The world got a little more Armageddon/Deep Impact-y yesterday. A meteor blast hit the Russian city of Chelyabinsk and surrounding areas injuring more than 1000 people, costing more than $33 million US, and blew out most of the windows in over 4,000 building making the freezing temperatures at night feel all the more cold, you know, being windowless and all, has made the window repairs one of the most pressing items to repair. But to be honest, I'm sure most of the folks are content to wrap up in a few blankets and be thankful to be alive. The meteor packed a punch of approximately 300-500 kilotons of energy (the Hiroshima nuke the Americans dropped was 15 kilotons). NASA reported that the meteor was the largest recorded since 1908, where an asteroid entered the atmosphere and exploded, which knocked over 80 million trees to the ground in an area of 820 square miles in northern Siberia. If you haven't seen the video you should def watch it!
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Nipples. Maybe its just simple fundamental difference between the US and Canada. We aren't too weirded out by nips in the Great White North… we have a nude beach in Toronto, and both men and women are allowed to walk around topless. No big deal. In North Carolina however, a Republican state representative is trying to introduce House Bill 34 which would make it illegal for women to bare their breasts, even in a accidental or wardrobe malfunction scenario. Women who are worries about showing too much cleavage should use pasties, or some kind of double sided tape. Depending on the intent of exposure women could face up to a six month sentence for an 'errant areola,' whereas more mundane exposure results in a 30 day sentence. Fortuantely, there is an exemption made for breastfeeding, allowing the breast to be exposed is it least appealing sexual state." Rep Rayne Brown said "there are communities across this state, there's local governments across this state, and also local law enforcement for whom this issue is really not a laughing matter" despite the utter hilariousness of the whole bill.
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Amidst the shocking case of Oscar "Blade Runner" Pistorius (the feel good story of the London, Olympics) Monty Python/Fawlty Towers funnyman John Cleese tweeted 'Oscar's defence will be that he was absolutely legless at the time." It caused a major uproar on the social networking site leading to him to lose more followers than Mel Gibson or say, Stephen Baldwin (if he had any to begin with). As it turns out, what seemed really, really inappropriate is only mildly inappropriate since 'legless' turns out to be British slang for drunk, and therefore it's pretty damn 'punny' when you think about it. People were in an uproar, but personally, I don't think the Olympian merits much compassion if the charges against him are in fact true. One of my favourite Python bits:
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The decay of the Star Wars franchise may have begun with Episode I. Not that it was a terrible movie, more than a terrible character or two, with too much CGI but it was overall semi-enjoyable. Fortunatly, Episode II and III were much better. The Disney purchase of Lucasfilm may have been the final nail in the coffin. It's not like I won't watch the new series when it comes out but then Disney has announced they will be doing some stand alone Star Wars films, focusing on characters of Han Solo, Yoda or Boba Fett. Horrifying idea. The stand alone spin off that seems to gathering the most attention is that of Obi Wan Kenobi, a role that Ewan McGregor would be more than willing to reprise, going as far as coming up with a potential storyline that would take place between Episode III and IV. On the plus side, Harrison Ford is now in negotiations to reprise his role as maverick smuggler/hero of the rebellion Han Solo. He hasn't officially signed on, and word has it the negotiations could take months to finalize, but how bad ass would that be?
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The Grammy Awards were handed out, I don't know, sometime recently. Who cares. As it turns out the big winner was Katy Perry's boobs. Ellen approved!
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The Toronto Maple Leafs put together an impressive string of games while I was gone, which makes me want to stay out of the continent just so they have a chance in hell of making the playoffs. The Leafs currently sit in sixth place in the Eastern Conference with 35 games to play, and hopefully they can survive without goaltender James Reimer who got injured in the 5-2 beating the Leafs laid on the Philadelphia Flyers. Reimer had put up numbers that ranked with the leagues best, but back up Ben Scrivens has been great as well. The Leafs defence corps has tightened up, shaving nearly a goal per game of their team goals against average under the tutelage of Coach Carlyle. The Leafs main problem has been putting the puck in the net, and as their 3-1 loss to Carolina proved, their lack of strength/size down the middle. James Van Riemsdyk, Matt Frattin (who is now injured for a week or so), and Nazem Kadri have been doing most of the scoring, while sniper Phil Kessel sits on just two goals for the season (but has added 9 assists). The Leafs play the Senators on Hockey Night In Canada tonight 7PM EST start.
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Video for the title track from Bad Religion's stellar new album "True North":
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