Hasta La Gadget!

You’d better get used to the interfaces you saw for Android Auto, Wear and TV at the Google I/O conference this past week — you’re going to be seeing them a lot. Google tells Ars Technica that it will maintain sole (official) control over the…

You’ll never look at stretch marks the same again… I hope.

Ten years ago, I lost 60 pounds. This was when I reached 172 pounds, which at 5’0 was a size 14-16 and didn’t feel like me. It wasn’t even my highest weight, which was 200 pounds when I was pregnant with my first child almost 17 years ago. Weight issues ran in my family and my stomach was my nemesis. Yes, my very own body part was, even when I was thinner.

But I decided I earned the “right” to wear a bikini because I worked so hard at getting in shape. It wasn’t perfect, but it was good enough. Of course, I had no foundation of self-love, so I still saw my 110 lb. body had a pooch. That pooch was from having my two kids. Fast-forward to now. I am 37, and my fifth child is five months old. I was on page 102 of the May issue of Oprah Magazine answering the question,” What do you love about your body?” I answered, “My belly.” Regardless of anyone else’s standards, I feel a responsibility to my daughters and even my sons to practice what I believe about loving our bodies completely. I have stretch marks and I’m sexy as hell.

Why?

Because I feel that way.

I own it.

I define who I am. Why would stretch marks take away from my beauty or any other woman’s? Nature’s stripes, those lines on my body, are a map of where I’ve been and the road I’ve taken. Stripes are always in style too, right? Those magic marks lead to birth and the whole damn pregnancy thing is seriously magic. I mean… really, we make a human being in less than a year. It’s a miracle. From here on out, they shall forever more be called goddess tattoos. Each of those goddess tattoos tells a story as well. From that bulimic teen to overweight adult, through five pregnancies, weight losses, self-loathing and hard work, my goddess tattoos have led me to become a confident, happy woman. Lots have bloomed out of that womb.

What lives in my belly is not limited to fat, muscle, food or even babies… it’s fire.

It’s the same way I feel about women’s curves or their wrinkles. We can be in shape, take care of ourselves and work on health and wellness… but these bodies are supposed to be fun. Body obsession is not healthy. You’re not taking this puppy with you. When you die, it’s not going with you. So relax and enjoy it. Let’s stop shaming ourselves and other women over our “flaws!”

Fabulously
Luscious
Amazingly
Wonderful
Selves

Here’s what I’ve encountered when I’ve posted pictures of my abs:

“I’m surprised someone hasn’t told you about this firming cream.”

“You look great for just having a baby.”

“You look good for having five kids.”

“You’re brave for showing your stretch marks.“

“Because you showed your body in a bikini, which isn’t perfect, I feel better.“

I get so many wonderful comments, but sometimes people don’t realize what they say. They don’t realize it’s an insult wrapped in a compliment. You can never go wrong with the comment: “Beautiful.” I truly see every woman as beautiful, not in different degrees, levels or values, but rather flavors. If a woman posts a picture in a dress, I wouldn’t say, “You’re really brave for wearing that dress with that big ass.” If you would post that, it’s rude, and that’s letting the culture of media define what’s acceptable as beautiful, as in young and thin. Bullsh*t. If you’re truly happy with yourself and LOVE everything about yourself, you would not write mean comments on un-Photoshopped bodies.

Let’s rewrite this story for the next generation. When you see a lady you know on the street or even one you don’t know post a picture online, tell her, “You look beautiful.” It’s such a powerful thing. She feels good and you feel good. It’s a win-win.

My body is my temple. I will treat it as such. When a temple is less shiny, gets older and has a few cracks, it is still worthy of adoration. You don’t tear it down when you see a perfect building that’s built right beside it. Because the temple is holy. And there is so much love that goes in inside of it, the structure is solid and foundation is Divine. Love your body always. Embrace your beauty. Never feel bad about yourself for one moment. It’s hogwash to think you need it for growth. You can know on a deeper level your own worthiness. The lesson is just to step into it and owning your Divine brilliance.

Don’t apologize for your wrinkles, your opinion, your thighs, your voice, your cellulite, or your past. Just shut up about, you sexy thang, and celebrate by living.

And DO NOT make women into body parts, my sisters of the world. NEVER comment negatively on another women’s body part, unless you want your daughter to think that is what we do as ladies. Judging another woman’s body harshly is judging your own… surgically enhanced or not. Also, to society, when you comment about my beautiful Buddha girl baby with her big belly and even bigger smile, “What are you feeding her? She’s so… fat, pudgy, chunky, huge, never misses a meal,” remember you said my sons that were the same size were, “healthy, strong, Buddha, gonna be a football players,” and your tone was different. There is a judgement in your joke that made me want to punch you in the face, but my heart knows the media set this dynamic up. What I can do is shatter stereotypes, build women’s self-esteem, speak my truth, call out baloney when I see it, and keep preaching self-love. Way too many women have shame about their bodies. Shame cannot live where love does. We’re really are all in this together, chickies, and never forget, you’re a goddess.

For the first time ever, nature lovers and photography buffs everywhere are being given a chance to choose a winner in the esteemed “Wildlife Photographer of the Year” competition.

To mark the prestigious contest’s 50th anniversary this year, a new publicly-decided category — the “People’s Choice Award” — was announced earlier this month. The category welcomes members of the public to cast their vote for the photo that best “captures your imagination.”

Every year, the spectacular photographs that clinch the top prizes at the wildlife photography competition invariably leave us awestruck, gaping in amazement at the skill (and often-perfect timing) of the photographers behind the masterpieces.

Based on the 50 jaw-dropping images in the “People’s Choice” collection — pre-selected by a panel of judges from more than 41,000 entries — this year will certainly be no different.

“In this landmark 50th year we’re opening up the judging experience to the many wildlife photography fans that follow the competition so closely,” said Tom Ang, a member of the 2014 judging panel, per a press release. “If you’ve ever puzzled over why one image wins out over another, this is your chance to have your say. But with so many outstanding shots and just one vote per person, the pressure is on to cast it wisely.”

Voting for the “People’s Choice” collection closes on Sept. 5, 2014. The winner of the “People’s Choice Award” will be announced at the “Wildlife Photographer of the Year” awards event in October.

The “Wildlife Photographer of the Year” competition is jointly organized by the BBC and London’s Natural History Museum.

Scroll down to see a handful of images from the “People’s Choice” collection. Do you have a favorite?

* Davis trailing Republican rival as state party meets

* “Battleground Texas” group aims to mobilize non-voters

By Jon Herskovitz

DALLAS, June 29 (Reuters) – For one day a year ago, Wendy Davis became the brightest star in the U.S. political universe when she donned pink tennis shoes and launched a one-woman, 10-hour filibuster against abortion restrictions that brought her international attention.

Now she is battling to revive a seemingly stalled campaign to become the first Democratic Texas governor in more than 20 years by winning over frustrated Republicans and motivating enough voters who would otherwise spend election day at home to find a few minutes to vote.

State Senator Davis, 51, came into the Texas Democratic convention in Dallas over the weekend with surveys showing her 10-13 percent points behind the Republican nominee, Attorney General Greg Abbott, 56, and failing to close ground.

Davis, with an inspiring life story going from a single mother in a trailer park to a Harvard Law School graduate, has portrayed Abbott as part of a ‘good old boys’ network more interested in enriching each other than helping voters.

“I’m running because there’s a moderate majority that’s being ignored – commonsense, practical, hardworking Texans whose voices are being drowned out by insiders in Greg Abbott’s party, and it needs to stop,” she told the convention on Friday.

But as Mark Jones, a political science professor at Rice University in Houston, said: “Texas is difficult terrain for any Democrat, let alone a Democrat who rose to prominence on an issue such as abortion that is associated with the liberal wing of the Democratic Party.”

Davis, who this month reshuffled campaign brass, has also taken hits when it was found she embellished parts of her biography.

Despite this, she remains a prominent candidate who can raise funds among major donors in Hollywood and Washington, D.C.

BATTLEGROUND TEXAS

For her staunchest supporters, the key to victory rests with Texans being targeted in one of the largest, state-wide grassroots campaigns in U.S. political history.

Alumni from President Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign quietly have built a Democratic political army in Texas, where gun-rights advocates brandish semi-automatic rifles on city streets and pickup trucks bear “SECEDE” bumper stickers.

The group called Battleground Texas, started about a year and a half ago, has enlisted about 20,000 volunteers who have made 2 million phone calls and house visits among voters.

“People are hungry. They see the opportunity and they want to take it,” said Jenn Brown, the group’s executive director.

In a state as large as Texas, adding a few percentage points with groups that typically favor Democrats but have not turned out in high numbers could mean all the difference.

According to a poll by survey group Latino Decisions, 39 percent of eligible Hispanics cast ballots in the November 2012 election in Texas, while 61 percent stayed home. The numbers were almost reversed for non-Hispanic whites.

By 2030 Latinos, who typically support Democrats, will be the majority in Texas and could turn the state blue. Texas could then join populous California and New York among Democratic strongholds, with the three states securing the party nearly half the electoral votes needed to win the White House.

Democrats have also become emboldened by the strength of U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas and his no-compromise tea party allies, seeing them as driving moderate Republicans into their tent and antagonizing Hispanic voters with their hardline stance on immigration.

“We have seen Republicans consistently move further to the right and as they are excluding people from the promise of Texas, our job is to speed up those changes,” said Will Hailer, executive director of the Texas Democratic Party. (Additional reporting by Marice Richter; Editing by Tom Heneghan)

Imam Khalid Latif is blogging his reflections during the month of Ramadan for the third year in a row, featured daily on HuffPost Religion. For a complete record of his previous posts, visit his author page, and to follow along with the rest of his reflections, sign up for an author email alert above, visit his Facebook page or follow him on Twitter.

Two young men came by our Islamic Center at New York University the other day as we were getting things ready for Ramadan to start, one of Albanian descent from Staten Island and the other of South Asian descent from Virginia. I shook their hands and gave them hugs and asked how they were doing. As our conversation continued, a pattern started to develop. I would speak, the young South Asian man would listen attentively, and then he would sign what I had said to his friend, “hear” him through his own signing, and then tell me what he said. We did this because both of these young men were deaf and I don’t know sign language.

We went for a walk together to Honest Chops, an all-natural Halal meat store that I recently opened in the East Village with some people from our community. They had heard about it and went there thinking it was a restaurant, but to their dismay found out it was a butcher shop only upon arrival. As we laughed about it, I told them I’d go back with them and we could get some burgers and other things to sample and grill.

On our walk over, we started talking about marriage. At first I was amused somewhat that these two young men had marriage on their minds like most young Muslims. As we talked, they indicated frustrations in finding a spouse as many would not consider them suitable life partners due to their being deaf. They also ran into a challenge in marrying someone else who was deaf as either their own parents or the other set of parents were against it, their concern being if two deaf people got married, somehow it would increase the chances that their children would be deaf. One of them frustratingly commented on how this was illogical and that his parents were not deaf, yet they gave birth to a child who was.

They then asked me if it was ok for deaf people to sign their prayers. When prayed in congregation, each of our prayers consists of some type of vocalized speech by the one who is leading the prayer. For many deaf Muslims, they end up just standing and following in the motions, but not being able to hear the recitation of the Qur’an or any of the other invocations taking place. These two young men wanted to know if it would be considered religiously permissible to use sign language when leading a prayer so that those who could not hear would be able to be more actively present. Aside from not being qualified to answer the question, it was honestly something that I have never thought about, which was all the more alarming to me. Having this experience literally hours before Ramadan started was of great benefit to me as it helped me realize the world is made up of many different people, all trying to figure out a way to fit into it. I told them I’d ask one of my teachers or a qualified scholar of Islamic Law and get back to them on it.

“Oh Mankind, indeed we created you male and a female and made you into nations and tribes that you may know each other. Verily the most honored of you in the sight of God is he who is most deeply mindful of Him; Indeed God is All-Knowing, All-Aware.” (Quran 49:13).

When we think of this verse, we attribute it a lot to racial, ethnic and cultural diversity. As much that it a part of the, the world is so much bigger and there are so many more constructs that one can utilize to self-identify. Our knowing of one another has to expand and this month of Ramadan can serve as a tool to achieve that if we are willing to take steps towards those who are different than us with the intention of getting to know each other beyond simple acquaintanceship.

May God make us from amongst the ‘Arifeen, the knowers. Ameen.

The experience also made me reflect on my own relationship with my prayer and the Qur’an itself. These young men would do anything to be able to hear the Qur’an and they even stand in prayer despite not being able to hear it. In these first hours of Ramadan, it seems so easy to justify not praying or engaging in self-reflection because the hours of the day are so long and doing so would make less the number of hours of sleep in nights that are already short. There are people who have a thirst they are trying to quench from wells that you and I can easily drink from every day, but a lack of mindfulness on our part keeps us from realizing what we actually have and no one ends us drinking anything at all.

“O you who believe. Fasting is prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you, that you may become deeply mindful.” (Qur’an 2:183)

To me, fasting is about gaining a deeper awareness and mindfulness of one’s self and, in turn, the world in which one is situated. From the outside it might seem like it’s about deprivation of food and drink. But by shifting my focus away from a simple satiation of my stomach and looking more towards the satisfaction of my soul, I realize that are many different ways that I can nourish myself and many different parts of me that need to be nourished that I often times neglect, my heart being a primary amongst those. My fast helps me to be more present and aware, to see my blessings and reflect upon my strengths and weaknesses. It helps me to understand that as much as I have a place in this world, so too do many others whose lives are similar to my own as well as those whose lives have been completely different. It is mostly for my benefit to understand and appreciate their existence, rather than being comfortable living in my own bubble.

As I did in the last three years of writing these reflections, I would like to start the month with a quote from a female Islamic scholar named Fariha Fatima that my wife Priya shared with me before we got married. My hope is that is will offer an insight as to really how deep the practice of fasting can be if we let it be.

There are as many forms of fasting as there are organs of perception and sensation, and each of these has many different levels. So we ask to fast from all that Allah does not love for us, and to feast on what the Beloved loves for us. Let us certainly fast from the limited mind, and all that it conjures up. Let us fast from fear, apart from fear and awe of Allah’s majesty. Let us fast from thinking that we know, when Allah alone is the Knower. Let us fast from thinking negatively of anyone. Let us fast from our manipulations and strategies. Let us fast from all complaint about the life experiences that Allah gives us. Let us fast from our bad habits and our reactions. Let us fast from desiring what we do not have. Let us fast from obsession. Let us fast from despair. Let us fast from not loving our self, and from denying our heart. Let us fast from selfishness and self-centered behavior. Let us fast from thinking that only what serves us is important. Let us fast from seeing reality only from our own point of view. Let us fast from seeing any reality other than Allah, and from relying on anything other than Allah. Let us fast from desiring anything other than Allah and Allah’s Prophets and friends, and our own true self. Essentially, let us fast from thinking that we have any existence separate from Allah.