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Iesha Pompey

Alois Bell stiffs server, tithes God

Alois Bell fights for Gods labor rights. God 10 percent, Applebee’s server O.

Alois Bell, pastor at Truth In The World Deliverance Ministries, is making headlines today for attempting to remove an automatic gratuity intended for her Applebees server in St. Louis, Missouri. The server showed the receipt to a coworker who was fired after posting a picture of the bill were Alois Bell, the Christian, scratched out the 18 percent gratuity and wrote, “I give God 10 percent. Why do you get 18 percent?”

Applebees notes on the menu that an 18 percent gratuity is applied to parties of eight or more. The pastor was dining with five adults and five children. The photo was posted on Reddits atheist section for “entertainment” but Applebees didn’t see the humor in making fun of the pastor who was clearly advocating for Gods labor rights.

Chelsea Welch, the server’s coworker, said she thought the note was insulting, as anyone making less than minimum wage hourly would. But she also found it to be comical and wanted to share the laugh with the Reddit community.

Applebees fired Chelsea Welch on grounds of violating customer’s privacy. She captioned the photo: “My mistake sir, I’m sure Jesus will pay for my rent and groceries according to dailymail.co.uk.

A Facebook page supporting Chelsea Welch by boycotting Applebees surfaced recently. One user offered the fired server a job.

Alois Bell says she left the tip in cash and is stunned by the publicity, according to Mercurynews.com. She says her heart is broken as she has brought embarrassment to her church and ministry.

Moral of the story: Religion has granted the opportunity to get out of doing many things: pharmacist refusing to file birth control prescriptions or legislation refusing black people the right to marry (prior to 1896, happy black history month!) for example. But dining in is not one of them. If you don’t have enough money to tip your waitress, you also don’t have enough money to be served and should take your food to go.

Amen.
 

Kwame Harris loses it over soy sauce and underwear

Kwame Harris is charged with a domestic abuse felony for abusing ex boyfriend at a chinese restaurant

Former NFL player, Kwame Harris likes his rice dry. Or so we’re told by witnesses who saw him get into a physical altercation with his ex boyfriend at a Chinese restaurant in August.

The two were having dinner at Su Hong, a Chinese restaurant in Menlo Park, California, when on-again off-again boyfriend Demitri Greier tried to put soy sauce on Kwame Harris’ rice, causing Harris to become infuriated and go into a rant about stolen underwear.

Kwame Harris and Demitri Greier were dating prior to the incident that ended in Harris being charged with felony counts of domestic violence causing great bodily injury and assault with force likely to produce great bodily injury according to USAToday.com.

According to court documents, Kwame Harris argued with Demitri Greier for about seven minutes before exiting the restaurant. He then returned to tell Demitri Greier, who had continued eating, that he would not take him to the airport and would throw Greier’s belongings of his car.

Demitri Greier tried to get his things from the former NFL player’s car but Kwame Harris began trying to pull Greier’s pants down and accuse him of stealing his underwear. He then began to physically abuse Grier, giving him several facial fractures that required the surgical implant of a metal plate according to sfgate.com.

Though Kwame Harris plead not guilty last fall, he appeared in San Mateo County Superior Court for pretrial on Monday. The former 49er and Raider player is set to go to trial in April and may face up to seven years if convicted.

Demitri Greier is said to be filing a civil suit.

Taye Diggs catches burglar after SAG awards

Taye Diggs, 42 captures a 20-year-old burglar in his garage after returning home from SAG awards.

Something’s in the Studio City water

Taye Diggs’, 42, is the second celebrity to tackle a burglar in his home recently. The Private Practice actor found suspect, Hassan Juma, 20, in his home after he’d returned from the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday.

The burglar tried to escape and got several blocks away from the Diggs’ humble abode after being caught in the garage “looking for items to steal” according to CNN.com. But the doctor slash landlord slash casanova caught the perpetrator and held him until the police arrived.

On Sunday, Scott Leo “Taye” Diggs presented the award for “Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series” and later tweeted “Dee felt bloated, but I had a blast. My favorite part is the dance party afterwards. Dj Paesche kills it and everyone’s on the dance floor.”

Little did he know, he’d soon be taking down a man who came over to “borrow” his tool box.

Hassan Juma remains in jail on a $50,000 bail and Taye Diggs can now rest somewhat peacefully next to his Tony award winning wife, Idina Menzel in their Studio City home.

It is rumored that Hassan Juma was running toward a getaway driver who got away.

LL Cool J, also caught a burglar in the kitchen of his Studio City home in August. The actor and hip hop artist did some physical damage -breaking the burglars jaw and nose- and held the perp until police arrived.

Perhaps Studio City (Los Angeles) isn’t the safest neighborhood for celebrities. Then again, perhaps celebrities aren’t the best targets for amateur thieves. Watch out Miley Cyrus!

Brooke Hogan has legs and her dads not afraid to show 'em

Hulk Hogans in the hot seat for tweeting photo of his daughter, Brooke Hogan

Hulk Hogan tweeted a picture of his daughter Brooke Hogan on Sunday with the caption “Brooke’s legs” and now the world is using it against him. His followers are calling him a creepy pervert for the full shot of Brooke lounging in a chair but justify wrestling, a sport where half naked body painted muscle bound women and men get uncomfortably close while “fighting”, to be completely normal.

It’s just a picture. In many other countries, this would be as significant as Hulk Hogan tweeting a picture of his breakfast.

Fatherhood is tough on dads across America, the land where anything aside from playing sports and being completely detached from your family is a perversion. If they bathe their toddlers, it’s a perversion! If they kiss their child on the lips, it’s perversion! And if they’re more involved in their kid’s life than the mother, the “dad” title is revoked altogether and they become “Mr.Mom”.

Give Hulk Hogan a break. He’s an ex pro wrestler who’s clearly into taking care of his body and he’s proud that his daughter, Brooke Hogan, has a little calf muscle. She hasn’t shied away from tanning and hair bleaching either, which the orange skin white haired Hulk Hogan could be just as proud of.

Brooke Hogan, who retweeted the photo of herself, is standing up for her father and telling all the name callers and “ignorant” instigators to “go back to your farm animals”.

Perhaps generalizing farmers to be ignorant isn’t the best way to go but kudos to Brooke Hogan for sticking up for her dad. Maybe Hulk Hogan’s sex tape leak doesn’t help the situation much either…

Let’s just hope their local farmer isn’t smart enough to navigate Twitter.
 

It's in the humps! Princess the camel predicts super bowl win

The Baltimore Ravens may have to come up with a hump back dance if Princess’ prediction is correct.

Hardcore fans will go to some pretty drastic extremes for their favorite teams. What used to be face painting and ‘big finger’ waving fun has turned into full on fights and pistol whipping flat screens. Thankfully we have physic animals keeping the piece with their 2013 predictions.

This year’s pick for future telling is Princess, a 26-year-old Bactrian camel at Popcorn Zoo in Lacey Township, New Jersey. According to Princess, a well known psychic camel, the Baltimore Ravens will take home the Vince Lombardi trophy on February 3rd. If she’s right, she’ll have a 7 and 1 track record which makes her more credible than many sport commentators.

The method to this camel’s madness? Graham crackers. John Bergmann, the general manager at Popcorn Zoo, says the camel chooses the winner from a palm of graham crackers according to ABCNews.com.

One of the two playing teams is written on the palm of each hand in magic marker. The palms are then covered with a graham cracker. The graham cracker Princess eats first reveals the name of the future winning team and this year, it’s the Baltimore Ravens.

To be fair, Princess did choose the 49ers to win the game they won yesterday. Already, 49er fans are making jokes about camel recipes and comparing the Princess to Paul the octopus who they feel would’ve sided with them if he were still alive. Sorry 49ers fans. This one’s in the humps!

The First Lady sports a J Crew bridal belt at the Inauguration

Michelle Obama wears J. Crew belt with her custom made Thom Browne coat

J. Crew is selling like hot cakes! They’re probably selling faster than hot cakes actually, considering we’re still in the first month of the year and a third of the weight loss resolutions are still going strong. The First Lady of the United States, or FLOTUS as we’ve grown to know her on Twitter, wore a bejeweled J. Crew belt over the waist of her custom made Thom Browne coat at the inauguration yesterday.

The belt, part of J. Crew’s bridal collection, is reportedly sold out as of this morning. Malia also sported J. Crew yesterday. Her $325 “Double-cloth lady day coat” in “fresh plum” is now only available in a size 0. Other colors like “retro jade” and “authentic red” go up to a size 10 and “antique white” goes up to a size 16. Jeanna Lyons, president and creative director of J. Crew, had no idea the first family would wear J. Crew accessories for the Inauguration. But she, along with the rest of the world, knows the first lady is a fan of J. Crew.

Before President Obama was elected in 2008, Michelle Obama told Jay Leno that she likes to browse J. Crew’s website for good finds. The First Lady wore a pair of leather olive J. Crew gloves at the first inauguration. This year, it’s all about the bejeweled bridal belt that made the perfect accessory for her custom made coat and new bangs.

Kudos to all the brides who saw the beauty in this presidential bling before yesterday. You are now officially among America’s most stylish women, for the next four years!

Manti Te’O has no Valentine. Boo hoo.

Manti Te’O’s only making reservations for one this Valentines Day.

Everyone’s in an uproar over a woman that doesn’t exist. Yet real, living breathing human beings of the female anatomy get no love.

Are we really meant to feel sorry for Manti Te’o? He’s been given this heroic yet sympathetic image in the media as the jock who dates a car accident victim, that dies from cancer, that doesn’t actually exist.

The entire story is worthless and frankly quite disrespectful to actual cancer patients and victims of sexual assaults, especially those carried out by college football players.

I was so amazed yesterday by how much time FOX (which I completely watched on accident after American Idol) spent on the Manti Te’O story. I went from not knowing Mantai Te’O, the now infamous lover of invisible women, to learning his entire football and relationship history with Lennay Kekua, the woman who doesn’t exist.

And why is this news?

By midnight, my Facebook newsfeed was filled with dark humored memes and men fondling air, aka their invisible companions.

Meanwhile Lizzy Seeberg, one of many college students who reported being sexually assaulted in 2012, was a Norte Dame student who was sexually assaulted by one of the schools football players, according to NCROnline.org. 

Lizzy Seeberg committed suicide soon after the incident following a line of threats from a friend of the football player who told her “Don’t do anything you would regret. Messing with Notre Dame Football is a bad idea.”

I don’t remember seeing “Lizzy Seeberg” trending on Google or  hashtaged on twitter. But this Lennay Kekua has been at the top of every news feed I’ve come across this morning. Even searching “Lizzy Seeberg” in Google news today doesn’t bring up nearly as many results as “Lennay Kekua”.

In a nutshell Manti Te’O is either a genius or a complete idiot. Solely because he’s an athlete, I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and go with the latter. I don’t know what his actual grades are but he can’t be too brilliant to carry on an exclusively online relationship with a woman, who may or may not have been a good friend playing a terrible prank (or secretly showing his true affections for Manti Te’O, whichever), for four years.

Besides the real woman behind the infamous hottie photo taped to Manti Te’O’s locker and of course Te’O no one should care. Oh, and of course Notre Dame.

But to everyone else taking the time out of their day to feed into this melodrama, buy the man a blow up and get on with your lives. At least then Manti Te’O will have a somewhat real Valentine.

Dear Abby dies at 94

Pauline Friedman Phillips, Dear Abby, died on Wednesday

Pauline Friedman Phillips, author of the Dear Abby column, passed away on Wednesday in Minneapolis.

Dear Abby was known for her short quips and sassy responses to the thousands of readers who wrote in seeking advice on there marriage, roommates, sex lives, neighbors and family issues.

America fell in love with Dear Abby in the 50s and 60s, before daytime talk shows were popular, as they were able to be honest and candid about their problems and they humored her short, feisty, no nonsense replies. Dear Abby received 3,000 to 25,000 letters a week according to WashingtonPost.com.

One of Dear Abby’s latest columns was from a reader who wrote in with concerns about a gay coupled who’d just moved into the neighborhood. The reader explained that they and other neighbors were concerned with the kind of company the two men kept and wanted to know what they could do to improve the neighborhood.

“You could move.” Abby responded.

Phillips was candidly in support of many things like abortion rights, AIDS testing and education and supporting different organizing like the March of Dimes and the womens movement (ERA) to LATimes.com.

Abby was short for Abigail Van Buren, a name the columnist took on soon after the self-proclaimed homemaker snagged the job by challenging a San Francisco editor to let her prove that she could write a better advice column than their current writer. The editor, impressed with her confidence but unsure of her inexperience, gave her a chance to improve herself. Needless to say, he was nothing short of impressed.

For many years, Dear Abby was in competitions with Ann Landers another advice columnist who also happened to be Phillips twin sister, Ester Pauline Phillips. The two had a public falling out after Dear Abby, previously Ann Landers apprentice, became heavy competition and eventually sky rocketed to syndication.

The two Sioux City, Iowa natives reconciled their differences and rekindled their inseparable relationship before the sister, Ester Pauline Phillips, died in 2002. Dear Abby announced that she had Alzheimer’s the same year.

After the announcement, Pauline Friedman Phillips began to co-write the column with her daughter, Jeanne Phillips, who has become her mother’s successor and says she has “very big high heels to fill”.
 

 

Katie Beers breaks 20 year silence with memior

Katie Beers remains positive about the 17 years she spent in her neighbors basement.

Katie Beers was kidnapped at 10 years old and molested in her neighbor’s basement for 17 years. Twenty years later, she’s releasing her memoir that recounts why she is grateful for the kidnapping that saved her from the abuse she’d endured since she was a toddler at home.
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Katie Beers went to live with a foster family that sheltered her from the media after her neighbor, John Esposito, was arrested for the kidnapping and molestation. She now lives in rural Pensalvania with her husband and children and hopes her memoir “Burried Memories: Katie Beers’ story” helps others and gives her a chance to be a inspirational or motivational speaker.

While writing the story, Katie Beers interviewed her former kidnapper, who is now serving 15 years in prison. John Esposito admits he’s guilty but also says he feels that he’s had enough punishment and initially thought his crime would be beneficial for the both of them according to CBSNews.com

As most victims, Katie Beers has connections to things like chocolate mints that remind her of her time in the basement. Chocolate mint candies among many other junk foods were fed to her repeatedly during the 17 years she spent in her neighbors basement. She recalls having a small tv and watching photos of herself on the news and news anchor who is co-writing the book with her.

In her prior home, Katie Beers was chained in a coffin sized box and molested by her godmother’s husband, Sal Inghilleri, according to NBCNews.com. One officer involved in the case says she handle the situation better than most 9 year olds because she was already used to being abused.

Katie Beer’s is breaking her 20 year silence and delving into the memories she once tried to repress as a defense mechanism during her upbringing with her foster family. Though she appeared on the Dr.Phil show and the cover of People Magazine to promote her memoir, Katie Beers says she will be fine if nothing comes of the book. Her main concern is to help other victims.

“I’m very satisfied and happy with my life,” she told NBCNews.com.
 

When life hands you lemons, do the Master Cleanse

The master cleanse is easing its way back to the top of spring diet trends.

The master cleanse, also known as the lemonade diet, has gone viral again. Whether it’s the New Year resolutions or the fabulous stars on the red carpet at the Golden Globes this past Sunday, something has put a new glamour in going to the commode 12 times a day.

The sweet and spicy potion consists of purified water, cayenne pepper, grade B maple syrup and fresh lemon juice. The liquid-only diet is meant to last 10-40 days, and a gourmet salt-water flush and laxative tea is the only alternatives to get New Year cleansers through their hours of cravings and fatigue.

There are some health benefits, as 1940s self-taught healer Stanley Burroughs originally intended. Many believe their loose stool side effect is actually the release of foul toxins and report having more energy during and after the master cleanse. Not being full of you-know-what tends to have that effect on people.

Others on the master cleanse report more serious side effects like the formation of gall stones and malnutrition due to the average 650 daily caloric intake. Many master cleansers report finding their inner zen through overcoming the irritability of not being able to consume solids with their friends at buffets and their ex’s wedding receptions.

Beyonce and Miranda Kerr are among many celebrities who attribute their weight loss to the master cleanse trend that now has its own endcap at some Whole Foods Market locations.

It’s said that 5-year-olds will be selling the master cleanse for an extra 10 cents at their lemonade stands this summer. I can imagine all the suburban moms rushing home from their car pool duty. No pun.

As always, it’s best to consult your doctor before trying a new diet. Those with diabetes, cancer and anemia are strongly encouraged to stay away from the master cleanse.