Here’s The Things You’ll Want To See Hear and Know Today.
The Big Picture
In addition to violating your cell phone privacy, the federal government has also been watching you through your web cam.
Roy Costner just graduated from high school in South Carolina, as the valedictorian of his class. Only problem is, he’s a Christian, and the school district just banned prayers at the graduation ceremony. So while he was speaking at the ceremony, he ripped up his pre-approved speech and started recitingthe Lord’s Prayer instead. (Roy attends Liberty High School, in Pickens County. The school district was surprisingly rational about it. Most of the time they try to withhold a diploma for stunts like this. But a spokesperson for the district said they wouldn’t punish a student for expressing his religious views . . . and in any case he was already a graduate, so they had no authority over him.)
Showbizzy Newz
Martha Stewart had her first two Match.com dates this week. One guy is named Larry and he’s in the steel business. The other is named Stan, and he’s a commercial director. Martha definitely didn’t fall in love at first sight. But she told Matt Lauer she had fun and she’d see them again. (Stan actually worked on some of the old Kmart commercials that Martha used to do, before she went to jail.)
Brad Pitt went to TWO premieres for his new movie “World War Z” yesterday, first in Atlanta and then in Philadelphia. They were both surprise appearances. Here’s Brad talking to the crowd before the Atlanta showing.
Esther Williams died yesterday. She was the star of all those swimsuit movies back in the ’50s, including “Bathing Beauty” and “Million Dollar Mermaid”. Before that she was a champion swimmer who had a shot at the 1940 Olympics, until they were canceled because of World War Two.
In Theaters This Weekend
“The Internship“ (PG-13)
Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson are two unemployed salesmen with outdated computer skills who talk their way into intern positions at Google . . . where they’ll then have to compete against dozens of tech-savvy college students for a job.
“The Purge“ (R)
In the future, on one night a year, you can LEGALLY COMMIT ANY CRIME you want . . . even murder. During that 12-hour period, hospitals are closed, the police can’t be called, and it’s up to you to figure out how you’re going to survive the night.
The night when everyone releases their darkest impulses is called “the purge,” and Ethan Hawke’s gotten rich off of selling security systems to make people’s homes impenetrable, so they can defend themselves from their homicidal neighbors.
Q Country Closeup
Ronnie Dunn played a live show on the roof of a restaurant the other night, right across the street from where people were leaving the CMT Awards. Turned out to be a pretty smart move . . . he got a huge crowd line-dancing in the street, and he got to unload a bunch of t-shirts on them.
RODNEY ATKINS is engaged to a singer-songwriter named ROSE FALCON . . . but they’re trying really hard to keep it quiet.
The news came out on Wednesday when TOBY KEITH’S daughter KRYSTAL Tweeted, “Congrats to my girl @Rose Falcon on her engagement to @Rodney Atkins.”
And then, also on Wednesday, Rose hit up Facebook with a photo of her and Rodney, plus a pic of the diamond ring. She wrote, “I forgot to tell ya. We are engaged!” However, she either took that post down or changed its privacy settings.
Fortunately, CountryMusicIsLove posted a screen shot. (You can check that out here.) We haven’t heard anything from either of them since.
The Backside of the News
In Nashville, Tennessee, 33-year-old Orlando Shaw has TWENTY-TWO KIDS with FOURTEEN different women. They just took him to court for child support. He says he’s not sure how he’d pay, but his plan is to play the lottery. Here’s Orlando talking about all his kids, and why he didn’t use contraception. (He said he loves all his kids, and he didn’t use contraception because he was “young” and “ambitious.”)
There are a lot of videos on YouTube of dogs that play dead. But not many dogs can give a performance like this one. It’s a German shepherd that plays dead every time its owner pretends to shoot it. And when it goes down, it gives this long howl, like it’s dying a slow, heroic death.
A guy got arrested this week in Florida after he showed up naked on the porch of a random house. He claimed he was going to propose to his girlfriend. But the people in the house didn’t even know who he was. Here’s the homeowner making the 911 call. (The full call is online here. The man says he doesn’t know who the intruder is or what he’s doing, and then he tells the operator that the guy is taking his pants off. The intruder’s name is Thomas Edwards, and he’s 22 years old. When the cops came to the house, he spit on one of them and got tased. So now he’s facing charges of burglary, battery of an officer and indecent exposure.)
News You Can Use This Weekend
The most common burger mistakes at barbecues include: Buying hamburger that’s too lean, so it doesn’t have any flavor . . . over-handling the meat, which makes it less tender . . . pressing the patties with a spatula while they’re cooking, which gets rid of the taste . . . and shutting the lid of the barbecue to speed things up, because it makes them taste like smoke.
Buzzfeed has the details
