It Came First

Have you ever asked yourself, "what came first: the chicken or the egg?" Well, according to recent findings, the Sinornithosaurus (AKA the Chinese lizard-bird) came before either. There weren't actually any bodies to speak of, but there were fossils that showed plenty of proof.
The fossils seem to say that this turkey-sized bird lizard creature had large fangs that had little grooves inside them. These were supposedly used for biting and injecting venom. Also, the venom wasn't supposed to be lethal; it only would shock the prey so the bird monster could rip it to shreds and viciously devour it.
They also had feathers used for flight on the back of their legs, which showed that it was a four-winged gliding predator. These fossils were found in northeast China and they, according to Larry Martin (a KU scientist), are going to change they way people think of birds and will completely shake up what we know about birds. I would think so, what with the bird being a gliding raptor that could probably tear you in half. Really, I'm not surprised at all.

Proof!

Most people might say that every Bigfoot sighting is either a pervert in a gorilla suit or an escaped ape from a local zoo trying to make its way home. Most people and their brother would say that every Bigfoot footprint was a fake. But, I bet my blog that no one could disprove a print and a sighting in the same place. I welcome you to San Antonio, Texas.
Local police say that a 'Bigfoot-type' creature was seen lumbering around highway 151 and Loop 1604. Someone called the police and said that a big hairy thing was dragging a deer carcass into the woods. The cops searched the area, but they never found anything.
"If one sighting is real, then that means something is out there," said Rick Tullos, who is a member of the Gulf Coast Bigfoot Research Organization. Tullos was looking for any telltale signs that Bigfoot tried to make a speedy escape, like bent fences or hairs latched onto trees. He and a News 4 WOAI news crew searched the area, but they found nothing. But, wait, what's this? A strange foot print that didn't like like that of a human's? OH MY GOD! WHO CALLED IT? I said at the beginning of this blog that there was going to be both a sighting and a print in the same area and, what do you know, I was right! Anyways, so Tullo said that he was going to test the print to see if it was legit. But, in the meantime, we just sit back and wait for another sighting.

The Monster Mash Catches on in a Flash

Hear ye, hear ye! Paranormal enthusiasts of every shape, height, breed, and species, do I have a treat for you. On October 16th, 17th, and 18th, Loren Coleman, Jeff Belanger, and a host of others will be speaking about a number of different subjects involving paranormal incidents, cryptid encounters, and much, much more at the, "2009 Mass Mystery Weekend." Over the course of the three days that his goes on, different lecturers talk about a bunch of different things.
October 16th is the "UFO Show." This features a "lost" interview with Betty Hill to get the ball rolling and then they feature various guest speakers. The speakers will be Nick Redfern (UFO crashes and such), Peter Robbins (The Bentwaters UFO Incident), and John Horrigan (1942 Air Raid and Black Helicopters). There will also be a panel discussion on UFO's that will be hosted by Tim Binnall.
October 17th marks the, "Monster Mash." This is another series of guest speakers such as that lovable cryptozoologist, Loren Coleman (Abominable Snowman), Nick Redfern, again (Chupacabras), Jeff Belanger (White House Ghosts), and Chris Balzano (The Bridgewater Triangle).
October 18th, the final day of the event, is called the, "Mystery Tour." A bus that will be taking you on the tour leaves from Raynham Park in Raynham, MA. It will bring you nto a whole bunch of different places in the Bridgewater Triangle, such as haunted houses, UFO crash sites, and places where strange creatures have been spotted. There wil also be snacks, trivia, and more!
To buy your tickets, visit 2009 Mass Mystery Weekend. You can also go t0o this link for more info. It will be held at Hibernian Hall 151 Watertown St. in Watertown MA. 02471

Bigfoot Hunters Go Hollywood

The recently released Bigfoot documentary, "Not Your Typical Bigfoot Movie," meets the expectations of a certain blogger who loves this stuff. The film is about two Bigfoot hunters, Dallas Gilbert and Wayne Burton, as they cope with problems of the past and the present, and at the same time catch the Bigfoot video of the century. Their quest started when the two spotted a strange creature in the woods near their home town in Ohio, and since then, they've spent valuable time and money on the equipment (AKA, a barbecue, a couple of folding chairs, and a video camera) that they use.
Both Dallas and Wayne seem a little bit emotional, and they don't seem to mind sharing their problems. The sadder interviews show the one of them either crying or talking about past experiences and emo incidents.
Though it really IS (for the most part) an average Bigfoot documentary, the two average joes show their passion for Bigfoot hunting through the interviews and throughout the scenes in the movie. Though you don't get to see Bigfoot, you get to see the lives of two men who have dedicated years of patience and study to this enigma that we call "Sasquatch."

Skinny "Gollum" like creature beaten down in Panama

GeoTagged, [N42.25471, E71.09032]

I keep expecting a wizard with a long white beard to come into the world because, for some reason, Lord of the Rings seems to be coming to life. First there was the hobbit, and now there is Gollum.
In Cerro Azul, a town north of Panama City, a group of teenagers were playing, when all of a sudden, the creature crawled out of a nearby cave and crawled towards them. The teenagers picked fight over flight and beat the creature to death with rocks and sticks. They tossed the body onto the side if the lake and ran away. They returned later to take pictures of the body.

Mr. and Mrs. Sasquatch: JUST MARRIED!!!!

Now THIS is a Bigfoot sighting.
Mr. and Mrs. Sasquatch were just like the real thing, now you see them, now you don't. Sometimes, when I'm looking at this picture, I wonder why they wrote Mr. and Mrs. "Sasquatch." I'm not saying that it isn't an awesome name, but normally, people would think that would be pretty weird. But, that guy did have some hair on his face, so I wouldn't put it passed him to maybe shave to disguise his true cryptid form. Really, it wouldn't surprise me a bit. And the woman riding shotgun was a nice touch. Though, to be honest, I wouldn't know why the heck he would've picked Interstate 84 in upstate New York to take a drive. I would've picked the Canadian forests.

The Book the Blogger Read

Cryptozoology once again was able to sneak its way into the hearts of children's book authors. Roland Smith introduces Marty and Grace, a pair of fun-loving, and yet slightly flawed twins in his book, "Cryptid Hunters." In the book, after their parents are missing from a plane crash, the twins end up with their Uncle Travis. Soon after, they get dropped into a jungle by accident. So, in a fight to survive the perilous jungle, they stumble upon something that both Uncle Travis and his enemy, Noah Blackwood, are after.
In a way, it's almost offensive to cryptozoologists, seeing as how their uncle, Travis Wolfe, is a cryptozoologist and yet, he is described as a cryptid hunter, while cryptozoologists aren't necessarily hunters of cryptids. I also found that I couldn't really tell where the twins were from because it didn't leave any clues in the dialouge, so I couldn't really establish that part of their character which had irritated me constantly. Also, the book never really explains some of the strange things that happen in the book, like how a native of the Congo is able to use a shotgun, or how you could get over lifelong fears in an hour.
But, the pros of the book are that it was very action packed, so there was never a moment of dullness or a moment where there wasn't something intriguing being said. It was also noticed that nothing was written in the book as a space filler. Everything was relevant to the story, or was at least going to trigger something later in the book, or maybe even was going to explain something later. I thought that the characters were interesting and had a lot of depth. Not like some books where the characters are just words on a page and nothing more. All in all, the book wasn't bad, but it could stand some improvement.

Red Fish, Blue Fish, Small Fish, Big Catfish

When Jessica Wanstall from Sittingbourne, Kent went on a vacation to Spain, and when she traveled to the Ebro River (also in Spain) to go for a little fishing trip, she had no idea that she would go home catching more than "tiddlers." In a 20 minute battle of muscle over monster, Jessica, with the help of her father Mark, reeled in a 109 pound, 9 foot long monster of a catfish.

"I didn't realize just how big it was until I saw the photos afterwards. I look tiny next to it," she said after the whole thing was over. "My dad thought it was going to be a small one and I told him it didn't feel small when I picked up the rod. It was really hard work pulling it in and my arms turned to jelly. My dad helped lift it onto the bank and I stood back and just laughed when I saw it. It was massive." The picture on the right gives you an idea of the size of the behemoth catfish. "Jessica normally catches tiddlers (hey, there's that word again!) but just loves a day's fishing," he said. After they took a snapshot of the fish and the fisherwoman, they threw the catch back into the water.
Regular readers of this blog will have noticed that this isn't really a cryptozoological happening, but it's summer and I just can't resist a great fish story.

Bryozoan Breakout in Vietnam. Better Get the Proactiv.

For those for you who have read my blog when it took its first steps, we talked about the bryozoans in Denver that clogged up the drains. If you don't know what a bryozoan is, it's a prehistoric animal that is an invertebrate. It reproduces by budding (it puts one in mind of a thing that might come from a "Star Trek'' episode). Well, they're back.
The most recent sightings are being reported at Rung Lake in Tu Trung Commune in the Vinh Tuong district. The first clue of its presence was the mass of dead fish that had sprung up in the lake around the October of 2008. In April, the Binh Minh Cooperative took some fish from the lake with shocking results: All of the fish were dead, weakened before they died, and caught in the net with them were close to two tons of a weird blob-like thing the locals called called "The Strange Creature." The experts, however, knew better than to think that they were monsters, so they knew that they were bryozoans, though I can't really disagree that they were strange.
The even stranger part is, that whenever somebody touched one of the strange creatures, they got itchiness and sore eyes. These creatures were doing nothing for the lake, nor for anybody's complexion. They also discovered that these things were sticking to plants, the bottom of the lake, and other surfaces. Apparently, the fish in lakes might've died after contact with the bryozoans, which explains the sticky mucus that stuck to their gills. Luckily, the bryozoans won't pollute the water and the fish can reproduce. Good news all around.

Musings About a Museum

Betty and Barney Hill were a biracial couple living in Durham, New Hampshire. Barney Hill was a postman and a civil rights activist for the NAACP (The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). Betty, who was a graduate of UNH, did some social work. On the morning of September 20, 1961 while returning from a vacation in Niagra Falls, NY and Montreal on US Route 3 through the White Mountains, Betty had said she spotted an illuminated object zooming through the sky. Just South of the Franconia Notch in New Hampshire, the disc started to descend, and according to Barney, it hovered 100 feet above their car. They apparently remembered Barney leaving the car to have a look at some sort of humanoid creature, getting back in to the car, and driving home, scared and confused. But this memory maybe wasn't all they thought it was, for the couple noticed that Betty's dress from the other night was torn and their watches had stopped. They even found that their car trunk was marked with concentric circles that made their compass needle spin.
The Hills told their story to their families and to the military officers at the Pease Air Force Base, but didn't tell their tale to anybody else, for they were afraid that they might scoff and mark them as lunatics or that they were raving. Before long, Betty started to have a reocurring dream of the aliens taking them into their ship and doing all sorts of physical tests, and even putting a needle into her abdomen. She also dreamt of seeing the star map that the aliens had brought. Later, in 1964, the Hills went through a series of hypnosis sessions, and told everything that had happened.
Well, Kathy Marden, who pegs herself as a UFOlogist, believed her aunt's (Betty) story. "They were honest, stable, regular people," Marden told the Boston Globe. She also decided to put some of the famed Hill alien abduction artifacts on display, such as Betty's torn dress, the tapes of the hypnosis sessions, a paper mache bust made based on Betty's descriptions of the head alien (who Betty's named Junior), and other items as well. These artifacts can be found at the University of New Hampshire museum.

Easter Bunny Gets Hungry Too

Is your child dying to do something different this year? Well, if he/she is, then I have the solution. Feed the Easter Bunny. You'll get miraculous results. Here's how.
First, you must get the veggies that you'd imagine the Easter Bunny might like, such as carrots and lettuce. Then you chop up the vegetables, and put them in a bowl. Afterwards you fill up another bowl with water and set both out on your doorstep. Put the baskets you go easter egg hunting with near the bowls. Make sure that if you have pets, that you keep them away from the food you set out.
I guarantee that if you follow these three easy steps, that you'll prove that one of the most elusive mythical creatures will be proven to exist. And if you look outside the next day you will find a pleasant surprise in the baskets, and almost nothing in the bowls. Happy Easter Everyone!!!!!

The Neon Cats

GeoTagged, [N42.25462, E71.09028]

Yes, I know. It sounds like a cheesy name for a jazz band, but this is some really weird stuff!!! South Korean Scientists at Gyeongsang National University last year
came out with kittens with modified genes, so that their skin would glow under Ultraviolet rays. "The ability to manipulate the flourescent protein and use this to clone cats opens new horizons for artificially creating human illness linked to generic causes," the Ministry of Science and Technology said. Out of the four kittens they produced, 3 survived. Well, it seems that people are making their own cryptids, these days. Go figure.

Borneo Monster Photo: Fake or Fact?

Locals fear it. Cryptozoologists marvel at it. But is it real? That's the question.
London's Telegraph newspaper reported this week about the emergence of this photo, which appears to show a 100-foot snake in the Baleh river in Borneo.
Questions have arisen about whether this image is either faked or perhaps just a shot of a submerged log or some other object.
Dartmouth University computer science professor Hany Farid, who looked at the shot and reported on his findings in a Scientific American blog, says that because the photo is so grainy, "it's as if you took away 99 percent of a blood sample and asked me to do a forensic analysis." Wise words.
As an expert of digital photography forensics, Farid also says that since there aren't many pixels to analyze, there isn't much that they can say. Photos with such low resolution are the exact reason that people such as Hany and other people are out there. But grainy or not, that photo reveals something strange, either why somebody would make a hoax like that, or what that monster is and, is it dangerous?
While there are clearly doubters, local villagers don't count themselves among them. Those who reside along the banks of the river believe in the serpent's existence and refer to it as Nabau, after an ancient magical serpent which has the powers to turn itself into different animals.
The Telegraph reported that scientists unearthed the fossil of a snake that was longer than a bus this month. The 45-foot long monster was thought to live on a diet of crocodiles and giant turtles.

SLIders (and not the dimension-shifting types)

SLI (Street lamp interference) is a very rare phenomenon where a person finds that he or she can turn off lights just by walking under them.
I have had the opportunity to talk to an actual SLIder. I will call her Joan.
"I first found out I had SLI in 2000 or 2001. At first, I had thought, 'Wow, that street lamp just turned off,' but over time, I came to notice it. It happens not only to street lamps, but indoor lamps, too. I turn them off when I'm traveling in a group; I turn them off when I'm alone; and I even turn them off in the car."
And then came the most shocking parts. "About 50% of the time I'm putting in light bulbs, they blow out as soon as they connect with the socket, right in my hand! And also, I was putting on my robe, and when I was walking, sparks started to fly! I even have my boyfriend to vouch for me!"
We shall call her boyfriend, John. " I saw it. It was like those sparklers you see at the 4th of July!" he said.
In Joan's case, the SLI seems to be triggered by her emotions. "It usually happens to me during times of stress," said Joan. "It also happens when I'm happy, but mostly during times of stress. My theory is that it's the electrons in my body. The positive and negative ions start to act up and I turn off the lights. It usually happens to me at least twice a month, if not more."
For those, like Joan, who experience SLI, parts of life seems to be a matter of sitting and watching the sparks fly (or the lamps blow out.)

Bilbo Baggins Gets Real

It seems as if J.R.R. Tolkien hadn't been telling a lie. The skull of the so called "hobbit" that had been discovered in Indonesia in 2003 has been classified by numerous experts, like Karen Baab, Ph.D., a researcher of Anatomical Sciences at Stony Brook University in New York as not human. The researchers can tell because the skull isn't quite like an ordinary human skull, or at least, not a healthy one. They believe that the hominid had some sort of disease that caused his brain and his skull to not grow as a normal human's should, but for now, we're all assuming that this skull, didn't belong to a human. This means that we might've shared this Earth with other hominids, which also means that there could possibly be hundreds of other cryptids out there that we just haven't found yet.