Incredible films, incredible sartorial elegance in the name of literature, incredibly popular cephalopods, incredible stupidity… Yes, it’s Crazy Talk, the week’s unusual news bulletin.
Saints on film
Climbing a mountain is one thing, but Axel Naglich and his companions’ attempt at the longest-ever ski descent, a total of 15 miles (24km) and 18,000ft (5.5km) from the summit of Mount St Elias (on the border of Canada and the US) to Icy Bay at its foot, with all the attendant risks of avalanche and beset by changeable weather conditions, is quite another. But that’s just what Naglich and co did, with the expedition all filmed and directed by Gerald Salmina. This week, Mount St Elias won an award at the Alaskan International Film Festival in Anchorage. Read more here and watch the trailer for this epic production.
For Shoe the Bell Tolls
We all need shoes, and as it turns out, some of us like them as well. (Imelda Marcos, wife of the onetime Philippines president Ferdinand Marcos, owned 3,000 pairs.) Apparently, author Ernest Hemingway, most famous for his works The Old Man and the Sea and For Whom the Bell Tolls, liked leather shoes (at least until he killed himself in 1961), so the next logical step is to make some in his name, which is what an Oregon-based company in the USA have done. "Hemingway was very fond of loafers," his 82-year-old son Patrick commented. "A lot of celebrity endorsements are phony, but not in this case.” Also not phony are stories that a German cop has managed to persuade his employers in North Rhine-Westphalia that the time he spends getting dressed in his police uniform is part of his working day. Martin Schauder will now have an extra week’s holiday annually as a result – plenty of time to buy one of 30,000 pairs of Hemingway loafers. We bet they’d take a loooong time to put on in the morning.
‘Bellend’ touched at awards ceremony
From tolling bells now to bellends. As thorough and diligent researchers here at redbull.com, we never ever trust Wikipedia, and here’s a good reason why… We’ve mentioned elsewhere this week that a certain Thierry Henry was once subject to the abuse of his Wikipedia entry by the insertion of foul insults, but it seems that one light-hearted prank has gained an even wider significance. Vandals edited the name of oft-derided FIFA President Joseph ‘Sepp’ Blatter to ‘Joseph Sepp Bellend Blatter’ on the people’s encyclopaedia, a mistake that was unfortunately copied by an ingenuous researcher for the Order of The Companions of O R Tambo, an honour given to foreign nationals for services to South Africa. The howler duly appeared on the government’s official announcement – ‘Bellend’, in case you were unaware, is a taboo slang term for what good old Wikipedia itself describes as the ‘sensitive bulbous structure at the distal end of the penis’, or the glans – but fortunately the Swiss, who helped bring the highly successful soccer World Cup to Africa, was unfazed. “I'm touched by this honour,” Blatter said. “I would like to thank President Zuma and all the people of South Africa for this gesture.” Touching gestures, bellends… let’s stop there, shall we?
Transfer payable in eight instalments
More soccer news: Paul, the octopus who (or which – it’s an animal, not a person) correctly predicted every one of Germany’s World Cup results by choosing the right seafood placed strategically in his tank, even the defeat by eventual champions Spain, is subject to a ‘bidding war’ because of his celebrity, with the lead bid reportedly by a zoo… in Spain. Not satisfied with having the best soccer team on the planet, they now want the most psychic cephalopod as well, and Madrid Zoo are prepared to pay €38,000 and some other animals in part-exchange. In a saga eerily reminiscent of local soccer team Real Madrid’s tireless pursuit of the world’s best footballers, the zoo are persisting despite the fact that his German owners have said their own little Galáctico’s not for sale, so there. You keep your World Cup and we’ll keep our Paul, thanks.
Resistance is Futral
Octopuses may be lovable enough to attract tens of thousands of Euros –crocodiles and sharks are harder to love, but apparently they’re easier to ride, if dangerous. A drunken Australian managed to get thrown out of a pub in Broome – so far, so Saturday night the world over – but so intoxicated was Michael Newman that he thought entering the enclosure of 800kg, 5m-long Fatso the saltwater croc was a good idea. Fatso didn’t agree, and when Newman tried to ride him, he took sizeable chunks out of the trespasser. “Fatso has taken offence to this,” explained the local police chief, “and has spun around and bit [sic] this man on the right leg." Weird, that, they’re usually so docile in cool weather. Meanwhile, freediver Ashley Futral from the USA decided to add a little more danger to a deep, lungbusting dive by hitching a lift on the fin of a deadly sand shark in North Carolina. And she wasn’t even pissed…
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