West Words

A fundamentalist church is planning a Halloween bonfire of “heretical” books – including the Bible and writings by the Pope and Mother Teresa.
Pastor Marc Grizzard of the tiny Amazing Grace Baptist Church in Canton, North Carolina, believes that the King James version of the Bible is the only true word of God and that all other English translations are “perversions of God's word” and “Satan's bibles.”
He and his 14-strong congregation will also burn books by preachers including Billy Graham and Robert Schuller, as well as music including Southern gospel and contemporary Christian, plus pop, country, rap and heavy metal.

Rap superstar Kanye West and his road manager have been ordered to do 50 hours of community service after a brawl with photographers last year.
Once they have done so a Los Angeles judge will dismiss the charges against them both.
West, 32, pleaded not guilty in May to misdemeanour vandalism, battery and grand theft stemming from the run-in at Los Angeles International Airport in September last year.
His roadie, Don Crawley, 33, pleaded not guilty to two counts of each charge.
West's lawyer, Blair Berk, convinced the judge the criminal charges were too harsh, and said West will perform his volunteer work with the American Red Cross.

Desperate Housewives star Eva Longoria Parker and her husband Tony Parker are starring in a sizzling new advertising campaign for Christmas.
The actress and the basketball star feature in a new campaign for London Fog which sees them snuggling up together to promote the firm's clothes and accessories.
“It was fun to work together,” Longoria Parker, 34, said. “London Fog is always classy and beautiful, and we knew we were in good hands for the campaign.
“The coats and bags were gorgeous; I am a huge fan of trench coats and all the London Fog trenches were amazing.”

Joseph Wiseman, who played the original James Bond villain Dr No, has died, aged 91.
Wiseman, who had been ill for several years, died at his home in Manhattan, his daughter Martha Graham Wiseman said.
Canadian-born Wiseman had made several Broadway appearances and featured in films including Viva Zapata! and The Silver Chalice before he was cast as the mysterious title character in the film which introduced Sean Connery as James Bond.
He had no idea he was to become an iconic figure in launching one of the most successful and longest-running film franchises in history.
“As far as I was concerned, I thought it might be just another grade-B Charlie Chan mystery,” he said in a 1992 interview.

Pop star Britney Spears has settled a lawsuit brought a photographer whose foot she ran over two years ago.
Ricardo Mendoza sued the Circus star for assault, battery and negligently driving her car in the incident outside a medical building in Beverly Hills.
The incident occurred just hours after Spears lost custody of her sons Sean Preston and Jayden James, and Mendoza claimed her minders should have know she was in no condition to drive safely.
Terms of the settlement were not revealed.
When Mendoza filed the lawsuit in May he asked for unspecified damages, but amended his complaint last month to as for nearly $230,000 in damages and medical expenses.

Actress Lindsay Lohan has called on her big-mouthed dad to stop talking about her.
Michael Lohan has accused the Mean Girls star of becoming addicted to prescription drugs and has threatened to stage an intervention.
He has also accused her of leading her 15-year-old sister Ali astray.
Now Lindsay, 23, has told Us magazine: “I'm so hurt that someone who calls himself my father needs to use the press to communicate with me.
“I have not spoken to my father, nor have I responded to his threatening and erratic messages over the last several months.
“It's so sad that he needs to stay in the media spotlight by using my name and making up excessive lies. He should instead try to be a real father.”

Police have launched a murder investigation going back four decades after a man choked to death on a raw hot dog.
Jimmy Crawford, 65, died in July when he had a seizure in mid-mouthful.
Now a medical examiner in New York has ruled his death a homicide – because his seizures were the result of a brutal attack in Greenwich Village in 1965.
His ruling has detectives in the 6th Precinct hunting for a suspect, but so far they have not found a record of the attack.
“I doubt very much if any of the detectives involved are still alive,” Crawford's uncle, Tom Delaney, himself a retired New York detective, told the New York Daily News.

Tennis ace Chris Evert is being sued by a friend of her children who was injured near her home.
Miles McKnought-Smith suffered a broken foot in a collision between a golf cart and a dirt bike owned by the three-time Wimbledon champion.
Florida businessman Al Malnik, godfather of Michael Jackson's younger son Blanket, is also named in the suit because the accident happened on his land.
McKnought-Smith's lawyer, John Agnetti, said he did not believe Evert, 54, was at her five-acre, $2 million Boca Raton home at the time.
“It seems that Ms Evert's home became a hangout with schoolchildren,” he told columnist Jose Lambiet. “She has a lot of toys and there wasn't much adult supervision.”

The estranged wife of Terminator 2 star Edward Furlong wants to dismiss a restraining order she obtained against him three weeks ago.
Rachel Kneeland claimed in court papers that he had threatened to kill her, that his drug use had escalated and that he had been place on a psychiatric hold after she called the emergency 911 number.
Now actress Kneeland, 25, who also uses the surname Bella says she wants to keep things amicable.
“We're actually friends,” she told People magazine. “We're not having a bad divorce. We just ran into some issues.
“Eddie did some things to prove to me that he's back on track with his life and that's all I wanted.”

A beauty queen sacked after she made controversial remarks about gay marriage has been sued by pageant organisers for the cost of her boob job.
Miss California Carrie Prejean, 22, was plunged into controversy during the Miss USA finals in April, when in answer to a question she said she believed marriage should be between a man and a woman.
Pageant owner Donald Trump defended her right to speak her mind and she retained her second place title in the contest.
But in June she was fired as Miss California for breach of contract for being too controversial, including making an advert for the National Organisation of Marriage and making appearances without pageant officials' approval.

Reality star Kelly Osbourne was sent to hospital after inuring her foot taping an episode of Dancing with the Stars.
But the 24-year-old daughter of wild-man rocker Ozzy Osbourne bravely struggled through to complete the taping, doing her final group dance barefoot.
She was then rushed to Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in West Hollywood.
Her Dutch dance partner Louis van Amstel told E! News after Monday's recording session: “At the end of our pasa doble Kelly banged her foot on the floor which may have caused an injury.
“She is at the hospital right now to take an X-Ray and an MRI to make sure she will be OK to dance. Kelly will keep me updated on her prognosis.”

Actress Megan Fox has transformed her opinion of the film series which made her a star.
During the summer she criticised both her hit film Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and director Michael Bay.
But she changed her tune when she accepted a sci-fi actress award at the Spike TV fourth annual Scream Awards at the weekend.
“I don't usually do this but I wanted to say something,” she told the audience at the Los Angeles suburb of Los Feliz. “There have been a lot of false reports about how I feel about this movie.
“I just want to be very clear that I've always felt I'm a very ordinary part of an extraordinary film.”

Ghostbusters star Dan Aykroyd has revealed he was born to the role – because his family home is haunted.
Aykroyd, 58, who is set to team up with Bill Murray and Harold Ramis in a third instalment of the spooky series, has been aware of the spirits all his life.
“I remember when I was about four or five my grandparents and mom and dad discussing what went on in this room,” he recalled of the parlour in the family's 19th century farmhouse in Ontario, Canada.
“It was all in hushed tones, as if I wasn't supposed to hear. It was about the seances that were held here.”

Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe has bought a third multi-million dollar property in New York.
He paid $5.65 million for a five-storey townhouse in Greenwich Village.
It is one of three adjoining houses built in 1847 by a sea captain for his three daughters, and has five bedrooms, four bathrooms and six working fireplaces.
A 39-foot garden is landscaped with old trees, according to Sotheby's International Realty, with a balcony off a bedroom overlooking it.
The house is divided into two units at present, with a separate one-bedroom, one-bathroom flat on the garden level with access to the garden.
The main house has an open-plan living room, dining room and kitchen taking up a whole floor.

Hotel heiress Paris Hilton is said to have demanded luxury hotel style service on the set of her new film – including live lobsters.
Hilton, 28, wanted the crustaceans on hand, along with a bottle of pricey vodka, in case she got peckish during her one-day shoot on The Other Guys.
The comedy, starring Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg as bumbling cops and Samuel L Jackson and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as elite officers, is filming in New York.
A source told the New York Post: “Paris has a cameo role in the movie, where she plays herself.

Elizabeth Clare Prophet, former head of the new age Church Universal and Triumphant, has died, aged 70.
The church, which combined elements of major world religions as well as mysticism, was founded by Prophet who claimed she was guided by “ascended masters” including Jesus, Buddha and St Germain.
It was dismissed by mainstream religions as a cult but at its peak in the 1980s it had about 50,000 members.
Prophet, brought up as a Christian Scientist in New Jersey, was introduced to the theology of ascended masters by her husband, Mark Prophet, who founded a spiritual organisation called Summit Lighthouse.

A New York neighbour of pop superstar Madonna is suing over her high-volume music.
Karen George, who lives above Madonna's Central Park West flat in New York has filed a suit against the building's management board to get her to pipe down.
The suit says: “Madonna and one or more of her invited guests repeatedly dance and train to unreasonably high-decibel, amplified music,causing noise and vibration to pour through the walls, ceilings and radiators.
“Ms George has been forced to endure blaring music, stomping and shaking walls for approximately one and a half to three hours each day.”
The suit also says the board has already threatened to evict Madonna, 51, if does not quieten down and stop the dance sessions.
 

Oscar-winning actor Nicolas Cage is suing his business manager for driving him to the brink of financial ruin.
He claims Samuel Levin was so reckless and incompetent with his money that he has been forced to sell of part of his property empire and is facing massive tax debts.
In the past two weeks it has been revealed that Cage owes more than $6 million in income tax and is being sued for non-payment of a $2 million line of credit.
Now, in his Los Angeles superior Court lawsuit he accuses Levin of lining his own pockets at his expense while leaving the actor facing “catastrophic losses.”

Rocker and activist Bono has one of the most solid marriages in showbusiness – but after 27 years he's not sure why.
“After all these years she's still a mystery to me,” he said of childhood sweetheart Ali Hewson.
Bono, 49, started dating Hewson, 48, in 1975, a year before U2 was founded, and they have four children, Jordan, 20, Memphis, 18, Eli, 10, and eight-year-old John.
He made his comments after a party to celebrate Irish musician Gavin Friday's 50th birthday at New York's Carnegie Hall, where he and Hewson appeared inseparable.
 

Jennifer Aniston and singer John Mayer are more than just good friends once again.
The couple who started dating in March last year, only to split up twice, are back together,according to American reports.
Since their last split in March, after they made a very public appearance together at the Oscars in February, former Friends star Aniston has had flings with Bradley Cooper, her co-star in He's Just Not That Into You, and Gerard Butler, who stars with her in the upcoming comedy The Bounty.
Now a source close to Mayer, 31, has told Us magazine: “They are very close. They remain great friends. He thinks she's amazing, nice and smart, and he has nothing but respect for her.”