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groo-ver

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Posts posted by groo-ver

  2. So Farewell Then Tom Clancy

    in General Nonsense

    Posted

    Books were good, spoiled somewhat by the fact that when reading them now you visualise Harrison Ford as Jack Ryan..

    personal favourite was 'Cardinal of the Kremlin', very tightly written book that built on the tension and danger, you could read it almost like a movie. Still don't know why it was never made into a film. oh yeah, Russians aren't baddies anymore...

  3. Eggheads

    in General Nonsense

    Posted · Edited by groo-ver

    I'd be delighted to have a bash... specialist subject being 'all that obscure pish nobody should really know about'

    although i do agree with Oaksoft that the ability to remember trivia is in no way a measure of intelligence

  6. The Curse of Paisley

    in General Nonsense

    Posted · Edited by groo-ver

    Seven people – Margaret Lang, John Lindsay, James Lindsay, John Reid, Catherine Campbell, Margaret Fulton, and Agnes Naismith – were found guilty of having bewitched Shaw. Reid committed suicide by hanging himself in his prison cell, using his handkerchief attached to a nail in the wall. The other six were hanged and then burnt on the Gallow Green in Paisley on 10 June 1697,[2] the last mass execution for witchcraft in western Europe.[3]

    http://www.paisley.org.uk/famous_people/christian_shaw.php

  7. The Curse of Paisley

    in General Nonsense

    Posted

    Paisley gets its missing memorial horseshoe back thanks to the Paisley Daily Express

    A UNIQUE piece of Paisley history which mysteriously vanished can now be returned to its rightful place – thanks to every Buddie's favourite newspaper.

    Earlier this month, the Paisley Daily Express revealed that the horseshoe memorial at Maxwellton Cross – which was installed in memory of seven people who were killed and then set on fire 300 years ago after being labelled witches – had gone missing.

    We asked for our readers to help find the missing horseshoe – and quickly discovered, due to a bit of luck, that it had been handed into a police station for safekeeping.

    Mystery and intrigue has long surrounded the slaying of the so-called witches in the 17th century.

    They were strangled at the stake on the Gallow Green in the West End of Paisley and then had their bodies burned on a blazing bonfire.

    Afterwards, their charred remains were buried at Maxwellton Cross at a site marked by a horseshoe and a circle of cobblestones.

    Paisley folklore at the time decreed that, so long as the horseshoe was there, the town would prosper and many people believed that, when the original horseshoe disappeared in the 1970s, that led to a period of decline for Buddies.

    Two years ago, the Paisley Development Trust unveiled a new stainless steel and bronze horseshoe piece, which was sculpted by world-famous Sandy Stoddart.

    The tondo – a Renaissance term for a circular work of art – sat in the middle of the busy junction at Maxwellton Street and George Street and included the inscription 'Pain Inflicted, Suffering Endured, Injustice Done.'

    Bosses at the Paisley Development Trust were devastated when the horseshoe went missing but are now delighted to have been reunited with the unusual artefact.

    We were able to arrange for Trust chairman Piero Pieraccini to collect the horseshoe after one of our readers called to say it had been handed into Renfrew police station.

    It is believed a heavy lorry dislodged the horseshoe while trundling over it and it was then given to the police.

    Piero said: "I am delighted to get it back, thanks to help from the Express. It is an important, symbolic piece of Paisley's history.

    "Paisley folk wrongly convicted and killed these seven people, who were simply misunderstood. For us to honour them, we need to have the horseshoe there at Maxwellton Cross."

    The mass execution at Gallow Green was one of the darkest days in Paisley's history.

    The alleged witches, who were simply ordinary countrymen and women who used herbal remedies and forecast the weather by studying natural phenomena like the flight patterns of birds and the behaviour of cattle, had been found guilty of putting a spell on 11-year-old Christian Shaw, the daughter of the wealthy Laird of Bargarran.

    The child, who nowadays may have been diagnosed with the attention-seeking Munchausen's Syndrome, accused the 'witches' of causing her to float through the air and regurgitate bones, fur, feathers, sticks and stones.

    They vigorously denied the allegations but a court consisting of local ministers, wealthy landowners and government officials found them guilty and sentenced them to death.

    In accordance with the laws of the time, they were taken to the Gallow Green, just off Castle Street, and executed on June 10, 1697.

    The gruesome scenes included the sorry spectacle of young brothers John and James Lindsay, from Formakin Mill, near Houston, aged just 11 and 14, clutching each other's hands as they were garrotted together.

    Katherine Campbell was carried struggling and screaming to the stake, where she called down the wrath of God and the Devil on her accusers.

    The other victims were Margaret Fulton, John Lindsay, Margaret Lang and Agnes Naysmith, who laid 'a dying woman's curse' on all those present at the scene and their descendents.

    I did some research on this a few years back, and i'm sure the horseshoe was not to mark the resting place of the six burned victims, but the seventh, a man named John Reid, who committed suicide in prison before the trial.

    It was also interesting to follow the story of the girl, Christian Shaw, who grew up to become one of the main driving forces behind the towns textile trade...

  13. I'm Listening To....

    in General Nonsense

    Posted

    listening to xfm - good radio, good playlist.. but not quite the same since they closed down the scotland part.. i know Dominic Diamond and Julyan Sinclair were twats but feck me I miss that station!!

    (and Amanda McClatchie at the 1:30 mark ... hubba hubba ! :rolleyes: !)

  16. Follow Follow "sleeper"

    in e-Saints

    Posted

    i like the notion of infiltrating ... have to choose a user name that is either ironic or just palin offensive to them without them realising.. shouldn't be too hard i guess..

    I went on a sellic site a couple of years back, and managed to survive for almost an hour without being barred,

  19. Top 5 Film Soundtracks.....

    in Top Fives

    Posted

    Grease 2 is better :rolleyes:

    Cant believe no one has mentioned Joaquin Phoenix & Reese Witherspoon in Walk The Line :blink: Superb at covering the songs

    agree.. it'd surely be on my list along with

    Shrek 2

    Tank Girl

    Titan AE

    and Rocky horror show (does that count since it was a musical show before it was a film?)

  22. I'm Listening To....

    in General Nonsense

    Posted

    Chunka-Chunka-Chunka-Chunka

    Brutal but magnificent. A zillion miles away from Margherita Time.

    200px-Live_StatusQuo.jpg

    feckin brilliant album.. at the appollo no less,

    *i went to see their 'farewell' show in1984 !! ( a certain mr glitter actually gave a bloody good show as one of the support acts!)

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