XJ Selman
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In exchange for the science and technology that afford us quick access to photographs of breasts, humanity has relinquished that sense of slack-jawed wonder that kept us chained to superstitions for so much of human history. This probably explains why there are those among us who still search for mystical explanations for simple phenomena. (Or, phenomeNOTs, if you're feeling particularly Dana Carvey today.)
Last summer, Egyptophiles all over the world were left in suspended states of shock as video proof of the paranormal had finally been captured. At Britain's Manchester Museum, a 10-inch ancient Egyptian statue had been recorded spinning all on its own.
ABC News
"Stand in the place where you haunt/Now face north
Think about possession/Wonder why you haven't before."
Curators at the museum were baffled, claiming that the statue would spin in the daytime, even if no one else had been walking around. Some speculated that the statue was magnetic, releasing ancient gas, or just plain cursed as shit.
But last November, vibrations expert Steve Gosling placed a sensor underneath the statue's glass cabinet and recorded the movement, finding that patrons' footfalls and the rumble from nearby traffic were subtly shaking it.
But why did this statue move while the others remained stationary? It has a lump at the bottom that makes its base a tad more wobbly. Yes, this message from beyond was nothing more than a janky hunk of metal. But hey, let's not laugh too hard -- we'd all love to meet a real ancient Egyptian spirit (instead of that old man who fell behind on the mortgage for his carnival).
Earlier this month, Rosy Long of Scotland stumbled upon a lost cat in her garage. Upon taking the cat -- whom she'd named Juanita, presumably for her flaming Spanish accent -- to the vet, Long learned from the animal's tags that it was from the Canary Islands, 2,000-plus miles away. Media outlets like the BBC, Independent, and Daily Mail were baffled as to how a cat could traverse 2,000 miles of open water.
dailymail.co.uk
"There is literally no device, man or inhuman, that could have done this."
After reporting on the missing cat all throughout the United Kingdom, and probably filing a report of a magical cat to the queen herself, the cat's owner, who had recently moved to Scotland, saw it on the local news and came out, claiming that she had simply forgotten to update the cat's tags. So if you consider international flights magic, yes, Juanita was pretty much a witch. Otherwise, she was a cat who managed to find her way 15 miles from her house.
bbc.co.uk
"IS YOUR NAME EVEN JUANITA???"
In February of 2013, a strange gelatinous slime appeared in a park in Somerset, England, and nobody -- scientists included -- could determine its origin. The manager of the nature reserve claimed that he had never seen anything like it before, and they had been finding the gunk dotted all around the grass banks. Several theories cropped up, including one claiming that it was a substance of ancient legend known as astral jelly, which appears in the wake of meteor showers.
But other, more credible theories speculated that the jelly was perhaps connected to a UFO sighting that had been observed in the region the week before, because apparently space-faring aliens use Earth much in the same way sexually frustrated long-haul truckers use that secluded corner of the Applebee's parking lot.
huffingtonpost.com
The UFO was last seen headed toward the Peter North star.
Unfortunately, killjoy scientists ran thorough tests a few weeks ago and found that the substance contained both magpie and frog DNA. The likeliest conclusion? A certain magpie threw a magpie bachelor party one night and served all his buddies bad frog. So no, alien lovers, that's not alien goo you're poking -- that's partially digested frog mixed with a bird's mouth-shit. Nature is full of miracles.
Last January, YouTube user/"paranormal researcher" WoWForReeel posted a video examining a strange anomaly on the moon's surface. How did a regular Joe get access to the moon? Easy, through the use of Google Moon, which is exactly like Google Earth, except it's the moon.
In the video, he describes a strange triangular object with lines too straight to be natural, along with dots that were arranged in perfect symmetry across the surface. So what was it? An alien spaceship? Probably, according to multiple outlets and paranormal forums. The Huffington Post was so concerned that they interviewed former FBI Special Agent Ben Hansen, lead paranormal investigator on SyFy, who claimed that the photos were "very intriguing" and might actually point to a secret moon base.
Google Earth, Energia Productions
"Two words: Moon. Nazis."
But unfortunately for everyone who got a lunar hard-on, the story was quickly debunked. One site pointed out that Google Moon uses multiple image tiles, and when you zoom in too much, sometimes the sharpening filters on the tiles mess up, thus creating the strange anomaly you can see in the picture. Basically, you're not supposed to zoom in too much or else it starts to look stupid, not unlike every single other mapping technology out there.
The third part of XJ's epic science-fiction novel is out now on Amazon. The first $0.99 novella can be found here, with Part 2 out here. Or leave a review and get a free copy! Poke him on Twitter and follow him on Facebook.
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