'All the better to break my toothbrush! Damn! Now I have to get another one.'
And so I am less than a minute into brushing my teeth when I hear a piak sound from within my mouth, followed by a cessation of pressure on my gums and I pull out a toothbrush without the brush (thankfully without the tooth). Mind you this toothbrush has only been around for about 3 months when it's decided to snap itself clean into half.
Pregnant Man Gives Birth to Girl
Agence France-Presse - 7/4/2008 7:43 AM GMT http://news.sg.msn.com/topstories/article.aspx?cp-documentid=1544557
A US man who was born a woman before undergoing gender realignment surgery has given birth to a baby girl, US media reported.
Thomas Beatie, who is legally male but decided to keep his female sex organs during chest reconstruction surgery and testosterone therapy, attracted worldwide attention in April after revealing his pregnancy.
The 34-year-old gave birth to a baby girl at a hospital in Bend, Oregon, on June 29, People Magazine reported Thursday.
‘The only thing different about me is that I can’t breastfeed my baby. But a lot of mothers don’t,’ the magazine quoted him as saying.
It said the girl is Beatie’s first child, and he had given birth naturally, not by Caesarean section.
Beatie, who sports a beard, was dubbed the ‘pregnant man’ after appearing on Oprah Winfrey’s television talkshow to discuss his pregnancy.
‘I feel it’s not a male or female desire to have a child. It’s a human need. I’m a person and I have the right to have a biological child,’ he told the chat show queen.
Beatie’s unusual situation first became public when he wrote an article in the leading US gay magazine The Advocate in March, entitled ‘Labor of Love.’
‘To our neighbors, my wife, Nancy, and I don’t appear in the least unusual,’ he wrote, explaining that his wife was unable to have a child after undergoing a hysterectomy.
So he chose to become pregnant by artificial insemination, he said.
‘Our situation sparks legal, political, and social unknowns,’ Beatie wrote, adding the couple had experienced opposition from health care professionals, friends and family.
One doctor refused to treat the couple, after consulting an ethics board.
‘How does it feel to be a pregnant man? Incredible. Despite the fact that my belly is growing with a new life inside me, I am stable and confident being the man that I am,’ Beatie wrote.
Here are the lyrics for the song, as well as production details:
URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpLEILOcbFw
Lyrics
I love the mountains
I love the clear blue skies
I love big bridges
I love when great whites fly
I love the whole world
And all it's sights and sounds
Boomdiata, Boomdiata, Boomdiata, Boomdiata
I Love the ocean
I love real dirty things
I like to go fast
I love Egyptian Kings
I love the whole world
And all its craziness
Boomdiata, Boomdiata, Boomdiata, Boomdiata, "BOOM"
I love tornadoes
I love arachinids
I love hot magma
I love the giant squids
I love the whole world
Its such a brilliant place
Boomdiata(rest of song)
Full Credits
Client: Discovery Channel
Agency: 72andSunny
Creative Director: Glenn Cole
CD/Designer: Bryan Rowles
CD/Copywriter: Jason Norcross
Agency Executive Producer: Sam Baerwald
Agency Producer: Angelo Ferrugia
Production Company: Outsider
Director: James Rouse
Director of Photography: Max Goldman
Producer: Jeremy Barrett
Editorial Company: Mad River Post
Editor: Lucas Eskin
Producer (Editorial): Ann Kirk
VFX: Method
VFX/Online Artist: Alex Kolansinski
VFX Producer: Helena Lee
Music: Beacon Street Studios
Composer: Brian Chapman
Producer (Music): Adrea Lavezzoli
Sound Design: Lime Studios
Mixer: Loren Silber
Telecine: Company 3
Colorist: Stefan Sonnenfeld
Mark Hamill aka Luke Skywalker in the first three Star Wars movie is also the voice behind the Joker in Batman: the Animated Series. In this video he tells us how he develops his own intepretation of the Joker's iconic, maniac laugh.
We see this advert in the cinema, it's really cute with a lovely catchy song whose verse and chorus we begin singing even in the darkened theatre just before our show starts. And note that it's rare to register a song's verse and chorus with near immediaecy upon the first hearing!
*吵死人 has two meanings to it. One, it is a colloquial complaint directed at someone / something which is making too much noise; two, it literally means 'disturbing dead people'.
Whistler's Mother is actually a painting. Check out the following link for more details, which might help you understand the joke better: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistler's_Mother
Applicable to every and any kind organisation: your guiding philosophy that will be felt by all those who have a stake in it, as well as the prospectives who are looking to engage it.
Not only for your company, but for any organisation that you set up.
In promoting something, how do we become the 'single white tulip in the field of other crappy tulips'? Guy Kawasaki not only advises us how to make ourselves and our products and services special, but reminds us to be pragmatic as well. Put your shoes into those of your customers.
Dream Theatre's keyboardist Jordan Rudess doing a demonstration showcasing the capabilities of the Kurzweil K2600 synthesiser which he used to bring on tour - he uses a Korg Oasys now.
A 'sampler' (which he mentions) is a device that enables one to record and digitised the sound of a live instrument, so that the sound of this instrument can be produced the synthesiser. It's a bit like the concept of a computer font on a word processor.
Matthew Bourne adapted Tim Burton's Edward Scissorhands into a ballet. This is the Ice Dance interpreted in dance.
One of the most haunting themes ever written for the screen: the Ice Dance from Tim Burton's Edward Scissorhands composed by Danny Elfman. Starring a youthful Johnny Depp and Wiona Ryder
Whales that can fly due to a supernova; set to a condensed version of Italian composer Ottorino Respighi's Pines of Rome - one set of his 'Roman Trilogy'
The story of the Hans Christian Andersen's Steadfast Tin Soldier set to the first movement of Shostakovich's youthful Second Piano Concerto, written as a birthday present for his then-19-year-old son Maxim, who was also a burgeoning pianist himself.
Presented by Bette Midler
The finale to Disney's Fantasia 2000, on the theme of life and rebirth after destruction.
Presented by Angela Lansbury (who played the original Mrs Lovett in the stage musical version of Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd)
Comical animated sequence starring Donald Duck as Noah's assistant, sheperding the animals to the massive ark before the flood comes.
The music has been specially arranged for this sequence, with the inclusion of four Pomp and Circumstance Marches (including the famous No. 1 aka Land of Hope and Glory which is a favourite at graduation ceremonies). The marches appear in this order: No. 4 (the call), No. 1 (when Donald is called into duty), No. 2 (the storm), No. 3 (the calm) and finally No. 1 to top it off.
Maestro James Levine presents.
With the yo-yoing flamingo!
Animated sequence to George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue drawn in the style of Al Hirscheld, taking you through life in a day in New York City in the era of the Great Depression. One of my favourite sequences from the movie :-D
Watch out for the caricature of George Gershwin (composer of the Rhapsody in Blue) in the opening seconds!
Former head of Ren Ci Hospital, Ven Shi Ming Yi, charged in court
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/cna/20080715/tap-407-head-ren-ci-hospital-venerable-s-231650b.html
SINGAPORE: Former head of Ren Ci Hospital, the Venerable Shi Ming Yi has been charged with alleged forgery, conspiracy and misuse of funds.
Venerable Ming Yi, who was also the former Ren Ci chairman, was slapped with 10 charges on Tuesday morning.
The monk faces four charges under the Penal Code involving two counts of alleged criminal breach of trust. He also faces one count of alleged forgery for the purpose of cheating and one count of abetment for allegedly falsifying accounts.
He also faces six charges under the Charities Act for allegedly providing false information.
Two of his associates, Raymond Yeung and Phua Seow Hua, were also alleged to have gone into conspiracy with the Venerable and were also charged in court on Tuesday.
Separately, a volunteer from Ren Ci was charged with allegedly possessing some 70 copies of obscene film.
Venerable Ming Yi, also known as Goh Kah Heng, is out on a S$200,000 bail. His case will be heard in court on August 4.
Venerable Ming Yi has been on leave for five months before his arrest on Monday night. He had been under probe by the Commercial Affairs Department (CAD).
The CAD was called in after auditors engaged by the Ministry of Health (MOH) highlighted possible irregularities in some of the charity’s financial transactions.
The MOH had said that several transactions, which involved several million dollars, could not be satisfactorily explained.
Ren Ci and 11 other large Institutions of a Public Character were subject to the Health Ministry’s general review in July 2006.
Ren Ci is believed to be the third largest health charity in Singapore after the National Kidney Foundation and the SingHealth Endowment Fund.
The Commissioner of Charities has suspended Venerable Ming Yi from his office as Chief Executive Officer of Ren Ci Hospital & Medicare Centre with immediate effect.
He will also be suspended from his executive positions in five other charities: Foo Hai Ch’an Monastery, Foo Hai Ch’an Buddhist Cultural and Welfare Association, Singapore Buddhist Free Clinic, The Singapore Regional Centre of the World Fellowship of Buddhists, and the Katho Temple.
However, he remains the religious leader of the Foo Hai Ch’an Monastery.
The husband snores loudly, emits foul gases, salivates, rolls about… while the wife’s eyelids have short-circuited and refuse to shut.
The husband is an analogy for the citizens, while the wife is the government that is constantly tortured wide awake by its own people and its own problems.
Yeah, the husband has bad habits, but the wife still loves him. Maybe these characteristics even expand the appeal of this man, so thinks the wife.
Yeah, motors are dirty, they cause jams and pollute the environment, but you still gotta love them. They’re indispensable where public transport fails to take the grit, and you’ve got to ride on your own two (or four) wheels.
What about the wife suffering insomnia from the husband’s atrocious sleeping habits? Governments are always caught in the middle with regards to dealing with the car problem – a right and left turn are both booby traps. They’ve got to walk the plank the divides two crocodile enclosures precariously.
I felt inspired to write the above post after chancing upon the following article. My reading: the writer takes an ambiguous stand about cars. The avoidable-indispensable debate (love-hate is too generic to afford usage here).
(I think the ‘London solution’ mentioned in the article has to be the electronic road penalty, abbreviated ERP – which, taking one step further, comes from where else but Singapore. Singapore is proud to introduce another twenty more gantries to show the world that it can do it – and so can you!)
The madness of owning a car in Manhattan
By David Usborne
B-Net website; originally from The Independent (London), 23 Jul, 2007
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20070723/ai_n19387592?tag=artBody;col1
I am on my way home after a week spent a long away from New York. It has been the perfect summer break - books, no newspapers, only an occasional, reluctant glimpse at the television news and hours watching the ever-changing palate of the ocean from the deck of our rented house.
Best of all, we have been in a place without roads and, therefore, without cars. I have not missed them and I am not looking forward to returning to a Manhattan that I know will be more tangled in motorised mayhem than ever thanks to exploding steam pipes not far from my home.
It has always been a wonder to me that Fire Island, a sand barrier off the southern edge of Long Island, could seem so far from the city when the distance is just 50 miles. The last part of the trip is by ferry, which is when you leave your car behind. Once there, you find a community of wooden homes in the dunes connected by wobbly boardwalks. The only thing that could run you over is a deer.
The Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, has spent much of the last few months trying to sell a plan for a congestion charge for Manhattan, more or less inspired by London. But it’s going to be a long slog. His proposal has some genuine difficulties, such as the suburbs becoming parking lots and a mass transit system that is bursting at the seams.
Beyond that, you know how Americans are about their cars - roughly as they are about guns. You don’t mess with their right to own them and drive wherever they please. A congestion charge also sounds a lot like a tax and new taxes are taboo in this country, however sensible they might be.
You’d think that if any city in the US would be interested in following London’s example, it would be New York. It’s the most pedestrian-friendly large city in the nation and hardly anyone I know has a car anyway. OK, I do. Owning a car in New York has its benefits, like being able to flee it, to Fire Island for instance. But then there is the murder of parking. Someone recently calculated that a quarter of the emissions from cars in the city come from drivers circling their neighbourhoods looking for a space. You must do this at least twice a week even if you aren’t going anywhere, to make way for street cleaning.
Which means having a space in a garage, even if it requires a degree of wealth. I now pay more each month for the luxury of renting a garage space than I do to lease the car. Something is definitely out of whack with that.
Developers of new apartment towers in Manhattan have cottoned on to the problem and are offering indoor parking spaces for sale. But this is where Manhattan’s car-nomics really go crazy.
The average price for a single space for a car is $165,000 ([pound]80,500), or about $1,100 per square foot. The average per- square-foot price for a new apartment in New York is exactly the same, but at least it comes with walls, windows, maybe cherry wood floors and a stainless steel fridge. What do you get with a parking space? Zero, nada, zip. Bare cement, no facilities. Yet someone recently paid a record $225,000 for a single space under a new building on West 17th Street. Elsewhere in this country, you could buy a decent sized house for less.
I should qualify one thing about Fire Island. All those homes need looking after. When Monday comes and the weekend crowds have ebbed, the service people surface, delivering propane tanks, checking on chemical levels in pools, emptying overflowing dustbins or simply cleaning and laundering. Because some things can’t be carried by hand, they buzz about on little motorised wagons.
Even they can create enough traffic to be a hazard. One day, a pool-man leaves a house across the way. He guns up his wagon, starts out and, oops, he has vanished with a thump and a slight sound of crunching vegetation. Startled but not seriously hurt, he had driven clean off the boardwalk. Why, I am not sure. Perhaps he had been distracted by a rampaging deer.
Copyright 2007 Independent Newspapers UK Limited. All rights owned or operated by The Independent.
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.
A member of the Thai advertising industry explains why so many Thai commercials set out to tickle the funny bone. Interestingly, it is a way of Thai culture – the advertisements did not originally set out to appeal to the world, but the world finds itself flocking to Thai commercials and laughing its guts out.
Are British Ads Still the Best?
By Mark Tungate
B-Net website; originally from The Independent (London), 23 July 23, 2007
URL: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20070723/ai_n19387699
Even the most jaded television viewer would have a hard time denying that, just occasionally, they enjoy advertising. Tell me you didn’t thrill to the sight of white stallions rearing out of the pounding surf to promote Guinness? How many times have you found yourself humming the soundtrack to the latest Levi’s ad? And is there anyone who wasn’t even slightly enthralled by the idea of unleashing thousands of coloured bouncy balls in the streets of San Francisco, just to flog a TV set?
British advertising is the best in the world. Everyone says so. ‘The United Kingdom is the most audacious market,’ says Georges Bermann, boss of the French advertising company Partizan. ‘Agencies are keen to engage young directors because they bring with them the latest trends. And British advertisers take risks that others shy away from.’
At the Cannes Lions Advertising Festival - the industry’s self- congratulatory version of the film festival - British ads often reap the top prizes. Highly scientific research conducted in bars throughout the festival suggests that people like British ads because they are funny. ‘Somehow, British humour works worldwide,’ a German creative director told me. ‘Your ads are chatty, sarcastic and provocative. Whenever I meet a British person in a pub, I feel like I’m in one of your ad campaigns.’
So what does a country’s advertising say about its national characteristics? Some people will tell you that globalisation has had a homogenising effect. But I spend disproportionate amounts of time looking at commercials from around the world, and I can assure you that - at least when it comes to the ad break - that is not the case.
Take the French. With their history of producing the world’s finest luxury goods, wines and fashion, they are the masters of sophisticated advertising. The problem is that they barely know how to do anything else. The glamour button is permanently stuck down. Look at the advertising for Air France. It features a couple relaxing by a sublime swimming pool, or a woman in a sari reading at the end of a jetty. Right until the end, you think you’re looking at a perfume ad.
The Germans rarely win awards for creativity. Their ads are as smart and streamlined as a BMW. The most popular German advertising campaign shows a celebrated thinker - an architect, a novelist or a politician, whose face we never see - hidden behind the broadsheet newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. The slogan reads: ‘There’s always a clever mind behind it.’
‘The explanation for Germany’s lack of creative edge is probably its strong manufacturing base,’ my German creative pal told me. ‘Britain, like Holland and Spain, has a trading history. Germany is a producer. Thus Britain makes great ads for cars - but Germany actually makes cars.’
Let’s mock the Italians. Their advertising was permanently marked by something called Carosello - the carousel - which was a fixed ten- minute advertising slot screened every day at around 8.45pm from the late 1950s until the mid 1970s. Thanks to a government edict, it had to provide sponsored entertainment as opposed to a hard sell. And because kids loved watching Carosello just before bedtime, Italian advertising began to resemble kiddies’ TV. To this day - long after Carosello was replaced by conventional advertising breaks - a brand of Italian coffee is promoted by two featureless cone-shaped cartoon characters. Italian ads tend to be humorous and musical.
As you might expect, Latin advertising is lively and entirely free of political correctness. A recent Argentine ad for Axe body spray (the international version of Lynx) showed a guy zipping through the streets on a scooter. As young women rushed into the road to pounce on this irresistible chap, they collided with one another - magically merging with a puff of smoke to form a composite, even sexier babe. The ad promoted a new ‘two-for-one’ offer, or something of that sort.
But my favourite advertising comes from Thailand. The Thais seem to have it all: technical wizardry, imagination, and a sense of humour. Thai creative director Suthisak Sucharittanonta, of the agency BBDO Bangkok, says that the country’s approach is summed up by the Thai word ‘zab’, which means ‘flavourful or delicious’. ‘Thai humour is slapstick and in-your-face,’ he says. ‘We started out making ads that we thought would appeal only to Thais, but it turns out that people all over the world love them.’
Thai ads are about overacting, drama and hilarity. For a fix of advertising Thai style, try scouring YouTube for the award-winning ‘Twister’ spot, made for Bangkok Insurance [my note: see YouTube video in the next post below].
A family runs screaming into the street as a whirlwind ploughs into their wooden house. They look on in horror as their home is torn to pieces and the wreckage whipped into a towering funnel of wind. Then the twister subsides, gently depositing the house back on its foundations - completely intact. The family members stare comically. A final roof tile skitters into place. And that, in the end, is why British advertising professionals spend a great deal of time watching commercials from around the world. We may make some terrific ads, but we’re not above learning a few tricks from our rivals overseas.
Mark Tungate is the author of ‘Adland: A Global History of Advertising’, [pound]18.99, published by Kogan Page
Copyright 2007 Independent Newspapers UK Limited. All rights owned or operated by The Independent.
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved.
This is the commercial mentioned by the article.
Very creative road safety propaganda, but it gets the message across.
A gang of robbers make an interesting discovery by breaking into an unorthodox bank...
Oh gosh this is damn corny... I LIKE!
Spring Awakening is one of the newer musicals to grace Broadway. It is the story of 'teenage self-discovery' (to quote the presenter).. these kids are from upper families with plenty of discipline and control with the package... which they resist. The characters are transformed into the world of their minds during the musical number: when they whip out microphones hidden within their clothing and the rest of their surrounding seems to freeze for the moment of song.
Read more about it at Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spring_Awakening
Keyboardist and drummer together in a duet. Wikipedia said once there was a power outage during a Dream Theatre concert, which took out all the equipment save Rudess' and Portnoy's (duh!) - so the duo improvised while efforts were being undertaken to get the electricity restored.
Jordan Rudess is GOD! Amazing keyboardist of Dream Theatre, whom I totally admire. Man it's gonna take eons before I can ever reach his standards.
Another one of those videos shown before a briefing during the recent reservist
From Youtube:
'Old Navy ad, which reminds you, that school is coming soon...'
Commercial for Blockbuster.com (one of the many videos that was the main attraction on a Wednesday afternoon during the recent reservist training).
I am so sorry: this message should have appeared very much, much earlier. For I have no time at this moment to translate my blog notes into proper prose for posting (being perfectionist me), hence this blog shall be in hibernation (note: hibernation, not shut down). Please come back in a month's time, thanks!
