Diane McNease, a high school student from the northern Michigan town of Ishpeming, had sweet idea when she saw a friend folding Starburst wrappers. "I was waiting for my event at a swim meet," she tells Shine, "and an exchange student from Ecuador was making them into bracelets." Eighteen thousand candies later, she fashioned the bodice of a homemade dress completely out of the colorful papers and wore it to the prom last Saturday night, May 5. Her date, Luke DeWitt, is one of her best friends from the swim team.
VIDEO: Pier Breaks As Prom Picture Taken
The teen told WLUC-TV it took her a year-and-a-half to collect all the wrappers and five months to create the dress which also features a black satin "ball gown" skirt layered with tulle. "It was kind of a dare," she tells Shine. "Someone said I couldn't do it. That's the last thing you should say to me." She says DeWitt encouraged her through the whole process.
McNease explains to Shine that she did have some help. "My friend Bria Johnson made the fabric part of the dress for me. I couldn't have done it without her." The high school junior also says that dad, David, pitched in. "Every night he would help hand sew the folded strips of wrappers to the dress for a few hours."
For the first month, McNease ate all the candy herself. "But then I got sick of it." Friends at her school, which only has about 300 students, were happy to assist in the eating phase of the project.
detail, Frye's dressMcNease isn't the first young woman to don a candy wrapper dress on her big night. Last year, Tara Frye splashed out in a tutti-frutti colored gown that her mom, Kerrin, had spent six years crafting out of Starburst wrappers. Kerrin Frye explained the process to KARE-TV. Each wrapper had to be folded eight times and squeezed with tweezers to "get it just perfect." Mom initially contacted Wrigley Company to see if she could just buy the wrapping papers but they declined. Instead she purchased bulk bags, 20 pounds at a time, and enlisted her neighbors' sweet tooths.
McNease says she already had her plan and was collecting wrappers when pictures of Frye came out in the news. "But I really admire her dress. Especially the shoes. They are fantastic."
The crafting website fluffyland.com has an easy tutorial for how to make a cute Starburst bracelet with only 30-36 wrappers.
A hydrogen explosion rocked the plant on Monday, sending a huge cloud of smoke over the area while engineers flooded the three reactors in the complex with sea water in a desperate attempt to prevent what was shaping up as the worst nuclear emergency since the Chernobyl disaster 25 years ago.
Nuclear fuel rods at one of the reactors may have become became fully exposed raising the risk they could melt down and cause a radioactive leak, Japanese news agency Jiji said.
U.S. warships and planes helping the relief efforts have moved away from the coast temporarily because of low-level radiation from the stricken nuclear power plant, the U.S. Navy said on Monday. Singapore said it was checking Japanese food imports for radioactive contamination.
The nuclear crisis was a triple whammy for Japan, coming on top of the earthquake -- the fifth strongest ever recorded -- and one of the most powerful tsunami in history, which caused scenes of unimaginable destruction in northeast Japan.
Japan's Prime Minister Naoto Kan said the country was facing its biggest crisis since the end of the Second World War, which was when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
"We're under scrutiny on whether we, the Japanese people, can overcome this crisis," Kan told a Sunday night news conference, his voice rising with emotion.
The quake caused Japan's main island to shift 2.5 meters (8 feet) and moved the earth's axis 10 cm (2.5 inches), geologists say. The question now is whether the catastrophe will spur other seismic changes in Japan, which has yet to emerge from its "lost decades" of stagnant growth, aging population, and loss of international prestige following the collapse of the Japanese asset bubble in the early 1990s.
At the very least, the drama at Fukushima is bound to shake the faith of many Japanese in the safety of their nuclear plants. The catastrophe will also sorely test Kan's deeply unpopular government. And the immense reconstruction effort that is coming may bring changes to rural Japan, where many of its older citizens live.
The first voter survey by pollster Consulta Mitofsky since the debate showed support for Pena Nieto of the opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, at 38.5 percent, up 0.5 percentage point from a previous poll published on May 1.
That gave him a lead of 17.5 points over Josefina Vazquez Mota of President Felipe Calderon's National Action Party, or PAN. She fell 1 point to 21 percent, her lowest level of support since the presidential campaign began at the end of March.
Two points behind her at 19 percent was leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who narrowly lost the 2006 election.
The survey polled 1,000 eligible Mexican voters from Monday to Wednesday and had a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points.
Pena Nieto's debating skills had been discussed as a potential weak spot before the debate, and he came under sustained fire from Vazquez Mota and Lopez Obrador, who accused him of corruption, lies and being a pawn of the media.
However, the 45-year-old PRI candidate, who has led polls to succeed Calderon for more than two years, counter-attacked in the debate, and analysts said he held his own.
By law, Calderon cannot seek a second term in office.
BOOED AND MOCKED
The PRI ruled Mexico for 71 years until it was ousted in 2000 by the PAN, whose support has faded because of its failure to create enough jobs and contain rampant drug-related violence that has killed 50,000 people in the last five years.
However, plenty of Mexican voters still have doubts about the prospect of the PRI's return.
Allegations of corruption and authoritarianism dogged the party during the latter years of its rule, and Pena Nieto was booed and mocked by students at his appearance at the Ibero-American University in Mexico City on Friday.
The same day newspaper Reforma reported that Pena Nieto had paid leading broadcasters to make favorable comments about his administration when he was governor of the State of Mexico, a populous region next to the capital, between 2005 and 2011. Pena Nieto denied the charge on Mexican radio, saying his government had only made legitimate use of advertising space available on the airwaves to promote its work.
Lifestyle factors you can easily change account for more than 90 percent of heart attack risk, a landmark study of about 30,000 people in 52 countries suggests. And making small, positive changes in your everyday habits can have a surprisingly big impact on your heart health—or even save your life.
Here’s a look at six of the worst habits for your heart, and how to turn them around.
Being Glued to the Tube
Spending too much time parked in front of the TV can actually be fatal, according to a 2011 study published in Journal of the American College of Cardiology. The researchers found that people who devoted four or more hours a day to screen-based entertainment—mainly watching the tube--had double the risk of a major cardiac event resulting in hospitalization, death or both, compared to those who spent less than two hours daily on these activities.
Another compelling reason to limit TV time: Those who spent the most time on leisure-time screen-based entertainment had a 48 percent higher risk of dying prematurely, even if they also exercised. Recent research also shows that too much sitting can be just as bad for your heart as smoking.
The Warning Signs of Heart Attack
Having a Negative Attitude
While stress and depression have long been linked to higher heart disease risk, a new Harvard review of more than 200 earlier studies, published this month in Psychological Bulletin, highlights the benefits of turning that frown upside-down: An optimistic outlook may cut heart disease and stroke danger by 50 percent.
And while you may think that happy people are just healthier, the researchers found that the association between an upbeat attitude and reduced cardiovascular risk held true even when they took the person’s age, weight, smoking status, and other risk factors into account.
Research also shows that laughter literally does the heart good, by expanding the linings of blood vessels and boosting blood flow. A fun way to add more joy to your life—and defuse stress--is laughter yoga, an exercise program that combines self-triggered mirth with deep yogic breathing to draw oxygen deeper into the body.
Top 10 Simple Ways to Leave Stress Behind
Ignoring Snoring
Frequent loud snoring can trumpet obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), a dangerous disorder that magnifies heart attack and stroke risk, if untreated. OSA (bouts of interrupted breathing during sleep) frequently goes undiagnosed because people don’t recognize the symptoms, which include waking at night for no apparent reason and unexplained daytime drowsiness.
If you fit this profile, ask your doctor to order a sleep study. Because OSA, which affects 18 million Americans, is most common in people who are heavy, treatment typically involves weight loss and in some cases, continuously positive airway pressure (CPAP), a device that blows moist, heated air in your nose and mouth as you sleep.
Aamir Khan brought up the issue of child sex abuse in the second episode of "Satyamev Jayate" Sunday. Yesteryears screen diva Sridevi made a special appearance on the show, her first appearance with Bollywood's Mr. Perfectionist.
The 48-year-old came to meet Harish Aiyer, one of the victims of child abuse who told Aamir that he was abused by a man for 11 years. He also said that when he tried to tell his mother, she didn't take him seriously.
At that time his only support was his dog and Bollywood movies, especially the ones starring Sridevi. And that is why the actress was invited on the show.
Harish was excited when he received a gift from his favourite star.
On the show, Aamir spoke to several other victims who narrated their horrific experiences of being molested, sodomised and threatened by their tormentors.
Cinderella Prakash, another victim, said how she was abused by a 55-year-old man when she was just 12.
According to a survey, 53 percent children who went through child sexual abuse were boys.
Aamir concluded the show with Good Touch, Bad Touch workshop for children to teach them about the importance of understanding sexual abuse and recognising predators.
The actor also appealed to people to press the government to pass the Protection of Children From Sexual Offences Bill in parliament.
