Nick Redfern and Raven Meindel: Podcast: Exploring All Realms

Nick Redfern, with co-host Raven Meindel, will present their first episode of Exploring All Realms July 15th. Nick writes:

I'm very pleased to announce that from this coming Thursday night (July 15) at 9PM EST I will be co-hosting a regular, weekly, 1-hour-long radio show with good friend Raven Meindel called Exploring All Realms. For all the information on times, schedules, guests and more, see: http://apexn.com/

The Red Bluejay: Birds and Omens

I'm standing inside a grove of trees. It's daytime. A woman is with me; she's tall, possibly in her mid to late thirties, long white hair, dressed in a long white gown, with gold trim. She's slightly pale; not unhealthy, just a white cast to her skin. She lives here, or knows all about this place, and is my guide to this place. Not many are allowed to come here, or know about this place. I don't know why I'm here exactly, or how I got here, but here I am.

I'm in the middle of the grove, the woman is behind me, slightly to my left. A blue jay appears and flies, in circles, around me, faster and faster. I am excited and surprised at both the appearance of the blue jay, as well as its behavior. The blue jay looks exactly like a blue jay, except that it's red. I call out "Look, look at that! The blue jay is red, it's red!" almost like a child would exclaim. The bird keeps flying around me, in a perfect circle, faster and faster. Now I'm feeling a little alarmed; this is strange behavior for any bird.


The woman tells me to stand still, and watch. And wait. 


The red blue jay keeps flying faster, ever faster, in a circle around me. Then it changes into a hummingbird. I call out, again almost like a child:  "It's a hummingbird, a hummingbird! It turned into a hummingbird!" The woman tells me to look closer, and I realize it's not a hummingbird, it's not a bird of any kind, it's an orb.


A small reddish-brown orb, a solid object, a definite machine of some kind. The orb keeps moving around me, ever faster, in a circle, as I stand there. The woman sternly tells me to stay there and watch. What I'm about to see is very important, she tells me, and I'm here for a reason.


And unfortunately, that's when I wake up.

I had this dream the night I posted this item about Colin Andrews news about an orb and crop circles. The next day I received an email from Colin Andrews. And found  that Nick Redfern had a moving post about his recent experiences with birds: Dead Birds, on There's Something in the Woods.

A few days ago I experienced bird synchronicities. We were driving out Lorane Highway on our way to "The House of Mystery," Oregon's vortex in Gold Hill (a place known for being a UFO hot spot of sorts, and home to some abduction accounts, one which I wrote about here.) The night before, I had a persistent uncomfortable feeling about driving out there. As much as I wanted to see the place, I just didn't feel right about going out there. I woke up bitchy and grumpy and told Jim if he didn't want to go it was all right. He said it was fine. As we were driving, we saw vultures on the side of the road. Not unusual to see vultures but we don't often see them right on the side of the road like that, just standing there. Suddenly, just as we drive by, one swoops up into the air, a long snake dangling from its claws.  We both thought that was odd, and kept driving.

I told Jim again that we didn't have to go; this time he said he didn't want to go either. By this time we were on the interstate; too far to turn back for nothing, yet, didn't want to go. He told me he couldn't explain it but had the same feeling. He didn't say anything because he didn't want to influence me, and knew I wanted to go. I assured him I couldn't explain it but had a bad feeling about going. We happily agreed to go to Wildlife Safari instead and had a great time.

On the way back, traveling again on Lorane Highway, we saw more vultures  standing right on the side of the road, several miles from where we saw the first vultures. We commented on how odd this was, then noticed the vulture was standing on top of a dead deer.
 

From Speculative Realms: "DIe, UFOlogy, Die!"

The fraud is not the main event. The fraud is sleight of hand to accomplish the suspension of analytic activity in the reader’s mind so that the apocalyptic message can enter, through the backdoor, the rooms of the mind where it finds its welcome.

That's from an excellent article by Gary Haden at Speculative Realms: "Die, UFOlogy, Die!"

---

UFOlogy isn't dead now, and it never was. It's a meme, a myth, that UFOlogy is "dead."  UFOlogy is shifting, lots of upheavals as we've recently seen (Jacobs, Carrion, Texas MUFON, etc.) but all of those episodes and more haven't killed UFOlogy, just shook it up a lot.

Richard Dolan at X-Conference 2010 (A.D. Disclosure)

Colin Andrews: New Images of Orb Object in Crop Circle

New information on an orb shaped object during creation of a crop circle, with witness comments. Very interesting!

Random Rant for the Day

There are some persnickety legal nitpicking minutiae over linking to sites, but basically, it's perfectly legal, ethical and normal in a common-sense-I'm-a-blogger-and-want-people-to-know-all-about-my-genius-insights kind of way to expect and want others to link to your blog or site. You don't need permission, you don't need qualifiers, ... if you don't want people linking to your blog, then try this: SHUT UP and stay off the internet.

Jacobs, Hopkins, Woods, Interpretations, and Getting It. . .

Everyone in UFO Land knows who David Jacobs and Budd Hopkins are. I believe that, way back when, both were sincere in their efforts to unravel a bit the mystery of UFOs. I believe Hopkins is still  sincere, but after hearing plenty of Jacob's participation in regards to Emma Woods, it just gets worse and worse. Any sincerity Jacob's might have had has turned into All About Me, and little about any UFO "truth." Woods may be fragile, may even have "issues" (for fucks' sake, who doesn't.)  If you have had a life time of weird experiences, finding no support or insights from various authorities whose job it is, presumably, to help in these matters, you too might be "obsessed" as Jacobs has called Woods. As Gary Haden at Speculative Realms said back in May:

Some of the so-called "balanced" observers maintain that the recordings Emma Woods made of her conversations with Jacobs were altered and content damning to Emma was edited out. I suspect they hope to find in the edited material evidence that exonerates Jacobs. I'll address that later in the post. The question here is whether any material could exonerate Jacobs.

David Jacob's actions as a UFO researcher -- note: UFO researcher, (and history professor), not psychologist, medical doctor or therapist of any kind -- are reprehensible. Jacobs makes it clear he isn't any of those things but his actions negate his empty explanations.  It's not about "is Emma nuts?" as so many have decided, it's, to quote Haden again, an:

"... attempt to use Emma's mental health history, in violation of confidentiality protections she is due, simply to justify belief in the existence of extraterrestrials would be a disgusting example of just how far gone certain paranormal authorities are."

Some contend that, well, it is all an even split. He's nuts. She's nuts.

No. It's not an even split. She is not nuts. He was insane.

Let's get something straight: hypnotizing someone and diagnosing them with multiple personality disorder for the purpose of evading capture by aliens was not just an act of a fruitcake. It was an insane act.

A few weeks ago Hopkins was the guest on Coast to Coast. Interesting interview but I found myself frustrated with much of what Hopkin's had to say; or rather, his interpretations of the UFO puzzle/question/enigma. . . for example, he isn't much given to spiritual religious considerations, which colors his interpretations of would be motivations and agendas of any aliens, UFOs, and the dynamic between witness and UFO/alien. And, for that matter, between researcher and witness. . .

And this is a key point. Both Hopkins, who has stood up for Jacobs throughout this disgusting Jacobs scandal, have come to conclusions about the UFO phenomena. They both have firm interpretations, -- answers -- to what UFOs and their occupants are, what they're doing and why . . .

Jacobs so much so he's created a surreal swirl of typical UFO insanity that include things like alien hybrid e-mails and requests for Emma Woods panties to be sent to him -- unwashed. (To check for DNA don't you know.)

I don't know what's going on with abductions; I don't know what missing time and other high strangeness weirdness is all about. NO idea. (A lot of possible explanations I do reject however; sleep paralysis? Can we please get past that stupid theory?)

I've had a life long experience with sightings, telepathy, "aliens" or non-human beings, shared experiences, missing time, and so much more. And I'm not any closer to answers than I was when I was younger.

Has anyone read what Woods has to say about her life long experiences? 

Most of my memories of my anomalous experiences are fragmentary and I am aware that there is much that I do not understand about them. Nevertheless, the experiences have had a major impact on my life. In part, this is because of my inability to have complete recall of them, and also because I have had no framework within which to understand, process and assimilate them.

That's what a lot of us can say about our experiences involving UFOs, aliens, paranormal and, as Emma says "anomalous."

I can thank Jacobs for something; just before the ugly nasty mess hit the fans in UFO Land, both Jim and I were discussing, kind of sort of, going through hypnosis to uncover what happened during our missing time/UFO events. Thanks to Jacobs, that's not going to happen.

Woods has said, on tape and on her website, that she questions the alien abduction scenario as explanation, at least in some cases. This has not set well with Jacobs, and this, if you listen to the tapes, is obvious. This is what has set Jacobs off; that his self-imposed role of an authority has been questioned, that his requests and theories have been rejected.

Interpretations of magnificent crazy events. That's all we have. Speculations tendril out from those events; which is also all we have, and that's an okay thing. We need speculation to inspire us, to move us forward. And to keep us honest, for all we have is speculation. 

But when two researchers well seated in UFO Land offer up interpretations as the truth, and one of them is deeply stewed in a roiling stinking mess, and the other one denies it stinks...what they have to offer doesn't seem so appealing.

Random Thought for the Day: Did the Ancients Hoax UFOs?

Just over at the ol' JREF and came across a post by some obviously new to the skeptoid realm and naive as to their evil ways, or, a troll. Either way, posts a link to a UFO documentary, with an account of his own sighting, and a "What do you think?"

Naturally the responses, short and few as they are, were anything but curious as to anything close to discovering anything about UFOs; just yawns and silly jokes, as well as insults. Among those responses, comments about UFOs being hoaxed.

Which got me wondering: while in our modern times there have certainly been UFO hoaxes, I wondered about all the centuries worth of UFO sightings. And did anyone from two hundred, three hundred, years ago hoax a UFO sighting? Or whatever it was they called UFOs back then. What about centuries ago? Did ancient Egyptians goof around and fake flying saucers? I doubt it. Possibly some snarky high priest did something with lots of incense and noise to confuse and lull the masses but as to UFOs...

Jacobs Gives Emma Woods False Suggestion

Why hasn't Jacobs been -- I don't know, arrested, called up on ethics charges, something? And why is the UFO community still oddly silent (save for a few, like Vaeni for example) on this?

Posted by Christian Fedor-Flores-Cordova via Facebook: Emma Woods given a false suggestion by David Jacobs.

New Age Clown Fish Dream

Wonderful dream last night in a kind of goofy way. There is much more to this dream that goes along with what I posted about awhile ago on Snarly Skepticism, and maybe I'll post about that but for now, I'll just share this one part:

I'm some kind of psychic/healer/medium and am hired by a family to heal their fish; a clown fish. The clown fish is beautiful, but much larger than clown fish in waking life. This dream clown fish is about two feet long, almost eel like, but very friendly and beautiful. The orange color, all the colors, just lovely. But the clown fish is sick, so I'm hired to come and help.

The family is a blended family and a large one. Mostly Caucasian American and Indians, Hindu and Buddhist. 


I go into the room where the fish is. There are two tanks. One on a shelf, the other tank on a shelf higher and off to the left a bit. A tube connects the two. After looking at the fish I know the fish will most likely be all right, though it's sick now, but the rest is up to the family, I tell them. They really love this fish. I tell them the fish has a "Forty seventy" chance of living (I realize when I woke up you can't have a "forty seventy" but that's what was said in the dream) and that, instead of being sad that there's a seventy percent chance it might die, be grateful and concentrate on the forty percent that he'll live.


I show them how to sit with the fish every day, for at least ten minutes a day, and just concentrate on the fish being well. Send it love, literally, white light from your heart to the fish, and back again. Everyone in the family has to do this, and even when away from the fish, think about the fish and send it love and light.

I tell them it's important to keep the tanks clean, make sure the water is fresh and running and let the fish go back and forth between tanks. The fish follows the tube between tanks.  And indeed, as we're there in the room and I'm talking, the fish is happier and brighter and swimming back and forth between tanks.

I think this dream has something to do with the subconscious and the whole circus discussion surrounding UFO experiences. The clown fish, aside from the name, is orange (orange orb.) The clown fish was not just a happy go lucky rather silly fish; it was actually very beautiful and intelligent, as well as happy.

Time, Elks, Dreams . . .

I have a vivid dream life, always have; dream in color, sing, sounds, scents, fly, sleep paralysis, OOBEs. . . I've even had a couple of dreams where the dream was in color, but little pieces were in black and white. One dream I recall: the dream was in color, but I was watching a black and white TV. But I've never had dreams where I had missing time or amnesia in the dream; until recently. A few months ago I had missing time within the dream, and last night, I had a similar episode within a dream.

Much preceded the missing time, or amnesia, too personal to post but at one point, I was leaving my place of work and found that all the roads had been torn up. Earth moved into huge piles, gravel everywhere, dirt roads... no signs. "Great," I thought, "how the hell am I going to get to where I'm going?" but I had no choice, so start to drive. A hassle but not a big deal. But at the end of this torn up road is a crazy network of freeways. Just dozens of on-ramps and freeways and hundreds of cars just zipping every which way, and no signs. Not a one to tell me where to go, how to get there. . . and I have no time! No light or anything just have to MOVE, now! So I make a decision in my panic and just drive like mad onto an on ramp, no idea at all where I'm going.

After awhile of driving crazy-mad the freeway insanity ends and I find myself on one of my "dream scapes" -- a one lane, one way highway or bridge over the ocean. The ocean is a beautiful royal blue color. The water is almost as high as the bridge/freeway, and it's churning. Very active. I am scared and nervous. Still no idea at all where I'm going, no signs The bridge/freeway goes on forever, I can't see anything ahead. The water is so high it's splashed onto the road, and I'm worried I'll slide right off into the water. All I can see on either side of me is water. There's a railing about four feet high on the sides of the bridge but it's little protection.

Next thing I know, I wake up in a funky small motel room. No idea how I got there. I'm wearing a large baggy tee shirt and underwear but that's it. I walk outisde, confused -- where am I?! I see it's a little coastal town, hilly, kind of funky but in a comfortable, easy way. I'm in the "poor" part of town but as I continue walking, find myself in a more habitated part of town. I go into a little cafe, order breakfast. It's very good. I tell the people there, who are very friendly, that I barely know who I am, let alone how I got there or why, etc.

I was thinking of this dream all day, and for some reason, that led me to remember something that happened when i was about twelve or thirteen. I was in the Girl Scouts, and we went camping in Northern California. Here we were out in the middle of nowhere, or so it seemed to me. I loved it though.

I've thought of the following experience many times, but only remembering the wonder of what I saw, not how I got there in the first place. We were all setting up camp and then, I took a walk. I was just walking around, in the woods. And came out on a road. So I'm standing there on the side of the road, and less than ten yards from me, directly across from me, an elk walks out from the trees and just stands there on the side of the road. I was in awe; this was the first time I had seen anything like this. I remember just standing there, looking at this beautiful creature. I wasn't scared, just amazed. I felt like crying, it was so beautiful. We just stood there, looking at each other, then it walked off.

What's surprising to me now, is that even though I've often revisited this memory of seeing the elk, some obvious things about this event never occurred to me -- until now. For one thing, I can't see the adults in the group allowing anyone of us to just walk off on our own. Yet apparently I did. I was all alone. And what road would that have been? No idea; it wasn't one we were on. I don't remember what happened before that, or after. All very strange.

Layers of memory. One "real" memory with no surrounding context, one missing bit of memory within a dream. Shifts of memory; no experience dreaming of having missing memory within the dream, and suddenly, two within a few months time.

Maybe age has something to do with the dreaming; I can't explain why it is I don't remember what happened before, or after, meeting elk on the road. . .

UK's Muse Can't Use UFO Prop

I found this item about the banning of a UFO prop interesting, and a little ironic, considering the staged UFO events England has created in schools. UK group Muse was told they could not use their UFO prop as part of their act for "health and safety reasons." Hmmm... More here.

Bruce Duensing: James Carrion On The Day the Circus Came To Town

Bruce Duensing has done it again; where he consistently finds the words to convey ... all this .. . is an envious mystery. In James Carrion On The Day The Circus Came To Town, Bruce captures "it" perfectly. "It" being why it is futile, and missing the point of ... again, all this ... to rage against the "circus."

I was going to quote from Bruce's post but felt it was too out of context, and so, I encourage you to read the entire piece yourselves. . .

My Truth Can Beat Up Your Truth

"My truth is bigger, better, stronger than your truth. My truth can beat up your truth. My truth IS the truth, your truth is not the truth. How do I know? I have the truth!" (Surreal and wants you to bang your head against a steel beam for about ten hours straight, doesn't it? )So, the latest drama in the so-called UFO "circus" has been James Carrion's announcement of his new organization CUT. (Center for UFO Truth.)

"CUT will work outside of the three ring circus that is Ufology. . . "

He won't acknowledge his own participation in this so-called "circus" but once you're in, you're in. And once you've been the Director of MUFON, have a UFO blog, and start an Official UFO Organization that also contains the word "truth" in it, you are not only in, you're one of the top acts.

But this idea that UFOlogy is a "circus" is something of a lie. The UFO phenomena has always had its share of the bizzarre and the colorful, giving the field an overall carnival tinge to things. That's just part of the whole process, you can't have one (people seeing odd lights and machines in the skies) without the other (oh, say, reptilian lizard lovers or Venusians in the desert.) Call it the trickster element or what have you, in all of esoterica -- and UFOs are a part of that esoteric landscape -- there has always been, is, and will always be, extra layers of weird.

In spite of this obvious aspect, there are those who want to stay at the "circus" but don't want to be seen. They're terribly embarrassed by everything about it; from the clowns to the bearded lady to the acrobats, yet can't seem to leave. And when they do leave, the tell tale signs they were are part of this "circus" follow them wherever they go. Big Science or some other acceptable institution which, no matter how badly these embarrassed ex-circus members want it to happen, will never let them in.

In Carrion's case, it isn't so much that he's created CUT, it's the context. We have an ex-director of MUFON, a once respected (no matter what your opinion of MUFON, at least they had the air of respectibility) who's said some disdainful things  about UFO witnesses-researchers-pundits-experiencers-whatevers. 

He quits MUFON and starts CUT, in an effort to find the truth about UFOs. Like the so-called trickster element whose presence so many deny, the idea that there's a UFO "truth" is a paradox. This "truth" is valid as well as elusive. There is no single "truth" and yet the "truth" is everywhere. It's been scattered around us for so long and in so many places we're constantly stubbing our toes on it.

Of course, that's my idea of the "truth" and I don't have the truth anymore than you do.

Carrion's idea is that the government intentionally manipulated UFO events to distract citizens away from classified technologies and operations. No news flash there. And proof --  more proof that is -- that this has happened doesn't solve anything about the UFO phenomena. It doesn't give us the Big Answer. Documents proving that the government was responsible for Roswell, or Kenneth Arnold's sightings doesn't put an end to things.

So, let's say Carrion gets proof of the U.S. government's involvement of certain UFO events? Then what is he going to do?

How does that answer abductions, various entities like our beloved reptilians (I know, I have a thing for reptilians), USOs, cattle mutilations, MIBS, telepathic communications between "aliens" and humans, orbs, spheres, triangles, leaving the body, missing time, and a very long list of anomalous experiences? Not to mention the last, oh, elevenity-hundred years or so of UFO-alien contact.

No doubt Carrion would say the above listed UFO elements are merely the lowest form of circus entertainment, and not to be seriously discussed. See how we're in a loop of non-discovery? Dismiss all the things you're embarrassed or offended by (yet call yourself a researcher anyway) (one who wants the "truth") all the while stating to the world you're on a search for the truth.

A Final Note
I don't agree much with Carrion's views, (in fact, often finding them downright insulting)  but I will say that he does at least question Bigelow's involvement in MUFON and UFOs in general:

And then there’s Robert Bigelow, benefactor of the paranormal, champion of space science and extraterrestrial science. What a swell guy funneling dollars into UFO research. Of course it is easy to take the altruistic philanthropist pedestal when not disclosing the true source of those dollars, giving out government security clearances to prominent UFO researchers and then hiding behind signed non-disclosure agreements. Visions of Howard Hughes begin to swim around in my mind.

Of course, that's a whole other topic, including Carrion's surrounding comments in that post. 

Joe Capp on Carrion

Joseph Capp at UFO Media Matters has written a good piece on James Carrion's search for truth: James Carrion: "The Center For UFO Truth?"

I tried to leave a comment there but for some reason Goolge/blogger was behaving oddly and I couldn't post. Here's what I wrote:

Another excellent post Joseph. I've been writing about this latest UFO Police caper as well.

We all know the government manipulated UFO scenarios for their benefit and our distraction. Nothing new. Proof that this is so will not provide the world with the Big Final UFO Answer.

Meanwhile, Carrion continues with his classist, insulting snobbery towards much of what is UFO-ness.

He doesn't understand that he's a part of the "circus" as anyone else, and the sought after Big Science he so desperately wants to be a part of won't have him. They won't have any of us, of it, of this.

There are cracks and leaks and mavericks and you can get in, sometimes, through the back way but will never be invited in through the front and to stay awhile.

Meanwhile, there is a wonderful, complicated, weird, rich world -- or, "circus" -- of experience to be explored.