Well, we’ve been away for the summer, we hope you haven’t been too lonely without us. Badger has been working on finishing the final in a trilogy of ebooks, soon to be transformed in hardback with pictures, who doesn’t like pictures? Bee has been keeping some very odd hours (well she is eight hours behind anyway) and our canine correspondent Annie Butler has been so bored that she set up her own Twitter account @AnnieBBarks (all views are her own and in no way associated with Newsnibbles). Just because we have been super busy in our own different ways does not mean that we haven’t been keeping abreast of current events, so here are some choice gems we have observed in the news over the summer.
Fresco Jesus Gets a Facelift
An eighty year old woman in a village in Spain decided to do a bit of art restoration at Sanctuary of Mercy Church near Zaragoza. Ecce Homo by Elias Garcia Martinez was severely deteriorated due to the humidity in the church, so the woman took a paint brush and a pot of Dulux and set to work repairing the flaky image. According to a video on the BBC website the priest told her to do it, although this is yet to be substantiated. We think that descriptions of the new image as looking a monkey, or claims that it is the worst restoration ever are grossly unfair, as she clearly tried her best. What she has to remember amongst all this criticism is that great artists are rarely recognised within their own life time, and it is entirely possible that in years to come this will be recognised as the start of a new art movement, possibly calling itself “Frescoism”. Remember, if this does happen you heard it here first.
A video containing both before and after shots is embedded below, do let us know what you think.
Bin Lurker Wanted in Sweden
A man in Sweden is wanted by police for hiding in rubbish trucks and filming the bin men at work. Police were contacted after a spate of incidents where the man hid either inside the rubbish compactor, or actually climbed onto the roof of the van to get a better view. Whilst the man clearly has an interest in all things rubbish (it is for that reason that we hope he is one of our tens of fans) there are concerns amongst police and local authorities that his activities could result in him becoming seriously injured. Bin men have been informed that they need to check their truck for hitch hikers and keep a general eye out for him.
Read more here.
A Legitimate Blow for the Republican Campaign
Well, in case you hadn’t heard all the hooha surrounding this latest little gem, let us fill you in. Anyone who has attended school within the last say forty years (maybe longer, feel free to correct us here) knows that you only have to have sex once to get pregnant, right? That is right, we think. What you may not know is that if that sex is not consensual, but LEGITIMATELY rape, the female body secretes some sort of natural spermicide to block off the unwanted invasion… This is what Republican Senate Nominee Todd Aitkin said to an American broadcaster when asked about his views on abortion after a rape. According to a video on CNN, from “what [he] understands from doctors that’s (getting pregnant after a rape) really rare, if it is a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down”. This is opposed to the illegitimate rape where your mouth says no and your body say yes??? WTF??? Yes, we know those last two sentences were not appropriate for a news report, we don’t care. Republicans were quick to distance themselves from the remarks, Mitt Romney, the republican presidential candidate described the comments as “insulting, inexcusable and frankly, wrong” and there have been calls for Mr. Aitkin to step out of the running. Despite this he is standing firm. In his apology he claimed he “used the wrong words in the wrong way”… he neglected to mention that there is absolutely no scientific evidence to back up his ridiculous assertion (we didn’t mean to call his assertion ridiculous, we used the wrong word in the wrong way). He currently sits on the Science Committee… we just thought we’d mention that too.
For an interesting analysis of the situation we found this post very useful.
