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The newest STI-awareness ads to hit the street actually seem more like how a five year old describes a urinary tract infection, but either way, it's enough to make you want to go pee in the nearest available jar and bring it to your doctor. So in that way…success?
From the Dept. of Studies We Don't Need comes one revealing that television advertising can lead to childhood obesity! When Justin Timberlake endorses McDonald's and Michael Phelps endorses Frosted Flakes, kids these days take that to mean they should be shoveling these foods down their double-chinned little faces. The research suggests — and research always suggests — the more unhealthy TV ads a child sees, the more likely he will develop weight issues. So what's the solution? We could either get kids off the couch and into the backyard with a jump rope, or pray for an economic collapse that forces the world's biggest companies to cut back on marketing campaigns. Whew, there is a god.
Kombucha is that hot new tea drink that was recently named-checked in an episode of Gossip Girl, celebrities have been seen drinking it, and now it's officially a "thing," despite the fact that it's made out of a blob of live cultured bacteria and yeast, and tastes like feet.
Guess retailers realized after that gross Yerba Mate craze, New Yorkers will drink anything as long as they are told it is macrobiotic.
Who says the magazine industry is dead, besides everyone? This quarter actually saw a rise in magazine launches: 29 more titles than in 2007! You remember 2007, right? That was such a carefree year, looking back at it.
Anyway, you can see why skeptics would scoff at this optimistic analysis of the industry, since none of the major publishers are printing new titles, and all those title-launching is happening at the behest of smaller start-ups. Not that that's a bad thing! One thing a recession is good for is small business growth, right? Like Joe the Plumber? Anyone?
The best new launch on the market is a little something called Dear Doctor: Dentistry & Oral Health, which the Philidelphia Enquirer calls "she sexiest dental magazine this side of the Atlantic."
Um? That's like saying "the best TV show that featured all of The Golden Girls but wasn't The Golden Girls, and also Don Cheadle was on it." (That would be The Golden Palace.) Also, is there a sexier dental magazine on the other side of the Atlantic?
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Time for some real talk: if you are ever in a situation where you need to perform emergency chest compressions as CPR, make sure you have the Bee Gee's on your iPod. The number of chest compressions necessary while administering CPR is difficult to gauge while in the heat of the moment, because it's actually a much higher number than people think —around 100 beats per minute— and a new study at Illinois found that medical students had a much higher success rate at achieving the correct amount of pushes to restart a heart if they were listening to a particular song from the 70s disco group:
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With American children and their goddamn obesity epidemic, it's only reasonable to assume that sooner or later the traditional TV-repellent overweight tykes would start appearing on your favorite shows. Weeds has Cylia's daughter Isabella, the chunky wise beyond her years proto-lesbian. Arrested Development had the curvy Maebe played by Alia Shawkat, who was on the receiving end of Michael Cera's unrequited lust. Nothing wrong with normal-sized children on TV, in fact this is a good trend! But what about when TV characters start treating overweight children without kid gloves, much the way the fat kids are treated in school?
On this season of Desperate Housewives, Gabrielle's daughter is constantly berated for being overweight, and now some viewers are fearing for the self-esteem of the actress playing little Juanita Solice.
Ever since Pong first took kids away from their studies and introduced them to the magic of bouncing a virtual ball against two virtual walls, parents and educators endeavored to slyly promote their own learning agenda within the world of videogames. Unfortunately, they've never succeeded: Number Crunchers was such a failure. And all Oregon Trail did was teach kids how to ford a river.
Adults have never stopped trying to Vulcan mind-meld the low art of computer and video games with the highs of picking up a damn book, even though reading is exactly what these children are trying to avoid by playing with their Wii all day.
But as Dance Dance Revolution once brought a modicum of physical activity to the world of professional gamers, a new development emerged to trick kids into reading so they can better win at video games. Sort of like a Game Genie, but with words:
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Lydia Hearst, of red carpets and Gossip Girl cameos, was rushed to New York-Presbyterian Hospital yesterday. Updating her Facebook status along the way, she reveals she's trying to pass a kidney stone. Ouch! What's worse, Monday night's Edridge event, Ms. Hearst is due to headline 1407 Broadway's party this evening. Safe to assume somebody canceled?
We've always hated those ads for pain medication or heartburn relief pills, since they always turn the human body into something that's lit on fire to explain just where the pain is, and how it can be extinguished. Windows salesman Jerry Seinfeld noticed it to, and produced a skit about it. Turns out, it's not just the over-the-counter pharmaceutical industry that's relying on this ad gimmick — but the hip- and joint-replacement industry. CONTINUED »
Cord Jefferson, editor of Jossip's celebrity blog Mollygood will return to New York City this week after a not-so-brief stay in Saudia Arabia, where he went to donate a kidney to his father.
So, that’s that. I’m in more pain than I’ve ever felt - kinda easy since my entire history of real physical trauma consists of fracturing my foot playing tennis in sixth-grade - but in an uncharacteristically tough-guy move, I swore off narcotics two days after surgery because I didn’t like the way they made me feel. Now it hurts to eat, sleep (yes, it’s possible) and scratch my back. And I’ve had to turn off both Sixteen Candles and Police Academy because they were making me laugh, which is agonizing.
I can’t believe people go through this shit in order to have slightly smaller noses. [Kidney and the Kingdom]
Next week I’m scheduled to set foot on US soil for the first time in three months. I suppose it’s about time I begin to get reacquainted with my mother nation’s traditions and values, so I’m really happy this article ran in today’s Wall Street Journal, reminding me that America is a place where serious thought is put into whether our politicians are fat enough to be good leaders.
Now that we're in the running toward November's general election, the questions are getting TOUGH for candidates. Like this one aimed John McCain's way: Is it unfair that some insurance companies cover prescriptions for Viagra but not birth control? (It was McCain's own spokeswoman who said it was unfair.)
Watching McCain squirm around in his chair before admitting he "[didn't] know enough about it to give you a informed answer" perhaps resembles what McCain looked like during his first sexual encounter, when he and the young lass who took his V-card had the contraceptives conversation.
The American Medical Association, in a rare move by a national organization, will issue a formal apology today for its past treatment of black doctors. Ronald M. Davis, a past president of the association, wrote in the July 16th issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, “The medical profession, which is based on a boundless respect for human life, had an obligation to lead society away from disrespect of so many lives. The AMA failed to do so and has apologized for that failure.”
Amy Winehouse’s recent hospitalization was evidently the best thing to ever happen to her, according to her father, Mitch. The troubled singer is reportedly not suffering from tuberculosis, but she has a host of other problems, including emphysema and looming death. Mitch breaks it down for us:
Capitalizing on the mass branding effort of those yellow rubber brands and his sexual intercourse with celebrities, super-athlete Lance Armstrong today debuts LiveStrong.com, the health/wellness site that's all about cashing in. This site is, of course, different from LiveStrong.org, the foundation set up to raise awareness about cancer and, um, Lance Armstrong. The dot-com/for-profit site, meanwhile, is a partnership with Demand Media, and greets visitors with everything from "why eating the fruits 3 times a week can help prevent the disease" to ways to "Get Fab Abs" through "a magic circle, plus other ways to strengthen your tummy with Pilates." The deal also means Armstrong is laying himself out there for endless product endorsements, including something called FRS ("Fight fatigue, Raises metabolism, Supports immune system), some sort of energy drink whose purchase will go toward funding Lance Armstrong, and his plight to turn a battle with cancer into a lucrative profiteering scheme.
As if you had any intention of getting to the gym in this heat this week, but if you're a New York member of Equinox, find something else to do this Friday between 12-4pm, because you won't be spending time at the gym. That's because the fitness club is shutting down during those hours so employees can partake in a company picnic.
Sure, it's nice to reward your hardworking staff with some cucumber sandwiches and unsweetened iced tea and all, but does this strike anyone else as the most dick move to members – who pay somewhere between $150-$200/month for membership – just so corporate can rally the troops? (Especially at locations with pools?)
If not, consider a couple of these other scenarios:
1) Staples shutting down in the middle of the day so headquarters can screen motivational training videos for employees, then sending them off with gift bags stocked with manila envelopes and not one, but two boxes of paperclips.
2) Another Starbucks "outage," with all employees in NYC required to report to Central Park, from 8am-12pm, for team building exercising, liking falling backward into a fellow barista's arms. Yes, this means NO COFFEE FOR YOU.
Couldn't Equinox, say, complete their corporate picnic in two shifts, with half the staffers attending one of two outings? Your other alternatives are welcome.
The Equinox notice to members, below. CONTINUED »
So you can't get this body through diet, exercise — and supplements?
Christian Boeving is, in our mind, the real life Brooke Wyndham, the fictional exercise queen from Legally Blonde, whose alibi for the murder of her husband is a liposuction procedure she needs to keep quiet or risk losing her entire empire.
But in this case, Boeving is a real person, and a real fitness model, and he was, until recently, the spokesman for Iovate Health Sciences' dietary supplements, including Hydroxycut.
That was until he admitted, on camera, that he took steroids. The camera he acknowledged this tidbit to was filming for the documentary Bigger, Stronger, Faster, which was screened at Sundace in January.
Granted, Boeving's steroid use was doctor-prescribed, but Iovate isn't in the business of hashing out details; they're in the business of public perception that their product works all by itself. So they fired Boeving. CONTINUED »
When staffers at UCLA's Medical Center were fired in March for snooping on Britney Spears' medical records, and then selling tidbits about the pop star, like details of her giving birth so Sean Preston in 2005, one teensy weensy other revelation floated to the surface: The practice was nothing new.
Plenty of other celebs had their privacy violated, including Maria Shriver, George Clooney, and Farah Fawcett.
Now, tapes of conversations between tabloid The Globe and a score of hospital employees, from 1992-93, show how editors there regularly paid off sources inside various hospitals' walls for dirt on Tom Cruise, Liz Taylor, Billy Crystal, Kelsey Grammer, Magic Johnson, Roseanne Barr, Al Pacino, Paula Abdul, Frank Zappa, and Vanna White. From plastic surgery procedures to eating disorder treatment, every tidbit was available for the right price. CONTINUED »
The bed bug infestation that rocked Fox News back in March has resurfaced as a much less friendly beast: a lawsuit. FNC veteran Jane Clark is suing her employer because she "can no longer go to work after suffering emotional distress due to a continuous and ongoing bedbug problem at work." [TVN] As recently as April 30, she claims she was again attacked by the insects, even after her department was moved to a different floor. But FNC is pretty much off the hook (except for the worker's comp claim); she's named the building's manager Beacon Capital and the maintenance company, Triangle Services, as defendants.
Kanye West’s mother, Donda, who died of a heart attack after extensive plastic surgery, will live on forever in West’s song, “Dear Mama.” But she might also be remembered for spurring medical reform in California?
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