Month: June 2003
Thomas Heazle Parke (or “That Guy on the Statue …”) Part 1.
Ever wondered who he is? Well, wonder no more... <!-- --> We've all walked past him. We've all seen him. Thousands of Dubliners' lay eyes on him every day, whizzing by on their buses, in their cars, on their bikes. He has been there longer than I'm sure he would care to remember. He has stood and watched rebellion, bloodshed and war, the end of an empire and the birth of a new nation. He has witnessed governments come and go, buildings rise and fall, technology grow and the city in which he stands expand, bulge and explode around him. He has dodged bullets from the 1916 rising (which hit the building behind him). He could bear testimony to a million clandestine conversations which have taken place in the buildings that surround him and he has been defecated on by a million pigeons. Some of us have maybe even wondered...
The adventures of Jasper the time travelling cat (Volume 1. Episode 3)
Volume 1. Episode 3. Oh dear. He's in Egypt. Again. Oh dear. Dear oh dearie. Yesterday, we reported that Jasper the intrepid time travelling cat had wound up in the court of the heretic pharaoh Akenhaten. We also stated our hope that he had ?leaped? to somewhere a bit safer and closer to home. Never one to do things the easy way, it turns out Jasper has actually leaped backwards about a millennium. He has wound up at the Giza plateau ca. 2550 B.C. We have received an abundance of downloaded data from the instrumentation on his collar, but the moggy-to-human-voice-translator is still acting up so it?s hard to translate exactly what the hell is talking about. We did receive one interesting sample though which read as follows: ?Miaow snarl? pyramid capstone and ramp? snarl, roar?. thousands of men? clearing of throat? miaow, hiss? dodgy wig?miaow?kill you in your sleep??....
The adventures of Jasper the time travelling cat (Volume 1. Episode 2)
Volume 1. Episode 2. The intrepid moggy makes contact. From Ancient Egypt... Well cover me in kitty litter and call me moggy, but dagnammit if things aren?t getting exciting down here at Blather Paranormal Investigations Inc. Last night, sat as we were in our lab, quaffing a small glass of absinthe, ruminating over the cycling results and lightly tinkering with the Tesla-inspired warp field coils, a small but distinct crackling began to emanate from the wireless. As we had previously reported, Jasper, the intrepid time-travelling cat was lost somewhere in Siberia. In 1908. However, our readings had indicated to us that he may have ?time-shifted? just prior to the Tunguska event. To where, we knew not. Until last night? Frantically we managed to tune in the faint miaowing and screeching and set to locating the daredevil feline. It turns out that Jasper has wound up in Ancient Egypt. But not...
Ghost in a Jar?
Weird shite for sale on Ebay As posted by Dr Bob to P45rant.com Somebody is trying to sell a 'ghost in a jar' on Ebay. Weird: I don't have enough space here to tell the complete story behind this, so I will briefly go over it. Back in the early 1980's, while out metal detecting, I came across and old abandoned cemetery with the foundation of a homesite or Church or something nearby. While searching around the foundation, my detector indicated there was something in the ground close by the southwest corner of the foundation. After digging down about 2 feet my shovel struck a wooden box that had nearly rotted out. The metal hinges and hasp were about all that was left of it. I thought I had discovered a fortune! Boy, did that ever turn out to be wrong!! There were 2 jars and an old journal in...
Invasion of the Jellyfish
Wexford, Cornwall, taken over by bags of goo... Tens of thousands of jellyfish-like creatures have washed up on the Cornish coast. The tiny blue animals called Velella Velella are related to the deadly Portuguese Man o'War. But at around three centimetres long they only give a sting similar to that of a nettle. There have been no reports of similar shoals of jellyfish washing up on the nearby Wexford coast. From the Irish Independent Also: Ananova:Thousands of stinging 'jellyfish' washed up in Cornwall BBC: Thousands of jellyfish on beaches News just in: Contrary to initial reports, the jellyfish have infiltrated the Irish coastal defences at Baginbun, and have made their way north from the Hook Penninsula to Wexford town. After a length siege of Wexford County Hall, the Velella Velella have established taken control of Wexford, and have established an interim government in the region. Human casualties have been described...
The adventures of Jasper the time travelling cat (Volume 1. Episode 1)
Volume 1. Episode 1. How it all began... As we reported in a previous issue of Shitegeist, we here at Blather Paranormal Investigations Inc. have been dabbling with experiments in that old chestnut 'Time Travel'. As we explained, we had made an earlier attempt by harnessing the power of a particle accelerator, some Tesla warp-field technology, a small lump of plutonium, a can of tuna and a rather docile black cat by the name of 'Jasper'. All went well. Kind of. Jasper has been gone for some time now. In time. If you follow me. He is in 1908 to be precise. But, hark! Yesterday evening as we sat tinkering with the dials on the flux capacitor and oiling the tubing between the mass spectrometer intake valve and the large brass vat where we store the absinthe, a distant crackling could be heard on the vintage wireless in the corner...
Irish Lake Monsters
More bleddy beasties! No! In the deep dank past of this website, we spent a lot of typing raving on about the lake monster mythology of Ireland. Then we bored ourselves to death with, and shut our gobs. There's so many lake monster articles on blather.net, we don't know where to start recommending from. NOW though, Nick Sucik, a young American chap with whom we are acquainted, has put together a whopping big website about Irish water beasties at www.irishlakemonsters.com Lethal Lutra Erne Peist Savage Controversies Blather on Tour Mysterious Achill Try a search for lake monsters on blather.net
Time Travel
Blather goes surfing through the mists of time. Kind of... Well, in the interests of science (and staving off the mind-numbing, soul-destroying tedium that is my miserable pathetic life) we here at Blather Paranormal Investigations Inc., decided to build a time machine. Well, ok. Not exactly. My early flirtations with worm-holes, flux capacitors and white coats have left me a little vexed. As was Jasper, my girlfriend's cat, who cheerfully helped me with an early experiment involving a particle accelerator, a tin of tuna chunks and a short trip to the outer Hebrides. He is, apparently, recovering well. In 14th century Russia... So, enough farting around. We?ve gone to the only reliable source on the whole planet for advice on such matters: the web. Some cursory surfing led us across a few gems, including this piece which informs us that worm-holes are indeed the way to go. The only difficulty...
Spacebeagle: Mission to Mars
You know, if I didn?t know better, I?d say I was feeling good? Finally, some good news. Yesterday saw the launch of the British mission to Mars. The Mars Express orbiter and it?s more famous passenger, the Beagle2, launched yesterday from Kazakhstan without any perceivable hitches. The Beagle2 is due to land on the surface of the red planet on Christmas day. You can read all about the Beagle2 mission here. It?s events like this, that fill us here at Blather Paranormal Investigations Inc. with a warm fuzzy glow. You know that sort of rosy-tinted tingle? The wonderful feeling that despite the fact that monsters like Saddam Hussein and George Bush are holding sway on our little blue-white orb, there are still scientists on earth who are actually working to better the lot of mankind? People who have devoted their lives to furthering human knowledge and expanding the boundaries of...
Steven Shainberg’s ‘Secretary’
Wonderful, touching and inventive. Get and see it. Secretary is a gem. An absolute gem of a movie. Superb dialogue, wonderful acting, crisp, minimal direction (is Shainberg the new Soderbergh?) and a catchy, quirky soundtrack make this the must see comedy of the summer' that's if you can honestly call this a comedy. Perhaps the clearest pigeonhole you could shove this into is 'romantic comedy', but that would barely begin to do the movie justice. The story concerns Lee, a young woman who has just been released from a mental institute where she was being treated for an obsessive-compulsive disorder, who decides (upon returning home) that she needs to get her first real job. She spots an advert asking for a secretary with typing skills and meets the deranged lawyer Edward Grey (James Spader). What develops is a wonderfully quirky relationship between the two, which is based upon a mutual...