Blog Archive

Saturday, October 31, 2009

News Today, November 01, 2009 (2)


MIAMI BEACH, FL - OCTOBER 31: Actress Christina Ricci and her new boyfriend Curtis Buchanan are seen on October 31, 2009 in Miami Beach, Florida.


MIAMI BEACH, FL - OCTOBER 31: Actress Christina Ricci and her new boyfriend Curtis Buchanan are seen on October 31, 2009 in Miami Beach, Florida.



MIAMI BEACH, FL - OCTOBER 31: Actress Christina Ricci and her new boyfriend Curtis Buchanan are seen on October 31, 2009 in Miami Beach, Florida.



MIAMI BEACH, FL - OCTOBER 31: Actress Christina Ricci is seen on October 31, 2009 in Miami Beach, Florida.



A Chinese security guard looks out near snow covered foliage outside a residential compound in Beijing China, Sunday, Nov. 1, 2009. The Chinese capital turned white Sunday as it received its first snow of the winter.



A Chinese woman walks past a snow blanketed table and chairs in a residential compound in Beijing China, Sunday, Nov. 1, 2009. The Chinese capital turned white Sunday as it received its first snow of the winter


credit photo: Reuters

the annual Village Halloween Parade October 31, 2009 in New York City.


A man covered in fake blood carries an axe as he participates in the annaul Halloween parade in Greenwich Village in New York October 31, 2009.


NEW YORK - OCTOBER 31: Participants wait for the start of the annual Village Halloween Parade October 31, 2009 in New York City. Approximately 2 million visitors attend the event each year, making it the largest Halloween celebration in the country.



Costumed in plastic, Alexis Clarino, of the Brooklyn borough of New York, right, waits with others for the start of the Village Halloween Parade Saturday Oct. 31, 2009 in New York.



NEW YORK - OCTOBER 31: A participant dressed as Michael Jackson dances before the start of the annual Village Halloween Parade October 31, 2009 in New York City. Approximately 2 million visitors attend the event each year, making it the largest Halloween celebration in the country.



NEW YORK - OCTOBER 31: Participants prepare to take part in the annual Village Halloween Parade on October 31, 2009 in New York City. Approximately two million visitors attend the event each year, making it the largest Halloween celebration in the country.



NEW YORK - OCTOBER 31: Participants wait for the start of the annual Village Halloween Parade October 31, 2009 in New York City. Approximately 2 million visitors attend the event each year, making it the largest Halloween celebration in the country.



NEW YORK - OCTOBER 31: Participants wait for the start of the annual Village Halloween Parade October 31, 2009 in New York City. Approximately two million visitors attend the event each year, making it the largest Halloween celebration in the country



NEW YORK - OCTOBER 31: Participants wait for the start of the annual Village Halloween Parade October 31, 2009 in New York City. Approximately two million visitors attend the event each year, making it the largest Halloween celebration in the country



A participant poses for a picture at a Halloween parade in Tegucigalpa October 31,2009.



A dance group performs Michael Jackson's Thriller video in the Halloween parade in Greenwich Village in New York October 31, 2009.



People take part in the annual Halloween parade in Greenwich Village in New York October 31, 2009



A woman dressed as Nadya Suleman nicknamed "Octomom" takes part in the annual Halloween parade in Greenwich Village in New York October 31, 2009. Suleman recently gave birth to eight babies.



A woman wears a costume depicting a waitress serving breakfast and coffee at the annual Halloween parade in Greenwich Village in New York October 31, 2009.



A stilt walker wears a bird-like costume in the annual Halloween parade in Greenwich Village in New York October 31, 2009.



NEW YORK - OCTOBER 31: A performer on stilts waits for the start of the annual Village Halloween Parade October 31, 2009 in New York City. Approximately two million visitors attend the event each year, making it the largest Halloween celebration in the country.



A man carries a blue ribbon as he participates in the annual Halloween parade in Greenwich Village in New York October 31, 2009.



A group dressed as zombies dance as the make their way up Sixth Avenue during the Village Halloween Parade Saturday Oct. 31, 2009 in New York.



Costumed spectators Victoria Ochoa, second from right, and Melissa Valencia, right, stand with others as they watch the Village Halloween Parade make it's way up New York's Sixth Avenue Saturday Oct. 31, 2009.



Dressed as ghostly dancers, Natasha Wozniak, right, helps Michele Wang with her makeup as they wait for the start of the Village Halloween Parade Saturday Oct. 31, 2009 in New York.



A stilt walker wears a bird-like costume in the annual Halloween parade in Greenwich Village in New York October 31, 2009


credit photo: Gettyimages

This Is It makes $20m in one day

THE Michael Jackson concert documentary This Is It earned $20.1m at worldwide box offices in its first day, the studio that made the film has said.
The movie, which is based on rehearsal footage for the star’s ill-fated comeback shows, was premiered around the world on Tuesday.

Steve Elzer from Sony Pictures said the movie is a “reaffirmation of the global appeal of Michael Jackson”. The film made $7.4m in the US and $2m in the UK.
“The studio believes that the worldwide launch, with very strong performance across North America, Europe, Latin America and Asia, represents an amazing beginning for the film,” Mr Elzer said in a statement. He has also revealed that the studio will submit the movie to the Academy Awards for consideration this year in the best picture category.
To be a contender for Oscar shortlisting, the film must complete a seven-day run in Los Angeles County and film-makers would need to “submit the proper paperwork,” Academy spokeswoman Leslie Unger said. Director Kenny Ortega said the late star “deserves” to win an Oscar.
Jackson’s brothers attended the film’s screening in LA on Tuesday and simultaneous premieres were held in 18 other cities around the world. The movie was then released to cinemas on Wednesday for a two-week run only.
However, Sony has said the movie will be extended beyond its planned stint if ticket demand is high.
The movie, which runs to nearly two hours, features Jackson singing and dancing to his biggest hits, including Beat It, Black or White and Man in the Mirror. – BBC Jackson, who died on 25 June aged 50, had spent the previous four months rehearsing in LA for the record 50 concerts which were to be held in London.
More than 800,000 tickets had been sold for the concerts, with organisers promising one of the “most expensive and technically advanced” live shows ever. He was just two weeks away from the opening night at the time of his death. By the weekend, it will be shown in 110 countries. – BBC

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - OCTOBER 28:Crowds starting to gather at the Australian Premiere of Michael Jackson's 'This Is It' at the Event Cinemas on October 28, 2009 in Sydney, Australia

People leave on October 28, 2009, the Grand Rex movie theatre in Paris after attending the screening for the documentary film 'This Is It,' culled from more than 100 hours of footage taken from rehearsals for Michael Jackson's comeback. Yesterday, four months after Jackson's death, red carpets were rolled out for worldwide premieres 18 simultaneous screenings on five continents for King of Pop posthumous thriller.


source: Nation.com
credit photo: Gettyimages

In love with Cinque Terre


The word “Cinque Terre” is the name given to the five lands or villages along the Eastern Ligurian Coast on the Italian Riviera. The villages from north to south are known as Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore, which each has a unique and picturesque landscape. It is named as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO and also protected as a National Park and National Marine Sanctuary. The best way to experience the beauty of Cinque Terre is simply by walking on the breathtaking trails from one village to another.



For our Cinque Terre vacation, we picked to stay at the sublimely romantic Vernazza for its remarkable beauty. Since most places to stay in Vernazza are located up on the hills, we therefore have to climb hundreds of stairs to get to our bed and breakfast (B&B), and some of the stairs are very steep. Some rooms are on higher floors and accessible only by small spiral stairs. As seen in many forums, a lot of tourists are complaining about quickly getting tired going up so many stairs especially when carrying heavy backpacks. I ended up taking a rest for a while before reaching our B&B. It’s a very good exercise. The view from the top of the hill near our B&B was incredibly stunning. We could see different parts of the Vernazza village with an amazing view of the blue Mediterranean sea. The gorgeous scenery instantly refreshed our minds and we couldn’t wait to explore the villages. Right after dropping our backpacks at our B&B room, we went for a walk and stopped at a small gelateria to get my first gelato at Cinque Terre. The gelato was probably not best but still considered okay to satisfy my craving.



Next, we headed to Manarola by train to have a lunch at Tratoria dal Billy. Thanks to V, a friend of mine whom we met a couple days before at Basel, Switzerland, and who recommended this superb restaurant. Perched high on the southern cliff, this small restaurant has a spectacular terrace that grants a magnificent view of the ocean surrounded by vineyards and pastel-color buildings of the Manarola village. We ordered their homemade squid-ink pasta with local seafood (which was their special dish of the day), and their grilled fish served with potatoes and local white wine. The homemade pasta was very fresh and flavorful. We could savor the blended rich taste between the pasta and the mixed fresh seafood. Billy serves simple homemade dishes made from fresh high-quality ingredients. It is definitely a must-visit restaurant in case we revisit Cinque Terre in the future.




After the delightful lunch, we spent some time checking the nearby ancient San Lorenzo Church, which has a traditional Basilica design and is embellished with a rose window, a bell tower and a wall overlooking the Mediterranean ocean. Then we continued walking down the road and, after twenty yards, we followed a wooden railing leading towards the seafront. An impressive sight along the path was a finely crafted vineyard and lemon groves. The scenery was so marvelous. We never imagined that it could be that beautiful.





There exists a famous easy hiking trail along the coast line that connects all five villages. The trail is twelve kilometers in length, with spectacular seaside views. Hiking the entire trail takes about five hours. Via dell’ Amore (The Lover’s Way) between Manarola and Riomaggiore is the easiest hiking trail in the Cinque Terre. So, without a doubt, I chose to walk this easiest trail. Hehehe… The trail has a wide path and is nicely paved, which makes it easy for almost everyone to do this hike. Walking along the path, we enjoyed great views of the ocean and the steep rocky cliff. We stopped several times admiring the view and capturing some pictures.


Arriving at the Riomaggiore village, we first checked out the church of San Giovanni Battista whose design is a typical local style (similar to the San Lorenzo Church in Manarola) with a white stone rose window on the front wall. We then continued walking towards Marina just to sightsee, take pictures and relax.




After leisurely walking for a half day, I started to crave for another scoop of gelato again. So, at Riomaggiore I grabbed one cup of lemone and fragola gelato, which tasted much better than the one I had previously in Vernazza. Being in Italy with the ubiquity of gelaterias enabled me to eat gelato every single day during my entire stay in Italy. Ahhh… I was extremely happy! I would ensure to have at least two scoops of gelato everyday! Yay…


Time flew by so fast, and it showed 5pm already. We planned to enjoy the sunset from a ferry going straight to Monterosso. Boarding the ferry along the Cinque Terre coast line is the best way to get an amazing panorama of the colorful houses and vineyards perched against on hill. We then hurriedly moved to Riomaggiore ’s Marina to wait for the ferry to come ashore. At that time, many people were sunbathing on the rocky beach and some were even swimming in the cold sea water. Brrr…





source: foodtravelblog

Top 5: Date Ideas You Can Do Naked

By Denis Merkas

Well, if you believe that old Seinfeld episode, there’s good naked and there’s bad naked. Frankly, we’re pretty happy with any kind of naked we can get! All of these date ideas will require you to be sans clothing to make it work, and we think you’ll be pretty happy with the ultimate results.

Just to lay it bare from the start, these are not by any means date ideas you can use to impress a lady on the first night. Similarly, if you two haven’t rolled in the sack yet, it’s probably not a good idea to force nudity. For long-term couples, however, we say go for it and get into it! Compiled by $30 Date Night, here is a list of the top five date ideas you can do naked.

Start with No.5


No.5 - Life drawing/photography session at home
Pick up some art supplies or whip out your digital camera, if you’re handy with it, and have a night at home learning something new while also posing for each other. It doesn’t matter if you’ve never tried drawing or photography before; the internet is a great place to start for tutorials.

If you’re trying photography, you’ll need the right lighting. Shooting in black-and-white will also hide a multitude of technological sins. For life drawing, a large sketch pad and some graphite pencils will serve you well. Make sure the room temperature is comfortable and that your partner can hold her pose for awhile. Then, all that’s left is to convince your sweetie to pose.



No.4 - Treat her to a massage
Spread an old sheet or towel out on your bed and tell your sweetie you’re going to give her a sensual massage. Gather everything you will need, massage oil (sweet almond oil from the health food store is best), a hand towel for wiping off and turn off the phone.

Leave the room while she strips off and covers herself with a towel and then come back in and begin. Make sure you indulge her with a good 15 to 20 minutes of massage before you put the moves on and "accidentally" knock her towel off.



No.3 - Skinny dipping
There’s nothing quite like the feeling of splashing around in cool water in the nude. If you have a private pool in your backyard, then you’re already sorted. Otherwise, be very sneaky and find a quiet pool or waterway after hours so you can indulge in a late night skinny dip under the stars with your sweetheart.

Make sure you’re all alone before you dare your date to jump in nude. Let her get in the water first if she's a bit shy, then strip off and join her. Pack a picnic blanket and some towels so you can chill out afterward while you dry off.



No.2 - Take a private bath
The ritual of bathing has long been a decadent and romantic pursuit. Book a luxury hotel room with a gorgeous marble bathroom -- the tub will have to be big enough for two -- and surprise your date with a flawless setting for a bathtub date.

Think scented candles, soft music, a bottle of bubbly, and luxurious handmade bath products. Splurge on some premium moisturizer and massage each other with it afterward. Then, jump into your fluffy white robes and relax on the king bed.

Of course, you could always recreate the same at home, assuming your bathtub is up to the job!


No.1 - Strip chess
Think a game of chess sounds like a boring date? Perk it up by playing strip chess. Make sure you start off the game in a room that already has a bit of atmosphere -- nothing like fluorescent lights and naked skin to kill your mojo! Dim the lighting.

The rules go like this: Pawns are excluded. For every other piece you capture, your opponent removes one article of clothing. You’ll notice that this changes the entire strategy of the game. Screw taking her king. Take what you can, piece-by-piece, and defend to the death right down to the last little castle -- sacrifice nothing!

Boasting one of the largest collections of date ideas on the internet, $30 Date Night is the perfect inspiration for first dates, creative dates, fun dates, romantic dates, and much more. Ideal for daters and long-term couples alike, browse their random date generator to find your next great date idea.


source: askmen.com

Defriending can bruise your 'digital ego'

By Breeanna Hare, CNN

(CNN) -- If you harbor a bit of angst over Facebook friend requests gone unanswered, a surprise "defriending" or being deserted by your Twitter followers, you're not alone.

Elaine Fogel has amassed more than 500 connections on LinkedIn, a professional networking Web site, by extending invites to those who appear to fit her wide array of career interests.

"Ninety-nine percent of the time, people just say yes," she said.

But then came "this one woman" who Fogel encountered on one of the 40-plus discussion groups she belongs to on LinkedIn. The woman offered interesting opinions, so Fogel sent her an invitation to join her network.

"She sent an e-mail saying, 'I only connect with people I know, and hopefully our paths will cross one day,' " said Fogel, of Phoenix, Arizona, her voice still carrying notes of disbelief. "I read that, and I said, 'Oh, my God, I've been rejected.' "

Fogel echoes other users who have felt the twinge of hurt and surprise from social media rejection. Some may think hers is an overreaction -- it happened online, with a woman she didn't know -- but recent research shows that our "digital egos" can bruise as easily as we do in person. In fact, rejection online may have the potential to sting even more.

"People tend to think that these relationships are trivial and not very deep, but this is what we're moving towards, having a lot of our communications play out over the Internet," Purdue University social psychologist Kip Williams said. "That's the way it's becoming; this is how we interpret our worth. People care how many [online] friends they have."

Or, increasingly, how many Twitter followers they have. This year, a third-party service launched Qwitter, which allows Twitter users to determine who's stopped following them and which tweet may have turned them off.

Experts say rejection on social networks can hurt worse than an in-person snub because people are usually more polite face-to-face than they are online.

"I think the thing that is often clearly worse online is when it's relatively anonymous, and people use that as a cover and are more cruel than they would be otherwise," said Jean Twenge, a San Diego State psychologist who has studied the way social networking affects personality development.

Online rejection also doesn't lessen the physical reaction we have to emotional pain.

"Pain is divided into two components," said Baldwin Way, a UCLA researcher who studies the way human brains respond to social rejection.

"If you put a red-hot poker on your arm, one part of your brain says, 'This pain is on your arm,' and the other part says, 'Ow, that hurts' and is less concerned with where it is and more concerned about the emotional meaning of it," he said. "That [second] part also seems to be activated when someone's left out or excluded and rejected."

To Way's surprise, that neurological reaction holds true even when the rejection comes in a digital form, lacking the real-world body language, vocal intonations and other aspects that can influence the way rejection is perceived and felt.

"If you'd asked me a few years ago if you'd get the same effect online as you would in person, I'd say no way," Way said. "I thought doing something in person would have stronger effects than doing something online, but interesting data has come out in the last few years that show mental representations are just as powerful as the real thing."

These data include Williams' "cyberball" studies, which ask a participant to play a virtual ball-tossing game with two other icons. In one study group, the participant plays the game for the entire six minutes, but in the second group, he or she is included for only a fraction of that time and then ignored. The second group reports feelings of anger and lower levels of self-esteem.

Whether participants believe they're playing with humans doesn't appear to affect their feelings of rejection.

"Even when people get rejected by the computer, they feel bad," Twenge said.

Kenneth Loflin, a student who participated in Williams' study, got so frustrated by his fellow players that he gave the computer screen an offensive gesture.

"I'm a people person, and I like people to like me," he said.

The study also affected the way Loflin interacts online. Out of the 1,200 friends he has on Facebook, 400 of them he doesn't really know, many of them being friends of friends.

"I thought about defriending them, but I didn't want them to feel how I felt" during the "cyberball" game, Loflin said.

By contrast, Bruce Hammond doesn't have a problem giving the rejection slip to Facebook hangers-on.

"For the most part, the people that I'm defriending are the people that I don't have a relationship with: the people I haven't talked to in 15 years," said Hammond, 30, of Chicago, Illinois. "I don't let someone know if I'm going to defriend them. I just do it."

Similarly, Hammond doesn't expect any of his Facebook contacts to let him know before giving him the ax. If someone rejected him in real life, he would ask why the person felt that way, but when the relationship is online, his thinking changes.

"If I come on [Facebook] tomorrow and see I have 425 friends instead of 426, I'm not going to go through my list and see who did it and be upset with them," he said.

Cecilia Sepp, a Washington, D.C.-area consultant, said she avoids the issue entirely by limiting her online network to about 100 friends.

"I don't have a problem with defriending because I don't accumulate [enough] to have a high number," Sepp said.

"When I first heard that defriending was beginning on social networks, it was through a blog post by someone who was shocked that this person had defriended them because they didn't understand why," she said. "The person wanted to know had they done something, had they said something, should they ask, 'What did [I] do?' "

Sepp believes that online "defrienders" should extend the courtesy that Fogel's LinkedIn rejecter gave her: an e-mail explanation.

"You have no facial expression online; you have no tone of voice online; it's very easy to misinterpret phrasing in an e-mail. You have to be very careful about your wording and be more explicit with people when you're making or removing connections," Sepp said. "That's why it's so important to connect with people that you actually know."


source: CNN.com

Is Trick-or-Treating Dangerous?

By Laura Fitzpatrick

Halloween strikes fear into parents' hearts for reasons that have nothing to do with scary costumes. Hospitals have been offering to X-ray candy for decades, and this year a forensic lab in DuPage County, outside Chicago, will inspect suspicious sweets using technology that's usually reserved for homicide, sexual assault and burglary. Health officials are warning against letting kids scoop up candy with their germy hands, lest they spread H1N1 flu to other revelers. In Bobtown, Pa., spooked officials have banned trick-or-treating altogether. But is trick-or-treating really dangerous?

The most persistent Halloween bogeyman is tainted candy from strangers. The parental panic may stem from around 1964, when a woman handed out dog biscuits, steel-wool pads and ant poison (clearly marked with a skull-and-crossbones logo) to teenagers she deemed too old to be trick-or-treating. The horror story refuses to die down. "In recent years, there have been reports of people with twisted minds putting razor blades and poison in taffy apples and Halloween candy," Ann Landers wrote in 1995.

But were the reports true? For all the anecdotal evidence, the notion that psychotic strangers pose a danger to children has been repeatedly debunked. Only two children are known to have been killed by poisoned Halloween loot. In both cases, the perpetrators were family members who tried to exploit the trick-or-treating urban legend to throw police off their trail. Plenty of parents call poison centers to report concerns related to Halloween, says Gail Banach, director of education at the Upstate New York Poison Center in Syracuse, but overall complaints don't spike. And other experts agree that the concern is overblown. In 1985, Joel Best, a professor of sociology and criminal justice at the University of Delaware, studied media reports going back to 1958 and found no evidence "that any child has ever been killed or seriously harmed by a contaminated treat picked up in the course of trick-or-treating." Most of the 100 or so cases of alleged poisoning over the past 50 years, he adds, were probably hoaxes. "You can't prove a negative. You can't prove that it's never, ever happened," Best says. "[But] if it was happening, it would make the news."

So is there any likely candy-borne danger? Well, yes: eating your way to a bellyache. Dr. Tony Woodward, chief of emergency medicine at Seattle Children's Hospital, expects to see a few of those cases in any given year. "When they have a ton of candy in front of them, they're going to eat it," he says. Experts recommend filling kids up with snacks or dinner before sending them out so they'll be less tempted to nosh on sweets.

But even though candy doesn't pose much of a threat, trick-or-treating does carry safety hazards. According to the American College of Emergency Physicians, common Halloween injuries include eye wounds from sharp objects and burns from flammable costumes. The Poison Center's Banach notes that kids can have allergic reactions to face paint or makeup. "We always recommend that if you're using that kind of product, you test it out on a patch of skin before you put it all over your child to be the Incredible Hulk," she says.

But the biggest Halloween danger of all is car accidents. Children are more than twice as likely to be killed by a car while walking on Halloween night than at any other time of the year, according to a study by Safe Kids USA. Such tragedies are often preventable. Parents can make sure that costumes aren't too long, shoes don't make a child prone to tripping and masks don't restrict their vision. And parents of young children should accompany them on the walk around the neighborhood to keep them safe. "A lot of kids don't know the right way to cross the street because they're not walking anywhere on a regular basis," says Nichole Hodges, home safety coordinator for the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio. "This may be a good time to provide that education as parents."

Ultimately, getting a child's candy X-rayed can't hurt — as long as parents aren't too preoccupied with overblown threats to watch out for real ones. "We do want to check the candy," says Hodges. "At the same time, we have to focus our energies on how kids are actually getting hurt."


source: Time.com