Olympic gold medalist Soraya Jimenez has died at the age of 35.
Reuters is reporting that Jimenez died of a heart attack at her home in Mexico City. She reportedly had multiple health issues, and only one lung.
Jimenez won gold for Mexico in the women’s 58 kg weightlifting competition at the 2000 summer Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia. She lifted a total of 222.5 kg (490.5 pounds), beating the North Korean silver medalist Ri Song-Hui. The victory made her the first female gold medalist from Mexico.
Jimenez retired from the sport of weightlifting after the 2004 summer Olympic Games in Athens, Greece, where she did not place.
A bill in the Maine legislature that would legalize and tax marijuana has gained some considerable support.
According to a report from the Bangor Daily News, the legislation now has 35 co-sponsors.
The bill, LD 1229 or “An Act to Regulate and Tax Marijuana,” would regulate marijuana in the state of Maine the way alcohol is regulated. Having up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana and growing up to six plants in a locked area would be legal under the bill. Smoking marijuana in public would still be illegal, and a tax of $50 per ounce would also be imposed. The bill tasks the Maine Department of Administrative and Financial Services with licensing retail stores and licensing the cultivation, manufacturing, and testing of marijuana in the state.
Lawmakers are touting the bill as a tax boon for the state, as well as a way to limit government prohibitions. The bill has been assigned to the Maine legislature’s Criminal Justice and Public Safetey Committee – the same committee that shot down a similar bill during last year’s legislative session.
Maine has allowed the medical use of marijuana since 1999.
It has been a tough week for Today Show co-host Matt Lauer. New York Magazine this week published an expose on the Today Show‘s mishandled firing of Ann Curry and the ratings bomb in the aftermath. The story also revealed that Lauer may have been courting ABC as a contract negotiation tactic against NBC.
Now that the new details have surfaced, Lauer’s role in Curry’s firing and his off-screen personality are once again coming into question. Lauer isn’t one to let people go talking behind his back, though.
Earlier this week, former Today Show intern Mark Zinni posted a response to a rather pointed question asked of him on Twitter, saying that Lauer was “not nice”:
Whatever the real story is, Lauer’s reputation has certainly taken a hit in the past year. Going forward, Lauer and the Today Show will continue to war against Good Morning America for morning show supremacy.
Mariah Carey is quickly entering the public eye again as a judge on the hit Fox karaoke competition American Idol.
This week, Carey posted what is supposedly a makeup-free picture of herself to her Instagram account. Some critics are pointing out that Carey actually might be wearing makeup in the pic, but it’s certainly a lot less than she is seen wearing on network TV.
The pic shows Carey hugging a plush lamb, and the caption reads, “Love to all the lambily!!! #WWLD.”
Carey has a thing for lambs. She calls her fans lambs and often posts pictures of herself with plush lambs to her social media accounts.
Back in December she posted a picture of her husband, Nick Cannon, wearing her lamb slippers beside the couple’s Christmas tree. Two weeks ago she posted a picture of a lamb-style Hello Kitty that a member of the American Idol studio audience had given her.
A former state trooper murdered his wife before committing suicide near Philipsburg, Pennsylvania on Thursday.
Local news station WTAJ is reporting that 51-year-old Mark Miscavish shot and killed his wife, Traci Miscavish at the Country Market store where she worked. Mark had retired from the Pennsylvania State Police in recent years.
Mark was reported to have entered the front doors of the store, walked upstairs to where Traci worked, and shot her twice with a shotgun. He then shot himself. Both were found dead when first responders arrived.
The two had reportedly been separated since January. According to a Reuters report, Traci had filed for divorce in the past week. Mark had reportedly been arrested in January for attempting to capture his wife with duct tape and threatening to kill her with a handgun. Traci was awarded a protection-from-abuse order following the incident.
Police are still investigating the murder, making sure that Mark acted alone in the murder-suicide.
A young girl who was kidnapped from her L.A.-area bedroom has been found alive.
The Associated Press is reporting that the girl was spotted wandering around a Northridge coffee shop in a white t-shirt and no shoes by someone who had seen her in local reports about her abduction. Her face was reported to have cuts and bruises, and she was taken to a hospital for treatment.
The girl’s parents stated that they last saw her just before midnight. They reported her missing just before 4 am.
According to the AP report, the girl told police that two men entered her bedroom in the early morning hours of March 28 and kidnapped her. She stated that she was held in an abandoned house near her home for most of the day.
Police are now investigating the incident but are also emphasizing that these types of kidnappings are rare, and that there probably isn’t a serial kidnapper in the area.
Anyone who has ever been to a zoo knows that they are usually pretty docile places. The animals, being animals, mostly lounge around all day.
This is especially true for big cats, which don’t seem to have temperaments much different from the house cats all of us on the internet are so familiar with. However, big cats still possess their hunting instincts, and an unfortunate heron took this fact for granted at an Amsterdam zoo recently.
The incident was caught on video by zoo-goers. It shows the heron innocently striding along the water in the Lion enclosure before a lioness takes notice. The heron gets only a spit-second to try and fly away before the lioness takes him down. A very excited younger lion then tries to get in on the action, taking the dying bird away and promptly losing it.
If you’ve ever wondered how your cat catches those birds it leaves on you doorstep, the video below is a good approximation.
If that video hasn’t sated your thirst for zoo animals, you can also check out the video of drunken monkeys that National Geographic uploaded this week.
While Kris Humphries has been dealing with his contentious divorce from reality TV star Kim Kardashian, it turns out that he has also been trying to get back in the dating game.
According to a New York Post report, this week’s US Weekly will report that Humphries was wooing Lindsey Vonn last year. This was allegedly during the same period that Tiger Woods was getting more intimate with the blonde skiing star. Vonn announced via a Facebook post earlier this month that she and Woods are now dating.
US’s unnamed source stated that Humphries’ and Vonn’s relationship never got to the physical stage, but that the two are close.
Vonn has been nursing her injuries after a horrific crash at a competition in Austria last month. She had to be airlifted to a nearby hospital, and later had surgery performed on her right knee. She is now chronicling her recovery via her social media feeds:
Family pets are,on the internet at least, normally shown as protective of their family, especially babies and children. One family in Georgia, however, learned that some pets don’t make friends with toddlers.
Local Savannah, Georgia news station WTOC is reporting that a 21-month-old girl was killed when seven dogs attacked her outside her home in Ellabell, Georgia. The seven dogs were all pit bulls or pit bull-mixed, and have now been put down.
The girl, Monica Laminack, reportedly crawled outside through a doggie door while her 12-year-old brother was supposed to be watching her. In total, there were a reported five people in the house at the time of the mauling. The family owned a total of nine dogs. A beagle and Irish setter were not involved in the attack, and were not put down.
Bryan County Sheriff Clyde Smith told WTOC that the girl was found with multiple bites on her body and had apparently been dragged throughout the yard sometime during the hour-and-a-half after she crawled outside. Smith related that the girl’s body was cold when first responders arrived, indicating that she had been dead for some time. The sheriff indicated that he expects charges related to the death to be filed.
Though the sexual roots of yoga have been all but purged from the practice the “spiritual” attachments have remained. This means that there are still “spiritual” leaders of certain styles of yoga. That, along with the teacher-student power dynamics inherent in yoga classes, can create an atmosphere ripe for the exploitation of authority.
This week, the yoga world was shaken by a lawsuit that has been filed against the founder of Bikram Yoga, Choudhury Bikram. According to a Gawker report, a woman named Sarah Baughn claims that Bikram sexually harassed and assaulted her during a yoga instructor training camp in 2005.
Baughn claims that Bikram came onto her during the camp, even going so far as to tell her that he knew her “from a past life,” and that he had a special type of feeling for her. Baughn rejected his offers, but claims she was later assaulted by the teacher. She states that Bikram “pinned her against a door” and humped her leg while kissing her face, neck, and chest.
The Bikram Yoga organization has released a rebuttal to the charges laid out in the lawsuit:
Bikram Choudhury has spent over 50 years bringing the benefits of Bikram Yoga to people through his teaching and the creation of his worldwide Bikram hot yoga organization.
He is disappointed by the false charges made in this lawsuit. However, the matter is in the hands of his attorneys, and he will not comment at this time.
Bikram expresses gratitude to all who have reached out to express their love and support.
Famed Hollywood screenwriter and producer Fay Kanin has died. She was 95.
Kanin gained fame along with her husband, Michael Kanin, in the 1940s and 1950s while writing screenplays for classic movies such as Sunday Punch, My Pal Gus, and The Opposite Sex. She and her husband were nominated for a best original screenplay Academy Award for the 1958 movie Teacher’s Pet, which starred Clark Gable and Doris Day.
Kanin went on to produce movies and stage productions, including a 1959 adaptation of Akira Kurasawa’s Rashomon. In 1979 she became the president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, a title she held until 1983.
Though the details of her death have not been released, the Academy has released a statement regarding Kanin’s death:
The Academy is deeply saddened by the passing of our beloved former president and Oscar-nominated screenwriter Fay Kanin.
She was committed to the Academy’s preservation work and instrumental in expanding our public programming. A tireless mentor and inspiration to countless filmmakers, Fay’s passion for film continues to inspire us daily.
Our prayers and condolences go out to her loved ones.
(Image courtesy the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences)
Kardashian women are known to have generous hips, but not every member of the family is as voluptuous as Kim. Kendall Jenner, the half-sister of Kim, Kourtney, and Khloé, this week graced the cover of Harper’s Bazaar Arabia, showing off the athletic body she inherited from her father, Olympic decathlete and gold medal-winner Bruce Jenner.
According to a Daily Mail report, the young model and reality TV star told the magazine that she is “constantly criticized for being too skinny.” She goes as far as to say that she is “trying to gain weight,” but that her body “won’t let it happen.”
“What people don’t understand is that calling someone too skinny is the same as calling someone too fat,” said Jenner.
Jenner began appearing on the reality TV show Keeping Up With the Kardashians in 2007 and began her modeling career at age 14. She just celebrated her 17th birthday back in November 2012.
Jenner has not directly addressed her comments through her social media accounts, though she did post the following cryptic message the day after the Bazaar story was published:
For some celebrities, the pressure of constant exposure in public can become almost overbearing. When combined with the Hollywood demand that celebrity bodies always look perfect, the mix can sometimes cause trouble.
This week, reality TV star Rob Kardashian is accused of stealing from a Paparazzo who was allegedly photographing him without his shirt on. A TMZ report cites unnamed “law enforcement sources” as saying Kardashian took the memory card from the photographer’s camera, promising to pay for it later.
Rob Kardashian has appeared on the reality TV shows Keeping Up With the Kardashians, Khloé & Lamar, and Dancing With the Stars. TMZ reports that he is currently working through a weight loss program, which could explain his shyness. He also broke up with singer Rita Ora this past December, accusing her of cheating on him.
When even Bill O’Reilly is conceding that gay marriage supporters have a compelling argument, it’s clear that a tipping point on the issue has already been reached. Even so, prominent celebrities are lending their voices to the cause this week, as the U.S. Supreme Court over the last two days heard arguments in two different cases involving gay marriage.
The latest celebrity to lend her support is singer Beyoncé Knowles. On Tuesday she posted one of the red equality pictures seen all over social media the past few days to her Facebook and Instagram accounts. She followed it up with a clever handwritten message reading: “If you like it you should be able to put a ring on it.”
The statement is, of course, referring to Beyoncé’s 2008 hit song “Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It).”
Coming off of her Super Bowl halftime performance, Beyoncé’s popularity and cultural relevance are as high as ever. Her support for gay marriage will undoubtedly influence the millions of followers she has on Facebook and Instagram.
A large portion of women around the world would do just about anything to lock lips with Brad Pitt, but to have the famous actor be their first kiss would be something almost too fanciful to imagine. So, when a young actress dismisses that very event with a word like “disgusting,” people will take notice.
In an interview with Bullett this week, Kirsten Dunst reveals that her on-screen kiss with Brad Pitt in the movie Interview With the Vampire wasn’t a life-changing moment. She was only 12 at the time, playing a young girl who is turned into a vampire.
The kiss was Dunst’s first one in her life, and she describes it as “just a peck.” Though the people around her were telling her how lucky she was to kiss the actor, she only knew her co-star as “a hippie-ish cool dude” with long hair.
“…I thought it was disgusting,” said Dunst, describing the kiss.
It turns out the burgeoning actress wasn’t yet into boys. She goes on to state that she didn’t kiss anyone else until she was 16, so it’s clear that Dunst might have had a different opinion on the kiss if she had been a little older. In that way, it’s not entirely an insult to Pitt.
Many murders go unsolved, and many murderers are reluctant to reveal the extent of their crimes, even when they have no hope of being released from prison. This week, New York police have revealed that a severed head found in 1989 has been linked to one of New York’s most notorious serial killers.
According to an Associated Press report, New York state police have revealed that a woman named Heidi Balch was likely serial killer Joel Rifkin’s first victim. The 25-year-old’s head was found on a New Jersey golf course in 1989. She, like most of Rifkin’s victims, was a New York City prostitute. Police cited physical evidence and statements by Rifkin in making their determination that Balch was murdered by Rifkin.
Joel Rifkin is believed to have killed more than a dozen women from 1989 to 1993, most of them prostitutes. He was convicted of nine of the murders in 1994 and sentenced to 203 years to life in prison. He is currently serving his sentence in the Clinton Correctional Facility in Clinton County, New York.
Last night, Fox News star Bill O’Reilly shocked many of his viewers by admitting he finds the case for gay marriage “more compelling” than the opposition’s case. In a conversation about the court cases with Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly on The O’Reilly Factor, he stated that U.S. policy shouldn’t be based on the Christian Bible.
Though O’Reilly prefaces his statement with “I hate to say this,” he goes on to say:
“The compelling argument is on the side of homosexuals. That’s where the compelling argument is. ‘We’re Americans, we just want to be treated like everybody else.’ That’s a compelling argument, and to deny that, you gotta have a very strong argument on the other side, and the other side hasn’t been able to do anything but thump the Bible.”
O’Reilly made it clear that he has always supported civil unions, but that he doesn’t feel strongly one way or the other about gay marriage, seeing it as an issue for states to decide. “I want all Americans to be happy,” said O’Reilly.
O’Reilly also used the conversation to attack politicians for changing their views on the issue of gay marriage now that public opinion in the U.S. has shifted. He calls former President Bill Clinton a “phony” and called politicians who shift their views to match popular opinion “sleazy.”
O’Reilly may have a point that politicians who took a principled stand for gay rights before that stance became popular might be remembered more fondly by history. However, another way to look at it could be that the politicians changing their minds are simply representing the majority opinion of their constituents in a representative democracy. Considering his experience, O’Reilly seems inordinately surprised that politicians are playing politics.
The FBI revealed this week in a blog post that an agency memo referring to “flying saucers” is the most-requested file in the FBI vault.
The memo is dated March 22, 1950 and was written by the FBI’s Washington, D.C. field office head at the time, Guy Hottel.
The document is freely available via the FBI records vault. It reads:
An investigator for the Air Forces stated that three so-called flying saucers had been recovered in New Mexico. They were described as being circular in shape with raised centers, approximately 50 feet in diameter. Each one was occupied by three bodies of human shape but only three feet tall, dressed in metallic cloth of a very fine texture. Each body was bandaged in a manner similar to the blackout suits used by speed fliers and test pilots.
According to Mr. [REDACTED] informant, the saucers were found in New Mexico due to the fact that the Government has a very high-powered radar set-up in the area and it is believed the radar interferes with the controlling mechanics of the saucers.
No further evaluation was attempted by SA [REDACTED] concerning the above.
According to the FBI, the Hottel memo was first released to the public in the 1970s. Though it is often assumed to be connected to the legendary Roswell UFO crash, the memo is dated almost three years after the Roswell incident.
The agency also stressed that the Hottel memo is not proof of extraterrestrials, in that it refers to a second- or third-hand account that was never investigated further.
A woman in the U.K. has reportedly given birth to a humongous baby more than twice the size of a normal infant.
According to a BBC News report, Jade King of Bristol gave birth last month to a baby George. The newborn was reported to have weighed 15 pounds, 7 ounces at the time of his birth.
As you might imagine, a baby that large caused some complications during childbirth. George’s shoulders became stuck during birth, and the baby reportedly went five minutes without oxygen. Doctors told the couple that George had only a 10% chance of survival as they transferred him to St. Michael’s Hospital in Bristol. Luckily, doctors were able to help the baby and George was allowed to go home for the first time only four-and-a-half weeks after his troubled birth.
George is getting regular check-ups and Jade stated that an MRI did not reveal any major brain damage to the child. She did relate, though, that none of the clothes they had bought before his birth were able to fit him.
Frito Lay seems to have discovered that its customers apparently enjoy tacos as well. Earlier this month, Taco Bell debuted its cool ranch Doritos-flavored Locos Tacos, continuing its Locos Tacos success.
This week, Frito Lay announced that Doritos Locos Tacos will soon become a flavor for Doritos chips. That’s right. The tacos at Taco Bell that have shells based on classic Doritos flavors will now themselves become “new” flavors of Doritos tortilla chips.
The Locos Tacos Doritos will come in either nacho cheese or cool ranch varieties, and both will also have “crunchy taco” chips in the bag as well, which will presumably hold the flavor of an entire Taco Bell taco. The flavors arrive in stores starting April 8:
Doritos is also holding a Twitter contest in which the winner will win a pallet (132 bags) of Locos Tacos Doritos:
I am now down to one crutch!! 
