The Los Angeles Sparks are among the young teams in the WNBA building around a strong rookie class, with Cameron Brink and Rickea Jackson forming a new foundation for the Sparks.
Jackson is second on the team in scoring this year with 10.3 points per game, while Brink has quickly established herself as a defensive force in the WNBA, averaging 2.4 blocks and 1.1 steals per game from her center spot (along with 8.1 points and 5.7 rebounds). Brink has quickly made plenty of fans around the league, not just with viewers but has impressed a number of the league’s veterans with her play and toughness.
Unfortunately, on Tuesday night in Connecticut, the No. 2 overall pick took an awkward step while driving the ball and collapsed to the floor in considerable pain.
Brink would try to walk off the floor with some help, but ultimately got carried from the bench to the locker room with what appeared to be a left knee injury. We are still awaiting official word from the Sparks on the initial diagnosis, but the way her knee bent inward on her drive did not look good on the replay they showed on TV. We will provide an update when one becomes available, as Sparks fans and W fans as a whole await word on the status of one of the league’s brightest young talents.
Sabrina Carpenter has pop music in a chokehold. For the past few months, her hit single “Espresso” has been taking over our airwaves and our TikTok feeds. And of course, we can’t get her latest single, “Please Please Please” out of our heads. But during an appearance on BBC Radio One’s Live Lounge, Carpenter performed a cover of another equally infectious pop hit.
Carpenter’s version starts off a little bit more slowed-down, but then picks up after the first chorus. As Carpenter is known to — as she says in her hit single, “Nonsense.” — jump the octave, Carpenter shows off her wide vocal range.
Carpenter has nothing but love for her fellow ladies in the pop game. And like all of us, Carpenter can’t get “Good Luck, Babe!” out of her head.
“I just haven’t stopped listening to this song since it came out,” Carpenter said. “I’m a huge fan of Chappell’s and we wanted to put our own little twist on it.”
You can listen to Carpenter’s cover of “Good Luck, Babe!” here.
Carpenter’s new album, Short N’ Sweet is out 8/23 via Island. Find more information here.
One of the time honored traditions in sports is finding motivation in people doubting you, particularly in the NBA. Michael Jordan was the master at seeking out even the tiniest of slights and turning it into fuel for his competitive fire, and every acolyte of Jordan’s (and, subsequently, Kobe Bryant) has used that template to get through the grind of the NBA season.
Sometimes you have to really manufacture that doubt, but other times it is much more readily available. Despite the fact that they posted the NBA’s best record and rolled through the Eastern Conference in the playoffs, the Boston Celtics didn’t have to search far to find people picking against them in the Finals against the Dallas Mavericks. As it turns out, those wondering if the Celtics hadn’t faced a tough enough road or talking themselves into the Mavs having the two best players in the series were overthinking things a bit, as Boston cruised to its 18th championship in five games.
On Tuesday, the Celtics social team decided to read off some receipts, compiling a video of prominent people — and one prominent corgi — picking the Mavs to beat them in the Finals.
Including the corgi that picks NBA playoff series on TikTok by bouncing a ball down the stairs alongside Stephen A. Smith, Skip Bayless, Shaq, and other talking heads is extremely funny, and credit to the Celtics social team for recognizing opportunity and clipping all of these before the series, knowing how fans would eat it up once Boston won the title.
Even when parents do their best to teach kids the importance of kindness and mutual respect, tiffs will happen. Navigating those circumstances is tricky enough, but when the adults also participate in immature behavior, well…that’s a whole ‘nother can of interrelational worms.
This was the dilemma that a mom named Victoria found herself in, and it caused her so much uncertainty that she reached out to her TikTok followers for advice.
Here’s what happened: her 7-year-old son had gotten into a few arguments with another child while at summer camp.
“Camp counselors have noticed it. They said something to my son, said something to this other kid, also talked to me about it and also to the other parent. They did not tell me who this other child is for safety, privacy, that’s fine, I don’t care,” she said in her video.
Victoria went on to explain that after the camp reached out, she and her husband talked to her son “at length” about how these altercations were not okay.
“We treat people the way we want to be treated and that we are nice and we don’t do those things. We are at camp to make friends, not to make enemies. Be nice and stop your garbage,” she told him.
Unfortunately, that wouldn’t be the end of the issue.
The next day, her husband watched as their son walked up to the camp grounds, where the other little boy was, along with his grandmother. The grandmother apparently “stared” at Victoria’s son, asked her grandson, “Is that the little boy?” and when she got a “yes,” she handed her grandson a note to give to Victoria’s son.
Victoria’s husband quickly stepped in to take the note and notify the camp, because it was written by the boy’s parents, and wasn’t very kind.
Here’s what it said:
“Ethan, Please STAY AWAY from [name of boy]! Do not talk to him! Do not touch him! Do not even look at him! You guys do not get along! I do not want to hear another incident that involves you! Keep your hands + your mouth to yourself!!!”
This “infuriated” Victoria, and even the camp counselor who was shown the note was pretty flabbergasted, saying in their 32 of teaching, they had “never seen” something like that.
Still, in an effort to not let anger get the best of her and “handle the situation properly,” Victoria sought out the advice of other parents to see how they might respond.
Across the board, folks agreed that the note was inappropriate, and that Victoria should reach out to the camp directly.
“That note should be grounds to remove that family from camp. Period,” one person wrote.
Another added, “The other parents are unhinged. Escalate to the director ASAP. If they don’t dismiss the other family, I’d switch camps. They are not safe people.”
Another person wondered if there was “more to the story” since the notes mentioned that the boy should keep his hand to himself, which implied hitting might be involved. Victoria clarified that “The counselors simply told me they were playing and then at one point they started arguing and calling one another names. This has happened a few times when they played together.”
Whether there’s “more to the story” or not, people are in agreement that the other adults unfortunately aren’t offering much in the way of setting a good example of mature problem-solving. But hopefully Victoria can feel a little more at ease with the support she got from online viewers, and have more confidence in going to the camp director about this situation.
Visitors to SeaWorld Sea Antonio, Texas have been doing double takes for the past 5 years after running into identical twin brothers Westin and Jakob Fenton. Guests often catch Westin educating children about exotic birds as a member of the Animal Ambassadors team near the park’s entrance. Then, a few minutes later, spot Jakob in a wet suit at the Orca Encounter.
“Every day it’s like, ‘Didn’t I just see you?’” Westin told Upworthy. “It surprises them,” Jakob added. When Westin had braces, countless visitors frantically approached Jakob with a confused look, asking, “When did you get your braces off?”
The 23-year-old twins have been turning heads at SeaWorld since they were young boys and began attending the park’s summer camps at 7.
“They were the cutest. You could tell how obsessed they were with the animals. It made me so happy years later when they got hired here and to see how well they both do,” Kari Tomarelli, a trainer at Orca Encounter, shared with Upworthy.
From a very young age, the Fenton twins knew SeaWorld was more than just a place they visited—it was their destiny. “It was during my time away from SeaWorld that I realized, ‘This is where I’m meant to be,'” Westin shared. “We’ve always been the twins who do everything together. Same friends, same passions, extracurriculars… everything,” Jakob added.
So, pursuing the same career wasn’t a big stretch for the twins.
The twins are incredibly close, but they also allow plenty of space for their animal companions at SeaWorld. Jakob spends a lot of his time, energy and heart caring for two of the park’s five orcas: Kamea, a 10-year-old 3,000-pound female, and Tuar, the park’s dominant male, who is 24 years old and weighs over 8,000 pounds.
The pair couldn’t be more different.
“Tuar is very goofy; he has a great attitude,” Jakob said, noting that even after a challenging training session, “he’s just happy to be there.” Conversely, things haven’t been so easy with Kamea. “It took time to earn her trust, and it took months to develop a relationship,” Jakob admitted. “Now, I actually adore her.”
Even though park visitors see Jakob in a wetsuit, giving hand signals at the Orca Encounter presentation, most of his job takes place backstage, holding a scrubber. “Eighty percent of being a trainer is cleaning,” he told Upworthy. “We need to make sure that these animals are in a clean environment so our morning is 3 or 4 hours of maintaining habitats. Scrubbing ledges, cleaning glass, cleaning fish buckets.”
While Jakob’s role as an orca trainer may seem glamorous, he sees it as a platform to serve the animals and educate guests. His responsibility is more significant given the scrutiny marine parks have been under in recent years and the fact that this is the last generation of orcas under SeaWorld’s care.
“Being able to introduce people who’ve never seen a killer whale and then have them walk away with an appreciation of the species and a desire to protect them in the wild means everything,” Jakob said.
While Jakob is loading up buckets of salmon for the Orca Encounter, on the other side of the park, you’ll run into Westin, presenting one of SeaWorld San Antonio’s 17 exotic animals—most of which were rescued and rehabilitated—to gawking park guests. As an Animal Ambassador, Westin educates guests about exotic reptiles, birds, and small mammals. He also travels with his animal companions to nearby schools, retirement homes and hospitals to introduce them to the public.
When he’s not taking questions from park guests about his animal companions, such as Star the bald eagle or Azul the hyacinth macaw, he’s flashing his pearly (and recently straightened) whites for photos with guests. He estimates he poses for about 50 a day.
While many would assume training means exerting authority over the animals to force them to do desired behaviors, Westin says it’s all about building relationships. “We’re simply asking, ‘Hey, would you like to come and participate?’ And Star has every opportunity to say no or to say yes,” he told Upworthy. “Everything is an ask. I’m not expecting Star to do anything. Whatever Star would like, we do.”
Even though people have difficulty telling the twins apart, the animals can tell the difference. “They learn our behavior just like we learn theirs,” he told Upworthy.
The twins spend much of their lives together at SeaWorld and as Pilates instructors on the side, so what sets them apart? “Westin is a little more tamed. More reserved and to himself. Whereas Jakob is the life of the party,” Cesi Buitrago, a trainer at Orca Encounter, said. They also have one big difference in diet: Westin can’t stand cheese on his burger, but Jakob loves it.
For the Fenton twins, life at SeaWorld has taught them a lot about the animal kingdom, but it has also changed how they see humans.
“I had no idea the impact these whales would have on my life and how they would teach me how to be a better human and mentor,” Jakob told Upworthy. “Building my relationships with them, I can use what I’ve learned when thinking about developing a relationship with a human. They teach me to be patient, to listen, to invest, to really get to know someone. Don’t fake it. I never would have imagined all of these life skills I would have learned from killer whales.”
It’s no surprise that Westin has come away with a similar lesson.
“So much of what we do is relationships. [The animals] have taught me what it takes to get to know someone; they’ve taught me patience, just really connecting on a deeper level,” Westin says. “I’ve learned a lot about life and, ultimately, connection.”
Craig Ferguson was the host of “The Late Late Show” on CBS from 2005 to 2014. He’s probably best remembered for his stream-of-conscious, mostly improvised monologues that often veered from funny observations to more serious territory.
In 2009, he opened his show explaining how marketers have spent six decades persuading the public into believing that youth should be deified. To Ferguson, it’s the big reason “Why everything sucks.”
“In the 1950s, late ’50s, early ’60s, a bunch of advertising guys got together on Madison Avenue and decided to try to sell products to younger people. ‘We should try to sell to younger people because then they will buy things their whole lives,'” Ferguson explained.
The problem is, according to Ferguson, that young people are “kind of stupid.”
“So the deification of youth evolved and turned into the deification of imbecility. It became fashionable to be young and to be stupid,” he continued.
‘Why everything sucks’
On a deeper level, Ferguson makes the point that exalting youth and inexperience over wisdom and experience runs contrary to the way of nature.
“Then what happened is that people were frightened to not be young,” he said. “They started dyeing their hair, they started mutilating their faces and their bodies in order to look young. But you can’t be young forever, that’s against the laws of the universe.”
Calling marketers’ war on the over-49 set the reason why “everything sucks” may be a bit of an exaggeration. But the takeaway from Ferguson’s monologue is spot-on. There’s no reason to feel bad about aging. You’ve got experience, wisdom, probably better credit, and have learned that Saturdays are a lot more fun after you’ve been to bed by 10:00 pm on Friday.
A childhood game can go very wrong in the blink of an eye.
“You’ll never get me!”
“Freeze! Put your hands up.”
If you’ve ever played cops and robbers, you know how the game goes.
John Arthur Greene was 8 and he was playing that game with his older brother Kevin. Only the two brothers played with real guns. Living on a farm, they were both old hands at handling firearms by their ages.
The blast from the gun must have startled them both.
“We were always extremely safe. They were never loaded,” John said.
Except this time it was. And John’s brother died in his arms while he watched.
It happens more often than you would ever want to imagine.
In federal data from 2007 to 2011, which is likely under-reported, an average of 62 children were accidentally killed by firearms per year.
“In Asheboro, North Carolina, a 26-year-old mother was cleaning her home when she heard a gunshot. Rushing into the living room, she discovered that her three-year-old son had accidentally shot her boyfriend’s three-year-old daughter with a .22-caliber rifle the parents had left in the room, loaded and unlocked.”
And the numbers may actually be getting worse.
With an increase in unfettered access to guns and philosophical opposition to gun regulations, the numbers seem to be on the rise. Here’s how many accidental shootings happened at the hands of children in 2015 alone, by age:
From January 19-26 of 2016 — just one week — at least seven kids were accidentally shot by another kid.
If the pace holds up for the rest of the year, America would be looking at over 300 accidental shootings of children, in many cases by children, for the year. That’s far too many cases of children either carrying the guilt and pain of having shot a loved one or hurting or killing themselves by accident.
John Arthur Greene has been able to manage his feelings of guilt and sorrow through music and by sharing his story for others to hear.
He told his story during an audition for the final season of “American Idol.” He says music has helped him keep his brother’s memory alive:
“Right now I lift him up every day and he holds me up. Music is how I coped with everything.”
It’s a powerful reminder. No matter how we each feel about gun safety laws, guns should always be locked away unloaded and kept separately from ammunition.
Our babies are too precious to leave it to chance.
Watch John Arthur Greene’s audition for “American Idol” here:
Back then, it was a hard riddle. A very hard riddle.
By 1993, when I first heard it, the notion that women could be highly skilled, highly trained professionals wasn’t so absurd.
To me, it was normal.
I knew women who were lawyers. Bankers. Politicians. My own doctor was a woman.
To be sure, women still faced challenges and discrimination in the workplace. And even 20 years later, they still do.
But at its core, the riddle is about how a family can work. And that had changed. Long-overdue progress had rendered the big, sexist assumption that underpinned the whole thing moot.
A very hard riddle was suddenly not a riddle at all.
I never forgot it.
Now, I’m 30 — almost as old as my dad was he first told me that riddle.
I don’t have kids, but I mentor a child through a volunteer program.
Once a week, we get together and hang out for an hour. We play ping pong, do science experiments, and write songs. Neither of us like to go outside.
It’s a good match.
One day, we decided to try to stump each other with riddles.
He rattled off about five or six.
I could only remember one: The one about the man, his son, and the surgeon.
I thought it would be silly to tell it.
I was sure that, if it was easy in 1993, it would be even easier in 2014. Kind of ridiculous, even.
But a part of me was curious.
It had been 21 years — almost as long as it had been between when my dad first heard the riddle and when he shared it with me.
Maybe it wouldn’t be so easy.
Maybe I was missing something obvious, making my own flawed assumptions about how a family could work.
Maybe the world had changed in ways that would be second nature to a 13-year-old but not to me.
So I began:
“A man and his son are driving in their car, when they are hit by a tractor-trailer. The father dies instantly. The son is badly injured and is rushed to the hospital by paramedics. As he is being wheeled into the operating room, the surgeon takes one look at the boy and says:
‘I can’t operate on him. He’s my son.’
How is that possible?!”
Without missing a beat, he answered: “it’s his other dad”
Times change. Progress isn’t perfect. But no matter what shape a family takes, at the end of the day, #LoveWins.
This article was written by Eric March and originally appeared on 06.21.16
“I consider this EP to be a very beautiful introduction to me – both sonically and creatively, and how I process things like love, heartbreak, and joy.”
The future is looking very bright for Lekan. The Columbus, Ohio-born singer is just a few days removed from the release of his debut EP So You Know, and in less than three months, he will begin a nine-show run as an opener for Tems on her Born In The Wild World Tour. It’s been a long time coming for the singer who brought his talents to Los Angeles, where he is currently based, with the goal of achieving all his music dreams. So You Know and the Born In The Wild World Tour are the beginning moments on that journey.
Fresh off the release of So You Know, Uproxx caught up with Lekan to discuss his gig as an opener on the Born In The Wild World Tour, his So You Know EP, and more.
What was your first reaction to hearing that you’ll be an opening act for Tems’ Born In The Wild World Tour?
I for sure screamed [laughs]. Outside of that, I was just super grateful because when you getting somewhere, you never really know what that actually looks like. So when you get somewhere to that extent and to that platform, you’re just thankful for never really giving up. I’m just grateful for the opportunity.
What helped you stay patient in the time before your breakout “Need Somebody?” How did you remain confident that your moment was coming?
The work. I knew that the work that I was doing was just eventually going to have to be seen because I wasn’t going to stop. I knew the work that I was putting out was quality, it was just only a matter of time until the world would figure it out. I just kept doubling down on just quality work and it would speak for itself.
What was the moment that you realized things were changing for the better?
It’s really interesting because a lot of stuff that the world is starting to figure out, is something that like I feel like I was showing a long time ago. I’ve always say where it started to really changed for me was when I moved to LA. That was really when it started changing for me. From there, I was just like nothing’s ever gonna be the same. So I just kept making sure [that] I put myself in position to be aligned with like-minded individuals who could see my vision, could see my life, and could prioritize me to help me make this into a thing. It only made it easier because I would just want to run with them.
For the tour with Tems, what are you most excited for and what are you most nervous about?
I’m not nervous. I truly feel like I’m just gonna keep doing what I’ve been doing, if anything, just do at times 10. I have no fear about that because it’s just something that I’ve just been doing. What I’m most excited about is to be able to really see the people, to see the real time interactions with new fans or even just supporters that came out to see me. Seeing what that actually looks like, seeing the actual impact of these records in real time, watching people actually singing along, the experiences that I’m going to have along the way in different environments, and then also sharing that with my childhood best friend who produced the title track who’s gonna be on the right side of the stage with me for every show. That’s what I’m most excited about.
What do you hope fans takeaway from hearing So You Know and seeing you perform from it?
I just want them to be sonically introduced to me. I want them to know that I care about the music, the craft, and the advancement of this of the sound to see how much it can really impact people. I was blessed with a gift to be utilized when it comes down to music, but I just want people to understand that it really also just stems from taking initiative, having faith in something bigger than you, but also yourself. None of this stuff is happening without confidence. So, just take that, run with it, and apply that within their own system.
Bongo ByTheWay is your right-hand man in your career so far, I feel like he’s to you what D’Mile is to Lucky Daye. How did this relationship start and what makes him the perfect collaborator for this point of your career?
It’s really helped, honestly. You can come to the table and then you just see what someone else can also just bring to the table, as well. He’s someone that had accolades and just experience walking into this. For me personally, it was dope to see someone who looked like me, as far as like Nigerian American just out here really making a name for himself. When him and I started to work together, he just affirmed me. He was just one of the first people to really put his arm around me and really be like, “Nah, he’s the one,” and just affirm me, really believe in me, and push me ultimately. He definitely pushed me and got a lot out of me. I’m really grateful, forever indebted to how he just did that off of discernment, honestly. He could have handled it in so many different ways, but he did the right things in handling it. I’m grateful for the relationship that him and I have built.
You once tweeted that you have to listen to Kendrick Lamar’s “The Heart Part 2” and The Kurt Carr Singers’ “For Every Mountain” or your days feel weird. What are some other things that are key to your routine? Especially before a show.
Before a performance, I always got to listen to jazz or Anita Baker — just certain things that keep me in such a very mellow mode. It’s a lot of noise, you just got to be able to find your way to stand firm and find your own little process of things that you need to do to keep you firm within whatever’s going on. Also family, I always gotta talk to a loved one of mine every day. If it’s not all of them, it’s one of them for sure. I have to do that.
What song on this project do you think speaks best to your artistry and the experience can best define you by?
If I had to choose, I would say “Change.” That’s one thing that is solely just me which is something that I wanted to highlight. I felt like it was a very important part of my process for people to understand. I do stuff like that all the time, I have albums-worth of like stuff like that. It was just really important for me to make sure that the world understand the identity, the texture, the intentionality, [and] the care, that stuff takes a lot of time. It might be probably 8/9-hour sessions for just to do that one song. It’s definitely nothing light, it’s definitely not nothing easy. Yeah, I think that something that I would like for the world to really understand like, “Okay wow, this dude’s sound is… he definitely cares about trying to push the sound.”
If there’s one word that could describe the last year for you, what would it be? And what do you hope the next year brings you?
This year, I would say is affirming. It’s been affirming to everything that I’ve always believed, everything that God has always shown me, everything that I’ve always known to be true, which is that I could do anything that I put my mind to through Christ that strengthens me. Every time I gotta circle back bro because I could say that I’ve done everything on my own strength and put myself in position, but there’s a lot of stuff that is just simply based off of His favor and based off of me being faithful to focus on what He was showing me when it didn’t look like it. So, I guess affirming will be this season [and] this year and then next year will be faithful. Just continue to stay faithful to the craft, faithful to the grind, [and] faithful to the goal which is to inspire the masses. What comes with that is just gonna come with that, and it’s gonna be a lot, but I’m only just gonna get stronger to be able to withstand it.
So You Know is out now via At The Studio/ByTheWay/Human Re Sources. Find out more information here.
At some point last year, HBO likely reached out to George R.R. Martin and asked “what do ya got for us next?” and he knew exactly what the network needs to make another hit show: a boy named Egg.
HBO announced today that production on A Knight Of The Seven Kingdoms is underway in Ireland, and the network even shared an image of Ser Duncan the Tall, played by Peter Claffey. Get this: at 6 foot 5, he’s two inches taller than Alan Ritchson, which is almost unheard of.
HBO
The drama will be an adaptation of Martin’s Novella The Hedge Knight, which was first released in 1998 as a part of Martin’s Tales of Dunk and Egg series. The series takes place before the events of Game of Thrones. Dexter Sol Ansell, who was born after the premiere of Game of Thrones, signed on to star as the young Egg.
Here is the official synopsis:
A century before the events of “Game of Thrones,” two unlikely heroes wandered Westeros… a young, naïve but courageous knight, Ser Duncan the Tall, and his diminutive squire, Egg. Set in an age when the Targaryen line still holds the Iron Throne, and the memory of the last dragon has not yet passed from living memory, great destinies, powerful foes, and dangerous exploits all await these improbable and incomparable friends.
It may be a while until we get to see Dunk and Egg on screen, fans can rest easy knowing that as soon as House of the Dragon season two ends, another epic tale will be shortly behind it. But with a very tall man.
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