Tuesday, August 16, 2016

International airport news ticker rage, stadium sound guys as comedians and Mariah Carey v. censorship


- File this under the heading of massive, massive understatement….and then some. A Menlo Park, N.J. woman says she’s undecided on whether or not to open the door to her home to another potential hooker to use it as a makeshift brothel after a previous Airbnb guest flooded her home and ran an adult business from the room she was renting. Sharon Marzouk probably figured she was just fine when she headed out of town, knowing she had a roommate who could keep an eye on things while she was away…and if not for that roommate giving her a ring, the situation could have been much worse. “He told me that I’d better come home quickly and there is an emergency at the house. And where’s the circuit breaker?” Marzouk recalled of talking to her roommate on the phone. She hurried home and found that the woman to whom she rented her room on Airbnb had turned on the faucet for the tub and walked away, flooding the upstairs. “It had overflowed from the second floor to the first floor and water was pouring from all the light fixtures,” she said. Oh, but that was just the start. It turned out that the guest was not only sleeping their, but setting up a sort of sex shop. “I noticed that there was a handbag with only condoms in it,” Marzouk said. After (almost certainly) burning her sheets, her mattress and every other flammable item within arm’s length of her bed, Marzouk was able to take stock of the situation and shockingly, said she’s simply not sure whether she’ll ever list on Airbnb again. “It’s the house owners and the hosts that are putting all of their assets on the line,” she said. Yes, her insurance will cover most of the damage caused by the overflowing bathtub, but there is no insurance for the mental scarring with which she has to be dealing………


- Even when it comes to Las Vegas, apparently there are still limits. Mariah Carey, who at this point is pretty much coasting through her career based on her long list of past pop hits and sex appeal, is set to perform at Caesars Palace later this month, so she threw down a nice chunk of change for a photo shoot to promote her performances. She will be finishing a five-leg residency in Las Vegas, entitled “Mariah: #1 to Infinity,” and the photo shoot yielded Carey covered by a gold sheet, an image that was then used as the centerpiece for billboards to be posted in the area around Las Vegas and surrounding states. Those must have been some damn suggestive billboards because a pair of California airports have banned the billboards on account of Carey revealing too much skin in the photo. Word on the street is even Caesars, which again WILL BE HOSTING THE CONCERTS - wants a toned-down version of the billboard lest it offend anyone who comes to the world’s tackiest city, a place where prostitution is legal and modesty is the most foreign word imaginable. Carey is reportedly unwilling for any alterations to be made to her advertisements, putting her foot down even though it puts her at odds with the very venue with which she will be working once she actually begins her stint in Sin City. Maybe she can focus her attention on her upcoming guest spot on Fox’s hit drama “Empire,” a show of which she’s a big fan and one that probably doesn’t mind her generating some extra publicity for herself ahead of her appearance. If she’s smart, Carey will also find a way to work that controversial gold sheet into her Vegas shows as well…….


- Pick your fights, Turkey, because right now you have a lot of them. You’re still trying to regain control over your country following an attempted coup last month, you have various terror groups all around you and quite frankly, it’s questionable judgment to turn a non-incident involving a digital news ticker at a foreign airport into a battle. Yes, news tickers at the airport….those scrolling signs of insignificance no one actually pays attention to and only stares at distantly and absent-mindedly while waiting for their travel buddy to buy an overpriced danish at Hudson News….and yet, such a ticker is the reason Turkey has summoned Austria's charge d'affaires to answer for crimes over which he has no control. The offending message was shown at Vienna's airport and it claimed Turkey allows sex with children under age 15. According to a Turkish Foreign Ministry official, the diplomat was called to the ministry over the weekend to listen to Turkey’s outrage over the incident. A ministry statement accused Austrian officials of encouraging news reports that "besmear" Turkey, although trying to silence everyone to criticizes Turkey at this point is something of an overwhelming endeavor. Turkey's Constitutional Court last month scrapped a penal code clause that defined all sexual acts against children as abuse, a move that raised widespread concerns among child rights advocates. Turkey’s parliament now has six months to enact a new law, but the country is in a weird gray area until then. Oh, and there’s also the small issue that Austrian officials have urged an end to Turkey's EU membership talks, while Turkey has called Austria the "capital of radical racism." In other words, this supposed news ticker beef is about a whole lot more than a digital message scrolling right to left for a few seconds. Next up, social media slander allegations, perhaps………


- Dear sounds guys at all high school, college and professional sports venues around the world….you’re there to make sure to microphones work and to play the same bland, mainstream pop playlist that every other arena in the world plays to entertain the masses during lulls in the action. You are NOT there to amuse or entertain with your wit or to show off how clever you are with a well-timed zinger of a musical pun. It was true nearly a decade ago when Baltimore Ravens running back Willis McGahee suffered a serious leg injury trying to turn the corner on a running play and the DJ at Heinz Field in Pittsburgh quickly chimed in by playing Credence Clearwater Revival’s “Down on the Corner” and it was true over the weekend when a clown spinning tunes at Wrigley Field bumped Prodigy's "Smack My Bitch Up" after Cubs reliever Aroldis Chapman left the mound during a 6-4 loss. Chapman infamous missed the first 29 games of this season under baseball's domestic violence policy because he was involved in an October incident where he allegedly choked his girlfriend. Although police did not file charges against the Cuban-born left-hander, citing insufficient evidence, the charge has stuck to his reputation and Major League Baseball announced Chapman's suspension in early March, two months after the Yankees traded four minor leaguers to the Cincinnati Reds for the All-Star closer. Why anyone working for his current team would clown one of their own players this way is curious. Doing it to Chapman on the road would still be over the line, but at least make sense. Maybe this was a rogue domestic violence crusader looking to make a statement … or maybe this was just a moron who deserved to be fired, as he or she was the next day. "We apologize for the irresponsible music selection during our game last night," Cubs president of baseball operations Crane Kenney said in a statement. "The selection of this track showed a lack of judgment and sensitivity to an important issue. We have terminated our relationship with the employee responsible for making the selection.” Next time, stadium sound guy, stick to Usher, Bruno Mars, Justin Timberlake or Rihanna and you should be fine…….

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