Paula Patton to
divorce Robin Thicke
He pledged in a song he would "get her back", but
Newsbeat has been told that Paula Patton has filed for divorce from Robin
Thicke.
The couple
announced they were separating in February after nine
years of marriage and reports of Robin's infidelity.
Paula filed for divorce from the
singer on Friday in Los Angeles, citing "irreconcilable differences".
She is asking for joint custody of
their four-year-old son, Julian Fuego Thicke.
The pair met when they were teenagers
and went on to marry in 2005.
Paula, who's starred in films like
Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol and Precious, inspired much of Robin's
music and appeared in some of his music videos.
However, cracks in their marriage
started to show when Robin's celebrity status rocketed after he released
Blurred Lines, which also featured Pharrell Williams and rapper TI.
It was named the
best-selling single of 2013, but was also heavily criticised, with people claiming some of
the song's lyrics referred to non-consensual sex.
During a radio
interview earlier this year, Thicke admitted he had "a little too much" fun following the song's
global success.
"I changed, and I got a little
too selfish, a little too greedy and little too full of myself," he said.
"I'm a man. I messed up and I had to lie for a while, and then I stopped
lying."
Since February, Robin has made several
public appearances where he has pleaded for his estranged wife to consider
taking him back.
He also dedicated his latest album to
the 38-year-old star, even naming it after her.
The record Paula sold 24,000 units in
the US when it was released in July, compared to his previous album Blurred
Lines which sold 177,000 units when it debuted last year.
Newsbeat has contacted Robin's
representatives for a comment, but have not received a response so far.
Conker fights: Is it the end for
the playground game?
By Jennifer Scott
Small, shiny and glowing with the promise of autumn, conkers
were once irresistible to generations of children who baked them in ovens,
dipped them in vinegar and put them on strings to enjoy playground conker
fights. But, as record numbers of conkers fall from trees, the trend appears to
be falling from fashion. BBC News Online asks why.
As Aileen Francis and her two sons make one of their regular
trips to their local sports centre, in Nottingham, they pass a line of horse chestnut
trees.
Aileen's sons - aged 10 and 12 - dart forward and fill their
bags and pockets with conkers.
"They love collecting them - we come home with massive
bagfuls," said Mrs Francis. "But they don't have conker fights any
more. I don't know anybody that does."
"When I was at school, people would put them on string. But
lately, there's not one child I have seen play with a conker on a string,"
said Mrs Francis.
"I'm not sure if they would be banned in schools because of
health and safety. I don't think schools would want parents complaining if
their children got hurt in a conker fight.
"I also think parents have less time to supervise their
children baking conkers in ovens and then drilling holes in them - I wouldn't
want mine doing that unsupervised. There's less time for old-fashioned play -
particularly when children have tablets and computer games to entertain
them."
In the early 2000s, a myth sprang up that the Health and
Safety Executive (HSE) had banned conker fights. The HSE was even forced
to put a denial on its website, describing the story as, "an old chestnut".
Some schools took to allowing their children to take part in
fights provided they were wearing protective goggles - Cummersdale Primary School, in Cumbria, was one such
school.
The school's current head teacher, Gareth Jones, says he would
not object if children wanted to play with conkers - and the protective goggles
would not be necessary - but many do not.
"It's hard to know why - they just don't seem very
interested in conkers any more," he said.
One school - Cleve House in Knowle, Bristol - has sought to
revive the tradition by staging conker tournaments for the past two years with
a trophy for the winner.
Joint head Elaine Lawson said the idea was prompted by children
bringing conkers into school and asking how to play.
"I think they had heard about conker fights at home and
were keen to do something like that, so we made it into a bit of a tournament
with a trophy," she said.
Mrs Lawson said it was "a pity" the school probably
would not be able to leave children to play with conkers outside of a
tournament, "for safety's sake".
"There has always been a risk attached to conkers, but more
people seem more aware of it now," she said.
"Also, children are much less used to playing with them.
Twenty years ago, children were playing conkers all the time - down the park,
or on the street with their friends. Today, they don't know how to play as
much."
Mrs Lawson added she had noticed today's children had fewer play
skills than their predecessors - which is why it was important to keep
traditional games like conkers alive.
"Games today either have to be organised, or sometimes
children will copy something they have seen on TV, but they are rarely
spontaneous," she said. "What we call 'old-fashioned games' is, in
fact, just something children have always done for sheer pleasure."
All the more pity because the time is ripe for conkers, with
more of the seeds in abundance than experts have seen for a long time.
"It has been an exceptional year," said David Knott,
curator at Edinburgh's Royal Botanic Gardens.
"We had a very mild winter, while spring was excellent for
pollinating insects which has led to a very good fruiting year for trees. They
have also ripened marginally earlier.
"Horse chestnut trees are actually native to Northern
Greece and Albania, so the conditions we have seen this year are more akin to
their natural environment."
The organisers of the World Conker Championships, which are
being held in Oundle, Northamptonshire, on Sunday, agreed there had been a
"bumper crop".
In 2012, the Scottish Conker Championships were cancelled
because of a lack of conkers.
This year however, the organisers of both competitions say
conkers are bigger and better than ever.
Nicola Hunt, who judges the Scottish championships - being held
in Peebles this year - says the crop is "outstanding".
"We are just out gathering them at the moment," she
said. "We possibly do have less children taking part, but there is the
great joy of foraging conkers - I don't think kids ever get tired of that. It's
just they're not going on to play games as much as they used to."
And while children's interest may be diminishing, Mrs Hunt says
their parents' love of the game is as strong as ever - in fact, it may be
growing.
"In the seven years we have been running the competition,
we have seen more and more adults taking part - they're just big kids,"
she said.So, can she imagine conker fights continuing to grow as a niche
interest but maybe led by adults, rather than children?
"Possibly," she said. "It's a really fun game
that just epitomises autumn."
Find out the direct sentences
1) He said. "I'm a man. I messed up and I had to lie for a while, and then I stopped lying."
2) "When I was at school, people would put them on string. But lately, there's not one child I have seen play with a conker on a string," said Mrs Francis.
