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Tuesday, March 4, 2008

'Idol' once danced here


American Idol" contestant David Hernandez once entertained audiences by removing his clothes instead of singing tunes, a manager at a male strip club in Phoenix told The Associated Press.

The 24-year-old finalist from Glendale, Ariz., once worked as a stripper at Dick's Cabaret, appearing fully nude and performing lap dances for the club's "mostly male" clientele, club manager Gordy Bryan said Monday.

"He had the look and the type that people like, so he made pretty good money here," Bryan said.

It's not clear whether a history as a stripper could disqualify Hernandez from the competition. In 2003, finalist Frenchie Davis was dismissed because of her appearance on an adult Web site; but last year, Antonella Barba remained in the competition after racy photos of her surfaced on the Internet.

Fox spokeswomen Jill Hudson did not immediately return telephone calls seeking comment Monday.

According to Bryan, Hernandez steadily worked at the club for three years until September 30, 2007.

"He never renewed his licensing with the state, so he hasn't been on my roster since then," Bryan said.

Bryan said he was aware that Hernandez was a vocalist, but that Hernandez never sang at the club. Bryan said he now believes Hernandez stopped working at the club because of his participation in "American Idol." Hernandez has never been referred to as a stripper or former stripper during the Fox singing competition.

Rumors of a stripper past — along with photos of a scantily clad Hernandez working as a bartender at gay nightclub Burn — were first posted last week on VoteForTheWorst.com, a site that encourages "Idol" viewers to vote for "the bad and truly entertaining contestants."

"It was like moths to a flame," said VoteForTheWorst.com founder Dave Della Terza. "As soon as I posted that, we started getting 10, 20 letters every single day from people saying, 'Yeah, he's a stripper in Phoenix.'"

Terza and other members of VoteForTheWorst.com community scoured MySpace, Photobucket and other social networking and photo sharing sites to find information and images of Hernandez. Terza said he contacted the club to confirm the Internet chatter, but they never got back to him.

"They said they couldn't give me a statement before talking to their lawyers," said Terza.

Hernandez, who originally auditioned for "Idol" in San Diego on July 30, 2007, is in the Fox singing competition's top 16 contestants. Last week, he earned rave reviews from the judges after his performance of The Temptations' "Papa Was a Rolling Stone." He is scheduled to perform with the other male contestants on Tuesday's show.

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Men Can Suffer Postnatal Depression



New Study Claims Men Can Suffer Postnatal Depression!
MUCH is now known about postnatal depression, which ensures that acknowledging it and going for help are that bit easier.


Health visitors and GPs are alert to the possibility of this condition arising, with successful treatment making life infinitely easier for those who suffer from it.


Postnatal depression in men is less often recognised and harder to talk about, not least because of the impression that they could well be hijacking a condition that was always considered both female and hormone-based.


Yet there is no doubt that there is a huge emotional impact in becoming a dad and many struggle to cope with the transitional phase.


Men are often shocked when they realise the reality of having a baby - lack of sleep, crying baby, mums who are finding it difficult to cope, the pressures of providing for a family. It is also hard for some men to understand what their partners are going through - if their partners are depressed, too, - it's bound to affect their relationship and make each of them feel worse.


Recent research completed at Glasgow's Caledonian University indicates postnatal depression can result from situation, as much as hormones, which applies equally to both sexes.


"There are a whole range of issues to be considered here " said Cynthia McVey, Head of Divisional Psychology.


"Having a baby is such an enormous change in life and one where we're not encouraged to dwell on the negatives.


"However, despite all the positives and the sheer joy of being a parent, there are other factors coming into play which can also have a major impact.


"Sometimes a father feels he doesn't have the connection with a baby that the mother has, especially if she's breastfeeding or making all the decisions about caring for the baby.


"She could be unhappy about how she looks, he may feel financial pressure if he's the only one currently earning, the sexual identity of both partners changes and if you add too little sleep, fatigue and lack of confidence about how you're coping, life can be dismal at a time when it should be wonderful."


If you need help or advice on any aspects of postnatal depression contact your GP or health visitor for help and advice.


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Magic' Solution for Depression?
Researchers at Johns Hopkins have published what has been described as a "landmark" study seeking further understanding of drugs that can affect human consciousness and, beyond that, how thought, emotion, and ultimately behavior are grounded in biology. The Hopkins researchers looked at the effects of psilocybin, the active agent in sacred or "magic" mushrooms responsible for their spiritual or mystical effects. Controversy surrounding the drug culture of the 1960s pretty much closed the door on scientific research into what substances like psilocybin might reveal about the nature of consciousness and what beneficial effects they might have. The Hopkins study was published in the July 11, 2006, online edition of Psychopharmacology and generated front-page news around the world.


The researchers noted that more than 60 percent of their 36 volunteers reported effects that met criteria for a "full mystical experience" as defined by established psychological scales. One third of the participants said that the experience was the single most spiritually significant of their lives and more than two-thirds rated it among their five most meaningful and spiritually significant events. The effects appeared to be lasting: two months after the study ended, 79 percent of the subjects reported "moderately or greatly increased well-being or life satisfaction" compared with volunteers who got a placebo rather than the psilocybin.


On the downside, about one third of the study subjects reported extreme anxiety in response to the drug that researchers said could escalate into dangerous behavior under less carefully controlled conditions. In my experience, effects of psychoactive drugs are very dependent on set and setting (expectation and environment), and the probability of negative reactions to them can be minimized by attention to these variables.


The average age of the study volunteers was 46 and none had a history of drug abuse or mental illness. Because of the reputed effects of psilocybin, the researchers sought out volunteers with an interest in spirituality. Each of the subjects attended two eight-hour drug sessions, two months apart. At one session they got the psilocybin; at the other, they got Ritalin, the active placebo.


The same group of researchers is now planning a study to test psilocybin on patients suffering from depression or anxiety related to advanced cancer and is designing other studies to investigate whether psilocybin can help treat drug dependence.








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'New Amsterdam'



This season, more than ever, "new" is a relative term.


Waiting in the wings since fall, New Amsterdam is the latest example of a recurring TV type - the immortal crime fighter - already represented this season by Torchwood and Moonlight. Though it's never wise to be the third show on a match, this relatively entertaining fantasy has one obvious viewership advantage over many of its strike-bound scripted competitors: new episodes, and not bad ones at that.


Adding to its appeal is an attractive new star, Danish actor Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as John Amsterdam, a 17th-century Dutch soldier killed while rescuing a Native American girl. She rewards him with a kind of mixed blessing: eternal life but only until he finds true love. Then he'll age and die like the rest of us.


It's a romantic notion in a sick sort of way, but it does make you wonder why, if Native American women had this power, they weren't using it on their own warriors. Think what a different New Amsterdam that would have made.


Four hundred years later, John is working as a New York cop and using his vast knowledge of the city to solve crimes - sometimes to amusing effect, sometimes not. Let's just say you'd think that somewhere in his four centuries, he would have learned not to bring a child to a crime scene.


FIND MORE STORIES IN: New York | Dutch | Danish | Native | Omar | Moonlight | New Amsterdam | Torchwood
As we meet him, John has just gained a reluctant partner, Eva Marquez in a role that is one of those "old" ideas New Amsterdam should have rethought. Partner or not, the only person John confides in is Omar (Stephen Henderson), a jazz club owner who has a surprising secret of his own, as we learn in Thursday's better second episode.


That episode also indicates this revamped series intends to move beyond crime to time travel, tracing John's lives and identities through the centuries. John, we learn, is an accomplished artist, lawyer, furniture maker and forger. While he may not have found true love, he found plenty of companionship, even beyond his 36 dogs.


Enjoyable as these tours of old New York may prove to be, they point out the show's most problematic break with the immortal tradition: John's astoundingly public life. Usually, the hero's very existence is revealed on a need-to-know basis. But John is out-and-about, posing for pictures, going to clubs, attending law school and now, holding down a high-profile city job. And in all this time, no employer has done an efficient background check, and no friend has noticed he doesn't age?


It's one thing for a fantasy to be unbelievable, another to be illogical. Lapses in logic pull us out of the story: We're less willing to suspend disbelief for the aspects of the story that are beyond our natural experience if we can't accept those parts with which we're familiar. What's worse, they're usually a sign that the producers don't have a firm-enough grasp on their story and are winging it as they go along.


Sometimes they get it right. But it's an awfully fast learning curve, and most shows don't live long enough to round it.



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Fox's New Amsterdam (Tuesday, 9:00 p.m., WNYW 5) sounds like a mashup of Pocahontas and Forever Knight, but with out the animation or the vampires. The story for this new series starts in 1642 when a Dutch soldier (Danish import Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) saves a Native American girl and is given the gift/curse of immortality and not ageing until he finds his true love. Fast forward to today and that soldier is now NYPD homicide detective John Amsterdam, who now has to deal with a new partner (British import Zuleikha Robinson).


Hopefully it will not be just another cop show with a twist, but one with some depth. Still anything is better than another moronic Fox fakeality show and Fox will actually give it a chance. Plus, it seems to have been filmed in the city, so even if it isn't any good to watch it is good for the local economy!


Also of note this week:
Treasures in the Harbor (Monday, 10:00, WNET 13) Channel thirteen's President Emeritus Bill Baker takes a tour of all the National Parks in New York Harbor in both New York and New Jersey, some you may not even know about.






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What drinking really does to you?



AT the age of 52, Anne Collins considers her youthful appearance something of a blessing.


She is often mistaken for being anything up to a decade younger than she actually is, and enjoys the fact that her face and body have not yet fallen prey to the normal ravages of time.


Yet Anne has just taken part in a unique experiment that has shattered any illusions she had about keeping her looks for very much longer, The Daily Mail in London reports


Conducted by UK television show Tonight as part of an investigation into British middle-class drinking habits, the experiment involved Anne being digitally aged by 25 years.


Rather than simply take into consideration the natural passing of the years, the scientists who constructed the images have also factored in the ageing effects of the 45-plus units of alcohol that Anne consumes each week.


Anne insists she does not have any kind of drink problem, and that her wine intake is no more than that of tens of thousands of other busy mothers like her.


But the results of the ITV Tonight investigation into just how her appearance and health will be affected in the long term tell a very different story.


Anne describes the pictures as "horrifying".


Gone are her bright eyes, dewy complexion and refined features. Instead, she has huge wrinkly eye bags, droopy jowls, sallow skin and ruddy cheeks covered in broken veins.


"I took one look at the picture and I thought 'I've got to stop drinking,"' says Anne, a cookery teacher.


"My eyes looked dead. I had huge, ugly frown lines on my forehead and a horrible turkey neck.


"I always hoped I'd age with dignity. Instead, I looked like a miserable old hag carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders.


"I had no idea that the couple of glasses of wine I look forward to at the end of a busy day were causing me so much harm.


"I've always loved drinking wine - I love the taste of it and the lovely warm feeling it gives me.


"But now I haven't been able to stop thinking about how awful I'll look in 25 years' time if I carry on drinking the way I do now."


While we often read about the epidemic of teenage binge drinking, new evidence suggests equally destructive patterns of drinking exist among middle-class, middle-aged mothers - with many, like Anne, drinking dangerous amounts of alcohol on a daily basis.


The Government recommends that men drink no more than 21 units per week, and women no more than 14 units. That's about eight to ten small glasses of wine for women.


Anne admits she has spent the past decade or so consuming more than three times that amount.


She is far from alone. According to the Office for National Statistics, almost a quarter of adult women report drinking on five days or more per week; and recent NHS figures state that 20 per cent of women drink more than the recommended number of units.


A recent survey by website Netmums found that 49 per cent of mothers drink regularly at home, and 85 per cent say they do so to unwind after a stressful day.


"The number one stress factor for mothers is lack of 'me time', which means not having time to sit and think or simply do something enjoyable, like read a magazine or have a relaxing bath," says Siobhan Freegard of Netmums.


"These women want to find a way to wind down - and the quickest way to do that is with a glass of wine."


Dr Mark Wright, consultant hepatologist at Southampton General Hospital, says he has seen an increase in the past decade in the number of middle-aged women facing serious medical problems - such as end-stage liver failure - as a result of heavy drinking.


"People like Anne think that because they drink Merlot and Pinot Grigio rather than cheap cider, their behaviour could not possibly fall into the realm of 'alcoholism'," he says.


"They refuse to believe there are any similarities between themselves and teenage binge drinkers who down shot after shot of flavoured spirits.


"They think they are not drinking to excess because they don't get intoxicated every night or notice the day-to-day ill-effects of the amount they are drinking.


"But the truth is they are. Even if they are not alcoholics, many are teetering on the edge of alcohol dependency - and causing their body real harm.


"The most obvious effects of alcohol are premature ageing and wrinkling of the skin (which are thought to be caused by the body having to 'work harder', rather like an engine driving uphill, because the alcohol effectively poisons the body).


"But it goes beyond that. Like Anne, thousands of women across the country are putting themselves at increased risk of everything from breast cancer and osteoporosis to strokes and cardiovascular problems."


Even so, Anne clearly finds it hard to accept that she drinks too much.


"


In my teens and early 20s I did drink a lot, I'll admit that," says Anne, who lives in Fleet, Hampshire, with her husband Paul, 40, a landscape gardener, and their children Aaron, 15, Brooke, 13, and Euan, ten.


"But I haven't touched spirits for years, and I certainly don't drink alcopops.


"I started drinking at home every night when the children were very young. Paul was then working long hours as an IT consultant, and once the kids were finally in bed, I'd find myself thinking: 'Oh, I need a glass of wine!'


For me, having a drink was a way of winding down.


"I certainly never drank enough to get drunk. It was simply that a few glasses of wine helped me dispel the tension that had built up during the day.


"I grew up in a family where it was normal to have a drink every night.


"My mum still likes a tipple in the evenings - a sherry or a glass of wine - and I'm the same.


"I simply enjoy a few glasses of good-quality wine.'


Over time, though, Anne's drinking increased. Whereas once it was just a glass or two an evening, for the past few years it's been three or four, and on Friday and Saturday nights at least a bottle.


Anne admits that more recently, since binge drinking became a serious national debate, she has begun to wonder if she is drinking too much - but until now her attitude has consistently been one of denial.


"I realised from reading the newspapers that I was consuming well over the recommended amount of 14 units per week," says Anne.


"But somehow I always managed to justify it to myself. I used to kid myself that my huge glass of wine contained only one unit.


"Or I'd tell myself that it didn't matter how much I


drank as long as I didn't get drunk, and that I didn't drink more than my friends.


"It wasn't as though my life was being affected in any negative way by my drinking. I didn't wake up with a hangover and I could still function perfectly normally during the day.


"My mantra was always that life is for living, and what was the point of worrying about how much alcohol I was consuming when I could get run over by a bus tomorrow.


"Even the fact that some years ago I was diagnosed with high blood pressure and a stomach condition - gastritis - which was clearly being aggravated by alcohol wasn't enough to make me consider cutting down on the amount I drank."


Now, though, the shock of seeing the digitally-aged photograph of herself has finally made Anne take stock.


As part of the TV investigation, she was also shown a visual example of how much alcohol she consumed in the week.


"Twenty or so glasses of wine - the amount I drink each week - were laid out on a table for me to see," says Anne.


"I took one look at it and felt utterly ashamed of myself. It looked like the sort of table you'd find in a nightclub, crammed with drinks belonging to a large group of people.


"Yet this was the amount I was putting away each week. I'm only 5ft 1in and weigh just 8 stone.


"The thought of all that alcohol inside my body made me feel sick.


"I realised, too, that I was setting a really bad example for my children, especially now the oldest is getting near the age when they start to drink.


"I was also shown photographs of livers that have been destroyed by alcohol abuse - and they weren't pretty pictures.


"Thankfully, a test revealed that my liver hadn't been harmed by the amount I was drinking.


"I cried with relief when I realised that my own liver was OK."


More ominous were the results of an alcohol dependency test. This was comprised of a series of questions relating to alcohol intake and a person's attitude to drinking.


Scores of eight and over are said to show some level of dependency.


Anne scored 12, admitting to things like "drinking more than six drinks on at least one occasion a week" and "finding herself unable to stop drinking once she's started".


"I was slightly alarmed by my score, but I maintain that I was drinking out of habit and not dependency," she says.


"I certainly never woke up in the morning thinking about alcohol, and I never craved drink during the daytime."


This, says Anne, is borne out by the fact that she is now halfway through a four week alcohol-free detox and has not suffered any withdrawal symptoms or cravings at all.


"If I truly had been dependent on alcohol, I wouldn't be finding being teetotal so easy," she says.


"Now that I understand the harm I was causing myself, I haven't missed alcohol at all.


"I can say without doubt that I was never addicted to alcohol. It had just crept into my life and become a part of my daily routine - as it is with millions of other people these days."


After just a fortnight, Anne has already noticed a positive change in her health. Not only does she have more energy, her stomach condition has improved, too.


And although she is finding it harder to fall asleep at night without the help of alcohol, she says the sleep she is getting is of significantly better quality.


In time, Anne hopes that by drinking less she will also be able to bring her high blood pressure under control.


Socially, too, she says her life is better without alcohol.


"I hadn't realised it, but because I was drinking at home every night, I'd ended up a virtual prisoner in my own home.


"If Paul was doing something like watching football, because I'd drunk too much to drive the car I'd have no choice but to sit there with him.


"Now, I've rediscovered the pleasures of popping over to a friend's house in the evening to have a cup of tea.


"For so long I've linked alcohol to having fun and relaxing - yet I've realised I have actually got much more freedom as a result of not drinking."


Having been presented with the reality of how alcohol is likely to affect her looks and her health over the coming years, Anne is determined to change her habits.


"I will drink again once my detox is over - but I will absolutely not return to my old habits," she says.


"I'm going to stick to 14 units a week, and not drink at all between Monday and Thursday. Now that I've come this far, I'm determined that I'm going to change my ways."


Whether she sticks to her word remains to be seen.


But Anne's story should serve as a warning to a middle-aged generation for whom one glass of wine a night is never quite enough.




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New Nine Inch Nails music live online now


Entertainment


The band Nine Inch Nails has reportedly released parts of their new album for people to download free of charge using BitTorrent.


"ghosts i - iv" is the name of the album and according to reports, the free release was such a hit, that the band's web site server crashed repeatedly.


Since being released from its major-label recording contract last year, Nine Inch Nails has joined the growing ranks of prominent artists who are navigating the digital wilderness on their own. Like another independent-minded act, Radiohead, Nine Inch Nails has responded to the wash of free music on the Internet, but with its own tactic: the band has uploaded tracks from its new album directly to an unauthorized file-sharing network even as it offered more elaborate versions for up to $300.


The plan, which was announced on the Nine Inch Nails Web site, nin.com, on Sunday night, is the latest in a running series of experiments that counter the music industry's typical sales and marketing tactics. Fans can obtain digital downloads of the first nine tracks from the 36-track instrumental collection, "Ghosts I-IV," and a bundle of graphics free from the band's Web site or through the online network BitTorrent (bittorent.net), where users can share unauthorized music and other media.


The band, which is led by Trent Reznor, described file sharing in one online post as "a revolutionary digital distribution method, and we believe in finding ways to utilize new technologies instead of fighting them."


Mr. Reznor also afforded fans freedom in another way. The band decided to offer the music with a Creative Commons license, a new type of intellectual-property copyright. It allows creators to reserve certain rights and, in effect, authorize various unpaid uses of their products. In this instance the band is allowing virtually any noncommercial use of its music. The band is also testing a tiered pricing system that could add a new wrinkle to the conventional wisdom on how to attract fans in the music business, in which a slump in sales has prompted Wal-Mart and other retailers to pressure record companies to cut their wholesale prices. The Nine Inch Nails plan also expands upon a model that had been tested by a handful of other acts, like Radiohead, which offered its latest album, "In Rainbows," online in a setup that allowed fans to name their own price (including nothing) or pay roughly $80 for an expanded version.


Nine Inch Nails is offering a digital download of the entire 36-track "Ghosts I-IV" collection for a flat $5 from its site and Amazon.com. The band will offer a CD version in a two-disc package for $10, with sales through its site or through record shops starting April 8. (A $39 vinyl version will be available the same day.) For particularly enthusiastic - or deep-pocketed - fans, there are two more extensive collections: a $75 version will include the music on two CDs, and a DVD will contain data files of the multitrack recordings of the 36 songs, allowing fans to remix and alter the music as they choose. A $300 deluxe version - the band said only 2,500 will be made, all with Mr. Reznor's signature - will include the discs, the vinyl set and additional material.


Jim Guerinot, the manager of Nine Inch Nails, suggested that the band's plans are not "a reaction to what doesn't exist today. I think it's more just like, 'Hey, in a vacuum I can do whatever I want to do.' " Referring to Mr. Reznor, he said, "His appetite is such that: 'I want a little bit of everything. I'm not content with just a singular experience.' "


One option Mr. Reznor is not offering fans is a way to obtain the entire collection free. Last year he produced an album by the rapper and poet Saul Williams, which was offered online free or for a $5 contribution in a test of whether people would pay if given a choice. Mr. Reznor wrote on his band's Web site that he had been disheartened by the lack of paying customers.


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Internet Lessons from Nine Inch Nails and Obama


Most business execs probably aren't familiar with Trent Reznor's angst-filled industrial rock. But they could learn a lot from the Nine Inch Nails frontman's experiments with online business models. Last year, Reznor released two versions of an album on the Web: One which fans could download for free and a higher-quality version that cost $5. More than five times as many people opted for the free version, leaving Reznor disappointed.


But rather than abandoning online distribution, Reznor rethought his model. This past weekend, he surprised fans by releasing a new album on his Web site. This time fans have five distinct options, including a free downloadable version which only contains nine songs, a $5 downloadable version with 36 songs, and a $300 version that comes with autographed vinyl records.


Proving again that he's willing to experiment with new ways of marketing his music - last summer Reznor hid USB drives with an unreleased song in the bathrooms at his concerts - he personally loaded some of his new songs onto an underground filing-trading service.


Another person who businesses could learn something about the Internet from is Senator Barack Obama. "His Web site is amazing," Rishad Tobaccowala, chief innovation officer for a division of advertising giant Publicis, tells Fortune. Tobaccowala says the way Obama uses his site to engage followers is particularly innovative. For example, he's willing to embrace messages that didn't originate with his inner circle. When the band Black Eyed Peas posted a video about Obama on the Internet, he quickly decided to run it on his homepage.


Last Friday's Journal had another example: The Obama campaign has made available its database of supporters to anyone who wants access to the information. While some bad seeds have misused the information, it's also empowered local volunteers to make calls on their own, greatly expanding the number of people working for the campaign.









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