- Any
time you think rock stars are not like the rest of us, remember this story. Recall
the tale of Joakim Brodén, the vocalist from
Swedish metal band Sabaton, and how he ended up walking 320 miles to his band’s
next gig. Like so many non-famous people who have never stepped behind a
microphone or performed in front of hundreds of people who paid to see them, Brodén
entered a drunken bet with his friends. In this case, his friends were his
bandmates and they agreed that he loser would walk from the band’s hometown in
Falun, Sweden to their next gig at Trondheim Metal Fest in Norway. That walk is
approximately 323 miles and will take an estimated 107 hours on foot, which
both means Brodén is an incredibly slow walker and that he has a lot of time to
think about new song lyrics in the next few days. "I will not go into
details on exactly what happened, but I can say that it was fun and a bit
silly. It started out almost as a joke, but it evolved to be quite serious,” Brodén
said. "Now I will take a few days'
rest. I have made contact with some fans via Facebook, who have provided me
with food and shelter. The first day was the hardest. That's when I walked for
10 hours without proper shoes. It wasn't exactly ideal." After a
rough first day, the lead singer now walks between
four and eight hours a day. When he gets where he’s going, he will help the
rest of Sabaton tour in support of their seventh album, “Heroes.” Having the
lung capacity to hit all of the right notes and hold them shouldn’t be too
tough for the now-fitter Brodén after all of this………
- It’s
said that in a good negotiation, both sides end up a little unhappy and feeling
as if they gave up something they wanted. That’s usually not the measure of a
good court case, but it’s the result we have in the case of the Italian captain
convicted earlier this year of the 2012 shipwreck of the Costa Concordia cruise
liner off the Tuscan coast. The lazy, cowardly captain of that ship, Francesco
Schettino, was convicted in February by an Italian court in the manslaughter
deaths of 32 passengers and crew members, of causing the shipwreck by colliding
with a reef near tiny Giglio island and of abandoning the capsized vessel with
people still aboard. The infamous recording made in the aftermath of the ship
capsizing featured the coast guard angrily chiding Schettino to get his
despicable ass back to the ship and see what could be done to help those still
aboard. Now, both sides in his case are asking the court to revisit its
sentence and see what more (or less) can be done to this barnacle on the side
of the cruise liner of humanity. Both the prosecution and defense are appealing
the verdict, which resulted in Schettino being sentenced to 16 years in prison.
Prosecutors wanted a nice, round 26 years, while defense lawyer Saverio Senese
plans to argue that the court didn't correctly evaluate evidence in Schettino's
favor. A Florence appeals court will decide on this one and let’s just say the
odds aren't really with the captain………
- It’s
Coach Handsome vs. The Ignoramus Who Wants College Football to Return to 1950. After
the Texas Tech Red Raiders beat Arkansas 35-24 on Saturday night, it took the
looks-rich Kliff Kingsbury two seconds to turn his postgame news conference
into a verbal street fight with Arkansas coach Bret Bielema. Kingsbury looked
to bury Bielema after the latter made offensive comments during a summer
convention in front of Texas high school coaches, speaking ill of the
pass-happy offensive style Tech and other schools favor. "[Bielema] stood
up and said if you don't throw to the fullback, we'll kick your ass, and if you
throw it 70 times a game, we'll kick your ass,'' Kingsbury said. "[Bielema]
just got his ass kicked twice in a row and probably next week by [Texas]
A&M as well. That did feel good.'' As the son of a Texas high school
football coach and a noted proponent of the spread offense, he was clearly
irked by Bielema trying to help his teams remain competitive by railing against
the evils of that newfangled spread offense that Kingsbury says is run by
"90 percent'' of Texas high schools. The portly, fashion-backwards Bielema
really can't match his younger rival in terms of looks, fitness or wardrobe,
but that hasn’t stopped him from trying. He cited a study earlier this year
that "players in the no-huddle, hurry-up offense play the equivalent of
five more games than those that don't," which leads to an increase in
injuries. "We have an obligation to do what's right," Bielema said in
March. "I can't understand how some guys can't see that." Nice try,
B. Your style of having 350-pound offensive linemen smash into 325-pound
defensive linemen every play with 230-pound running backs behind the line,
waiting to crash into 250-pound linebackers isn't exactly great for players’
health. After losing to mid-major Toledo the previous week and now Tech, all
Bielema could offer was a lame quip about Kingsbury being new as a head coach
and having a .500 record. Weak sauce, bro. Weak sauce………..
- If
only all county commission hearings were this interesting. Normally, they’re
filed with procedural, bureaucratic bullsh*t like zoning ordinances, tax codes
and utility disputes, but the most recent Washoe
County Commission meeting was no ordinary hearing. It all started with a man who
has complained about pesticides in Reno's drinking water getting up to address
the commission. That would typically be a boring time featuring an out-of-touch
kook ranting about something he’s only vaguely informed about, but thankfully Ross
Tisevich of Fallon, Nevada brought a visual aid with him to help liven up his
diatribe. That visual aid was a weed killer bottle he placed on the lectern in
front of him and before the night was over, that cheap plastic bottle would
cause a whole lot of drama for everyone in the room. Tisevich was rambling on
and on when he spilled a green liquid from the bottle, setting off a panic as
deputies tackled him and frantic room full of people were quarantined for about
two hours before officials determined it was a water-and-sugar substance that
posed no danger. One of the best parts of the whole scene was the mayors of Reno
and Sparks being among those quarantined before Tisevich was jailed on charges
including dispersing a hoax hazardous material and disrupting a public meeting.
Hi cohort, Joseph Benedict of Reno, also spoke at the meeting and was arrested
on the same charges. Credit to these two ass hats for calling plenty of
attention to their point, whatever the hell their point was in the first place,
that is………
No comments:
Post a Comment