D.B. Cooper, Alive and Well

While attending the annual Rose Parade in Portland OR last weekend, a www.coasttocoastam.com contributor caught a glimpse of the infamous D.B. Cooper. Looks like he might have survived the jump after all!

I've been saying this for years!

Dragonfly Crop Circle

A 150ft long crop circle depicting a dragonfly has appeared in a barley field in the village of Yatesbury, Wiltshire.
Crop circle enthusiasts claim the succession of animal designs have been created in an attempt make people more aware of the threat of climate change and predict they could continue throughout the summer.

In past years the crop circle season has typically run from July to August but already four have been found in barley fields stretching from Wiltshire to Oxfordshire this year.
They have been found across the ancient 'ley lines' - believed to have mystical qualities.
"There has certainly been a lot of activity and this is the busiest year since 1999 at the moment,"
"People believe they will increase in frequency up to 2012 where there will be some kind of cataclysmic world event."

First Crop Circle 2009

The huge crop circle sculpted in a sea of barley seems to be based on the Yin and Yang theme, and appeared near an ancient British burial mound beneath Windmill Hill near Devizes, Wiltshire on 25 May.
The ancient area of Wiltshire close to Silbury Hill, Windmill Hill and the Sanctuary is a hot spot for crop circles.

I bet these folks (the ones who make these) are also tattoo artists.

Bigfoot in Siberia

You've obviously found that I have a penchant for off-beat news. One of my favorite sites is a Russian newspaper, http://www.mosnews.com/. Today, there is a very interesting story about a large vegetarian stealing local produce. See what you think. CNN is sending a correspondent...

Siberians complain about Bigfoot’s appetite
The Shor people of Siberia gather wild leeks in the forest this time of year. This year, however, they are having trouble finding it. Something is getting there first, and leaving behind huge footprints.

Newborn speaks

A newborn baby has started talking in the Russian city of Norilsk, amazing his parents and the obstetricians, who nevertheless claim pre-natal education can work miracles.
According to the Yoki.ru website, the baby boy pronounced his first word right after he was born, distinctly saying: “Papa!”
In just a few minutes, newborn Stepan said: “Mama!”
The next day, when the boy’s mother was telling him that his dad was about to visit them at the hospital, he asked: “Who? Papa?”
The boy’s mother, Lisa Bazheyeva, is just 17 years old.
The obstetrician who helped her in labor confirms the proud mother’s report.
“I heard with my own ears that the newborn baby spoke!” said Doctor Marina Panova, adding she had never seen anything of the kind in the 23 years that she worked at the maternity clinic.
“Newborns just can’t pronounce syllables as complicated as that,” she said.
“The fetus can learn while still in the mother’s womb. If a mother talks to the fetus, entertains it as if it has been born already, the baby is usually born gifted,” Panova said.

Only in Russia...

Qatar Creature

Newest strange creature to surface on the internet from Qatar. Primate? Rodent? If you've seen one, let me know!

Are you a believer?

Recently, an Apollo astronaut came forward and said he believed in UFOs. He's not the only fruitcake out there. Look at this list:
Jimmy Carter, US President from 1976 to 1980, promised while on the campaign trail that he would make public all documents on UFOs if elected. He said: "I don't laugh at people any more when they say they've seen UFOs. I've seen one myself."
General Douglas MacArthur, the Korean and Second World War soldier, said in 1955 that "the next war will be an interplanetary war. The nations of the earth must someday make a common front against attack by people from other planets. The politics of the future will be cosmic, or interplanetary".
J Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI from its inception in 1935 to 1972, said of a famous incident when flying saucers were allegedly fired at over Los Angeles in 1942: "We must insist upon full access to disks recovered. For instance, in the LA case the Army grabbed it and would not let us have it for cursory examination."
Monsignor Corrado Balducci, a Vatican theologian, said: "Extraterrestrial contact is a real phenomenon. The Vatican is receiving much information about extraterrestrials and their contacts with humans from its embassies in various countries, such as Mexico, Chile and Venezuela."
Professor Stephen Hawking: "Of course it is possible that UFO's really do contain aliens as many people believe, and the Government is hushing it up."
Dr. Herman Oberth, a Nazi rocket engineer who was taken to the US after the war and became one of the fathers of modern spaceflight, said: "It is my thesis that flying saucers are real and that they are spaceships from another solar system.There is no doubt in my mind that these objects are interplanetary craft of some sort. I and my colleagues are confident that they do not originate in our solar system."
Dr J Allen Hynek, director of the US Air Force's Project Blue Book investigation into UFOs, said: "When the long-awaited solution to the UFO problem comes, I believe that it will prove to be not merely the next small step in the march of science, but a mighty and totally unexpected quantum leap... we had a job to do, whether right or wrong, to keep the public from getting excited."
Air Chief Marshal Lord Dowding, commander of RAF Fighter Command during the Battle of Britain: "I am convinced that these objects do exist and that they are not manufactured by any nations on earth."
Ronald Reagan, US President from 1980 to 1988, "I looked out the window and saw this white light.It was zigzagging around. I went up to the pilot and said, 'Have you ever seen anything like that?' He was shocked and he said, 'nope.' And I said to him: 'Let's follow it!' We followed it for several minutes. It was a bright white light.We followed it to Bakersfield, and all of a sudden to our utter amazement it went straight up into the heavens. When I got off the plane I told Nancy all about it."
Mikhail Gorbachev, the USSR's last head of state: "The phenomenon of UFOs does exist, and it must be treated seriously."
Richard Nixon, US President from 1969 to 1974: "I'm not at liberty to discuss the government's knowledge of extraterrestrial UFO's at this time. I am still personally being briefed on the subject."
Dr. Walther Riedel, research director at the Nazi rocket research establishement at Peenemunde: "I am completely convinced that UFOs have an out-of-world basis."

Ever had the feeling someone was looking at you?

See the man's face in the clouds? Close up below with greater detail. This was taken looking to the north in the California sky. I'm pretty sure he is watching the Iditarod race in Alaska...they must not have the internet up there.

Another Cemetery Ghost

Look closely in the circle...I'd say a Civil War Vet

This was posted to www.coasttocoastam.com by a listener:

I took this photo, I believe in 1991, at Maple Park Cemetery located in Springfield, Missouri. It was a cold fall day, just after an ice storm. I took the photo with a Canon Pelix 35mm. I was scanning my old photos, and for the first time got a good close up view of several pics I took in the cemetery that day. In the first view I could hardly see the figure standing near a headstone in the upper right of the photo, but as I zoomed in the figure became much more visible. It really creeps me out... I thought I was alone!

this is not the zoomed up photo...you couldn't get the cemetery affect on that one!

Suddenly, my eyelids feel heavy

A Chinese man pulled a car by a rope attached only to his eyelids for more than five metres.

Yang Guanghe, 35, of Guizhou was cheered and applauded at the Cherry Blossom Festival in Guangzhou as he towed the VW car.
Yang, who weighs only seven stone, said he had been practicing the stunt for more than 10 years.
"At the beginning it was a bit painful, but gradually I got used to it," he told the Guangzhou Daily newspaper.
"I just want to know what the limit is of the weakest link in the human body."

Mystery Compound in desert

Feb 23, 2009. Over the past five months, this "compound" has taken shape out in the central Arizona desert, in the middle of nowhere near Blackwater and Sacaton Arizona, along the dry Gila River. It looks to be about a quarter mile long by an eighth mile wide. It has razor wire all around it, power lines run to it and about half of it is cleared of vegetation. It is in an inhospitable and inescapable area of the Sonoran desert. The closest small towns would be about 10 miles away in any direction. You'd be lucky to walk one mile in the summer heat there. April to November temps are commonly well above 100F. Summertime temps are routinely 120 F or even higher. Could this be for Guantanamo Bay detainees? Coming civil unrest? Illegal aliens? Mortgage defaulters?

Hummmm...interesting. If this started some 5-6 months ago...I think that would correspond with the T Boone Pickens energy commercials. I think it's going to be a windfarm.

Addicted to piercing

Elaine Davidson, the world's most pierced person, started out with 'only' 280 piercings in 97. Now she has 6005, 1500 of which are internal (whatever that means). Wonder how she gets through metal detectors...

Brazil's "Town of Twins"

The mystery has persisted for decades, attracting international attention and inspiring books and investigations by geneticists.

The geneticists have no solid explanation for the 38 pairs of twins among about 80 families living in a one-and-a-half-square-mile area in CÂNDIDO GODÓI, Brazil. Locals say it's "in the water" that a mineral exists that affects ovulation. Some specialists say it's due to inbreeding and genetic isolationism. Some even think it is linked to Joseph Mengele, the Nazi doctor who did experiments at Auschwitz during WWII on twins, who is said to have roamed this Brazilian area years ago. A local doctor who set out to discover why the high concentration of twins believes that the citizens are holding back on information on Mengele still fearing for themselves.

This would be a nice village for Octo-mom.

Lost Chompers found in Ocean

While we're on the subject of the southern hemisphere, I found this little tidbit and thought I'd post especially for Mom:

IT is a trillion to one story - and Phillip Worth is happy to have the teeth to tell it.

The 67-year-old was contemplating a miserable New Year’s Eve after losing his dentures while surfing at Terrigal on the Australian coast.
But 26 hours later his luck changed when he saw his pearly whites coming in with the tide.
“I was on my surfboard about 100 metres out and I sneezed, the next minute my top plate popped out and sank,” said Mr Worth.
But two days later, he stumbled across his gnashers being washed in by the tide.
When he put his teeth back in they were better than ever. “They’re sharper I noticed, truly.”

Broken Fingernails-at last

World's record holder breaks nails in car crash!

Ms Redmond of Salt Lake City, Utah, sustained serious but non-life-threatening injuries in the accident this week, the Deseret News reported.
She is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as having the longest fingernails in the world.
Ms Redmond's nails, which hadn't been cut since 1979, were broken in the crash. According to the Guinness Book of World Records website, her nails measured a total of more than 28 feet long in 2008, with the longest nail on her right thumb at 2 feet, 11 inches.
Salt Lake County Sheriff's Lt Don Hutson said Ms Redmond was freed from an SUV in the crash and taken to the hospital in a serious condition.

Better the nails than the neck....

Yeti expedition returns

The recent return of the first expedition searching for Yeti in 2009 has come back with a few frightening stories. The hunt was supported by MonsterQuest, who filmed an episode of their Season Three during the investigative journey.
Senior producer Will Yates just told me http://www.cryptomundo.com/cryptozoo-news/1-yeti-exp-09/ that the team found themselves, indeed, on “a dangerous expedition out in Nepal. The trekking was much more difficult than they anticipated and at one point a crew member nearly slipped to his death. At the end of the expedition helicopters had to do an extraction off the mountain.”

Picture on the right is an oldie of Sir Edmund Hillary with a supposed Yeti skullcap. MonsterQuest must still be editing because season three has started and there's no mention of the Yeti in www.historychannel.com 's monsterpedia.

Knoxville's mysterious burnt man

Hot (burning hot) off the press!

I've had some bathroom events that brought tears to my eyes but never anything like this:

KNOXVILLE (WVLT) – A man suffered severe burns on Monday afternoon in spite of there being no signs of fire.
Knoxville Fire Department crews were dispatched to the fire at Cagle Terrace Apartments on Renford Drive around 3:30 PM. Officials say they knocked on the door to the unit but could only hear moaning inside. After breaking it down they discovered a 56 year old man inside the bathroom suffering from third degree burns to his face and second degree burns to his hands.
According to investigators, there was no sign of fire in the apartment except for a candle inside the bathroom.
The victim was taken to the University of Tennessee Medical Center for treatment but had to be transferred to one of the region’s two burn centers late Monday evening.
Fire officials say their investigation is still on going.

Hmmm...another case of spontaneous human combustion or methane ignites aftershave?

Wolf Moon

According to the Farmers Almanac, January's full moon is considered the

Wolf Moon

Full Wolf Moon - January Amid the cold and deep snows of midwinter, the wolf packs howled hungrily outside Indian villages. Thus, the name for January's full Moon. Sometimes it was also referred to as the Old Moon, or the Moon After Yule.

According to http://www.cryptomundo.com/

This one is called the Wolf Moon, a Full Moon in Cancer, and it is indeed a precursor to a year that will be full of

werewolf news.

Probably a good idea to hop on over to www.amazon.com and invest in the above book and remember the old adage from American Werewolf in London: "don't go into the Moors!"

Whacked Windmill Update

I have just found an update on the mangled Windmill in England from a few days ago and I am compelled to release this information to free my readers of undue ASS (alien stress syndrome).

With the absence of any rational explanation - an aircraft collision, meteorite or catastrophic material fatigue - we were left with the unsatisfactory possibility that it was an alien collision.

However,

a small fireworks display (roman candles, chrysanthemums and splitting comets raining down over Lincolnshire) celebrating an elderly man's birthday confused onlookers to say that they had seen some kind of UFO with octopus-like tentacles the night before the windmill was found whacked. In other words, probably no alien involvement in the mangled windmill. Shucks!

So, what did happen to the windmill???

"I reckon something the size and weight of a cow would do it," Dale Vince of energy firm Ecotricity told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. "If there is a rational explanation – we will come up with it."

A smart blogger came up with this explanation and seems as good as any:

Since there appears to be no dead flying cow underneath the broken blade, nor any other mangled machinery that might have come from something that hit the blade, my vote would go to a rogue airline discharging toilet waste. A large ice block dropping several thousand feet could do this sort of damage, and most of it would melt and sink in the ground before an investigation crew arrived.

Windmill gets Whacked

On January 4th, a large turbine at a wind farm in Conisholme, England was damaged, with one blade falling off, another badly bent. Locals said they saw a "tentacle"-like UFO in the sky near the wind farm on the night before the damage was discovered:

Mr John Harrison, Saltfleetby described how on Saturday night, January 3 he looked out of his landing window to see a 'massive ball of light' with 'tentacles going right down to the ground' over Conisholme wind farm."It was huge" he said "At first I thought it must have been a hole where the moon was shining through but then I saw the tentacles – it looked just like an octopus."It was an incredible site; I have never seen anything like it before. I have no idea what it was, all I can say is what I saw".

Hum...., did anyone predict this?