Blog Guy, recently you told about some people who go jousting for sport, but their concept was disappointing.
Have you found anyplace else were real armor enthusiasts can go to use their lance a lot?
You bet. Try Ukraine, where this time of year you’d swear it’s still the 14th century. We have a video report on the action, and you can see they mean business - one knight even takes off his helmet to show us the dents.
Chad Ruble is back from his fancy vacation today, with a nice collection of odd video stories about things that actually happened recently, instead of those old leftover clips we’ve been watching.
This week, meet a bunch of sweaty people, a guy who rides a pogo stick under water, and the mysterious giant Lego Man. You can’t get quality material like this anywhere else. Here’s Chad:
There are a number of claims that we should immediately view with major suspicion. Stuff like, “The check is in the mail,” “We’re from the government and we’re here to help you,” and others I can’t print here. Well, I have one to add to the list: “Oh, get closer, that crocodile is very gentle.” Sure thing, buddy.
There is this zoo where visitors are encouraged to play with the crocodiles, and we have a video report on it. A guy explains that the crocs are gentle because the zoo plays Buddhist prayers every day. Well, how do we know some of these reptiles aren’t just atheists pretending to be Buddhists, until some juicy sucker like me sticks his arm in their mouth?
If you are a sports nut who rifles through YouTube looking for Nike commercials — we know there are plenty of you judging by nearly 3 million views of just one Ronaldinho spot — there’s a new campaign for you to check out.Regarded as one of the best when it comes to branding, Nike is launching a new campaign for its “ZOOM” shoe featuring star athletes like football’s LaDainian Tomlinson and basketball’s Steve Nash. The campaign’s tag: “Quick is deadly.”The broadcast TV commercials come courtesy of Michael Mann, the director behind such films as “Ali”, “Miami Vice” and “Heat”, and kicked off this week with the Tomlinson spot (of course it’s on YouTube).
Nike also has print, digital and PR elements thanks to its longtime agency Wieden+Kennedy Portland.
Wieden+Kennedy teamed with Ensequence to develop an interactive component to the TV campaign for Dish Network customers who have DVRs, offering viewers 22 extra minutes for viewers to learn more about the product or watch additional footage.
And Nike gets a little bonus from the interactive TV part of the campaign — it will be able to track and measure viewer response, giving it one more important metric to play with.
A slogan among serious Internet hackers says that “information wants to be free.” A sentiment among some folks holds that fudge wants to be free, as well.
A woman was charged with burglary after police said she made a late-night raid on a fudge shop and escaped with as much fudge as she could carry.
According to the Washington Post, police who questioned her at a nearby hotel noticed that she had huge amounts of fudge stuffed in her pockets. Like, if that’s a crime, they might as well come and get me, too. But anyway, the story said the thief apparently tried to get rid of the loot by flushing it in a restroom, clogging a toilet in the process. It occurs to me that determining the toilet was clogged by rocky road fudge instead of, you know, the usual, is about the least glamorous police job I’ve heard about in a long time. Lindsay Claiborn reports:
Ya know what they say, Blog Guy. It’s not so much the heat, as the humidity. That’s true, isn’t it?
No, sometimes it’s really the heat. Like in Finland, where they have this sauna competition. Indeed, a number of clichés come to mind here: If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the sauna, and Never let ‘em see you sweat.
But here’s the thing. Our video report mentions temperatures of 110 degrees Celsius. Now, here’s some advice to pass along to your children: if you’re ever anyplace where the temperature sounds obscene no matter whether it’s Celsius or Fahrenheit, maybe you should leave.
Hey Blog Guy, I read that this dude set a new distance record for bouncing underwater on a pogo stick. Wow! Could that story get any better?
Maybe. Like if the man was also a dancer in a 1960s lounge, and if he came from Lome, in West Africa, and if he had his own distinctive little sketch to promote himself.
Chad Ruble, who hosts our weekly collection of strange video footage from around the world, has his own way of saying things, just like any media biggie.
For instance, this week Chad promises “some of my favorite recent picks from the Reuters Oddly Enough file,” but that really translates to: “Sheila, I’m off on vacation in 10 minutes. You remember that gold swimsuit story I rejected a few weeks ago? Suddenly it doesn’t seem so awful.”
Anyway, it’s still a pretty good show, and you get to hear Chad talk about road food. Here’s Chad:
Dear Blog Guy,
I know you’ve frequently given good career advice in the past. I’m a 22-year-old guy. Are there any new opportunities my college job counsellor may have overlooked?
Well, if you have the stomach for it, so to speak, you might consider a career in belly dancing. It turns out it’s not just for the ladies anymore. We have a story about a belly dancer named Alex, who seems to be successful at doing, uh, navel maneuvers.
There does seem to be a logical flaw, though. The story traces male belly dancing back to Ottoman times, “when men in the Sultan’s palaces were entertained by young male dancers as the women lived separately in harems,” to show that there is a popular precedent.
Hey, Blog Guy! I’ve been following this Red Bull Air Race, held in various places around the world. I know you get around - have you seen it in person?
We do have video footage of a recent leg from London, as the planes do hairpin turns and other aerial acrobatics.
But I see this more as a math story problem. If a plane travels very close to the ground, at speeds of 250 mph… Let’s see, height divided by seconds, multiply, carry the 4… It looks like it could take about 2.2 seconds for one of them to get down to where I’m watching with my chili dog and root beer. So, I think I’ll just enjoy the nice Reuters video clips. Daragh Burke reports:
