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After facing accusations of violating campaign laws, making obscene comments, public drunkenness and squandering public funds, it didn’t seem possible that a controversy existed that Toronto Mayor Rob Ford hadn’t faced.

At least until two news sources came forward, Thursday, claiming to have seen a video they say shows Rob Ford smoking from a crack pipe.

Toronto mayor Rob Ford laughs as he sees a sculpture of himself made of butter. / Getty

Both Gawker and the Toronto Star say they were contacted by an anonymous source seeking $40,000 for a copy of an iPhone video. Both outlets declined to pay for a copy, but each say they saw the video which shows Ford inhaling from a glass pipe most commonly used to inhale crack. The seller told both outlets that there was crack in the pipe, and that he had seen the mayor smoke on more than one occasion.

Both sources say the video shows Ford ranting about politics, at one point calling a political opponent a “fag,” though they disagree on if Ford was referring to former prime minister Pierre Trudeau or his son, liberal leader Justin Trudeau.

From the Star:

“I’m f—ing right-wing,” Ford appears to mutter at one point. “Everyone expects me to be right-wing. I’m just supposed to be this great.…” and his voice trails off. At another point he is heard calling Trudeau a “fag.” Later in the 90-second video he is asked about the football team and he appears to say (though he is mumbling), “they are just f—ing minorities.”

The Star says that Ford’s lawyer has already denied the accounts in both news stories, saying that — in any case — it would be impossible to tell what is being smoked from a video alone.

As stated, Rob Ford is no stranger to controversy or serious allegations. Boing Boing has put together a list of all the claims made against the politician, ranging from serious allegations of squandering public money to sprinting out of a town hall meeting to slap magnetic campaign stickers on cars.

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford/Getty

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Tuesday, Fox released a trailer for a modern-day version of Sleepy Hollow. One that sees time-displaced, badass revolutionary war soldier Icabod Crane going toe-to-toe with an assault rifle-clad Headless Horseman — revealed to be one of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse from the bible — in modern New York.

If you want to see a Washington Irving character make jokes about Starbucks, the trailer is below:

The press release that goes along with the video says that rather than a gawky nerd, this Icabod Crane is a time travelling soldier under direct orders from George Washington to stop the Horseman.

From co-creators/executive producers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci (the “Star Trek” and “Transformers” franchises, “Fringe”) comes the adventure thriller SLEEPY HOLLOW. In this modern-day retelling of Washington Irving’s classic, ICHABOD CRANE (Tom Mison, “Salmon Fishing in the Yemen”) is resurrected and pulled two and a half centuries through time to find that the world is on the brink of destruction and that he is humanity’s last hope, forcing him to team up with a contemporary police officer (Nicole Beharie, “Shame,” “American Violet”) to unravel a mystery that dates back to the founding fathers.

It’s Rip Van Winkle meets National Treasure meets a 3 a.m. brainstorming session and shameless desperation. Sleepy Hollow is set to premiere this fall.

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The Mars Rover cost $800 million, and relies on decades of research from hundreds of the top scientific minds to do research that could fundamentally change the course of the human race.

Also, as pointed out by Reddit, you can use it to draw genitals.

Nasa

Here’s hoping that made your day a little brighter.

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Today — Nov. 27 — would have been Jimi Hendrix’s 70th birthday. It’s a good time to remember the musician’s accomplishments, but just as fun to dredge up some of the weirder parts of his life, too.

For example the fact that Jimi Hendrix’s one-year military career ended because of his music, but also because he owed $80 to the military laundry and was caught masturbating on the job.

The fantastic Letters of Note blog tweeted a deposition from Hendrix’s sergeant urging the man be discharged from the army.

Sgt. James Spears commanded Hendrix — then a private working in the warehouses at Fort Campbell, Kentucky — and was forthcoming with his unhappiness at Hendrix’s behavior:

From Lettersofnote.com

I feel bad for anyone who ever tried to top Strobls and Mattox’s locker room stories. Spears continues to criticize Hendrix’s attempts to excape a laundry debt:

From Lettersofnote.com

Between these anecdotes, Spears also complains about Hendrix’s poor performance and disinterest in his work before finally mentioning his music:

From LettersofNote.com

Fortunately for his fans, Hendrix was honorably discharged in 1962. For less lurid memorials of Hendrix, check out our slideshow featuring his life and times.

For more lurid memorials, check out this NSFW plaster molding of his penis.

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The USADA says it will strip Lance Armstrong of his seven Tour de France titles. Armstrong defends his innocence, but do you believe him? Let us know in our poll:

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Not this Elmo. This Elmo only wants to hug you.

A man in an off-brand Elmo costume had to be taken from New York City’s Central Park after launching into an obscenity-filled rant, according to the Gothamist.

The man — also clad in blue kneepads for some reason — became agitated after pestering tourists to pose with him for pictures and, according to witnesses on twitter, aggressively blamed most of his troubles on the Jewish population.

Police described the Elmo impersonator as “emotionally disturbed” and the man was reportedly taken away for psychiatric observation.

It’s worth noting that the man was a poor impersonator, given Elmo’s generally sunny, accepting disposition. Though that has been known to wane on occasion.

Apparently, an intolerant Elmo has been plaguing the park for some time. YouTube has several videos of a man in a matching, kneepad-clad Elmo suit ranting in the area of the Zoo. The most recent one is embedded below, followed by a video where Elmo screams that he “works for John Gotti,” and is ultimately confronted by a man in shorts and a heart-spotted, long-tailed tuxedo jacket.

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Facebook decided its easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission in promoting its e-mail client.

If you have a Facebook account, and haven’t been checking your ‘about’ page recently, you might not have noticed that your e-mail was hidden, and a complementary @facebook.com account was put in its place.

In case you’re happy with your own e-mail, it’s a simple if somewhat unintuitive process to restore your contact information.

• Go to the ‘About’ page and click the ‘Edit’ button next to ‘Contact Info’
• A window will pop up. The first lines will list the e-mail addresses you entered.
• To the far left of the e-mails there are circle icons next to each address. Click the one next to the e-mail you want to display and select Shown on Timeline from the dropdown menu.
• If you want to hide the Facebook account, select Hidden from Timeline in the dropdown menu next to that e-mail.

If you do that, your account should return to its original setting until Facebook decides to tamper with it again.

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Obama cemented his image as ‘the cool president’ by talking about his favorite character on ‘The Wire’ and revealing that he knew about Jeremy Lin before he got all mainstream.

On a recent episode of ESPN’s The B.S. Report with Bill Simmons (Grantland has a transcript here), Obama talked about his love of the Bulls, but delved into pop culture in a few places. First revealing that he’d been made aware of Jeremy Lin through the Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, a Harvard alum.

Obama:”I knew about Jeremy before you [Bill Simmons] did, or everybody else did…[Secretary of Education Arne Duncan] and I were playing and he said, ‘I’m telling you, we’ve got this terrific guard named Jeremy Lin at Harvard’…So I’ve been on the Jeremy Lin bandwagon for a while.

[Bill Simmons]: Are you taking credit for “Linsanity”? It kind of feels like you are a little bit.

Obama: I can’t take credit for it, but I’m just saying I was there early.”

President Obama, playing basketball

They went on to talk about the Bulls, Obama’s general love of sports, how he tries to make time to watch his daughter’s play, and an off-the-cuff 3-pointer he swished in Iraq. The entire interview worth a listen or read. And at the very end, the POTUS reveals his favorite The Wire character — ostensibly to settle an office bet at ESPN — to be Omar Little, Michael K. Williams’ shotgun-toting robber, who only steals from drug-dealers.

“[Bill Simmons]: Settle an office debate. Best Wire character of all time?

Obama: It’s got to be Omar, right? I mean, that guy is unbelievable, right?

BS: We might break this down as like a March Madness bracket, and I think he’s going to be the no. 1 seed. [Laughter.] Everyone is in on Omar, it seems like.

Obama: He’s got to be the no. 1 seed. I mean, what a combination. And that was one of the best shows of all time.”

Obama’s love of the critically acclaimed HBO drama — and character of Omar — should be a delight to headline writers everywhere, who now have cause to make”Obama coming!” jokes over and over again.