September 23, 2004

• Actually, wot I need is a Childhood Goose Trauma Foundation. /practices saying "Boo!", "Boo!" off in a corner
• I was traumatised by a rabbit at a petting zoo.
• How about a Childhood Goatse Trauma Foundation?
• Though she was an adult at the time, my mother had a serious goat trauma at a petting zoo in Florida when I was maybe 9 years old. She tried to feed the goat, the goat came running up to get the food, and Mom FREAKED. She started screaming, jumping, stomping her feet, and actually climbed up on top of a picnic table (my mom is a very small woman, and the sight of her making the tabletop in one leap was surreal). Unfortunately, the hell-beast followed her, still wanting the food that she kept clutched in her fear-frozen hands (had she just dropped the food, it would have been much less traumatic). She finally fled to a bathroom on the premises, but again, as if by the machinations of cruel fate, the bathroom was one of those cinderblock buildings with no doors on the entrance/exit--just a twisty-maze back to the actual toilets. So of course, the Devil-thing followed here in THERE as well. All the time she was emitting these rapid-fire, high-pitched shrieks and alarming all the kids and parents in the petting zoo, most of all my younger brother, who was 5 and crying in uncomprehending terror. In the end, one of the attendants caught up with the animal in the women's room (all this happened over the course of less than a minute), where my mother had managed to lock herself in a stall, still shrieking. They led the goat away, my grandmother retrieved my mother, and we surrounded her to lead her safely out of the area (after wrenching the food from her grasp and throwing it at last to the appreciateive Bearded Demon). That story gets so much play at family get-togethers, you would not believe. And it happened 24 years ago.
• Just for you parents thinking about taking your kids to the petting zoo? Goats may seem threatening, but if you punch one in the snout, it takes the fight right out of them. Summary: they're all attitude and no ass.
• Because it's too hard to reach around and punch 'em in the cock, that's why.
• A faun sneezed on me once. Big black gobbets of snot. I still have nightmares. People, please, think twice before going to a petting zoo. I also have an inch-long scar from a snow-leopard kitten who scratched (same day) but far from being traumatized, I'm quite proud of it and use any excuse to tell people about it. Like now.
• A faun sneezed on me once while we were having lunch; a centaur made him quaff far too much wine before carrying him off -- and so goes the life of the semi-divine.
• Haha -- great story, TenaciousPettle!
• Did I spell faun wrong? I meant a Bambi-type beastie, not a Pan. beeswacky's version is better, tho.
• fawn = beastie as in "doe, a deer..." faun = nymph, sprite, imp, etc. (Still laughing at the thought of TenaciousPettle's mother being terrorized by the goat.)
• I need childhood-horse trauma support - when I was 14 and looking after a friend's horse while she was on holiday, I was showing my potential boyfriend how to put a bridle on when said horse bit me, right on the boob - scarred for life. Now I get nervous when I'm near a horse's head. Seriously.
• TenaciousPettle, that's the funniest thing I've read all day -- thanks! (I was butted by a goat once, but I was more or less adult and it didn't have room to work up a good head of steam, so I can't say it traumatized me. Pissed me off, though.) tracicle, do you have a doppelganger in NYC? 'Cause I swear I've seen you on 42nd Street two days running.
• The mouse-over on the logo is great. Scary rectangular pupils.... *shudder*
• Perhaps if Alois Schickelgruber had access to the CGTF way back when, World War II may never have happened. (second link is google's cache of an article)
• Just imagine the goat is this breed! Trauma begone!
• languagehat, I'm working on a teleportation device right now. But it's still in beta-mode.
• All I can think about is that episdode of SNL where they bring the goat out and Brian Fellows keeps saying "That goat is WEIRD! He's got devil eyes!"
• From goofyfoot's link: Myotonia is the condition that causes Fainting goats to stiffen and/or fall over when startled. This condition is caused by a combination of recessive genes. Fainting goats can show varying degrees of myotonia. When startled some will fall to the ground with their entire bodies perfectly stiff and rigid. Others will only stiffen in their limbs and not fall to the ground. The condition lasts for ten to fifteen seconds after which time the animal will rise and walk off stiff, still showing a noticeable degree of stiffness in their back limbs. After a short time this stiffness will disappear and they will walk and act like any other goat. I bet all the other goats make fun of them, jump out from behind trees and say 'BOO'....poor things.
• Hey beeswacky, you were tramatised by geese too? My memory from when I was a kid is that they were terrible things. I remember them as really big and nasty. Their hissing was very intimidating (especially after they had already nipped you), and then there were those huge wings that sting like mad when they whack you with them.
• What is meant by a "Premium" fainting goat? From the Fainting Goats FAQ: Fainting Goats are registered in two categories, Premium & Regular. 1. PREMIUM –Goats that readily faint. Bucks require a full down photo. Does require a down photo or one showing obvious stiffness (ready to go down). 2. REGULAR –Goats that are wooden legged but don’t fall over. Does only.
• Torluath, from your description, I think we may have met with the very same hectoring geese. Were yours white feathered bullies with orange beaks and about as tall as Mt. Blanc?
• Damn, y'all just missed the International Goat Days Festival! Good times... "The festival evolved around the idea of having goat chariot races for fun. It simply followed that folks would enjoy other goat contests, such as the largest goat or the longest horns and, yes, even 'pill' flippin'." I highly recommend the official Goat Days souvenir selection, now being unloaded at a 25% discount.
• What's 'pill flippin'?
• It involves flicking goat droppings with your thumb, according to this guy.
• Hmmmm, Beeswacky, first Flanders and Swann and now geese. We would appear to be birds of a feather.
• And, yes, those were the very same birds -- white plumage, orange beaks, green poop...
• Ah, Torluath and Bees, if it makes you feel any better, I ran three of them down with my car one extremely foggy morning. Good God, were they huge. They definately didn't make it. I felt bad....no, really. Oh my God, Tenacious! You've brought my smoker's hack back in full force! I had to claw my way along the floor for a glass of water. That was a funny story!
• Oohhhh, pill flippin'! Dang, and I missed it.
• gone gooses seekers with a nomad heart follow the leader geese of the new moon necks curved like eyelashes fluttered by snowflakes then like feathers touch down geese of the full moon belly up to the stars scull through a night with the lesser stars then arc lower into sun-up wheel with such honking as questions fly bold leader at the fore with wing-flash and wing-flash steady keep anser ring
• I ain't afraid of no goat! /Goatbusters
• Um, we'd have and killed it and moved on,
• bees - love the 'anser ring' - hee hee! Lovely poem. Thanks.