Brilliant thinkers are creative and they use techniques to boost their creativity. You can improve your ingenuity by using some of these methods.

San Francisco - Sunday Streets are events that encourage recreation, community activities and fun in San Francisco. Essentially, they can be thought of as large block party.

Detroit - Supporters from nearby areas of Canada came into the United States to bring fresh water to residents of Detroit. Many of those living there have no water now due to unpaid bills which led to mass shutoffs from their companies.

Foxboro - Five-year-old Danny Nickerson wanted cards for his birthday, which is today. He got it in spades, or perhaps avalanches, as 30,000 cards and 3,000 gifts flooded in and more were coming.

When France declared that, by law, employees would have to unplug from their workplaces at 6 p.m. every day, everyone working a 45-hour week huffed saying "Well, I wish!"

Toronto - On Thursday the Lamport Stadium Parkette was alive with island flair when the Scotiabank Toronto Caribbean Carnival held a community BBQ sponsored by the Liberty Village BIA from 12-2pm.

Vancouver - The University of British Columbia has been researching that elusive thing that America’s constitution is dedicated to pursuing, and presumably catching: Happiness. Apparently happiness is now regional, rather than national.

Metairie - A school district in Louisiana has agreed to end its discrimination against Latino students as part of a settlement agreement with the U.S. Justice Department.

Sofa seat belts on; this week sees the release of Need For Speed on DVD. The film’s raison d’etre is to see how many ridiculously fast cars they drive (and destroy) in 132 minutes of fully-leaded action.

A woman who owns a so-called "kennel" in the Boston area will likely face charges relating to owning and operating a puppy mill. But the real story here is not the woman and her puppy mill, but rather a little puppy named Noisette.

The hottest men's fashion trend today is not what you might guess. No macho sleeveless T-shirts or "hunky-looking" pants can compete with..are you ready for this? It's the "floral beard." Man has come a long way in his quest for masculine beauty.

Colleges have been instrumental in changing the culture of reporting sex assaults on their campuses. After what happened at Penn State, colleges see that they can save reputations by encouraging students to take action and report.

Caldwell - The California Missions seem pretty familiar to us Californians that it is easy to assume that just about everyone knows of them. Yet, according to author and historian John J. O'Hagan, few people really know much about the California Missions.

New research has shown that female students are twice as likely to end up in debt at university as their male counterparts owing to poor personal finance skills and the large amounts of stress placed on them.

In June, construction spending in the U.S. had its largest decrease in over three years, affecting the government, housing and non-housing sectors.

Another month, another weird and wonderful trend to report on. This time, the item in question involves a rather different use of Microsoft Excel.