Suzy Favor Hamilton, a three-time U.S. Olympian, has revealed that she has spent much of the past year working as a $600-an-hour escort. It's a stunning admission, and a decision that Hamilton now calls a "huge mistake," according to The Smoking Gun.

Since last December, Hamilton has, according to TSG, worked with Haley Heston's Private Collection in Las Vegas, and has gone on engagements in Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Chicago and Houston. The 44-year-old married mother of one worked under the name "Kelly Lundy," but apparently revealed her true identity to several male clients.

Hamilton responded to Thursday's story with a lengthy response and apology on Twitter:

    I realize I have made highly irrational choices and I take full responsibility for them. I am not a victim here and knew what I was doing. I was drawn to escorting in large part because it provided many coping mechanisms for me when I was going through a very challenging time with my marriage and my life. It provided an escape from a life that I was struggling in. It was a double life.

    I do not expect people to understand, but the reasons for doing this made sense to me at the time and were very much related to depression. As crazy as I know it seems, I never thought I would be exposed, therefore never hurting anybody. I have been seeking the help of a psychologist for the past few weeks and will continue to do so after I have put things together. I cannot emphasize enough how sorry I am to anyone I have hurt as a result of my actions and greatly appreciate the support from family and those closest to me. I fully intend to make amends and get back to being a good mother, wife, daughter, and friend.

A special screening of Tom Cruise's new film "Jack Reacher" has been postponed in the wake of the Newtown, Conn. shooting that left 20 children dead at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

"Out of respect for the families who lost loved ones in Newtown, CT, we are postponing tonight's fundraising event with Tom Cruise to benefit the 50th anniversary fund, which supports K-12 education and new artist programs," Rose Kuo, executive director of the Film Society of Lincoln Center, said in a statement. "We extend our love and condolences to our neighbors. Our community grieves with yours."

The event was going to be held at the Rose Theater in New York's Lincoln Center. Cruise was expected to attend.

Of all the movies coming out before the end of the year, "Jack Reacher" is the one that has been affected most by the massacre in Newtown. On Saturday, the film had its U.S. premiere in Pittsburgh canceled out of respect for the victims and their families.

Based on the novel series by author Lee Child, "Jack Reacher" focuses on an ex-military police officier who tries to solve the murder of five people at the hands of a sniper.

While it is a painful truism that brutality and violence are at least as old as humanity, so, it seems, is caring for the sick and disabled.

And some archaeologists are suggesting a closer, more systematic look at how prehistoric people — who may have left only their bones — treated illness, injury and incapacitation. Call it the archaeology of health care.

The case that led Lorna Tilley and Marc Oxenham of Australian National University in Canberra to this idea is that of a profoundly ill young man who lived 4,000 years ago in what is now northern Vietnam and was buried, as were others in his culture, at a site known as Man Bac.

Almost all the other skeletons at the site, south of Hanoi and about 15 miles from the coast, lie straight. Burial 9, as both the remains and the once living person are known, was laid to rest curled in the fetal position. When Ms. Tilley, a graduate student in archaeology, and Dr. Oxenham, a professor, excavated and examined the skeleton in 2007 it became clear why. His fused vertebrae, weak bones and other evidence suggested that he lies in death as he did in life, bent and crippled by disease.

They gathered that he became paralyzed from the waist down before adolescence, the result of a congenital disease known as Klippel-Feil syndrome. He had little, if any, use of his arms and could not have fed himself or kept himself clean. But he lived another 10 years or so.

They concluded that the people around him who had no metal and lived by fishing, hunting and raising barely domesticated pigs, took the time and care to tend to his every need.

“There’s an emotional experience in excavating any human being, a feeling of awe,” Ms. Tilley said, and a responsibility “to tell the story with as much accuracy and humanity as we can.”

This case, and other similar, if less extreme examples of illness and disability, have prompted Ms. Tilley and Dr. Oxenham to ask what the dimensions of such a story are, what care for the sick and injured says about the culture that provided it.

The archaeologists described the extent of Burial 9’s disability in a paper in Anthropological Science in 2009. Two years later, they returned to the case to address the issue of health care head on. “The provision and receipt of health care may therefore reflect some of the most fundamental aspects of a culture,” the two archaeologists wrote in The International Journal of Paleopathology.

And earlier this year, in proposing what she calls a “bioarchaeology of care,” Ms. Tilley wrote that this field of study “has the potential to provide important — and possibly unique — insights into the lives of those under study.” In the case of Burial 9, she says, not only does his care indicate tolerance and cooperation in his culture, but suggests that he himself had a sense of his own worth and a strong will to live. Without that, she says, he could not have stayed alive.

“I’m obviously not the first archaeologist” to notice evidence of people who needed help to survive in stone age or other early cultures, she said. Nor does her method “come out of the blue.” It is based on and extends previous work.

Among archaeological finds, she said, she knows “about 30 cases in which the disease or pathology was so severe, they must have had care in order to survive.” And she said there are certainly more such cases to be described. “I am totally confident that there are almost any number of case studies where direct support or accommodation was necessary.”

Such cases include at least one Neanderthal, Shanidar 1, from a site in Iraq, dating to 45,000 years ago, who died around age 50 with one arm amputated, loss of vision in one eye and other injuries. Another is Windover boy from about 7,500 years ago, found in Florida, who had a severe congenital spinal malformation known as spina bifida, and lived to around age 15. D. N. Dickel and G. H. Doran, from Florida State University wrote the original paper on the case in 1989, and they concluded that contrary to popular stereotypes of prehistoric people, “under some conditions life 7,500 years ago included an ability and willingness to help and sustain the chronically ill and handicapped.”

 Wal-Mart longed to build in Elda Pineda’s alfalfa field. It was an ideal location, just off this town’s bustling main entrance and barely a mile from its ancient pyramids, which draw tourists from around the world. With its usual precision, Wal-Mart calculated it would attract 250 customers an hour if only it could put a store in Mrs. Pineda’s field.

After years of study, the town’s elected leaders had just approved a new zoning map. The leaders wanted to limit growth near the pyramids, and they considered the town’s main entrance too congested already. As a result, the 2003 zoning map prohibited commercial development on Mrs. Pineda’s field, seemingly dooming Wal-Mart’s hopes.

But 30 miles away in Mexico City, at the headquarters of Wal-Mart de Mexico, executives were not about to be thwarted by an unfavorable zoning decision. Instead, records and interviews show, they decided to undo the damage with one well-placed $52,000 bribe.

The plan was simple. The zoning map would not become law until it was published in a government newspaper. So Wal-Mart de Mexico arranged to bribe an official to change the map before it was sent to the newspaper, records and interviews show. Sure enough, when the map was published, the zoning for Mrs. Pineda’s field was redrawn to allow Wal-Mart’s store.

Wal-Mart de Mexico broke ground months later, provoking fierce opposition. Protesters decried the very idea of a Wal-Mart so close to a cultural treasure. They contended the town’s traditional public markets would be decimated, its traffic mess made worse. Months of hunger strikes and sit-ins consumed Mexico’s news media. Yet for all the scrutiny, the story of the altered map remained a secret. The store opened for Christmas 2004, affirming Wal-Mart’s emerging dominance in Mexico.

The secret held even after a former Wal-Mart de Mexico lawyer contacted Wal-Mart executives in Bentonville, Ark., and told them how Wal-Mart de Mexico routinely resorted to bribery, citing the altered map as but one example. His detailed account — he had been in charge of getting building permits throughout Mexico — raised alarms at the highest levels of Wal-Mart and prompted an internal investigation.

But as The New York Times revealed in April, Wal-Mart’s leaders shut down the investigation in 2006. They did so even though their investigators had found a wealth of evidence supporting the lawyer’s allegations. The decision meant authorities were not notified. It also meant basic questions about the nature, extent and impact of Wal-Mart de Mexico’s conduct were never asked, much less answered.

The Times has now picked up where Wal-Mart’s internal investigation was cut off, traveling to dozens of towns and cities in Mexico, gathering tens of thousands of documents related to Wal-Mart de Mexico permits, and interviewing scores of government officials and Wal-Mart employees, including 15 hours of interviews with the former lawyer, Sergio Cicero Zapata.

American Idol alumna Kelly Clarkson and her boyfriend of 1-year Brandon Blackstock (a.k.a. Reba McEntire’s stepson) are gettin’ hitched!

The 30-year-old singer made the announcement via her Twitter account yesterday saying,

    I’M ENGAGED!!!!!  I wanted y’all to know!! Happiest night of my life last night! I am so lucky and am with the greatest man ever.

Awww.  We could not be happier for the “Catch My Breath” singer, who totally stole our hearts during the very first season of Idol, back in 2002.

The singer also posted a pic of the giant rock she’s now sporting on her left ring finger, along with the caption:

    Everyone has been asking about my engagement ring, so here it is :) … It’s a yellow canary diamond with diamonds around.


During an appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show last month, Clarkson revealed that while Blackstock hadn’t proposed just yet, she knew it was coming.

    … We are totally going to get married. We love each other. We are totally going to get married one day…

Well Kel, that day is finally here!  Congrats to the happy couple!

In Gujarat assembly elections the question was hardly about whether Narendra Modi would win a third term in office, it was always about the margin. And, it was about the X factor in the elections this time: Keshubhai Patel of the Gujarat Parivartan Party.

If Modi manages an emphatic victory here —

seats in the region of 130 or beyond — the intra-party challenge to his ascendance in national politics withers away. If the tally falls behind 117 seats, which the BJP won in 2007, it won’t hurt his prospects at the national level but it would certainly leave him a bit insecure. This way, it was always a Modi vs Modi battle in Gujarat in 2007.


The Congress going to the polls with a 11 per cent vote share deficit did not stand much of a chance. It could only have hoped to increase its tally of 2007 — in the sub-60 territory — by a few more seats and wait for the GPP to cause the damage to Modi, bringing down his strike rate. The large voter turnout in a situation where the electorate has no anti-incumbency axe to grind could only have made the writing on the wall clearer for it. As the post-poll surveys of the first phase of polls indicate the party’s electoral standing has not changed a bit.

The biggest challenge for Modi, at least in the Saurashtra region, was Keshubhai, the old BJP hand-turned principal Modi baitor and a former chief minister. The leader of politically influential Leuva Patels, Keshubhai threatened to bring down the seat tally of the BJP in the Saurashtra region by at least 12 seats. However, as the post-poll survey conducted by Delhi-based conducted by Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), he has failed to cause any damage to the BJP. In fact, he might have worked to the disadvantage of the Congress.

Polls for the Saurashtra region were held in the first phase. As many as 87 seats — including 48 in Saurashtra — went to polls in that phase and as the survey suggests the BJP is likely to win anywhere between 53 and 63 seats with 45 percent vote share. The Congress is likely to have a vote share of 33 per cent and win anywhere between 19 and 27 seats. Others, including the GPP, would manage 22 percent of vote share but would end up with 3-9 seats. Keshubhai’s party would manage a vote share of 12 percent.

The survey, conducted between 13-14 December at 120 polling booths across 29 assembly seats, had a sample size of 1,805 voters. An overwhelming 41 percent of respondents felt Modi was the best choice for chief minister while eight percent felt Keshubhai was a better bet. The same number of contestants rooted for Congress’s Shankersinh Vaghela.

After India's crushing series defeat against England on Monday, former chief selector Krishnamachari Srikkanth called for MS Dhoni's removal as Test captain, stating that he is no more effective as the leader of the team.

"Dhoni's become stale and doesn't know what to do when things go out of the way. He shouldn't be the Test captain anymore. Had I been the chairman of selectors, I would have picked Dhoni as a wicketkeeper batsman but it is time to look beyond him as a Test captain," Srikkanth said while speaking to CNN-IBN.

 "I will pick Dhoni as a keeper/batsman because his contribution has to be considered. I think he will be better off without captaincy and add more value to the Test team," he added.

Srikkanth also believed the time has come when seletors should analyse the future of Sachin Tendulkar, who failed miserably against England. "Sachin needs to take an honest call about what he wants to do. If he thinks he can play against the Australians then he should be given another series. The best way forward will be to have a conversation with Sachin and I guess the selectors will be talking to him and making him feel comfortable," he said.

 Long before Christopher Chaney made headlines by hacking into the email accounts of such stars as Scarlett Johansson and Christina Aguilera, two other women say he harassed and stalked them online.

The women, who both knew Chaney, say their lives have been irreparably damaged by his actions. One has anxiety and panic attacks; the other is depressed and paranoid. Both say Chaney was calculated, cruel and creepy: he sent nude photos they had taken of themselves to their family members.

Their accounts as cybervictims serve as a cautionary tale for those, even major celebrities, who snap personal, and sometimes revealing photos.

Chaney, 35, of Jacksonville, Fla., is set to be sentenced Monday and could face up to 60 years in prison after pleading guilty to nine felony counts, including wiretapping and unauthorized access to a computer, for hacking into email accounts of Aguilera, Johansson and Mila Kunis.

Aguilera said in a statement that although she knows that she's often in the limelight, Chaney took from her some of the private moments she shares with friends.

"That feeling of security can never be given back and there is no compensation that can restore the feeling one has from such a large invasion of privacy," Aguilera said.

Prosecutors said Chaney illegally accessed the email accounts of more than 50 people in the entertainment industry between November 2010 and October 2011. Aguilera, Kunis and Johansson agreed to have their identities made public with the hopes that the exposure about the case would provide awareness about online intrusion.

The biggest spectacle in the case was the revelation that nude photos taken by Johansson herself and meant for her then-husband Ryan Reynolds were taken by Chaney and put on the Internet. The "Avengers" actress is not expected to attend the hearing, but she has videotaped a statement that may be shown in court.

Some of Aguilera's photos appeared online after Chaney sent an email from the account of her stylist, Simone Harouche, to Aguilera asking the singer for scantily clad photographs, prosecutors said.

Chaney forwarded many of the photographs to two gossip websites and another hacker, but there wasn't evidence he profited from his scheme, authorities said.

For the two women, who were only identified in court papers by their initials, their encounters with Chaney went from friendly to frightening.

Sunday night's WWE TLC 2012 results have brought early championship match winners as well as some new top contenders for other championships. So far a variety of matches have taken place with at least one surprise during the latest pro wrestling Pay-Per-View event. There's still plenty of great action on the way, which could have WWE surprising its fans even more in the last PPV event of the year.

The WWE TLC results started with a live stream pre-show featuring the divas in action. The special battle royal was held to determine the latest #1 contender for Eve's Divas title. Surprisingly, Naomi, one of Brodus Clay's dancers, emerged as the winner. Many fans might not realize that she was the runner-up to Kaitlyn on a season of NXT, and actually has some athletic in-ring skills. Naomi earned the right to challenge Eve for the title, and it could be another surprise should she win the title.

Another championship contender was decided in a tag team tables match. The team of Cody Rhodes and Damien Sandow managed to outwit the team of Rey Mysterio and Sin Cara, ultimately shoving Sin Cara out of the air and down through a table. With that move, they captured the win, making them the #1 contenders for Team Hell No's tag team titles. Rhodes Scholars will get a future title shot, most likely on Raw or at another Pay-Per-View, as Daniel Bryan and Kane are in action tonight.

Two championship matches have completed with no major surprises. Both R-Truth and Wade Barrett failed in their quests to win the titles they were competing for. Barrett lost out to Kofi Kingston's Trouble in Paradise kick in the end, while R-Truth fell victim to the Neutralizer finisher from Antonio Cesaro. After his match, Cesaro talked about how when the American fans boo him, they're booing themselves since he is their US champion.

While Naomi is the major surprise so far, there was also a special moment at the start of the TLC Pay-Per-View. Prior to the event starting up, the ring bell was sounded 26 times to pay tribute to those who lost their lives at Sandy Hook Elementary School this past Friday. WWE's headquarters are stationed in Connecticut, and the pro wrestling organization made a classy move, just like many other sports professionals and entertainers, to pay respects over this tragedy.
(Post Source:  entertainment.gather)

Prior to speaking at a vigil for victims of Friday's massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School, President Obama met with the families of those killed in the mass shooting.

Among those family members were the daughter and granddaughter of Dawn Hochsprung, Sandy Hook's principal who was killed in the shooting. Hochsprung's daughter, Cristina Hassinger, captured a touching moment between Obama and her daughter.

Friends and family of Emilie Parker, a 6-year-old victim of the shooting, were also photographed with the president.

 Adam Lanza of Newtown, Connecticut was a child of the suburbs and a child of divorce who at age 20 still lived with his mother.

This morning he appears to have started his day by shooting his mother Nancy in the face, and then driving to nearby Sandy Hook Elementary School armed with at least two handguns and at least one semi-automatic rifle.

There, before turning his gun on himself, he shot and killed 20 children, who President Obama later described as between five and 10 years of age. Six adults were also killed at the school. Nancy Lanza was found dead in her home.

A relative told ABC News that Adam was "obviously not well."

Family friends in Newtown also described the young man as troubled and described Nancy as very rigid. "[Adam] was not connected with the other kids," said one friend.

State and federal authorities believe his mother may have once worked at the elementary school where Adam went on his deadly rampage, although she was not a teacher, according to relatives, perhaps a volunteer.

Nancy and her husband Peter, Adam's father, divorced in 2009. When they first filed for divorce in 2008, a judge ordered that they participate in a "parenting education program."

Peter Lanza, who drove to northern New Jersey to talk to police and the FBI, is a vice president at GE Capital and had been a partner at global accounting giant Ernst & Young.

Adam's older brother Ryan Lanza, 24, has worked at Ernst & Young for four years, apparently following in his father's footsteps and carving out a solid niche in the tax practice. He too was interviewed by the FBI. Neither he nor his father is under any suspicion.

"[Ryan] is a tax guy and he is clean as a whistle," a source familiar with his work said.

Police had initially identified Ryan as the killer. Ryan sent out a series of Facebook posts saying it wasn't him and that he was at work all day. Video records as well as card swipes at Ernst & Young verified his statement that he had been at the office.

Mexican authorities have confirmed that the remains of Jenni Rivera have been identified and turned over to her family, according to CNN.

The Mexican-American superstar was killed in a plane crash Sunday. Shortly after taking off from the northern city of Monterrey on her way to Toluca, the Learjet 25 carrying Rivera and six companions crashed.

Rivera's mother Rosa Saavedra had previously told reporters that she still hoped her daughter would somehow be found alive.

HuffPost Voces was able to confirm that Lupillo, Juan and Gustavo, Jenni's three brothers, had traveled to Monterrey to identify their sister’s body and are in the airport about to take a flight to Los Angeles, where the rest of the family is waiting for them.

We will continue to update as this story develops.

Taylor Swift's video for "I Knew You Were Trouble" begins with an ominous -- and lengthy -- bit of voice-over narration. Deep breath:

"I think when it's all over it just comes back in flashes, you know? It's like a kaleidoscope of memories; it just all comes back. But he never does. I think part of me knew the second I saw him that this would happen. It's not really anything he said, or anything he did -- it was the feeling that came along with it. Crazy thing is, I don't know if I'm ever going to feel that way again. But I don't know if I should. I knew he world moved too fast and burned to bright, but I just thought, 'How can the devil be pulling you toward someone who looks so much like an angel when he smiles at you?' Maybe he knew that when he saw me. I guess I just lost my balance. I think that the worst part of it all wasn't losing him. It was losing me."
After that bit of introspective, post-relationship clarity? It's time for Swift to cue up "I Knew You Were Trouble," a catchy pop song with a faux-dubstep bass drop.

While the song is a Top-40 smash waiting to happen, the video continues in the somber mood of Swift's initial monologue. She's shown cavorting in dirty hotel rooms and bathrooms with a scrawny male companion, who runs hot and cold on the pop singer and eventually gets beaten up in a pool hall. (Don't ask.) Later, he's making out with another girl, all while Swift -- in her Debbie Harry Sunday best -- looks on in horror.

"I don't know if you know who you are until you lose who you are," Swift says at the end of the video.

It's like Rihanna's "We Found Love" video, without anything actually scary. At least Swift's song is great.

The Big East is headed for another break up. This time, the seven prominent basketball schools that don't play FBS football are planning to break away from the ever-changing conference.

The divorce is expected to be complicated, maybe even contentious, with millions of dollars and possibly the future of the league at stake.

The Big East's non-football members decided Thursday to separate from the conference, a person familiar with the decision told The Associated Press.

The person spoke on condition of anonymity because officials from those schools are still sorting through details and trying to figure how best to split from the conference. No official announcement is imminent.

The seven schools that don't play FBS-level football are St. John's, Georgetown, Marquette, DePaul, Seton Hall, Providence and Villanova. Officials at those schools have concerns about the direction of the conference and feel as if they have little power to influence it.

Commissioner Mike Aresco conferred by phone with the leaders of those seven schools earlier in the day, according to another person familiar with the situation, also speaking on condition of anonymity.

The current Big East football membership includes only four schools – South Florida, Connecticut and Cincinnati, Temple – that are committed to the league beyond 2013. But there are 11 schools with plans to join the Big East in the next three years, including Boise State and San Diego State for football only in 2013.

Because those schools won't be members until next summer, the majority of the voting members of the Big East are basketball schools right now. Still, those schools aren't in position to dissolve the conference. That would take the votes of at least two football members, according to the Big East bylaws.

The Catholic schools can leave without financial penalty. The Big East has provisions in its bylaws that allow a group of schools to leave without exit fees.


But what they would do remains unclear, as are the legal ramifications of their actions. There has been speculation those seven basketball schools could merge with the Atlantic 10 or possibly add schools from that league to create a basketball-only conference of smaller Catholic schools.

One of the many things that will need to be sorted out is who owns the rights to the name Big East. Will it stay with new members or go with the old. Georgetown, Providence, Seton Hall and St John's were among the original members of the conference when it was formed primarily for basketball in 1979. Villanova came in a year later. Marquette and DePaul came in 2005, the Big East's last previous major expansion.

The "Top Chef" host sizzled in a blue fringed bikini, flaunting her washboard abs and toned arms as she frolicked in the surf in Miami earlier this month. The single mom, whose daughter Krishna is almost 3 years old, obviously doesn't let those calorie-packed meals affect her figure.


"I’m lucky. I have a fast metabolism, I’m tall, and my digestive tract is ironclad and can really take a beating," Lakshmi revealed to Playboy in November. "Having been a model for 15 years, I know a thing or two about how to dress if I've put on a few pounds."

 At least one person is dead and several people are wounded this evening after a masked shooter opened fire at Clackamas Town Center, a mall in suburban Portland, Ore.

Police said the shooter had been "neutralized," but would not say whether the person was alive or dead.

"This is no longer an active shooter," Clackamas County Sheriff's Office spokesman Lt. James Rhodes said. "I believe the shooter has been neutralized and we are securing the mall, securing the scene and treating the wounded."

There was not an exact count of those killed or wounded, he said.

"We believe there's at least one deceased and maybe more," he said. "We know there are multiple wounded. Lifeline has landed to treat at least one of those wounded and we're set up to treat them as we find them as we search the mall."

Hundreds of people were evacuated from the busy mall full of holiday shoppers after the shooting began at around 3:30 p.m. PT.

Witnesses described seeing a gunman who looked like a teenager with a white hockey mask, wearing what was believed to be a black, bulletproof vest and carrying an assault rifle.

The person entered the mall through a Macy's store, ran through the upper level of Macy's and opened fire near the mall food court, firing multiple shots, one right after another, with what is believed to be a black, semiautomatic rifle, according to witness reports.

Witnesses described the shooter as being on a mission and determined, looking straight ahead.

Those interviewed said that Macy's shoppers and store employees huddled in a dressing room to avoid being found.

Evan Walters told ABC News Radio that he was locked in a store for his safety and he saw two people shot and heard multiple gunshots.

Beyonce has signed a $50 million deal with Pepsi, The New York Times reports. The agreement includes traditional promotional appearances and a new commercial, but also the beverage company's investment in a number of the singer's creative projects.

Pepsi's move is in line with a trend toward content creation as advertisers seek new inroads into the music business and labels' marketing budgets continue to decline. Red Bull -- through its Red Bull Music Academy and Red Bull Media House -- has been funding original content for some time now, as have Scion and Converse.

Beyonce will appear in a new TV spot for Pepsi, a brand she has been involved with since 2002. Her previous ads have included Britney Spears, P!NK, Jennifer Lopez and David Beckham. She's also performing at the Super Bowl halftime show, which is sponsored by Pepsi.

Billboard notes that Pepsi and rival Coca-Cola are the biggest players in advertisements that touch on music. The two companies have spent over $330 million on campaigns involving entertainment and sports figures. The Times notes that both brands each spent $148 million on domestic advertising in the first six months of 2012.

Jay-Z and Beyonce were the highest-paid celebrity couple of the year. Beyonce earned $40 million to Jay-Z's $38 million.

The "Love on Top" singer's face will also appear on a limited edition run of Pepsi cans. Other artist recently featured by the brand include One Direction and Nicki Minaj.

Guys, have you ever worried you don’t have that elusive something that women crave? Perhaps you think you lack a devil-may-care attitude that the ladies love, or that you don’t have a Jon Stewart-esque wit that would win someone’s heart. Relax! We spoke to relationship experts and women across the country and learned that those attributes men believe are impressive just don’t cut it. In fact, the qualities that attract women may surprise you... and, chances are, you possess at least one of them. Learn how to embrace these six traits for dating success.

1. She loves that you’re a man of few words
It’s no secret that women love to communicate with the men in their lives. “Women like to connect, and when that happens, they will melt,” says Emerson E. Eggerichs, Ph.D., author of Love and Respect: The Love She Most Desires, The Respect He Desperately Needs. Of course, when most men hear that, they cringe, thinking it means long, drawn-out talks about every feeling either of you has ever had since you met. Wrong! According to Dr. Eggerichs, women don’t need lots of verbiage from men. The truth is, your lady can get the same communication from you via eye contact — without a single word being uttered. Simply stand face-to-face with her, look into her eyes, and show your affection with a simple physical gesture — say, holding her arm or caressing her face. “It’s in their very nature for women to want you to look at them,” Dr. Eggerichs explains. “Infant girls make eye contact with adults who are around them, while boys make eye contact but look away if there’s a mobile, ceiling fan or anything else to distract them overhead.” Cultivate your connection with a little unabashed eye contact, and you’ll be on the fast track to winning her heart.

2. She loves your hairy body — really!
Wait, she likes your what?! That’s right, go ahead and cancel that back-waxing appointment. A study at the Zoological Society of San Diego (of people, not animals) revealed that women are more attracted to men with furry bodies, regardless of the silhouette. Scientists theorize that body hair advertises good health and active hormones, making it a positive sign in the selection of a mate. For further proof, just listen to Laura McNeely of Spring, TX: “I always love noticing that a guy, especially a clean-cut one, has a little bit of chest hair sticking up out of his Oxford shirt. It’s like saying, ‘I may have an uptight job, but there’s a caveman lurking inside.’”

3. She loves your unnatural emotional attachment to your favorite sports team
Most men learn by their teens to downplay their obsession with professional sports in front of the ladies. But dating coach David Wygant says that revealing certain elements of your big-league insanity to a woman will make her feel more connected to you. “Men try to hide when our eyes get all wet during the last 30 seconds of a game or when we see our fellow men get all emotional on the sidelines, but after a long season, we need that emotional release,” Wygant says. And the truth is, women would rather see you get sappy over sports than never see you act mushy at all — it lets them know there’s a sensitive guy underneath. And if you are prone to hugging your friends after your team wins? You just added some bonus points!

4. She loves when you act tough
While women often want an evolved, emotionally available man these days, putting a little “wild man” demeanor into your repertoire can equal popularity on the dating scene. “Most women want bad-boy qualities so they don’t have to act perfect all the time,” says Nancy Slotnick, author of Turn Your Cablight On: Get Your Dream Man in 6 Months or Less. After all, if a woman is afraid to be anything less than perfect in front of you, your relationship will be stifled and you’ll both end up bored. Anne Giddens of Wilmington, NC, adds: “A lot of guys are total gentlemen on dates, so being with someone who mouths off a bit shows that he’ll protect me if something happens. And that, in turn, makes me feel girlie and taken care of. It’s a total turn-on.” Hint at your bad-boy side by being slightly protective of your girl when someone else talks to her, suggesting thrill-type dates — which can increase adrenaline production and promote physical attraction — or simply planning a date without consulting her (spontaneity in general is a good thing). Of course, don’t do anything that’s actually disrespectful or dangerous — that’s not the kind of bad-boy behavior anyone wants.

5. She loves your artistic side
You don’t need a massive paycheck to appeal to the ladies. They actually find the “I’m working on a screenplay” lifestyle alluring. One study found that artists and poets had experienced a total of 4-10 romantic partners, while people with less creative jobs had three. According to the study’s author, Daniel Nettle, Ph.D., a psychology lecturer at Newcastle University in the UK, creative people tend to be charismatic and their artistic pursuits are particularly interesting to others. The study also found that the number of romantic partners an artsy type had increased when he spent more time on creative, right-brained pursuits. And you don’t have to be a starving artist to appeal to women. Even if you’re an investment analyst, you might play the saxophone on the side. So flaunt that hobby — women dig guys with creativity.

With the 12-12-12 benefit concert for Hurricane Sandy just around the corner, controversy is stirring about ticket sales for the event.

All profits from the concert, which features performances by The Rolling Stones, Kanye West, Billy Joel, Eric Clapton, and Alicia Keys, among others, are supposed to benefit victims of the superstorm. However, when tickets to the event sold out in minutes, scalpers saw an opportunity for a quick profit of their own.


While even the standard fee that Ticketmaster collects will be going to the concert beneficiary, the Robin Hood Foundation, there is no way to force the ticket scalpers to fork over their personal profits to the charity as well.

New York's U.S. Senator Charles Schumer spoke out against the scalping and urged ticketing sites to keep scalpers from turning a profit on resales.

“Every dollar spent for these concert tickets should go to help the victims of Superstorm Sandy – not to line the pocket of unscrupulous scalpers,” Senator Schumer said in an statement. “Ticket resale websites have the opportunity to make it much more difficult for scalpers to make money of this charitable event, and they should seize it.”

Currently, tickets are listed on StubHub for as much as $27,175. With the highest face-value price of a ticket reaching $2,500, scalpers are in a position to make an enormous profit. While StubHub is donating its service fees and commissions to the Robin Hood Foundation, it isn't regulating the reselling of tickets. NYT reports that StubHub's spokesman, Glenn Lehrman, said about the company's decision, “This is going to take place regardless of whether we enable it or somebody else does, and at least by us enabling it, we can give a good portion to charity.”

Ticketmaster's resale sites, however, are not allowing tickets for 12-12-12 to be sold.

"We proactively blocked all posts for 12-12-12 as is our policy for charitable events," a representative for TicketsNow and TicketExchange said in an email.

Police believe he was from Africa, probably from Angola, but they don't know his identity.

The mystery began in September when residents of a suburban street in the Mortlake neighborhood of West London woke up on a quiet Sunday morning to find the crumpled body of a black man on the sidewalk of Portman Avenue, near a convenience store, an upscale lingerie shop and a storefront offering Chinese medical cures.

Detectives believed at first the man was a murder victim and cordoned off the area. Within a day, however, police concluded the man — probably already dead — had fallen to the ground when a jet passing overhead lowered its landing gear as it neared the runway at nearby Heathrow Airport.

The apparent stowaway had no identification papers — just some currency from Angola, leading police to surmise that he was from that African nation, especially as inquiries showed that a plane from Angola was beginning its descent into Heathrow at about that time.

The macabre explanation made perfect sense to residents, who are familiar not only with the roar of the jets descending, but are also able to see the planes lower their landing gears as they pass overhead, said Catherine Lambert, who lives a few doors down from the spot where the man landed.

"You could see him, his body was contorted," she said. "It was a beautiful blue day, really sunny, but we had to keep the children inside. I didn't want the children to see, and to have to explain to them and put fear into them every time a plane goes over."

A post mortem conducted two days after the body landed listed the cause of death as "multiple injuries."

In the days afterward, some neighbors put flowers on the spot where the stowaway was found, and a small group of Angolans who live in the London area came to place more flowers and to pray. Lambert, 41, said there is lingering sadness, since the man has not been identified and there has been no way to tell his family he is gone.

"I felt, what was he running away from? What made him think he could he could? And how will his family ever know? He's a lost soul now; his father and mother are probably waiting for him to make contact," she said.

A London police spokesman, who wasn't authorized to speak on the record because of force policy, said Sunday that police are appealing to the public for help identifying the man based on a composite image of his face and a photo of a tattoo on his left arm. The tattoo showed the letters "Z'' and "G'' inked on his upper arm, with a horizontal line through the "Z''.

Police also said attempts to identify the man with the help of Angolan authorities had been unsuccessful. They stressed there is only "circumstantial" evidence linking the stowaway to that country.

Sudan and South Sudan have asked the African Union to help hammer out details of a proposed withdrawal of troops from their disputed border, defense ministers from both countries said on Monday, as stalled talks continued to delay oil exports.

Week-long negotiations in Khartoum failed to reach an agreement on how to withdraw their armies, a step both sides had said was necessary to resume oil exports from landlocked South Sudan through Sudan.

"We will meet in Addis Ababa on the 15th to continue our meeting and dialogue on how to implement the cooperation deals signed by Sudan and South Sudan in Addis Ababa," Sudan's defense minister, Abdel Raheem Mohammed Hussein, told reporters.

His southern counterpart, John Kong Nyuon, said some "issues" remained unresolved. The talks in the Ethiopian capital will be brokered by AU mediator Thabo Mbeki.

In September, the former civil war foes agreed to end hostilities and restart oil exports after coming close to war in April, the worst violence since South Sudan seceded from Sudan last year after decades of civil war.

South Sudan's top negotiator Pagan Amum had raised hopes for the Khartoum talks by saying oil exports could restart this month. But Juba has delayed turning on oil wells, originally scheduled for November 15.

South Sudan, which inherited three-quarters of oil production when it broke away, shut down its output of 350,000 barrels a day in January after tensions over pipeline fees escalated.

Lingering disputes have continued to fuel conflict between the neighboring countries.

Sudan said last week it will not allow South Sudan's oil exports to flow through its territory until Juba cuts ties with anti-Khartoum rebels and expels their leaders, dampening hopes bilateral tensions were over.

 While the name of the play may not indicate it’s a holiday tale, Theatre Macon Director Jim Crisp deliberately chose “Meet Me In St. Louis” for the holidays.

“We have to do something really happy and I love this because of the sweetness of the story. It’s about a family and it is openly and unabashedly nostalgic. It harks back to an era or eras in our past lives when things seemed a little simpler and easier and Christmas was about family and spending those times together,” he said.

While most people may be familiar with the film, featuring Judy Garland, Crisp is certain that the story translates to the stage wonderfully.

“This show is so lovely to do on stage. It features a family in St. Louis looking forward to the World’s Fair next summer. Suddenly, the father announces that they will move to New York City and the family is shattered,” Crisp said. “The family is rooted in St. Louis and it was a time when people felt a stronger connection to the places where they lived.”

The show takes place over the better part of a year, but the highlight is undeniably the Christmas Ball.

“This year, as they prepare to move to New York, the ball is bittersweet for the Smith family, who believe they are spending their last Christmas in their childhood home. This feeling still resonates strongly with people. We live in a world now where people lose connections to hometowns and the places where their families are from and families struggle with these issues. But the song ‘Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas’ remains a favorite for a reason,” he said.

Crisp called the show’s cast “superb. ... Jim Penndorf is our musical director, as always, and is doing a marvelous job getting the cast prepared. We have 27 people in the cast, including an incredibly strong group as the family and romance interests.”

Mother and father are being played by Matt Astin and Gail Johnson. Esther, the Judy Garland role, is being played by Kailey Rhodes, whose husband, Matt Hlavity, plays Warren Sheffield, the young heir of the Sheffield fortune from New York. The boy next door is being played by Tayler Darnell. Rose is played by Lauren Paris.

Given that the show is a period piece, special attention has been given to the set and costumes.

“It’s set in 1904 and it is a beautiful period for costumes for both men and women. Shelley Kuhen is designing a beautiful set of costumes for this show. While the opening number sets up the location very well as being in St. Louis, so much of the play takes place inside the home and on their front porch that it really is about this family’s life in their home,” he said. “The main goal was to create a period look inside the home. I want people to have the sense that they are looking through a window back in time to this wonderful era and into the family’s life. ... This play is really just perfect for the holiday season. Everyone will enjoy it.”

 Congress and the White House can significantly soften the initial impact of the "fiscal cliff" even if they fail to reach a compromise by Dec. 31. One thing they cannot control, however, is the financial markets' reaction, which possibly could be a panicky sell-off that triggers economic reversals worldwide.

The stock market's unpredictability is perhaps the biggest wild card in the political showdown over the fiscal cliff.

President Barack Obama's re-election gives him a strong negotiating hand, as Republicans are increasingly acknowledging. And some Democrats are willing to let the Dec. 31 deadline pass, because a rash of broad-based tax hikes would pressure Republicans to give more ground in renewed deficit-reduction negotiations.

A chief fear for Obama's supporters, however, is that Wall Street would be so disgusted or dismayed that stocks would plummet before lawmakers could prove their newfound willingness to mitigate the fiscal cliff's harshest measures, including deep, across-the-board spending cuts that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta says could significantly damage the nation's military posture. Some Republicans believe that fear will temper the president's insistence on a hard bargain this month. Obama and GOP House Speaker John Boehner on Sunday held their first meeting between just the two of them since the election, and spokesmen for both emphasized afterward their lines of communication remain open.

The so-called cliff's recipe of major tax hikes and spending cuts can actually be a gentle slope, because the policy changes would be phased in over time. Washington insiders say Congress and the White House would move quickly in January or February to undo many, but not all, of the tax hikes and spending cuts.

Financial markets, however, respond to emotion as well as to research, reason and promises. If New Year's headlines scream "Negotiations Collapse," an emotional sell-off could threaten the president's hopes for continued economic recovery in his second term, even if Republicans receive most of the blame for the impasse.

"Nobody can predict the markets' reaction," said Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Tenn.

Some Republicans are surprised that the White House has not made clearer efforts to reassure Wall Street that if the Dec. 31 deadline is breached, the worrisome pile of tax increases and spending cuts would not hit all at once.

A few liberal commentators are making just that case.

"If we go past the so-called fiscal cliff deadlines and all the resulting budget cuts and tax increases come into force, the administration can minimize the damage," Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne wrote last week. "Obama can publicly announce he is delaying any cuts, on the theory that Congress will eventually vitiate some of them. And he can make sure the bond markets know of his plans well in advance. ... Everyone (especially Wall Street) should calm down."

Some financial bloggers agree. "Although it would be bad to let the spending cuts and tax hikes fully go into effect, if this thing is addressed in early January, things will be okay," wrote Business Insider's Joe Weisenthal.

So far, the stock markets have stayed calm. The S&P 500 index is up 12 percent for the year.

That might be because investors agree that a temporary trip over the cliff wouldn't be too harmful. Chastened lawmakers, the thinking goes, would quickly minimize the economic damage with a deficit-reduction compromise that eluded them in December.