US Women’s National Soccer Team: Guide To Etiquette

Posted on by Kelly Welles

Image: AP Photo/Julie Jacobson, Ronald Martinez/Getty Images.

We hope you enjoy your moment of glory.

But please try & remember to retain an air of humility and dignity during all gold medal celebrations. Do not shout, squeal, run, jump or borrow someone’s camera and take pictures of your team-mates. Basically, no spur of the moment acts that could be interpreted as unbecoming.

Despite winning, you are still women, and it would be uncomfortable for people to have their gender stereotypes challenged while they’re just trying to enjoy some sport.

Thank you.

Kufr Qaddum: A Protest Of Biblical Proportions

Posted on by Kelly Welles

Image: JAAFAR ASHTIYEH/AFP/GettyImages.

Things would have probably ended quite differently in the David & Goliath story if Goliath had been driving an armoured earth mover.

But judging from this image, taken during the weekly protest at Kufr Qaddum, near Nablus this morning, it’s going to take another 2000 years or so to resolve this conflict.

That should give us enough time to work out those pesky funding disparities.

Kenneth Tong: Famous Or Infamous, It’s All The Same

Posted on by Kelly Welles

And so it came to pass that Twitter ceased to be a fun and friendly way for ordinary citizens to communicate with celebrities, and became a tool for utter idiots to claim their fifteen minutes.

Our evolutionary cycle appears to be complete, people.

David Cronenberg: This One Time, At Medical School

Posted on by Kelly Welles

An idea is born. Image: REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino.

Alright, Mrs Vanderpump, your scan is complete now, please stay relaxed for… HOLY SHIT! Mrs Vanderpump! What the hell… ?!

Dave?  Have you been sneaking that damn cat into the CT machine again?

If you insist on knowing what really caused this fantastic photo opp, it’s here.

Olympic Observations: Oversights & Lessons Learned

Posted on by Kelly Welles

Iran’s Ghasem Rezaei (r) and his trainer do what comes naturally. Image: Mike Hewitt/Getty Images.

Just bask for a moment in the sheer unadulterated joy of two men so overwhelmed with emotion after one of them wins the Greco-Roman wrestling heavyweight gold that they kiss.

And then hope miscellaneous idiots from across the globe don’t get the wrong idea and run with it.

Continue reading “Olympic Observations: Oversights & Lessons Learned” →

Olympics 2012: It’s All In The Presentation

Posted on by Kelly Welles

Images: Michael Steele/Getty Images, theaviationist.

Local residents would never have protested about having surface to air missiles stationed on their roofs  if this had been touted as a possible outcome.

Admittedly it’s a bit of a stretch to imagine the Games being held to ransom by a gang of criminals driving minis, but it wouldn’t be unprecedented. If only the organisers had put a bit of thought into it. Or phoned Banksy.

Mother Nature: Hey, Mama! Look What We Did!

Posted on by Kelly Welles

Image via tumblr.

Remember that strange sensation that occasionally overwhelmed you as  a child? The one that, despite being aware of the dire consequences of spraying paint around your parent’s living room, putting all your mother’s make up down the toilet after coating your baby brother in it, or sticking your fingers in your Dad’s can of Swarfega and wiping the gloopy green contents all over your face,  compelled you to do exactly those things?

Well, although the toxic chemical spill in the Ajka forest, Hungary in 2010 that caused this ‘looks totally photoshopped but it isn’t‘ damage to the area was not my fault, I feel a similar, if vague, sense of culpability. When Mother Nature gets home and sees what we’ve done to her beautiful homestead, she is Going. To. Be. Pissed.

Hunker down, people. We are going to be grounded for, like, ever.

Oak Creek, Aurora, Virginia Tech: And The Hits Just Keep On Coming…

Posted on by Kelly Welles

Images: REUTERS/Tom Lynn.

Six people were shot dead yesterday morning at a Sikh Temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin.

This is less than three weeks after 12 people died in Aurora, Colorado, and brings the total number of civilians murdered in spree killings in the US in the last five years to 86. That tallies nicely with the 85 civilians PER DAY killed in incidents involving firearms

I began this post imagining I would round it off by asking how many deaths would have to accrue before gun control reform would be enacted. I’m not going to bother now, because clearly casualties have no influence on a situation with so much power is at stake.

What a dumbass I am.

Pussy Riot: Theatre Of The Absurd

Posted on by Kelly Welles

How come the dangerous punk revolutionary is dressed more appropriately for court than her guard? Image: AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko.

Clearly punk feminist collective Pussy Riot knew that they would face severe punishment for attempting to sing a protest song inside a Russian Orthodox church while wearing badly knitted balaclavas. Presumably they were counting on the heavy handed treatment meted out to them by the Russian authorities being picked up by the global media, encouraging high profile figures from the music community to offer their support and further publicise their cause.

Continue reading “Pussy Riot: Theatre Of The Absurd” →