finer points of mechanics

[Jurassic Referee]

Originally Posted by Dan_ref

Or even (gawd forbid) used my whistle as a weapon.

One of the first things that they taught me many moons ago in Football was the recommended whistle usage. I was told to use a finger whistle instead of a lanyard/whistle combo. The rationale at that time was that there were fewer quick whistles if you had to bring a whistle up to your mouth. There were no plastic Fox40 whistles around then; we used metal Acme Thunderers with a finger grip. I was told to tape up the finger grip so that I wouldn't cut my fingers on a bare edge if I got run into or knocked down. I was also told not to never take the whistle off my fingers until I hit the dressing room after the game-- the reason being that if someone came at you, you could always defend yourself by smacking them in the nose with your whistle.

Never had to swing at anybody, but I sureasheck got threatened by fans more than a few times coming off the field.