Turning the World Gold

Three years ago, Vaughan native Sabrina Cannella stumbled across the Twitter page of a teenage cancer patient in Nashville, Tennessee. Struck by the strength and liveliness of young Taylor Filorimo, Sabrina felt compelled to reach out. What began as a few simple emails soon blossomed into an extraordinary friendship that defies the boundaries of distance, hardship, and even death.

Taylor was 13 when doctors discovered a softball-sized tumour on her kidney and diagnosed her with renal cell carcinoma, a rare cancer typically found in adults. Over the next three years, she would develop 23 more tumours in her lungs, one on her spine and another behind her heart.

“She always said, ‘I will not let the fear of cancer strike me out,’” says Read more

App Yourself: Helpful smartphone apps

Since the launch of the iPhone, “app” has become a buzzword all-to-familiar with today’s wired generation. To complement your connected life in the city, we’ve compiled this handy list of essential apps to keep your thumbs busy.

Bump
Kiss those piles of business cards goodbye and say hello to Bump. A quick means of trading information, Bump allows users to swap everything from phone numbers, emails and photos, or even become Facebook friends. Bumpers simply select what info they wish exchanged and gently “bump” phones together. Presto! Information exchanged. This free digital Rolodex also allows free texting between users. Read more

The Great Dane Cook

Dane Cook is staring at cover art for his Greatest Hits album. He’s narrowed the title choices down from 15 to three and his deadline is today. The creative process has caused the sandy haired star comedian to take a scenic route down Memory Lane – long before his Forbes list fortune and arena-filling fame. He’s spent the last few weeks listening to grassroots routines and discovering edits of CDs that he didn’t even know existed. “It’s interesting – watching and listening to the evolution of myself. It’s very, very strange.” He pauses. In that brief silence you can hear the deafening authenticity behind Cook’s quiet confidence.

Ankle-deep in conversation, it becomes refreshingly apparent that one of Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People hasn’t let sold-out stadiums and Hollywood movie roles alongside Kevin Costner, Kate Hudson and Steve Carell Read more