Today I learned that Van Halen have that rider in their contract about “a bowl of M&Ms with all the brown ones removed” in order to know at a glance if the promoter read the entire contract. And the reason they do THAT is because they once had a stage collapse because a promoter hadn’t read the proper way to set up all the specific technical stuff.
So if the band goes in the dressing room or catering and sees brown M&Ms, they know they have to double-check the stage setup for safety.
I heard about this on Freakonomics Radio. Turns out the bit about no brown M&Ms is HUGE, in BIG font, bold, underlined and quotated like they’re on the Group W Bench.
The band was all, “We have fifty-pound lights hanging over our heads and fire being shot out of cannons. We had to know whether they read our safety regs so we didn’t flamebroil any roadies.”
interesting how this has become a meme in the music industry about divas. i’ve always heard jokes that amount to “this stuck up celebrity hates the green gummy bears!! they’re refusing to perform just for that???” and its reading stuff like this that i realise how that joke might have come about. people get grumpy that the band refuses to play but cant admit its because THEY’RE incompetent, so they make it all about the M&Ms. another example of artists using a creative method to ensure they have a perfectly reasonable request fulfilled that is then bastardised by lazy people who wanna make money off them.
…this is like the music industry version of hearing the truth behind the McDonalds hot coffee lawsuit
A day or two ago, I was at “boob” restaurant (like an owl one) for a best friend’s brother’s birthday. I got up to go to the bathroom. Talked to a waiter to ask where it was, blah blah blah, normal stuff. And when I was halfway across the restaurant, some guy at a table slapped my ass. And he and all his friends started laughing about it. I spun around and slapped him across the face back.
He got sooo pissed. Started yelling at me and calling me a bitch and then told me “You can’t hit me! I’m a customer!”
I’m pretty well developed for my age, and this happened when it was hot as fuck outside so I was wearing shorts and a tank top.
“I’m not a worker, asshole! And you shouldn’t slap their asses too just because they can’t hit you back!” I’m pretty sure I said something to the effect although I probably am explaining it as if I was smooth and calm back then, but I was an embarrassed, mortified mess
And then I asked one of the waitresses to call the police. The guy was backpedaling and trying to apologize.
Fun fact: I’m 15. Like I said, very well developed for my age.
So I told him no, we were both going to wait here for the police to show up so I could report him for sexually abusing and harassing a minor.
He panicked and was even trying to bargain with me, but like fuck I was letting him off the hook. Think of how many other girls this asshole has probably harassed! I just have the power to do something about it.
Police got there and I had about at least 50 witnesses to attest to the fact a stranger, who was probably like 40, slapped my ass, when I am, in fact, a minor. Not to mention he yelled things at me when he thought I was a worker like “You can’t touch me! I’ll beat your ass, cunt!” Which I referenced as him threatening me too.
The rest of his friends were mortified and had tried to leave but I insisted that they have to stay because the cops might want statements from them. Whether or not that’s true, I don’t fuckin know, but the manager seemed to agree enough to tell them to wait for the police.
I had tried not to, but as some point when talking to one of the waitresses while waiting for the police, I started crying because of how violated I felt. It may have done good for the police came in to see my crying, I don’t know, but the waitresses were all so sweet and tried to comfort me when they had the chance.
I intend to press charges. Since I am a minor I need my parents to help or whatever and I know nothing about this kinda thing but I can potentially get him labeled a sex offender, which he IS, so I want him to actually feel punishment for his abuse towards female workers (I doubt I’m the first girl he’s harassed, maybe just the first who could fight back without her job on the line, so I want to be the last girl he harasses), just… ugh. I just hope he gets the punishment he deserves. So… wish me luck with this whole “legal system” nonsense.
Oh, it’s still there, but it doesn’t move anymore. They just have fans blowing on it and a strobe light so it’s not as obvious that it’s just sitting there.
When Expedition Everest was built, the animatronic yeti was touted as a marvel of Disney’s technology:
And when the attraction opened in 2006, the yeti was very impressive indeed.
The trouble is, when Joe Rohde was talking about what a marvel of engineering the yeti is, he apparently didn’t realize the massive failure in engineering that actually happened with construction of the attraction.
Expedition Everest is three different structures: the track is its own structure, the mountain is its own structure, and the yeti is its own structure. In order to fit them all together, there was some very complicated engineering that had to take place – so complicated that a computer program was used to figure out what parts of construction needed to be done at what times.
And I forget whether the program was wrong, or ignored, or if delays in some parts of construction combined with trying to rush the next step was the cause, but they got it wrong. The movement of the yeti actually poses a structural danger to the entire attraction. The last time the yeti moved as intended was in March of 2009. Some smaller movements were tried, but even that proved too stressful for the foundation, so now the yeti just sits there, unmoving, with fans and a strobe light being the only things giving it the (sadly unconvincing) illusion of movement – and the reason for the animatronic now being mostly referred to as “Disco Yeti.”
The trouble is, due to the complicated nature of the attraction’s construction, there’s absolutely no way to fix the yeti without tearing apart the entire mountain. They’d basically have to tear the attraction down and rebuild it from scratch. And Animal Kingdom just doesn’t have the attraction lineup to handle its biggest attraction being out of commission for probably multiple years for that to be done (not to mention the fact that it cost $100 million to build incorrectly, so Disney would have to be willing to shell out the cash to tear it down and rebuild it correctly).
So with all those factors in play, it’s likely that we’ll never see that yeti move again. I read somewhere that Joe Rohde has said that it’s his mission to see the yeti move again, but I’ll believe it when I see it.
Okay but what if Peter and Shuri are at the Avengers Compund and Peter asks Shuri if she wants to watch a movie with him in the screening room and she says yes. So they go in and Peter turns on Star Wars and half way through the movie he jokingly says how she should make real life SW tech. She tells him to pause the movie and she walks out of the room and comes back 10 minutes later and is like “I made these when I was 11!” And pulls out 2 functioning lightsabers and hands one to Peter, who is in shock and they start running around the compound fighting with lightsabers. T’Challa is annoyed because he told Shuri to leave them at home and Tony doesn’t know if he should be impressed bc Shuri made actual lightsabers or worried that two 16 year olds are running around using ACTUAL lightsabers.
i once heard a scientist in a documentary about evolution refer to the human spine as an “architectural nightmare” and then procede to explain why every back is a bad back. it was so validating.
I adjusted my bra straps wrong one day and I’ve been in a ridiculous amount of pain for the past week.
Sunshine and Shit Jokes 