Unadulterated Madness and Tragedy...

Right, I'm not sure if anyone's noticed but in the last 15 hours or so, the world has gone completely, off-the-wall, dingo ate my baby crazy. It is very much a mad world (not like the song... well not the Gary Jules version anyway... maybe the Tears For Fears one...).

From what I can remember it all started yesterday evening, when reports came out of SeaWorld that a trainer had been killed by a killer whale. Obviously a tragic event, but I can't help but feel that there is a clue in the title. It's another strong claim for why we shouldn't keep sea creatures in tiny environments. If I was trapped in a bathtub (to try and keep things to scale) for most of my life, I think I'd probably want to kill someone too. PETA have been lobbying SeaWorld to cease and desist in their capture and confinement of sea mammals and this has given them a pretty strong case. Telly, the murderer, had form however. He worked with a gang in the killing of another trainer in British Columbia in 1991 and in 1999 was discovered with the body of a naked man lying across his back. They appear to be dealing with the Godfather of orca- an uncompromising, lethal criminal genius. One eyewitness explained how Telly made it look like an innocent bit of playing. This time however, Telly made the crucial mistake of committing the crime in front of hundreds of people and will surely be tried and convicted. I worry that (as is the form with these kinds of things) Telly may have to be 'destroyed'. That always bothers me- "and the Bull Mastiff has been destroyed". Don't say 'destroyed' Peter Donaldson, you're not Auric Goldfinger; they didn't lock the poor bugger in a room and atomise it with bombs, they put it down.

The trainer was one of SeaWorld's most experienced and died 'doing what she loved', though I'm not really sure that anyone loves being attacked by a whale. That said, I offer (for what they're worth) my deepest condolences to the family and friends of the trainer. A little known fact is that on the cutting room floor of Hollywood is a reel labelled 'Willy kills Jesse, alternate ending'.

The second crazy event of the night (and the one that nearly carried me off) was the brave but ultimately futile effort of David 'the Iceman' Murdoch, Murdy, the Lockerbie Leopard, whatever you want to call him (albeit I came up with most of those nicknames...) and his men's curling team. GB came out to pipers playing 'Scotland the Brave'. It was quite an entrance, but it's fair to say that they had a poor opening 5 ends, with errors coming from the previously immaculate Euan Byers, Third Ewan MacDonald and the Iceman himself. Cram (playing the part of Alan Partridge) announced "I've just been of Dave Murdoch's Facebook page and apparently he likes listening to Oasis." Rhona immediately put him in his place and told the viewers at home to keep the faith. "It's a long way to the 10th end." She reminded us and told us to be positive- one of her catchphrases for the games. Take-out master 'Pistol' Pete Smith had a solid game and in the second half the throws started to come together for the GB team. Murdoch blew the chance for the win in the 10th, but managed a 1 to take the match to an extra end. The tension was palpable now, but GB were on the back foot as it came to Murdoch's final two stones. The Swedish Skip, tiny Nicklas Edin (the man with enormous arms) had hardly put a foot wrong all game and Murdoch was well and truly up against it. Rhona was remaining positive, explaining that if Edin fluffed his lines then it was as good as ours. She never says die, Rhona, it's very easy to see how she won a gold medal. Forget Cram in the commentary box, Rhona should have been down on the ice, dispensing the tactical advice to the boys. Edin made the take-out for the win with consumate ease and the World Champs found themselves ejected from the tournament. Asked what had happened, Murdoch (in true British 'don't admit your own failings' style) explained that "sometimes it doesn't go for you and this week it just didn't go for us at all." It was a plucky effort but no reward for our brave curlers. I was distraught, curling's as good as over, I'll have to go back to hoping that men/women crash spectacularly on ice/snow.

Speaking of spectacular crashes that's exactly what our other world champs did too. Minichello and Cooke in the Two Man Bob flipped over on the 12th corner and rode the remainder of the track the wrong way up. It was a biggie, an absolute peach of a stack (I missed it, because I was bleeding the radiator at the time, but I did eventually see it). Both were unharmed though and there were raucous cheers from the Whistler Sliding Center Crowd as the British pair had a cuddle in the middle of the track. So our dreams of olympic gold are as good as over. Amy Williams did exceptionally well to claim gold in the skeleton but it looks like that's all we're getting.

And finally this morning, in a spectacular bid to become 'Massive Wanker of the Week', UKIP MEP Nigel Farage launched a disgraceful, racist, character assassination at EU President Herman van Rompuy. In his quest for the title, Farage has already made Ashley Cole look like a thoroughly decent chap and Cheryl Cole look like a media-shy shrinking violet. It makes me thoroughly ashamed to be British. When I first heard the rant on the radio news, I expected it to be from the scorn-filled jowells of Nick Griffin, however it was from Farage, probably spurred on by the aforementioned Nazi's usurping of his key electorate. I don't idolise van Rompuy, I'm not a member of his fan club, I don't have posters of him on my walls, but no-one deserved the hideous tirade unleashed by glorified xenophobe Farage. I'm astounded that such brazen disrespect for a president doesn't result in immediate assassination - I suspect if it had been directed at Hugo Chavez instead of van Rompuy, that's what would have happened. The worst part is that the British public voted in this horrible bastard. How does that make us look to the rest of Europe, eh?

While van Rompuy generated more interest in the British media for his amusing name than his political exploits, he is a highly effective politician. Able to steer Belgium from political civil war between the Flemish and the Walloons, van Rompuy was chosen unanimously as the inaugural EU President. Farage claimed that van Rompuy's 'hatred of nation states' stemmed from the fact that van Rompuy came from a 'non-country'. This was the final straw, I practically hurled my radio through my window. As a man with Belgian heritage, whose ancestors died in Flanders fields to prevent the Germans from grabbing any piece of land they wanted in the Great War and had British relatives fight alongside them to take it back from the Kaiser, I feel pretty strongly about Belgium's right to be a 'country' and one hateful, bigoted little man is not going to change my opinion. Farage is an uncouth, attention-seeking racist and the biggest indictment of his ludicrous accusations was the fact that van Rompuy did not rise to them. "There was one contribution that I can only hold in contempt, but I'm not going to comment further." The Belgian said, with a dignity conspicuously absent from Mr. Farage's appearance.

Seriously, Farage was keen to bang on about democracy in his paranoid-delusional bellicose oratory, so perhaps we can remind him of what it means, by removing him from his role at the next election (if we can't forcibly remove him sooner). No man should have to face such unwaranted hateful bilge in any professional capacity and it was a great credit to the president that he was not affected by the comments.