1. A Victorian woman called police 38 times in the weeks before she died at the hands of her violent former partner, who had tried to run her over and strangle her before he stabbed her to death.
News Ltd is reporting on the inquest, which heard that Kelly Thompson, 43, had taken legal steps to protect herself from Wayne Wood, who killed her at her Point Cook home in February 2014.
Wood tried to strangle Kelly, and run her over and he stalked her many times, yet Kelly seemed unable to get protection from him.
Counsel Assisting the Coroner, Rachel Ellyard, told the hearing Ms Thompson had phoned police at least 38 times in the weeks before she died.
“Kelly died in her home, she died in bed, but she died violently,” Ms Ellyard said.
The inquest is continuing.
2. Prime Minister Tony Abbott has crowed with delight at the damage done to the Labor party by the ABC documentary, The Killing Season.
The Sydney Morning Herald reports that Mr Abbott got to his feet in Parliament yesterday saying: “I want to say publicly ‘thank you to the ABC. Thank you to the ABC’” while “throwing his arms high and wide.”
“I don’t normally say thank you to the ABC but I have to say Australia is indebted to you on this instance,” he crowed.
The three-part documentary, The Killing Season, shows Labor in all its dysfunctional glory, with Kevin Rudd ripping into Julia Gillard and vice versa.
Current Labor leader Bill Shorten wasn’t interviewed from the program but has been shown to be behind the removal of both leaders.
3. When it comes to losing weight, which is more important? Diet or exercise?
According to The New York Times, it’s definitely diet.
The Times says the problem with exercise is that it doesn’t burn anywhere near as many kilojoules as people think.
According to the report, swimming laps for 30 minutes burns as little as 350 calories, which is about one plain bagel. Walking for 30 minutes burns off about two Tim-Tams.
Also, when you exercise, you get hungry. That’s because the body is signaling you to replace even those few calories you are burning. You feel hungrier than you did when you weren’t exercising, and in an effort to fill up, you easily eat what you’ve just burnt off.
The good news is that diets don’t have to be drastic to lead to weight loss. Forget all the fad diets, the most important thing is to cut down your portion sizes. That’s it. Just eat a little less at each meal. Half a cup of rice instead of a whole cup. Half a giant food court sandwich instead of the whole thing. Also, try to lose weight over the long term. It’s the most sensible, sustainable way.
All that said, the report concludes that exercise “has a big upside for health beyond potential weight loss.” It’s good for taming depression, and may even keep diabetes under control.
“But that huge upside doesn’t seem to necessarily apply to weight loss,” the report says, probably sadly. “The data just don’t support it. Unfortunately, exercise seems to excite us much more than eating less does.”
4. Police in Britain are searching for two men wearing motorcycle helmets who dragged a woman to the ground and stomped on her, killing her unborn baby.
They don’t believe the attack was random, but targeted, and probably designed to kill the child.
The 21-year-old victim, Malorie Bantala, was 32 weeks pregnant when she was attacked. Witnesses say she was approached by two men whose faces were hidden behind the helmets.
They pushed her to the ground and repeatedly kicked and stamped on her stomach before running off. The victim lost her baby and is in a critical condition.
Robert Pack, from the Metropolitan police’s homicide and major crime command, told the Guardian had never seen a crime like it.
He added: “It’s an indication of how seriously the Metropolitan police are taking this that it’s been passed to my team, the homicide and serious crime command. We are treating this with all the resources and seriousness of a murder investigation.”
5. Civil rights activist Rachel Dolezal, who has been forced to resigned from various jobs in the US this week after her parents outed her as white not black, continues to insist that a person’s race has nothing to do with the colour of their skin.
Race is, she says, a social construct, so never mind that she has white parents, and white skin, and no African American heritage at all. She identifies as black and wants to be accepted as black.
Fine. So how come Rachel Dolezal is a regular at the local self-tan joint?
Gossip website TMZ says Rachel – who also dyes her hair and gets it permed nice and springy and then posts Facebook pictures saying she’s ‘going natural’ with her hair – is a ‘loyal customer’ at Palm Beach Tan in Spokane, Washington.
“We’re told she was a fan of Mystic Tan. We’re told Rachel was a frequent customer,” the website says.
Rachel doesn’t deny tanning to make herself appear darker, while at the same time insisting it’s irrelevant. In interviews this week, she said she didn’t even try to stay out of the sun.
6. And in sporting news, the Blues (is that NSW?) have levelled the State of Origin series (is that rugby) with what the Nine Network has described as a “pulsating 26-18 win” over the Maroons (is that Queensland?) in front of a record crowd at the MCG (isn’t that in Victoria?).
Apparently Josh Dugan’s “scything run clinched the win for NSW, just minutes after both sides were both denied tries with dubious refereeing decisions.”
Then, “with the Maroons leading 18-14, Pearce loped over next to the posts in the 65th minute but referee Ben Cummins ruled the final pass from Trent Hodkinson forward.”
Okay. Whatever. The point is, it’s now one-all and down to the big decider. Not that anyone thinks its rigged.
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