No more ankle bracelet

New York – Martha Stewart was finally given the signal to step into the future – on a lighter foot.

Stewart told The Associated Press the irritating electronic ankle bracelet would come off at 12:05 a.m. today, in the first minutes of the first day when she was freed from house arrest.

For more than five months of home confinement – including a three-week extension for violating unspecified probation rules – the monitoring device was her constant companion, broadcasting a signal to federal authorities who could track her every move.

Stewart, 64, was sentenced last year to five months behind bars and five months of house arrest after she was convicted of lying to authorities about her 2001 sale of about 4,000 shares of ImClone Systems Inc. stock.

Chris Stanton, the chief federal probation officer in New York, said there was a standard procedure for releasing someone from the device at end of house arrest. “We advise the offender in advance that, unless they otherwise hear from us, at 12:01 a.m. they can cut the bracelet off – it’s just a rubber band,” he said. Then, “all monitoring will cease.”

Any further monitoring of Stewart would be by the reporters and photographers who have followed her since she was released from a federal prison five months ago.

Inaugural Fred Rogers scholarship announced

Los Angeles – A scholarship in memory of Fred Rogers, who produced and hosted the acclaimed PBS children’s program “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood,” was given to its inaugural recipient, a University of California film student.

Michelle Lyn Banta, a graduate student at the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television, received $10,000 to support her study in children’s media and further “the values and principles of Rogers’ work,” the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences said.

Banta’s selection was announced Tuesday at a ceremony attended by Rogers’ widow, Joanne Rogers.

Rogers died of cancer in 2003 at age 74.

Banta also will have the opportunity to work with a mentor from the academy’s children’s programming group during the school year.

The TV academy established the Fred Rogers Memorial Scholarship with funding from Ernst & Young LLP.

A wolf tail tale

New York – Andre Benjamin, a.k.a. Andre 3000 of OutKast, is a vegan, and a famous one, having been named “sexiest male vegetarian” by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. But wait, what’s that thing hanging from his belt? Why, it’s a genuine gray wolf’s tail he picked up in Canada.

Apparently opposed to eating animals, Benjamin seems to have no problem wearing them. Never mind, by the way, that the gray wolf is considered an endangered species in the United States.

And it gets better. Benjamin, currently starring in the movie “Four Brothers” with Mark Wahlberg, plans to put out a line of clothing that includes the wolf’s tail as an accessory, the New York Post reports.

Asked about the hollow hypocrisy of it all, Benjamin said, “I’m a vegan, but I like to look good, too.”

Schwarzenegger museum lacks financial strength

Graz, Austria – A museum displaying training equipment once used by Arnold Schwarzenegger was due to close because of financial problems, officials said.

The collection of Schwarzenegger memorabilia, which opened in 1997 when the former bodybuilder-actor turned 50, also includes photos and paintings.

It is tucked into a corner of a fitness center in the Arnold Schwarzenegger Stadium in Graz, a southern Austrian city near the California governor’s home village of Thal.

The fitness center and museum were to close Wednesday.

An administrator at the center blamed financial problems. The official said a letter had been sent to Schwarzenegger asking for financial help, but the letter wasn’t answered.

Susanne Hoeller, an official at the Graz tourism office, said that although the privately run museum didn’t attract large crowds, it was a “pity” for the city to lose its only Schwarzenegger site.

Hoeller said the collection will be stored and might one day be displayed again.