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I've not caught a whole lot of the 2007 Cricket World Cup but I just watched the final and it was a really extraordinary match in more ways than one.

Adam Gilchrist put in a truly astounding performance and scored 149 off 104 balls and broke two records in the process not only the highest total in a World Cup Final but also the quickest century too.

Thanks to Gilchrist the Australian team set a daunting total for Sri Lanka of 282 from 38 overs to win (due to rain the number of overs was reduced to 38).

The Sri Lankans to their credit didn't seem too fazed by this and when Sanath Jayasuriya and Kumar Sangakkara got into their flow they looked to be on target to get the required runs. The loss of Sangakkara's wicket came as a bit of a blow but that did mean that their captain Jayawardene would be coming to the crease and if he could pull off yet another great innings as he did in the semi-final against New Zealand there was still some hope.

It wasn't to be though as firstly Jayasuriya's wicket fell, the weather stopped play yet again and on the return Jayawardene suffered a bad LBW decision.

With the light fading and the run rate rising to unattainable levels the match descended into farce when with three overs to go the umpires offered the light to the batsmen. Everyone then assumed the match was over and Australia were declared the winners of the tournament followed by the organisers bringing out the stanchions onto the pitch for the award ceremony only for the umpires to order them off and to restart the match again.

The foregone conclusion now reached it's actual conclusion with the end of the 36 over and Australia were now officially the champions of the 2007 Cricket World Cup, their third in a row.

Labels: Sport

Not only have we been experiencing summer like weather the past couple of weeks (Met office reports it to be the hottest April on record) but we've had a number of news stories more suited to the summer months when we get a slew of unusual stories on slow news days.

Some enterprising company has been conning thousands of wealthy Japanese ladies into believing lambs were valuable miniature poodles.

The bizarre scam was rumbled when Japanese movie star Maiko Kawakami complained on a talk show that her new poodle refused to bark or eat dog food.

She showed photos of the animal and was devastated when told that it was a lamb.

And a schoolteacher from Haverfordwest was tricked into having sex with a Syrian-born airline pilot who told her that he could cure a rash that she had through the method of administering it vaginally on the end of his penis.

The teacher put up with the treatment for nine months before telling her doctor.

Two very bewildering stories.

Labels: humour

This has to be just about the best parody of the movie 300 that I've seen so far.

Labels: Games, movies

In the wake of the massacre at Virginia Tech many so called experts such as Dr. Phil stepped forward linking the killings with the playing of violent video games before the authorities had even released any details about the perpetrator of this atrocity.

As you might expect Jack Thompson was amongst these yet again exploiting tragedy to push his agenda. The gaming site Kotaku have an excellent article analysing Thompson's televised statement and dissecting the lies contained within it.

Ars Technica have a similar article about the media's knee jerk reaction of linking the shootings to video games before the facts are in.

In fact according to GayGamer.net not only did the police not find any games amongst Cho Seun Hui's belongings but his roommate says that he'd never ever seen Cho play a video game.

Labels: Games

I have a lot of respect for Bitch Ph.D and read her blog regularly but I think she may be overreacting about the Rapist No.1 action figure from Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's new movie Grindhouse.


As well as the Rapist figure (which is the likeness of Tarantino as he portrays said character in the movie in one of his customary cameo appearances) action figures of other characters such as Cherry and Dakota are available to buy.



She seems mostly concerned that it is being marketed by the name Rapist No.1 doll but that is just the name of the character in the movie and to my mind is no different than a Freddy Krueger action figure. It's not as if the figure is even depicted in an act of rape and can hardly be considered glorifying rape or fostering an attitude that rape is acceptable.

I haven't seen Grindhouse yet but I would imagine if Tarantino's previous movies are any indicator that this rapist character meets a gory and well deserved end. I think there is a debate to be had about the depiction of rape in movies and on television and the trend for the sexualisation of female victims of rape in them as opposed to the depiction of male rape victims. Also there is a disturbing trend (in comics it is referred to as the Women in Refrigerators Syndrome) for using violence against women as a plot device and motivating factor for the hero protagonist of the story to whom the victim is connected.

I think that Bitch Ph.D has picked upon the wrong thing for her argument here.

I don't see the appeal myself for these action figures designed for adults and they are very much a niche product that as opposed to movies have little to no impact on society at large. I believe that had she not written about it then virtually the entire readership of Bitch Ph.D would never have known that such a thing as a Rapist No.1 action figure even existed.

Labels: cinema, comics, movies

I recently discovered that my home town of Devizes was the site of the first commercial telephone system, made and used by an Alfred Cunnington in 1878 to connect his business with his home.

Labels: cool

I'm sure you've seen this advert if you've been to the cinema in the past few months. Some guy chokes on a pretzel in the first few seconds and then is cremated, his remains are taken by his brother Morton. The ashes are then taken by Morton to a company called Live On that through a filtering process similar to that which Smirnoff vodka is subjected to can turn those ashes into a girl's best friend. Morton then is seen pawning this diamond for a stack of notes.

I hate this bloody advert, partly I guess because I'm stuck listening to it four times a day at the cinema, but mainly because it is idiotic. Whilst it is indeed possible to turn cremated human remains into diamonds the process is so expensive that you couldn't possibly profit from doing so and there is nothing particularly special about human ashes as opposed to any other type of ashes that makes them more suitable to produce diamonds from.

I can be so anal sometimes.

Labels: cinema

Pierre Scerri of Avignon, France took 15 years and more than 20,000 hours to build this 1:3 scale Ferrari 312PB.

This marvel is the real thing in every sense, from its operating 12-cylinder engine to the exact scale operating Ferrari gauges which are calibrated precisely to indicate rpm, oil pressure, water temperature and oil temperature.
Find this video and thousands of others at vSocial!

It is an astonishing piece of work.

Labels: cool