Venezuelans line up to switch PIP breast implants

In this photo taken on Jan. 26, 2012, plastic surgeon Dr. Ignacio Sousa holds two PIP breast implants after they were removed from a patient at a clinic in Caracas, Venezuela. The yellow implant at right is broken. Thousands of women throughout Latin America are consulting their doctors, fearing health risks due to faulty silicone implants made by the now-defunct French company Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP. The scandal has hit Venezuela particularly hard. About 16,000 Venezuelans have the PIP implants, making the country the per-capita leader in Latin America. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

In this photo taken on Jan. 26, 2012, plastic surgeon Dr. Ignacio Sousa holds two PIP breast implants after they were removed from a patient at a clinic in Caracas, Venezuela. The yellow implant at right is broken. Thousands of women throughout Latin America are consulting their doctors, fearing health risks due to faulty silicone implants made by the now-defunct French company Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP. The scandal has hit Venezuela particularly hard. About 16,000 Venezuelans have the PIP implants, making the country the per-capita leader in Latin America. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

In this photo taken on Jan. 26, 2012, a plastic surgeon holds a broken PIP breast implant after it was removed from a patient at a clinic in Caracas, Venezuela. Thousands of women throughout Latin America are consulting their doctors, fearing health risks due to faulty silicone implants made by the now-defunct French company Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP. The scandal has hit Venezuela particularly hard. About 16,000 Venezuelans have the PIP implants, making the country the per-capita leader in Latin America. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

In this photo taken on Jan. 24, 2012, Sania Arroyo, 33, sits next to the two PIP breast implants that she had removed, during an interview in Caracas, Venezuela. The yellow implant at left is broken. Thousands of women throughout Latin America are consulting their doctors, fearing health risks due to faulty silicone implants made by the now-defunct French company Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP. The scandal has hit Venezuela particularly hard. About 16,000 Venezuelans have the PIP implants, making the country the per-capita leader in Latin America. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

In this photo taken on Jan. 24, 2012, Sania Arroyo, 33, shows the two PIP breast implants she had removed in Caracas, Venezuela. The yellow implant at left is broken and sits in a case. Thousands of women throughout Latin America are consulting their doctors, fearing health risks due to faulty silicone implants made by the now-defunct French company Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP. The scandal has hit Venezuela particularly hard. About 16,000 Venezuelans have the PIP implants, making the country the per-capita leader in Latin America. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) ? The office of plastic surgeon Ignacio Sousa is so packed that women are lined up outside the door. College students in their 20s, housewives in their 40s, middle-class office workers: nearly all are fearful that their breast implants may be leaking.

Thousands of women worldwide are consulting their doctors about health concerns that have sprung up since December due to faulty silicone breast implants made by the now-defunct French company Poly Implant Prothese, or PIP. In some cases, the implants filled with industrial-grade silicone have split open, prompting growing demand for their removal.

"It's like a snowball," said Sousa, who has been receiving dozens of patients every day since the news broke that French authorities recommended the implants be removed.

The scandal has hit beauty-obsessed Venezuela particularly hard. An estimated 16,000 Venezuelans have the implants, one of the highest figures among Latin American countries, along with much-larger Brazil, where about 20,000 women have either PIP or other defective implants sold by the Dutch company Rofil Medical Nederland BV.

Breast enlargement surgery is common in Venezuela and has grown in popularity in recent years among middle-class women, thanks in part to low-interest loans offered by private clinics for the operations.

The PIP brand was used frequently until the implants were pulled from the market in 2010.

Like many of those affected in Venezuela, Sania Arroyo has struggled with the mounting medical bills. The 33-year-old bank employee and single mother managed to save about 20,000 bolivars, or $4,600, for surgery to replace the implants in January, scraping together nearly four times what she paid to have them inserted in 2007.

She suspected a problem with the implants when she felt a tingling pain under her left breast, and an ultrasound exam confirmed one had ruptured and was leaking silicone into her body.

She said the replacement implants feel more comfortable, but she's still apprehensive about them.

"I feel so much better now, although I still have the fear something similar could happen again," Arroyo said, holding a plastic case containing the ruptured implant and the yellowish silicone that leaked out.

PIP's silicone gel is transparent, but doctors say the substance often turns yellow when it comes in contact with body tissues.

Arroyo is one of 495 Venezuelans who are suing companies that sold the implants, demanding payment of medical costs.

Venezuela's government offered to remove the implants for free, but many women say they won't take up the offer because they prefer to have new implants and the government won't pay for them.

French authorities say an estimated 300,000 women have the implants worldwide, including more than 42,000 in Britain, more than 30,000 in France, 9,000 in Australia and 4,000 in Italy.

The implants were never approved for sale in the United States, but tens of thousands of pairs were sold in Latin America. In Colombia, for instance, the association of plastic surgeons says about 14,000 pairs of PIP implants were sold.

On a per-capita basis, Venezuela appears to lead Latin America in the number of breast implants. That's no surprise to most people in the country, where beauty pageants are a source of national pride and where some teenagers receive implants as birthday presents. Middle-class women sometimes set aside large portions of their salaries for the surgery.

An estimated 35,000 to 40,000 women undergo breast enlargement surgeries in Venezuela each year, and doctors say the numbers have been rising.

"Terror has certainly gripped patients who have the implants, but I don't believe the desire for breast enlargement surgery is going to diminish," said Gabriel Obayi, a surgeon who has been answering many emails from women concerned about health risks.

Like most surgeons in Venezuela, Obayi recommends that PIP implants eventually be removed but advises that surgery is not urgent in most cases.

Regardless of the brand, breast implants are known to break down over time and rupture in some cases.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration banned silicone-gel type implants in 1992 amid fears they might cause cancer, lupus and other diseases. But in 2006 the agency returned the implants to the U.S. market after most studies failed to find a link between silicone breast implants and disease.

The FDA began an investigation last year into a possible link between implants and a very rare form of cancer, known as anaplastic large cell lymphoma. The agency said it had learned of about 60 cases of the disease worldwide among women with implants.

France's Health Safety Agency has said the suspect PIP implants appear to be more rupture-prone than other types, but officials have not specified why.

French health authorities have said they don't know enough about the health effects of the industrial-grade silicone in the faulty implants, and have recommended that women get them removed after the implants ruptured in more than 1,000 cases. The government has agreed to pay for the procedure.

Investigators in France say PIP sought to save money by using industrial silicone rather than the medical-grade variety.

Last week, French authorities filed preliminary charges against PIP's founder, Jean-Claude Mas, who according to his lawyer is under investigation for "involuntary injury." His company went into bankruptcy proceedings shortly after the government in 2010 pulled the implants from the market.

The scandal has left many women asking about the risks they may face, and doctors so far have limited answers.

"We don't know, neither in Venezuela nor Latin America, what percentage of PIP implants rupture," said Dr. Carlos Nieto, a surgeon and board member of the Venezuelan Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery.

It's also unclear how many women have had the implants removed so far.

In Argentina, about 300 women are negotiating with private clinics and a local distributor, Pro Estetica, demanding the defective implants be replaced for free, said attorney Virgina Luna, who represents the group.

Gabriela Febres, a 30-year-old financial analyst in Caracas, has joined the legal case against Venezuelan distributors. She suspects she needs to have surgery soon because her right breast has been hurting for weeks.

"This affects you in so many ways: your job, your finances and your psychological state," Febres said. "The uncertainty is the worst."

____

Associated Press writers Almudena Calatrava in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Stan Lehman in Sao Paolo, Brazil, Cesar Garcia in Bogota, Colombia, and Angela Charlton and Jamey Keaten in Paris, as well as AP Medical Writer Maria Cheng in London contributed to this report.

___

Christopher Toothaker on Twitter: http://twitter.com/ctoothaker

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/bbd825583c8542898e6fa7d440b9febc/Article_2012-01-31-LT-Latin-America-Breast-Implants/id-5673dd303b45427b9d99c764d7908c40

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2 for Wambach, Morgan; US women beat Canada 4-0

Canada goalkeeper Erin McLeod dives to make a save during the second half of CONCACAF women's Olympic qualifying final soccer action against the United States in Vancouver, British Columbia Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)

Canada goalkeeper Erin McLeod dives to make a save during the second half of CONCACAF women's Olympic qualifying final soccer action against the United States in Vancouver, British Columbia Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)

United States' Abby Wambach (20) celebrates her goal against Canada with teammates Alex Morgan, Carli Lloyd (10), Megan Rapinoe (15) and Lori Lindsey (16) during the first half of a CONCACAF women's Olympic qualifying match in Vancouver, British Columbia, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)

United States' Alex Morgan (13) celebrates her goal against Canada with teammates Megan Rapinoe (15) and Lori Lindsey (16) during the first half of a CONCACAF women's Olympic qualifying match in Vancouver, British Columbia, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)

United States' Alex Morgan, left, celebrates her goal with teammate Lauren Cheney (12) as Canada's Shannon Woeller (2) and Desiree Scott (11) walk past during the second half of a CONCACAF women's Olympic qualifying match in Vancouver, British Columbia, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)

United States' Alex Morgan, left, celebrates her goal with teammate Lauren Cheney during the second half against Canada in a CONCACAF women's Olympic qualifying match in Vancouver, British Columbia, Sunday, Jan. 29, 2012. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Jonathan Hayward)

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) ? With a flick of the head, Abby Wambach sent Alex Morgan on a 30-yard run that gave the United States an early lead, the first of three goals resulting from impeccable teamwork between the veteran and the up-and-comer.

There's no question that Wambach, now the second leading goal-scorer in women's soccer, will be at the front of the attack for the U.S. women's soccer team at the London Olympics. The emerging question is whether Morgan should be starting as well.

Wambach and Morgan scored two goals apiece Sunday night in the Americans' 4-0 victory over Canada in the championship game of the CONCACAF Olympic qualifying tournament, a match that was essentially for bragging rights between two teams that had already earned their berths for the Summer Games.

"I'm not going to lie. I think we play really well together," Wambach said. "Her skill set is completely opposite of mine, and that just makes for a nightmare for any defenses. She's so fast. Not only is she fast, she's so strong on the ball."

Wambach's head-flick provided the assist on Morgan's goal in the fourth minute, then Morgan assisted in the 24th and 28th as Wambach pushed her career total to 131 goals, one ahead of longtime U.S. captain Kristine Lilly. The 31-year-old forward said last week that it's only a matter of time before she or Canada's Christine Sinclair topple Mia Hamm's record of 158, but that's still a few years off.

"Lill emailed me a couple of days ago," Wambach said. "And she says 'How about you go ahead and tie me already, and then why don't you go ahead and beat me already? But don't make it a toe-poke, make it a nice goal.' And I think those two goals were great goals for us."

Wambach left for a sub at halftime, but Morgan continued merrily on, scoring her second goal in the 56th after running onto a long ball from Lauren Cheney.

Morgan has become the Americans' super-sub, bringing energy and lightning-fast scoring potential off the bench at last year's World Cup. She'd prefer to start ? and she admits she was mad when she sat the entire game against Mexico last week ? and she took advantage of a spot in the first 11 on Sunday to show that is perhaps where she belongs.

"If we play tomorrow, I'd say yes," coach Pia Sundhage said. "When we go to Algarve Cup (next month), I don't know. That's the beauty of the team we have right now. We will still change the starting lineup quite a bit. Regardless of who we pick, it will be a good team. But she brought something special today with Abby."

Sundhage has been starting games with a Wambach alone at the top of a 4-2-3-1 formation. Playing Wambach and Morgan together, as the coach did Sunday, makes it a more traditional 4-4-2 ? and it worked magic from the opening whistle.

When Carli Lloyd hit a long ball early in the game, Wambach knew that all she had to do was nod it to on to Morgan, who used her power and speed to fight off two defenders. Canada's Candace Chapman did everything but pull Morgan to the ground, but instead it was Chapman who ended up on the turf as Morgan finished off a left-footer from 12 yards.

Morgan then supplied the cross for Wambach's header to make it 2-0, then collected a rebound and slid the ball to Wambach again for an easy right-footer from 7 yards four minutes later.

Wambach and Sinclair started the game tied at 129 goals, but the anticipated head-to-head matchup between two of the game's greats turned out to be as lopsided as the final score. Sinclair, whose nine goals led all scorers in the tournament, found herself bottled up by U.S. defenders. The better scoring chances were left to Christina Julien, who was twice stymied point-blank by goalkeeper Hope Solo in the first half.

Solo played every minute of the tournament despite a slight pull of her right quadriceps suffered before the second game. The Americans outscored their opponents by a combined score of 38-0 over five games.

The U.S. and Canada were playing for the 50th or 51st time ? there's some disagreement between the two sides over a game that might or might not have taken place in the 1980s ? but either way it's been a series of American domination. Canada has only three wins and five draws, its last victory coming 11 years ago in a tournament in Portugal.

Even a sellout crowd of 25,427 at BC Place ? the second-largest ever for a Canada home game ? failed to rally the underdogs, who have much work to do to catch up with the Americans before heading to London.

"From what we can see, the naked eye will tell you, there's a bit of a gap there," Canada coach John Herdman said. "We can close that gap. I'm absolutely sure."

___

Joseph White can be reached at http://twitter.com/JGWhiteAP

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2012-01-29-SOC-US-Canada/id-71d5c32e49994621bfa4b37edf231e57

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The World's Greatest Chefs Talk About their Favourite Kitchen Tools [Video]

Hearing Anthony Bourdain, Eric Ripert, Jos? Andr?s, and April Bloomfield talk about their favorite kitchen tools won't make you a better chef. But that doesn't mean you can't learn from them. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/olAiAR6aZlU/the-worlds-greatest-chefs-talk-about-their-favourite-kitchen-tools

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John Lundberg: Scotland Celebrates Robert Burns

This past Wednesday was Robert Burns day in Scotland. The annual birthday celebrations in honor of the great 18th Century poet featured the traditional bagpipe music and boozy dinners, and, this year, the release of a Burns Night iPod app to help make the most of your celebrations. The parties were going smoothly until a four-foot tall papier-m?ch? haggis caused a security incident at a Scottish railway station. But what's a good party without a security incident?

Whether you're familiar with Burns or not, you know his poetry. He penned the words to "Auld Lang Syne" that you fumble through after the ball lands on New Year's Day. And two of the most celebrated American novels, Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye and Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, take their names from Burns' poems.

But while Burns has made his mark here, his influence in his home country of Scotland is massive. Burns is Scotland's national poet. He was, and is, revered for choosing to write his poems in the Scottish dialect, rather than in English. And his efforts to celebrate and memorialize Scottish culture were invaluable for their contribution to the Scottish identity.

Burns also, less fortunately, immortalized a Scottish dish called haggis -- the liver, lungs and heart of a sheep spiced and stuffed in a sheep's stomach -- in his poem "Address to Haggis":

Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,?
Great chieftain o' the puddin-race!?
Aboon them a' ye tak your place,?
Painch, tripe, or thairm:?
Weel are ye wordy o' a grace?
As lang's my arm.

Speaking of poetry, Scots also voted, this year, on their favorite Burns poem. His great narrative poem, "Tam o'Shanter," came in first -- the tale of a man who has a vision of the devil while drunkenly riding home on his horse. It's a moralistic, tongue-in-cheek tale about the evils of drinking. Tam's wife, you see, had warned him that his carousing might cost him:

She prophesied that late or soon,?
Thou wad be found, deep drown'd in Doon,?
Or catch'd wi' warlocks in the mirk,?
By Alloway's auld, haunted kirk.

But just when it looks like the devil might take Tam, he escapes, at the cost of just his horse's tail. You can read the entire poem here.

A poignant poem about humanity, "A Man's a Man for A' That'," came in second:

A prince can mak a belted knight,
A marquis, duke, an' a' that;
But an honest man's abon his might,
Gude faith, he maunna fa' that!
For a' that, an' a' that,
Their dignities an' a' that;
The pith o' sense, an' pride o' worth,
Are higher rank than a' that.

And there is perhaps no better way of understanding Burns' value to Scotland than to listen to a Scot singing one of his poems. You can watch a great version of "A Man's a Man" sung by a Lionell McClellend of Moffat, here. It's enough to make a man wish he were Scottish (and A' That).

?

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-lundberg/robert-burns_b_1236879.html

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Statins May Stave Off Liver Cancer in People With Hepatitis B (HealthDay)

THURSDAY, Jan. 26 (HealthDay News) -- Popular cholesterol-lowering statins may also lower risk for liver cancer among people with hepatitis B, a new study shows. Hepatitis B, an inflammation of the liver due to the hepatitis B virus, is one of the main causes of liver cancer.

This is not the first time that statins have shown promise in reducing risk for cancer. Other studies have hinted that these drugs may play a role in preventing certain types of cancer, including breast cancer.

In the new study of more than 33,000 individuals with hepatitis B followed from 1997 to 2008, those who took a statin were less likely to develop liver cancer, when compared to participants who were not prescribed statins. What's more, the longer a person took statins, the greater the liver-cancer risk reduction. Study participants were prescribed the statins to treat high cholesterol levels. Overall, 1,021 people developed liver cancer during the study period.

More research is needed to see how statins may lower liver cancer risk among people with hepatitis B, the researchers said.

"Statins have potential protective effects against cancers [and] carriers of hepatitis B virus infection have a substantial risk of [liver] carcinoma," said Dr. Pau-Chung Chen, a professor of environmental medicine and epidemiology at National Taiwan University, in Taipei. "Statin use is not only a benefit to preventing cardiovascular diseases, but also an additional, convenient and acceptable strategy for preventing hepatocellular carcinoma," or liver cancer, Chen said.

However, statins can cause a potentially dangerous rise in liver enzymes and liver damage. Regular liver function tests are required for all people who take statins.

The study appeared online Jan. 23 in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

"This is exciting and unequivocally solid research," said Dr. Eugene Schiff, a professor of medicine and director of the Center for Liver Diseases at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine.

"One of the issues is that statins are relatively contraindicated in people with liver disease," Schiff said. But "the take-home message for people with hepatitis B or anybody with liver disease is that statins are safe. This re-emphasizes the point that if someone has chronic hepatitis B and there is an indication for statins, they should get them and they may be beneficial far beyond lowering cholesterol: They may also reduce their risk for liver cancer."

Dr. David Bernstein, chief of hepatology at North Shore University Hospital and Long Island Jewish Medical Center in Manhasset, N.Y., is more cautious. "In almost all other liver conditions, cirrhosis must be present before [liver cancer] develops," he said. During cirrhosis, scar tissue replaces healthy liver tissue. "Statins must be used with caution in patients with cirrhosis, which can limit their use in patients with liver disease at risk of developing liver cancer," he said. "Further studies are needed in this patient population to confirm these findings."

More information

For information on hepatitis B, visit the U.S. National Digestive Diseases Information Clearinghouse.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/cancer/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/hsn/20120128/hl_hsn/statinsmaystaveofflivercancerinpeoplewithhepatitisb

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Scientists create star matter in a lab: what could possibly go wrong?! (Yahoo! News)

Experiments bring us closer to understanding our own sun

As scientists work to discover more and more about the?galaxy and our own?solar system, they're doing some pretty amazing things. But U.S. Department of Energy scientists working at the?SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford University have accomplished something that really boggles the mind: they have created superhot solid plasma?? the kind of material you would find at the center of a star or a giant planet.

The scientists used a machine called the Linac Coherent Light Source, the most powerful X-ray laser machine ever created, to accomplish this feat. They fired the laser at a tiny cube of aluminum only one-thousandth of a centimeter wide, and as the laser pulses converged on the aluminum, it created a superhot solid plasma burning at a temperature of 3.6 million degrees Fahrenheit (2 million degrees Celsius).

While that might sound pretty darn hot (and it is about the temperature of our sun's corona or outer atmosphere), it's still much cooler than the 14 million Kelvin (13.9 million Celsius) of the matter at the center of our star. But the research goes a long way toward understanding the nuclear fusion process that powers our sun and makes stars work.

[Image credit:?University of Oxford/Sam Vinko]

This article was written by Katherine Gray and originally appeared on Tecca

More from Tecca:

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/techblog/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_technews/20120126/tc_yblog_technews/scientists-create-star-matter-in-a-lab-what-could-possibly-go-wrong

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Obama admin says new forest rules stress science (AP)

WASHINGTON ? The Obama administration says new rules to manage nearly 200 million acres of national forests will protect watersheds and wildlife while promoting uses ranging from recreation to logging.

The new rules, to replace guidelines thrown out by a federal court in 2009, are set to take effect in early March. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced the rule change on Thursday.

Vilsack said in an interview that the rules reflect more than 300,000 comments received since a draft plan was released last year. The new rules strengthen a requirement that decisions be based on the best available science and recognize that forests are used for a variety of purposes, Vilsack said.

"I think it's a solid rule and done in a collaborative, open and transparent way," he said.

The guidelines, known as a forest planning rule, will encourage forest restoration and watershed protection while creating opportunities for the timber industry and those who use the forest for recreation, he said.

Vilsack, who has pledged to break through the logjam of political conflict over forest management, said the new regulation's emphasis on science and multiple uses should allow it to stand up to likely court challenges from environmental groups or the timber industry.

"I am hopeful and confident that it will stand scrutiny," he said.

Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell said the guidelines would allow land management plans for individual forests to be completed more quickly and at a lower cost than under current rules, which date to the Reagan administration.

Several attempts to revise the 1982 planning rule have been thrown out by federal courts in the past decade. Most recently a Bush administration plan was struck down in 2009. Environmentalists had fought the rule, saying it rolled back key forest protections.

The Obama administration did not appeal the ruling, electing to develop a new forest planning rule to protect water, climate and wildlife.

Under the new rule, forest plans could be developed within three to four years instead of taking up to seven years, as under current guidelines, Tidwell said.

"We really can protect the forest at lower cost with less time," he said.

The new regulation also should give forest managers more flexibility to address conditions on the ground, such as projects to thin the forest to reduce the risk of wildfire, Tidwell said.

"We'll be able to get more work done ? get more out of the forest and create more jobs," while at the same allowing greater recreational use, Tidwell said. Recreational use of the forest has grown exponentially in recent years.

Like Vilsack, Tidwell said he is optimistic the new plan will stand up to scrutiny from environmental groups and the timber industry, both of which have challenged previous planning rules in court.

"I'm optimistic that folks will want to give it a shot," Tidwell said.

The 155 national forests and grasslands managed by the Forest Service cover 193 million acres in 42 states and Puerto Rico. Balance between industry and conservation in those areas has been tough to find since the existing rules went into effect three decades ago.

At least three revisions of the rules have been struck down since 2000.

The planning rule designates certain animal species that must be protected to ensure ecosystems are healthy. However, the rule became the basis of numerous lawsuits that sharply cut back logging to protect habitat for fish and wildlife.

Meanwhile, the timber industry has continued to clamor for more logs, and conservation groups keep challenging timber sales, drilling and mining projects.

Tom Partin, president of the American Forest Resource Council, a timber industry group, said his members will review the final rule to see if it follows a federal rule to manage forests for a diversity of plants and animals ? not in a manner that places a single use or species above all else.

Jane Danowitz, U.S. public lands director for the Pew Environment Group, said national forests are the source of drinking water for one in three Americans, are home to fish and other wildlife and are an economic engine for local communities across the West.

"Faced with unprecedented threats from industrial development, these national forests need strong national protections," she said, adding that the new framework for forest management appears to reflect comments from scientists, the business community and conservation advocates.

"The plan now has stronger safeguards than what was originally proposed. That said, the true test of this plan will be how it's implemented on the ground," Danowitz said.

___

Matthew Daly can be followed on Twitter: (at)MatthewDalyWDC

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/obama/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120126/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_forest_rules

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HP Folio 13

One's too steep and one's too shallow, and they're the Achilles' heels of ultrabooks. What are they? Prices and keyboards, respectively, and HP goes a long way toward fixing them with its entry in the super-slim laptop sweepstakes, the HP Folio 13?$899.99 with Windows 7 Home Premium or $1,048.99 as tested with Windows 7 Professional, and equipped with one of the nicest keyboards in the class.

The HP Folio 13 is nice in other ways, too, from its Ethernet port to its memory-card slot. It's a few ounces heavier and a few ticks of the benchmark stopwatch slower than some competitors, but the more you use it the less you'll care about that: Ultrabooks are about convenience and productivity, and the Folio 13 delivers so much of both that it comes within a whisker of unseating our Editors' Choice in the category, the Asus Zenbook UX31-RSL8 ($1,049 list, 4 stars).

At $899.99 with Win 7 Home Premium, the Folio is the second most affordable ultrabook with a true solid-state drive instead of a spinning hard drive with solid-state booster like the Acer Aspire S3 ($899.99 direct, 3.5 stars). The most affordable, the Toshiba Portege Z835-P330 ($799.99 at Best Buy, 3.5 stars), makes do with a tepid Intel Core i3 processor versus the HP's perkier Core i5, as well as a thinner, more flex-prone screen and keyboard. The difference is worth the $100, even if the upgrade to Win 7 Professional is pricey at $149 (blame Microsoft, not HP).

Design
Though not carved out of an aluminum unibody like the Apple MacBook Air 13-inch (Thunderbolt) ($1,299 direct, 4 stars) or Lenovo IdeaPad U300s ($1,495 direct, 4 stars), the Folio 13 makes good use of the metal, combining a brushed aluminum lid and palm rest with a grippable, soft-touch plastic bottom. It offers a mix of matte and glossy finishes, with a non-reflective bezel around the mirror-finish display and a glossy tray beneath the matte keys.

Between the aluminum construction and a large-for-the-category six-cell battery, the HP, while still quite light, is heavy for an ultrabook?3.25 pounds on PC Labs' scale, compared to about 2.9 pounds for most rivals and 2.5 pounds for the Toshiba Z835-P330. The difference is barely noticeable; you can still slip the 8.7 by 12.5 by 0.7-inch Folio into your briefcase and almost forget it's there. Meanwhile, the system is flex-, wiggle-, and wobble-free, whether you're grasping the screen by the corners or typing with it in your lap?something you can't say for many ultrabooks.

The 13.3-inch display offers the same 1,366 by 768 resolution as most ultrabooks (trailing the 1,440 by 900 of the MacBook Air and 1,600 by 900 of the Asus UX31). It's nicely sharp and passably bright if you keep the backlight cranked up to its top couple of settings, though white backgrounds aren't washday-miracle white and colors don't pop as they do on some competitive screens.

If the screen is only fair to good, however, the keyboard is very good to excellent, as long as you don't mind having Home, End, PgUp, and PgDn doubled up on the cursor arrows instead of given their own keys (and one quirk: full-sized left and right arrows bracketing half-sized up and down keys). Travel-wise, ultrabook keyboards are by definition shallower than those of thicker laptops, but the HP's soft-touch keys manage to provide good tactile response without the did-that-keystroke-register uncertainty of some rivals.

The keyboard is backlit, too (the F5 key toggles the handy backlight), like the Toshiba's and Apple's and unlike the Asus', and doesn't oblige you to press a Fn key to access the functions such as screen brightness and audio and media controls assigned to F1 through F10. It's accompanied by a touchpad whose silky-smooth gliding and tapping contrasts with fairly stiff mouse buttons.

Features
Deskbound users will look in vain for a Kensington lock slot, but they'll find a full-sized Gigabit Ethernet port as well as Wi-Fi for connecting to office networks plus Bluetooth for sharing data with smartphones. The Wi-Fi worked fine for Web surfing and Windows Update sessions. There are also one USB 2.0, one USB 3.0, and HDMI ports, as well as a headphone/microphone jack and the SD/MMC card slot that's missing from the Lenovo U300s and Dell Inspiron 13. The only thing missing is a VGA port for connecting older monitors and projectors, but HP sells an HDMI-to-VGA adapter for $40.

Intel Wireless Display (WiDi) is another presentation option, allowing you to beam the Folio's video and audio to an HDTV equipped with an aftermarket adapter, like the $99 Netgear Push2TV. The ultrabook's own audio is easily able to fill a room, with hearty, not-too-tinny sound through its above-the-keyboard speakers?which are worth turning up, because the Folio 13's cooling fan makes a faintly audible whir at most times.

Like all 13.3-inch ultrabooks, the Folio 13 lacks an optical drive; the 128GB Samsung solid-state drive is divided into a 97GB C: and 18GB D: or system recovery partition. Preloaded software, despite the Windows 7 Professional OS, skews toward the consumer side with links to movie and music sites and the WildTangent games that are the very definition of bloatware, though you'll also find Evernote, a 60-day trial of Norton Internet Security, and Microsoft Office Starter 2010. HP backs the Folio 13 with a one-year parts-and-labor warranty.

Performance
The Folio 13 is built around Intel's dual-core, four-thread Core i5-2467M "Sandy Bridge" processor, the same chip found in the Acer S3, with 4GB of DDR3 memory. Thanks in part to its pure SSD instead of hybrid storage solution, the Folio 13 soundly beat the Acer S3 in the PCMark 7 all-around performance benchmark test, scoring 3,146 to 1,899, although it in turn trailed the Asus Zenbook UX31's score of 3,531. The Folio managed cold start and resume-from-sleep times of 26 seconds and 3 seconds, respectively, in stopwatch tests.

The ultrabook posted competitive, if not head-of-the-class, numbers in our Handbrake video encoding (2 minutes 30 seconds) and Photoshop CS5 image manipulation (5 minutes 27 seconds) tests?easily besting the Core i3-powered Toshiba Z835-P330 (3:29 and 8:17, respectively), if a step behind the Core i5-based Asus UX31 and 13-inch Apple MacBook Air. The only area where it raised the white flag was in gaming graphics, posting an unplayable 14.3 frames per second in Lost Planet 2 and an unbearable 6.6 fps in Crysis. The MacBook Air and Core i7-powered Toshiba Portege Z830-S8302 led the field here with 21.2 and 19.7 fps, respectively, but even the Core i3 Toshiba Z835-P330 did better than the Folio 13 with 16.2 and 14.8 fps, respectively, on the gaming tests.

HP touts the Folio 13 as having a better than nine-hour battery life (and indeed, its 59Wh battery is the main reason for its slightly-excessive-compared-to-comrades weight), so we were mildly disappointed to record a runtime of only six hours and six minutes in our MobileMark 2007 test. Even as is, that's better than the MacBook Air's 5:46 or Acer S3's 5:20, but doesn't threaten the Toshiba Z835-P330's ultrabook battery record of 7:35.

But if the HP Folio 13 isn't the longest-lasting ultrabook on the market, well, it isn't the thinnest or lightest or fastest, either. What it is, is one of the most immaculate designs we've seen, with clever attention to small details as well as thoughtful attention paid to big issues like connectivity and typing comfort. With either a slightly brighter screen or a couple of better benchmark numbers, the Folio 13 would have bumped our Editors' Choice Asus Zenbook UX31 from its top spot; as is, it's a must-have on ultrabook shoppers' short lists.

BENCHMARK TEST RESULTS:

COMPARISON TABLE:
Compare the HP Folio 13 with several other laptops side by side.

More laptop reviews:
??? HP Folio 13
??? Acer Aspire TimelineX 5830TG-6614
??? Toshiba Portege Z830-S8302
??? HP Pavilion dm1-3010nr (Verizon)
??? Dell Latitude E6420 XFR
?? more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/XnjGY1iJpkE/0,2817,2399370,00.asp

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Memorial service to cap 3-day mourning for Paterno (AP)

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. ? A simple two-word message flashed this week on the electronic signboard outside Penn State's Bryce Jordan Center.

"Thanks JoePa."

On Thursday, a capacity crowd of more than 12,000 is expected to pack the arena for one more tribute to Joe Paterno, the Hall of Fame football coach who died Sunday from lung cancer.

His death at age 85 came less than three months after his stunning ouster as head coach in the wake of child sex-abuse charges against a retired assistant. But this week, thousands of alumni, fans, students and former players in Happy Valley are remembering Paterno for his record-setting coaching career, his love for the school and his generosity.

"What's Joe's legacy? The answer, is his legacy is us," former NFL and Penn State receiver Jimmy Cefalo said Wednesday before Paterno's funeral. Cefalo is scheduled to be one of the speakers at the tribute called "A Memorial for Joe" at the arena across the street from Beaver Stadium ? the stadium Paterno helped turned into a college football landmark.

Paterno's son, former Nittany Lions quarterback coach Jay Paterno, also is expected to speak at the memorial, which will cap three days of public mourning for Paterno. Viewings were held Tuesday and Wednesday morning, before the funeral and burial service for Paterno on Wednesday afternoon at the campus interfaith center where family members attended church services.

Cefalo, who played for Penn State in the `70s, said it will be the most difficult speech of his life. But he offered a hint of what he might say.

"Generations of these young people from coal mines and steel towns who he gave a foundation to," Cefalo said. "It's not (the Division I record) 409 wins, it's not two national championships, and it's not five-time coach of the year (awards). It's us."

The memorial Thursday is expected to feature a speaker for each decade of Paterno's coaching career, according to Charles Pittman, a former player who said he will represent the 1960s.

Pittman said he was in Paterno's first class and was the coach's first All-America running back. Pittman's son later played for the Nittany Lions as well, making them the first father-son pair to play for Paterno, Pittman said. They wrote a book about their experiences called "Playing for Paterno."

Pittman said he spoke with Paterno two or three times a year. In 2002, the coach chided Pittman for moving to South Bend, Ind. ? home of rival Notre Dame ? to take a job as a newspaper executive.

"He called me a traitor," said Pittman, a senior vice president for publishing at Schurz Communications Inc., an Indiana-based company that owns television and radio stations and newspapers, and a member of the Board of Directors of The Associated Press.

Pittman attended Wednesday's funeral, which also drew other notable guests including former NFL players Franco Harris and Matt Millen; and former defensive coordinator Tom Bradley. Nike founder Phil Knight and actor William Baldwin were there, too.

A procession wound through the Penn State campus and the surrounding State College community. Quiet mourners lined the route, watching with grief and reverence as the electric-blue hearse carrying Paterno's casket slowly drove by.

Some took pictures with their cellphones, or waved to his widow. Others craned their necks hoping for a better glimpse through the crowd sometimes four or more deep.

A family spokesman, Dan McGinn, said Paterno's grandchildren escorted the casket down the aisle during the opening procession, and again at the end of the service. Jay Paterno and his brother, Scott, were among the pallbearers.

___

Associated Press writer Kathy Matheson in Philadelphia contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/sports/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120126/ap_on_sp_co_ne/fbc_penn_state_paterno

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NFL 2011

Giants-Patriots comes with its own storylines. Bill Belichick spent 12 years with the Giants, two of them alongside Tom Coughlin. Tom Brady is 34, absolutely old enough to play the tipi fissi of the aging quarterback wondering how many chances are left, and going up against a younger Eli Manning who can join him in some arbitrary "elite" pantheon with a win. You have the vaunted Giants pass rush against the juggernaut Patriots offense, except it's not so clear which side has the edge on either side of the ball.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=ae91fb44987e78798db874609e5da2c9

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VIDEO: Vote in the iVillage Entertainment Awards!

Source: http://www.ivillage.com/ivillage-entertainment-awards-video/1-a-421390?dst=iv%3AiVillage%3Aivillage-entertainment-awards-video-421390

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Google to allow some nicknames on Plus service

Google is relaxing a requirement that real names be used on its Plus social network.

Many people have been seeking the right to set up accounts using nicknames or pseudonyms, but Google has been suspending them when it knows of violations.

Google said Monday that it will now allow nicknames and pseudonyms, as well as maiden names and names in non-Latin scripts.

There's a catch, though. Google may still deny some names. People would then have to offer proof that they are known by that alternate name, such as through a reference in a news article or a link to a blog with a "meaningful following."

Plus's rival, Facebook, requires real names. Some social networks have been reluctant to permit alternate names, arguing that real names improve trust.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/495d344a0d10421e9baa8ee77029cfbd/Article_2012-01-23-Google%20Plus-Names/id-e90efde11f11456089050bf5f2b12d97

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Aid groups: With new Africa drought looming, donors must speed response

Aid groups warned that a drought was coming to the Horn of Africa in 2011, and say now that a late response by donor nations unnecessarily cost thousands of lives.?

Scientists and aid organizations gave the world plenty of time to prepare, but a late response by the world?s donor nations cost 50,000 to 100,000 lives during last year?s drought in the Horn of Africa region.

Skip to next paragraph

That is the message of a joint report by Oxfam International, Save the Children and other charities, released today, during the global meetings at Davos, Switzerland, and at the African Union in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Now, with a new drought looming in the West African nations of Mauritania, Niger, Mali, and Chad, the joint report, ?The Dangerous Delay,? is calling for an overhaul of the world?s aid delivery system to avoid more preventable deaths from starvation.

?The humanitarian community needs to come together and raise its voice louder so governments and donors know the gravity?of?crises such as the one in the?Horn?of?Africa,? said Carolyn Miles, President and CEO?of?Save the Children in a statement. ?By the time the world sees starving children on TV, it?s too?late. Tens?of?thousands?of?deaths could have been prevented had aid groups and governments received funding earlier to scale up programs.??

Aid groups estimate that 50,000 to 100,000 people died of hunger between April and August 2011, more than half of them children. Even today, the UN warns that as many as 750,000 Somalis could die in the ongoing food crisis in Somalia.

What makes the deaths in the Horn of Africa so galling for many activists is the fact that the world had advance warning. Unlike the famine in the Horn of Africa in 1984, which caused an estimated 1 million deaths in Ethiopia alone, aid organizations had received alerts from a massive computerized system called the Famine Early Warning System, which is comprised of ground sensors, satellite imagery, and field observations. FEWS-Net and other systems alerted aid groups as early as August 2010 that drought conditions were worsening, but slow funding from international donors meant that aid groups could not mount a full-scale response until July 2011, when the drought was in full force.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/csmonitor/globalnews/~3/xclAIUnW0yc/Aid-groups-With-new-Africa-drought-looming-donors-must-speed-response

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Drinking Doubles Your Lifespan and Makes You Impervious to Stress* [Booze]

*Restrictions may apply. Someone get me my whiskey-drinking cap, I'm gonna live forever! Wait, whaddya mean it only works for worms?!?! More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/uGRKXW66sXg/drinking-doubles-your-lifespan-and-makes-you-impervious-to-stress

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PFT: Bucs, Kelly hope to reach deal in next 48 hours

Reuters

Shortly before Ravens kicker Billy Cundiff did his best Gary Anderson impersonation (to the chagrin of Matt Birk), Ravens receiver Lee Evans had the ball in his hands, in the end zone.? But Patriots defensive back Sterling Moore knocked the ball out of Evans? hands, and the ruling on the field was that the would-be touchdown pass was incomplete.

Though it wasn?t a scoring play, fewer than two minutes remained in the game.? Thus, the decision (or not) to review the play was to be initiated by the replay assistant in the booth.? Even though the slow-motion angle shown by CBS seemed to suggest that it may have been a catch, the replay assistant didn?t instruct referee Alberto Riveron to take a look via the on-field portable TV on wheels.

As to whether a catch was made, the standard is simple.? From Rule 8, Section 1, Article 3, Item 3:? ?If a player controls the ball while in the end zone, both feet, or any part of his body other than his hands, must be completely on the ground before losing control, or the pass is incomplete.?

There?s no Calvin Johnson component.? No requirement of a football move.? Possession plus two feet down equals a catch, and a touchdown.

So why didn?t the replay assistant direct Riveron to take another look?? Absent indisputable visual evidence that the call on the field was correct, the replay assistant must tell the referee to look for indisputable visual evidence to overturn it.

The league disagrees.? ?The ruling on the field of an incomplete pass was confirmed by the Instant Replay assistant, correctly, and as a result, there was no need to stop the game,? the league said in a statement forwarded to PFT by spokesman Michael Signora.? ?The receiver did not get his second foot down in the end zone with possession, and as a result, it was an incomplete pass.?

Former V.P. of officiating and current FOX rules analyst Mike Pereira expressed a similar sentiment via text message to PFT.? ?Clearly not a catch,? Pereira said.? ?Ball coming out before second foot clearly down. . . .? No need to review it because it was clearly incomplete.?

But where?s the harm in taking a look at the play?? The left foot may have been down a nanosecond before the ball was dislodged.? Why not have Riveron decide whether or not that was the case?? Moreover, a different camera angle may have shown that Evans had the ball before his left foot previously left the ground.? (There?s no doubt that the right foot was down while Evans had the ball.)

It could be that the replay assistant erred on the side of not giving Riveron a chance to make what could have been another Bill Leavy-style error.? Either way, under the league?s standard for initiating a booth review, we think a booth review should have been initiated.? And if it had been initiated, Riveron would have been faced with a decision that wouldn?t have been quite as easy as the league seems to think it would have been.

Source: http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/01/22/report-bucs-kelly-hope-to-reach-deal-within-next-24-48-hours/related

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93% Mission: Impossible Ghost Protocol

All Critics (189) | Top Critics (34) | Fresh (176) | Rotten (13)

"Mission: Impossible-Ghost Protocol" is sheer hurtling mechanism-and it's great silly fun.

As usual with the series, the movie combines a plot line a toddler could understand with gadgets that would baffle an engineering Ph.D.

I'm thinking it, so I might as well say it: Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol is no Fast Five.

...it's pretty much state-of-the-art.

[Bird's] fresh touch gives breathless energy, tremendous excitement and, above all, humor to what could have been a wearying genre exercise.

Powered by Cruise's moxie, Mission: Impossible -- Ghost Protocol proves that in a Hollywood action-ride culture drenched in fake adrenaline, it's cathartic to encounter the real thing.

... a good-size barrel of fun.

still does not have the hang of what made the TV show so good.

Cruises on the WOW! factor.

Snagging Oscar-winning animation director Brad Bird to fill the director's chair proves to be an inspired choice--and, upon thought, a bit of a no-brainer.

The screenplay doesn't rely too much on gimmicks to advance the plot. Instead, the plot is also character-driven to an extent. There are interesting dynamics going on in the Mission Impossible team.

Director Brad Bird juices and gooses the whole affair with edge and excitement, new energy, humor and heartbeat, and a terrific feel for big, bold, audaciously daring sequences that beg for the biggest screen available.

Great stunts and not a dull moment,

Mission: Impossible -- Ghost Protocol could very well be the series' best installment.

It has a few very good ideas, and then, the rest of it is totally lackluster.

Watching Tom leap from a hospital window on to a passing truck, I couldn't help but worry: Tom, those knees won't last forever.

Succeeds in dishing up exactly what you would expect: State of the arts stunts, non-stop action, and a series of clearly laid-out heists and chases that go awry in all kinds of creative ways.

Bird manages the escalations from the preposterous through the more preposterous to the most preposterous with skill and wit...

...great cinematic entertainment.

Better than the tower climb is the scene in which Hunt infiltrates the Kremlin with, essentially, a high-tech magic trick; the playfulness of the effect demonstrates the usefulness of Bird's background in the astonish-the-audience culture of animation.

So exciting you have to remind yourself to breathe.

Ghost pulls off the impossible.

Film number four has found its optimum screen display, its best director for the job and its sense of humour while increasing the gadgets and death-defying stunts.

Something goes wrong and the entire Kremlin blows up. 'The wattage of my smile has overpowered the antiquated Russian electrical grid,' explained Tom.

The cinematography is rewarding enough for a travelogue. The good guy vs. the world with a hateful bad guy is involving. This is another film where you should just leave your brain at home, relax, and enjoy it.

More Critic Reviews

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/mission_impossible_ghost_protocol/

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Chart of the Day* (talking-points-memo)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories Stories, RSS and RSS Feed via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/188698053?client_source=feed&format=rss

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My gaming set up - YouTube

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Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jsxHjZcgBg

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Johnny Otis of 'Willie and the Hand Jive' dies

By Robert Jablon, The Associated Press

LOS ANGELES -- Johnny Otis, the "godfather of rhythm and blues" who wrote and recorded the R&B classic "Willie and the Hand Jive" and for decades evangelized black music to white audiences as a bandleader and radio host, has died. He was 90.

Otis, who had been in poor health for several years, died at his home in the Los Angeles foothill suburb of Altadena on Tuesday, said his manager, Terry Gould.

Otis, who was white, was born John Veliotes to Greek immigrants and grew up in a black section of Berkeley, where he said he identified far more with black culture than his own. As a teenager, he changed his name because he thought Johnny Otis sounded more black.

"As a kid, I decided that if our society dictated that one had to be black or white, I would be black," he once explained.

His musical tastes clearly reflected that adopted culture and even after he became famous, his dark skin and hair often led audiences and club promoters to assume he was black like his band mates.

Otis was leading his own band in 1945 when he scored his first big hit, "Harlem Nocturne." In 1950, 10 of his songs made Billboard Magazine's R&B chart. His "Willie and the Hand Jive" sold more than 1.5 million copies and was covered years later by Eric Clapton.

He later wrote "Every Beat of My Heart," which was a hit for Gladys Knight & the Pips.

But the influence of Otis was felt most through his ability to recognize and promote talent. He wove into his bands such diverse and legendary R&B vocalists as Etta James, Hank Ballard, Big Mama Thornton and The Robins, the latter a group that would evolve into the Coasters.

He produced Thornton's original recording of "Hound Dog," a song that would later become an even bigger hit for Elvis Presley.

"His band shows a different style on pretty much every new recording," said Piero Scaruffi, author of "A History of Rock Music, 1951-2000." "The reason is that Otis did not force his personality on others but worked with the personality of the others. He may not have been a great composer or performer himself, but he was an impressive conductor."

Otis launched his professional music career as an 18-year-old drummer for bawdy barrelhouse pianist Count Otis Matthews, although he had never played the drums until then.

Matthews instructed him to simply pound out the syncopated "shave and a haircut, six bits" beat that would become the backbone of early rock 'n' roll. His mastery of it soon proved his ticket to other bands and eventually to headlining his own group.

Otis saw himself as curator of black popular music, which for him represented much more than a diversion or livelihood. His cross-country R&B reviews and his radio and television appearances were dedicated to delivering black music to white audiences.

"The music isn't just the notes, it's the culture ? the way grandma cooked, the way grandpa told stories, the way the kids walked and talked," he once said.

While he always returned to playing music, in later years touring with his sons Shuggie and Nicky, Otis' eclectic interests also included politics, art and organic food.

He worked for years as deputy chief of staff to state Assemblyman Mervyn Dymally when Dymally served in the Assembly, state Senate, as lieutenant governor and as a congressman.

In later years, Otis spent much of his time painting and sculpting. He also opened an organic grocery store in Sebastopol in the early 1990s to sell his son Nicky's vegetables, decorating the store with his own colorful murals.

Although he had little success selling groceries, he did draw large crowds to the market every Friday and Saturday night when he performed there with his band.

"It was a smashing success," Gould said. "You had to make reservations three weeks ahead. It was amazing."

Otis also had a regular show playing records on the nonprofit Pacifica Radio Network's stations until failing health prompted him to retire in 2005.

In addition to his sons, Otis is survived by his wife, Phyllis, whom he married in 1941; daughters Janet and Laura; and several grandchildren.

Former Associated Press writer Andrew Glazer contributed to this report.

More music news:

Source: http://todayentertainment.today.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/19/10191604-johnny-otis-of-willie-and-the-hand-jive-fame-dies-at-90

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Jessica Simpson: Baby Bumpin' and Beautiful!

We have to say, Jessica Simpson makes a cute pregnant person.

She may be ballooning by the day, but the 31-year-old singer isn't about to let that stop her from getting out and about - in glamorous fashion.

Jess stepped out looking ultra chic in Los Angeles earlier this week, wearing a beautifully ornate black and grey patterned dress and black jacket.

With her adorable baby bump on display, flawless make-up and silver and black high heels completed the look for the pop star / fashion mogul:

Suffice it to say, pregnancy looks good on J-Simps.

Although it is not clear when exactly her first child is due, she has had she is expecting a spring baby with her fiance, former NFL player Eric Johnson.

Jessica has also been upfront about her pregnancy cravings, recently revealing that she is enjoying indulging in all her favourite childhood foods.

Hey, what better excuse than eating for two?

[Photos: Fame Pictures]

 

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2012/01/jessica-simpson-baby-bumpin-and-beautiful/

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