Little Brass Bunny

A 30-foot tall bronze statue of South African president Nelson Mandela was unveiled on the Union Grounds of Pretoria, South Africa, ten days after Mandela’s death in December 2013. The artists, Ruhan Janse van Vuuren and Andre Prinsloo, were not allowed to engrave their names on their work.

After the unveiling, government officials spotted a little brass rabbit inside Mandela’s right ear – the sculptors’ trademark. The Afrikaans word for rabbit is haas, and represents the speed at which their work was completed.

The government officials were not amused.

“We don’t think it’s appropriate because
Nelson Mandela never had a rabbit in his ear.”
–Government spokesman Mogomotsi Mogodiri.

The sculptors were made to apologize and removed the offensive bunny.

[Image found here via here. Background story here.]

OSU Class of 1923

Although the Ohio State University sports teams didn’t officially adopt their moniker until 1950, they were known unofficially as The Buckeyes since at least 1919. People referred to Ohioans as “buckeyes” years before that, as the name’s relationship with locals goes all the way back to 1788, years before Ohio even became a state.

[OSU yearbook page found here; trivia source here. Related image here.]

IT’S OUR BLOGOVERSARY! 19 YEARS OF STUFF!

On Friday, 3 August 2007, the date of our first posted post that was posted, the world twitched imperceptibly, a global nanoflinch, an earthquake with the power of a morning fart, or less.

3 August 2007 – Whelped
3 August 2008 – 1st year Blogoversary
3 August 2026 – 19th year Blogoversary!

As of this date, there are exactly 7,318 posts in our archives, +12K comments and +3.35M referral links that comprise

Steal, lift, purloin, burgle and abscond with anything you find here, just link back and give us credit for finding the stuff before you did.

We’ve featured the Top 11 Posts every year since 3 August 2008 and this year is no different.

—>Last Year’s Top 11 Hits linked here<—

The numbers adjacent to the titles indicate ranking for the previous 12 months, followed by the previous year’s ranking, and the third number is for all-time popularity. Unfortunately WordPress modified its statistics tracker and only includes the top 400 or so.

“NR” denotes Not Ranked. “NA” is Not Available (due to stats limitations or posts less than a year old).

Click on any link below and it’ll take you to the original post.


No. 11 / 25 / 36 – The Kluck Klams

No. 10 / NR /  4 – Giant Woolly Bear Caterpillar

No. 9 / NA / NA – Bastard Chairs

No. 8 / NA / NA – Cakes of Wonder

No. 7 / NA / 284 – Nothing Much Happened Today #101

No. 6 / NA / 280 – Third Ave & Bowery, NYC

No. 5 / NA / 273 – Noah’s Camper

No. 4 / NA / 249 – The Days of Our Hives

No. 3 / NA / 247- Childhood Nightmare

No. 2 / NA / 204 – Living on the Edge

And the No. 1 Post of the Year:

The .Gif Friday Post No. 919 – A Bucketful of Reflex, Zombie Defense & Surfing the Crowd

Posted on 29 August 2025, with a rank of 1 / NA / 202, this trio of .gifs got a surprising amount of attention.

Top 5 Audio posts for the past year:

Some people somewhere seemed to like these A LOT.

[I do not own copyrights to these recordings and they are posted for entertainment purposes only.]

Thanks for all your visits, comments, favorites and linkies, and I wish you all the best.

Bunk

P.S. Follow @bunkstrutts on X/Twitter for automatic updates and ephemeral inanities; ditto for you folks on Facebook. Both accounts are spam-free. Muchísimas grassyass to those of you who contributed to the PayPal Donation Account. I’m not in this for profit and don’t beg, but that doesn’t rule out blogwhoring. In any case, I appreciate it.

Koniological Hot Links

This granite sculpture titled “Cranberry Eater” (Dzērveņu ēdājs) was created by artist Kārlis Īle in 2006 for the International Stone Sculpture Symposium. The artwork features a distinctive coiled form and is located in Dzirnavu Square (Mill Square) in Ventspils, Latvia.

Chicken Payback, The Bees (2004)Known in the US as A Band of Bees, the British indie / psychedelic / garage rock / country / reggae / jazz group from the Isle of Wight has been performing and recording since 2001. Recorded at Abbey Roads Studios, Chicken Payback was featured in a television advertisement for Sure Deodorant.

Fleabot.

Diceman.

FLOCK off.

Inspections.

AC/DC Lane.

Sepia people.

Just imagine.

Motobalineras.

Buy this house.

Cloud crossing.

Mary Lou in ’52.

Olbers’ paradox.

Auto suspension.

“You got it, docker.”

Karelian Bear Dogs.

A bunch of campers.

Sumpm’s goin’ down.

Flaming corrugations.

Bless the vile apostates.

Earworm / ringtone / video.

“Shhh” whispered the trees.

Sea battle [via Thompson, blog].

Animatus [via Everlasting Blört].

GWB touching bald men’s heads.

1936 Cadillac Series 60 Convertible Coupe.

Mid century motel rooms [via Memo Of The Air].

The History of Slavery You Probably Weren’t Taught in School.

[Top image “Cranberry Eater” found here.]

From the Archives: 1 year ago. 5 years ago. 10 years ago. 15 years ago.

Saturday Matinee – Danielle Nicole Band, Blues Overdrive & King of the World

Danielle Nicole Band: Bass player and vocalist Danielle Nicole Schnebelen is an American blues/soul musician born in Kansas City, Missouri. She began her career with her brothers Nick and Kris in the band Trampled Under Foot, receiving local and international recognition. Since going solo, she was inducted into the Kansas Music Hall of Fame and earned eight Blues Music Awards.

Blues Overdrive is a Danish blues band formed in Nykøbing Falster, Denmark in June 2000. Led by frontman, songwriter, guitarist and vocalist Martin Olsen, the band has gained international recognition, performing across 18 countries and earning multiple European Blues Awards, Danish Music Award nominations, and international critical acclaim.

Formed in 2012, King of the World (aka The Hardest Working Band in the Netherlands) is a blues rhythm and roots supergroup of sorts, and features Belgian guitar virtuoso Stef Delbaere and singer/drummer Marlon Pichel.
(NOT to be confused with the Steely Dan tribute band from New York of the same name.)

News of the Week: Wild fires in France, Moroccans invaded Spain, Hamas said they’re sorry and won’t do it again. Dr. Fauci is full of No. 2; people got all humpy because Trump said some things, and our stray cat returned from his tour of the world.
Tomorrow, when the sun is directly overhead, there shall be a porch directly below. See you then and there, and don’t be L7.

The .Gif Friday Post No. 966 – Panda Violence, Pep Band War Face & Panther Women

Las Mujeres Panteras (1967)

[Found here, here and here. Related war face here.]

Hey Babe.

[An oldie, found in here.]

Women in Trees

“I love pictures that aren’t perfect, that I know nothing about,then, stories immediately being developing in my mind. For me, the women happen to be taking a Sunday walk with their partners. They are well dressed, look happy, and some of them seem to be really in love. These are young people who went off with a camera, clowned around, and captured their happiness in a snapshot.”

Jochen Raiß (1969-2022), a photo editor based in Hamburg, Germany, found most of the vintage photos in flea markets, scanned them and published his collection in a book Women In Trees (2014).

[Found here.]

Sunny’s Gate

[Found here.]

Cows of Venspils

Via Google Translate:
“Ventspils [Latvia] is a city of sculptures. Naturally, the cows stand out among them, having become a sort of symbol of the city. There are about 30 cows in the city in total. Most of them (IMHO) can hardly be called ‘masterpieces.'”

[Found here.]