Redfern gets about.........

Our Nick is flying the CFZ flag far and wide these days. Most recently he was interviewed by Lisa Shiel, author of `Backyard Bigfoot`, for her blog. The entire text can be read HERE .......

This is a little strange.......

From the Greenock Telegraph:

THESE are the sensational images of a big cat claimed to be roaming wild on a Gourock hillside. It was captured on a mobile phone at Faulds Park.

Just seconds earlier office girls had entered the Amazon warehouse, unaware of what was behind. And youngsters on a nearby housing estate were setting out for school.

The huge black beast appeared out of bushes and strolled across a car park as workers turned up at 8.30am. One said: “There were people going in and out of the building, but it was not fazed by anyone.”

Now Gourock councillor George White has called for action. He said: “It is a matter of great concern if there is a big cat roaming wild in Gourock.

“I will be asking officials to investigate. It is their responsibility to protect the public.”

Big cat expert Sandy Smith of Kilmacolm said he was delighted the big cat had been captured on film.

He said: “A lot of people think talk about big cats is all a bit of kidology.
“Maybe this picture will make them take notice. “I know what I saw and I am 100 per cent certain they are roaming the area.”

Sandy, who set up Scottish Big Cat Investigations after sighting a big cat near Kilmacolm cemetery three years ago, said he would be looking to authenticate the picture.

The Gourock sighting is one of a number since then. In March two window cleaners were startled when a black beast ran across the road at Auchenbothie Gardens, Kilmacolm. In January a Greenock couple found a big cat prowling around their front garden in Fairrie Street, Greenock. And in February last year a man in Inverkip came across a dead deer he claimed had been ripped apart by a big cat.

The Dragons of Africa

PRESS RELEASE: DRAGON HUNTERS RELEASE FILM OF THEIR AFRICAN EXPEDITION

A team of British cryptozoologists from the Centre for Fortean Zoology have released a film, documenting their expedition into the swamps and jungles of West Africa, in search of a dangerous dragon-like monster known as the Ninki-Nanka.

The six person team visited the Gambia and Senegal last summer, to investigate the legend of a monster so awful, locals believe that to look upon it is death. The Ninki-Nanka is said to resemble a gigantic crested serpent and provokes terror in the locals even to this day.

“One man was so frightened of the monster he refused to enter a swamp where, years before, a sighting of the beast had caused a whole village to be abandoned. We had to speak to him from behind a bush, where he was hiding in terror,” said Richard Freeman, Zoological Director of the Centre for Fortean Zoology.

The team spoke to many people who claimed their relatives or friends had seen the dragon, and had subsequently died. One man, who claimed to have seen the beast himself, described it as a monstrously huge snake with a horse-like head, and a crest. He believed that only a herbal potion from a holy man saved him from the Ninki-Nankas’ curse. When shown pictures of an Apatosaurus, a Komodo dragon, a Nile monitor lizard, and a Chinese dragon, he chose the Chinese dragon as being most like what he saw.

The beast was also blamed for causing a lorry to crash, as it slithered out on to a rural road. The team visited the crash site, where the lorry is still on the side of the road.

They spoke with keepers at a sacred crocodile pool, who recount an ancient song to keep the monster at bay, and were even given a supposed Ninki-Nanka scale for examination.

The team also investigated two other unrelated mysteries; a supposed sea serpent carcass - buried on a beach by an amateur naturalist - and the continued existence of a tiny lizard known only from five museum specimens.

Just as tangled as the African forests, are the jungles of the mind, where legend, and superstition, are entwined with natural history. The film goes some way towards exploring both of these shadowy places.

The music for the film was composed especially by Paul Whitrow, a Bristol-based record producer from the legendary Bristol recording studio, Channel House, best-known for his work with Portishead, John Getty, The Mission, Alison Moyet, Imogen Heap, and cult indie band, the Blue Aeroplanes, as well as Japanese production company Creativeman.

Mike Williams flies the CFZ flag down under

At the risk of sounding like a Beach Boys cover band .... we get around

My strange land gets stranger

As many readers will know, my favourite author is Robert Heinlein. Predominantly a science fiction writer, he wrote a string of intelligent, emotive novels which changed the thought ptocesses of an entire generation.

His most famous novel, and coincidentally my favourite, was `A Stranger in a Strange Land`, written in 1963. A magnificent book with an epic scope, it challenged many of the established social and literary mores, and introduced the word `grok` (after 44 years it ain't a neologism any more) to the English language.

From Wikipedia: Grok (IPA /gɹɑk/ (GA) or /gɹɒk/ (RP), both rhyming with rock) is a verb that connotes knowledge greater than that which can be sensed by an outside observer. It is an understanding beyond empathy and intimacy. In grokking, one experiences the literal capabilities and frame of reference of the subject. The verb can be used both transitively and intransitively; in the transitive sense the Oxford English Dictionary defines it as "to understand intuitively or by empathy; to establish rapport with", while in the intransitive sense it is defined as "to empathize or communicate sympathetically with; also, to experience enjoyment." The OED also specifies the alternate spelling "grock".

Many people consider that the most interesting character in the book is not the `hero` Mike - a human who returns to earth having been brought up by Martians, but his `adopted father` Jubal Harshaw, described as: "Jubal E. Harshaw, LL.B., M.D., Sc.D., bon vivant, gourmet, sybarite, popular author extraordinary, neopessimist philosopher, devout agnostic,professional clown, amateur subversive, and parasite by choice."

As I get older I find myself becoming more and more like Jubal Harshaw - and to be quite honest it is quite a nice place for a professsional grouch like me to be. I live in rural seclusion surrounded by the people I want to be with and away from those I don't. I have an extended family of people and animals and I line where I want, most of the time at least doing exactly what I want to.

In the words of Jubal: "A desire not to butt into other people's business is at least eighty percent of all human 'wisdom' . . . and the other twenty percent isn't very important."

However, the wit and wisdom of Dr Harshaw was not the reason I decided to sit down at the computer today with a mind full of things Heinlein.

Another series of books of Heinlein's told the story of Lazarus Long, the oldest member of the human race. I have to admit that I have taken a lot from his brand of happy libertarianism into my own personal philisophy, but this ain't the time or place to talk politics. However, in the last book in the saga, To Sail Beyond the Sunset which purports to be the autiobiography of Lazarus's mother Maureen, who grew up in the late 19th Century. In it she writes of how her father - an admirer of the writings of Mark Twain - had written a letter to the great man, and how - much to her father's pride - Twain had written back, and how on one never to be forgotten occasion, he and she went to see the great man when he lectured in a nearby town, and how her father and Twain sat up all night talking, as she listened agog.

Well, something similar has happened to me. I am not the sort of person who usually writes fan letters, but recently I came across a blog by someone I have admired for many years - Paul Rose aka `Mr Biffo`.

For ten glorious years Biffo wrote Digitiser - the video games pages on Channel 4 teletext. The subject is of little interest to me as a rule, but Rose filled the pages with bizarre, and often disturbing characters, each imbued with his anarchic sense of humour.

After 10 years he moved on to pastures new, and so did we. However two of our cats, Helios 7 and Chastikos the Deceiver were named after Rose's characters, and Richard and I always promised that if we ever do find the Ethipian Death Bird (surely a giant bat), we would name it after the punchline of one of Digitiser's most memorably stupid jokes..

Q> What do you call a giant bat?
A> Super Beast 47

Well, recently Biffo published a book, called Confessions of a Chatroom Freak in which he poses as a naive, and slightly odd (in a loveable sort of way), 21 year old girl called `Lisa`, and hangs out in chatrooms fending off the advances of a string of would be suitrs.

I read some excerpts and they were hilarious (or at least I thought so), and so I ordered a copy from Amazon, and wrote only the second fan letter I have ever written in my life (the first was to Yoko Ono, and she wrote back as well), to Biffo. I then forgot about the whole thing.

Imagine my pleasure, when just like Lazarus Long's grandfather, I not only received an answer, but that Biffo - or Paul as I should now call him - turned out to be a kindred spirit. We have been exchanging eMails for a couple of weeks now, and have even talked about a couple of projects that we want to do together, including - we hope - him accompanying the expedition to Guyana later in the year.

Then the book arrived. Of course it was funny. I had expected that, but I hadn't expected it to be touching. By the end of the book I was quite fond of `LoopyLisa 21f`, and more than a little annoyed with the legions of semi literate men who refused to see her as anything more than a fairly base sex object. I urge you all to buy the book, you won't be disappointed.

As for me, I am just happy that I will seeon be in the position of Lazarus Long's grandfather, and spend an evening talking crap to a literary hero.

Cos next month Biffo is coming to tea!

Global a GoGo

It is with great pleasure that I can announce that only a few weeks after the CFZUSA office was properly launched, that Ruby Lang and Mike Williams have opened the Australian office of the CFZ, and will be coordinating events in the antipodes.

They have a smashing blog HERE and I have the highest hopes for this latest venture for the organisation that I founded...

In other news, the museum floor is now built, and work will be commencing on the exhibits soon, and Corinna, the love of my life, and the poor soul who - as Administrative Director of the CFZ - has to make some order out of the appalling chaos me and the boys cause, has now got a blog of her own. I shudder at the revelations it may contain...