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Friday, April 11, 2014

Idina Menzel admits to being rattled by Adele Dazeem intro

March 2, 2014. Idina Menzel performs nominated original song "Let it Go" by Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez, for the film "Frozen" at the 86th Academy Awards in Hollywood, California.REUTERS
Idina Menzel admits that John Travolta’s mangling of her name momentarily “threw” her. The 42-year-old actress was set to sing the blockbuster song “Let It Go” from “Frozen” at this year's Oscar ceremony when Travolta now-infamously introduced her as Adele Dazeem.

Thursday, April 10, 2014

What You Need to Know About Heartbleed, the New Security Bug Scaring the Internet

What should you know about Heartbleed, a recently uncovered security bug? The shortest version: You'll have to change all of your passwords, and temporarily avoid any site that is known to be vulnerable. That sounds a bit alarmist, we know, but now that internet and security experts know a little more about the security vulnerability, it's becoming more and more clear that Heartbleed is nothing to mess with.

Tumblr users recently heard about Heartbleed thanks to a note sent out by the blogging service encouraging all of its users to change their passwords, immediately. So here's the rundown on what you need to know, and what you can do to protect yourself as much as possible from the fall-out.

Thursday, April 3, 2014

Shooting at US Army's Fort Hood base in Texas

Lt Gen Mark Milley describes the final moments
before the gunman shot himself 
Photograph: Erich Schlegel/Reuters
A soldier shot dead four colleagues and injured 16 others at the US Army's Fort Hood base in Texas before killing himself, the military says.

US media named the suspect as Ivan Lopez, 34, although his identity has not been officially confirmed.

The gunman had served in Iraq and had mental health problems, officials said.

President Barack Obama said he was "heartbroken" over the attack. A gun rampage at the same base in 2009 left 13 soldiers dead and 32 wounded.

Maj Nidal Hasan was sentenced to death for that attack.

How the ‘How I Met Your Mother’ finale betrayed the series’ ideals

Ted finally finishes telling his kids
the story of how 
he met their mother. 
(Credit: Ron P. Jaffe/Fox/CBS)
“How I Met Your Mother” almost pulled something special off. After a rocky beginning to its finale, we finally got to see the joys of Ted Mosby (Josh Radnor) and Tracy (Cristin Milioti), the woman who would become his wife, together: getting pregnant, going to robot wrestling matches, and seeing each other on their wedding day. It was not quite a surprise when we learned, as many had predicted, that their happiness was cut short by her illness and death. But it was definitely jarring to learn that the Mother was, as one of my guestbloggers joked in a more positive assessment of the show four years ago, a MacGuffin — a goal he chased for 208 episodes, only for us to find out she was only a plot device. The whole frame of the story was an excuse to reunite Ted with the woman he has spent so many years leaving behind: Robin Scherbatsky (Cobie Smulders). It was the shallowest, if not easiest, answer to Ted’s lifelong quest for love that “How I Met Your Mother” possibly could have arrived at.

12 Simple April Fools' Day Pranks

April Fools' Day is upon us, which means a prank could be lurking 'round every corner, chair or potentially Saran-wrapped door.

If you didn't plan the greatest, most YouTube-worthy prank of all time, no worries. You can still fool your friends and family with pranks that require little effort and yield big laughs. (From you, at least.)

This year, forget blasting your mom's car with Post-it notes and settle for a simpler prank. Check out these easy gags you can pull together before the day's end.

But don't blame the Internet if your friends shun you for a few days — it's tough to forgive someone for a donut full of mayonnaise.

Google Maps is overrun with Pokémon for April Fools', and you can catch 'em all

Google has been experimenting with augmented reality for a few years now, but never in such an ambitious way as it's announcing today... sort of. For April Fools' Day this year, Google has created a video advertising an augmented reality Pokémon game loosely tied into Google Maps. In Google's vision, players would hold their smartphones out in front of them and see Nintendo's cartoon creatures appear on screen before them, often ready to do battle.

Powerful earthquake strikes off Chile, triggers tsunami

People embrace on the upper floor of
an apartment building in Iquique, Chile
A mighty 8.2-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of northern Chile late Tuesday, triggering small landslides, sapping power and generating a tsunami.
Four men and one woman died -- two due to heart attacks and three crushed to death, said Interior Minister Rodrigo Penailillo.
About 300 prisoners escaped from the northern port city of Iquique in the immediate aftermath, he said.

The quake struck about 8:46 p.m. local time, some 60 miles northwest of Iquique. It had a depth of 12.5 miles, the U.S. Geological Survey said.
Chile's National Emergency Office asked everyone to evacuate the South American nation's coast. And residents complied.

Anderson Cooper reveals he won’t inherit mother Gloria Vanderbilt’s millions: ‘There’s no trust fund’

Gloria Vanderbilt (left) with her son
Anderson Cooper might be sitting on millions of dollars, but he doesn’t care.

The cable news anchor, 46, who is the son of heiress Gloria Vanderbilt — legacy to the New York railroad fortune — says the family's old money won't fall in his lap.

"My mom's made clear to me that there's no trust fund," Cooper told radio host Howard Stern on Monday. "There's none of that."

Cooper added that he doesn't "believe in inheriting money" and that he thinks having one would be a "curse."

"Who's inherited a lot of money that has gone on to do things in their own life?" he said. "From the time I was growing up, if I felt that there was some pot of gold waiting for me, I don't know that I would've been so motivated."