Friday, September 24, 2010

Karaoke Singers Living on the Dumpling Line

"Contestants from 28 countries, including the UK, have already started to belt out hit songs from the likes of Abba and Queen giving impassioned performances they hope will win the 2010 Karaoke World Championships.

Each country is represented by a male and female contestant and the competition, which started on Thursday, will culminate today (Saturday) when the jury makes its decisions."

What makes a karaoke singer any different from a normal singer? You're singing to a backing track, or a live band, it makes little difference what the source of the music behind your voice is. This seems like a peculiar competition, but there is weirder stuff so I guess I could forgive them.

"However, this year's top prize of [one] million Siberian dumplings or "pelmeni" has raised eyebrows."

So these people have traveled from all around the world, and when one of them wins they're presented with DUMPLINGS?!? They couldn't think of a prize better than dumplings, a million dumplings, no less? Let's think of some prizes that would've been better than dumplings: A car, a boat, a house, a TV. OK, OK, these are obvious, let's think of some more: A year's supply of KFC, a year's supply of beer, since the competition is in Russia how about a year's supply of vodka?; a tractor, an AK-47, a barrel of oil, a set of Russian dolls, a ushanka.

I sometimes wonder about the human race.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/8022986/World-Karaoke-competition-top-prize-one-million-dumplings.html

Thursday, September 23, 2010

What goes DRILL in the middle of the night

"TIRANA (Reuters) - Two would-be Albanian bank robbers were arrested Wednesday as they tried to drill a passageway into a bank vault from a shop they had rented above it, police officials said."

This sounds like a pretty smart idea.

"In an aborted heist echoing the plot of the Woody Allen film "Small Time Crooks," the two men were caught after the noise from their drilling between the upper floor shop and the bank vault alerted the authorities."

What's this? They didn't think anyone would hear a big fucking drill in the middle of the night? The synopsis sounds good but it becomes evident that they really didn't think about this at all. In fact I'd be surprised if they couldn't get off this on a plea of insanity because you have to be full fucking retarded to think this could work.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE68L3G420100922

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Don't kill the crocodiles!

"MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – At least 280 crocodiles have escaped from a Mexican refuge near the Gulf of Mexico after heavy flooding caused by Hurricane Karl, Mexican media said Tuesday."

Everyone knows how common hurricanes are around the Gulf of Mexico, what's particularly surprising is that the people who run this crocodile refuge didn't fortify the area well enough to stop crocodiles getting out in the event of a flood. I could possibly understand this if it was a small reserve, but when we're talking about hundreds of animals that can and will kill people then somebody has fucked up royally.

"The endangered Morelet crocodiles were on the roam in six coastal areas in the Mexican state of Veracruz and residents were told not to try to capture or kill them, El Economista reported."

We don't know when this happened exactly, but they've already spread around a pretty large area by the sounds of things, and now the authorities have seen it fit to issue a warning to not capture or kill them? What the fuck is wrong with them? Did they not think that a warning along the lines of 'CROCODILES ON THE LOOSE. STAY THE FUCK INDOORS' would suffice? Do they really need to tell people this?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100921/od_nm/us_mexico_crocodiles