We are very aware of that paradox of fashion—in order for something to be fashionable it must first be unfashionable until enough people catch on to make it fashionable. As a result, we are unfashionable all the time, explaining it away as ’something you wouldn’t understand, but soon will in 6-8 months’.

What we are accuately aware of, is the brash, in-your-face ugliness of an Ugg boot, which looks like someone drop-kicking a French poodle.

As we noted previously, if Mongolia had a space program, its astronauts might wear something like these, as might a child raised by wolves in the hinterland of that country who found them dropped from a plane.

Uggs: Ever wanted an office cubicle on your feet?

As a way to help nudge this trend into oblivion and get this footwear past homeless shelters and straight to landfill, we were happy to note that there is now some science to back up our aesthetic objections.

The head of the British College of Osteopathic Medicine called these galosh grotesquery  ’slippers’ and said they were not meant for outdoor use. We could not agree more, thereby relegating Ugg-style boots to the apartments of people behind on their heating bills.

Uggs and boots like them come in many forms like right—what you’d get if your office’s wall-to-wall carpeting was wrapped around your ankles— and have metastasized the world over.

Hopefully, observations like a consultant podiatric surgeon made in the Telegraph—that these boots cause wear and tear on the joints—will be the last nail in their coffin before they’re shipped off to the Bata Shoe Museum and laughed at by future generations.

An enterprising company in Phoenix Arizona, Objecs, is offering a new gizmo that could up the entertainment value of the graveside experience, and give future generations more to remember about the deceased than the tombstone particulars. The company’s RosettaStones are stone tablets that can be affixed to headstones (or passed out on keychains at funerals) and contain radio frequency identification (RFID) tags, which direct users of mobile phones carrying compatible technology to an online memorial archive. The archive could contain remembrances, photos, biographical info, IMDB highlights, favorite recipes, and voice messages that you don’t need a member of the psychic alliance to access.

We welcome this multimedia dimension being added to the otherwise – let’s face it, dull and depressing – experience of visiting a cemetery, and would like to offer our own suggestions for ways to perk up that trip to the boneyard:

A/V tours of entire cemetery: Now commonplace at museums and places of great historical import, such as Graceland, user-controlled guided tours delivered via headsets could boost cemetery attendance and raise the profiles of those interred for whom attendance is down.

Theme songs: While picking out a tombstone, a perspective dead person could also choose a themesong to be played at a respectful volume when a large red button on top of the tombstone is struck. “Grandpa Joe did enjoy his Battle Hymn of the Republic”.

Artistic rendering of life’s dreams realized: Here, the person buying the tombstone would meet an artist and discuss the dreams of youth that were crushed long ago and replaced by disenchantment and dread. The resulting painting could be included as a multimedia item as part of the RosettaStones archive, or maybe slapped on the back of the tombstone itself, depending on cemetery rules.

Enemies list: The RosettaStones archive could include a list of all the people truly despised by the deceased, from those who never paid back loans, to the type of grudges so intense they outlast even death.

Electrified tombstones to ward off pee vandalism: The jury is out on whether peeing on the electric third rail of a train track can result in an unpleasant zap to the genitals and death. Mythbusters found that this could only happen when someone was ridiculously close to the track. Here we suggest electrified tombstones with enough of a current running through them to kill enemies looking to urinate on the grave of a vanquished foe. The cost would be prohibitive and environmentalists, as well as health and safety officials, might raise cause for concern, so only really an option for privately run cemeteries.

Noel recently recorded a segment for the second episode of the Bad Psychics podcast, the Badcast. The topic is psychic year-end predictions. Readers familiar with this rundown of psychic predictions from 2008 and this one from 2009 will be able to safely predict the tone of what he has to say about our clairvoyant friends.

Listen for him at the 13:50 mark, and stay tuned for future Badcasts, as you never know which Shark Guy might turn up!

CLICK HERE FOR MORE PLAYING OPTIONS

The Telegraph reported that Toby Elles, a bank cashier, nearly checked out when he “fell asleep cooking some bacon” and awoke, startled to find that cooked into the skillet was non other than the pan-seared prophet himself.

“My housemates and I had a few beers earlier in the evening [Editors' note: this should come as no surprise to anyone] and I thought I would snack before going to bed and as it was cooking I decided to take a rest on the couch. When I woke up about an hour later the room was full of smoke.”

That the Savior would be rendered in bacon fat  is in keeping with his artery-clogging culinary tour which has included pancakes, fish sticks, Pizza Hut pasta, pierogis and Kit Kat bars. Considering his name is so often uttered in restaurant kitchens (albeit with the modifying gerund in between that starts with ‘F’ and ends in ‘G’) perhaps it’s not suprising that he’s been made to order.   

Elles, who is considering making a glass case for his find, considers it a miracle and that the image is uneqivocally JC, however we’re not so sure (see pic below).

The crusty likeness could also easily be South American Marxist revolutionary and noted t-shirt Che Guevara and not just because it suits the name, but 70s-era Eagles guitarist Glenn Frey.

Also, a case could be made for Daniel Day Lewis as Bill the Butcher from Gangs of New York, WWE wrestler Al Snow, possibly Dennis Hopper in Easy Rider and at one time or another, all members of the Allman Brothers Band except the black guy.

In the 90s, in a fad that had a shelf life of your average cheese curd, so-called ‘oxygen bars’ dotted the landscape, offering patrons a way to get light-headed that was ostenibly healthier than the usual elbow-tilting self-pitying milieu of the local tavern.

This was, of course, until killjoys pointed out that oxygen is already carried optimally through the bloodstream and that unless you’re piggybacking a Sherpa or a morbidly obese football player winded after a sprint to the Gatorade, you’re unlikely to benefit from sucking face with O2.
 
Worse, breathing oxygen through a plastic hose was found to be actually  harmful, and not just aesthetically-speaking. Of course, this didn’t stop folks like Woody Harrelson (featured in our list of 911 Nutcases) from opening such an establishment.

The fad has mostly faded along with the plaid shirts purchased for $85 dollars during that decade.
 
Now, oxygen’s effects are being revisited, although with a different conduit than something rammed up your nostrils: the drink itself. It’s possible that when 90s nostalgia invariably breaks, shuttered oxygen bars may make a triumphant return, although not with oxygen concentrators, but through the actual content of the drinks.

Scientists in Korea have developed more oxygenated alcohol and have found that the effects of a hangover—usually that one facet of drinking that prevents most people from turning into full-blown alcoholics—can be diminished. According to reports, “alcohol was processed significantly quicker with drinks that had a higher oxygen content”, and that this sobering effect was in addition to mitigating the effects of a hangover. Of course, one thing not taken into account was the Bud Lite Effect—the need to pound 12 of these impotent potables instead of 6 beers of normal strength in order to get the same buzz not to mention just how quickly brewers/distillers would adopt this into their production process.

For those with any doubts as to the potency of the capital of the United Arab Emirates comes this press release from the exceedingly potent folks of the Municipality of Abu Dhabi.

Your attendance? It is pleasing them.

I don't want the bad Mojo from 'The Village' rubbing off on me

Many professional associations hold ceremonies recognizing outstanding achievement in a given field. Give a guy a personalized plaque and it’ll be at least a week before he places a silent call to his boss followed by an email saying he can’t make it to work that day due to a case of acute laryngitis, and sending out resumes like distress signals.

The awards show that trumps them all when it comes to stroking more egos than a brothel on Small Penis Island is the Oscars. Watching them, you have to pinch yourself to remember that Ben Kingsley only played Gandhi, and had no part in actually helping India break from colonial rule. The approbation doled out will have you believe that the recipients spent their lives massaging lepers and filling holes in the ozone layer by hand rather than lolling about in a Malibu pool while a personal assistant organizes a timed sprinkler light display in front of their on-set trailer.

This pomposity reached its pinnacle in 2009, when nominees for the acting categories had a past winner read their IMDB highlights and explain why they were the best thing since the flush toilet. Even those who don’t have a hope in hell of winning can go home basking in the knowledge that Jack Nicholson reenacts scenes from their movies in his backyard gazebo.

The hauteur, the lack of perspective and the threat of being exposed to the comedy of Billy Crystal are reasons enough to get caught up on your Home Shopping Channel viewing come Oscar night. But there have been some moments in the history of the Academy Awards that are obnoxious even by the sky high bar set by Hollywood:

Clooney cracks himself up. However the real joke was that his movie won out over A History of Violence

10) George Clooney, Best Supporting Actor for Syriana, 2005:

In 2005, George Clooney’s affected Oscar speech for the baffling Syriana summed up just how deeply Hollywood’s head is implanted up its ass. Responding to host Jon Stewart’s earlier dig that Hollywood was out of touch with America, Clooney said: “I would say that we are a little bit out of touch in Hollywood… It’s probably a good thing. We were the ones talking about AIDS when it was just being whispered, and we talked about civil rights when it wasn’t popular and this group of people gave Hattie McDaniel an Oscar in 1939 when blacks were sitting in the backs of theaters.” Clooney failed to mention how this same group shoved more ethnic stereotypes down people’s throats than racist Uncle Lou the master impressionist at a family barbecue.

9) Bob Hope and Frank Sinatra as hosts, 1975:

The film chosen as the best documentary for 1974 was “Hearts and Minds” a hard-hitting documentary on the Vietnam War by Burt Schneider. Bob Hope, one of the hosts that night was featured in the documentary in a less than flattering light: as a hack comedian and cheerleader for an unjust war (in other words, accurately). He was no doubt refraining from doing knuckle bumps with anyone when Schneider was announced as the winner, but was peeved into action when the documentarian took the opportunity to read a message from the North Vietnamese after the recently signed Paris Peace Accords: “Please transmit to all our friends in America our recognition of all they have done on behalf of peace.” Jane Fonda obnoxious? Sure, but the guy had just won an Academy Award for a film condemning the Vietnam War, so fair pool. A furious Hope scribbled down a message and cajoled fellow presenter, Frank Sinatra, into reading it, purportedly “on behalf of the Academy”. “We are not responsible for any political references made on the program, and we are sorry they had to take place this evening.” Hope became persona non grata at the Oscars following this for invoking the name of the academy because of his bruised ego.

8) Debby Boone (Award for Songwriter Joseph Brooks):

In 1977, singer Debby Boone performed “You Light up My Life” at the ceremony. The ditty would later go on to win an Oscar for songwriter Joseph Thompson, who would go another few decades without accomplishing much before returning to the limelight as a defendant in a slew of rape cases. Boone thought it wasn’t fair that deaf people should be kept from enjoying this terrible song, so she brought a group of 11 kids on stage to sign the song for the hearing impaired watching the broadcast. As it turned out, the 11 kids were not deaf, as everybody had assumed they were, and had no clue how to sign. Deaf people called the performance “mumbo jumbo” and likely offered up a single digit you don’t need conversational ASL to comprehend.

7) Greer Garson, Best Actress, Mrs. Miniver, 1942:

Greer Garson won the Academy Award for her role as a strong wife and mother in World War II England and to support the war effort, the Oscars that year were made of plaster (producers of the Adult Video Awards take note)—a fact you can pull out of your hat if charades fails to enliven the dullest party imaginable. Garson rambled on for what the Guinness Book marks as the longest Oscar acceptance speech in history, one that made the Gettysburg address seem like a knock-knock joke. The presenter sat down and in an eerily prescient moment being that Cuba Gooding hadn’t even been born yet, Garson touched on the arbitrary nature of the awards. Wags dubbed it longer than her performance in the film and due to her long-windedness, speeches were capped.

"listen to the beating of your heart!"

6) James Cameron, Best director for Titanic, 1998:

Fittingly, as he also directed the Abyss, just when you thought things couldn’t sink any lower, Cameron proved the sea bottom could still be trawled. After thanking the cast earlier for giving him “pure gold every day” (since this is one of the worst films ever to win an Oscar, we’d hate to see how things would’ve turned out if they’d given him the stuff that rusts), Cameron noted “this is for a real event that happened when real people died and shocked the world in 1912 and I’d like…to do a few seconds of silence in remembrance of 1500 men, women and children who died.” Don’t’ forget, earlier he’d completely shattered whatever sense of solemnity he’d manage to craft among the drunken Hollywood assembled, by pumping his fist in the air and shouting: “I’m the king of the world!” not to mention following up that moment of silence with “now let’s party ’til dawn!”

5) Laurence Olivier, accepting the Irving Thalberg Award, 1979:

Olivier is often considered the greatest Shakespearean actor ever to fill out a codpiece while many of his acting rivals only graced a stage when it came time to bask in the glow of their charitable foundations. Olivier has consistently avoided the type of movie that topped box offices that year, such as Meatballs and The Muppet Movie and could’ve elevated the tone of the proceedings by dropping a bit of the ol’ Bard rather than copy that would’ve been edited out of the shittiest ‘thank you’ card, with this: “The prodigal, pure, human kindness of it [the Academy giving Olivier the award]—must be seen as a beautiful star in that firmament which shines upon me at this moment, dazzling me a little, but filling me with warmth and the extraordinary elation, the euphoria that happens to so many of us at the first breath of the majestic glow of a new tomorrow.”

4) Adrien Brody, Best Actor, The Pianist, 2002:

Brody won the Oscar for the Pianist and must have made the director of that film, Roman Polanski proud when he grabbed presenter Halle Berry and dipped the actress for an ill at ease lip-lock. He then cemented himself as a likely pincher of flight attendant bottoms with the lecherous quip: “I bet they didn’t tell you that was in the gift basket.” A follow-up was a meandering spiel mercifully interrupted by the band– a full minute after the usual cut-off time – but not soon enough to prevent Brody from sharing his revelation that war is indeed an ugly thing.

3) Julia Roberts, “Best” Actress, Erin Brockovich, 2001:

In 2001, Roberts, previously known for being out-acted by her body double in Pretty Woman, beat out Joan Allen, Ellen Burstyn, Juliette Binoche and Laura Linney – all far superior actresses. Roberts neglected any pretense of trying to keep things moving along with an under-two-minute speech, by going over six. Given lightning is unlikely to strike twice and she’ll never be granted hardware again, we can cut her some slack, but what made her speech particularly intolerable was her haughty bossing of the orchestra conductor. “You’re so quick with that stick, mister man, so why don’t you just sit down.”  Why the poor slob didn’t strike up the band with an up tempo “Roll out the Barrel”, we’ll never know.

2) Vanessa Redgrave, best actress for Julia (1978):

When Michael Moore won his Oscar for Bowling for Columbine, he proved himself one of the more disliked people in Hollywood by actually being booed by a room full of liberals when he called Bush 43 a “fictitious president” leading the country into a “fictitious war” (the latter sentiment likely not sitting well with the families of soldiers having their “fictitious asses” shot off overseas). But he at least won the award for what could loosely be deemed ‘a political documentary’. Vanessa Redgrave’s Oscar came for her role in Julia in which she played a woman struggling against tyranny in Nazi Germany, so it seemed incongruous to say the least, to single out “Zionist hoodlums” during her speech. That anger stemmed from a sympathetic documentary Redgrave made that same year about the PLO. While “hoodlums” were burning her in effigy in the stadium car park Redgrave said: “I think you should be very proud that in the last few weeks you’ve stood firm and you have refused to be intimidated by the threats of a small bunch of Zionist hoodlums, whose behavior is an insult to the stature of Jews all over the world.”

FACTOID: Redgrave’s middle finger was compounded by further obnoxious behavior later on in the night when screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky, there to present the award for best screenwriter, decided to upbraid Redgrave for her speech earlier in the evening: “I would like to suggest to Miss Redgrave that her winning an Academy Award is not a pivotal moment in history, does not require a proclamation and a simple ‘Thank you’ would have sufficed.” It would have sufficed for Chayefsky to announce the names of the nominees rather than just blurting out the name of the winner following his rant.

1) Marlon Brando, best actor for The Godfather, 1973:

Winning his first Oscar in 1959 for On the Waterfront, Marlon Brando accepted the award with humility, grace, and brevity worthy of rousing applause.  “It’s a wonderful moment and a rare one,” he said, “and I’m certainly indebted. Thank you.” Fast forward to 1973 when it was pretty much assured that Brando would win the Oscar for the Godfather, and he pulled off the most obnoxious stunt in the history of the Academy Awards. Instead of attending the ceremony, Brando sent Sacheen Littlefeather, supposedly as a representative of the Apache tribe, to read a prepared statement about Hollywood’s negative treatment of Native Americans. There were probably a few Italians in the house who found this ironic. Littlefeather, whose Apache credentials later came into doubt as she was reported to be a Mexican actress, had been given a 15-page statement by Brando to read, though the booing and catcalling that greeted her speech cut that short.

Pliny the Elder, likely embittered by everybody referring so bluntly to his advanced years, summoned the descriptive powers of a man with freshly poked out eyes when he wrote: “A killer whale cannot be properly depicted or described except as an enormous mass of flesh armed with savage teeth.” Apparently, specifics such as “black and white in color”, “big as a motherf’ing really big boat”, were beyond Pliny.

The view of orcas as predatory threats to mankind remained until the creatures were studied and it was found that they were not motivated primarily by a desire to chomp on human extremities. That understanding came partly as a result of research undertaken on orcas after they were captured and put on display in the 1960s. When it was observed that Moby Doll, the first orca to be captured and displayed, didn’t pop off the heads of every second marine biologist it met, researchers concluded that killer whales weren’t the menacing predators that Pliny and his lot made them out to be. In other words, they were the ideal candidates to perform circus-like stunts that may be aberrations of nature, but for which SeaWorld and the like can charge a hefty per-head fee.

Marine parks operate on the Victorian notion that we can better understand nature’s majesty by removing animals from their native habitat, locking them up somewhere the public can gawk at them without being mauled and, where possible, by teaching them skills so they can earn their keep, like riding unicycles or reading sheet music. These parks are skilled at maintaining the pretense that the creatures on show are enjoying themselves and not merely anticipating a fish-guts-based reward.

There are times, however, when the primal nature of creatures not intended by evolutionary processes to play beach volleyball and splash package tourists surfaces, as it did at a Florida SeaWorld recently (See Entry No. 1) when a trainer was drowned by an orca. It wasn’t the first time – even for that particular whale – and isn’t likely to be the last until we realize that nature should be left alone or at least kept at a respectful distance – 32 feet, the spray distance of bear repellent, is about right.

Here are The Top 7 Captive Killer Whale Attacks of All Time!

7. The Fins of the Father

Tillikum is the orca responsible for last week’s death of a trainer at Orlando SeaWorld and indeed, all of the top three killer whale attacks on this list (wags have dubbed him a “serial killer whale”). He is also the father of Ky, a whale that in 2004 at a SeaWorld show in San Antonio displayed the old man’s penchant for taking marine park trainers on unscheduled jaunts around the tank.

In a stunning blow for nature in its battle against nurture, Ky stopped listening to his trainer’s commands and began ramming him and knocking him under water each time he came up for air. The trainer waited it out and eventually emerged unharmed from the incident; though one reckons the bottom half of the wetsuit would have had to go to the cleaners. Afterward, the trainer was remarkably calm for a man who had been nearly drowned by a six-tonne marine mammal, saying, “It looked like Ky lost a little bit of focus.”

6. Shame on Shamu

Often imitated: The original Shamu in less violent times.

Shamu, Namu and Ramu are the brand names given to SeaWorld orcas while they’re performing. In 1971, a 22-year-old secretary rode the first Shamu, a legend in orca circles, as part of a publicity stunt. Perhaps unaccustomed to the snapping cameras and harsh glare of the media spotlight, the whale threw Eckis off, kept divers from entering the pool to rescue her, and bit her on the leg as she was finally able to make her exit.

The secretary was left with several lacerations and puncture wounds from the attack. For stunned fans of the Shamu show, the incident was the marine park equivalent of Elvis putting the boots to a puppy at a live concert.

5. Whales Play Trainer Ping Pong

When grisly incidents happen involving wild animals in captivity behaving, well, like wild animals in captivity, attempts are made to rationalize the actions of the animals in terms humans can understand and appreciate. One of the most common is the suggestion that when the killer whale is engaged in the kind of behavior it would use in the wild to, say, drown and eat a sea lion that it is in fact “playing”.

In March, 1987, SeaWorld San Diego trainer Jonathan Smith, then 20, found that playtime is no fun when the other kids in the pool are the size of buses and homicidal. Smith was in the water performing with two whales, when one of them seized him in its teeth and shot to the bottom of the pool before resurfacing with Smith bleeding and spitting him out. Rather than scrambling for the exit or signaling the harpooners, Smith waved to the crowd, who after all had paid damn good money to see a performance. Then the second whale picked up where the other had left off and slammed him into him. Playtime continued as the whales repeatedly dragged him to the bottom of the pool. He managed to escape, but emerged with cuts around his torso, a ruptured kidney and lacerations on his liver.

Not such a pretty sight for anyone at the landing spot.

4. Splash Landing

Divers who don’t properly survey their landing points are a menace in public pools, and, of course, the larger the diver, the greater the peril. But imagine lolling about in a pool, mid-Sunday afternoon swim, only to look up and have the light in your world eclipsed by the descending specter of a diver 60 times the size of Oprah Winfrey.

In 1987, John Sillick, then a 26-year-old trainer for SeaWorld San Diego, was performing a routine with two orcas. He was riding on the back of a female orca, when a fully mature male, Orky, perhaps incensed by the minimal effort that went into naming him, jumped and came crashing down on Sillick. This is enough to warrant an asterisk in any published sentence in which a marine park official stresses the low number of captive killer-whale related fatalities over the years. Survival in this case, like all others on this list, cannot be considered much more than a fluke. Sillick nearly did die, sustaining fractures throughout his body and requiring six operations in 14 months so that he could be “reconstructed”.

Special Mention: In 1987, Joanne Webber, a trainer at SeaWorld California, broke her neck when an orca landed on her during rehearsal as a result of a miscue.

Not the drifter mentioned.

3. Tillikum and the Drifter

Top of the list of awkward points for SeaWorld PR flacks trying to put a positive spin on last week’s trainer killing: the fact that the orca involved, Tillikum, appears to be an incorrigible recidivist – he’s tied to two deaths prior to the most recent one. The second death with Tillikum’s fin-prints all over it involved a 27-year-old man who gained access to Orlando SeaWorld afterhours and found his way into Tillikum’s tank. (Yes, the Darwin Awards people have recognized this man’s contribution to the gene pool). Park staff found the man’s body draped over the whale’s back behind the dorsal fin the following morning. He died apparently of hypothermia, though scrapes on the body suggested he might have been dragged along the bottom of the tank, which falls in line with the MO the orca established in the other two deaths.

After Tillikum was found with a corpse in his tank, SeaWorld’s then executive vice-president Victor Abbey made one wonder whether he is able to differentiate wild animals from their animated counterparts when he said: “This isn’t a bad animal. He’s a good animal.”

In his film, Grizzly Man, Werner Herzog said in reference to the bears Timothy Treadwell “befriended” before they ate him, “I discover no kinship, no understanding, no mercy. I see only the overwhelming indifference of nature.” Extrapolate that to all wild animals and we tend to agree.

2. Tillikum’s first strike

If we were to take a leap and think of killer whales along the simplistic lines suggested by Victor Abbey, then surely an incident involving Tillikum that occurred eight years and involved him drowning a 20-year-old biology student would put him in the “bad egg” camp. On February 20, 1991, Keltie Byrne slipped and fell into the orca pool at Sealand of the Pacific a now defunct marine park in British Columbia. Tillikum was in there with three orcas and Byrne had just finished a show with them. One of the whales grabbed her in its teeth and began dragging her around the pool. When she tried to scramble out of the pool, the whales pulled her back in, screaming, and she drowned. Several hours elapsed before park officials were able to extricate her body from the tank.

An inquest was held and, surprise, it was determined that the trainer’s death was the result of the whales playing a game that got a bit out of hand.

1. Tillikum and the Florida trainer

Tillikum’s killing of a trainer at SeaWorld Florida prompted this blog. Late last month, Tillikum grabbed 40-year-old trainer Dawn Brancheau by her ponytail and drowned her in front of horrified spectators, including screaming children, who will likely be reliving that day in their nightmares for some time to come. Park officials and rescue workers tried to rescue Brancheau, but, minus the crucial weaponry that would have been their only hope in this situation, they couldn’t extricate her from the creature’s teeth until 30 minutes after it had snatched her from the side of the tank and by then it was too late.

Not good, not bad -- indifferent.

The trainer’s death reignited the debate about killer whales being used in marine parks and also a bizarre take on the situation from the American Museum of Natural History’s Richard Ellis. “The fact that they’ve been in captivity for 60, 70 years and not attacked anybody makes this a very surprising event,” he said. He followed up this erroneous statement with his attempt to make like Jonah and get inside the beast and try to guess at its motivations for the attack. “This was premeditated, and for whatever whale reasons, the whale did this intentionally.” More helpful analysis followed: “Whatever prompted the whale to do this, it behaved in killer whale fashion. That’s what it uses to attack with. It doesn’t have hands, so it uses its teeth – it has a lot of them.”

The most worrying quote came from another AP story. Larry L. Smith, president of the Institute for Crisis Management, in Louisville, Kentucky, said the attack could drive up attendance at marine parks among teens and young adults.”It’s not going to draw families necessarily or older people who would typically visit there, but there is an age group that gets excited about the risks and the potential for drama and it may attract some of those folks,” he said.

Killer whale shows would go from being an obscenity in the face of nature to an exhibition made more exciting by the prospect of someone’s ghastly death.  These Sharks will stay out of the no-splash zone.

Honorable Mention to this Russian bobsledder celebrating his good fortune after a competitor crashed.

With the globe heating up and polar bears circling the drain, it won’t be long before the mud slide becomes a demonstration sport and the Winter Olympics are no more. The few countries in the world that experience snow should enjoy the games them while they can.

We are fair-weather sports fans – we don’t venture outside if it’s too cold and don’t give a much of a hoot about sports in general – but we can appreciate the aerial snowboard acrobatics that always seem a hair’s breadth away from a wheelchair fitting, and the death-defying trips down frozen water slides (though sadly in the case of a Georgian luger death was not defied enough).

Despite having half the countries and a fraction of the athletes who’d ordinarily compete in the Summer Games, otherwise known as the real Olympics, the Vancouver Winter Olympics have had their share of scandal. The Games have not produced their own Tonya Harding, which is probably for the best when you consider that drama’s conclusion in a trashy sex tape and foxy boxing. But they have had enough gaffes, and minor scandals to keep us interested and raising our score cards like corrupt Russian pair figure-skating judges paid off by the mafia. And here is our rundown of the Top 10 Winter Olympic Scandals!

Note: We didn’t include the unfortunate Georgian’s death here, as it doesn’t seem overly scandalous for someone to perish doing something so dangerous it makes Formula 1 look like paddle boating,

10. Glitch-ridden Opening Ceremonies/Logistical Nightmares

The botched ceremonial lighting of the giant spliffs in the opening ceremonies (this is the home of BC bud after all) did not auger well for the rest of the 2010 Games. Of course, neither did the lousy anthem rendition nor for that matter the malfunctioning mechanism meant to raise the cauldron, which, like the drummer in Def Leppard, was missing an arm.

With alpine skiers hurtling downhill at speeds often exceeding 100 mph, ironically it was spectator safety that came under the microscope when an area to house them had to be closed.  The Vancouver Olympic Committee said it was forced to refund 20,000 tickets after warm temps and heavy rain made the standing area at the Cypress snowboard stadium a safety hazard. Also, bus shortages, Zamboni lemons, Canadian athlete venue-hogging, ticket gouging, Biathlon starting line blunders, empty seats at supposedly sold out events dampened more spirits than drinks by an unscrupulous bartender.

9. Athletes Turfed due to Doping

Winter Olympians are just as drug-fueled as their summer counterparts only it’s harder to tell because of the heavy winter coats they wear. And not surprisingly more than 30 Olympic hopefuls were barred from the games as a result of doping. No word yet on whether an alternative, All Drugs, Angry Men With Shrunken Testicles and Receding Hairline and Women Who Can Sing Baritone Olympics will be held for these athletes.

8. PWN the Podium

Canada dominates the world in one sport: hockey. It also dominates curling, which is not so much a sport as shuffleboard on ice with maid service that makes the professional dart circuit look like the triathlon in terms of athleticism. The government aimed to change this bi-sport dominion with the arrogantly named ‘Own the Podium’ initiative, which resulted in more money being thrown at our athletes than a bachelor party blackjack table. For the hundreds of millions spent, it was thought that Canadians would reign supreme over all other countries.  And then Norway, which has a population roughly that of Toronto, nearly knocked Canada out of the top three. Canada not only doesn’t own the podium, it hasn’t even put a security deposit down on it.

7. Scotty Lago Photo Scandal

As one blogger wag put it, Scotty Lago got his half-pipe bronzed. Lago is part of professional snowboarding culture, which, as we know, is highly principled and beyond moral reproach. Lago was beaming when he was photographed with a fan fellating his bronze medal, though he was not as pleased when the morality police running the show sent him a letter asking him to leave, lest he besmirch whatever good name the Winter Olympics has left after Salt Lake City.

The snowboarder later blamed the woman in the photo — pictured with more metal in her mouth than Ugly Betty — as having instigated the entire incident. But the question remains: What would she have done for a gold?

6. Barricade Falls at Alexisonfire Concert

The Canadian screamo act Alexisonfire were busy deafening thousands of tin ears when a barricade came down during their set, sending nine to hospital. Not heeding the words of words of Queen’s immortal ‘The Show Must Go On’, the show was abruptly canceled and the band joined the pop culture ranks of Curtis Mayfield, as being notable for having things collapse on them mid-song.

5. Olympic Security Personnel Controversy

The Disney-fied image of the Mountie stateside is decidedly at odds with the indiscriminately Tasering, scandal-plagued corrupt outfit we’ve come to know north of the 49th parallel.

The cost of Vancouver 2010 security is pegged at one billion dollars. What do you get a return for your investment? Well, round-the-clock protection of a guy who’ll, god forbid, become president if anything happens to Obama and a number of personnel being sent home for conduct that was deemed “unbecoming”. These included allegations of shoplifting, drunk and disorderly conduct, and even sexual assault.

4. Olympic Mitts Made in China

China, a Mao-venerating behemoth that burns more coal than most developed nations combined, depletes the ocean of its fish, spies on its citizens, oppresses Tibet, sends shoddy, dangerous goods to our shores, makes copyright infringing knock-offs, aggressively hunts endangered species to extinction—was naturally the first choice when it came to outsourcing of Olympic gear.

The Oprah-approved (that should tell you something) red mittens with a Maple Leaf on the palm, were a hot item and before anyone could object, it was pointed out that a percentage of the sticker price goes to supporting our athletes, so it’s OK!

3. Lotus Land No Fun. Beer and Liquor Stores Closed at 7pm.

With a reputation for nightlife rivaling Mormon speed-dating, Vancouver did not help its reputation as a place where the streets empty at midnight when security officials cracked down on the sale of booze at 7pm as part of a full-scale offensive on fun. This made the cordoned off, bylaw-mad Toronto come off as the Big Easy in comparison.

2. Heavy Handed Cauldron Security

Organizers are treating the Olympic cauldron like it’s the White House Lawn and as one observer put it, “People flocked by the thousands, hoping to snap a photo of themselves and the fire. Instead, they got a shot of themselves with opaque plastic, the flame barely licking over the top of the fence.” A Checkpoint Charlie approach to an Olympic icon earns a spot on our podium of distinction here.

1. Ladies Love Lager

It was a veritable brouhaha on blades (!) when the Canadian women’s hockey team celebrated routing the Americans and winning the gold by drinking beer and champagne and passing around a cigar (Editor’s Note: Passing around a cigar is not recommended as someone is bound to juice it after a couple of puffs).

The tut-tuts that this incident raised had nothing to do with their pedestrian, obvious choice in beer — they’re championship winning national team hockey players so Molson Canadian probably comes out of their taps at home — or the fact that one of them got ripped and tried to drive the Zamboni. Apparently it had to do largely with one of the players being about a month away from the legal drinking age of 19. Fortunately, this lame scandal fizzled out: Team Canada apologized for having brought this dark day upon our nation and the IOC stepped back from its threat to investigate the incident.