Reviews Category
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Through a Glass Darkly: 5 Horror Films and TV Episodes about Mirrors
THE painter Pablo Picasso once asked who can see the human face correctly: the photographer, the mirror, or the painter.
Popular horror films and television programs have long highlighted all three possibilities, but focused most intently, perhaps, on the mirror.
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Posted: 15th, April 2014 | In: Film, Flashback, Key Posts, TV & Radio | Comments (3)
The New Noah Is Looking A Bit White – And There’s A Weird Reason For That
From left, New Zealand actor Russell Crowe and Australian actor Hugh Jackman arrive for the UK Premiere of Noah at a central London cinema, London, Monday, March 31, 2014.
PEOPLE have long chuckled about America’s insistence that people from the Middle East are white. Apart from present day Middle Eastern people of course. They HATE those guys.
We’re talking about the meme that got out of hand. European artists painted Jesus as a white guy and everyone cleverly ignored the fact that he would have at least been olive-skinned, or even darker. He definitely wasn’t some white guy with fair hair and a neat beard who looked like he might be the road manager for Creedence Clearwater Revival.
So too, the rest of The Bible’s important figures found themselves being whitened, in modern American depictions especially. And so, to Noah, who just happens to be the subject of a new film and, unsurprisingly, he’s played by a white guy; Russell Crowe.
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Would You Use Facebook As A Bank? Because They’ll Be Asking You Soon
IT looks like Facebook is going to open itself up as something of a bank. Why not, they’ve a billion users already and that could make them the largest bank in the world by a long way if they can pull it off. They’re starting over here in Europe too:
Not content with being just a platform to host cat photos and status updates, Facebook is readying itself to provide financial services in the form of remittances and electronic money.
The social network is only weeks away from obtaining regulatory approval in Ireland for a service that would allow its users to store money on Facebook and use it to pay and exchange money with others, according to several people involved in the process.
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Posted: 15th, April 2014 | In: Money, Reviews | Comments (2)
Doctors Successfully Create And Implant Working Lab-Grown Vaginas For Women (And Men)
PSST! Want to buy a vagina? Four women born with an underdeveloped or absent vagina have been living with artificial ones for the past four years. The women suffer from Mayer-Rokitansky-Kuster-Hauser syndrome (MRKH).
* Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser (MRKH) syndrome is a disorder that occurs in females and mainly affects the reproductive system. This condition causes the vagina and uterus to be underdeveloped or absent. Affected women usually do not have menstrual periods due to the absent uterus. Often, the first noticeable sign of MRKH syndrome is that menstruation does not begin by age 16…
Posted: 15th, April 2014 | In: Reviews, Technology | Comment
Airbnb Home Share Is A Boom To Prostitution
YOU may or may not know what Airbnb is. It’s a system whereby people can rent out their homes, or an extra bedroom, for a couple of days or a week or whatever. And therefore it’s also a website where you can rent a room in a town for a week or a night or two or whatever. Well, that’s great and it’s booming, currently worth some $10 billion as a company. But obviously, people have found a way to exploit that system as well:
Hookers are using the controversial Airbnb home-sharing Web site to turn prime Manhattan apartments into temporary brothels, The Post has learned.
One escort service is even saving a bundle by renting Airbnb apartments instead of hotel rooms for clients’ quickies, says a 21-year-old call girl who works for the illicit business.
“It’s more discreet and much cheaper than The Waldorf,” said the sex worker, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“Hotels have doormen and cameras. They ask questions. Apartments are usually buzz-in.”
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Posted: 15th, April 2014 | In: Money, Reviews, The Consumer | Comment (1)
Vintage Footwear Adverts Unlaced
LADIES – no need to fight. There are shoes aplenty in this article, so there are more than enough for the both of you. Here is a cornucopia of retro footwear adverts that should keep everyone satisfied for a while. From hippy clogs to funky sidewinders fit for the most stylish of 70s pimps, they’re all here. Some of the advertisements are blatantly sexist, some are just plain odd, but there is much fun to be had. Enjoy!
Each Dexter shoe comes with a hotel coupon and a free condom. Plus, the shoes are highly durable and waterproof in case you’re going to move on from Casual Dex to Fetish Dex.
For much of the Seventies, no brand embodied the Black Power philosophy as much as Flagg Brothers and Eleganza. They offered the very best in pimpwear – I’m talkin’ ermine collars, big ass heels and pearl handle canes. African-American fashions were bold and flamboyant during this decade – if the jive-turkeys didn’t like it, they could kiss their black ass.
A completely nude woman hopelessly in love with a guy’s shoes. Is this advert pure genius, or pure sexist? I’d posit that it’s a lot of both.
It’s become a cliché to say that fashion is circular, but it is absolutely true. The 1970s clogs above would have been absolutely mocked and ridiculed in the 80s and 90s. In 1986, you would have been stoned to death and your entirely family imprisoned for sliding into a platform mule. Today, it’s the entirely fashionable…. although, embroidered fruit still hasn’t made a comeback. In due time.
At first this just seems incredibly odd; however, I guess there are stranger things than choosing to paint your shoes. Apparently, they even had “animal textures” – for instance, you could spray on lizard skin. (And at that point, I would start to question your mental condition.)
Amazingly, someone along the way thought having a nude middle-aged man on a ladder was a good way to sell slippers. But, before you start feeling too sorry for yourself for being subjected to this – just think about what a view those poor firemen are getting!
Very few people know this, but it’s a fact that Nostradamus actually predicted the arrival of the denim boot.
In the land with a climate opposite to Babylon there will be great shedding of blood.
Heaven will seem unjust both on land and sea and in the air.
Sects, famine, kingdoms, denim boots, plagues, and confusion shall rule the Earth.
– Century I, Quatrain 55
What significance it has remains to be seen, but the mysterious denim boot will no doubt play a major role in the apocalypse.
It says the footwear was designed especially for Pat Boone. I’m assuming that means it will never become unclean and remain for all time as pure as the wind driven snow. In this advert, Pat demonstrates the magic of Velcro – “the closure invention of the century”. There’s even directions for proper Velcro use: “to close, press together – to open, peel apart.”
These slippers come in a variety of colors: Spring Green, Royal Blue, Cocoa Brown, and Glowing Nuclear Waste Orange. All Minute Crochet Slippers are machine washable and stain resistant, except the orange, which may cause birth defects, tumors and long term environmental devastation.
The infamous “egg chair” was perhaps mankind’s greatest creation, yet it fell out of favor by the end of the 1970s. You were comfortably enclosed within this upholstered ovum, and some even had speakers inside…. a toker’s throne, you might say.
A guy in a leisure suit is framed by a ring of godawful footwear – Worst selfie ever.
This seems to be nothing more than a cheap and shameless ploy to grab our attention by having us look up this chick’s skirt. In a perfect world, all adverts would be this cheap and shameless. I’ll wager this particular shoe advert had more than its share of men examining it close-up for any glimpse of immodesty.
And speaking of cheap and shameless… ¡Ay, caramba!
Posted: 15th, April 2014 | In: Fashion, Flashback, Key Posts | Comment
Hillsborough In Photos: A Lone Liverpool Fan Sits On The Broken Terraces
FLASHBACK to April 15, 1989:
A lone supporter sits by the damaged fencing at Hillsborough Stadium, in Sheffield. Twenty years after the Hillsborough disaster, English football is enjoying a golden age with multi-millionaire players starring in modern stadia, reaping the rewards of lucrative TV deals. But in the aftermath of the disaster at the Sheffield ground in April 1989, that saw 96 Liverpool fans crushed to death at an FA Cup semi-final against Nottingham Forest, things never looked so bleak.
Posted: 15th, April 2014 | In: Flashback, Liverpool, Sports | Comment
Boeing Dreamliner: US Air Tweeted This Photo Of A Woman With A Toy Plane In Her ‘Lady Hanger’
THE Boeing 787 Dreamliner also did sound a bit like a tampon. Maybe that explains why US Airways reacted to a woman who complained of a bad flight with a photo of a woman with a model of a Boeing 777 in her vagina?
Or was it comment on leg room?
The tweet was up for around an hour before it was deleted.
A US Air rep (see above) said:
“We apologize for an inappropriate image recently shared as a link in one of our responses. We’ve removed the tweet and are investigating.”
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Posted: 14th, April 2014 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
Britain’s Biggest Hero Lives In Stonegate And Ticket Inspectors Spread TB In Cattle
THE biggest fare dodger in railway history is Our Hero. Every work day for five years Our Hero travelled from his home in Stonegate to London’s Canon Street station. He worked out that if he swiped an Oyster card at Canon Street but not at Stonegate, East Sussex, the machine undercharged him.
Bright lad. His quick wits and low cunning saved him £42,000 in train fares.
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Posted: 14th, April 2014 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
Man Banned From Buying Alcohol In Co-op After Joking It Was For 12-Year-Old Daughter
“THAT’S your beer sorted out,” said Kieran O’Sullivan, 48, to his sober 12-year-old daughter as they attempted to pay for alcohol at a Co-op supermarket in Worthing, West Sussex. We say attempted because the cashier heard the quip and banned Kieran from buying the booze.
She demanded to see the child’s ID. Was she over 18? If not, then she’d have to get her kicks from smoking bedbugs like all the other kids, or else call the Co-op’s bank and order some crystal meth.
Mr O’Sullivan is a teacher. He probably needs the drink. He tells the Argus:
“So there I am, this middle aged, middle income, average Joe, cracking an innocent joke to my entirely sober 12-year-old daughter when the cashier narrows her eyes and says, ‘I’ll have to see your ID, sir.’ I asked if she was kidding, but then she asked to see my daughter’s ID, which made me laugh.
“She said that by law, if you make a comment about purchasing alcohol for a child then they had to see both our IDs. I asked to speak to the manager but instead of using his judgement, he backed his employee up and said it was the law. I told them I was clearly not getting alcohol for my daughter and the law was all about judgement and about circumstances. But they refused.”
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Posted: 14th, April 2014 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
Thieves Make Off With $15,000 Of Nads Hair Removal Cream
Posted: 14th, April 2014 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Polyester Prayers: Gospel Family Album Covers of the Seventies
THE 1970s was a decade set ablaze with countless Jesus Freaks and Holy Rollers cranking out an untold number of gospel records. There seemed no end to the number of artists Bound for Glory and preaching the Good Word. What holds them all together is not only their brand of music, but also their total inability to produce an album cover that is not jarringly awkward. The hideous fashions, the frightening hair styles, the creepy vibes… each one is a tiny miracle of condensed tackiness and unease. Hallelujah!
The Farr Family – Family Portrait
I guess the glory of the Lord is so bright; four of the six bespectacled Farr boys had their lenses tinted. The top-center Farr is simply majestic – the mighty ‘fro helmet is a thing of heavenly beauty.
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Posted: 14th, April 2014 | In: Flashback, Music | Comments (5)
Manchester Smoker ‘Blown Up’ In Hospital: Tobacco Safer Than Digital Ciggies
PAUL KEAVENY has news of Jean Booth, known to tabloid readers as “e-cigarette grandma Jean Booth”.
“Heavy-smoker” Jean was in Manchester’s Wythenshawe Hospital for a hip operation when the oxygen supply she was using to ease her breathing caught fire. He head and face were badly burnt. She is “fighting for life”.
Terrible. Did the e-Gigs ‘blow her up’?
Further down the story we get facts:
“…an investigation tried to discover whether an e-cigarette found near her was responsible for the blaze.”
A relative adds:
“Now Jean is a smoker, don’t get me wrong. She’s been in and out of hospital for the past two years but she has never ever attempted to light a cigarette in there. She has never done that.”
Smoking tobacco is terrible for your health, but it’s better than being blown up.
Nurse Nancy Lennox smilingly lights a cigarette for James Blair as he lies in bed today (Sunday) at Bangor Hospital, County Down, Northern Ireland, after being rescued from the disaster to the British Transport Commission’s MV Princess Victoria (2,694 tons).
The ship foundered in a severe gale five miles off the County Down coast with the loss of over 130 lives. There were about 170 persons aboard.
A Deadly Affair: Mayka Kukucova Claims Her Innocence In Andy Bush Killing As Maria Korotaeva Tells All
THE Sun leads with news of Maria Korotaeva, aka Masha, lover to Andrew Bush, the British jeweller found shot dead at his rented home on Spain’s Costa del Sol. His ex-lover Mayka Kukucova is accused of murdering him. Reports suggest she could be carrying his child.
On Sunday, Mr Bush’s daughter Ellie, 19, told The People about Mayka, recalling a family trip to Dubai:
“We were out shopping and there were loads of things Mayka wanted to buy but Andy said no. She went into a blind rage, screaming and threw a handbag at him. She did it to purposefully hurt him and then stormed off. We didn’t see her for a few hours, it was a common thing… She stamped all over his laptop, then put it underneath a tap and put it back in the case. When we got back to England he realised but he tried to ignore it. He thought he could change her.”
Mr Bush’s sister Rachel worked in the same Bristol shop as Kukucova. She told the paper:
“She wasn’t right in the head. It got to the stage where Andy had to ask her to find a new job because her anger became uncontrollable. She’d come into the shop and create these scenes in front of the staff.”
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Posted: 14th, April 2014 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
School Administrators Suspend Teachers For Teaching ‘Dangerous’ Science And Boy For Making Hydrogen Bomb At Home
IS there a fear of youth? The LA Times reports on the trials of science teacher Greg Schiller, now suspended because two of his students made projects that “appeared dangerous to administrators”. Rogan and Susan Ferguson say district officials confiscated their son Asa’s science fair project, “Evolution of a Coil Gun.”
One project used compressed air to propel a small object but it was not connected to a source of air pressure, so it could not have been fired. (In 2012, President Obama tried out a more powerful air-pressure device at a White House Science Fair that could launch a marshmallow 175 feet.)
Another project used the power from an AA battery to charge a tube surrounded by a coil. When the ninth-grader proposed it, Schiller told him to be more scientific, to construct and test different coils and to draw graphs and conduct additional analysis, said his parents, who also are Los Angeles teachers.
A school employee saw the air-pressure project and raised concerns about what looked to her like a weapon, according to the teachers union and supporters. Schiller, who said he never saw the completed projects except in photos, was summoned and sent home. Both projects were confiscated as “evidence,” said Susan Ferguson, whose son did the coil project.
This type of idiocy has form. In 2002, a middle school students at a Long Beach, California, school was overheard discussing his science fair project.
The student was planning on making the plastic hydrogen bomb as a science project. Because he said it was a bomb, he was suspended from school and the principle deemed his project to be an implied threat. The school even called the police to investigate the bomb and the student’s house was raided by the police. The police found nothing and attached a copy of the web site to the report.
The police letter was epic:
COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT INCIDENT REPORT
Suspicious Circumstances: Possible Posession of a Destructive Device
B. Allen, Employee #434180
I contacted [the principal] regarding a suspicious circumstances call, tag 627.
[The principal] said about one week ago she heard [the student] talking to a group of students at Hoover Middle School. [The principal] said she heard [the student] say he was building a bomb.
On 02-27-02 [the principal] approached [the student] and asked him if he was really building a bomb. [The student] told her that he was building a hydrogen bomb and his parents were buying the materials to make it for him.
[The principal] said [the student] never threatened to bring the bomb to school or harm anyone with it.
With the help of assisting units I responded to [the boy’s address] and searched the residence for any explosive device and materials for its manufacturing (see attached consent to search form authorized by [the student’s] father [father’s name]).
We were unable to locate any explosive device or manufacturing materials.
I contacted [the student] and asked him if he remembered telling anyone he was making a hydrogen bomb.
[The student] said he did tell people he was making a hydrogen bomb. He said he was making a hydrogen bomb toy from scitoys.com. The toy squirts water out of a hole when it’s ignited via 9 volt battery.
[The student] printed out the details of the hydrogen bomb off scitoys.com. See attached 12 page printout.
After examining the scitoys.com printout I came to the conclusion the hydrogen bomb [the student] said he was making was in fact a toy.
Watch Commander, Lt. Stringham, notified of the above.
Who put the imbeciles in charge?
George Davis Is Innocent: The 1970s Campaign That Proved The Police And State Were Not OK
ON August 19, 1975, the third England v Australia Test at Headingley was abandoned following vandalism. A man who said he was a supporter of the George Davis campaign telephoned BBC radio London and claimed the group was responsible. Slogans were daubed outside the ground and the wicket was vandalised with a bit of digging and poured oil.
The Test was declared a draw robbing England of the chance to win back the Ashes and the trophy.
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Posted: 13th, April 2014 | In: Flashback, Key Posts | Comment
1936: Claud Butler Cycling Tweed Suits For Whitsun
ANYBODY else think cycling gear has gone downhill since this Claud Butler Whitsun “rigout” was advertised in 1936?
Newcastle United: Foolish Pardew Inspires Sunday Sun To Publish Epic Back Page
NEWCASTLE United manager Alan Pardew is the inspiration for a fantastic back page from the Sunday Sun newspaper.
In response to pouting Pardew blaming the Press for the current hostilities toward him and his ailing team, Tyneside-based tabloid Sunday Sun has issued a full-page apology.
Said Pardew:
“Four defeats for Newcastle is going to bring its own pressure. I don’t think the local press have helped. Four defeats as a Newcastle manager, we have 10 senior players missing. It is a difficult hole to try to fill. Their frustration has boiled over a little bit. And we need to settle it down. The only way to settle it down is to get a win.”
If only there were someone in charge of the team who could help make a win a reality…
The local press still matters. Tell Pardew…
Seattle Burger Shop Uses Bong Toking Jesus To Celebrate Cheap Easter Meat
OUTAGE in Seattle, Washington, over the new ad for burger eatery Lunchbox Laboratory featuring the call to celebrate Easter with a weed-smoking Jesus. The ad tells readers:
“When I get back all I want is the Burger of the Gods.”
Jesus is holding a burger and a joint, with the 4/20 date highlighted in green.
Lunchbox Laboratory owner John Schmidt tells KIRO radio:
“We knew we were pushing it a little bit but at the same time that is kind of what our marketing is about.”
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Posted: 13th, April 2014 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
Spanish Town Castrillo Matajudios ‘Considers’ Changing Name From ‘Kill Jews’
THE good people of Castrillo Matajudios , Spain, are to discuss changing the name of the town from “killing Jews” to the pre-Inquisition-era “Jews’ Hill”.
Diario de Burgos says Mayor Lorenzo Rodriguez thinks the time is ripe to change the town’s name to Castrillo Mota de Judios, which means “Castrillo Jews’ Hill.”
Know that in the north of Spain, the phrase “killing Jews” (matar Judios) has become a reference not to intense murderous persecution, rather downing glasses of lemonade spiked with alcohol at Easter.
On Good Friday, April 18, Leon will hold a “matar Judios” fiesta. Locals will chin 40,000 gallons of lemonade to the last drops – or until all the Jews have been eaten.
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The Evinrude Fishing Saucer Concept Boat Of 1957
THE Evinrude Fishing Saucer concept boat designed by Brooks Stevens and made for the 1957 New York Boat Show.
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Posted: 12th, April 2014 | In: Flashback, Technology | Comment (1)
Murderabilia: Nurse Wants £10,000 For Harold Shipman’s Medical Examination Couch
PSST! Wannabe buy Dr Harold Shipman’s old medical examination couch? He was Britain’s most prolific serial killer, given 15 life sentences for the murders of as many as 215 patients.
Marjorie Chakravarti, 72, was a senior sister at the Abraham Ormerod Day Hospital, Todmorden where Shipman began his career as a GP and worked for seven years. She saw his old couch and bought it for £10.
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Posted: 12th, April 2014 | In: Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
I Was G-Man Jerry Cotton: When Hedy Lamarr Performed The First On-Screen Orgasm And Jane Powell Grew Up
SO. ‘What does the music for a 1965 West German movie about a New York FBI agent sound like?’ asks James Lileks? That question to you, special agent Jerry Cotton, hero of Operation 100 Dollar Gang.
Cotton was played by US actor and all-round beefcake George Nader. You may know him from his 1958 melodrama The Female Animal, starring 1940s sex symbol Hedy Lamarr and actress-singer Jane Powell, pictured below taking advantage of the warm California winter to relax at pool side on Jan. 16, 1958.
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Posted: 12th, April 2014 | In: Film, Flashback, TV & Radio | Comment
