When last we heard from the British Royal Family, the circumstances were not very positive as Prince Harry was compelled to apologize for making racial slurs on a video recorded while he was serving in Afghanistan a few years ago. Today, news from the Royals still has a military bent to it but it is much more favorable and not at all controversial. Prince William, who continues his military training this week, was spied in full gear at the Defense Helicopter Flying School at RAF Shawbury, near Shrewsbury, Shropshire. Rockin’ the regulation uniform and eyewear for a military helicopter pilot, Prince Wills looked quite the flying ace at the training grounds yesterday … behold:

They”re probably not the sort of eyewear that a fashionable young prince about town would choose for himself. But when you’ve got problems with your eyesight, the RAF insists you wear its regulation glasses while flying, even if you’re Prince William. The specs fit under a pilot’s helmet and night vision goggles and give them the best possible field of vision. The Ministry of Defence said: “Admittedly they are not the trendiest piece of eyewear going, but they do the job.” William, 26, was pictured in the glasses as he took his first training flight with the Defense Helicopter Flying School at RAF Shawbury, near Shrewsbury, Shropshire. Some might be surprised to see a would-be RAF pilot in glasses in the first place, but in fact only those who are colour blind or have chronic eye conditions are unlikely to be able to qualify for the job. Applicants must, however, have perfect 20/20 vision when wearing glasses. RAF pilots are not permitted to wear their own specs when flying, however, hence the regulation glasses. William, who is believed to be short sighted, has needed glasses for several years. He owns a pair of trendy metalrimmed spectacles, but prefers not to wear them in public. The prince – whose codename at the air base is ‘Golden Osprey’ – took off in a Squirrel, the MoD’s elementary flying training helicopter, with an instructor at his side for a successful hour-long ‘ sortie’ on Wednesday afternoon. On his return he puffed his cheeks out and smiled with relief that all had gone well. He looked equally delighted at the opportunity to take off his unflattering eyewear. If he passes the intensive 12-month course, William hopes to go on and qualify as a Search and Rescue pilot, which could see him taking on his first ’shout’ in early 2011.

I actually like the glasses on Prince Wills … they give him an air of sophistication, I think. The whole military outfit is what looks a bit strange on His Royalness. Even still, I think it’s very commendable that he is taking on this military training in order to prepare himself for the throne when the time comes. It seems pretty clear that rather than feeling the “need for speed”, Prince Wills most likely feels the “need to lead”. It is much nicer to hear and see stories like this coming from the Royal family rather than stories of the other ilk. I’m looking forward to seeing more photos of the young Prince engaged in further military training … watching him play dress-up is fun!

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Yesterday we played a little game of Guess Who with a photo of a young male Hollywood celeb showin’ off his underpants by lettin’ his pants sag off his derriere … and today we get to see the very same sort of thing from one, David Beckham. Becks was spotted making his way out of Nobu in Milan, Italy last night (his temporary home while he plays professional soccer with AC Milan) and was spied showing off his tighty white undies (Armani, no doubt) as he let his pants sag off his ass:

Lord, if this becomes a fashion trend again, I think I’ll scream. Well, OK, mebbe that’s not entirely true cuz if Becks wants to show off his undies, I’m really not going to complain. This saggy pants look was really big in the early ’90’s (Marky Mark Wahlberg, when he was rollin’ with The Funky Bunch, was very fond of this look back then). I suppose I *want* to hate this look until someone of a certain caliber of hawtness decides to do it and then … well … yeah. While some folks are trying to outlaw this look, I suppose we should be able to make for some concessions … especially in the case of one, David Beckham. I mean … right?

[Photo credit: INFdaily]

Boy George was in court today for sentencing after he was convicted of, among other crimes, false imprisonment after it was proven last year that he unlawfully handcuffed a male escort and beat him with a metal chain during a “drug fueled” night of mayhem back in 2007. Boy George was sentenced to 15 months in prison and was treated to a very stern tongue-lashing from the judge who handed down his sentence. Here are a couple photos of Boy George as he arrived at court in the UK this morning to learn his fate:

Boy George was sentenced to 15 months jail today for handcuffing a male escort to a wall and beating him with a metal chain. The 47-year-old former Culture Club singer, whose real name is George O’Dowd, imprisoned Audun Carlsen during a drug-fuelled naked photoshoot at his London flat. Sentencing the musician at Snaresbrook Crown Court in East London, Judge David Radford told him he was guilty of “gratuitous violence”. The judge condemned his “premeditated, callous, and degrading drug-fuelled actions which traumatised” his victim. The judge added: “He was denied his dignity.” Blank-faced O’Dowd glanced briefly at family members in the public gallery, who gasped as his jail term was read out. There were emotional scenes outside court as family members and supporters of the pop star reacted to his sentence. One male family member kicked one of the courtroom doors, shouting: “Fifteen months!” Mr Carlsen, a 29-year-old Norwegian, fled in his underpants and alerted police after the attack in Shoreditch, East London, in April 2007. Violence had flared after O’Dowd accused Mr Carlsen of stealing photos of himself from a laptop, taken when the pair met three months earlier. O’Dowd has previous convictions for going equipped for theft as a juvenile in 1977, and a Class B drugs offence ten years later. In 2006, in New York, he was given community service after pleading guilty to falsely reporting a burglary at his apartment in the city. O’Dowd, who was convicted of false imprisonment last year, denied performing unprotected oral sex on Mr Carlsen as he sat naked in a chair during their first meeting. He had told police: “I’ve never slept with someone who is HIV positive.” The pair had made contact on the Gaydar website. According to prosecutor Heather Norton, their first meeting went well until the computer hacking accusation flared. They parted on good terms and O’Dowd paid the younger man £300 of the £400 they had agreed. In the weeks which followed, they exchanged e-mails in which the singer accused Mr Carlsen of hacking into his computer. But he eventually said that he wanted to see the younger man again. During the second meeting, things took a violent turn. After calling Mr Carlsen into his bedroom, O’Dowd and another man leapt on him, wrestled him to the floor and started beating him. O’Dowd, who did not give evidence in his defence, was screaming: “Fucking whore! Now you are going to get what you deserve.” Mr Carlsen was dragged along the floor towards O’Dowd’s bed and a manacle was put on his right hand and attached to a hook drilled in the wall. The second man left, Mr Carlsen said, and O’Dowd fetched a plastic box containing chains, sex toys and leather straps. Mr Carlsen told the court he was able to unscrew the hook from the wall using handcuffs as a tool. He ran to the door with O’Dowd pursuing him, lashing out with a metal chain. The victim managed to escape and ran out into the street screaming for help … Passing sentence, Judge Radford said: ‘Whilst I accept that Mr Carlsen’s physical injuries were not serious or permanent, in my view there can be no doubt that your premeditated callous and humiliating handcuffing and detention of Mr Carlsen shocked, degraded and traumatised him. “He was deprived of his liberty and human dignity without warning or proper explanation to him of its purpose, length or purported justification.” The judge also ordered O’Dowd to pay £5,000 costs … Returning to the details of the case, he added: “You assaulted the victim of this offense whom you had invited into your home by handcuffing him to your bed and inflicting on him additional wholly gratuitous violence beyond that needed merely to secure physical restraint and detention.”

At last this long, sad saga is finally finished. Honestly, I never thought the case would get to this level … there was so much delay in prosecuting Boy George for this crime that I figured he’d walk away with a slap on the wrists. I cannot fully understand why George’s family is so upset with this sentence. You do the crime, you do the time. I sincerely hope that Boy George is able to use his time in prison to his advantage and makes serious effort to clean up his act.

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As you may have heard yesterday, US Airways Flight 1549 crash landed in the Hudson River in NYC shortly after take-off as the result of the plane’s impact with at least two birds, each flying into the plane’s two engines (referred to as a double bird strike). In footage that has already been seen over and over again, all across the world, the US Airways plane — piloted by Captain Chesley B. Sullenberger III — crash landed in the Hudson River in such a way that NO LIVES were lost in the impact. Today, NYC Governor David A. Paterson and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (and others) are calling Capt. Sullenberger a “masterful” hero worthy of praise and accolades for his quick thinking and expert piloting during yesterday’s emergency. Here are a couple photos of the half-submerged plane as it was towed to Battery Park last night, after every single passenger and crew member was safely removed from the plane after impact:

A day after a dramatic splashdown and rescue, in which all 155 passengers and crew members of Flight 1549 escaped safely from an icy plunge into the Hudson River, investigators prepared to lift the mostly submerged aircraft from its resting spot in the water at Battery Park City. The plane, an Airbus 320, was towed from the site around 48th Street down the Hudson Thursday evening, intact. Getting it out of the water intact Friday might prove to be even more of a challenge. Investigators Friday brought an oversize crane and a barge to extract the aircraft — 123 feet long and weighing more than 81 tons — out of its docking place and ship it to a site to determine the cause of the accident. Near the Hudson piers where only cruise ships and ferry boats dock, the plane’s silent presence in the water Friday morning was yet another chilling reminder of the incongruous scene of near-disaster turned into rescue phenomenon. Gov. David A. Paterson called it a “miracle on the Hudson,” while everyone from Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg to passengers on the flight hailed the “masterful” efforts of its pilot, Capt. Chesley B. Sullenberger III. Captain Sullenberger used the river as an impromptu landing strip when both of his engines blew out less than two minutes into the takeoff from La Guardia Airport. He radioed the air traffic controller and said that both engines had suffered a “double bird strike.” Mr. Sullenberger, unable to get back to La Guardia, had made a command decision to avoid densely populated areas and try for the Hudson, and had warned the 150 passengers to brace for a hard landing. Most had their heads down as the jetliner slammed into the water, nose slightly up, just three minutes after takeoff on what was to be a flight to Charlotte, N.C. “If it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t be here today,” said Mary Berkwits, of Stallings, N.C.,a passenger on Flight 1549, who prepared to return to Charlotte Friday morning at La Guardia Airport. “He was just wonderful.” What might have been a catastrophe in New York — one that evoked the feel if not the scale of the Sept. 11 attack — was averted by Mr. Sullenberger’s quick thinking and deft maneuvers, and by the nearness of rescue boats. Many on board and watching from the shores were shocked that the aircraft did not sink immediately. Instead, it floated, twisting and drifting south in strong currents, as three New York Waterway commuter ferries moved in. Moments later, terrified passengers began swarming out the emergency exits into brutally cold air and onto the submerged wings of the bobbing jetliner, which began taking in water. “I was on the wing hanging on with a lot of other passengers,” Ms. Berkwits said. “We’re slowly sinking further and further into the water. And the water was very cold. We’re all trying to stay as warm as possible by holding on to one another. We knew somebody would come and get us right away. We could see boats coming, helicopters flying around us.”As the first ferry nudged up alongside, witnesses said, some passengers were able to leap onto the decks. Others were helped aboard by ferry crews. Soon, a small armada of police boats, fireboats, tugboats and Coast Guard craft converged on the scene, and some of them snubbed up to keep the jetliner afloat. Helicopters brought wet-suited police divers, who dropped into the water to help with the rescues. Over the next hour, as a captivated city watched continuous television reports and the Hudson turned from gold to silver in the gathering winter twilight, all of the passengers, including at least one baby, and both pilots and all three flight attendants, were transferred to the rescue boats — a feat that unfolded as the white-and-blue jetliner continued to drift south. When all were out, the pilot walked up and down the aisle twice to make sure the plane was empty, officials said. Brought ashore on both sides of the river, the survivors were taken to hospitals in Manhattan and New Jersey, mostly for treatment of exposure to the brutal cold: 18 degrees in the air, about 35 degrees in the water that many had stood in on the wings up to their waists. Still, most of them walked ashore, some grim with fright and shivering with cold, wrapped in borrowed coats. But others were smiling, and a few were ready to give interviews to mobs of reporters and television cameras. Some described their survival as a miracle, a sentiment repeated later by city and state officials; others gave harrowing accounts of an ordeal whose outcome few might have imagined in such a crisis.

I cannot, for the life of me, imagine what it must’ve been like to be on that plane. Quite possibly the most horrifying words you can hear while on an airplane are “Brace for impact” and I understand that the passengers on board this flight had to hear those words repeated as the plane prepared to hit the water. This is an amazing story that, thankfully, has a very happy ending. My thoughts go out to all the passengers and crew of US Airways Flight 1549 today … while everything turned out well for them yesterday, I fear that the effects of the trauma might still come to plague them later on. Kudos and mad respect goes out to Capt. Chelsey Sullenberger … he truly is a hero. Well done!!

[Photo credit: Bauer-Griffin; Source]

Yesterday we saw photos of Sienna Miller stepping out with (but yet, trying to keep some distance from) a mysterious fellow as they made their way from Groucho Club to Jerry’s Bar in the wee hours of Thursday morning. At the time, I wasn’t sure who the lucky guy was … but a Pink reader clued me in that the guy was none other than Irish actor Cillian Murphy (who has starred in films as ranging as 28 Days Later to Batman Begins) … who is very married. Today we get to see a few more photos of Sienna and Cillian in very close proximity as they piled into the same car after they finished their biz at Jerry’s Bar (I think they serve alcohol there). Are the pair just really good friends or could there be something more?

Honestly, I’m pretty sure that no hanky panky was going on between these two. The pair just wrapped a film together (Hippie Hippie Shake) and it’s very likely that they are just friends. Even still … if I were Cillian Murphy’s wife, I think I’d be a bit concerned. Sienna does have an affinity for married men, they seem to be very much her type (just ask Balthazar Getty’s wife). I’m just sayin’. Even still, I don’t think there is any cause for concern … I’m sure this hangin’ out session was just a one-time thing between friends. Let’s hope it stays that way.

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BritneySpears.com has been updated with a new gallery of photos taken during tour rehearsals for Britney Spears’s upcoming concert tour The Circus starring Britney Spears. Previously, the site had released dance rehearsal photos taken in dance studios but these are the first photos that show Britney and her dancers rehearsing with actual stage props that will be seen on the tour … check ‘em out:

Here is your first sneak peek at The Circus Starring Britney Spears, taken at tour rehearsal on Monday night. In this gallery, you can see Britney working with contributing choreographer JaQuel Knight as well as Jose, the Womanizer from the European tour. Britney (and her abs — damn!) is wearing Lisa Kline J’aime Drawsting Pants which benefit the Susan G. Komen foundation. Sadly, they don’t make these pants anymore, but there is a lot of cute Pink Ribbon Gear on the Komen Foundation site if you want to get Britney’s look and support Breast Cancer research.

So now we know what has been keepin’ Brit Brit bizzy in recent weeks … except for her emergence earlier this week, Britney has stayed relatively out of sight, most likely, because of all the work she’s been doing on her tour rehearsals. Is anyone really surprised that there is a stripper pole of sorts featured in the staging of her new tour? It hearkens back to the Gimme More music video, no? Seeing these photos is really exciting … and drives home the fact that her new tour starts up in just two months! While I am very anxious to see her live on stage, I really hope she is able to get all the prep done in time for the big tour launch. Will she be ready? I really, really hope so.

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