As we are mere weeks away from the end of the year, Blather would like
to make it know that *we don’t care* about the (change of) millennium.
We don’t.
Ok?
However, we will discuss possible Irish meteorites, Wexford UFOs and other malarkey…
‘Blather is here. As we advance to make our bow, you will in vain for signs of servility or for any evidence of a desire to please. We are an arrogant and depraved body of men. We are as proud as bantams and as vain as peacocks. “*Blather* doesn’t care.” A sardonic laugh escapes us as we bow, cruel and cynical hounds that we are. It is a terrible laugh, the laugh of lost men. Do you get the smell of porter?’
|
THE SPIEL
In between the last few issues, we’ve been prostrating ourselves,
itching in our liquid latex hairshirts, and flagellating ourselves
with the guilt of not producing Blather on a more regular basis. It’s
not that we’ve been short of material, rather we have had very little
time to devote to the matter, and what time we’ve had has been spent
considering the path that Blather should take, as we enter what is
alleged to be the final month of the ‘millennium’. We promise that we
will do better in future. Somehow.
Since the last rant, this Blatherskite has been living in interesting
times, turning his life upside down and travelling to distant lands.
And we still, somehow, managed to annoy *some* people at least. In the
last Blather, we stated that we were to be ‘pitted against one Alan
Sewell of the Irish Centre for UFO studies in *UFOs Exist. A debate*’
at *Octocon*, the 10th Irish National Science Fiction Convention,
held on the 9th and 10th of October in The Royal Marine Hotel, Dun
Laoghaire. We showed up on the day, apprehensive but full of
devilment. Alas, Mr. Sewell pulled out at the 11th hour, apparently
stating that he felt Blather’s Dave Walsh would ‘only twist his
words’.
Feeling both flattered and disappointed, we instead took part in a
ramshackle assortment of panelists for the UFO discussion, which
included authors Robert Rankin and Eugene Byrne. The result was
pleasantly chaotic – we probably didn’t really get anywhere
constructive, but it was a lot of fun, with some frighteningly
concise all-encompassing conspiracy theories For Everything Including
UFOs getting aired. Much thanks to Pádraig Ó’Méalóid and the other
organisers, and cheers to Robert Rankin, who entertained us with
tales of having his car windows shot out and the culinary horrors of
human-chicken relationships.
A few weeks later, on the afternoon November 5th, not long back from
having spent Samhain (Halloween) in the hills of Leitrim with the fine
people at the Grove of Sinann (Irish readers should look out for more
about the Grove in a forthcoming issue of *Source* magazine), we found
ourselves being fed an improbable cornucopia of alcoholic beverages by
an Australian-German British Airways hostess at about 35,000 ft over
the south-west Irish coast. Landing at Baltimore, this blatherskite
was whisked off to the hotel where the The International Fortean
Organization’s Fortfest 99 was to take place – the 29th annual
conference on anomalous phenomena.
Speakers present included the wonderful John Keel, author of *The
Mothman Prophecies* and *Operation Trojan Horse*, the elegantly droll
Doug Skinner, Michael Grosso on miracles and the like, Budd Hopkins
(who showed us endless slides of, er, implant scars), the highly
enjoyable Paul Harrison – president of the Loch Ness Monster Research
Society and Paul LaViollette – ‘the first astronomer to disprove the
expanding universe theory and the first to discover concentrations of
cosmic dust and gold in ice age polar ice’. Also speaking were Doug
Rogers on crop circles, J. Antonio Huneeus on UFOs, Tom Vallone on
‘free energy’ and Vincent Bridges on ‘Alchemy, Fulcanelli and The
Great Cross’.
This Blatherskite ended up being the final speaker of the two-day
conference, recounting tales of *Accidental Satanists* – a further
exploration of the Hell-Fire Clubs of the 18th century, a subject
previously touched up in this publication.
Memories of the weekend (vague as they are) include getting a gift of
a deer bone discovered during drunken fortean forays behind the hotel,
sitting on the podium with John Keel, Larry Arnold and others,
recounting all kinds of crazy after-dinner stories, consuming unwise
amounts of Jameson 1780 at 4am at the party that just kind of happened
in Jim and Brent’s room, secret self-service at the hotel bar, six
people crushed into a five-seater car on a quest into the strip-mall
hell that is College Park, Maryland, in an long hilarious and hopeless
search of *yet more* drinkables, getting yelled at by the audience
during *Accidental Satanists* ‘cos we were too quiet, too fast and too
Irish (it was all good natured of course), and the entertaining
Monday drive to New York City, passed by storytelling and poetry.
The cast: dozens, but you know who you are. Special thanks to Jim Boyd
and his warrior-sprog Kiarna, Phyllis Benjamin and Sheila and Corinna
Makris.
Octocon
http://www.lostcarpark.com/octocon/
The Grove of Sinann
http://www.iol.ie/~sinann/
A Mothman Retrospective
http://www.blather.net/archives2/issue2no5.html
The International Fortean Organization
http://www.research.umbc.edu/~frizzell/info
Doug Skinner @ White Knuckle Sandwich
http://www.whiteknucklesandwich.com/
FORTEAN FALLS
On November 29th, the RTE email news *UPDATE* (amongst other RTE media
types) announced that Astronomy Ireland had reported the possibility
of a meteorite landing on the night of the November 28th, around
10:10pm. A large fireball had been seen *and* heard in many parts of
Ireland.
They’re apparently looking for witnesses who may be able to help them
plot its trajectory. No meteorite has been found in the Republic of
Ireland since 1835 – one fell in Northern Ireland in 1969.
For more see:
http://www.astronomy.ie/
In the last issue, we reported on claims of ‘Black Rays’ over Lough
Neagh. Harriet Moore, who lives 4 miles (6.4km) from Aldergrove
Airport a similar distance away from Lough Neagh, emailed to tell us
of not black *rays*, but *black rain*.
‘We saw it one Sunday morning about 10/11am. In our estimation it was
fuel dumped from aeroplanes, and as it isn’t very far from the airport
to the Irish Sea, we reckoned the planes were dumping fuel. Certainly
didn’t look like anything else we could think of. It started as black
parallel ‘lines’ roughly where the wings would be, and with high
altitude winds, cloud formation etc., the two ‘lines’ gradually spread
out and could be seen ‘falling’ in much the same way as contrails do.’
Harriet continues:
‘There also was weekend rave in the Nutts Corner area in late
June/Early July. It lasted from Friday to Sunday night and was
attended by something over 1,500 people. Of course Laser lights and
other stuff to create light effects were in use at the time. I
have seen laser lights bouncing off low cloud cover from a distance of
20 miles which turned out to be a Laser show in Belfast which I could
see from Dromore, south of Hillsborough. It was weird initially as I
was driving along the dual carriageway, but I pulled over and
watched.’
Shereen Beckett was in touch, from the Carrickfergus area – she
informed us that, having asked around, she can confirm that no-one
locally had picked up the ‘black rays’ story, including the media.
See: *Funny what you can find near Bundoran…*
http://www.blather.net/archives3/issue3no6.html#blackray
UFOS AT HOME AND ABROAD
It seems to have been remarkably quiet on the UFO side of things
recently, at least in Ireland. Despite the Leonid meteor showers of
mid-november, no reports have come our way, except a third-hand report
from Co. Wexford. On the night of December 2nd 1999, a power cut,
apparently due to high winds, plunged some of the county into
darkness. During the black-out, two large, slow-moving bright lights
were reported in the Carne area (south of Rosslare Harbour and east of
Kilmore). They were also reported as being seen near Tuskar Rock, the
island lighthouse to the south-east of Rosslare, some 8km (5 miles)
off the coast, and as far away as Duncormick, some 20km (12.5 miles)
west of Carne.
That’s all we have for now, more reports welcome…
While we’re on the subject, we should add that Blather’s Turkish
correspondent, Soner Goksu, informed us that around the 7th and 8th of
November, there were UFO sightings over Istanbul. Soner commented that
they’ve been seen regularly since the eclipse of August 11th. We would
point out that the horrific Turkish earthquake took placed mere days
after the eclipse. Any possible correlation? The phenomena of
‘earthquake lights’ has been explored in the past by Paul Devereux and
Michael Persinger – see:
*The Tectonic Strain Theory as an Explanation for UFO Phenomena*
http://www.laurentian.ca/neurosci/tectonic.htm
UFOS OVER SHANGHAI?
“UFO darts across the city’s skyline”, reported the Shanghai Daily,
“UFO appears in the sky over Shanghai”, said the Wenhui Daily, on
Thursday 3rd December…
‘Nearly 100 people claimed to have seen a cylindrical object with a
flaming orange tail moving over the western part of the city for about
an hour Thursday afternoon, the newspapers said. They offered no
theories on what it might have been’, said Fox News…the following
day.
Even odder, the Shanghai Daily ran the story *next * to an
advertisement for the X-Files movie, and of course, we got the story
from Fox, who of course are the company behind the X-Files, and…
ALIEN FOETUS NEWS
Curiously, the Irish alien foetus story has died a death. We certainly
haven’t heard anymore about it. However, our favoured webzine at the
moment, the fascinating *GettingIt*, recently ran an article which may
be of interest to alien foetus fans, called *Have You Hurled a Fetus
today? – England’s in love with alien embryos*:
‘They’ve been called “the most disgusting toy in the world.” This may
be so, but there’s certainly a sick thrill in recklessly hurling
embryos against a wall. Especially as they collapse on impact with a
satisfying splat into formless ectoplasm. But the best part is there’s
no mess to clean up afterwards. Slowly peel them off and they
magically reconstitute themselves into embryonic form.’
Click here to be taken to GettingIt article:
http://www.blather.net/archives3/issue3no7_gettingit.html
*Funny what you can find near Bundoran…*
http://www.blather.net/archives3/issue3no6.html#embryo
EMAILS IN:
From: Ettye Hurleu
Subject: Christina Gallagher
Comments:
‘Having visited Achill Island on pilgrimage and having prayed at the
House of Prayer, I witnessed first hand what you have chosen to
disregard – in your sophistication. Open your heart.’
Blather sez: We fear that Ettye is oblivious to our peculiar blend of
ironic impartiality. If we had chose to disregard, we wouldn’t have
mentioned Ms. Gallagher at all… we do not dismiss the claims of
miracles at The House of Prayer on Achill Island, we simply choose to
doubt. Is that such a sin? We use ‘alleged’ because we cannot vouch
for what we ourselves have not experienced.
For more on the Achill/House of Prayer story see:
*Weird Achill*
http://www.blather.net/archives2/issue2no9.html
*Baaaaah-Humbug*
http://www.blather.net/archives2/issue2no2.html
*Rocks from Irish Skies*
http://www.blather.net/archives/issue1no33.html
LORD LUCAN SIGHTINGS
Following Blather’s stint on South African radio, we’re happy to say
that Lord Lucan was back in the news, albeit briefly. On Wednesday
October 27th, *The Irish Times* reported that the British government
had declared Lord Lucan officially dead.
*Lucan’s family ‘draws line’ under disappearance*
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/
breaking/1999/1027/break5.htm
On Saturday October 30th, 1999, *The Irish Times* printed:
‘He still qualifies for a place in the profile slot – just. It was the
obituary page editors who were flexing their muscles earlier in
the week as Lord Lucan, the missing earl, was reported
“officially” dead. He was promptly resurrected on Wednesday,
however, and officially declared alive and well and living in . . .
well, take your pick.’
*Missing earl who died and was resurrected*
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/
newsfeatures/1999/1030/newsfea18.htm
*The Things We Get Asked To Do*
http://www.blather.net/archives3/issue3no5.html
BLATHER RECOMMENDS:
The Village – Building Sustainable Community – Sustainable Projects
Ireland Ltd.
http://www.sustainable.buz.org/
sustainable_projects_pages/
‘Sustainable Projects Ireland Ltd. wants to create an ecological
settlement of about 40 houses on an 100 acre rural site, about one
hour from Dublin. The village is to be a model of sustainable
development for the next millennium. Its aim is to lead the way in
ecological building techniques, local enterprise creation, renewable
energy systems, rural regeneration, worthwhile job creation, waste
management, and environmental/social education.’
Voice of Irish Concern for the Environment
http://voice.buz.org/
Signum Magazine: Meaning & Paranoia by Blather’s Barry Kavanagh
http://www.signumpress.com/Issue2/marrow/madness1.html
*Are You… Experienced?* by Skylaire Alfvegren – all about a ‘jazz
singer who happens to be in touch with higher beings’
http://www.laweekly.com/ink/99/52/reverb-alfvegren.shtml
Our *favourite* webzine of the moment, *GettingIt*
http://www.gettingit.com
An *Irish Times* retrospective on the ‘moving statue phenomenon’.
http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/
features/1999/1130/fea1.htm
23
http://www.twentythree.co.uk
Adbusters – Culture Jammers Headquarters
http://www.adbusters.org
Time Travel Hangar Grand Opening
http://members.aol.com/AppleAlien
‘This site contains info on several first-ever SETI and Time
experiments plus much overblown hype. You may be interested in
publicizing the effort.’
