taint.org: Justin Mason’s Weblog

Sport: Observer: Football, blood and war: an insane article about the
crossover between Serbian nationalist paramilitaries and football hooliganism:

The crowd watched as a group of Serbian paramilitaries (the self-styled ‘Tigers’), dressed in full uniform, took up positions in the north stand. There were about 20 of them and, one by one, they held aloft road signs: ‘20 miles to Vukovar’; ‘10 miles to Vukovar’; ‘Welcome to Vukovar’. More road signs were brandished, each one bearing the name of a Croatian town that had fallen to the Serbian army. From high up in the stand, Arkan, the notorious commander-in-chief of the Tigers and director of the Red Star supporters’ association, emerged to receive the delighted applause of supporters who were no longer fractious but united in hatred of a common enemy - the Croats.

Mind you, that was 1992. Still, very scary. (Via the ie-rant mailing list)

Tags: article, blood, football, observer, road, serbian, sport, stand, tigers, vukovar, war

Beer: Irish Independent: Now ads can’t say it but you always knew it — Guinness IS
good for you:

One pint of Guinness a day can reduce the risk of blood clots that cause heart attacks, according to new research presented at the annual meeting of the American Heart Association in Orlando, Florida.

… Scientists investigating the health benefits of drinking beer found that stouts like Guinness worked much better than lager. They said dark beers were packed with anti-oxidant compounds called flavonoids which help reduce damage to the lining of the arteries. … For maximum benefit a person would need to drink just over one pint of Guinness a day.

My grandfather was ‘prescribed’ a bottle of Guinness per day by his GP, to lower cholesterol and blood pressure. Mind you, that was in ’70s Ireland ;)

Tags: beer, blood, day, guinness, heart, independent, irish, meeting, pint, research, risk

My cat has turned into a murderer. For the last week, he’s been going out and bagging 1-2 wild animals per day; mostly rabbits, but some voles and a finch too.

It’s really wrecking my head. I don’t have the nuts to kill a half-dead rabbit in cold blood, so I wind up leaving them in the bushes to die; and I’m sure that’s exactly what happens to most of ‘em. The other day I had to fish out a dead baby rabbit, put it in a plastic bag, and dump it in the bin.

Maybe I should leave them out for the hawks. There’s a pretty big peregrine and red-tailed hawk population around here.

Alternatively, maybe some cat transformation sets would help… at least around the house: ‘The cat which became a hood figure is likely to have a broom at any moment, and is likely to begin cleaning.’

Bonus: via jwz:

Tags: baby, blood, cat, day, finch, fish, head, murderer, rabbit, week