STATUS UPDATES
A week in which an NFL star went all Harry Potter and the Internet found the world’s most attractive dog
CROWNED Tea, a five-year-old black Afghan hound from Sydney, Australia, informally deemed the world’s prettiest dog after a photo of her went viral. “We always thought that she was far too pretty to keep at home,” owner Luke Kavanagh told Australia’s Daily Telegraph. All the attention has led to appearances in ad campaigns for canine perfume and luxury dog food.
CHARGED College senior Alec Cook, who is facing 30 charges after police in Madison, Wis., searched his apartment and found a black book containing women’s names and “what he wanted to do with the females,” an investigator told the Star Tribune. Cook’s lawyer characterized much of what has been reported as “character assassination of my client.”
BANNED 1 The scattering of cremated Catholics. New instructions from the Vatican declared, “It is not permitted to scatter the ashes of the faithful departed in the air, on land, at sea or in some other way, nor may they be preserved in mementos, pieces of jewelry or other objects,” the BBC reported. Anyone doing so could not have a Catholic funeral.
SECRETLY MARRIED Swimming champ Michael Phelps and Nicole Johnson. While Phelps flatly denied their status as recently as this month, TMZ Sports obtained and posted a copy of the couple’s Record of Marriage. The date: June 13 — almost two months before the swimmer competed in the Rio Olympics. Johnson gave birth to their first child, a son, Boomer, in May.
ROBED Seattle Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman, who got into the Halloween spirit early by conducting a mid-week press conference dressed as a character from Harry
Potter. Wearing a Gryffindor robe and sporting round glasses and a wand, he explained, “When you’re a wizard, like we are out here, sometimes you have to show it to the Muggles out in the world.”
DISCHARGED Singer Sevyn Streeter, whose performance of the U.S. national anthem at an NBA game in Philadelphia was cancelled because of her “We matter” jersey. “I’d say two minutes before we were about to walk out . . . the organization told me that I could not wear my shirt while singing the national anthem,” she said. A Sixers dancer filled in.
BANNED 2 “Incorrect” dancing at weddings in Chechnya. To enforce the policy, authorities plan to set up wedding vice squads to ensure that, among other things, dancers do not swap partners and the bride does not dance at all, the Guardian reported. The crackdown, which applies to all weddings held outside private homes, also targets drunkenness and the firing of weapons.
PUBLICLY DIVORCED Elon Musk and Talulah Riley. Again. The Tesla boss and Pride & Prejudice actress married in 2010, divorced in 2012, remarried in 2013, filed for divorce in 2014 and withdrew the filing. They submitted the documents for their second divorce on Wednesday, TMZ reported. Though no terms were released, the abandoned 2014 settlement called for a $16-million payout.