J.K. Rowling outs Hogwarts character

NEW YORK — Harry Potter fans, the rumors are true: Albus Dumbledore, master wizard and Headmaster of Hogwarts, is gay. J.K. Rowling, author of the mega-selling fantasy series that ended last summer, outed the beloved character Friday night while appearing before a full house at Carnegie Hall.

After reading briefly from the final book, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows," she took questions from audience members.

She was asked by one young fan whether Dumbledore finds "true love."

"Dumbledore is gay," the author responded to gasps and applause.

She then explained that Dumbledore was smitten with rival Gellert Grindelwald, whom he defeated long ago in a battle between good and bad wizards. "Falling in love can blind us to an extent," Rowling said of Dumbledore's feelings, adding that Dumbledore was "horribly, terribly let down."

Dumbledore's love, she observed, was his "great tragedy."

"Oh, my god," Rowling concluded with a laugh, "the fan fiction."

Potter readers on fan sites and elsewhere on the Internet have speculated on the sexuality of Dumbledore, noting that he has no close relationship with women and a mysterious, troubled past. And explicit scenes with Dumbledore already have appeared in fan fiction.

Rowling told the audience that while working on the planned sixth Potter film, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," she spotted a reference in the script to a girl who once was of interest to Dumbledore. A note was duly passed to director David Yates, revealing the truth about her character.

Rowling, finishing a brief "Open Book Tour" of the United States, her first tour here since 2000, also said that she regarded her Potter books as a "prolonged argument for tolerance" and urged her fans to "question authority."

Not everyone likes her work, Rowling said, likely referring to Christian groups that have alleged the books promote witchcraft. Her news about Dumbledore, she said, will give them one more reason.

[via - HILLEL ITALIE]

Gmail Mobile 1.5, Java Application - Released

Google launched a new version for Gmail Mobile Java application for mobile phones.
If you go to gmail.com/app, on your Java-enable mobile phone and download the small application, you'll be able to use Gmail, almost as easy as on your desktop.

Gmail Mobile 1.5 makes it easier to access your contacts by adding an option in the menu. If you click on a contact, you'll see the same information available in Gmail's desktop interface: a photo, the email addresses, the phone numbers and other notes. If you entered the phone number in your contact's details, you can call him directly from Gmail.

Some key features:

• Up to five times faster access and use, thanks to automatic pre-fetching of messages

• Drastically reduced clicks and scrolling to access email

• Fewer keystrokes for reading, composing, or searching mail

• Attachments, including files and photos, viewable and automatically resized to fit the user's phone

The application lets you save an unfinished message for sending it later. The weird thing is that the message is saved on your phone, not in Drafts, and you can only have one unfinished message at any given time.

If you care about your Internet traffic, Gmail shows the bandwidth usage every time it loads data. There's also an option for encrypting your traffic, but this is not recommended because it slows down the app.

But the most surprising feature (if you can call this a feature) is the thing that helped Hotmail grow, but it's still a big annoyance in the free versions of Hotmail and Yahoo Mail: the ad automatically added at the end of your message. Gmail Mobile 1.5 appends by default to your message:

"Sent from Gmail for mobile | mobile.google.com"

Fortunately, you can disable Google's promotional message by going to the settings and unchecking the last option.

Gmail Mobile 1.5 seems to have a worse performance than the previous versions and it's still incompatible with Google Apps accounts. This release is currently available only in English.

You should check the requirements, the most important being J2ME (Java) MIDP2. Gmail Mobile is also available from your browser if you go to gmail.com (or m.gmail.com) on your mobile phone, but you won't get these features.

[via - Dotoca.net]

"Mansion Madam" Arrested on Drug Charges

Lisa Ann Taylor, who gained notoriety earlier
this year after she was indicted for allegedly running a house of prostitution in her upscale Atlanta subdivision, has been arrested on drug charges.

Her lawyer, Max Richardson, says Taylor is in the Gwinnett County jail Saturday.

She was arrested Friday on three felony drug
charges and one misdemeanor charge and is being held in lieu of a $2,300 bond.

Taylor and Nicole Probert became known as the "mansion madams" and gained national attention when they were charged with running a
house of prostitution at Taylor's home in the Sugarloaf Country Club subdivision in Gwinnett County.

Their trial is scheduled for February. Both women have pleaded not guilty to those charges.


The Associated Press Contributed to this story.

[via - 13wmaz]

Are we missing a dimension of time?

Could "hypertime" help develop a theory of everything? Roger Highfield reports

A scientist has put forward the bizarre suggestion that there are two dimensions of time, not the one that we are all familiar with, and even proposed a way to test his heretical idea next year.

Time is no longer a simple line from the past to the future, in a four dimensional world consisting of three dimensions of space and one of time. Instead, the physicist envisages the passage of history as curves embedded in a six dimensionals, with four of space and two of time.

"There isn't just one dimension of time," Itzhak Bars of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles tells New Scientist. "There are two. One whole dimension of time and another of space have until now gone entirely unnoticed by us."

Bars claims his theory of "two time physics", which he has developed over more than a decade, can help solve problems with current theories of the cosmos and, crucially, has true predictive power that can be tested in a forthcoming particle physics experiment.

If it is confirmed, it could point the way to a "theory of everything" that unites all the physical laws of the universe into one, notably general relativity that governs gravity and the large scale structure of the universe, and quantum theory that rules the subatomic world.

In the quest for that all embracing theory, scientists have been adding extra dimensions of space to their equations for decades. As early as the 1920s, mathematicians found that moving up to four dimensions of space, instead of the three we experience, helped in their quest to reconcile theories of electromagnetism and gravity.

Today, theoreticians are studying a theory of everything called M-theory that adds yet another dimension, taking the total to 11: 10 of space and one of time.

Until now, they have been reluctant to meddle with time because it can lead to unexpected consequences, such as time travel.

Changing our picture of time from a line to a plane (one to two dimensions) means that the path between the past and future could loop back on itself, allowing you to travel back and forwards in time and allowing the famous grandfather paradox, where you could go back and kill your grandfather before your mother was born, thereby preventing your own birth.

Bars first found hints of an extra time dimension in M-theory in 1995 and, when he looked into it, discovered the grandfather paradox and other fears could be overcome by using a new kind of symmetry - a mathematical property to work out the relationship between the quantities of position and momentum. It is this symmetry that might help reconcile the two mighty pillars of 20th-century physics, quantum mechanics and relativity.

Simply adding an extra dimension of time doesn't solve everything, however. To produce equations that work with the new symmetry that describe the world accurately, an additional dimension of space is needed as well, giving a total of four space dimensions, he explained in the journal Physical Review D.

According to Bars, the familiar four dimensional world we see around us is merely a "shadow" of the six-dimensional reality, just as a hand makes many different shadows on a wall when lit from different angles.

Although we cannot experience the extra time dimension directly, we can effectively notice it through the different perspectives of the different "shadows".

In this sense, he points to already existing evidence of physical phenomena at both macroscopic and microscopic scales. Furthermore, he believes that more evidence for his theory could emerge next year, when particles are smashed together in CERN's Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, Switzerland to create hitherto unseen "supersymmetric" particles.

The work poses a question: is his proposal a mathematical fix, rather than a real physical entity?

Bars insists his extra dimensions are more than mathematical sleight of hand. "Absolutely not," he told New Scientist. "These extra dimensions are out there, as real as the three dimensions of space and one of time we experience directly."

[via - telegraf.co.uk]

Prosecutors say Stripper Mechele Linehan Followed Movie Plot to Kill Fiance

AP Photo/Al Grillo

A murder case in Alaska is the forum for a real-life drama that ended in the killing of stripper Mechele Linehan's fiance at the time.

Mechele Linehan is on trial for masterminding the murder, where prosecutors say Linehan followed the plot in the film "The Last Seduction," where a female character talked her lover into murdering her husband for cash. Prosecutors claim Linehan was obsessed with the film and followed the script to the end, including the murder of 36-year-old fisherman Kent Leppink.

Prosecutors also say the motive for the murder was the life insurance policy of Leppink, which was for $1 million. What she didn't know is Leppink was suspicious and made his parents the beneficiaries only days before he was murdered.

Leppink's body was discovered on the ground by utility workers, having been shot three times with a .44 Magnum.

Actress Linda Fiorentino, who played the role of the femme fatale in the film said, "Isn't it unbelievable? I'm a little shaken up by it."

John Carlin III, who was another fiance of Linehan's, was convicted of murdering Leppink in April.

The case broke when Carlin's son gave testimony that he had seen his dad wash the murder weapon with bleach in a sink while Lineman looked on. He wasn't able to testify originally because he was underage at the time, and wasn't allowed to be his father.

8 Simple Ways to Enjoy Life Every Day

In The Magic of Starting Small, I made the point that it is your days that define your life. In this article, I want to challenge the common perception that it is only possible to enjoy your leisure time. In particular, this article is targeted at the professional stuck in the 9 to 5 grind who longs for the weekend and, in the process, has given up on trying to find pleasure in the ordinary experiences we have every day.

1. Appreciate Beauty

Each day we come across beauty in a number of shapes and forms. It’s a shame, then, that many people have become so accustomed to this beauty that it largely goes unappreciated. I suggest looking again at the people, plants, gadgets, and buildings (to name but a few examples) around you and taking a moment to appreciate what makes them so special.

2. Connect With Nature

Nature is an amazing healer for the stresses and strains of modern life. Eating lunch in the park, attending to a vegetable garden in your backyard, or watching the sunset are just a few simple ideas for how you can enjoy the outdoors on a daily basis.

3. Laugh

E. E. Cummings once said “the most wasted of all days is one without laughter.” How very true. Never be too busy to laugh, or too serious to smile. Instead, surround yourself with fun people and don’t get caught up in your own sense of importance.

4. Have Simple Pleasures

A good cup of coffee when I first wake. Time spent playing with my 8 month old son. Cooking a nice meal in the evening. These may not seem terribly exciting, but they are some of the simple pleasures I enjoy in life. If you slow down for just a moment and take the time to appreciate these ordinary events, life becomes instantly more enjoyable.

5. Connect With People

In so many ways, it is our relationships with people that give us the most happiness in life. Perhaps, then, the best way to enjoy your work more is not to get a raise or a promotion, but rather to build rewarding relationships with your co-workers.

6. Learn

There is a strong link between learning and happiness. Given this, there is no excuse not to be stimulating your brain and learning something new each day. My favorite way to find time for learning is to make the most of the commute to and from work. Audiobooks and podcasts are great for this purpose.

7. Rethink Your Mornings and Evenings

Are the mornings a mad rush for you to get out the door? Do you switch off the TV at night and go straight to bed? I have personally experienced the profound benefits of establishing a routine in the morning and evening. For example, in the morning you may choose to wake an hour earlier and spend the time working on yourself, whether it be reading, writing or exercising. In the evening, consider spending some time just before bed reviewing your day or in meditation.

8. Celebrate Your Successes

During a normal day we are sure to have some minor successes. Perhaps you have successfully dealt with a difficult customer, made a sale, or received a nice compliment for your work. These aren’t events worth throwing a party for, but why not take a moment to celebrate your success? Share the experience with someone else, reward yourself with a nice lunch, or just give yourself a mental pat on the back.

[VIA - pickthebrain.com]

who this man?

that he did the finger?