The Goat Man
Speaking of psychotic killer rabbits, I wanted to mention some other animals that are almost as dangerous. Lions and tigers (but no bears, oh my). I have caught this TV show a couple of times, about the Lion Man. Craig Busch. My first thought was that it was rather goofy because the title theme had words like “He’s a Lion Man, doing all he can”. But I hung around for the darling lion cubs. And I was rather impressed with Mr Lion Man after all. He obviously loves the animals a lot and he knows them very well and is very comfortable with them. He actually goes into their cages and interacts with them. Plays football with them! At one point a big lion was coming at him growling and swiping with claws and biting with jaws. And he stood his ground and pointed at the lion and said “NO” “NO” “NO” and the lion backed off. Can you imagine that? A lion attack, it doesn’t get much scarier than that. He did get his hand hurt a little, and his wiki page says that he’s been mauled a couple of times. But imagine having a relationship like that with animals like that. Wow. It reminds me a little of my relationship with the goats. No, no. Don’t laugh. I’m not saying that goats are as dangerous as lions and tigers (except if you have raisins and nuts in your pocket, obviously). But just how comfortable I am with them, compared to how scared I was the first time I got close to them. And how scared or apprehensive others are sometimes. The other day a bunch of kindergarteners were at the playground, and they all wanted to feed the goats. But one of the adults was scared, almost too scared to help. A boy wanted her to give his slice of apple to the goat but she was too scared to do it. Now of course being scared of lions and tigers is smart, being scared of tame goats isn’t really smart. The chance of getting mauled by pet goats is very low I think. Unless you’re called Luis, then you better duck! Haha. But anyway. I think my point is that it’s a great feeling to be comfortable with these animals and to be able to go in and sit with them and 99,9% of the time knowing what is happening and what to expect. Magnethe is a big and strong goat, if she wanted to she could probably hurt you. But I’m not scared for a second when I’m with her. Even when I can tell she’s going to head-butt me in the side because she wants me to give up the treats I have in my pocket. I know her so well, I know how to handle it and I know there’s nothing to worry about.
I guess that’s what struck me as so amazing about the Lion Man, that you can get almost the same relationship with those kind of animals. Of course you can never be a hundred percent sure with animals, and I think I’d prefer the unpredictability of a goat over the unpredictability of a lion. At the end of the day.
Anyhoo, I recommend that show if you can catch it on the telly. You might want to close your eyes at some of the big cat encounters if you have frail nerves. But you’ll love the baby tigers and lions. They’re almost as cute as baby goats.
On imdb I randomly came across the fact that Barbara Topsøe-Rothenborg was a second assistant director on House of the Dead 2. Haha. That’s wicked. I know none of you will know who Barbara is but I guarantee that there is a whole generation of Danes who will get misty-eyed at this clip. Nana. Possibly the best children’s TV show ever made. That and the one about Lotte who turned invisible when she pushed her belly button. Denmark makes the best kid’s TV. At least we did when I was a boy. I hope we still do.
Christ, Vi er ude på noget! Oh boy I loved that so much.
Oh oh, there is Da Lotte blev usynlig too. “When Lotte became invisible”. I love you youtube. HULUBULU LOTTE HVOR ER DU HENNE?!
That’s a scary belly button though. And I just watched Dark Water the other day, so I am convinced little girls are scary.
There was so much good music in those programmes. Kaj & Andrea! Wow.
Snemusen Knud. Rednosed snowmouse.
Fy fy skamme sangen. The “you can’t do that” song. Or “be ashamed” song.
Okay, I’ll stop. Leave me alone with my memories!
September 10th, 2008 at 5:31
My those were interesting videos. Now I’m humming some song I have no idea what they were saying!
That snowmouse was mean to the polar bear! And they say Americans have violent cartoons! hee, hee
Did you ever watch Sesamee Street or Captain Kangaroo? Captain Kangaroo had puppets (Bunny Rabbit and Mr. Moose) along with Grandfather Clock and Mr. Green Jeans.
It was on daily and Captain read us a story, showed us all kinds of things to make out of a an empty shoe box, and there were always baby animals at the end of the show.
He also had a magic drawing board with Tom Terrific and Manfred the Wonder Dog.
Baby animals and talking animal puppets . . . not hard to understand why I was a big fan as a kid!
Sesame Street had Big Bird, the Count, the Cookie Monster and there was lots of repetition, and today was brought to you by the letter “R” – then lots of things that started with “R” was brought up in the show.
September 11th, 2008 at 0:13
Debster – The polar bear had it coming though! And you know how dangerous mice, and bunnies, are. I have never heard of Captain Kangaroo. And we didn’t have Sesame Street in Denmark when I was a kid. Only when I grew up did I learn the coolness of the Cookie Monster. Bert and Ernie are from Sesame Street too, right?
September 11th, 2008 at 3:17
I LOVED, LOVED Mr. Moose!
I wanted to grow up and be like him.
–sigh–
September 13th, 2008 at 16:06
LuisLemmings: who dropped the ping pong balls? Did Bunny Rabbit drop them on Mr. Moose or vice versa? I can’t remember. Are you good at making things out of empty shoe boxes?