For my 39th birthday I went for dinner in Rome with Phyllis, Barbara and Don. Rome is called ‘The Eternal City’ and that’s probably because stuff has been going on there for a long time. Two things I never knew that I found astonishing.

The Collosseum – where 700,ooo souls were brutally slain for amusement – at a time when the Earths population was 200 million – and where 2.1 Million wild animals were slain for the same reason. Considering these wild animals had to be captured before tranquilizers, we can only wonder at how much effort in man power and wasted animal life this 400 year period of barbarism involved. Is there any finer demonstration of how absolute power corrupts.
And then there’s the gay porn in the Vatican. A 100 acre Kingdom, where 520 people control wealth and influence beyond imagination. I marveled at the story of the most expensive art commission in history. Where celebrated homosexual genius Michaelangelo was paid to paint the rear wall of Capella Sistina – a place where the elite of Vatican City would gather for their private moments. Clearly the artist painting musclebound men naked is intentional, as is the choice of his boyfriends face in the body of Jesus, staring at a self portrait further down. So in the last judgment, his boyfriend (Jesus) is gazing lovingly at him. No wonder Catholics are so keen on wearing dresses and kiddie fiddling.

Some pictures of these and other stories are HERE