Showing posts with label AOL®. Show all posts
Showing posts with label AOL®. Show all posts

Sunday 4 August 2013

Mary Beard sent Twitter bomb threat, reports AOL®* : How media pique our interest

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2013
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)



4 August


Ten headlines from aol.co.uk's home-page



Text : Sexism, pinkification and our daughters

Sub-text : Ostensibly, we're taking this seriously, but really...


Text : Revealed: World's silliest hotel request

Sub-text : (1) Yes, there is none sillier, and (2) We know this, because we're AOL®, Fount of All Wisdom !


Text : Elle Macpherson 'marries billionaire'

Sub-text : We've got you guessing with those idiot quotation-marks, haven't we... ?


Text : Cringiest ever celebrity music videos

Sub-text : A numbered list made intriguing by a grotesque contortion of the language


Text : Carla shows off incredible bikini body

Sub-text : My blog (link above) tells you all that you need to know...


Text : The people who affect house prices

Sub-text : We're not going to tell you any more than you already know**


Text : Baby Cambridge's top 10 play dates

Sub-text : Not that you have any idea who these people and their kids are, but You need to know !


Text : Annoying telephone customer services

Sub-text : We want you to interpret it as how to do a Henry Root on call-centres


Text : Revealed: World's silliest hotel request

Sub-text : I just put that in twice to see whether you were 'keeping up', but, whilst you're here : In my headline, quoted also from AOL®, Mary Beard is made to appear to be the subject, not the (indirect) object...


Text : PC maintenance could save you cash

Sub-text : It 'could', but will it ? Just AOL® promoting itself by trying to attack your pocket mentally ?



End-notes

* Not that there was anything wrong with synonyms such as received, got, had.

** In a numbered list, of course - with sarky comments.




Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)

Thursday 25 April 2013

Kelly Brook's ex hit by doube-decker (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


25 April

At any rate, the hedline (sic) talks of a doube-decker.

Knowing that a deck denotes part of the equipment of the likes of DJ Skunk, I dare not assume that this is a merror (a portmanteau word*, comprising 'error' and 'mere'), but guess that doube might denote :


* That 'whole dub thing'

* A Routemaster smeared with melted cheese and barbeque sauce

* A bi-plane flown by a dove**

* A love-track sung by Kelly, which went straight to this former partner's heart



Yes, I am too lazy to read 'the actual' story, or rather, me and my doube, we're havin' too much craic... !


Postscript : 26 April

And to-day AOL® excels itself :

Woman defiant against bag theif [sic]



End-notes

* Thank you, Lewis Carroll !

** German Taub.


Tuesday 23 April 2013

Video: Woman shocked to see tiger in public toilet (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


23 April

Of course, a tiger in the petrol-station, or in the woman's bedroom, would have been unremarkable*.

After all, Esso still seems to like tigers (though, I am quick to say, I do not have any idea what it does to forestall their extinction - nearly said 'secure', but that was just  a confusion of seeking and stopping), and many a home has a Tigger, either a fluffy version, or built into a photograph-frame.

As for this toilet tiger, it couldn't have been a bothersome sort, because there is no claim that the woman was hurt ('mauled' is the preferred term), but just that she was shocked by seeing it. Perhaps she was under the faulty impression that they are extinct...

Mean of someone, then, to go and proof her wrong by attracting it inside the WC, but you know what these activists are like !


End-notes

* Oh, the perils of what T. S. Eliot (to be specific) liked, I think, to call specificity !


Tuesday 22 January 2013

The sexiest man on the planet - revealed

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


22 January

Yes, we all know that it's AOL® having fun with some crap...

However

(1) If he is the sexiest, then - unless he's a hermit (if so, he might not want to be called the sexiest man on the planet) - we all know who he is

(2) And we all know that he will be white, muscular, in his early or mid-twenties, rather than the countless billions who do not match that description (on one or more counts)

(3) Can I even be bothered to find out who it's said to be... ?


Wednesday 16 January 2013

Video: Myleene Klass hits the beach in bikini (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


16 January

Almost as stupid as stating Customers shocked with horse meat ! Would we expect delighted with horse meat ?!

And, with this...


Which is worth the 1,000 words, since there is patently water (or might it be a swimming-pool), and patently bikini-wearing going on.

OK, we might not clock that it is MK, but what's this rubbish about hit[ting] the beach', and don't many women wear bikinis (one at a time) on the beach ?

QED


Tuesday 20 November 2012

Video: Courteney Cox is bikini fabulous at 48 (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


20 November

Do we, at last, see some variation in this twaddle about '[insert woman's name]'s bikini body' ?

Not what (semi-mockingly, as I recall) Fowler - in Modern English Usage (or was it The King's English?) - called elegant variation (because we might have our own go at something that actually works now...), but variation nonetheless :

* Fabulous in bikini - Courteney Cox at 48

* 48 years of Courteney Cox, and still fabulous in a bikini

* That bikini looks fabulous worn by 48-year-old Courteney Cox


etc., etc.


PS Other than Kinnock stumbling at the seaside, or Daniel Craig on the beach when he first became Bond, what other men at the seashore have been given any significant report and images circulated and perpetuated...?


Monday 15 October 2012

Video: Has Russell Crowe called time on marriage? (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


15 October

If some actor doesn't want to get married (again), do I care? It's only what he says.

If, though, he is revealing hiself as a Supreme Being, declaring that no one, anywhere, can now get married, then maybe I'm interested - I might even watch the video-clip of this Great Astronaut of the Universe...


Thursday 11 October 2012

Brad Pitt wants to play a scouser (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


11 October

If it's a classic Mark Twain (although such things as the Feast of Fools and the framing device of The Taming of the Shrew foreshadow him), then the scouser chosen should have the chance to be Pitt in return.

Whatever happens, I think that Pitt should be under Terene Davies' direction as to how he can play what he apparently wants to be - either that, or thator Alexei Sayle.


Thursday 4 October 2012

Brad and Angelina consider changing names (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


4 October

That's just a bit silly, isn't it?

So we have to contemplate calling him Angelina, Angelina Pitt, whereas she comes Brad, Brad Jolie...

About as crazy as Fairbanks and Pickford calling their place Pickfair!


Saturday 15 September 2012

Video: Cat survives trip to Disney in airline luggage (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


15 September

Well, cats might be discerning, and would prefer the Methuen Winnie-the-Pooh to the Disney one any day, but why would they be so traumatized by Walt's Wonderful World that they did not even survive a trip there?

Piglet, in contrast, would probably have pigged out on haycorns through sheer terror, and done his poor little piggy ticker no good into the bargain with hyper-anxiety.



Wednesday 12 September 2012

Popular postings this week (no, not 'trending')

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


12 September

This is just a list of page-views (with hyperlinks and kinky boots), OK?


5th = All on one day (13)

4th =
Wilfredo gyrates in his Y-fronts - expanded view (20)

3rd =
Kristin shows her comedic flair (26)

2nd =
The patterns of Samsara (26)

1st =
How do you weigh 16,000 animals? Has AOL® done a Freudian? (48)


Video: Could Victoria Beckham be pregnant? (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


12 September 2012

The answer, without looking at the video, self-evidently is Yes :



* VB is not known to have done anything to affect her fertility, and

* Nor is she, whatever the age is now, beyond child-bearing age


So why look at a video of someone who - like any other mother sharing those characteristics - could be pregnant

Sooner hear a determination as to whether, at any point, she could sing sweetly...



Thursday 23 August 2012

How do you weigh 16,000 animals? Has AOL® done a Freudian*?

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


23 August

It's easy to get a meetkat on to the scales[...]



Meetkat**? So they're not these cute animals with the comedy voices, then? - they're a source of food!

Good, eat the lot of 'em!



End-notes

* Or, as I first typed, Has AOL® 'done a Fruedian'?

** I am not convinced, either, that AOL is spared by the entry in the so-called
urban dictionary
...






Tuesday 7 August 2012

Madonna works tight knee-high boots (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


8 August

So is it G4S Games absconders who write this stuff?

Is there no sense that, whatever people nowadays might really mean (if they stopped to ask) by some model or starlet working whatever clothing it may be, working something tight (or loose) means something, too?

Or why the hell do I despair at the typical knowledge-base of a human being?


Thursday 2 August 2012

Big bloody news: King Juan Carlos of Spain trips over (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


2 August

No doubt there's an awkward piece of footage, showing the royal foot stumbling over something - do we think that it was the right one, or the left?

And did Juan Carlos - just in case we don't know where he is king of (as I am not aware of any other king so named), we have to be told - just trip, or did he actually stumble and end up on the floor, crying Shit!?

And is it better or worse than when the poor blighter sneezed yesterday, maybe three times in succession? And, if so, better or worse than when Beckham (unofficial King of Span) tripped over in 2007...?


Saturday 28 July 2012

Explore the natural beauty of Caledonia (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


28 July

What is this? Bloody cornering the market in a fanciful form of what Fowler dubbed Elegant Variation?

Just so that you can refer to it as Scotland below?

And why not Hibernia, whilst you're at it?!

@TheAgentApsley

Wednesday 25 July 2012

Horrified tourists watch as man falls from sixth floor of Tate Modern (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


25 July

So how many things make this reporting imbecilic?


OK, factually it was at Tate Modern, but :

* Was it only tourists who watched (others assumed it to be just a happening, and ignored it)?

* And it was a special sub-set of the tourists, the ones who were alread horrified, who watched?

* Did the choice of floor have some effect on them, or was it just the falling?

* Everyone else (all the other tourists) watched the man fall from a different floor - or, somehow knowing that it had been the sixth, were uncomprehending about the choice of floor


Better stop there...


Saturday 21 July 2012

Russell Brand Jokes About His Sex Life With Ex-Wife Katy Perry (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


21 July

I looked at the headline, and thought - until I remembered that this was Russell Brand - that I wanted to hear what this really witty guy had to say about his ex-wife.

Sorry, I must have blinked and so missed the joke. (I had been drinking, y'r'onour.) As this was a report of a radio broadcast, it might have been 'nice' - rights issues permitting - to hear what Brand said, rather than reading it described. (That said, the photo of him with a semi-transparent top left me wanting to know less, not more.)

As I try to be Celebrity Deaf, I have no idea what the wheelchair references meant, but I simply found myself thinking which, visually, was more of a catch, Katy for Russell, or vice versa: just look out that one with the top, if you need to, to answer the question. A story about nothing, but I should have guessed...

And as for that 'film' Take Me - I'm a Geek, that really says it all, doesn't it?


Friday 20 July 2012

Spice Girls to reform for Olympics (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


20 July

Some people don't realize that one can distinguish between verbs - with a hyphen.

Or maybe they did mean reform...?


Tuesday 15 May 2012

Kym Marsh rocks skimpy LBD (according to AOL®)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2012
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)


15 May

It is possible, though I doubt it (it is the whole point of this postlet), that LBD is a recognized term of art in these tinsel teasers on sign-on pages. (Remember the one, a few issues back, that reported Lorraine Kelly tumbling from her horse, whereas a newspaper had reported the story at least a fortnight earlier - not so much breaking news as breaking new ground for peddling old tat!)

For those not initiated (right trouser leg rolled up, etc.), I shall not spell it out*, though I was probably helped - when appeared words appeared to be missing in the headline - by the image below, because that would spoil the Fun of Who Is In The Know, i.e. who is manipulated into using some stupid expression or contraction, but merely continue with my would-be contentious proposition:

Is this a WAG** in the making, or an MCD (to refer gratuitously, for the sake of cross-pollination, to Pork and beef on the same plate) - what some might call a defining moment, when that unhelpful term is contracted to its initials?

Although many acronyms (and some contractions) are no easier to say than the original text, are we heading for A Contracting Universe (ACU)?:


With LSL, she skipped down the catwalk in an LBD, courtesy of NBC, and, after a VAC, went home for a NLS


End-notes

* Though 'skimpy' is already part and parcel of the 'L' of LBD. More asutute readers may surmise, then, that it does not represent London Bomb Disposal, Lesotho Bisexual Dilettantes, or Liverpool Ballroom-Dancing.

** An amazing acronym, not only because the words 'and' merits a letter of its own (after all, it was WMD, not WOMD (which might have been mistaken for WOMB, I guess)), but also two categories of women in a relationship (with a man) are brusquely yanked together!

In fact, though celebrities are not, of course, unfaithful or promiscuous, X's WAG could also be (in the other capacity) Y's WAG - KK, for example, is shown dating other men when, as far as I am aware, the man whom she married, and who alleged just weeks after that she had not been sincere in marrying him, has not yet been announced to have divorced her.