1 Whoopi Goldberg says deciding to have an abortion was 'a hard choice,' and she has no use for people who take such decisions lightly.
2 Goldberg offered few details, such as when she had the abortion or who else was involved, in an interview in the March issue of McCall's magazine.
3 'I was in a great relationship at the time, but we were barely getting by,' the Oscar-winning actress said.
4 Goldberg grew up in New York City housing projects and has one child, a daughter she gave birth to at age 18.
5 As for abortion in general, she says, 'I have great anger toward people who cavalierly make these decisions, assuming some woman just decides, `I'm going to get my hair done and then get an abortion.'' ------
6 NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Chuck Norris will get his kicks as a grand marshal of one of the top parades in this year's Mardi Gras.
7 The karate champion and action movie hero, currently starring in television's 'Walker, Texas Ranger,' will reign with Richard Karn of the TV comedy series 'Home Improvement' over the Krewe of Endymion's parade Feb. 25.
8 The 1,500-member krewe will include 42 marching bands in its multimillion-dollar, 29th annual parade.
9 Other guest marchers include KC and The Sunshine Band and Huey Lewis and the News. ------
10 NEW YORK (AP) -- Johnny Depp has found a godfather figure in Marlon Brando.
11 'He's the most generous actor I've ever worked with and one of the most generous people I've ever known, in terms of advice or feelings or whatever,' Depp told Newsweek magazine.
12 He bonded with Brando on the set of the film 'Don Juan DeMarco,' set for release in April, in which Brando plays a psychiatrist treating Depp's character, who claims to be Don Juan.
13 'It's like meeting an older guy in a bar,' Depp gushed. 'You just sit there and talk to him for hours and hours and hours, with his fascinating stories and fascinating thoughts.'
14 Furthermore, he says, Brando is 'one of the funniest guys I've ever met in my life. He could be the funniest.' ------
15 DETROIT (AP) -- If the Detroit Tigers start this season with replacement players, Gov. John Engler says he'll take his ball and go home.
16 Traditionally, the governor and the Detroit mayor have thrown the first pitch to open the American League team's season.
17 Engler says he won't -- in fact, he'll boycott the game if the home opener April 3 against the Kansas City Royals is played by replacements for striking major leaguers.
18 'We want the regular season. We want the real team,' Engler's spokesman, John Truscott, told The Macomb Daily.
19 Mayor Dennis Archer has not decided whether he will attend.
20 Spring training for the Tigers opens Feb. 22. The club holds open tryouts Saturday at its facility in Lakeland, Florida. ------
21 BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) -- No stranger to scandals, the state legislature of Brasilia was rocked last week by charges that the proposed symbol of this capital city was a sexually deviant hermaphrodite.
22 No matter that it was a fish.
23 The uproar revolved around a bill in the state legislature to make the pira-brasilia, a rare, 2-inch-long (5-cm-long) fish native to Brazil's central plains, the capital district's official symbol.
24 But last week, legislator Cesar Lacerda dropped a bombshell: his research had revealed that the pira-brasilia was hermaphroditic -- each fish was both male and female.
25 Lacerda told the daily O Estado de Sao Paulo that choosing a creature of 'heterodox sexual positions' could reflect badly on the city.
26 After heated debate, the bill was withdrawn. The savanna wolf was proposed instead as the new symbol of Brasilia.
27 'It's a shame that some people take such a prejudiced view of the reproductive habits of the species,' one legislator was quoted as saying.

Goldberg grew up in New York City housing projects and has one child , a daughter she gave birth to at age 18 .
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Why is this offered after the previous information?