Dr. Travis Stork: Engaged to Dr. Charlotte Brown!


Dr. Travis Stork was once The Bachelor. Now he's just the fiance.

Stork proposed to his girlfriend of two years, pediatrician Dr. Charlotte Brown, while vacationing on the island of Lanai in Hawaii recently. Congratulations!

Brown accepted. No wedding date has been set yet, but Stork, who now co-hosts the talk show The Doctors, and his bride-to-be couldn't be happier!

Travis Stork and Charlotte Brown

Travis Stork and Sarah Stone likely had the shortest engagement in The Bachelor history, breaking up before the After the Final Rose special even aired.

But things happen for a reason, right? Surely he and Charlotte will make this work. On a side note, this guy once dated Carrie Underwood! Amazing.

Natalie Portman Larissa Meek Shannon Elizabeth Scarlett Johansson Olivia Wilde

Charlie bit my finger ? again !

Posted by ILookFlyChick - Monday May 2, 2011 07:19

Charlie bit my finger ? again !

Even had I thought of trying to get my boys to do this I probably couldn?t have. Neither were coerced into any of this and neither were hurt (for very long anyway). This was just one of those moments when I had the video camera out because the boys were being fun and they provided something really very funny. FAQ Harry is 7, Charlie is 4 3/4, Jasper is 2 1/2 Harry and Charlie Blogging harryandcharlie.blogspot.com Twitter twitter.com
Video Rating: 4 / 5

Veronika Vaeková Amanda Peet Georgianna Robertson Christina Milian Amber Valletta

Check Out Graphic Video Taken Inside Osama Bin Laden?s Compound

binladencompound Check Out Graphic Video Taken Inside Osama Bin Ladens Compound

Gruesome photos of terrorist Osama bin Laden?s luxury compound have been released, along with reports that bin Laden was buried at sea.  Check out the graphic video below.

Al Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden had been hiding out at a luxury compound at the end of a long dirt road, where sources claim he was being protected by Pakistani security.

Intelligence officials reveal Bin Laden?s hideout was a huge, high-security compound, which was secured with barbed-wire topped walls.

The huge $1 million dollar compound is located about 90 miles northeast of Islamabad and 1,000 yards away from their military academy.

Sources reveal there were around 22 people living in the compound.

An ABC news reporter gained entry into the compound?s site in Abbotabad, Pakistan where the U.S. Navy SEALs killed the terrorist.

The rooms in the luxury hide-out were ransacked and filled with broken glass and blood-splattered walls and rugs.

Osama bin Laden, one of his sons, two Al Qaeda couriers, and a woman used as a human shield were all killed in the mission.

Many people hesitate to believe that Osama bin Laden has finally been found and killed.  But DNA results of 99.9% have proven the dead man is indeed Osama.  The CIA facial recognition technology also identified Bin Laden?s face with 95% certainty.

Sources also claim one of Bin Laden?s wives called him by name during the raid.

The United States has photographs of Osama bin Laden?s dead body but officials are debating on releasing them to the public.

?There?s no doubt it?s him,? a U.S. official stated.

One argument against releasing the photos of Osama?s dead body is because they are gruesome.  Bin Laden reportedly has a huge head wound above his right eye where he was shot, with brains and blood showing.

Sources have revealed that Osama bin Laden was buried at sea, according to Islamic practice and tradition.

Check out the gruesome video taken inside Bin Laden?s compound:

 

 

PTMmbz*3MWFlMWZkYWIwYWQ*ODdjYjFlMjk3NDEyZjg1MGVjYiZvZj*w Check Out Graphic Video Taken Inside Osama Bin Ladens Compound

Click thumbnails for larger pictures

Images: AP/ABC news

Samaire Armstrong Daniella Alonso Jennifer Morrison Jodi Lyn OKeefe Deanna Russo

Guess Whose Butt Tat!

Please keep your comments relevant to this blog entry. Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments.

When you enter your name and email address, you'll be sent a link via email to confirm your comment along with a password. To leave another comment, just use the password you were given.

To create a live link, simply type the URL (including http://) or email address and we will make the link live for you. You can put up to 3 URLs in your comments. Line breaks and paragraphs are automatically converted ? no need to use <p> or <br /> tags.

TMZ has upgraded the comments system. Please re-register to comment.

Dominique Swain Malin Akerman Drea de Matteo Tricia Helfer Leelee Sobieski

Guess Whose Butt Tat!

Please keep your comments relevant to this blog entry. Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments.

When you enter your name and email address, you'll be sent a link via email to confirm your comment along with a password. To leave another comment, just use the password you were given.

To create a live link, simply type the URL (including http://) or email address and we will make the link live for you. You can put up to 3 URLs in your comments. Line breaks and paragraphs are automatically converted ? no need to use <p> or <br /> tags.

TMZ has upgraded the comments system. Please re-register to comment.

Nicole Richie Paige Butcher Katharine McPhee Alexis Bledel Aaliyah

Jonathan Lewis: Three Empty Cups of Tea

This week I was honored to guest lecture at the prestigious Monterey Institute for International Studies. The topic was nation building but because I am the founder of MicroCredit Enterprises, which finances microloans for poor women in the developing world, the discussion shifted to people building.

My talk was open to the public (what a splendid idea for all universities!) and in the audience a raised hand came from a gentlemen with deep faith convictions. He described how his church addresses the multidisciplinary nature of poverty in African villages by drilling wells, building schools, erecting health clinics, etc. while also distributing bibles and proselytizing the gospel.

photo credit: Danny Gallant

As I suggested to the class (pictured here) that all economic development promotes one sort of gospel or another. Microfinance, for example, inherently proselytizes the virtues of free market capitalism. Microfinance embeds gender equality, women's empowerment and human rights -- development for the whole person, if you will. Enduring economic development upsets the status quo.

What disturbed me about this particular gentlemen was not his faith motivation which was genuine, but his unwavering conviction that his church's time and money is actually doing good on the African continent. Whether it is or not, he is never going to know because he is not asking any self-examining questions about his impact on the lives he purports to save.

From beginning to end, he unconditionally follows the personality cult of his Savior and the doctrine of his religion. He is a change agent without doubts.

He not much different than the donors, journalists and other apostles who believed in Greg Mortenson, best-selling author of Three Cups of Tea and founder of a school-building program in Afghanistan and Pakistan. His compelling (but allegedly hyped) personal story created a media blizzard of belief in him and a dearth of data about his impact.

For two very thoughtful commentaries read Three Cups of BS by Alanna Shaikh and It's Not About The Tea by Kevin Starr.

One regrettable defense for Mortenson is that he is simply a bad manager. This narrative feeds an urban legend pushed by ideologues and market fundamentalists who want to believe an alternate reality. Nonprofit is a tax status, nothing more. It does not establish management quality or results. It is certainly not an excuse for anything.

Yes, some nonprofits are poorly run, as the Mortenson dustup and opulent church altars surely suggest. However, by the same fuzzy yardstick, British Petroleum confirms the mendacity of all corporate chieftains and Donald Trump is an icon of political truth-telling. We can reject the charlatans of social change without concluding that dedicated nonprofit executives don't care a whit about the efficacy of what they do, wantonly waste money or poorly evaluate programmatic results.

Let's reject social change by personality cult and embrace empowering the poor to speak up, speak out and speak for themselves. That's what good nonprofit leaders have always done.

 

Shakara Ledard Nicole Scherzinger Coco Lee Alicia Witt Chandra West

Susan Piver: Should We Have Celebrated Osama Bin Laden's Death?

"In the Shambhala warrior tradition, we say you should only have to kill an enemy once every thousand years."
--Chogyam Trungpa

Osama bin Laden is dead. We killed him. It seemed there was no choice. We were clearly in an "us-or-them" situation, and if we didn't kill him, he was going to continue to do everything in his power to kill us.

As Buddhists, we are supposed to abhor all killing, but what do you do when someone is trying to kill you? Obviously, great theologians have pondered this question for millennia, and I'm not going to try to pile on with my point of view, which would be totally useless.

Instead, I'll pose this question: How do you kill your enemy in a way that puts a stop to violence rather than escalates it?

Strangely, I keep coming back to the same rather ordinary conclusion: the answer is in our ability to face our most intense emotions. When we know how to relate to our anger, hatred, despair and frustration fully and properly, they self-liberate. When we don't, when we can't tolerate them and therefore act them out, we create enormous sorrow and confusion.

Look at your own reaction this morning.

Was there even a hint of vengefulness or gladness at Osama bin Laden's death? If so, that is a real problem. Whatever suffering he may have experienced cannot reverse even one moment of the suffering he caused. If you believe his death is a form of compensation, you are deluded.

There has been an outpouring of misdirected jubilation, as if a contest had been won. Nothing has been won. Unlike winning a sporting event, this doesn't mean that our team has triumphed. Far from it. There is only one team, and it is us.

One of us is gone -- one apparently horrific, terrible, vicious person among us is gone. I don't feel regret for him or about this. I'm regretful for the rest of us who are now left thinking that this is a cause for celebration. It is not. It is a cause for sorrow at our continued inability to realize that there is no such thing as us-and-them, that whatever we do to cause harm to one will harm us all.

When we hate, we cause hate. When we think we have won by vanquishing our enemy, we have lost. In killing Osama bin Laden, "they" lose because one of their leaders is gone. But we lose, too, because we have deepened the causes and conditions that lead to more hatred and its consequences. This is not over.

So what do we do? I don't really know, but for me, rather than cheering on this day, I'm going to rededicate myself to the idea of brotherhood toward all, even those that want me dead -- and not because I'm some kind of really good person (I'm not), but because I know it's the only way to stay alive in the only kind of world I want to inhabit.

Perhaps the way to kill your enemy as a way of putting a stop to violence rather than escalating is to shift our view of "enemy" altogether. Our enemy is not one person or country or belief system. It is our unwillingness to feel the sorrow of others -- who are none other than us.

So take aim at this enemy completely and precisely. Feel your sadness for us and them so fully and completely that all boundaries are dissolved and we are left standing face to face, human to human, each feeling the other's rage and despair as our own, one world to care for.

"[W]hen you do not produce another force of hatred, the opposing force collapses."
--Chogyam Trungpa

If you'd like to try to generate such a switch, please try lovingkindness meditation. Here is audio instruction in the practice.

 

 

 

Follow Susan Piver on Twitter: www.twitter.com/spiver

Daniella Alonso Jennifer Morrison Jodi Lyn OKeefe Deanna Russo Joanne Montanez

Chris Hemsworth Talks About His Mighty Debut as Thor

Readying for the release of his latest project, Chris Hemsworth has opened up about his excitement over "Thor."

The 27-year-old newcomer, who plays the lead role in the film as Mighty Thor, revealed that his sudden superhero status is quite a change for his family, telling "ET" that during a recent film screening they found it "pretty funny for them to see me in a cape."

Chris also dished that - although his "Fast Five" actress wife Elsa Pataky enjoyed his buff body during the making of the movie - the tough "buckets of chicken and brown rice" protein diet left them few options for date night dinners out.

Hemsorth and co-stars Anthony Hopkins and Natalie Portman are set to hit the big screen when "Thor" conquers theaters on May 6.

Anna Kournikova Katie Cassidy Diora Baird Dania Ramirez Ivanka Trump

Kimberley Walsh thinks Peter Andre and Elen Rivas faked their ?showmance?

Home > Reality TV > Kimberley Walsh thinks Peter Andre and Elen Rivas faked their ?showmance?

Kimberley Walsh has admitted that like the rest of us, she doubts that Peter Andre and Elen Rivas?s relationship was the real deal.

The Girls Aloud star said that the whole romance seemed really ?contrived? and speculated that the whole thing could have been set up by their joint management.

She told OK: ?Whenever I?ve met Peter Andre I?ve thought he?s really sweet but his relationship with Elen Rivas seemed contrived. If it was a showmance it?s really sad to go to those lengths.?

Just after their split, Peter and Elen were pictured meeting for a very quick coffee at Danielle Brown?s (Mel B?s sister) coffee shop. Unsurprisingly Danielle is managed by Claire Powell, just like Andre and Rivas.

Kim added: ?I also saw that they met up at Danielle Brown?s coffee shop, who Pete and Elen?s management also look after. It?s cringey on their part! I?m surprised they think people are so clueless!?

Follow unrealitytv on Twitter

Giulianna Ramirez Katie Holmes Gisele BĂĽndchen SofĂ­a Vergara Jessica Alba

Neil Rimer, Index Ventures: Diversity is Always a Benefit

?Pemo Theodore, a Startup Coach & Australian origin online entrepreneur, video interviews venture capitalists & women entrepreneurs on the shortfall in funding for women @EZebis: Winning theVenture Game for Women.

Video interview with Neil Rimer.  Neil is a co-founder and Partner of Index Ventures. In 1992, Neil started the venture capital activity of Index's predecessor firm, later co-founding Index Ventures and raising the firm's first fund in 1996.  Neil's current investment focus is on innovative solutions for energy and environmental problems.

Index portfolio companies with women CEOs or foundees:Astley Clarke, Notonthehighstreet, AlertMe, Foodily, doubleTwist, 7TM, GoTryItOn, Editd (co-founder), Mobissimo, Net-a-Porter, Songkick (co-founder), Seedcamp, GenMab.   In 2009, Index were honored by Astia with a Diversified Portfolio Award - the firm with the greatest percentage of investments in woman CEOs or founders.  You can find Neil on Twitter @narimer

 

Pemo: What is your sweet spot, in what kinds of businesses do you like to invest? 

Neil: We are really early stage investors. I think we've been most excited about getting involved with the entrepreneurs at the earliest stage possible.  Really help them form the idea & help them recruit the nucleus that will create the management team.  So we really invest as early as we feel comfortable.

Pemo: Fantastic & is there any particular theme that you guys are interested in than others?

Neil: I think we're really interested in opportunities to disrupt big segments of the economy leveraging technology & innovative business models.

It doesn't have to be entirely newly invented technology.  It could be adopting or applying technology that's been around for a little while but coming up with a novel approach or novel business model that allows you to put a combination together that is disruptive.  

Pemo: So there's no particular industry that you guys focus on?  It's just that piece, the early stage & the disruption that you like?

Neil: No I think that's really a philosophy & we look at any industry providing that it's large & that there's a plan that could result in building a big company that would be valued highly.  

Pemo: And make lots of money?

Neil: I never thought I'd say this out loud but I actually even find the insurance industry interesting these days. 

Pemo: Oh fantastic, ok, so there's lots of possibilities out there.

Neil: If that's possible then anything's possible.

Pemo: Really

Pemo: What percentage of women startups do you get pitches for? And what percentage have you funded?

Neil: We don't really keep those statistic, although we probably should. We have funded a fair number of businesses that have been started by women or women teams over the years. I don't know if that's because we do a fair amount of investing in Europe. But we've probably funded a dozen or so, possibly more businesses that have been started by women. In terms of whether or not that's a higher hit rate based on ones that are pitched by men or pitched by women. I'd have to assume that it's a higher hit rate because we don't see that many businesses pitched by women. Because we've done that many, probably means on balance it is a higher hit rate.

Pemo: Have you noted differences with women entrepreneurs in how they pitch & build businesses?  (We're getting into that area of generalization & I know it's a bit touchy?)

Neil: I frankly think that the variability among women is as great as the variability between men & women. I don't think I've seen any particular bias one way or another.

Pemo:  That's brilliant!

Pemo: I have been told that venture capitalists fund people similar to them, white, male etc.  What is your take on this & if this is happening how can women startups find an opening in this culture?

Neil: I think the venture capital industry is fairly large at this point.  There's a lot of different people you could be talking about or talking to.  But I don't think the good investors try to fund people who are like them. In fact if what you say is true, then I don't know who's funding all of the guys from South East Asia who are going to Silicon Valley & starting businesses. They certainly don't fit the mold that you talked about.  I think strong investors will look at somebody's background, their track record, their vision & their ability to lead a team & carry out the vision & really don't pay much attention to whether they come from the same background.

In fact I think diversity is always a benefit so that's going to bring additional strengths to the company. 

 It will help them draw on a broader pool to build their team. It will give them access to a broader network to sell their product into & ultimately to exit their business. I don't see how restricting the scope of people you fund can help in any way.

Pemo: Aileen Lee, Kleiner Perkins, recently wrote a post on Techcrunch about the market of women & how huge that market is. I would imagine as you said with diversity, having women on the team is definitely going to mean you're going to have an insight into that market.

Neil: Well you know sometimes people forget that half of the customer base out there is women.  In fact it's more than half, because many products the purchasing decisions are essentially made by women. So you may want to understand that. You may want to have some people on your team who understand that segment market.     

Pemo: Thank you, thank you that's great encouragement

Pemo: Do you think that networking with Venture Capitalists is harder for women entrepreneurs in Europe?

Neil: I don't think so.

Pemo: What do you see as the obstacles for inclusion of women entrepreneurs in achieving funding in Europe?

Neil: I think the biggest problem & probably the only problem is that there aren't enough women in technical & engineering & scientific tracks.

I think that given that we invest in lots of technology companies, many of the founders & members of the founding team come from that background.  If it's predominantly a male source then by the sheer numbers we're going to see more male entrepreneurs.  So we end up funding more of them. Really it's a supply problem. I don't see any obstacle to women getting in front of us with their great idea. 

Pemo: Great so really a lot of people do say that it starts really young as in children & encouraging girls to study technical subjects. 

Neil: That's right!

Pemo: Do you think that women need to have their business developed before they can achieve funding?

Neil: Yeah but I don't know why that would apply more to women than men. There are some businesses & in some cases some entrepreneurs where you would only be comfortable if they have significant prior experience.  There are some instances where you're willing to back a couple of kids out of university or out of a graduate program with no prior experience but a lot of vision & a lot of promise & belief that they're scalable.  And I don't that see that's any different for men or women.

Pemo: It's really obvious that you've got no bias Neil, because even the question was a curly one for you.  Thank you

Pemo; Often advice for sourcing venture is equated with dating, implying that there is a matching that needs to happen with entrepreneur & investor. Have you noticed a general psychological profile of venture capitalists and also of entrepreneurs that promotes the attraction & synergy between them to develop a great startup?

Neil: Yes so I think that confidence is the fundamental currency of these decisions & it really cuts both ways.  I think the entrepreneur has to have a lot of confidence in the investor that they're letting into their company & that they're ultimately forming a very important partnership with. And the investor has to feel that way about the entrepreneur. That's again like dating or like a marriage. 

You have to be able to look at each other & feel like no matter what comes, you're going to be able to face it. 

You may have arguments & you may have disagreements but one of you will end up convincing the other, or you both will be in agreement to begin with, what the right thing to do is. You'll face whatever challenges & this is somebody that you'd like to go into battle with. I think again that applies for any entrepreneur.  I don't think it's any different for men or for women. But I do think that that is probably the single thing for any entrepreneur to convince an experienced investor.  Lots of people can come in with interesting ideas, big markets, nice demos but the real question is, given that I know that things will not go as planned (& that's really a given), is this someone that you're willing to get into that kind of trouble with. Are you confident that you will be able to get through those challenges & prevail in a very productive way. Actually are you going to enjoy doing that because life is short & you prefer to do this with teams that you're going to enjoy spending lots & lots of time with. That's a key fundamental question. I think chemistry has a lot to do with that. The approach that somebody takes in a conversation, how straightforward they are & whether or not they are the type that shares risk & talks about risk & says 'Hey this is the biggest challenge that I'm facing, I have a couple of ideas about how I might deal with it but what are your ideas?'  Rather than a different approach would be to dress everything up & conceal risk & hope that the investor only figures out that that risk exists when it's too late & they're down the path.

Pemo: Authenticity & building trust is what I'm hearing are very important & that there's a human connection between the investor & the entrepreneur.  

Neil: Yep

Pemo: Very good thank you.

Pemo: In the dance with an entrepreneur both in the decision making process of funding a startup & then in working with those startups what are the necessary qualities that make a good venture capitalist. Some of the talents mentioned: Would you trust your gut instincts & feelings that happen within the relationship with the entrepreneur as signs about what's happening in the business, in the startup? Or would you ?manage by influence or persuasion?

Neil: Again I think you want to have the kind of dialogue & relationship that you would have in a personal relationship.  This may be very different than what you hear from some other folks. There's kind of no room for formality or politics or protocol I think in a discussion between partners. We don't see ourselves as anything other than just another partner in a business.  This is the kind of the stuff that gets in the way at the larger companies & the incumbents that our companies are trying to run circles around.  So if we get caught up in the same kind of stuff, we're not going to do very well.  We really need to have just a really direct, open discussion.  There should be nothing that you can't say to each other.  You can criticize the business as much as you need to to make a point, if that's genuine & it shouldn't be seen as an attack on somebody's value as a person & it shouldn't affect the relationship. In the same way that 2 brothers or 2 sisters can really say anything to each other if there's that kind of underlying trust & respect & love that protects them & allows them to just communicate very effectively.  I think you really need to aspire to that same kind of channel between partners in a business, whether they're founders or founder & investor.

Pemo: Yes because you're working so closely together for a long time, correct?

Neil: Absolutely. 

Pemo: Thank you so much Neil, it's been really, really valuable to hear your feedback about this issue & I really appreciate that you've taken the time out of your busy schedule.

Neil: My pleasure thanks for giving me the opportunity.

Thanks to Alexander Blu for music 'Electricity'

Erica Leerhsen Sarah Wynter Rachel Perry Samaire Armstrong Daniella Alonso