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Nicki and Mariah at war on American Idol

Nicki and Mariah at war on American Idol

The war between Nicki Minaj and Mariah Carey is heating up on the set of American Idol.

The two, who were filmed during an explosive feud about a contestant (see video above) during auditions on Tuesday in North Carolina, are continuing the argument off set.

Fellow judge Keith Urban was stuck in the middle of the pair during the blow-up, in which Nicki was recorded saying: “I told them I’m not f–kin’ putting up with her f–king highness over there.

“Figure it the f–k out. Figure it out.”

Now veteran TV journalist Barbara Walters has got herself involved in the row.

Mariah sought the advice of The View host following the war of words and called her to talk about the incident, saying the worst part wasn’t even captured on video.

“She said that when Nicki walked off the set, multiple people heard her say, ‘If I had a gun I would shoot that bitch’,” Barbara revealed on The View.

“And she said there were staff members that heard – hairdressers, producers and other people. She said she’s very concerned. She is with her twins and doesn’t feel that anything would happen, but ‘Nicki is unpredictable’. Mariah says she can’t take a chance and has hired extra security.”

The interference didn’t go down well with 29-year-old singer Nicki, who took to Twitter to slam the claims.

“Ironically no camera or mic heard the gun comment though,” she tweeted. “LOL at the struggle. Not even the producers believed you. Say no to violence barbz.

“I don’t call TMZ and Barbara Walters because I stand on my own two feet. Never needed an army. God is good. Insecurity is as cruel as the grave,” she wrote.

“I guess it hurts to have the producers tell you to your face that Nicki is the best judge we’ve had since Simon. Awww, poor you. Keep them lies coming.”

Mariah’s husband Nick Cannon has also spoken out in defence of his wife. “[Mariah] is the strongest and the classiest woman I’ve ever met,” he told Access Hollywood “She signed up to do a job to help young people accomplish their dreams and [the spat] is like a sidebar. I hope that’s not what this show becomes about, the catfights.”

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Mother’s emotional reunion with missing boy

Mother's emotional reunion with missing boy

Bianca Graham and her son Riley Martin, 4.

A mother’s emotional reunion with her missing four-year-old son has been caught on camera.

Riley Martin, who has Down syndrome, disappeared from his home in Nambucca Heads at midday yesterday, along with the family’s three dogs.

In pictures: The beautiful faces of Down syndrome

His mother Bianca Graham was in the middle of an impassioned plea for his safe return on the TODAY show this morning when the boy was found.

A couple discovered Riley lying under a tree with one of the dogs and family friends interrupted tearful Bianca’s live TV interview to tell her the happy news.

Their reunion was then captured on camera and was quickly shared thousands of times on social networks.

Bianca says she believes the family dogs, a kelpie and two fox terriers, helped keep Riley safe.

In pictures: Meet the newest Down syndrome superstar

“I tell you those dogs kept him alive, they looked after him, those dogs,” she said.

Riley was taken to hospital for a check-up, but appeared to only to have suffered a few minor scratches after the incident.

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Arnold Schwarzenegger: I will win Maria Shriver back

He had a love child with the family maid and lied about it for years, but Arnold Schwarzenegger still hopes he can rebuild his relationship with estranged wife Maria Shriver.
Couples reunited: Can a relationship be revived after divorce?

He had a love child with the family maid and lied about it for years, but Arnold Schwarzenegger still hopes he can rebuild his relationship with estranged wife Maria Shriver.

Arnold, 65, has given a candid interview condemning his infidelity, praising his “fantastic” wife and revealing his desire to win her back.

“It was a situation where I couldn’t even blame anybody else but myself, because my wife was a fantastic wife,” Arnold told US TV show Hannity while promoting his new memoir Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story.

“She was a great friend, she was a great adviser, everything, great mother. I mean, my kids were fantastic. The thing that I cherished the most, I destroyed by some stupid things that I’ve done.

“For me, it’s important to kind of rebuild again, get the trust back with the kids, with my wife.”

Arnold said he was confident he and Maria would reconcile “eventually” but conceded it would probably take a few months for her to get over his betrayal.

“It takes a lot of time to heal those wounds and to trust each other again,” he said. “But, you know, I will make every effort.”

Maria, 56, filed for divorce in July 2011, two months after Arnold’s affair with the family’s long-term housekeeper Mildred Baena — which resulted in the birth of son Joseph, now 15 — was revealed.

They have been married for 25 years and have four children together, Katherine, 22, Christina, 21, Patrick, 19, and Christopher, 15.

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Why I give my four-year-old daughter Viagra

Why I give my four-year-old daughter Viagra

Jo and Ruby Ernest.

Ruby Ernest is just four years old, but she has already spent many long nights in hospital, struggling to breathe as the inoperable tumour in her lung swells.

Six months after doctors told Ruby’s family that there was nothing they could do, help came from an unexpected place: a packet of tiny blue pills traditionally used to treat erectile dysfunction.

For the past five weeks, Ruby has been taking Viagra every day as part of an experimental drug trial in conjunction with Stanford University in the US.

Related: Meet the toddler who shouldn’t be alive

Researchers are hoping the controversial treatment will shrink Ruby’s 9.5cm lymphatic malformation, a tumour-like deformity that is blocking her airways and putting pressure on her heart.

Ruby’s mother Jo has been hoping for a cure ever since the tumour was discovered in March, but admits she was a little dubious when the paediatrician suggested Viagra could help.

Her disbelief was quickly replaced by excitement, but many of her family and friends have been unable to get past the bad jokes.

“It’s been shocking!” Jo says. “Even the doctor has been throwing erection jokes around!

“My dad is an absolute shocker! A lot of people don’t seem to know whether they should laugh or look concerned, so I’ve been breaking the ice.

“I say, ‘How ironic is this? We’re using Viagra to make something smaller?'”

Ruby is now nearly half-way through the recommended 12-week trial. Doctors are yet to see any noticeable results, but shrinkage is not expected until week 11 or 12.

Jo hopes the medication will do its job, but she’s trying not to get her hopes up.

“I can’t think about the future because then I can’t cope,” she says. “You just have to take things one day at a time. It’s a roller coaster of emotion. I’m grateful for hair colour because I’ve literally gone grey overnight.

“The tumour is touching her heart already. Tomorrow it could grow, could swell in the wrong direction and that could be it.

“That’s the hardest part — the unpredictability. There’s this ticking time bomb inside your baby and you don’t know when it’s going to go off.”

Sadly, Ruby’s condition is likely to worsen as she gets older. Lymphatic malformations grow with the child, swelling larger every month.

Until recently, the condition has been considered untreatable, as the enlarged lymph vessels are too close to vital organs to remove them surgically.

But earlier this year, doctors at Packard Children’s Hospital in San Francisco discovered a potential cure while treating a child with an unrelated condition.

Related: My four-year-old son had a heart attack

The patient — who coincidentally suffered from severe lymphatic malformations — was given Viagra to treat pulmonary hypertension, and doctors were shocked to discover the drug shrank the girl’s tumours significantly.

The findings were published in the New England Journal of Medicine in January and Stanford University is now closely following the treatment of other children around the world with the condition.

If you want to show your support for Jo and Ruby, join their toy challenge and donate toys to public hospitals who desperately need them.

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Kim Kardashian taking diet pills to lose weight

Kim Kardashian taking diet pills to lose weight

Kim Kardashian is famous for her curves but she is desperately trying to lose the weight she has gained since dating singer Kanye West.

The 31-year-old recently tweeted that she and sister Kourtney, who recently gave birth to a baby girl named Penelope, have the same amount of weight to lose.

“How is it that @KourtneyKardash & I have the same amount of weight to lose but she just had a baby! SMH help! LOL,” Kim tweeted.

Like most aspects of her life, the reality TV star isn’t afraid to share how she plans to lose the weight either, saying that she is taking diet pills to help her along.

“Since I started QuickTrim again a few weeks ago, I’m down 6 pounds!!! Yay best feeling. I was getting discouraged but now I’m so motivated!” she recently tweeted.

Kim, who has an endorsement deal with the company, recently flew to Australia to promote the controversial product which is the subject of a lawsuit in the USA by customers who say it doesn’t live up to its weight-loss claims.

The sisters who are currently filming the upcoming season of Kourtney & Kim Take Miami, have been spotted together working out, while the whole Kardashian clan have been spotted in Miami visiting the pair.

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Doctors fear dangers of texting while parenting

Doctors fear dangers of texting while parenting

An increase in accidental injuries in small children coincides with a huge increase in adults use of smartphones

Don’t text and drive — we know this much. But has anyone considered the dangers of mobile-distraction while supervising children? The answer is yes, doctors have, and they’re concerned.

The perils of texting while parenting have been uncovered in data released by the US-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suggesting that a 12 percent rise in nonfatal injuries to children under age five may be related to the also increasing number of Americans who own and use smartphones.

Related: I have a favourite child and so do you

Accidental injuries to children under age five rose 12 percent between 2007 and 2010, after falling steadily since at least the 1970s.

While limited data is collected that could establish direct links, the dramatic increase in unintentional injury in young children under parental supervision coincides with a spike in smartphone sales.

The number of Americans who own smartphones has grown from almost 9 million in 2007 when Apple’s iPhone was first released, to 63 million at the end of 2010.

In July 2012, that number had again rocketed to 114 million.

The dawn of the iPhone brought with it a mini-revolution in digital advances and hand-held convenience, but doctors are now suggesting it could also have heralded a new era in irresponsible parenting.

“It’s very well understood within the emergency medicine community that utilising devices — hand-held devices — while you are assigned to watch your kids — that resulting injuries could very well be because you are utilising those tools,” an emergency centre doctor told the Wall Street Journal.

“We think we’re multitasking and not really feeling like we are truly distracted. But in reality we are,” said another.

Increases in injuries were present in older age brackets as well, but the rates of increase tended to drop off by the ages in which the requirement of constant adult supervision subsided.

Unintentional injuries among kids aged five to nine increased by five percent in the same time period, and three per cent for kids aged 10-14.

Other factors have been suggested to explain the three-year increase across age groups, including budget cuts by schools and governments, riskier behaviour among children, or an increasing tendency for parents to present at emergency rooms.

Child experts have said that it is difficult to determine causes for parental distraction as parents don’t often offer explanations of what they were doing when their child was injured, combined with a tendency for people to underreport the time they spend on their mobile devices.

Dr David Schwebel, an injury prevention expert from the University of Alabama said that children have a natural risk to hurt themselves if they are not properly watched by an adult.

“If the adult is distracted, clearly the risk is increased. We know that drivers and pedestrians are more at risk when they use devices. It’s a fairly small leap to suggest that supervisors are distracted,” he said.

Related: Asthma drugs make kids shorter

In the US, a 35-year-old woman was charged with reckless endangerment in the second degree and risk of injury to a minor after her friend’s two-year-old son who she was minding almost drowned in a hotel pool while she fiddled with her phone, texting and looking at photos.

This is one of many cases in the US that has childcare experts and medical professionals concerned over the link between mobile phone use and child safety.

Your say: Do you get distracted by technology while supervising your children?

Video: Child anxiety linked to parenting: study

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Sleep-deprived teens at greater risk of heart disease

Sleep-deprived teens at greater risk of heart disease

A Canadian study has found teens who get sleep are more likely to have heart problems

Teens who get less sleep are more likely to develop heart problems later in life, a new study has found.

Researchers found that of the 4,100 teenagers studied, the third with the poorest sleep quality were more likely to be overweight or have unhealthy blood pressure or cholesterol levels.

Related: One in five kids overweight when they start school

Though all the kids in the Canadian study were ‘unhealthy’, of the third with the worst sleep-scores, determined by studying their sleep quality, 48 percent were found to be overweight or had higher blood pressure, compared to 39 percent in the group that were more well rested.

When it came to risk factors, teens with the worst sleep quality were 43 percent more likely to develop heart problems.

“When people think about cardiovascular risk, sleep doesn’t usually come up,” senior researcher Dr McCrindle said.

“These findings give some more evidence that sleep is one of the things people should think about.”

Though the relationship between sleep quality and heart health in teenagers was consistent, the findings did not prove that sleep problems were directly to blame.

Those with poor sleep — qualified by problems falling or staying asleep, restlessness and bad dreams — were found to have less than ideal lifestyle habits in other areas, including getting less exercise, spending more time in front of the TV, and having a poorer diet.

It was also suggested that those awake in the wee hours had greater opportunity for late-night snacking, which could also be a contributor a poor diet leading to heart problems.

Though the connection between snooze-time and heart health may be indirect, researchers were quick to emphasise the importance of a good night’s sleep.

“I think the importance of sleep hygiene cannot be overemphasised,” said Dr Indra Narang who led the study.

Related: Staying up all night playing video games ‘puts teens at higher risk of diabetes’

“In general, we recommend that teenagers get eight to nine hours of sleep each night.”

The Australian Centre for Education in Sleep also recommends that adolescents get nine or more hours sleep a night, warning that sleep deprivation could results in an increase in accidents, obesity, sickness, and varied psychological effects.

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Oprah is smokin’ in new film

Introducing Oprah Winfrey the actress! The TV talk show host turned sexy vixen has shared some pictures of herself as she shoots new movie The Butler.

Oprah plays Gloria Gains, the unfaithful wife of Cecil Gains played by Forest Whittaker. Oprah, who added these images to her instragram account, has some on-screen steamy love sessions with co-star Terrance Howard and recently tweeted her thanks to director Lee Daniels for her experience.

“And THAT’s a Wrap! Terrance Howard and me in our goodbye ‘love scene’. Thanks Lee Daniels for the great experience. #theButler,” she wrote.

Take a look at Oprah in the movie here.

Oprah and Terrance Howard during a scene for The Butler.

Oprah on set with costume designer Ruth Carter channeling 1957.

Oprah and director Lee Daniels on set.

Oprah is serenaded by Terrance Howard.

In the make-up chair.

Oprah on set.

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Good girl gone bad: Smoking Oprah Winfrey in The Butler

She is the world's most famous talk show queen, but Oprah Winfrey has shelved her respectable daytime TV persona for a new film.
Oprah Winfrey in the Butler

She is the world’s most famous talk show queen, but Oprah Winfrey has shelved her respectable daytime TV persona for a new film.

The 58-year-old star has released a still from the set of her new movie The Butler which shows her in a seductive pose, smoking a cigarette as a younger man gazes hungrily at her.

It is a far cry from Oprah’s usual immaculate image and she seemed to revel in the saucy snap, sharing it on her instagram account with the caption: “And THAT’s a wrap! Terrance Howard and me in our goodbye ‘love scene’. Thanks Lee Daniels for the great experience.”

The Butler is based on the life of long-serving White House servant Eugene Allen, played by Forest Whitaker. Oprah stars as Forest’s rebellious wife who, judging by the latest image, is something of a vixen.

Alex Pettyfer, James Marsden, Jane Fonda, John Cusack, Alan Rickman, Robin Williams, Cuba Gooding Jr, Minka Kelly and Lenny Kravitz also star in the film.

Oprah recently spoke about the role with her best friend Gayle King on US TV show This Morning.

“I felt pretty good about it, let me just say,” Oprah said. “Forest is a good kisser, how about that?”

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‘Fat’ TV host fights back against bullies

'I'm more than a number on a scale' TV host fights back at bullies

A US TV anchor has taken aim at bullies addressing attacks over her weight on air

A US TV anchor has taken aim at bullies in an on-air response to an insulting viewer letter over her weight, and is encouraging kids to stand up to bullies as well.

Jennifer Livingston, a news show host in Wisconsin received an email last week accusing her for being a bad role model.

Chrissie Swan: I’m not ashamed of my size

“Surely you don’t consider yourself a suitable role example for this community’s young people, girls in particular,” the letter read.

“Obesity is one of the worst choices a person can make and one of the most dangerous habits to maintain.

“I leave you this note hoping that you’ll reconsider your responsibility as a local public personality to present and promote a healthy lifestyle.”

Ms Livingston said that she was not personally offended by the letter, but felt it necessary to stand up to the viewer after the comments had caused a great deal of criticism since being posted on Facebook by her husband and colleague.

“The truth is, I am overweight,” she said.

“You can call me fat, and yes, even obese on a doctor’s chart.

“But to the person who wrote me that letter, do you think I don’t know that? That your cruel words are pointing out something that I don’t see?

“You don’t know me and you are not a friend of mine. You are not a part of my family and you have admitted you do not watch this show, so you know nothing about me but what you see on the outside, and I am much more than a number on a scale.”

The mother of three girls pointed out that while she was not affected by the comments of bullies, there were many children who don’t know better, who are being bullied or are learning bullying behaviour from adults who demonstrate those behaviours to them as the viewer had.

Ms Livingstone rounded off her four minute address with a message to young people.

“To all of the children out there who feel lost or who are struggling with your weight, with the colour of your skin, your sexual preference, your disability, even the acne on your face, listen to me right now.

Related: How you can boost your daughter’s body image

“Do not let your self-worth be defined by bullies, learn from my experience that the cruel words of one are nothing compared to the shouts of many.”

The video has since been shared by thousands of people including celebrities like Ellen Degeneres, and has been met with resounding support.

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