Valentine’s day. Hell all round for many people, single, attached or somewhere in between. The most common states? Worried about not “having anyone”. Freaking out in case the person you already love suddenly decides that, because you didn’t buy enough flowers or make a reservation in time, you clearly can’t be in love with them. Livid because now that you’ve chosen your life mate, you don’t get any mystery cards. Pining over the "brief encounters" column in Metro and wondering if any of them are about you. Gutted that despite being single, you don’t get any mystery cards. Fielding the inevitable newly-married couple’s “singles dinners” so they can get kicks out of unsuitable match making. Unable to look your secret crush in the eye when you see them at the train station every day. Stressed because while you’re head-over-heels in love, your best friend is utterly bereft and heart broken. Not to mention handling the near-constant barrage of dating websites, Tom Hanks films and love-themed TV programmes (E4’s Top 300 Lesbian Soap Opera Kisses or whatever they decide to cobble together) whilst trying to maintain an air of devil-may-care insouciance about the whole thing.

Hmmph. Who, you might ask, was St Valentine? Who do we have to blame for this sorry state of emotional saturation? Valentinus was a Roman priest, martyred during the reign of Claudius II (the soldier emperor, not the perve). He was caught conducting weddings for Christian couples and generally aiding-and-abetting the followers of Jesus – a crime in those days (around 269 – 270). Claudius didn’t think Valentine was entirely bad until he tried to convert him to Christianity. So the Emperor had him beaten with clubs and stoned. He was still alive, so they chopped his head off outside the Flaminian Gate.

This is a picture of his severed head. It’s now kept in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome.

The actual festival of St Valentine’s day took over from a (possibly pre-Roman) festival called Lupercalia, which was held on February 15. It was a spring rite designed to scare off evil spirits, purify the city and generally make things healthy and fertile (it also took the place of an even earlier spring festival called Februa, which is the root of the month's name).

The Lupercalia was named after the Roman god Lupercus, who was related to Faunus, their equivalent of the Greek god Pan. Lupercus is the god of shepherds, so his priests tended to hang around nude except for a goatskin. It was also part in honour of Lupa, the she-wolf who suckled Romulus and Remus.

At the Lupercalia, the young citizens of Rome (mainly noble youths and magistrates – the Luperci, or brothers of the wolf, included Caesar, Mark Antony and more) would kick off by sacrificing two male goats and a dog. A bit of wool would be dipped in milk and sacrificial blood, then used to wipe the heads of the Luperci, at which they were supposed to smile and laugh.

Then they’d have a big feast, each cut two strips from the victims’ skins and run around the walls of the old Palatine city. As they ran, girls and young women would line the route, and the Luperci would whip them with these bloody strips – if you were hit by them, it would make you fertile and ease the pains of childbirth. Even in the fifth century, when “paganism” was outlawed, the Christian Romans still celebrated the Lupercalia – but it was something the plebs did, not something the aristos bothered with.

Now, of course, it has all changed and evolved from something with meaning (fertility etc) to a day that almost celebrates the superficial. We are encouraged to take the easy way out, buying little white bears holding garish hearts, two dozen roses because That's What Women Want, whipped into a panic by competitive spending with friends ("yeah well I'm taking MINE to Nobu and I'm getting her KNICKERS made from SPIDER SILK," "yeah well I'm taking MINE to VENICE and getting her lingerie that has been WASHED in the tears of ANGELS").

Whatever happened to just going for a walk and carving each other's names in a tree trunk, or picking wild flowers, or just a nice card and a kiss? Now, though, Valentine’s Day is the second most gifted holiday next to Christmas. The most lucrative sectors for marketers are the lovers staples: flowers, chocolates and jewellery. This year, Britons are expected to spend £107.2m on flowers, £55.4m on chocolates, £89.1m on jewellery, while £82.5m will go on "other gifts". Over a billion cards are exchanged worldwide on Feb 14th, and the sad thing is, most of them already have the Hallmark message written in them.

On balance, I think I’d rather do the whole chasing chicks naked with a fresh bit of goat skin up The Strand than suffer the choice of either an interminable evening of shit telly at home or finding all pubs and restaurants full of couples who aren’t talking to one another because they’re so done in by being “spontaneous”. Okay so it's not a completely made up festival, but if you love people, you shouldn't have to be told when to be nice. So there.

ps - The St Valentine's Day Massacre is a whole different ball game, but fascinating. Al Capone, Chicago gangsters etc. Click this to read about it.

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[googlemaps http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=embed&hl=en&geocode=&q=portobello+market&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=18.409311,38.583984&ie=UTF8&hq=portobello+market&hnear=Portobello+Market,+Portobello+Rd,+Kensington,+W10+5,+UK&ll=51.519989,-0.209568&spn=0.019107,0.038418&layer=c&cbll=51.513349,-0.202844&panoid=D6zbUT2D0O6C7e-38Hibxw&cbp=12,26.72,,0,13.82&output=svembed&w=415&h=350]

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[by Tim Edwards in The First Post]
Chris Morris's comedy film, Four Lions, about a group of bungling British Muslim terrorists who try to attack the London Marathon, premiered to a warm reception at the Sundance Film Festival on Saturday - the same day Home Secretary Alan Johnson announced he was raising the UK terrorism alert level from 'substantial' to 'severe'.

Yet if Four Lions contains any truths at all, the government has little chance of being taken seriously when it makes such pronouncements. As for Osama bin Laden, he came out on Sunday to 'claim' for al-Qaeda the Christmas Day plot to blow up an airliner over Detroit. Why would the world's most feared terrorist leader endorse a bungled attempt that has landed the perpetrator, Farouk Abdul Mutallab, with the moniker "The underpants bomber". Does Osama perhaps have a sense of humour?

Four Lions was conceived by Morris, the satirist behind such media-skewering TV series as The Day Today and Brass Eye. He says he first came up with the idea of a film about incompetent jihadis when he read of a plot to destroy a US warship at night. The terrorists slipped their boat into the water at the quayside and stacked it with explosives. It sank. "I laughed," said Morris.

BE SURE YOU READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE - IT'S GOOD, AND YOU'LL SEE A TRAILER OF THE VIDEO.

I won't spoil it, but I will suggest you click this link to see Geekweek's full list. And you know what? I agree with pretty much every single one of them. Funny how I didn't even register a few of these scenes as extended takes or tracking shots until seeing them out of context just now. Also, I've never seen Hungarian film "The Werckmeister Harmonies" before (number 13 on the list), but the shot from that film is just plain nutty.

This scene, from Thai martial arts film "The Protector" (number five on the list), took five takes and over a month to shoot:
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Just. Plain. Bonkers.

(if you're on FB, click here or you won't see nuthin)

Saw this on Boingboing , and it's too important to miss. It was picked by Stephen Worth, who is the Director of the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive , a museum, library and digital archive for professional artists and students. He's bang on as far as the skill limbo goes. I couldn't agree more.
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CLICK THIS IF YOU'RE ON FACEBOOK Nathan Milstein: "Paganiniana" 1968

"Now here's an area of music where I'm a little out of my familiar territory. I played violin for one grueling year in elementary school and swore off it forever (much to the relief of my parents). Although I'm interested in violin music (as long as someone else is holding the fiddle) I've never really explored the repertoire for solo violin. I know a little bit about Paganini- he was a flamboyant showman who used pyrotechnic technique to dazzle audiences- and I know Nathan Milstein was a great violinist who performed into his 80s- but I can't call myself knowledgeable about this stuff at all.

"But I can tell you that when I first saw this clip on EMI's Great Recordings of the CenturyDVD, my jaw was hanging on the floor. Ever since Andy Warhol made "ideas without skill" fashionable back in the 60s, it seems to me that popular culture has been playing a game of "skill limbo". How low can we go? How badly drawn can a cartoon be and still be considered a cartoon? How many drum machines and sequencers can we stack up to avoid having to learn a real instrument? How much plastic surgery does it take to make acting skills unnecessary? I really don't know the answers to those questions. Every day is a new horror.

"But when I see someone who has both an idea AND skill, I'm reminded just how doggone powerful and dynamic a creative artist can be. I'm sick and tired of accepting "half a loaf". Speak to me with eloquence. Dazzle me with your skill. Communicate an important idea. I insist on "all of the above"."

Won Park. The man can FOLD though, you get me. His fish actually have scales. He has made the Millennium Falcon out of a dollar bill. Type his name into a Google image search. You won't be disappointed. He lives in Honolulu.

What’s more, he offers up downloadable instructions (PDF) and a series of instructional videos on how to fold your own dollar koi. Some of his stuff is in this gallery.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHBVnMf2t7w&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

(if you're on FB, click "view original post" or you won't be able to see anything)

Cyantrend posted these fantastic polygonal images of animals by Argentinian artist/creative Nacho Gil (whose moustache, incidentally, is rather disappointing - needs much more volume). The pictures look loads better big, so be sure to check out the full set on his website by clicking HERE.

Saw this on boingboing - I'm definitely going if I can. It's important. Bring your cameras, get your arses in gear. The UK activist group "I'm a Photographer Not a Terrorist!" is planning a mass photo-shooting this Saturday in Trafalgar Square, London: "Following a series of high profile detentions under s44 of the terrorism act including 7 armed police detaining an award winning architectural photographer in the City of London, the arrest of a press photographer covering campaigning santas at City Airport and the stop and search of a BBC photographer at St Pauls Cathedral and many others. PHNAT feels now is the time for a mass turnout of Photographers, professional and amateur to defend our rights and stop the abuse of the terror laws." Mass Gathering in defence of street photography

Genius adaptation of Be-yonsss.

Skinny Ladies - watch more funny videos

ps - if you're on FB, click "view original link" or you won't see nothin'.

And the winner is...

(I'm going out RIGHT NOW to buy the necessaries)

ps - if you're on FB, click to view original post or you won't see nothin'.

Good set of Venn diagrams on Huff Post. Click the pic to see the orginal set.

(you need to read this in either a Scottish or New York Gangster voice, it doesn't work in Mockney) First off, get your fucking priorities right. No use trying to get cracking on a half-decent sandwich if a) you don't know what you want to put in the fucker, or b) you don't have the right shit. So work out what shit you need, and then get the right shit. We'll make a BLT. That's bacon, lettuce, tomato. First off, you need bread. Now, I'm talking decent fucking bread. Bloomer's good. Holds the condiments. Plus that shit won't split on you and leave its guts on your fucking hands. You'll need some bacon too. Back bacon's the motherfucker. Better coverage. Not too skinny. Smoked or unsmoked, I don't give a shit. You choose. But cook that shit. Cook three slices of it in the frying pan - not too much fucking oil or you'll fucking die from a fucking heart attack. So, pan's on, bacon's in. Go to the fridge, get out a good white Burgundy. A good one - Meursault or Montrachet, not the shit you take to parties. Open the bottle and pour a little into a clean fucking glass. Swirl it a little, hold it to the light. Admire the herby, savoury nose and have a sip. Now slice the bread. Not too thick or it won't fit in your mouth. Make three slices and hold one in reserve. Every sandwich needs backup. If you want to toast, toast like a pussy so it's golden at most. Any more and you'll slice your fucking mouth. Now get some good butter. President is badass. Lightly salted. Put it on one piece. On the other, spread some mayo. Done? Wipe the fucking surfaces down. Crumbs everywhere. You wanna cause an accident? Shit. Now, peel of a couple bits of lettuce. Make sure it's fresh, and clean as fuck. Put that on the mayonnaised slice of bread. Now get a good tomato. Black ones are the best. If you can't get that, use a small vine-ripened one. Beef tomatoes taste like lint. Slice the fucker quite thickly and roughly. Chuck it on the lettuce. You put it straight on the bread and all you do is make that shit soggy. Have another sip of that crispy, clean white. Good isn't it? Now, the bacon should be done. Get a couple of bits of kitchen roll and put the bacon on them so they soak up the grease and shit. Now get the pan and wash that motherfucker while it's hot. Clean as you go. Clean. As. You. Go. Done? Now put the bacon on the lettuce. Make it jigsaw together. You want total coverage. Grind some pepper on that shit. Put the other bit of bread on. Slice it diagonally. Plate up. Don't waste fucking time. Sit down and eat it. Chew. You want to make another? Tidy up first. Maybe put in some avocado too next time. You want hot sauce too? What am I, your fucking mother? Put it on and shut up. Have some more wine.

 From Holy Taco, spotted by MewMew: Joseph Ducreux was a French painter, who, in 1793, made this pimp-ass self portrait. 216 years later, his internet meme exploded on the scene. See the whole set of bad boys by clicking THUSLY.

ps - there's a set of similar things for the Bachelor Frog, which made me laugh. Mainly because they describe my current living arrangements worryingly well.

Letters of note is is an attempt to gather and sort fascinating letters, postcards, telegrams, faxes, and memos. That means billets doux from Monica Lewinsky to Bill Clinton, a plea by a mother to Myra Hindley to make a full confession (it worked), inspirational replies to fan mail, even letters to Stalag Luft prisoners in the Second World War. Get stuck in. It's the most interesting thing I've seen in ages (spotted by Ben Hammertown).

(if you're viewing this feed on Facebook, click "view original link" to see it in all its Dysonology glory)
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PS - Be sure to ferret out the Oscar Wilde letter, in which he justifies his claim that 'all art is useless'.

I had one of the most fascinating days in a long time last November when I went to the McLaren Technology Centre with ace photographer Benedict Redgrove. We were there to see last ever SLRs being built and also to meet the new McLaren MP4-12C (which they just call "The New Car"). Click the photo or this link to see the whole story. Or get the latest copy of WIRED, where you can see it in all its glory! 

(Tim Edwards wrote this for The First Post - click the link at the end to read the full piece)

An eminent doctor has described the swine flu pandemic as "one of the greatest medical scandals of the century" perpetrated by big pharma and the World Health Organisation.

Dr Wolfgang Wodarg, an epidemiologist, claims the WHO was persuaded to change the definition of 'pandemic' by scientists linked to pharmaceutical companies in order to trigger lucrative 'sleeping' vaccination contracts.

The accusations are to be investigated by the Council of Europe after Dr Wodarg, the chairman of the body's health committee, tabled a damning resolution.

Dr Wodarg's allegations of a "false pandemic" pose a serious threat to the big pharmaceutical companies, which have profited considerably since the WHO declared swine flu a pandemic in June 2009 even though it was already clear that the mortality of people contracting the virus, also known as H1N1, was even lower than in normal seasonal flu. GlaxoSmithKlein is estimated to have made $1.7 billion from sales of H1N1 vaccine sales in the fourth quarter of 2009 alone.

Lower than expected uptake of the vaccine has led to a huge oversupply, to the extent that France, Britain, Germany and the Netherlands are all attempting to sell or give away surplus shots - or cancel orders, where possible.

Britain, where a mere 360 people have died, has taken delivery of around 30 million doses of a total order of 90 million from GSK and Baxter International at an estimated cost of £100m. Although there is a break clause in the contract with Baxter, there is none with GSK. David Salisbury, director of immunisation at the Department of Health, said there are a number of options, including "selling vaccines or giving them away".

Dr Wodarg claims the WHO "in cooperation with some big pharmaceutical companies and their scientists re-defined pandemics and lowered the alarm threshold" so that governments would begin to order vaccines.

"From June 2009," he explains, "it was no longer necessary, that 'an enormous amount of people [should] have contracted the illness or died'. There simply had to be a virus, spreading beyond borders; one that people had no immunity towards."

Dr Wodarg sees the root cause as lying in governments' responses to the avian flu (H5N1) outbreak of 2004. That virus, which had a far higher mortality of between 20 and 90 per cent, led to governments putting in place 'sleeping contracts' with pharmaceutical companies. These agreements are automatically triggered when the WHO declares a pandemic.

"'In this way," says Dr Wodarg, "the producers of vaccines are sure of enormous gains without having any financial risks.
 [read the full article on The First Post's site here]

[if you're on Facebook, click 'view original post' or whatever it is]

Related links:
http://www.theflucase.com/
http://educate-yourself.org/vcd/swinefluindex.shtml (though quite a lot of this seems to be conspiracy bonkers too)

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I'm this guy---------------------------------^

(If you're on FB you need to click THIS).

I'll add to this if I think of any other goodies, but 'til then, what springs to mind if I say:
The Euro, Y2K, 9/11, 7/7, Tsunami, Hurricane Katrina, Iraq, Anthrax, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, Darfur, al-Qaeda, Mumbai, iPhone, Blackberry, Bali disco bombs, Steve jobs, Bird flu, Swine flu, WMD, anti-war demos, migration and emigration, Burma, Usain Bolt, Tiger Woods, Wacko, Bush, Blair and Brown, Florida recounts (stipples? dipples?), Clinton and Lewinsky, Ricky Gervais, Tyson, Jonny Wilkinson, Ellen MacArthur, Zidane's headbutt, Flintoff's Ashes, CO2, digital cameras, Al Gore, Hedge Funds, Sarah Palin, Jade Goody, The Hadron Collider, Hubble, Wii, Wind farms and all that bollocks, Blu-Ray discs, subprime mortgages, 'progress', Google (maps too), Botox, trout pout, Viagra, X Factor, Britain's Got Talent, Harry Potter, Obama, Alan Greenspan, Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Putin, Tate Modern, Section 28, YouTube, The Human Genome Project, Elian Gonzalez, Slobodan Milosevic, Boutros Boutros Ghali, bonkers Britney, Benazir Bhutto assassinated, Wikipedia, Foot and Mouth, Jordan and Peter Andre, Sarah Payne, Civil Partnerships, Tamil Tigers, Mayor Giuliani, Microsoft Antitrust, Kings of Leon, Israel and the West Bank/Gaza Strip, Daniel Pearl, Ukraine elections, Williams sisters, Dot-com bubble, Moscow hostage gas goes wrong, Bush fires, Ricin, Chechnya, David Kelly and the Hutton Enquiry, Uday and Qusay Hussein, Michael Schumacher, various eclipses (solar and lunar), the Rugby World Cup, SMS, suicide bombers, Harold Shipman's suicide, The Lord of the Rings, Camp X-Ray, Guantanamo, Twitter, General Electric closes down, fox hunting, Reagan dies, John Paul II dies, Maddie, Fritzl, Foxy, Scottish Parliament, loooooads of suicide bombers, Iceland banks crash, Lost is on TV,  worldwide smoking bans, Enron, ETA, the Kyoto Protocol, George Galloway and Oil For Food, IRA ends armed campaign, Facebook, first face transplant, Russian and Ukraine gas arguments, Playstation 3, Castro resigns, Michael Phelps, Lehman Brothers, water on the moon, latte, Al Jazeera, HBO, Bennifer, Brangelina, MMPORGs, Jack Bauer, Abu Ghraib, Kanye, Sex & The City, Craigslist, vampires, slow food, auto-tune, cheese-eating surrender monkeys, blogging, true love, your family and friends.



Now, how many of these were actually good news? It's interesting what we choose to record. 


ps - In 2000, the world population was 6,070,581,000. It's now 6,793,800,000. Health and wealth have never been so abundant, but outside warfare, 20th century governments murdered 7.3% of their people, through needless famine, labour camps, genocide and other crimes. That compares with 3.7% in the 19th century and 4.7% in the 17th century.