Last week, Dave Chappelle spoke about his first encounter with Kanye West—whose life is dope, and who does dope shit
West performed three songs: "New Slaves," "Gold Digger," and "Jesus Walks." Although cell phones, cameras, and recording devices of any kind were not allowed, a few videos of the performance have popped up online:
'Cause their lives are dope, and they see dope shit.
[h/t Stereogum, image via Getty]
Police in Macau have raided two illegal gambling rings that have yielded million dollars of bets related to this year's World Cup tournament. Officers arrested 26 in two raids on a hotel in the Chinese city, apprehending bookmakers who had been taking bets online and on the phone from across the world.
Information from the raid revealed that one gambler had placed a bet of more than $5 million alone. According to BBC News, "Gambling is mostly illegal in mainland China, although it is allowed in Macau and, to a lesser extent, Hong Kong."
There has been a recent crackdown on gambling in the Chinese cities, however, due to criminal gangs getting involved in the underground networks, authorities say. Those who were arrested were handcuffed and paraded in front of the media with with black bags over their heads.
According to the South China Morning Post:
Since the World Cup kicked off in Brazil in the early hours of Friday last week, Hong Kong police have arrested 39 suspected illegal bookmakers and confiscated betting slips worth nearly HK$85 million.
[Image via AP]
Sesame Street has built up a good history of sweetly spoofing
True Mud follows a grouch (gasp!) in a diner, just trying to get some True Mud. Instead, he only gets rhymes. (You'll find out what a rhyme is, don't worry.)
[via Sesame Street]
Goalkeeper and Olympic gold medalist Hope Solo, aka Hope Amelia Stevens, is being held without bail at the South Correctional Entity Regional Jail in Des Moines, Wash. in an investigation on two counts of domestic-violence assault.
The goalkeeper for the Seattle Reign FC was arrested overnight after being accused of striking her sister and nephew. The report in the case says both suffered "visible injuries." Officers were called to Stevens' house, which she shares with former NFL player Jerramy Stevens, around 1am.
Kirkland police's Lieutenant Mike Murray told The Seattle Times that "There was a big party going on at her house. It was an out-of-control situation." According to USA Today, no release date for Solo has been set.
According to the Kirkland police's account of the incident, Solo appeared intoxicated.
[Image via AP]
In order to avoid going to the dentist, a 12-year-old boy (a 12-year-old dentist avoiding hero) in France ran away and, when found, created a detailed kidnapping story. Police looked for his kidnapper for an entire month.
French paper Midi Libre reports that the boy, from the Alpine village St-Gervais, was picked up by local police when they saw him hiding in the village on May 21st. He immediately told the cops that he had been abducted from the nearby town of Bagnols and proceeded with his story, via The Local:
He even gave the officers a detailed description of the man who had abducted him – "European looking, aged in his thirties, of muscular build with a height of around 1.70 and a vertical scar on his right cheek".
The kidnapper was also wearing a black shirt and light jeans according to the boy. Police quickly drew up an e-fit image of the alleged abductor.
The young boy was also able to hand over details of the car he was driving and of course what happened during the abduction.
The boy told the officers that he was going to his dental appointment ("Which I, you know, was really looking forward to—I mean, seriously, suuuper bummed that I didn't get to go. Most people don't like the dentist but I'm like, 'Why?' You know? I'm like, 'Why not?'") when a man pulled up to ask him for directions. He said that he was then forced into his car and only escaped when the kidnapper stopped briefly in St-Gervais.
Upon further questioning this week, he finally admitted that he ran away and invented the story because he was afraid to go to the dentist.
We can assume that this is a fair representation of his escape:
[image via Shutterstock]
Two police officers in Baltimore have been suspended after authorities say they slit the throat of a Shar-Pei that had broken free from her owner's backyard and that had reportedly bitten a stranger. The dog, Nala, was seven years old.
The dog belonged to Sarah Gossard, who told police that Nala had slipped through a gate in her backyard, after which it was discovered by a woman who tried to get the dog home. The dog then reportedly bit the woman, resulting in a superficial wound. The woman then called police.
According to the charging documents in the case, Officer Thomas Schmidt and Officer Jeffrey Bolger responded to the call.
As Bolger got out of the police truck, a witness overheard him say, "I'm going to [expletive] gut this thing," the police report said.
Schmidt and Bolger struggled to get the dog under control, and Palmere said they had the dog restrained, tethered to the dog-control pole. Witnesses told police Schmidt held the dog on the ground while they saw Bolger slit its throat.
Police said that the knife used wasn't issued by the department. Officer Schmidt was placed on paid administrative leave while Officer Bolger, who is allegedly responsible for killing the dog, was released on "his own recognizance Thursday morning after being charged the night before with aggravated animal cruelty, animal cruelty and malfeasance in office." He has been suspended without pay.
Police spokesman Lieutenant Eric Kowalczyk revealed that the investigation is still ongoing.
"Internal affairs is continuing the investigation into the specifics of the incident," police spokesman Lt. Eric Kowalczyk said. Other officers who were at the scene are being questioned about their involvement, police have said, and internal investigators are trying to determine why police commanders only learned of the dog's death Monday, two days after it occurred.
[Image via Baltimore Sun]
Footage of a massive fire on a $24 million yacht named "Polar Bear" was caught on a drone camera by a man named Kurt Roll, who immediately uploaded it to YouTube. It is beautiful, in a horrifying sort of way.
Roll added this description to the video:
I filmed this approx. 10-15 minutes after the fire started . I was filming a friends boat in south bay close by when we saw the smoke coming from The marine groups yard. This was fascinating to watch through my monitor, but having a boat myself,I couldn't help thinking of how horrible it would be to have your dream boat go up in flames. I'm sure the insurance will replace it, but wow , what a bummer and a hassle.
The owner of the yacht, Larry Jodsass, spoke to NBC San Diego about the fire:
"Am I angry? No. Anger is not the right word. It was my toy, my wonderful, beautiful piece of equipment. I think it's the most beautiful boat that ever has been built."
Jodsass said the yacht took him five years to build and had been in the water for three years. A witness told NBC that he and his crew were doing welding work on the yacht when it caught fire. The shipyard was evacuated as a precaution, and fire officials said two workers suffered minor smoke inhalation injuries.
The fire didn't spread to any other nearby vessels.
[h/t Uproxx]
The last time I saw my mother was seven years ago. My girlfriend Jaime and I had just bought our first home, a fixer-upper overlooking a greenbelt on a quiet street in Seattle. Instead of a housewarming party, Jaime wanted to have our moms over for lunch.
After several months of silence, I'd recently reconnected with my mother. I don't remember why we stopped talking this time, or who initiated it, but ever since I moved out, our relationship had its ebbs and flows. When I left New York for college in California, we talked sporadically and then not at all — me, busy with school; her, resentfully empty-nesting — until I was almost expelled for fighting, and I called her for advice. And then we didn't talk again until 9/11. And then again until I graduated and moved to Seattle, and she followed, wanting to be closer to me. I never understood the reasons for our patches of estrangement, but changes and crises never failed to bring us back together. She was a single-mother, and I was her only child. In the end, we were all each other had.
That day was the first time my mother had seen our new home. After Jaime and I made an offer on the house, I called her out of the blue to share the news, hoping she'd be proud of me since she never owned a home, but she was skeptical. When my mother arrived that afternoon, she took it all in with a suspicious eye: the janky security door, the stained carpet wavy as a Shar-Pei's scruff, the small shed out back one strong gust from collapsing.
In her eyes, the house wasn't any better than the dingy apartments she and I bounced in and out of around Queens when I was a kid. Despite our frequent tumult, my mother always wanted the best for me — good schools, name-brand clothes, anything I needed really — and would work long hours cleaning rich peoples' houses to provide it without any help from my father who'd left her when she was pregnant. I knew she thought Jaime and I could've done better, but it wasn't worth the argument. I didn't want to ruin lunch, especially with my girlfriend's mom there.
After we finished eating, my mother walked around our place some more, wondering aloud about its deficiencies to no one in particular. I noticed her lingering for awhile at a bureau in the living room staring at a group of photos Jaime had recently framed. There were pictures of the two of us kissing, of our Lab mix Jelly and our fat tabby Butterball, of Jaime's family, and one of me and my grandmother.
"Why don't you have any pictures of me up?" my mother asked.
"We just moved in, Ma," I said. "Jaime put these up."
"But you have one of Grandma?"
My mother stopped speaking to her mother and the rest of our family years ago, again for reasons I still don't understand because my mother has refused to say. I'm sure it has something to do with her decision to have me out of wedlock, and the judgment she felt having been raised Irish Catholic. Since I was just a boy then, I was forced to choose between her and everyone else, which wasn't really a choice at all. Now a man, I'd started exchanging letters with my grandmother and emails with some of my aunts and cousins back in New York. I tried to speak with my mother about it, to encourage her to do the same, but the conversation ended when she accused me of betraying her and hung up on me. Then we didn't talk for a few months.
"Ma, we're still unpacking," I tried to explain, gesturing at the boxes inconspicuously tucked in corners, but I could see the anger in her narrowing eyes and clenched jaw. She excused herself to use the bathroom, then gathered up her purse and coat, and left quickly with a short wave.
The next day I left a message on my mother's answering machine thanking her for coming and apologizing about the pictures. A week later she hadn't returned my call, so I called again. And again. And again.
I never heard back.
***
Four years later Jaime and I were at the hospital for our first sonogram. The room was warm and dark, and the smell of hand sanitizer was so strong I thought I was already suffering from sympathetic pregnancy.
Jaime had told the technician that we wanted to know the baby's sex. She was indifferent, but I hoped for a boy, if only to make up for all the things I'd missed not having a father, like playing catch or talking about girls. The technician ran the ultrasound wand across Jaime's gooped-up belly and showed us the head, arms, legs, and other indiscernible body parts on the flat-screen mounted to the wall above us. Suddenly, a small arrow popped up pointing at the middle of a staticky, gray blur that was supposed to be our baby, and then the technician typed the words, "It's a boy!"
Although my mother and I hadn't spoken since she'd come over for lunch, she was all I could think about when I saw those three words. Over the years, so much had changed in my life that I wanted to share with her. Jaime and I had eloped. I'd started my career. We'd renovated our home. Was this the change that would bring us back together? And if it didn't, what would?
As I stared at the flat-screen, a hollowness filled my chest, and I could feel the tears welling in my eyes. I took my glasses off and dabbed at my cheeks with my fingers, hoping Jaime wouldn't notice in the dim light of the room. When she did, I grabbed her hand and smiled, passing it off as tears of joy over our unborn son rather than my long-lost mother.
After the technician finished, she handed Jaime a towel to wipe the goop from her belly and asked if we wanted pictures.
"Yes," Jaime said. "Can we have three? I want to give one to my mother."
"Make it four," I said.
***
It was brisk day in late October, six weeks before the baby was due. Outside of the hospital where our breastfeeding class was, Jaime and I sat in her car while I stared at a cardboard box in my lap. In its corner was a strange address, somewhere in New York I didn't know, written in a familiar handwriting, my mother's. Five months had passed since I sent her a card with a picture of the sonogram and a note that read, "I'm not sure what's come between us, but let's put it behind us. You're going to be a grandmother." This was her first response.
I took a deep breath and tore open the box. Inside it was filled with piles and piles of little boy's clothes — some new, some used — and my first Christmas ornament, a baby blue ball with the words, "It's a boy!" printed across it and the year, 1981. I remembered the ornament from our Christmases together and couldn't believe she still had it thirty years later. On top of everything in the box, there was an envelope. I opened it and read the card inside slowly to myself.
My mother wrote that she'd recently left Seattle, moved to some mountainside town in upstate New York, far from the city life she swore she'd never give up. She explained that she'd met someone, though she didn't mention who or how, and she was happy out there living among the dirt roads and chipmunks and pinecones, far from everyone and everything. And then she wished me good luck in life, as if we'd never see each other again, before signing, "Mom," minus the stream of XO's she'd dashed across every card she'd given me when I was a boy.
I closed the card and cried harder than I'd ever cried before. In the months since I sent her the sonogram picture and never heard back, I assumed our relationship was over. At first, I blamed myself. Did I do something wrong? Should I have tried harder? Then, instead of confronting reality, I convinced myself my mother was dead. It was easier to grieve the loss of her body than it was the loss of her love, to believe she'd never written me back because she couldn't, not because she didn't want to be in my life anymore.
Now I had to accept the truth: I was a 30 year-old orphan. My mother was cutting me off as she'd done with everyone else in our family, and there wasn't anything I could do about it. Despite how long it had been since we'd spoken, I always thought she would come back into my life when the change or crisis was big enough. If becoming a father, making her a grandmother, couldn't bring us together, nothing would.
"I can't go to this class," I said to Jaime in between sobs.
"I know," she said before holding my broad body in her arms. She held me the same way my mother did.
Brian McGuigan is a Seattle-based writer whose nonfiction has appeared in Salon, The Rumpus, HTMLGiant, The Weeklings, and elsewhere. He writes a monthly column about being a father for ParentMap Magazine called "Daddy Issues." When he's not writing and parenting, Brian curates the popular reading series "Cheap Wine & Poetry and Cheap Beer & Prose." He's currently at work on a memoir about fatherhood, violence, and masculinity.
[Illustration by Tara Jacoby]
It's tough to imagine which of his equally disturbing sex crimes finally motivated the American Apparel board to fire CEO Dov Charney. Now it's come out that a 2011 case, in which former employee Irene Morales accuses Charney of forcing her into "sex slavery," was the tipping point.
According to the New York Post, Charney also authorized an employee to post nude photos of Morales to a blog without her knowledge and consent, a move that is so wrong on a variety of moral, ethical, and legal levels:
The board's concern, according to sources, is that the blog not only harassed and defamed Morales, but also ran afoul of certain California laws that forbid falsely impersonating others online, as alleged in a suit at the time by Morales's lawyer Eric Baum.
Morales ended up suing Charney for $260 million, but her case was thrown out in 2012. It's good that she's finally getting some justice with the American Apparel board's recent move, but this still raises the question of why they didn't do more to help her when this incident came up three years ago.
Another factor in Charney's ouster could've been this video
Image via Getty.
Sing Sing Correctional Facility, a maximum security prison in New York state, may see its adjacent power plant turned into a prison museum in the near future, supporters say. Though many prisons in America have been converted into visitors' sites, this would be one of few nationwide with the adjoining facilities still open.
The power plant once supplied electricity for the electric chair at the Ossining, N.Y.-based prison. Plans for a museum at the prison were enacted as early as 2005, but had never gone into effect due to the economic crisis. Now, with New York state budgets focusing on tourism and construction, the plans have been resurrected.
Via the Associated Press:
Supporters envision thousands of tourists streaming "up the river" from New York to see artifacts including "Old Sparky," as the chair was known; a metal "head cage" used when prisoners were transported; and a display of prisoners' weapons, from axes made in metal shop to shivs fashioned from plastic forks.
Arthur Wolpisnky, the prison's historian and a correctional officer at the facility, believes that the museum will be a big draw. "Electrocutions, riots, escape attempts. And so much has changed over the years. Inmates can have cable TV in their cells now," he said.
The power plant is separated from the prison facility by high wall topped with guard tower, and unlike the Angola Museum at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, visitors will not get a tour of the prison itself.
Supporters of the museum say that the Sing Sing power plant museum could get up to 250,000 visitors a year.
[Image via AP]
SHORT I AM. STOLE MY HAT HE DID. pic.twitter.com/lHhhioPlRl
— Patrick Stewart (@SirPatStew) June 21, 2014
On the heels of Disney's announcement that Rian Johnson will direct Star Wars: Episode VIII
Kate Middleton and her double tufts of hair in body sacks, Prince William and porkpie Prince George, have been living in Medieval squalor at their Kensington Palace apartment. With no running water and tons of asbestos infiltrating their happy home, the repairs on the palace are reportedly going to cost UK taxpayers nearly £4 million.
These aren't the first repairs made on the royal trio's abode. Before little man-baby George was born, renovations were made to the tune of £1 million, causing a polite uproar among Brits everywhere.
As Carole Malone wrote in an op-ed last year for The Mirror:
Buck House insists these grand palaces have to be maintained and held in trust for the nation. Really? So when was the last time any of us were invited to any of the private royal residences for tea and a digestive?
Quite! But spokespeople for the upcoming renovations stand by their decision to make the Plebeian people pay for the upkeep of a house they'll never live in.
Via BBC News:
"We also had to take into account the fact that Kensington Palace is a scheduled ancient monument, and all elements of the refurbishment had to be agreed with English Heritage.
"The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge paid privately for all the internal furnishings, including carpets and curtains.
"They were also at pains to ensure that the specification is not extravagant."
Their house was last renovated in 1963 and the official details and costs of the fix-up are to come next week.
[Image via AP]
"I thought 'I've got this one in the bag' – it was an absolute scream.'" After posing for his firearm license photo with a colander on his head, police confiscated four of an Australian "Pastafarian"'s guns under the (possibly correct) assumption that he was mentally unstable.
Joe Biden, who just returned from his whirlwind tour of fun sports grab-assing in Brazil
To the dismay of many, last year's romp was canceled for unknown reasons. We're all glad to see the festivities are back in action, Joe Mac.
[Image via Instagram]
A Texas day care center is under investigation after admitting to duct taping children to their sleeping mats when they wouldn't sleep during nap time.
A photo, shown above, of a boy wrapped in a blanket and taped by his legs and chest to his sleeping mat, was taking by an employee at Heart2Heart Montessori Academy in Parker County. She circulated the photo among parents and quit her job shortly after.
Lorrie Almquist, mother of a 3-year-old boy who was also duct taped, received a call a day later from the day care's owner, Pam Decker. According to ABC News, Almquist said that she took full responsibility for the incident, and confirmed that her son had also been taped down:
"I felt violated and I was irate. I couldn't find any words to say to her. I was so hurt and saddened to think that my child had to go through that."
Almquist also told ABC that Decker had been complaining for weeks that her son was unable to sleep during nap time, and had requested that Almquist buy a weighted blanket to help keep him down. She and another parent contacted the Willow Park Police Department and Child Protective Services about the incident.
According to ABC News, Heart2Heart also reported the incident to authorities, but defended the actions in an email to parents:
...Heart2Heart's director, Ashlea Pena, said the children were not harmed and described Decker's actions as "thoughtless" and "foolish."
Pena, however, defended the school, claiming that the situation had been "extremely exaggerated by a very upset parent." She added that "the child involved was in no way harmed or caused any distress, in fact within 5 minutes he was sound asleep with his arms tucked under his chin. And woke up smiling."
Almquist, of course, thinks this defense is ridiculous:
"Ashlea Pena has a daughter that's less than a year old and I know she would feel the same way if this happened to her daughter."
The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services' Child Licensing Division has launched an investigation, which could last up to 30 days.
[photo via ABC]
Seattle, home to the highest minimum wage in America
The study is performed by Blackbaud yearly. This is the third consecutive year that the Northwestern city has held the top slot for most online donations made.
In its sixth annual survey, Blackbaud's report looked at the total amount donated through the company's services for 265 cities with a population of more than 100,000. In total, $822 million was raised from more than 8.3 million donations.
Many speculate that the reason for Seattle's consistent online generosity is that the city is full of young people with smartphones, wifi accounts named LETSBLAZE, and money. Another speculation suggests that the "guilt donation," where friends share their generosity to social media, is also causing a domino effect of giving.
Susan McPherson, who works to build partnerships between corporations and nonprofits, said younger people are specifically looking to share philanthropic behavior online with friends and networks. In addition, millennials are looking to join bigger giving communities, which she said makes it a "perfect storm."
The second and third biggest cities for online giving are Alexandria, Va. and Atlanta, Ga. You'll be surprised to hear that New York is nowhere near the top ten:
The above image is of Washington governor Jay Inslee tying the shoe of a local Seattle school child in an initiative to get kids to walk to school instead of take the bus.
The full list of ranked cities can be downloaded here, where Miami Gardens, Fl. finishes dead last and New York can't even break the top 50.
[Image via AP]
A truck full of live pigs in the north of Spain in Caparosso overturned on the highway on Sunday, killing two cyclists and injuring one. The cyclists were training for an upcoming race.
Officials on the scene said that a helicopter, three ambulances, and three fire trucks had to be sent to presumably return the highway to working order and also chorale the pigs. The highway northeast of Madrid has been shut down since this morning and police are looking into the cause of the accident.
File "death by overturned pig truck" under ways I hope to never die.
[Image via AP]
Hey, remember those inmates who fled a Canadian jail via helicopter?
Kim Kardashian and Kanye West celebrated North West's first birthday yesterday with a kid's version of Coachella, deemed "Kidchella," in Kourtney Kardashian and Scott Disick's backyard. A baby's dream! Social media wasn't around when we all had our first Kidchellas, but—luckily for us—North's was well documented.
North's birthday is actually on June 15th, but because it fell on Father's Day, the party—which featured a ferris wheel, lip synching for some reason, and both babies and adults in Coachella clothes—was held this weekend. It was heavily Instagrammed:
Really takes you back to your own first birthday!
[image via Instagram]
This fifteen-second video perfectly captures what it would have been like if, instead of a dinosaur, this Jurassic Park scene featured a very large bulldog named Wally.
You can't say that it doesn't!
[h/t DailyDot]
