Across Difficult Country

Sad news from Nigeria, the Tide reports reggae artists there are “now in limbo”, thanks to the surging popularity of other musical forms, many of which are even worse than reggae.  Also sad is how the Tide, once a great newspaper with a commitment to truth , has gotten rid of all of its interesting columnists and is now little more than an African version of Vox media, minus Vox’s smug pretensions and tedious liberal bias. Sad news from Driffield: the Driffield bus depot closes May 31st , annihilating my plans to finally take that bus trip to Driffield. I think there is a carpe diem type  lesson here, either that or try harder to come up with holiday ideas that aren't total shit. Sad news from Harare , where tobacco farmer Brighton Magutakuona had “his privates burnt” by a goblin . The saddest part is the goblin was his own, one he inherited from his grandparents.

In Zimbabwe the beheading of an overly demanding goblin went awry, producing  an explosion which destroyed a house  and killed five people. In other Zimbabwe news, six women were arrested after a bag they had stolen attracted the attention of a crowd by talking. Zimbabwe used to look like this , back when it was called Rhodesia and run by evil racists. I've joked about Whitby falling into the sea , now Whitby is falling into the sea . Painter Georg Baselitz reminds me of a Bernhard character. Sad news from Timmanakumeri , where  Ramakrishna Acharya  drowned while bathing in a stream.  Research indicates nothing else has ever happened in Timmanakumeri. Children in Catterick Garrison, have been reading to dogs to boost their confidence, the Northern Echo reports . Why the dogs lack confidence the article does not say. Stanley drivers can check if their child car seats are fitted correctly at clinics sponsored by the Good Egg Ca...

Communist gun control laws have forced New York city residents to improvise weapons to defend against looters : “I would take a looter with a boa . If I felt threatened I would definitely use it,” said Keone Singlehurst, 42. “Its like the Wild West. A borderline lawless situation.” Using a snake as a weapon is something  I've remarked upon before . Meanwhile in Mexico, a mile long cylindrical UFO was filmed flying into the Popocatepeti volcano . If you have a mile long cylindrical UFO and want to zoom it around without being bothered Mexico is a good place to do it, no one pays attention to what goes on down there.

A "mysterious hand" appeared at appeared at a church service in Calabar, Nigeria, and why not? 1 The people of Calabar certainly could use a hand. The mysterious hand, radiating light, "pierced through the ceiling" of the the Glorious Assemblies Ministries, astounding all who witnessed it. 2 Pastor Timmy Larry "described the hand as the hand of Jesus Christ", which matches the account of parishioner Princess Agnes Archibong, who said "the hand does not look like ordinary [i.e. black] hand". 3 Oddly, one of Calabar's many attractions is a statue of a giant hand. 1 Nigeria is roughly 30 times the size of Belgium. 2 The Glorious Assemblies Ministries is "popularly known" as the Christ Endtime Military Academy. 3 Possibly a descendant of King Archibong III .

Giant spiders invade Upper Assam , killing two: It all happened in the evening on May 8. Most of the inhabitants of Chaulkhowa Nagaon village had been to a Bihu function. When the programme drew to a close, swarms of spiders suddenly descended from nowhere and started biting the people. The festive mood soon turned into one of panic with people bumping into each other and tripping over empty benches in their frantic bid to egress.  I nearly ignored this story, on the assumption giant spiders routinely invade India’s Upper Assam, usually when the venomous snakes are taking the day off, but that’s not the case: Assam doesn't have venomous spiders, it never had any throughout history, or there would have been some document, text or art that depicted this spider. An entomologist, speaking “ on condition of anonymity”, points out: The place was notorious for human sacrifice until the mid-19th century when the British stopped this barbaric practice. The place also suffered imm...

The Northern Echo reports :    A Labour politician has stunned his town council colleagues by claiming his “real mother” is a 9ft green alien with eight fingers.  Councillor Simon Parkes, who was elected to represent Stakesby ward on Whitby Town Council last month, said although he has had hundreds of close encounters with extra-terrestrials, it will not interfere with his mission to help residents at the seaside resort. Speaking on YouTube , Coun Parkes said he first saw an alien at the age of eight months, when “a traditional kite-shaped face”, with huge eyes, tiny nostrils and a thin mouth appeared over his cot.  He said: “Two green stick things came in. I was aware of some movement over my head. I thought, ‘they’re not mummy’s hands, mummy’s hands are pink’.” He added: “I was looking straight into its face. It enters my mind through my eyes and it sends a message down my optic nerve into my brain.  “It says ‘I am your real mother, I am you...

Podbury. A stone head depicting my high school history teacher Mr. Podbury was unearthed in a Cupar garden . “Top experts” have no idea who carved the head, but agree it’s “very, very old”. I called Podbury to see if he could shed any light on the matter. When he answered I told him I was with the utility company, there was a gas leak, and he needed to open all his doors and windows then flush his toilet ten times. Some people never change I guess.

An immense orange UFO witnesses describe as “Dorito shaped” returned to the skies over Dudley. 1  It flew around for a while, then left. 2 I recall writing about the Dudley Dorito’s earlier appearances , but find no mention of it in the archives. 3  I also remember seeing an advertisement for the Chia® Hitler in the back of a magazine, sometime in the early 90’s, but I can’t locate any evidence such a product ever existed, which complicates my Christmas shopping. 1 Apparently the seductive contours of junk food are crowding basic shapes out of the popular mind. 2 The timing is slightly suspicious . 3 The inventor of Doritos, Arch West, died in September. He was 97 .

The Whitby Gazette reports Whitby is “under water” after a “freakish set of circumstances”. Does Whitby ever have any other kind? The Whitby Gazette is not reporting a number of Whitbians were nearly drowned by something in the floodwater that grabbed their ankles and tried to pull them under, but my sources tell me it’s happening. On this day in 1974 a Frenchman, whom we will call Jacques M. because he wishes to remain anonymous, was driving at night when he “suddenly saw a man at least eight feet tall in the light of his car's headlights, standing by the roadside. This being was milky white in color, as if wearing a tight white coverall, and his round head was without hair or facial features.”  On this day in 1979 , a couple in Puerto Rico saw the same figure in white coveralls standing on a “luminous“ flying platform, only now he was also wearing a “large helmet with a dark visor that completely covered his face”, and had shrunk to a height of four feet. On ...

Footage of the legendary Zambian Space Programme  has turned up: To this day many question  official explanations for ending the Apollo missions. I sometimes wonder if we stopped going to the moon because we found ZSP Afronauts up there.

Saturday, June 4th : Wild winds lifted three inflatable bounce houses - with kids inside - into the air, and then tumbling end-over-end on a Long Island soccer field. The bizarre incident at the Oceanside United Soccer Club event sent 13 people, including several children, to area hospitals..."It was the craziest thing you ever saw," [said] one father... Monday, May 30th : Three children have been hurt after a bouncy castle thought to have been caught by a gust of wind left the floor and became wrapped around a telegraph pole. Horrified onlookers who were attending a double christening celebration at the White House pub in Whitby yesterday screamed as the youngsters fell off the inflatable suffering multiple broken bones...the children are said to be in a stable condition.

In a lengthy treatise I have not read, Bradford W. Scharlott ( journalism professor, potential sex offender )  argues Sarah Palin faked the pregnancy and birth of her fifth child , of whom she is actually the grandmother. It’s an interesting theory. A more interesting theory: what if Sarah Palin traveled back in time, to give birth to Barack Obama? It would explain why he’s gone to such lengths to conceal his long form birth certificate. We know for a fact, courtesy of the FBI,   USG recovered crashed flying saucers .   Lt. Col. Philip J. Corso  has stated the craft were not spaceships from other planets, but  time machines from the future . Corso, I just realized,  kind of looks like  Brad Scharlott. How many layers are there to this thing?

Spiritual fires like the ones that bedeviled Malaysia are now breaking out in Botswana : A family of eleven is begging for help after a series of mysterious fires destroyed their property and left them homeless.  The latest in a trilogy of devastating blazes occurred this week when a remaining storeroom and the police tent in which they had been sheltering also went up in flames.  The unexplained fires that have been tormenting the family in the Southern District village of Goodhope since January, has baffled police investigating the incidents...  As suspicions abound that the fires were the cause of a demonic curse, a Pentecostal church leader was expected to visit the family on a spiritual intervention mission. The Malaysian spiritual fires, you may recall, were impervious to the prayer recitations of ten ulamas . Given the trajectory of the phenomenon, FEMA should consider setting up spiritual fire monitoring stations on the East Coast, as a precautionary measure .

A Bear-Wolf prowls Wisconsin : Steve Krueger was doing his job...removing road-side deer carcasses overnight for the Department of Natural Resources. Krueger said he had just made a pick-up along a remote road near Holy Hill about 1:30 a.m., and he was in the cab doing some paperwork. When his parked truck started shaking, he looked in the rear view mirror and got the scare of his life. He said his flashing lights illuminated a huge hairy beast standing on its hind legs -- dragging a deer off the open tailgate . With luck, the beast will make its way to Madison, and feast on the hippies infesting the Capitol. I’ve spoken before of Nature’s moral degeneracy , the existence of a Bear-Wolf is another example. In an important new essay , noted historian Ian Kershaw says Fascism is on the rise in Europe. 1 Or something of the sort, I read no further than the following paragraph: Though the immigrants were actually important to the continued economic growth of the wealthier nations,...

Fainting spells afflict Vietcong school children: “ Since January 17, between 12 and 40 students faint every day at school, mainly between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. ” The cause of the fainting is a mystery. Also a mystery is why these children are in school, when they could be in a factory making sneakers. From Malayisa comes an amazing report of “spiritual fires” plaguing a house . The unusual blazes have left the entire nation baffled: A weird "spiritual fire" broke out in a residential house at Jalan Pantai Cahaya Bulan, Kampung Barembang, Kota Bharu recently. More than ten ulamas failed to put out the "fire" by way of reciting the Koran verses, and incidents of spontaneous fires burning the clothes continue to take place for more than twenty times thereafter. [O]wner of the house, Zainab Sulaiman, 73, said even though the incidence of "spiritual fires" had somewhat slowed down after the ulamas offered the prayers, they still came for about fou...

“The foolish fire, is an Exhalation kindled by meanes of violent moving, when by cold of the night, in the lowest region of the ayre, it is beaten downe, and then commonly, if it be light, seeketh to ascend upward, and is sent downe agayne; so it banceth up and downe: Els if it move not up and downe, it is a great lumpe of glewish or oyly matter, that by moving of the heat in it selfe, is enflamed of it selfe, as moyst hay will be kindled of it selfe.” - William Fulke (1563), A Goodly Gallerye: William Fulke's Book of Meteors,   pp.10-13 . “There is some evidence that phenomena such as the Will o' the Wisp in England and Min Min Light in Australia are luminescing Barn Owls Tyto alba (e.g. Purdy 1908; Gurney 1908; McAtee 1947; Bunn et at 1982; Macnamara 1989). However, the source of the luminescence is yet to be resolved. The most common explanation for such luminescence is that the owls have become contaminated with luminous fungi that grow inside hollow trees (e.g. Bunn et a...

The New York Times reports : The city of Moberly, Mo., is stirred up over the discovery of a wonderful buried city, which was discovered at the bottom of a coal shaft, 360 feet deep, which was being sunk near the city. A hard and thick stratum of lava arches in the buried city, the streets of which are regularly laid out and enclosed by walls of stone...A hall 30 by 100 feet was discovered , wherein were stone benches and tools of all description for mechanical service. Further search disclosed statues and images of a substance closely resembling bronze...A stone fountain was found, situated in a wide court or street, and from it a stream of perfectly pure water was flowing...Lying beside the foundation were portions of the skeleton of a human being. The bones of the leg measured, the femur four and one-half feet, the tibia four feet and three inches, showing that when alive the figure was three times the size of an ordinary man...[ cont .]

Near the nation’s capitol a sea serpent was spotted , swimming merrily along. Cryptozoologists hope the monster will be captured; normal Americans hope politicians will be lured to the banks of the Potomac, where the serpent can lunge out and devour them.

There are likewise here many birds called barnacles, which nature produces in a wonderful manner out of her ordinary course. They resemble the marsh geese, but are smaller. Being at first gummy excrescences from pine beams floating on the waters, and then enclosed in shells to secure their free growth, they hang by their beaks like seaweeds attached to the timber. Being in process of time well covered with feathers, they either fall into the water or take their flight in the free air, their nourishment and growth being supplied, while they are bred in this very unaccountable and curious manner, from the juices of the wood in the sea-water. I have often seen with my own eyes more than a thousand minute embryos of birds of this species on the seashore, hanging from one piece of timber, covered with shells, and already formed. No eggs are laid by these birds after copulation, as is the case with birds in general; the hen never sits on eggs in order to hatch them; in no corner of the world...

Deep in the Texas woods cryptozoologists searching for Sasquatch found something far worse: a sinister forest donkey , lurking suspiciously. Could the entire Bigfoot phenomenon be a hoax perpetrated by donkeys? The cryptozoological community should strongly consider it. Meanwhile, in Lapland (when was the last time you heard that?), a Thai berry picker vanished after reporting by cell phone “Something weird is following me, it's like a dog or something.” Could the poor berry picker have been followed, then abducted, by a forest donkey? The local Poliisi should strongly consider it.