Horror in Harlem: Relatives find dead grandmother stuffed in closet as grandson has sex in bed

Body of grandmother Cora Davis is removed by city medical examiner’s workers.

An East Harlem granny was found dead in a bedroom closet on Wednesday - after relatives walked in on her grandson having sex with a woman in the same room, police sources said.

Two concerned relatives walked into the apartment at the Wagner Houses on E. 124th St. shortly before 11 a.m. They hadn't heard from 76-year-old Cora Davis for two days.

They opened the bedroom door to find her grandson Larry Davis, 21, having sex with a 20-year-old woman on the bed.

"Where's Mama? Where's Mama?" a relative asked Larry Davis, according to the sources.

An argument erupted. One of the relatives threatened to call police, and Davis ran off. The woman he was having sex with - who has a prostitution bust on her record - stayed behind.

Cops arrived and searched the apartment, finding Cora Davis' body crammed in the bedroom's closet under a pile of clothes, the sources said.

The city medical examiner was trying last night to determine the cause of death. Sources said investigators found signs of hemorrhaging around Davis' eyes that suggest she may have been strangled.

"I was here when [Larry] left," said neighbor Angel Rodriguez, 56. "I saw him go out of the building. He didn't seem upset."

Law enforcement sources said there were several domestic incident reports filed at the home, but none involved violence. The elderly woman also had an order of protection against her grandson.

Neighbors said they'd witnessed Davis' drug-addled grandson getting hauled out in cuffs before.

"It's just a horrible thing because she was a lovely lady," said close friend Dorothea Sadler, 81. "She didn't bother anybody."

Sadler said Davis had lived in the building for more than 40 years.

"She was a beautiful woman," Rodriguez said. "I knew her most of my life."

Larry Davis, who is still being sought by police, has prior arrests that include drug possession and assault.

He was arrested early this month for trespassing. An arrest warrant was issued after he failed to appear in court to answer the trespassing charge.

Judge Judy 'much better' after being rushed to hospital from set of TV show for medical emergency

Judge Judy became ill while on the set of her hit television show in Los Angeles.
LOS ANGELES - Judge Judy got served a clean bill of health Wednesday afternoon after paramedics rushed her to the hospital in serious condition hours earlier.

"She's feeling much better. She said all the tests were negative, and she's going home tomorrow," her spokesman Gary Rosen told the Daily News. "She will be back taping her TV show on April 12 as scheduled."

The Brooklyn-born TV judge was working on the set of her hit show when a wave of nausea and "intestinal discomfort" caused her to halt production, Rosen said.

"I'm just exhausted, and my body was telling me it needed a day to chill," the spitfire judge told TMZ.com in a cell phone call from her bed at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

"I was feeling funky this morning ... funky enough that I knew someone should give a gander over what I got," said the jurist, whose full name is Judith Sheindlin.

"I'm exhausted. I'm just tired," Sheindlin, 68, said. "A lot of things just zoned together, including the bad news of the world."

"At my age, I know my body," she told TMZ, adding that she'd had an MRI. "My body is fine."

An ambulance responded to a 911 call for a "person down" at her studio on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood shortly after 9 a.m., a fire official told the Daily News.

"She was rushed to a nearby hospital in serious condition," Capt. Jaime Moore of the Los Angeles Fire Department said.

Her producer quickly shot down Internet rumors that the emergency trip stemmed from recent oral surgery and that she turned "incoherent" on the bench before the 911 call.

"Absolutely not!" Executive Producer Timothy Regler told the Daily News when asked if she had trouble speaking.

"That's ludicrous," he said of the alleged dental link. "She had her teeth cleaned yesterday."

Candice Swanepoel, Victoria's Secret model, appears shockingly thin while promoting new swim line

Candice Swanepoel (l. in March 2010, r. Wednesday) is sporting an alarmingly tiny waist.

There's sexy skinny and then there's scary skinny.

Model Candice Swanepoel looked more like the latter Wednesday when she made an appearance to promote the new Victoria's Secret line of swimwear at the collection's launch event in West Hollywood.

 Swanepoel's itty-bitty bikini only highlighted her stick-figure legs and bony arms. The 22-year-old South African's waist was also shockingly thin.

Fellow models Alessandra Ambrosio and Adriana Lima, who flanked Swanepoel on either side while posing for pictures, also showed off skinny – yet more enviable – bodies. Ambrosio, however, has been criticized in the past for also appearing too thin.

Ambrosio (l.) and Lima (r.) both appeared slender but healthier than Swanepoel. (Sullivan/WireImage)

Swanepoel seems to have lost a significant amount of weight since she appeared in ads for Victoria's Secret's Valentine's Day campaign, which began in January.
Also released in January was the Victoria's Secret 2011 Swim Catalog, which featured a slender, but seemingly healthier, Swanepoel on the cover.

She has posed nude in numerous magazine pictorials that often highlighted her small frame, but she now appears to be smaller than ever.

According to her modeling agency, IMG, Swanepoel is 5-feet-9 and a size 8 with 33-23-34 measurements – figures that seem unbelievably out of date.

Swanepoel's current body type seems to be a marked departure for the Victoria's Secret brand, which used to be known for featuring more curvaceous beauties like Tyra Banks.

Swanepoel (l. in November 2010) always had a tiny frame, but now appears especially slim. (Wargo/Getty; Sullivan/WireImage)

Dancing With the Stars' Season 12

Everyone knows half the fun of watching 'Dancing With The Stars' is seeing what sort of ridiculous costumes the contestants will be wearing. Sometimes the look is a blast from the past, and other times the outfits are so skimpy, the term 'clothing' seems be to used loosely. But no matter what, there are bound to be sequins ... oh, so many sequins. Take a look at few dance moments.  

'Dancing with the Stars' results show showed that couple Mike Catherwood and Lacey Schwimmer may have chemistry, but it wasn't enough to save them from season 12's first elimination.

Kirstie Alley & Maksim Chmerkovskiy
Third place points-wise went to a very saucy Kirstie Alley, who quipped that she needs to feel confident in her own skin and stick with her hopes of losing five pounds a week on the show. 'I'll need to stay through a lotta rounds to lose that 40,' she said, referring to her ultimate goal.

Chris Jericho & Cheryl Burke
Chris Jericho has put up a fight in the ring and now he's bringing the same heat - yet more gracefully - to the dance floor. Bruno gushed that he loved how Cheryl Burke has turned Jericho from 'a beast into a gazelle.'

Amazon Introduces a Digital Music Locker

Amazon.com plans to introduce a service that will let people upload their digital music to the Web and access it from browsers on any computer and from Android phones.

The service, known as a music locker, was made available to Amazon account holders early Tuesday. Amazon will offer a Web-based hard drive backup service called Cloud Drive, where people can store documents, photos, videos and music.

It will also offer Cloud Player, which will let people listen to, download and make playlists from the music they store on Cloud Drive from any Web browser or from an app on Android devices. Cloud Player will automatically upload songs bought on Amazon and scan iTunes or Windows libraries to find other music to upload.

Amazon is racing Google and Apple, both of which are interested in offering similar services. One key difference is that Google and Apple reportedly want to automatically make all the music that a user owns available to stream on other devices, while Amazon will require that people upload music, except songs they buy on Amazon, to access it elsewhere.

The dream of these companies, along with many start-ups, is for people to be able to listen to their music from any computer or phone. But they have all run into the same problem: music labels and publishers would prefer that listeners buy a new copy of a song everywhere they want to listen to it.

Several experts in digital music say that the music locker business is still legally ambiguous. For example, though some companies let people upload their music and listen to it elsewhere without any outcry from the labels, others, like MP3tunes, have been sued by music labels. Another issue: it is impossible for Web companies to tell whether a song was bought legally or downloaded illegally.

Amazon says it has sidestepped the problem, because its users would upload their songs, in MP3 or A.A.C. format, to the cloud-based service, just like backing them up on an external hard drive or a Web-based computer backup service.

“We don’t need a license to store music,” said Craig Pape, director of music at Amazon. “The functionality is the same as an external hard drive.”

Companies including Google and Spotify have been forced to delay introducing certain services while they negotiate with the music labels and publishers.

Several executives at major labels expressed concern about such a service from Amazon and whether it would violate the terms of their current licensing agreements with the company. They agreed to speak on the condition of anonymity because their agreements with Amazon are confidential.

Amazon is offering five gigabytes of free storage and 20 gigabytes free if a customer buys an album from Amazon.

YAKUZA 4 - FUN COMBAT, INTENSE STORY.

'Yakuza 4' features some high-kicking action.

The best way to describe Sega's Yakuza series is to consider it the offspring of Final Fantasy and Grand Theft Auto. It's an open-world game with a Japanese RPG-type story, a game that presents you with limitless options, then places careful limits on those options.

It is an unlikely marriage that the PlayStation-exclusive series has flirted with for four iterations, but much of it comes together in "Yakuza 4." As usual, the game isn't without downfalls, but "Yakuza 4" more than compensates for its weaknesses.

Story is this game's greatest strength. The first three games followed one character, Kazuma Kiryu, as he ascended the Yakuza clan and then stepped back to open an orphanage. "Yakuza 4" tracks four different characters in an interlocking story. The tale features plenty of twists and turns, all in a style befitting a giant Final Fantasy game, and each character grows endearing in his own way. Akiyama, a money lender with a heart of gold who is the first character you take over, is perhaps the best of all.

Things get hard to follow, though, mostly because you're reading text-heavy section after text-heavy section. All the voice-acting is Japanese, leaving you to follow captions as you go along. There are plenty of cutscenes, but these are unpausable unless you hit the PS button.

These cutscenes are also unskippable, which speaks to how Sega feels about their importance to "Yakuza 4's" narrative but also grows annoying. Scenes are lengthy and somewhat inconsistent, occasionally sandwiching four minutes of beautiful, fully voiced action with two minutes of in-game scene. Just when you're sitting back as if to watch a movie, you're watching static characters from the in-game engine.

"Yakuza 4" runs off the same engine that the third game did, and while the cutscenes look spectacular as ever, the in-game visuals are starting to show their age. Characters move artificially, and the use of light and shadows is limited.

Another slight flaw: sometimes the on-screen map inexplicably disappears. This happens with little rhyme or reason, leaving you to wander Kamarucho blindly and wait for the map to reappear – or restart the game. In such instances, the venerable system of save points becomes rather troublesome. You can't even save and restart, because you're limited to hunting down phone booth save points as opposed to merely saving and hopping back into gameplay Still, if you can survive these pratfalls, you'll truly enjoy the story and varied gameplay. Kamarucho is bustling with action. "Yakuza 4" does a fantastic job of introducing you to a bevy of personalities, and each typically has something to offer. You'll feel encouraged to talk to people, knowing that they won't all hand you a "go here" or "get me that" mandate. One moment, you'll try to solicit as many hostesses as you can in five minutes, the next you're chasing a wallet-thief around town.

Kamarucho is filled with minigames. Unlike previous iterations, "Yakuza 4" made it from Japan to the U.S. completely intact, so certain slightly racy sections (parents, pay attention) are available. You're free to attend hostess clubs (Japanese clubs where you can essentially hang out with women) and even pursue a relationship. Other fun minigames include a surprisingly addictive version of indoor baseball and a rather racy version of ping pong. Not that everything's fun, though. You have two varieties of chase games - one in which you chase and the other in which you elude - and both feel clunky and frustrating with characters rarely performing as they should.

All these games feel distinctly Japanese, as does the combat. You're essentially faced with random battles, with citizens rushing up to you and challenging you. Their reasons feel ridiculous – think "I don't like your face, old man" – but once you're past that, combat feels fluid. You'll punch, kick and elude, gradually building a Heat meter. Once that meter is full, you can perform more powerful attacks, sometimes using weapons or accessories that are in the environment.

In typical Japanese fashion, you'll gain experience as you fight and accomplish different tasks, and your XP can be applied to learn new combat moves. This keeps combat lively throughout the lengthy story, as does the fact that each of your four protagonists has a slightly different fighting style.

Style. That's another word to fittingly describes "Yakuza 4." It's far from a perfect game, but it's ridiculously over-the-top fun nevertheless.

New concept cars .

The 2011 International Motor Show in Geneva is chock full of cars that are sure to impress. This sleek, yet pointy, Swiss Sbarro concept car looks like it was designed with the future in mind. The TwoFort100 isn't the only awesome concept car unveiled this year  
Are these the cars you'll be driving in the future? These car prototypes have been developed to showcase new concepts, new styling, and amazing new technology. Here are the latest in debuted concept cars ... 

 

OBAMA'S DEMOCRATIC DINNER-FOR-DOLLARS ,2012 CAMPAIGN FETCH $1.5 MILLION.

President Barack Obama's DNC fundraiser at the Red Rooster in Harlem on Tuesday netted a cool $1.5 million for the party and marked the opening of the 2012 campaign season.

President Obama rolled into Harlem Tuesday night for his first major Democratic dinner-for-dollars of the 2012 campaign season.

After a whirlwind day in the city, Obama attended the swank $30,800-a-plate soiree with 50 fat cats at the new Red Rooster restaurant on Lenox Ave.

The cash bash raked in a cool $1.5 million for the Democratic National Committee.

As hundreds of New Yorkers jammed the streets outside hoping to get a peak at the Prez, Obama rubbed elbows with movers and shakers inside the hot spot.

He received a standing ovation as he emerged from the kitchen after being ushered in through a back alley.

"You guys applauding for the corn bread?" he joked, before discussing a "challenging time" for the nation and the world, mentioning the Japan earthquake and the U.S. military intervention in Libya.

"I could not do what I do, making the best possible decisions I can for American people, without knowing that I had so many people rooting for me," he said.

His remarks were brief, but he pledged to visit all six tables of guests, who dined on lobster salad, braised short ribs and chocolate cake with rhubarb compote.

The event unofficially marks the kickoff of the 2012 political season - and serves as an early marker of Obama's money-making prowess.

New York was a gold mine for Obama in 2008, with area residents pumping more than $42 million into his campaign war chest - an amazing feat considering he was up against hometown Sen. Hillary Clinton in a brutal primary.

Obama also hosted a "Thank You" get-together with 250 supporters and pols at the nearby Studio Museum.

The hop into Harlem offered Obama a chance to repair ties with many of New York's prominent African-American Democrats.

He angered many with his team's clumsy attempt to push then-Gov. David Paterson out of the 2010 gubernatorial race, and he rankled others by suggesting Rep. Charles Rangel resign after he was censured for ethics violations last fall.

Rangel was in the crowd at the Red Rooster, and was also alongside Obama at an earlier dedication of a United Nations building named after late Secretary of Commerce Ron Brown.

There, Obama also teamed up with the other Democratic presidential titan - Bill Clinton. Bubba, who had a tense relationship with Obama during the 2008 primary, couldn't have given the current President a bigger shoutout.

"He [Brown] would be very proud that Barack Obama became President of the United States, and very proud, Mr. President, of what you're doing in Libya," Clinton told Obama.

His first stop in Manhattan was at the American Museum of Natural History on the upper West Side, where Obama taped TV interviews and then addressed students at a citywide science fair. He was joined by Mayor Bloomberg.

"You are key to our success," Obama said. "What you're doing is important for our country."

Bronx Science High School senior Max Kiss took pride in giving the President details about the bamboo bicycle he had built.

"I've been riding it to school for at least two years," Kiss told Obama.

"What, they wouldn't let you bring an actual bike?" the President quipped.

Slimebusters rescue iPhone from sewer.

The Department of Environmental Protection has a squad of city workers on call to fish lost items out of city subways when citizens call 311. Workers rescued Queena Feng's iPhone.

They're the patron saints of lost items - as long as the item was dropped down a sewer grate.

The Department of Environmental Protection has a squad of city workers on call, ready to fish dropped valuables out of Gotham's catch basins for free.

All it takes to summon these municipal Saint Anthonys is a phone call to 311 - and a strong stomach to handle the smell.

"I got my iPhone back!" squealed Queena Feng, 20, after a DEP worker plucked her precious hand-held device from a Dyker Heights, Brooklyn, drain yesterday. "I'm really happy. I thought I'd never get it back."

The Brooklyn College student lost her phone Sunday night climbing out of her boyfriend's car. He gave her the iPhone 3GS as a gift last year.

"When I opened the car door, the phone slipped out of my pocket," said Feng.

Her quick-thinking beau suggested they call the city's information hotline. "She was spazzing out," said Victor Yuen, 18. "I was like, 'Let's try calling 311.'"

A 311 operator transferred them to a DEP secretary who took down Yuen's phone number. First thing yesterday morning, the agency called back to schedule a retrieval.

DEP catch basin cleaner Radames Soto met Feng on 14th Ave., removed the grate and used his truck's hydraulic arm to lower a metal claw into the muck.

When the claw resurfaced, dumping a wet wad of trash onto the street, Feng gasped. There was her iPhone in its pink plastic case, covered in slime.

The phone didn't turn on right away, but Feng was hopeful it would after drying out.

"I can't believe it!" gushed her mother, Grace Feng, 49.

The DEP received 1,259 retrieval requests last year and is successful about 20% of the time, said Soto, who's recovered more than one wedding band. "It makes me feel good to know I'm helping the people," he said.

Home prices falling in most major cities nationwide: report

Home prices are falling in most major U.S. cities, and the average prices in four of them are at their lowest point in 11 years.

The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller 20-city index shows price declines in 19 cities from December to January. Eleven of them are at their lowest level since the housing bust.

Home values in Atlanta, Las Vegas, Detroit and Cleveland are now below January 2000 levels.

The only market where prices rose was Washington, where homes prices gained 0.1 percent month over month. The nation's capital has outperformed every other city in the index. Prices there are up 3.6 percent year over year.

'Mad Men' season 5 premiere date set for 2012, says AMC

'Mad Men' season 5 premiere date is set for 2012, according to AMC, despite claims that creator Matthew Weiner may not sign a deal.

 In a drama worthy of "Mad Men" itself, the folks at AMC say the '60s set series  will be back for fifth season even though there's still no deal with show creator Matt Weiner.

Details, details, details.

The latest round of speculation over the future of "Mad Men" hit Monday night  when word surfaced that Weiner was not digging AMC's request to add two minutes of commercial time to each episode, and cut two characters.

The partners  apparently agreed on Weiner's new pay package -- $30 million over two years -- according to Deadline.com, making him one of the highest paid show runners working in cable TV.

They were now stuck on the other aspects of the deal -- the fine points -- which Deadline reported also includes a potential for product integration into the show, a common practice on most series, as a way to increase revenue.

From AMC's standpoint, "Mad Men" is a franchise that helped put the network on the map.

Moreover, requests for more commercial time would give the network a shot at capitalizing off of "Mad Men's" small, but influential audience.

The latest "Mad Men" negotiation gurgle has fans of the show concerned, as well as those following the talks closer than world events, that the show may never see the light of day.

Not so fast, according to AMC.

"AMC has officially authorized production of season 5 of Mad Men, triggering our option with Lionsgate ('Mad Men's' production company)," the network said in a statement. "While we are getting a later start than in years past due to ongoing, key non-cast negotiations, 'Mad Men' will be back for a fifth season in early 2012."

"Mad Men" is set in an advertising agency in the '60s. The show has earned fantastic critical reviews for Weiner's keen attention to period details and sharp dialog. The show has also racked up Emmy wins. Despite the critical acclaim, "Mad Men"  has generated audiences far lower than the kind of  media attention it generates.

To that end, given the importance of the project to the network and Weiner, a back and forth with threats of not going forward during negotiations is expected.

A study report saysTeens who use Facebook, social media may suffer from new condition called 'Facebook depression

Facebook and Twitter could actually be psychologically damaging, causing a new condition known as 'Facebook depression,' according to researchers.

Teens who frequently use Facebook have more to worry about than lost homework time.

A new condition dubbed "Facebook depression" may affect teenagers who spend a significant amount of time on the social-networking site, researchers warned in the latest issue of Pediatrics Journal.

The problem, researchers found, was that the popular website's constant feed of status, picture and message updates gave users a skewed view of reality, which could make vulnerable kids feel like they aren't good enough.

Facebook, according to the study, can create a false reality because people normally post the best sides of themselves, or at least not the full story.

Users like 16-year-old Abby Abolt agreed.

"If you really didn't have that many friends and weren't really doing much with your life, and saw other peoples' status updates and pictures and what they were doing with friends, I could see how that would make them upset," Abolt told The Associated Press. "It's like a big popularity contest – who can get the most friend requests or get the most pictures tagged."

But cutting off the site might not be so easy. A 2010 Pew survey found that 72% of American teens have social network profiles.

A similar study led by Dr. Joanne Davila at Stony Brook University found that texting, email and time spent on social networking sites can worsen teens’ moods and make them obsess over issues instead of moving past them.

"One of the things we are finding is that there are people who are at a greater risk to the negative interactions in social networking and consequently feeling depressed or sad afterwards," Dr. Davila told CBS Miami.

Dating: who pay on dates? Hot girls or Guy?

 

A new dating study reveals hotter women rarely pick up the check.

The prettier the girl, the less likely she is to be shelling out for her dinner on a date, a new study found.

A study by researchers at the University of St. Andrews found that men are more likely to pick up the tab if they believe their date is more attractive than them, the study found.

The study was published in the Journal of Evolutionary Psychology.

In the study, psychologists set up hypothetical blind dates and asked participants how they would prefer the bill be split. While half would prefer to split the bill regardless of gender, 30% of men prefer that their date pay for the meal, while 45% of females want the bill picked up.

Only 23% of men prefer to pay for the meal themselves – and a measly 5% of women said they wanted to pick up the tab.

The participants' answers also depended on how attractive they rated themselves. Both men and women who rated themselves highly were more likely to want their date to pay.

In the end, researchers found, it was all about what women – and men really want.

"Female participants preferred that more attractive dates pay for them, indicating a preference to receive resources and enter into a potential courtship exchange with more attractive mates and a preference to avoid entering a possible reciprocation relationship with less attractive potential mates," researchers said.

Men, on the other hand, were more likely to "invest resources" in mates that they found more attractive, the study found.

DJ Megatron shot and killed in Staten Island

A Staten Island deejay and rising hip-hop star was shot to death while walking to a local bodega to buy a cigar early Sunday, police and a close friend said.

DJ Megatron was down the block from his Staten Island home when his killer approached about 2 a.m. and fired a single shot into his torso, cops said.

The 32-year-old regular on BET's "106 & Park," whose real name was Corey McGriff, died on the street - his eyes facing the sky and a baseball cap at his side.

"It is just earth-shattering," his mom, Louvenia McGriff, 60, told the Daily News by phone from her Georgia home.

"Words can't describe the way my husband and I feel right now. I just don't know how we're going to make it without him. He was our golden child."

Detectives combed the crime scene for several hours but no witnesses came forward, and there was no arrests.

Nor did cops have a motive.

Corey McGriff's family and friends said he had no known enemies, but The News found that a furious former friend repeatedly slammed the popular, young BET star in an online forum.

About three months ago, a flurry of nasty messages about McGriff owing someone money was posted on nearly all of the deejay's videos on YouTube.

In one comment, the venom seemed eerily prophetic:

"I told u all u had to do was pay the f-----g bill. I tried to help u out but u wanna play me, right? Bite the hands that feed u, right Mega?

"Bad s--- will continue happening to u, Dude!"

The comments were posted with different handles, including "MegaPayup," but appear to be written by the same person.

Another reads: "Like really Mega you can sleep with a clear concious [sic]?? ... like how are u an example to ur kids?"

An NYPD official could not say whether the online rants were being probed. As of early Sunday night, police did not know whether the killer specifically targeted McGriff or whether he was simply the victim of a botched stickup, officials said.

One police source said robbery doesn't appear to be the motive.

McGriff, a father of three children who got his start as a deejay on Hot 97, was slain on Osgood Ave. in Stapleton, around the corner from his brother's apartment, where he was living temporarily, his family said.

"He was going to get a Dutch," close friend Mex Guevara said, referring to a cheap cigar known as a Dutch Master.

Guevara, 33, added that he believes McGriff, a Staten Island celebrity who always wore a hooded sweatshirt, was killed by a robber.

"He definitely didn't have no beef with anybody," he said. "Some young kids probably saw him and didn't know who he was."

 

'Chica Chica' cards pimp hookers and prostitution, says state senator who wants to make them illegal

Similar to baseball cards, Queens politicians want to make it a crime to distribute the raunchy 'Chica Chica' cards on the streets of the borough.

ALBANY - They're called "Chica Chica" cards - and they're flooding Corona and Jackson Heights, Queens.

They look like baseball cards. But instead of featuring A-Rod or Derek Jeter, they have graphic pictures of naked or half-naked women - with a phone number offering free delivery.

They're really the business cards of prostitutes and pimps who operate along a stretch of Roosevelt Ave. in Queens - and a move is afoot to make them illegal.

Queens Democratic Sen. Jose Peralta wants to make it a crime to distribute the raunchy cards. He and his Assembly counterpart Francisco Moyo have introduced a bill making distribution of the cards a misdemeanor, categorizing them as obscene material.

"Is this going to eliminate prostitution? It's not," Peralta said. "It's the first step toward improving the quality of life on Roosevelt Ave."

The lawmakers say that on a nighttime walk down Roosevelt Ave., there will be men uttering the words, "chicas, chicas," which means "girls, girls" - and they'll thrust forward one of the cards.

Residents are fed up.

"It's infuriating," said Nuala O'Doherty, a 42-year-old mother of three who lives near Roosevelt Ave. "They're all over the streets in the morning. You can't get rid of them."

The cards have led to some awkward questions from her three young kids.

"The kids pick them up," said O'Doherty. "They'll ask, 'Mommy, what are the cards for? Why are the women standing like that? Why do they have no clothes?'

"I don't have good answers."

O'Doherty said her husband called the number on one of the cards and was asked all sorts of questions in Spanish about what kind of woman he wants.

"They'll come to you," she said. "They'll bring the girl to you so they don't have to pay for a room."

Queens District Attorney Richard Brown calls the "Chica" cards "a vexing problem that is plaguing our communities."

But he said a law to ban them raises "difficult legal questions under the court's interpretation of the First Amendment."

Dont miss the opportunity - Take The Time And Apply For Scholarships!

When it comes to finding scholarships to help pay for college and university studies, students have an easier time than they have in the past. There are Internet searches along with library resources and guidance and financial aid counselors to which students might turn for tuition assistance.

There are these days more scholarships than there are students entering colleges and universities, according to Terry Wilfong, President of the College Options Foundation. Even so, information from those such as Tennessee university suggests that 1 in 10 to 1 in 15 scholarship applications results in a financial return.

The Georgia-based College Options Foundation works in part to help students prepare for college and university studies. With rising tuition costs in a stagnant economy, scholarships and grants can be one of the most important means of preparing for colleges and universities. Yet the Washington Post pulled information from "Secrets to Winning a Scholarship," a book by Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of the scholarship search site fastweb.com, suggesting that very few students receive enough grants and scholarships to pay for all of the costs associated with their college and university studies.

Scholarships are provided by many donors such as government agencies, large corporations, non-profit foundations and community and civic groups. They're often awarded based in academic merit, requiring minimum grade point averages or based on needs, such as financial needs. Scholarships also are provided based on a combination of criteria, with some intended to increase studies in specific subjects and among certain demographic groups. Kantrowitz, Wilfong and others offer some advice that might help students to improve their chances of winning scholarships. They include:

Apply for as many scholarships as possible, keeping in mind that small scholarships can add up. Some also contend that scholarships in the $100 range can be less competitive than those that reward more money. Essay-based scholarship competitions also tend to be less competitive than others. Also, complete scholarship applications in their entirety. Leaving certain areas blank could potentially reduce the chances of winning scholarships, particularly when scholarships can be competitive.

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Make sure that essays provide the information that's requested as part of scholarship applications. Keep essays interesting so that they stand apart from others, and make sure they include solid examples for getting a point across. Students might even be able to draft two or three essays that they can tweak as needed for different applications.

Apply for scholarships as early as possible. Scholarship applications often have to be mailed to or received by scholarship providers by certain deadlines in order for students to be eligible. Because a missed deadline could be a missed opportunity, students might want to give themselves lots of extra time for preparing theirs and getting them in.

 

Instant Payday loan: Easy way to meet emergencies

Many people have found that they can receive Instant Payday Loans more quickly than a bank loan. Where banks usually have a lot of red tape, pay lending companies do not. Banks have very strict rules that they use to govern the way they conduct business. Lending companies are not extremely strict, and they too have their own set of rules, and requirements.You can get $500 to $2000 immediately if you meet their requirement by filling the application in on line ,cash will be wired to you.

Lenders maintain a strict age policy. Individuals under the age of 18 are not eligible for a payday loan. They must be at least 18 years of age, before they are allowed to enter into a legal contract. Another requirement is that the borrower must have a steady source of income. It does not matter where the income comes from, as long as it is verifiable.

Having an active checking account is what many lenders prefer. The borrower must have direct deposit already in place. The account can be an existing one with at least one month of activity. The checking account is needed for the deposit of loans and the withdrawal of payments. Payment due dates on set up on the borrower paydays.

Loans which cannot be paid back on their original due dates will incur additional charges. Borrowers will need to call the lending company and ask for an extension to avoid higher fees. Higher fees are normally check return fees that banks charge for insufficient funds. Despite of the charges associated with bank fees, paydays are still easier to obtain, and can be borrowed with no explanation.

The money can be borrowed for nearly any purpose. No explanation is needed nor is one required, as to why the money needs to be borrowed. Most people need to pay utility bills such as lights, water, and gas. Some people may find themselves running short while they are still on vacation.

Individuals can use one of several ways to apply for an instant payday loan. They can apply online in the comfort of their home, or they can visit an onsite center. The online process is probably the simplest and most preferred method for applying for a loan.

The onsite visitation requires a lot of documentation. The individual can walk into any lending office, and apply in person. They must have verifiable information like proof or source of income, Current bank statements, Current picture ID card, and proof of residence. No loans are approved without these items.

As long as the borrowers have this information, or can bring it back, they can be approved for a loan. The reasons why these loans are popular are because of their low interest rates. As long as the age requirement are met the borrower should have not problem qualifying for a loan.

Anyone with bad credit can apply for a low interest loan. No cosigner and no collateral are needed. These short-term loans are not meant to be a permanent long time solution to financial problems. Banks are not as generous as other institutions. Their strict guidelines will not allow them to approve a loan for everyone.

Filing income taxes in a year of economic upheaval can be stressful, but there are deductions

Filing taxes during a time of economic hardship can be even worse than your job hunt, but there are deductions related to looking for work.

What could be more fun than the endless worry and toil of pounding the pavement in search of a new job?

How about worrying about the fast-approaching deadline to file your income taxes? Many who have received unemployment checks throughout the year are surprised to learn that they now owe taxes on this amount - a change from 2009, when at least a portion of unemployment benefits was tax-free.

The good news is that the government does offer some little-known benefits to job seekers. For many who are struggling due to job loss or underemployment, this small break could not come at a better time.

Get the help you need

The IRS website has a great resource called Free File (apps.irs.gov/app/freeFile/). Taxpayers who meet certain eligibility requirements, such as making less than $58,000 per year, can avail themselves of free services in which tax professionals will prepare their taxes.

Deduct from your job search

You can deduct certain job-search expenses as long as you are searching for a job in the same occupation, you itemize deductions, and your writeoffs are greater than 2% of your adjusted gross income.

Have you taken an "in-between jobs" job to pay the bills? Fear not: If you are temporarily working in another field while looking for a job in your primary profession, you are still eligible to deduct job-search expenses.

Make a list of the many small expenses you incurred in your search. You may be able to deduct résumé preparation, long-distance calls, postage, copying, use of a recruiting/employment service, a percentage of your meals while traveling, mileage for going to interviews and job fairs, and fees for networking events.

Hitting the road

Did you move 50 miles or farther to take a new job?

This is good news, so long as you stay for at least 39 weeks in the year that follows.

If you qualify, you can deduct certain moving costs, such as traveling from your old home to your new one, including such traveling expenses as tolls and hotel stays.

Hiring movers or renting storage space also can be deducted.

Don't get too creative

There are certain expenses that are not deductible, which is why it cannot be overstated: Consult a tax professional. It's free in many cases.

Here are a few things that do not make the cut: Just about anything having to do with your physical appearance, such as grooming, clothing and maintenance. Your manicures, haircuts, interview suits and gym membership may all be very worthy investments, but they don't count at tax time. Interestingly, job-search expenses are not eligible for deductions if you are searching for your first job. This also goes for searches that begin after an extended period (years) of unemployment.

Another no-no: If any expenses you incurred are reimbursed by a new employer, you may not deduct them.

Taxes are complicated, especially in a year in which your financial situation went through unexpected changes. Use the information presented here, get help from a tax professional and research the IRS website (IRS.gov) to make the most of your unique situation.

Student Natalie Dylan from San Diego auctions her virginity, reportedly got bids up to $3.7 million

Going, going, gone!  Sold to the highest bidder! 

No, it's not a painting or a trip.  It's Natalie Dylan's virginity.

Dylan, a 22-year old student from San Diego, is selling her virginity to the highest bidder, according to the Daily Telegraph. 

She claims she has received offers up to $3.7M for a one-night stand with her, the paper reported.

Dylan says that 10,000 men have bid to have sex with her, according to the paper.

"I think me and the person I do it with will both profit greatly from the deal," Dylan told the paper. 

Dylan wants to auction off her virginity to pay for her master's degree in Family and Marriage Therapy. 

She was inspired to do this by the actions of her sister, Avia, who worked as a prostitute for three weeks to help pay for her degree, the paper reported. 

"I know that a lot of people will condemn me for this because it's so taboo but I really don't have a problem with that," Dylan told the Daily Telegraph.

Dylan is confident that she is not degrading herself by auctioning her virginity.  "My study is completely authentic in that I truly am auctioning my virginity but I am not being sold into this. I'm not being taken advantage of in any way," she told the paper.

"It's shocking that men will pay so much for someone's virginity, which isn't even prized so highly anymore," she told the paper.

Intel Corp. survey: Nearly 1/2 of all women and 1/3 of men prefer the Internet to sex

Yes, you read that headline right.  No, it's not a gimmick. 

48 percent of women and 30 percent of men prefer the Internet to sex, according to a new study by Intel Corp. 

The study asked more than 2,000 adults what they would rather give up for a period of two weeks, the Internet or sex. 

Turns out, a lot of them would rather give up sex.  (This begs the question: where can we find out what they're surfing the Web for?!)

The survey also found:

• 58 percent of adults would give up watching TV for two weeks rather than have to give up Internet access for only one week
  
  
• 65 percent of adults said they cannot live without Internet access
  
  
• 39 percent said they couldn't live without cable TV and 20 percent couldn't live without dining out
  
  
• Only 10 percent said they couldn't live without a gym membership.   

Apple may have a more inexpensive alternative to the iPhone - a smaller mini-iPhone

The new iPhone mini would cost half as much and be half the size of a regular iPhone.

The iPhone may soon be competing against another slick new smart phone - a smaller, cheaper version of itself.

Speculation that Apple is developing a mini-iPhone has intensified after several media outlets cited multiple sources within Apple that a new phone is in the works for a possible summer release.

Dubbed the iPhone Nano by techies, it would be about half the size and sell for considerably less than the iPhone 4, which retails for $199 with the cheapest options.

The new iPhone would also come with little to no internal memory, relying instead on so-called cloud storage that saves data on the Internet, according to The Wall Street Journal.

There were conflicting reports about the possible cost of a mini- iPhone.

The Journal said carriers AT&T and Verizon - which buy iPhones from Apple for about $625 each, then sell them for $199 to $299 with a two-year contract - could either sell the new iPhone for half that amount or even offer it to consumers for free to lure them into signing a contract.

Other tech websites speculated that Apple would sell the phone directly to consumers for $99 without any contract.

The introduction of a smaller iPhone is seen as Apple's answer to inexpensive phones using Google's Android operating system, the leader in the worldwide smart phone market with a 33% share, according to tech research firm Canalys. Apple is third with a 16% share.

More people get breast implants today than 10 years ago; nose jobs, liposuction are on the decline

More women are getting breast implants today than they were 10 years ago, research shows.
Nose jobs and liposuction? So 10 years ago. Today's top procedures are boob jobs and wrinkle treatments.

New numbers released by the American Society of Plastic Surgeons show that although breast enhancement surgeries have shot up almost 40 percent in the past decade, other cosmetic procedures, including nose reshaping, liposuction, eyelid surgery and face-lifts, are losing popularity.

The New York Times Well blog reported that 13.1 million cosmetic procedures took place in 2010, a 5 percent increase from 2009. Of those procedures, 11.6 million were noninvasive treatments and 1.6 million were operations.

About 90 percent of patients were women, and many were looking to give their breasts a boost. In 2010, 296,203 people sought breast implants and 90,000 received breast-lifts, a number up 70 percent from 2000.

Breast reduction operations were also up 6 percent from 2009, and implant removal procedures jumped 9% from the year before.

But although more women are changing their cup size than they were 10 years ago, people are less willing to undergo other invasive surgeries. Doctors performed 43 percent fewer liposuctions than they did in 2000. Nose jobs also went down 35 percent and face-lifts declined by 16 percent.

One treatment that has taken off in the past decade? Botox. The Times reported 5.4 million people received injections in 2010, up a whopping 584 percent from 2000. Wrinkle fillers and laser hair removal also spiked in popularity.

Patients aged 40 to 54 accounted for nearly half of all procedures last year, but an increasing number of older people are getting work done these days, too. The Times reported that 3.3 million people over age 55 received some sort of treatment last year, up 4 percent from 2009.