SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- James Malcolm Band's "Is It Never Too Late" advanced to the Finals of American Songwriter's 3rd Annual Road Ready Talent Contest, the publication announced Aug. 27, 2026. The South Florida band, led by singer Malcolm Philip Flavell, moved past an earlier Semi-Finalist round and now stands one selection away from a live performance slot in Nashville this October. American Songwriter will select three finalists for that Nashville show. The recognition adds to a breakout year for the Davie, Florida-based act.

HUNTLEY, ILLINOIS -- August 28, 2026 -- Freedom Home Care cut the ribbon on its first office outside Chicago's North Shore suburbs on August 13, opening a location at 12151 Regency Parkway, Suite 12169, in Huntley. The new address extends the company's private-pay home care services into McHenry and Kane counties for the first time. Freedom Home Care, a member of the PurposeCare family of companies, has operated in the North Shore for more than 28 years. The Huntley office now offers personal home care, outpatient services, transportation help, and post-surgery assistance to families in Huntley, Algonquin, and nearby suburbs.

SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- Virginia Cancer Specialists announced Aug. 28 that Kai-Li Liang, MD, has joined the Fairfax, Virginia practice as a medical oncologist and clinical investigator. The hire adds capacity to the largest community-based oncology clinical trials portfolio in the Mid-Atlantic region. Dr. Liang trained at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Stony Brook University School of Medicine before arriving at the 10-location practice, which Castle Connolly has ranked the No. 1 physician practice in Virginia in cancer care and across all medical specialties for three straight years, from 2024 through 2026.

SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- Ten of the best young songwriters competing on Germany's "Dein Song" spent last week filming at a new songwriting camp in Frankfurt am Main, part of the ZDF and KiKA competition's 19th season. The camp followed a casting round held in Wiesbaden in late July 2026. Contestants reworked their compositions and performed a semi-final round for the judging panel. The 16-part documentary series and finale are set to air in February 2027 on KiKA, kika.de, the KiKA app, ZDF streaming and the ZDFtivi app.

SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- Germany's men's basketball team beat the Netherlands 99-83 in Cologne on August 27 in a World Cup qualifying game, while forward Johannes Voigtmann was honored before tip-off as he stepped away from the national team after 11 years, 128 caps and 830 points. In a separate preparation match at the same venue, the German women's team lost 62-63 to Turkey, its third straight defeat in August. Both squads now shift focus to upcoming tournaments: the men travel to Poland on August 30, and the women open the home World Cup in Berlin on September 4.

SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- Massage Envy named five massage therapy students as its July 2026 scholarship recipients on Thursday, each receiving $2,500 toward their education. The Scottsdale, Arizona-based franchisor picks five winners every month through its National Scholarship Sweepstakes, a program running continuously since 2022. The July recipients are Haley S., Auriel B., Yesenia V., Jingmin H. and Thanyaporn G. None of them are required to work at a Massage Envy location after graduation.

SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- Homeowners in Recklinghausen, Germany, are discovering that decades of deferred maintenance can shrink a house's resale value far more than the cost of fixing it would. Brummelt & Müller Immobilien GmbH, a real estate agency in the western German city, said buyers are increasingly avoiding homes where heating, electrical systems or windows haven't been updated in 30 or 40 years. The agency's outlook covers the wider Ruhr region, where a wave of generational property transfers is now reaching the market.

SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- iScreen, a mobile customization app used by more than 100 million people, launched an interactive digital pet feature for iPhone Home Screens on August 28, 2026. The Los Angeles-based company built the update around Nimori, an original animated character that users can place alongside new widgets and stickers. The release lets iPhone owners turn a static grid of app icons into a screen with a character that reacts and moves.

Nimori Turns A Static Home Screen Into A Moving Character

Nimori is not a wallpaper or an app icon. It is built as an interactive figure that sits on the Home Screen and responds within the layout users create, giving the screen a sense of motion instead of a fixed image. Users can pair Nimori with themed widgets and stickers to build a layout around the character rather than around a single wallpaper.

SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- Fortuna Düsseldorf beat VfB Stuttgart II 1-0 on Friday night in the third matchday of Germany's 3. Liga, picking up its first win of the season after opening the campaign with two straight losses. Andreas Müller scored the only goal. Both clubs' coaches described the match as scrappy and low on quality, with Stuttgart II head coach Nico Willig calling the winning goal a classic bad-luck own-side error.

Düsseldorf, which dropped from the 2. Bundesliga last season, had rebuilt its squad with 16 to 17 new signings over the summer. Head coach Alexander Ende said the team played a solid preseason but stumbled out of the gate, losing a difficult away match at Mannheim before following it with a poor home performance. He said breaking that pattern required grinding, defensive work rather than open, attacking football, and that keeping a clean sheet mattered more than style points on the night.

SHERIDAN, WYOMING -- August 28, 2026 -- Seven new animated short films from Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia went live on the ARD Mediathek streaming platform today, the result of the "Key Frames 2026" funding program run by Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk (MDR) and Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung (MDM). Regional filmmakers and production companies completed the films within a few months. MDR has scheduled a televised premiere for October 30 during its MDR Kurzfilmnacht broadcast.