Heimlich maneuver on a nurse.

There was this Chinese girl in the lobby of the hospital I was getting some testing done at. She was stuck there. I offered her an Uber, but she declined and asked to use my phone instead. She called her mom and left a voicemail. I left and her mom called me back. I told her her daughter left her a voicemail and that she was waiting at the hospital. Neither of them spoke English very well. They were both very kind. Not a big help, but it felt nice to do it.

informed a random dude that his broken macbook he was selling for cheap is easily fixed with a software patch

Probably giving some advice here on Lemmy. But I try to do some small things here and there. Help strangers who get lost at the jungle of German train stations and so on. Generally works out well. And I also get help or advice in return, (for example once I struggle with a ticket machine in a foreign country), so it goes both ways.

I gave away a bunch of trees I’d raised from seed. They were Metasequoias, long thought extinct and known only through fossils. I’d never seen any locally and thought it might be fun to get them going again. They were native here ~40 million years ago.

I gave 15 USD to someone who looked really down on their luck and (seem to me) to be genuinely at their wits end

Not something I did, but someone did for me just yesterday that was very nice.

I was driving home through rural-ish Texas and had just stopped at a bakery to get some coffee and absentmindedly left it, along with my wife’s favorite water bottle, on the roof of the car when I started to pull out.

Guy in a pickup across the street pulled into the turn lane and stopped in front of me (not a busy road) rolled down his window and pointed over the roof of his car.

I was super confused for a moment, but got the picture and was able to pull off again and grab the water bottle. The coffee was KIA.

Anyway, thanks to that random stranger.

Last thing was one of the ones I have the opportunity to do most. No words necessary, just a knock on the glass and gesticulation.

Some chick was standing outside of the bus shelter at which I’d just arrived, and I saw her Pikachu backpack with tiny unknown weeaboo characters hanging from the zipper’s pull-tabs hanging low. She’d been walking around with it open, something that’s happened to me before for hours on end without anyone telling me. Couldn’t figure out why I’d knocked on the glass to get her attention until I pointed at the backpack full open, and mimicking a zip-unzip motion with my hands. She clued in and closed it, easy peasy, no valuables lost.

I was walking through my suburban neighbourhood this afternoon and noticed someone had left their car door open in the driveway. I figured they were probably unloading groceries or something, so no big deal.

But on my way back from the park, about 45 minutes later, I saw the door was still wide open. A few thoughts ran through my head: maybe they just forgot, or maybe something was wrong. Either way, it didn’t feel right to just walk past and ignore it.

I went up to the front door and knocked. No answer. I was about to leave, but that open door kept bugging me. So I knocked again. This time someone came to the door. I smiled, introduced myself, told him I lived four houses down, and mentioned I wasn’t sure if he knew his car door was open.

He smiled, laughed, and said thanks. Told me his name, shook my hand, then walked over and shut the door. Gave me a wave as I headed off.

It might not seem like much, but I see so many people just walk past things like that, thinking it’s not their business. But I’d definitely want someone to tell me if I left my car door open. Your battery could die, or someone could come by and nick something out of it.

I was glad I said something and even more glad the guy seemed genuinely thankful.

When I left my wilderness camp spot I made it look like nobody had been there.

If that doesn’t count, then it’s that I cut fallen trees off the trail.

I let them adore my cute son and when they smiled, I smiled back.