RIP

[Kobi]

Seems we dont have a special space to acknowledge the passing of the famous and infamous people who have been part of our lives.

Rather than just throwing them in a general news thread, I thought it might be nice to honor them with a space of their own.

To start....Andy Rooney of 60 minutes fame died Friday from complications of an undisclosed surgery. He was 92 and died a month after his last broadcast.

http://news.yahoo.com/andy-rooney-wry-60-minutes-commentator-dies-133038061.html

I thought he was a funny guy with his bushy brows and common sense look at stuff. He wasnt without controversy but he made me laugh more than he pissed me off.

Thanks for the memories Andy.

[foxyshaman]

I was very sad to hear that one of my all time favorite equestrian powerhouse horses, Hickstead, died on Saturday at the World Cup in Verona, Italy. He collapsed in the ring after jumping and died of an apparent heart attack. Eric Lamaze was his rider. My heart is so very sad. My condolences to Eric and to his owners. I loved watching the beauty and grace of that wonderful and amazing Stallion.

[Apocalipstic]

I was very saddened to hear about Andy Rooney as well.

[Kobi]

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Joe Frazier had to throw his greatest punch to knock down "The Greatest."

A vicious left hook from Frazier put Muhammad Ali on the canvas in the 15th round in March 1971 when he became the first man to beat him in the Fight of the Century at Madison Square Garden.

"That was the greatest thing that ever happened in my life," Frazier said.

It was his biggest night, one that would never come again.

The relentless, undersized heavyweight ruled the division as champion, then spent a lifetime trying to fight his way out of Ali's shadow.

Frazier, who died Monday night after a brief battle with liver cancer at the age of 67, will forever be associated with Ali. No one in boxing would ever dream of anointing Ali as The Greatest unless he, too, was linked to Smokin' Joe.

"I will always remember Joe with respect and admiration," Ali said in a statement. "My sympathy goes out to his family and loved ones."

They fought three times, twice in the heart of New York City and once in the morning in a steamy arena in the Thrilla in Manila in the Philippines. They went 41 rounds together. Neither gave an inch and both gave it their all.

In their last fight in Manila in 1975, they traded punches with a fervor that seemed unimaginable among heavyweights. Frazier gave almost as good as he got for 14 rounds, then had to be held back by trainer Eddie Futch as he tried to go out for the final round, unable to see.

"Closest thing to dying that I know of," Ali said afterward.

Ali was as merciless with Frazier out of the ring as he was inside it. He called him a gorilla, and mocked him as an Uncle Tom. But he respected him as a fighter, especially after Frazier won a decision to defend his heavyweight title against the then-unbeaten Ali in a fight that was so big Frank Sinatra was shooting pictures at ringside and both fighters earned an astonishing $2.5 million.

The night at the Garden 40 years ago remained fresh in Frazier's mind as he talked about his life, career and relationship with Ali a few months before he died.

"I can't go nowhere where it's not mentioned," he told The Associated Press.

Bob Arum, who once promoted Ali, said he was saddened by Frazier's passing.

"He was such an inspirational guy. A decent guy. A man of his word," Arum said. "I'm torn up by Joe dying at this relatively young age. I can't say enough about Joe."

Frazier's death was announced in a statement by his family, who asked to be able to grieve privately and said they would announce "our father's homecoming celebration" as soon as possible.

Manny Pacquiao learned of it shortly after he arrived in Las Vegas for his fight Saturday night with Juan Manuel Marquez. Like Frazier in his prime, Pacquiao has a powerful left hook that he has used in his remarkable run to stardom.

"Boxing lost a great champion, and the sport lost a great ambassador," Pacquiao said.

Don King, who promoted the Thrilla in Manila, was described by a spokesman as too upset to talk about Frazier's death.

Though slowed in his later years and his speech slurred by the toll of punches taken in the ring, Frazier was still active on the autograph circuit in the months before he died. In September he went to Las Vegas, where he signed autographs in the lobby of the MGM Grand shortly before Floyd Mayweather Jr.'s fight against Victor Ortiz.

An old friend, Gene Kilroy, visited with him and watched Frazier work the crowd.

"He was so nice to everybody," Kilroy said. "He would say to each of them, 'Joe Frazier, sharp as a razor, what's your name?'"

Frazier was small for a heavyweight, weighing just 205 pounds when he won the title by stopping Jimmy Ellis in the fifth round of their 1970 fight at Madison Square Garden. But he fought every minute of every round going forward behind a vicious left hook, and there were few fighters who could withstand his constant pressure.

His reign as heavyweight champion lasted only four fights — including the win over Ali — before he ran into an even more fearsome slugger than himself. George Foreman responded to Frazier's constant attack by dropping him three times in the first round and three more in the second before their 1973 fight in Jamaica was waved to a close and the world had a new heavyweight champion.

Two fights later, he met Ali in a rematch of their first fight, only this time the outcome was different. Ali won a 12-round decision, and later that year stopped George Foreman in the Rumble in the Jungle in Zaire.

There had to be a third fight, though, and what a fight it was. With Ali's heavyweight title at stake, the two met in Manila in a fight that will long be seared in boxing history.

Frazier went after Ali round after round, landing his left hook with regularity as he made Ali backpedal around the ring. But Ali responded with left jabs and right hands that found their mark again and again. Even the intense heat inside the arena couldn't stop the two as they fought every minute of every round with neither willing to concede the other one second of the round.

"They told me Joe Frazier was through," Ali told Frazier at one point during the fight.

"They lied," Frazier said, before hitting Ali with a left hook.

Finally, though, Frazier simply couldn't see and Futch would not let him go out for the 15th round. Ali won the fight while on his stool, exhausted and contemplating himself whether to go on.

"It was unworldly what we had just seen," Arum said. "Two men fighting one of the great wars of all time. It's something I will never forget for all the years I have left."

It was one of the greatest fights ever, but it took a toll. Frazier would fight only two more times, getting knocked out in a rematch with Foreman eight months later before coming back in 1981 for an ill advised fight with Jumbo Cummings.

"They should have both retired after the Manila fight," former AP boxing writer Ed Schuyler Jr. said. "They left every bit of talent they had in the ring that day."

Born in Beaufort, S.C., on Jan 12, 1944, Frazier took up boxing early after watching weekly fights on the black and white television on his family's small farm. He was a top amateur for several years, and became the only American fighter to win a gold medal in the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo despite fighting in the final bout with an injured left thumb.

"Joe Frazier should be remembered as one of the greatest fighters of all time and a real man," Arum told the AP in a telephone interview Monday night. "He's a guy that stood up for himself. He didn't compromise and always gave 100 percent in the ring. There was never a fight in the ring where Joe didn't give 100 percent."

After turning pro in 1965, Frazier quickly became known for his punching power, stopping his first 11 opponents. Within three years he was fighting world-class opposition and, in 1970, beat Ellis to win the heavyweight title that he would hold for more than two years.

A woman who answered Ellis' phone in Kentucky said the former champion suffers from Alzheimer's Disease, but she wanted to pass along the family's condolences.

In Philadelphia, a fellow Philadelphia fighter, longtime middleweight champion Bernard Hopkins, said Frazier was so big in the city that he should have his own statue, like the fictional Rocky character.

"I saw him at one of my car washes a few weeks ago. He was in a car, just hollering at us, 'They're trying to get me!' That was his hi," Hopkins said. "I'm glad I got to see him in the last couple of months. At the end of the day, I respect the man. I believe at the end of his life, he was fighting to get that respect."

He was a fixture in Philadelphia where he trained fighters in a gym he owned and made a cameo in "Rocky."

It was his fights with Ali that would define Frazier. Though Ali was gracious in defeat in the first fight, he was as vicious with his words as he was with his punches in promoting all three fights — and he never missed a chance to get a jab in at Frazier.

Frazier, who in his later years would have financial trouble and end up running a gym in his adopted hometown of Philadelphia, took the jabs personally. He felt Ali made fun of him by calling him names and said things that were not true just to get under his skin. Those feelings were only magnified as Ali went from being an icon in the ring to one of the most beloved people in the world.

After a trembling Ali lit the Olympic torch in 1996 in Atlanta, Frazier was asked by a reporter what he thought about it.

"They should have thrown him in," Frazier responded.

He mellowed, though, in recent years, preferring to remember the good from his fights with Ali rather than the bad. Just before the 40th anniversary of his win over Ali earlier this year — a day Frazier celebrated with parties in New York — he said he no longer felt any bitterness toward Ali, who suffers from Parkinson's disease and is mostly mute.

"I forgive him," Frazier. "He's in a bad way."

http://news.yahoo.com/boxing-great-joe-frazier-dies-cancer-fight-051359865.html

[DapperButch]

I am very saddened by the loss of Frazier. Thanks for posting the article, Kobi, it is the most thorough one out there.

[Thinker]

Rest in peace, Smokin' Joe. You were a good champion and a hero to many.

[Gemme]

Heavy D died today at age 44. :(

[J. Mason]

Wow Heavy D passed, I didnt hear about this till now.

[SugarFemme]

http://www.esquire.com/cm/esquire/images/xf/esq-joe-frazier-picture-110711-lg.jpg


I had my Olympic gold medal cut up into eleven pieces. Gave all eleven of my kids a piece. It'll come together again when they put me down~Joe Frazier

[SugarFemme]

Hispanic writer, poet and essayist Tomas Segovia died in the Mexican capital of complications to the cancer he suffered. He was 84.
The Spanish-born Segovia, who went to Mexico as an exile after his homeland's 1936-1939 civil war, was the recipient of numerous honors including the 2000 Octavio Paz Prize for Poetry and the Essay and the 2005 Juan Rulfo Prize for Latin American and Caribbean Literature.
He was also honored in 2008 with the Federico Garcia Lorca International Poetry Prize.


Read more: http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/lifestyle/2011/11/08/poet-tomas-segovia-dies/#ixzz1dAeJw99Y

[Vlasta]

RIP Joe .... you always been a class act ..... god bless .

I know Ali and his wife personally and in our private discussions he had always a great respect for you .

[AtLast]

I was very saddened to hear about Andy Rooney as well.

Me, too. Loved that old crabby guy!

[ruffryder]

Heavy D died of pnemonia. so young. RIP. Thanks for the music!

[Apocalipstic]

RIP Heavy D.

[The_Lady_Snow]

RIP Bill Keane creator of Family Circus :(

[Thinker]

RIP Bill Keane creator of Family Circus :(

:( :( :(

I couldn't get my hands on the comics fast enough.

[DapperButch]

:( :( :(

I couldn't get my hands on the comics fast enough.

Yes, it was my favorite too, as a kid.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/09/bil-keane-dead-family-circus-dies_n_1084283.html?ref=media&icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl21%7Csec3_lnk1%7C111190

[Leigh]

http://i288.photobucket.com/albums/ll167/chevytruckman85/Family_Circus.gif

[Kobi]

December 7, 2011, 10:23 a.m.

Emmy Award-winning actor Harry Morgan, who played the crusty yet sympathetic Col. Sherman T. Potter in the sitcom "MASH" and the hard-nosed LAPD Officer Bill Gannon in the television drama "Dragnet," died Wednesday. He was 96.

Morgan died at his home in Brentwood after a bout with pneumonia, his daughter-in-law, Beth Morgan, told the Associated Press.

Morgan's eight-year run on "MASH," the pinnacle of his seven-decade acting career, began when he was 60 and had already appeared on the Broadway stage, in dozens of television shows and more than 50 films.

Morgan went on to appear in such films as "High Noon" (1953), "The Glenn Miller Story" (1954), "Inherit the Wind" (1960), "Support Your Local Sheriff!" (1969) and his personal favorite, 1943's "The Ox-Bow Incident."

One of his early TV credits was "December Bride," in which he played Pete Porter, the wry-humored, henpecked neighbor who cracked jokes about his wife, the never-seen Gladys.

After seven years on "December Bride," Morgan appeared opposite Cara Williams in an early 1960s spinoff, "Pete and Gladys." His TV career continued with the anthology series "The Richard Boone Show" and with "Kentucky Jones," in which Morgan played a ranch handyman who works for the title character, portrayed by Dennis Weaver.

Until "MASH" Morgan was best known for his role as Officer Bill Gannon in "Dragnet", a show that he had first appeared on in the 1940s on the radio. In 1967, Morgan replaced Ben Alexander as the partner of Jack Webb's Sgt. Joe Friday in the show that lionized the Los Angeles Police Department. He remained a fixture for four seasons.

In the early 1970s Morgan worked on another Webb creation, the courtroom drama "The D.A.," and appeared opposite Richard Boone in "Hec Ramsey," a western that was part of "NBC's Sunday Mystery Movie" series.

The role of Col. Potter in "MASH" came along when the fictional surgical unit needed a new commanding officer after McLean Stevenson left the show in 1975. He received eight Emmy nominations for the role and won once, in 1980, the same year he was nominated for directing an episode of "MASH."

He also costarred in a spinoff sitcom, "AfterMASH," which was set in a stateside veterans hospital and aired from 1983 to 1984.

After that he appeared in about 20 more TV productions, including a few episodes of "3rd Rock from the Sun" in the late 1990s.

Survivors include his second wife, Barbara; his sons Christopher, Charles and Paul; eight grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren.

[Kobi]

Alan Sues, who brought his flamboyant and over-the-top comic persona to the hit television show "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" in the 1960s and 1970s, has died, a close friend said Sunday night. He was 85.


A native Californian who moved to New York in 1952, Sues began his career as a serious actor and in 1953 appeared in director Elia Kazan's "Tea and Sympathy" on Broadway.

But he would be remembered for his wild comic characters.

They included "Big Al," an effeminate sportscaster, and "Uncle Al the Kiddies Pal," a hung-over children's show host, on "Laugh-In," the TV phenomenon that both reflected and mocked the era's counterculture and made stars of Goldie Hawn, Lily Tomlin and many others.

Sues also donned tights as the commercial spokesman for Peter Pan peanut butter, and appeared in the popular 1964 "Twilight Zone" episode "The Masks."

Michaud said that while Sues was always cast as the stereotypically gay character, he believed he needed to hide his own gay identity during his years on television.

"He felt like he couldn't publicly come out," Michaud said. "He felt like people wouldn't accept him."

Sues was grateful for "Laugh-In," but wasn't happy he was typecast in his comic persona as he sought to return to more serious acting.

He got one chance that he cherished in 1975, the serious role of Moriarty with the Royal Shakespeare Company in "Sherlock Holmes" on Broadway.

He stayed with the show until it closed the following year, then went out to perform it with the touring company.

In later years he would make many more theater appearances, do voiceover work for television, and appear in guest spots on TV series like "Punky Brewster" and "Sabrina the Teenage Witch."

Sues is survived by a sister-in-law, two nieces and a nephew.

[Arwen]

Alan Sues, who brought his flamboyant and over-the-top comic persona to the hit television show "Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In" in the 1960s and 1970s, has died, a close friend said Sunday night. He was 85.


A native Californian who moved to New York in 1952, Sues began his career as a serious actor and in 1953 appeared in director Elia Kazan's "Tea and Sympathy" on Broadway.

But he would be remembered for his wild comic characters.

They included "Big Al," an effeminate sportscaster, and "Uncle Al the Kiddies Pal," a hung-over children's show host, on "Laugh-In," the TV phenomenon that both reflected and mocked the era's counterculture and made stars of Goldie Hawn, Lily Tomlin and many others.


:awww:I adored Uncle Al. He was a funny, funny man.

[Kobi]

PRAGUE (Reuters) - Vaclav Havel, a dissident playwright who was jailed by Communists and then went on to lead the bloodless "Velvet Revolution" and become Czech president, died at 75 on Sunday.

The former chain smoker, who survived several operations for lung cancer and a burst intestine in the late 1990s that nearly killed him and left him frail for the rest of his life, died after a long illness.

Havel was with his wife Dagmara and a nun who had been caring for him when he died at his country home, north of Prague. "Today Vaclav Havel has left us," his secretary, Sabina Tancevova, said in a statement.

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said on Twitter, "Vaclav Havel was one of the greatest Europeans of our age. His voice for freedom paved way for a Europe whole and free."

"We will remember his commitment to freedom and democracy just as much as his great humanity," said German Chancellor Angela Merkel. "We Germans especially have much to thank him for."

The diminutive playwright, who once took Bill Clinton to a Prague jazz club and was also a friend of Mick Jagger, rose to fame by facing down Prague's communist regime when he demanded they respect at least their own human rights pledges.

Just half a year after completing his last jail sentence, he led the peaceful uprising that ended Soviet-backed rule in Prague and emerged in charge at the mediaeval Prague castle.

"I am extremely moved," an emotional Prime Minister Petr Necas told Czech Television when told of Havel's death.

"He was a symbol and the face of our republic, and he is one of the most prominent figures of the politics of the last and the start of this century. His departure is a huge loss. He still had a lot to say in political and social life."

Havel became a guarantee of peaceful transition to democracy and allowed the small country of 10 million to punch well above its weight in international politics.

"Truth and love will overcome lies and hatred," was Havel's slogan that Czechs remember from the Velvet Revolution days.

But at home, Havel lost some of his allure in the later years of his presidency.

STRUGGLE FOR THE SOUL

Much of his presidential term was cast as a struggle for the soul of democratic reforms against right-wing economist Vaclav Klaus, who replaced Havel as president in 2003.

"In the Czech Republic, he was not only a prophet recognized worldwide, but also a concrete politician who made concrete political mistakes," Havel's ex-adviser, Jiri Pehe, said.

Havel returned to writing, and published a new play, "Leaving," which won rave reviews and premiered in 2008.

When asked in a magazine interview that year if he wanted to be remembered as a politician or playwright, he said:

"I would like it to say that I was a playwright who acted as a citizen, and thanks to that he later spent a part of his life in a political position," he said.

Born in 1936, the son of a rich building contractor, Havel was denied a good education after the communists seized power in 1948 and stripped the family of its wealth.

On December 3, 1963, his first play, "Garden Party" premiered at a Prague theatre, lampooning the communist system.

Havel was barred by communist leaders from his job as a writer/editor after the suppression of the Prague Spring reforms of 1968 and he was forced to work as a manual laborer.

He became the first spokesman for the Charter 77 dissident group that strongly criticized communist officials.

Havel was sentenced in 1979 to 4-1/2 years in prison for "subversion" against the state. In 1983, he was released from prison amid immense foreign, diplomatic pressure after falling seriously ill with pneumonia.

Chosen as Czechoslovak president following the 1989 November collapse of the communist regime, he left office in 1992 ahead of the breakup of Czechoslovakia. On January 26, 1993, he was elected president of the newly-emerged and independent Czech Republic.



http://news.yahoo.com/former-czech-president-havel-dies-tv-112758479.html

[Vlasta]

PRAGUE (Reuters) - Vaclav Havel, a dissident playwright who was jailed by Communists and then went on to lead the bloodless "Velvet Revolution" and become Czech president, died at 75 on Sunday.

The former chain smoker, who survived several operations for lung cancer and a burst intestine in the late 1990s that nearly killed him and left him frail for the rest of his life, died after a long illness.

Havel was with his wife Dagmara and a nun who had been caring for him when he died at his country home, north of Prague. "Today Vaclav Havel has left us," his secretary, Sabina Tancevova, said in a statement.

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said on Twitter, "Vaclav Havel was one of the greatest Europeans of our age. His voice for freedom paved way for a Europe whole and free."

"We will remember his commitment to freedom and democracy just as much as his great humanity," said German Chancellor Angela Merkel. "We Germans especially have much to thank him for."

The diminutive playwright, who once took Bill Clinton to a Prague jazz club and was also a friend of Mick Jagger, rose to fame by facing down Prague's communist regime when he demanded they respect at least their own human rights pledges.

Just half a year after completing his last jail sentence, he led the peaceful uprising that ended Soviet-backed rule in Prague and emerged in charge at the mediaeval Prague castle.

"I am extremely moved," an emotional Prime Minister Petr Necas told Czech Television when told of Havel's death.

"He was a symbol and the face of our republic, and he is one of the most prominent figures of the politics of the last and the start of this century. His departure is a huge loss. He still had a lot to say in political and social life."

Havel became a guarantee of peaceful transition to democracy and allowed the small country of 10 million to punch well above its weight in international politics.

"Truth and love will overcome lies and hatred," was Havel's slogan that Czechs remember from the Velvet Revolution days.

But at home, Havel lost some of his allure in the later years of his presidency.

STRUGGLE FOR THE SOUL

Much of his presidential term was cast as a struggle for the soul of democratic reforms against right-wing economist Vaclav Klaus, who replaced Havel as president in 2003.

"In the Czech Republic, he was not only a prophet recognized worldwide, but also a concrete politician who made concrete political mistakes," Havel's ex-adviser, Jiri Pehe, said.

Havel returned to writing, and published a new play, "Leaving," which won rave reviews and premiered in 2008.

When asked in a magazine interview that year if he wanted to be remembered as a politician or playwright, he said:

"I would like it to say that I was a playwright who acted as a citizen, and thanks to that he later spent a part of his life in a political position," he said.

Born in 1936, the son of a rich building contractor, Havel was denied a good education after the communists seized power in 1948 and stripped the family of its wealth.

On December 3, 1963, his first play, "Garden Party" premiered at a Prague theatre, lampooning the communist system.

Havel was barred by communist leaders from his job as a writer/editor after the suppression of the Prague Spring reforms of 1968 and he was forced to work as a manual laborer.

He became the first spokesman for the Charter 77 dissident group that strongly criticized communist officials.

Havel was sentenced in 1979 to 4-1/2 years in prison for "subversion" against the state. In 1983, he was released from prison amid immense foreign, diplomatic pressure after falling seriously ill with pneumonia.

Chosen as Czechoslovak president following the 1989 November collapse of the communist regime, he left office in 1992 ahead of the breakup of Czechoslovakia. On January 26, 1993, he was elected president of the newly-emerged and independent Czech Republic.



http://news.yahoo.com/former-czech-president-havel-dies-tv-112758479.html

thanks for posting this . He will be missed , but not forgotten .

[Kobi]

(Reuters) - Top Canadian freestyle skier Sarah Burke, seen as an early Olympic gold medal favorite ahead of the 2014 games, died on Thursday from injuries sustained in a training accident in Utah last week, a family spokeswoman said.

Considered one of the leading half-pipe athletes in the world, the 29-year-old was airlifted to Salt Lake City last Tuesday after falling during a half-pipe run in Park City, Utah.

"Sarah passed away peacefully surrounded by those she loved. In accordance with Sarah's wishes, her organs and tissues were donated to save the lives of others," family spokeswoman Iris Yen said in a written statement released to Reuters.

Burke, who was married to fellow skier Rory Bushfield, had surgery last Wednesday at the University of Utah hospital to repair a tear in her vertebral artery, the hospital said.

Yen said that Burke had suffered a ruptured vertebral artery in the fall on the Eagle Superpipe at Park City, which led to a severe intracranial hemorrhage.

"After the operation, numerous neurological examinations, electrodiagnostic tests and imaging studies revealed that Sarah sustained severe irreversible damage to her brain due to lack of oxygen and blood after cardiac arrest," Yen said in the statement.

"While early reports in the media stated that Sarah's injury was a traumatic brain injury, it is important to note that Sarah's condition was the result of a lack of oxygen to the brain during cardiac arrest," she said.

Yen said Burke had been training for upcoming winter events at the time of the accident.

"Our hearts go out to Sarah's husband Rory and her entire family. It's difficult for us to imagine their pain and what they're going through," Peter Judge, chief executive of the Canadian Freestyle Ski Association, said in a statement.

"Sarah was certainly someone who lived life to the fullest and in doing so was a significant example to our community and far beyond," Judge said. "She will be greatly missed by all of us at the CFSA and the entire ski community."

Yen said Burke's family "was moved by the sincere and heartfelt sympathy expressed by people inspired by Sarah from all around the world." A public celebration of Burke's life would be held in the coming weeks, she added.

Burke reached the podium at every career World Cup start and is a four time champion at the X-Games, according to the ski association.


http://ca.news.yahoo.com/canadian-skier-sarah-burke-dies-injuries-spokeswoman-205637711--spt.html

[Tawse]

(Reuters) - Top Canadian freestyle skier Sarah Burke, seen as an early Olympic gold medal favorite ahead of the 2014 games, died on Thursday from injuries sustained in a training accident in Utah last week, a family spokeswoman said.

Considered one of the leading half-pipe athletes in the world, the 29-year-old was airlifted to Salt Lake City last Tuesday after falling during a half-pipe run in Park City, Utah.

"Sarah passed away peacefully surrounded by those she loved. In accordance with Sarah's wishes, her organs and tissues were donated to save the lives of others," family spokeswoman Iris Yen said in a written statement released to Reuters.

Burke, who was married to fellow skier Rory Bushfield, had surgery last Wednesday at the University of Utah hospital to repair a tear in her vertebral artery, the hospital said.

Yen said that Burke had suffered a ruptured vertebral artery in the fall on the Eagle Superpipe at Park City, which led to a severe intracranial hemorrhage.

"After the operation, numerous neurological examinations, electrodiagnostic tests and imaging studies revealed that Sarah sustained severe irreversible damage to her brain due to lack of oxygen and blood after cardiac arrest," Yen said in the statement.

"While early reports in the media stated that Sarah's injury was a traumatic brain injury, it is important to note that Sarah's condition was the result of a lack of oxygen to the brain during cardiac arrest," she said.

Yen said Burke had been training for upcoming winter events at the time of the accident.

"Our hearts go out to Sarah's husband Rory and her entire family. It's difficult for us to imagine their pain and what they're going through," Peter Judge, chief executive of the Canadian Freestyle Ski Association, said in a statement.

"Sarah was certainly someone who lived life to the fullest and in doing so was a significant example to our community and far beyond," Judge said. "She will be greatly missed by all of us at the CFSA and the entire ski community."

Yen said Burke's family "was moved by the sincere and heartfelt sympathy expressed by people inspired by Sarah from all around the world." A public celebration of Burke's life would be held in the coming weeks, she added.

Burke reached the podium at every career World Cup start and is a four time champion at the X-Games, according to the ski association.


http://ca.news.yahoo.com/canadian-skier-sarah-burke-dies-injuries-spokeswoman-205637711--spt.html


holy crap... I loved watching her perform! :(

[Kobi]

(CNN) -- Etta James, whose assertive, earthy voice lit up such hits as "The Wallflower," "Something's Got a Hold on Me" and the wedding favorite "At Last," has died, according to her longtime friend and manager, Lupe De Leon. She was 73.

She died from complications from leukemia with her husband, Artis Mills, and her sons by her side, De Leon said.

She was diagnosed with leukemia in 2010, and also suffered from dementia and hepatitis C. James died at a hospital in Riverside, California. She would have turned 74 Wednesday.

The powerhouse singer, known as "Miss Peaches," lived an eventful life. She first hit the charts as a teenager, taking "The Wallflower (Roll With Me, Henry)" -- an "answer record" to Hank Ballard's "Work With Me, Annie" -- to No. 1 on the R&B charts in 1955. She joined Chess Records in 1960 and had a string of R&B and pop hits, many with lush string arrangements. After a mid-decade fade, she re-emerged in 1967 with a more hard-edged, soulful sound.

Throughout her career, James overcame a heroin addiction, opened for the Rolling Stones, won six Grammys and was voted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Despite her ups and downs -- including a number of health problems -- she maintained an optimistic attitude.

"Most of the songs I sing, they have that blue feeling to it. They have that sorry feeling. And I don't know what I'm sorry about," she told CNN's Denise Quan in 2002. "I don't!"

Through it all, she was a spitfire beloved by contemporaries and young up-and-comers.

"Etta James is unmanageable, and I'm the closest thing she's ever had to a manager," Lupe DeLeon, her manager of 30-plus years, told CNN in admiration.

British songstress Adele named James as one of her favorite singers, along with Aretha Franklin.

"If you were to look up the word singer in the dictionary, you'd see their names," Adele said in an interview.

Etta James was born Jamesetta Hawkins in Los Angeles to a teen mother and unknown father. (She suspected her father was the pool player Minnesota Fats.)

Her birth mother initially took little responsibility and James was raised by a series of people, notably a pair of boardinghouse owners. But she was recognized from a young age for her booming voice, showcased in a South Central Los Angeles church.

In 1950, her mother took her to San Francisco, where James formed a group called the Peaches. Singer Johnny Otis, best known for "Willie and the Hand Jive," discovered her and had her sing a song he wrote using Ballard's tune as a model. "The Wallflower," with responses from "Louie Louie" songwriter Richard Berry, made James an R&B star.

Her signing to Chess introduced her to a broader audience, as the record label's co-owner, Leonard Chess, believed she should do pop hits. Among her recordings were "Stormy Weather," the Lena Horne classic originally from 1933; "A Sunday Kind of Love," which dates from 1946; and most notably, "At Last," a 1941 number that was originally a hit for Glenn Miller.

James' version of "At Last" starts out with swooning strings and the singer enters with confident gusto, dazzlingly maintaining a mood of joy and romance. Though the song failed to make the Top 40 upon its 1961 release -- though it did hit the R&B Top 10 -- its emotional punch has long made it a favorite at weddings.

James' career suffered in the mid-'60s when the British Invasion took over the pop charts and as she fought some personal demons. But she got a boost when she started recording at Rick Hall's FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. Her hits included the brassy "Tell Mama" and the raw "I'd Rather Go Blind," the latter later notably covered by Rod Stewart.

She entered rehab in the 1970s for her drug problem but re-established herself with live performances and an album produced by noted R&B mastermind Jerry Wexler. After another stint in rehab -- this time at the Betty Ford Clinic -- she made a comeback album, "Seven Year Itch," in 1988.

James mastered a range of styles -- from R&B and soul to jazz and blues -- but she was always one step behind the popular genre of the day, said Michael Coyle, a Colgate University professor who has written about jazz and R&B and reviews records for Cadence Magazine.

"She never really got her moment in the sun," Coyle said.

But James soldiered on, and by the end of her life she had made so much meaningful music that she was considered a living legend. "By the mid-'90s, she's survived so long that people start to look up to her," Coyle said.

James was portrayed by pop star Beyonce in the 2008 film "Cadillac Records," about Chess. After Beyonce sang "At Last" at one of President Barack Obama's 2009 inaugural balls, James lashed out: "I can't stand Beyonce. She had no business up there singing my song that I've been singing forever." She later told the New York Daily News she was joking.

Earlier this year, news reports revealed that the singer's estate was being contested in a legal struggle between her husband, Artis Mills, and son Donto James. (Donto and her other son, Sametto, both played in her band.)

Over the years, James had her share of health problems. In the late 1990s she reportedly weighed more than 400 pounds and required a scooter to get around. In 2003 she had gastric bypass surgery and dropped more than half the weight, according to People magazine.

However, until her latest issues, James maintained a steady touring schedule and appeared full of energy even when sitting down -- as she sometimes did on stage, due to bad knees and her weight battles.

Even while sitting down, James gave it her all on stage, singing as though possessed, caressing every note like a long-lost love. If that seemed a little much to critics, well, the legendary singer had a show to put on, she told Quan.

"They said that Etta James is still vulgar," she said in the 2002 interview. "I said, 'Oh, how dare 'em say I'm still real vulgar! I'm vulgar because I dance in the chair?' What would they want me to do? Want me to just be still or something like that?

"I gotta do something."

http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/20/showbiz/etta-james-obit/index.html



ADDigK8LwyE

[AtLast]

(CNN) -- Etta James, whose assertive, earthy voice lit up such hits as "The Wallflower," "Something's Got a Hold on Me" and the wedding favorite "At Last," has died, according to her longtime friend and manager, Lupe De Leon. She was 73.

She died from complications from leukemia with her husband, Artis Mills, and her sons by her side, De Leon said.

She was diagnosed with leukemia in 2010, and also suffered from dementia and hepatitis C. James died at a hospital in Riverside, California. She would have turned 74 Wednesday.

The powerhouse singer, known as "Miss Peaches," lived an eventful life. She first hit the charts as a teenager, taking "The Wallflower (Roll With Me, Henry)" -- an "answer record" to Hank Ballard's "Work With Me, Annie" -- to No. 1 on the R&B charts in 1955. She joined Chess Records in 1960 and had a string of R&B and pop hits, many with lush string arrangements. After a mid-decade fade, she re-emerged in 1967 with a more hard-edged, soulful sound.

Throughout her career, James overcame a heroin addiction, opened for the Rolling Stones, won six Grammys and was voted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Despite her ups and downs -- including a number of health problems -- she maintained an optimistic attitude.

"Most of the songs I sing, they have that blue feeling to it. They have that sorry feeling. And I don't know what I'm sorry about," she told CNN's Denise Quan in 2002. "I don't!"

Through it all, she was a spitfire beloved by contemporaries and young up-and-comers.

"Etta James is unmanageable, and I'm the closest thing she's ever had to a manager," Lupe DeLeon, her manager of 30-plus years, told CNN in admiration.

British songstress Adele named James as one of her favorite singers, along with Aretha Franklin.

"If you were to look up the word singer in the dictionary, you'd see their names," Adele said in an interview.

Etta James was born Jamesetta Hawkins in Los Angeles to a teen mother and unknown father. (She suspected her father was the pool player Minnesota Fats.)

Her birth mother initially took little responsibility and James was raised by a series of people, notably a pair of boardinghouse owners. But she was recognized from a young age for her booming voice, showcased in a South Central Los Angeles church.

In 1950, her mother took her to San Francisco, where James formed a group called the Peaches. Singer Johnny Otis, best known for "Willie and the Hand Jive," discovered her and had her sing a song he wrote using Ballard's tune as a model. "The Wallflower," with responses from "Louie Louie" songwriter Richard Berry, made James an R&B star.

Her signing to Chess introduced her to a broader audience, as the record label's co-owner, Leonard Chess, believed she should do pop hits. Among her recordings were "Stormy Weather," the Lena Horne classic originally from 1933; "A Sunday Kind of Love," which dates from 1946; and most notably, "At Last," a 1941 number that was originally a hit for Glenn Miller.

James' version of "At Last" starts out with swooning strings and the singer enters with confident gusto, dazzlingly maintaining a mood of joy and romance. Though the song failed to make the Top 40 upon its 1961 release -- though it did hit the R&B Top 10 -- its emotional punch has long made it a favorite at weddings.

James' career suffered in the mid-'60s when the British Invasion took over the pop charts and as she fought some personal demons. But she got a boost when she started recording at Rick Hall's FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. Her hits included the brassy "Tell Mama" and the raw "I'd Rather Go Blind," the latter later notably covered by Rod Stewart.

She entered rehab in the 1970s for her drug problem but re-established herself with live performances and an album produced by noted R&B mastermind Jerry Wexler. After another stint in rehab -- this time at the Betty Ford Clinic -- she made a comeback album, "Seven Year Itch," in 1988.

James mastered a range of styles -- from R&B and soul to jazz and blues -- but she was always one step behind the popular genre of the day, said Michael Coyle, a Colgate University professor who has written about jazz and R&B and reviews records for Cadence Magazine.

"She never really got her moment in the sun," Coyle said.

But James soldiered on, and by the end of her life she had made so much meaningful music that she was considered a living legend. "By the mid-'90s, she's survived so long that people start to look up to her," Coyle said.

James was portrayed by pop star Beyonce in the 2008 film "Cadillac Records," about Chess. After Beyonce sang "At Last" at one of President Barack Obama's 2009 inaugural balls, James lashed out: "I can't stand Beyonce. She had no business up there singing my song that I've been singing forever." She later told the New York Daily News she was joking.

Earlier this year, news reports revealed that the singer's estate was being contested in a legal struggle between her husband, Artis Mills, and son Donto James. (Donto and her other son, Sametto, both played in her band.)

Over the years, James had her share of health problems. In the late 1990s she reportedly weighed more than 400 pounds and required a scooter to get around. In 2003 she had gastric bypass surgery and dropped more than half the weight, according to People magazine.

However, until her latest issues, James maintained a steady touring schedule and appeared full of energy even when sitting down -- as she sometimes did on stage, due to bad knees and her weight battles.

Even while sitting down, James gave it her all on stage, singing as though possessed, caressing every note like a long-lost love. If that seemed a little much to critics, well, the legendary singer had a show to put on, she told Quan.

"They said that Etta James is still vulgar," she said in the 2002 interview. "I said, 'Oh, how dare 'em say I'm still real vulgar! I'm vulgar because I dance in the chair?' What would they want me to do? Want me to just be still or something like that?

"I gotta do something."

http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/20/showbiz/etta-james-obit/index.html



ADDigK8LwyE


Yes, Etta, be at peace.

[DapperButch]

Crap. I knew she was in the hospital, and figured her days were numbered. :(

[Vlasta]

(Reuters) - Top Canadian freestyle skier Sarah Burke, seen as an early Olympic gold medal favorite ahead of the 2014 games, died on Thursday from injuries sustained in a training accident in Utah last week, a family spokeswoman said.

Considered one of the leading half-pipe athletes in the world, the 29-year-old was airlifted to Salt Lake City last Tuesday after falling during a half-pipe run in Park City, Utah.

"Sarah passed away peacefully surrounded by those she loved. In accordance with Sarah's wishes, her organs and tissues were donated to save the lives of others," family spokeswoman Iris Yen said in a written statement released to Reuters.

Burke, who was married to fellow skier Rory Bushfield, had surgery last Wednesday at the University of Utah hospital to repair a tear in her vertebral artery, the hospital said.

Yen said that Burke had suffered a ruptured vertebral artery in the fall on the Eagle Superpipe at Park City, which led to a severe intracranial hemorrhage.

"After the operation, numerous neurological examinations, electrodiagnostic tests and imaging studies revealed that Sarah sustained severe irreversible damage to her brain due to lack of oxygen and blood after cardiac arrest," Yen said in the statement.

"While early reports in the media stated that Sarah's injury was a traumatic brain injury, it is important to note that Sarah's condition was the result of a lack of oxygen to the brain during cardiac arrest," she said.

Yen said Burke had been training for upcoming winter events at the time of the accident.

"Our hearts go out to Sarah's husband Rory and her entire family. It's difficult for us to imagine their pain and what they're going through," Peter Judge, chief executive of the Canadian Freestyle Ski Association, said in a statement.

"Sarah was certainly someone who lived life to the fullest and in doing so was a significant example to our community and far beyond," Judge said. "She will be greatly missed by all of us at the CFSA and the entire ski community."

Yen said Burke's family "was moved by the sincere and heartfelt sympathy expressed by people inspired by Sarah from all around the world." A public celebration of Burke's life would be held in the coming weeks, she added.

Burke reached the podium at every career World Cup start and is a four time champion at the X-Games, according to the ski association.


http://ca.news.yahoo.com/canadian-skier-sarah-burke-dies-injuries-spokeswoman-205637711--spt.html

So sad , I can't still can't get over it's was sad day for the entire world , at least people they are in the sports .

[Vlasta]

Kobi , that's an another sad RIP . thank you for posting .

[~Bo]

JoePa (w)

[Inuus]

JoePa (w)

RIP JoePa I hope the last few months of your life wont be what you are remembered for.

[Arwen]

Don't you think Paterno died of a guilty conscience? He KNEW!

[The_Lady_Snow]

One less predator on this earth...

I hope the victims, his family get some kind of peace.

[UofMfan]

You know, I don't wish to disrespect the dead, but...

He knew, he hid it and now he has to meet whomever or whatever he believes in/on and justify that.

I love football, but I don't idolize people, this is where we go wrong.

To me, children are way above football and profits. I wish we could all see that before idolizing someone who covered up something so ugly and damaging.

[Chancie]

I am not happy that Paterno is dead, though I believe his behavior was heinous, and not just at one isolated moment in time.

He died of cancer, and people don't get cancer because they are evil.

I don't especially love football, and I don't understand why so many people love it enough to overlook criminal and immoral behavior.

[~Bo]

He knew??? How do you know that??? Nobody knows that.
Show me your proof that he knew. If you HAVE any.


Just because YOU think he knew, that makes it true? That's just YOUR opinion.

[~Bo]

One less predator on this earth...

I hope the victims, his family get some kind of peace.





What kids did Joe Paterno attack?????

[UofMfan]

He knew??? How do you know that??? Nobody knows that.
Show me your proof that he knew. If you HAVE any.


Just because YOU think he knew, that makes it true? That's just YOUR opinion.



Here is (http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/7200340/joe-paterno-penn-state-nittany-lions-says-true-were-all-fooled), in his own words. He knew.

[~Bo]

You know, I don't wish to disrespect the dead, but...

He knew, he hid it and now he has to meet whomever or whatever he believes in/on and justify that.

I love football, but I don't idolize people, this is where we go wrong.

To me, children are way above football and profits. I wish we could all see that before idolizing someone who covered up something so ugly and damaging.







Where has it been proven???? He only knew when McQueary told him at his kitchen table.

If you know more than anybody else and have proof, please show me.

[Mister Bent]

He knew??? How do you know that??? Nobody knows that.
Show me your proof that he knew. If you HAVE any.


Just because YOU think he knew, that makes it true? That's just YOUR opinion.

Bo, have you seen any news coverage regarding Jerry Sandusky? In case you've somehow missed it, here's (http://abcnews.go.com/US/joe-paterno-delayed-sex-abuse-report-ruin-officials/story?id=15169824#.TxywzCOQ2JM) a pretty convincing report that Paterno "knew."

Even in the reports I've read announcing Joe Paterno's death have included the fact that he knew.

[UofMfan]

Where has it been proven???? He only knew when McQueary told him at his kitchen table.

If you know more than anybody else and have proof, please show me.


Wow.

He knew because McQuary came to him and told him.

That's not good enough for you?

It was good enough to get him fired.

[~Bo]

Here is (http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/7200340/joe-paterno-penn-state-nittany-lions-says-true-were-all-fooled), in his own words. He knew.



I read that whole thing and I saw no where where Joe says he knew before McQueary told him. Can you please show me what paragraph you see it?

[UofMfan]

I read that whole thing and I saw no where where Joe says he knew before McQueary told him. Can you please show me what paragraph you see it?


Who is saying he knew before McQueary told him?

So, hmm for you it is the timing that matters?

I am not sure I can make sense of that. I am sorry, I am stopping here because you seem not only to be really aggressive about this, but unwilling to see the facts.

[~Bo]

Bo, have you seen any news coverage regarding Jerry Sandusky? In case you've somehow missed it, here's (http://abcnews.go.com/US/joe-paterno-delayed-sex-abuse-report-ruin-officials/story?id=15169824#.TxywzCOQ2JM) a pretty convincing report that Paterno "knew."

Even in the reports I've read announcing Joe Paterno's death have included the fact that he knew.



Right......he knew when McQueary told him. He didn't know before that day.

[Kobi]

Joe,

Death is sad. Whether it be the death of a person, the death of a reputation, or the death of an ideal.

To me, you will always be a coach with an unprecedented legacy, a legacy now tainted by the alledged predatory actions of one of your employees. I will never know what all occured during this hideous part of your history at Penn State. I dont know if anyone ever will cuz when people rush to cover their asses, the truth becomes a forgotten part of the process.

Joe, I dont blame you for what happened. What Jerry is accused of doing is horrid but you didnt do it. Jerry did. You had it dropped in your lap. Sometimes it is hard to know what to do in a situation. And sometimes even when you do what you should, it still wont be perceived, in hindsight, as the right thing or the best thing or enough. And you will be called many things for not having done more. What is worse is, every good thing you have done gets pushed aside because people need someone to blame, someone to be responsible, someone who dropped the ball in the scheme of things.

Joe, as someone who was responsible for protecting innocent kids, I have been there. And, I knew what to do and who to report it to, and put my career on the line more than once only to watch the system fail. And when the system failed, I failed. Sometimes, I didnt know what to do or the best thing to do. Sometimes, I maybe didnt act when I should have. I know, regardless, I agonized over it every step of the way. Some things still haunt me and they always will. But, nothing will haunt me more than the look in the eyes of a child I failed.

So, Joe, I am not going to judge you or call you names cuz I know what it is like. I'm just going to say thank you for the memories both good and not so good. Just seems like the right thing to do for another imperfect human being.

[Mister Bent]

Right......he knew when McQueary told him. He didn't know before that day.



So, we're all agreed. He knew.

[~Bo]

Wow.

He knew because McQuary came to him and told him.

That's not good enough for you?

It was good enough to get him fired.



That's what I said. He knew when McQueary told him. But you all are saying he knew before that.

And when McQueary told him, he reported it to his superior. Just like he was required to do.

So what is your beef?? Even the DA said Joe was legally right.


And yes.....I have read and heard all about the Sandusky case. I live in central PA. And I work for the PA Supreme Court and we're involved with the court hearings.
So yeah.......I DO know a little bit about it.

[~Bo]

Joe,

Death is sad. Whether it be the death of a person, the death of a reputation, or the death of an ideal.

To me, you will always be a coach with an unprecedented legacy, a legacy now tainted by the alledged predatory actions of one of your employees. I will never know what all occured during this hideous part of your history at Penn State. I dont know if anyone ever will cuz when people rush to cover their asses, the truth becomes a forgotten part of the process.

Joe, I dont blame you for what happened. What Jerry is accused of doing is horrid but you didnt do it. Jerry did. You had it dropped in your lap. Sometimes it is hard to know what to do in a situation. And sometimes even when you do what you should, it still wont be perceived, in hindsight, as the right thing or the best thing or enough. And you will be called many things for not having done more. What is worse is, every good thing you have done gets pushed aside because people need someone to blame, someone to be responsible, someone who dropped the ball in the scheme of things.

Joe, as someone who was responsible for protecting innocent kids, I have been there. And, I knew what to do and who to report it to, and put my career on the line more than once only to watch the system fail. And when the system failed, I failed. Sometimes, I didnt know what to do or the best thing to do. Sometimes, I maybe didnt act when I should have. I know, regardless, I agonized over it every step of the way. Some things still haunt me and they always will. But, nothing will haunt me more than the look in the eyes of a child I failed.

So, Joe, I am not going to judge you or call you names cuz I know what it is like. I'm just going to say thank you for the memories both good and not so good. Just seems like the right thing to do for another imperfect human being.










Exactly. Thanks

[~Bo]

So, we're all agreed. He knew.




Right. And when he was told, he reported it. So why are you all attacking him?? HE didn't abuse the kids. Sandusky did. So how does that make Joe a preditor?

[The_Lady_Snow]

Paterno's football "legacy" was built the backs of children who came from single parent homes, under priveledged kids that to him and any other classist POS person that stood by quietly knowing one of their own was/ is/ and would still be molesting children if he hadn't of been "retired".. Paterno kept his yap shut alllllll that power and position and his "right hand" continued to abuse children...

Not once did Paterno scream out HEY KIDS ARE BEING abused...

[UofMfan]

~ Bo, I said in my post I was going to stop. So I am going to kindly ask you to stop leaving me rep messages about this.

Thank you.

[~Bo]

~ Bo, I said in my post I was going to stop. So I am going to kindly ask you to stop leaving me rep messages about this.

Thank you.




Sure thing. And you please stop leaving them for me too. Thanks

[~Bo]

Paterno's football "legacy" was built the backs of children who came from single parent homes, under priveledged kids that to him and any other classist POS person that stood by quietly knowing one of their own was/ is/ and would still be molesting children if he hadn't of been "retired".. Paterno kept his yap shut alllllll that power and position and his "right hand" continued to abuse children...

Not once did Paterno scream out HEY KIDS ARE BEING abused...



I don't understand what you're saying here, Snowy. It's going over my head.
But Joe has mentored hundreds of players and I've never heard any of them say anything bad about him.

I cannot see how you can say JoePA abused any kids.

[The_Lady_Snow]

I don't understand what you're saying here, Snowy. It's going over my head.
But Joe has mentored hundreds of players and I've never heard any of them say anything bad about him.

I cannot see how you can say JoePA abused any kids.



Bo, when keeps quiet about any kind of abuse against a child, when a person doesn't take their right hand man tithe side and ask WTF are you doing showering with children!, when a person in a position of power like Paterno turns a blind eye it harms kids and there are children that were harmed.

It's been reported that Paterno was fired for "covering up the incidents" and also failing to notify authorities and when he did he didn't tell the full truth, so if he hadn't of passed he may have been brought up on perjury charges.

That to me is just as bad as what Sandusky did, he and any other POS Penn State official who knew are just as guilty..

These children were abused under the Paterno watch, he is disgusting

[The_Lady_Snow]

PS

I'm gonna shush now cause I feel really strong about child abusers and their enablers. Plus nothing anyone says will change my view of a POS.

:)

[Chancie]

I am not happy that a man is dead, but seriously, I forgot how important football is to some people.

[weatherboi]

Evidently a patriarchal group of men thought football was more important than a group of young boys safety.

[Vlasta]

PS

I'm gonna shush now cause I feel really strong about child abusers and their enablers. Plus nothing anyone says will change my view of a POS.

:)



100% agree with you , I will not add fuel to the fire as I already see . I just say it's disgusting to me as well .

[PaPa]

Being from Happy Valley has gotten my blood boiling more than once on this case. If you believe everything from the media, then unfortunately our schools are not teaching enough. Without the facts people are making misinformed statements and flying off the handle and it still doesn't mean anything when tomorrow comes because none of this blabbering is changing the lives of the kids who were affected.

I know which side I stand on with this, but it does me no good to defend or crucify because ya know what? The kids lives are still altered whether you choose to argue this point or not.

As a side note...JoePa did report. The police dropped it!! They dropped the flippin' ball. The dead/missing DA even believed Sandusky was innocent. Of course if you knew all of the facts then you would have known a DA from here also turned up missing after the first allegation and his statement that he was cleared.

Second of all, the sick pervert Sandusky used his non-profit troubled kids agency as a way to find young boys and yes most of them were underprivileged or poor. I actually have friends in the Mental Health field who sent young troubled boys to that agency and you have NO CLUE WHATSOEVER how much guilt those persons feel today to know these kids lives were already screwed up and they sent them into the possible hands of a monster. People are too busy looking to JoePa because of his name and status in the college, but guess what JoePa had a superior too. In case you forgot he was fired. He was the middleman, but yet his superiors are not taking this heat. His superiors Failed. Why are they not the targets of this crime as well? The higher ups in a university that I attended failed miserably. They failed the community, the college students and staff, and MOST importantly the children. RIP JoePa. Nobody knows the turmoil you lived and the communications you had with God before your time was done here on Earth. It's time for us to live in the solution not the problem. So RIP.

[The_Lady_Snow]

For every kid that was molested AFTER Paterno had the KNOWING makes him an accomplice and EVERYONE else that knew. They are just as guilty.. What's sad is football and it's reputable so called "leaders" are more sympathized than these kids are and that's what's gross to me...

[Kobi]

Actor James Farentino, who appeared in dozens of movies and television shows, died Tuesday in a Los Angeles hospital, according to a family spokesman. He was 73.

Farentino died of heart failure at Cedars-Sinai Hospital after a long illness, said the spokesman, Bob Palmer.

Among his many television appearances, Farentino guest-starred in 1964 with Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., in the episode "Super-Star" of the CBS drama series, The Reporter, with Harry Guardino in the starring role of journalist Danny Taylor of the fictitious New York Globe newspaper. Early in 1967, he appeared in Barry Sullivan's NBC western series The Road West in the episode "Reap the Whirlwind".

In 1969, he starred opposite Patty Duke in the film Me, Natalie. Farentino was one of the lawyers in NBC TV series The Bold Ones (1969–1972) which also starred Burl Ives and Joseph Campanella. He made two appearances in the 1970s anthology television series Night Gallery, once with then wife Michele Lee ("Since Aunt Ada Came to Stay"), and secondly with actress Joanna Pettet ("The Girl With The Hungry Eyes"). In the 1970s, he appeared in an NBC Mystery Movie, Cool Million. In 1978, Farentino was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Performance by a Supporting Actor in a Comedy or Drama Special for his portrayal of Saint Peter in the mini-series, Jesus of Nazareth.

In 1980, Farentino starred in The Final Countdown with Kirk Douglas and Martin Sheen. In the movie, the super carrier U.S.S. Nimitz (captained by Douglas) is sent back in time by a strange storm at sea to December 6, 1941 (the day before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor) The Captain must decide whether to use the force of the modern warship Nimitz to stop the attack or to allow history to proceed as "normal". Farentino appeared as "Frank Chaney" in the short-lived 1984 ABC series Blue Thunder, based on the 1983 film of the same name starring Roy Scheider. (The 11-episode series, which starred a then-unknown Dana Carvey, was released on DVD in August 2006.) In the late 1990s, he appeared as Doug Ross' estranged father, "Ray", on ER.



http://www.wearysloth.com/Gallery/ActorsF/5494.gif

[DapperButch]

He was excellent in Jesus of Nazareth.

[Kobi]

Basking in the warmth of childhood memories on this one.


By Claire Noland, Los Angeles Times
January 25, 2012

Dick Tufeld, a longtime radio and TV announcer who intoned "Danger, Will Robinson!" as the voice of the Robot in the 1960s science-fiction TV series "Lost in Space," has died. He was 85.

Tufeld died Sunday at his home in Studio City while watching the NFL playoffs, his family said. He had heart disease and had been in declining health since sustaining a fall last year.

In "Lost in Space," producer Irwin Allen's futuristic retelling of the "Swiss Family Robinson" story that aired on CBS from 1965 to 1968, actor Bob May wore the Robot costume and Tufeld provided the voice.

Besides warning young Will Robinson of impending danger, Tufeld's Robot uttered other lines that became catchphrases for faithful viewers — including "That does not compute" — and needled the antagonistic Dr. Zachary Smith with barbs like "Dr. Smith is a bubble-headed booby."

Tufeld was the announcer for Allen's other TV shows, including "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" and "The Time Tunnel," and his narration and other voice-over work could be heard on an array of TV programs. He introduced many Walt Disney productions, notably the 1950s TV series "Zorro" and Disney's long-running prime-time anthology series.

His other TV credits from the '50s through the '90s included "Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends," "The Fantastic Four," "The Gallant Men," "Surfside 6," "Annie Oakley" and variety shows starring Judy Garland and Julie Andrews.

Richard Norton Tufeld was born Dec. 11, 1926, in Los Angeles to Tanya and Bentley Tufeld and raised in Pasadena. He grew up entranced by the radio fiction of "The Shadow" and "The Green Hornet" and rehearsed his own play-by-play accounts of sporting events.

After studying speech at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., he returned to Los Angeles and began working in radio. Beginning in 1949 he was the announcer for ABC radio's "The Amazing Mr. Malone" and "Falstaff's Fables" before becoming the narrator for "Space Patrol," a science-fiction serial on radio.

"Space Patrol!" Tufeld cried out at the beginning of the show. "High adventure in the wild vast reaches of space ... missions of daring in the name of interplanetary justice. Travel into the future with Buzz Corry ... commander-in-chief of ... the Space Patrol!"

Tufeld also worked as a sports and news announcer for local TV and radio stations and narrated hundreds of commercials.

He returned as the voice of the Robot in the 1998 "Lost in Space" feature film. By 2004 he was still playing the Robot, for an episode of "The Simpsons."

Tufeld's wife of 56 years, Adrienne, died in 2004. He is survived by sons Bruce and Craig, daughters Lynn and Melissa, six grandchildren and a brother, Howard "Bud" Tufeld.

[Kobi]

http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.1012656.1327650060!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_200/image.jpg



Robert Hegyes, one of the Sweathogs on the immortal New York high school comedy “Welcome Back, Kotter,” died Thursday after suffering apparent heart failure at his Metuchen, N.J., home.

On “Kotter,” Hegyes played Juan Luis Pedro Philippo DeHuevos Epstein, a Puerto Rican Jew who was known for his tall hair, short stature, big mouth and large attitude.

His signatures on the show included a large red handkerchief in his rear pocket. He also wrote regular notes to the teacher, Gabe Kaplan’s Mr. Kotter, that asked he be excused from various activities, including his classes.

They were always signed, “Epstein’s Mother,” and when Kotter read them aloud, Epstein would mouth the words.

Born in Perth Amboy, N.J., Hegyes graduated from Metuchen High School and Glassboro State College, now Rowan University, before moving to New York to join a children’s acting company, Theater in a Trunk.

He auditioned for the Epstein role and landed it, playing alongside John Travolta’s Vinnie Barbarino, Ron Palillo’s Arnold Horshak and Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs’ Boom Boom Washington.

After “Kotter” he stayed in acting, guesting on shows like “NewsRadio,” “Drew Carey” and “Saturday Night Live.”

He became a regular as Detective Manny Epstein on “Cagney and Lacey.”

He always said his acting idol was Chico Marx, whom he would occasionally imitate on “Kotter,” and he played Chico in a stage production of “An Evening With Groucho.”


Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/television/robert-hegyes-played-sweathog-epstein-back-kotter-dies-60-article-1.1012658#ixzz1keHGh46t

[MsTinkerbelly]

Don Cornelius Commits Suicide

What a shocker. Soul Train creator Don Cornelius has apparently committed suicide at the age of 75. Here's what little is known so far.

"Soul Train" creator Don Cornelius was found dead at his Sherman Oaks on home Wednesday morning. Law enforcement sources said police arrived at Cornelius' home around 4 a.m. He apparently died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, according to sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the case was ongoing. The sources said there was no sign of foul play, but the Los Angeles Police Department was investigating.

[SnackTime]

Rest In Peace Don Cornelius!

I read a article on facebook, Jesse Jackson reported that he talked to Cornelius a few days ago and there were no signs of him being upset.

[Gentle Tiger]

Be at peace Mr. Cornelius. Thank you for everything you did! You paved the way for many and made it possible for me to see people who looked like me on television growing up.

[Gentle Tiger]

Camilla Williams, first black opera diva, dies at 92 (http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/entertainment/music/news-and-interviews/Camilla-Williams-first-black-opera-diva-dies-at-92/articleshow/11711818.cms)

Thank you for sharing your gift and paving the way for others.

[MsTinkerbelly]

Don Cornelius took 'Soul Train' on pioneering trip
Feb. 1, 2012, 3:28 PM EST

NEW YORK (AP) -- In an era when Beyonce and Jay-Z are music royalty, when Barack Obama is the nation's chief executive and when black stars in the cast of a TV show are commonplace, it may be hard to grasp the magnitude of what Don Cornelius created once he got his "Soul Train" rolling.

Yes, the syndicated series delivered the music of Earth Wind & Fire, the Jacksons, Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder into America's households, infusing them with soul in weekly doses. Yes, it gave viewers groovy dances and Afro-envy, helping get them hip to a funky world that many had never experienced, or maybe even suspected.

But it was more than that. Before BET would give African-Americans their own channel, and before black music and faces found their way to MTV videos as well as network dramas and comedies, "Soul Train" became a pioneering outlet for a culture whose access to television was strictly limited.

"Most of what we get credit for is people saying, 'I learned how to dance from watching "Soul Train" back in the day,'" Cornelius told Vibe magazine in 2006. "But what I take credit for is that there were no black television commercials to speak of before 'Soul Train.' There were few black faces in those ads before 'Soul Train.'

"And what I am most proud of," he added, "is that we made television history."

"Soul Train" (which went on for 35 seasons) didn't make history just by influencing the music charts. It served as a pop-culture preview and barometer of fashion, hairstyles and urban patois.

By some measure, "Soul Train" was the equivalent of Dick Clark's "American Bandstand," although belatedly. Arriving on the wave of the Civil Rights Era, it premiered 13 years after "Bandstand" went national, then took a while longer to attract local stations to air it and advertisers to support it.

From there, it became a Saturday afternoon ritual as soul and rap artists (and white artists, too, including Elton John and David Bowie) showed off their latest releases while kids responded on the dance floor.

"When you come up with a good idea, you don't have to do a whole lot," Cornelius told The New York Times in 1996 in describing his show's formula. "The idea does it for you."

On "Soul Train" ("the hippest trip in America," the announcer proclaimed, "across the tracks of your mind") the host, of course, was Cornelius, but to describe him as the black Dick Clark is somewhat misleading. (A bit like calling Pat Boone the white Little Richard, as David Bianculli noted in his "Dictionary of Teleliteracy.")

For Cornelius, the difference was all in the execution, as he told The Associated Press in 1995.

"If I saw 'American Bandstand' and I saw dancing and I knew black kids can dance better; and I saw white artists and I knew black artists make better music; and if I saw a white host and I knew a black host could project a hipper line of speech — and I DID know all these things," then it was reasonable to try, he said.

On his show, Cornelius was the epitome of cool, with a baritone rumble that recalled seductive soul maestro Barry White, and an unflappable manner.

He laced his show with pro-social messages directed at his black audience.

On a 1974 program, he interviewed James Brown about the tragedy of violence in black communities ("black-on-black crime looks very bad in the sight of The Man," Brown said sorrowfully). Then he brought on a 19-year-old Al Sharpton, already a civil rights activist, who presented Brown with an award for his music.

But Cornelius never let preaching get in the way of "Soul Train"'s hipness — or of his own.

Standing by Mary Wilson of the Supremes on another edition, he displayed a slim black suit that flared into bellbottoms, a gray shirt with white polka dots and a huge afro.

"What do you do for kicks?" he asked Wilson, who mentioned bowling as one hobby, but said how much she wanted to dance with Cornelius on "Soul Train."

"You can dance with me," Cornelius replied. "But not on television."

[The_Lady_Snow]

First Don, now you.... You are phenomenal woman, and you will be missed...

RIP



http://idolator.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/Whitney-Houston-Brisbane-2010.jpg


H7_sqdkaAfo



:candle:

[DapperButch]

http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/whitney-houston-superstar-records-films-dies-15565063


Was just looking for this thread to post the above, when I saw Snow's post.

She had an amazing voice. I really feel saddened by this.

[LeftWriteFemme]

mRIx1ceFEqY


Addiction is no respecter of persons it takes the great and unknown alike, but I have to say I had hoped it would be different for her. I am so sorry she is gone.

[Gentle Tiger]

I am just now seeing this! And for several reasons this hits hard! I can't believe this. This has to be incorrect. It can't be right.

May you finally know real peace Whitney.(f)

[princessbelle]

It's really just so hard to believe.

She was just beautiful in so many, many ways.

The world will miss her. She was just magical.

[always2late]

I am so shocked and saddened. What an amazing voice and incredible talent. RIP Whitney.

[girl_dee]

She will always be a DIVA and much more.

[DapperButch]

She was just magical.

Magical really is the right word. I graduated from high school in 1988, so Whitney was a big singer in my high school years.

Now, you guys are going to think me whacked, but this is no bullshit.

I took at nap between 6:30 - 7:00pm tonight. During that nap I had a dream about Whitney. Well, really, it was a dream about a high school friend who I haven't thought about in a long time who was a huge fan of hers. The dream/ensuing wakeful thinking, was about my friend and her attachment to Whitney. I mean, I can't even tell you the last time I thought about Whitney Houston.

An hour after I wake up I read about this. How weird is that?

[princessbelle]

Magical really is the right word. I graduated from high school in 1988, so Whitney was a big singer in my high school years.

Now, you guys are going to think me whacked, but this is no bullshit.

I took at nap between 6:30 - 7:00pm tonight. During that nap I had a dream about Whitney. Well, really, it was a dream about a high school friend who I haven't thought about in a long time who was a huge fan of hers. The dream/ensuing wakeful thinking, was about my friend and her attachment to Whitney. I mean, I can't even tell you the last time I thought about Whitney Houston.

An hour after I wake up I read about this. How weird is that?

I don't find that weird at all or maybe i don't find that weird because i'm weird. But, weirdly enough, i was thinking about Whitney just yesterday and even said to my mom "What ever happened to Whitney Houston, i haven't heard about her in a long time". My mom's response was "Well, we can only hope she is alive and happy somewhere."

So yeah....weird. I agree.

I'm just so freaking sad over this. I'm listening to all these songs and words people have posted and crying. Its so terribly sad. I truly believe she was an angel on earth.

She blessed so many people with her voice, her smile, her strength and her radiance.

[Gráinne]

Well, I'm weird, too, then :(. For some reason, I was just belting out "Wanna Dance With Someone" yesterday in the car, and hoping she would get back on track and make a comeback. It's been years since I heard one of her songs. I read she even had some work coming up and was clean.

I'm more torn up over this than losing the wreck that Michael Jackson had become.

[macele]

talent, just natural born talent. she was put on this earth to sing. and sing she did. i sure am sorry to hear this.

walking thru the house about a week ago, i over heard the tv ... talking about her addiction. she lived on the edge.

may you rest in peace, whitney houston.

[Mr Nice Guy]

I just can't believe it, I'm shocked.

[mustangjeano]

I just heard about Whiyney on Tv. I can't believe it. Her music was such a part of my life especially in the eighties. What a voice. She was a master! I was really hoping that she would soon come back better than she had been for quite awhile. Such a loss.

[Skittlesluver]

Sad Sad day for the music world...Whitney was a great performer and an awesome singer....R.I.P. Whitney :vigil:

[Okiebug61]

I cant' believe the media makes us watch a 30 second bank commercial to listen to her sing the national anthem. I so *(*** sick of corporate commercial CADFADFDSDSSDf I could puke. God Bless you Whitney.

[~ocean]

** sings I will always love you ** rip whitney

[Scuba]

Tragic indeed...in life and in death...

[Leigh]

R.I.P. Whitney, you will for sure be missed :(

[Mtn]

It's a very sad loss, but I hope her life lessons will be absorbed by the up and coming artists, RIP Whitney, few have ever been able to carry a note like you.

[MissItalianDiva]

Such a tragic loss. I had the honor of seeing and meeting her when I was a little girl while my dad was working on a production. The strength of her voice and her energy I will NEVER forgot. RIP Whitney...

[Greyson]

May she rest in peace. Certainly one of the best. I am not trying to be disrespectful in any way here. Do any of you remember before she married Bobby Brown all the rumors that she was a lesbian? She had the "friend" that was I believe a friend of her childhood. The friend played basketball and was her constant companion. I wonder where this woman is tonight.

My condolances to Whitney's daughter, mother, her ex-husband, her entire family and all of the people, fans who loved her.

[musicman]

There was a time when I was able to walk long distances. I chose to walk in a local cemetery. It was peaceful and serene albeit for a male in his 30's who obviously lost his wife at a young age. He had his car door open and blasting out of the speakers was Whitney's song I will Always Love You. It was hard to hear the song over this young man's wailing. In watching the tributes of Whitney last night and hearing that song it brought me back to a young man's lost. I wonder what he is feeling today as we all try to deal with this tragic lost.

[AtLast]

Whitney Houston had an amazing range and depth in voice- one of the greatest we will ever know. Her ability to change keys in the middle of a song like it was routine was a vocal talent few have ever had.

Of course there is a lot of speculation about her death. We will have to wait for causation. Something on my mind is that due to her longterm coke use, her heart could have very well been damaged and it might end up she died of heart failure without any drugs in her system. I fear suicide as well because she was struggling so much with her music career comeback and dif lose some of her voice range. And her being an abused woman that obviously had poor self-esteem. yes, even someone as beautiful and talented as her can have low self-esteem- happens all of the time. Also, I hope to hell that she did not have one of the Hollywood docs to the stars that scripted her narcotics for sleep, etc. and her death was due to prescription drug abuse along with alcohol. Thinking about Heath Ledger and MJ (others) here.

She struggled so much with getting clean & sober and being able to remain so. It is like this for some addicts especially if they never get to the emotional components of their addiction. And like so many stars, she could never get away from the media when in crisis.

I feel really sad about this because it might be a story we have heard far too often about the deaths of music icons that have brought something extraordinary to their art. My heart goes out to her family and especially her young daughter.

I hope people see beyond the addiction and poor choices in her life plus just plain being fragile at certain points and see that she was simply human dealing with things that for most people are not judged continually in the public eye.

[SnackTime]

Rest In Peace Whitney Houston! You will be dearly missed.

My thoughts and prayers go out to her family

I just heard on the news a little while ago, she passed in her hotel room hours before Clive Davis' Grammy party. They reported, finding prescription medication(s), but no illegal drugs were found.

[DapperButch]

May she rest in peace. Certainly one of the best. I am not trying to be disrespectful in any way here. Do any of you remember before she married Bobby Brown all the rumors that she was a lesbian? She had the "friend" that was I believe a friend of her childhood. The friend played basketball and was her constant companion. I wonder where this woman is tonight.

My condolances to Whitney's daughter, mother, her ex-husband, her entire family and all of the people, fans who loved her.

Robin Crawford.

[SugarFemme]

Whitney, I hope you are able to find the peace that you so desperately sought in life. You will be missed. You touched many many lives. Including mine.

[adorable]

http://i1152.photobucket.com/albums/p488/Anglilbadgirl/whitney.jpg

[UofMfan]

http://keanu.reeves.mediafetcher.com/news/top_stories/actor_skiing.php

Keanu Reeves reported dead


The link you posted doesn't work and I have not found any credible news sources reporting this.

[SoulShineFemme]

http://keanu.reeves.mediafetcher.com/news/top_stories/actor_skiing.php

Keanu Reeves reported dead

Down at the bottom of the page this link leads to there is a disclaimer that the website is 100% fake.

[GPS]

Down at the bottom of the page this link leads to there is a disclaimer that the website is 100% fake.

nice, my apologies

[UofMfan]

http://keanu.reeves.mediafetcher.com/news/top_stories/actor_skiing.php

this link is working all over facebook


This one is. Still nothing in the major news feeds.

Hoaxes are easily done, this is why I always check credible sources.

[SoulShineFemme]

nice, my apologies

No worries. I'm just so glad the story wasn't true. I was kinda freaking out there for a min. :)

[GPS]

This one is. Still nothing in the major news feeds.

Hoaxes are easily done, this is why I always check credible sources.

i feel bad enough lol so i deleted them luckily i could do that. i have searched all over. i will watch and read before posting a death

[UofMfan]

i feel bad enough lol so i deleted them luckily i could do that. i have searched all over. i will watch and read before posting a death


Thank you. Due diligence is important when posting any such news.

[CherylNYC]

I was and am inspired by this woman's life and work.

(I'm really bad at this, so this link may or may not work.)

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/12/us/patricia-stephens-due-civil-rights-leader-dies-at-72.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y

Patricia Stephens Due Dies at 72; Campaigned for Civil Rights

Frank Noel, courtesy of the State Archives of Florida
Patricia Stephens Due, center, in a protest at a segregated theater in 1963 in Tallahassee, Fla.
By DOUGLAS MARTIN
Published: February 11, 2012
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Patricia Stephens Due, whose belief that, as she put it, “ordinary people can do extraordinary things” propelled her to leadership in the civil rights movement — but at a price, including 49 days in a stark Florida jail — died on Tuesday in Smyrna, Ga. She was 72.

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The cause was thyroid cancer, her daughter Johnita Due said. She had moved to Smyrna, an Atlanta suburb, to be near her family after living in Miami.

At 13, Patricia Stephens challenged Jim Crow orthodoxy by trying to use the “whites only” window at a Dairy Queen. As a college student, she led demonstrations to integrate lunch counters, theaters and swimming pools and was repeatedly arrested.

As a young mother, she pushed two children in a stroller while campaigning for the rights of poor people. As a veteran of integration and voting rights battles, she went on to fight for economic rights, once obstructing a garbage truck in support of striking workers. As an elder stateswoman of the movement, she wrote a memoir to honor “unsung foot soldiers.”

She fought beside John D. Due Jr., a civil rights lawyer, whom she married in 1963. For their honeymoon, they rode the Freedom Train to Washington to hear the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. give his “I Have a Dream” speech.

Mrs. Due paid a price for this devotion. She wore large, dark glasses day and night because her eyes were damaged when a hissing tear gas canister hit her in the face. She took a decade to graduate from Florida A&M University because of suspensions for her activism.

Her F.B.I. file ran more than 400 pages. Her stepfather urged her to give up civil rights, to protect her and his own job. She was kicked and threatened with dogs, including a German shepherd whose police handlers gave it a racial slur for a name.

Mrs. Due’s greatest prominence came after she and 10 other students were arrested for sitting at the “whites only” lunch counter at a Woolworth’s store in Tallahassee, Fla., on Feb. 20, 1960. It was 19 days after four black students in Greensboro, N.C., had made civil rights history by doing the same thing.

Mrs. Due and seven others refused to pay $300 fines for violating laws they abhorred. Five served the full 49-day sentence.

As leader of the sit-in, Mrs. Due became a national figure. Jackie Robinson sent her a diary for her jail-time thoughts. James Baldwin, Harry Belafonte and Eleanor Roosevelt endorsed her efforts. Dr. King sent a telegram saying, “Going to jail for a righteous cause is a badge of honor and a symbol of dignity.”

It was not easy behind bars. She and her sister, Priscilla Stephens Kruize, her compatriot in many battles, had to share a narrow bed. They suspected that a mentally disturbed woman was placed in the cell to unnerve them. Food was awful; nights were cold.

Thurgood Marshall, head of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, questioned whether it was all worth it, given the deplorable state of Southern jails. But the drama of righteous incarceration seized the nation’s attention, a freed Mrs. Due went on a national fund-raising tour and the “jail-in” became a movement standard.

Patricia Gloria Stephens was born on Dec. 9, 1939, in Quincy, Fla., and was raised in Belle Glade, Fla. As high school students, she and Priscilla, who was 15 months older, started a petition to have the principal removed, The Miami Herald reported in 1990. Patricia said the two were “always testing things.”

In 1959, she formed a local chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality. It was the beginning of life as “a professional volunteer,” in her daughter’s words. She worked with youths, helped out in political campaigns and spoke on human rights issues. In the last year of her life, state, county and local governments in Florida honored her.

In addition to her husband of 49 years, her sister and her daughter, Mrs. Due is survived by two other daughters, Tananarive Due and Lydia Due Greisz; a brother, Walter Stephens; and five grandchildren.

In 2003, Mrs. Due and her daughter Tananarive, a novelist, wrote “Freedom in the Family: A Mother-Daughter Memoir of the Fight for Civil Rights.” The book discusses thorny issues like black people’s ambivalence about the civil rights struggle in the movement’s early days and the emotional turmoil of children whose parents are activists. It also contains many tales of courage.

“Stories live forever,” Mrs. Due liked to say. “Storytellers don’t.”

[Lady Pamela]

Miss Whitney Houston dies at 48


Miss Houston, May you sore free now and your transendance be beautiful and all you ever imagined and then some!
Thank you not only for your voice but also for being such a powerful role model with domestic abuse.
You helped many see it was possible to get out and leave.

You will be seriously missed by many, myself most definately included.

http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2012/02/11/whitney-houston-dies-at-48/


.

[Chancie]

May she rest in peace. Certainly one of the best. I am not trying to be disrespectful in any way here. Do any of you remember before she married Bobby Brown all the rumors that she was a lesbian? She had the "friend" that was I believe a friend of her childhood. The friend played basketball and was her constant companion. I wonder where this woman is tonight.

My condolances to Whitney's daughter, mother, her ex-husband, her entire family and all of the people, fans who loved her.

I can't believe that Whitney Houston is dead.

I came out in the '80s and I remember dancing to her music at the Duchess in the West Village. I always thought that she had a gorgeous strong powerful voice. Years later, when she was a guest on Saturday Night Live, she was hysterically funny in a skit with that little girl who used to smell her own armpits.

I did hear rumors that she was a lesbian and I remember her saying, I'm not a gay girl. Why would I be a gay girl? People said, Why doesn't she just say, I'm not a lesbian, but so what if I was.

When I heard that she was struggling with drugs and alcohol, I did wonder if her own internalized homophobia contributed to her suffering, and I felt so sad for her.

Of course I don't know whether she had a girlfriend, or was a lesbian, or that she died from drug use, poor thing.

[tapu]

Oh, sure, everyone cares about Whitney Houston dying, but what about the 86 Syrians who lost their lives today? Is it because they're white??

[princessbelle]

Oh, sure, everyone cares about Whitney Houston dying, but what about the 86 Syrians who lost their lives today? Is it because they're white??

Please, please tell me this is a joke!!!! Are you freaking kidding me Tapu? I don't believe i've heard a word said about Syrians and that no one cared. Is it because no one mentioned it? For real? What about the millions of POC AND white people that die and have died daily in wars, in epidemics, due to no food or shelter, and continue to die daily, world wide....are YOU saying you don't care about them now? Because you didn't mention those people either?????

I don't get steamed about many things on here but this has got my blood boiling.

Because we mention someone famous dying and just because she so happens to be a POC, now we are all "haters of whites"? Really????????

That's beyond rediculous!!!!!

[SugarFemme]

Are you serious?? Do you realize how racist this post is?? Your post was so wrong and offensive on may levels. We have all posted out of emotion, but sometimes you have to think about how what you say will hurt others.




Oh, sure, everyone cares about Whitney Houston dying, but what about the 86 Syrians who lost their lives today? Is it because they're white??

[CherylNYC]

Oh, sure, everyone cares about Whitney Houston dying, but what about the 86 Syrians who lost their lives today? Is it because they're white??

I've never reported a post before. This one is beyond the pale.

[Janny]

The fact that none of you get it, is beyond the pale.

[DapperButch]

Oh, sure, everyone cares about Whitney Houston dying, but what about the 86 Syrians who lost their lives today? Is it because they're white??

What the hell, dude? If this is a joke, it is a poor one. Really, guy. This is the RIP thread for the death of well known figures.

[DapperButch]

The fact that none of you get it, is beyond the pale.

I "get it", I just don't find it humorous.

[tapu]

I "get it", I just don't find it humorous.


Well, let me hear how you explain it.

[tapu]

Here's what I have to say after hearing various reactions, and I'll stand by it:

I'm truly sorry that some are offended, but when I think of a line like that that exposes and challenges the dominant paradigm in our society, I can't concern myself with who won't get it. There will always be those who don't. I still have to just grit my teeth and post it. Believe me: If you got the joke, you'd love it.

[BullDog]

Tapu you aren't challenging any paradigms. You're racist.

[girl_dee]

i wish i hadn't *gotten it* or read that post. "Humor" in the name of racism is still racism. What an insult to the intelligence of the reader.

[clay]

Whether "humor or not" , a place where readers are paying respect and their condolences to anyone who has passed is NOT the place to be posting such remarks. It was simply rude and disrespectful to all of us here!, not to mention to the Memory of the departed...and in very poor taste...SMH.....I just can't believe that remark was even posted here!

[CherylNYC]

Well, let me hear how you explain it.

Well, I would prefer to hear how YOU explain it, tapu.

[nycfem]

MODERATION

Tapu,

We're placing you on time-out for a month with the hope that this will give you some time to think about how you can contribute to the community in a positive way. The mod/admin team deems your post to be racist, incredibly insensitive, and not appropriate "humor."

Jennifer

[Mr Nice Guy]

I still cant believe she's gone. My friends and I all stunned.

[clay]

I still cant believe she's gone. My friends and I all stunned.

it does seem so surreal, doesn't it? I smile and think what an awesome and incredibly happy time all those greats of the music industry must be having where they all are....Rock N Roll Heaven...can you just imagine how wonderful the music is? smiling...

[Martina]

i never got what was funny.

Whatever. Racist. i am glad that action was taken.

[CherylNYC]

i never got what was funny.

Whatever. Racist. i am glad that action was taken.

It wasn't funny. Unless you're a racist.

[Ebon]

Calling someone racist is serious business. It was way too soon to be saying such a thing and I get what she was saying even if it was in bad taste and it wasn't funny but I don't think she is racist by a long shot. She's been dealt with now maybe let it rest in peace.

[DapperButch]

Well, let me hear how you explain it.

Baiting people like this is not funny.

[Greyson]

Calling someone racist is serious business. It was way too soon to be saying such a thing and I get what she was saying even if it was in bad taste and it wasn't funny but I don't think she is racist by a long shot. She's been dealt with now maybe let it rest in peace.

Ebon, I agree with you that calling someone a racist is serious business. In the few exchanges I have had with Tapu via rep comments and/or posts, I did not think she was in anyway being offensive toward me in a racist way. I do think all of us can hold racist, homophobic, misogynist ideas, thoughts and actions. Sometimes we are unaware of our stuff because it is subtle or we had never been called on it, yet.

I think Tapu's post was in poor taste and I think Tapu is intelligent enough that at some point she may get it. I also think I did "get it" about the Syrian people being murdered today. Their life is not worthless and yes many of us are very aware of such things.

Sad as it may seem, the Syrian people, their history and astrocities are not imbedded in our conciousness yet, like our pop culture celebrities, and yes they can be our heros too.

[BullDog]

I didn't misunderstand what Tapu said. I got her humor all too well, and I don't say anything lightly. She thought she was "turning the tables" so to speak.

People are free to disagree with me or anyone else as to what is racist or not, but I certainly don't throw the term racist around lightly.

[SugarFemme]

Bully, Ive always respected you and what you post. I UNDERSTAND what you are saying. I get it. But the problem lies in how people "hear" things. What one person might have heard as a joke, offensive or not, another may not have "heard" that same joke. "Jokes" take many forms, but sometimes it is not a joke to someone else. It is just plain hurtful. We cannot always sidestep responsibility by saying, "fuck you it was a joke. Deal with it". People get hurt and get offended whether it was meant to hurt or not. This is just my take on it.



I didn't misunderstand what Tapu said. I got her humor all too well, and I don't say anything lightly. She thought she was "turning the tables" so to speak.

People are free to disagree with me or anyone else as to what is racist or not, but I certainly don't throw the term racist around lightly.

[Leigh]

I'm about to watch the Grammy's, and record it just to have the tribute to Whitney my PVR !!!!!!

[Martina]

wupsPg5H6aE&feature=related

[AtLast]

I remember watching Houston sing the Star Spangled Banner sitting on my sofa by myself and tears pouring down my face. Part of this was just the sheer depth of her voice and its power- and the timing after 9/11 and (a friend worked in Tower 1 and lost friends & co-workers- family of mine live in NYC). I was also struck by her wearing the red, white & blue running suit, not because it was those colors, but it really seemed to represent more everyday people in some way. Also, I thought about how her forceful rendition transcended a lot of how so many African Americans can certainly not always feel that our national anthem represents their true experience in this country (or Native Americans- all POC). But she seemed to draw us so close that day as a people hurting as one. Not to mention that it is perhaps the most difficult song for even the very best vocalists to sing and she not only nailed it vocally, but finally (for me, anyway) made it feel like it belonged to us all on a level that felt so much more open. Chilling in more ways than I ever knew. Brought feelings about national pride that actually felt
OK to me for once.

Something else I have been thinking about is her singing "I Will Always Love You"- her signature and written by (and sung by) Dolly Parton. Parton has said that even though she wrote it, it belongs to Whitney Houston.

[Kobi]

Whitney was a beautiful woman and a wonderful singer. Her death at 48 is just tragic.

My thoughts are with her young daughter who is reportedly experiencing significant difficulty in coping with the loss of her mother. I hope she has a strong network of family and friends to help her with this.

[Leigh]

The tribute last night by Jennifer Hudson almost had me in tears ~ it was beautiful and heartfelt, and Jennifer did a wonderful job :)

[Dominique]

The tribute last night by Jennifer Hudson almost had me in tears ~ it was beautiful and heartfelt, and Jennifer did a wonderful job :)

She sure did. She did not have much time to put that together and I thought she nailed it.

Considering how much domestic abuse Whitney was subjected to, over and over again. I thought Chris Brown need not have been there. That was disrespectful to Whitney, I thought. Again, my opinion. I didn't give it much thought until he showed up a second time. One less appearance may not have made me think this. If Jennifer Hudson could bring something so wonderful to the show, certainly someone else could have filled a Chris Brown slot. His singing wasn't all that.

[Rugged]

Still can't believe it, but not surprised by hearing it. I was working in Newark, her hometown, when I heard of her passing. I didn't believe it until I passed by the church she used to sing in as a child. I saw a line of people putting candles and flowers by the gate. On the radio, Whitney sang her heart out during a celebration of her life. Still can't understand it.... Finally, Whitney is at peace.

[Vlasta]

R.I.P. Whitney, I will always love you , I grew up on your music . I just wish that media would stop dissecting your life and stopped mulching from your death . You were the icon and you stand by your man no matter what . It's disgusting to me a comments on the Internet about you by people faceless behind a monitor . We all have our demons , but we are not public figures . Love you and I am wishing your daughter and family a privacy . God bless .

[DapperButch]

http://www.oprah.com/own/Oprah-Remembers-Whitney-Houston?own


Oprah's 2010 interview with Whitney aired on OWN

[DapperButch]

http://www.oprah.com/own/Oprah-Remembers-Whitney-Houston?own


Oprah's 2010 interview with Whitney aired on OWN

Ooops, sorry, it is tomorrow night.

[ruffryder]

RIP Whitney Houston.

Anyone watching the live stream of her funeral?

http://omg.yahoo.com/whitney-houston-funeral/

[SnackTime]

RIP Whitney Houston

Watching the service on CNN

[Scuba]

One thing that attracts me to an artist and to their music is their authenticity. Tell me a story, make me believe that this is your truth to some degree.

I've not paid much attention to Whitney in my life and in an attempt to overcome judgement (specifically the glorified life of an addict), I sat and watched her videos (music and interviews). Here is what stood out for me.

She loves to sing.
She loves the camera.
She has one hell of a voice.
She has passion and it shows.
She cares deeply.
She loves God.
She lives to move people through music.
She has touched a lot of lives.
She, like all of us, suffers from the human condition.

A person's life should be celebrated despite their mistakes. Imagine the burden of having a gift so beautiful it moves people to tears, instills pride and empowers people...this is the gift Whitney and so many others have given. We should all just be grateful :)

So...on that note :) I invite you to watch this one...it's now one of my favorites.

H7_sqdkaAfo

[Kobi]

Scuba, that was a very sweet and lovely tribute. Thank you for sharing it.

[macele]

i really don't think there is another voice as powerful/beautiful ... as whitney's. i've thought about this, and i just don't think anyone else compares. oprah said that when she hears whitney's voice, ... it's like hearing god.

her voice was/is an inspiration. her voice lifts you up. i get lost, ... in that space of inspiration.

i watched her funeral service. i know that made her rejoice. the service was powerful, beautiful, and inspirational, ... just like whitney. amen.

[Vlasta]

As well known as a resident boo hoo femme , I watched entire service and cry , cry and cry . I personally think was beautiful . I am disgusted , by the fact how people post on Internet such rude, mean and ugly comments on the day of Whitney funeral service . It's disgusting ! Who we are to judge ? There are a many people with addictions just not in a public eye . This it's what is wrong with today society . People are mean , non empathetic and there for themselves . Sad !

[foxyshaman]

I am often drawn to romanticize bravery. I don't know why, nor does it matter if I ever find out why. I have deep respect for war journalists and photographers. I have even deeper respect for Marie Colvin.

Marie Colvin was truly one of a kind. She had bravery I could only dream about. I am truly sorry to hear of her passing. I truly am. To all the brave warriors and the people who bring us "truth" no matter how ugly, I give you my heart.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-17136037

[Kobi]

http://img2.timeinc.net/people/i/2012/news/120312/davy-jones-300.jpg

Monkees singer Davy Jones has died after suffering a heart attack. He was 66.
Martin County, Florida’s Medical Examiner’s Office confirmed the news.
Authorities are still investigating the circumstances surrounding his death, which happened earlier today.

Jones joined the Monkees in 1965 along with Michael Nesmith, Micky Dolenz, and Peter Tork.
Their hits include “I’m a Believer,” “(I’m Not Your) Steppin’ Stone,” “Daydream Believer,” and “Last Train to Clarksville.”

[Kobi]

Mel Parnell, the left-handed pitcher who spent his entire 10-year career with the Boston Red Sox and faced some of the best hitters of the 1940s and early 1950s, has died. He was 89.

Mel Parnell was masterful at Fenway Park even though he pitched in front of the Green Monster, a home run hitter’s dream at only 310 feet down the left field line. Parnell had a career record of 123-75, but he was 70-30 at Fenway.

He still holds the club record for left-handed pitchers in games started, innings and victories. Parnell’s victories rank second in team history, behind Cy Young and Roger Clemens, who each had 192 victories.

[Gemme]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/21/ruby-garrett-butte-montana-madam_n_1369771.html?icid=maing-grid7%7Cmain5%7Cdl18%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D145374


Ruby Garrett, Butte, Montana's last madam died.

BUTTE, Mont. -- Ruby Garrett ran the last brothel standing in this mining town's once-lively red-light district with a reputation for kindness toward her girls, but the grandmotherly figure was also a husband-shooting, tax-evading madam who once said that prostitution should be considered a commodity.

The first time Garrett went to prison, it was for shooting her husband five times in the middle of a card game in 1959. She killed him, she said, because he had abused her repeatedly.

She went to prison again in 1982 for failing to report her earnings. While she was investigated, the sheriff padlocked the doors of the Dumas Hotel in late 1981, marking the end of the brothel that had catered to the miners in the Montana boomtown since 1890.

Butte's last madam died Saturday at Crest Nursing Home at the age of 94, the Duggan-Dolan Mortuary confirmed Tuesday. The cause of her death was not immediately known.

Garrett, also known as Lee Arrigoni, told the Montana Standard in 1991 that prostitution should be considered a commodity instead of being morally wrong.

"If you don't think it's morally wrong, then it's kind of fun," she told the Butte newspaper.

The ex-madam, then in her mid-70s, even had advice for the next generation of women: "These little chippies who will do it for a burger and a beer, I say they might as well sell it."

People who knew Garrett in her later years remembered a kind person who looked out for the women who worked at the Dumas. Ellen Crain, director of the Butte-Silver Bow Archives, said Garrett was a savvy businesswoman who felt strongly about treating the women well and took pride in keeping the brothel clean and orderly.

"She was truly one of the last living legends in Butte, from the end of Butte's famed red light district," said Chris Fisk, a Butte High School history teacher who met Garrett two years ago.

Former Sheriff Bob Butorovich, who shut down the brothel, said prostitution became a fact of life in Butte with so many young, single miners. He said Garrett never held a grudge against him for closing down her establishment.

"She was a wonderful old gal," he said. "Part of Butte history is gone."

She lived in the little town of Divide, south of Butte, and her friends and neighbors were protective of her. The day before she began her six-month prison term in 1982, they threw her a party at the Melrose Bar.

Les Baldwin, one of those who turned out to bid her farewell, told an Associated Press reporter at the party: "I think it's a crime that a fine woman like this is sent to prison. I've done more things wrong than this woman."

Garrett was acquitted of a first-degree murder charge for shooting common-law husband Andy Arrigoni but served nine months for the shooting on a manslaughter conviction. Garrett had said that he beat her, and Crain said she was a domestic-violence victim.

"She was beaten so bad that day that when she walked in that Board of Trade to shoot him, they couldn't recognize her," Crain said.

Garrett pleaded guilty in 1982 to failing to failing to pay $51,670 in federal taxes from 1975 to 1978. She received a six-month sentence and was fined $10,000, which she said she paid with a loan from a friend.

Garrett had refused to sell the Dumas unless it could be used as a brothel, news reports said at the time. It's now a tourist attraction in Uptown Butte.

Garrett made no apologies for what she did, but she told the Montana Standard that she would have made some different decisions if she could do it over again. She was raised a Catholic, sang in the church choir and prayed regularly, she said.

"I don't think I would have become a nun or a Sister, but I would have done some things different," Garrett told the newspaper.

Services were pending with Duggan-Dolan Mortuary.

[Kobi]

Reuters - Murray Lender, who made a traditionally Jewish food a staple of American cuisine and built a frozen bagel empire, died on Wednesday in Miami Beach, Florida, after a 10-week illness. He was 81.

He became the face of Lender's Bagels in the 1970s and 1980s when he appeared on television advertisements encouraging people unfamiliar with bagels to try them.

"It's not so easy telling people that after all those years of eating toast for breakfast, now there's something better," Lender said in one ad from the 1980s. "But it's not so hard either."

Lender's father immigrated from Poland to the United States in 1927 and opened a bakery in New Haven, Connecticut, where he made bagels, a doughnut shaped bread that is boiled and then baked. Lender and his siblings took over the family bakery in the 1960s and built the bagel line into a national brand. "He took this idea of a bagel, which in the 1960s was primarily a product eaten by Jews in the greater New York area, and he envisioned this product becoming available to everyone in the country," Marvin Lender, his brother and business partner, said in a telephone interview.

"The way we did that was through the vehicle of frozen foods. Because of his marketing and sales prowess we took every penny we had and directed it toward advertising." The Lenders grew the company from seven employees in 1963 to 700 in 1984, when they sold it to Kraft Foods. Kraft retained Lender as a spokesman for two years after it purchased the company. Lender's Bagels was later sold to cereal-maker Kellogg Company, which in turn sold the company to Pinnacle Foods Group, based in Peoria, Illinois. Later in life, he and his brother spent two years running a bagel restaurant company in Israel, where bagels are not widely eaten, Marvin Lender said.

[Martina]

From Twenty-One Love Poems

V.

This apartment full of books could crack open
to the thick jaws, the bulging eyes
of monsters, easily: Once open the books, you have to face
the underside of everything you’ve loved—
the rack and pincers held in readiness, the gag
even the best voices have to mumble through,
the silence burying unwanted children—
women, deviants, witnesses—in desert sand.
Kenneth tells me he’s been arranging his books
so he can look at Blake and Kafka while he types;
yes; and we still have to reckon with Swift
loathing the woman’s flesh while praising her mind,
Goethe’s dread of the Mothers, Claudel vilifying Gide,
and the ghosts—their hands, clasped for centuries—
of artists dying in childbirth, wise-women charred at the stake,
centuries of books unwritten piled behind these shelves;
and we still have to stare into the absence
of men who would not, women who could not, speak
to our life—this still unexcavated hole
called civilization, this act of translation, this half-world.

[Kobi]

(CNN) -- Earl Scruggs, who as a child developed the distinctive picking style that forever changed banjo playing, and whose association with Lester Flatt cemented bluegrass music's place in popular culture, died Wednesday of natural causes at a Nashville hospital, his son Gary Scruggs said. He was 88.

For many of a certain age, Scruggs' banjo was part of the soundtrack of an era on "The Ballad of Jed Clampett" -- the theme song from the CBS sitcom "The Beverly Hillbillies," which aired on CBS from 1962 to 1971 and for decades afterward in syndication.

But much more than that, he was the originator of the three-finger picking style that brought the banjo to the fore in a supercharged new genre, and he was an indispensable member of the small cadre of musical greats who created bluegrass music.

Scruggs was born in 1924 to a musically gifted family in rural Cleveland County, North Carolina, according to his official biography. His father, a farmer and a bookkeeper, played the fiddle and banjo, his mother was an organist and his older siblings played guitar and banjo, as well.

Young Earl's exceptional gifts were apparent early on. He started playing the banjo at age 4 and he started developing his famed three-finger banjo style at the age of 10.

"The banjo was, for all practical purposes, 'reborn' as a musical instrument," the biography on his official website declares, "due to the talent and prominence Earl Scruggs gave to the instrument."

In 1945, Scruggs met Flatt when he joined Bill Monroe's Blue Grass Boys, for whom Flatt was the guitarist and lead vocalist. Along with the group's mandolin-playing namesake were fiddler Chubby Wise and bassist Howard Watts (alias: Cedric Rainwater).

In an article on the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum's website, bluegrass historian Neil V. Rosenberg described Scruggs' style as "a 'roll' executed with the thumb and two fingers of his right hand" that essentially made the banjo "a lead instrument like a fiddle or a guitar, particularly on faster pieces and instrumentals. This novel sound attracted considerable attention to their Grand Ole Opry performances, road shows, and Columbia recordings."

Scruggs and Flatt left Monroe in 1948 to form the Foggy Mountain Boys, according to the Country Music Hall of Fame website. Along with guitarist/vocalists Jim Eanes and Mac Wiseman, fiddler Jim Shumate and Blue Grass Boys alum Rainwater, the group played on WCYB in Bristol, Tennessee, and recorded for the Mercury label.

The Foggy Mountain Boys' roster changed over the years, but Flatt & Scruggs became the constants, the signature sound of the group on radio programs, notably those sponsored by Martha White Flour, and as regulars at the Grand Ole Opry. They became syndicated TV stars in in the Southeast in the late 1950s and early '60s, and they hit the country charts with the gospel tune "Cabin on the Hill."

But it was during an appearance at a Hollywood folk club that brought them into contact with the producer of "The Beverly Hillbillies" and led to "The Ballad of Jed Clampett." It was their only single to climb to No.1 on the country charts.

The 1967 film "Bonnie and Clyde" featured their 1949 instrumental "Foggy Mountain Breakdown," with its distinctive Scruggs-style banjo solo perhaps the most ubiquitous of bluegrass sounds

[Martina]

Damn. i'll miss him. That Three Pickers concert he did with Doc Watson and Ricky Skaggs was something.

apiGwX8Hgvk&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL5758A0D9D486863E

[Martina]

7bRJLkNqNXI&feature=fvst

[Jess]

From Twenty-One Love Poems

V.

This apartment full of books could crack open
to the thick jaws, the bulging eyes
of monsters, easily: Once open the books, you have to face
the underside of everything you’ve loved—
the rack and pincers held in readiness, the gag
even the best voices have to mumble through,
the silence burying unwanted children—
women, deviants, witnesses—in desert sand.
Kenneth tells me he’s been arranging his books
so he can look at Blake and Kafka while he types;
yes; and we still have to reckon with Swift
loathing the woman’s flesh while praising her mind,
Goethe’s dread of the Mothers, Claudel vilifying Gide,
and the ghosts—their hands, clasped for centuries—
of artists dying in childbirth, wise-women charred at the stake,
centuries of books unwritten piled behind these shelves;
and we still have to stare into the absence
of men who would not, women who could not, speak
to our life—this still unexcavated hole
called civilization, this act of translation, this half-world.

I will plant flowers for her today
She planted so many seeds in me...

[Arwen]

From Twenty-One Love Poems

V.

This apartment full of books could crack open
to the thick jaws, the bulging eyes
of monsters, easily: Once open the books, you have to face
the underside of everything you’ve loved—
the rack and pincers held in readiness, the gag
even the best voices have to mumble through,
the silence burying unwanted children—
women, deviants, witnesses—in desert sand.
Kenneth tells me he’s been arranging his books
so he can look at Blake and Kafka while he types;
yes; and we still have to reckon with Swift
loathing the woman’s flesh while praising her mind,
Goethe’s dread of the Mothers, Claudel vilifying Gide,
and the ghosts—their hands, clasped for centuries—
of artists dying in childbirth, wise-women charred at the stake,
centuries of books unwritten piled behind these shelves;
and we still have to stare into the absence
of men who would not, women who could not, speak
to our life—this still unexcavated hole
called civilization, this act of translation, this half-world.

Such an amazing talent. The OtherSide will be happy she's with them, I'm sure.

[BullDog]

Planetarium
by Adrienne Rich


Thinking of Caroline Herschel (1750-1848),
astronomer, sister of William; and others.


A woman in the shape of a monster
a monster in the shape of a woman
the skies are full of them

a woman 'in the snow
among the Clocks and instruments
or measuring the ground with poles'

in her 98 years to discover
8 comets

She whom the moon ruled
like us
levitating into the night sky
riding the polished lenses

Galaxies of women, there
doing penance for impetuousness
ribs chilled

in those spaces of the mind

An eye,
'virile, precise and absolutely certain'
from the mad webs of Uranusborg
encountering the NOVA
every impulse of light exploding
from the core
as life flies out of us

Tycho whispering at last
'Let me not seem to have lived in vain'

What we see, we see
and seeing is changing

the light that shrivels a mountain
and leaves a man alive

Heartbeat of the pulsar
heart sweating through my body

The radio impulse
pouring in from Taurus

I am bombarded yet I stand
I have been standing all my life in the
direct path of a battery of signals
the most accurately transmitted most
untranslatable language in the universe
I am a galactic cloud so deep so invo-
luted that a light wave could take 15
years to travel through me And has
taken I am an instrument in the shape
of a woman trying to translate pulsations
into images for the relief of the body
and the reconstruction of the mind.

[puddin']

AJOIqmlI65Y

[Novelafemme]

RIP Caballo Blanco. You were an incredible inspiration to so many of us. Your legacy will live on in the hearts and feet of runners everywhere. I wish you were still with us, but I take comfort knowing that your death came while you were doing what you loved the most. May we all be so blessed. Have fun running on those soft, fluffy clouds. <3

[DapperButch]

RIP Caballo Blanco. You were an incredible inspiration to so many of us. Your legacy will live on in the hearts and feet of runners everywhere. I wish you were still with us, but I take comfort knowing that your death came while you were doing what you loved the most. May we all be so blessed. Have fun running on those soft, fluffy clouds. <3

http://www.theweek.co.uk/world-news/46121/body-runner-micah-true-caballo-blanco-found

http://www.dailycamera.com/boulder-county-news/ci_20298068/micah-true-boulder-ultrarunner-search-new-mexico%20%20

[AtLast]

Yes, RIP, Adrienne Rich. Mentor, teacher of long, long, ago. Her works are among the very few I have kept over the years- all dog-eared, covers worn.

[Lady_Di]

RIP Bob

http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2012/04/01/Author_of_Self_Help_Book_for_Gay_Men_Commits_Suici de/

I was wishing this was a April Fool's day joke...


(w)

[Blade]

Thomas Kindade has died at age 54. Known as the Painter of Light, the family says he died of natural causes. RIP Thomas
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-0407-thomas-kinkade-20120407,0,6353513.story

[DapperButch]

RIP Bob

http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2012/04/01/Author_of_Self_Help_Book_for_Gay_Men_Commits_Suici de/

I was wishing this was a April Fool's day joke...


(w)

This is so very sad. This man was trying SO hard to convince others that it is ok to "get older", but he couldn't convince himself (it seems to me).

I would wager that the gay men's community's obsession with looking young and beautiful (i.e. young and in shape), fueled any inherent negative thinking about getting older Bergeron may have already had.

So sad.

[clay]

R.I.P. Mike Wallace!!!

[Kobi]

NEW YORK — A spokesman says CBS newsman Mike Wallace, famed for his tough interviews on "60 Minutes," has died. He was 93.

Wallace was on the staff of "60 Minutes" when it began in 1968, and was one of its mainstays from then on.

He retired as a regular correspondent in 2006 but continued contributing occasional reports.

Wallace was known for spending hours preparing for interviews and for his skeptical follow-up questioning.



http://i.i.com.com/cnwk.1d/i/cbsnews/2002/02/25/image502004g.jpg
--------

Growing up, I thought this guy was the best investigative thorn in peoples sides. I loved the way he used to question the absurdity of the things he was told or uncovered. Miss this type of journalistic integrity.

Cant believe he was 93. Geez time is flying. Thanks for finding this clay.

[bkisbutchenuff]

Easter....a good time to reflect on the time I had with my Grandmother (03), my Mom (78), my Sister (90), and my Dad (06). They seem to have been taken before their times - leaving me alone except a niece, nephew and cousins...and I miss them dearly... there is a reason and one day I will understand...
(w)

[DapperButch]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/18/dick-clark-dies-dead-heart-attack_n_1435415.html?icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D153111

[suebee]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/18/dick-clark-dies-dead-heart-attack_n_1435415.html?icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D153111

Does this mean rock 'n roll is over? :| RIP Dick Clark.

[The_Lady_Snow]

RIP Mr Clark.....


:musicnote:

[Kobi]

Dick Clark. Wow. Wasnt expecting that. Loved American Bandstand. And his hair.

Hard to imagine the man of perpetual youth is gone. Thanks for the memories Dick.

[Kobi]

Jonathan Frid, the man known to fans around the world as Barnabas Collins, the suave vampire from the cult hit soap opera "Dark Shadows" has died at age 87.

The Hamilton Spectator, of Hamilton, Ontario, reports the Canadian actor died in his hometown of Hamilton at the Juravinski Hospital on Friday, April 13.

Frid's final screen role was a cameo in "Dark Shadows," the soap opera's upcoming big-screen revamp directed by Tim Burton and starring Johnny Depp as Barnabas.

The soap opera ran on ABC from 1966 to 1971. Originally conceived as a straightforward gothic soap opera by creator Dan Curtis, it languished in the ratings until Curtis began adding supernatural elements, first a ghost, and then Barnabas Collins. Frid joined the show in 1967 and it began to take off as a cult hit, especially with younger children, who rushed home from school to watch the show.

Outside of the Barnabas role, Frid had an extensive stage career, including a Broadway and national tour of "Arsenic and Old Lace" in the mid-1980s.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/.a/6a00d8341c630a53ef01676565d7fe970b-600wi


I remember running home from school to watch this show....until it got to be totally bizarre.

[Kobi]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Charles Colson, a Richard Nixon White House operative during the Watergate scandal who had a reputation for ruthlessness before going to jail and starting a prison ministry, died on Saturday at age 80, the ministry said.

Colson served as counsel to the president from 1969 to 1973 and a major part of his job was playing hardball politics to assure Nixon's re-election in 1972.

In 1973, Time magazine said Colson "was probably more disliked, as well as feared, than any other White House aide ... If Colson actually performed half the various acts of which he has been accused, he was easily the least principled of all Nixon's associates."

It was in that atmosphere that Colson and others at the top of the White House staff engaged in a series of misadventures and illegal acts that resulted in Nixon resigning the presidency in 1974 in the face of impeachment over the Watergate scandal, which grew out of a 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington.

Colson ended up with a sentence of one to three years in prison but it did not come from a Watergate crime. He had pleaded no contest to obstruction of justice in the break-in of the offices of the psychiatrist to Daniel Ellsberg, the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers to The New York Times.

ENEMIES' LIST

In 1971, Colson had been the chief author of a memo listing Nixon's major political critics and opponents, including businessmen, members of Congress, journalists and entertainers. When the "enemies list" became public, those included on it - among them actor Paul Newman - wore the mention like a badge of honor and cited the list as a prime example of Nixon's paranoia.

The same year, the president's re-election committee set aside $250,000 to do "intelligence gathering" on Democrats. To lead the program, Colson choose one of his assistants, former CIA agent E. Howard Hunt.

Hunt's group came to be known as "the plumbers" and they participated in a number of questionable and outright illegal events, including the Ellsberg break-in.

Colson had other capers in mind, including starting a fire at the Brookings Institution think tank and breaking into the apartment of the man who tried to assassinate Alabama Governor George Wallace. Such ideas were never carried out.

Then came the break-in that failed when "plumbers" were caught inside the Democratic headquarters in the Watergate complex.

http://news.yahoo.com/watergate-figure-charles-colson-dies-210520742.html

[bkisbutchenuff]

RIP Sheila....woke up to learn that a HS friend - very talented young lady, passed away after battling cancer for a year or month...either way...I am totally shocked and speechless! Life is so short....

[Kobi]

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/05/03/sports/03seau/03seau-articleInline.jpg


OCEANSIDE, Calif. — Junior Seau, regarded as one of the N.F.L.’s best linebackers over a 20-year career with the San Diego Chargers, the Miami Dolphins and the New England Patriots, died of a gunshot wound to the chest Wednesday at his home in Oceanside, Calif. He was 43.

The Oceanside police said Seau’s death was being investigated as a suicide. He was found by his girlfriend in a bedroom of his beachfront house Wednesday morning, and a handgun was found near the body, the police said, adding that Seau did not appear to leave a note.

A native of Oceanside, Seau starred at the University of Southern California before being drafted fifth over all in the 1990 N.F.L. draft by the Chargers, who played 40 miles south of his hometown. A 12-time Pro Bowler, Seau played 13 seasons with the Chargers and was one of the team’s most popular players. In the 1994 season, he led the team to the Super Bowl, where they lost to the San Francisco 49ers, 49-26. The Pro Football Hall of Fame selected him for the 1990s All-Decade Team.

Seau was traded to the Dolphins in 2003, and after three injury-plagued seasons he was released. He signed a one-day contract with the Chargers in August 2006 to announce his retirement. But four days later, he signed with the New England Patriots and was a member of the 2007 team that went undefeated in the regular season, losing to the Giants in the Super Bowl.

His last season in the N.F.L was 2009. He finished his career with 1,524 tackles, 56 ½ sacks and 18 interceptions.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/03/sports/football/junior-seau-famed-nfl-linebacker-dies-at-43-in-apparent-suicide.html?amp

------------------------


This man was one heck of a football player. Loved when he played for us. Didnt like it much when he was playing against us. Thanks for the memories Junior.

[DapperButch]

I can't help but wonder if his suicide was a function of losing too much of his identity when he retired in 2009. It can be intolerable for athletes who are used to the limelight and being revered. For that matter, it can be hard for anybody who identifies greatly with their career.

[starryeyes]

Having grown up in Oceanside and still living in San Diego, Junior Seau was always around. I remember him coming to our high school pep rally. He was such a sweet and giving person. It is terrible to see someone take their own life like that. RIP Junior!


http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/05/03/sports/03seau/03seau-articleInline.jpg


OCEANSIDE, Calif. — Junior Seau, regarded as one of the N.F.L.’s best linebackers over a 20-year career with the San Diego Chargers, the Miami Dolphins and the New England Patriots, died of a gunshot wound to the chest Wednesday at his home in Oceanside, Calif. He was 43.

The Oceanside police said Seau’s death was being investigated as a suicide. He was found by his girlfriend in a bedroom of his beachfront house Wednesday morning, and a handgun was found near the body, the police said, adding that Seau did not appear to leave a note.

A native of Oceanside, Seau starred at the University of Southern California before being drafted fifth over all in the 1990 N.F.L. draft by the Chargers, who played 40 miles south of his hometown. A 12-time Pro Bowler, Seau played 13 seasons with the Chargers and was one of the team’s most popular players. In the 1994 season, he led the team to the Super Bowl, where they lost to the San Francisco 49ers, 49-26. The Pro Football Hall of Fame selected him for the 1990s All-Decade Team.

Seau was traded to the Dolphins in 2003, and after three injury-plagued seasons he was released. He signed a one-day contract with the Chargers in August 2006 to announce his retirement. But four days later, he signed with the New England Patriots and was a member of the 2007 team that went undefeated in the regular season, losing to the Giants in the Super Bowl.

His last season in the N.F.L was 2009. He finished his career with 1,524 tackles, 56 ½ sacks and 18 interceptions.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/03/sports/football/junior-seau-famed-nfl-linebacker-dies-at-43-in-apparent-suicide.html?amp

------------------------


This man was one heck of a football player. Loved when he played for us. Didnt like it much when he was playing against us. Thanks for the memories Junior.

[starryeyes]

I can't help but wonder if his suicide was a function of losing too much of his identity when he retired in 2009. It can be intolerable for athletes who are used to the limelight and being revered. For that matter, it can be hard for anybody who identifies greatly with their career.

He had some weird stuff going on lately. He drove his car off a cliff in Carlsbad last year, and was accused of abusing his girlfriend. I think some of this restaurants closed too. Who knows. Sad tho.

[Novelafemme]

RIP Adam Yauch. My music world will never be the same. (f)

Oh ya, and FUCK CANCER!

[DapperButch]

RIP Adam Yauch. My music world will never be the same. (f)

Oh ya, and FUCK CANCER!

http://www.theboombox.com/2012/05/04/adam-yauch-dead/?icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D158138

[Kobi]

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — George Lindsey, who made a TV career as a grinning service station attendant named Goober on "The Andy Griffith Show" and "Hee Haw," has died. He was 83.

Lindsey was the beanie-wearing Goober on "The Andy Griffith Show" from 1964 to 1968 and its successor, "Mayberry RFD," from 1968 to 1971. He played the same jovial character on "Hee Haw" from 1971 until it went out of production in 1993.


Really bumming me out to see the folks from my childhood dying off.

[Miss Scarlett]

"Where the Wild Things Are" author Maurice Sendak died this morning at age 83.

My favorite author/illustrator...

[Kobi]

"Where the Wild Things Are" author Maurice Sendak died this morning at age 83.

My favorite author/illustrator...




Fascinating man. So much more than just an author. And, funny, they dont mention he was queer.


Sendak didn't limit his career to a safe and successful formula of conventional children's books, though it was the pictures he did for wholesome works such as Ruth Krauss' "A Hole Is To Dig" and Else Holmelund Minarik's "Little Bear" that launched his career.

"Where the Wild Things Are," about a boy named Max who goes on a journey — sometimes a rampage — through his own imagination after he is sent to bed without supper, was quite controversial when it was published, and his quirky and borderline scary illustrations for E.T.A. Hoffmann's "Nutcracker" did not have the sugar coating featured in other versions.

Sendak also created costumes for ballets and staged operas, including the Czech opera "Brundibar," which he also put on paper with collaborator Pulitzer-winning playwright Tony Kushner in 2003.

He designed the Pacific Northwest Ballet's "Nutcracker" production that later became a movie shown on television, and he served as producer of various animated TV series based on his illustrations, including "Seven Little Monsters," ''George and Martha" and "Little Bear."

But despite his varied resume, Sendak accepted — and embraced — the label "kiddie-book author."

When director Spike Jonez made the movie version of "Where the Wild Things Are," Sendak said he urged the director to remember his view that childhood isn't all sweetness and light. And he was happy with the result.

"In plain terms, a child is a complicated creature who can drive you crazy" Sendak told the AP in 2009. "There's a cruelty to childhood, there's an anger. And I did not want to reduce Max to the trite image of the good little boy that you find in too many books."

Sendak's own life was clouded by the shadow of the Holocaust. He had said that the events of World War II were the root of his raw and honest artistic style.

Born in 1928 and raised in Brooklyn, Sendak said he remembered the tears shed by his Jewish-Polish immigrant parents as they'd get news of atrocities and the deaths of relatives and friends. "My childhood was about thinking about the kids over there (in Europe). My burden is living for those who didn't," he told the AP.

"Kids don't know about best sellers," he said. "They go for what they enjoy. They aren't star chasers and they don't suck up. It's why I like them."

------------------

Sendak mentioned in a September 2008 article in The New York Times that he was gay and had lived with his partner, psychoanalyst Eugene Glynn, for 50 years before Dr. Glynn’s death in May 2007. Revealing that he never told his parents, he said, "all I wanted was to be straight so my parents could be happy. They never, never, never knew." Sendak's relationship with Glynn had been mentioned by other writers before (e.g., Tony Kushner in 2003). In Glynn's 2007 New York Times obituary, Sendak was listed as Dr. Glynn's "partner of fifty years".

Sendak donated $1 million to the Jewish Board of Family and Children's Services to memorialize Glynn, who had treated young people there.

[Kobi]

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Vidal Sassoon used his hairstyling shears to free women from beehives and hot rollers and give them wash-and-wear cuts that made him an international name in hair care.

When he came on the scene in the 1950s, hair was high and heavy — typically curled, teased, piled and shellacked into place. Then came the 1960s, and Sassoon's creative cuts, which required little styling and fell into place perfectly every time, fit right in with the fledgling women's liberation movement.

My idea was to cut shape into the hair, to use it like fabric and take away everything that was superfluous," Sassoon said in 1993 in the Los Angeles Times, which first reported his death Wednesday. "Women were going back to work, they were assuming their own power. They didn't have time to sit under the dryer anymore."

His wash-and-wear styles included the bob, the Five-Point cut and the "Greek Goddess," a short, tousled perm — inspired by the "Afro-marvelous-looking women" he said he saw in New York's Harlem.

Sassoon opened his first salon in his native London in 1954 but said he didn't perfect his cut-is-everything approach until the mid-'60s. Once the wash-and-wear concept hit, though, it hit big and many women retired their curlers for good.

His shaped cuts were an integral part of the "look" of Mary Quant, the superstar British fashion designer who popularized the miniskirt.

He also often worked in the 1960s with American designer Rudi Gernreich, who became a household name in 1964 with his much-publicized (but seldom-worn) topless bathing suit.

"While Mr. Gernreich has dressed his mannequins to look like little girls," The New York Times wrote after viewing Gernreich's collection for fall 1965, "Vidal Sassoon has cut their hair to look like little boys with eye-level bangs in front, short crop in back. For really big evenings, a pin-on curl is added at the cheek."

In 1966, he did a curly look inspired by 1920s film star Clara Bow for the designer Ungaro. He got more headlines when he was flown to Hollywood from London, at a reputed cost of $5,000, to create Mia Farrow's pixie cut for the 1968 film "Rosemary's Baby."

Sassoon opened more salons in England and expanded to the United States before also developing a line of shampoos and styling products bearing his name. His advertising slogan was "If you don't look good, we don't look good."

The hairdresser also established Vidal Sassoon Academies to teach aspiring stylists how to envision haircuts based on a client's bone structure. In 2006 there were academies in England, the United States and Canada, with additional locations planned in Germany and China.

"Whether long or short, hair should be carved to a woman's bone structure," he told the Los Angeles Times in 1967. "Actually short hair is a state of mind ... not a state of age."

Sassoon's hair-care mantra: "To sculpt a head of hair with scissors is an art form. It's in pursuit of art."

He wrote three books. The first was an autobiography, "Sorry I Kept You Waiting, Madam," published in 1968. "A Year of Beauty and Health," which he wrote with his second wife, Beverly, was published in 1979. In 1984 he released "Cutting Hair the Vidal Sassoon Way."

He sold his business interests in the early 1980s to devote himself to philanthropy. The Boys Clubs of America and the Performing Arts Council of the Music Center of Los Angeles were among the causes he supported through his Vidal Sassoon Foundation. He later became active in post-Hurricane Katrina charities in New Orleans.

He had moved to Los Angeles in the early 1970s in search of a chemist to formulate his hair-care products and had decided to make the city his home.

A veteran of Israel's 1948 War of Independence, Sassoon also had a lifelong commitment to eradicating anti-Semitism. In 1982, he established the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Growing up very poor in London, Sassoon said that when he was 14, his mother declared he was to become a hairdresser. After traveling to Palestine and serving in the Israeli war, he returned home to fulfill her dream.

"I thought I'd be a soccer player but my mother said I should be a hairdresser, and, as often happens, the mother got her way," he told the AP in 2007.

He told the Chicago Tribune in 2004 that he was proud to have entered the field.

"Hairdressers are a wonderful breed," he said. "You work one-on-one with another human being and the object is to make them feel so much better and to look at themselves with a twinkle in their eye. Work on their bone structure, the color, the cut, whatever, but when you've finished, you have an enormous sense of satisfaction."

http://news.yahoo.com/hairstyling-pioneer-vidal-sassoon-dies-84-la-193906259--finance.html

[Teddybear]

My ex's father passed this afternoon.

I loved him he was a very nice to me. He accepted me for me and NEVER once questioned my gender and our life together.

Joe you will be missed by many, you were loved and still are.

Thanks for being a beacon of acceptance to everyone.

[The_Lady_Snow]

Legendary Mexican Writer Carlos Fuentes dies at age 83.

[Lady_Di]

Legendary Mexican Writer Carlos Fuentes dies at age 83.


Damn! :praying:

Irreplaceable

May he be resting in peace and contented with how much he made such a difference in so many lives.

d'sad grrrrl

[girl_dee]

i know you will be missed, especially by your brother!




http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505245_162-57434363/swamp-people-cast-member-mitchell-guist-dies/

[clay]

Thanks for showing your world in the "bye" Mitchell!!! I LOVE this show. I don't have TV or Cable, so can only watch on my computer after the show has aired....but you can bet I always do!!!
The show will be so empty without you, and I hope Glenn will continue to be on the show.
Sending healing energies and comdolences to the entire Guist family and the Swamp People show's cast....(f)
:candle:.....your flame will always burn bright, Mitchell!!!

[Blaze]

i know you will be missed, especially by your brother!




http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505245_162-57434363/swamp-people-cast-member-mitchell-guist-dies/


This Man and his brother are legends in their own right. I always loved when they went Gar hunting and told stories, and built there front porch. They loved each other and the way their Daddi raised them, I will miss him!

http://wafb.images.worldnow.com/images/18439386_BG1.jpg

[girl_dee]

Swamp People exposes the life of most of my kin. I am not sure how i feel about the show yet. I grew up with dead alligators, deer, varmint of every species and with hard working shrimpers, crabbers and trappers. It's a hard way of life and not so much glamour. Many of my folk are killed in boating accidents or dying at a young age because the life is so hard. Brothers are brothers for life and often just like the show, live together from childhood to death. Alligator season is one month per year so it's intense. Alligators are not killers, they are quiet creatures who strike when provoked or hungry. Swamp tours have destroyed much of the way of life of the alligator, making them unafraid of man. (Once you feed a gator they associate people with food forever). STILL i love that Swamp People is popular and i hope changing how many of us feel like outcasts in society. I also know there is an ugly, cruel side to hunting and that part isn't shown on the show. Not all hunters are like the ones on Swamp People. If ever you want to know i'd be glad to tell you.

[SnackTime]

Rest In Peace...

Donna Summer

You will be missed by many of us that grew up listening to your music

[vixenagogo]

jOpUfTi1keI&feature=fvwrel

[Kobi]

27-TM3q5-Cc

[Canela]

xi8J5yPyL9M

Rest In Peace...beautiful girl/woman/vocalist/sister/friend/angel...

[~ocean]

RIP .... :(

[Dude]

C2q2bis6eLE

[girl_dee]

RIP Donna Summer you will ALWAYS be the Queen of Disco!

[bkisbutchenuff]

RIP Donna Summer you will ALWAYS be the Queen of Disco!

YES! RIP....

[Dude]

MSIQ7Hnimwo

[Dude]

QfL7Gk7Fpes

[Glenn]

Riposa in Pace Bella Diva

[Parker]

RIP Donna :(

QsY066wa08E

[DapperButch]

RIP Donna :(

QsY066wa08E



I had this on an LP (obviously) with the record player arm set up to repeat...same song over and over and over again. Played it day after day after day...

[puddin']

1TKQcWEXSKU

[Parker]

I had this on an LP (obviously) with the record player arm set up to repeat...same song over and over and over again. Played it day after day after day...

I bought it on Amazon a few months ago for my MP3 player and when it comes on, I always repeat it several times. :winky:

[deedarino]

As a young, aspiring singer, she was my idol. I sang every song she did hundreds of times...

I was out, loud, and proud....of Disco


TJrz1CTCWto

h1ArZEFwRsY


...will be hittin up itunes today. :blues:

[*Anya*]

Omg, she so reminded me of my disco days!

I still remember dancing with such joy to her songs for hours with my first girlfriend until the clubs closed @ 2:00AM!

I did not even "know" her but feel really sad at her passing.

As far as I am concerned, disco never died and never will.

RIP Donna.

[Kobi]

Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, the German baritone whose beautiful voice and mastery of technique made him the 20th century’s pre-eminent interpreter of art songs, died on Friday at his home in Bavaria. He was 86.

Mr. Fischer-Dieskau was by virtual acclamation one of the world’s great singers from the 1940s to his official retirement in 1992, and an influential teacher and orchestra conductor for many years thereafter.

He was also a formidable industry, making hundreds of recordings that pretty much set the modern standard for performances of lieder, the musical settings of poems first popular in the 18th and 19th centuries. His output included the many hundreds of Schubert songs appropriate for the male voice, the songs and song cycles of Schumann and Brahms, and those of later composers like Mahler, Shostakovich and Hugo Wolf. He won two Grammy Awards, in 1971 for Schubert lieder and in 1973 for Brahms’s “Die Schöne Magelone.”

Mr. Fischer-Dieskau had sufficient power for the concert hall, and for substantial roles in his parallel career as a star of European opera houses. But he was essentially a lyrical, introspective singer whose effect on listeners was not to nail them to their seatbacks, but rather to draw them into the very heart of song.

The pianist Gerald Moore, who accompanied many great artists of the postwar decades, said Mr. Fischer-Dieskau had a flawless sense of rhythm and “one of the most remarkable voices in history — honeyed and suavely expressive.” Onstage, he projected a masculine sensitivity informed by a cultivated upbringing and by dispiriting losses in World War II: the destruction of his family home, the death of his feeble brother in a Nazi institution, induction into the Wehrmacht when he had scarcely begun his voice studies at the Berlin Conservatory.

His performances eluded easy description. Where reviewers could get the essence of a Pavarotti appearance in a phrase (the glories of a true Italian tenor!), a Fischer-Dieskau recital was akin to a magic show, with seamless shifts in dynamics and infinite shadings of coloration and character.

He had the good luck to age well, too. In 1988, at 62, he sang an all-Schumann program at Carnegie Hall, where people overflowed onto the stage to hear him. Donal Henahan, then the chief music critic of The New York Times, noted that Mr. Fischer-Dieskau’s voice had begun to harden in some difficult passages — but also that he was tall and lean and handsomer than ever, and had lost none of his commanding presence.

Mr. Fischer-Dieskau described in his memoir “Reverberations” (1989) how his affinity for lieder had been formed in childhood. “I was won over to poetry at an early age,” he wrote. “I have been in its thrall all my life because I was made to read it, because it gave me pleasure, and because I eventually came to understand what I was reading.”

He discerned, he said, that “music and poetry have a common domain, from which they draw inspiration and in which they operate: the landscape of the soul.”


9TP9xXomDfk


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/19/arts/music/dietrich-fischer-dieskau-german-baritone-dies-at-86.html?amp

[Mr Nice Guy]

RIP to the cat I tried to rescue. Her name was Babyluv. She was orange and white stripe. I found her hungry outside my condo. I had her for a couple of months and started noticing changes. She passed away today from cancer. I loved her. It's always hard to lose those you love be it pet or human. I know she's not in pain anymore and that's all that matters.

[CherylNYC]

Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, the German baritone whose beautiful voice and mastery of technique made him the 20th century’s pre-eminent interpreter of art songs, died on Friday at his home in Bavaria. He was 86.

Mr. Fischer-Dieskau was by virtual acclamation one of the world’s great singers from the 1940s to his official retirement in 1992, and an influential teacher and orchestra conductor for many years thereafter.

He was also a formidable industry, making hundreds of recordings that pretty much set the modern standard for performances of lieder, the musical settings of poems first popular in the 18th and 19th centuries. His output included the many hundreds of Schubert songs appropriate for the male voice, the songs and song cycles of Schumann and Brahms, and those of later composers like Mahler, Shostakovich and Hugo Wolf. He won two Grammy Awards, in 1971 for Schubert lieder and in 1973 for Brahms’s “Die Schöne Magelone.”

Mr. Fischer-Dieskau had sufficient power for the concert hall, and for substantial roles in his parallel career as a star of European opera houses. But he was essentially a lyrical, introspective singer whose effect on listeners was not to nail them to their seatbacks, but rather to draw them into the very heart of song.

The pianist Gerald Moore, who accompanied many great artists of the postwar decades, said Mr. Fischer-Dieskau had a flawless sense of rhythm and “one of the most remarkable voices in history — honeyed and suavely expressive.” Onstage, he projected a masculine sensitivity informed by a cultivated upbringing and by dispiriting losses in World War II: the destruction of his family home, the death of his feeble brother in a Nazi institution, induction into the Wehrmacht when he had scarcely begun his voice studies at the Berlin Conservatory.

His performances eluded easy description. Where reviewers could get the essence of a Pavarotti appearance in a phrase (the glories of a true Italian tenor!), a Fischer-Dieskau recital was akin to a magic show, with seamless shifts in dynamics and infinite shadings of coloration and character.

He had the good luck to age well, too. In 1988, at 62, he sang an all-Schumann program at Carnegie Hall, where people overflowed onto the stage to hear him. Donal Henahan, then the chief music critic of The New York Times, noted that Mr. Fischer-Dieskau’s voice had begun to harden in some difficult passages — but also that he was tall and lean and handsomer than ever, and had lost none of his commanding presence.

Mr. Fischer-Dieskau described in his memoir “Reverberations” (1989) how his affinity for lieder had been formed in childhood. “I was won over to poetry at an early age,” he wrote. “I have been in its thrall all my life because I was made to read it, because it gave me pleasure, and because I eventually came to understand what I was reading.”

He discerned, he said, that “music and poetry have a common domain, from which they draw inspiration and in which they operate: the landscape of the soul.”


9TP9xXomDfk


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/19/arts/music/dietrich-fischer-dieskau-german-baritone-dies-at-86.html?amp

What a tremendous loss!

[Teddybear]

Robin Gibb of the Bee Gees

Loved their music RIP Robin

[The_Lady_Snow]

xVjITlgqlHo


http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2njdqbjPK1qea5wyo1_1280.jpg

[girl_dee]

OMG i have been listening and downloading their music all week, i had NO idea he died, i just posted a song on youtube, i had no idea. Freaky. RIP a very talented man.

[Rocket]

RIP Robin Gibb
I couldn't be a fan of Donna Summer after the way she treated the gay community, which had been her biggest following. Read- http://www.donna-tribute.com/articles/80/advocate2.htm

[musicman]

I had the honor of briefly working with Donna, her sweet husband Bruce and his writing partner Nathan.

Sweet lady will surly be missed. It's been a bad year of losing some great artists.

[Wolfsong]

I am so completely bummed today. Saturday Night Fever is one of my guilty pleasures

[SnackTime]

Rest In Peace

Robin Gibb

[firegal]

Wow cancer claims 2 more.... crap

Donna Summer and Robin Gibb.... very talented artists that so many of us danced to.....and maybe did a lil bit of fooling around to.......

Their incredible songs! RIP

[DapperButch]

Inventor of the remote control dies:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/22/eugene-polley-dead-tv-remote-inventor-_n_1536435.html?ref=technology&icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl5%7Csec3_lnk3%26pLid%3D163177

[Kobi]

http://mi-cache.legacy.com/legacy/images/Cobrands/NYTimes/Photos/NYT-1000468615-LEVINEE.1_012945.jpg

NEW YORK—Ellen Levine, a prolific and highly regarded author and activist whose children's books told stories of slaves, immigrants and the fight for social justice, has died. She was 73.

Levine died May 26 in New York after being diagnosed with lung cancer 19 months earlier, according to Scholastic Inc. Her beloved spouse and partner of 40 years, Anne Koedt, whom she married last fall, was at her side.

She was the author of fiction and non-fiction for children, young readers and adults that focused on important social issues and historical periods. Her rigorous research and devotion to accuracy made her stories compelling.

Her books included "Henry's Freedom Box," the true story of a slave who mailed himself to freedom; "Darkness Over Denmark" details the rescue of Jews by the Danes in World War II; "A Fence Away from Freedom" details the internment of Japanese Americans in the 1940s; "Freedom's Children, a profile of young black civil rights activists in the 1960s; "I Hate English," about a Chinese girl struggling to learn English, has become a resource for ESL teachers. Her most recent novel, "In Trouble," the story of two pregnant girls in the l950's, reflects her profound belief that the right to choose abortion is an individual choice, and that whatever one's ultimate decision, it must be viewed with compassion and respect.

She also worked on documentaries for CBS television. A native of New York, she was an undergraduate at Brandeis University and received a law degree from New York University.

[Kobi]

Richard "Dick" Beals (March 16, 1927 - May 29, 2012) was an American voice actor. He performed many voices in his career, which spanned the period from the early 1950s into the 21st century. He specialized primarily in doing the voices of young boys.

As the result of a glandular condition, Beals stood 4 feet 6 inches tall, weighed less than 70 pounds and possessed a voice that hadn't changed since grade school.

Perhaps his most recognizable characterization was the voice of the stop-motion animation figure called "Speedy Alka-Seltzer", featured in TV ads for more than 50 years.

In 1953, Beals was hired to do the voice for his first cartoon character. This was Ralph Phillips, a Walter Mitty type boy in From A to Z-Z-Z-Z by Warner Brothers. The cartoon was nominated for an Academy Award. He originated the voice of the title character in the late 1950s in "The Gumby Show."

Beals continued doing voices for Warner Brothers cartoons, often as un-credited secondary characters. When Hanna-Barbera started with the Flintstones, and then The Jetsons, Beals did many of the kid's voices on those shows, sometimes performing several different minor characters on the same show. One of his recurring roles was as Mr. Spacely's son Arthur on The Jetsons.

From 1960 to 1964, Beals played the voice of Davey Hansen, as well as other child voices, on Davey and Goliath.

Beals provided voices for both the characters "Yank" and "Dan" of the "American Eagles" troupe in the mid-1960s cartoon series Roger Ramjet. In 1967, Beals was the singing voice of child actor Bobby Riha as Jack in the NBC-TV special Jack and the Beanstalk starring Gene Kelly. He was the voice of Buzz Conroy, the boy scientist on Frankenstein, Jr. and The Impossibles, and Richie Rich's mischievous cousin, Reggie Van Dough on Richie Rich. Beals was also the voice of Birdboy on Birdman and the Galaxy Trio.

During the late 1980s, Beals provided the voices for various characters on Garfield and Friends with the most major character he voiced being Jon's cruel nephew Rosco.

From 1989-1993 he played Nicholas Adamsworth on the Focus on the Family radio drama Adventures in Odyssey.

In 1996, Beals provided the voice of the Pinocchio puppet in the horror film Pinocchio's Revenge.

Later in life, he was a motivational speaker who turned to his 1992 autobiography to inspire audiences. He called his book "Think Big."

[Kobi]

Orlando Woolridge, the rugged forward who carved out a reputation over 13 NBA seasons as a scoring specialist and one of the original alley-oop artists, died late Thursday while under hospice care for a chronic heart condition.

The 6-foot-9 Woolridge was the sixth overall pick by the Chicago Bulls in 1981 after starring at Notre Dame in college and Mansfield High School in Louisiana.

Known for his high-flying dunks and ability to throw down lob passes in the open court, Woolridge played for the Bulls, Los Angeles Lakers, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Denver, Milwaukee and Detroit, and also coached the Los Angeles Sparks of the WNBA. He averaged 16.0 points in just over 28 minutes per game, quickly emerging as an offensive spark plug no matter if he was in the starting lineup or coming off the bench.

He participated in one of the greatest slam dunk contests of all time in 1985, competing against Michael Jordan, Dominique Wilkins and Julius Erving, among others, and he averaged 22.9 points per game for the Bulls in 1984-85, the last player to lead Chicago in scoring before Jordan took over.

One of Woolridge's defining moments came as a senior at Notre Dame in 1981, when he hit a buzzer-beating jumper to beat Ralph Sampson and No. 1 Virginia on national television, ending the mighty Cavaliers' 28-game winning streak. Woolridge averaged 10.6 points in 109 games at Notre Dame, helping the Fighting Irish reach the NCAA Tournament in each of his four seasons, including the Final Four as a freshman in 1978.

[Kobi]

http://img2.timeinc.net/people/i/2012/news/120618/richard-dawson-440.jpg

Richard Dawson was an English-born American actor, comedian, game show panelist and host in America. He died yesterday from complications of esophageal cancer.

He was best known for his role as Corporal Peter Newkirk on Hogan's Heroes, being the original host of the Family Feud game show from 1976–1985 and 1994–1995, and for being a regular panelist on the 1970s version of Match Game on CBS from 1973 to 1978. He was a regular on Laugh In, the New Dick Van Dyke Show, and I've Got A Secret.

Dawson parodied his TV persona in 1987 by co-starring alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger in the action film The Running Man, in which he portrayed the evil, egotistical game-show host Damon Killian. (I swear this movie was the prototype for The Hunger Games trilogy.)

[Kobi]

CINCINNATI (AP) Pedro Borbon, who pitched 10 years for the Cincinnati Reds and helped the Big Red Machine win back-to-back World Series titles, died of cancer on Monday. He was 65.

Borbon was a key member of the bullpen on Cincinnati's 1975-76 championship teams, winning 13 games during those two seasons. He also pitched for the Angels, Giants and Cardinals. In 2010, he became the third reliever to be inducted into the Reds Hall of Fame.

Borbon appeared in more games than any other NL pitcher from 1970-78. He holds the club record with 531 career appearances. Borbon pitched in 20 playoff games during his career with a 2.55 ERA.

Borbon became part of baseball lore in 1995 when, at age 48, he decided to return to the game as a replacement player during Major League Baseball's labor dispute.

[Kobi]

Herb Reed, the last surviving original member of 1950s vocal group the Platters who sang on hits like "Only You" and "The Great Pretender," has died. He was 83.

Reed sang bass on the group's four No. 1 hits, including "The Great Pretender," ''My Prayer," ''Twilight Time" and "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes."

The Platters were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990 and the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 1998. Their recordings are in the Grammy Hall of Fame.

The group's popularity reached across racial lines and genres, "achieving success in a crooning, middle-of-the-road style that put a soulful coat of uptown polish on pop-oriented, harmony-rich material," according to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's website.

Reed was the only member of the group to appear on all of their nearly 400 recordings. He continued touring, performing up to 200 shows per year, until last year, often performing with younger singers under the name Herb Reed and the Platters or Herb Reed's Platters.




TzHGYHPibNw

[Kobi]

Ray Bradbury, author of Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles, and other beloved science fiction novels, died Tuesday night at the age of 91.

Bradbury sold eight million copies of his books in 36 languages, according to The New York Times' obit.

He attributed his success as a writer to never having gone to college--instead, he read and wrote voraciously. "When I graduated from high school in 1938, I began going to the library three nights a week," he said in an interview with The Paris Review. "I did this every week for almost ten years and finally, in 1947, around the time I got married, I figured I was done. So I graduated from the library when I was twenty-seven. I discovered that the library is the real school."

His best known book, Fahrenheit 451, was a dystopian tale set in the future about a society where books were banned and firefighters spent all day burning them. "Bradbury's novel anticipated iPods, interactive television, electronic surveillance and live, sensational media events, including televised police pursuits," the Associated Press writes.

[Apocalipstic]

Ray Bradbury, author of Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles, and other beloved science fiction novels, died Tuesday night at the age of 91.

Bradbury sold eight million copies of his books in 36 languages, according to The New York Times' obit.

He attributed his success as a writer to never having gone to college--instead, he read and wrote voraciously. "When I graduated from high school in 1938, I began going to the library three nights a week," he said in an interview with The Paris Review. "I did this every week for almost ten years and finally, in 1947, around the time I got married, I figured I was done. So I graduated from the library when I was twenty-seven. I discovered that the library is the real school."

His best known book, Fahrenheit 451, was a dystopian tale set in the future about a society where books were banned and firefighters spent all day burning them. "Bradbury's novel anticipated iPods, interactive television, electronic surveillance and live, sensational media events, including televised police pursuits," the Associated Press writes.

RIP, re was one of my favorites! "There Will Come Soft Rains" and "Something Wicked This Way Comes".

[Kobi]

Bob Welch, a singer-guitarist who left Fleetwood Mac for a successful solo career with such 1970s hits as "Ebony Eyes" and "Sentimental Lady," was found dead in his Nashville home of an apparent suicide on Thursday. He was 65.

The Los Angeles-born son of a movie producer, Welch joined Fleetwood Mac in 1971 and performed on several albums and tours until leaving in 1974. He was replaced by Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks.

As a solo artist, Welch garnered huge success in 1977 with a revamped version of "Sentimental Lady," which he first recorded with Fleetwood Mac, with new backing vocals by the group's Christine McVie and Buckingham, and the hit singles "Ebony Eyes" and "Hot Love, Cold World."

[Kobi]

Feel like my childhood has been flashing before my eyes the last few weeks.


Frank Cady (September 8, 1915 – June 8, 2012) was an American actor best known for his recurring and popular role as storekeeper Sam Drucker in three American television series during the 1960s — Petticoat Junction, Green Acres, and The Beverly Hillbillies.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/55/Frank_Cady.jpg

[theoddz]

Anne Rutherford, who played Scarlett O'Hara's sister, Careen, in the classic movie "Gone With The Wind", has died at age 94 (some sources say she was 91). (f)

Rest in peace, Ms. Rutherford, and thank you for your part in bringing such a wonderful movie...one that I have so much enjoyed over the years, to the silver screen. Now THAT was great movie-making!!! :thumbsup::stillheart:

ICQMLAp4mIo

http://todayentertainment.today.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/06/12/12183944-gone-with-the-wind-actress-ann-rutherford-dies?lite

~Theo~ :bouquet:

[Kobi]

(Reuters) - Elinor Ostrom, a professor at Indiana University who was the first woman to win the Nobel Prize for economics, died Tuesday from cancer, the university said. She was 78.

Ostrom received the 2009 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for research on the ways that people organize themselves to manage resources. She shared the prize with University of California economist Oliver Williamson.

[Kobi]

http://img2-2.timeinc.net/people/i/2012/news/120625/yvette-wilson-300.jpg


Comedian Yvette Wilson, who had been battling stage 4 cervical cancer and kidney disease, died Thursday, reports NewsOne.com and other news outlets. She was 48.

Wilson was best known as Andell Wilkerson on UPN's Moesha and its spinoff, The Parkers. In addition, she appeared in the movies House Party 2, House Party 3 and Friday.

According to NewsOne, Wilson went to California's San Jose State University and became a regular on Russell Simmon's Def Comedy Jam.. Her big break came in 1993, on the short-lived ABC sitcom Thea, which, like the later Moesha, also starred Brandy Norwood.

[nycfem]

A nice obit for a member of our community, Dillon62, and someone a number of us loved dearly in real time:

http://www.washingtonblade.com/2012/06/13/sylvia-colon-49/

[QueenofSmirks]

Ray Bradbury, author of Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles, and other beloved science fiction novels, died Tuesday night at the age of 91.....

I still have an old, beat up copy of The Illustrated Man. I love so many of his works, it would be tough to choose a favorite.

[Parker]

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-snc6/282656_10100765254151570_489482138_n.jpg

[Kobi]

http://www.theroot.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/large-image/feminista_kennedy-061512-400bj.jpg



Erica Kennedy, an author and blogger best known for popular novels Feminista and Bling, has died. She resided in Miami Beach and was 42 years old at the time of her death, according to a family member.

A former fashion publicist, Kennedy started her writing career as a special correspondent for the New York Daily News. She went on to write about fashion and entertainment for magazines such as Vibe, In Style, Paper and Elle UK, according to her website.

In 2004 she published a satire on the high stakes world of hip-hop with her debut novel, Bling, which went on to become a New York Times best-seller. Five years later she released her second novel, Feminista, a story about smart, modern women.

[Kobi]

NEW YORK (AP) — LeRoy Neiman, the painter and sketch artist best known for evoking the kinetic energy of the world's biggest sporting and leisure events with bright quick strokes, died Wednesday at age 91.

Neiman was a media-savvy artist who knew how to enthrall audiences with his instant renditions of what he observed. In 1972, he sketched the world chess tournament between Boris Spassky and Bobby Fischer in Reykjavik, Iceland, for a live television audience.

He also produced live drawings of the Olympics for TV and was the official computer artist of the Super Bowl for CBS.

Neiman's paintings, many executed in household enamel paints that allowed the artist his fast-moving strokes, are an explosion in reds, blues, pinks, greens and yellows of pure kinetic energy.

http://news.yahoo.com/leroy-neiman-artist-sports-world-dies-ny-011213688--spt.html

[Kobi]

Composer and lyricist Richard Adler, who won Tony Awardsfor co-writing the songs for such hit musicals as "The Pajama Game" and "Damn Yankees," has died. He was 90.

His family says he died Thursday at his home in Southampton, New York.

Some of Adler's biggest songs are "You Gotta Have Heart," ''Hey, There," ''Hernando's Hideaway," ''Whatever Lola Wants," ''Steam Heat," ''Rags to Riches" and "Everybody Loves a Lover."

Adler staged and produced several shows for U.S. presidents, including the unforgettable birthday celebration for President John F. Kennedy featuring Marilyn Monroe singing "Happy Birthday."

[Kobi]

When Harry Met Sally," "Sleepless in Seattle" and "Silkwood" screenwriter Nora Ephron has died, according to the Washington Post and CBS News. She was 71 years old and was said to be suffering from leukemia.

Known as a prolific writer spanning film, stage, novels, works of journalism and blogs, Ephron was also an accomplished filmmaker, having both written anddirected "Julie & Julia" (2009), "Bewitched" (2005), "You've Got Mail" (1998), "Michael" (1996), "Mixed Nuts" (1994), "Sleepless in Seattle" (1993) and "This Is My Life" (1992). She was nominated three times for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.

------------------------------------------

Nora Ephron passed away today. Not only did we lose an amazing writer, thinker, journalist, storyteller, and director; we lost the world’s funniest feminist.

Ephron came up in the 1960s, working first as an intern in John F. Kennedy's White House (“…it has become horribly clear to me that I am probably the only young woman who ever worked in the Kennedy White House whom the president did not make a pass at,” she wrote in The New York Times), and then the New York Post (she got that job by satirizing Post columnists and being a little too good at it). From there she started writing essays for Esquire like “A Few Words About Breasts,” which combined her penchant for personal history mixed with incredible humor.

Ephron graduated from Wellesley at a time when six girls in her class were expelled for lesbianism. “We weren't meant to have futures, we were meant to marry them,” she told the college's class of 1996. “We weren't' meant to have politics, or careers that mattered, or opinions, or lives; we were meant to marry them. If you wanted to be an architect, you married an architect.”

Naturally she had something to say about that. Her work in the late 1960s and 1970s focused on women, sex and the feminist movement, which was eventually compiled into the books Crazy Salad: Some Things About Women and Scribble Scribble. She used her greatest gift to cut to the core of inequality and misogyny so prevalent at the time:

“Men dominate the conversations in Washington and therefore, as far as I am concerned, the conversations are far less interesting than those in New York.”

“I am continually fascinated at the difficulty intelligent people have in distinguishing what is controversial from what is merely offensive.”

“I am still amazed at the amount of Christian charity [Wellesley] stuck us all with, a kind of glazed politeness in the face of boredom and stupidity. Tolerance, in the worst sense of the word.… How marvelous it would have been to go to a women's college that encouraged impoliteness, that rewarded aggression, that encouraged argument.”

Forget the never-ending “women aren’t funny” line that spews from every male comedian who has been or will be on the Celebrity Apprentice. The debate Ephron tackled was sexual politics itself and she did it with humor, with words both powerful and resonant. She understood that aphorisms aren’t just throw-aways that cheapen over time but can be piercing retorts in the right woman’s mouth. As Entertainment Weekly wrote about Crazy Salad, “Gloria Steinem was never this much fun,” which is both a little catty and deeply true — Steinem’s weapon of choice was never humor.

Of course, Ephron also made fun of the women’s movement when she found things frustrating or ridiculous. You are more likely to be heard if you’re a member of a choir you’re preaching to after all. When Crazy Salad was published, the AP wrote, “A dedicated feminist, Miss Ephron nevertheless pokes affectionate fun at her consciousness-raising group and sexual politics (‘We have lived through the era when happiness was a warm puppy…and a dry martini and now we have come to the era when happiness is ‘knowing what your uterus looks like.’)” (Notice that the AP called her “Miss” and not “Ms.”)

Ephron took on Betty Friedan, Phyllis Chesler and Jan Morris in her essays, always poking holes where she saw hypocrisy, cliché or narcissism, and at the same time outwardly struggling with how to be a good reporter and a good feminist. I would (with admitted bias) argue that even if you don’t agree with what she wrote the courage and talent behind it was great for women.

As her career grew, she extended her voice from journalism to film, writing Silkwood, When Harry Met Sally, and directing Sleepless in Seattle, You’ve Got Mail and many more. She said she “[tried] to write parts for women that are as complicated and interesting as women actually are.” Considering the number of Oscar nominations and the number of roles Meryl Streep took in her films, I think she exceeded expectations.

In 1996, two years before You’ve Got Mail would premiere, she gave the commencement address at her alma mater. After some warm-up jokes about dated hairstyles and tuition prices, Ephron, in no uncertain terms, challenged the graduating class to bring it or go home:

What I'm saying is, don't delude yourself that the powerful cultural values that wrecked the lives of so many of my classmates have vanished from the earth. Don't let The New York Times article about the brilliant success of Wellesley graduates in the business world fool you — there's still a glass ceiling. … Don't underestimate how much antagonism there is toward women and how many people wish we could turn the clock back. One of the things people always say to you if you get upset is, don't take it personally, but listen hard to what's going on and, please, I beg you, take it personally. Above all, be the heroine of your life, not the victim. Because you don’t have the alibi my class had.

When her book I Feel Bad About My Neck came out, she again found herself at odds with some women of her generation who saw it as demeaning to negatively portray the process of aging. If that were what the book was about, I’d agree with them, but it was so much more than that. It was about family and politics, food and parenting, and yes, a look at those little embarrassing moments that come with time and all the little injustices your body inflicts without your consent. As she’s said in many ways over the years, “When you slip on a banana peel, people laugh at you. But when you tell people you slipped on a banana peel, it’s your laugh.” I dare you to argue that’s not empowerment.

Nora Ephron will be remembered for many things — that she loved her family, that she helped change the voice of journalism, that she was one of the first great female directors — but I will always remember her for what she did for women be they her friends, women she mentored, women she advised, women she employed or women who read/heard/saw her work. Thanks, Nora, from all of us.

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/entertainment/2012/06/nora-ephron-funniest-feminist/53954/#

[Arwen]

Molly Judith Olgin, 19.

She wasn't famous but she wasn't given a chance to become who she might have been. Her 18 year old girlfriend,Mary Kristene Chapa , is fighting for her life.

They were shot in Corpus Christi. Police have no suspects. Yet. I call on the Gods to bring swift justice to whomever shot these two young women.

I suspect it is someone who knew them and their hang outs. I think there was more than one person. I think this was a hate crime (http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-texas-lesbians-shot-20120626,0,5851118.story).

I cry tonight for the one who is dead and for those who are left behind. (w)

[Kobi]

Don Grady, who was one of television's most beloved big brothers as Robbie Douglas on the long-running 1960s hit "My Three Sons," died Wednesday.

Born in San Diego as Don Louis Agrati, Grady had a brief stint singing and dancing on "The Mickey Mouse Club" starting at age 13.

But he was best known by far as one of Fred MacMurray's "My Three Sons" on the series that ran on ABC and later CBS from 1960 to 1972.

A musical prodigy from a young age, Grady appeared with a band, the Greefs, in the series, and in real life played drums for The Yellow Balloon, who had a minor hit with a self-titled song in 1967.

He made a handful of guest appearances on TV series in the 1970s and 1980s, but worked primarily as a musician and composer, writing the theme for "The Phil Donahue Show" and music for the Blake Edwards film "Switch" and the popular Las Vegas show "EFX," a showcase for "Phantom of the Opera" star Michael Crawford.

[Kobi]

Doris Sams, who pitched a perfect game and set a single-season home run record in the women’s professional baseball world of the 1940s and 50s that inspired the movie “A League of Their Own,” died Thursday in Knoxville, Tenn. She was 85.

Sams was one of the leading players in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, founded in 1943 by Phil Wrigley, the owner of the Chicago Cubs, to provide evening entertainment in Midwestern towns and keep interest in baseball alive when the majors were losing most of their players to military service in World War II.

The women’s league, which survived into 1954, was largely forgotten until the 1992 Hollywood comedy with Madonna and Geena Davis on the field and Tom Hanks as the profane manager who drove one of his players to tears and then famously exclaimed in bewilderment, “There’s no crying in baseball!”

Playing for Michigan’s Muskegon Lassies and their successor franchise, the Kalamazoo Lassies, from 1946 to 1953, Sams, who was 5 feet 9 inches and wore glasses, pitched underhand, sidearm and overhand, as the rules governing deliveries evolved.

She hit a league-record 12 home runs in 1952, playing in 109 games; she hit better than .300 in each of her last four seasons; threw out many runners playing the outfield when she was not pitching; and she was the league’s player of the year in 1947 and 1949.

Sams pitched her perfect game in August 1947, retiring all 27 batters for the Fort Wayne Daisies in a 2-0 victory, then threw a no-hitter the next year against the Springfield Sallies.

Doris Jane Sams was born in Knoxville on Feb. 2, 1927. A grandfather and her father, Robert, played semipro baseball, and she joined with two older brothers in playing baseball as a youngster. By 11, she was playing fast-pitch softball on a team with much older girls. She also won a regional marbles tournament and was a Knoxville city badminton champion before turning to pro baseball after a tryout in 1946.

She was soon a star and shared the covers of Dell publishing’s 1948 major league yearbook with Ted Williams — he on the front, she on the back. She estimated that she was paid about $4,000 a season.

The Hall of Fame displayed one of Sams’s player-of-the year trophies along with her Louisville Slugger bat when it opened its permanent exhibition on women in baseball.

In her interview with The Post-Dispatch, Sams said that a mannequin of Babe Ruth was on display near the women’s exhibit.

“I look over to the right and see Babe Ruth,” she said. “I look over on the left and see Ted Williams. Then I look in the mirror and say, ‘What are you doing here?’ It’s all so unbelievable. I never ever dreamed our league would get this kind of recognition.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/02/sports/doris-sams-womens-pro-baseball-star-dies-at-85.html

[clay]

http://news.yahoo.com/report-andy-griffith-died-age-86-141449183.html

[vixenagogo]

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.aoltv.com/media/2006/02/matlocko.jpg

[Breathless]

Spent alot of my childhood with Mr. Griffith, he will be missed.

[Jess]

I live 20 minutes from Mt Airy, which is where Mayberry was set. I am quite sure there will be amazing tributes and may find myself aimlessly riding down there today or tomorrow.

Will be missed without a doubt...

http://img.discountpostersale.com/posters/MVSM172997/1/Andy-Griffith.jpg

[~ocean]

sweet dreams (((( andy ))))

[Breathless]

R.I.P. ERNEST BORGNINE (1917-2012)

http://www.usatoday.com/life/people/obit/story/2012-07-08/ernest-borgnine-dead/56097750/1