samhexum

There’s at least one person attending the State of the Union speech who’ll be sleeping easy afterward — Mike Lindell, CEO of MyPillow. Lindell said that he snagged a ticket at the last minute from House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.). He was told by Cramer that the invite came from “both your favorite Kevins,” Lindell told The Post. This will be the first time the prominent Trump supporter has attended the big speech. “I’ve never been invited to such a thing,” Lindell said. “Everyday is pretty surreal for me, for being an ex-crack addict, it’s surreal all this stuff that has happened in my life,” he added. Lindell has spoken openly about his struggles with addiction and was a White House guest in October when Trump signed bipartisan opioid legislation. Before being invited to the speech, Lindell was already headed to Washington to participate in this week’s National Prayer Breakfast, where he plans to hobnob with people like HUD Secretary Ben Carson, a close friend. Lindell will be speaking Wednesday about the role faith has played in his successful pillow business. “Then I found out my good friend Stephen Baldwin is leading the prayer before I speak,” Lindell revealed, referring to the youngest of the acting Baldwin brothers who’s a mainstay at conservative events. Lindell, a political novice before meeting then-candidate Donald Trump in 2015, said the president needed to focus on his accomplishments during the State of the Union address. “I just think tonight the president needs to focus on the great things that have been done in spite of all the negative media and it’s just terrible what he’s had to go through, but he’s still just, he’s so amazing, he just get things done,” Lindell said. “Everyone loves our president, some just don’t know it yet.” :eek::eek:

A man whose body was discovered partially eaten by a bear in Great Smoky Mountains National Park last year died of a meth overdose before the bear ever got to him, according to an autopsy released on Monday. The remains of William Lee Hill Jr., 30, of Louisville, Tenn., were discovered in the national park in September when officials encountered a bear feeding on the body in an area off a trail. Without knowing the exact cause of death, park officials and wildlife professionals decided to euthanize the bear a few days later for “public safety reasons.” But on Monday, the Knox County Regional Forensic Center revealed Hill died of “accidental methamphetamine intoxication,” WATE reported. Hill had a history of drug use, and his body was found near syringes and other drug paraphernalia, according to a copy of the report obtained by the Knoxville News Sentinel. The 30-year-old had gone to the park with his friend, Joshua David Morgan, to illegally remove ginseng from the park, but the pair became separated, according to the newspaper. Morgan, 31, died Oct. 1 at a hospital in Tennessee, according to his obituary, which does not list a cause of death. The 3-year-old 155-pound bear who was euthanized showed no signs of rabies, The Daily Times reported at the time. Officials estimate 1,500 bears are in the park along the Tennessee-North Carolina border, and though few show aggressive behavior toward humans, bears that pose a threat to visitor safety are euthanized on rare occasions. The park says that attacks on humans are “rare,” but that people should stay at least 150 feet away from the animals. “Bears are wild animals that are dangerous and unpredictable,” the park says on its website. “Do not approach bears or allow them to approach you!”

A 24-year-old man was killed in Texas last week when his vape pen exploded — slicing open his carotid artery and leaving his grandmother’s car covered in blood. William Brown died after his left internal carotid artery was severed due to trauma from the exploding vape pen he just bought from Smoke & Vape DZ in Keller, a town just north of Fort Worth, his distraught grandmother told WFAA. “He popped it and it exploded, and that’s when it shot across his mouth,” Alice Brown told the station. Brown claimed the device’s battery malfunctioned, melting bits of plastic from her car to the vape pen — which launched the charred debris into her grandson’s face and neck, leaving her car soaked in blood. Brown died at John Peter Smith Hospital two days later, she said. “When they X-rayed him, they found the stem, the metal embedded to where the blood flows up to the brain,” Brown continued. “I miss him already, and knowing he won’t open that door and come through it ever again is the hardest part.” Funeral services for Brown, a licensed electrician, are scheduled for later this week, his grandmother said. Brown, who wasn’t a regular smoker, purchased the device on Jan. 27 while on the way to the bank, the grandmother told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. He suffered from asthma and was told that a specialized vape pen might help improve his breathing, she told the newspaper. After the blast, William Brown managed to crawl out of the car and toward the trunk, where he collapsed on the pavement. A nearby witness called an ambulance, she said, and a medical examiner later ruled that his cause of death was penetrating trauma from an exploding vaporizer pen, making him at least the second person in the United States to be killed by an exploding e-cigarette, according to the newspaper. Brown, a high school graduate who loved fixing up his Mazda RX8, was preparing to celebrate his birthday in just two weeks, his grandmother said. “It just hurts so bad,” she told the Star-Telegram. “Now he’ll never see that birthday. It’s a waste of the thing he could have accomplished.” She continued: “It just all seems so unreal. He was running around doing his thing at 24 and now he’s gone.” Brown said an investigator in the case told her the device’s battery caused the deadly explosion. She told the newspaper she searched her vehicle and found a piece of the battery with its serial number. “That’s the important part,” she told the newspaper. “That’s what the investigator said he needed … I just hope, if anything, I hope it stops someone from [smoking electronic cigarettes]. I don’t know how many more people will have to die.” A store employee who witnessed the incident, meanwhile, told the Dallas Morning News that the vaporizer was not purchased at the location. Authorities told the employee not to discuss details of Brown’s death. The newspaper also cited US Fire Administration statistics from 2017 showing that 133 acute injuries from e-cigarettes, vaporizers and other similar devices were reported between 2009 and 2016. Most of the fires and explosions occurred while the device was being used or stored in a pocket and none had resulted in death, according to the report. But a Florida man named Tallmadge D’Elia, 38, suffered multiple injuries to his face when he was killed by an exploding e-cigarette last May. A medical examiner’s report listed his cause of death as a “projectile wound of the head,” leaving him with burns on about 80 percent of his body, the Star-Telegram reports. One of the pieces removed from D’Elia’s head featured the logo of Smok-E Mountain Mech Works, a company based in the Philippines, according to the New York Times.

A 24-year-old man was killed in Texas last week when his vape pen exploded — slicing open his carotid artery and leaving his grandmother’s car covered in blood. William Brown died after his left internal carotid artery was severed due to trauma from the exploding vape pen he just bought from Smoke & Vape DZ in Keller, a town just north of Fort Worth, his distraught grandmother told WFAA. “He popped it and it exploded, and that’s when it shot across his mouth,” Alice Brown told the station. Brown claimed the device’s battery malfunctioned, melting bits of plastic from her car to the vape pen — which launched the charred debris into her grandson’s face and neck, leaving her car soaked in blood. Brown died at John Peter Smith Hospital two days later, she said. “When they X-rayed him, they found the stem, the metal embedded to where the blood flows up to the brain,” Brown continued. “I miss him already, and knowing he won’t open that door and come through it ever again is the hardest part.” Funeral services for Brown, a licensed electrician, are scheduled for later this week, his grandmother said. Brown, who wasn’t a regular smoker, purchased the device on Jan. 27 while on the way to the bank, the grandmother told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. He suffered from asthma and was told that a specialized vape pen might help improve his breathing, she told the newspaper. After the blast, William Brown managed to crawl out of the car and toward the trunk, where he collapsed on the pavement. A nearby witness called an ambulance, she said, and a medical examiner later ruled that his cause of death was penetrating trauma from an exploding vaporizer pen, making him at least the second person in the United States to be killed by an exploding e-cigarette, according to the newspaper. Brown, a high school graduate who loved fixing up his Mazda RX8, was preparing to celebrate his birthday in just two weeks, his grandmother said. “It just hurts so bad,” she told the Star-Telegram. “Now he’ll never see that birthday. It’s a waste of the thing he could have accomplished.” She continued: “It just all seems so unreal. He was running around doing his thing at 24 and now he’s gone.” Brown said an investigator in the case told her the device’s battery caused the deadly explosion. She told the newspaper she searched her vehicle and found a piece of the battery with its serial number. “That’s the important part,” she told the newspaper. “That’s what the investigator said he needed … I just hope, if anything, I hope it stops someone from [smoking electronic cigarettes]. I don’t know how many more people will have to die.” A store employee who witnessed the incident, meanwhile, told the Dallas Morning News that the vaporizer was not purchased at the location. Authorities told the employee not to discuss details of Brown’s death. The newspaper also cited US Fire Administration statistics from 2017 showing that 133 acute injuries from e-cigarettes, vaporizers and other similar devices were reported between 2009 and 2016. Most of the fires and explosions occurred while the device was being used or stored in a pocket and none had resulted in death, according to the report. But a Florida man named Tallmadge D’Elia, 38, suffered multiple injuries to his face when he was killed by an exploding e-cigarette last May. A medical examiner’s report listed his cause of death as a “projectile wound of the head,” leaving him with burns on about 80 percent of his body, the Star-Telegram reports. One of the pieces removed from D’Elia’s head featured the logo of Smok-E Mountain Mech Works, a company based in the Philippines, according to the New York Times.

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton was courtside Monday night in New York taking in the Milwaukee Bucks’ game against the Brooklyn Nets. It’s not the first time that Clinton has attended Bucks games, having appeared most prominently at Game 6 of last year’s first-round series in Milwaukee. Clinton is close friends with Bucks co-owners Mark Lasry and Wes Edens — who have been donors to the Democratic Party in the past — and he joined them and fellow co-owner Jamie Dinan to take in their team’s 113-94 victory over the Nets. But despite his close personal relationship to the owners — he and Hillary Clinton attended the wedding of Lasry’s daughter — the 42nd president’s interest and knowledge regarding the NBA team comes across as very real. When interviewed by NBATV Monday night, Clinton expressed his excitement about the play of Giannis Antetokounmpo and the moves the Bucks made to add to the roster in the past year. “He’s unbelievable, and he’s really come into his own this year,” the 72-year-old Clinton said of the Greek Freak. “I love to watch him. But he’s got a lot of good help now. You know it’s a different team now … They got George Hill. George Hill is reliable, he’s a great team player, he adds value to every place he ever plays. They’ve done things that works, and (Brook) Lopez is doing great there.” Later in speaking with writer Chris Sheridan, Clinton once again praised Antetokounmpo calling him a “once in a generation player, one of the great players in the league.” “This is becoming a team. It’s a different, strong team. The veterans they picked up are adding value. They can put three 7-footers on the floor if they want to and still move up and down the court. It’s a great, fascinating thing. I can’t wait to see what becomes of them,” Clinton added. “They’ve got some work to do, but they have the personnel now that can really do something exceptional.” Clinton certainly sounded like someone who frequently is tuning into Bucks games with his answers. And he’s justified in his excitement for watching: Milwaukee is first in the entire league with a 39-13 record and league-best plus-10 scoring differential.

It’s risky to have multimillion dollar artworks aboard one’s yacht, it turns out. During a panel at the Superyacht Investor conference at the Landmark Hotel last week in London my invitation must've gotten lost in the mail, Pandora Mather-Lees REALLY?!? you know her real name is something like Mathilde Smith— who instructs billionaires on how to care for their priceless art pieces on the high seas — recalled an unfortunate incident involving breakfast cereal and a Jean-Michel Basquiat piece. “[The yacht owner’s] kids had thrown their cornflakes at [the Basquiat] over breakfast on his yacht because they thought it was scary,” Mather-Lees said, according to the Guardian. “And the crew had made the damage worse by wiping them off the painting.” Helen Robertson, a conservator at the National Museum in London’s Greenwich, was also on the panel, the paper reports, and recalled another incident in which a Champagne cork struck a multimillion-dollar canvas when the crew had a party. Another expert explained how his swanky client had cut up an expensive work by famed Japanese artist Takashi Murakami so that it would fit into a space on board that also doubled as a kind of garage for Jet Skis. Another client hung a Rothko sideways.

HUH????????????

A California woman died in August as a result of being hit in the head by a batted ball at Dodger Stadium, according to a Los Angeles County coroner's report obtained by ESPN's "Outside the Lines" and details her daughter revealed to OTL in December. Linda Goldbloom, a mother of three and grandmother of seven, died on Aug. 29. The coroner's report states the cause as "acute intracranial hemorrhage due to history of blunt force trauma" and states that the injury occurred when she was struck in the head with a baseball during the Aug. 25 game at Dodger Stadium. Television coverage of the Padres-Dodgers game that night did not follow the flight of the ball or show where it ended up. No media outlet has reported what happened, but Goldbloom's family didn't keep it a secret and included this sentence in e-mail notifications on the day she died: "While the end came suddenly by a foul ball at Dodgers (sic) Stadium, she had a long beautiful and blessed life." The accident happened in the top of the ninth inning, when San Diego's Franmil Reyes fouled back a 93 mph pitch from Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen. The ball was hit a little to the first-base side of home plate, it sailed into the Loge Level -- just over the area protected by netting -- and it struck Goldbloom's head as she sat in section 106, row C, seat 5. "Ushers came down and asked if she was all right, and she said no, then EMT came and rushed her to the hospital -- she threw up in the ambulance," her daughter, Jana Brody, told OTL. Goldbloom, a longtime Dodger fan, was celebrating her recent 79th birthday and 59th wedding anniversary with her husband, Erwin, brother-in-law Michael and sister-in-law Eve. Brody was 100 miles away and celebrating her own wedding anniversary when she got the news that her mother was going to have emergency brain surgery after midnight at L.A County-USC Medical Center. For three days, Goldbloom was unresponsive, Brody said, except when a nurse saw her move one finger one time upon being asked if her name was Linda. Her eyes never opened at the hospital, and a ventilator kept her breathing. On the night of Aug. 28, Goldbloom's whole family and a rabbi gathered around her to share memories and say goodbye before abiding by her wish that she not be kept alive by machines if doctors deemed it impossible to restore her quality of life. After Goldbloom died the next morning, the Dodgers made no public comments about her death or what caused it. When OTL contacted the team Monday, more than five months later, a spokesman provided this statement: "Mr. and Mrs. Goldbloom were great Dodgers fans who regularly attended games. We were deeply saddened by this tragic accident and the passing of Mrs. Goldbloom. The matter has been resolved between the Dodgers and the Goldbloom family. We cannot comment further on this matter." Brody told OTL on Monday that she and her family would not comment on any agreement with the Dodgers or possible legal action, but she said she hopes to have a fund established in her mother's memory to assist victims of such accidents and their families. In Major League Baseball's 150-year history, there were two previous reported instances of fans dying after being struck in the stands by balls that left the field of play, including one nearly half a century ago on a foul at Dodger Stadium: Clarence Stagemyer, 32, died one day after he was hit in the head by a thrown ball on Sept. 29, 1943, at Griffith Stadium in Washington. Senators third-baseman Sherry Robertson fielded a grounder hit by Cleveland's Ken Keltner and threw it over the head of first baseman Mickey Vernon, and the ball struck Stagemyer in the first row of the stands. Alan Fish, 14, died four days after he was hit in the head by a foul ball on May 16, 1970, at Dodger Stadium. L.A.'s Manny Mota was batting against San Francisco's Gaylord Perry when he hit a liner down the first-base line, near the dugout, that struck Fish two rows from the field. The fatal injury to Goldbloom came during the first season in which all 30 major league teams had protective netting extending from behind home plate to at least the far ends of both dugouts to safeguard especially vulnerable sections of stadiums' lower bowls. MLB didn't mandate such extensions but had issued recommendations. Several teams that hadn't already announced plans for increased netting in 2018, including the Dodgers, did so after a young girl, seated on her grandfather's lap behind the third-base dugout, suffered life-threatening injuries from a foul line drive that left the bat at 105 mph and hit her in the face on Sept. 20, 2017, at Yankee Stadium. After the Yankees and other teams installed more extensive netting for last season, Geoff Jacobson, the father of the recovering toddler, told ESPN, "Sadly, it often takes great tragedy and suffering to cause change." He said he hoped his daughter would eventually write a college application essay about "how she was the last person to be seriously hurt at a baseball game." "My heart goes out to the whole family," Jacobson said after OTL told him what happened to Goldbloom. "It's so unnecessary that this had to happen. ... It's just tragic that another family is going through this and lost a loved one." MLB has historically relied on the century-old "Baseball Rule" to deter and defend against claims of injuries in the crowd from the impact of baseballs and thrown or broken bats. It says on the back of tickets that fans assume the risks incidental to games when they enter ballparks, and courts of law have generally held that as long as teams provide warnings and install netting in the areas of greatest danger, MLB has lived up to its responsibility. As MLB teams have put in the netting extensions, some fans who've endured serious injuries in ballpark episodes over the years have said it's not enough and that spring training, minor league and college parks are not keeping pace and are even more dangerous. Brody said she hopes her mother's death will spark serious consideration of further increases in protection, perhaps using Japan's more extensively netted stadiums as examples, especially in an era of bigger and stronger players, higher velocity and launch-angle projectiles, and more and more distractions for people attending games. "I just hope MLB takes a serious look in the mirror and continues to evaluate and improve fan safety," Jacobson said. "It was always questionable whether the nets were extended far enough or high enough, and every stadium has different degrees of protections." He suggested that the nets go all the way to the foul pole, as in Japanese ballparks. "Why did they stop where they stopped?" he said. "It seems arbitrary." "I'd love to see the netting extended vertically, and we know it doesn't block the view," Brody said. "Raise it a little higher -- what's the hurt in that?" Unlike some modern fans, whose smartphones can be dangerous diversions when the ball is in play, Goldbloom had only a flip phone that she wasn't using then and hardly ever took out, Brody said. The ball ricocheted off her mother's head and struck her uncle in the stomach, but he wasn't injured. Her parents, Brody said, had the same seats for about 10 games each of the past 10 years under partial season-ticket plans, and in the preceding decade, they attended about the same number of games in a different set of seats. Erwin Goldbloom turned down his chance at Dodgers postseason tickets and didn't renew for 2019 but will consider attending single games in seating that is "somewhere safe" -- meaning where there's netting -- Brody said. Linda Goldbloom, described by Brody as a "true fan," was buried about 10 miles from Dodger Stadium. "My mom went to the game and never came home," Brody said. "People need to be aware, and we'd really like them to be protected in the future."

Kristoff St. John, the long-running star of “The Young and the Restless,” was found dead on Sunday. He was 52. Friends went to check on St. John at his San Fernando Valley home on Sunday, when they discovered his body, TMZ reported. They called police and paramedics, who pronounced the actor dead at the scene. Police and reps for St. John didn’t immediately returned Page Six’s request for comment. In a since-deleted tweet, however, St. John’s ex-wife, boxer Mia St. John, blamed the mental health facility that treated their son for Kristoff’s death. “THAT HOSPITAL KILLED OUR SON @TheArtofJulian THEN MY HUSBAND @kristoffstjohn1 THATS WHAT HAPPENED! THEY KILLED MY FAMILY,” she wrote. Kristoff and Mia’s son, Julian, died by suicide in 2014 while seeking treatment at the unnamed facility. They sued for negligence and later settled. The former couple also founded the El Saber es Poder (Knowledge Is Power) Foundation to battle mental illness. In 2017, Kristoff threatened suicide and was placed on a 72-hour hold for psychiatric evaluation. He leaves behind two daughters, Paris St. John and Lola St. John.

'Third time is NOT a charm': Hawaiian Airlines flight to Maui is forced to return to LAX THREE TIMES before being cancelled after suffering technical difficulties Hawaiian Airlines Flight 33 from Los Angeles to Kahului Airport was grounded on Friday because of 'separate and unrelated faults with different systems' Of the three returns that the flight had to make to the airport, one occurred before the flight had even taken off while the other two occurred mid-flight There were 207 people on board the flight All of their trips were refunded and each passenger was given a $100 credit to use on a future flight By MATTHEW WRIGHT FOR DAILYMAIL.COM A Hawaiian Airlines flight to Maui was cancelled after it was forced to return to LAX three times because of equipment failure, prompting the airline to issue refunds for more than 200 passengers. Hawaiian Airlines Flight 33 from Los Angeles to Kahului Airport was grounded on Friday because of 'separate and unrelated faults with different systems', airline spokesman Alex Da Silva explained to KTLA. The flight was initially supposed to take off at 4.30pm. Of the three returns that the flight had to make to the airport, one occurred before the flight had even taken off while the other two occurred mid-flight 'We understand our guests' disappointment and deeply regret their travel plans were disrupted,' Da Silva added. There were 207 people on board the flight. All of their trips were refunded and each passenger was given a $100 credit to use on a future flight. Additionally, the airline paid for all the passengers to have hotel rooms and provided them with meal vouchers for dinner and breakfast. They hope to accommodate the passengers on other flights.

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On the other hand, I've always believed that if God is truly divine and understanding/forgiving, he/she wouldn't be petty and get caught up in the technicality of whether you believed or not, and would judge you on the quality of person that you were. Thus, if the life you led was worthy of being rewarded in the afterlife, whether you were a believer or an atheist, you'd be rewarded.

When I was a kid, my pool club would occasionally have movie nights. Somebody at the club had connections, and I saw THE GRADUATE & THE FRENCH CONNECTION there I'd guess pre-1974. Also Mel Brooks' THE 12 CHAIRS. ANYHOO... Whilst Benjamin was driving and Scarborough Fair was playing, my friend leaned over to me and asked 'Are they singing Are You Going To Start An Affair?' I cracked up, but given the storyline at that point in the movie, it kinda made sense. I've never been able to sing it any other way since.

And it's funny... Yaphet was exactly how I pictured him! More importantly, were you turned on or off by Bortus' mustache?