VENICE, Florida (AP) -- A man who lost his ball in a golf course pond nearly lost a limb when a nearly 11-foot alligator latched on to his arm and pulled him in the water, authorities said.
Bruce Burger, 50, was trying to retrieve his ball Monday from a pond on the sixth hole at the Lake Venice Golf Club.
The alligator latched on to Burger's right forearm and pulled him in the pond, said Gary Morse, a spokesman for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. Burger used his left arm to beat the reptile until it freed him.
"I saw him reach down to get his ball and he yelled" for help, said Janet Pallo, who was playing the fifth hole and ran over to drive the man to the clubhouse.
Burger, from Lenoir City, Tennessee, was taken to a hospital but was not seriously injured, Morse said Tuesday.
It took seven Fish and Wildlife officers an hour to trap the one-eyed alligator, which measured 10 feet, 11 inches, Morse said.
The pond at the sixth hole has a "Beware of Alligator" sign.
"Unfortunately, that's part of Florida," course general manager Rod Parry said. "There's wildlife in these ponds."
Lauren's Ferrari is not just a car that happens to be made of wool. This is a carefully considered object that questions the relationship between male symbols and feminine craft to suggest the relationship is more complex than first thought. The car also cleverly plays on the hard smooth object being transformed into a soft textured one.
Nah, I think it's a car that happens to be made out of wool.
IT'S every arachnophobe's worst nightmare: millions of spiders on the move, blanketing everything in cobwebs.
The Gippsland flooding has triggered a spider population explosion of up to 30 species, which have taken to the air in the search for new homes.
Australia's leading "spider man", the senior curator of spiders at Queensland Museum, Robert Raven, said the phenomenon was triggered by recent heavy rain, after the drought had postponed hatchings.
"It's amazing stuff that is always a moisture-triggered event, and I would love to be down there to see it directly,'' he said.
Arachnids from up to five families, including money spiders, wolf spiders, water spiders, crab spiders and orb-weaving spiders are in a spin, producing silk, which catches the breeze and lifts them into the air.
"They are remarkable animals and they can get up into the stratosphere higher than planes,'' Dr Raven said.
But when the air gets heavy, the web drops and they fall to the ground, covering everything in sight.
After Age photographer Joe Armao stopped to photograph the shimmering gossamer of webs at Seaspray, near Sale, last week, he returned to find his car draped in webs, along with hundreds of culprits.
Said Dr Raven: "The thing is, if they all stayed at the same spot, there would be no food and they would eat each other.
"After floods you'll also get things like scorpions and centipedes that will float on the water and then get into houses because they are high and dry.''
Gippsland pest controller Peter MacManus said he had noticed that fences in the area were covered in cobwebs.
Locals were reaching for insect spray rather than calling for professional help to keep them at bay, he said.
"I have heard that some people were inundated with spiders after the floods, but in my business, you don't spray houses in the winter time,'' he said.
The spiders are not the only creatures seeking shelter in houses.
Mr MacManus said one Licola resident returned home to find that six snakes had taken up residence inside.
I was imagining an actual explosion of spiders. I think I would move somewhere else... at least temporarily, if I was able to. A huge increase in snakes and spiders and scorpions and centipedes sounds scary.
*sigh* I can smell the next disaster movie coming already. Tommy Lee Jones is Volcano 2: The Spidering. OOH OOH! or, Spiders on a Plane: They Came from Above!
MARSEILLE, France - A woman has been arrested on suspicion of kissing a painting by American artist Cy Twombly and smudging the bone-white canvas with her lipstick, French judicial officials said Saturday.
Police said they arrested the woman after she kissed the work on Thursday. She is to be tried in a court in the southern city of Avignon on Aug. 16 for "damage to a work of art," judicial officials said.
The painting, which is worth an estimated $2 million, was on display at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Avignon. It is part of an exhibition slated to run at the museum through Sept. 30. Officials did not provide further details on the painting.
Twombly is known for his abstract paintings combining painting and drawing techniques, repetitive lines and the use of graffiti, letters and words.
And the next article has a little more detail. Some of those lipsticks can stain things badly. Doing what she did spoils it for the other artists wanting to look at the artwork.
PARIS (AFP) - A Cambodian-born French woman faces prosecution for criminal damage after planting a kiss on a painting by the American artist Cy Twombly, leaving the imprint of her lipstick on the otherwise immaculate white canvas.
The untitled work three metres by two (roughly nine feet by six), valued at two million euros, is part of an exhibition dedicated to the US painter in the southern French city of Avignon.
Thirty-year-old Sam Rindy, who visited the show with a friend on Thursday, told AFP that she was so overcome by the white canvas that she kissed it.
"I stepped back. I found the painting even more beautiful," said Rindy. "The artist left this white for me," she added.
Staff of the Lambert foundation, which owns the painting, took a different view. They called the police and the woman, herself a painter, was arrested as she left the premises. She will appear in court on August 16 to face charges of criminal damage.
Okay, I didn't know exactly what this painting was... the way they're describing it, it sounds like it's just a white canvas with nothing painted on it, but that can't be right. I wanted to see if I could find an image of the painting somewhere... I don't think this is it, but this is another one of Cy Twombly's paintings...
I know I might sound like a bit of a traditionalist, but how is this award-winning, critically acclaimed art????
Edit: In light of Garnet's edit, I guess it was just a white canvas. Hmm... My question now is twofold.
And I'm not saying this because I want to bash all over it... I just want to hear what other people think, especially if they like abstract art. What's the draw in this?
I'm not sure what was on the canvas either. From the description, it sounds very minimalist. I just thought it was somwhat amusing that she was so moved by the painting enough to kiss it. I've been impressed by alot of paintings. I've had the fortune of seeing many of the impressionists including Renoir, Da Vinci's drawings, some of Van Gogh's lesser known paintings(as well as his Sunflowers) and many others. But I wouldn't let myself be so moved to kiss a painting. It can damage the artwork and of course, you'll get in trouble.
I remember reading in the paper(sorry I don't remember the exact article) awhile back about some celebrity painted a horizontal black line across a white canvas.
It was worth quite a bit of money(because of the celeb) until some guy used a sharpie and I guess made some more lines on it,heh. He got in trouble too.
Looks like a drawing my 6 year old cousin did...
Ha ha....well, there are many artists who paint and draw like that and are successful. I don't know anyone off hand though.
Haaaahahaha, I thought that wasn't related at first.... good link though, haha.
I think it's really just this whole writer/artist worship stuff, you know? If I were to take a marker and paint a vertical line on a canvas and give it to an abstract art museum, they'd say that I lacked vision or something. But when an already established abstract artist does it, it is worth money.
Reminds me of William Carlos William's poem, "The Red Wheelbarrow":
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens.
I hold a bachelor's degree in English Literature, yet this poem pisses me off. People write articles about this poem, analyzing the structure and the metaphors and imagery and all that, but it's a perfect example of the same type of thing as the vertical line "painting". This poem is frequently anthologized not because it is an outstanding poem, but because it is a poem by William Carlos Williams. Urg.
I can see the elephant paintings going for some money though, because a painting done by an elephant is at least something of a novelty.
I agree with you on paintings. I usually don’t find much interest in abstract art.
If I could reproduce something similar, I’m not that impressed.
I find artwork such as this fascinating. The beauty alone is captivating.
However, I don’t think that I would necessarily apply the same rule to poems. Some of the best poems I know are simple and would seem easy enough to reproduce. I actually really like the poem you’ve just mentioned. I totally know what you mean though. I wasn’t impressed by T. S. Eliot’s “The Hallow Men”, but we had to analyze and study the poem none the less. I don’t even like how T. S. Eliot read his own poem.
Comments
http://www.sockbaby.com/media/sockbaby1.wmv
http://www.bathspa.ac.uk/about/news/default.asp?article=426
I wonder if the ferrari would be comfy.
Uhh... we were watching Frasier, dammit.
Elephants in a Bus!
Crocodiles on Motorcycles!
Bugs in a Spaceship!
Tyrannosaurs in F-16's!
The possibilities are endless!
Is this a Calvin and Hobbes reference?
And the next article has a little more detail. Some of those lipsticks can stain things badly. Doing what she did spoils it for the other artists wanting to look at the artwork.
French woman plants lips on white canvas
I know I might sound like a bit of a traditionalist, but how is this award-winning, critically acclaimed art????
Edit: In light of Garnet's edit, I guess it was just a white canvas. Hmm... My question now is twofold.
And I'm not saying this because I want to bash all over it... I just want to hear what other people think, especially if they like abstract art. What's the draw in this?
I remember reading in the paper(sorry I don't remember the exact article) awhile back about some celebrity painted a horizontal black line across a white canvas.
It was worth quite a bit of money(because of the celeb) until some guy used a sharpie and I guess made some more lines on it,heh. He got in trouble too.
Ha ha....well, there are many artists who paint and draw like that and are successful. I don't know anyone off hand though.
I think it's really just this whole writer/artist worship stuff, you know? If I were to take a marker and paint a vertical line on a canvas and give it to an abstract art museum, they'd say that I lacked vision or something. But when an already established abstract artist does it, it is worth money.
Reminds me of William Carlos William's poem, "The Red Wheelbarrow":
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens.
I hold a bachelor's degree in English Literature, yet this poem pisses me off. People write articles about this poem, analyzing the structure and the metaphors and imagery and all that, but it's a perfect example of the same type of thing as the vertical line "painting". This poem is frequently anthologized not because it is an outstanding poem, but because it is a poem by William Carlos Williams. Urg.
I can see the elephant paintings going for some money though, because a painting done by an elephant is at least something of a novelty.
If I could reproduce something similar, I’m not that impressed.
I find artwork such as this fascinating. The beauty alone is captivating.
However, I don’t think that I would necessarily apply the same rule to poems. Some of the best poems I know are simple and would seem easy enough to reproduce. I actually really like the poem you’ve just mentioned. I totally know what you mean though. I wasn’t impressed by T. S. Eliot’s “The Hallow Men”, but we had to analyze and study the poem none the less. I don’t even like how T. S. Eliot read his own poem.