Over 10,000 Facebook users have joined forces in an effort to help return items lost during this week's Oklahoma tornadoes to their rightful owners.

The "Tornado Doc & Picture Recovery" initiative was launched this Sunday by West Tulsa, Oklahoma, resident Leslie Hagelberg.

Hagelberg says it all started after she found a mysterious photo near her mailbox along with some other debris and soon deduced that it had been dumped in her yard by the tornado that struck Shawnee — a city some 90 miles away.

Hagelberg later learned that many of her Facebook friends had found similar items in their own yards, and so came up with the idea for a Facebook group devoted to tracking down the items' original owners.

After yesterday's killer tornado in Moore, Hagelberg's group quickly surpassed 10,000 members, and success stories have increased as well.

Hagelberg told The Huffington Post that, thanks to the group's members, some 60 items have already been claimed by tornado victims, including photos, artwork, and even an urn.

Facebook users are welcome to post whatever they find, Hagelberg said, so long as it doesn't include any sensitive personal information.

There is also a separate page for people who find lost pets.

[screengrabs via Facebook, The Daily Dot]

A camera set up by a Tasmanian man to record "paranormal activity" in his home instead picked up an extramarital affair between his 28-year-old wife and his 16-year-old son.

According to prosecutors, the woman, who has been the man's "de facto partner" for the past several years, entered her stepson's room one day last October to talk about his driving lessons.

Talking led to tickling, which led to kissing, which led to sex, Crown Prosecutor Jackie Hartnett told the Supreme Court.

A day later, the woman's partner set up a camera in the kitchen with which he hoped to capture "evidence of paranormal activity in the house."

Going back to view the footage, the man saw the woman and his son making out and confronted them about it.

Denying the relationship at first, the woman eventually came clean, and admitted to having had sex with the teen on at least three occasions.

The sexual encounters apparently continued for weeks after the two were discovered, but the woman now says she mistakenly believe the age of consent was 16 (it's 17 in Tasmania) and is "ashamed and embarrassed at her conduct."

Moreover, she claims she is attempting to patch thing up with her partner, with whom she shares a small child.

The woman has reportedly pleaded guilty to five counts of having sexual intercourse with a young person, and will be sentenced next week.

[H/T: Guyism, screengrab via Paranormal Activity]

One year ago this Sunday, a 31-year-old Miami resident named Rudy Eugene spent some 18 minutes beating, stripping, and chewing the face off of a 65-year-old transient named Ronald Poppo.

Eugene was subsequently shot and killed by a Miami Police Department officer. His behavior remains unexplained.

Poppo somehow managed to survive the so-called "Miami zombie attack," and, following a month-long stay in the hospital, has since been living in a long-term care facility.

Though he was blinded and permanently disfigured by the attack, Poppo's doctors say he is happy, healthy, and is not interested in undergoing additional reconstructive operations.

In a video uploaded to YouTube by the Jackson Health System (see below), Poppo can be seen sitting on a hospital bed at Miami/Jackson Memorial Medical Center, strumming a guitar which he has been learning to play.

He pauses after a few notes to thank the public for its support.

"He continues to work with an occupational therapist, who taught him how to dress himself, feed himself, shower and shave," the hospital wrote in a statement on its Facebook page. "[H]e is living happily [at the long-term care facility], and adjusting to his new life."

[H/T: HyperVocal, mug shots via AP, photo via Facebook]

Investigators in Minnesota say they are looking for the people behind a "bizarre" scam that involved purchasing a gas station from its owner using a bad check, and then selling all the gas at cut-rate prices.

The scam took place last Saturday at a SuperAmerica in Waconia.

The owner told a local ABC affiliate that he had sold his station to the buyers for an unspecified sum, and then left it in their hands to do with as they pleased.

And so they did: The scammers announced a half-off sale on everything inside the gas station store, and reduced the price for a gallon of gas to $3.85.

Needless to say, cars quickly lined up around the block.

Consumerist cites GasBuddy as reporting that a gallon of gas in Waconia costs on average about $4.29.

After taking in almost $50,000, the thieves took off, leaving behind a single bounced check.

Investigators say that, in addition to stealing cash, the scammers also broke the law by setting their gas prices too low.

The SuperAmerica's owner has since reopened the station, and hopes to recoup some of the losses by giving his customers a temporary 5-cent discount on a gallon of gas.

[screengrab via KSTP]

Comedian and Daily Show co-creator Lizz Winstead faced sharp criticism from both sides of the aisle after she joked on Twitter that yesterday's devastating tornado was in Oklahoma, "so clearly it has been ordered to only target conservatives."

As her followers started to complain that Winstead's quip — ostensibly poking fun at the recent IRS scandal — was insensitive, Winstead initially stood by it.

"If Its not OK to YOU for me to combine news stories to point out hypocrisy AND Im not making fun of victims u shld Unfollow," she told one self-identified Oklahoman.

Winstead continued making Tornado jokes for several minutes, asking her readers "how long has Obama known about this Tornado," and lamenting that Tornado coverage "just bumped me from MSNBC."

Two hours later, when the extent of the damage made it impossible for Winstead to continue her line of defense, she finally decided to pull the tweet and issue an apology.

"Made a political joke, Twas before devastation revealed. In hindsight, had I understood, I would have refrained. Beyond sorry," she told her diminished follower count, adding the hashtag "#LetMeHaveIt."

Since then Winstead has flooded her feed with tweets encouraging people to help out the tornado victims by donating money and clothes.

Meanwhile, conservative pundit Erick Erickson, who was serious when he tweeted his followers to ask "when President Obama will find out about Oklahoma," remains unapologetic.

[H/T: Mediaiate, images via Twitter]

A former Teacher of the Year at North Marion High School in Marion County, Florida, was suspended without pay after a student complained that he touched her inappropriately with a banana during a college-level lecture on "cylinder objects, phalluses and/or sex symbols."

The incident took place three months ago, but the student only came forward last week.

A discipline letter sent to Jonathan Hampton claims the teacher "crossed a line" while discussing the "Freudian implications" of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

The student alleges that Hampton "rubbed [her] head and neck area with a banana," leaving her embarrassed and humiliated.

"That is disgusting, very disgusting," said the grandmother of a student at the school. "I don't think he should be allowed to teach kids. You don't do stuff like that and get away with it."

Hampton's lawyer (and stepfather) Mark Fiedelholtz says the entire thing was blown out of proportion, and that Hampton tapped a student with a banana from his lunch to get her attention, and that sometimes a banana is just a banana.

"There was nothing else to it," the attorney said.

After conducting its own investigation into the matter, the school district issued Hampton an official reprimand saying it was poor judgement on his part to use "a banana to make physical contact with a student."

The teacher has since completed the three-day suspension and was allowed to return to class.

[H/T: Arbroath, screengrabs via WKMG, video via @whoismaxwell]

Twenty years ago, after moving to LA to "be discovered," a then-25-year-old Zach Galifianakis met and befriended an elderly laundromat volunteer named Elizabeth "Mimi" Haist.

The two remained close until a few years ago, when Galifianakis went mainstream with the first Hangover film.

Though they briefly lost touch, when Galifianakis learned that Haist had become homeless, he quickly found her a one-bed, one-bath apartment to live in, and has been covering her rent and utilities ever since.

More than that, Galifianakis has made it a habit of taking Haist with him to red carpet events in Hollywood — and even sends her in his place when he can't attend.

"If he’s in town, he takes me. Otherwise he lets me take a friend," Haist, 87, told the New York Daily News. "I dress up nice and a friend helps me with my makeup. It’s fun, not something I’ve ever dreamed I’d experience. The limo takes me home afterwards."

Haist, who shares Galifianakis' mischievous sense of humor, says she enjoys the bewildered looks on the faces of fans who have no idea how she ended up among the glitterati.

"All the fans were taking photos and I waved at them, I said, ‘They don’t know who I am!'," Haist said.

The frail octogenarian, who still works at Fox Laundry, will walk alongside Galifianakis once again at this Monday's premiere of the Hangover Part III.

[H/T: BuzzFeed, photos via Getty/Facebook]

The entire fall was captured on 25-year-old Matthew Gough's headcam.

After 180 successful BASE jumps around the world, Gough's parachute got twisted and was facing backwards upon inflation.

"I was trying to think about what to do, but all I could think about was trying to stay alive, I knew the final impact was coming soon and I knew if I hit the floor at the speed I was travelling, I was in a whole lot of trouble," Gough said later. "I managed to hang off one side of the [canopy] and get away from the cliff but couldn't control it still, I didn't know if I was going to hit the floor or go into the lake."

Though he slammed into the ground at nearly 40mph, Gough was incredibly lucky to have missed a series of metal spikes by mere inches.

"The spikes were around a foot long and there was ten of them, the one right in the middle brushed my face and went between my helmet and my face and ripped my helmet off, I think it cushioned my fall slightly," he said.

Gough sustained minor injuries to his lower extremities and was released from the hospital just hours after being admitted.

In fact, Gough says he's ready to go again.

Said Gough: "Some jumps I may not do, I may avoid the more technical ones but I will carry on jumping, my parents are desperate for me to stop, but I fully accept the dangers of this sport and don't expect any sympathy."

[video via SWNS TV]

Garcia was holding on to her dog when the winds came, but after the walls fell down the two separated, and she had been unable to locate him since.

Then, in the middle of the interview, little "Toto" suddenly emerged from the rubble, and the two were reunited in the most tearjerking of fashions.

"Well I got God to answer one prayer to let me be okay, but he answered both of them," Garcia said.

[video via CBS News]

"He was worried it was going to come back at him and was searching for a way to scoot out it's way once he was able to gauge how insanely close it was to him," says his son, who posted the video on Reddit. "He hung in there, though. Unbelievable."

[H/T: Reddit]

An Ohio woman with an unfortunate appellation was indicted by a grand jury last week, several months after she allegedly struck and seriously injured a bicyclist while operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol.

Dr. Elizabeth Unk — Dr. Unk to her Delaware County patients — was driving along SR-23 last September when she reportedly hit an individual who was cycling by the side of the road.

Dr. Unk was charged with two misdemeanor counts of driving under the influence and one felony count of aggravated vehicular assault.

The Ohio State Highway Patrol said Dr. Unk's BAC was twice the legal limit.

[H/T: Arbroath, photos via Shutterstock, 10TV]

"Who did it? Do it again, you fuck, and you're fucked!" the unidentified man, said to be a relative of the Bat Mitzvah family, can be heard yelling. "The driver will kill you! He will kill you! One more time, you will die, you will bleed, out of your fucking nose! That's right I'm spitting in your fucking eye! Ever do that again and you will die, got it? DEATH! You fuck! You spoiled fuck! Spoiled fuck! Do it again, and you're dead."

It went on like that for a while.

A parent of one of the children aboard the bus later reported that the angry chaperone appeared to be intoxicated.

Scarsdale10583.com says all parents received a decidedly unapologetic email from the parents of the Bat Mitzvah girl, claimed the man — referred to as a "counselor" — was responding to "a serious safety issue," and was merely concerned that "the safety of the children could be compromised."

The email concluded: "We are very sorry if any of your children were upset by what happened."

As it turns out, many of the children were upset, and the parents are still waiting for a proper apology.

[audio via Scarsdale10583.com]

De Leeuw was introducing a band of women who founded a charity that facilitates milk exchanges between mothers who have too much and those who have too little, when he suddenly inquired of his guests if he can have a taste.

"How does it taste, nice and sweet?" de Leeuw asked.

One of the women who brought a bottle of her milk offered some to de Leeuw, who declined, asking instead who among them would be willing to let him drink from the source.

"Well, if you don't bite you may try it," said a volunteer.

Proving he wasn't joking, the comedian then approached the woman, and proceeded to place his mouth on her nipple.

After a few long sips, de Leeuw retracted his face — only to lunge at the second breast.

"I find the second one better tasting, but I can taste that you've eaten asparagus yesterday," de Leeuw said after his taste test. "Well, not yesterday but Tuesday," the woman responded.

Defending her decision to allow de Leeuw to get up close and personal, the participant, Wendy, told her Twitter critics that "it was for a good cause."

De Leuuw — a Knight of the Order of the Netherlands Lion, by the way — has already moved on to his next stunt: Going full-frontal on his other TV show.

[H/T: Reddit, video via YouTube]

A London woman who has been unemployed for the last two years says it's not for lack of trying, but rather for excess — of good looks.

Laura Fernee, who has a PhD in an unspecified field of science, says she had been working at a medical research lab earning £30,000 (~$45,000) a year from 2008 until 2011, when comments from coworkers about her attractive physical appearance became too much and she quit.

"I’m not lazy and I’m no bimbo," Fernee told The Daily Mail. "The truth is my good looks have caused massive problems for me when it comes to employment, so I’ve made the decision that employment just isn’t for me at the moment. It’s not my fault...I can’t help the way I look."

Appearing on ITV's This Morning, Fernee elaborated on her condition, saying the constant attention and "romantic gifts" left her "traumatized."

"In the end, as much as I loved my work, going in to work became very, very difficult because of the psychological impact on me," she said.

Luckily, Fernee had her rich parents to fall back on.

The Daily Mirror reports that wealthy retirees Catherine, 65, and Alan, 70, have been happily covering their daughter's expenses, which include £2,000 (~$3000) for rent and utilities and another £1,500 (~$2280) on clothes.

"I know people will judge me for choosing not to work but they are underestimating just what a curse good looks can be in the workplace," Fernee insists. "Everyone thinks it must be great to be attractive but there are serious downsides."

[H/T: Guyism, screengrabs via ITV]

Many brands would kill for a hugely popular, entirely fan-fueled International "holiday" dedicated to expressing affection for their product by buying it by the boatload.

But Nutella, which had exactly that in World Nutella Day, decided instead to kill it.

The annual celebration of all things Nutella was ordered to cease and desist by Ferrero, the hazelnut spread's manufacturer.

Founder Sara Rosso, who launched World Nutella Day in 2007, announced the news late last week:

On May 25, 2013, I’ll be darkening the World Nutella Day site, nutelladay.com, and all social media presence (Facebook, Twitter), in compliance with a cease-and-desist I received from lawyers representing Ferrero, SpA (makers of Nutella).

Seven years after the first World Nutella Day in 2007, I never thought the idea of dedicating a day to come together for the love of a certain hazelnut spread would be embraced by so many people! I’ve seen the event grow from a few hundred food bloggers posting recipes to thousands of people Tweeting about it, pinning recipes on Pinterest, and posting their own contributions on Facebook! There have been songs sung about it, short films created for it, poems written for it, recipes tested for it, and photos taken for it.

The cease-and-desist letter was a bit of a surprise and a disappointment, as over the years I’ve had contact and positive experiences with several employees of Ferrero, SpA., and with their public relations and brand strategy consultants, and I’ve always tried to collaborate and work together in the spirit and goodwill of a fan-run celebration of a spread I (to this day) still eat.

I have hope that this is not a goodbye to World Nutella Day forever, for the fans’ sake, and hopefully it will live on in one form or another in the future.

Though the Cult of Nutella will undoubtedly survive this bizarre move in the name of "brand equity," many of the snack's devotees took to the World Nutella Day Facebook page to express their outrage.

"Nutella...more nuts in company management than in every jar," wrote one well-liked commenter. Suggested another: "How about 'Spread-That-Must-Not-Be-Named Day'..??"

[photo via Amazon]

Students at Loras College in Dubuque, Iowa, say a lightning strike is most likely to blame for completely stripping the bark off an on-campus tree.

One student says he and others heard a "loud bang and crack," and went outside to see what had happened, only to encounter an all-natural streaker.

Another witness to this incredible phenomenon posted a daylight photo of the scene to Reddit, prompting many amateur scientists to offer explanations for the incident — "the water just under the surface was converted to steam" — and lament the imminent demise of the naked tree unless someone does something soon.

[H/T: HyperVocal, photos via Reddit]

The perp had anticipated making a quick getaway from the Bogotá bus station after snatching the victim's phone, but forgot to look both ways before leaving the scene of a crime, and was promptly struck by a bus.

Despite the dramatic footage captured on the stations' CCTV camera, the thief sustained only minor injuries.

Amusingly, it was the victim who helped save her attacker from further damage by pulling him out from underneath the bus.

[H/T: Clip Nation]

Kaitlyn Hunt, an 18-year-old high school senior from Indian River County, Florida, is facing felony charges for engaging in a sexual relationship with another girl at her school.

Kate, then 17, reportedly met the unnamed then-14-year-old toward the beginning of the school year.

The two began dating last September shortly after Kate's 18th birthday, and their relationship eventually became intimate.

Everything was fine until a few months later, when Kate was suddenly arrested and charged with two counts of sexual battery on a person 12-16 years old.

It seems Kate's girlfriend's parents found out about the relationship, and went straight to the police.

Though Kate may have run afoul of the state's age-of-consent statute, her mother believes the charges have little to do with the law and everything to do with homophobia on the part of her girlfriend's parents:

They are out to destroy my daughter, because they feel like she ‘made’ their daughter gay. They see being gay as wrong and they blame my daughter. Of course, I see it 100% differently. I don’t see or label these girls as gay. They are teenagers in high school experimenting with their sexuality – with mutual consent. And even if their daughter is gay, who cares? She is still their daughter.

Sebastian River High School, where Kate was voted "Student with Most School Spirit," has taken a similarly prejudiced approach toward dealing with the situation, according to Kate's father.

First she was kicked off the school's basketball team by the coach in order to avoid "drama."

Then, caving to pressure from the parents of Kate's girlfriend, the school board voted to expel her.

Kate is now faced with a Sophie's Choice: Accept Assistant State Attorney Brian Workman's plea deal, which would require her to admit to a felony, spend two years under house arrest, and possibly end up on the sex offender registry for life — or go to trial.

She has until this Friday to decide.

Refusing to remain silent, Kate's family has launched a petition to convince Workman to "stop the prosecution of an 18-year-old girl in a same-sex relationship." The petition has nearly 56,000 supporters at the time of writing.

Correction: A previous version of this article incorrectly listed Kate's 18th birthday as having occurred this year. According to court records obtained by ThinkProgress, Kate turned 18 on August 18th of last year. She was arrested in February.

[photos via Facebook]

"So self-obsessed — tweeting your Vines, hashtagging your Spotifys and Snapchatting your YOLOs — your generation needs everything to be about you," Colbert told 12,000 graduates and family members during his keynote address at Saturday's valedictory exercises. "And that's very upsetting to us baby boomers because self-absorption is kind of our thing."

But boomers have bequeathed to millennials at least one useful thing: A world filled with challenges.

"I believe we have given you a gift, a particular form of independence," Colbert continued. "Because you do not owe the previous generation anything. Thanks to us, you owe it to the Chinese."

[H/T: BroBible]

Taylor Swift may have swept the 2013 Billboard Music Awards with eight trophies and eight corresponding expressions of shock, but it was her backstage reaction to the sight of Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez kissing that won the night.

Swift's shade was the least of Bieber's Billboard woes, though: The man-boy was bombarded by boos from audience members during his acceptance of the Milestone Award for making it through four whole years in the music biz.

The strongly negative reaction forced the Biebz to stop and beg to be "taken seriously" because he is "not a gimmick" but "an artist."

Watch:

[Gif via Reddit]

23 years after being abducted on his way to kindergarten, one lost boy has finally made his way back home with the help of Google Maps.

Lou Gang, originally from China's Sichuan province, was kidnapped at the age of 5 and taken to the southeastern province of Fujian, nearly 1,000 miles away.

After being abandoned there, Luo was adopted by a family that loved him as their own, and Luo's birth parents eventually gave up their search and adopted a daughter.

But Luo refused to abandon hope of ever finding his biological mother and father.

"Everyday before I went to bed, I forced myself to re-live the life spent in my old home," he told a Fujian news outlet. "So I wouldn’t forget."

Nearly a quarter-century later, his persistence finally paid off.

After posting what little he remembered of his hometown — a crude map with two bridges — to a Chinese website dedicated to "bringing lost babies home," Luo was informed that a couple who reported their son abducted 23 years ago lived in a small town in Sichuan matching the description he provided.

The South China Morning Post reports on what happened next:

Luo searched for pictures of the Sichuan town and found they looked familiar to him. To confirm his suspicions, he turned to the satellite version Google Maps. The minute he zoomed in on an area called “Yaojiaba” near the Sichuan town, Luo recognised the two bridges.

“That’s it! That’s my home,” shouted Luo, in tears.

Not long after, Luo — whose given name, it turns out, is Huang Jun — was finally reunited with his birth parents, Huang Qingyong and Dai Jianfang.

"I felt heartbroken," Luo's mother is quoted as saying. "I couldn't eat or sleep and I cried every day thinking my son was missing and didn't have enough food or clothes out there."

The Daily Telegraph cites the China Daily as reporting that some 76,000 Chinese children go missing each year, with as many as one million currently listed as lost.

[screengrabs via SCMP]

A woman in Sacramento who had been scheduled to undergo an upper-gastrointestinal endoscopy told her doctor she was concerned that her overly sensitive gag reflex might present a problem during the invasive procedure and was allegedly prescribed a less invasive means of ameliorating her condition: Oral sex.

Dr. J. Peter Zegarra reportedly suggested the unorthodox treatment to the woman and her husband after the former complained that she "gags at the dentist."

The patient "should be practicing twice a week on her husband by giving him a blowjob to address her gagging reflex," the colo-rectal surgery specialist reportedly advised.

The California Medical Board was subsequently alerted to the "playful suggestion," and Dr. Zegarra was issued an official public reprimand.

"This constituted unprofessional conduct, and so this is a message that this probably wasn’t appropriate," said California Medical Board rep Cassandra Hockenson. "A more appropriate response should have come with regards to dealing with her gag reflex issues."

[photos via Shutterstock, Sutter Health]

Waitress CeCe Bruce wasn't having the best of Wednesdays working the morning shift at an Indianapolis Steak 'n Shake.

"I was having a hard time at another table, but kept smiling and going on," she told WTHR.

Her mood ring changed colors quickly, however, when she went back to check on another customer and found that she had been left a $446 tip on a $5.97 bill.

That generous tipper, a regular identified only as "Miss Jo," didn't bother offering Bruce an explanation, but was very insistent that she accept the money nonetheless.

"I said 'Oh my gosh Miss Jo, I'm not taking that!'" Bruce recalled. "And she said, 'Yes, you're taking it' and I said no and she said 'You need to take it.'"

Explanation or no, the restaurant's general manager Greer Gooley is certain Bruce deserves it.

"She stays late, comes in early. Whenever we need her, she's here," Gooley told WISH-TV. "It just lets servers know that you work hard and it does pay off. There are people out there that [if] you do your job people reward you for it."

A part-time student at Martin University, Bruce says she has plenty of bills of her own that need paying, and she intends to do just that with her windfall.

[H/T: Eater, screengrabs via WISH, WTHR]