we were sitting in the dining room that first night, the theme song from the movie Titanic began playing. I remember Georgia commenting that maybe this…

AS TOLD TO DOUG SHADEL FROM AARP the Magazine My name is Jim, and I have spent most of my adult life swindling people out of money—big money. I worked in 30 fraudulent business operations over a ten-year period, pitching everything from gold coins to time-shares to oil and gas leases and other “business opportunities.” These scams took in millions of dollars. No matter how much money we made or how farfetched the deal was, I never got caught. That is, until September 30, 2004. That was the day 40 U.S. postal inspectors and FBI agents with gold badges and guns burst into my office. This was on Biscayne Boulevard in Miami. We occupied two full floors of a nondescript commercial office building. The place housed numerous other scam boiler…

Pop culture pundit Malcolm Gladwell is an idea blender, mixing concepts from vastly different sources (everything from business to science to the Bible) to produce new ways of seeing the world. And with a knack for nifty phrases like “tipping point” and “outlier,” he’s the odd savant whose books routinely top the bestseller list. In his latest, David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits and the Art of Battling Giants, Gladwell applies the age-old story to modern times. He has chosen his heroes, among them a cancer specialist, a financier, and a Northern Irish mother, because they each overcame a tragedy or disadvantage and went on to great success. Against all odds, they beat the giant, just as the shepherd David triumphed over the warrior Goliath. In Gladwell’s world, the little guy…

RECENT BITS FROM RD.COM Learn something new every day! Get the full stories at rd.com/november. 1IF I HAD A BILLION DOLLARS Make an offer: It’s the base price for Hulu, the Chicago Cubs, restoration of the Gulf of Mexico, the Hannah Montana franchise, the Solo Cup Company, all the bitcoins, and Asia’s live-reef fish trade. 2 THE TRICK TO STOP PROCRASTINATING Leo Babauta, author of Focus and the blog zenhabits.net, suggests you write focus on an index card and put it on your desk. Simple yet effective. 3 HERE’S HOW TO SAVE THE PLANET Astronomer Roger Angel’s theory: A 10,000-squaremile solar shade would reduce harmful rays. Like giant Ray-Bans! 4 HEY, DIAL DOWN THAT NEWS FEED Recent studies link heavy social media use with overspending, overeating, and overvaluing others’ thoughts…

OOur normally sweet Great Dane has one quirk: She hates United Parcel Service drivers. While walking her one day, we came upon a guy delivering a package. Struggling to keep hold of her, I joked, “As you can see, she just loves UPS men.” Circumnavigating us, he muttered, “Don’t you feed her anything else?” Donald Dawson, Gilbert, Arizona A few weeks back, I went to the hardware store and bought an ax to use on an overgrown shrub. I put the ax in a bag and went a few doors down to the grocery store, where I bought two bottles of wine. As the clerk placed the wine in the bag, he spotted the ax. “This,” he said, “has all the makings of a very interesting weekend.” Lyle Brewer, Palm…