Thursday, February 23, 2017

Weaponizing pork products, Hungary's Olympic wisdom and Incubus + Skrillex


- Rarely does Polish theater get this much run publicly. Apparently the way to garner some attention is to stage a new production that alludes to murdering the country's most powerful politician and has sexual scenes involving the cross and an image of the late Polish pope, St. John Paul II, although some of the attention the play is garnering comes from prosecutors. Those legal eagles are investigating the production to determine if the play, "The Curse," offends religious feelings and acts as an incitement to murder. Yes, because people always go to the theater and do exactly what they see the overly makeup-ed, costumed thespians on stage acting out as they sing and dance around. Those two crimes can be punished with prison terms of two and three years, respectively, so it’s not a matter to be taken lightly for Croatian director Oliver Frljic. His play debuted Saturday at Warsaw's Teatr Powszechny and the politician named in his production is Law and Justice party Chairman Jaroslaw Kaczynski, which apparently is enough to get the law breathing down your neck in Poland. Another adversary for the production is the Polish Bishops' Conference, not known for its tolerance or sense of humor and which called the play blasphemous and says the scenes involving the cross and John Paul II are "extremely painful" to people in predominantly Catholic Poland. Sometimes great art is built on a foundation of pain, uptight religious leaders, so grab some popcorn and enjoy the show……..


- They’re two odd musical ingredients to mix together, so who knows what the hell will result from this unusual collaboration? Incubus and Skrillex have been pictured working together in the studio, apparently as part of Incubus’ not-much-awaited return from a long hiatus with their eighth studio album, the unimaginatively titled “8.” The band marked the announcement of their next album with the single “Nimble Bastard” and have chased that news with an Instagram photo showing band members in the studio with EDM hero Skrillex, who is believed to have a guest spot on one of the album’s songs. Guitarist Mike Einziger posted the photo from the studio, showing band members sitting around a mixing desk with Skrillex and the cryptic caption, “Nothing cool is happening right now…nothing at all.” Einziger previously spoke about the “Nimble Bastard” single and explained that the track was actually a fairly recent development. “This song actually came very late in the process of writing new music for our new album that we have coming out very soon,” he said. “We’re just about done actually and it just kind of happened in the studio and we were messing around with this musical idea and the next thing we know we had a song.” The track, he noted, is a story about someone who manages to consistently overcome adversity in life and always seems to come out of those trials looking like a rock star. One of the album’s remaining tracks will apparently be Skrillex’s chances to shine, so here’s hoping he makes the most of it………


- Only in the South. Of any corner of the United States, there’s only one region where weaponizing processed pork products is a go-to move in a dispute with a family member. It’s the perfect place for a man like Terry Bernard Ball Jr., who was recently arrested for simple battery for allegedly assaulting his mother with a pork chop and then head-butting her for not buying him cigarettes. That’s the tale being told by Athens-Clarke County police, who noted that a good, upstanding citizen like Ball was also charged with a probation violation from a prior case six months earlier. Proving once again that cancer sticks are hazardous to one’s health in more ways than one, this smoking addict was eating a pork chop at his home on Simmons Street around 7:30 p.m. when a major problem arose. Ball’s mother, for some odd reason, refused to pony up the necessary cash and make a trip to the store to buy her son’s lung darts, prompting her own child to pick up his pork and hurl it across the room at her. At least he didn’t pick up the chop, use it like a club and try to assault his beloved mother, but he did then use his head as a battering ram, head-butting mom and prompting his father to step in and restrain his son until police could arrive. As always, at least there’s a good reason police had to be called to a residence to quell a dispute that never should have happened and now, the Ball family kitchen can hopefully return to being a place of peaceful pork products…….


- The no-one-wins game of international sports chicken is down to just two foolish cities, both driving toward sure disaster at a reckless rate of speed, determined to make sure that they become the latest municipality to take on the financial albatross that is hosting the Olympics. Budapest figured out what a terrible idea it would be to continue with its pursuit of a bid to host the 2024 Summer Olympics and officially hit the eject button, leaving only Los Angeles and Paris in the race. Hungarian government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs confirmed the withdrawal, which was a joint decision by Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Budapest mayor Istvan Tarlos and the Hungarian Olympic Committee. All three deserve immense credit for making the right choice and although the measure must be formally voted on by the Budapest City Assembly, that rubber stamp is only a matter of time. The country’s governing party, Fidesz, said the decision was made to avoid "a loss of international prestige" for Hungary because the country had a very small chance of success, but the reason is irrelevant. Those involved should be saluted for their forward thinking because all that matters is that Hungary won't be wasting billions of dollars building Olympic venues that will be abandoned ruins within months of the games or constructing infrastructure that will only be needed for the three weeks of the Games. The International Olympic Committee will choose the host city in September and the worst part of this news is that residents of L.A. and Paris now have a 50/50 chance of having the Olympics shoved down their throats and plunging their town into fiscal ruin all in the supposed name of national pride………..

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