- Cats:
They’re what will bring the visitors back to one of Europe’s best cities. You
may not feel that way, but officials in Brussels are banking on felines to send
out the clarion call for travelers who may have
been scared away by images of soldiers armed with machine guns in the capital's
deserted streets. Following a five-day lockdown prompted by the maximum
security alert, Brussels officials are desperate for ways to jump-start tourism
in the wake of a shutdown of the city’s subways and schools that came with a
request to stay away from public places because they might be targeted by
extremists in a Paris-style attack. Tourism officials are seeking to capitalize
on the fact that cats became an unofficial mascot of the Brussels lockdown when
residents flooded social media with hundreds of feline photos this week
following a police request not to share information about ongoing raids. Instead,
wacky Belgians tweeted images of cats, including with their paws up, disguised
as police snipers and even wearing a bowler hat, the trademark of Rene
Magritte, Belgium's greatest surrealist painter. Police responded by tweeting a
picture of a bowl of cat food to thank people for their help and tourism
officials chased that with images of cats at famous Brussels landmarks in a cheeky
attempt to encourage visitors to come for the chocolate, waffles, parks and
culture. Crowds have so far been much smaller than normal at Brussels' Atomium,
a nine-sphere structure of an iron crystal that is one of the city's biggest
draws. Patrick Bontick, head of Brussels' tourism office, noted a 20 percent
drop in bookings this week. "Even in a bad situation, we can also have some
humor in Brussels," he said. "We're a surrealistic country.”
Surrealism and cats … you can't go wrong with that combo……..
- Adele
is the sh*t in music right now. So much so that one of the biggest names in the
industry is openly pining for the chance to take his latest hit song and remix
it with the addition of the British songstress’ dulcet tones. After Adele
expressed an appreciation for “Hotline Bling,” it seems Drake is eager to take
up her good-natured offer. "I really want us
to do an official remix. I love Drake. I love Drake so much. I even got the
coat that's in the video – I got it delivered the other day, I ordered it…the
red one,” Adele said. “I had a drink like three weeks ago [with] my best
friends – in fact, it was to celebrate ‘Hello’. And I was off my face because I
don't really drink anymore, and they've got a video of me dancing to it on a
coffee table as well.” As could be expected, that comment didn’t take long to
work its way back to Drake and after attending a Toronto Raptors game last
week, the singer addressed the idea of collaborating with one of the best
voices in music. "I’d do anything with
Adele. I’d literally go to Adele’s house right now and do laundry for her,”
Drake said. Adele’s latest numerically titled album, “25,” dropped on Nov. 20
and has been a smash hit on both sides of the Atlantic. In the United Kingdom,
it sold the most copies of any album during its first week of sale, topping
800,000 copies to break the previous record, held by Oasis for its 1997 debut
album “Be Here Now,” which sold 696,000 copies in its first week of release. Putting
together massive, single-named musical powers like Drake and Adele is a
definite recipe to both break the Internet with a music video and sell a whole
lot of digital copies to loyal fans of both, so this one is going to happen at
some point………
- Welcome
back, "Dancing Cop." Retired Providence
(R.I.) police officer Tony Lepore enjoyed his 15 minutes of fame a few decades
ago with his wacky dance routines while directing traffic, a practice he began
back in 1984. However, officials in Rhode Island's capital city let him know he
wouldn’t be used to help direct holiday traffic this year after he organized a
protest last month outside a Dunkin' Donuts where a worker wrote the
"blacklivesmatter" hashtag on another officer's coffee cup. Officials
determined that Lepore wrongly gave the impression he was speaking for the
department, leaving the 68-year-old former officer sidelined during the holiday
season. However, where Providence swung and missed, others saw an opportunity
and as it turns out, Lepore won't be sitting on his Yule log watching the world
go by in the weeks ahead. He revealed recently that he's been hired by the city
of East Providence to conduct traffic this holiday season and while his stint
back on the streets will be a short one, a little bit of time with the Dancing
Cop is better than none at all. Lepore will be posted in front of City Hall in
East Providence from December 10 through Christmas Eve, trying to ward off the
cold while keeping frustrated holiday shoppers, revelers and travelers both
entertained and properly directed by channeling his inner Usher, Fred Astaire
and Jason Derulo……..
- You
shut your mouth, Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho. How dare you suggest that
critical comments made about you by one of your former stars, current Major
League Soccer star Didier Drogba, were nothing more than a shameless attempt to
promote a book Drogba recently released? Mourinho was asked about Drogba
speaking negatively about Chelsea - the defending English Premier League
champion, currently languishing in the 15th position in the Premier
League standings, saying that the team’s younger players must develop their
mental strength in order to reverse its recent slide. The comment was an
indirect shot at Mourinho, who fired back by saying he wouldn’t comment and
doing so by commenting about what he refused to comment on. "When you
speak because you want to sell books, I don't read. I don't read," the
veteran Portuguese coach said. “I like good interviews. I like interviews from
big guys like Didier with good journalists, newspapers or television. But
this is not an interview. It was to sell books. It doesn't disappoint me. It
was just the reality. It was just to sell books. I can analyze Didier's
interview with pleasure, but not Didier selling books." Drogba, now
playing in MLS with the Montreal Impact, called for the Chelsea squad to
show more leadership and suggested that even with veteran leader John Terry
still on the roster, it was incumbent on the next generation of Chelsea stars
to assume that leadership mantle. "Yes, JT [John Terry] is still there but
on your own it is very difficult," he said. "Other players have
to come up with this mentality, you are not born with it. You build it. Maybe
you have it in you but you build it." Hmm, that doesn’t sound like a
controversial remark made simply to sell a few more copies of your book………..
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