Today on Monday Mysteries:  Eurovision: outcome and destinies revealed.

1. The answer to last week’s Monday mystery is now clear: Conchita’s destiny was to win the 2014 Eurovision title.  She won with a dramatic performance that showed she is a diva of a singer.  Even with the beard. 😉

2. Norway’s singer had a different sort of destiny than I’d envisions last week. As a result, I’d like to take a moment to offer my apologies to the singer from Norway. He performed so wretchedly in the semi-Final last Thursday that I snarkily commented he shouldn’t quit his carpentry day-job, even if his famous singer/song-writer cousin thought he should follow his music career dreams (his cousin wrote the song that he performed at Eurovision). On Saturday, however, the singer, Carl Espen, acquitted himself rather well. In fact,  he was the act that Chris and I, in our personal scoring at home after the final, ranked #1 in the whole competition. How’s that for a turn-around?

Of course, Chris and I actually noticed that a lot of the acts that sounded off-key in the semi-finals seemed much better on Saturday, which made us wonder if there had been a problem with the sound system that got fixed by Saturday night.

Anyway, the Norwegian singer did not win the title, of course, but at least he finished in the top 10. Hopefully that means that he can quit that day job after all.

3. I incorrectly described the flag creation from Azerbaijan as having the light painting photography just for the symbols in the middle of the flag. Upon seeing the little video of its creation again on Saturday night, I realized that in fact the entire flag, both the symbols and the stripes, was created that way. So it was even cooler than I’d realized.

Azerbaijani Flag with light painting symbols, Eurovision 2014

Unfortunately, the Azerbaijan song was worse than I’d remembered, and ultimately Azerbaijan came in 22nd out of 26 acts. Ah well – maybe she can stick to photography, it was far more interesting than her song.

4. The singer from the UK must have left her Leicester good luck charm at home on Saturday, since despite some predictions of a top 5 finish, the UK finished in 17th place.  Her hippie-inspired fringed outfit, along with her run of the mill power ballad, just wasn’t enough. Although, to give her credit, she did do better than the last two UK acts at Eurovision combined; that Leicester good luck charm can only do so much.

Anyway, I’m monitoring a developing scandal with the Eurovision voting, so I may have further updates as developments warrant. However, for today, I’ll bid Eurovision 2014 a fond farewell, and leave you with the two acts that symbolizes everything wacky about Eurovision, and the ultimate reasons I am so taken with it: first,  France’s entry for 2014,  Moustache, one of the few songs not sung in English, and then Iceland’s “muppet’s gone post-punk” entry, No Prejudice.

Enjoy.