Blog Posts by Beth Greenfield, Shine Staff

Maid costumes are the new in-flight look. Photo: Facebook/Spring AirlinesFlying these days is a total drag. But there’s at least one airline out there trying to turn that notion on its head: Shanghai-based Spring Airlines, known for its budget rates, is aiming to make flying fun again with a dash of old-school, in-flight sexism, as it’s unveiled plans to dress its female flight attendants up like maids, and their male counterparts as butlers. So far, reviews have been mixed.

“The airline should respect their crew members because flight attendants are still quite different from maids and butlers,” one blogger wrote, according to Shanghai Daily. Other critics, said the article, said that Spring should instead focus on making sure flights were on time, offering cheaper tickets and improving services, rather than relying on this “excessive way” of gaining public attention. Some even worried that the costumes, with their high heels and short skirts, could pose a safety risk.

Supporters thought a flight with themed costumes could be fun, and that it was reminiscent

Read More »from Spring Airlines' Flight Attendants Wear Sexy Maid Uniforms. Just Because.

Dane Weller is hoping is late mother's wedding band turns up. Photo: KCTVFollowing the death of his mother earlier this month, a Kansas man is not only dealing with grief, but with anger about the fact that his mom's wedding ring went missing from her finger.

More on Shine: Husband and Wife Die 16 Hours Apart, After 76 Years Together. That's True Love.

“It’s unsettling, to say the least,” Dane Weller told Yahoo! Shine when reached at home in Overland Park, where he now lives with just his father, Don. 

Weller, who had become particularly close with his late mother, Vicki, and moved back in with his parents after a spinal cord injury left him temporarily paralyzed several years ago, had made a promise to her shortly before she died: He would honor her request to make sure his niece, Vicki’s first-born granddaughter Jenni, 34, received the gold wedding band upon her death.

More on Yahoo!: Family Reunited with Stolen 1938 Heirloom Telegram

“That was the last thing she said to me—‘I would like Jenni to have the ring’,” Dane said. “That was the only thing she askedRead More »from Son's Quest to Find Late Mother's Wedding Ring

Anzor Tsarnaev, father of alleged bombers. Photo: Getty ImagesThe parents of alleged Boston bombers Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev have been called “awful,” “crazy” and “deluded” ever since they’ve begun speaking publicly about their “very nice” sons. But their utter disbelief and denial, according to experts in parent-child dynamics, is far from unexpected. 

More on Shine: Boston Bombing Suspects' Family: What They're Saying

“If you were to see your child and all their deficiencies, it would be very painful,” Renana Brooks, PhD and director of the National Institute for the Study of the American Unconscious, told Yahoo! Shine. “You really can’t see your children as evil. Almost always you have to see them as being framed, unless you decide not to love them anymore.”
 
In other words, she said, “How could you think you raised a monster and not have noticed it?”

More on Yahoo!: Tsarnaev's Condition Improves; Brothers Reportedly Motivated by U.S. Wars

The brothers allegedly were "self-radicalized," and were motivated to kill by U.S. wars, according to

Read More »from Boston Bombers' Parents Defend Their Kids: Can We Blame Them?

Strapless dresses are not allowed at this year's 8th grade dinner dance. Photo: Stephen Vance Photography/Getty Images.A newly instituted ban on strapless dresses at an upcoming eighth-grade dance in Readington, New Jersey—with a promise to turn away girls who don’t obey—has some parents crying foul.

More on Shine: Prom Dress Rules: High Schools Ban Sexy Gowns

“I’m objecting to the fact that government can come in and change the rules without asking parents. That’s an abuse of authority,” parent Charlotte Nijenhuis told the Courier News Monday about the ban, instituted by principal Sharon Moffat at Readington Middle School and backed by superintendent Barbara Sargent.

More on Yahoo!: Father Asks School to Rethink Dress Code After Son Was Told to Remove Marines T-Shirt

While Moffat did not return a call from Shine, Sargent, who would not answer specific questions about the situation, released the following statement:

“The Readington Township School District has a policy regarding dress code which is being universally applied to the school day and school events.  We regret that a small number of families

Read More »from School Dress Code Bans Strapless Dresses for Girls at Dance

Be happy! Photo: Mauro Grigolio/Getty ImagesWho doesn’t want happiness? For most people, the question of how to achieve it is right up there with that of wondering what happens to us when we die. And psychology professor Sonja Lyubomirsky is on the forefront of helping everyone find some answers, both through tireless research as well as with her books, like “The How of Happiness” (2007) and its just-published follow-up, “The Myths of Happiness.” 

More on Shine: 7 Reasons Photographs Can Boost Your Happiness

Lyubomirsky, based at the University of California, Riverside, believes that everyone has his or her own set happiness level, noted the New York Times in a recent profile of the researcher. And the less happy among us tend to share traits like frequently comparing themselves to others (and finding personal disappointment in others’ successes), rationalizing often, and dwelling on unhappy events. Happy folks, meanwhile, have a greater tendency to store up positive moments in their memory.

More on Yahoo!: Seeking Hope, Balance,

Read More »from How to Be Happy: 8 Ways to Feel Better About Everything

Gargano, left, and Batugo at Sunday's dream wedding. Photo: COCO Gallery.Of the thousands of weddings that no doubt took place in the U.S. on Sunday, there was at least one—between Jennifer Batugo and Brian Gargano, held in a picturesque Japanese garden on a Los Angeles hilltop—that had become a matter of life or death. 

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At least it felt that way for the bride, who was diagnosed with an extremely rare and aggressive form of breast cancer in late March. Told by doctors that she may only have a few months to live, Batugo, 29, and her fiancé decided they would move their August wedding to April. “We were given kind of a deadline, you could say,” Gargano told Yahoo! Shine. But they had no concrete plans set, and found themselves daunted not only by Batugo’s prognosis, but by the idea of pulling off a wedding so quickly.

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For help, Gargano placed a call to L.A. wedding officiant Elysia Skye. Though he didn’t know it at the

Read More »from Strangers Donate Dream Wedding to Bride With Cancer

Tatler's May issue A British society magazine is getting heaps of attention for a controversial celebrity list in its latest issue. A bizarrely sophomoric three-page spread in the May edition Tatler ranks the breasts of 34 accomplished public figures. That's right, it's a list of breasts. And not just any breasts, but the "most magnificent, marvelous breasts in all society," according to the magazine.

The magazine gives dubious praise to women including Helen Mirren (“Theatrical Tits”), Helena Bonham-Carter (“Gothic Tits”) and former Parliament member turned writer and social-media user Louise Mensch (“Tweeting Tits”).

Not surprisingly, readers are having pretty strong reactions. There are currently protest groups organizing on Twitter and Facebook, describing the spread as "demeaning and degrading."  

Fashion bloggers have joined the chorus of outrage. "We know times are tough in the world of print, but magazines must still have some kind of vetting system in place before an issue gets sent off to

Read More »from Magazine Ranks Celebs by Their Breasts. It's Enough With the Sexist 'Sexy' Lists

Photo: Martial Colomb/Getty ImagesThe Environmental Working Group (EWG) released its newest Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides on Monday, which is Earth Day. And apples top its annual “Dirty Dozen” list of fruits and vegetables with the highest pesticide residues for the third year in a row. 

More on Shine: Another Reason to Eat Organic

Other changes from the 2012 findings: cherry tomatoes and hot peppers are newcomers this year. Blueberries and lettuce, meanwhile, dropped off the Dirty Dozen list. The environmental watchdog group uses data compiled by the USDA, based on pre-washed samples of 48 types of conventionally-grown fruits and vegetables, to produce its findings.

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“I think most Americans would be very surprised about how prevalent pesticide residue is,” EWG senior analyst Sonya Lunder told Yahoo! Shine, noting that pesticides were still seen on 67 percent of the samples, which were all either washed or peeled before being tested.

Among the

Read More »from New 'Dirty Dozen' List of Pesticide-Laden Produce Just Released