THIS was the last time Bradley O’Mara was legally able to walk on to a racetrack.
O’Mara, 31, from Canberra, has been warned off tracks around the world for life after this drunken prank at Moruya in February which nearly had disastrous results.
The racehorse Morcombe was galloping to an easy win when O’Mara, wearing nothing but underpants and a purple wig, jumped on to the track and made his own dash to the finish line, only to fall flat on his stomach right on the finish line.
Morcombe caught sight of the stumbling O’Mara, took fright and tried to jump the inside running rail, nearly dislodging jockey Tracy O’Hara.
This enabled Bournda See to “win” but stewards declared a no-race as O’Mara’s actions had effectively altered the result. O’Hara said Morcombe was definitely going to win until O’Mara ran on to the track. Read more…
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Say It Ain’t So: George Carlin Dies, by Ward Harkavy, Village Voice Blogs [includes the full transcript of Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television monologue]
Dedicated to those too squeamish to discuss an incident related to the temperament and character of a guy who’d like to be President.
McCain’s freaky-mean ‘92 outburst is a well-sourced story found in Cliff Schecter’s book The Real McCain. Due to the particularly profane nature of the offense it would probably be useless to wait for the press to give it the full-on, endlessly repeating, 24-7 Reverend Wright treatment. So we’d love to help. Here is:
He Said It First
The uncensored version. A “safe for work” version is here.
You’ve heard the term “greenwashing.” It refers to corporations that try to appear “green” without reducing their negative impact on the environment.
Since 2002, the group Breast Cancer Action has promoted its “Think Before You Pink” campaign. It’s fighting “pinkwashing,” which is when corporations try to boost sales by associating their products with the fight against breast cancer. Pinkwashing is a form of slacktivism — a campaign that makes people feel like they’re helping solve a problem, while they’re actually doing more to boost corporate profits. Pinkwashing has been around for a while, but is now reaching almost unbelievable levels.
The worst pinkwashers exploit the intense emotions associated with breast cancer while selling products that actually contribute to breast cancer.
So how can the average person recognize pinkwashing? Here are some examples. Read more…
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A behind the scenes tour of an award-winning creative farm, juicing process and distribution in South West England.
The South West produces some of the UK’s finest creative work (animation, web design, design, fashion, architecture…) Now you know why. Nice conditions, space to breathe and opportunities with some of the best firms around.
Part funded by the Southwest Creative Growers’ Association. Filmed on location on the Wedmore Creative and Artist Farm, Somerset, South West England.
Moscow (AP) — A monument to the enema, a procedure many people would rather not think about, has been unveiled at a spa in the southern Russian city of Zheleznovodsk. The bronze syringe bulb, which weighs 800 pounds and is held by three angels, was unveiled at the Mashuk-Akva Term spa, the spa’s director said Thursday.
“There is no kitsch or obscenity, it is a successful work of art,” Alexander Kharchenko told The Associated Press. “An enema is almost a symbol of our region.”
The Caucasus Mountains region is known for dozens of spas where enemas with water from mineral springs are routinely administered to treat digestive and other complaints.
Kharchenko, 50, said the monument cost $42,000 and was installed in a square in front of his spa on Wednesday. A banner declaring: “Let’s beat constipation and sloppiness with enemas” _ an allusion to a line from “The Twelve Chairs,” a famous Soviet film comedy _ was posted on one of the spa’s walls.
We are launching the website with this year’s results of the workshop on autonomous public art taking place in the Faculty of Fine Arts of Aranjuez, Madrid, Spain. Started in 2006, the course is a yearly four-month class, part of the Bachelor’s Degree on Fine Arts of the Complutense University of Madrid. We hope you enjoy the work.
An intervention that intelligently targets a certain Achilles’ heel of advertising. As pointed out by culture jamming documenter Dave Gross in his brilliant piece Interrupt pathological, media simulated social interaction, it is by engaging us in a fictional personal relationship through eye contact that most advertisements get our attention. Read more…
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In this undated image released by Stan Winston Studio, Stan Winston is shown. Winston, the Oscar-winning special-effects maestro responsible for bringing the dinosaurs of “Jurassic Park” and other iconic movie creatures to life, has died. He was 62. He died at his home in Malibu surrounded by family on Sunday, June 15, 2008, after a seven-year struggle with multiple myeloma, according to a representative from Stan Winston Studio.
Rome - A German sports reporter who was late for his plane to cover the European Championships staged a bomb scare at Italy’s Verona airport in order to delay its take-off, police said on Thursday.
The 27-year-old reporter, who has not been identified, called police saying a bomb had been planted on the Air Dolomiti flight to Vienna on Wednesday, police in northern Verona told Reuters by telephone on Thursday.
The airport was closed for about two hours and two incoming flights were forced to land at another airport.
The reporter arrived at check-in just five minutes before the scheduled take off, shortly after the phone call announcing the bomb scare.
When told he was too late to check in he said he had heard the plane was still not ready for take off, even though the airport officials had still not made any announcement of any delay.
“He changed his version several times, first claiming he had arrived at the airport on time and then admitting he only arrived five minutes before take-off,” a police officer said.
The man’s mobile phone was linked to the call.
He was arrested and charged with causing an alarm and interrupting a public service.
The Getty Museum expected big crowds for its recent “family festival” day, involving Mexican singers and art workshops tied to its show of Graciela Iturbide photographs. The organizers got that and more when a flash mob of 200-plus people materialized for the sole purpose of meandering around the museum in (more or less) single file. The gathering was the work of GuerilLA—a sister group of global prank organizer Improv Everywhere—which had notified members of their “mission” via e-mail the day before. Although no major disruptions were reported, one flash mobster says his favorite part was watching camera-toting tourists angle for the perfect family portrait, only to have to wait for the seemingly endless parade of strangers to pass by.
“Get Thee to the Getty” originally appeared in the June 2008 issue of Art+Auction. For a complete list of articles from this issue available on ARTINFO, see Art+Auction’s June 2008 Table of Contents.
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A Fresh Pack of Gum Blondes
by Jason Kronenwald
LE Gallery
1183 Dundas St W. in Toronto’s Little Portugal Neighbourhood, Canada
June 4th to June 29th, 2008
Exploring the pervasive scope of “Blondeness” in contemporary culture, Kronenwald’s Gum Blondes, portraits composed completely of chewed bubblegum, offer a cross section of popular blondes from Hillary Clinton to Lindsay Lohan. Employing unconventional materials, a team of chewers and a critical practice, Kronenwald’s work positions itself directly within today’s celebrity obsessed mindframe, blurring the lines of fine art and pop culture.
Washington (AP) — Democrat Barack Obama’s campaign said Thursday that Michelle Obama never used the word “whitey” in a speech from the church pulpit as it launched a Web site to debunk rumors about him and his wife.
The rumor that Michelle Obama railed against “whitey” in a diatribe at Chicago’s Trinity United Church of Christ has circulated on conservative Republican blogs for weeks and was repeated by radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh. The rumor included claims of a videotape of the speech that would be used to bring down Obama’s candidacy this fall.
“No such tape exists,” the campaign responds on the site, http://www.fightthesmears.com. “Michelle Obama has not spoken from the pulpit at Trinity and has not used that word.”
The site is a response to the realities of a brave new world, where information travels 24 hours a day on blogs and voters are increasingly turning to the Internet for information. It’s a particular problem for Obama, a relative newcomer to national politics who is still unknown to many voters and has been the target of persistent misinformation campaigns online. Read more…
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Oceanside, Calif. (AP) - On a Monday morning last month, highway patrol officers visited 20 classrooms at El Camino High School to announce some horrible news: Several students had been killed in car wrecks over the weekend.
Classmates wept. Some became hysterical.
A few hours and many tears later, though, the pain turned to fury when the teenagers learned that it was all a hoax — a scared-straight exercise designed by school officials to dramatize the consequences of drinking and driving.
As seniors prepare for graduation parties Friday, school officials in the largely prosperous San Diego suburb are defending themselves against allegations they went too far.
At school assemblies, some students held up posters that read: “Death is real. Don’t play with our emotions.” Read more…
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Welcome to Pranks.com, produced and edited by Joey Skaggs. Here you will find insights, information, news and discussions about pranks, hoaxes, culture jamming & reality hacking around the world - past, present and future - mainstream and counter culture. You are invited to contribute to its development. May your journey be filled with more than your expectations.
THIS was the last time Bradley O’Mara was legally able to walk on to a racetrack.
