The most evil map I’ve ever seen

*my favorite thing: “1 dot = 500 goats”

[courtesy of alert reader and fellow goat-hater Peter]

crazy goat videos, part 5

(Thanks, Alexis, for passing this gem on.)

More (dead) goats in the news

Hey, wanna be an army doctor? Why not head to Fort Carson, CO and try practicing surgery on goats given faux combat wounds.

Don’t worry about the protesters from PETA. If one of them bothers you too much, try this little prank. Nothing sends a message like leaving a dead goat on someone’s doorstep.

Goat haters unite!

3,000 miles away, in a land of tobacco and horses, there’s a courageous group fighting the same good goatless fight as ZPG. It’s called the
Childhood Goat Trauma Foundation (I’m not making it up), and it’s been around for more than 25 years. Not only do they have a sterling website dedicated to GTA (Goat Trauma Avoidance), they also apparently have an Investigative Team (which has kidnapped suspicious goats and shut-down evil goat farms) AND a Strike Force (which has thwarted terrorist goat plots). I am duly impressed, and jealous.

On the CGTF website, which is full of valuable information about rogue goats, rebel goats, terrorist goats, disturbed goats, and deranged goats (I’m not making any of this up, I swear), there’s a simple set of rules to live goatlessly by:

*stay alert

*don’t leave urban areas

*be suspicious of all farm animals

*avoid petting zoos (send a double instead!)

There’s also a simple set of rules to consult if the worst happens, and you do encounter a goat:

*don’t turn your back!

*stay away from younger goats!

*don’t seek safety up a tree

Elsewhere on the CGTF website, there’s photo evidence, an amazing survey, and this piece of fan mail; the best this goat-hater has ever seen:

From: XXXXXX@yahoo.com

Date: Fri Jan 21, 2005 10:11:41 AM US/Eastern

To: tour@goat-trauma

Subject: I’M A VICTIM! …

When i was a child a herd of wild bloodthirsty goats charged through our home, we had no idea what was happening, tiny furry horned monstrosities tore through our home eating all in their path. My mother and i where the only survivors and we did this by hanging from the celing fan. When the herd passed all that they left where a few scraps of wood, and blood stains on the foundation of our home. We found a few bones and a tooth that was dna tested and they where that of my sister, there was nothing to be found of my father. Ever since i have taken a role as vigilante bounty hunter and goat exterminator. The goats had driven me to a state of dependace upon drugs and alchohol. I have murdered over 6,000 goats both large and pigmy and have a horn from each. Since my discovery of your foundation i have been greatly relieved to find that many people have also experienced such tradgedies. I can never thank you enough, if it weren’t for you i’d still be a drunk slaughtering goats with an assault rifle across the country.

There’s also this frightful message; the most terrifying letter this goat hater has ever seen:

From: XXXXXX@haapi.mn.org

Date: Wed May 5, 2004 5:32:38 PM US/Eastern

To: trauma@goat-trauma

Subject: help

Help! please I don’t know how they found me but they got in the house and they are gnawing through the door. Please you are the only one who can help me. Send the police they bit the telephone lines. they are her fjsdiasoi;afgao;dsf fhelpl mdjfsadfjsd help ee afdsfjdfj send sd dskfs;lflddjgajhelfglafdjikfesoelp sen

Yikes!

Hats off to the CGTF, for their valiant efforts in the never-ending struggle against goats and the evil they embody.

Evil Goat News, part 8 (thanks, alert readers)

I’ve never worked in law enforcement, so I can’t speak from experience, but I imagine that cops have seen pretty much every trick in the book, and that they’re not deterred when their suspects transform themselves into goats. I mean, come on — you’d  have to be a total rookie to fall for that move.

That’s why police in Lagos, Nigeria, are holding a “black and white beast” (also known as a goat) in custody. According to the Kwara State Police Command Force, the goat is actually an armed robber who tried to steal a Mazda 323, and then, just before being apprehended, transformed into a goat. Apparently, there was a second car thief, but he got away, or transformed himself into something less obviously evil, like a squirrel, or a bird, or a tire, or a newspaper, or pretty much anything. I think Harry Potter once said something about using the powers of sorcery and witchcraft carefully.

The “best quote in the story” prize goes to Tunde Mohammed, a police spokesman, who was probably asked about what sort of investigation would follow.  “It… has to be proved scientifically,” he said, “that a human being turned into a goat.”

Buzkashi: the best team sport ever invented

If you blinked you might have missed it. This phrase — “A large black goat, beheaded, disemboweled” — was on the front page of the New York Times. Alas, you probably missed it. But not to worry, that’s why you’ve got me, your eyes in the sky, your one man surveillance team, your intrepid GITMMW (Goats-In-The-Mainstream-Media-Watchdog).

Now, the NY Times has run a couple of other stories mentioning goats, but this goat story was different… it was fantastic. It was about (and I’m not making this up), an ancient team sport, passed down from the days of Genghis Kahn, in which three teams of men on horseback in a dusty field compete to:

1) scoop up the 70-lb carcass of a frozen, beheaded, disemboweled goat;
2) gallop around a pole 75 yards away with it;
3) race back to their goal with it still in their possession

For completing elements 1, 2, and 3, a team is awarded 1 point. Matches often go to 30 or 40 points.

Yes, I know, it’s both the best use for goats I’ve ever heard of, and also maybe the best team sport ever invented. It’s called Buzkashi (which means “goat pulling”), and acclaimed war journalist Dexter Filkins calls it “polo played with a dead animal.” It’s times like these in which the life of a war journalist really has its appeal.

But wait, there’s more. Among other things:

a) There are no real boundaries to the game
b) Spectators, when not getting trampled, yell things like “Go in there and grab that goat!” (except in Farsi, which probably sounds way more dramatic)
c) Competitors whip each others’ horses and each other
d) The referee carries a Kalashnikov, in case things get out of hand
I’m not sure what was implied by “out of hand,” as the rules seem pretty clear to me.

How does it all end? How else: the winning team roasts the bedraggled goat. A thing of beauty. And they say sportsmanship is all gone.

Alleged Goat Felons on the Loose in the DRC

This breaking goat-news just in from the BBC:

A dozen goats have been released from prison in Kinshasa, and are now presumed at-large –  no doubt spreading evil.

Deputy Justice Minister Claude Nyamugabo ordered the goats released, after discovering them on a “routine jail visit” — which sort of makes you wonder what else he discovered.

At least the cops in the Democratic Republic of the Congo do things right: for illegally selling goats, the owners AND the goats were put behind bars.

That’s no evil sheep — it’s an evil goat!

A sheep/goat hybrid is still half evil

Breaking news! Scientists somewhere (I was so excited I forgot the place) have created a sheep/goat hybrid! Evil is spreading! Watch the news clip!!

Genetic Scientists Develop Sheep With Brain Of A Goat

NY Times is NOT goatless!

From today’s NYTimes:

SOME people would just as soon ignore the culinary potential of the Carolina flying squirrel or the Tennessee fainting goat. To them, the former is too small to bother eating, and the latter is just too plain evil to approach.

But not Gary Paul Nabhan. He has spent most of the past four years compiling a list of endangered plants and animals that were once fairly commonplace in American kitchens but are now threatened, endangered or essentially extinct in the marketplace. He has set out to slaughter and eat all of them, even the notoriously evil goats, which often involves inventing new ways to kill them.

Mr. Nabhan’s list, 1,080 items and growing, forms the basis of his new book, an engaging journey through the nooks and crannies of American culinary history titled “Renewing America’s Food Traditions: Saving and Savoring the Continent’s Most Endangered Foods” (Chelsea Green Publishing, $35).

The book tells the stories of 93 ingredients both obscure (Ny’pa, a type of salt grass) and satanic (pretty much every goat), along with recipes that range from the accessible (Centennial pecan pie) to the challenging (whole pit-roasted Plains pronghorn antelope).

To make the list, an animal or plant — whether American eels, pre-Civil War peanuts or Seneca hominy flint corn — has to be more than simply edible. It must also be fun to kill. Mr. Nabhan’s book is in that sense part of a larger effort to bring back long-lost sacrificial techniques.

“This is not just about the genetics of the seeds and breeds,” said Mr. Nabhan, an ethnobotanist and an expert on Native American foods who raises Navajo churro sheep and heritage crops in Arizona. “It’s about using knowledge and science to destroy goats as efficiently as possible.”

A cosmic convergence of goats and cars

The True Citizen, of Waynesboro, GA — which reports on such heavy-hitters as a garden destroyed by pigs, and a stolen mailbox — wins this week’s award for best evil-goat news coverage. The story: a goat in Maple Lane climbed up onto a guy’s car and did an evil little goat dance (typical), leaving, as evidence, a) scratches and b) goat hairs. There’s also c)video footage, which I will try to get my hands on.

This week, in evil goat news:

Alert reader Kevin found this week’s goat news, courtesy of HealthInspections.com.

TBS African Restaurant, in Chicago, was forced to shut down (temporarily) after health inspectors found cockroaches in the kitchen, and bad goat meat. But really, isn’t all goat meat bad?

Listen to the webcast (which isn’t exactly more informative), or let me tantalize you with spicy summaries from other HealthInspections.com episodes

-A hairy arm stirring mashed potatoes
-Cats running wild in hotel rooms
-Ham slices hitting the floor.
-Live animal found in a bagel shop.
-Evil goat cursing entire neighborhood.

In other goat news, Erin and Andrew thought it’d be funny to send me some goat-related products for my birthday last month.

Hear this, you two: Revenge will be exacted, I swear it.

news from the great plains: goats gone wild = they’ll fine your ass for that

Out there in the Great Plains, law-enforcement is done right: if you’ve got goats in your yard, and you live in the city limits (which is crazy anyway), and your goats get kinda horny and start humping and/or peeing and/or pooping, they fine your ass.

check, check, don’t check

check it out: I was interviewed in SF Indie Fashion

check this out, too: some ZPG wares are now available at Portage Bay Goods (in Seattle), at Porcelynne (in San Francisco), and will soon be available at Made From Scrap (in San Francisco).

Don’t check this out: My good-but-apparently-off-their-rockers friends Justin and Walker donated a goat, or actually a portion of a goat (technically, a share of a goat), in my name, via Heifer International. How do I feel about it? Offended. Violated. Cheated. It’s the worst Hannukah gift ever. And what the hell: what kind of organization distributes goats around the world? Maybe they should rename themselves Evil Incarnate International. Shit. Hear this, J and W: you will pay for this. I will exact my revenge, someday, somehow…

41 years of giant, swedish, goat-burning glory

This story, full of burning 40-foot-tall goats, is so awesomely awesome that I need to shout out to Josh Karns for alerting me to it.

So here’s the deal. For 42 years, a bunch of goat-crazed fanatics in the scenic, seaside town of Gavle, Sweden have spent a fair portion of each December building a giant, 40-foot tall goat out of straw. Like, almost 4 tons of straw. (You can watch their efforts in a nifty time-lapse film.) They take great pride in the fact that their Christmas Goat, as they call it, is the largest of its kind in the world. They also take great pains to protect their giant goat from being destroyed, because, for reasons obvious enough to this goat-hater, townspeople have made it their goal, year after year, to destroy the damn thing. In its 41 incarnations, the goat has been destroyed 28 times — 22 of those times by burning, and 6 of them in some other creative way, either by sabotage, fire, or crashing a car into it.

See for yourself, in this compilation of 40 years of Swedish Christmas Goat status reports

1966: unmolested
1967: unmolested
1968: unmolested
1969: burned
1970: burned, then rebuilt
1971: abandoned, then broken
1972: collapsed due to sabotage
1973: unknown
1974: burned
1975: unknown
1976: destroyed in car crash
1977: unknown
1978: broken
1979: burned, rebuilt, then sabotaged and broken
1980: burned
1981: survived
1982: burned
1983: legs broken
1984: burned
1985: burned
1986: burned
1987: burned
1988: survived
1989: burned, rebuilt, burned again
1990: survived
1991: burned, rebuilt
1992: burned, rebuilt, burned again
1993: survived
1994: survived
1995: burned, rebuilt
1996: survived
1997: slightly damaged by fireworks
1998: burned
1999: burned
2000: burned
2001: burned
2002: survived
2003: burned, rebuilt
2004: burned
2005: burned, rebuilt
2006: minor burn to right leg

This year, the straw has been impregnated with a waterproof/snowproorf flame retardant, a webcam has been placed nearby to monitor it, and guards have occasionally been posted overnight to protect it from vandals. There’s even a blog, hopefully the only one if the world, written from the point of view of a giant goat, where other goat-crazed fanatics can delight in the supposed glory of, and send email to <gavlegoat@merjuligavle.se >, a giant inanimate chemical-laden goat.

So here’s hoping some creative pyromaniac gets to the Christmas Goat before too many people are forced to see this thing.